Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/2370581.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Graphic_Depictions_Of_Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Peter_Pan_&_Related_Fandoms, Peter_Pan_-_J._M._Barrie
  Relationship:
      Captain_Hook/Peter_Pan, James_Hook/Peter_Pan
  Additional Tags:
      This_is_a_messed_up_fic, seriously, Read_at_your_own_discretion,
      Prostitution, Medical_Procedures, Sexually_Transmitted_Diseases, Hurt/
      Comfort, Steampunk, Historical_Fantasy, Underage_Sex, Major_Illness,
      Poverty, London, Alternate_Universe_-_Historical, 18th_Century
  Stats:
      Published: 2014-09-28 Chapters: 6/? Words: 21943
****** Peddled ******
by lexyhamilton_(ohheichoumyheichou)
Summary
     This is an AU based around the premise that Hook captured Peter,
     brought him back to late 17th century London, and sold him off to a
     brothel. Years later, guilt makes him go back and look for him.
     This was a strange idea, written a while ago, but with all the
     "legitimate" Peter Pan AUs that have officially come out since then,
     this no longer seems as far-fetched.
     Major warnings for underage, non consensual sex, generally dark
     themes.
***** Chapter 1 *****
“Listen, I peddle ass. It’s what I do. I don’t know every other venue in
London. Now, do you want to buy time or what? They’re all eight of them very
pretty, and clean as virgins.”
Hook left with an exasperated sigh, trudging back out into the snow. He had
left his captive in what seemed to be a more or less respectable bennyhouse,
years ago. Since then he had managed to acquire more loot than notoriety and
eventually established himself in Italy. It was a risk to even come back to his
native soil, but his conscience had been nagging at him lately about the boy.
Hook knew Peter would not age, even outside Neverland. Three years they had
sailed together, Hook determined to raise him up into the profession, but the
boy never changed—always too weak to tie a good sailor’s knot or do some useful
carpentry, or participate in any raids. His depressed state even deprived him
of any value Hook might have gained exhibiting him, as the power of flight
disappeared within days of leaving the island.
He could have easily kept him on as a cabin boy, Hook thought wistfully. Even
as a toy used solely for pleasure, Peter would have been most satisfying, but
Hook only learned this on the night of the transaction, when he took the boy to
a room in the brothel to teach him the fundamentals of what was expected of
him.
Peter had cried not to be left behind, tugging at Hook's coat, clinging to his
boots in desperation even when he was pushed away roughly, though not moments
ago he had been raped rather methodically by the man for whose protection he
was begging now. Hook stayed in the tavern a while longer, unbeknownst to
Peter, checking that the master of the house knew how to take care of the boy
and pick clients for him. Satisfied that Peter would adjust to his new life
eventually, Hook left for the sea again. He had asked for a hefty price, but
more to show the keeper that the boy was a valuable commodity than anything
else. It was all spending money compared to how much he had come to pirate away
later.
He came to the last whorehouse that he knew in Southwark, though he doubted
this one even kept boys. He came up to the bar, and rapped three times with his
knuckles on the wood. The tavern-keeper looked askance at him before motioning
him into the kitchen.
“I’m looking for a boy, about twelve or thirteen…”
“We don’t keep that around here. Only girls.”
“Do you know what happened to the establishment at the Red Deer?”
“They were broken up.”
“And its workers?”
“Scattered, I’m sure. If you think you’ll ferret out some illegal practice at
this place, I dare you to try…”
But Hook had already turned to leave. There was no reassurance that the boy
might not have died years ago, but simply returning with no other clues felt
disappointing. Hook made his way down the crooked back street heading to his
place of lodging, frustrated huffs condensing in the cold winter air. He had
given up his ship, and would have to await the next departure of a
Mediterranean bound vessel. Coming out on a wider street, Hook saw a large
crowd gathered around a performer doing something either ridiculous or
extraordinary. In any case, Hook would have passed by the lowbrow spectacle
without a second thought had he not heard a shockingly familiar voice.
“Please, sir, couldja spare a farthing?”
Hook stared at the child, wearing several layers of grubby clothes. A tattered,
all-too-large hat sat low over his eyes, and a dirty handkerchief obscured
everything below his nose. The gentleman he was addressing turned away
brusquely, and the boy hurried over to another on the fringes of the crowd,
outstretching his palms to expose tattered gloves, and clutching the coins he
finally received to his chest with fervor.
Hook approached, and found that there was no denying it. He would recognize
those eyes anywhere, though it had been a slim chance finding him here so
conveniently. He took a guinea out of his pocket and held it up to catch the
boy’s gaze. Peter’s eyes bugged out, and he rushed over to the generous
stranger. He doesn’t recognize me, Hook thought as he watched the boy
hesitantly reach for the coin. Would the urchin run away as soon as the money
was in his hands? Had he himself really changed so much in appearance? His hair
had grayed perhaps, and he wore it back, as befitted the times. Perhaps the
absence of a mustache was throwing him off? Then again, he wondered how much
Peter could remember of his origins, seeing the way he acted the perfect common
London waif.
“Come into the carriage with me, and I’ll give you all the coins you want.”
Peter blinked and looked about uneasily. How noticeable was the boy’s thinness,
even with the multiple layers of clothing! “Are you hungry? I’ll buy you
anything you want on the way.”
Peter cocked his head, then finally said “Even oranges?”
“Don’t know if they’ll be selling oranges at this time of year…”
“They say the rich can get themselves oranges even in winter.”
“Well, I’ll procure them for you later if you come along. Hurry up now.”
This was the final straw, and the boy’s hand slipped into Hook’s extended one.
Hook’s right he was vigilantly keeping under his cloak. They stopped to buy a
small bun of bread, which Peter finished off before Hook had time to hail a
cabdriver. Before they stepped into the carriage, Peter stopped short, suddenly
hesitating again. Finally, he removed the cloth covering his mouth, which Hook
had assumed was some feeble device to keep out the cold. Alas, Hook could not
help but move back at the sight of the lesions that extended from one corner of
those young lips, almost to the very neck.
Noting the frightened reaction, Peter immediately piped up. “I’m not so dirty,
sir, I’ll keep it covered, if you like, and if you had some face powder about
you, I’d be more than happy to obscure it all! I can still do it, sir, you
needn’t use a new sheath for me if that’ll be too much trouble…”
Hook felt sicker from this onslaught of wretched prattle than anything gracing
Peter’s face, but the boy continued frantically, seeing his patron’s hesitation
as an opportunity sliding away. “Please, sir, whatever your likes, I’ll
perform. And this hair you see… it’s got no lice… I’m only a child, sir, it’s
my only livelihood…”
“Just… get into the carriage, boy.” Peter nodded hopefully and climbed in,
sliding to the floor into a kneeling position as soon as Hook closed the door.
The carriage jolted before taking off, but Peter kept steady, hands already at
the buttons of Hook’s breeches.
“Stop that, and get back up on the seat,” Hook said more gruffly than he’d
intended. Peter stared wide-eyed before slowly rising back, readjusting the
handkerchief to cover his diseased lips. He was sitting on the edge, tense to
the point of shaking now, eyes running back and forth as they followed people
and buildings rushing by, then returning to the man seated across from him,
full of disconcertion—no doubt fearing what sort of inventive entertainment he
was going to take part in once they reached their destination.
Hook had not wanted to rescue Peter, and part of him still hoped he could leave
the child in someone’s responsible hands and then return to Italy, so he did
not care to hint at his identity though he felt sorry for Peter and his
palpable anxiety. The boy had to have been on the streets for years, by the
looks of him, and yet he was still foolish or desperate enough to climb into a
carriage with a strange old man.
“What happened to the whorehouse you served in before?”
Peter startled, eyes avoiding Hook’s before answering. “I was never in no
whorehouse, sir. It’s against the law to be hosting boys in whorehouses...
Especially not ones so young as me…” Peter looked back at Hook, only to see him
arch his eyebrow in a way that made Peter’s gaze slink back to the floor.
“Don’t you know?”
“The Red Deer rings no bells?”
“No, sir!” Peter quickly replied, and brought the handkerchief up his face to
his very eyes in an attempt to hide the flush of his cheeks. He was probably
beginning to regret having gotten involved with such a rake as himself, Hook
mused. He saw Peter’s limbs tremble in anticipation of bolting the carriage as
soon as it would stop, and beckoned Peter to sit next to him. The boy
reluctantly obeyed and they rode on through the narrow streets, enjoying the
unusually smooth ride, listening to the carriage’s wheels crunch against the
grimy snow—one recollecting a distant past, the other fretting about his
immediate future.
                                      ***
The boy had to be practically dragged into the tavern, but once inside Hook’s
room he stood silent, looking extremely timid and afraid to touch anything,
instinctively sensing that the place was a notch above seedy.
Hook sat down into a short legged armchair and opened up the cigar box on the
table. “I’ll have them make something warm for you to drink later when the bar
downstairs opens.”
Peter stood growing more uncomfortable by the minute—one hand clutching his
other arm’s elbow for lack of a better occupation. He wondered how much time he
was expected to spend, as well as the likelihood of the gentleman keeping his
promise about procuring him fruit for his efforts.
“Shall I strip for you, sir?” he finally offered in desperation, tired of the
cold blue gaze boring into him.
Hook exhaled acrid smoke. “Why don’t you.”
What a queer, Peter thought worriedly as he began peeling himself from his
layers. He dared not step on the carpet and stood on the cold hardwood floor,
carefully casting the clothes right beside himself so as not to sully anything
with his belongings. He worried the man might send him out once he saw what was
adorning his body in certain places, but then again he had not been turned away
after revealing his mouth. Peter prayed that the gentleman liked to watch. As
soon as the last article had joined the pile of the rest on the floor, Peter’s
hand slipped across his torso, arching into his own touch. He had not had the
opportunity to earn money in the nude for months, but the skill was thankfully
well rehearsed in his memory. His eyes fluttered closed and he let a contrived
moan escape his lips as both hands slid up and down his body.
“Quit that and turn around,” Hook said, somewhat disconcerted by how
automatically the shy boy had morphed into a practiced trollop when his clothes
were gone. The frightened boy returned just as quickly as he had been
overshadowed by the confident whore, and turned to face the door. Hook
approached him, gently goading him to bend down and expose his rear. It was a
sorry sight and Hook shuddered when he saw the medley of rashes and sores that
adorned the boy’s entire nether region. There was no use leaving him here—even
the poorest parish orphanage would admit no one so diseased into their midst.
It was to Italy with the boy in tow, then.
“You can straighten yourself out, lad. I only wanted a look.”
Peter rose up, his eyes so full of tears that Hook felt a pang of guilt though
he had certainly done no injury to him just now.
“Boy, why are you crying?”
“It’s just…” the boy was interrupted by a spastic sob. “I was fearing you’d do
something nasty and painful like what an old pervert had done me a while ago.”
Hook only arched a brow, but the boy shrank away as if threatened with a blow.
“Please, sir, I don’t want your money, I just want to be on my way. I’m too
dirty to service the likes of you, I think…”
Hook slowly took off his cloak revealing the foreshortened arm. Peter’s eyes
widened and ran across Hook’s entire frame before the rest of his body finally
ventured to run and clutch at Hook’s leather jerkin, as if hanging on for dear
life.
“Captain… captain…” he stammered, pulling at his former caretaker, only hazily
remembered after all these years. “Don’t leave me, please don’t leave me here
again, please take me with you and I’ll mop the deck day and night and wash
dishes too. I don’t eat much at all either, and I can sleep in the hold if
there’s no room…”
Hook ran his hand through Peter’s hair as the child kept babbling on, smiling
wistfully to find that the boy’s claim to having no lice was not entirely
honest. “I don’t have a ship of my own anymore, Pan. We’ll be taking a voyage
to a much nicer country where I sincerely hope to cure you of this servility of
yours. I’d never thought I’d miss that old impish Peter Pan when I left you
here.”
Peter blinked at Hook dumbly, then wrapped his arms the man’s torso, wordlessly
this time.
                                      ***
The ship was to sail in a couple of days, Hook learned, so he ventured to buy
the boy a warmer coat for their brief sojourn in the dreary city. Buying for
such a grateful recipient was a pleasure, as Peter expressed unmitigated and
effusive delight in everything given to him, and at the same time would only
diffidently confess his heart’s desire when prodded as Hook led him through the
marketplace. Vendors stared at the boy’s now exposed ailment and shook their
heads in self-righteous disapproval when they noted the hand clutching the boy
with unmistakable possessiveness. None dared say anything however, and Peter
hardly felt self-conscious when under the protections of an imposing adult. He
indulged himself with the rooster shaped candies he had longed to try for ages,
and excitedly picked out gloves for himself which Hook bought without a word of
warning about the fact that he would soon have no need for them at his
destination.
Hook noticed the careful way Peter sat down on the chair when they returned to
the room—overly careful even when he had grown easy in the captain’s presence
in the past several hours.
“Does it hurt you inside too?” Hook asked as the boy sat daintily alternating
sips of tea with licks at the treacle sweetmeat he held on a stick.
“What does?”
“Your… maladies…”
Peter’s eyelids flickered down for a moment. “Sometimes it’s worse. It’s like a
fire that flares up and I an’t able to eat for a day or two, or even swallow my
own spittle. And… down there… it feels like a dragon’s taken residence inside
me…”
“A dragon?”
“Yes, they breathe fire, didja know? And it’s like a little dragon is clawing
at me from inside, all scalding hot, sometimes.” Peter smiled shyly and
irresistibly.
“Such fanciful descriptions. And where did you even hear about dragons?”
“Street shows with those puppets have them. But mostly Tom told me about ‘em. I
ask him to tell me every night, but he only does when I bring back some money.”
“You pay for stories about dragons?” Hook did not know whether to be amused or
dismayed.
“Yes, of course. They even fly, you know. They have wings. And knights slay
them so as the lady can marry them then. I like hearing about things that don’t
really exist like that.”
“But Peter, you…” Hook gazed at the boy, who was fiddling with his sweet, but
turned his attention back quickly when he noticed Hook trail off. If the boy
remembered his own rather fantastic past, he certainly did not show sign of it.
And what was the purpose of bringing something like that up now? Hook decided
to change course. “So who is this Tom?”
“Oh, he works as a loader on the docks now. I only see him at the taverns
though usually. He likes his drink. I sleep in his bed on most nights if I’m
not out on the streets working.” There was something disturbing about how
blithely the boy was relating his miserable life. “I knew him since my days in
the brothel…”
“So you did work at the brothel then, eh?” Hook smirked.
Peter blushed but only slightly. He related how he eventually caught an ailment
and was lowered in rank, also doing menial work. On one of his errands to
market a warden stopped him and made him reveal where he earned his living. The
Red Deer was broken up, the owners were fined, and all its workers were briefly
jailed. Tom had been a boy not so much older than Peter and helped keep him
safe from the other resentful mollies while they were locked up. The guards
liked to make the prettier of the boys perform for them, right in the cells,
and Tom began to use Peter for their pleasure, and more importantly, their
extra portions of food. When they were released, they kept up the relationship,
and by and by raised enough money to purchase a miniscule room in the slums.
Not much had changed since then. Tom was now in what must have been his
thirties, too old to fetch good money for offering his body, diseased and
abused as it was, and made an indifferent living working at odd jobs.
“And he wasn’t surprised when you never changed into a man?”
“He was, I suppose, but he thinks that I’m really an adult. He thinks my hard
early life on the ship stunted me. Many people in the pubs around here know I'm
much older than I look, but I could convince newcomers they were buying time
with a near-virgin. Tom envies me my opportunities, but lately I haven’t been
making much with this sore on my face. When we find ourselves in a pinch, I do
it in an alley for three pence, and that’s when I get new ailments sometimes,
after.”
Hook could not believe his ears. “And what do you think? Are you an adult?”
“I don’t know… I suppose he’s right? I’m not so good at understanding how the
world works and such, though, and I like to have Tom by to count on. And I must
tell him I’m leaving!” Peter suddenly exclaimed. “He’ll be downright
heartbroken, I reckon.”
“Well, if you’d rather stay…”
“No!” Peter interrupted rather forcefully. “No, I want to go with you, even to
a hard life at sea.”
“Your days of hard labor are over, Pan, so no need to brace yourself. And we’ll
seek out your friend tomorrow, before we leave. I should thank him for keeping
an eye out for you, if nothing else.”
Peter’s smile was warmer than the still-steaming tea that he raised to his
lips, and Hook found it hard to push down certain guilty feelings rising up as
if to spite him.
***** Chapter 2 *****
They’d been looking for hours, starting at the docks where Tom was supposed to
be working, then beginning to make the rounds of the taverns he usually
frequented. Most of them were located on the riverbanks, and though there was
no summer heat to fester sewage floating in the river, it still stank when low
tide revealed the shallows and the filthy debris that was left on them.
It took six inquiries before they came to the right establishment.
“Well, look who’s here!” The barkeep grinned. “And in such a nice warm coat
too. Been making good rounds lately?” He eyed the foreign-looking gentleman
looming over the boy.
Peter beamed. “You could say that. Tom hasn’t been in here today, has he?”
“Tom’s in the back. He was just grumbling to me about having to go out and look
for you if you weren’t coming back tonight.”
Hook followed Peter’s lanky form as it snaked between densely packed tables.
The place was half-full even at this odd hour. The entire bar reeked of smoke,
drink, and just a hint of vomit. These were the hangouts of London bums and
shirkers, Hook mused. He was sorely tempted to shoot a few people clean through
the head when dirty hands groped the boy’s bottom as he passed by them, giving
them a meek acknowledging nod instead of being outraged or frightened. This was
not his ship, Hook calmed himself, and continued down into the darker corner of
the establishment.
Tom was a gangly, dried-up man, looking more world-weary than his thirty-odd
years. There was an incongruous delicacy in the way his hands toyed with the
shotglass, even as he sat craning himself over a bottle. He displayed just
enough poise to hint at his past occupation, though one could see he had been
out of commission for a long time as soon as he raised his bleary drunkard's
eyes at the two of them.
“Well look who’s decided to come back…”
“Tom, I was just gonna tell you that I’m going to be leaving for far away on a
ship, and…”
“Hold up. Hold up…” Tom could barely keep his hand steady as he raised it, bony
index finger extended as if what he was about to say was to be a great oration.
“You’re not going anywhere today. You’re going to roam and come back at night
when you’ve earned enough.”
“But you’re not listening!” Peter took Hook’s hand. “I’m leaving for good. I
just came to say good bye and thanks.”
Tom looked at Peter as if he had only just gotten out of bed at an ungodly
hour. He finally noticed that the man standing behind his boy was holding him
rather possessively, and his face contorted into a lazy anger.
“Pisspot whore! You don’t want him, govn’r, he’s rotten to the core. I should
know—that slut’s let me bugger him since our cradle days, not to mention anyone
else who is willing to shell out.”
“From what I hear the shelling out all comes to you in the end. I don’t really
think it bodes well when a man relies on his punk to provide for him.”
The man was growing redder but was not up to standing up. “You been going
around complaining to the authorities?”
“No!” Peter squeezed Hook’s hand harder.
“Who the hell is this? You just plan on abandoning me, after all I’ve done for
ya? Why you been staying out for days on end? Been taking hospitality from
high-on-up-cultured perverts? Aren’t I good enough for the likes of you
anymore?”
“If you weren’t so wankered most times, maybe I’d come home more often!”
Tom suddenly jumped to his feet, knocking over the stool on which he had been
seated. Peter was behind Hook quick as lightning. Hook was more than happy to
oblige, and Tom stopped short, gazing up and down at the man in front of him
trying to estimate whether his social rank and physical size could allow
getting into a brawl.
“He’s right, you know.” Hook tossed a shilling to the man, who caught it and
stuffed into his pocket without second thoughts. “Get your sorry arse off the
stool and get a proper shave before looking for some respectable work.” The two
turned to leave, still listening to the drunkard’s vituperation as they
navigated their way between the cramped tables of the dingy establishment.
“Sure, you’ve gotten yourself your prize.... Your knob-rot, more likely. Hope
you two fuck yourselves into your graves. He’ll throw you out after he’s done
playing, too, m’laddo. Cast ya out back in the gutter where you came from.
Won’t be sticking up your nose at your friends then, will ya…”
Hook was tempted to turn back, but Peter pulled him forward as soon as he felt
the hesitation. “Please, let’s just go. I told him all I wanted to, and we’ve
no more business here.”
The crisp cool of the air outside was a welcome change from the reeking heat
indoors. The two walked on in awkward silence.
“You shouldn’t have said that,” Peter suddenly said. “About him being horrible
to me before. He wasn’t.”
“He used your body and your money… in exchange for what, may I ask?”
“Lodging…”
“You don’t seem to live there much as it is. I think you could do just as well
as other city orphans—finding yourself an abandoned attic in those same slums.”
“You don’t understand!” Peter suddenly let go of his new caretaker’s hand. “I
wouldn’t have made it this far if Tom hadn’t been there for me… It’s all good
while I’m up and about, but sometimes you’re just in a pinch. Like, years ago,
there was some old bastard who took it upon himself to exterminate the likes of
us. He’d solicit as if he were the commonest Londoner and lead you to his room,
where he’d force lye up your ass so as to keep you from practicing further
abominations and such. More often than not the mollies died wriggling in pain
unimaginable right in his room—and he weren’t ever tried, our profession being
illegal."
“And no one was able to give a decent description of the butcher or his lair?”
Peter shook his head. “He was rumored to like to purge the devil out of the
young ones best, and it wasn’t long before I met him and got asked. He brought
me up to his crabby old room and told me to bend over, just as you did, and I
obeyed him to the tee, suspecting nothing at all. But I saw his nasty leather
bladder and hose as I looked at him upside down and ran for the door. That was
locked, and he tried to catch me, but I slipped by him and threw myself out the
window, not caring where I landed so long as he didn’t follow. It was three
stories, though not very high ones, and I splintered my leg and collarbone
good. I lay crying, asking for help from the passerbies, but my occupation was
made plain enough by my nakedness and I couldn’t hope for sympathies. A molly
doing his rounds saw me, had pity, and asked where my friends lived. Tom came
down and carried me off to the doctor. He spent good money to have it all set
and wrapped up. I was lame for two months, it must have been, and he fed me all
the while...”
“So he didn’t set you out on the street to collect as a cripple?”
Peter’s cheeks reddened. “And if he did? We had to make ends meet. I didn’t say
he was a god-sent angel, ‘sblood! He couldn’t work magic to make money sprout
up.”
“Sounds to me as though you’ve been put to good use as long as you’ve lived
here. This Tom of yours knew where and when there was profit to be made.”
Peter’s cheeks were afire, chest heaving up and down. “At least he hasn’t sold
me off to a whorehouse yet… So long as we’re counting past offenses…” The thin-
wristed hand flew up to his mouth as he quickly regretted the words that had
escaped his mouth.
“Don’t worry about making accusations, Peter, when they’re well-founded. You
have your own past offenses, though I’ll wager you don’t remember them. As for
me, I’ve forgiven you long ago.” Peter stood fearful and puzzled, clearly not
understanding Hook’s references. Damn the naïve façade of this child, Hook
cursed to himself.
“Come.” He offered Peter his hand again. “The ship will take us away from this
dreary place and perhaps you’ll forget some of these misfortunes too.”
Peter clutched at Hook’s body. “I’m s--”
“Don’t be,” Hook snapped.
“You’re right, of course, about Tom and everything. What I’ve really been
wanting all these years is someone to say more than five words to me before and
after the buggering. Tom could talk when he wasn’t plastered and violent…”
“I’ll talk to you, lad. You’ll get sick of my talking yet.”
Peter glanced up adoringly before clutching tighter. How Tom or anyone else
could entertain the idea that Peter was an adult in disguise was beyond Hook’s
understanding. They stood intertwined, frozen to the spot as passerbies threw
them quick, puzzled looks before trudging on.
                                      ***
“To a prosperous and safe voyage!” The captain raised his glass of champagne,
followed by everyone at the table. The wealthiest passengers had assembled in
the great room, which was none too great in size, but still afforded space for
the thirty or so people to fit snugly. Hook watched Peter out of the corner of
his eye as the first mate explained the course they were going to take to reach
Cadiz, almost unable to bear how slowly they promised the merchantman would
travel along the coast. He had powdered the boy up to make him presentable, but
some of the others still stared at him as he ate his dinner.
When they finally shuffled out of the stuffy room, Hook noticed that one of the
sailors was watching them intently. He approached cautiously, examining Peter
from the side before finally making up his mind as to the identity and
addressing him.
“Pretty Peter!”
Peter seemed to react with instinctual fear if he was recognized by strangers.
His head hunched, eyes staring wide at the tall, sinewy young man who was
addressing him.
“You don’t remember, I think. Five years… euh…Christmas, in London. We were
seven or eight… francais. You remember?”
“Ah…” Peter said softly. It was impossible to tell whether he was blushing or
not under the layer of powder. “I think I do.”
“I never forget. Yes, in the old pub. Mais… it’s, how you say," he indicated
Peter's diminutive stature while trying to find word in English. "Encore,
encore... still pretty like before! Boy, after years. C’est magnifique!”
Hook began to wonder how far they would have to travel to avoid encountering
past acquaintances of Peter's, and the French sailor sensed the animosity well
enough.
“I know, I know. This man… good, very good. You, euh, earn the big money, no?”
He turned to Hook, winking. “He is magnifique. Ass… magnifique. Mouth…
magnifique. So pretty. Good Noel we have with him, and he sings good carol when
the mouth is not, euh, doing business, you know, as they say?” Hook stepped
away before he could be nudged by the laughing sailor's elbow.
“Yes, I’m sure,” Hook said, pulling Peter forward in order to retire for the
night. The galley steward was directly behind the reminiscing sailor, who slunk
off rapidly as soon as he heard the voice of his superior behind him.
“Sir? This is not your child, is it?”
“Not my son, if that’s you mean,” Hook answered tersely.
“I’m afraid we’ll have to ask full fare for him…” The galley steward said. Hook
felt urges to gut these men, and felt emasculated by both the absence of his
hook and the staid behavior he had to conform to in efforts to remain
unrecognized. He hesitated for only a moment, handing over money without
counting it out, guessing his temper would be better served by winking at these
small annoyances.
“And,” the man mumbled as he rummaged through the packet of coins. “We don’t
want to see him in the mess hall, or anywhere on the deck. It lends the wrong
aura to the place…”
Hook’s glare turned so vitriolic that the steward’s hands began to shake. “We
shall take our meals in our cabin, but the boy can walk where he pleases
especially now that his passage has been so generously funded.”
“But, sir, you must understand… we’re being most lenient about the matter.
Truth be told, we should not have allowed him any passage and reported you to
the authorities, let alone let him into upper levels…”
“Truth be told, the boy deserves fresh air just as much as anyone else on this
sorry vessel. In any case, I wonder that you presume to question the boy’s
honor when he, so young and impressionable, is standing here, before you.” Hook
felt Peter squeeze himself close.
The steward was trying hard to put on calm airs. “No need for tense talk of
this kind, sir…”
“Indeed,” Hook grumbled, pushing past the man, Peter’s hand firmly in his.
He locked the door of the cabin and sat down, full of fiery resentment. He had
been risking far too much as it was—being a relatively recent wanted man in
England. Yet there were also far too many things that irked him, from the way
the captain was conducting business to their plan of navigation, and now
complaints about the quality of his travel companion. Peter sat down on the
bed, fingers clasped and eyes pointed at the floor, failing to think of a
better way to pass the time.
“You can still take meals up there, can’t you?” he finally asked meekly. “If
you go without me, I mean.”
Hook looked over and could not help but smile. “What makes you think I want to
dine with those pompous old Navy rejects?”
Peter smiled wide, the layer of powder on his face cracking under the duress.
Hook had asked for an extra cot, but the ship had none. The bed was nearly big
enough for two, and Peter instinctually felt that he should at least offer to
do something nice for his savior again.
Hook noticed the change. The boy’s movements became slow and sweeping, his eyes
catlike as he partially undressed for bed, contorting himself into obviously
uncomfortable poses, to show off a hip or a jawline.
“You can stop playing the strumpet, Pan. Just get into bed and stay on your
side.”
Peter’s face paled. “I didn’t mean… not to use me… but wouldn’t you like to
have a looksee? I’m very good at shows, I was trained at the brothel, back in
the day...”
Peter trailed off when Hook shook his head, smiling wistfully. The man
approached the bed and embraced Peter stroking his hair. “No more whoring. It’s
not who you are, and I don’t want to see you keep putting on the masquerade for
me. Unless you want to keep serving 'seven or eight francais'?”
Peter shook his head and hugged Hook's torso in reciprocation. Hook suddenly
felt something hard and irregular between his and Peter’s chests. He reached
into the clothes without a second thought, pulling out a spoon.
Peter cowered at once and began babbling something about how he was going to
return it until Hook asked to have everything else concealed in his outfit.
Peter quickly relinquished an entire collection of items he had managed to
pilfer off the table, including napkin rings and several people’s silverware.
Hook could not contain his disgust and finally spanked the child with three
rather violent strokes.
“Only giving them proof that their haughty judgment of you was well-founded.
Quit whoring-- quit stealing-- and, most of all, quit lying!”
“Yes, sir!” Peter sobbed, still clutching at the foreshortened arm that had
held him put.
“And don’t ‘yes sir’ me. It all stops right now. Put everything that’s happened
behind you and just return to being a respectable human being.”
“I can’t make out what it is you want me to do, is all… I'm not used to just
doing nothing,” Peter said shakily, teary eyes finally coming up to meet
Hook’s. “And, besides... it’s not as if you haven’t made a living out of
stealing.”
Hook grinned. There was the glimmer of the boy he was trying to disinter from
the sordid muck. “Firstly, yes, I’ve made a good living, and I find it an
insult that you feel compelled to steal when I have promised to provide you
with everything. Secondly, I am not a pirate, never was, never will be, and
being a respectable gentleman I advise you never to mention that rumor to
anyone again.”
It took Peter a moment to relax and join Hook in grinning.
He watched Hook strip down to his breeches, absentmindedly sitting down on the
chair. Hook turned at the sound of a sharp hiss of pain to see Peter’s face
contorted.
“Did I… hurt you badly?” Hook asked, cursing himself for forgetting that
spanking may have been a particularly cruel punishment for the boy. Peter
forced a smile and shook his head, eyes squeezing shut as he raised himself up
and walked over to the other side of the bed.
“Nah, it’s just flaring up, I guess. I get it often when I’m in jitters.”
“There’s nothing to worry about… why are you in jitters?”
“Oh, no, nothing at all. Thanks for everything. Just a bit frightful to venture
out. I don’t remember anything outside of London much.”
“Well, I assure you you’ll like your new home better.”
“Yes, I know. My body is just being naughty.”
“The dragon?”
“Yes.” Peter laughed.
He climbed into bed, moving as close as possible to the edge, facing outwards.
Part of him hoped Hook would turn to him and fondle his body. He knew how to
work with people of that persuasion. Yet he only felt the bed dip and nothing
else. The man was facing outwards as well, Peter discovered when he got up the
courage to look over. No person would believe how chastely he was living under
Hook's auspices even if they were told. Peter fell asleep, ignoring the
mounting burning sensations in his body.
Put it all behind me…
***** Chapter 3 *****
Hook groaned, feeling an urge to vomit for the umpteenth time in the past hour.
Where was the damn boy? He had very graciously offered to shuttle back and
forth with the bedpan to remove the stench of vomit as quickly as possible from
their cabin, but was now nowhere to be found when his services were needed
most.
The captain had laughed good-naturedly at the boy when the latter began
vomiting frequently early in the voyage, reminding him how he had begged to be
taken on as cabin boy though the slightest bit of rough sea apparently made him
ill. Soon it became apparent that it was no seasickness that afflicted Peter
with such severity, however, especially when reports of dysentery aboard the
vessel began to be rampant. Not only was Peter unable to keep anything down,
but all his other afflictions also quit their dormant state. Hook tended to the
boy, contending with both vomiting and severe runs, as well as frightening
blisters and sores on the two regions involved.
Hook was amazed by the boy’s stoic lack of complaints and tears about what was
obviously a very painful experience. Peter frequently expressed regret about
making his caretaker deal with such foul material, and never asked for more
than the bedpan and an occasional drink. Lying on his back made Peter feel more
nauseous than sitting upright, so Hook often held him in his lap, the boy’s
body leaning onto his own. His head just below Hook's. The man had regaled him
with stories most of the time, finally venturing to tell him about the boy
called Peter Pan who resided in Neverland, carefully omitting mention of his
pirate nemesis but including everything else he could recall about the boy’s
former glory. Peter lay listening very intently, and Hook was sure that his
memory was being triggered. When he finished Peter leaned back to gaze at
Hook’s face, no doubt digesting some of the story’s elements in his mind, but
the product of all this contemplation was only a request for another story that
featured him as a main character, preferably involving dragons.
The boy had all but recovered in a few days, by which time Hook founded himself
doubling over quite often. He knew the boy was more than happy to return the
favor, and soon saw the pleasures in having Peter dote on him and run back and
forth for all his needs. Yet where was he now? An uncomfortable gurgle in his
stomach finally prompted Hook to get up and risk trekking to the head of the
ship.
Just as he was getting ready to lean down and retrieve his boots while trying
not to lose the contents of his stomach, the door creaked open. Peter slinked
in, eyes averted to the floor, and made his way to the bed to lie down and face
away from Hook.
“What took you so long?”
“Oh, I just got stopped to talk to someone.”
“Talk to someone? And I suppose you simply lost the bedpan on the way?”
Peter jerked up from the bed. “I’ll get it, I must have forgot…”
“Stay,” Hook commanded. “Turn around and stop hiding. Now, if you think I
didn’t notice the way you walked in here, you are gravely mistaken.”
“Well, alright.” Peter sighed. “I got buggered. You’re happy now, I ‘spect?”
“Oh, ecstatic.” It was easier to ignore his discomfort when he was irritated by
something else. “I suppose you’ll just have to tell me who it was so that I may
send my proper regards.”
“Please don’t… Once a whore, I’ll always be a whore. They don’t know that I’ve
decided to stop. It’s only natural, on their part…”
“They? So this was a veritable gathering, was it?”
“No, only two. Please, let’s just forget about it, and I’ll just go fetch the
bedpan…”
“So let me venture a guess.” Hook’s voice pinned Peter in place. “They took you
from fore and aft at the same time?”
Peter eyes fled to the side. “Yes…” He swallowed hard, deciding to get the
interrogation over with as quickly as possible. “Twice, for each to sample
both. But it isn’t as though they hadn’t used sheaths! Good cow bladder stock
and newly washed too…”
“Washed in saltwater?” Hook sighed in disgust when Peter nodded. “That must be
very pleasant for you, isn’t it, with your open sores. Not to mention that you
must have liked getting a taste of your own ass the second time around… Just in
case your throat and bowels don’t already share every single affliction.”
Tears were falling down Peter’s face very quickly by this time. “Why’re you
being so cruel? It’s not as if I wanted to be doing that with them…”
“Ah, there. That’s what I wanted to hear from you. No more ‘always a whore’ and
it being ‘natural.’ They treat you like garbage and they’ll get their due once
you describe them to me. But as for you, don’t ever start thinking you wanted
something that was forced on you.”
Peter’s face remained morose. “Easy for you to be preaching like that. You’re
treating me as though it were the first time. At least these men were acting
half-decent and paid me good money for my troubles,” he said, pulling out two
schillings.
“Give me those!” Hook snatched them out of Peter’s outstretched hand. Armed
with the information that it had been Peter’s old French acquaintance and some
stout, close friend of his with a goatee, he strode out of the cabin into the
pitch darkness-- queasiness hardly hampering his sense of purpose in this
instance. Peter lay back down onto the bed, heart pounding.
The next morning he woke to find the captain next to him, hand entwined in
Peter’s hair, mouth and nose pressed into the delicate brow. Peter ran his hand
along Hook’s chest, wondering whether the captain had fallen asleep in that
position or only shifted in his sleep into this proximity. He left the pleasant
warmth of the bed to travel over to the head. The previous night’s
uncomfortable cross-examination rushed back into memory when he saw a frenetic
crowd gathered around something he could not see until he squeezed through to
the front.
His two customers lay dead, necks rather obviously broken. The surgeon’s
assistant had been cutting them up for a cursory autopsy since the murders
appeared so strange and unnatural. Peter could hardly contain his fear when a
man standing beside him related how a schilling was found in the stomach of
each man, crossing himself many times over but still obviously excited to be
witness to what would surely become legend and rumor in many ports.
When Peter returned to the cabin, Hook was already up and about. He smirked at
the boy’s pallor. “Well if you’re going to say something, you might as well go
on and say it…”
Peter shook his head frantically, but the words began spilling out in spite of
himself, voice progressively rising as his fear was converted to outrage.
“Are you mad? Whadja have to go and do that for? They didn’t do anything to be
deserving of a fate like that!”
“Kindly lower your voice. These walls are not impermeable.” Peter was not to be
calmed, however. He trembled and fussed about what a heinous crime murder was
and how could Hook do such a thing on a ship where there could be relatively
few suspects, until Hook finally cornered him and pushed him into a wall of the
cabin with his foreshortened forearm, clapping the boy’s mouth shut through a
handkerchief. Peter felt frighteningly thin and fragile when the larger body
pinned him like that, but he also thought he recognized something like lust in
Hook’s eyes. He fluttered his eyelids, casting his eyes down seductively, his
body growing limp. Where physical strength failed him, it was always easiest to
seduce and distract.
“No more screaming and yelling nonsense, understand? Nothing terrible has
happened, and we are headed for Italy just as we planned.” He felt an urge to
kiss the boy just then, if only on his forehead, but refrained and simply
released Peter’s body from the wall.
“It’s just that,” the boy stammered. “A quarter of London should be murdered
then, for greater offenses…”
“Perhaps they should,” Hook said. “I’m only concerned with those that would
harm you.”
Peter startled when there was a knock on the door, breathing again only when
Hook turned to the room carrying the breakfast tray. He didn’t know whether to
be proud of meriting such ruthless retribution or frightened of the man with
whom he had agreed to take up quarters. Most of all he tried to avoid imagining
what had happened before the men met their end, given the evidence of struggle
and that they were made to swallow the money.
He also had a sense of disappointment that Hook never seemed to pull through on
any questionable advances. It was a rare thing for Peter to be genuinely
attracted, but the more he watched the man across the table stare at him with
those cat-like blue eyes, the more he wished he’d be thrown on the bed and
ravished in some way, even if it hurt considerably. The murders were disturbing
mostly because they made him feel strangely excited, Peter realized. The
gruesome incident recalled something pleasant from his blurry past-- a love of
blood and carnage, and a sense of carefree fun about them.
Yes, he would have done it for free with a man of Hook’s caliber, he thought to
himself as he picked at the yolk on his plate and watched its contents spill
across to drench everything else in yellow.
                                      ***
Hook decided to get the worst over with first, and bring Peter to a famous
doctor in Palermo before heading off to his countryside estate. “Countryside”
evidently meant little to Peter, who kept asking where Hook’s apartment was in
the city. He was more dazzled by how sunny and warm a city could be, even in
winter, than by the pompous architecture and sculptures in the squares through
which they passed.
When they finally arrived at the correct address, Peter made to protest, having
had some less than agreeable experiences with doctors, but Hook pushed him up
the winding staircase and into the patients' room. The doctor was an aged man
and looked kindly enough to have Peter comply to all his directions, mostly
given as hand gestures accompanied by English intermixed with Italian. After a
cursory examination of the inside of his mouth, the doctor uncovered a
sinister-looking device that reminded the captain more of a rack than anything
else. Hook watched as the doctor strapped Peter’s legs into the birthing-stool-
like contraption. The boy was evidently distressed but not particularly
ashamed, chest rising and falling frantically as he was turned almost upside
down exposing his private parts for easy scrutiny.
The doctor turned his head this way and that, stroking his beard. “È il vostro
figlio?”
“Figlio?” Hook struggled to remember, biting his lip, wondering whether the
doctor was speaking standard Italian or the local dialect.
“No,” Peter suddenly answered. He turned his head to Hook, growing red from the
uncomfortable position, or perhaps a belated sense of his decency being
violated by someone who wasn’t going to make use of his services. “I think he’s
asking if I’m your son.”
“Ah.” Hook was impressed, though more by the international character of London
sleaze than any aptitude Peter might have possessed.
“Parli italiano?” The doctor asked, amused, and he and Peter began carrying on
a rather broken conversation, each trying to speak the other’s tongue but
constantly inserting his own as a crutch. Hook coughed impatiently when he saw
that the doctor was hardly doing anything else, prompting the old man to rush
back into action and insert what looked like an oiled, tall narrow glass right
up Peter’s opening. The boy arched off the chair, its metal rattling
erratically, while the doctor examined his insides, recruiting Hook to help
keep the boy’s lower half still. Hook sneaked a peek out of morbid curiosity,
and even his untrained eye could discern small bloody lesions on the bright
pink lining inside when held to the light.
“Please don’t look!” Peter begged, obviously mortified.
“I think he’s in pain,” Hook advised the doctor, who only looked at him
blankly. “Uh.. Dolore, DOLORE!” Hook added in exasperation.
“Sì, sì.” The doctor took out the instrument carefully. “The boy needs…
clistere.”
“What?” Hook and Peter asked in unison, though with different degrees of
anxiety.
“Clistere, clistere,” the doctor repeated as though that would clarify
anything. By and by, Hook slowly deciphered that the doctor was recommending a
thorough enema, but that he was unwilling to sully his instruments for that
with such an infectious body. Hook left the building shaking his head, going
along city streets in search of the apparatus the doctor required, resentful of
being made to run errands.
Peter was exceedingly nervous and began to cry at the sight of the apparatus
when Hook returned. The captain assured him his fears were unfounded, reminding
him that, even to his knowledge, the brothel made the top-tier whores cleanse
themselves out between customers if they were to have several a night. Peter
watched intently as the doctor heated the silver colloid solution he wanted
administer before pouring it into the bladder. Hook promised him that he would
barely feel a thing, and might even find it pleasant to be cleaned out so
thoroughly, so Peter took in the porcelain nozzle with professional ease. Yet
as soon as the bag was raised and he felt the liquid pouring into him, the
silver colloid began to feel as if it was burning him up from the inside out.
Peter screamed and bawled and protested until Hook was forced to secure his
arms with leather straps as well. The doctor motioned with his head, suggesting
the captain could spare himself the sight, and Hook took full advantage despite
the boy’s desperate cries not to be left alone. He shut the door, listening as
the muffled screams slowly faded, and was content to remain outside until the
doctor had finished the procedure and Peter himself hobbled out, fully dressed
but his hair mussed and his face swollen with tears.
It was Hook’s turn to stay inside with the doctor, as the latter enumerated the
host of conditions he had identified in the unfortunate boy. This was greatly
aided by the use of medical textbooks, through which Hook gathered that, in
addition to having just about every named venereal disease, the boy also had
many other conditions in their incipient stages like rickets, scurvy, and, most
strange of all to the doctor-- mild cataracts. The doctor made it clear that he
was vastly interested in Peter’s case as one of very aggressive development of
many diseases that would usually take longer than he had obviously lived to
even take root. Hook brushed the doctor’s questions aside, and made him write
out a detailed prescription to get the boy back up on his feet as soon as
possible. After writing out a complete regimen with as much English as he could
muster, the doctor made his final pronouncement—the boy might get better, but
he would only give him a maximum of another year to live, given his present
afflictions. In any case, the doctor vehemently cautioned Hook against pursuing
his “relationship” with the boy any longer, even offering to take a quick look
and see if any of the diseases had managed to spread to him.
Hook walked out woodenly, wondering if Peter could eavesdrop as effectively on
their hushed tones as he on the boy’s hysterics. He took up Peter’s aching body
and carried him out, reassuring himself that the gloomy prognosis would only
apply if Peter Pan were an ordinary mortal.
***** Chapter 4 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
The brat was growing more arrogant, Hook noted. He was surprised at how long
Peter had stayed silent on the ride out to the countryside. It was a protest
against having been forced to endure all that humiliation and pain, Hook
guessed, meeting the boy’s bitter gaze. Or perhaps being left alone with the
doctor after all those screams for Hook to stay by his side. In any case, it
was not his concern if Peter didn’t understand what was good for him.
Hook glared out the window, determined to avoid perusing the boy’s features.
There was no need, he felt, to delve into the intricacies of silly resentment.
The road was rough, and they were certainly not moving very quickly. Hook was
slightly annoyed that the driver was very likely to demand more payment for the
journey back, especially when there would be no passengers to return with to
the city from that rustic area.
Though Hook could see Peter was impressed with his property when they finally
reached it, the boy did not deign to say a word, still glum, and still awkward
and pained in his gait as he walked up the short path to the door. The
housekeeper looked at him with puzzlement and slight disapproval as he gimped
across the threshold of the villa. Hook retired him to a small guestroom he had
assigned to him, and left for downstairs to see how everything had been managed
in his long absence.
Peter couldn’t help but marvel at how beautiful and ornamental the things
inside the house were—things he couldn’t even begin to name. He stood, drinking
in the sight, suppressing compulsive urges to try to swipe anything and
everything that wasn’t directly attached to the walls. He stared out his window
at the rolling fields that stretched on and on as far as his eye could see from
this vantage point. Clumps of woods were somewhere far in the distance, and if
Peter situated himself at the extreme right of the window, pressing his nose
into the glass, he could see the seashore not very far off. The great blue
expanse was a far cry from the dank water of the Thames, which he thought he
knew and loved.
He felt rather silly now, for having begun the game of silence with Hook.
Hunger was beginning to gnaw at his insides, but he didn’t know whether it was
acceptable for him to come out of his room, especially after his behavior
toward his host. Camille, the morose housekeeper, came in, skin wizened up like
a raisin, glaring with her beady eyes at him as she went about dusting the room
that had been more or less neglected before. Peter sat on the bed, blushing
when his stomach growled loudly enough for her to turn around.
The game didn’t last long however. Hook came in as if he had forgotten the rude
behavior towards him. Peter knew he hadn’t and apologized profusely, partly
because he wanted to eat something before going to bed, and partly because Hook
had shown him nothing but kindness, really.
Kindness was a tricky word, however. The regimen the doctor had prescribed was
brutal, and Hook was rather disgusted by many parts of it yet performed it all
himself. The mouth cleanings had to be performed several times daily, with
tonics so nasty their sickly aromas made Hook retch while he was administering
them. Peter cried when it was time to drink the cinnabar, and more often than
not simply vomited it up minutes after drinking it. For his skin ailments,
Peter rubbed in the ointments himself, under Hook’s supervision and then sat
shuddering, begging to be allowed to wash off the caustic substances. Yet
despite both of their misgivings, Peter was soon on the mend. Hook dropped some
of the more vile parts of their routine, and Peter in turn stopped protesting
even the most painful of the remaining treatments.
Hook encouraged him to spend as much time as possible outside, and Peter had
soon scoured out the entire territory of Hook’s domain. It was a small estate,
and did not produce much crop besides that which was used for the table, but
quite large enough for Peter to amuse himself with. He soon befriended everyone
from the cook and the keeper of the stables to the rustic tenant farmers living
on the outskirts and tilling the fields. Only Camille refused to come around as
easily, but she took a special pride in being obstinate and contrary to the
rest of the household.
Spring was full underway by the time Hook took Peter to the doctor again,
asking if it was possible to reduce the stringency of the regimen now that the
boy was outwardly in practically perfect health. To Hook’s surprise, the doctor
remembered them extremely well, greeting them like long-lost relatives. He was
all too eager to examine Peter very thoroughly, still amazed by the light
cataracts, but Hook kept his grip firmly on Peter’s wrist throughout the visit.
The doctor also advised Hook to make use of a prosthesis that was all the rage
nowadays—some improvement on Paré’s design. Hook bought it and entertained
Peter the whole ride home with his metal hand. The prosthesis had been cheap
though, and one of the springs popped itself before they even arrived back.
Granted, Peter had been abusing it, pulling on its fingers, trying to bend them
into grotesque configurations. He sat sheepishly as Hook tried to fix it and
then gave up on it. The boy was so worried, Hook wondered how he would feel if
he knew how much all his medicines cost.
He nearly dropped the box containing the lot of them when Peter quietly
apologized for ‘ruining his hand.’ How different this child was from his
terrible incarnation that reigned supreme on that desolate island, and the one
which he could not even remember nowadays. He couldn't stand Peter being
servile, but neither could he bear the thought of that arrogance being
resurrected. It was a narrow road he was trekking with this child.
As if to celebrate Peter’s return from that journey, the ducklings living in
the small lake on Hook’s property suddenly hatched. Peter could spend all day
running around the pond, feeding and watching the birds that lived in it. He
finally disobeyed Hook and brought one small fuzzy chick to his room, only to
be rather heartily spanked when he was found out. Yet Peter’s initial worries
about being thrown out for bad behavior were quickly being dissipated. He was
growing secure in the knowledge that as long as Hook lived he would enjoy this
carefree lifestyle. ‘As long as Hook lived,’ bothered the boy a bit, and he had
learned better than ignore the future while living in comfort, but his plans
were straightforward.
He was growing proficient in Italian more quickly than Hook. His body looked
untouched, though the doctor had repeatedly stressed that he would alwas remain
somewhat infectious. All in all, he had few qualms about finding employment in
Palermo should something happen to his host. He only suffered from lack of
practice in his trade, feeling his muscles growing stiffer and wished he had
access to a proper dildo like the one the brothel keeper had trained him with
in his very early days in the trade. He dared not ask Hook for something like
that, and practiced only with fingers, trying to regain full voluntary control
of his clench.
With his skin cleared, Peter found that Hook was also growing less careful with
avoiding touching him during the administration of the treatments, though never
anywhere near the extent Peter might have liked. As he lay naked on his bed in
the dead of night, teasing himself under pretext of practicing, he fantasized
about Hook coming into the room suddenly. How angry he’d be. He would most
definitely spank him on his bare bottom and then punish him by giving him the
stuffing of his life. The bed would rattle and Peter would scream as heat
lanced through him. So would Hook, his hot tears falling right on Peter’s back
because the fit would just be so tight and perfect…
The fantasies were becoming more frequent and almost urgent in nature as he got
better.
                                      ***
He rocked back a little against Hook’s hand, willing his muscles to spasm. Hook
felt it, and stared at the boy in front of him—the kid was raising his ass up
from the bed with his knees, shamelessly trying to turn an enema into something
titillating.
"If you're going to play around, you can do it yourself," Hook's voice boomed
behind Peter. The boy stiffened and tried to recall what it was that he had
just been doing while lost in his reverie. The porcelain nozzle he had probably
been squeezing out slid into him, and he obediently gripped it into place.
Healed up, Peter practically liked the feeling before the liquid would start to
flow into him, and lately even this discomfort he had grown accustomed to.
Perhaps it hurt less because there were no open lesions anymore. His face was
certainly clearer-- hardly any signs of the open wounds from before remained.
Peter jolted forward when he felt the water finally pouring in.
"Too hot?" Hook asked, lowering the bladder for a moment. Having someone be
concerned about you was bliss, Peter was beginning to notice.
"No, just peachy." He heard Hook fasten the bag onto the latch and prayed the
large, coarse hand would now be free to do more pleasant things. He smiled and
closed his eyes when he felt the palm-- so comfortingly familiar now-- press
itself gently against his slowly expanding belly. He sighed his pleasure into
the pillow below his face. It was pleasure that overshadowed his discomfort
from being bloated. To be touched with affection was even higher bliss, there
was no question about it.
"I think you're getting well enough that you don't even need these every week,"
Hook said, his hand brushing ever so lightly, almost haphazardly, against
Peter's thigh, which was quivering from both light pain and eagerness to be
caressed. Peter nodded quickly, though he rather liked some of the treatments.
The magnesium salt bath for his whole body, for example, felt very good-- he
appreciated the feeling of being constantly clean, and though the water
tingled, it was nothing to the silver colloid rinses of his insides. Sitting in
the warm water with Hook’s eyes roaming over his naked figure was perhaps best
of all.
The nozzle slid out and Peter quickly ran into the small adjoining room,
grateful that the outhouse was not his only option in the sumptuous villa.
Hook smirked when he saw the boy wait for him to leave, desperation in his
eyes.
“I’m glad to see you’re ashamed of something these days,” the captain remarked
with good humor when he returned a short time later to find Peter still
dressing.
“I wouldn’t mind you staying much, to tell you the truth. I just think you’re
too high on up cultured to like that sport. Although…” Peter trailed off, too
lost in thought to continue either dressing or talking.
Hook sat down in the armchair, leaning onto one side in true decadent fashion,
waiting for the boy to gather his thoughts. Though he wasn’t sure about how
healthy it was to harbor and recall the memories Peter seemed to, he thought it
was healthier to remember than have those awful lapses. Perhaps he’d recover
some parts of his former life if given practice.
“There was one gentleman,” the boy finally picked up. “Rich, with a wife and a
reputation. Wouldn’t touch me if I’d paid him, dirty whore that I was, but he
did like to watch me take a shit onto a silver platter of his, right in his
office.”
Hook grimaced. “A veritable pervert, then?”
“Well, might’ve been. But the easiest job I had in any case. And when he
learned that giving me money meant I’d be robbed of it or pass it on to Tom
instead of eating my wages, he started to feed me instead of paying. Sumptuous
meals he had, I thought, and felt like a bloomin’ prince. Still nothing to the
food here, but to my mind then… I’d known no better. So I’d stuff myself and
then we’d wait a little while for my bowels to work. At first I was a bit
ashamed, and wouldn’t let him see my face as I was at it. But by the end, I’d
mastered it and could even pull it off with a certain, you know, grace!…”
“Spare me the gruesome details, I beg you.”
But Hook was laughing, so Peter placed himself on the arm of the chair Hook was
sitting on and continued with his story’s more proper sections, energy building
from a receptive audience. “His wife drops in to see him at his office one day
after work. She’d been suspicious of him staying late so often. So she walks
in, and I’m right dab in the middle of it, on his desk, a knee on either side
of the silver platter, moaning ‘sif I were having the time of my life, and he
with front row seats to my ass, wanking off like no tomorrow.”
“So, what happened… dare I ask?” Hook was still trying hard to suppress his
laughter, and Peter was beginning to feel riled up. What wouldn’t he give to be
in that compromising position on Hook’s desk right now…
“Oh, she did throw a scene, that woman. When I’d quickly gotten myself decent-
- meaning to get out before more trouble started-- she decided to give me a
beating I was supposed to remember for ages to come. And then she finds her
frail gentlewoman’s hand doesn’t do the damage she’s looking for, so she takes
to beating me with her parasol. And he all the while running after the both of
us, shouting ‘Dearest! Dearest, put it down!’”
“Shh.” Hook snatched Peter into his lap, clapping his hand over the boy’s
mouth. Those lesions on his face really must have healed, Peter realized,
reaching out his tongue to lick at the palm suppressing his giggles. He
pretended he was trying to get free, squirming methodically to rub himself
against the captain’s body as much as possible.
“Don’t yell while you’re telling me something. You’ll wake the whole
household.” Hook’s voice hitched and his body stiffened against the close
contact he himself arranged.
“So you’ve been enlightening me quite some time about every which perversion
you’ve come across in London scum and gentry, but this hardly surprises me.
What did you enjoy doing, is what I’d like to know.” The captain’s hand freed
Peter’s mouth.
“Enjoy?” the boy asked, hardly sobered from his excitement before.
“Yes. Were there some customers you enjoyed servicing?”
“The ones who didn’t beat me?” Peter ventured. “I’m no whore at heart, so I
enjoyed none of it… sir. I assure you.”
“Really. Are you saying that only to please me?”
“But of course.” Peter grinned and ran his hand provocatively across Hook’s
silk cravat.
“I think it’s best we find you a hobby before you grow too bored,” Hook said,
taking the boy’s hand away. “And for myself too, perhaps.”
Peter felt his heart race at the grip around his wrist. The captain had the
spirit. All he required was the impetus. He’d be broken down eventually. Peter
smiled at his private thoughts, lowering his eyes to admire his new outfit for
the thousandth time.
“Oh yes, hobbies are quite nice.” He just caught Hook staring down at his
thighs when he brought his eyes back up. Hook quickly looked away.
Things were progressing nicely, Peter mused, crossing his legs so that one knee
deliberately dug into the captain’s torso, and unbalanced himself enough to
feel Hook’s hand come up to safeguard him from falling. He did not recall ever
having been so happy.
                                      ***
Peter found he and Hook had very different notions of hobbies. At the very
least, he had hoped to share them, but it had turned out quite the opposite. At
least Hook watched as he learned to fence, Peter consoled himself, and his
heart swelled with pride when the instructor praised his uncanny natural feel
for a sword. His only fault was concentration, as he kept turning to see
whether those blue forget-me-nots were still fixed on him when he was at his
exercises. Hook simply nodded when the other man would comment on the boy’s
aptitude, gazing off beyond them into a long-gone past. He was only brought
back to the here and now at the end of the lesson, when Peter came toward him
and whipped the sword out in only half-serious en garde stance. Hook’s
foreshortened arm jerked and his countenance changed so much that both Peter’s
hand and smile immediately sank down in fear.
“Never point swords at me, Pan.” Hook said with no hint of his usual sense of
humor. Peter nodded, surprised but hardly resisting the spanking he received
for his apparently grievous offense.
The same day Hook ventured out somewhere and brought back two young women in
the evening. He had been looking for some innocent, empty-headed country girls
from the neighborhood, but happened upon two who were visiting the countryside
and seeking to escape their cramped living conditions in Palermo.
They were giggly, mischievous, and youthful, and though Hook barely bothered to
learn their names and distinguish them—Florentina was taller than Celeste, or
had it been the other way around?—he was sure they would provide him with
something he had neglected for far too long. They also had a smattering of
French and even English, priding themselves on their cosmopolitanism.
Peter understood the situation well enough as soon as he beheld them, and Hook
was sure he caught a look of disappointment in the boy. But Peter didn’t fail
to be polite and played along convincingly, inventing realistic details about
how he became orphaned and came under Hook’s guardianship because he was some
obscure relative. The women fell absolutely in love with the idea of something
so romantic and altruistic, and to Hook’s bemusement became rather enthralled
with the boy, doting on him and prattling on only half-fluent nonsense.
Hook coughed and they finally tore themselves away to head upstairs. There was
an unmistakably great sadness in Peter’s eyes, but Hook chose to ignore it,
bidding the boy put himself to bed at a reasonable hour as he mounted the
stairs, the girls rustling in front of him with their long, elegant dresses.
He had rescued Peter, cured him of many ailments, and would provide him with
lodging-- even opulent lodging. He had no further obligation to hover over the
silly boy and satisfy his less than subtle demands for inappropriate intimacy.
Tumbling among the sheets, he was finding the girls did not disappoint, but the
sad boy downstairs haunted his thoughts as if to spite him. Peter Pan somehow
managed to obsess him in any setting, it seemed.
Peter heard the laughter coming from Hook’s bedchamber and crept upstairs,
slowly enough to produce only the lightest creaking—surely not to be heard
inside the loud room. He lowered himself to his knees, finding that the keyhole
afforded a marvelous view of most of the room, and, most importantly, the bed.
He watched intently—every movement the girls made, every gesture and grimace
was under scrutiny to see what elicited the best reactions from Hook. Whatever
it was that distinguished their methods from his was either very understated or
nonexistent. Hook had often complained about Peter’s vulgarity, but these girls
were speaking of things that made Peter blush. Hook had claimed he was easily
disgusted by lewd behavior, but they were unashamedly naked and doing things
that Peter judged did not put them in the most advantageous light. And these
were not sophisticated temptresses, he realized in surprise. In fact, there was
something decidedly amateur and childish in the way they laughed at strangely
inappropriate moments and ran about the room in only their drawers thinking a
game of tag to be the height of titillation.
He might have been happy in this discovery that it was not his skills which
were to blame, but watching where Hook’s hand went left Peter with the
realization that an ample bosom and bottom were very important to earning any
love under this roof. He finally began to feel inadvertent excitement when Hook
thrust into one, then the other not so long after. The excitement built like it
hadn’t in the entirety of his memory—perhaps because he had never before
watched without the expectation of getting his own turn all too soon.
Hook promised the girls new dresses laid out in the downstairs salon, and they
ran off squealing with delight, Peter quickly slinking off before they’d opened
the door. He was going to do as he’d been told and go off to bed, but his
desire to be touched was too great and he soon returned to knock on Hook’s
door. If anything, it was a matter of principle now, to prove to himself that
he hadn’t lost his art. His heart began to race when he was bidden to come in
without so much as a shuffle to get dressed. Indeed, Hook was half-sitting up
in bed, nude, hair loose and wild over his shoulders. He was covered to his
chest only with a sheet, the smell of sex hanging heavy in the air.
Much as Peter wished to ask for what he really wanted upfront, he dared not.
Hook was a man to be dealt with delicately.
“I’m feeling a little sick,” he said quietly, hoping the women would not return
too quickly. “I think I need…” He longed to say bath, but he was fairly sure
Hook would not stay with him for that. Sacrifices had to be made. “… an enema.”
Hook raised his eyebrows, although the rest of his face betrayed that he didn’t
really believe the boy. “I’m sorry to hear that, lad. Have Camille do it then.”
“But!” Peter couldn’t help feeling his ruse was becoming more transparent with
each passing moment. “She… she’s never done it before. She doesn’t know how to
do it, proper-like…”
“Well, instruct her. I’m sure she won’t bungle it up. Or if she’s busy, I
imagine you could do it yourself.”
Peter crimsoned and promised to try it later, both knowing that ‘later’
signified an indefinitely large period of time.
He passed Celeste and Florentina on his way down the stairs, the two girls
still quite pleased with their expensive new gowns. They kissed the boy they
believed to be theirs, and he cherished these affections well enough, though he
never let their lips near his own. The last thing he wanted was to pass on his
afflictions to the captain. He pitied the girls too. They were so healthy, and
happy, and pleasing to Hook.
Chapter End Notes
     Cinnabar is a mercury compound used to treat syphilis
     Ambroise Pare invented the Petit Lorraine which was the first
     advanced prosthesis
     Coprophilia appears to have gained sudden, momentary popularity at
     the beginning of the 18th century
***** Chapter 5 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Hook awoke to late afternoon sunlight, finding both the girls and their
garments gone. Perhaps I’m growing too old for these games, he thought
wistfully as he brought himself to order, feeling rather drained by the
activity of the last few days. He headed downstairs to the salon from which he
could hear the soft laughter and leisurely conversation of women, rather
embarrassed to have fallen asleep in the middle of the day.
“I’m out-playing them in checkers, captain!” Peter’s gleeful voice sounded out
as soon as Hook entered the room. The boy was kneeling on the chair, which he
swung back and forth with only two legs planted on the lacquered floor. He was
leaning on the table over the game board. The two girls sat opposite him,
giggling and fanning themselves. Losing miserably too, Hook noted as soon as he
looked at the board.
“I’ve been watching them play and learned the rules well enough without them
explaining or anything…” Peter continued excitedly, fading away when Hook
walked across to the other side and displaced Florentina from her chair, only
to have her reseat herself onto his lap. “I don’t think I can play you,
captain. It’s not right, somehow.”
“Sit back down,” Hook commanded with sudden acerbity that shocked Peter though
he dared not show it. “What, afraid to lose?”
“No.” Peter tried to smile. “Afraid of winning. It’s not good practice to beat
your host, dontcha think?”
“We shall see,” Hook said and proceeded to play. The women booed whenever Hook
managed to further improve on the bleak legacy they had left his side. Peter
was trying very hard not to notice how Hook’s hand held Florentina’s body
close. He smiled amiably, though his eyes betrayed rather intense distress as
they watched the playful flirting of the girls.
His last piece eaten, Peter stared at the girls in Hook’s arms. “I guess I’m no
good at these sort of games after all,” he said, forcing a smile and leaving
the table to go up to his room.
“You horrible man. Why make bad feeling about the silly things like this.”
“Don’t think we were not playing on rules with you and make you win,” Celeste
added helpfully, addressing Peter, and letting out a giggle when Hook pinched
her bottom.
“Not those games either,” Peter said quietly as he mounted the stairs.
“Why don’t you spend more time outside, Pan. Go and soak up some sunlight. Go
and play with those neighborhood children that cause such a racket early in the
morning. They trespass on our property all the time anyway.”
“I an’t a child! You of all people should know that, eh?” Peter didn’t care who
heard him at this point.
“Fine, don’t befriend them. Just go outside and stop sulking all day. It
disgusts me.”
At this, Peter’s eyes opened wide in surprise, arms falling limply at his
sides. He swallowed hard. “I don’t wanna disgust you… You’ve given me so much,
and--”
“Peter is not sulky!” Celeste cried, though she was not at all sure she was
catching the entire drift of the conversation.
“Not sulky when you and Peter isn’t together here,” Florentina chimed in.
“Ladies, please--”
“Thank you, Flora and Celeste. But I’m going to go upstairs. Because I can’t
understand why you want to mold me ‘sif I were a child when it’s so plain that
you hate children.” He quickly made his way upstairs, hearing indecipherable
talk in the salon, but judging easily enough that it was verging on bickering
by the tones. At least the women stood up for him. Soon, however, he heard
three pairs of feet go up the stairs and retire into the next room.
Again?! Peter thought in dismay, sitting on his bed hugging his knees and
listening, not deigning to raise his head from his knees when the housekeeper
walked into his room.
“I know why you’re sad,” Camille said in her coarse Italian. She was sweeping,
and Peter absentmindedly raised his feet off the floor for her. “I know your
secrets. You’re a little prostitute. You don’t think I’ve forgotten those
blisters you came in with. Shame… shame on the likes of you.”
“I needed the money, you old witch, and I was sold into it, so shut up.”
She fumed, and she was rather funny when she fumed. Almost funny enough to
ignore the cries of ecstasy behind the wall. Suddenly she raised the broom to
strike him, but thought better of it before swinging.
“Afraid of the master then, eh?” Peter got up, making to leave.
“You deserve it. You liked it, little strumpet. I know your kind. You burn in
hell later.”
“I’ll see you there, then, along with your mean tongue,” he declared in
triumphant English. It was impossible to tell what she had understood of that,
if anything, but the tone alone was enough. He ducked from the swipe of her
broom and bolted out with her in hot pursuit until they reached the railing and
he slid down, leaving her huffing and puffing at the top. The bubbling sense of
fun reminded him of something long ago and he felt like a child more than ever
before.
Peter stuck out his tongue and raced outside to try the advice he had so
disdained earlier.
He returned so late that Hook had begun to worry and contemplate sending
someone out for him. The boy was drunk with happiness and power when he
strutted into the salon, informing everyone present that he had subordinated
the entire group of boys in the area, despite his limited Italian, and had been
ordering them about in efforts to orchestrate a grand-scale raid of the
neighboring pear orchard. He threw the pears down on the table as if he had
returned from the hunt, saving one in his hand and surprising everyone when he
ran over to Camille with it.
“Camille, my favorite housekeeper!” he shouted, smiling a lopsided smirk Hook
hadn’t seen since the boy’s capture, many decades ago. He threw his arms around
her stout figure, and she made an attempt to avoid him, expecting some cruel
joke as boys are wont to do, but he only handed her the pear. He knew she would
not dare shoo him away under Hook’s eye.
Florentina and Celeste wasted no time in lavishing attentions on him. Hook
remained pensive in his chair, studying the scene before him. Peter threw
surreptitious glances his way, but averted his eyes if their gazes locked. He
felt fearful hatred and a strange, gentle affection swirl together in his heart
when he looked at this strange creature he had managed to trap and secure. He
seemed to work charms on everyone around him, and even distrustful Camille
could not dislike him for long. It was a myth he’d retrieved from the dirtiest,
most mundane muck. And he never wanted to part with him.
Peter suddenly decided to do something rather bold, and began to caress parts
on the girls that only Hook had touched before.
“Oh Celeste,” he said in the deepest voice he could muster. “How I love your
plentiful ass!... And Florencia, my darling, take off my breeches and sit in my
lap…” The girls laughed raucously to see this miniature parody, and kissed him
over and over on the cheeks. The boy’s eyes were wholly on Hook, however.
“Insolent youth,” the captain finally muttered. The girls laughed and tried to
shield Peter when Hook approached.
“Un comedien, eh?” Hook said, taking Peter by the ear and practically dragging
him upstairs. Peter’s body heated up so much with fear and excitement that his
ear did not seem to burn peculiarly in comparison to the rest of his face.
“Sod off!” He laughed as he tried to free himself, only to suddenly get shoved
onto his bed.
“I think you’ve had enough fun for today. It’s time for children to sleep.”
“Oh, but I’ll sleep so much better if you…” Peter trailed off, grabbing at
Hook’s coat to prevent him from leaving easily.
“We’ll have none of that. You’re like a dog that’s torn its leash all day
today. Have you been sneaking wine?”
“No…” Peter was crawling out of his skin to be seductive. “Please… right now…”
He wanted to say something naughty, and he would have had no qualms with anyone
else, but his voice all but disappeared when he looked at the judgmental,
intense eyes above him.
“I’ve told you, those days are over for you. And you’re still sick, you know.”
Peter pursed his lips. As if to emphasize Hook’s words, the burning sensations
began creeping up in his body. Calm down he commanded himself, but tears
suddenly threatened to spill out. He took another plunge, speaking too quickly
from his nervousness. "Your body makes me want to tear myself to shreds... It
drives me wild with desire. If all men were like you, whoredom would be
downright bliss..."
"Rather poetic language, if somewhat crass. I'll venture the brothel taught you
those lines?"
Peter smiled. "Don't mean I never use them sincerely..."
"You vulgar little thing." Hook chuckled, running his hand through Peter's
hair. “Why can’t you just pretend you’re a normal child, at least for my sake?”
“Why can’t you just pretend to like me?” Peter finally answered, his voice
hardly above a whisper.
“I like you well enough,” Hook said, but his body language grew even more
aloof. He got up and made for the door to leave Peter alone in the room.
Peter felt strange urgency—as if he would never see the captain again if he let
him go now. He was grasping at straws. "Are you too old?" Evidently the wrong
straws in this case, Peter thought to himself when he saw Hook’s face change.
"Too old for what?" the captain snapped, and Peter was sure he understood the
drift well enough without further explanation. No matter—he couldn’t very well
back down now, and besides, Hook might be more interested in doing something if
his manhood were in question. Or so Peter hoped in the frantic thoughts that
barely had time to race through his mind.
"Too old... for fun... that I can offer..."
Hook looked at him incredulously, but Peter could see he was at least somewhat
troubled. He was beginning to sincerely regret bringing the question up.
"Because…" the boy said to fill in the awkward silence, more than anything
else, but felt like he was digging himself into a deeper hole. "Because if
you're getting on in years, I should tell you that when the Spanish ambassador
dropped by our establishment, I entertained him all through the night, one way
or another, and he was well over sixty--"
"We'll have no more of your fascinating tales here, and I never want to hear
obscenities from you again, understand?"
Peter nodded anxiously, but Hook did not even care to see his reaction,
striding out the door as if to escape a house of plague. Peter gulped down his
tears over and over as he washed his susceptible skin with the magnesium salts
before going to bed, spreading the liquid around his mouth, then delving back
to wash all his privates.
He had said all the wrong things and Hook would never come near him again, he
was certain. He had little decent reason to be unhappy. Then again, something
made him crave to be back in London, in that nasty old bed, Tom pounding into
him, and even though it hurt, both knowing full-well that Tom had no one else
in the world to rival Peter’s place in his affections. They were vulgar, maybe
even base, affections, but Peter knew his role there and felt beautiful and
talented. Hook never failed to make him feel stupid, and even ugly nowadays.
Peter walked over to the mantelpiece and gazed in the gilded round mirror above
it. The reflection was convex and distorted, so it was difficult to judge his
own appearance. He tried to wipe off his tears with the back of his wet hand,
forgetting that the magnesium salts would sting even more acutely.
                                      ***
He desperately wanted to make amends and ventured to do just that the following
morning, though he woke up with a body so sore he found it hard to walk. That’s
what he got for getting himself agitated over nothing.
He eased the door of Hook's bedchamber open, glad that he had timed his
entrance right-- Hook was awake but still lying in bed, as seemed to be his
custom. He turned to Peter, and for a moment the boy had the urge to run back
out whence he came. He swallowed and approached the bed as gracefully as
possible, consciously twisting his hips just a bit more than necessary. He slid
onto the bed, though not beneath the covers, not wishing to be impertinent.
"Hello," Hook said, unable to conceal his surprise. "What brings you here?"
Peter's spirits rose at the captain's easy tone. "Nothing. I was just wanting
to say good morning. And sorry about yesterday, truly. And thank you for
everything you've done for me--" He shut up, seeing Hook smile at his babbling.
"Quite a lot for a casual visit. Well then: good morning, you're forgiven, and
you're welcome." Hook grinned.
“And I’ve decided that you’re right. I just want you to be pleased with me,
Captain. I’ll act as you’ve been desiring all these days.”
Hook drew him in. “Come here.” Peter trembled as he felt a parental kiss place
placed on his forehead. “You don’t mind those women being here, do you?”
Peter shook his head. “Unless you don’t like them, of course. I rather like
them. They’re so nice. The women whores in London would gang up on young
mollies and would rob and beat us with their hard shoes. But I’m good friends
with yours.”
“Whores…” Hook repeated, smiling wistfully, before noticing the worry spread
over Peter’s face when he thought he’d said something inappropriate again.
“Consorts, I mean, or I… I don’t know the proper words for women…”
“Alright, alright, just don’t tremble. Go eat and then entertain yourself
outside. Can you find something to do?”
Peter nodded and walked out. He had no desire to tell Hook that he was feeling
pains deep inside him again.
                                      ***
“He say the boy of him and yours caught by the polizia for the going into
garden of the neighbor,” Florentina translated hurriedly from the words of the
man standing in the doorway.
Everybody had already been quite restless even before the man showed up at the
door. Darkness had fallen hours ago, and though Hook would not verbally
acknowledge his worry over the boy’s absence he could not do much more than sit
and bite at the toothpick from dinner, pretending to be immersed in his reading
material. Even now his face remained rather impassive, though he had already
donned his coat just before the man came, planning to go out and look for the
boy himself. “Peter was taken?”
The two women nodded frantically and began babbling amongst themselves. The man
was imploring something, but Hook could not hope to make out the rushed Italian
with the heavy local dialect.
“He say please get his boy from the prigione. It needs money.”
“Tell him I’ll do it if he can tell me where they were taken.”
“Palermo… prigione… the closed house.”
“The prison?” Hook cursed as he saw them nod. Though he had no acquaintance
with the prisons in this country, he could imagine they were not quite so
different from the squalid, violent establishments in England. Thankfully he
had never once had direct experience with the inner workings of such places,
but some of his crewmembers’ horror stories had been enough. There was nothing
left to be done except head straight into the city as soon as possible. The
horses were readied and Hook stomped out, shaking his head, the girls following
him to the carriage, staying behind to wring their hands and babble to each
other in worried tones that he did not care to hear.
                                      ***
They had finally summoned someone with a considerable understanding of English.
The little man sat at the desk, straining to hold his monocle in place even as
he shuffled through old dusty documentation.
“Is this all about the pears? Where is this man? I will pay him for those
ridiculous pears. I’ll buy him another orchard of his godforsaken pears! Pere..
pere… pagare for the pere…”
“It is not only that crime, signor. It is, ah, moreover, ah... the man love of
Sodoma.”
Even here there was no respite. Englishmen were moreover easier to bribe in his
native tongue. Hook finally turned to speak to Peter, who was listening to the
whole conversation intently, clutching the bars of the cell he shared with five
others. “Are you an idiot? Why would you ever tell them that?”
“I… I didn’t,” Peter mumbled, his face almost narrow enough to squeeze through
the bars.
Hook sharply turned away to face the guard.
“How much? Quanto… quanto lira? To get him out? To… eh…” Hook said, pointing to
the lock of the jail cell.
“We are much excuse, signor, but he is a prisoner of Palermo. Signor cannot buy
them to return, unless we have proof that you are good citizen.”
Hook walked out of the building, trying not to think about how pathetic Peter
had looked clutching at the bars or how ridiculous the entire situation was. He
must have looked a fright that morning, having spent all night pacing around
the jail until it opened, and now just barely making it out of the building
without gutting someone from frustration. At least he knew his destination well
now.
A servant answered the door, trying to declare that the doctor was not
receiving patients yet, even as the doctor burst out past him still in his
nightshirt, evidently having recognized the broken Italian speech of the
visitor.
“‘Good morning’, come dite. Where is mio piccolo bambino?”
“Piccolo bambino is precisely what I’m here about. He is in prison… prigione.
Can you come down to the ufficio governativo and sign that you know who I am,
and who Peter is? That Peter is your patient… paziente?”
The doctor squinted, digesting the words, his face lighting up when he finally
understood.
“If he is my paziente, why I see him not so… spesso?”
Hook was willing to offer anything at the moment. “I’ll bring him. I’ll bring
him often.”
“You don’t understand. That bambino is uni… unico.”
“Unique, si, capisco, capisco, but can we--”
“He is… eh… child but diseases like adult.” Both he and Hook were slowly
reverting to hand signs to fill in inadequacies in their respective languages.
“And I think first when I see bambino he is fast grow, but then I think he is
not, eh… grow. Very slow grow, not fast. You can’t know age?”
“No, I don’t know. I don’t think he’s over fourteen.”
“But you don’t see his eye—his eye… has years of… sporcizia”
“Cataracts?”
“Yes, cataracts! Cataracts… yes… And number of disease—it is stupendo.”
“Stupendo? What, are you happy? You felice?”
“No, no… it is interesting.”
Hook was thoroughly annoyed by now. “If you won’t come with me to sign I’ll
have to look for someone else then?” Never mind that he had no one else in this
city to turn to. Even were he to summon them, the inhabitants of his household
were hardly respectable sources.
“No, no, I go with you. But you come every two week to me. I want to see my
piccolo bambino spesso before he die.”
“He won’t die. He’s feeling much better.”
The doctor nodded his head, and retreated back into his house to get dressed.
                                      ***
Thankfully the doctor had an overwhelmingly good reputation in the city, and
the little official hurriedly filled all the release forms out without any
further troubles. Hook paid for Peter and the other two peasant boys whose
fathers were awaiting them. The two were about Peter’s apparent age, and begged
for a ride home though they steered clear of Peter now. Hook could guess well
enough why, seeing Peter’s tattered state when they were taken out of the cell
full of other hardened criminals. They were riding home now, finally. The two
boys not being admitted into the carriage, were sitting on the back, out in the
open air though there was a light drizzle. Hook wanted to be alone with Peter.
He was angry at no one in particular. He should have been angry at Peter, but
the boy was sitting in the carriage seat across him so timidly that it was
impossible to entertain such feelings for long. He refrained from speaking
however, waiting for Peter to get up his courage and break the silence.
“How often did you promise to go?”
“He’d like to see you every fortnight,” Hook said, taking care to keep
annoyance out of his tone. Peter’s eyes fled to the floor. The boy had not
dared to say anything directly to Hook since they left the jailhouse, though he
guessed well enough who had vouched for their identities when Hook led him to
the doctor’s immediately after his release. Peter's posture was still
uncharacteristically hunched over, obviously shamed by the predicament he’d
gotten himself into.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s no concern of mine. You’re the one who’s going to have him peering into
all your orifices.”
“He said I need to do something like needlework. To keep my eyes and fingers
sharp and all that.”
“He told me.”
Peter looked out the window. “I don’t really feel that bad. I get spots in my
eyes, and my legs shake sometimes…” He trailed off slightly when he saw Hook
look up sharply. “But… but I think… I probably do have the pox, but it’s not
hurt me for years…”
Hook watched the boy play with the laces from his new shirt. His old clothing
was far too begrimed after his stay in the jail for Hook to suffer him to walk
around like that, though Peter’s breath still hitched when they threw the
clothes away into the street as if they were nothing but rags.
“So, pray tell, how did they know of your occupation?”
Peter winced. “It always worked in London…”
“What did?” There was the annoyance showing through clear as day. Peter sniffed
wiping at his eyes. “Don’t touch your eyes. You might spread something to
them.”
“I… well… they came to chase us. I ran far before he caught up to me. I was
more than halfway home from that orchard, but he caught up to me, and tackles
me to the ground, and I see it. I see that he’s the kind that wouldn’t mind it,
so I offer to… to exchange for freedom.”
“Exchange?”
Peter sighed, playing with his laces even more frantically as if it could
divert his attention. “Suck him off. And he nods his head and promises to let
me go if I do. And I do a excellent job of it—and hell knows, he liked it well
enough—but he still takes me up by the arm and leads me back, sneering ugly as
hell, telling them that I were a lecherous whore ‘sif he didn’t make use of my
services.”
“But you offered first?”
“I didna want to end up in jail and trouble you.”
“And sucking off the law would help you with that, you thought.”
“It’d work in London. I can tell apart those that’ll go for it and those that
won’t.” Peter finally looked up from the floor, pained. “I know you think I’m
stupid. Well, I can’t help being stupid. Might as well make the best of it,
shouldn't I? Might as well try to get by.”
“That has nothing to do with anything.”
“You’re just such a goddamn judge most of the time. I feel like my soul
shrivels when you look on me. And… and I know you’re treating me far better
than I’m deserving of, so I have no right to be complaining, but I feel like
such an idjit all the time. I can’t help you in the only way I know how to
help.”
“You’re so desperate to help?” Hook suddenly launched himself across the
carriage, drawing out a handkerchief and stuffing it against Peter’s mouth
before his lips assaulted the same spot. It was a short and violent kiss, and
though they were separated by several folds of linen, each could feel the heat
of the other’s breath. Hook came away and sat back on the seat opposite
Peter’s.
“There. You helped me in the way you wanted. Are you satisfied?”
Peter burst into tears and, knowing Hook did not pity sniveling, began to cover
his face and choke back the sobs. Hook remained impassive. Though he was sure
the boy took it as mocking, it had felt very liberating to finally do something
he had been so tempted to do before. To think he’d ever be so coy with a whore,
in his old age.
“I’m… sorry,” the boy spoke when he thought he had regained control of his
voice. “I don’t think I got enough sleep yesternight.”
“They kept you occupied, eh?”
“Dju have to ask?” Peter looked out the window. “After they’d all heard what I
was in there for they could barely wait until dark. ‘Tleast I managed it so
that they didna touch any of the other boys.”
“What, you want congratulations for being a martyr?” Why was he being horrible?
He was wringing pleasure from the boy’s pain, and for what? His act had already
been punished twice over.
“I don’t want anything but for you to be pleased with me, but I canna ever
manage it, it seems. I give myself freely just to keep myself safe. If I didna
whore myself, I’d still be sore and come out with bruises and cuts.”
Hook stared at Peter’s face—a light blush lingering on his cheeks, cracked lips
showing evidence of the recent ill-use. It could not be helped much longer.
Peter sensed the stare, but not its intent. “Why question me about every single
nasty bloke I’ve had to do because of my stupidity or weakness or poverty? You
want me to tell you about each one that did me up against the bars last night?”
“No. I’m only jealous.”
Peter looked up, too hesitant to entertain hopes about the meaning of those
words. They did it silently—Hook unbuttoning and putting on the sheath, Peter
slipping down to the floor, tying the sheath’s laces even as he began to suck
eagerly, then—deeming everything ready—stripping down.
Everything was done with seasoned skill, Hook marveled, even in the unstable
environment of the carriage on the rough country road. Peter knelt on the seat,
facing away-- too afraid he’d blush to death if he were face-to-face with those
critical eyes. He lowered himself down slowly with each knee on the outer side
of Hook's thigh. On the one hand he wanted to speak, wanted to ask if he was
pleasing, to ask if Hook wanted him to try clenching tighter still. It was too
intimidating to start a conversation, so Peter simply guessed to clench down
and establish a steady rhythm, praying that his patron was enjoying himself. He
felt a rough hand come up and trace his spine as he rocked up and down. Peter
smiled, knowing the pretty arching he’d been taught was now being rewarded.
“Faster?” The boy finally exhaled the word in one breathy sound, still not
daring to turn around.
“Let’s…” The tremble in the captain’s voice brought Peter new confidence. They
were both keeping quiet except the heavy breathing—not really wishing for the
driver or their passengers to be able to hear what was happening inside—but
their voices betrayed the heat of their union. Peter suddenly felt the man’s
midsection leap from the seat as he stood up, grabbing Peter’s legs and
suspending the boy practically in mid-air, pushing him forward until his hand
desperately found anchoring on the opposite seat. Between the violent rutting
of Hook's hips into Peter’s from behind and the frequent jolts of the entire
carriage, it was all the boy could do to hold on to the edge of the seat to
keep both of them steady.
Then came the end, just as quickly as the entire thing began. Hook removed
himself and Peter collapsed naked and panting on the opposite seat while the
captain brought him to order. Peter jerked when Hook discarded the sheath out
the window.
“Weren’t… weren’t I to your liking?” he stuttered, his senses still reeling
from the physically demanding position they’d just engaged in. He wished he
could have serviced Hook in a more fitting state, not sore from a previous
night’s brutalities.
Hook looked over at Peter, smiling a little sadly. Why had he given in to the
impulse? “Greatly to my liking.”
“Then… an’t we ever going to do it again?”
Hook burst out laughing. Would the boy ever be cured of his frugality? “Perhaps
we will, but I don’t keep around used things.”
“You keep me, don’t you?” Peter winked. Some of the boy’s confidence was
finally returning. He pulled his clothes back on, sitting back into his seat
opposite Hook.
“I can do more, you know. I was just fearing you were angry with me, so I
didn’t feel up to interrupting with my babble…”
“It’s alright. Enough for me for a first time, I assure you. But you must
promise not to ever ask for it. Don’t even mention it at home.”
Peter nodded earnestly. His excitement was beginning to wear off into
drowsiness, and his head bounced painfully when his relaxing neck didn’t
compensate for the carriage’s shakes.
“Come here. I’ll hold you so you can sleep. We still have hours ahead of us
before we reach home.”
Peter moved across timidly, afraid to intrude on the man’s space, but Hook took
him up in his arms.
“You didn’t sleep all night either, didja?” Peter said, running his fingers
along the chin above him, roughened with bristles.
“Nonsense.” Hook was trying to keep a straight face. “Why would I come to
Palermo in hopes of rescuing you, pacing outside the jail, then pacing outside
the office, then selling my soul to some doctor so he can come sign for me…”
Peter cringed. “I’m sorry. I won’t ever go into other people’s properties.”
Hook stared out the window at the fields, and was about to add something when
he noticed the child in his arms had already fallen into uneasy sleep, eyelids
trembling ever so faintly, dreams troubling him where life could not. The boy
was happy, Hook reasoned to himself. He would not have defiled him if it would
not have made the boy happy. What did it matter? It was not as though the boy
hadn’t been getting almost as much action lately as in his working days. No
difference, Hook assured himself.
Chapter End Notes
     "Dama" would really be the proper name for checkers in Italy.
     "Droughts" in England. The board in vogue in the early 18th century
     was 10x10.
     Condoms were expensive and were usually reused after washing.
     18th century carriages were pretty similar to their English
     counterparts but roomier. Something like a stagecoach, but a little
     lighter, because 4 mph is really a miserable speed, even for country
     roads.
     The 17th century prison in Palermo, formerly the host of atrocious
     tortures under the Inquisition (among other more mundane functions)
     is being turned into a museum.
***** Chapter 6 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Peter was content to smile knowingly at Hook for only a few days. Though he
dared not disobey and explicitly ask, he tried very hard to let it be known
that he was primed and ready for another encounter. When Hook ignored him, the
boy slid back into paranoia about his skills. Sure that he had not been all
that Hook had looked forward to, he drifted like a ghost through the rooms,
inventing elaborate plans to give his caretaker the ride of a lifetime if only
given the chance.
Hook deeply regretted giving in to his urges. Not that he found the boy
lacking—God knew, he had been satisfied so thoroughly only a few times before.
It was simply disappointing how easily he had turned a precious possession into
just another household whore. Peter didn’t, and probably would never remember
his fantastical past, but Hook had imagined him to be something extraordinary
even in the ways of sex. Yet Peter was quite ordinary—experienced but ordinary.
His only quality was eternal childhood, and even that was marred. Hook could
not decide if he felt better or worse about leaving an ordinary child to an
awful fate.
After feeling the boy rub up against him with unnecessary intimacy one too many
times, Hook decided to call off his decree confining Peter to stay indoors. He
installed a simple swing off a tree in the wooded area near the house, and this
was large enough to be used by all three of his permanent houseguests at once.
Amazing how much giggling and simple pleasure could be derived from a piece of
wood strung up by a long rope, the man thought, but he would be the last to
complain as he played spectator to their games. They stood on the board,
holding on to the rope strung through the middle, calling on him to swing them-
- the girls’ skirts blown to and fro, obscenely exposing their knees, and Peter
Pan, face contorting with delight, hair billowing around his face, eyes burning
with dangerlust, always calling for Hook to push them even harder until the
girls would start shrieking and demanding pause in the game.
Tales about what had happened in the jail spread like fire in the countryside,
of course, and boys from all over would gather not too far from the house,
shouting insults at Peter when he came out on the side facing the country road.
Flora and Celeste were puzzled at first at the accusations, but quickly
interpreted what had happened as an example of the innocent martyr-like quality
of their protégé, and only the housekeeper muttered angrily about having to
serve in a house of sin such as this one, though on the day of payment she
usually bore her tragic fate better.
Only Hook was mildly worried, often watching the boy from the window when he
was outside alone, seeing him make obscene gestures in reply to the taunts.
Once Peter ran off to fight them, outnumbered three to one, and Hook was sorely
tempted to come out and give them a beating—if not a proper gutting—as well,
but he was desperate to see… see something. A glimmer of true Peter Pan
perhaps. He watched the figures in the distance, pleased to see the three of
them finally run away. The fourth returned to the house, dragging its feet.
Hook receded from the window and waited for Peter to come through the front
door, then realized the boy had decided to take the servants’ passage.
There he stood on the doorstep, plenty of blood still dripping from a split lip
onto the wooden floor as the cook and housekeeper tried to clean him up.
“Fought them off?”
Peter mumbled a barely coherent “Yeah.”
“Such humbleness. I’d say it’s a worthy victory.”
“Hardly. They don’t realize I’m not a little child such as they are. I had to
know how to handle idiots like that to live in London.” Peter’s face turned
away. “Why are you here, anyway. I didna want you to see me looking like all
ruddy hell.”
Hook wiped away some blood before taking Peter by the hand. “Why not? I have
tonics for cuts upstairs.”
They walked silently, Peter following Hook, coughing occasionally. Once they
were in the Peter’s room, Hook stripped him down to reveal a myriad of other
scrapes and bruises, and began applying iodine tincture to every area with
broken skin.
“What made you come after them this time anyway? Going one against three…” Hook
stopped realizing Peter now knew that he had been watched.
“Cause they had no right screaming about how my ass opens up wide as a barrel
when two of them were the ones in the cell with me, huddling in the corner
probably pissing themselves from fearing they’d be next. And nastiness about
you too—how you keep me for pleasure, when you’re a reputable man who can
barely stand me and my filthiness…”
There was an awkward pause. The boy was desperate again, but Hook would not use
this as an excuse to despoil him again.
Crestfallen at the apparent truth of his own words, Peter continued. “At least
my cheeks and nose didna break, so I’ll be pretty to look on again, if I heal
some. Would you like that?…”
Hook was on his knees, applying the iodine to cuts on the skinny legs in front
of him in silence, pretending not to notice the tension in the boy.
“…Do you care a fig?”
“I care,” Hook muttered without looking up. “But it’s no longer your job to
look nice, so don’t fret so much.”
“But I like looking nice…”
Hook rose to his feet, chuckling lightly when he looked at the boy’s body in
brown splotches. A veritable leopard, he teased.
Peter’s eyes widened in sudden fear. “Leper?”
Hook had to put all the boy’s fears about being sent away or having the horrid
malady to rest, which took surprisingly long, and then go on and explain about
what sort of animal it was that he was referring to.
Peter stared at his body, unable to ignore the realization that his skin might
have looked this motley if he didn’t take so much care every night to stop each
skin ulcer. The medicine was wonderful for that, though it smelt terrible, and
he was still very grateful to the doctor. Hook didn’t know, and wouldn’t have
to know. Peter knew the first rule of his kind of life was that every effort
had to be made to keep up appearances of health.
                                      ***
Now that Peter was forbidden from leaving the estate proper there was less to
do outdoors, but the captain did more and more to keep him entertained. To the
chagrin of the housekeeper and cook, Hook allowed Peter to bring various
animals into the house. As most of these were from the nearby pond, they
consisted of mostly large insects, frogs, and the occasional duckling.
Occasional shrieking became common, and though Celeste and Flora found many of
the boy’s antics funny and endearing they still feared toads more than death.
Hook was most fascinated with watching Peter catch dragonflies—hands swift but
delicate enough not to crush their wings.
“I like things that fly,” Peter explained once while showing Hook a
particularly huge specimen. His eyes seemed to want to escape their sockets
when Hook informed him that the name of the creature in his hands was called a
dragonfly.
“A fly like a dragon?”
“Haven’t you ever seen one before?”
Peter shook his head. “I don’t think they like the Thames.”
“Who does, besides the corpses that float up in it?” Hook laughed, and Peter
immediately took advantage, letting the dragonfly fly free and insinuating
himself into his caretaker’s lap. Hook went no further than stroking the boy’s
hair, so Peter resigned himself to acting the child and laid his head on Hook’s
shoulder.
“Might we… might we take the carriage and go to the doctor’s?” The way he was
sitting allowed him to feel the chuckle that followed be born deep within
Hook’s chest and rattle up to his throat.
“Are you more interested in the doctor or the carriage ride? If there’s
something really wrong, I’ll have the stableman take you into town.”
Indeed they had been completely remiss in returning on the promised fortnight
interval, but Hook preferred to make as few visits as possible. At this time he
didn’t feel up to spending the better part of a day in that same carriage alone
with the boy.
Peter sighed. Much as he had wanted to take advantage of another long ride,
there were things wrong. He found he didn’t have sensation in his legs when he
woke up in the morning, and sometimes his fingertips. And the spots in his eyes
were sometimes bad enough to make him want to close them.
“I’ll be going with him then.”
“There’s something really bothering you?”
Peter was staring somewhere at the ground. It felt counter-productive to
divulge maladies that could not be seen. “A little bit. It’s nothing, I just
need some medicine probably.”
He couldn’t help but smile when Hook squeezed him to his chest and promised to
accompany him to the city the next day himself.
                                      ***
The doctor had been displeased that they had not returned regularly, muttering
something about the human body being more than a machine you take to repair
only when it’s broken. The prognosis terrified Hook. Peter had been
surprisingly diligent in rubbing down any ruptures on his skin, but there was
nothing to do about the ulceration eating him away inside. The boy was dying
from the inside out. It was only a matter of time, the doctor claimed in his
broken English, before Peter began losing his wits, among other things.
“Don’t look so sad,” Peter said hastily as Hook climbed up to join him in the
carriage. “I already know what I have, you don’t have to hide it from me. I’ve
seen it in others. I always pull through, maybe this one won’t take me down
either…”
Hook nodded and looked out the window.
Peter shifted uncomfortably and sat silent for some time.
“If… if you don’t want to be involving yourself with me, just know I don’t bear
grudge. Tom pumped into me every time he got the chance, but he was filth-
ridden himself. Think he had the pox even before me. Even he didn’t let me go
into his lodging when I had my hands and face erupt with it. I couldn’t get
work either, in that state, but begging was easier than usual. It was summer,
so I managed. I went back to Tom when it’d healed, but he told me that I wasn’t
ever going to be rid of it now…”
Hook finally looked over and saw tears streaming down Peter’s cheeks, though
his voice hardly betrayed it.
“I – I just don’t wanna die! And I wanna stay pretty, not like those pox
sufferers I’d seen, drying up like raisins with their nose all decaying and
hollow, on their ugly crutches…”
Hook took Peter and held him with bruising force, quickly slipping a folded
handkerchief between their lips as he kissed the boy. They felt the heat of
each other’s mouths through the cloth, their noses still bare and rubbing past
each other side to side. Peter’s heart sang, and he felt important and needed
again.
“There’s always a way out, boy. If you ever feel it’s bad enough, there’s a
drug…”
Peter shook his head. “I want to live. I want to live forever and ever and
ever, and I want to make you happy…” It was obvious what the boy was aiming
for, as he straddled Hook, arching his back.
“Are you sure you won’t ache inside?”
“I’ll be alright. As long as I can make someone else happy, life is worth
living.”
They did it facing each other, much more relaxed this time, Peter staring into
Hook’s eyes as he impaled himself over and over, frantic as though death would
catch up with him before his job was done. They stayed together, wrapping
themselves into embrace, Peter’s body still applying delicious pressure
variation around the quickly subsiding erection.
“Do you ever come, my pretty nymph?” Hook said, running his fingers along each
protruding vertebra.
“I come dry. It’s very much in fashion nowadays, you know. People think I’m
still twelve years old because of it.”
“And just what age are you?”
Peter pulled back to face Hook again. “Don’t you know, Captain?”
“Hell if I do. I don’t know how long you’ve been around when I’d picked you up
from--”
Peter suddenly clapped his hands over his ears. “I don’t wanna hear about it… I
don’t wanna!”
“Why not?” Hook asked, rather perplexed.
“Because I know it’s something bad. I remember some of it. It wasn’t any good,
none of it. I’m happier nowadays.”
Hook couldn’t let this go now. “No, lad, you were quite happy before I laid my
hands on you. You lived in a paradise of your own making.”
Peter relaxed a bit and smiled. “Oh, you mean that story about me flying with
the fairy people?”
“Yes, ‘that’ story. And since you refuse to believe it, I will wager you don’t
remember that it was you who deprived me of my hand.”
He had gone too far again, in some weird quest to restore Peter’s memory,
though he had despised the boy at that stage in their lives. Peter went rigid,
voice croaking as he said he didn’t quite understand the joke.
“It’s nothing,” Hook said. His hand alighted on Peter’s waist and the boy was
instantly immersed in efforts to regenerate the man’s excitement inside
himself, rocking his hips back and forth, happy to be back to turf he
understood.
Only a skilled whore could excite him twice in such rapid succession Hook
mused—leaning his head back this time, and enjoying the boy’s efforts without
making eye contact. The boy also found it easier to say something now that he
didn’t have to stare into piercing blue.
“If… if it gets so that I’m not pretty to look on anymore… you can give me that
drug… I never want to be ugly to you… I don’t want you to remember me all
gopping and falling apart...”
Hook cursed silently, pretending not to hear as he neared climax again. Damn
the boy for being so unaware of just how wretched he sounded.
                                      ***
It was the first time Hook awoke before his two bedmates. He heard it as a soft
kind of mewling coming from the next-door room. The two girls snuggled closer
together when he extricated himself from between them and wrapped a simple robe
around his body.
Peter was sitting up in his bed, hesitantly calling for the captain. Hook
approached him, still rubbing at eyes weighed down by a rather late retirement
to bed.
“I… I didna wanna wake you so early, but I can’t… I just canna feel my legs at
all this morning. No matter what I do…” Tears were threatening to spill out.
Hook sighed heavily and uncovered the boy’s lower half, sitting on the bed and
rubbing his feet, asking the boy if he felt anything. He wished he had two
hands at that moment, but entrusted one of the feet to be revived by Peter
himself. Strong callused fingers kneaded the small foot, trying to return life
to it.
“And sometimes they go jerking about, so that it keeps me awake at night. I
don’t understand it,” Peter said, looking forlorn. “I’ve seen the pox, and the
legs don’t usually suffer this much. Not the first thing anyway…”
Hook couldn’t help feeling guilt at having used the boy only a few days prior.
Feeling in Peter’s legs gradually revived, but not before the entire household
had woken up and stood staring from the doorway of the boy’s room. Camille was
muttering something about how evil was repaid with evil from heaven, while the
keeper of the stables offered less medical advice than complete bunk.
“Do you understand that this is a boy is not a horse!?” Hook finally shouted in
exasperation across the room.
Flora and Celeste paced around the room worriedly, wringing their hands and
whispering in worried tones to each other. Peter stood up, but had to lean
heavily on Hook to walk across the floor.
Over the next few days, the symptoms became worse, the legs sometimes
unresponsive, sometimes thrown into unsettling fits and tremors. Hook found his
courage failing, and left him to the women for most of the day. Flora and
Celeste had by and by deduced Peter’s real former occupation-- the
housekeeper’s grumbling making the task easy. Far from being aghast and
disapproving, as Hook had feared, they pampered the boy to no end, certain that
he was an embodiment of angelic suffering, and tended to his every superficial
need.
“Sunlight, orange marmalade and needlepoint – who will think this thing will
make a boy happy?” Celeste asked Hook when he came by to see Peter sitting in
the easy chair outside.
“I know the doctor recommended needlepoint, but must you girls further
humiliate him with these?” Hook untied the brightly colored bows the girls had
tied around Peter’s wrists.
“I’m not humiliated.” Peter smiled up at him. “I was just thinking you might
like them.”
Hook smiled and left. Peter went back to his needlework, determined not to lose
coordination in his hands. Nowadays it was sometimes harder to see the
needlework than to do it.
“Such rude!” Flora laughed. “Men never understand.”
Though he avoided Peter through much of the day, at night Hook performed the
most difficult and gruesome part of the routine. Everything was harder now that
Peter had mostly lost function in his legs, but the boy bore everything
patiently, helping as much as he could and never letting out screams that would
frighten the household. Silver colloid still made him retch, and the mercury
vapor bath was almost unbearable even for Hook, but the boy tried to smile as
often as possible to express his gratitude.
Visits to the doctor grew more frequent, though Hook took along his consorts
for the carriage ride, so that they could do their shopping in the city. This
largely avoided long awkward silences.
                                      ***
Peter moaned as the doctor ran a swab of linen across his insides. Hook looked
over reluctantly. Though he remained in the room throughout the visit, he still
preferred not to watch certain things.
“Why are you always doing that? It scratches him. It hurts. Dolore. What for?”
The doctor gave a light smirk and only continued with his work, Peter rattling
the chair.
“Eh? Answer, dammit. Perchè? What the hell are you doing anyway?”
The doctor hardly looked over when Hook walked up to the chair, standing poised
over it. Peter smiled at him around the rag stuffed into his mouth for safety,
tears streaming down his face grown crimson from the position and no doubt the
pain.
“You must this ragazzo stay at infermeria di Palermo. Vita bella! Good life
until muore.”
“Si, si, until he dies. I know how it is with you doctors,” Hook said, trying
to extricate Peter out of the examination chair. “Ragazzo is not dying, and I’m
not leaving him in any case.”
“Non capite… He is… unico. If I learn him, we will know more medicina. Soon no
boy.”
“That’s lovely, but nessun grazie. I can give him vita bella too, so kindly
take those instruments out and let us go home.”
“Non capite, non capite! You look—” The doctor ran over to a cabinet and took
out a bottle of gunk.
“What is that?” Hook asked, not exactly sure if he wanted to know the answer.
If it was new medicine, he was sure they had enough already, bought and ready
to be transported back home.
“It is—I wipe…” He pointed to the forceps holding the linen that he had left
inside Peter. “Wipe and throw into botti… bottiglia… it is cow’s blood in
bottiglia… to feed, and no death. It is, eh, immortale.”
Hook felt himself losing color. This was just what he needed—a doctor with side
hobbies in nosy inquiry. He made to remove everything from Peter’s body and
release the straps binding his ankles, but the doctor ran up to Peter and began
to question him after removing the rag from his mouth.
“You drink alchemia? You see gold? Eh… mago make gold?”
Peter shook his head, looking rather frightened. “I don’t remember anything
about my past.”
The doctor almost yelped for joy, clapping his hands once just as Hook freed
the boy and began to dress him, contemplating carrying him out in the nude if
only it would expedite their exit.
“Bambino di alchemia! Truth is leggenda!”
The doctor ran shouting it after Hook all the way to the carriage, apparently
sensing that Hook had decided never to return.
“You have bambino di alchemia. Leggenda! It is answer for universe,
everything!”
Hook emphatically closed the door to the carriage, instructing the coachmen to
hurry and head for market to collect Flora and Celeste from their outing.
“I an’t ever going to get better, am I…” Peter said in dejection, absent-
mindedly staring out of the carriage at the old doctor still managing to run
alongside them, waving his arms about.
Hook didn’t answer and pretended to immerse himself in the search for his two
girls. “Where do they always manage to get to? More trouble than they’re worth,
honestly.”
“Less trouble than I tend to be,” Peter said, and Hook was relieved to see him
smiling instead of sulking. “They’re really very nice to me. I’m glad you
invited them to stay—I an’t lonely, and they letcha rest from seeing me all day
long.”
“Pan, I don’t…” Hook stopped in mid-sentence, resolving to spend more time with
the boy since the illness had made him quit his lascivious demands to practice
his trade.
“I kinda wish you’d sow your oats with them.”
“What?”
“Well… eh, that’s to say have your own brood.”
“Have children?”
Peter shrank back into his seat. “Yeah…? Don’t high-on-up people ever have
some?”
Hook tried to understand why the idea seemed so anathema to him, but couldn’t
conjure up one rational explanation. Neither could he guess why Peter would
suddenly concern himself with such nonsense.
Peter’s eyes fled to the window, and he suddenly spotted the girls running
toward the main street through the crowds. They climbed in, huffing and
puffing, laughing about something or other and both sat on either side of
Peter.
“We sit with Peter today, because he’s the most favorite,” Florentina said in
singsong. The girls proceeded to question Peter about how his visit went,
lavishing kisses on his head, showing him trinkets and toys they bought for him
at the market with unparalleled excitement. Hook watched the boy sit smiling
wide, his body drowned between two large pannier dresses on either side.
Some carriage rides should go on forever, Hook thought. Even later, as he
watched all three of them fallen asleep, leaning on each other, mouths slightly
open—looking more innocent than a church painting—he couldn’t help but wish the
road to the estate were just a little longer.
Chapter End Notes
     On alchemy: So we finally get to the crux of why I even starting
     writing this. The word 'alchemy' is derived from the Arabian phrase
     "al-kimia," which refers to the preparation of the Stone or Elixir by
     the Egyptians, and its root comes from the Coptic "khem" (fertile
     black soil of the Nile delta). Esoterically and hieroglyphically, the
     word refers to the dark mystery of the primordial or First Matter
     (the Khem), the One Thing through which all creation manifests.
     Alchemy, then, is the Great Work of nature that perfects this chaotic
     matter, whether it be expressed as the metals, the cosmos, or the
     substance of our souls. Alchemists believed that the secret to
     eternal life was intertwined in the secret of transforming iron into
     gold. Mercury was a popular candidate catalyst for this, and there
     are many instances of people drinking mercury in their quest to halt
     the decay of their bodies. It's interesting that mercury DID halt
     decay caused by such diseases as syphilis (not used today only
     because of the rather unpleasant side effects). Syphilis has often
     been viewed as a sped-up caricature of the general decay of the body
     from living.
     There is documented usage of mercury to gain eternal youth in the
     Chinese Imperial courts.
     *imagination totally captured by the idea of a youth-preserving
     poison*
     On dialect: Obviously, any attempt at actually reproducing speech
     patterns of that time period is difficult, if not impossible (due to
     lack of data, and also sheer laziness) so I only give tokens of
     trying. But I'd just like to point out that "an't" has an interesting
     history-- if only "ain't" didn't get in the way-- with its
     catastrophically plebeian reputation-- we might all still be saying
     "an't" just as we say "can't" and "won't."
     Panniers are the framework of wire/whalebone/other material used to
     puff out women's skirts in the early 1700's
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