Never Never

Serena Valentino

Title Page

Copyright

All rights reserved. Published by Disney • Hyperion, an imprint of Buena Vista Books, Inc. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. For information address Disney • Hyperion, 77 West 66th Street, New York, New York 10023.

First Edition, July 2022

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022931027

ISBN 978-1-368-08213-6

Dedication

Dedicated to my lovely readers for their unwavering love, support, and enthusiasm for this series. I love and appreciate you more than you could possibly imagine. Thank you.

Prologue

Captain James Hook

Captain James Hook would like it known he is the bravest man to ever hoist a pirate flag. We know the truth, however. We see clearly into the changeable hearts of men, and we write their stories. We are the Odd Sisters; powerful witches, the creators of fates, and the authors of this Book of Fairy Tales. If you’re reading our stories in the order we have preordained, then you will remember we are in the Place Between—the place between the land of the living and the land beyond the veil. Though much time has passed since our daughter Circe sacrificed herself to save the Many Kingdoms, we still find ourselves trapped in this place, with only one of our magic mirrors to show us what is happening in the outside world. Not that we need it—these stories are etched on our souls, for we have written them, and we have found ways to make our influence felt in the Many Kingdoms, and in the outside realms. But enough of our tale for now. This is Captain James Hook’s story.

James wasn’t always the man he is today, constantly thwarted by the Lost Boys, outsmarted by their impish leader Peter Pan, or besieged by a deep and abiding fear of a menacing crocodile with a clock ticking away in its belly. As hard as it may be to fathom, there was a time when James was a very brave soul, and one of the most feared and respected pirates to sail the Seven Seas. Those stories however have been eclipsed by his misadventures in Never Land, by his reputation for being a cowardly “grown-up.” Our story focuses on what happened before James made his way to Never Land, because you already know what happens once he got there. The adventures of Peter Pan and his nemesis Captain Hook are widely known, but what you don’t know is how James became Captain Hook, and how it was he came upon that name.

James wasn’t born to pirate life. He was raised in London, a rather mundane non-magical realm where he was son to a grand lord and lady, well before the time of Lady Tremaine and Cruella de Vil, but not so dissimilar from their own upbringings. You will notice that the last three entries in this Book of Fairy Tales have worked their way back in time rather than moving forward, but as you will soon learn, time means nothing in the magical realms, and even less so to those who rule the lands where the magic is as dense as the Dead Woods in the Many Kingdoms.

As with most children in aristocratic households, James’s daily care was left in the hands of a nurse, a nanny who attended to the child’s every need. On one of their daily strolls in the park, James’s nurse found her attentions diverted from her charge, and returned to find James had disappeared from his pram (or stroller, depending where in the world you are reading this).

As you can imagine, James’s disappearance sent panic into the hearts of his family. Little James was missing for six days. For his parents, it was six gut-wrenching days. But by all accounts they were the most glorious six days of James’s entire life, and have remained so to this day.

In all our time chronicling fairy tales in this book, one of the most delightful things we’ve learned about London is that for a non-magical realm, it is often touched by other worlds’ magic. For instance, when a boy falls out of his pram in London, he is transported to a place called Never Land. If the child is not claimed by his parents within seven days, that is where he will stay, and thereafter be known as a Lost Boy.

It makes sense to us, for who else would be the caretakers for young boys? Certainly not the high fairies of the Fairylands, whose attentions are devoted almost entirely to young girls (all but the Blue Fairy, but she is the exception in more ways than this), and we witches don’t have time for the likes of grubby little boys. We suppose that is why the Fairy Council sent one of their unruly fairies, a tinker fairy by the name of Tinker Bell, to care for the boys in Never Land. Two birds with one stone, as they say: the Fairy Council has someone care for the little troublemakers who refuse to grow up and they rid themselves of a fairy whom the Fairy Godmother and Three Good Fairies did not approve of. This is not unusual in the Fairylands, as you may have read or will read in this tome should you decide to explore it. But we will waste no more time on the likes of the Fairy Godmother and her ilk here. Instead we will focus on James, and his quest to find Never Land.

To us, Never Land was a trifling place, filled with ill-tempered and foolhardy young boys who wish never to grow up—and somehow never do. That seemed to be the extent of the magic there as far as we knew, aside from Tinker Bell’s magic fairy dust, so it didn’t bother us that we were forbidden by the Fairy Council to travel there. But when James started to get our attention, our gaze shifted upward to the second star to the right, and straight on till morning.

As you can imagine, a place such as Never Land appealed to young James.

When he fell out of his pram in London, he spent six days in Never Land. It was a place of high adventure, where he ran around in animal skins and got up to all sorts of tomfoolery with the Lost Boys. It was far more appealing than his life in London with his stuffy nurse. He would have stayed there happily for the rest of his days, but unfortunately, on the sixth day, his parents found him and brought him home. If he had remained missing just one day longer, Never Land would have claimed him, and he would have remained a Lost Boy forever. But his destiny was to grow up.

James would never get over leaving Never Land behind. Visions of the life and the adventures he could have had stayed with him, haunting him to the point of obsession into adulthood. He made it his life’s quest to return to Never Land, and he never gave up on his search.

As he grew older James made it his mission to learn everything he could about Never Land and how to find it again, but the secrets of Never Land were always out of reach. He found nothing but rumors that sounded like children’s stories, chronicling the adventures of Peter Pan—adventures James felt should have been his own, and that had been stolen unjustly from him when he was found and brought home. And just as he was about to lose hope of ever finding Never Land again, like magic James found stories of pirates sitting on the shelves of his father’s library. He was intrigued by these dastardly pirates who were said to sail to mysterious and magical lands. He found himself enamored of these tales of the brave seafaring men and women who traveled the high seas looking for treasure and having adventures, in his world and beyond.

Of course this wouldn’t do for James’s parents, who raised him to be a proper young gentleman. He was sent to the finest schools, first Eton and then Balliol College, Oxford, and upon graduation he was expected to find a wealthy young woman to marry. Like so many titled families, James’s parents were burdened with the upkeep of a large estate and grounds without the money to do so. Of course they wouldn’t stoop to working, so their only option was finding the daughter of a wealthy family so they might save the family estate. But James had other plans in mind. He was going to become a pirate.

James read every book he could get his hands on about pirates and their ships, and made it his mission to be able to impress the most seasoned of pirates with his extensive knowledge of cartography, navigation, ship rigging, artillery, and order of accession in the ranks, and of course he became acquainted with their skullduggerous and dastardly ways through the stories of their exploits and adventures. His time at Eton and Balliol College proved helpful in his research. He had read everything in his father’s library when he was quite young, and was happy to have a whole new world of books at his disposal in the vast and expansive libraries while away at school. But there was something else his education and obsessive reading did for James that he did not expect. He became an excellent storyteller, and found that he could speak with authority on almost any subject, as he was able to substantiate his opinions with the facts he easily remembered from the numerous books he had devoured over the years. In other words, he was a good talker, which was one of his greatest sources of pride. The more James read about pirates, the more he became convinced that if anyone could help him find Never Land it would be a pirate. He could think of no one else who had seen more of the world, or met more interesting people. What James didn’t expect is that his adventures would eventually bring him to the Many Kingdoms, a truly magical place unlike any other. But we are getting ahead of ourselves.

James’s true adventure started on the evening of his graduation from Balliol College. His family shouldn’t have been surprised when their butler brought them the farewell letter James had left for them in his bedroom near a stack of pirating books that evening, but they were nevertheless shocked and horrified. Who wasn’t surprised however was their butler, because it was he who had truly known James’s heart since he was a young lad.

When James’s father read the letter aloud, James’s mother all but fainted, and then, in true aristocratic fashion, she took to her room for several weeks afterward, heartbroken that her only son could bring such shame upon his family.

Dearest Mama and Papa,

Today I embark on my true calling. By the time you read this I will hopefully be well on my way to fulfilling my dream, testing my mettle against treacherous seas, and even more dangerous enemies, while searching for the ever elusive Never Land, where I feel I truly belong. I fight a battle within my heart that keeps me from resenting you for claiming me before I would become a Lost Boy. I remind myself you only did so out of love for me, but I cannot bring myself to live the life you have planned. Please know that I have not forsaken you, and I do not shirk my duties to our family. I have found a way to live the life I want while fulfilling my duties to you. I am to be a pirate. Rest assured I shall send you my plunder as I search the seas in my quest to find Never Land.

Yours faithfully,

James

Chapter I

James couldn’t have looked more out of place when he walked into the Crusty Toad, an infamous establishment in the worst part of London, where pirates were known to frequent. It was a shabby place, with filthy, oil-stained wood floors and tables, dimly lit, and filled with the roughest men James had ever laid eyes on. All of his reading couldn’t have prepared him for the likes of men he encountered that evening. It had, however, prepared him for how to dress and speak properly while in the company of pirates, and he was rather pleased he had gone to the trouble of outfitting himself properly and learning their jargon. He was pleased he had taken the time to research the correct livery to serve on a pirate ship, and made it his business to acquire it at a little shop on Eaton Square with all manner of intriguing items with interesting tales, including the dashing black pirate coat he was wearing that evening. All of the men assembled were rather rough looking, with clothes that were worn down from wear and battle. James felt he stuck out in his brand-new livery, and though he went to great lengths not to pick out the fanciest of the coats he had spied in the shop, he still managed to look much more finely dressed than the other men there. There were a couple of pirates in particular who looked well-seasoned and nastier than the rest, who seemed to take an interest in James when he walked into the Crusty Toad—a bushy bearded pirate with dark hair, and a ginger-haired scallywag with a fresh, gruesome-looking wound on his face. James didn’t let his gaze linger long on the dastardly-looking men, for fear of offending them. Instead, he focused his gaze straight ahead. He took a deep breath as he was met by jeering laughs while walking past the pirates, likely due to his pristine and newly acquired white pirate shirt, long black belted frock coat with bright silver buttons, and shiny black pirate boots he had only just procured earlier that week.

James was reminded again of the little shop on Eaton Square with all manner of curiosities that had piqued his interest, but he had been there to buy a proper pirate’s outfit and he was rather pleased with his purchase. He had almost bought a red belted frock coat with gold trim, but he resisted trying it on because he knew if he saw himself in it he would buy the thing, and he knew the moment he saw the coat it was something fit for a captain. Maybe one day when he had worked his way up in the ranks and become a captain he would return for it, but for the meantime, he told himself he was pleased with his outfit. He was proud of it, really—that is, he was until all the pirates in the Crusty Toad looked at him as if he was an interloper, or some sort of impostor. Never mind, he thought. Perhaps they were simply jealous he had outfitted himself so well.

James took a seat in a dark corner, laying his small sack of belongings beside him on the wooden bench, and pulled out a book to read from his sack. He hesitated before putting it down, seeing, even in the dim candlelight, that the wooden table was greasy. He took out his handkerchief and put it on the table so the grime wouldn’t sully his beloved book. Just as he opened his book, an older woman with long wild gray hair approached him. She was wearing a blue dress cinched tightly with a green bodice that was heavily soiled and stained for lack of wearing an apron.

“What can I get you, guv’nah?” her voice croaked, and James wondered if this was the establishment’s namesake, because to James she looked and sounded like a crusty toad.

“What do you recommend?” he asked, causing the old woman’s croaky laugh to fill the room.

“You are a precious one, aren’t you, dear? Are you sure you’re in the right place?” she asked, appearing rather amused, and glancing back at the pirates across the room who were laughing and looking in James’s direction.

“I am quite sure,” he said with a saucy smirk, hoping the pirates heard him.

“The likes of these men don’t appreciate being mocked, especially by those who believe themselves to be their betters,” she said, leaning in rather too close and making James uncomfortable. He tried to back away from her, almost toppling off the bench, which made the wild-haired woman and the pirates laugh again. The sound of their raspy and rough laughs sent a chill through him, but he straightened up and spoke with authority.

The Story Continues on BooksBarbecue!

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