Rating Warning: There is a bit of foul language and violence that happens later in the chapter.
"Lay him down carefully," Milah ordered as the group of four reentered the brig cell blocks. They followed her into her own cell where there was a bit more room to stand in, giving Adam the benefit of lying stomach-down on the bed to tend to the flayed remains of bloodied skin over his back. With his shirt barely hanging by the seams over his shoulders, the bits and pieces of muscle that were cut-up were also exposed to the salty misting air within the deep confines of the ship.
Adam was unresponsive by the time they were able to lay him and assess the wounds. Taking a step back away from the wafting fumes of blood, Jack covered his mouth with disgust.
Elizabeth did give her own single lash a thought as she stood by the older woman's side. Unlike her wound, which was lessened by the clothes that somewhat shielded her skin from the enormity of the cut, Adam had taken on lash after lash. His body had gone pale from the blood loss since the final lash slit through his back, alighting each sickly bead of sweat that formed over the hot skin of his neck.
Staring down at Adam on the brink of death only supplemented the trembling sickness churning in Elizabeth's gut. With the lasting image of Peter whipped down mercilessly across the deck, unable to fight back against her demonic grandfather, she couldn't make a guess as to whether her Lost Boy had even made it out from the confrontation alive. She felt the emerald pendent of her necklace Peter had given her sit still over her chest, cold as ice without a single tremor of a heartbeat.
Wake up, Peter.
Milah ripped the sleeves of her white undershirt for scraps to apply pressure. At first contact with Milah's clothed fists, Adam remained motionless without uttering a single moan from the anticipated pain. She gave him a gentle shake, though it did little to rouse him from his deepening sleep. "Lizzie, wake him up. We need to keep him conscious."
"This isn't going to help anything. He's already lost too much," Elizabeth answered back quietly, her tentative gaze suddenly showing signs of resolution. She felt her blood chill within her veins. The deep crevices of her heart began to tingle in the sensation of ice shards reforming over tissue.
Jack reached out to grasp the edge of Lizzie's arm, though shuddered back at the feel of her ice cold skin.
Her eyes had narrowed down at the ground. Menace had consumed all rational within her, replacing grievance with rage and embracing the essence of power that had begun to infatuate her being.
Silently, she walked closer to the bed where the tops of Adam's shoulders were in reach. She weaved the freezing ends of her fingers through Adam's long shaggy hair, dragging her nails down his scalp and over the smooth skin of his neck untouched by the whip. He suddenly sucked in a shallow gasp under her touch. Shivers crept like a trail over his skin.
She rested her palm flat over the open gashes still seeping with hot crimson.
Jack nudged past Milah around the bed to where he could look Elizabeth in the eye. "What are you doing?"
"What does it look like?"
"No," Milah interjected. "It's been made clear you aren't to use magic."
Elizabeth ignored both critical stares on her, keeping her attention fixed on the peels of skin her hand slowly dragged over. Closing her eyes, she channeled all her energy, all her anger and fear, out through the numbed fingertips and into Adam's body. The curled scraps of skin began to magically pull over the open gashes along his back. Elizabeth felt the slow mold of his muscles reattach under her palm, linking and connecting all feeling and movement back into his body.
Adam let out a shuddered groan, mostly through his breath rather than voice.
"Shh," Elizabeth gently flipped her hand over to her knuckle and roamed it down over his ripped up waist. She tilted her head as he met her observant glare. Adam winced up at her, almost in disbelief when witnessing her natural ivory skin pale into a shade of ice white.
Milah took a step forward to slap Lizzie's arm away. "Stop this," she growled. "Magic is harmful to you. You can't endorse it."
Lizzie ripped her arm out of the woman's grasp, her stare remaining oddly blank in response to the demand. "Have you noticed where playing by their rules have got us?"
"Surely there's a better way than this. Adam doesn't want you doing this, neither would the other boy, Peter."
"I'm not so sure about that," Elizabeth's eyes settled down on Adam's healed back. "He looks pretty relieved from where I'm standing."
"Adam took those lashes to protect you; to keep you from having to expose yourself to bodily harm or temptation to fight back with magic." Milah challenged the girl with her firm tone, nudging a step in between her and Adam.
"My father has a saying about what a man deserves if he doesn't fight back. I'm done playing by their rules. Clearly neither of you are." She took a step back from the two of them, allowing her eyes to drop to Adam for a moment before turning to the cell door.
"Elizabeth, stop. I won't let you go through with this. You'll get yourself killed."
"And why would that concern you? Why do you care what happens to the both of us?" She motioned down at Adam. "I thought pirates only cared for themselves."
"I wasn't always a pirate. I was a mother once."
"Yeah well you're not our mother. Stop acting like you have a say in what we do here on this ship."
Milah flinched, the sting of Elizabeth's shallow words sinking deep through her guarded walls. "You're right, I'm not. That's not to say that I can't make amends by taking care of the both of you. Your uncle insisted that of me."
"My uncle? … Uncle Liam is-"
"Just about as dead as Milah, no?" She challenged. Elizabeth frowned, taking a step to actually get a good long look at the woman she had befriended in the past few days. "I take it your father has mentioned me to you, then?"
"You're Milah. My father's Milah?" Elizabeth gawked with disbelief.
Adam let out a shaky breath, "You're Henry's grandmother? Baelfire's mother?"
Milah paused, her wide glare faltering to the ground in a moment's hesitance. "Yes."
"You knew my father," Elizabeth stated plainly. "And Rumplestiltskin as well?"
"I did," Milah nodded. "Both men played such integral parts in my life."
"That's not the way my father tells it," Adam mumbled.
"No, I don't suppose he would. I let down my family many years ago, all in different sorts of ways. My actions cost me my life and life sentence aboard this ghastly ship. If there's anything I can do to repent for what's happened, at least grant me the duty to care for the both of you while aboard."
"No," Elizabeth growled. "You can look after Adam all you want, but I can't linger here just to let you coddle me. You had your chance to make the right decisions all those years ago, and it was on you when everything fell apart. The lasting memory of you brought hell to my father for so many years. He spent centuries wasting in the bay of Neverland plotting empty schemes of revenge, and for what? To avenge a lost ghost? You have no idea of the extent of damage your ghost inflicted on him."
"I never meant for your father to go through such misery…-"
"Yeah, well he did." Elizabeth gripped the handle of her blade impatiently. "Rumplestiltskin did. Your son, Baelfire did. Hell, I'd go as far and say my brother Henry did. You can try all you want to make up for the shattered pasts of my family, but you sure as hell won't be using me to do it." Turning on the edge of her heels, Elizabeth whipped out her arms towards the cell doors, causing a great boom that dismantled the lock to the brig. "Stay here if you'd like. I'm done waiting."
The anger had translated into a swell of magic that pumped through her veins painfully slow, as if it were frozen slush sucked through a narrow straw. Elizabeth let out a shuddered breath before stretching her arms out on both sides, grazing her nails over the wooden walls of the hall and creating a thin sheet of black ice that consumed the walls, ceiling and floor.
The door slammed after her, followed by the pained shrieks of men a short ways down the hallway. Loud thuds and bangs echoed throughout the brig. Milah watched apprehensively as the wooden cracks of the doorway filled with ice from the other side. The sounds of footsteps faded until they could assume she made it through beyond the brig.
"That was the magic talking," Adam shifted painfully to sit up against the metal bar over the bedside. "Elizabeth's not cruel like that. She's changed since she was first brought aboard this ship. It's like something's eating away at her..."
No doubt judging from her white-clenched fists Milah had taken some of it to heart, though the girl's words induced more self-loathing than anything. Elizabeth's words were the exact phrases that had haunted Milah's dreams in the long centuries she had spent undead aboard the Dutchman.
"Hey," Adam muttered to gain her attention. "My father's issues didn't start with you. The same goes with Captain Killian Jones. I don't care what she said; Elizabeth is well-aware of the extent you played in our families' lives. I am too. Don't let what she said stop you from finally setting things right."
Milah chuckled bitterly, "It seems the situation involves more than a simple forgive and forget. What's happened can never be forgotten."
"If none of that happened, my father might not have met my mother. He might not have become the Dark One. Baelfire might have avoided the portal, Queen Regina would never of had the curse my father created to separate Emma from her parents… long story short, we wouldn't be here." Adam swallowed, "I'm not saying what happened with you was just. It was a mess. You should know though, that we've all made it out on the other side. My parents found true love, same as Captain Killian Jones and Emma the Savior."
Milah silently nodded, a grim smile perking up the sides of her cheeks.
"Life went on. It wasn't easy, but we figured it out together. Lizzie and I were raised as a team; the best of friends; the strongest of allies and mightiest foes whenever one was cross with the other." Adam chuckled bitterly, dropping his gaze away from her, "It must be strange for you to see us together; the son of Rumplestiltskin and daughter of Captain Jones all buddy-buddy."
Milah wiped her bright eyes with a trembling smile, "Not strange, more like miraculous."
The boy nodded, "You were right to tell Lizzie no. Her parents would have done the same. If they could have seen her just now, they'd be horrified."
Milah turned back to Adam, leaning back until she sat on the end of his bedside. "I was never good for your father. I can't say that I was any better for Killian either."
"They figured it out."
The two men gripped fistfuls of Peter's shirt, dragging his still body into a dark room before chaining his wrists to the floor. They eyed the boy warily, knowing full well the extent of damage that the boy was capable of inflicting if he was awake. "Stop your lolly-gagging," one of the men snapped as the other fumbled with the lock around Peter's wrist.
"Oh would you shut it," the other pirate growled under his breath. "Better we make sure these locks are tight than hurry out in mad dash. The Captain will promise a fate far worse for us if the lad makes it out of these binds."
"Seeing what the Captain did to him, I wouldn't doubt the boy to be dead at this point." He kicked the bottom sole of Peter's pirate boots, chuckling deeply as he glanced over to the door. "There's a man on deck that supposedly served aboard Captain Hook's crew during their stay in Neverland. He had a few stories to share that revered the infamous Peter Pan, and yet here he is, lookin' like nothing more than a bloodied sack of bones. So much for them stories."
The other pirate soon finished fastening the shackles over Peter's leather-bound wrists, tightening them to the furthest notch to keep the boy from escaping the prison hold. "That ought to do it."
One of the men hesitated as they shut the door to the prison room, swearing he heard the softest rattle of the iron chains move in the dark shadows where they had left the great Lost Boy to wither.
Liam was already in the Captain's Quarters before his father returned from the beating, sitting on the very edge of the bed where mold had already begun to fester beneath the sheets; no one slept aboard the Dutchman, least of all Davy Jones. He was unable to look his father in the eyes when the man first entered.
The pirate captain let out a hearty chuckle as he poured himself a swig of rum in a dainty glass. The whip hung loosely from the Captain's belt, dripping scattered drops of blood over the wooden panels of the floor. "You missed quite the show."
"Judging the lasting trace of red along your whip, I take it you were able to identify the man responsible."
"Aye," Davy grinned with amusement before throwing back the cheap amber burn down his throat. "It was as I expected. Peter Pan's been stowing on board."
Liam swallowed, his jaw flexing tightly to keep the bite out of his already strained voice. "What business would a Lost Boy have aboard the Dutchman?"
The slightest glint of malevolence crossed Liam's hardened glare, immediately signaling a red flag in the Captain's mind. He set the glass down gently over the wooden dresser, then moved closer to his unnerved son. "You've got something to say to me, boy?" Liam glared up at the Captain, wide-eyed with forced innocence. "There's no use hiding it from me. Spit it out."
"Everything I thought I knew about you and this ship is not what it seemed."
"I didn't ask for a riddle," Davy snapped, his eyes alighting in blue fire. "What's your trouble?"
"What's my trouble?" Liam laughed half-heartedly, finally giving in to the animosity growing against his deceitful father. "You've been lying to me. All this time I trusted that you had my best interests at heart. Not once did I doubt you." Liam faltered when Davy's furrowed brow relaxed into a mocking grin. "You don't care for me. You clearly don't care for my brother, seeing as I just discovered him locked in the depths of the ship, under your guard and your orders."
"I never had a use for Killian. Everything I've done was always for you."
"Until I died and arrived to the Dutchman," Liam nodded. "You've swore every sailor aboard this ship that they would only be serving a century of labors, though it seems quite a few have gone by without anyone having left. You haven't been saving anyone, father; you've been hoarding them."
"So you've come to my Quarter's to patronize me?" Davy asserted. "After everything I've done to keep you breathing, this is how you dare talk to your father?"
"I can't be sure if it was even worth saving my breath. You've only kept me around to run your dirty work. What kind of thanks do you expect from that?" Liam stepped forward in a challenge. "That's not to mention my niece. Yes, I know of the girl's heritage and I know of your plan to corrupt her as you once tried with me. I'll not let you harm her, father, not so long as I'm here to stop you."
"Stop me?" Davy chuckled. "My dear boy, I succeeded the moment that child took her first step on this ship. She's already lost, far beyond saving. The same goes for you." Davy was quick to strike the side of Liam's head, hitting the central soft spot of his temple to knock him painfully unconscious. "Such a pity…"
The door blasted open from the surge of energy that left Elizabeth's outstretched reach. Still lying along the flat wooden floor, Peter hadn't moved since the pirates first chained his beaten body. The light that seeped in from the hallways found Peter's exposed back, which was bloodied and lashed far worse than Adam's had been. The shreds of white cloth that were still scrapped over Peter's back were tainted red in his blood. Along the edges of each marked lash, Elizabeth could see the remnants of glowing embers left by the whip, literally scathing his skin even after the beating had concluded.
"Oh God," Elizabeth murmured softly, hurrying into the dark shadowed room down to where Pan lied. She crouched down, letting her knees lean in the pool of blood not yet absorbed by the floorboards, and gently ran her hand over the hot dribbles that continued to throb out from his back. "Peter," she whispered.
He remained still, not a sound escaping even the back of his throat to answer her.
"C'mon," she pleaded gently while turning him over. Pulling the upper-half of his body up into her cradled arm, Elizabeth brushed her hand over his cool cheek. Rolling her lip into her mouth, the tremble of anxiety got the best of Elizabeth as she felt her limbs shake.
Peter kept still; his eyes remained shut as if lost in a deep sleep.
Elizabeth shook him, though earned no success. When taking a good long look at the boy, she finally noticed how bare his exposed neckline seemed without his vial of pixie dust resting from its string. "Bet you're missing that," she smiled weakly, spreading her hand under the collar of his shirt to feel the weak thrum of his heart deep in his chest.
She reached for her own vial and eagerly ripped it from the thin metal chain. After popping the cork and settling Peter's head back lower against her arm, she poured the antiquated Neverland sparkling powder into his cracked mouth.
She expected him to jerk forward; open his eyes immediately from the effects of Neverland's lasting magic. Much to her dismay however, Peter remained still as stone, not even giving the faintest hints of movements beneath his closed eyelids. She swallowed nervously, carding her fingers through the ends of his golden hair before leaning down close to his face. "Please," she whispered, leaning her forehead over his.
Footsteps suddenly whipped around the corner in the hallway approaching the busted prison door. Elizabeth glared up expectantly, already feeling the harvesting swell of magic grow in her gut. She laid Peter back down gently and stood to her feet. Her fists were clenched tightly, knuckles white as the ends of her finger tips began to tingle.
She was prepared when the first pirate stormed into the room. He barely had the chance to get a good look at her before she shot her arms up in the air, propelling him back out through the door with a gust of ice wind. Three more men pushed through and met a similar fate, unable to bear their swords before being greeted with flying shards of sharpened icicles that jammed into the wooden walls behind them. Elizabeth quickly bent down and grabbed a hold of Peter's knife, wasting no time with her throwing skills to whip the small blade across the room to sink into the nearest pirate's gut. "Come on, then..."
She spared no counts for mercy; her arms rose back up to magically suspend the two other men in midair before slamming them back into the wall. The brute force of their final blow had the four pirates knocked cold.
Footsteps continued to approach. Elizabeth grit her teeth in rage, feeling the animosity surge through her. She could practically taste the bloodthirsty need to grant these men their deaths.
She saw them round the corner, though just as she made her move to attack, the entire ship jerked forwards as it fell through the green vortex portal.
Elizabeth was thrown forwards against the wall ahead, her forehead being the first to slam into the unforgiving wall panels. Her body cracked as it contorted unnaturally from the hit; her waist searing with an excruciating rush of pain.
The ship continued to fall, lower and lower down until finally it blasted back up into the surf of its unknown destination. Elizabeth collapsed to the floor. Her body screamed against her attempts to move; she was completely debilitated from feeling anything below the waist.
"What the fuck," she heard one of the pirates growl from outside the hallway.
Elizabeth's heart began to race. Her head had swollen where it took the brunt of her initial fall and had gashed open to trickle a trail of blood down over her temple. She was seeing four of everything. The corners of her vision were blurred in stars, making it impossible to focus on channeling any magic out to ward off her attackers.
Now slumped in the corner of the room, Peter remained recumbent in the shadows away from the attentive eye. His insides, however, sparked to life in a catalyst effect. Every speck of pixie dust that Elizabeth had just poured into his system had combusted to life caused by their return to Neverland. The air that now infatuated the cabin was like a gaseous fume that seeped into his pores and ignited the magic in spark waves.
The pirates stumbled into the room once composing themselves from the fall. They eyed Elizabeth lying across the room, immediately finding great excitement from the view of her broken body. She whipped over with her arm to reach for a blade that had fallen to the ground, though just barely missed the handle as it grazed away from her fingertips.
"There's no fighting your way out of this one, lassie." The closest pirate chuckled as he drew his curved knife. "You've caused enough trouble aboard this vessel as it is. The Captain's orders are shit. We'll not be having some girl rule us with nothing but handful of fancy magic tricks."
"I couldn't agree more," Peter answered from behind. He didn't give them a chance to react before he made his move to strike. With a wave of his wrist, Peter sent the largest of the three pirates back flying into the far-off wall before reaching into the chests of the two men standing on either side, ripping out their shadows with one quick yank. Turning his attention to the far-off pirate pinned against the flat wall, he rose his hand and curled a finger, as if he were beckoning the shadow out from the man's body on its own will. The shadow leaned out of the man's body, disregarding the pained shouts and screams that the pirate let out in his suffering. "That's it, just a bit further," Peter encouraged the shadow as it reached out towards Peter on the other end of the room.
Elizabeth watched in silent horror, as the final rip detached the man from his shadow. The pirate's inanimate body fell down to the ground, leaving the shadow hovering on its own accord in midair.
"Let's not be shy," Peter grinned at the shadow. It hovered closer to the Lost Boy, slowly closing the distance between them until it made contact with Peter's outstretched palm. A short surge of magic blurred the outline of the shadow, sending it backwards a short ways from the shock of Peter's electrified touch. He grinned, "You'll do for now until we arrive at the island."
The shadow flinched back from Peter's declaration. A short moment passed before unspoken words were exchanged and the dark figure flew out from the room into the corridors, having been given the orders to raise some hell.
Elizabeth sucked in a quick gasp, her eyes having already begun to water from the ache of her broken skull. Peter turned his attention back to where she lied. His look of evil mischief was suddenly replaced by hint of unrest at the sight of her mangled being.
He sighed before closing the distance and settling down beside her. "Why is it that I can't leave for an hour's time without you falling into some sort of peril?" He murmured down at her frustratingly, though the gentle touch of his hands offered comfort as it rested over where her hip bone was crushed by the fall of the ship.
She pushed out an angry huff in response, battling her dizziness to meet his glare with her own.
Peter frowned, tracing his finger up her side to rest of her heart. The touch of his rough hand over her cool skin sent a rush of warmth through her being. Just like before, Elizabeth sensed the magic begin to simmer beneath Peter's touch. Her fingers wrapped over his palm, keeping his hand settled there in relish of the heat he offered.
"Did I not warn you against using your magic?" Peter mumbled while trailing his thumb along the chilled skin of her collar bone. "Your body's gone cold."
"You should have thought about that before you pulled that stunt out on deck. How could I not come after you?" She answered softly. "Besides, I think beating down a few pirates is exactly what I needed."
Peter smiled grimly, raising his hand to cup the side of her cheek before leaning in to brush tender kiss over her cold mouth. She hummed in his mouth as the surge of warmth flooded her being from where their lips met, soothing the sting of her insides where her magic had festered. "A conversation for another time – for now, let's look forward to actually getting off this ship," he murmured in her ear. "I've had my fill of pirates."
Elizabeth felt his arms curl under her, careful not to rouse her broken hip as Peter lifted up against his chest. "Where are we going?"
"The shores of Neverland aren't too far." He smirked as a green cloud of smoke formed out from his brown leather pirate boots, consuming the both of them in magical smog as he continued walking over the fallen men. Emerging out from the smoke, Elizabeth noticed Peter's wardrobe change back to his Lost Boys getup. She had been changed as well. Abandoning her tattered sea garb, Elizabeth was returned back into her riding pants and a loose-fitting white button shirt. Her legs were wrapped by her knee-high leather dark suede riding boots, taking the place of the soggy footwear she had previously been enduring.
"Though before we go anywhere, I'm afraid I can't deny the Savior anymore of your absence." He began stepping up the narrow staircase of the ship, unmoved by the bodies of pirates laid out over the steps where his new shadow had just cleared a path for them.
Elizabeth beamed and let out an excited laugh. Fighting the last moments of her consciousness before the blood loss got the better of her, she brushed an endearing along the underside of his jaw. His grip around her back tightened as she settled into his arms, closing her eyes to count each step up the stairs that brought her closer back to her mother waiting up on deck.