Page 112 of Caging Darling

“I’m so sorry, Winds,” says Maddox. “We tried to get to you sooner.”

I nod, my cheek rubbing into his pectoral muscles, but when I pull away, I return to the bed, sitting with my knees to my chest.

I take in a deep, dusty breath. “I need to know how,” I say. “How you came looking for me.” How often, how relentlessly, did you take breaks, was there something more you could have done?—are the questions I don’t ask. The way my voice trembles asks all the same.

Charlie and Maddox exchange a look.

“We made a mistake, Wendy,” says Charlie. “We never should have let Peter take off with you.”

“No, it was my choice,” I say. “I chose to go back with him. I wanted him to take me back to my brothers, and then I was going to leave him. I just…” My words twist in my mouth, unruly and insubordinate. “Didn’t realize how much I loved him. How I couldn’t live without him. It’s not Peter who held me captive. It was the Sister. She controls both of us.”

Charlie and Maddox had almost looked relieved at the first bit, but their relief had soon melted to pity by the end of my account. Neither address my feelings for Peter. Instead, Charlie says, “The captain wanted to go after you right away. He’d passed out from shock by the time we got to him. When he woke up on the ship, he was?—”

Maddox clears his throat. “Nolan might not want us sharing?—”

“I don’t really care,” snaps Charlie. “He was screaming your name, berating us for letting you go. Of course, he was feverish by that point, thrashing around in the bed like some deranged inmate at an asylum. He kept trying to get out of bed, said he had to get to you.” She stops herself. “We found him on the floor three times, trying to crawl to the door, before we had to start restraining him. It took him a while to recover?—”

I don’t miss how Maddox shoots Charlie another warning look. This one she heeds.

I don’t have the words to ask. Not when the only image in my mind is Astor crawling. Crawling to get to the door.

To get to me.

“How long?” I ask. “How long did it take him to recover?”

Again, Charlie and Maddox exchange a look. “There was…an infection. It was months before he could get out of bed without falling. We were trying. Trying to keep Astor from dying. Trying to figure out how to get to you. Maddox took over as captain temporarily. We took turns taking care of the captain, taking shifts, rotating between that and captain duty and trying tofigure out how we were going to get to you. We thought… Well, we thought there was a possibility Peter might not let you go. Captain was frantic over it.”

“We were too,” says Maddox.

“I’m fine. Really, I’m okay,” I say, and they both look at me so sadly.

“Peter snuck onboard and sabotaged our aeromechanism, so we couldn’t use the faerie dust to make the ship fly anymore, and our shadow box was gone. I tried to repair them, even hired contractors to help us, but the mechanics are complicated, and no one could seem to figure out how to fix them. And we’d already used up so much of the money healing Astor.”

“He was furious when he found out, too,” says Maddox. “Ripped into me for paying for his healers before making sure we had enough to fix the aeromechanism.”

“We really did think we had enough for both at first,” says Charlie. “But the mechanics kept failing, and the price kept climbing. I’m sorry,” she says again.

I stare at her. “You tried,” I say. “That’s all I wanted anyone to do.” It’s verging on betraying Peter, but it doesn’t. It seems I’m more free to speak my mind with them than I am Astor, though still not completely free. But perhaps that’s only because I’ve cast the Sister as the one to blame.

“After that, we tried everything we could think of to break into Neverland. It just wasn’t possible. We even… Well, we might should wait and let Astor tell you that part,” Charlie says.

“Astor has had plenty of time to tell me anything he wanted to,” I say. “I think if he were interested in explaining himself, he would have already done it.”

Maddox says, “Now, is that the Astor we’ve come to know and love?”

“I don’t love Astor,” I say, though I’m not sure whether it’s the bargain saying it or me.

Once Maddox leaves us,Charlie surprises me by taking my sleeve and pulling it up my arm to reveal the crook of my elbow.

“So he’s called it in,” she says, staring at the center link of the chain that once was broken.

Peter’s commands to keep our bargain a secret whisper in my ear, and I answer by yanking the sleeve down to cover my shame.

Charlie’s brown eyes water as she looks up at me. “Did he make you love him?”

I shake my head, swallowing.

Charlie’s brows knit together as she tries to work out the terms of the bargain.

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