Artifacts by Pete Catalano Page B

he had left Neverland,” Grifter said.
    “The only thing he left behind was a box of treasures . Baubles, trinkets, and shiny pieces of broken things that weren’t worth much, except they meant the world to him,” Touch continued. “There was also a note from Wendy, thanking him for the gift he had so kindly given her when she left and saying she would use it to make no less than wondrous things.”
    “Wendy was given the artifact?” I asked.
    “Yes,” Skylights said. “And she brought it back with her to London. Over the years, her children and grandchildren arrived here at various times and we believe one of them brought it with them to North Carolina. We still aren’t sure what it is or where to look for it.”
    “So that’s why Hook’s here?” Korie asked.
    “Yes.” Skylights nodded. “When he found out about the artifact, he became obsessed with it and launched a very elaborate mission to retrieve it.”
    “So he recruited Butt-Kiss?” I asked.
    “The villains of Fairy Tale Land needed the most ruthless and the strongest for this journey,” Skylights said. “They’ve also been given special gifts, like the Blackthorn, to try to secure their success. The only weakness those two share are the allies they keep closest to them.”
    “Smee and Jerkin,” Tank said.
    “Smee and Durkin,” Skylights confirmed.
    “Why are you and the other Lost Boys here?” Korie asked.
    Skylights smiled shyly. “We’ve had some success with Hook in the past, so the others thought we would be the best choice to stop him before he was able to retrieve the artifact.”
    “Why did you wait so long to come here after they arrived?” Mouth asked. “They had a waaaaay longer head start.”
    “We didn’t know Hook was gone from Neverland,” Skylights said. “Until it was nearly too late.”
    I laughed. “He and Smee must have been surprised to see you show up in the cafeteria.”
    “Butkus and Durkin, as well,” Touch said. “Grifter even brought a very special clock which tick-tocked loud enough for Hook to believe we had brought the crocodile with us.”
    “We’ve been to every garbage dump and flea market slash junkyard we could find,” Mouth complained. “Why didn’t Hook just say, ‘This is what I’m looking for, go and get it?’”
    “Hook doesn’t know what it is, either,” Skylights said. “As the items are recovered and brought to him they are dragged back out to this house to be looked over and sorted through.”
    “How do you know Hook still doesn’t know what it is?” I asked.
    “Smee gave it away when he stopped by our table the other day. He didn’t say anything about the artifact directly, but he asked very Smee-like questions. What were we looking for and if we didn’t know what we were looking for, would we know it when we saw it?”
    Touch laughed. “We told him we had no idea what he was talking about.”
    “He then asked that if we were looking for something and had an idea of what it was, would we know where to look?”
    “I’m getting a headache just listening to Smee’s part of the conversation,” Korie said.
    “And what did you tell him?” Tank asked.
    “We told him that we had been here looking for an artifact. But we had it on good authority that Butkus had found it months ago and was keeping it hidden,” Skylights said. “We told him the only chance for him to get that answer would be through Durkin.”
    I cracked up. “Jerkin doesn’t know anything about anything.”
    Skylights smiled. “That’s the beauty of it. It gave them a chance to drive a wedge deep into their partnership and give us more time to find our way in through the maze.”
    “Do we know what it is we’re looking for?” Korie asked.
    “Do we know what it does?” Crunch asked.
    “Do we know what fairy tale it’s from?” Tank asked.
    Skylights shook his head. “We don’t know anything about it except that …”
    “It can change the course of fairy tales forever.” I finished