Straight On Till Morning (Disney Twisted Tales) - Liz Braswell Page 0,25

world will make room for who you are and what you want.…And then you find the world of adults is even more limiting than the world of children. With no room for adventure, much less yer own thoughts.”

Wendy regarded the pirate curiously. This was the most thoughtful, intelligent thing she had heard on the ship so far.

He laughed quietly at the look on her face. “I’ll get ye out,” he promised.

“Really?” Wendy asked, surprised out of her usual politeness. “But…why?”

“Because some of us always have to escape, to hide in plain sight, to fight with the world to get the adventure we deserve. Ye’d think a pirate would be the freest person in the world, wouldn’t you? But even here there are other people’s rules to follow. And men don’t like what’s different—at least not at first, now do they?”

“No, I suppose not,” Wendy said thoughtfully. She wasn’t entirely sure what he was driving at. Maybe he didn’t want to be a pirate? Maybe he wanted to be something else altogether. What if she and the boys, just by imagining it, had cast him in the roll of buccaneer forever? What if he wanted to be a shepherd, or even a banker? The poignancy of his words struck her heart.

“I might be trapped in the part I play…and maybe it’s because o’ that, but I can’t stand to see others what are constrained against their will, too. And maybe it’ll be a good deed what goes against my own litany of skullduggery.

“But enough o’ ruminatin’. The captain’s involved in that shadow nonsense and the crew is getting restless. He’s promised we’re soon back to our villainous ways, so when the tide turns on the morrow we’ll be off—or there’ll be mutiny, mark my words. You’ll have to get out tonight, just before dawn.”

“I can’t swim,” Wendy said, looking doubtfully at the water below. “At least, not very well.”

“There’s a one-man dinghy for repairs and whatnot I’ll toss over the side. But you’ll have to slide down the rope to it, and I don’t think I could spare more’n one paddle without raising suspicion. If you care enough about your freedom, you’ll figure out how to use it right.”

“I feel like that is some sort of metaphor you could apply to your own life, sir.”

The pirate laughed again, and not at all like a villain.

“Just make sure you’re up before the Southern Cross fades from view, and meet me stern side.”

“Not that I am not greatly appreciative of all of this,” Wendy said politely, “but what is to keep Hook from turning around to look for me? Even if I manage to figure out how to row with one paddle, I daresay it’s unlikely I could be on the beach outrunning a crew of angry pirates bereft of their…mother.”

Zane gave a thin smile. “Oh, don’t you worry about that, love. I’ll just say, ‘What’s that? Anyone hear the tickings of a clock?’ And Hook will have us speeding out of here like that old dead croc is on his pants. Or he’ll say it’s the croc—but between you and me, I think it’s just the sound of time passing that puts the fear of the devil into him. I think he knows somewhere in that musty head of his that his old companion is long gone.

“Anyway, our beloved captain is mostly engaged in other pursuits. You’re a pretty thing, and useful, but a thin detail in the calamitous fable of our captain’s life. He’s after bigger prey.”

“Bigger prey?”

“Ain’t it obvious? His using the shadow to somehow find and get Peter Pan. Thought we were done with that nonsense years ago,” Zane said, sighing.

“But what about his first mate, Mr. Smee? It sounds like he’s very loyal to Captain Hook. Won’t he see through your ruse and try to persuade Hook to chase me?”

At this the pirate just laughed and kept laughing, wandering away and slapping his knee. It wasn’t pleasant laughter, and despite the rescue she was being offered, it left Wendy uneasy.

To stay up, she tried a trick she’d read about in a book: she drank several pints of (tar-scented) water just before bedtime.

(This was hard to keep from the pirates, who drank nothing before bed besides their grog ration and whatever flasks they had hidden.)

The crew had made her a private “bedroom” belowdecks among the ship’s stores, and to their credit, they hung there a very nice hammock and covered it with whatever they had that passed for cushions.