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“Greetings,” Burton called out with a wave. “We meet again, Caretakers.”

Before the companions could respond, the Croatoan warriors, all heavily armed with knives and spears, had leaped over the sides of the airship and encircled them on the sand. Once more they were captives.

“You planned to use the airship all along, didn’t you?” John said.

“Of course,” said Burton. “The chance to gain both an airship that could finally take me out of the Underneath, as well as a Dragonship that could cross the Frontier back into the real world, was too good to pass up. Besides, your crew had done most of the repairs, anyway.”

“You mean before you ate them,” Charles spat. “But how did you find us?”

In answer, Burton merely smiled—and held up Laura Glue’s Compass Rose.

Bert groaned. It had still been attuned to seeking the Caretakers. All Burton had to do was follow the glow.

Aven pieced together something else. “We didn’t really escape from you, did we?” she said coldly. “You allowed us to escape, just so you could follow us.”

Burton nodded and grinned more broadly. “That I did,” he replied. “And you are far too trusting, you helpless wench. Just because Billy could show you a shiny trinket, you thought you could trust him. And you were wrong.”

From the foredeck of the Indigo Dragon, Hairy Billy smiled—but it wasn’t the smile he’d shown them before, the smile of a friend and collaborator. This smile was cold and cruel. He took off the silver thimble he wore around his neck and dropped it to the deck as if it were trash. In that moment the companions realized the full extent of how they had been manipulated and betrayed.

“But why, Burton?” said Bert. “What purpose did it serve?”

“You wouldn’t willingly tell me where you’d taken our children,” replied Burton, “so we had to let you think you’d escaped so we could follow you. And from the looks of things,” he added, looking around at the children playing in the sand and surf, “it was the right decision.

“Now,” he said, as he stepped closer and a more threatening tone crept into his voice, “where are our children? And where is my daughter Lillith?”

None of them knew how to answer, or to even say anything that Burton might believe.

At least, John thought to himself, none of the children had yet realized what was taking place there on the beach.

None, save for one—Jack.

Burton didn’t know one of the children was actually a Caretaker.

Quietly Jack was moving among the children, whispering to them, and several had already begun running toward the Indigo Dragon.

Burton realized that they were about to be overwhelmed with children, and he barked a series of harsh commands to the Indians who were still aboard.

The rest of the Croatoans climbed out of the ship and began to herd the children toward the nearby fishing cottages—which was exactly what Jack had intended to happen. He was hiding under one of the small fishing boats, and his expression told John that he needed to keep Burton’s attention, even if only for a few more moments.

“I’ll tell you where your children are,” John said, much to the others’ surprise, “if you’ll answer a single question for me.”

“Fair enough, Caretaker,” agreed Burton, still fingering the spear that he had loosely cradled in his arms. “What is your question?”

“Why are the Pan and the previous Caretaker enemies?”

Charles’s jaw dropped, and he stared at John in amazement. That was not what he had expected him to ask of an avowed enemy of Peter Pan’s.

The reaction of the Croatoans was different. They looked at one another and nodded, as if this were one of the common stories of their people. Even the expression of the one called Murthwaite seemed to shift to one that was more respectful as Burton began to answer.

“Well asked, Caretaker,” the explorer said, a soft burr in his voice. “The Pan and his friend-now-enemy were as brothers once. They met here in the Archipelago, and it was here that the Pan showed his friend the secret of how to never grow old.

“Then,” he continued,