Page 121 of The Last Lost Girl

“Ready?” Hudson asks.

When I nod, he tells the man to hold out his arm for me.

I clasp his forearm, then place a palm over Belle’s middle. Extracting the shadow is easy. Watching his life before Neverland is hard. But not nearly as difficult as swallowing the shards when my body wants to keep his shadow and refuse to give it up.

The shadowy wound on my back won’t heal because every time I transfer one of these, it feels like I’m being cut open again. The pain gets worse with each one. By the end of the day, I will feel like I’ve been stabbed over and over in the same spot. My breath hitches as I try to breathe through the pain.

Hudson notices. “Ava?”

I shove the shadow into the man, turn on my heel, and start toward the next house, rubbing my chest because the cold has spread all the way through me.

“What’s wrong?” Hudson asks.

I startle, unaware he was so close. Swallowing thickly, I point at my throat. “I need a drink. I’m overheated. My mouth and throat are so dry,” I tell him. “The wind and salty air aren’t helping.”

“I’ll be right back,” he promises. He doubles back to the house we just left and steps inside. I listen as he asks the man for a drink.

Belle slides into step beside me. “You’re a terrible liar,” she whispers as we near the next home.

I turn to look at her. “What makes you think I’m lying?”

She rolls her eyes. “I know when you’re in pain, Ava. Are you feeling pulled by the shadows?”

“No,” I answer truthfully. “It’s not that.”

“What is it?”

“Pulling them out of you is easy, but I think what’s draining me is the energy it takes to immediately push them into their owners. If I just took what’s left from you now, all at once, I might have the strength to finish returning all of them today.”

Wisps of shade rise from her shoulders like steam from a fresh cup of coffee. She looks like she’s about to tell me no. That our process has been working fine. But it’s not anymore. I don’t think I can make it to the end of this row of houses unless something gives. I’m crumbling.

“There aren’t that many left, and you can’t fly with so few. I promise that if it seems too hard, I’ll stop, and we’ll just keep pushing through this way until I can’t go on.” I throw a hand up when she opens her mouth to argue. “But please stop looking at me like you can’t trust me. Please believe in me, for once.”

“I’ve always believed in you.” She takes my hand and places it on her stomach. “But before we do this, you should know that there’s a small cache of shadows you shouldn’t rid yourself of today.”

“Whose?”

“The Lost Boys,” she answers. “Peter kept theirs with all the rest. We might be able to use them as leverage to get your shadow back from Pan.”

My heart thunders. “Are there enough to conceal me and let me cross the curse line the way I did the night you brought me here?”

She tries to smile. “There were many cloaking you from the Second Star then. What remains will be nothing more than a thin and shredded blanket. Her light will pierce it.”

I nod, afraid I’ll never leave this place. That like Pan, I’ll be stuck here forever. Maybe with Pan, I’ll watch as my friends leave Neverland for the home I wish I could reach again.

“Would the Lost Boys turn on Pan in exchange for their shadows?” I ask.

Belle ponders my question for a long moment. “Maybe one or two of them would. If he doesn’t kill them first.”

Great. “I understand that I’ll have to carry their shadows, and all that might come with that burden. Let’s finish it, Belle.”

She gives me a watery smile. “Okay.”

I place a hand on her stomach and draw in everything that doesn’t feel like Belle. Several very quick scenes flash before my eyes, but my sister grabs my wrist and squeezes tightly, drawing me away from the tumble memories. I choke a laugh. “How did you know to do that?”

She shrugs her slender shoulder. “When I felt free of them, I decided to try to break the connection.”

“It worked.” That was so remarkably easy, so painless. I wish she’d have figured that out sooner.

---