Jack felt awfully bare without Baby Tooth's warmth on his chest.
"Did you mark down the spots?" Flynn crouched beside him around the cobblestone bend, eyes hard and focused. Jack nodded, handing over the sheet of crumbled paper. On it, Flynn had drawn lines in the vague shape of the castle walls for Jack to take on his scout in the skies.
Flynn mumbled under his breath, counting the dots Jack had etched. "Twenty-two... Twenty-Four... Twenty-six guards," he said finally. "That we know of. Most of them are likely outside, so the tough part is gonna be getting in. And then we've got about three-dozen doors to check, if not more. You sure you can't use your..." he waved a hand in the air "sixth-sense to lead us to her?"
"I'm sure," Jack said. The thread had completely faded not too long ago. It had been faint in strength compared to the one that lead him here, but he'd expected it to last far longer than this. He closed his eyes a moment, felt for the prayer, the words Rapunzel had said in his head, and how much he wanted to follow them. But when he opened them again, the grounds were just as normal as they'd been before. What had been different with the thread this time round?
A sinking feeling filled his gut. Jack refused to think that anything had happened to her. She was needed; Pitch wouldn't harm her.
Would he?
Flynn glanced at him, unsure. He paused. "They can't see you, right? With your whole non-existent, spiritual thing?"
"Lack of belief," Jack corrected. "And no. I don't think so. I didn't exactly stop to test it out." The most likely thing was that they couldn't. But he'd also been under the impression that Flynn Rider couldn't see him, yet here they were.
"I'll go in from the back," Jack decided. "You keep watch." Despite how much he believed in Flynn's siding, Jack still had every intention of being the one who found Rapunzel. They didn't need a repeat of what happened at Evanora Hailwell's home, and he didn't exactly trust Flynn to not contemplate betraying them again if a better offer came. Jack knew very well how tempting Pitch Black could be with a few well-chosen words.
Flynn rested an elbow on his bent knee. "Do you want me to bake you congratulatory cookies too while I wait?"
"I think Rapunzel would appreciate that, yeah," Jack agreed, eyes narrow.
Flynn sighed, gesturing to Maximus with a tug to his reigns. "And so we shall await to swift our blondie away."
Something pulled at Jack's chest—a feeling unlike that of Gothel's expulsion, but one still somehow unknown to him. Our blondie. The feeling was uncomfortable, overwhelming, and he pushed it deep within the depths of himself. He would focus on fetching Rapunzel out of Pitch's grasp first.
But was he the one Jack should be fearful of? When Rapunzel had prayed to him about a week ago, she'd been afraid for her life—of what her own mother would do to her.
Jack didn't tell Flynn that he intended to fly Rapunzel away—or at the very least hide her until North or Bunnymund found their way here through their portals. He stood from his crouch, the stone wall just tall enough to cover him, and willed the winds forth.
"Watch out for the shadows," he told Flynn. Flynn nodded once, turning to glance around the bend.
"It's nice of you to worry, Ice Man."
The castle sat at the very top of the mountain Corona was built upon. Though streets and homes climbed their way to its gates, a lush forest hugged its back. Jack curled the winds toward the forest, toward the large, stone wall surrounding the gigantic building. Though he wouldn't ever dare admit it aloud, North's Workshop was nothing in size compared to this. Yet Jack still thought it unimpressive next to what North had made the Workshop to be.
He spotted a window along the back that seemed open a sliver. He pressed his palms against the rough, stone wall surrounding the royal grounds, making to leave—until he caught whisper of an oddly familiar sound. Whoosh. Like a distant shattering, muffled and drawn back.
He glanced left, gazing deep within the wood, to no avail.
He glanced right, to the direction he'd come from. But nothing.
Frowning, he tipped his head up to the skies in time to feel a cool breeze wash over him, one that would be noticeable to the island locals. But, to him, it was a cold that tasted of the North Pole.
The hairs at the nape of his neck stood, suddenly. Jack heard the flutter of a wing and—
"Baby Too—?" he began, stopping once he took a good look at the mini fairy flying toward him. Unlike Baby Tooth, this one had a green feather atop her head and purple eyes that went wide at the sight of him. She squeaked a song—a call, Jack realized. Because, just then, Toothiana, full size and all, flew fast from the forest.
"Tooth?" Jack exclaimed, trying to muster his surprise into a quiet whisper. It proved difficult.
"Jack!" Tooth's excitement-mixed-relief was apparent as she approached him, hands clasped to her feathered chest. "I came as soon as Freesia showed!"
"Freesia?" Jack asked, drawing his gaze back to the mini fairy hovering at Tooth's side. It was only then that he recognized her—she was the fairy he and Rapunzel had found trapped in Gothel's cellar. The one the Rettersonne's were supposed to be keeping safe. But where was Baby Tooth, then?
Tooth nodded. "She showed up at the Palace not long ago." A glimmer of worry laced her gaze. "Jack... North sent word that there was a situation up at the Workshop."
"What do you mean?" Jack demanded.
Tooth fluttered, her pointed, human nose scrunching as she blinked. "North and Sandy have been analyzing the thread you followed two months ago—with Freesia's help we were able to pinpoint where it lead on the Globe of Belief. It... There's an evil here. Don't you feel it?"
"It's Pitch," Jack growled. "He found a way back."
Tooth shook her head. "Not Pitch."
Jack scowled, thinking of the grin plastered across his face as Rapunzel was swallowed in his shadows. "If that wasn't Pitch," Jack said, "then I'm a flying walrus who shoots laser beams out of his—" Two months ago. The words just registered in his head. But before he could question it, Tooth tilted her head.
"No," she insisted. "Pitch's power feels restricted, leashed. Like he's only partly here, or still waking up. There's another magic at the end of the thread, one even Sandy and I could hardly remember."
Jack considered telling Tooth about Rapunzel, the girl of light who could heal wounds with mere song, but the noontime sun warned him of their limited time. Still, his mind drifted over Tooth's words, then to the mother who had cleverly hidden her knowledge of the Guardians and found spells to keep him away. Jack was the youngest of the Guardians—would her spells also work on one as ancient as Sandy or, worse yet, Pitch Black? Jack glanced back to the castle looming behind him. If he was right...
"Tooth," he said, facing her. "Has a mortal ever summoned one of us?"
The fairy frowned, her colourful feathers fluttering. "Not since the Dark Ages. Long before any of us were chosen."
Jack cursed under his breath. He'd been so weary of Pitch that he hadn't even considered the fact that he might not be the one they should've been worrying about. Somehow, this woman had found a way to summon and leash a dangerous spirit to use as her pet—her weapon.
And Rapunzel was trapped right in the middle of her nest.
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*Edited, (May 6th, 2021).