Page 5 of The First Lost Boy (The Shadows of Neverland Duet #2)

Ava

I am a greater threat to my survival than anything else on this island.

My memory and mind are damaged. To what extent the loss is permanent or to what degree I’ll heal, I don’t know. I don’t know anything . So, I have no choice but to follow Peter and Bones back to the place they insist is my home.

Bones asks Peter to just “carry us back home,” though I’m not sure how Peter would be able to make us appear somewhere else. And I’m equal parts disappointed and relieved when he refuses, claiming I need to experience Neverland’s dangers so I will learn not to venture off on my own again.

At that, I roll my eyes. I’m not a child, and my memory, not my will, is the problem with that equation.

I won’t even recall this lesson later today, Peter.

Moron.

As we walk, I watch for anything that screams ‘predator’ and replay the events of the day in my mind, tumbling them over and over again until the edges are smooth and their details more finely polished.

Some of the information I’ve gleaned will come in handy when I do get the chance to leave…

Like the fact that saltwater crocodiles do, in fact, inhabit this island and the waters surrounding it. Bones pointed to an enormous one swimming in the breakers before we left the shore. It appeared as a long, menacing smudge swimming through the curling turquoise water.

Then there’s the Neverbird, whose call raises my hair no matter how close or far the creature seems to be lurking. One of the fowls followed us for a time, according to Peter. I didn’t see the beast, but Peter and Bones took turns describing the horrid thing in a level of detail that will likely bring it to life in my nightmares tonight.

According to the men, Neverbirds have bright green feathers and a broad orange bill. They stand taller than I do and build their nests from branches and the bones of whatever it manages to kill.

We aren’t far from the treehouses when an eardrum-severing shriek comes from just behind me. Bones pries the spear from my clenched fist and moves to guard my back as I swivel and come nearly face-to-face with a creature that looks like it crawled straight out of the mouth of hell.

There is an intelligence in the Neverbird’s eyes I never want to witness or question again. Ever.

So I’m relieved when we step foot back into a vast circle of soft grass so vibrant and green, it stands out in sharp contrast to the tall trees casting shade all around it. Peter says we’re safe in the circle and claims the Neverbird wouldn’t dare cross the barrier he’s made.

I watch the fowl stalk around the bright grass, but it never ventures closer. It’s like it can’t…

Bones relaxes and starts using the spear like a walking stick instead of a weapon. “Come on, Six. Forget the Neverbird. He can’t bother you here.”

“Not even from the sky?” I jog to catch up to them.

“You’re safe in the circle,” Peter answers.

Safe in the circle. Safe in the circle. Safe in the circle.

The sun’s last light sweeps over the grass and the angled roofs of the six tree houses that circle the bright lawn, in the center of which lies a fire pit. A stranger, who I likely should know, is cooking dinner over the flames.

Fallen logs are positioned around the fire. I sit down on one and examine my cut soles. My feet are tender. Some of the more recently obtained cuts are still bleeding.

This place doesn’t look familiar to me in the least, and I don’t know what to do now that I’m here.

Bones crashes onto the log next to mine. “Do you remember this morning?”

I purse my lips, trying, then shake my head.

“You were sitting right there,” he tells me, gesturing to the opposite side of the log I’m on. “Staring at the fire. You asked me where I was going and I told you I was going to the shore. You were upset when I told you it would be safer if you stayed here. And then you followed me anyway.”

“And look where it got me!” I try to laugh, but it comes out hollow.

I don’t remember any of what he’s describing, but I remember stumbling upon what was left of Wendy Darling and Peter’s cruel smile. His cold words and the fear he evoked when he found us on the shore. His presence was more disturbing than the Neverbird’s scream.

Peter and Bones sit on the logs and discuss what the other ‘Lost’ are doing today. I don’t recognize any of their names, and I can’t recall a single face. I don’t even know the stranger cooking dinner over the fire.

I sit with the men, chilled to know that I’ve forgotten everything but the past few hours, Peter, Bones, and the fact that they call me Six. Likely, and thankfully, because they keep using my name. And I’m terrified that in a few hours more, I won’t remember how Peter snapped Wendy’s bone free from its cage and smiled at her horrific fate. How he was glad that she was dead. The way he said her death made his life more interesting.

I fight a shudder at the remembrance of those words, glad I’ve held onto them, at least – because I don’t want to forget that Peter mistreated her that way.

Repeating the memory in my mind is all I can do to try to cling to it, even as it feels no more solid than sand running through spread fingers.

The cook sits cross-legged in front of the fire, turning fish over on a spit and stirring the pale-yellow contents of a huge pan of what looks and smells like scrambled eggs. He’s dressed like Peter and Bones in simple tan shorts, the frayed edges brushing his knees and stained with the Second Star knows what. He’s lean, but muscled like them, too.

A thick, puckered scar stretches across his throat like someone slit it, which isn’t possible because he’s alive and well and staring at me like he’d like to cut mine for even noticing the mark. His shaggy, strawberry blond hair and tan skin need a good scrubbing.

I look at Bones and Peter, then tug at my own sweat-soaked strands.

We all do.

Peter juts his chin toward the food. “Dinner smells good.” His bright green eyes slide to me. “Doesn’t it, Six?”

“It does,” I rasp to the man cooking, offering a polite smile.

He scowls back, never even pausing as he turns the fish around and around, ever so slowly.

I clear my dry throat and begin to cough. I’m so thirsty, it feels like I’ve swallowed razor blades.

“You should get a drink of water,” Peter suggests.

He’s absolutely right. There’s nothing I need more than a glass of water, but I don’t know where I’m supposed to go, or where to find glasses or water here.

I glance at each treehouse, wishing for one to stand out from the rest, but none does, and startle when Peter’s warm breath brushes my cheek. He’s sitting next to me and I’m not sure how he severed the distance between us so quickly. Or so silently.

“You’ve forgotten, haven’t you?” His eyes glimmer like they did when he first realized he knew the corpse that had once been Wendy Darling. Like he’d bested her, and now was besting me.

I nod, embarrassed and afraid.

Of him. Of my failing mind.

His lips quirk upward at the corner. “Let me show you.”

Swallowing thickly, I thank him and stand, ready to follow him because if I don’t get a drink soon, I’m going to faint.

Bones gives me a worried look as he stands, too, hiking his bag up onto his shoulder. He turns and walks toward one of the treehouses situated across the yard without looking back as Peter leads me up the spiraling wooden staircase that leads to his home’s narrow porch.

Peter pushes the door open and gestures for me to go inside before him. I tentatively step into the room and look over the furnishings. Against the wall to the right sits a wooden bench that has been polished to a shining gleam, and just ahead is a solid square table with a chair positioned on each side. All the furniture boasts intricate carvings of oak leaves and acorns.

Who crafted all this?

My gaze flicks to Peter.

He gestures toward a wooden basin at the table’s edge where a ladle rests within a bowl of crystal clear water. “Drink.”

I surge forward and wrap my fingers around the intricately carved handle –

more acorns – filling the ladle to the brim and drawing it to my parched lips and mouth again and again until my stomach feels like a water balloon on the verge of bursting.

Peter leans against the wall, tan legs crossed at his ankles.

I step away and apologize. “I can get more for you if you tell me where to find the spring.”

“Don’t worry over the water, Six,” he interrupts. “There’s a far more pressing matter we need to discuss.” He pushes off the wall and prowls toward me.

My hip bumps the back of a chair as I instinctually move away, heart panicking. When he hears the leg scuff the floor, he stops. He’s within an arm’s length. Striking distance. And I don’t like the feeling of fear that spikes through my chest.

“If Bones hadn’t realized you were following him, you would have gotten lost in the jungle where deadly vines streak like veins and the predators outnumber you a thousand to one.” I swallow thickly under his unblinking appraisal. “Until your memory returns, it’s not safe for you to wander alone.”

My throat tightens. “I won’t leave unless I’m with someone.”

He tries to smile. “The trouble with tomorrow is that it allows a person too many opportunities to forget today’s danger.”

A feeling of familiarity floods me at the cadence and strangeness of his words. He’s right. But his phrasing reminds me of someone. Maybe it’s from earlier memories of him…

The sense of déjà vu is gone as quickly as it washed over me and I’m left wondering whether I’m finally close to remembering something like Peter seems adamant that I will, or if I’m deluding myself, grasping at something, anything , because the alternative is far too terrible to consider.

“Your hands are trembling,” he carefully notes, waiting quietly like he’s waiting for me to reply or explain. He reaches out to take them but I pull them toward me, wringing them and inwardly begging them to stop shaking.

“I’m sorry,” I choke, tears filling my eyes as I look up and try to blink them away. “I feel stupid admitting it, but I’m just… afraid.”

His head tilts ever so slightly. “Of me?”

I shake my head.

I’m terrified of Peter, but it’s best if he doesn’t know it. I have a terrible feeling he would use that knowledge against me.

“What if… what if my memory doesn’t return?” I reply around the knot in my throat. “What if something in me broke during the fall, something that can never be repaired?”

He shrugs. “Then the same holds true. Leaving the safety of home could get you killed.”

I hate this place. Hate him. Hate my own body for faltering.

“But maybe there’s a way to coax your memories forward,” he slyly suggests, offering me his broad hands.

I reluctantly place my quaking palms in his warm ones and watch them engulf mine. Just knowing how easily he snapped Wendy’s bone from her ribcage makes my panic rise. I swallow it down, desperate to hide it from him. “What do you mean?”

Peter peers into the bedroom down the hall. I turn my head and follow his line of sight. A wooden bed frame is situated against the wall, and other than that, all I can see is a window propped open with a stick to let the evening’s cooler breeze flow through the house.

“Do you remember falling from it?”

My brows meet. “From that window?”

He nods. “You were sitting on the sill and lost your balance.”

“I did?”

He confirms with a hum. I release his hands and pull mine back, plastering them against my stomach, then ease past him, morbidly drawn to the perch from which I’d fallen instead of flown.

My feet stop shy of the sill, like my body knows what happened here and doesn’t want to repeat the past. Peter follows, his chest a sudden, intrusive source of warmth at my back.

“I’m here,” Peter quietly says. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

His tone makes my heart thunder. I can’t help but wonder if he’d ever spoken so softly to Wendy Darling.

If I fell, would he look at my corpse and smile? Would my death make his life more interesting?

“How did I survive?”

Peter drags his knuckles down my bare arm; a wake of goosebumps erupt at his touch. “I’ve been wondering the same thing.”

I take another tentative step forward and stretch out my hands. My fingers drift over the thin wooden frame and I wonder why I decided to sit on the sill that day. This seems like a precarious ledge, and one to which I can’t fathom being drawn. But maybe that’s because I can’t recall being comfortable here, can’t remember this being home to me.

Peter angles himself beside me and peers down at the green lawn below. He points to his hostile friend still tending the food over the fire. “Can you tell me his name?”

I purse my lips together, emotion welling. “No,” my voice cracks, betraying me again.

“There’s no need for you to feel embarrassed,” Peter assures, mistaking the dread washing over me for humiliation. “They understand. They were here when you fell. They helped care for you while you healed.”

But I’m not healed. Not in the ways that matter most.

I crane my head, wincing at the pain that shoots up my neck with the movement. Peter turns me to face him and places a strong hand at the small of my back. “I’ll help you remember,” he softly promises, placing his chin on the top of my head. “I’ll help you remember everything.”

Awkwardly, I brace my hands on his stomach, feeling it expand and contract with every breath. “Thank you.”

He leans back to search my eyes, then brushes a strand of hair from my face the same way he’d done to Wendy. I shiver.

He runs a thumb over my bottom lip, smiling as if pleased. As if he thinks my reaction to him is anything but revulsion.

When the clash of male voices outside draws his attention, I’m grateful for their disruption.

“Come with me, Six,” he whispers, as though he means far more than for me just to follow him. As if he wants me to give in to him instead. To stop bracing against his authority and suggestion and more than anything, about the feelings he somehow evokes. Feelings that say I can’t trust him. That he’s not what he seems. That he’s a liar.

If only I knew why I felt that way.

I should trust my instincts, but with my head injury, I just can’t right now. What if he’s being honest and I’m being unfair because I can’t remember anything from before?

He reaches for my hand and wraps his larger one around it, then confidently leads me back outside, across the lawn and to the fire. He doesn’t formally introduce me to the one cooking dinner, but casually drops his name during conversation, along with a wink that says my secret is safe with him.

The cook’s name is Wraith, and his uneasy stare makes my skin crawl. His eyes are glassy and feverish as he watches me and Peter sit on the log across from him. His cheekbones are as sharp as the edge of the knife he uses to peel a sleek-skinned, seeded magenta fruit.

As the sun sinks below the horizon and two brilliant stars twinkle overhead, Peter regales everyone with stories of his morning, which he spent traversing the island. He says he saw a mother black bear and her cubs, but I can’t help but wonder if he’s lying. This doesn’t seem like the right habitat for black bears.

But… if it isn’t, what is? I can’t be sure.

What I am sure of is that his stories become grander and more elaborate the longer he talks. And as his tales grow, so does his conceit. He literally puffs his chest at times and I wait, wondering if he might pound on it. I’m not sure why that would be funny, only that it would.

Bones eventually joins the three of us, claiming the open log to my right. And the feeling of dread that’s clung to me like the scent of death worsens when Bones pulls out Wendy Darling’s rib bone and a small knife. He works the blade around the shard, scraping away what the sand and water didn’t scour.

“You look pale,” Peter notes, a hint of amusement in his voice as I swivel my attention from Bones to him.

I don’t want him to know how it affects me, so I give a reassuring smile. “I’m fine.”

Peter raises a brow and ticks his head toward Bones. “You can ask him.”

I look at Bones, keeping my eyes trained on his face to avoid watching his hands. “Ask him what?”

“What he’s making,” Peter answers with a quirked brow.

Bones’s blade goes still on the bone as he peers up, his gaze sliding from Peter to me.

I don’t want to know. I really don’t. “What are you making?”

“A key,” Bones quietly offers, going back to his work.

I blink. A skeleton key. How perfectly fucked up.

“A key to what?” I rasp.

“The cages,” Peter interjects with a smirk. “The one we currently use is brittle. It’s best to carve a new one before it breaks.”

I glance around, looking for any trace of a cage, and see nothing. My brows kiss. “What do you keep in the cages?”

His eyes shimmer again in that way that makes my skin crawl. “Who,” he corrects.

My ribs slowly tighten as he watches me.

Other than Peter, Bones, and the standoffish Wraith, three other young men come to the fire to eat when Wraith gives a shrill whistle. They claim positions at the spaces around the fire, claiming or sharing the remaining logs as Wraith serves Peter, providing him with a wooden plate with large portions of the eggs, fish, and fruit. Before he sits, Peter tells me to collect my plate next.

I tell him the others can go first, but Peter insists, so I stand and move to the fire. My mouth waters at the scent of the food Wraith serves me. My stomach is empty and while the water I gulped eased the feeling of hunger, it hardly erased it.

Peter and I sit as Wraith calls for Shorty.

None of them are particularly short, but I’m stunned for a second when the tallest of the three men stands stiffly from the log he’d claimed before making his way over to the fire. He must be nearly seven feet tall and is by far the most muscular of the group, with ebony skin and rich black hair cut close to his scalp. His dark lashes are so long they sweep the tops of his cheeks when he blinks. He offers a shy, kind smile as he returns to his seat. “Six.”

“Hi, Shorty,” I reply.

Thorn is served next. He nods politely when he notices me looking at him. I smile and return the gesture, taking in the shoulder length, sand-colored hair escaping the small knot he’s managed to tuck some of it into. His intelligent hazel eyes scan the jungle beyond our small circle. He’s not paranoid or afraid like Bones was at the shore; he just seems aware of our surroundings.

“Thorn can tell you about every plant and tree on the island,” Peter boasts.

I raise my brows, wondering if that’s possible considering the various flora here.

Thorn doesn’t boast of his knowledge. In silence, he slowly chews, looking between Peter, me, and the other Lost Boys.

It must be weird for them – being introduced as strangers, given that they already know me. But they’re kind about it. I can’t help but wonder how many times they’ve gone through these motions. How many times have I forgotten and been reintroduced to these men?

“That knowledge has saved our asses more times than any of us can count,” the third and most playful of their trio agrees of Thorn with an ornery grin, pointing at his friends as he speaks of them, then hooking a thumb at himself. “Thorn’s the smartest of us, sure. And Shorty is the strongest, but I’m the master craftsman.”

He gestures in a circle as if all the homes were his doing. Maybe they were.

“I’m Ash, by the way,” he adds playfully.

“The humblest of us all,” Thorn says, throwing a sliver of egg at him. The egg slaps against Ash’s chest, sticks to his skin for a moment, then tumbles down. He catches it against his navel and pops it in his mouth, thanking Thorn for sharing before giving me a wink.

“Do you want a plate or not, Ash?” Wraith snaps.

He hurries to take his plate from Wraith and immediately lobs a piece of fish toward Thorn, who snatches it in his palm and rakes the meat into his mouth. Ash cackles, doubling over on the way to his seat. “I can’t believe you caught that!”

In the firelight, Ash’s curly mop of hair looks to be a mixture of brown and gray. Like Bones, he has freckles on his cheeks and nose and icy blue eyes, though Ash’s skin is paler than all the others. He looks younger than them, too, but his twin dimples may add to that effect.

Wraith grumbles at their antics as he serves himself before dividing the remainder of the food into two equal shares. He stands and takes a seat on the empty log beside Peter, stretching his back. For the next few minutes we all chew in silence, enjoying the freshly prepared meal.

Shorty praises Wraith for the delicious dinner, and of course, we all chime in. It’s really good. I’m not sure how he made such basic ingredients so flavorful, but I’m here for it.

Ash chatters about how fast he made it through the Never Wood today, his laughter infecting everyone but Wraith, who seems impervious to happiness.

Bones scrapes his fork over his wooden plate. “Ash is a terrible cook, as his name implies.”

Peter laughs, nodding to confirm it. “True.”

“I thought you were named for your hair color,” I quietly tell Ash, who’s chewing with a bemused expression on his lips. He shakes his head.

Bones points a fork at Ash. “No, if he cooks, ash is what we end up eating.”

I laugh with all of them and settle easily into a familiar place among them.

“Did they circle again?” Peter asks.

I’m not sure if his question is aimed at one or all of them. And I have no clue who ‘they’ are. It also feels like he’s leaving out details on purpose because I don’t know what he means, and Peter knows it.

“Like vultures,” Ash answers playfully, before taking a bite of the strange fruit, which is sweet and bitter all at once. Fleshy like an apple, it tastes like a combination of grapefruit and lemon.

I look at the jungle beyond our backs and wonder what they’re talking about. What’s circling? Predators? Something worse? Some one worse?

Peter juts his chin at Thorn. “Did you find what you needed?”

Thorn nods in response, his eyes sliding to me as he takes another bite from his plate. He tucks his sandy strands behind his ears and looks back at Peter when he begins to speak again.

“What news from The Lagoon?”

At first, I thought they were being cryptic to exclude me, but realize now that this isn’t a conversation, it’s a debriefing.

“None,” Thorn answers. “My calls went unanswered.”

Peter focuses on the fire, a muscle ticking in his jaw. “None… How long were you there?”

“Most of the afternoon,” Thorn replies.

“ I’ll go tomorrow,” Peter finally decides. “They won’t deny me .”

That’s the last anyone speaks for a very long, uncomfortable time. Quiet chewing as we finish our meals, the rapping of flame, and the pop and creak of burning wood are the only sounds until the crickets begin to sing.

My lips part. My ear tilts toward the jungle to better hear them sing, because it reminds me of something I can’t catch hold of.

My heart swells with hope; tears sting my eyes. Something in me is still aware of my past. I might not remember now, but it’s there, lingering on the borders of my memory. I just have to figure out how to reach it or be more patient until it returns to me.

Bones goes back to carving the fresh key from Wendy Darling’s rib bone, the firelight washing orange over his work. When he senses me watching, his eyes flick to mine, a question in them.

I look away when Ash appears in front of us and reaches out to take Peter’s empty plate, then mine.

He gathers the plates from those who have finished eating before heading to a wash bin staged beneath the bottom steps of the small treehouse to the left of Peter’s, where he scrubs the plates clean before twilight surrenders fully to the night. “I’m heading in for the evening. Unless someone else volunteers, it’s my turn to cook tomorrow!” Ash sing-songs.

He gives a carefree laugh when a chorus of groans rises to meet him just as he reaches the landing and pushes his way into his home.

The boys urge one another to volunteer, but no one immediately takes the chore.

“I can do it,” I volunteer with a shrug.

All heads swivel in my direction like I’ve said something magical or absurd. I’m not sure who thinks which.

“What? I can take a turn. I’m not that bad a cook,” I defend, taking in Ash’s triumphant smile as he leans out his window. He gives me two thumbs up before backing into the interior of his home where shadows swallow him.

Peter grins wildly at me, pleased by my offer to pitch in.

Thorn strolls away from the group with a quick inclination of his head and moves to the house to the right of Peter’s, which is made of dark wood with a roof thatched with moss.

Shorty towers over us when he stands from the log, stretching his arms above his head to ease his back. He waves politely to everyone and says goodnight before retiring to the slightly lop-sided house sandwiched between Thorn’s and Bones’s homes.

That leaves four treehouses sitting empty for some reason.

Is one of them mine?

Peter’s is behind me, I think. And Bones emerged out of… That one . I glance at its neat facade. And now I know which houses are Thorn’s and Shorty’s.

Wraith takes the two extra dinner plates holding equal portions of food and starts along the path that winds between the houses, disappearing into the dark jungle.

I turn toward Peter. “Where’s he going?”

“To the cages,” Peter simply says. “Lock is on guard tonight, so Wraith’s taking dinner to him and feeding our prisoner, too.”

“What does Lock look like?”

Peter thinks for a moment. “Skin that’s either so pale it hurts your eyes or red from sunburn and bright red hair. Too many freckles to count. He’s tall. Not as tall as Shorty, but close. Why do you ask?” His tone isn’t just curious. It’s wary.

“I haven’t met him,” I shrug. “What did the prisoner do?”

I’m not sure he’ll answer.

“That’s a story for another day.” Peter stands and starts toward his house. When he realizes I haven’t followed, he adds, “Come on, Six.”

I hurry over to him, looking over my shoulder at the empty homes. “Whose houses are those?”

“That one is Lock’s,” he says, pointing to the narrow house beside Bones’s, then to the tall home beside Ash’s. “And that’s Wraith’s.”

“What about the others? Are they empty?”

“You can’t stay by yourself until your memory returns.” Turning his back, he walks away. “It’s not safe for you to be alone until you can recall what’s dangerous and what isn’t.”

Everything seems dangerous here…

“But when it comes back, can I have one of them?” I chance.

Peter doesn’t answer, which is answer enough.