E L E V E N

AT MIDNIGHT, Temma, a shoemakingtalent fairy, drowned. Her last thought was that she’d never get her wand wish—to make a shoe with a toe that flickered back and forth from pointy to round.

Beck went to tell Mother Dove, who already knew. They wept together.

“Could the wand bring Temma back?” Beck asked.

“No. Not even a wand can do that.”

Terence flew through the night. He wished fairy glows were brighter. The questers might not be far away. A dozen yards off and he wouldn’t see them. He could fly until his dust gave out, and they might already be behind him.

If I die, he thought, it will be for love.

Dawn came. Rani opened the picnic basket. Nestled inside were lentil sandwiches, sesame-seed chips, and cherry tartlets. She took a sandwich. Another appeared. “It’s a magic basket!”

The morning passed. Every few minutes, Tink closed her eyes and counted to a hundred, hoping that when she opened them she’d see Never Land.

Ree evaluated wand project after wand project. She was debating raising a mountain under Fairy Haven when Rani said, “If I threw the wand overboard, I think Never Land would appear in two minutes.”

“Don’t!” Ree said. “I forbid it.”

“Rani wouldn’t,” Tink said. “Fairy Haven would—”

“—be done for. Ree, you know I wouldn’t.”

Ree nodded, feeling strange. For a moment she thought she might have wand madness. But she couldn’t. She’d spent a day with the wand and hadn’t used it yet.

Tink, who was convinced of Ree’s madness, flew back to the wand and waved it, unaware that she was breaking her one-wish promise. “Cure Queen Ree of wand madness. Cure us all.”

Another thing a wand can’t do is cure wand madness. It can only cause the disease.

Terence estimated that he had an hour’s supply of fairy dust left, including the dust that was clinging to his frock coat and the days-old dust in the toes of his socks.

He shook his hair and his sleeves, creating a mist of dust. He imagined Tink scowling, Tink dimpling, Tink tugging her bangs, Tink sticking out the tip of her tongue as she worked.

What was that distant glimmer? Tink? The questers? He put on a burst of speed, the last burst he had left. Even so, he thought the glimmer too far off to reach.

Ree considered hawks. Beck always maintained they were dignified and honorable. But how honorable was it to eat a fairy?

What if she waved the wand and shrank them? She wouldn’t change anything else about them. They could go on being dignified and honorable.

She flew onto the carrier. “Wand, I command you to shrink the hawks of Never Land to a quarter of an inch from beak to tail.” She picked up the wand and waved it. Perhaps she should change her title from queen to empress. Her true reign had just begun.

Beck heard the hawks’ cry. Every animal talent heard it, a surprised squawk followed by a woebegone call, strong and deep at first, then weak and high as the birds shrank.

Beck flew out of her animal-rescue boat. She flicked fairy dust into the air and blew on it. Then she headed for Mother Dove. A hawk would meet her there.

The golden hawk arrived a few minutes after Beck. He was the oldest hawk, the magical one, whose feathers were brown on top and pure gold underneath.

Beck’s glow winked out when she saw him. He was tiny! “Someone used the wand, right?” she said to Mother Dove. Her glow returned, deepening to a furious purple.

“Yes, dear.” Mother Dove ached for the hawks. She was convinced Ree had made the wish.

“Who?” Beck asked.

“It doesn’t matter.”

Beck knew Mother Dove would never tell. “How could they have done anything to the golden hawk?” He’d helped save Never Land after the hurricane.

He landed on Beck’s head. Hawks aren’t complainers, and they’re not chatty. He didn’t say there was no joy without hunting. He didn’t say the fairies might as well have killed all the hawks. He only said, “How will we feed ourselves?”

“We’ll help,” Beck promised. The animal talents could feed them, but food wasn’t enough. Fairies couldn’t give them back their pride.

“Mother Dove? What can we do?”

Mother Dove was silent. They couldn’t do anything.

Terence made out Tink even before he saw the balloon carrier. He was flying slowly now, using muscle mostly and hardly any dust. His breath was coming in gasps, and she was much too far away to hear, but he called anyway, “Tink!”

At least he’d seen her one more time.

She saw his glow. “What’s that?” She pointed. “A firefly?”

“It’s not a hawk,” Ree said. “We’re safe from them.”

Rani spit and shaped the drop of water into a lens. “It’s Terence!” She observed him for a moment. “He’s dropping! He’ll go under.”

That was when they should have used the wand. A single wave, and Terence would have been in the balloon carrier.

But none of them thought of it. Instead, they swooped down, leaving the carrier with the wand hovering above.

They’d almost reached him when the water closed over his head.

Rani dived in and caught him just before his breath ran out. If not for her new wings, she wouldn’t have had the strength to pull him to the surface. Everyone was puffing by the time they’d hoisted him into the carrier.

“You’re safe!” he gasped out to Tink, smiling at her.

She tugged her bangs. “Of course, I’m safe. We saved—”

“—you!” Rani started laughing.

Tink dimpled. Ree smiled.

Rani flew out of the carrier to shake herself pleasantly damp.

Ree checked around, beginning to frown. Tink stood over Terence, making sure he was all right. He thought he could look at her forever. Then he realized—he’d been in the water, and he was alive! He saw Rani flapping her wings.

“New wings, and they swim!” he said.

Ree pushed the picnic basket aside.

Rani nodded, looking both proud and distressed, thinking of Mother Dove. “And I can breathe underwater. I could have—”

“Where’s the wand?” Ree said. Her voice rose. “Where’s the wand?”