Page 12 of Veiled in Stars and Silver
Alighting onto a branch next to me, the little fairy tinkled. I shook my head. “Sorry. I can’t understand you.”
She stamped her feet, her hands on her hips.
Maybe this was a mistake. Tink had never really liked me.
The fairy shot straight up into the sky.
“Hey! Wait!” I flew after her. We went up so high, we were above the clouds and the vast stretch of sea laid out before me, the sun beating down, the breeze whipping at my braid. The Jolly Roger was moored out among the rolling, choppy waters.
Tink dropped close to the cloud and pointed toward the pirate ship, no more than a toy model I and my brothers used to play with from this height. “It looks as if the rear window is open?” I looked at Tink for confirmation.
She gave me a mock hand clap. I assumed that meant I was on track. Then the little fairy curled her finger and shook it.
“Those are Hook’s quarters?”
Tink clapped her hands again. Then shook her curled finger again at me.
“And Hook is in there?”
Another hand clap.
I squinted at the ship. I didn’t see any movement on deck. “What about the watch?” If I dropped below the sparse smattering of clouds and approached the Jolly Roger, I’d be seen.
Tink folded her hands and pressed her head against them, pretending to snore.
“They’re asleep?”
Again, she gave me a hand clap.
“And Hook?”
She pretended to snore some more.
“He’s asleep, too?”
More clapping.
“I guess now is a good time to go.”
The little fairy tapped her foot and gave me a look that seemed to say. “What are you waiting for?”
“Thanks, Tink.”
She rolled her eyes in response and zipped off. I took a deep breath and double-checked my knives. This was it. I dropped beneath the clouds and descended to the Jolly Roger.
Part of me was tense, waiting to be spotted and the alarm to be sounded any moment, but I made it to the ajar window with no noticeable sign from the tenants on board the ship. The opening was large enough for me to slip right through.
I landed, near silently, onto the wooden floor.
Hook’s quarters were spacious. I saw a bed through a small door, but the main area comprised a large wooden desk, an armoire with a mirror, and walls made of drawers and other compartments. A length of rope knocked steadily against the one wooden post in the middle of the room, timing the rock of the ship.
And there he was. Hook lay on a thin chaise longue, out cold, a cup of ginger-colored rum in his good hand, resting on the floor. His ruffled shirt was split open, revealing a tattooed chest and his hook rested gently on his stomach, rising and falling with his breaths. A small earring pierced his left ear, and a golden chain bunched around his Adam’s apple, the end disappearing into his shirt. He was tall and a little lean, though the thickness in his neck, not to mention the thin fabric covering his torso, revealed he possessed plenty of muscle.
I crept toward him. He was… handsome. In my mind, I always remembered Hook as a man so much older than me, but as I gazed upon him, I noticed his unblemished face, and his disheveled locks,as black as night, with not one gray hair. A light shadow covered his cheeks and chin. He appeared to be somewhere around the age of twenty-five. Neverland stopped time for everyone. It was only I who had grown and matured in the eight years since I’d been gone.
I paused right next to him and glared down at his still form. Matured enough to be more than a match for the man before me. The coldness rose into my veins. An icy anger that went beyond anything I’d felt before. Forget trying to get on his good side. I’d give him one chance to reveal the location of the magical book Peter wanted, and if he refused, I’d end him. Reaching to my thigh, I pulled my first throwing knife, clenching it in my palm.
Hook’s eyes flew open, and he jolted up from the chaise longue. I had barely enough time to realize I’d been played before I found myself in the arms of the captain of the Jolly Roger. He held me pinned against his chest, his good arm spanning across me to keep both of mine trapped at my sides. A cold metal point pricked against my throat. Somehow when he stopped moving, we both stood in front of the full-length mirror on the outside of his armoire.
