Unhooked(73)

With the gaping, horrible maws of nightmarish beasts open before me and the deadly height of the cliff behind me, I have a choice. I can keep clinging to that fragile story of what I thought I was and I can die, devoured by those terrible mouths. Or I can admit that maybe I’ve always been something else—something more.

“Gwen,” Rowan says, taking another swipe at the first beast when it gets too close.

My head snaps around, and my eyes meet his for a moment. It’s the first time he’s ever called me that. All along he’s used the stiff formality of my whole name to keep me at arm’s length. But for the space of a heartbeat, his expression is open and trusting . . . and hopeful.

“You can do this, lass. Get us out of here.”

Then the moment is over, and he turns again to lunge at the monstrous Fey that have corralled us.

The time to be scared, the time to deny is over, unless of course, I want to die. Unless I want him to die with me.

I turn and press my hands against the rough surface of the cliff rising up behind us, tracing the rock tentatively with one finger, testing it. Nothing happens. Resolved, I lay my palm against it and I focus, just as I did when Pan asked me to. Just as I did when I felt the warmth flare beneath by palms near the edge of the trench. And as I did in the dark tunnel, when I wanted to destroy the bars that kept me from Rowan.

Closing my eyes, I concentrate on the erratic pulse of the rock beneath my hands. At first nothing happens, but I will not give up. I draw all my attention—everything I am—to the place where my skin presses against Neverland. The beasts growl, inching closer, but I do not let myself think, It’s not working. The idea is there anyway, just below the surface. Taunting me. Threatening me. But I ignore it, and as I’m about to give up, the rock beneath my hand grows warm.

I force myself to hold steady as the warmth spreads through my fingertips, across my palms, and begins to creep up my arms, heating and burning as it climbs toward my chest. But when it reaches my elbows, the heat begins to sear me from within. I clench my teeth and force myself to ignore the pain, but when the heat reaches my shoulder, the burn flashes even hotter, and I wrench my hands away.

Immediately, my arms go cold, but the scar on my upper arm tingles and aches as I try to catch my breath. I was so close, but . . . “It’s no good.” Tears burn at my eyes.

They were wrong about me—all of them were wrong. I don’t have this in me. Or if I do, it’s not enough.

Rowan shouts in rage, and I turn in time to see him barely beating back one of the monsters. He’s panting, his shoulders rising and falling with the effort of the fight, and I can see he’s tired. Sweat has begun to bead on his brow, and his muscles are already drawn with the exertion. The beasts are toying with him, wearing him down, and at this rate, he won’t last long.

He will die because of you—because he chose you and you failed him, a voice deep inside me taunts. And then you will be alone, and you will die as well.

I have to try again, but as I press my hands to the rock, I know deep down, where you know things without having to think about them, it will be useless.

Because you know what must be done, the voice whispers. Because you know what your mother did to you.

“No,” I say, grabbing the scar on my arm, even as the terrible truth settles over me like a shroud.

What was it my mother told me after they found me in the woods—after she ordered me to forget what had happened out there?

The clearing, the monsters, even the sound of Rowan’s exertion as he tries to battle the monsters falls away, and I can hear my mom’s words clearly, echoing in the far recesses of my mind. This will never happen again.

And with them comes the memory of the sharp surprise of her fear and an even sharper pain. An unbelievable pain, because how could my mother have hurt me like that? I was just a child, and even as it was happening—even as the silver blade bit into my skin, I couldn’t believe my mom was capable of hurting me like that. Even as the blood trickled down my numb arm, the younger me couldn’t accept what she did.

I don’t even need the Dark Ones now—the memories that have lain buried and suppressed for so long rise up like a wave and overtake me. The look on my mother’s face when she collected me from the police station that night wasn’t relief—it was terror. Not for me or for what had happened to me out there in the darkness. No. Even my five-year-old self understood she was afraid of me.

My breath rushes out of me at the memory of her blue-gray eyes nervous, fearful as the police explained where they’d found me and what I had told them. How long have I tried to forget the memory of that night? How long have I been trying to earn back her love—to earn a place in her life—by being the perfect daughter?

By doing what she commanded and forgetting. By always doing everything she asked of me.

Not five feet away, Rowan is being driven back against the rock by one of the beasts, and when it accomplishes its final victory over him, he’ll be gone. And then it will turn on me, and any chance of saving Olivia, of getting back to my world, will be lost—all the human children in this world will be lost right along with me. All because I’ve been too afraid to do what needs to be done.

I remember now what my mother did that night when I was barely five years old, and I know how to fix it.

In this world, power requires sacrifice, Pan had once told me. The pain of his Queen carving into his skin had given him tremendous power. But my mother had done the opposite.