Disclaimer: If you recognise it, it's not mine.
AN: Okay, I'm trying not to gush like an idiot over the reviews today. Let's see if it works.
Thank you to everyone who reviewed, particularly Sparrow's Girl who reviewed every chapter, thanks!
Artemis Goddess: you are the first person to review BOTH Neverland and Blood and Cherries, so go you! The parallel was that both were short chapters preceding a longer chapter, not any actual content. That would be scary. And don't worry; I've got a nice little ending for Tinkerbell. Provided she behaves.
Thank you to Zorrinna who urged me urgently to update! And thank you to every single one of you who reviewed – I think you've got a pretty fair idea by now how much I love your feedback.
Lastly, thank you so much to Harlem. I'd love to read your stories, but I don't know this "Newsies" fandom – I am your only favourite story not Newsies-related! I dance!
And yes I know, they're all over each other at this point, but they're young, they're in love . . . *sigh *
Gushing like an idiot, I know. On with the story.
Chapter Ten.
Dawn had broken when they flew within sight of the island. Neverland glowed rosily in the morning's first light, the sight alone seeming to warm her chilled face, and Wendy didn't object at first when Peter guided her down onto the soft warmth of a particularly fluffy cloud.
At length, though, she was obliged to.
"Peter?"
"Hmmm?"
"We're going to have to get down now."
"Hmmm."
"No, really, we're – would you stop that a moment?"
He didn't reply, and suddenly, for the time being at least, she didn't think it worth pressing the matter.
Some time passed.
"Peter."
"Hmmm . . ."
"If we stay here any longer I shall fall asleep."
At that he did stop, abruptly, with such a ridiculously affronted look that she couldn't help laughing.
"It's not – I mean, we flew all night, and I'm exhausted, and it's so lovely and warm right here that I – now Peter, really!"
Sighing, he gave up. "Fine, fine. Let's go home."
They drifted gently enough to the ground, though Wendy thought the way she had felt when he'd said home could have kept her airborne for weeks.
Once there, they discovered that Tinkerbell had not been idle in the long while they had taken to arrive. The new Lost Boys were grouped neatly in a suspiciously tidy clearing, and each held a small bouquet of what could loosely be termed "flowers".
"Lost Boys, this is Wendy," Peter began, with an air of ownership Wendy was appalled to find she rather liked.
They didn't seem to require anything else, all staring at her as she had at Hook – a figure from bedtime stories made flesh. It was an unnerving sensation.
"And Wendy," he continued, putting on a woefully disappointed sigh, "I'm afraid these are the Lost Boys."
The rag-tag bunch grinned cheerfully at the slur. One by one they thrust the limp, yet colourful weeds at her as Peter introduced them by name.
"Charlie." A blonde boy, with a rather endearing gap between his two front teeth, was apparently the oldest there.
"Southey." Small and dark, the grin Southey gave her immediately made Wendy think of Slightly, and she didn't think the similarity of names was a coincidence.
"Gert." Gert was a brown nonentity at first glance, but on closer inspection his rather vacant gaze betrayed a glint she wasn't sure she liked.
"Twin." She had to stifle her laughter at that, for though Twin did indeed resemble her identical brothers; there was only one of him. She credited Peter's peculiar logic with this name, and later found to her amusement that she was not wrong.
"Peeps." Peeps was a funny little thing, red-haired as her brother Michael. She smiled as he presented her with a fistful of what was mostly long grass.
There was a long pause.
From the back, the smallest boy was pushed. He was no more than five, by Wendy's guess, as his white-blonde hair and rounded limbs attested. He looked solemnly up at her with eyes as blue as her own.
"And this horrible little brat," Peter said, with a mock-threatening growl, "is the Imp."
The Imp looked from her to Peter, and when his eyes met hers again he grinned – an insolent, mischievous, adorable grin that she would have known anywhere, that she would have – and had – followed to hell and back . . . Peter's very grin, exact and to the life.
Her heart leapt into her mouth. "Oh, the darling!" she breathed, sinking to her knees and sweeping the sweet little bear up in a hug.
The Imp wriggled a little, for form's sake, but as she lifted him into her arms Wendy very clearly saw him realise that he was second only to Peter in the strange new lady's affections. He cuddled closer to her, grinning at the older boys, who to a man made grotesque faces back.
"Tinkerbell, you know." Peter finished. The fairy hovered a small distance from the boys.
"Thank you for the welcome, Tinkerbell." Wendy said formally. "And thank you for allowing me to land under my own steam this time."
The boys snickered, and Tinkerbell jingled something Wendy couldn't catch.
Peter translated, grinning. "She says they already knew that trick. I think she's joking."
That seemed to mark a truce between Tinkerbell and Wendy, and for a moment they smiled at one another.
"Yes, we've heard all the stories," Charlie said suddenly, apparently elected the one to break the silence.
"The one about the battle at the Black Castle, and Captain Hook and Princess Tiger Lily and John and Michael Darling!" one of the others followed, though she wasn't now sure which one it was.
"Thrilling stuff," Gert put in, interrupted almost immediately by the little red-haired one as the boys burst out talking all at once, any shyness they'd originally felt swept away in the flood of their eloquence.
"And the fight on the Jolly Roger, when Peter almost died!"
"Peter did die, and -"
"Idiot; no he didn't, he's standing right there."
" - And then at the end, when you went home on the flying pirate ship,"
"Sad story!"
"Oh yes; dreadfully sad!"
"Awfully affecting, you know."
The small dark one called Southey elbowed forward eagerly. "Oh yes; why I quite cried myself to sleep for days!"
"Fibber, you did not!" Twin yelped, pointing an accusing finger at Southey. "You said Red Handed Jill was a stupid name, and you laughed, and Peter made you sleep outside!"
In response, Southey leapt on him and wrestled him to the ground, where he began most energetically to stuff leaves into Twin's mouth.
So it was, with her arms full of greenery and small boy, and Peter's arm resting proprietarily around her waist, that Wendy Darling knew she'd finally come home.