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1
HOOK
I blinked again, refocusing on the space where Never and her brother had just been. She was gone, they both were, but they hadn’t made the trip back to the human realm alone.
“Captain?” William’s voice filtered into my stunned thoughts, and I turned slowly.
The sense of dread that washed over me when Never disappeared now sat like a stone in my gut, only it was so much worse than just losing her back to her world.
“What is it?” I asked, finally pinning my gaze on my first mate. That was when I realized what else was missing. It was entirely too quiet for the fight that had been raging on my deck. “What’s happened?”
He cast a disbelieving glance over his shoulder. “They’re gone, sir.”
“They who?” My other men? Those damned souls Never had called Lost Boys?
“Petra and her men.”
How long had I been standing there staring at that empty space? “How? Where?”
“They jumped.”
Overboard?That didn’t sound right. Not with the sun now fully hidden beyond the horizon.
“Why wouldn’t they stay and fight?” Battling Petra and the demon’s twisted army had been a game we’d all played for a very long time. It wasn’t like the creature to run from a fight.
I replayed everything that had happened in my mind, even those last painful moments when Leo broke down the door to my quarters and went after Never.
What the hell was he thinking?
Like Never, he’d vanished in the void that had pulled her out of my world. And out of my life.
A flare of loss burned in my chest, and I closed my eyes, trying to bury the sensation. That was when the last few seconds of Never’s time here sharpened in my memory, and I saw the real threat.
The darkness.
I’d been so caught up in stopping Leo from interfering with her escape that the flicker of black slipping through the chaos hadn’t even registered.
“Sir?” William asked, his voice cautious.
Had I missed something? “Say again?”
“I said I don’t know why they chose not to fight, only that Petra gave the command a moment after Miss Darling vanished.”
Now that I knew what I’d seen, the demon’s retreat made far more sense.
“I need to get to the island as soon as I can.” I glanced down at my cutlass, still slick with the blood of the men I’d cut down. Soulless men who were back on their feet in a matter of moments.
“We’re going after them?” he asked.
“No.” Following Petra and her army to their mountain lair was a waste of time. Continuing the fight might help me blow off some of the rage bubbling just beneath my skin, but what I really needed was information. Confirmation. “I’m going to see the witch,” I said flatly, wiping my blade on my pant leg and sliding it back into its sheath. “Now.”
I brushed past him, ignoring the look of confusion twisting his features as I headed for the skiff.
He fell into step behind me. “How many men do you want—”
“I’m going alone. You stay on the ship and make sure the crew is accounted for.”
“Sir, respectfully, do you really think it’s a good idea to visit the sea witch?”
