Page 2 of Devour the Dark

You will be okay, I’ve told him. Over and over again, as if the more I say it, the truer it will become. As if he’s ever followed any of my orders or listened to any of my advice.

Please be okay, I think instead.I ambegging you.

The Crocodile tangles in the sheets, his eyes flickering back and forth beneath his closed lids.

Did I speak aloud?

I sit as still as I can in the wingback chair in the corner of my room at the back of my ship.

Don’t move, you idiot. Don’t breathe. Don’t say a word. Poor form.

In the days since we left Everland, there is no telling what will set him off. He is an unpredictable monster with very sharp teeth and a void inside of him that never seems to be filled.

What is he? How do I stop him?

This has plagued me since the first time I saw him shift.

When he’s in his monstrous form, he is no man. He’s all shadow and mist, with two hollows for eyes and a bottomless maw.

I’ve never seen anything like him in the Seven Isles. Smee knew he needed blood to stave off his transformation, but that seemed to be where her knowledge ended.

What are you?

He shifts again, and his arm turns to pure shadow before reforming.

He has a Myth Maker witch stuck inside of him.

Did he not know the consequences of devouring her? How could he be so reckless?

I inhale, trying to quell the rapid thumping of my heart. The Crocodile has heightened senses, likely even in sleep, and I don’t want my panic to wake him.

Please be okay. I am begging you.

I glance at the circular window on the starboard side of the ship searching the horizon line. Still daylight, enough to see by, but the glass of the window has grown murky with sea salt.

How much longer until we reach Neverland? I’m anxious to get answers but apprehensive about returning to the island. When Peter Pan forbade me from its shores, did that include water and port? If he spots my ship approaching, will he fly out to meet us and sink us on sight?

Christ. This is an impossible situation. But I have to risk it. There is no other choice.

The Crocodile settles back into a quiet sleep, his arm tucked beneath the pillow. Dark veins twist and branch off beneath his pale flesh, several of them thick and swollen in his forearm.

He’s naked—his last meal left his clothing torn and bloody—and the sheet skims his body like water. The fabric is tucked around his waist and tangled around his legs, leaving one thigh out and the other beneath. There are more tattoos on his left thigh, ones I’ve yet to study. When we’ve been unclothed, we are,generally speaking,preoccupied.

I take a tentative step closer. Hold my breath as I do.

The ink is black and grey, and it depicts a cemetery with an ivy-covered gate with a name twisted into the metal. MADDRED, it reads. Several tombstones are poking up from the earth. Most of them are far in the background, impossible to read, but there are three in front.

Vane. Lane. And?—

The bedroom door creaks open and my gaze jerks away from the Crocodile’s body to Wendy taking up the space in the doorway. The delicate skin beneath her eyes is puffy and dark. Neither she nor I have been sleeping. We’ve been surviving on coffee and brandy. The brandy helps the nerves. The coffee helps keep us awake.

When the Crocodile transforms and goes after my crew, it’s Wendy and me who pull him out. He won’t respond to anyone else, so we always have to be ready and on high alert.

“We’ve spotted land,” Wendy whispers, and I let out a relieved breath.

Neverland fast approaches then.

I turn away from the bed and follow her out the door, locking the Crocodile in.

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