I allowed myself a breath and felt the rush of strength from the battle and retreat drain away.
A second wind chilled me and I pulled my coat tighter. The slick of fairy blood oiled my hand and I wiped the sparkled mess on my pant leg.
“Any man hurt?” I asked.
I then saw Smee’s cheeks and wool cap flecked with the same pink sparkle and I laughed. The Irishman grew red and snorted through a smile. The laugh caught Cecco next, then spread to Starkey and Gustavo. Soon Noodler joined in and Smee chortled along.
By all accounts, every step of our time on the island was a catalog of horrors. Man-eating plants, child armies, murdering natives, and sadistic knights made for a terrible joke and here we were, splitting our sides over any or all of it.
Starkey pointed out each man’s cuts and scrapes, each one with a story and each one funnier than the last. Every brush with death brought about a chorus of laughter. The narrower the escape, the funnier the story was. I told them how I almost lost my five remaining fingers and the men doubled over, gasping for air. I let go and enjoyed the release.
Then the boat lurched to the port side. Wood splintered beneath us. We collected ourselves, still smiling when a second lurch threw Starkey overboard. I sobered myself and headed to the railing.
Boards floated on the water. Starkey swam to one and laid across it. He waved at me, signaling that he was unhurt.
The boat leaned starboard and the deck angled up to the rising afternoon sun. I slid to the mast. Waves swallowed more and more of the ship. In seconds, the mast was flat across the water and I lost sight of the other men.
I did see her, though.
And I heard her as well, ticking so beautifully.
The croc was only a shadow beneath the water, but she is a figure I’d recognize instantly. The fluid elegance of her movements betray the roughness of her body, all scales and teeth. Her long, powerful tail whipped from side to side, propelling her closer to me, her only goal. She wants my blood. Nothing less will sate her. A singular focus. I envy her simplicity.
The croc rose up and split the mast. I spilled into the water and all was darkness for an instant.
I saw her again. She glided through the water in clean strokes, surfaced just long enough to breathe, then dove straight for me. As she closed the distance, her wide frame took up my entire field of view and wiped out all thought save one.
This is it.
There was nowhere to go, no direction I could swim that would save me from her. I know that, for the croc, I am not a meal of necessity. I am a sweeter flavor long denied to her. The sick familiar emptiness stabbed my heart and I tried to hear the ticking of my father’s watch one last time, hoping that it would give me some final comfort.
The beast twisted sideways and opened her mouth wide.
I stared deep into my death, but it didn’t come. Not yet, anyway.
A second figure struck the croc from underneath and the beast’s jaws clamped shut inches to my right. The force of the bite pushed me to the left and the croc swam past me. A rush of bubbles surged around me and I swam for the light above.
I surfaced and gasped. Cecco and Smee called to me from atop a couple of loose boards. I waved, then dove into the water and watched the croc disappear in the distance.
I saw something else as well.
Obsidian eyes stared back at me.
The mermaid met my lips with hers and I sank into the depths of her stare. In these eyes, I saw darkness, but this darkness wasn’t total. A single blue light swirled and sparkled and even though I didn’t know what the light was, I knew I cherished it.
Then pain.
Sharp, stinging pain.
I pulled away, tasting salt and copper.
When I looked to her again her eyes didn’t call to me as they once did. The rich blackness was gone, as was the light within it. She smiled a toothy grin of sharp needles, stained in my blood, then darted away. Not a day sooner, I remembered her saying. Then you can die.
I swam to a board in the water.
As the Jolly Roger sailed toward us, I counted all six of us again, uninjured and unhurt.
This time, no one laughed.
Billy Jukes threw us a line and we swam for the old brigantine. We climbed aboard the Jolly Roger, each one of us looking more ragged than the last. Gustavo held the line for me, then followed me up onto the ship.
I crawled over the railing and mumbled orders to Billy Jukes. I didn’t even look my men in the eyes when I passed them on my way to the cabin.
The door creaked open and I shut it tight behind me. I shed my coat and my boots, looking at the clock only once.
11:14
Soft ticks of the brass hands soothed me as I stumbled to my bed and let the dark of the room swallow me.
Chapter Sixteen
August 18th
Sleep came quickly, but the dreams came even faster. I felt the presence of another. I looked to my left and saw that I wasn’t in my cabin at all anymore. It was a bedroom and a woman was sitting at my side. She said something sweet to me and, even though I didn’t recognize her, I trusted her enough to close my eyes again.
There was a crash of glass on the floor. Whirls of flashing lights danced around an empty room. A demon crept across the ceiling, all promises and smiles. I turned my back to him.
Acrid gray smoke kicked into the air and I held someone. She was weak and slight of frame. Her words were soft and blond hair covered her face. When I brushed it aside, there was only a blank canvas of skin. Rage swelled in me. I lashed out at the only other man around. Steel scraped steel and sparks fell like rain to the grass. I ran the man through and looked him in the eyes only to be met with the same pale slate where a face should have been. The man fell from my sword and the grass turned to ash.
I was on a ship. A score of men fought and died. I dragged one across the deck with an iron hook. Billy Jukes was there, as were many of my crew. Smee helped me lift the impaled man overboard and I watched the blank face sink into the water alongside another featureless man, this one in an officer’s uniform. Both men disappeared into the sea and I found myself alone, confused, and unsatisfied.
I carried these feelings with me as I woke.
A blue sun shone through the porthole. I turned over in my sweat-soaked sheets and wiped my eyes. The gentle ticking drew my attention to the clock.
5:32
Six hours was more than enough sleep.
I peeled off my cold, damp shirt and sat upright.
I stretched, then walked over to the wash basin and splashed my face. My chapped lips stung at the water’s touch and I felt the jagged edges left by the mermaid’s kiss.
The mirrored glass showed me a chronicle of my failures. Long crimson scrapes and flowering purple bruises decorated my face, even after the fairy’s magic at the Indian camp. The battles of the last few days left my muscles sore and bruised. I raised my right arm and examined a yellowing fist-sized welt on my ribs. I lowered my arm and winced, only to see the purple bruise that had spread across the left side of my chest. By reflex, I raised a hand to massage the battered muscle, but felt only the ghost of where fingers once were.
I breathed hard out of my nose and fought reliving that memory.
Instead, I decided to shave. I moved the mirror and the basin to a well lit area of the cabin and prepared the razor. Long, slow, precise strokes cleared away the unwanted growth of the past. I avoided the cuts and bruises as best I could.
I spent the next few minutes washing the dried blood and sweat off of me. It took several minutes to find a cloth clean enough to clean me, but I managed. When I was done, I dabbed a few drops of scented oil behind my ears.
Finally, I grabbed two biscuits, a piece of salted beef, and some dried apricots I had hid away for myself. The food didn’t satisfy me the way it usually does. Neither did the cup of terrible wine I drank with my breakfast. Even so, a clean shave and full stomach set me in the right attitude to face whatever came at me today.<
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I then put on a fresh shirt, pinned the sleeve over my missing hand, and stepped out onto the deck.
“Ahoy, Captain,” Smee called out over the Dread Song. The men continued singing as Ed Teynte mark each passing cycle with a notch.
I nodded and walked over to my boatswain.
“We were just about to wake you,” the Irishman continued.
“After six hours?”
Smee’s face twisted with confusion. “We’ve had two full shifts since we got back.”
“That isn’t possible. That would be over eighteen hours.”
“Like I said, Captain, we were going to wake you.”
I stared out over the horizon in disbelief. If anything, eighteen hours of sleep should have had me feeling and looking less exhausted.
“Has there been any trouble?” I asked. I passed Smee a knowing look and the Irishman smiled his understanding.
“None, sir,” Smee answered in low grumbles. “Not from the boy nor from the men. Whatever you said to Teynte put the fear of God in them for sure.” We smirked as Billy Jukes clapped a large hand on Cookson’s shoulder, catching the man unawares and knocking him forward a step. Jukes laughed and joked as Cookson forced an uneasy smile. Several others looked on while trying not to look at all.
“It is not a permanent solution,” I said.
“Can’t kill them,” Smee said. “We need the hands.”
“But not the ones that will stab us in our sleep.”
“What then?”
“I don’t know yet, but there has to be a better way to keep them in line.” I watched my crew for several minutes more before my eyes settled on Jack Elroy. The man wasn’t doing anything out of the ordinary. What caught my attention was that he was doing the same thing over and over.
Jack sat on the main deck tying and retying a bowline knot. Each time he finished it, he untied it and cursed to himself before starting again.
The man rocked back and forth, speaking to himself as his pale fingers pulled at the line. I was too far away to hear what the man was saying, but when Jack finished this third knot, he cursed loudly, untied it, and started over again. I walked over to my crewman.
“Mr. Elroy.”
The man didn’t answer. With each step, it became clearer to me that Jack wasn’t talking, he was singing. I listened to the short verse and soon discovered that the man was singing the directions of how to tie this knot.
“Loop, pass it through,
And continue ‘round the standing end.
Then bring her back
And pass her through the loop again.”
Jack Elroy’s expert hands moved as the song directed. He finished the bowline knot in two quick movements, then looked at it and said, “That’s my boy.” Then his face reddened, he cursed, untied it, and started over.
“Jack,” I said.
Again no response.
“Loop, pass it through,
And continue ‘round the standing end…”
I put a hand on the man’s shoulder and Jack Elroy stopped.
“My father taught me how to tie knots,” Jack said. “I was four and he made little rhymes for me to follow. One for each knot. When I did it right, he’d say ‘That’s my boy’ and smile. It was him and me, a two man crew. They killed him, the British did. Hanged him for doing what it is that we do.”
“We’ve all lost fathers.”
“That’s not it.” Jack Elroy looked up and the sunlight caught the tears on his freckled cheeks. “I think back to him teaching me knots and I hear the water. I see my hands looping and pulling. But when I finish and look at him, I see nothing. His face is gone.”
A shock rippled through me. I hadn’t shared what I learned about the Forgetting with my crew. I had never even stopped to address their concerns aside from base necessities.
“It was a long time ago,” I said, keeping my tone even.
“You’re not listening!” Jack snapped. Several men on the main deck stopped working and quieted down, watching. “He’s still standing there, like always, but his face is a blur. It’s gone and his voice is gone, too. The part that was his mouth opens and all I hear is the crowd that cheered at his hanging. Just cheering.” His face softened and his eyes became calm as he stared off into the blue and purple sky. “Do you remember your father, Captain?”
“His name was Jonathan.”
“Not just his name,” Jack said. “Do you remember him? His voice. The way he treated you and your sisters.” He looked over at me with puffy red eyes. “Do you have sisters, Captain?”
“No.”
“Funny how I never thought to ask. No one thinks that Captain Hook could have had sisters.” He looked out into the horizon again. “I had sisters, two of them. One died young. The other… I covered her eyes when they hanged our father. She heard it too, the cheering, I mean.” His voice became quiet. “I can’t even tell you her name now. I try to picture her and all I see is a head of long brown hair and no face beneath it.”
“The island is affecting us all.”
“That was Phillip Gulley’s worry,” Jack said. “I ran after Peter Pan with him. I didn’t care for Gulley’s talk about taking the ship. I just wanted it over.”
“Killing Peter Pan will get us home.”
“And what if you can’t kill Peter Pan?” he said, his voice now distant. “I’ve killed men who were faster or stronger than me, but that boy ducked me and I fell over barrels like a blind old fool. He didn’t even look back at me. I wasn’t a thought to him and I won’t be a memory either.” Jack Elroy drew the pistol from his belt and placed it to the side of his head. “T’where you headed, Captain?”
He pulled the trigger. Chunks of gray and pink sprayed over the deck and onto my shirt.
A dozen men gathered around the body. No one spoke.
The wind died and the waves that lapped the hull of the ship settled. It snowed, but only for a minute.
We wrapped Jack Elroy’s body in a sheet and moved him to a cargo hold. Collazo said a few words. We then swabbed the deck where he laid and agreed to bury him on the island the following morning.
The next few hours passed quietly so I took on some routine maintenance, both for the ship and for the crew. Billy Jukes, Smee, and I checked the stays, the sails, and our rations. We then split off and talked to each of the men. Every one of them suffered in his own way. Some knew that they lost family. Others weren’t sure if they had any. Most recalled names, places, and even a few of our trades, but many of their accounts differed widely. No one remembered their mothers.
It worsened by the hour. Soon we would all slip away like Peter’s children.
When finished, I told them that I’d be in my cabin for a bit to pour over our findings.
I closed the cabin door and walked to the mirrored glass above my wash basin.
T’where are you headed?
Jack Elroy’s last words echoed in my thoughts. How long was I going to hold out telling them about the passage behind the falls? As far as the men knew, their choices boiled down to freedom through killing Peter Pan or death, either at his hands or their own. Jack chose his own end.
Some time passed in thought before I realized that I was holding my pistol. It was heavy. How many more men will go the way Jack did? I paused for a breath, then tucked it away in my belt.
It was then that I saw how much of a mess my cabin was. Papers littered the desk and floor. I began sorting these sheets and scrolls into manageable piles. Charts. Letters. Manifests. Some I recognized. Others were foreign to me, save for the handwriting that marked them, which was clearly mine.
One paper, in particular, caught my eye more than once. It was one of the pages on the pile of journal entries. I held it for a moment, then decided to put it down. It was important to try this without reading it first.
I spoke to the mirror. “My name is Captain Hook. I was born James to Jonathan and Elizabeth. My father was captain of this ship… Jukes is my oldest friend. He and I grew
up together… His father was a great man who served as first officer to my father. Emily Jukes was his sister.”
Not one image passed through my mind. I said it again and listened to each empty word disappear into the air. I closed my eyes and mined my memory for any information. One blurred face melted into another until it focused on the dirty, childish features of Peter Pan. I thought back to my first meeting with Peter Pan in my room. I saw Pan on this ship and in this cabin. I remembered my first moments in Neverland, after I had traveled the passageway behind the waterfall. I saw the boy as the only clear fragments in an otherwise clouded glass.
And I heard the ticking clock.
The metallic beat rose out of the quiet and filled my thoughts. This clock hadn’t been mine for long, I remembered that much. So why did its gentle pulse mean so much to me? I swam in its soft measure, searching for meaning beyond the predictable strike of the brass hands.
Then the clock stopped.
Several seconds passed and I kept my eyes closed, listening for the beat that wasn’t there.
In its place came a quiet and familiar ringing.
A shock jolted through me.
My eyes opened wide and I watched a fairy climb out from a fold in the shirt I wore yesterday. It stretched, then fluttered about the room.
I drew my pistol and fired as it ducked behind the clock.
Wood splintered. Glass and gears rained down onto the floor.
The light circled above me, then dove for the desk and grabbed more papers than its little arms should have been able to carry.
“No!” I shouted. “What are you doing?”
A devious smile crept across the fairy’s face, the kind a child has when he knows he has something you want, even if he doesn’t know what it is. The kind of smile that says, “You want these? You’ll have to catch me!”
I jumped for it, but missed by inches. The fairy darted through the porthole and out over the open sea. I sprinted after it and reached my head and arm through, grasping air. Once away from the ship, the fairy let the papers fall to the water. I watched the remnants of my recorded life sink out of sight. I screamed. I beat my fist against the hull of the ship. I pulled at my hair. Had I fit, I would have thrown myself overboard.
Captain James Hook and the Siege of Neverland Page 12
