The Book Man, Chapter 84 (Revised)

84 GOBLIN’S TALE

“No one ever really loved me but my mother,” Goblin began. “My dear brother might tell you different, but I was her favorite.”

In addition to loving him, she was the only one who persistently called him by his real name, while everyone else in the world called him Goblin—if they called him anything at all. At best, they overlooked him in favor of his more beautiful twin. More often, they drew their children away from him when he walked the streets, or threw rocks and chased him from their villages.

If Neva had loved his brother, things might have been different, for as crown prince he could have at least stopped the people’s outward cruelty. But he did nothing, only laughed along and began to call his brother Goblin as well.

“Small wonder I turned to pranks,” Goblin said. He clenched Morrow’s fists. “At first I kept away from everyone, stuck to the woods and the palace gardens—”

His fists unclenched again, and the blue eyes strayed to the bougainvillea winding around the arms of his throne. He stretched out a hand. A green tendril curled out across the room and wound around his arm.

“Plants, growing things,” Goblin said. “They’ll love you, you know, if you give them some water and light and soil. They don’t care how you look. And they’re so beautiful, all of them.”

Tirion nudged Christian’s arm. Christian looked at him out of the corner of his eye and saw the elf point at the knife clenched in his fist.

“I was starved for a bit of beauty,” Goblin said. “And I was angry with the people, with my brother—so I turned to mischief.”

Christian inched his knife hand toward Tirion. He wasn’t sure how it would help while Goblin was still within the Rover, but he knew the elf wouldn’t kill Morrow.

“Your mischief caused a lot of trouble,” he said. “What about your mother?”

The blue eyes blinked and shone with tears.

“I should’ve known he would tell you about that,” Goblin said quietly. “But I suppose he didn’t tell you it was an accident.”

“Then you tell me,” Christian retorted.

There wasn’t supposed to be anyone in that part of the palace that day, not at that hour. It was the unveiling of a new portrait in the Hall of Kings: a portrait of Neva, whose coronation had been only the week earlier. The courtiers were sitting at supper in the dining hall, the palace servants attending them. Goblin planned to destroy the Hall of Kings and his brother’s new portrait.

“Our mother had been in poor health for some time,” he said. “She was supposed to be in her room—she was in her room, not long before. I went up to check on her, you see. And Evangeline was with her. Her lady-in-waiting. They were supposed to be there all night.”

But somehow, by the time of the prank, the two women were in the Hall of Kings, perhaps so the twins’ mother could see the portrait of her son now that it was finished and hung. No one ever knew for certain.

The courtiers came running when they heard the explosion, led by Neva. Goblin was already there, clutching his mother’s body, when they arrived. He had returned to her room after putting the explosives in place, to while away the evening and establish an alibi. But the room had been empty, and he’d rushed back to the hall in panic just in time to see it burst into rubble and flame.

“My mother was dead, and it was my fault,” Goblin said. “And my brother did not believe my remorse was sincere, would not listen to me—”

He fell silent for a moment, his tears running down Morrow’s cheeks as though the incident had happened yesterday. Christian felt less certain than ever of the plan. This creature had done horrible things, to be sure, and he was responsible for many deaths—but Christian couldn’t help thinking again of Frankenstein’s monster, feeling the blame lay in part with all those who had been cruel because of Goblin’s ugliness.

“And then my dear brother imprisoned me,” Goblin continued, angrily wiping away his tears. “Centuries, I was in that tree. Centuries. You can’t even begin to comprehend, with your insignificant human life, just a blip in time and space—”

He stopped speaking abruptly, his jaw working, but then he continued in a calm voice, “One of the fairies was very kind to me, actually. That’s why—when I heard of the portal to Earth—I knew I had a chance to get away for good, but I didn’t want her to get in trouble…but I’d had enough. I didn’t mean any harm. I just wanted to get away from my brother, the people’s prejudice, my past—to live quietly alone in the woods—”

Tirion struck with the knife, cutting him across the cheek. A scream of pain—a thin line of blood appeared, smoking like a fire—and then Morrow’s eyes were his own again, brown and narrowed in pain. He gripped Tirion’s shoulders and said through gritted teeth, “Get out, get out—he’s fighting me and I can’t—”

He blinked and his eyes went blue once more, and his breath came in sharp gasps of pain. He looked the elf in the eye and said coldly, “That was uncalled for.” Then he pulled a knife from his coat and thrust it into Tirion’s abdomen.

The iron blade clattered from the elf’s hand. He staggered back, coughing blood, and fell to the ground.

“No!” Christian cried. Something gray and ghostly, vaguely like the strange face he had seen in Morrow’s, flitted past, and Morrow was Morrow again, and he was looking at Tirion with wide eyes. He fell to his knees beside him—

In the corner Christian’s hellhound awoke with a bark and bit the spider guarding it, scattered the hellhounds surrounding the men and stood guard over them, biting and snarling as the other three hellhounds tried to close in again. Christian saw the gray ghostly thing sink into the winged black horse by the steps—The horse twitched as if irritated by a fly, and then its eyes turned blue and it bared its teeth in an equine grin. It launched itself into the sky, stretched its wings as it brushed the roots hanging from the ceiling, and took off through the passageway.

Christian grabbed the knife from the floor and began to sprint after it, skidded and stopped and looked back at Morrow, whose cheek was bleeding freely because his fingers scrabbled at Tirion’s wound instead of his own. The Rover caught sight of him and said hoarsely, “Go—”

So Christian went.

In a moment he heard yelping and three hellhounds ran by him. Then he felt a hot, wet mouth lift him up by his collar and slobber all over his shirt and hair.

“It’s you!” he cried. His hellhound gave a muffled bark in response.

“Follow that horse!” Christian said. The hellhound thundered down the passage with the accountant swinging from its mouth.