Forever Neverland

by Susan Adrian

  The Lost Boys say Peter never loses, that there’s nothing to be afraid of. He was pretty impressive with the mountain lion, and in the story he’s fearless against Captain Hook. But he’s never faced this monster before. He’s never seen this monster before. None of them have.

  And I bet Wendy was still afraid when she was going to have to walk the plank.

  What would Wendy do? She was my great-great-grandmother, after all. She did well here. I can try to be like her.

  She was brave, for sure. She took care of her little brothers and all the Lost Boys. I bet she’d swim right out there and sing.

  But she was also always worrying about risks…so maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe she’d put her hands on her hips and say, “This is ridiculous! Think of something else!”

  I know Mom would say it’s ridiculous. I can hear her in my head. Be safe, Clover, she’d say. This is far from safe.

  They’re depending on me—the mermaids, the Lost Boys, Fergus…everyone.

  But I can’t do this.

  “Are you okay?” Shoe asks. She drops on the sand next to me. I braided her hair again this morning, in two French braids, and she’s super pleased with it. She tugs on the ends and studies me, her dark eyes calm.

  I feel like I can trust her, of all of them. I swallow. “I can’t do it,” I say.

  “Sing to bring the monster?” Her eyes don’t change, still relaxed. “You’ll be safe. Peter always wins.”

  “So you’d do it?”

  “Of course!” She stretches out her legs and leans back. “I was bait for a bear once. I had to sit very quietly with a fish in my lap and wait for it to come close enough for Peter to shoot it with an arrow.” She frowns. “Thinking about it now, I don’t know why we couldn’t have just left the fish. But it was scary sitting there. When the bear came to the clearing, it roared so loud I shook, and I wanted to jump up and run, right into the sea. But Peter shot it in time. You must trust him.” She opens her arms wide, gesturing to the beach, the whole island. “Neverland is his place. You do not need to worry.” She smiles. Her teeth are crooked, but they fit her. “You worry too much.”

  I smile back, small. I feel a tiny bit better. “Yeah. Probably.”

  I just have to trust that this really is Peter’s place, and he’s not going to let me get taken by a monster.

  “It’s time!” Peter calls. “Let’s go!”

  Oh God. It’s time.

  * * *

  —

  I stand on the edge of the beach, my toes in the foam, breathing in the familiar salt smell of the ocean. It’s not soothing at all anymore.

  Serena and the other mermaids did some exploring on their own, underwater, but they haven’t been able to find anything. Serena thinks Scylla and the mermaids might be hidden with magic, and when Scylla dies, the mermaids will be released.

  I take a deep breath and look over my shoulder at Fergus. He’s standing apart from everyone else, rubbing his mouth. I’d nod to him, or smile bravely or something, like people do in movies—but he’s not looking at me. And I don’t feel brave anyway.

  I run my hands over the “swimming suit.” Shoe lent it to me, since it would be pretty nasty to swim in jeans. It’s mostly a band on the top, with improvised straps tied on, and loose shorts. It’s dark brown and green, and doesn’t fit very well, but at least it’s made of bits of cloth. I was afraid the leaf clothes that some of them wear might just dissolve in the water after a while.

  I feel naked without my backpack. I wish I could take it with me.

  “Away we go!” Peter calls, and dives into the water, his sword sheathed in a long stripe at his back. The Lost Boys cheer. I look at Shoe, and she smiles and nods. I guess I can’t wait any longer. I take a step, then two, the water swirling cool against my ankles. The bottom drops off, and suddenly there’s nothing beneath my feet. I splutter for a second, but then a hand takes mine, and I get my balance. Serena is with me.

  We swim together all the way to the rock. The water is the perfect temperature against my skin, the sun warm but not too bright, the waves relaxing, not too strong. It would be wonderful, if I weren’t swimming to face a terrible monster. I don’t want to get out of the water, but Serena lets go of my hand, and Peter reaches down and takes it, pulling me up onto the rock. It’s warm and smooth against my bare feet.

  I look back at the beach, at the line of Lost Boys waving and cheering. They seem far away. Fergus is still rubbing his mouth.

  I can’t do this. I can’t. I can’t call a monster.

  “Get your breath,” Peter says, “then sing!”

  His voice is excited, but still calm. Like he’s really in control. Trust Peter, Shoe said.

  What would Wendy do? Well, this far into the plan, I’m pretty sure she would sing. She’d lift her chin and get it done. She’d have to.

  I guess I have to.

  Peter pulls his sword out of the sheath, with a strange swooshing sound, and stands close to me, ready.

  I look at Fergus one more time, wipe my hands on my wet shorts, and sing.

  Clover is singing “Alouette”—but I can’t watch, and I can’t even really listen. It feels like my heart is beating in my throat instead of my chest, and it’s beating wrong. Jerking. I can’t stop rubbing my mouth, but it doesn’t help. I still feel the panic.

  What if she’s taken? What if she dies? Clover is sometimes annoying, and always worries, and makes me do things when I don’t want to…but she’s my sister. I need her.

  Mom wouldn’t have let her do this. I shouldn’t have let her.

  “Alouette, gentille alouette…” Her voice reaches out through the air, the words curling around me. I can easily believe Scylla would come to her voice.

  But Scylla doesn’t come. Clover’s in the third verse, and there’s nothing. I start to relax a little. Maybe she won’t come. Maybe she wanted two mermaids and that was all. I dare to peek.

  Clover looks brave, standing there on the rock, singing with her hands in fists. I’ve seen that expression before, usually when she’s standing up for me when someone is being a bully. Peter seems ready next to her, with his sword drawn.

  I relax more, the pressure releasing. It’ll be okay. Scylla won’t come, and Clover will swim back, and we’ll find the monster another way. Or maybe never see her again.

  “Je te plumerai le cou, je te plumerai le cou…”

  That part means “I’ll pluck the feathers off your neck.” I almost feel like laughing.

  The water churns, and the dogs bark in the distance. Oh no.

  Scylla is coming.

  I want to look away, but I can’t. I need to be strong for Clover. If she can do this, I can watch. Even though my whole body is trembling.

  “Be okay, be okay, be okay,” I chant under my breath. The dogs are loud, close. Clover’s voice has gotten so quiet I can barely hear it, but I see her mouth moving. The water looks like it’s boiling. Peter takes a fighting stance. He seems excited, not scared.

  The Lost Boys are all silent now, watching with me.

  Scylla breaks the surface, and I can’t move an inch. She looks bigger than before, terrifying. Those dogs could tear someone apart. She lunges out of the water and goes straight for Clover. Peter leaps in front of her, slashing with his sword. He gets a hit, blood streaming down Scylla’s arm.

  Scylla stops, pulls back, and eyes Peter. But she doesn’t study him like he’s a fearsome opponent. More like he’s a bug in her way. Peter still doesn’t seem afraid; he’s ready with the sword again. Clover is hiding behind him, so I can’t see her very well.

  Peter strikes, but misses.

  Suddenly Scylla reaches out, grabs Peter with one hand, and flings him away, sword and all, into the ocean, far outside the lagoon.

  The Lost Boys shout in horror. One of the mermaids streaks off after h
im.

  I really can’t breathe, my throat clamped in panic. Clover is alone. She’s defenseless against a hideous killer sea monster. She’s like Andromeda in Clash of the Titans. A helpless sacrifice.

  Clover shrinks down against the rock, covering her head with her arms.

  Scylla reaches out, snatches Clover off the rock, and throws her over her shoulder. Then she spins, and dives back down into the water.

  I find enough breath to scream, and sink to my knees in the sand.

  I’m frozen. A statue. I can’t think, or move. Clover’s underwater. She’ll drown if she’s underwater for too long. How long does it take to drown? I don’t think I want to know.

  Two of the mermaids dive after them. Maybe they can rescue Clover. Maybe they can win against Scylla.

  But Scylla is a goddess and a monster. She flicked Peter Pan away like he was a piece of fluff. What can the mermaids do? What can any of us do?

  Tears pour down my face. This is shock, grief. I know the words, but I didn’t understand before.

  Clover is gone. Clover is gone.

  Friendly, George, and Jumper come hover around me, their worried faces making it worse. I want to run away and scream again, let out all these terrible feelings. Shoe sits next to me and puts her arms around me. I pull away—it’s too much—but she stays there nearby, crouched on the sand.

  “Serena’s coming back with Peter!” Rella calls. Everyone but Friendly and Shoe runs to look, shading their eyes with their hands. I can see them, barely, two bright blobs in the water heading this way.

  Friendly touches my shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he says gently. “We’ll get her back. We always get hostages back.”

  “She’ll drown!” I say. It comes out like a howl.

  “Probably not,” he says. “It’s magic, after all. Everything here is magic one way or another.”

  I don’t know if I believe him anymore.

  “I told her to go,” Shoe says to Friendly. Her voice is shaky. “I told her it would be safe.”

  “She’ll be okay,” Friendly says. “We always get hostages back.”

  I’m breathing too fast. My head feels light, like it’s going to float away.

  The Lost Boys meet Peter at the shore, but he strides through them, straight toward me. His face is tomato red, freckles popping out all over his cheeks. His real color has gone dark green, the color of the forest in shadow.

  I push to my feet. I want to be standing when I face him.

  “This is your fault!” I yell, before he even reaches me. “You said you could defeat her! You said Clover would be safe!”

  The Lost Boys circle around us, and two pixies flutter right by Peter’s ear. The red spreads down his neck, and I think he’s going to yell back at me or hit me or something. But he presses his lips together, tight, and then he nods.

  “You are right. I thought I could defeat her, but I have not faced any such as her before. I went in unprepared, and she has Clover because of it. I…I apologize.”

  A couple of the Lost Boys gasp. I guess Peter hasn’t apologized much before.

  What good does it do, though? Clover is still gone.

  She threw Peter. Threw him right into the ocean. Then she turned her eyes on me, and I knew it was over. There wasn’t going to be a safe, triumphant return to the beach, a victory in our adventure before we go back to London.

  We lost. And now I’m drowning.

  I can’t see anything. My throat tightens, and I’m not sure I could breathe if I wanted to. I kick, and flail my arms. There’s nothing but water everywhere. Something cold and slimy slides across my bare back, and I realize it’s one of the eels that are Scylla’s hair.

  I can’t believe this is the way it happens. Drowned by a sea monster.

  Scylla stops, as suddenly as if we’ve come to the end of a line. She flips me off her shoulder with one hand and holds me out in front of her, studying me.

  I squirm, trying desperately to gasp for air. There is no air.

  “You are not a water creature,” she says. Her voice is rough and low—it echoes around me, in my head, in the water. “You are a land girl. Interesting. I was a land girl once. I will give you the gift.”

  As quick as a finger snap, the pressure is gone. I try to take a breath, and somehow—though it’s water around me and not air—it works. I can breathe.

  The fear flies away, replaced by a strange exhilaration. I can breathe underwater. I’m not going to drown. I can breathe.

  I can see again too, as clearly as if I were looking at the water through glass. I see Scylla’s face plainly for the first time. Her eyes are bright green, with gray circles under them. She looks tired. She has a long nose, like on Greek statues, and pale white skin you can almost see through.

  Scylla throws me over her shoulder again and dives, fast. It’s so fast the ocean is a blur, my hair flying behind me.

  The dogs are still barking, their barks echoing like Scylla’s voice. They’re not far from my head, which is bouncing on Scylla’s back. The closest one—a brown dog with smooth, short fur—snaps at me, but it can’t quite reach.

  I wonder if they bark constantly.

  The color changes below us, and I think we’re coming close to the seafloor. I see coral, and rocks, and things skittering along the bottom. Scylla turns and swims parallel to the ground. I can’t see where we’re going, but she does three twisty turns, as rocks fly past, and then stops suddenly again. She waves her hands, mutters something, and we pass through a curtain of kelp, into a sort of undersea house in a cave, with a high roof.

  Scylla sets me down gently on a rock that’s shaped like a chair and studies me, the eels whipping around her head, the dogs snapping. I grip the arms of the chair, cold and hard. If I didn’t hold on, I think I’d just float up again.

  “I must secure the boundary. I will return. Do not move.” She glares at me. “Or you will be very sorry.”

  She swims back out the entrance, and the sound of the dogs fades. I let go of the chair and float up to the middle of the room. I look around quickly. This may be my only chance to escape.

  It’s beautiful, in the same otherworldly way the pixies’ houses were beautiful. There’s a main room, where I am, and then two more kelp curtains, which I guess lead to other rooms. There are no windows to escape through, unfortunately. There are three other chairs spread around the room. The chairs are deep, so Scylla could probably perch on them to rest, in spite of the dogs. A wide, high table stands in the middle, carved out of a massive rock. But what makes this place beautiful are the decorations—the art.

  The ceiling, which arches high above me, is completely covered in a mural made of some sort of phosphorescent paint that glows in the dark space. It looks like a drawing from one of the mythology books: a flowing river, with a merman popping out of it, holding out his arms to a young woman on the shore who’s running away. I know what it is, from Fergus’s story: that’s Scylla running away, before she becomes a monster. And Glaucus, who started all of this.

  The walls are decorated with shells, all different sizes and colors, stuck on in detailed patterns. Some are only patterns, I think, but some are in the shapes of flowers, rainbows. A fire, dancing. A giant tree spreading its branches. They’re all painted with that glowing stuff too, so the whole room is bright enough to see pretty well.

  I move to the entrance—I really have to go before she comes back. But as soon as my hand touches the empty space, it’s zapped, with an intense, burning pain. I cry out.

  One of the kelp curtains moves, and a face peeks around it. It’s Jasmina. I recognize her from that first day on the beach. I see another face over her shoulder, pale and scared. That must be Allora.

  “You’re alive!” My voice echoes, like Scylla’s did.

  “You can breathe!” Jasmina says, her eyebrows knotting
together. “How?”

  “Scylla—the sea monster—said she gave me the gift of breath,” I say. “I don’t know how I can talk, either, but it seems to work. Are you both all right?”

  She nods. “We cannot leave this room. She has locked the entrance with magic.” She stretches her hand out an inch past the curtain, then snatches it back like it was burned. “She has not harmed us…yet. But we must find a way to leave this place as soon as we can.”

  “But what does she want?”

  “She is returning!” Jasmina says, and drops the curtain.

  I shoot back through the water to the seat, my heart pounding. Sure enough, I hear the dogs first; then Scylla appears. She glances around the room, then at me. She frowns, showing two deep lines in her forehead.

  “What did you do?” she booms.

  “Nothing!” I whisper. She comes closer, the dogs lunging at me, tumbling over each other. I close my eyes. “I looked around,” I say, my voice high. I don’t want to get the mermaids in trouble too, so I don’t say anything about them. “That’s all. I was looking at the ceiling. It’s…it’s beautiful.”

  Scylla studies me. “You cannot escape with flattery. It is an old mortal’s trick, and I know it well.” She sighs. “I have seen it used on others.”

  I grip the chair, looking up at her, at the eels and the dogs.

  She flicks an eel off her shoulder irritably. “There is no one following you. I have secured our area. No one will find us now.”

  “What do you want?” I ask. I see Allora and Jasmina peeking around the curtain again. “Why did you bring us here?”

  My voice hardly shakes at all, but it’s only bluffing. I’m terrified.

  She frowns. “Are you slow as well as mortal? I want you to sing.”

  No one is doing anything.

  Actually, they’re doing their normal things. Peter sent us all back to the house to rest and “regroup.” He stayed with the mermaids, so I think at least maybe he’s making a plan. The two mermaids who followed Scylla and Clover said they saw what looked like an underwater house, but they couldn’t get near it. And Clover appeared to be breathing underwater.