“Can he hear us?”
“No.” She floats to my side.
“Am I dead?”
“Not yet.”
“But soon?” I meet her gaze.
“Yes.” She dips her chin. “You’re fading. Peter has made sure of it.” Her face sours, her eyes flashing. “He drained so many of us once he visited the heart of the island and came out changed.”
“Why? I need answers, and I need you to fix me. I have to fight him, to stop him from hurting anyone else.”
She sighs. “If only it were that easy.”
“Look, lady, you’re flying and talking to me in a dream or something. Don’t sell yourself short. You’ve got magic. So just make it easy and heal me!”
She smiles, her face angelic save for the fangs. “I like you. Straightforward. Your mother wasn’t quite as pushy.”
“You met my mom?”
“Of course.”
“Then why didn’t you send her back to me? That’s what she wanted, right?”
“She asked to be sent back to the mainland with no more waking dreams of Neverland. I couldn’t give her that.”
“Why not?”
“Because there are some magics I can’t undo. Her fae legacy and the links she has to Neverland are things beyond my control.” She shrugs, her wings flapping along with her movement. “That’s not in my power. We are who we are, and our burdens can’t be erased without great sacrifice. Your mother’s fae side manifested in visits to faraway lands through the gateway of her mind.” She taps the middle of her forehead. “It was her gift.”
“It was acurse!” I yell. “She wanted to be with me. Not here!”
“That’s true.” She sighs. “She wanted that more than anything, but I told her as I must tell you. I don’t have that power. I have even less power now that Peter has drained so many fae?—”
“Why didn’t you stop him?” I snap. “You’re their leader, right? You should’ve defended your people.” I know I’m lashing out. And I know it’s hit home when she winces.
Her eyes begin to glow, and she floats higher. “You don’t think Itried?” Her voice is thunderous as a phantom wind whips around her. “I saved as many as I could, bringing them to shelter in the mountains where they live still. But there were many more I couldn’t save. I recite their names every time the moon rises high. They are written here.” She beats her breast. “I failed them. Don’t you think I know that?” Her vitriol seems to ebb as shefloats back toward the ground. “I failed all of them, because I let Peter in. I welcomed him as I’d always done, not realizing he’d taken a boon from the heart of the island.”
“Am I his boon?”
“Yes.” Her answer is like a shot, one that tears through my heart and out the back of my soul. Hook was wrong. I wasn’t his boon after all. I’m not the love he wished for. That rocks me to my core, and I stand there, dumbfounded and falling apart. The one thing I’d come to rely on, and it was only sand slipping through my fingers. Hook’s wish is still out there somewhere, some other woman who can make him whole. It’s not me. It was never me. Peter was right—he owns me.
Numb, I meet her gaze again. “What did Peter wish for?”
She gives me a look like I’m the biggest idiot this island has ever seen, and maybe I am. But her answer cuts deeper than her eyes ever could. “Power, of course.”
Power. Peter wished for power, and the answer to it was me. I look down at myself, at my shriveled hands and thin body. A crazed laugh barrels out of me. “Power?” I hold my hands out in front of me and stare at the thin skin lined with sinew underneath. “This isn’t power.”
“You told him stories, Moira.” She drifts all the way to the ground. “He took your power from you. That is our gift—or as you’d call it—our curse. Our stories have power, and if given to the wrong people, that power can be taken. Stories are a magic of the highest order. They can heal and unite. They can birth worlds within worlds. But in the wrong hands, they can bring untold destruction and pain.”
“I didn’t know. How could I have known?” I cover my face with my hands.
“You couldn’t have. That’s why you were his boon. He could use you for the power he craves.”
“Why didn’tyoutell me?” I yell.
Her eyes flash again. “You believe the island would let me do anything after the deal had been struck?”
