Page 138 of Freeing Hook

For now? For now I know the truth.

When I bring the dagger down, I know exactly what I’m aiming for.

And it’s not the captain’s blade.

The cut is so clean, I hardly feel it reverberate against the hilt. Barely get to feel the satisfaction of a perfect hit.

Astor’s hand goes flying.

I sever it from his arm just in time for Peter to scuttle out from underneath his dagger, dislodged from its target. By the time Astor’s hand hits the ground, the gold of his Mark has already shriveled to gray, matching the deathly ill skin of his forearm.

His blood drips from the edge of the blade I’m clutching.

He’s so shocked, so stunned, he doesn’t even cry out. He just stumbles, falls to his knees, and stares at the stump at his wrist, bleeding profusely, covering the dead tendrils of his Mark with blood.

Now that the Mark is gone, now that there’s nothing tying me to Astor, I wait for the pain to drizzle away.

It seems I’m going to be waiting for a very long time.

The captain’s gaze slides up to me, his mouth barely agape. There’s betrayal written all over his face, grief and loss, too, but there’s something else. Something I can’t quite place.

The captain swallows. “Well done, Darling.”

CHAPTER 52

WENDY

What happens next is a blur. At some point, I must have dropped the dagger, because as Peter leads me through the tunnels, hand gripped on my shoulder, I notice that my hand is empty. Except for Astor’s blood, which stains the folds of my palm, my knuckles.

We’d left him there, bleeding and grasping his wrist in shock. Peter had already begun to heal from the burns, aided by the fact that he was still transitioning from his shadow self to his fae form.

He’s still trembling, though. Even as his fingers dig into my collarbone.

I don’t have the energy to tell him he’s hurting me.

I hear little else except the pounding of blood in my ear, the sound Astor’s flesh had made as it split. Sickly. Like the last pig carcass I had cut through. But something else taps through the buzz in my head. Footsteps.

Charlie and Maddox round the corner, hair windswept, breathing hard. Upon seeing Peter, they instantly draw their swords.

“Saw you swoop into the cave,” says Maddox, steely gray gaze pinned on Peter. “We were keeping an eye out from the ship.”

Peter doesn’t seem to hear them. All I know is that his hand tightens at my shoulder.

It’s not quite fear that lances through me. I think I’m in too much of a state of shock for that. But my mind eddies into focus. Somewhere deep down, I know that these are my friends, and that I need to protect them, Peter still not himself.

As Charlie approaches, keeping her eyes fixed on Peter as she extends a hand to me, the other on the holster at her belt, I shake my head. “I’m going with Peter.”

They hesitate and Charlie gives Peter a suspicious look. “So you’re choosing him after all?” she asks, not bothering to mask the disappointment in her voice.

I continue, nodding toward where we came from. “The captain’s injured. He’ll be needing the two of you.”

Charlie and Maddox exchange concerned glances, then run off after their captain. Before they turn the curve, Charlie turns back to me. “Are you sure?”

I nod, because that seems like the only thing to do. She frowns. “Take care of yourself,” she says.

And then she’s gone.

The flightback to Neverland is cold.

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