Page 152 of Caging Darling

There’s so much I should want to say. So much vitriol I should spit at my captor. How often I’ve dreamt about the poetry I would make from my hatred for him, should this moment ever come.

But Astor will be gone soon, and I don’t want to waste another second of my life on the flying boy.

I turn back to Astor, but it’s an unnecessary gesture. He’s already scooping me into his arms, his hook pressing gently against the bottom of my chin, cold and wonderful, as he uses it to guide my mouth to his.

And then we’re kissing, and the whole world stops to watch us.

We only have a moment. A second. A blip in time. A wrinkle in the tapestry. Easy enough to take a stitch remover to and rip out.

But that moment is ours, that kiss.

It’s the only thing the two of us own together.

Astor doesn’t wait for the Sister to pry me out of his arms. No, he pulls away first, smoothing my hair against my scalp, and he offers me the most genuine smile.

“Thank you for saving me, Darling,” he says. “I didn’t remember what happiness was until you.”

And then the Sister takes him by the arm, and they’re both gone.

The garden is colderwithout Astor’s presence. There’s a silence that lingers over the four of us left.

Peter glances between me and Tink.

He’s lost both of us, I realize. I feel nothing regarding that.

There’s no joy in watching Peter suffer. Not when my own suffering at the loss of Astor gnaws a hole in my chest, one that hatred for my captor could never hope to eclipse.

There’s a glimmer in Peter’s eyes. A moment that the two of us share. And I know what he’s about to do. That he’ll take me anyway, regardless of the bargain. Keep me in a cage if he has to.

But when he lunges, so do Tink and the Nomad.

The Nomad reaches me first.

I scream for the Nomad to watch out, knowing that Peter can easily slip into shadow form and move through him.

Peter attempts as much, but when he shifts, his shadows appear, but separate from him. They form a cloud that funnels into the Nomad’s hand, then disappears altogether. When Peter barrels into the Nomad’s chest, the Nomad doesn’t budge. Peter, still in his solid form, falls to the ground, stunned.

Something shines in the Nomad’s hand. He’s pressing his finger against it, clicking it shut. A sleek black pocket watch. There’s something familiar about it, but I can’t place why.

“Amazing engineer, that Charlie of yours,” the Nomad says over his shoulder to me. “Once there was no reason to try to get the shadow powers of the ship working again, I convinced her to help me out with a little project of my own. You know, if she could figure out how the contraption contained the shadows, perhaps she could find a way to bind them.”

I’m reminded of the device used by the witch Peter paid to tie me to a table and rob me of my memories. The wretched woman who had taken one of Peter’s shadows as payment, had bound it in a black box made of adamant.

Peter’s eyes widen, and he lunges toward the Nomad, but without his shadows, the Nomad is faster and twists Peter around, securing his hands behind his back. Peter struggles, and the Nomad kicks out his knees. There’s a horrible popping sound, and Peter gasps in pain before falling on his knees on the stone padding of the courtyard.

“Pity you didn’t exercise your authority with more discretion,” says the Nomad. “We could have been partners, you and I. But I’m afraid I find your lack of self-control…distasteful.”

Tink, aware of her one opportunity to leave, sprints for the bushes, but the Nomad calls after her. “Don’t you want revenge?”

Tink halts, her hands shaking by her sides.

“I hear he killed someone you loved dearly. Took everything away from you. Kept you caged much longer than Darling here.”

“Run, Tink,” I say, but she doesn’t.

We both know she won’t.

She turns, not looking at the Nomad, but at Peter, kneeling before her.

---