Chapter 13—The Tree and The Tipi
Wendy could only hold off the boys for so long until they started asking questions again; questions about where Peter was and why he was taking so long.
"When's Peter coming home?" asked Nibs. "It's getting dark and he needs to tell me a bedtime story!"
"Oh, shut up," snapped Wendy, sitting down on a rock and glaring at the boys.
Slightly slammed the door to Wendy's 'house' and seconds later the roof fell in, showering the one hundred fifty year-old boy in banana leaves and twigs. Slightly screamed angrily and swiped at the leaves off of him, kicking them as they hit the ground.
Wendy sighed. "Let's rebuild the roof and get inside."
Tootles raised his hand awkwardly. "We could…" he glanced around at the other boys, "show you the tree."
Intrigued, Wendy agreed and the odd procession, led by an irritated Slightly, trekked deeper into the woods. Through the whole confusion, no one noticed a slightly annoying silver-yellow faerie was missing too.
0o0o0o0o0
When Peter awoke the air was thick and warm. The enclosure was smoky and smelt of burning pine and leather. Something hot was resting on his forehead, obstructing his eyesight and introducing a dizzying feeling to his head. He could see dim lanterns of blue, pink and yellow swaying above him. Peter tried to sit up, but binds held his hands down and the warm rock made him faint and weak.
There was a murmuring of voices in a language Peter could not hear or understand.
Hands pulled the rock off of his head and tilted his chin off the ground. Peter could see the smooth leather flaps of a tipi door and directly beside him a medicine fire was burning. The lanterns hung from the tipi opening's lip, trapped inside them were Peter's faerie allies, Marvin, Mariette and Jangela. The jangled louder as he looked around. Beside Peter was an old Indian shaman who was feeding the fire and prodding the faerie dust that was falling from the lanterns and the faeries struggled for release. Behind Peter, holding him up, was a young Indian warrior, clad entirely in black hides and earth orange camouflage. He pushed Peter up so that his wrists twisted painfully.
Peter's dazed eyes gazed around him in a sleepy stupor.
"What do you want?" asked Peter in a slow, tired way.
The young warrior spoke to the shaman in their language and after a second the shaman spoke.
"The new chief wants something. He wants an…arrangement." His voice was wise and his eyes were searching. Peter licked his dry, chapped lips.
"What kind of arrangement?" he asked warily.
The shaman sprinkled some sort of plant into the fire, making it burn a light purple at the embers before fading back to red.
"A wedding arrangement. To Princess Tiger Lily," said the young warrior.
Peter shifted his wrists around, cleared his throat and fell down in a faint.
0o0o0o0o0
The tree was very messy, but what else is to be expected of a boys' room?
The chairs to the long, wooden table were toppled over and strewn on the floor. There were articles of clothing hanging about the vicinity, swaying in the light breeze as someone walked past. It smelt awful and the hammocks for the boys were covered messily in blankets and turned inside-out.
Wendy sighed and pushed a chair back up, sliding it into place.
"Get to bed boys," she said tiredly, "I'm sure Peter will turn up somewhere."
And then she slept.
End Chapter
((I suppose I owe everyone an apology for taking such an incredibly long time to update, so here it is: I am so sorry everyone! I know I took forever to update, but I hope you enjoyed it when I finally did!))
Shoutouts:
Lisa Riddle—I know that my stuff is short. I do it freakishly often in many of my fics. I'm so sorry for that, but I hope you liked the content.
Talemera Rane—Peter dying would be an absolute tragedy.
Peter!Muse: Yes it would be!
Charlie!Muse: (tackles Peter!Muse)
Peter!Muse: Owwww…
petites sorcières—Ok, since I do have a grade nine education in French I got 'Why didn't John and Michael go?' and the answer is that they're just too annoying and influence the actual story too much. So I had to write them out.
Girl With The Evil Computer—You hit the nail on the head there. I have such bad writer's block when I get it. I just go blank when I'm writing and can't think of anything. But don't worry, I won't abandon this fiction uncompleted!
inu-youkai 911—Don't you just hate cliff-hangers?