Set Your Sails...to Atlantis || Peter Pan, OUAT

Chapter Eleven - The Moon

~ Davina

The guards bring me to the palace, placing me gently on a mound of cushions and pillows and blankets. I push myself to sit, my throat and chest sore and dry from the residue of saltwater still lining the delicate muscle.

"What happened?" She demands.

"Princess, you have to understand..." one of the guards begins.

"They attacked her," Pan interrupts. "She fell off a cliff defending herself."

"She was using weaponry — a bow and arrow, Princess," the guard attempts to justify.

"Was it aimed at anyone?" Kida asks.

"No, but-" the guard begins.

"I was simply practicing. I haven't done archery for a while and I...needed to clear my head," I reply, glancing up at Pan, whose eyes fill with guilt.

"And you ended up in the water how?" Kida says, pushing for the full story.

"They threw spears at me, and all I did was block them with my sword. Then they decided to try and challenge me to a fight. I would have won if it wasn't for that bloody cliff edge."

"And these wounds on your back, they are not from my men?"

Her observation takes me by surprise. I forgot I wasn't wearing it, and I begin to panic, but then see my leather jacket clutched in Pan's free hand.

"No no, they're from a long time ago," I say quietly, the scars stinging as I recall my time on The Flying Dutchman.

"Either way, you are injured and it is because of my men," Kida says and then slaps both of them upside the backs of their heads, like misbehaving children.

"She said something about a woman in the water, but there was no one else down there when we rescued her," Pan interjects.

"I swear she was there, she appeared right after one of the gems in my sword caught the light and there were others...screaming, crying, running in fear and a blinding bright, glowing, blue light." I say, the images repeating in my head.

"Show me the sword," Kida demands.

I pause, noticing it is no longer in my hands and let out a quiet sigh of relief as I find it at my side. Kida takes it, examining the weapon — its balance, the sharpness of the blade, the shape of the hilt, and finally, the stones embedded deep into it.

"Men, leave us. You too." Kida orders, pointing at her guards and then at Pan.

"I'm not leaving her," Pan protests.

"Just go." I say flatly, my eyes flicking up to him.

He sighs, lays my jacket across my legs, and makes his way through the doors with the guards. I heave myself out of the cluster of cushions, following Kida up the steps to where her father sits. They speak in Atlantean as he examines the sword with his touch, his unseeing eyes seemingly looking back on long-gone past.

"Davina," he says.

"Yes, Your Highness?"

"Give me your hand."

I remove my glove and rings, the shadow of the Black Spot suddenly prominent against the white stones and light colours, and place my hand in his. It is comfortingly warm, and has softened with age, but I can still see remnants of callouses on his palms. He places his other hand over mine, and sits quietly. Eventually, he says something to Kida and she takes a dagger, holding the hilt of my sword firmly in her grasp as she uses the tip of the dagger's blade to pry a gem from its position.