Page 133 of Losing Wendy

That seems to appease Simon’s worries a bit. Part of me wonders if I should ask him what he’s doing out here so late, but I feel like time is slipping through my fingertips like grains of sand. I’ve no idea how long it will be until Peter can move and realizes I’ve left.

“Well, I’m not quite worn out yet,” I say, and Simon grins sheepishly.

“Right, I won’t keep you then. See you in the morning, Winds.”

He walks away, but I’m frozen in place. Dread keeps me sutured there, on the beach between the Den and the cliffs. The space between the Lost Boys and my brothers.

You can’t save them all, I remind myself. But I know deep down that’s not entirely true. It would be possible to get all the Lost Boys out of here, the same way I intend to get my brothers out. The problem is getting them to believe me. The Lost Boys practically worship Peter. What are the chances that they’ll believe he’s the one picking them off?

Still, a vision glances through my mind. Yellowed bruises on a lifeless neck, singed hair, a missing pinkie, Simon’s eye sockets the ones eaten out by worms. My stomach twists, and I twist with it.

“Simon,” I say weakly. Almost in a whisper. Almost hoping he won’t turn around, that I’ll be able to go off with my brothers in peace and tell myself for the rest of my life that I tried.

He turns around, hands in his pockets. “Yeah, Winds?”

My heart thumps wildly. This is stupid. There’s no way I’ll be able to get all of them out of here. At least one of them will go running off and find Peter out of blind loyalty.

But Simon is my friend. How can I live with myself if I let him die?

“You’re not safe here.” I make myself rush the words out, before I become too much of a coward to speak them.

He flashes me a confused smile. “Of course I’m not. Have you seen the size of the nightstalkers on this island?”

Grief punctures my heart. I glance at the moon. It might as well be a shooting star for how it’s moving through the sky. “No. Simon, I mean, you’re not safe with Peter. None of the Lost Boys are.”

A shadow ripples from out of nowhere, overtaking Simon’s face. “What? Don’t tell me the two of you had a lovers’ spat?”

I shake my head emphatically. “No, you have to listen to me. Peter. This place. It’s not what you think it is.”

“I’ve never known what Neverland is.”

Tears sting at my eyes. “If you stay here, if any of you stay here, you’re going to die.”

“We’re all going to die eventually, Winds. It’s just part of the fae curse.”

A lump forms in my throat. Simon adores Peter so much, and it kills me to rip that brotherly facade out from under him. But I don’t know how else to make him understand. Parchment crinkles against my fingertips as I slip Peter’s journal out of my pocket and hand it to Simon.

He glances at me warily before opening it, eyes tilting down and darting across the open page, lit by the bare moonlight.

I can tell when he gets to the end by the way his muscles tense around his jaw.

“Where did you get this?”

“It’s one of Peter’s journals.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I know,” I say, then quickly explain what Peter told me about ransoming the boys’ lives from their Fates. About the fact that Neverland was made specifically to protect them.

“I don’t understand…” he says, jerking his head up toward me. “End them?” he says, his voice pleading. Like he’s begging me to enlighten him with a reasonable explanation of what those words mean.

It’s then I know I’ve got him. It’s written in understanding that dawns on his face, followed by the grief, the anger.

“Thomas,” he whispers, his voice sounding as if his throat is clenched up.

I nod. “Freckles and Joel, too. My brothers and I are leaving. We’re taking faerie dust and getting out of here. I want you and the Lost Boys to come with us.”

Simon shuffles in the sand. “The others won’t believe this.”

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