Goblin Ball (14 page)

Her mother was no help. “Lexi, what are you doing here? Did anyone see you?”

Mom and Moo both put on their worried faces. Agh! Couldn’t they see they were suffocating her?

“Only Cammy and Bella at
Into the Mystic
.” Lexi handed her mother the sack of biscuits. “They sent these for Daddy.”

“Chocolate Hobnobs don’t make everything all right,” Mom said. “How many customers were in
Into the Mystic
? My darling, we can’t risk people finding out about you.”

“I don’t care if they do,” Lexi said. “I’m not a child!”

“You’re… Let’s not do this here,” Mom said. “Wait while I get the mini.”

“Fine.”

Lexi didn’t know how it happened. She’d imagined it would be a lovely surprise when she showed up at the Tragic Fall, that she and Mom and Moo would have lunch together in the pub. Also, on the drive home, she’d wanted to ask her mom about the man in the mirror. She was certain he’d seen her too, that he’d called out to her to help him.

But now a heart-to-heart was out of the question. Mother and daughter both kept to a stony silence all the way up the hill.

III. Nooks and Crannies

Lexi’s mom tried to
smooth things over during dinner, and her dad appeared to be in on the mission. “Your mom and I are going to watch
Peggy Sue Got Married.
Want to join us?”

Darn it all.
Lexi loved that movie. But on the ride home from Tintagos Village, she’d made a decision. She had expected to have to wait until her parents were out of the house to carry out her plan, but the movie would keep them busy for a couple of hours.

She declined.

“I’m near the end of
Jane Eyre,
and I have to know if Mr. Rochester’s alive,” she said. “I was going to read in my room tonight.”

“If you say so, sweetie,” Daddy said. The look he shared with Mom told her they’d only asked her out of politeness anyway. They preferred to be alone.

Good. She might have even more than a couple of hours to find what she wanted.

“Good night then.” Lexi kissed her parents and left the dining room, her heart racing a little. In the gallery, she checked to be sure none of the staff were in sight, then flew up the stairs.

She didn’t go to her room, but to her mother’s.

The antique secretary looked completely different to Lexi now, her eye altered by reading Lydia Pengrith’s journal. Lexi opened the roll top eagerly and ran her fingers over its cubbies. One compartment was particularly interesting, as it was the only one locked. That’s where the ring must be. But where could the key be sequestered?

She stepped back and examined the piece as a whole. From the journal, she knew to look for a hidden cranny in the side of the desk, but which? Both sides looked exactly alike. She fanned her hands.

“Reveal.”

Ha!
A side door popped open, showing the brass skeleton key within.

The interesting compartment contained much more than what was listed in the journal. A brass object at the forefront obscured the rest of the contents, and when Lexi pulled it out of the way a shiver ran up her arm.

“Ooh!” She dropped the cylinder, which clattered noisily on the desktop until she slapped it still and picked it up again.

“Great gods…” This time there was no shiver, but awareness of the object’s properties seeped into her consciousness, and she could sense the places in the world where it had been used. The brass tube had glass on both ends, and it would seem plain and utilitarian if not for the lovely bright-cut apple blossom design etched over the tube itself. It was a kind of telescope, except that it didn’t unfold or retract.

Lexi took the glass to the window and looked through it. The sign over the Tragic Fall seemed so close! She absently reached out to touch the black blaze on the white horse’s face and laughed at herself when she grasped air. The ruined castle looked wonderful—she still hadn’t been to explore it.

Though it was late summer, the mist beyond Tintagos Bay was as thick as usual over the waters of the Severn Sea. But the scoping glass offered a view which cut through the mist, and on the horizon Lexi saw what might be a great ocean liner… or an island.

Avalos…
The name flitted through her mind like an Aeolian whisper, and she slipped the glass into her hidey pouch for later.

The next object was a bottle, half-full of liquid. Morning Glory’s love potion. “Perfect!” she knew just the application for the stuff, and the potion too went into the hidey pouch.

There was a peacock feather, which was interesting in that it had probably been worn by Lydia Pengrith herself, but Lexi couldn’t think of any use in it and set it aside.

And there, as if waiting for her, was the very thing she wanted.

She picked up the ring, half afraid of it, half thrilled just to touch the thing. It was simple and beautiful, two braided bands woven together, one of silver and one of gold. It called to her—not concretely as the scoping glass had done, but wordlessly, profoundly. Its essence and her essence were one.

She took a deep breath, pulled in as much air as humanly possible and blew it out, but it helped only a little to still her heart’s rapid beating.

“Silver and gold find you…”

Her voice quivered. There was no going back; this she knew. But equally she knew this was right and proper and her path—her true path as a living being, the path she was created by the high gods to take.

“Silver and gold bind you.
Serve not desire, but enhance delight…”

She slipped the ring onto her finger.

“All will be well, all will be right.”

It was done. Nothing had changed.

Everything had changed.

« Chapter 12 »
Drang

Morander was standing
alone at the casks, nursing a stout and looking morose, and though Drang had been dancing for only two hours, he wouldn’t mind a breather and a bit of a drink. He left Sturm on the line and joined Max’s new apprentice at the refreshment table.

“Hey, Morander.” Drang pulled a draft from the cask of jasmine stout and downed half of it in two gulps. “Congratulations on your new mentor. It must be amazing to learn from someone like Max.”

“He’s an artist, and no doubt about it,” Morander said.

Drang followed Morander’s gaze to his idol in the center of the circle, dancing with the queen.

“The guy is formidable,” Drang said. “More impressive than Vulsier—no disrespect to Vulsier.” Drang was pretty sure the gob was aware of his awesome quotient, but he never pressed it, never bragged, never traded on it. “Max is the humblest, yet the most supremely self-confident gob there ever was.”

“Which makes him even more awesome,” Morander said. “I can’t believe my luck.”

“No luck about it.” Drang half grunted, half snorted. “You’re the only one to work up the courage to ask. You deserve it.”

“Thanks.”

“So when are you going to drum up the courage to ask Boadicea to come out to dance?”

“Courage has nothing to do with it, alas.” Morander refilled his tankard. “She won’t. She refuses to show herself in public.”

“I don’t get it,” Drang said. “Sure, she was trapped in the abomination, but she wasn’t blinded for all those hundreds of years. She’s had as much time as the rest of us to get used to the change.”

“That’s what I told her,” Morander said. “She says she never saw herself all those years, and she can’t stand it now. I told her in my eyes she’s gorgeous, and she broke down in tears.”

“Ah, so that’s how it is with you,” Drang said. “I thought as much. How does your mentor feel about you wooing his sister?”

“He doesn’t know.” Morander nodded at Max and Queen Narcissus. “He’s too wrapped up in his own
tragédie de la coeur
to notice.”

“Now
that
is the one thing I don’t envy the treesap,” Drang said. “Our queen has a fairy’s true nature. She’ll never love anyone.”

“I don’t think Max has admitted to himself that he’s in love,” Morander said, “but it’s obvious the gob’s smacked. Heh. In everything he does, he takes into account how it will affect her.”

“For the good of the Dumnos fae, I’m sure,” Drang said drily.

“Surely that’s it.”

“Hey! Did you see that?” Drang put down his tankard and crouched low to look under the table through Morander’s bowed legs.

“See what? Is something behind me?” Morander rolled his eyes and turned around. “What was it?”

“I don’t know,” Drang said. “Someone, more like. A small, pink creature. Hey! Who’s there?”

A ginger-haired beastie slowly peeked out from behind the casks.

“Well, what have we here now?” Drang said. She was no kind of fae he knew of.

“Blimey, Drang,” Morander reached out and grabbed the creature’s arm. “I think it’s a human girl.” He pulled her from her hiding place and stood her up. Though taller than them both, she was obviously quite young and very unsure of herself.

“I’m a girl, not an it!” The beastie glared, and her violet eyes flashed. “Let go of me.”

Violet eyes.

“Hold everything. Wait a minute,” Drang said. “It can’t be, but… I believe it is. This is the faelings’ faeling. Excuse me, little miss. You’re Lady Lexi, right? Of Faeview? The queen’s grandniece?”

“Maybe.” She stood to her full height, which, unfortunately, was a head taller than either Drang or Morander. “Who’s asking?”

“Drang of the Blue Vale, at your service. And this is Morander, apprentice to Max of the Blue Vale,” Drang said. “Your great-aunt is here, by the way—”

“Stop!” the girl said. “I don’t want anybody to see me.”

“Too late for that,” Morander said with a laugh. “Drang, here, has already seen you. And for that matter, so have I.”

“How did you find your way to the Blue Vale, anyway?” Drang said. “Even faelings can’t get this far in fae without guidance.”

“So they say,” Morander added.

“I thought of you and popped out of my mother’s… out of Faeview, and then I was here. And yes. My name is Alexandra Lowenwyn Beverly Glory Marion Elyse Bausiney. But you can call me Lexi.”

“Blimey, good thing,” Drang said. “Kudos for remembering that mouthful.”

“Why would you be thinking of this gob?” Morander said.

“Good point. I don’t know you,” Drang said. “Or didn’t until a moment ago.”

“True, we haven’t met,” said the girl. “But I know you. I’ve seen you in… in a lady’s magic mirror. She was looking for her true love, and he was you.”

“Blimey.” Drang felt his face go red.

“Isn’t that special?” Morander cracked up. “What’s the fair maiden’s name? What does she look like? Does he have hair as blue-white as starlight and eyes merry from constant laughter? Is she a good dancer and a great cook?”

“Shut up, treesap,” Drang said.

“Her name is Bella,” Lexi said. “She works at a shop called
Into the Mystic
in Tintagos Village. She has blond hair, and I’m afraid her eyes are not at all merry. I don’t know if she can dance or cook… but she makes very good lemonade.”

“Why are you here?” Drang said. He glared at Morander. The treesap was having too much fun with this.

“I brought you something to help your courtship.” Lexi pulled a bottle from her hidey pouch, half-full of red liquid. “Ta-da! Morning Glory’s love potion.”

“Bah!” Drang threw his hands up and backed away. “I’ll have no woman it takes a love potion to catch.”

“That’s… honorable of you, I suppose,” Lexi said. “But the mirror didn’t lie. She asked twice, and both times it showed her you. What’s the harm in a little help to ease the way?”

“If she saw me twice, why do I need that?”

“Well, she
is
human,” Lexi said. “She can’t quite appreciate goblin appearances.”

“Aw, that’s tough, man,” Morander said. “As the girl says, the mirror doesn’t lie. You’re as stuffed as Max. Maybe you should just take the juice.”

“Maybe
you
should,” Drang said. “Use it with Boadicea. It could be just the thing to help her get over herself.”

He could see the wheels turning in Morander’s brain. He’d only said it reflexively, to give the gob a hard time. But now that it was out of his mouth, the idea didn’t sound half-crazy.