WHERE ARE THE FAIRY STORIES NOW
The Jolly Roger was not smaller than she remembered it, as is often the case when revisiting the places of our childhood. If anything it had grown, since she had seen it last, like some gothic spider all black and spindly on the water. Wendy balked as they reached the harbor and it rose into sight. This was the ship of her imagination, not memory.
"Something wrong?" Hook, all politeness, had stopped with her.
She looked up at him. "Captain, I feel I must enquire…has your ship--well--"
"What?" He was raising an eyebrow and making her feel very much the silly little girl.
"Has it--changed--at all?"
Hook did not seem to find this question silly in the least. "I could not tell you. It is as I remember it always. Does it look different to you?"
"Yes. It seems--darker."
Hook smiled just as dark, just to himself. "I would imagine so." He changed his position, taking her arm in one hand and placing his hook behind her waist to give her a gentle push as he continued walking. "But come, my lady, I deprived you of sleep this most passing strange of evenings. You must be quite tired."
She didn't answer. He didn't seem much to care.
There was another rowboat waiting on the shore to take them to the ship. She exclaimed on the coincidence, but the captain shrugged it off, saying the Neverland usually provided for its own.
"But," he said. "Are you going to fly away again, pretty little bird, or must I tie you to the boat?"
It was said in jest, if not meant in jest. She laughed politely. "No, good sir, I shall behave myself. I give you my word."
"The word of a storyteller?" Again, the smile in his voice was not sincere.
Wendy scoffed. "And what do you have to offer, sir?
"The word of a gentleman," Hook said prettily.
"The word of a story," she sneered prettily back.
There was a flash of red in his eyes she remembered, and the hook rose that much to close to her throat for the barest of instances before the man remembered himself.
"Quite," was all he said, as he helped her into the ship. "That must do for now."
What Wendy didn't tell him was that she had completely decided to be a willing hostage. She was not stupid, the Neverland was the most dangerous land imaginable. And who knew how it had changed? Hook at least seemed to have a vested interest in protecting her that heartless and forgetful Peter, to be honest, never had. She had never been on the pirate ship as a real guest. It was time, she knew, to explore this avenue she had chosen against as a child--Neverland off the island.
Hook must have sensed her calm, however, for he paid only mild attention to making sure she was not about to leap out or take off.
They pulled up next to she ship, the impossibly clear water licking and slapping against its dark wooden sides. Hook was back in his element as captain, yelling for men to hoist them up and she could see the shadows of men above them hurrying to do his bidding. It was tedious and loud, and just to show that she could, Wendy stood, calculated, and floated up to the deck where she landed lightly. A little white angel among the ruined crew.
"Hello sirs," she addressed the astonished men. "It is I, Wendy Darling."
"Wendy!"
"Red-Handed Jill!"
"Red-Handed Jill has returned!"
Oh yes, she realized belatedly. She had already chosen a pirate name. That little drop of darkness she had lately tried to forget.
"Yes," came the cold clear voice. "I have brought Red-Handed Jill back, me blackguards." Hook had made his own way up, and though he was addressing the men he was regarding her, clearly displeased at being upstaged.
"Shall she tell us stories, Captain?" a terrifyingly large man asked.
"We shall see," he said, still staring, until he suddenly drew himself up and faced the crew. "MEN!" he bellowed. "I have returned, as you see, with a lady. She is to be treated with every deference and luxury. Any man touches her or in any way inconveniences her shall answer to my hook!" he finished, with a flourish of the weapon and a quite imposing grimace. "Am I understood?"
"Aye-aye, sir!" returned the crew.
"Return to your posts," Hook instructed, and they did their best to scamper and look as if they were going about some very important business.
The captain approached the girl, with an expectant sort of look.
"Was that necessary, Captain?" Wendy asked. "The men have always been most civil before. That is," she amended, "if we were not trying to murder one another."
Hook's eyes grazed her, in disbelief, she imagined. "Aye, that they have. It is how we treat little girls in Neverland. Young women, though, are a different matter and I would not have you experiencing any undue discomfort."
"Ah," she said brightly, pretending she had understood the implication all along.
"Your quarters, my dear?" he said, and gestured she was to walk ahead. The men were only pretending nonchalance, she was obviously the most fascinating thing to happen in a while. She was in fact surprised they remembered her at all, it had been so long.
Hook opened a door to what looked like his own quarters. He held the door for her, which was questionable etiquette when leading a lady into one's own bedroom.
Wendy strode in, and looked around. "Are these not your lodgings, Captain?"
"That they are," he said, smiling, walking in after her and past her. "Ship's rules the cabin boy sleeps in the room with the captain for protection--""From what?" she interrupted, and blushed when she realized what he was trying to delicately imply.
"From danger," Hook said drolly. "As such I've had Smee prepare the bed where we would keep the cabin boy had we one, but children are a bit of a problem around these parts so I have been storing books there." He had strode over to a corner of the room where there was indeed a cunning little bed, about Wendy-sized. He knelt to make some last minute adjustments. "I am pleased to say Smee did a very good job," he said, while smoothing the blankets. "Shall you be retiring now? I will of course leave the room while you make the necessary arrangements."
Wendy was hanging back. There was something so odd and visceral about the mere mention of the innocuous subjects of sleep and bed.
"I thought I might tell the men some stories."
"You will do no such thing," he said, walking back over to her.
"And why not?"
"Because here I am the captain, and you are but the storyteller."
"The way I see it, sir, I am the storyteller and you are but the story."
Their eyes met, and Hook would later curse his brashness.
Just a story, indeed.
A/N I apologize for this rather anemic installment but I usually don't like writing sex and violence without context. And I'm telling you it's feeling off writing both a Joker story and a Hook one at the same time. They're, well. Different.
But I hope you enjoy this one. I apologize also for the lack of updates but I've recently moved home to regroup and I'll have more time to write.
Love as always, Dollfayce.
