"We've captured him, Pan. What do you want us to do?"

The king sighed and crossed his arms. "As much as I'd love to see you gone, you old crook, it isn't up to me."

Her husband inhaled sharply.

"Captain, this is your decision. What do you say?"

He stared at his father, hunched over on the ground, bound in shackles, glaring straight back at his son.

Placidia took his hand and squeezed it. "It's alright," she told him, hoping it conveyed her trust, her love, her belief in him.

He continued to stare at the shell of a man before them.

"Well, go on, lad," the man spat. "Here's your chance to justify your childhood. You can do whatever you want to me. Get back at me for the years of insults and beatings and hungry nights. Be a man, do it."

Everyone in the court had their eyes on her husband and she could feel his anxiety through his fingertips in hers. She knew he wanted to run, he didn't want to be in this position.

"You don't have to-" she whispered, but he shook his head. He let go of her hand and took a step forward.

"Do you know who I am?" He asked, his voice devoid of emotion.

"Excuse m-"

"Do you know who I am?" It was loud this time, it echoed around even in the absorbing wood of the throne room.

His father frowned for a moment, then smiled pleasantly. "Why, Harry James Rigel Arcturus. Me only son, of course."

"No," and that was a hiss. "Maybe, if ye'd been an actual father, you would know my name. You would know who I am."

"And who would that be, Your Majesty," that was spite.

Placidia's eyes were glued to his face. She watched his jaw clench and his spine straighten.

"My name is Captain Harry Davies. I am prince of Neverland by my marriage to Placidia Pan. And I never had a father. A father doesn't tear into his son's flesh when the boy fails to be cruel enough. A father doesn't let his children starve and leave them in the streets to fend for themselves. A father wouldn't have tried to kill his son's wife and their child.

"James Hook, you were no father to me. And I have never been your son. You have terrorized this island, these people, and my family for the last time. You're to be executed, Hook. Ye're done."

The man on the floor burst out laughing. "There he is! Where was that while I drove you mad, boy? Where was that fire while I carved your place in your back? You only ever had to display your father's traits and I'd've given you food."

He didn't respond then. He nodded to Placidia's father and mother, then he turned to her and took her hand. As they left the throne room, Captain Hook's deranged laughter followed them out.

...

"Harry! Harry, stop!"

It was dark and cold as she called out to him. He was walking - or stalking, more accurately - down the hillside path to the docks. Not long ago, she could have kept up with him easily. Now, with the burden in her arms and on her back, not having run so far in nine long months, she was frustrated and out of breath.

"Harry, you'd better stop walking...or so help me...I will file for divorce!"

Finally - if abruptly - he stopped. His shoulders were hunched, his head bowed down, and he did not turn to face her. She caught up and huffed, furious that she was so out of breath, and concerned for her husband.

She walked slowly in front of him and was reminded of approaching a wild animal. She faced him for a minute, in time to catch her breath, and when still he did not look at her, she took his left hand in her's. "Harry...talk to me."

He still did not speak or even look up from his toes. Placidia sighed and let go of his hand and gently reached up to tilt his chin up. He stubbornly did not meet her eyes. "What are you thinking?" she whispered.

The night was cold - very cold for Neverland which tended to maintain a perfect summer temperature at all times. But the night with wind rolling over the water in calm but icy gusts hit the young couple harshly. It seemed as though trillions of stars glimmered from above, twinkling, and shining, and lighting up the barely moving water.

Placidia took the silence patiently. She used it to study the man before her.

Well, he didn't yet look like a man. They spent their time in and out of Neverland so sporadically that the way the two aged had no relevance to the years that passed. Placidia herself was almost three hundred - a fact she was teased about relentlessly - and Harry was by now twenty-four, but both of them appeared scarcely nineteen.

Harry's brown hair was just as tousled as ever in the wind. His skin was smooth and milky in the starlight. The red Neverland captain's uniform he wore seemed - for the first time to Placidia - entirely too serious for him. Too formal and old and completely not her Harry.

When finally he lifted his blue eyes to meet her gaze, Placidia's breath left her chest. Harry had always been good at disguising his emotions - a trait he'd learned the hard way from the Isle - but she could always read his eyes.

And in that moment, she was swept up in lapiz waves of confusion and anger and sorrow and pain and horror. And her heart ached in sympathy. She used the hand cradling his face to pull him down for a kiss. One gentle and soft and sad. And when they pulled away, Harry did not open his closed eyes. Instead, he took a deep breath, remaining close to her and he whispered against her lips, "I killed him."

It would have been lost in the breeze if she had not been so close to him, his words against her mouth almost as if they were her own. She did not speak - not yet. She would wait for as long as it took for him to tell her. She could stand there for centuries if it took that long for him to manage the words.

"I...killed my father. How am I any bett'r than him?"

Placidia bit her lip to keep back her voice. Tears began to form in her eyes so she closed them and tilted his head so their foreheads rested against each other.

His breaths came fast against her lips and their was anguish in his voice. "What did I do? When C.J. and Harriet find out, they'll come after me. After you.

"But I was afraid, Dia...Afraid of him. Because of...of what he did to me. Selfish," and he shook his head furiously and she gently stroked his cheek with her thumb and brought their faces back together. "An' it doesn't matter what he did, because he was still my father, even if he was a crap father. He was all I had left of Mum. And my sisters...They'll come, Dia. For you, yer parents. For him. For me."

She felt his teeth grind underneath her palm and she worked to untense his jaw.

"'M still scared, Dia," he growled and it could have been dangerous to someone else's ears, but to Placidia, it was wounded. He was mad at himself for the pain his family had caused him. "I...I have to leave. Gotta get away from him, from them, get them all away from you. I'm leavn' t'night. Now, right now…"

But he did not move and his words were thick with his mother's accent and Placidia felt a tear sneak past her fingers. She kissed him again and it was then that he choked a sob into her lips and she quickly pulled his head down to her shoulder, wrapping her arm securely around his neck as he desperately clung to her waist. She gently combed her fingers through his hair and said softly, "It's okay to be scared. It's okay to be hurt. It's okay to still love him. It's okay."

And he cried into her shoulder while she whispered comforting words into his ear. Time did not pass - and it was not only magic of Neverland. The stars continued to twinkle, the wind continued to blow, the water continued to lap soothingly at the wood of the dock.

When finally Harry was only sniffling, his face buried in Placidia's hair, a coo came from the bundle in Placidia's right arm, in between her's and Harry's chests. Harry pulled back a little and smiled slightly despite the red of his eyes and the tear tracks down his cheeks. "Not patient, that one," he said in a quiet voice rasped from crying.

"Like his father," Placidia whispered back, smiling herself as she looked down at the tiny face bundled in blankets in her arms. The baby cooed again and squirmed in his cloth prison, his lapiz blue eyes staring up at their faces.

"Poppycock," Harry muttered. "He gets it from his mum."

"I'm only letting you have that tonight."

Harry huffed a short laugh. "I'll revel in it."

They watched the boy for a minute before the baby began to make more noise and squirm more. Impulsively, Placidia's arm slipped from around her husband's neck to cradle her baby more comfortably. "What do you think he wants?"

Harry hummed and glanced up at the sky. He grinned as he looked back at Placidia. "If he's any son of mine, he wants the stars."

Harry straightened up and backed away just an inch to make the baby's view of the sky more clear. The stars reflected in the boy's wide eyes and he giggled in delight. Placidia smiled along with her son and together, the little family of three stared up at the stars. Harry pulled Placidia to his side and held her tight around her waist.

Placidia rested her head on his chest and cradled the baby between them.

"Sing for him," she said softly after a time while their boy cooed happily in her arms.

"What?"

Placidia chuckled. "He needs to know his father," she said. "Remember? These stars can be his reminder of you. Sing."

"Dia, I told you before, all I know are-"

"I know," Placidia interrupted. "Your father's sea shanties. Sing one. They can't all be curses."

She felt Harry's uncertain gaze on her face, but she glued her eyes to the stars. Her husband sighed. There was still another minute of silence, before in quiet, cautious tones, he sang.

"Ohh, a pirate's life is a wonderful life

A-rovin over the sea

Give me a career as a buccaneer

It's the life of a pirate for me

Ohh, the life of a pirate for me

Ohh, A pirate's life is a wonderful life

They never bury your bones

For when it's all over

A jolly sea rover drops in on his friend Davy Jones

Ohh, his very good friend Davy Jones."

Placidia had only heard Harry sing a small handful of times. And every time - this one being no exception - she was calmed and warmed by the Scottish lilt of his tenor voice. It was as if his voice was made for singing and she always wished he would sing to her more.

The tune was a happy one, but the way that her husband sang at while staring wistfully up at the stars made it somber and sad.

"Ohh, a pirate's life is a wonderful life

You'll find adventure and sport

But live every minute

For all that is in it

The life of a pirate is short

Ohh, the life of a pirate is short.

Ohh, a pirate's life is a wonderful life

But not forever they say

When your neck's in a" Harry stopped suddenly and shook his head, tearing his gaze from the sky.

"What is it?" Placidia asked him, pulling her eyes to meet his.

"The next lines," he mumbled. "Forgot 'em."

Placidia studied his face, so suddenly depressed again. "What are they?"

Harry looked directly at her then and his eyes did not leave hers' as he whispered more than sang,

"Ohh, a pirate's life is a wonderful life

But not forever they say

When your neck's in a noose and you can't get loose

For the life of a pirate you'll pay

Ohh, for the life of a pirate you'll pay."

Placidia watched him and he watched her and their contest was broken by another coo from between them. Placidia glanced down out of habit and she felt Harry's eyes remain on her. Finally, he moved his hand to brush over the baby's cheek and the tiny boy yawned and his wide eyes were drooping.

"I have to leave," Harry said quietly.

Placidia smiled a little as she watched their son fight against sleep. "Maybe," she replied. "But we're coming with you."

"What? Dia, that isn't-"

"Harry, look at me." And he did. "There is no where you could go where I wouldn't want to follow. There is no trouble you could be in that I wouldn't want to help you. There is no pain you can suffer that I'd not suffer with you - for you," Placidia shook her head when he opened his mouth to speak. "I know you can't stay here, but I - we won't stay here without you."

Harry sighed. "Placidia, I can't always protect ye out there. Yer father can keep you safe here. I'll go take care'a my sisters."

Placidia smiled sweetly at him, a mischievous glimmer in her eyes. "You think you can do that without a sword?" She used her left arm to pull back her coat, revealing the decorated hilt of Harry's sword. "Or, a hook?" His father's hook was on her belt. "Without clothes, food, supplies, a crew-" And she displayed the enchanted bag on her back. "And most importantly…" She pulled is head back down so their noses brushed. "You think you can do anything without your wife? My dear, handsome, pirate," she whispered against his lips. "You are mistaken."

"Dia-" he tried, but she could hear the distraction in his voice. She kissed him then, smugly this time, because she knew she had won.

When they pulled away this time, Harry glared at her half-heartedly. "Yer ultimately gonna be my demise, luv," he snarled at her without venom.

Placidia grinned at him. She loved when he narrowed his eyes and clenched his jaw and scowled at her. It reminded her oh-so-much of the boy she met on the Isle what seemed like oh-so-long ago, yet yesterday at the same time. She loved it because it reminded her that he had not changed himself for her - like many princes her father had presented had done to win the fairy girl's power and pixie dust and gold. He had always been himself. Perhaps now, he was no longer a villain - despite his insistence otherwise - and the insanity Captain Hook had driven him into was no longer there. But Harry was still Harry. Her Harry.

She laughed at him. And in her arms, the baby fussed as if to say he was trying to sleep.

Harry sighed and pulled the bag from Placidia's shoulders and threw it over his own, then swung his arm around Placidia's waist.

"You know," she said quietly as she gently rocked their son back to sleep and they boarded Harry's ship, The Salvation. "Baby still needs his name."

Harry froze and Placidia briefly studied his face. He bit his lip almost nervously as he slowly said, "What about the name of a star?"

"Not Betelgeus," Placidia said.

"No, no...Of course not, I…"

"I was kidding, rascal. What do you have in mind?" Placidia amended calmly.

Harry glanced at her sheepishly - a terribly ill-fitting look on his features. "Regulus. Means 'little king'. Brightest star in the Leo constellation-" he rambled.

Placidia forced her fingers against his lips to stop him. She glanced down at their son and furrowed her brow for a second. Then she smiled. "Regulus Percival Davies," she said and looked back up at her husband with glittering eyes. "Harry," she praised softly. "It's perfect."

"Really? Kid sounds like somethin' from a thousand years ago…" Harry muttered. Placidia swatted him lightly on the cheek,

"Regulus," she told him. "I like it."

After a moment, Harry grinned too and they continued onto the ship.

It was late in the night - or very, very early in the morning - when Placidia was finally able to get Regulus to sleep again. He'd only slept for an hour after she'd laid him down for the first time in the cradle in the corner of the captain's quarters of Harry's ship.

Ultimately, they'd decided to sleep on the ship, send a message to her parents in the morning about their journey, and set sail by magic before noon.

Placidia yawned and her limbs felt dead as she fumbled around for the bed. When finally she found it and pulled the covers back, she near collapsed into Harry's waiting arms and he re-covered them both and pulled her close to him.

She was almost asleep again when she felt the humming on her temple.

"Ohh, a pirate's life is a wonderful life

You pledge your life to the sea

But ain't nothin' finer

Than when you're beside her

For ain't nothin' that's better than she

Ohh, ain't nothin' that's better than she."


Author's Note: This is the last one! Nothin's mine but Placidia, Regulus, and the last verse of the song. If you listen to the whole song, it's really dark and terrible. But somehow, that makes this chapter even better, I think.

Let me know what you think of this story and if you want to see more of Harry, Dia, and Regulus! Thank you so much for reading, have a great day!