Wendy woke to the sound of humming.
Not a song she recognized. Not something a child should hum. It was warped, circular, like someone trying to remember a lullaby from a dream they wished they could forget.
She opened her eyes and found Michael still curled against her chest, thumb near his mouth, fast asleep. John sat a few feet away, rubbing his temples like he’d woken from a bad dream.
The fire pit was cold. The sky above glowed dull grey, like light forced through ash, though one could not honestly tell if it was day or night here.
The hum continued, rising and falling.
Then she saw them.
The Lost Boys had gathered in a loose ring around the camp, crouched low or hanging from branches like spiders. Each one had their mask back on, blank and eyeless, bone-white except for the smeared markings Wendy hadn’t noticed before. Faint scratches. Crude symbols. Little stories scratched into silence.
The smallest boy, the one with the chipped mask, sat nearest to her. In his lap, he cradled a dead rabbit.
At least, she thought it was dead.
Then it twitched.
The boy began stroking its ears. Slowly. Rhythmically. Humming never stopped.
Wendy couldn’t look away. She’d seen dead animals before, birds, squirrels, once a rabbit mauled by a neighbor’s dog, but this was different. The reverence in the boy’s hands. The way he hummed, was like soothing something broken inside himself. It wasn’t cruelty. It was mourning. Or maybe mimicry of it.
The rabbit’s legs kicked once. Then again, it fell still.
He turned the rabbit over, dipping two fingers into its belly, and began to smear blood across the eyeholes of his mask.
Wendy’s breath hitched.
She clutched Michael tighter.
“What the hell,” John whispered.
The boy didn’t seem to notice them watching. Neither did the others. It was a ritual, not a show.
Wendy forced herself to speak. “What are they doing?”
A voice answered from above.
“Remembering.”
Peter dropped from a branch like a feather, landing soundlessly beside her.
He crouched beside the boy and touched his mask gently.
“Good,” Peter whispered to him. “Very good.”
The boy shivered with pleasure, then scrambled off into the trees.
Peter stood, brushing imaginary dust from his sleeves. His eyes flicked to Michael, then to Wendy.
“You slept well, I hope.”
Wendy didn’t answer.
Peter’s head tilted slightly, wrong, like he was adjusting a mask of his own. “It’s important to remember. Memory keeps them human. Or close enough.”
Wendy stared at him. The way he watched the ritual and the quiet approval in his voice wasn’t normal. But nothing about Peter appeared to be normal. He moved like he belonged to this forest. Like he was older than it. She wondered, not for the first time, how long he’d really been here. Or how long he’d looked like a boy.
She looked around at the other boys. None of them had spoken since she’d arrived. They watched her with stillness. Hunger. Not for food, but for something softer. Something inside.
“What happens if they forget?”
Peter smiled. “They become something else.”
John stood, his voice tense. “We need to leave this camp.”
Peter arched a brow. “Leave? But you haven’t seen the Hollow yet.”
“What’s the Hollow?” Wendy asked.
“A place that answers questions. Or silences them.”
He turned to lead the way, but before he could, a flicker of gold caught the corner of Wendy’s eye.
A shape slipped from the shadows, a woman, or something shaped like one.
She was radiant in a way that hurt to look at. Her skin shimmered like moonlit pollen. Her wings beat so quickly they were a blur – until they weren’t.
The wings vanished in a blink. And where the small fluttering creature had hovered, now stood a woman.
Slender. Sharp-featured. Her hair was black with veins of gold twisting through like cracks in porcelain. She wore little more than sheer fabric and confidence. Beautiful and dangerous – like a blade dipped in honey.
Wendy took a step back.
Peter only smiled. “Ah. Tinka.”
The woman gave a slow, graceful bow. “Peter.”
Wendy stared. “She’s a… fairy?”
Tinka’s gold-veined eyes fixed on her; head cocked. “That’s one word for it.”
“She’s more than that,” Peter added, his voice low. “Tinka is… herself.”
The way he said it felt intimate, almost reverent.
John stepped forward, defensive. “What is she doing here?”
“Protecting,” Tinka replied, circling them. “The woods are full of eyes. Not all of them are friendly.”
Her gaze lingered on Wendy, unreadable.
“You brought new blood,” she said softly. “That always draws attention.”
Wendy bristled. “We didn’t ask to be hunted.”
Tinka’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. “No. But you came all the same.”
Wendy stiffened. It wasn’t the words – people said worse when they were scared. It was how Tinka told them, like she knew something Wendy didn’t. Like she’d seen this story play out before. And it never ended well.
She stopped beside Peter and slid her arm through his. He didn’t resist.
John noticed. Wendy did too.
There was something tight behind her ribs.
Tinka leaned toward Peter’s ear. “They’ll be followed.”
“I know,” he replied, voice distant.
Tinka’s eyes flicked back to Wendy.
“They always are.”
They left the camp shortly after, led by Peter and Tinka, and went deeper into the woods.
The Lost Boys didn’t follow this time. They melted into the trees, their masks vanishing one by one.
The deeper they went, the colder the air became.
The trees lost their leaves. The moss gave way to brittle grass. Black mushrooms bloomed from the soil in clusters shaped like hands.
Once, Michael tripped and caught himself on a tree. The bark parted slightly where his hand touched, like lips about to speak. He yanked it back, eyes wide. Wendy pretended not to see. Pretended everything here wasn’t trying to touch them back.
Tinka walked ahead barefoot, untouched by the thorns.
Wendy stayed close to her brothers, whispering to Michael whenever he stumbled. In contrast, John stayed alert, a protective wall of teenage defiance.
Peter moved like a shadow beside them, silent but always nearby.
“How far is it?” Wendy asked.
Peter didn’t look at her when he spoke. “You’ll know when we arrive.”
After what felt like hours, they broke into a clearing.
It was vast, unnaturally so, as if it didn’t belong to the forest. A wide circle of earth, dead and dry. At the center stood a stone archway, cracked, moss-covered, and humming faintly. Symbols carved into the stone glowed dully beneath layers of grime.
“The Hollow,” Peter said. “Your first test.”
John narrowed his eyes. “Test?”
Peter only smiled.
Wendy looked at the arch. The air around it shimmered, like heat over pavement.
“What happens if we go through?”
Tinka’s voice was soft behind her. “You see something true.”
Wendy turned. “True about what?”
Tinka’s smile faded. “About yourself.”
Michael whispered beside her. “I don’t want to.”
“You don’t have to,” Wendy whispered back, kneeling. “You stay with John.”
She stood and looked at the arch again.
Something inside it pulsed, like a heartbeat.
Peter extended his hand. “I’ll go with you.”
Wendy didn’t reach for him. Not yet. Her instincts screamed not to trust him, but the Hollow’s pull was stronger. It felt like something inside her wanted to be known – even if it hurt.
His eyes were calm. But his smile – it was starving.
She hesitated.
Behind her, the forest creaked like bones shifting.
Ahead of her, the Hollow waited.
Wendy swallowed her fear.
With a breath she didn’t remember taking, she stepped into the Hollow.