Page 60 of The Never Queen

“Your wings will never recover,” I tell him.

Heat spins in the air as Pan’s power lashes out, melting Doren’s forewing to his hindwing.

“Fuck! Stop!”

“Where?” Pan repeats.

“There’s a warehouse…” He sucks in a deep breath, rocking on his knees, his body trembling. “It’s about five miles to the north of here on Nettle River in that old industrial park. There’s a painted sign on the side that says Thomas & Sons.”

“Great.” Vane tosses the wing aside. “Was that so hard?”

Doren spits blood into the dry grass.

We have the information we need, but I think Bash and I both know it can’t end here, not like this. Doren not only tried to keep Darling from us and our court, but he went so far as to make a deal with the devil trying to get her killed.

He doesn’t deserve to walk away from this.

Bash pushes the hair from his eyes and says in fae, “You thinking what I’m thinking?”

“Yes,” I answer back.

Doren looks at us over the trembling curve of his shoulder. “What are you thinking?”

There’s hope in his words. As if he thinks maybe we will take his side, as if him being fae and us being fae and Pan and Vane decidedly not, somehow puts us on the same side.

But it doesn’t.

We pledged our loyalty to Peter Pan a long time ago, and he’s never let us down.

Bash picks Doren up by the shoulders and spins him around. He can barely stand upright and blood has turned his white shirt dark.

“Please,” Doren says, low and beneath his breath.

But his pleas are wasted on me.

I am relenting and understanding and merciful when it’s warranted.

But if you endanger me or mine, I can be just as vicious as the rest of them.

I am a fae king, with the Neverland Shadow of Life, and sometimes that means taking one.

I grab Doren on either side of the head and yank.

His neck pops.

His heart thumps once, twice, then goes quiet.

His eyes, wide open, drain of all consciousness.

Bash lets him go and he crumples to the ground, dead.

30

PETERPAN

Long before Darling, before I found my true nature and when Vane still possessed the Darkland Shadow, he and I would disappear for days and go on a spree of fighting and killing trying to spend enough energy to feel more human, or maybe less. Or maybe we were actually trying to fill a hole at our core that could never be filled.

Not until Darling.