Page 19 of Freeing Hook

She’ll go back to her hideout. Whether she’ll eat Smalls’s meal, I’m not sure, but she has no reason to expect that I poisoned it. Unless she saw me switch out the food on the plate, in which case I’m already in trouble.

But if she eats the meal and becomes temporarily paralyzed, she’ll definitely know that I poisoned her. And when she regains control of her limbs, it’s likely she’ll hunt me down. She attacked Wendy unprovoked—well, unless you consider Wendy being in Peter’s room reason enough for an attack. If Wendy being in close proximity to Peter was enough for Tink to try to kill her, I can only imagine what she’ll do to me once she realizes I poisoned her.

I won’t be able to leave the Den safely. Even then, Tink has been known to sneak into the Den before. Ideally, I’d like to wait to follow her until she’s paralyzed, but I have no idea where she stays on the island, and I’m not confident that I’ll be able to find her in a day, the time it should take for the poison to run its course.

That means my only option is to follow her now and hope that she lures me all the way to her hideout. As long as she eats before she kills me, all should be well.

I am aware that my odds are less than optimal.

But Tink strikes me as the type of creature who likes to play with her food first. Not ideal, but at least that would buy me some time to think.

I feel a bit queasy, but I follow Tink into the woods all the same.

Branchesand brush crackle underneath footsteps ahead. Tink’s a faerie, meaning she could be imperceptibly stealthy if she wanted, but she’s choosing otherwise.

That doesn’t exactly relieve the churning in my intestines.

On one hand, that she’s letting me follow her is essential for my new plan. On the other, it means she has the upper hand. I’d been counting on the element of surprise, mismatched as I am with my human strength.

Okay, so I’m not all that strong anyway, even for a human.

Yet another way I’d failed my father.

As Wendy’s brother, I was supposed to be able to protect her. Instead, my father had gotten a bookish son with gangly limbs. I’d tried to use what I had to protect Wendy, studying up on the fae, gathering all the information I could on magical bargains.

In the end, it hadn’t been enough.

I’d never been enough.

My father had taught me that as a man, I was supposed to be a protector, but I’d failed drastically in that endeavor. I’ve been failing to protect my siblings long before Neverland.

I’m going to get Wendy and Michael to safety, or die trying.

The path of crackling footsteps leads me through the dark forest, moonlight peppering the ground, providing just enough light for me to sidestep fallen branches, though I have to prop my glasses on my head to see with as smudged as they are.

Yet another embarrassing secret.

I don’t actually need them.

I had the misfortune of never being taken seriously growing up, at least, with everyone except for Wendy. My father was taken seriously. But that was for his intense ability to woo people, to influence.

I look like him, just a smaller version.

Everyone expected me to be gregarious, but when they found me awkward, they simply dismissed me. Saw me as unintelligent because I couldn’t find my place in their conversations.

Wendy and I are alike in that way. People think we’re not clever because we lose the ability to be coherent when we’re nervous. And we’re nervous. A lot.

I would have been better off if I’d just kept quiet in groups. People always think quiet people are intelligent. But my father had pushed me to cultivate connections, and I’d consistently made a fool of myself.

Still, there was a young nobleman who spent time with my father’s group of confidants. I hated him and his round spectacles, not because everyone listened to him, not because he was drowning in accolades for his wisdom despite his youth, but because he was an idiot, and no one saw it.

The first time I wore spectacles to one of my father’s functions, it was meant as a cruel joke that only I was party to.

But then people had started questioning me, not to mock me, but because they thought I had answers. In a way, they’d freed me of my shackles, the tether that had hindered my tongue.

So the spectacles had stayed.

Even Wendy doesn’t know they’re made of ordinary glass.

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