Page 45 of Lost in the Never Woods

He only looked slightly less worried.

“Just sit, would you?” she said, placing a hand on the counter.

Peter gave her a dubious look before perching himself on the edge of the cool tile. “Okay, but be careful; don’t stab me,” he instructed.

“Then don’t fidget,” Wendy told him. His knee stopped bouncing, and Wendy got to work cinching the frayed material back together with deft fingers as well as she could.

Peter probed the cut on his temple, flinching. “I need to save my energy and not use my magic for stuff like flying, you know? I need it to fight off the shadow. Pixie dust is its opposite.” Peter gestured, as if weighing two things in his hands.

“Shadows are made up of darkness. They feed off of sadness and despair. They manifest what you’re most scared of and use it as a weapon to feed off your fear. That’s why it’s stealing all those kids.” He dropped his hands and they hung heavy at his sides. “It’s collecting them and using their fear as a source of energy. They’re making it stronger.”

“That’s … terrifying,” Wendy breathed. Her eyes flickered away from her work toward the back door. Somewhere, deep in the woods, there were kids who were scared and alone, being tormented by the shadow.

“That’s why we need pixie dust to fight the shadow,” Peter continued. “It’s made from light and laughter and joy. That’s why when you use pixie dust and think of good things—happy things—it makes you light enough to fly. That’s why I’m the only one who can fight it. I can use my light against my shadow and weaken it enough to capture it, and you can reattach it like you did before.”

“That was your shadow, then?” Wendy looped the end of the thread, tying it off securely. “That took Alex and attacked me?” She couldn’t explain with logic what had happened to her in the woods just now, and that in and of itself was terrifying to realize.

“Yes.” Peter rubbed his eyes. “The stronger it gets, the weaker I get. I can feel the magic bleeding out of me.” He looked so tired and defeated. It only made her more worried.

As she tugged the seam to test her work—it was good enough to hold together for now—a thought occurred to her. “The woods.” Heat clawed up her neck. Wendy put the needle and thread away and left the kit on the counter. “Is that why it’s keeping them there—the missing kids and my brothers? Because of me?”

Wendy was terrified of the woods and the shadow was using it against her. It had lured her in there to taunt her with Alex, with the promise of finding her brothers, just to feed off her fear. It was her fault. It was all her fault. Wendy raked her fingers through her hair. “But why? Why my brothers? Why me?”

“I don’t know,” Peter murmured quietly, thumbing the stitches on the knee of his jeans. “All I know is you’re the only one who can help me catch my shadow and put it back.” He looked … not good. His tan skin was paler than normal. Puffy bags were starting to form under his eyes. He was missing his usual spark. The change was unsettling.

Wendy wondered when was the last time he’d gotten some rest and something to eat.

“If we can’t stop it, what will happen?” she asked. “To the kids? My brothers?”

Peter shrugged and stared at the floor. It pained her to see him like this. It pulled at something in her chest. At the same time, she was frustrated with him. If she was going to help him, she needed more guidance and answers. She couldn’t just magically solve this mystery on her own. Those kids needed her and Peter—they had to find and rescue them. She needed to see her brothers again, to bring them back.

“Peter…” Wendy hesitated, scared of the answer she might get. “What will happen if you keep getting weaker, and it keeps getting stronger?”

Peter looked up and watched her for a moment. She could see him thinking. Physically, he was so young, even if he was growing older. But his intense eyes felt like they held the age of the galaxies swirling behind them. He was a star locked inside a boy’s body.

Peter shrugged again. “Nothing good.” He tried to conjure up a smile, but it was nothing compared to its brilliance when he really meant it. “So we can’t let that happen.”

Wendy pressed her fingers to her mouth and tried to think.

“We need to call the police. We need their help,” Wendy finally said. She couldn’t believe she was even considering it, but where else could they turn for help?

Peter arched an eyebrow, shaking his head. “Wendy, you barely believe me, do you really think a bunch of grown-ups are going to believe a word of this?” he asked. “They’ll lock me up and throw away the key!” He scowled. She had hit a nerve. “They can’t help us.”

“Then we need to at least tell them about Alex!” Wendy pulled her phone out of her back pocket. Her mind raced, thoughts tumbling over one another. She needed to do something. She needed to come up with some immediate solutions to these daunting and insurmountable tasks.

“They need to know he’s missing—his parents need to know! At least then people can be on the lookout for him,” she insisted. Wendy paced back and forth, tightly gripping the phone. “I—I don’t know what I’ll say, how I know he’s gone missing,” she mused. “I can just make something up—”

Wendy’s cell phone lit up. An AMBER alert with Alex’s name filled the screen.

“Too late,” Wendy said. Peter leaned over to give it a look. “They already know.” Wendy snatched the remote from the counter and turned on the TV. Sure enough, it was on the news, too. Alex’s face smiled at her from the corner of the screen. In the center, Detective James stood in the middle of a street. Bright lights from news cameras lit up his face, causing him to squint.

“Mrs. Forestay witnessed Alex being taken from their backyard this evening, but didn’t get a good enough look at the abductor to provide a description,” Detective James said.

Guilt swarmed inside Wendy.

“I heard voices when I was in the woods,” Wendy said, turning back to Peter. “I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but they were definitely kids. I couldn’t see them but it felt like they were right there, just out of sight.” Her skin crawled as she thought about the voices, the breathing, the footsteps. “That’s gotta be where it’s hiding.”

“That’s where I had tracked it to, when you found me in the road,” Peter said, walking to stand next to her. His shoulder lightly brushed against hers. “After what you saw, I think that’s a pretty safe bet.”