Chapter Two: Betrayals and Bargains
Sarah left the red book by Toby's hand, open on the page about wishing people away. His gold hair was soft as feathers under her gentle touch; he snuffled in his peaceful sleep.
"I need you to do something for me," she whispered into his ear. "I need you to wish Alice away. Can you do that for me? You don't have to mean it. In fact, I know you won't mean it. But it's the only way I can keep you both safe." She planted a soft kiss against his forehead and tiptoed out of the room. She held back another sob of anguish, silently cursing the Fae world and all who lived in it.
"I don't understand. He can't love me. He doesn't even know me!"
"Doesn't he?" the queen replied sarcastically. "He has kept watch over you for years, Sarah, before you ever entered our world. I have surveyed him these two years gone. He is reckless with his life; he is anxious and forlorn. He flies between our two realities to catch mere glimpses of you, abandoning his throne in the process. He is distracted from his leadership by his sheer fascination with you, though I can't say I understand it myself."
Her house seemed so blessedly normal in the aftermath of that wild afternoon. The rain had eased off, leaving the world grey and chilled. The carpet felt wonderfully soft under her feet after all that cold marble. She padded silently throughout the rooms, searching for the one thing of Toby's she knew he treasured most: a comic book, of all things. It was a Spider-Man story she'd found at a market for a quarter, nothing special. But it had sparked a superhero obsession that was still growing with every year. With Karen's help, Toby had a pretty decent collection of books and memorabilia but what he took everywhere was that crumpled Spider-Man issue. Sarah almost prayed she wouldn't find it, already dreading the look on his face when he found it. How had her life become this complicated by being loved?
"But why is love a crime? I don't understand what he's done wrong."
"Love itself is not a crime but a distraction. Who is the recipient of this interest is what matters."
Sarah splayed her hands on her hips, offended. "What's wrong with me?"
"You are human," she replied simply. Disdainfully. "Our laws are as immortal as us: they have not changed since the Birth of All Things, nor will they ever. The limitations placed over the Fae are there specifically to prevent disaster. We are the sole race responsible for the continued existence of this entire reality. We may fall in love, however uncommon it is, but only with our own kind. Never with another. Never with humans."
Sarah snorted. "You're talking like we're diseased."
"You are," the Queen replied bluntly. "You cripple so easily, you bow under the slightest weight of injury. Time itself is your disease, for you have so little of it. It is an ancient violation for my son to love one so far beneath us, so simple in relation to the complexity that is our domain."
"I'm not simple!" Sarah huffed. "And I still don't believe that he loves me. If anything, it's some kind of weird obsession that he needs to get over. And I'm not sleeping with him, if you think that's what's going to happen!" Sarah folded her arms; she could just imagine the types of things the Queen would have her do in order to get the job done.
"You will remain with him until he confesses," was all the Queen would say.
Sarah had sometimes dreamed of the Goblin King. Throughout her teenage years, mostly, when the right boys hadn't yet caught her eye. She'd imagined what he was doing and what they might have been doing together if she'd accepted his offer. They'd only ever been flights of fancy, of course, the desperate youthful need for gratification when she was searching through her newfound sexuality. She had never expected to see him again. When she'd hit her twenties and started meeting the right boys, she'd been okay with letting go of a fairy tale. It had been easier than she'd thought, especially since her other 'friends' hadn't thought to visit her, even once. When she ended up back in the Underground she was going to find them and ask just what the hell had happened.
Something stirred with the breeze from the window and Sarah's heart plummeted. She'd found the comic. Picking it up, she smoothed the cover under her hand. They'd been through so much, her and Toby. They'd been thrown together like jagged puzzle pieces and had managed to find a way to fit. Alice would join them just as snuggly soon enough, she knew, once the girl had learnt more from her brother. It dawned on her that she might not see them again for a while, once everything began. She started to cry then, just a little, her heart tearing along the seams just like the comic in her fists as she paved the way for her betrayal, the only way she could save them both.
Toby had had the strangest dream, he was sure…but the more he tried to remember the more it faded from his grasp. Yawning, he rolled onto his side, vaguely aware of crumpling something beneath him. Maybe the dream would come back if he ignored it, the way the mouse in his room sometimes did when he pretended he hadn't seen it. His mum would freak out if she knew he had a secret mouse, he thought with a sleepy smile. The thing squashed beneath him was getting hard to ignore as it dug into his rib. With a groan Toby wrenched it out from under him, frowning at the sight of his sister's book. Oh no, he thought, if I bent it she's going to kill me! He examined the pages but found them to be okay, except for one page which was bent in half. He unfolded it, scanning the room for Sarah, but saw no-one. The page was fine, just a little folded. He squinted in the late afternoon light, trying to read it. It was his favourite part! The creepy part about the sister wishing away her brother, and the nasty goblins that came to take him. Toby had always been especially creeped out by that bit, but curious too. How cool would it be to be able to call the goblins whenever you wanted?
Deciding the page wasn't hurt enough to get him in trouble, Toby set it down on the coffee table and sat up, scrubbing his face. His mind was full of half-forgotten dreams and strange creatures, mirrors with no reflections…it took him a moment to notice the colourful pile of paper scattered across the living room floor, near the beanbag where his little sister lay. What trouble had she been up to now? Alice had been a pain lately, especially because he wanted to be good for Sarah when they visited. He squinted at the mess, finding something familiar in the blue and red colours.
"What…?" he mumbled, getting to his feet to inspect the papers more closely. And as he realised what they were, he started to shout.
Sarah tucked her knees up to her chest and shoved her fingers in her ears as the yelling started. She couldn't bear to hear them fighting, not when they'd been tricked into it. Hiding under the kitchen counter she took deep breaths, hoping against hope Toby would say the right words but shivering with the fear of what would happen if he did. The muffled shouting was suddenly drowned in a scream as lightning split the sky outside and the power went out. Oh god, she thought, swallowing hard. Here we go. She ran from her hiding place, feeling her way in the relative dark, to find what she'd expected: a frantic Toby hugging Alice to him in one hand with a fistful of his beloved comic in the other. Oh, god. She ran to them as the rain started again, lashing the windows and spraying them with its strength.
"What did you do?!" she cried, a well-rehearsed line, but her trembling was real.
"I didn't mean it!" Toby cried, as the shadows began to ripple around them and the lightning strikes came in quick succession. "I didn't mean it, I swear! I'm sorry, Alice!"
"Sarah what's happening?!" Alice screamed. "I'm scared, I'm so scared!"
"It's all right, it's all right," Sarah hushed them both as they clung to her waist. She held them tightly with both hands, terrified that the goblins would snatch them away before she had a chance to do anything. "It's all right, I've got you; they won't take you away from me. They won't." Her knees shook. I don't think I can do this, she thought for one horrific moment as the shadows grew eyes and started to growl. "They won't take you."
"Won't we, Sarah?"
The lightning stopped. The rain hushed. The shadows trembled with anticipation. Sarah turned around and looked into the face of the Goblin King. He hadn't changed one bit. Resplendent in his terrible crimson attire, he looked like an angel of doom with his rippling cape like wings torn to shreds. She found the strength to answer him. "No," she told him firmly. "You're not going to take them." He smirked at her and an arched a brow, but his eyes were bleak and cruel, hardly amused. What if the Queen was wrong? What if he was nothing more than just the bad guy? Either way she was in trouble: a villain or an admirer, there was no positive way to gain the Goblin King's attention.
"Delightful to see you again, Sarah," he drawled. "Do tell me what I'm to do next, won't you? I've only have two hundred years of practice."
It wasn't difficult for Sarah to act desperate. "Please don't touch them," she let out in a rush of air. Something crept towards them from the shadow, enough that she could spot the outline of claws and spikes. She squeezed her brother and sister so tightly that they cried out in pain. "He didn't mean it. Please, I'll do anything. I'll – I'll give you anything. Just leave them alone."
He threw out a hand and the shadow stopped advancing on her. "Are you presuming to barter with me? Under the impression you have something that I want?"
It was so difficult to read his expression when she was really, properly scared of the outcome if she was wrong. Was this going to work? "Yes," she stammered. "I want to trade for their freedom."
He moved close enough that she had to crane her head back to meet his scrutinising gaze. "How charming, Sarah Williams, that you think you can bargain with the King of the Goblins." His voice was low and careful. She almost thought that he was listening for the sound of his horde creeping closer. "Not so eager to jump into my Labyrinth this time? A shame. It's a lot more fun these days."
Beneath her, Toby and Alice whimpered. Around her, the monsters groaned in agitation. She began to hear things, words hissed in ugly voices: want to tear, want to rip, drip drip drip their blood…her eyes widened in silent terror as she held the King's gaze, tears of panic threatening to spill over. "Please," she whispered fervently. "Please. You can have me. Leave them both and I'll come with you to the Underground. No one has to fight for my freedom, I don't want it. Give it to them."
Something like surprise flitted across his face for the briefest of moments. Then a gnarled hand reached out and snatched at Alice's foot and the Williams family screamed as one.
"Enough!" the King roared at his monsters, fury blazing in his eyes. "That is enough! You will get what you are given, when it is given to you!"
There was silence once more in the shadows. Alice moaned and Sarah kissed the top of her head, her shaking hands buried in golden curls. She looked up once more at the man with the power to stop it all and found his face infuriatingly blank. Despite herself, she felt a flash of anger. Why was he dragging it out like this? "Well?" she heard herself demand. "Do you want me or not?"
He chuckled. "That is a very loaded question. Always such fire, Sarah." He glanced down at Toby and Alice, at the shadows around them. "You never fail to entertain," he said quietly. Then, louder: "Very well. You will accompany me in their place, and they shall be left alone. Do we have a deal?"
Sarah took his outstretched hand. "Deal," she said resolutely.
He clamped his free hand around her arm and her world erupted. She heard goblins screaming in rage, Toby and Alice calling her name desperately. She felt a hard tug in the middle of her navel, blinked, and everything had stopped. There was no dark living room, no crying siblings, and no threats in the corners of her eyes. There was a gloved hand on her arm and a rough stone floor as she sank to her knees. There was the smell of dust and dirt and a shadow over Sarah as the Goblin King stared down at her in something like disbelief. "You – you didn't let me say goodbye," she murmured, pressing fists to her heart with the ache of it all. "You didn't let me say goodbye." The shadow disappeared, and Sarah curled into a ball and wept.
