Free Captain James Hook and the Siege of Neverland by Jeremiah Kleckner, Jeremy Marshall Page B

and I sprinted to greet it.  
    I cut through the branches and found Cecco prone on the grass, face up and flushed red.   Around his ankles was a coil of vines that led to an open pod.   Its green skin bloomed pink as it pulled the man closer.   Cecco’s eyes fixed on me and spittle dribbled out of his mouth as he tried to speak.  
    I severed the vine holding my crew mate, and two more sprang out at me.   I stepped on one and sliced the other in the air.   I then cut the one I stepped on and drove my sword into the mouth of the blooming pod.   It seized and pulled back into the trees.  
    I sheathed my sword and dragged Cecco to the grass several yards away.   I laid the man on his side, then ran back to where I heard the other cries.  
    Noodler was bound in the same way.   I cut the vines and readied myself for a counter attack that never came.   I raised my sword to thrust at the pod, but it closed and withdrew before I could strike it.   Once I dragged Noodler to safety, I went back for Smee.  
    The Irishman was prone and bound as well, but as I approached, the vines loosened and slinked away.  
    By the time I gathered the three men together, the feeling started to return in my right arm. I reattached my hook and tightened its straps around the familiar sore ache.   A small part of me missed feeling so numb.  
    The men laid for several minutes as dark clouds gathered in the distance.   I heard running water only yards away and made a decision.   “Stay here,” I told them.   “I’ll return in a moment with water.”
    I passed through the last line of trees and stopped dead.   There, in the clearing beyond the broad leaves and thick vines, a woman bathed in a grotto.   She raised her hands above her head and water streaked down her bare back.   Her long red hair whipped around and she looked at me with coal black eyes.  
    I approached.  
    I walked through the brush and waded into the pond until I was waist deep.   I stopped inches from her and she smiled at me.  
    She dove and took her trance with her.   I shook my head to clear my mind and searched for her in the water.   Laughter came from behind me and I found her with a fair haired woman, watching me from behind a large rock.   They embraced one another and the new woman called to me with her pitch black eyes.
    Again, I obeyed.
    They dove and I found myself neck-deep at the center of the cove.   Something moved below my feet and I treaded water to say afloat.   The two women circled me and cackled.   Their eyes rolled white.   They pinched me.   They pulled at my feet.   They smiled and their teeth arched forward like needles.  
    I flailed my fists and my blades at them.   They splashed me and bit my legs.   They dragged me underwater, but released me after a few moments.   Thick blood rose to the surface of the water around me, ringing me in widening circles.   They dragged me under again, this time for longer.   I kicked and swiped at them as the world darkened around me.
    Then a shriek screeched across the sky and the women disappeared into the red and black water.   I swam for the bank and coughed up blood onto the rocks.  
    “I am sorry about them,” a voice said.   “They should know not to do that with you.”  
    “Oh?” I said.   I turned and saw the same slick black hair and stunning, angled face of the mermaid from the bay.   Her eyes were a rich blue and, although beautiful, didn’t enthrall or terrify me.   “And what makes me so special?”  
    “You’re mine,” she said.  
    “Am I?”
    “Oh yes,” she said.   “All that you are, and, more importantly, all that you were.”
    I coughed more blood onto the beach, then wiped my mouth with the sleeve beneath my hook.  
    “Dear, dear,” the mermaid said.   “You’re just going all to pieces around here aren’t you?”  
    I looked down at my hook and scowled.   The thought reminded me why I came out this way and only then did I realize