The path and the cave and the monster at the heart of the island. Of course, where else would her brave, curious daughter go? Her heart trips, hard, but there’s a kind of excitement in Wendy as well. If she goes to the cave, Peter will find her there. She thinks of the way the ground shivered, and the black smoke over the center of the island. Some part of him must already know she’s here.

The hunger Wendy saw in Tiger Lily’s eyes is inside her too, a gnawing ache replacing the hollow where Peter once took the memory of the truth from her. She wants him to find her, she wants to face him. For everything Peter took from her, from Tiger Lily, for everything he might try to take from Jane, Wendy wants to take something from him too. No. Everything. She wants to take everything.

“Tell me where the path is,” Wendy says. The words come out more harshly than she intended.

“I’m going with you.” Tiger Lily touches Wendy’s wrist, startling her.

“But…” Wendy hesitates. She wants her friend with her, but she can’t help thinking of the mermaids in the lagoon, turned to bone because Peter looked away too long. She can’t help seeing the ghost of the girl Tiger Lily used to be, tucked inside what Peter has made of her.

“It’s my risk to take.” There’s an edge to Tiger Lily’s voice, and a hardness in her eyes.

Wendy looks down, away, heat flushing her cheeks. She has no right to presume to be Tiger Lily’s protector, or tell her where she can and cannot go. Tiger Lily doesn’t belong to Peter, and she doesn’t belong to Wendy either. Wendy raises her head, an apology on her lips, but instead of anger, she finds hope shining in Tiger Lily’s eyes, as fragile as a broken-winged bird.

“I want Peter to pay,” Tiger Lily says. “And I want to prove to him and myself that I’m more than just a shadow creature he dreamed into life.”

“Of course you are.” Wendy catches Tiger Lily’s hands, squeezing her fingers.

The hope in Tiger Lily’s eyes catches like a spark, roaring in Wendy’s chest. Flame steals her breath, and leaves her eyes stinging and hot. Through a blur of tears, Wendy sees Tiger Lily as she used to be—shadow-dappled, laughing as she showed Wendy how to catch the silvery fish leaping in Neverland’s streams. Those moments apart from Peter that were just their own— Wendy should have seen then how Peter’s idea of friendship was nothing like the real thing.