“Would it be too much to ask . . . ?”
“Absolutely not,” he said softly. “I’ll stay here until you fall asleep.”
“Thank you. Goodnight, Peter Pan.”
“Goodnight, Wendy Darling.”
Peter leapt out of the open door, the thin linen curtain blowing in his wake. She heard a thump on the roof and the sounds of Peter walking above. She heard him settle right above where her bed was. With a smile, she climbed into her hammock, pulling the thin blanket over her bare legs.
“Wendy?” Peter’s voice came through the thatched roof.
“Yes?”
“I look forward to seeing you tomorrow.”
She paused, her eyes growing heavy. “You as well.”
Just when she was almost falling into unconsciousness, she heard beautiful music, climbing up and down an unknown scale. On the roof above her, Peter was playing a pipe of some sort, the sound bright and confident, a lilting melody drifting down and putting to ease all her fears. The music carried down from her hut, echoing throughout Centermost, and she imagined it flowing like liquid out through its branches, drifting down to the ears of the Lost Boys, who smiled at its reassuring sound as it fell around them like rain. Wendy felt her heart swell to match its lonely melody, felt her skin tingle. Wendy had played Dvořák and Strauss, but she had never heard a melody that was quite so beautiful and dangerous at once. The notes rose up before her like a swelling sea, pushing her further out than she had ever been, pushing her further and further toward Peter, until the music suddenly relented, crashing her like a wave at his feet. In its wake, it reminded her of someone, someone who had deeply loved her once. Someone who had wanted her to be brave. Without warning, she fell into the welcoming arms of sleep, her subconscious once again reaching desperately for the boy whose face was fading forever. Just before she fell asleep, she was sure she felt the touch of his fingers on her palm.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
WENDY AWOKE TO A POUNDING HEADACHE that thrummed against the inside of her head with relentless procession. Wham! Wham! Wham!
“Ughh . . .”
She moaned and pressed both hands up against her temples and rolled over in bed. Only she wasn’t in a bed, she was in a hammock. The swinging bed flipped underneath her, and Wendy’s knees hit the floor with a hard thump, followed by the rest of her body. She laid her face against the floor.
“Owwww. All right. Give yourself a moment.”
Then she turned over on the floor, her body not willing to move. Instead, she sprawled out underneath the wildly swinging hammock, watching how the Neverland light reflected off the colored ribbons that brushed over her face with a gentle caress. The light refracted and bounced around the room, and Wendy thought that she caught the scent of breakfast wafting up from the Table below. She reached up her slender white arm to touch the light, watching it play over her pale fingers, reds and yellows filtered through the ribbons of her bed, purples and light blues through her linen curtains. Even the light here was different, she marveled—it was as if every particle of light had been brushed with gold, giving a hazy glow to everything it touched.
Wham! Wham! Wham!
The same drumming noise that she had thought came from inside of her head came barreling in through her open windows. What in God’s name was that awful sound? She pushed herself off the floor and brushed off her nightgown, which was now filthier than she had ever seen it. She was practically a street urchin at this point. With a sad sigh, she untied one of the lapis ribbons from her hammock and pulled her hair into a neat bun, lacing the ribbon around her brown strands and tying it with a bow. Even though she didn’t look like a lady, she didn’t have to behave like she wasn’t one. She splashed her face in the pot of water near the end of the bed. The morning was quiet without Michael scampering around her feet. She at once enjoyed the silence and missed him terribly. With more confidence than she had had the previous morning, she whistled her way down the tree branch, even leaping off it at the end with some grace. Oxley grinned at her from across a rope bridge when she landed, wiping her raw hands on her nightgown.
“You did that well, Wendy—no falling! Color me impressed! It must be a good omen for our raid day!”
Wham! Wham! Wham! Wendy turned her head away from the overbearing sound.
“Oxley—WHAT on EARTH is that?”
A huge grin stretched across his face. “Well, you aren’t on Earth, so that may help explain it! Those are the drums of war. Should I show you?”
“Do you quite have to? Can’t you just make them stop? It’s absolutely horrible.”
“I think you will want to see this.” Oxley trotted over and grabbed her wrist, and then they were flying downward. “Peter gave me flight this morning. For the raid.”
“Ah.”
Flying with Oxley was so different than flying with Peter. Flying with Peter was intimate, a chance to be close to him, a chance for Wendy to feel that fire flush through her skin. Flying with Oxley was at the very least fun, but practical. When they landed with an “oof” on one of the lowest levels of the tree, he released her wrist and pushed aside some hanging maroon leaves, each of them covered with microscopic veiny black lizards. They scampered into the leaves at his touch, but one proceeded to run up his arm before sinking its teeth into him. Oxley flinched.
“Argh! Blood suckers!” He flung the tiny lizard off into the tree. “Watch out for those. Weird little buggers down here! Argh, follow me!”
Wendy quietly followed him out onto a small overlook that looked down through a thicket of roots below. Directly below them was a long leather drum, easily the length of several huts, large enough that probably thirty Lost Boys could stand on it. Right now, however, there were only two boys on it—and one of them was Michael. Once she saw him, she could hardly contain her laughter and burst out with loud giggles.
“Michael!” He looked up at her and grinned.
“Look at me, Wendy!”
She did. Michael was bouncing up and down on the drum, getting higher and higher with each slam of his feet, flipping forward and backward, landing on his knees the vast majority of the time and then leaping into the air again. Wham! Wham! Wham! The other boy, Thomas, with his long blond curls, was bouncing along with him, the boys occasionally running into each other midbounce and collapsing into a pile of giggles upon the drum.
“Keep jumping, boys!” Oxley called out. “Sound the troops awake!”
Michael bounced up again, his blond hair standing up straight in the air.
“Look at us, Wendy, we’re making war!”
“Sounding the drums of war,” Oxley corrected.
Michael just giggled. “Same.”
Wendy was glad to see the big smile on his face as he and Thomas linked hands, bouncing each other higher and higher. They seemed like easy friends. She turned to Oxley.
“Where is John? Did Michael sleep with him?”
Oxley shrugged. “The Lost Boys sleep where they want. He might have slept in a soup bowl for all I know.”
Wendy frowned. Oxley grinned and linked her arm through his. “You must learn to relax, Miss Darling. There are no grownups here to tell you what you’re doing wrong. Don’t worry about Michael. He’s doing just fine.”
She nodded. “And John?”
“John is meeting with the other Generals in the treasure room. I’m actually heading there now. Will you walk with me there and I’ll drop you at the Table?”
Wendy turned to him. “Why walk when you can fly?”
Oxley smiled. “Because sometimes it’s good to feel your feet on the ground.”
With a grin, she linked her arm through his. They walked together through the tree toward the Table, Oxley showing her various flora along the way and telling her hilarious stories of when the Lost Boys lost all their pants, or when they had to steal chickens from the mainland. The walk was too short, and they quickly arrived at the Table, where Wendy hoped there would be a suitable breakfast.
“I
have one question before you go, Oxley—how exactly does one become a General?”
He looked down at her, his brown eyes glistening under his ebony skin.
“When you become a Lost Boy, you start at the bottom. You are a Pip, which means you have one of two duties: kitchen duties or chamber duties.” That made sense—it was always younger boys who had been coming to fetch Wendy’s mortifying toilet bowl. “Once you have put in your time as a Pip, you move up to a Lost Boy. That’s the vast majority of the boys here. They go on occasional raids and live on the island doing various chores here and there, and they get to have a watch on the Moon Tower. You may be a Lost Boy for ten years before becoming a General. Only a General has the right to Peter’s ear.”
“And what makes someone worthy of being a General?”
Oxley’s eyes focused on Wendy’s face. “You arrive with a pretty sister?” The annoyance in his voice was palpable.
“I didn’t tell Peter to do that. And John didn’t have anything to do with that either.”
He sighed. “You’re right. I’m sorry. That was rude. Here.” He plucked a small pink flower from an overhanging branch and handed it to her. “Forget that I said that! Okay? Please don’t be cross.”
She patted his arm. “I know, Oxley. You’re the nicest person here. I could never be angry at you.”
“In that case, where was I? Ah yes. Becoming a General. You must show extreme loyalty to Peter and not have any fear. When he feels you have mastered these things, you become a General. And then after General . . .”
“There is something above General?”
“Yes. Once you move up from General, then you become . . . a Swift.”
“A Swift?”
“Peter is the only Swift. It means that you have flight, forever, always.”
Wendy gasped. “That can happen?”
“No one knows how the gift is given. But once you move up from General, Peter gives you the gift. You become a Swift, like him.”
“Has anyone become a Swift?”
Oxley nodded, pushing a leaf out of his way and into Wendy’s face. “Felix. Felix became a Swift. But the night he got the gift from Peter, he flew too fast and plowed into the side of a mountain. He died there. That’s why you must be a General for a very long time before becoming a Swift—it’s a gift, but a dangerous one. Peter does not give it lightly.” Oxley dropped his voice. “Felix was my friend.”
Wendy gently placed her hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, Oxley. It must hurt to lose someone.”
“An all-too-frequent occurrence, unfortunately.”
“What do you mean by that?” The banging of the drums ceased suddenly, and then the sound of the moon bell clanged through the air. Oxley sighed.
“That’s Pan, he’s calling us to assemble. I was hoping to eat first. Mind seeing what’s in here with me?” Wendy nodded, her own stomach growling. They scampered into the Table, scooping up piles of nuts, cheese, and berries that lay scattered on the table. Oxley grabbed a half-eaten egg left on the round table and slid it down his throat. Then he handed one to Wendy. She had to swallow a gag first but then did the same. She was hungry.
“Ready?” he asked, wiping a smear of yolk off his face. She nodded. He grabbed her wrist, and then they were soaring up out of the Table, up into the great jade canopy of the tree, climbing up past her hut, soaring past Peter’s hut, up and up through a hole cut into the thick canopy at the tip of the tree. Wendy saw the branches around her thinning out, becoming short and brittle. The leaves of the tree gave way into small clumps of silverish gray berries that dotted the increasingly bare branches. Finally, Oxley pulled back, and they cleared a bramble of twigs, so thick that only the tiniest of creatures could slither inside. As they rounded the top of the bramble, easily ten feet high, Wendy gasped as a concave bowl as large as a building opened up underneath her feet, made entirely of intertwined fawn-colored branches. Dozens of Lost Boys were milling about underneath her, looking up as Oxley took her down to the base of the bowl, Peter’s yellow moon marking its center. Wendy worried briefly about her nightgown and the boys underneath them, but she was thankfully distracted by the whimsical beauty around her. She had increasingly less time for modesty in this magical place.
“Where are we?”
Oxley gave a joyful grin. “Right above Centermost.”
“Oh, oh!”
She had indeed seen this bowl before, but from below it only looked like an incredibly thick swatch of branched canopy. Oxley set her down gently on the branches.
“Welcome to the Nest!”
Wendy let out a girlish laugh, absolutely enchanted. It was indeed a nest, a giant bird’s nest, only just the right size for the Lost Boys. The Nest was woven with thousands of different types of branches: white crackled branches with fingerlike knuckles, thin dark brown spindly branches that curled into elegant whorls, red branches that were marked with black pocks, seemingly unbending, one thousand branches forming a perfect circle. Tucked into its openings were thousands and thousands of tiny scraps of paper and pale blue scraps of linen. Wendy walked over to the side of the Nest (its walls towered at least ten feet over her head) and picked out one of the scraps of paper. She carefully unfolded it. Scrawled in messy writing was a tiny wish: “I wich Peter to make me a swuft.” She smiled and put the note back, picking another right above it and unfolding it. “More meat at dinner & that Abbott would be nicer to me.” The next paper made the hairs on her arm stand on end. “I wish that I could remember who I was before.” She tucked it back, feeling guilty for reading the intimate wishes of the boys and alarmed by the uncomfortable feeling in the pit of her chest, which was threatening to take over her joy.
She followed the branched wall of notes until it stopped about halfway around the Nest, ending where the weapons began. Axes, bows, swords of every shape and color, wooden bats with jagged metal spikes, daggers, butter knives, and spears were stuck within the branchy tangle, jammed in between its crooked arms, the weapons looking so out of place in this natural wonder. A bounty of weapons, real weapons, Wendy noted with a shock. She reached out and touched a line of dried blood on the end of a sword, pulling back when crusted red dust came off on her finger. The quiet of the Nest was broken when the boys began cheering wildly.
Wendy’s head jerked up. Peter was landing in the middle of the Nest, his adoring boys all around him. His wild beauty took Wendy’s breath away, a violent tug on her heart. Gone were the forest-like clothes he had donned before; he was now wearing armor—if you could even call it that—over his white tunic, black pants, and short brown leather boots. The chest armor was made of tiny, glossy, mirror-like tiles that wrapped tightly to his muscular form, each meticulously sewed together so that the armor flowed with his movements. A black sash dashed across his shoulders and around his waist, holding his golden sword up against his hip. His red hair glittered with the same dust that had fallen around Wendy last night on the bridge. He had been with Tink. Flitting silver light darted in between his hair follicles and around his face, which was curved up in a naughty smile. As she gazed at him, he reminded Wendy of a fire on a cold winter evening—warm, radiant . . . and dangerous. A different sort of fire was burning its way through her chest as she looked at him, a desire to be close to his glistening skin, hoping that he would notice her. As she gazed upon Peter and he upon her, John entered the Nest through a small hidden ladder on the west side of the curved branches.
“John!” Wendy cried. He turned his head away from her and began talking to another Lost Boy who had picked up an axe.
“Don’t ignore me, John!” She grabbed his arm. “John! Please! I just need a minute.”
John rolled his eyes to the boy next to him and gave a snicker. “Women.”
Wendy resisted the urge to slap the smile off his face and pulled him into a corner.
“John, I need you to promise me you’ll be careful. Please! I’m sure there is nothing to worry about but . . .”
“I’m sure I’l
l be fine, Wendy. Go away.”
“John! Why are you behaving this way?”
He gave an easy grin, tossing his dull brown hair off his dull face. “Because nothing you say matters here. I’m a General; you’re not. I imagine once Peter tires of your frilly dresses and puerile charms, that you will be our cook . . . or nanny, perhaps?”
“What would our . . . our . . .” Wendy couldn’t think at the cruelty of his words. She struggled to reprimand him. “Those people, the people who cared for us, what would they say if they heard you speak to me that way . . .”
What was she trying to say? John stared blankly at her and then turned to grab a sword off the wall. He considered his options for a moment before finally settling on a short, fat sword with an emerald pommel.
“I don’t know what or who you are talking about.”
Wendy felt a coil of anger unspool on her tongue. “You don’t even know how to use that, John!”
John looked over his cloudy glasses at her. “You’re trying to upset me before the raid. I have an important job to do, unlike you. Keep being oh-so lovely. It’s what you are good at.”
Wendy stepped back from him, disgusted at his words and attitude. Peter walked over and put his arm on Wendy’s waist.
“Is everything okay here?”
She stepped away. “Peter, please, please don’t let him go . . .”
“John may do as he likes here. He is an intelligent asset to our Generals.”
“Or just an ass,” Abbott remarked as he walked past the arguing siblings to grab a well-worn spear off the wall. John’s eyes narrowed, but he said nothing, obviously intimidated by the other General. Abbott twirled the spear in his fingertips, flexing its tip. “Don’t worry, Wendy, your dear brother is just pushing a ship to the side. That’s all. There’s no danger in that. Those who are going to steal bounty have a much more difficult job.”
Wendy Darling Page 17
