𝓒𝓵𝓸𝓼𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓫𝓸𝓸𝓴 (𝓢𝓱𝓪𝓭𝓸𝔀 𝓠𝓾𝓮𝓮𝓷: 𝓑𝓸𝓸𝓴 𝓕𝓸𝓾𝓻)

A Disquiet Betrothal

Laughter, childlike laughter, like jiggling little belles, laughter that forced a smile, laughter that broke even the most fearsome of foes. That was her superpower. Maybe it was a princess thing, maybe it gave you a laugh so sweet that nobody could deny you anything, but he had never heard it from Tiger Lily. Maybe she was too old, maybe you grew out of it. Whatever the reason may be it made sure she was a forced to be reckoned with in the house under the ground.

She was the youngest of all of them even younger than tootles, only two years old, but she knew how to work all of them. "Please Slightly. Please Tootles. Please oh please Peter," that's all it took. A smile, a bat of the eyelashes and a please decorated with a giggle at the end and they would relent all just to hear the jingling little laugh of amusement she let out when she got her way. That's how she ended up sitting on Peters throne carving her own set of pan pipes with her fair Kai on her shoulder. Peter sat next to her on the floor showing her how to hold the dagger, so she didn't cut herself as she carved the wood of a Neverland ghost tree. "Benny will be so jealous," she giggled looking at the half-carved stick.

Peter frowned at the mention of the brother she had once had. Peter had meant to grab him but, in his haste, accidently grabbed the girl. A mistake but a happy one, every day he was grateful that he had taken her instead, she was a joyful and adventurous little thing he couldn't help but love. "You know you could stay her forever, right?"

She looked at him with a tilted head and a scrunched-up nose. "Why would I do that? I have a brother back in Auradon" she didn't remember her parents much, that was a side effect of being on neverland, you forgot adults and she had long since stopped calling the land she had been born in home. But her brother? She couldn't forget him, and it killed Peter that he couldn't take those memories away from her and give her nothing left in Auridon to hold on to so he could keep her here with him forever.

He looked down at his own carving and slashed at it violently, "I don't know, I mean I could be your brother." He glanced up at her to see her blue eyes light up making Peter smile, "I could take you to the pixie dust tree and we could wash away the enchantress magic that's making you age we can stop it and you can stay here forever, for as long as you want."

"Really?"

"Yeah, then you'd never have to worry about grown up things like work, and balls, and laws ever again!"

Brooke bolted up right in bed, clutching the side of her head. She reached over on the nightstand and blindly grabbed for her glasses. She looked at the clock on the far side of the room, 4:30 am. She sighed and looked over at Carlos who was still passed out not noticing the bed jolting from his girlfriend's flashback. She looked to their dog at the foot of the bed in a similar state. She rolled over putting her feet in her slippers and quietly padded out of the room.

This was the fifth time this week that she was woken up by flashbacks of Neverland. She didn't know why, and she didn't know now to stop it. Her head pounded as she made her way through the house. She ended up at her office which ironically had piles of paperwork on top of it, that made her cringe and made her skin crawl. She reached above the door and grabbed a key to the locked drawer.

She unlocked it and pulled out her pan pipes. This set was much too small for her hands now. These were the first ones she carved, and they honestly sounded like a dying cat when she played them without the magic of Neverland coursing through her to make everything sound like a childlike symphony.

She ran her fingers over the rough, bumpy exterior, any sane person would have canned them by now, but that were too precious. The wood was special, the sloppy carving was special, the memories were special everything about them was special. She hummed to herself and leaned back in her chair. Letting the memories wrap around her like a warm blanket, her own personal fortress where nothing could hurt her.