This isn’t her doing.
This is something else.
The plume of light shoots across the meadow and crashes into Tink. Both fly back, hitting the ground with a thundering roar, tearing up the earth like a giant scrape of skin.
“Holy shit,” Kas says.
“What the fuck is happening?” Bash asks.
The light stands up and looks over at us.
“Pan,” I breathe out.
Fucking Peter Pan, glowing like a star.
Vane and I meet each other’s eyes. We look across the clearing at the twins.
I can feel Pan like a break of sunlight on my skin, even though it’s dark and the air cold.
He’s changed. Something about him has changed.
But there’s no time to unravel the secrets.
We have to move. Now.
Tink gets up, one of her wings hanging crooked from her back. The other is missing completely.
“What have you done, Peter Pan?” she asks.
“Found my own light, Tink,” he tells her.
She swings. He darts to the side. She swings again, knife in hand. Pan catches her arm and wrenches the blade from her hand. When the black stone is firmly in his grip, he tightens his fist and the stone melts like ink.
“Hold her,” Pan says, and we all race across the clearing to him. Bash grabs her arm, Kas another. Vane and I circle, our shadow pushing back on Tink, squeezing the air from her lungs.
“No!” she screams, fights against the twins.
Pan takes her face in his glowing hands. Blinding light fills the meadow. Light so bright, it makes my eyes sting.
“No!” Tink screams again.
The light and the heat pulses out like an inferno. Darkness mists out from Tink, swirling in the light. Dark tendrils of whatever dark magic resurrected her, trying one last time to keep its foothold on this world.
“Goodbye, Tink,” Pan says.
She hangs her head back, face pointed toward the stars, and screams.
32
BASH
The heat and light and power coming off of Peter Pan is enough to scorch skin.
Kas and I hold on to our mother as the darkness that resurrected her comes pouring out in inky ribbons.
“Don’t let go!” Kas yells over the roar of the inferno.
Darkness and light swirl around us. My wings beat at my back, counteracting the sheer force pouring out of Peter Pan.
I can barely look at him, the light is so bright white, so fucking intense I don’t know if I’ll be able to see for a week.
Tink screams, her skin breaking open like parched earth, darkness leaking out.
This was never my mother. Just a worse version.
But she embodies everything I hated about Tink, about the way she sought power at the expense of everything else.
Pan grits his teeth and the light pouring out of him pulses, bubbling out until light literally pours from Tink’s mouth.
She disintegrates in our grip, bursting into a thick cloud of fairy dust.
The light cuts out and Pan staggers back. He’s breathing heavily, sweat shining on his forehead.
The fae and the Lost Boys break free of their stupor and look around like they aren’t sure how they got here.
Vane and Winnie come closer.
“You get yourself an upgrade?” I ask Pan.
His chest heaves with several deep breaths and then a cocky smirk lifts the corner of his mouth. “Something like that.”
Winnie runs at him and collapses into him, wrapping her arms around his waist. She sobs against him. “I was so worried about you.”
He embraces her, a hand buried in the knotted, bloody mess of her hair. “I’m all right, Darling.”
“What happened?” she asks.
“I’ll tell you all about it later.” And then he leans over and whispers in her ear and she blushes, giggling.
Tilly comes forward. She’s painted in blood like the rest of us. The fae queen did not sit this one out.
“Can I talk to you?” she asks Kas and me.
We break away from the others. The fae and the Lost Boys are still trying to figure out what the fuck is going on, least of all why some of their friends are lying dead at their feet.
I suspect the fae court has been dysfunctional for a while, but Tink really fucked shit up this time. I swear there has been a stain on the entire length of our rule.
“Thank you,” Tilly says. She swallows hard and wipes away the blood on her hand with the backside of one of her sleeves. “You cleaned up another one of my messes.” She laughs as tears well in her eyes. “Just like old times.”
Kas and I pull her into a hug.
“We’ll always protect you, Til,” I tell her, but I can feel the rigidity of Kas’s body. My twin will never completely move on from this, and I’m not sure I will either.
But how the fuck do we move forward?
“Tilly,” Kas says, breaking off the hug. “We refuse to leave the court behind now.”
She nods and swipes the tears from her face, then takes a deep breath. “I know. I’m the one that will leave.”
“Wait, what?” I say.
“I’ve lived my entire life doing what I thought everyone else wanted me to do. It’s time I live my life on my own terms. But somewhere off Neverland.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” I knock my brother on the shoulder. “Tell her. She should stay and we’ll find a place for her and—”
He shakes his head. “There is no place for her here.”
Tilly catches a sob before it comes out, clapping her hand over her mouth. It’s one thing to think something, it’s another to hear it spoken aloud by someone you love.
She nods quickly, choking back the tears.
“Kas,” I say.
“No, he’s right.” She sucks in a breath. “There is no place for me on Neverland. It’s time you two ruled as you were meant to from the beginning. You’ve been through hell. You’ve earned every ounce of power you have. I’ll report to the court that I’m abdicating and give the throne to you. They won’t fight me on it. Not now that you’ve saved the fae from my mistakes and claimed the Neverland Shadow.”
This is everything I’ve ever wanted. Kas too. But it’s hard to accept it at the expense of our sister.
“If you’re sure,” I say.
“I’m sure.” She hugs us once more and offers us goodbyes. “If I ever find a place to call home, I’ll write to you and invite you for dinner or something truly mundane, the way a family should be.”
“I’d like that.” I slap Kas. “We’d like that, wouldn’t we?”
“Umph. Yes. Of course.”
“Until then,” she says and bites at her bottom lip, smiling at us one last time before walking off toward the palace.
33
PETER PAN
I can feel them watching me, wondering.
I’m not usually the one that takes care of the carnage after a fight, but I have to do something to keep my hands busy.
Power is still beating through me, but behind it, hovering on the horizon, there is grief.
I must be patient with unraveling it all, but right now, doing is better than thinking.
Vane comes up beside me as I drag a dead Lost Boy to the cart someone summoned.
“What happened?” he asks me.
Darling is with Bash several dozen yards away, but they are watching this exchange, whispering amongst themselves.