Chapter Twenty-One: Bradley Endless
1537 Words
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
BRADLEY ENDLESS
It had been years since I had seen the Pirate. Hook and I had a complicated history, to say the least. And he hadn’t always been Hook. Once upon a time, he’d been Captain Jack Barrie, a young man from the British Royal Navy who had gotten lost on a mysterious island called Neverland, located in the heart of the Summer Courts ocean. Hook had only been able to get out only by making a bargain with the Summer Court Lord, Solis.
Hook agreed to steal children from earth. Human children, and their innocent believe in faerie, the myth that it was a good, wonderful, place, kept faerie alive. He’d steal into their houses in the middle of the night and take them.
When Emma had been thirteen, and I was seventeen, Hook had tried to take her at Oberon’s request. Oberon had grown tired of waiting, and he wanted Emma for himself. He thought she’d adjust better to being Queen if she grew up there.
I remembered the night that Hook tried to take her well. I’d been up reading and had heard my sisters startled cries. Instantly, I’d dropped the book, grabbed the sword I kept by my bed, and ran. It wasn’t the first, nor the last time Oberon had sent someone to try to take her away. Each of us, Louisa and Clark both, kept weapons in our room.
Emma was too young to keep anything in there, but she did have wards placed by The First Witch. It kept faeries out. But Hook wasn’t a faerie. Hook was a sailor, turned pirate, and human trafficker.
Louisa, at nineteen, had crossed paths with Hook many times and loathed the man. Although, there did seem to be a strange spark between them, one that unnerved me every time they met.
Hook always called her “lass” and Louisa always swore she’d kill him.
Emma’s screams filled the house, and it wasn’t long before I was joined by my other siblings. Louisa had her magic staff, gifted to her by the first witch, and looked pissed. Clark had a sword too, and at fifteen, Clark hadn’t been any less infatuated with my sister. So of course, the redheaded boy looked livid.
He ran on ahead of us, reaching Emma’s room first. “Let her go, you f*****g bastard!’
We heard Hooks cruel laugh as we entered the room. From what we heard, Hook had traded his soul to The First Witch for immortality. He had nearly drowned as a young, cabin boy and the incident had left him shaken. When he had found out about faerie, immortality had been one of the first things he sought out at any cost.
Hook didn’t age. He looked eternally twenty-one, with Caribbean Sea blue eyes, and long, dark hair. He was always dressed as if he were a member of Louis the Fourteenths court. Very French, very Versailles, despite being English. Despite all this, he had an Errol Flynn adventurer air about him.
But he had a scar on his hands, and chest from sword fighting which were always shown off in the low cut, white, billowy shirts that he wore. The scars, and the anger in his eyes, gave him a menacing look.
“What are you going to do about it, boy?” Hook challenged.
He had Emma’s arms pinned behind her back. Emma struggled. She was in nothing but an old, Harry Potter t-shirt too, to top it all off, which kept on rising every time that she moved.
“I’ll challenge you,” Clark snarled, “to a duel. If I win, you let Emma go.”
“No!” Emma cried out. “Clark, don’t. He’ll kill you. You know that he will.”
“Let her go, Hook!” Louisa demanded.
The pirate’s eyes turned on her. Hook grinned, like a shark who had just caught his prey. “Ah, gatekeeper. Pleasure to see you again as always, Lass. You know, for you, I’d drop this, if you were to take me up on my offer. We could be partners, you and me. Imagine the profit we’d make if the two of us teamed up.”
Louisa scowled, and stepped forward. “Or, you let my sister go, and I promise, not to cut off the precious hand you claim has so much…. skill.”
Hook laughed cruelly. “Oh, you wouldn’t do that, lass. We all know that my hands are one of your favorite parts of me.”
“Try me,” she challenged.
“Already have,” he replied, with a wicked grin, and he made his way to the door, as if to leave.
There was the sound of metal piercing through wood, and to my amazement Clark had tossed his sword into the wall. It landed, inches away from Hooks face. “Put. Her. Down,” Clark demanded.
Emma stared at him, wide-eyed, completely memorized by our adopted brothers’ sudden action. “Clark…” she whispered. “Please don’t. It’s not worth it. It’s easier if I just go.”
“No,” he said, “I don’t care where you are, or who you’re with, if you ever need to be rescued Emma, it will be me that does it. I swear it.”
She blushed, and Hook tightened his grip on her.
“You don’t know what you’re doing, boy,” Hook said, “you challenge me, you challenge the faerie king. You shouldn’t be even looking at this girl. She’s his future Queen.”
“Let her go,” Louisa demanded, “let her go, and I’ll give you immunity. I…. I won’t work with you, but I won’t interfere with you coming or going.”
Hook grinned. “You’ll mark me then?”
“Yes,” said Louisa, somberly, “yes, I’ll mark you.”
“That, I can work with. It’s your lucky day, your majesty. You get a free pass.” He let Emma go, and she ran immediately to Clarks arms.
“Come on,” he offered, “you can stay with me tonight.”
They left the room, leaving only Louisa, Hook and me.
“Come here,” Louisa said coldly.
Hook walked towards her, a smirk on her face. He pulled off the blue and gold jacket he wore, then pulled up his white, billowy shirt, revealing his scarred wrist. He held it out, his eyes roaming her body the entire time, as if this were the most erotic of experiences for him.
She held out her staff, and it glowed blue as she put her gatekeeper mark on him. It burned a little and would have made the average person hiss out in pain. But Hook had never been average.
Louisa’s mark was an intricate LE, complete with faerie wings on either side. “There. You’re under my protection. No one will stop you from going in or going out. Even me.”
“Always a pleasure, lass. But mark my words. One way or another, Oberon will get that girl, and I’ll be back to collect the little treasure.”
“Not until the right time,” Louisa said, “she as until she’s eighteen, and not a moment sooner. She’s no faerie Queen yet.”
Hook winked at her, then went to Emma’s opened window, jumping out it without so much as a scream or a thump. He had vanished, as if he had never came in the first place.
“f*****g prick,” I muttered.
“f*****g pirate,” Louisa hissed, “c’mon, lets go make sure Emma’s okay.”
We’d left the room. It wasn’t the first time, nor the last time that I would see Hook. We had a history, he and I. Which was why the pirate was now in limbo, holding a sword to my throat.
“Dragon,” Hook hissed, “we’ve got unfinished business, you and I.”
“Great,” I said with a false grin, “let’s leave it that way, shall we? More romantic, hmmm?”
“I’m hardly a romantic,” Hook snarled, “I want what’s mine, and you’re going to help me get it.”
I laughed nervously. “Hook, Captain, I think you’re a bit deluded. I’ve never taken anything of yours.”
“My hand, boy,” he said, “my f*****g hand.”
I winced. “Oh. That.”
“Yes,” he hissed, “that.”
- Writer
