Noodler held up a finger. “One man.”
“Noodler’s right,” said Cecco. The Italian stood atop a low hill and pointed over to the trees that bordered the clearing. “Three horses stood there. One man walked o’er. A large man.” He looked over to Noodler, who nodded his agreement. “I thought the footprints were too big, but there’s only one set o’ them. Look.”
Cecco walked over to where Smee and I were and pointed out three depressions in the grass. The width of them were enough for two men to stand in side by side and they were nearly half a yard in length. I stared at the footprints in disbelief.
“One man,” I said.
“Aye, sir.”
“The cuts are clean,” Starkey said. “These men were cleaved by a massive edged weapon.”
“And the three horses just waited for him as he cut these men to pieces?” Billy Jukes asked.
“Two had riders,” Noodler said, now hunched over the ground by the trees. “They watched.”
“And the third horse rode on the giant’s back?” Smee asked. Cecco and Noodler shook their heads.
“The horse was as big as the man,” Cecco said. He shrugged his shoulders and a pained expression wrinkled his face. “The beast had to have been o’er half a ton.”
I bent down to the body closest to me and ran the blade of my hook along the ragged edge of a wound on the man’s throat. “This man wasn’t cut.”
Noodler walked over and knelt beside him. His eyes narrowed as he searched the grass around the body. “Dogs.”
“That fits with the tracks I found o’er here,” Cecco said.
“I hate dogs,” Smee said.
“How can you hate dogs?” Starkey asked.
“You ever fight a dog that was trained to kill, Mr. Starkey?” Smee asked.
The gentleman shifted his stance, but didn’t answer.
“They’re not like men,” Smee said. “A man can be persuaded with a little pain. A dog knows only that it must live and you must die.” The Irishman stared off for a moment, then met Starkey’s eyes. “I like most dogs, but not dogs like these. I hate these dogs.”
At that, one of the bodies jerked up and grasped Cecco’s ankle. The Italian howled in surprise and jumped several feet.
“Five dead?” I asked.
“Four,” Cecco corrected. “Mi dispiace.”
“You’re forgiven,” I said, smiling.
We circled around the man as he clawed deep handfuls of grass. A gash across his stomach steamed in the now much cooler air. The back of his armor plating still clung to him even though his breastplate was several feet away.
The man’s words came out in gurgles at first. When he managed to form them, he said something that I didn’t understand.
“Mis costillas están rotos.”
“My ribs are broken,” Cecco said by reflex. I motioned to Cecco and the olive-skinned Italian leaned in close enough that the fog of the man’s breath broke against his cheek. The man spoke again and Cecco shook his head. “He’s not making any sense.”
“Can you catch any of it?” I asked.
“That’s not what I mean,” said the Italian. “He’s saying ‘el gigante verde.’ It’s Spanish. It means ‘green giant,’ but it’s nonsense.” The man said more words and Cecco stopped to listen. When he finished talking, Cecco frowned. “‘We were attacked by a green giant with red eyes.’ I can’t make out the rest.”
“He can’t be talking about the boy,” Starkey said.
“That’s unlikely,” I said. I knelt down to feel the ragged edges of the man’s broken chest plate. My fingers traced the outline of two broad punctures and I frowned. “It couldn’t have been him.”
“The wounds are too wide,” Noodler said.
“And see how the steel is bent here?” I asked. I held up the chest plate and showed them the inwardly curved neckline.
“You’re not saying someone ripped the man’s armor off by hand?” Starkey asked.
“That is what happened,” I said. “Look for yourself.” I handed the chest plate to Starkey.
“No man could have done that and neither could the boy,” Starkey said. “He’s as fast as the devil, but he’s not strong.”
“Mr. Starkey,” I said in an icy tone, “I would thank you to get into the habit of calling the boy by his name.”
“Yes, Captain,” Starkey said. “There is no way this could have been done by Peter Pan.”
Upon hearing the name, the dying man seized. Blood flushed his face and he gripped my coat with such strength that he lifted himself off of the ground a few inches. “Al diablo con ese niño, Peter Pan!”
The man released his grasp and slumped dead in the grass. This time, I understood him perfectly.
Silence filled in the moments, quieting the trees, the beasts, and the men as though the island itself held its breath.
A snapping branch tore our attention away from the body.
“What was that?” Starkey asked.
“Quiet,” I snapped. “Listen.” A ticking rose above the background. The sound of my father’s watch struck a curious and rapid series of feelings in me. My heart fluttered in time with the methodical beat. The soft, gentle ticking always reassured and comforted me. The moment of joy left me and a sickening dread filled the open spaces in my heart. A visceral panic gripped me and I looked from Smee to Jukes. “It’s her.”
Both men drew their pistols and held them at the ready. Starkey, Noodler, and Cecco followed their lead.
“Steady yourselves,” I ordered. My eyes scanned the trees for the croc. Thick blood pounded in my ears as I drew my pistol and clicked back the hammer.
It was in these seconds of silence that I first wondered how much time we’d been on the island. It felt like an hour, but the setting sun suggested that it could have been much longer. I thought about my father’s watch, mere feet away in the stomach of the beast, and how wonderful it would have been to coordinate it with the clock in my cabin. The thought frustrated me, which was a feeling that I liked better than the fear I felt just before.
A slow wind pushed through the trees and rustling leaves drowned out the watch. I strained to hear it, but the measured beats faded into the background again.
I tucked my pistol into my belt and Smee blew out a sigh.
“You sure it was the croc?” Cecco asked.
“As sure as I’m standing here,” I said.
Twigs crackled behind me. Without thought, I pulled the pistol from my belt and fired in the direction of the sound. An explosion of noise erupted from the bush. Screams were followed by footfalls, then a single thud.
The men sprinted past me towards the source of the screaming. They followed the panicked scramble of feet in three directions and disappeared into the trees.
I reloaded my pistol and made a direct line to where the first twig broke. As I approached, I heard a slight whimper, then silence. I peeled the thin branches away with my hook and looked over the bush.
There, on a patch of grass, lay a boy.
Chapter Four
The boy’s deep brown eyes fixed on me and moved as rapidly as his breath. He was dirty from his dark brow to his fingernails and could not have been older than eleven, by my estimation. His torn pants stuck to the sides of his legs and he clutched his midsection as though he were hiding a secret.
I stepped through the bush and the boy kicked at me. When he tried to stand, he fell on his side and rolled face down. He dug his fingers into the dirt and pulled himself a few yards. I watched the boy smear a red trail across the grass. He stopped, curled into a ball, and whimpered.
I knelt down by the child and he flailed at me. I grabbed the boy’s wrist and held it across his chest to pin the other arm down as well.
“Stop,” I ordered. We locked eyes. I let go of the wrist and the boy remained still.
I ripped the tattered cloth that served as the boy’s shirt and examined the wound. It was a true hit, right into the stomach. I felt the boy’s back and discove
red that the shot didn’t go through completely. It was still inside, tearing him apart from within. Despite not being immediate, the wound was as sure a death as cutting off a man’s head.
I saw the boy watching me closely and tried to mask my frown.
“It will be alright,” I said. I looked into the boy’s eyes again and could tell that he knew I was lying. I sighed and added the truth, “In a few minutes, you won’t feel a thing. I’ll be here the whole time.”
“C-cold,” the boy said. It was only one word, but it struck me as having an accent, as if it was a word he learned later in life.
I took my long red coat off and pulled it over the boy like a blanket.
The boy coughed and blood came out of his mouth. He clutched his stomach and curled into a ball on his side. His breaths became shorter and I watched the color drain from his face.
Heavy footfalls and snapping twigs heralded the approach of Billy Jukes.
“They’re gone,” Jukes said. “Cecco might have one, but I doubt it…” More words caught in his throat as he saw the boy. Jukes took a deep breath and asked, “Is that…?”
“One of Peter’s Lost Boys,” I said.
“I didn’t know there were others,” Starkey said as he walked up beside Jukes with genuine concern on his face.
Smee ran into the clearing loudly. He doubled over, put his hands on his knees, and wheezed a few breaths. “Right fast buggers, they are.”
Noodler and Cecco walked up beside Smee with more interest in their eyes than sympathy.
“Pan finds them and takes them here,” I told them. “Some he brings back. Others he keeps.”
The boy shook under my coat. His breaths became quick and short as he raised himself up and then slumped heavy at the foot of a tree. His eyes became distant and glassy. The boy grew silent.
“Is he…?” Cecco asked.
“No,” Starkey answered. “He passed out, but it won’t be long.”
“How many more are there?” Jukes asked.
“I counted seven,” Noodler said.
“There are easily a dozen,” I said. “He goes to their homes and promises them adventure. He lets them fly. Donald Sotheby is one of them. They call him ‘Curly’ here.” I looked over at Jukes, who shrugged his shoulders. “It doesn’t matter. You will recognize him when you see him. He doesn’t look a day older than when he disappeared. Once here, they are entirely his to control. They fight. They kill. They die. They lose themselves, forgetting…”
Walls crashed in my mind. I had always thought that the loss of the children’s memories was Pan’s doing, a means to keep them in line. It never occurred to me that it could have been a function of the island itself. Somehow, as men, I thought we’d be immune.
“Forgetting?” Smee asked.
“Yes,” I said. “There’s a Forgetting that happens here, in Neverland. I noticed it among the crew, but didn’t make the connection until now.”
“And you didn’t think to tell anyone about this Forgetting before chasing the boy here?” Starkey asked angrily.
“Watch yourself,” Smee said.
“It’s fine, Smee,” I said. “You have been griping all morning. Out with it.”
Starkey sighed and let his shoulders drop as though he had carried some great burden. “Some of the men have asked me to take command.”
Jukes and Noodler twitched, then became still as they studied one another. Smee growled. Cecco took a half step back and darted his eyes from one man to the next.
“And what did you say?” I asked.
“I told them no.”
“It’s what I said before,” Jukes said, keeping his eyes on Noodler. “They’re afraid.”
“I’m not the only one they asked,” Starkey said.
“Who’s with us?” Jukes asked.
“Mullins and Mason are loyal,” Starkey said, “but I can’t be sure about the rest.”
“Who is in charge of the group?”
“We don’t know,” Cecco said.
“Who’s been doing the asking?”
“Skylights,” Noodler answered. Jukes and Smee looked to one another then shook their heads.
“Agreed,” I said. “Skylights doesn’t have the fire for it.”
“We thought the same thing,” Starkey said. Cecco and Noodler nodded their agreement. “We think it’s Max Kasey or Phillip Gulley. They’re the only ones with brains and balls among them.”
“And Collazo?” Jukes asked.
“What about Collazo?” Smee said. “The man’s a priest.”
“Was a priest,” I interrupted. “He got too close to a parishioner’s wife, a captain in the Spanish Navy, if I remember right.”
“You have it right,” Starkey said. “He shot one straight, too. That’s how the captain found out. They’re all dead now, though. Spaniards.”
“Enough,” I said. “We won’t get anywhere guessing.”
“We’ve been away too long as it is,” Starkey said. “We need to go back.”
“No,” I said. “If we return with nothing, it will make things worse. We have to bring back something to abate their fears.”
“So what do we do about him?” Jukes asked, pointing to the boy’s prone body.
“Bury him, I guess,” Smee said.
“Starkey said he’s not dead,” said Cecco.
“He will be,” Noodler said.
The men went back and forth about this for some time as I stood in silence. I closed my eyes and made peace with what I did to this child. The Lost Boys are victims of Peter Pan and deserve a better end than this. A desire to see this boy live grew in my mind and it filled the moment with its presence.
Perhaps because I was so still, I heard a thud in the distance. I put my hand up and the men grew quiet just as the next few thuds came. The thuds grew louder and closer as they hit in repeating beats.
“Hooves,” Starkey said. I looked to Cecco, who nodded.
“There’s more,” Noodler added. “Listen.” The melodic clang of jostling steel joined the heavy pounding of hoof beats.
“They’ll be here in seconds,” I said. With a silent order the men readied themselves.
“Who do you think they are?” Starkey asked.
“We’ll find out soon enough.” Billy Jukes answered.
“Quiet, all of you,” I said. “They’re here.”
Chapter Five
Wood splintered in the distance beneath the beat of armored hooves. The men braced themselves and held their weapons at the ready. The galloping became louder and I heard voices, but was unable to make out what those voices were saying over the noise.
There was a different patter as well, closer and carrying with it the rustling of underbrush. I motioned to the crew and each one of them focused on it. Smee’s ears perked up and he twisted his head to one side. He held a hand to his ear and closed his eyes. The focused scrunch of his face softened into a heavy and burdensome look. His eyes grew hard and cold as he whispered. “Dogs.”
By the time the idea settled in our minds, the dogs were on us.
The first hound sprinted into the clearing. He stopped a yard into the knoll and growled. The second bounded after and stood with his forelegs on top of a fallen log. His gray and brown tiger-striped fur bristled as he snarled at us. The third dog stepped out in front of the other two. She was silent and watched us with a hunter’s eyes.
No man moved except for Smee. The Irishman inched forward and the lead dog burst into a vicious bark. He moved back and the dog barked again, spittle flying from her mouth.
“Smee, freeze,” I told him. “They’re not going to attack.”
“Aye,” Jukes said. “Their job is to keep us here.”
“For what?” Smee asked.
“For whoever is coming next.”
Large undefined forms took shape through the trees. The clang of steel overtook the cracking wood as the riders approached.
Two knights drove their horses into the clearing. Dull gray steel covered th
em from head to toe and, on either side of their saddles, a sword and a shield reflected the setting starlight. The horses, armored from shins to forehead, trampled twigs and low bushes underneath their hooves with a delicate majesty.
“Who are you?” one knight said. “Announce yourselves.”
I searched for the words, but came up short. I read stories set in the middle ages as a boy and these knights looked every bit as I had imagined them. The lead man looked to his partner and repeated his command. “Announce yourselves.”
“Announce yourselves, you’re so smart,” Smee said.
The lead knight’s horse whinnied, reflecting his rider’s offense to the comment. The knight reached for his sword as a third man rode in through the forest.
This third man wore no armor at all and neither did his horse. His broad and cheerful face was covered from ear to ear in a brown beard that was nearly as bushy as the hair on his head. Instead of a shield and sword, he carried a single green axe across his back.
The unarmored knight held his palm down and the dogs ceased their growling. The lead dog sat, then crouched low and became deathly silent. The man then gave us a broad smile.
“Greetings, strangers,” the unarmored knight said. His voice was deep and coarse, as though it had to work to escape from his barrel chest. “I am Bertilak de Hautdesert, son of Cerdic and Lord of the island.”
As I heard the man speak, something nudged my thoughts. Whether it was the name or the Welsh accent in which it was said, I couldn’t tell. I only knew the annoyance of not being able to recall something I should have known on the spot.
I pushed frustration aside, removed my hat, and bowed.
“James Hook, son of Jonathan. Captain of the Jolly Roger.”
“A sailor,” Bertilak said. “What business brings you to this land?”
“Survival,” I said. “We are in search of food and fresh water.”
“Food and water are plentiful here,” said Bertilak. He shifted his green and gold tunic at the waist. “Are you the cause of the thunder we heard moments ago?”
“Are you responsible for the bodies strewn about the field over there?” I asked in return.
Captain James Hook and the Siege of Neverland Page 3
