Page 9 of Caging Darling

Peter straightens uncomfortably. He doesn’t like it when I talk about John. Thinks it keeps the wound open, raw, instead of letting it heal.

I don’t deserve to let that part of myself heal. Not when I left my brother unprotected from the shadows. Not when I led him to his death. Maybe that’s why I’m surprised when tonight, Peter squeezes my hand and says, “I regret not taking the time to get to know him better.”

The words prick at my otherwise indifferent heart. “It’s not as if he would have let you. He never did like you nearly as much as I do.”

Peter furrows his brow. “Still. If I had it to do over… I would have tried to win him over.”

“I thought you did. While I was…” Stolen, taken, happy. “Away,” is the word I settle on. It tastes dishonest in my mouth. Like taking a sip of water, only to be greeted with the sharp tang of gin.

“I could have tried earlier.” Peter’s still speaking, it seems. “Maybe if I had, maybe if he’d trusted me, he would have come to me about the shadows.”

“Or never stopped eating the onions in the first place.”

Peter stares at me, and there’s such sadness in his eyes, it’s almost shocking. I have yet to get used to it, seeing Peter sad. Watching him hurt. Before, anytime anything painful would arise, it was as if a cold numbness washed over his expression. Now his silky blue eyes look as if they’ve been pierced, are bleeding water.

It hurts him that I hurt.

I don’t like seeing him hurt, either. Even after all he’s done to me, even after forcing me to choose him by calling in our bargain. At first, I was so angry. Angry with him. Angry with Astor. Angry over John’s suicide. I’d wanted to see Peter writhe.

I hadn’t realized that when Peter cried, I would see the boy who was burned for sport back in the orphanage. I hadn’t realized he would hurt on my behalf.

Vaguely, I’m aware that I’d be less affected by his pain if it weren’t for the Mating Mark that binds our hearts. When I severed Astor’s hand back in the cave, and his portion of the shared Mating Mark with it, I’d inadvertently refocused all the magic of the Mark back to Peter.

I’d still been in love with Astor at the time. Even when the Mating Mark had been ruined, my love had remained.

Even now…

“Wendy Darling,” says Peter, taking my hand and sliding in front of me. His wings billow at his back, blending in with the shadows of the night. “Dance with me.”

“Of course,” I say.

Because what else is there to say?

This isn’tthe first time Peter’s taken me dancing in the stars since we returned to Neverland. Since he called in my bargain. We both know it’s our favorite memory together—that single night of blissful ecstasy when together we soared through the stars. The night I thought I’d never want to stop falling.

He thinks that if he can recreate the dance, if he can ask me if it’s okay to drop me, and if I can beg him to do so, that we’ll go back, wake up in the stars, back in the bodies of the people we were before Nolan Astor.

In some ways, he’s right.

It’s these nights that I let myself believe I love Peter.

It’s natural, up here in the twinkling stars, to forget the pain and resentment that awaits me down below. When nothing is tethering me to the ground, it’s easier for the magic of the Mating Mark to coil me tighter, just like Peter’s arms, possessing me. Never letting me go.

I hate myself for it, but I like being possessed.

I like when we’re up here in the clouds, and the air gets so thin that my head swirls. I like the way Peter grips me like I’m his favorite toy.

When we plateau, I wrap my legs around his waist, making it easier for him to grasp my jaw in his hands. He pulls my mouthto his like the only air he is capable of breathing is hiding in my lungs. His lips are warm and hungry, and they taste of forgetting.

“Drop me,” I whisper in between kisses. I only ask because I know the answer.

“Never,” he says, and it’s almost as addicting as faerie dust.

He’s so obsessed with me, he can’t let me go. It feels like being drunk, but better. Because no one is going to take this bottle from me. No one is going to lock Peter in a cellar where I can’t get to him. It’s sick, and it’s disgusting, and tomorrow I’ll wake with a hammer at my skull, but Peter’s obsession with me, his desperation for me…

I like it.

It’s the only power I have left.

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