Lost Girl || Complete

Chapter 18: Tinkerbell

    “Hey! Wake up! C’mon, what’s it take to get you people up?” 

    The voice grew closer as I came to my senses. Once the blinding light had died down, I distinguished the small figure leaned over me. It was a girl, blonde, slightly older than me, with hair piled in a messy bun on her head. 

    “It’s about time, Sleeping Beauty,” she said sarcastically. 

    I sat up and rubbed the back of my head. Before I could say anything, she walked away and stirred the embers of a fire crackling in the center of the room. 

    The round structure was small and scattered with marks on its red clay walls. A few pieces of furniture, blankets, pots, and other supplies lay about on the floor or piled in neat “corners.” The girl who kneeled, stoking the fire, seemed very stoick despite her small build; dressed in green rags and boots, it was already clear that the wilderness had hardened her. 

    Suddenly panicking at what I didn't remember, I searched frantically for any weapon or clue as to a threat. Seeing none, however, I relaxed and went back to my pounding headache.

    “Yeah, sorry about that,” she said, noting how I rubbed my neck. “You can’t be too careful around here.”

    For the first time, I noticed she too British accent. “And who are you?” 

    “The name’s Tinkerbell,” she said. “But my friends call me Tink.”

    Tinkerbell… “Wait,” I said as it came together, “You’re… you’re a fairy.” 

    She stared at the fire, lost in thought. “Once,” she said softly. She reached up and rubbed her shoulders, right across from where her wings should be. 

    Feeling the tension, I moved on to ask, “Why did you bring me here?” 

    “Well, it’s not everyday that people come wandering the cliffs,” she stated firmly. “And with your hood pulled up you don't look that different from a Lost Boy, which is a chance I can't take.” 

    “You know the Lost Boys?” I asked. 

    Tink flashed a cynical smile. “Oh yes, quite well." Point to my bag, she asked, "And you. What business do you have with them?” 

    How'd she know? Looking where she pointed, I noticed an embroidered symbol on my bag - a small, dark ‘X’.

    “It means it’s the property of Pan,” she explained.

    How did I not notice that before? Slight worry overcame my thoughts as I wondered how long I’d been labeling myself as the “property of Pan” without knowing it. 

    “So what business have you got with ‘em?”

    “Oh, um…” Where to start? “I was captured by them a few weeks ago. Been on the island ever since.” 

    Tink shot up and walked over to me with her green eyes wide. “You came from Pan’s camp?” 

    “Uh, yes,” I stumbled out. What’s with the shock? 

    She gasped and looked at me with new excitement. “How did you escape?” 

    “Um, I set out this morning and slipped past the scouts,” I said, still confused. “Pan let me go.” 

    All the new life life drained from her eyes. She slumped down again and asked quieter, “Pan let you go?” 

    “Yeah.” 

    The discouraged fairy walked back to the fire and sat cross-legged in front of it. “Then it’s all part of his plan.”

    “His plan?” I asked, approaching the fire also. 

    “I would’ve thought by now you’d have learned,” she said almost frustratedly. “It’s all a game to him; Pan controls every piece of this island like pawns on a board. If you made it past him, it’s ‘cause he let you walk out. Pan never fails.” 

    I was taken aback at her bold accusations. A small part of me, though, knew she wasn’t wrong, no matter how much I wanted to deny it. 

    I suddenly felt Tinkerbell’s eyes examine me with a scoff. “Oh my stars,” she said laughingly. “You have feelings for him.” 

    I looked up at her in shock. “What? No, of course not!” 

    “Mhm,” she smirked in disbelief. “You think his boyish ways are charming, that his ferocity is intriguing, and his eyes and voice could melt you from the inside out." 

    I sat like a guilty criminal whose charges had just been read. "That… how did you know all that?" 

    She snickered. "Oh, I've seen it all before. Haunting, isn't it?" Her iron prongs set to stoking the fire once more. 

    "It sounds like the voice of experience." 

    The stoking ceased. Now she looks like the guilty one, I thought. 

    "It's uh… not…" 

    I'd had my suspicions, but it wasn't until she averted my gaze that I truly understood. "You cared for him," I realized. 

    She chuckled and shook her head. “It was a long time ago,” she said softly. “We were friends back then, believe it or not - I can hardly believe it myself sometimes - and very close. In fact, I was his right-hand man; we went into every battle together, fought against pirates, relished in our victory with the boys… It was quite the time on Neverland.” Her voice grew somber. “Then everything changed.” 

    I patiently waited for her to continue. After a moment, she recollected herself and resumed the history. 

    “The Pixie Dust on Neverland started fading. The hills ran dry, so the boys could no longer mine it out themselves. They all relied on the fairies to produce it. 

    “At the same time, Pan started changing… Something switched, and he wasn’t himself anymore. He demanded more and more of the fairies, insisting he needed more dust in his fight against the pirates, with whom he grew even fiercer. I’d never seen him like that before.” She looked in my eyes, stressing the severity of it all. “He wasn’t the same playful boy I’d known. We fought over and over, each time getting worse… until finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. I left the camp and him behind, fleeing to the mountains. But the Lost Boys soon started hunting fairies as well - who were refusing to aid Pan in his fight - driving us farther and farther back… until none of us were left.” 

    I stared in astonishment at her recollection. How could someone do that?

    “I’ve seen him once or twice in the years since,” she continued. “We even spoke once. He invited me to join him as his right-hand again, but I refused.” Smiling slightly, she added, “Felix doesn’t know that.” 

    I laughed, envisioning the commander turning red at the news that his position had been offered to another. 

    “I couldn’t go back; not after what he’d done,” Tink said softly. “It was the hardest thing I’d ever had to do… But I told him no. Three days later, the fairies had grown so scarce that the very belief in us started to fade.” She pointed sadly to her shoulder blades. “And with that belief went my wings.” 

    Despite her efforts to brush past the subject, I stared in sympathy. It clearly broke her heart.

    “So I’ve been on the run ever since. Finally, I found myself in the cliffs, farther than the Lost Boys have ever gone. This is where I’m safest.”

    I looked around at the markings on her home. Some were etched in chalk, others with clay, others carved in the wall with a blade. 

    “Are these the number of days you’ve been here?”

    “No,” she said, reaching up to touch one tenderly. “They’re the number of Pan’s fairy kills."