Shahrazád's Ghosts

Chapter 21: Darling (Bella) Part V

2404 A.D.

"Soon I would be a man?"

"Very soon."

"I don't want to go to school and learn solemn things," he told her passionately. "I don't want to be a man. O Wendy's mother, if I was to wake up and feel there was a beard!"

"Peter," said Wendy the comforter, "I should love you in a beard;" and Mrs. Darling stretched out her arms to him, but he repulsed her.

"Keep back, lady, no one is going to catch me and make me a man."

"But where are you going to live?"

"With Tink in the house we built for Wendy."

Peter Pan, J.M. Barrie

Oooooo

Augustine called Darling to Tunisia late one April, telling her it was urgent. She complied and when she found him, he was sitting on a Turkish rug on the floor of a large, square common hall in the underground rooms of his ksar. Augustine wore only a simple, white tunic, tied around the waist. His head was covered with a white keffiyeh and his eyes were nearly as dark as the night outside. He leaned against the wall with a colorfully illuminated Arabic manuscript on his lap, his long fingers delicately turning from page to page. When he heard her approach, he closed the book with a thick, dusty thud. He did not so much as smile or inquire into the health of her coven and she felt the dread grow in her chest. This was more serious than she anticipated.

It was nearly midnight, but no moon interrupted the inky darkness blotting out the sea beyond or the empty space of open window letting the night breezes into the uppermost portions of the room near the ceiling. She knelt onto the floor across from him, carefully arranging the violet folds of her dress around her ankles and nervously fiddling with the beads around the hem.

"Dulcissima, you are not well," Augustine noted, after a long pause had surrounded them both. "What is it that ails you and makes your heart so heavy?"

"It is nothing," she told him.

He didn't believe her. He never did, no matter how many times she tried to convince him she was fine. She did not expect him to believe her, since she knew it was a lie, however there were some subjects she would not ever raise with Augustine and this was one. By his many gifts and more frequent requests for her presence, she knew he could see right through her façade of strength and into the lace-like fragility of her heart. She did not think this visit was purely to inquire into her questionable well-being, though, and she was right. Augustine inhaled deeply and before releasing a sigh and clasping his fingers in front of his lips.

"Aro has summoned me to Volterra," Augustine told her. "I can hold him off for some time, but it will not be long before he arrives himself."

She frowned.

"If he comes, he will know more than he should," Augustine continued.

"I can shield you… or you can leave."

While it had been four years since Volterra's first "guests" arrived, Aro had only grown more persistent. She knew it was inevitable. Aro was bound to connect her to Neverland, if he hadn't already. Eventually, he would discover the location of their underground city and come for her. Since the day she first left Volterra, she knew Aro would someday come for her and she had spent over a century preparing for this very circumstance. She still preferred to put it off for as long as possible.

"How long can you run, Dulcissima? Is not this what you were created for? I say, let him come and welcome him with open arms."

"I don't understand."

"Become the queen you were always meant to be," Augustine said. He sat upright on his heels so he could take her hands in his and burn into her with his earnest gaze. "It is time to open your court to the outside. Throw off the secrecy that has shrouded you and step into the light. Stop hiding and let them come." He closed the distance between them until he could run one finger along her cheek and down her collarbone. "Let those who wish to find you bask in your radiance."

She no longer feared Augustine, and, while she did not always like him, she had developed a grudging respect for him. He had not led her wrong yet, but this was something she had avoided.

While their alliance had been founded on a mutually destructive sense of vengeance, the long years had sowed a gradual shift in both of their motivations. The change was as subtle as the transition between the rainy and dry seasons and both found themselves in a completely different place than when they first met in Volterra.

At some point, Augustine stopped sending her enemies for disposal, but instead sent her allies to court their favor. These allies came not for the cloned blood of their singers but for the ready supply of mixtures of cloned blood from a variety of individuals and creatures. Augustine was so openly enthralled by the possibilities this new means of food production created that his ambitions for advancement quenched his past desires for revenge. Augustine set the Moroccan and Mauritanian covens in charge of settling supply chains and marketing their product across the vampire world and soon more orders came in than Neverland could keep up with. He slowly developed a web of international exportation of cloned blood that circled the globe twice over and even delivered weekly shipments of black-market blood to the very heart of Volterra.

"Not every vampire enjoys hunting or wishes to hide or travel so far from home," Augustine had said. "If they wish to buy bottled blood, let them!"

He was right. Soon, Neverland made more money from bottles of mixtures of cloned blood than from any of its past "guests," and without any of the headache that the questionable sanity of those disintegrating vampires provided. It did not take long for Darling to disband her own pursuit of such "guests" and direct her Lost Boys to more profitable ventures.

"It is not wise to rely on one location for production," Augustine soon told her. "If anything occurs to your secret home, then what will happen? No, you must find a way to share your knowledge with others…without compromising your other secrets."

She knew what he did not say. Could she share the secret of blood cloning without revealing the secrets of the cloning of entire organisms? She could. She knew how. But, could she accept this change of direction of her life's work? Could she move away from the pursuing the destruction of the vampire world into its support and provision?

She found she could, and she blamed Peter for that.

Tiger Lily's death changed everything, though Darling never ever could have foreseen how profoundly impactful the event would prove to be. It was as if she had been sitting in a dark room and suddenly a light was turned on, illuminating everything around her and making her blink in the shear brightness of it and forcing her to recognize how very dark the room had been before. She could no longer hide in her own comforting shroud of self-deception but she stood exposed, glistening under the burning rays of the sun. She could never quite see herself…or Neverland… or Peter the same way again.

How could she say all vampires were worthy of destruction when not all were as Edward had been? Even if she considered herself among the number of the guilty, surely Peter was not. She could no more assign him absolute guilt than she could imagine wishing him harm in any way. He was, forever and always, assigned among the portion of those she considered "innocent and good."

Yet he was a vampire.

She had to admit that even some of her Lost Boys were not as intrinsically evil as she originally assumed. Slightly, while irritating and sometimes of questionable morality, was not purely evil and he had a kindness and compassion about him that Darling begrudgingly admired. Even Augustine, with all his ruthless ambition and political maneuverings, possessed a fierce loyalty to his coven and love of justice that meant Darling could never delight in the idea of his destruction.

Darling could not abide it. It took years wrestling with this conflict waging war in her mind before she reluctantly admitted the truth. She needed to change her focus, but the question remained just what her focus should now be.

"Who do you have in mind?" she asked her benefactor. She could feel him watching her and she could tell by the way he clenched and unclenched his fists that he wished he could close the distance between them again.

"Throw open the doors of Neverland and let your admirers straight into the heart of your little kingdom."

"I assume you have some particular individuals in mind?"

Augustine chuckled. "Only a few dozen or so. We could start with the Romanian coven. You remember them? They are so eager to depose the Volturi that they have been sending you gold by the truck load. Then, the coven in the Great Lakes may come even sooner. They prefer a much more open relationship with their humans. They miss the hordes of sacrifices the human kings used to send them in exchange for their protection. The Volturi did not approve, but the coven would much rather go back to their old arrangement. The coven in the Indus valley prefers a closer relationship with their humans, as well. If you have their support, the Volturi will not survive you."

"They are all despicable," Darling answered with a glare. "Why would I want to support the likes of those?"

"Ah, because sometimes one must befriend a crocodile in order to ward off a lion, Dulcissima. Once the lion is vanquished, then the crocodile can be dealt with and brought to order."

"I don't like it," Darling answered.

Augustine waited until Darling met his eye again. With a deep sigh she stood and smoothed down the folds of her dress. "When should I expect them?" she asked.

Augustine stood as well and closed the gap between them so he could kiss her on both cheeks.

"Soon."

Oooo

Darling sat on the silver throne in Tiger Lily's Camp, the throne Augustine had made for her, but which she had originally given to Tiger Lily. Behind her head, emerald stars were inlaid between opal and pearl moons. She wore the ornate garments he had given, and she felt every inch the queen she was supposed to be – the piece on a chess board that would be momentarily disbanded in order to win the game. Her position, her usefulness, her survival, was all dependent on the hands playing on the board.

Tiger Lily's Camp had been stripped of the domestic furnishing of its previous inhabitant and made to look the throne room of the queen Augustine wished her to be. Gifts from her admirers came from each of the points of the compass and overflowed from her walls and storage rooms and display shelves. She felt she could almost bury herself in gold and precious stones if she tried to bring it all into the room at once.

Augustine never came in person, but he sent a steady stream of allies to her newly formed "court." The adulation of gifts was nothing compared to the insufferable flattery that came with the parties of diplomats and alliance-seekers from covens across the globe. In truthfulness, Darling despised the public role she had stepped into. She despised being the center of attention and the hours spent on the dais were worse than a year of Augustine's miserable public events. She hated the feeling of so many eyes upon her and so many hanging onto her words in rapt attention, as if she truly were a monarch and not simply a living symbol used to unite them for a convenient, if temporary, alliance.

They came for their own reasons, some altruistic but most as far from it as Neverland was from the places they travelled from. Some potential allies were driven to Neverland by their curiosity. Neverland could support a vaster population than any in the vampire world had ever dreamed could coexist together in one place. Those at her court were guaranteed plentiful food without the danger of discovery and this was a novelty that many wished to see for themselves. Not all vampires were so keen on the exertions required to hunt for themselves and some preferred the more sedentary lifestyle such a food source provided. Vampires existed together a bit like droplets of water against a pane of glass. Naturally, individual drops crept and dropped down the glass. They clung to each other until the weight of their alliances forced them to move. In Neverland, those who had once lived as rain drops could experience life as part of an ocean.

Others were drawn by the idea of protection. There was no Chelsea or Jane or Alec to compel their obedience and the queen of this underground city was powerful enough to protect them from the influence of Volterra. A host of rebels and would-be revolutionaries flocked to her court along with any who held a long-simmering grudge against the vampire lords. As long as none sought to overthrow Darling or terrorize the humans, she did not involve herself in their affairs. None of her many courtiers knew about her the existence of her army or the telepathy of her Lost Boys. They did not know their innermost thoughts were held bare before her and that she could see into their souls.

She preferred to keep it that way.

The dispatching of punishments was also Augustine's idea. The first time Nibs returned from a visit to a Cambodian coven with a Hungarian vampire in hand, Darling thought he was another "guest." Nibs told her otherwise.

"This one has a penchant for 'collecting' little human children. I do not think he has ever found his singer, but his behavior and thoughts are so abhorrent, I would rather keep him here and feed him on bottled blood than allow him free reign among the little humans," Nibs said with a grimace and a rough shake of the shoulders of the captive vampire. A few more words of explanation on what exactly the vampire was guilty of sealed his fate. Darling took one look at the man and tore his head from his shoulders herself.

His was the first head placed on a pike along the wall of Tiger Lily's Camp. Each successive visitor who arrived was informed of his crimes and warned against following his example. When Augustine heard rumors of this "wall of shame," he sent his hearty approval.

"If you wish to take on the role of the Volturi, then you must behave as the Volturi, Dulcissima," he told her. "Hold court for your subjects. Warn those who would do wrong and reward those who would do good."

She had spent enough time in Volterra to know their rules. They cared more about secrecy than any altruistic interest in the well-being of humans. She did not think they would have even dealt with Edward, since all his handiwork was kept from the public eye and hidden from view. Yet Darling felt the suffering he sowed should have led to his premature removal from the living.

When she looked out across Tiger Lily's Camp, she did not see the crowd of courtiers or the piles of gifts. Instead, she stared at the growing line of decapitated heads and she thought of all the humans who would no longer suffer at their hands and she felt a grim satisfaction. This was her purpose. Instead of seeking to destroy all vampires, she needed to seek out the sadistic tyrants who delighted in the suffering of others. There were other Janes, other Margarets, other Darlings who could be spared by the multiplication of such heads on pikes.

With her army of telepaths behind her, she had the perfect force to seek out and bring them to her court in chains… or in pieces.

Oooo

Once each month, it was the Braves who came for an audience before their queen. She promised Slightly she would not create another Tiger Lily and so she would have to fill the gap herself and ensure each yearling was firmly devoted to her, and her alone. Each yearling would now meet Darling instead of Tiger Lily, and then receive their first taste of medicine from her hand.

One day, a portrait painter named Pietro Bellini arrived in Neverland. The vampire had first trained under Tiziano Vecelli in the early sixteenth century. When he was commissioned by Caius to paint a portrait of his mate, Caius had been so impressed that he turned the man and kept him on in Volterra as their primary artist-in-residence. For generations, Pietro had painted elaborate portraits of each member of the Volturi and their mates. During a visit to Turkey, he heard tales of the Mistress of Neverland and he was so intrigued that he followed the Romanian coven on their visit and stayed on to paint the mysterious vampire queen.

Darling tolerated him, but rarely gave him more than a word or two. He lurked around the shadowed edges of Tiger Lily's Camp, brush and easel in hand, and created his impression of her on the canvas that stood a head taller than the subject of his painting. Her initiation of the yearlings into Neverland was the way he chose to immortalize her in his painting. He then presented his final creation to her as a gift and begged her to hang it behind her throne.

She did, but only because she would not be forced to see it there. She would have preferred to memorialize a different aspect of her role in Neverland, but the painter felt this role most defined her.

Perhaps he was right.

When Peter first saw the painting, he gave a derisive snort.

"It suits you, my Lady," he said, but by his tone, she did not think he meant it as a compliment. Once, he had placed her on his own pedestal. Now, the more others paid homage at her dais, the farther she fell in his esteem and she realized she would gladly exchange her throne in Neverland to be replaced in the honored position he had once held her in, but it was impossible.

At least she no longer feared initiating a mating bond with any of her Braves or Lost Boys. She was no longer in danger through proximity to them and she could more freely move among them and gain their unswerving loyalty for herself. She knew she could thank Peter for this development as well.

She remembered how Buffy had mocked Edward when he first told her about the vampire mating bond. It was just after Buffy had received her final phone call from Badiyah, the call where she told her good-bye. She knew she was dying and it was only then that Edward realized how important… and irreplaceable… she was to him.

"My kind, we mate for life," he had said. "It's an intense emotional bond that only happens once and not even death can break it."

"Back up again for me. Sorry, a little slow here… your kind mates for life and when you first met your mate your first instinct was to eat her? Sorry, that's a little messed," Buffy answered.

"I didn't know she was my mate! I never knew, not until… not until last week."

"Woah- you lived with the woman for decades and you never figured it out? I'd think a permanent, life-altering bond with another person would be easier to identify than that."

"Well, as you so delight in reminding me daily, I'm an idiot," he said.

"This is a step beyond idiotic. This falls right over the edge into utterly ridiculous."

"For once, I think you are right."

It wasn't until Darling watched Peter walk away from her, Tiger Lily's body in his arms, that she finally understood Edward and his particular journey into idiocy. Reluctance had held up scaffolds of self-deception long enough for her to remain blind to her own heart – at least until it was too late. After Tiger Lily, and Peter was lost to her forever, she was forced to recognize the truth: her mating bond was firmly fixed on him.

And he despised her.

She did not fail to notice that Peter no longer called her "Darling." He mimicked all the other Lost Boys and Braves in addressing her only as "my Lady." She hated it. She hated it almost as much as she hated how Peter looked at her now. She wished to return to the old days, when he would follow her with his eyes no matter where she went. Back then, he gazed upon her as if she could do no wrong, as if she were the embodiment of all that was good and beautiful, as if she were someone worth loving. Through his eyes, sometimes she even thought she could believe it.

But I am not, she reminded herself. Let him see me as I am and despise me. I knew, even with all his great promises and adoring eyes, he could not really love me. Let him show himself false now that his eyes are opened and he hates what he sees. His infatuation was borne out of the mating imperative and he is captive to his biological makeup. There is nothing in me but my DNA which calls to him.

While she could now say that her claim to his unwarranted affections was not based on any great virtue she possessed, she could not say the same about him. She had interacted with over a hundred versions of Edward. None compared to Peter. To come across a reincarnation of her sire that was so strikingly and completely and unselfishly good shocked her to her very core and shattered her very foundations of reality. His goodness overflowed from a wellspring within his soul and all she could do was stand transfixed by what she saw, captivated by the beauty she had never even imagined existed.

She knew now, as clearly as she knew her own name, that she was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with Peter. Despite the fact that he was a vampire, despite the fact that he was a reproduction of Edward, despite the fact that some part of him, however large or small, was drawn to her like a moth to flame, none of it mattered. In her heart, she knew she could never love another in the way that she loved him and nothing he could do would ever change the fact that he had become the center of her existence.

Not even the fact that her affections would be seen as a curse and not as a boon, if they were ever known to Peter. She did not blame him. Peter was bound to her, against his will and solely because of their biological magnetism. How could someone like Peter come to terms with being bound to one like her? He did not deserve such a fate.

It reminded Darling of another conversation she overheard during her early days.

It was late one night when Buffy and Badiyah whispered stories to each other under the tent they had made of their blankets, their only light the dim flickering of a flashlight. Through muffled laughter and shared secrets, the pair stayed up late into the night, unaware that Darling was not asleep in her cot nearby, but only pretending to be. Buffy could not help but share her favorite shows with everyone around her and she gained almost as much delight from instilling enthusiasm into her audience as she did from watching a show herself. That night, she spent hours regaling the ignorant Badiyah about all the wonders of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Then Badiyah shared her favorite story – one acquired not through visual media but through a book and read to her by Edward himself, back in the days when he could still read out loud.

"King Shahryar was so grieved by his wife's infidelity that he married virgin after virgin and put them to death the morning after he wed them. In his eyes, all women were guilty for the trespasses of the one and it was not until Shahrazád came with her stories that the slaughter stopped. She willingly married the evil king, in hopes of rescuing other maidens from death at the hands of their king's wrath. In her cleverness and bravery, she schemed to tell her husband one half of a story and only finish it the next night and then begin another tale, which could only be completed the following night. On and on, her tales kept the king captive until the day he realized he loved her and no longer wished for her death… and the remaining maidens in the kingdom were spared," Badiyah had told.

The pair of friends continued sharing stories, but at some point, Darling had fallen into sleep against the backdrop of their voices. That night, she dreamed about a red-eyed king chasing her down with a sword in hand and a horde of undead brides in his wake. She woke with a start.

The story had stayed with Darling long after that night and it was one of the rare tales she sought out from the library in Volterra. There were many different manuscripts there and each translation and version gave a slightly different twist on the tale. Darling decided she much preferred the versions where on their wedding night the brave Shahrazád withdrew a hidden knife and stabbed the king through the heart and thus freed the kingdom from his tyranny. In Darling's mind, it was the one who held the knife, and not the storybook, who would truly survive the wrath of such a king.

Now, though, Darling realized the one who wielded the story book could be more transformative than the hand with the sword after all. Shahrazád felled the king with the scorching power of one not afraid to die to stem the tide of evil and preserve the life of another. Through the ravishing light of her goodness, she not only saved the maidens of her kingdom, but she saved the king himself from continuing his path of darkness.

It was unjust. Shahrazád did not deserve to be bound to Shahryar anymore than the brides before her had deserved to die for the sins of the former queen. Yet she was forced to marry a man soaked to the bone in the blood of his innocent wives. Yet how was Darling any different? She had forcibly bound clone after clone to Tiger Lily or herself, all the while knowing the clones were destined to die for her revenge against her sire. She made the many pay the bloodguilt of the one and she knew she deserved the hidden knife she always felt was just around the next corner.

Then, Peter had come to her with his unceasing tales and night after night, she was captivated by his stories. How could she still wish for his death? She could not leave his company unchanged or continue in the same ways she had before. She must throw up her own arms in surrender and admit that her wrath was not as entirely just as she first believed it to be. In her efforts to protect herself from others like her sire, she had failed to recognize the danger which lurked within her own heart.

No, it was Edward and Darling who were made for each other. When she looked at herself, she saw Edward's glaring red selfishness and unrestrained madness, driven by equally deadly doses of both fear and desire.

In her efforts to escape Edward, Darling had become Edward.

Peter deserved better.

ooooo

Darling watched Peter mourn Tiger Lily with a desperate sense of helplessness nothing could alleviate. Month after month, he locked himself away from everyone and everything. She wished to free him from the unwanted bond that connected him to her, if only to allow him the ability to move on and leave Neverland, even if the thought of him leaving was like cutting out her own heart with a knife and throwing it into the desert at midday.

If she simply avoided him, the draw would lesson, she thought.

For years after Tiger Lily's death, Darling avoided Peter as much as she could. This made her feel like an acacia tree after too many seasons without rain. She gulped up any glimpses she could grasp of him around Neverland. She tracked his movements. She inquired after him from Slightly. She ensured he was protected by her shield as much as possible. When she could feel his distinct pinprick of life hidden within the safety of her shield, she could rest easy. She knew he was nearby and no harm could fall upon him. This knowledge made it easier to grant him the space he needed. However, when Slightly insisted again and again that Peter needed to "get out" and "run errands" for him, she could not rest until he returned again. She was on edge, pacing more than usual, her thoughts continually running over who and what he could face out there in the "Real World" and she drove everyone around her crazy with her agitation.

It wasn't enough, though. She could see his inner turmoil through the loss of his smile and the way his eyes no longer shone with his brilliant light. His shoulders were weighted down by the dark shadows of cares that one such as himself should never have had to bear. It was as if she had crushed the songs out of a pet songbird and she longed to do everything in her power to breathe music back into him again. Darling grew more distraught the longer he shrank inward on himself and the knowledge that it was all her fault made her even more despondent.

Then one day the solution struck her like a thunderbolt. It was the loss of Tiger Lily that first made him withdraw. What better way to bring him back to life than resurrecting the object of his affection? Darling could give him what no one else on earth could give him: a mate. What better way to ease the pain in his heart and give him the love he so deserved? His great heart could not help but be warmed by the adoration of one truly devoted to him, one who was as pure and lovely as himself. He should not be chained to someone like Darling. Darling could only ever be "useful" and she was only admired for her machinations and medicine.

While the jealousy clawed at her throat at the thought of it, she bit it back. All that truly mattered was to see Peter safe and well. Peter needed to learn to sing again, even if it cost Darling her heart in exchange. Darling would see that when he finally left Neverland, he did not leave alone. Then Darling could rest, knowing she had fixed some of what she had broken, and made reparations for some of the pain she had caused.

Not only to Peter and Tiger Lily.

But to Badiyah.

And Margaret and Jane.

Everything else melted away into insignificance in comparison.

Oooo

As Slightly predicted, Peter was less than pleased by the turn of events that he was thrust into and he fell into a furious rage when he was informed of his new assignment. Her general had the sense to recommend the orders…and their explanation… come from Slightly and not from Darling.

"If you wish to make an intelligent man buy into a terrible idea, you have to sell it right. I know you well enough…and Peter well enough…to know that you are the worst possible salesperson for this. Leave this to me," Slightly told her. He was right, of course, and she did not know how he did it, but Peter reluctantly took on the care of the fledgling human with all the reticence of a cat forced into a warm bath.

It was the day Peter asked for his instruments to be sent to him in Tinkerbell's Homes that Darling knew her plan had worked. Peter's jagged edges melted away and the deep sadness evaporated in the presence of his Tinkerbell and it would only be a matter of time before he decided to "rescue" his maiden from captivity in Neverland and run away with her himself.

oooo

Long before Michael was ready, Slightly, Darling, and Augustine extended their network of trade of information and bottled blood into Volterra itself. They developed human contacts at both the local airport and heliports. These were given a substantial price in exchange for their pledge that they would inform Augustine's people immediately in case the Volturi ever sent a flight plan that involved north Africa. Another contact in the pay of the Volturi was tasked with the washing and servicing of the automobiles of the Volturi. He agreed to let Augustine's contact now if all of their cars were ever sent to the port to be loaded onto a cargo vessel or enough were prepared to fit all the guards for an extensive journey. While Aro checked the minds of even the most menial vampire plebian in his fold, he rarely noted the existence of the humans tasked with the upkeep of Volterra.

With these precautions in place, all that was left was gleaning all they could from their ignorant spy. Six years after Tinkerbell's creations, when the young Michael was deposited on Aro's doorstep, gift-wrapped for her former master, even Slightly had to grudgingly admit to the ingenuity of her plan (or at least the portion of the plan he was privy to). Then, all they had to do was listen and wait.

OOOOO

"Can you hear him yet?" Darling asked. She kept her shield firmly in place over Slightly and she shifted her weight against the wall of the cargo bed. Their purchase of a delivery truck had spared them from spending hours bound to the confines of the Cecina River. It gave them a greater range of scent-free movement around the city and enabled them to arrive day or night without difficulty. Darling much preferred the hours spent in the darkness of the cargo bed over the hours spent knee deep in rapids.

It was an imperfect, evolving system, but with Aro's near omniscient touch, it had to be. Sometimes, it was so fruitless that Darling wished to throw a shoe at Michael's head and scream at him to think about something other than Tinkerbell and the many wonders of leaves and clouds and insects. Other times, she wanted to kiss him on his silly forehead and thank him for his range of hearing and the secrets it allowed her to uncover.

Slightly's eyes were closed, but his mind was open and the truck slowly drove itself around its programmed route, just outside the city limits of Volterra. With Slightly's familiarity with Michael's mind, his thoughts were accessible from nearly four miles away. Under Darling's shield, Michael could not hear him, but Slightly could hear whatever Michael could. With Michael's less-practiced range, he lost tune of the minds in Volterra at about three miles, but this still enabled Slightly to hear what occurred within Volterra from a distance of a total of about seven miles away.

Sometimes, when they found Michael alone and far out of range of Volterra, all they could do was listen to his thoughts and musings as they passed through his mind and glean all they could. Occasionally, this would grant them a startling insights or seed of information, but more often than not, they would learn little more than the name of a new form of olive tree or the mating habits of a firebug. More than once, this monthly ritual was interrupted by the prowling sentry of a Volturi guard, but none ever grew suspicious of the unmarked delivery van and a quick retreat to the vineyards outside the city gave them time to regroup and try again.

"Got him," Slightly said and she could hear his head lean against the metal of the truck wall in the dark.

She stopped the van at the nearest curb and waited. In the Tuscan street, the night was never silent. Cats and cars and music wailed through the cobbled street and filled the air with reminders of constant life around them.

"He's close enough," Slightly said. "He's in the library."

"Leaves again?"

"No, flowers, actually."

"I see. Who else can you hear?"

"Let's see… the Volturi just finished their feed. Most are in a bit of a happy lethargy… oh, except for the mated pairs, they are, uh..."

"Stop. I don't want to know. Anything useful?"

Slightly sank into silence again and Darling could almost feel him listening. There were times Slightly had caught fragments of Aro's search for Neverland and his desire to find Darling. He confirmed what Darling already suspected – Aro knew she was connected to Neverland and he wanted to find her as much as he wanted to find her kingdom. He also confirmed that Aro knew some of what Neverland was capable of producing.

It was in this way they had discovered that Marcus kept a small urn in his opulent tower room. When he was released from his duties with the guard, he drifted back to the room he had once shared with his mate and spent his hours lost in memories of the past. His thoughts always revolved around Didyme and through his imagination, she continued to live on, despite her death.

"Can you tell what he keeps in the vase?" Darling had asked.

"It's, uh, ok, there is a golden broach that she used to wear on her toga and a necklace that Marcus once gave her…oh, you will like this."

"What?"

Slightly's grin covered his face and she could see it nearly glow in the dark. "It's a tooth."

"A tooth? You can't be serious."

"I am! It's, uh, pierced with a hole and a band of gold runs through it."

"Whose is it?"

"He remembers it as hers. She kept it with her jewelry after she was changed. I can't tell much else. He's thinking about, oh, never mind. You don't want to know."

It had been a risk. They did not know for sure if the tooth belonged to a human Didyme or was simply a loner from someone else, but Darling figured it was worth a try.

The next month was the first time Slightly himself entered Volterra.

They waited till they knew the Volturi guard was feeding and Michael had excused himself from the fortress. He was firmly ensconced on a hill of the wildlife reserve, happily sketching a view of the Castello dei Vescovi when Slightly donned one of Darling's old Volturi capes and removed his hat. From a distance, he looked exactly like Michael. He then slipped into the fortress and made his way through the halls to Marcus' tower in the eastern side of the fortress. From the shadows he carefully flew a drone up three floors and through Marcus' open window. The little robot was able to retrieve the urn in its arms and bring it to where Slightly waited, his hands covered in thick gloves.

He quickly exchanged the original tooth for an exact replica then returned the urn to where it stood on a table in the center of the room.

"Did anyone notice?" Darling asked him when he returned, anxiety plain in her voice.

"No, but we should wait around for Michael to return to make sure my scent does not raise any suspicions. I do not sense any newborns, but you never know."

Darling nodded. She could differentiate between the scents of her Lost Boys, but only because she was in regular contact with them. If she crossed paths with Slightly and Michael without knowing they were two separate individuals, they were similar enough not to raise immediate suspicion.

"Well, either we will resurrect Marcus' mate or some poor Etruscan peasant who donated their tooth to fill a gap in her mouth," Slightly said with a chuckle. "I'm counting on the latter."

"Pessimist."

"Realist."

"Whatever. Let's get farther from the walls and then we can argue statistical probability of success versus failure."

"As you wish, my Lady," Slightly answered.

A year later, a tiny, black haired woman with brown eyes blinked into the lights of Kensington Gardens. By the shape of her brow and the curve of her nose, Slightly and Darling swelled with anticipation.

"She looks like Aro," Darling noted and Slightly agreed. The resemblance was uncanny. Then Darling cocked her head to the door. "I think it may be time to invite Marcus to Neverland. What do you think?"

"Oh, I agree."

The invitation took the form of a blanket the woman had slept on and delivered to Marcus by Slightly himself outside the city. This was a gamble and Darling thought he was insane to try it, but he did not become general of Neverland through avoiding risks. When Marcus appeared at the port in Tripoli the next day, Slightly gave her a wink and she covered them both with her shield. He gave her a polite greeting and did not appear surprised to see her. He quietly followed her, all the way to Neverland. This was also a risk, but one which could pay off in their favor.

When Marcus saw the little human sitting up in her bed in the guest quarters of Neverland, he fell to his knees at her bedside and did not speak or move for the next twenty-four hours.

"The beauty of it is that even if he can't replicate the mating bond, she can make him so happy he won't notice its absence," Slightly said with a smirk as he followed Darling away from the room.

"He deserves some happiness," Darling said. "He has earned his freedom from Aro's hold, I think."

"I think you are right."

Marcus did not once mention leaving and he took over care of the human immediately. Overnight, Volterra found itself missing one of its trio of lords and to say Aro was furious would be an understatement.

"Can you get anything from Aro?" Darling asked Slightly, once they were back in Volterra a month after Marcus' desertion.

"Yeah, uh, I think the best way to phrase it is you stuck a stick into a hornets' nest and then used the nest to clean your chimney."

Darling gave a breathy burst of laughter and closed her eyes. She preferred Aro's anger over his flattery on any day, but especially now. Anger was something she could count on to cloud his mind and encourage his rashness. Anger would bring him to Neverland before he knew what he would find there.

"Oh. Oh. Ok, this isn't from Aro, but its from one of his underlings. He is running a facial recognition scan on every web-based database he can find on, get this, on Michael."

At that Darling's head shot up and her eyes flew open again. "On Michael?"

"Yeah. And not just current databases. He is also running his face through historical archives… and not just Michael. There's also a human called 'Anthony Edward Masen' that he's running a search on."

Darling leapt to her feet and began to pace the empty floor of the delivery truck without noticing the sound of her feet against the metal. "We need to get Michael out."

Slightly nodded. "Will he come, do you think? Or do you need to break Chelsea's bond?"

"If the Volturi's hold on him is too tight, then we will simply send him a bottle of medicine and tell him that if he does as he is told he will be granted more."

Slightly frowned, but nodded. "And then?"

"Aro will follow him. He will send Demetri to track him and once he is found, Aro and his guard will follow. I plan to keep Michael in Tinkerbell's House. It's far enough away to hide any tracks and once the Volturi follow him there, it will be simple enough for our army to surround them."

"You plan to bring the Volturi to Neverland?" Slightly asked, surprised.

"Yes. We are ready," Darling answered without ceasing her frenetic pacing or the thrum of her footsteps against the floor. "Our army is large enough and Aro knows little of our numbers or abilities. We can choose our own terms and position by making the first move. If we wait, we lose the element of surprise."

He whistled and removed his hat, showing off the short layer of hair on his head. "It's really time, then?"

"Yes," Darling answered.

"When should we call Michael home?"

"Soon," Darling answered, the barest hint of a smile on her face.

As soon as Peter and Tinkerbell fly away.

Oooo

Author's notes:

I love your reviews. They make my heart happy and make my fingers want to type more words so thank you!

This chapter, as so many others, could have become even more detailed and epic. I've tried to rein it in and restrain my world-building, but, yeah, it has a lot. We have approximately four chapters and an epilogue to go, so really, there is an end in sight.

Here's my philosophy on cloning, since it's come up a few times. Basically, since the change from human to vampire changed the make-up of the entire organism, I do not think a vampire can be cloned (with the technology available). Once they are changed, their entire body becomes flammable and burning a vampire leaves nothing but ash, thus the entire organism has been transformed into something entirely other. For the purposes of this story, humans can be cloned if there is access to a sample of their DNA. The best, most enduring samples will come from bone fragments or teeth. Limited DNA can be extracted from hair samples, but this isn't ideal. Thus, to clone a vampire, there must be access to some sample of their human DNA (like Edward, whose mother had kept all his baby teeth in a jar and that jar had ended up in a box in the attic and eventually in Edward's possession. He used this to create Anthony).

Why did Marcus have Didyme's human tooth? Apparently, the Etruscans have some of the oldest examples of prosthetic teeth and would use gold bands to fix replacement teeth into the spaces of missing teeth. Not only this, but they also have evidence of "deliberate tooth evulsion" (i.e. removing teeth to be pretty or to symbolize something) and would sometimes then tie in the old tooth into the missing space.

Convenient if one wants to clone a vampire a few thousand years later. Since I am assuming that upon the change into vampirism, flaws such as missing teeth would correct themselves, my working theory is that Didyme kept her removed tooth adornment with the rest of her jewelry, once she no longer needed to wear it.

Finally, let me give a quick disclaimer on my use of A Thousand and One Nights. In case you aren't familiar with it, Shahrazád (sometimes spelled Scheherazade depending on the translation) and King Shahriyár come from A Thousand and One Nights (sometimes referred to as Arabian Nights). This is a collection of folktales from across Asia and North Africa which uses the story of Shahrazád to frame the stories.

I gotta give a similar disclaimer to the one I gave on Peter Pan. I absolutely do not condone the representation of people of African descent in A Thousand and One Nights. Actually, I fell into a bunny trail researching different translations of the work to see if the racial attitudes conveyed were imported by the colonial-era English translators or part of the original work (yeah, it's basically both). And the evocation of negative racial stereotypes or flawed perceptions of Africa are not the sole properties of European and American literature and media. The role of the Arab world in the development of European conceptions of Africa and slavery is extensive and complicated and way beyond the confines of a fanfiction author's note.