Fairies lived short lives, but the saga of Peter Pan and Captain Hook had survived even more generations of fairies than it had humans. It was second only to the oldest story, the story of when fairies still manipulated the little lives of humans everywhere in the world. Few fairies were left anywhere but Neverland, and they resided far away. Twill, the pirate boy, picked pebbles off the path with his dark and monkey-bar callused hands. Not older than nine, he had dirt under all his fingernails and grass stains on all his joints.
“Do you think Neverland ever gets monsoons?” he asked, staring at the peaceful sky.
“What's a monsoon?” Rosemary asked. “You mean one of those little wiener dog cats?”
“No…”
It took Gwen a moment of visualization before she wrapped her mind around Rosemary's statement. “You're thinking of a mongoose.”
“Oh.”
“A monsoon is a really rainy, windy storm,” Twill informed her. “Lots of tropical islands get them.”
“That sounds like fun!” Rosemary declared, her whole smile lighting up, save for her one missing tooth. “We should ask Peter to get us one. I bet he would. It'd be fun to fly in a monsoon.”
Bracken and Thistle begged to differ.
As they arrived at the top of the mountain, the children returned to their feet. Rosemary took Twill's hand and they ran to the Never Bird, who already cawed in a bitter mood. Bracken and his twinkling red light followed after. Thistle, tired after the long flight up, nestled herself on Gwen's shoulder to catch her breath and recharge her pink glow.
Rosemary and Twill confronted the noisy, nesting Never Bird. The dowdy old creature had warmed up to Gwen a little, but not much, so she had no interest in seeing the bird when it was squawking up such a noisy storm of upset.
The older Hoffman sister took a moment to admire the panoramic view she had of the island. She wondered if anyone old enough to know the word panoramic had ever seen it. The moment would have been very pleasant, if not for the Never Bird's ceaseless fussing.
The sky stretched over everything, beautiful and incorruptible. The sea, just as blue, was almost as uninterrupted.
Gwen squinted at the small shape, far off and perched on the precipice of the horizon. She pawed her hand in her satchel, never taking her eyes off the ocean, as if she thought so much as a blink might erase it.
The Never Bird continued to caw in distress, her warnings untranslatable.
Had the view been a photograph, she would have dismissed the speck as nothing more than a minor imperfection in the film. But she was not looking at a photograph. Gwen found the spyglass in her purse and expanded it. Once the telescope magnified it, Gwen knew there was no mistaking the naval ship.
Chapter 4
“Peter! Peter!” Rosemary screamed as she burst into the grove, Gwen and Twill fast behind her.
Peter didn't seem interrupted. He'd been whittling a pipe at Oat's request. When he set the project aside it seemed he set it aside entirely his own accord. He looked up, but could not distinguish between this frightened tone and the joyful excitement that children so often screamed his name with.
“What nonsense are you about, Rosemary?” he asked, playful and chipper. He had forgotten he'd even sent the three of them on scouting duty.
“Tell him, Gwen! Tell him!”
Gwen was in no condition to do so. She panted, out of breath. The sight of the ship had given her such anxiety, her flight had faltered in spurts all the way back. She'd done plenty of running to keep pace with her frantic sister and poor, confused Twill.
Hollyhock zipped over with unabashed interest in Gwen's drama. The lost children in earshot came, creeping with curiosity, toward Gwen and away from their play-work. Her eyes darted between them, and back to Peter, before she had breath enough to say, “A ship. On the horizon.”
“A ship?” Peter repeated, the word tasting like excitement to him. “A pirate ship?”
Gwen shook her head, lest her weak voice fail her, “No.”
Peter gave her a distrustful gaze. “What kind of ship then? No one sails to Neverland but pirates. It must be pirates!”
“It didn't look like any pirate ship I've ever seen, Peter,” Rosemary told him, and Bracken and Thistle chattered over each other, their red and pink glows jittering as they elaborated, in language far too fast and colorful for Gwen to follow. Hollyhock, however, comprehended it all and launched into a trilling tizzy.
“It was a huge, metal ship. Nothing like a pirate ship. It looked modern. It looked like the military,” she explained. She tried not to let the wide-eyed expressions of the lost children unnerve her as she told him, “It looked like a warship.”
Peter became deadly serious. “From what direction?”
“Uhhh…”
“Sort of the curvy bit from like if they were heading round the beachy part before Cannibal's Cove,” Rosemary explained, motioning with her hands.
Peter seemed to understand this direction better than he would have precise degrees or standard directions. He looked to the lost children. “Get the others. Let's go.”
Rosemary fetched Sal, Newt, and the other tunnel diggers. Twill and Yam shot into the trees and made noises like whip-o-whirls in distress, a noise which echoed halfway across the island and brought everyone else back in a hurry. Peter ducked into the underground home just long enough to fetch an ancient sword from the precarious rack he kept it mounted on.
Together, they hiked through the jungle like a herd of skittish horses. Given the somber situation, it seemed improper to fly. The children scream-whispered their speculations to each other, and the
