Tinker Bell cuts her eyes at me. “You know the one.”
“Tink, you don’t have to—”
“Let the grown-ups talk,” she snaps.
Hook growls but doesn’t intercede.
“This won’t change what you’ve done.” The Spinner sits on the ground beside us. “You realize this will do nothing for you?”
“I know.” Tinker Bell looks at me. “But you’re the only one who can stop him. I give my life freely for you, but you have to promise me, Moira. Promise me you will stop Peter.” Her grip grows surprisingly strong on my hand. “Swear it, or all this will have been for nothing.” She sighs, her lashes fluttering as even more color leaches from her.
“I swear it on my mother.” A flash of heat moves between our palms, burning the promise into both of us.
“Good.” She closes her eyes. “Spinner. Do it.”
The Spinner nods and puts her hand over Tinker Bell’s chest, then puts her other over mine.
I look at Hook, his eyes full of worry as he watches me. “It’ll be okay.”
The Spinner begins chanting, and the trees seem to echo her lilting words back to her. Like a song in a foreign language, it melds into a beautiful melody. I close my eyes and drift away. The song turns into words I understand. A story.
One about an island where anything is possible. Both unsurpassed good and malignant evil can rule the island, but only in equal measure. It was just so for a long, long time. Until something changed. No,someonechanged. A heart that knew no mercy or kindness was forged anew, into one that felt regret, pain, and longed for love. It upset the balance.Heupset the balance. Hook. The villain had evolved, become something different, something the island had never encountered. So it adjusted. It gave and it took, it filled this cup and drained the other. It had to reach balance again, no matter the cost.
But the cost was great indeed. The island wept, its heart torn in two by good and evil, and dreamed of the sun that would one day return.
When balance was restored.
The story crosses oceans of time and miles of memories, worlds and galaxies, an entire universe nestled inside others like a Russian doll. The Spinner tells it to me, her voice winding around me. Spinning me backwards into the past. Some into the future. And showing me so much—the ancient fae, Hook when he committed villainy on the high seas, Peter when he was a boy with a brave heart and pure soul, Wendy as she doted on the Lost Boys, and my mother. All of us are woven into the Spinner’s tapestry, though there is no end to it. No way to know what will happen.
When her voice begins to fade, the story drawing to a close, I hear the song of the sea, the rolling waves.
I wake and am born anew, burning and screaming into existence with fresh life in my veins.
ChapterFifteen
“Easy now, lass!” Hook clutches me to him. “You’re all right.”
I breathe deeply, as if I’ve been long underwater and just breached the surface. The ache is gone, the dullness of my senses pealed back until I can experience everything again, perhaps even better than before. The only pain left is on my back, but I don’t care. It’s nothing to finally feeling alive again.
“Am I okay?” I look up at Hook.
“You’re wonderful.” He kisses my forehead. I feel it, the warmth of him and the love he bears.
I turn and look around, but my gaze falls on Tinker Bell. Her light is gone, her skin a dull gray.
Reaching for her hand, I take it in mine. “Thank you.”
She’s already cold, her essence gone and a shell left behind.
The Spinner takes her in her arms and stands. “She will be given the rites of our people. I’ll take her to the mountains.”
I stand too, my body moving under my command with ease. I took it all for granted, and now that I have it back, I marvel at every little thing.
“Will they forgive her?” I stare into the Spinner’s opal eyes. “She didn’t have to help me, but she did. More than I knew. She wanted to stop Peter, but she couldn’t.”
“She fell under his spell, though she also helped give him the power to weave it in the first place.” The Spinner doesn’t give me anything more than that. But I suppose she doesn’t want to make a promise she can’t keep. Tinker Bell’s legacy isn’t something I can simplify, not after she caused so much pain.
“I understand.” I place Tinker Bell’s hand on her stomach and let go. “Thank you,” I whisper again. “For everything.”
