Mere Phantasy

by Ashley Lauren

  Almost instantly, when I felt like I could focus again, my gaze moved to the only important object in this entire equation.

  The gun.

  It’d been knocked from Hook’s hands the minute Zane began to struggle with him. Zane’s eyes flashed to it just as the captain snaked his hook across his cheek, leaving a large line of blood as he reopened the wound from the night before.

  “Lacey!” Zane wrestled on top of the captain, knees planted to try and keep him at bay. “Get the gun!”

  Stumbling over myself, I tried to claw my way to the gun. An arrow landed just inches before my nose, causing my attention to shift to a sulking figure heading right for the tree. The figure looked over its shoulder, hooded by a large cloak, before they were gone, headed inside.

  Rhiannon in her child form. It had to be.

  And she was going after Peter.

  Startling me, someone reached down and grabbed my arm, helping me to my feet. I struggled against them, thinking it was one of Hook’s men, but the man grabbed my face and steadied me.

  “Lacey! It’s me; it’s Robin,” the familiar, deep, accented voice told me. I stopped fighting, pushing my messy hair from my face. Robin.

  “T-the witch, she’s inside. She’s trying to get to Peter,” I explained hurriedly, pulling away from him and toward the Nevertree as best I could with my limp.

  “Wait, Lacey,” Robin called behind me, light-hazel eyes startlingly exuberant against his dark features. With a flick of his wrist, an arrow landed in the bark of the tree next to me. He smirked lightly. “You shouldn’t be unarmed when you kick that hag’s arse.”

  Grinning back at him, adrenaline at its full peak, I ripped the arrow from the wood and staggered as fast as I could manage toward the hideout. My home.

  And without even a glance behind me, I slipped down the dark entrance with only one thing in mind.

  I have to save Peter.

  Dipping down into the cool air below the Nevertree, I realized my dreams hadn’t been nothing. Had Peter been warning me of what was to come? But that was impossible. He was asleep. Whatever the case, they’d warned me of the future, just like Fairy Godmother had said they would.

  Everything was falling into place now. Lox had been wrong; he was in danger, no matter who was protecting him. Hook must’ve set this up; he’d planned a diversion so someone else, someone who wasn’t a grown-up, could sneak into the Nevertree and kill Peter.

  So I had to save him. I had to. Every nerve in my body and brain urged me forward, and my heart and blood pounded fiercely in my ears. I had to get there. It was the last chance. A fix for the entire problem I’d caused.

  Unless I froze up again.

  I hoped the noise of my arrival went unnoticed, even after smacking into something sharp with my elbow with a yelp. The front foyer was dark as I scooted my way toward the main living room as quietly as I could, leaning on my good side, the one that didn’t feel ablaze from the pressure on my wound.

  No sound stirred in the Nevertree except the Peter’s soft snoring. But she had to be here. I’d seen her come in.

  Crawling farther toward Peter’s bed, I stood and peeked around the unlit room, my eyes still trying to adjust. They passed over a shadow I thought was one of the cow-skinned chairs, but then it moved. My job was squarely before me; Rhiannon was going to attack Peter, and I had to somehow defeat her before she could. Simple, right?

  The Lost Boys were nowhere in sight, probably lured out to another adventure despite their promise to watch over their leader.

  So I was all alone.

  I quickly retreated behind a low-hanging root in the Nevertree ceiling and hid.

  The shadow had been crouching, but when it rose up, I had to cover my mouth to prevent a gasp of surprise from escaping. Jack stepped forward, not the witch as I’d assumed, a match suddenly sparking as a candle illuminated the room dimly. I shuddered and pushed aside my emotions, focusing on watching, tensing my muscles, preparing for what was to come.

  The general squinted in the dim light and moved stealthily toward Peter, setting the candle down on his bedside table. My heart leapt when a shining knife was pulled from his pocket and he set it down beside the candle.

  “You were always the best,” Jack growled, glaring down at Peter sleeping peacefully in his bed. The general’s hatred wafted off him like waves of the bustling ocean. “You never let me take control, even when I knew what was best. And I’m so glad.” He chuckled, the smile on his face revoltingly joyful. He threw back his head. “I’m so glad Hook asked me to kill you. He respects me; he’s going to let me do all the things you never did. And you brought one of the biggest weapons right to us. Bet you didn’t think about that, huh, Pan?” Jack gritted his teeth and stared at the knife he had retrieved, raising it shakily into the air with another malicious grin. “So this was the easiest decision I’ve ever had to make.”

  I felt my feet moving without prompting, and before I coherently realized it, I was kicking and grabbing at Jack, trying to steal his weapon. His eyes widened in surprise as I wrapped my legs around him to wrestle him to the floor. Jack tried grasping my hair, but couldn’t get a good grip. We both went tumbling down by the foot of the bed. Since he had the advantage of strength and height, he stood us up and then threw me roughly onto the bed.

  “Stop!” I yelled, my voice ragged as I jumped up to intercept the knife once more. All the while Jack and I fought, Peter still slept soundly.

  “You little—” Jack snapped, trying to rip the weapon out of my grip. “Quit it!” He yanked his wrist from my grasp, and I rolled back, almost hitting my head into Peter’s glass case of antique guns next to his bed. But in that moment, I’d already darted the arrow Robin had loaned me the general’s way, not even stopping to blink.

  And it lodged in Jack’s lower shoulder with a sickening slurp.

  He bellowed in pain while I tried to shake off my own. When he was just beginning to recover, I went for him again, my whole body taken over by adrenaline.

  “You traitor!” I tried to kick his legs out from under him, but he was a stone standing tall over me, clutching his wounded arm. It wasn’t his dominant side I’d been able to target, disappointingly, but had gone in deep enough to stun him.

  “Get off of me!” he said between yanks at the dagger I still tried to grab from his healthy hand. “If you weren’t the only one with the power over that feral locket, I would’ve killed you by now, you wretch.” With a gasp, I felt Jack stop struggling and push forcefully against me, meeting my eyes with his hate-filled ones. His breath blew hard and hot on my face as we fought muscles against muscle.

  “Don’t do this,” I hissed, using all the strength I could muster to counteract his arcs of the knife. But I was losing.

  Suddenly, he caught me by surprise as he pushed me onto the bed, pinning me down with one hand, and with the other, he stabbed down at Peter’s chest.

  Time slowed in my mind.

  And then everything went wild.

  He would never, ever get to him.

  Over my dead body.

  I squirmed free and pressed my lips to Peter’s before I realized what I was actually doing. I braced myself for the pierce of the dagger.

  But nothing ever came; at least nothing sharp ever stabbed me.

  When I opened my eyes, Peter stared up at me, his irises alight and his face red. I pushed up away from him, but he grabbed my wrist and yanked me upward. We started to swivel between the Nevertree’s roots and up to the top, until finally, we burst out into the night sky.

  Just like that.

  The wind was startling, and the sudden rush of flight made me gasp and my stomach tumble. I looked up at Peter, who was staring down at me, the flush in his face gone. Behind us, there was a horrible cry of rage, but then it faded away as we flew over the treetops.

  I didn’t know how I did it.

  But I’d just saved Peter Pan.

  Twenty-Eight

  Peter landed near the ocean and set
me down gently in the sand. I flopped onto my back, breathing heavily while my heart still raced a mile a minute. What’d just happened? It all seemed like a blur in my mind, unable to completely fathom what I’d just done.

  Had I really kissed him?

  Was he really awake?

  I hugged myself, panting, while Peter stared at me in confusion.

  “You saved me, Lacey,” he said quietly.

  Yes, I’d done it.

  I saved him. Neverland is saved. Everything is all right.

  Those words rang in and out of my head like the waves lapping on the shore, over and over. But I still hadn’t realized the significance of this.

  “How—” I started, but Peter cut me off.

  “Shh. I heard everything.” His blue eyes darted to meet mine, warmth I’d missed for so long. “I’m safe now.” Peter stared down at his hands and then back at me, mouth agape with happiness. “You did it.” He sounded astonished, as if it had never occurred to him I’d be capable of such an act. And I didn’t take offense because, well, I couldn’t even believe I was either.

  So I sat up and flung my arms around his neck. He hugged me back, and we sat there clinging to one another for dear life as the ocean sounds surrounded us.

  Hope.

  “So you heard everything?” I asked, snatching a bite of apple and wiping the juice from my mouth.

  “Every single thing. I just couldn’t react,” Peter explained, running his hand through his now shaggy hair. “It was almost as if everything was in a dream, a little fuzzy since I couldn’t actually see or interact, but still, I knew. I can’t believe it.” He shook his head. “My own general wanting me dead.”

  “Believe it, bub.” I laughed, biting into my snack with a satisfying crunch. “He’s not the only one.”

  Peter was floating Indian-style while juggling three apples. We sat under a gigantic oak tree, where the leaves loomed above us the size of our entire bodies, casting a sickly green light over us. The sun was just about to rise, purple and yellow hues peeking above the ocean to warn everyone of its entrance for that day. I was still in my damp clothes, and freezing, but also perfectly content for the first time in a long time. Relief wasn’t a big enough word to describe how I felt in this moment.

  “M-Merlin said you couldn’t be woken up—that you were cursed as a child.” I swallowed the rest of my apple, tossing it into the water nearby and watching it float down the current easily.

  Peter stopped flying, sinking to the ground, and bit his lip. “Yeah, well, he never thought about the curse being broken the second I wasn’t a child anymore.”

  Choking on my last bite, I coughed and heaved after inhaling so sharply. “What are you saying?”

  Rubbing his neck, Peter let out a sigh. “It means I searched so long for you in the Mainland that I’m not a kid anymore, Lace. I’m…” His nose scrunched sourly. “A grown-up.”

  This made me laugh. “You can’t be older than sixteen. How is that considered a grown-up?”

  Shaking his head; Peter started to tear at the grass and flowers around him. “It wasn’t the fact that I aged, which I did. But it was the fact that I lost… a lot of faith. I didn’t think I’d find you. But when I got back… Lox noticed. And I noticed it, too. I just was in denial is all.”

  Swallowing finally, I paused, glancing up at the oak tree’s leaves swaying in the breeze like giant flags. “Wait. So that means…”

  “It means my curse to love is broken. And I was able to be woken by true love’s—”

  “Kiss. Right, I got that,” I said for him, standing to my feet and wincing at the pain in my leg. This conversation was making me too antsy to stay seated.

  Everything had just been so peaceful a few moments ago that it was very easy to pretend I’d forgotten there was a war going on and Peter hadn’t been awoken by true love’s kiss—my kiss. But I couldn’t hide it forever; there was so much revealed and work to be done.

  “What? What’s wrong?” He blinked around us as if I’d spotted an unseen enemy.

  I pressed my fingers to my mouth in thought. “Peter, I think we really need to talk about the impending war. Just sitting here, ignoring this, isn’t getting us anywhere. It’s more important than our DTR talk.”

  Peter raised an eyebrow, watching me. “When did you get so self-assured?”

  “This isn’t a time for messing around.” I hugged my waist. “The battle’s tomorrow, and we have to get back to them.”

  He moved to leave. “Well then, let’s go.”

  I stepped forward to grab his arm and keep him from flying away. “Wait, Peter. Not before we talk about it.”

  With a sigh, he dropped closer to the ground. “What exactly is there to talk about? I don’t want to talk about the war, Lacey.” As he said this, his body came closer to mine so it was easy for him to reach out and grab my hand. My blood pressure spiked, skin alight with remembrance that I’d kissed this boy. This boy who ruled over an entire kingdom of people, visited and mentored me in my dreams, and believed in me from the very beginning. This boy, who, with everything inside him, believed I loved him, and that had been the reasoning behind the kiss of his awakening.

  Slowly, I pulled away from his grasp, and his eyebrows dipped in concern.

  “Peter…” I didn’t know where to start, my voice cracking already with emotion. I didn’t know how to tell someone something like this, especially someone as amazing as Peter. But what was he expecting? That true love’s kiss would solve everything and there’d be happily ever after?

  Despite it sounding not one bit outrageous in Neverland, there was still a sliver of reality to deal with.

  And true love wasn’t part of that.

  I mean, seriously, I was sixteen. This wasn’t a fairytale, despite how ironic that sounded in the place like this.

  “Peter,” I repeated, looking away. Who could look at someone who seemed so trusting toward you? Guilt immediately gripped me. How could I be like the rest of the many who’d left before me? How could I be that person I didn’t think I’d ever become?

  “Just say it.” His tone dropped, waiting for the disappointment.

  “When you were asleep, I didn’t believe in true love. And after everything that happened… I think it’s why… what I did… it, well, what I found myself doing in the moment…” I stumbled over my words to try and make it come out right, and Peter’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Peter, I still don’t believe in it. T-the love was… not there for me. Not that kind of love. But… it still woke you up.”

  Peter studied me slowly, almost as if I could see the gears shifting within his magical mind.

  “So you’re saying—?” he urged, leaning in toward me now.

  The pain in my chest was making it hard to swallow down the guilt and get out the truth. But in the end, I managed. “I’m saying…” I rubbed my damp palms over my pants. “That… I don’t think the kiss was exactly two-sided.”

  “You think it wasn’t true love’s kiss,” he clarified, voice growing deeper by the second. Yet I could still clearly see the hurt little boy behind his eyes.

  “No, I-I don’t.” I bit my lip, waiting for his reaction.

  He was silent for a long time before his jaw clenched and his arm bent so he could scratch behind his head. “Ah, well, we’d better get going, then. To the Nevercamp, I mean. Lots of”—he cleared his throat—“um, work to do.”

  I opened my mouth to continue the conversation, but he was already swooping up into the air without me and, soon after, was lost from my sight altogether.

  When hope comes into a place like war, things turn for the better.

  So that’s exactly what happened to the Neverland forces.

  After Peter woke, everyone’s spirits were immediately lifted. A large banquet was held, with foods I never imagined I’d see stacked high across many different tables spread out over the camp. Music playing tunes more magical than anything back home. Peter didn’t come to the banquet, though, blaming it on plan
ning for the battle the next day and resting after his, well, rest. Though he claimed he was too absorbed in his work to be around me, I knew it was just because of our… disagreement.

  Or, more realistically speaking, my repudiation of his feelings.

  No matter what was happening between us, the rest of the soldiers were joyous and optimistic. They believed, with Peter awake, all their problems would be solved and the war would be an easy-peasy sort of win.

  But Lox, Zane, and I all knew better.

  “They outnumber us ten to one,” Lox explained as she dabbed a bacterial cleanser onto the cut across Zane’s cheek. He winced and cursed at her, but she took no notice of him, still as unforgiving as ever. Since having to admit to her that he’d turned me over to the captain, she’d beaten him more than the actual enemy had. Now she was only helping him because I’d asked her to, but she made sure I knew she wasn’t enjoying it one bit. As for me, I’d packed on the pixie dust and indulged in about ten ginger cookies, courtesy of Lox, in order to combat my harpy leg wound. I wasn’t too angry with her or FG anymore; I knew she’d only been trying to help. Besides, there was a war to fight. All the details could be gone through at a later time.

  I shook my head, sitting on a medical cot nearby and swinging my feet over the edge of it absentmindedly. “Do you think Peter knows this? If he doesn’t have a good battle strategy…”

  “We’re screwed.” Zane finished for me before shouting out in pain as Lox ripped the Band-Aid she’d just placed on his wound right back off again.

  She feigned being sorry. “My bad. Wrong size.” She shrugged before scouring through the medical supplies for another bandage.

  “Don’t lie.” Zane held his cheek. “You missed me.”

  Goldilocks leaned over with a raised eyebrow. “After you turned over my best lady friend and our biggest weapon for a quick drink?” She let out a mordant snort. “I’d say I’d much rather cut off the piggy toe on your right foot than say I missed your ugly snout.”

  “Now that’s just diabolical.” He gasped in mock fear, but I did see his eyes flash my way in concern. I offered him an amused smile of comfort.