We've had our first glimpse into the mind of the Goblin King. He seems to like what he sees.

Will Grace go quietly, do you think?

Grace made it through dinner through sheer willpower. Her back was to the window and she could feel the eyes on her. She knew her watcher was there in the shadows, marking every move she made. Was he watching her for someone else or out of his own personal interest?

Either way, she couldn't wait to meet him and force him to reveal his plans. She'd had about enough of playing the victim here.

Who did he think he was, anyway? To sit in the dark and see without being seen. It was just rude and unfair. Grace intended to get even.

She didn't consider how this was to be done. Or the consequences of catching someone who preferred to lurk in the shadows and confronting them. She would deal with consequences later.

For now she tried to listen as her brother and her cousin droned on about their project. She tried to ignore the feeling of being watched.

After dinner Edward led her back out into the night and handed her into the carriage without a word.

The moon was wonderfully full above her and she gazed out the window as they rode gently along the lane. Edward was falling asleep in the seat across from her, full and content. The feeling of being watched had left her sometime during the long meal with her frustrating relations and she had nothing left but a feeling of simple delight as she watched the moonlight chase away the shadows around her.

When they arrived at the Lodge Edward had to shake himself awake and Grace was steadier than he as he reached back for her hand. He didn't hesitate to go inside and head straight for his room. He was at the top of the stairs before he realized that his sister had not followed him in.

It wasn't unusual for Grace Darling to go tromping about in the middle of the night. It was one of the little peculiarities that had chased off many of her more rigid suitors. (But as they had been both old and altogether too proud, neither Ed nor his father had complained of result.)

Edward headed sleepily back down the stairs and stood in the doorway, looking for his sister.

She had always been a free-spirit. She was the perfectly English lady, in society, where people judged their family by her actions. But at home? She was just as likely to climb trees as she was to embroider. She could hardly be kept from speaking her mind when it was just she and Edward to hear. She would ride more recklessly (and with a better seat) than any English hunter on a thoroughbred through the wildest of country with nothing but a smile to say she knew better.

She put up a fine front. She truly did. She said all the right things and made everyone fall over themselves to fawn over her until she couldn't stand it anymore. Then, the moment the company had gone, she would steal out the door and away from the tame gardens the ladies liked to walk through and straight for the forest of their English manor. She wouldn't be seen for hours and when she came back it was like as not that her dress would be ruined.

Grace never had quite given up the idea that a person should grow completely, Up. She let down her skirts and tied back her hair as a young woman ought to do, of course. She was well-educated as a lady ought to be and more because their father had been unable to deny her anything. But still, there was something wild about Grace Darling that her brother simply had never been able to understand.

His father had described both Grace and her mother, Kate, as "magical". There had always been something fierce in Kate. She loved fiercely, even though she was with them only a little while, Edward remembered that ferocity as she held his hand and told him he would be a fine big brother.

She had been brave too. She had lost everything, her mother and father, her only sister, all before she turned eighteen. But she had never let it defeat her. She had been a fiercely determined woman. She was determined to find happiness and she had. She had brought happiness back into his father's life and into his own.

Grace was very much like her mother, Kate. She was brave, determined, fearless. But she had a wildness about her that had been absent in the firmly grounded Kate. Grace was inclined to believe in magic where Kate was a bit more pragmatic. Kate's loss and suffering had given her a more realistic view of the world than most. Grace had turned a different direction with the loss of her parents. Rather than finding solidity and familiarity in that inevitable idea of loss, Grace had decided that she would not be stopped by anything so trifling as mortality. She lived life so vibrantly, given the slightest chance.

Edward envied her that vitality. Even when she seemed a little lost she was alive. He often found himself living his life as if in a dream, wandering about aimlessly until he found some small purpose to keep him going.

Now Grace was striding confidently around the edge of the Lodge, past the lane and straight for the trees.

"Grace? Aren't you coming in?" She paused in the shadows at the edge of the trees and looked back at her brother. She seemed to struggle for a moment before she focused on him standing in the doorway. She smiled, "I think I'll spend the evening in the Druid's Circle. It's lovely tonight and I can't bear to be indoors." "Are you sure you know the way?"

Her smile grew. "Of course I do, Ed." "You might get hurt tripping in the dark." "The moon is full tonight; there is plenty of light to see by." "That's never stopped you from tripping before." "I'll be fine Edward. I promise you'll see me at the breakfast table, no harm done." "Be safe, sister-mine." "Goodnight, brother dear."

It was a farewell from when they were children and made them both smile. Then Edward turned back inside and shut the door. Grace continued on into the night.

She made good time to the Druid's Circle. She never faltered in course and even her clumsy feet didn't step false this night. She made it to the circle without hurt, just as she'd promised her brother.

When she got to the double ring of oak trees she didn't pause to admire them as she wanted. Something was sending a shock of urgency down her spine that pushed her past the tree line and into the protected circle.

She breathed a little easier when she stood beneath the full moon, its light unbroken by branches or leaves gave her comfort. Still, the feeling that she was not entirely safe gnawed at her and she turned a slow circle, searching for the source of her unease.

There.

In the shadow of the inner tree ring, just outside the open circle where she stood, glowed mismatched eyes.

For just a moment she let the startled fear take over and she stepped back from her watcher. Her body was tense with a desire to flee.

Just as she took a second step back she wondered, why? Why was she afraid? Who did this creature think he was to frighten her so? To make her uncomfortable in the place she wanted to be?

How dare he?

The fear was gone and suddenly she was righteously indignant. A flare of anger prompted her to retrieve the ground she'd lost upon first discovering the presence of another being in her woods. And then she spoke.

"Come into the light, if you please. I've no desire to be haunted by shadows any longer."

There was no trace of the fear that had driven her into the circle in the first place. No hint of the caution one should show an unknown observer in the woods. She was fearless.

The anger rose to the front again in Grace's mind as she heard a dark chuckle in answer to her challenge.

"Would you be so brave once you'd seen me? I think not. I prefer to stay here for the moment." "You've been watching me since I arrived at Hallow Hill. It's only fair that I get to see you too." "In time. Not yet." "How rude! Come out at once and introduce yourself or I shall scream." "Why on earth would you do that? You haven't even seen me yet?"

He was laughing at her, and it was definitely a he. His voice was smooth and refined, deep and musical, with the slightest edge to it as if it got sharp when he was less amused.

Grace didn't mind being laughed at, it was often the result when you were as clumsy a girl as she was. But this was just rudeness. He blatantly refused to show himself to her. He didn't even deny that he had been watching her for weeks, stalking her in the night! This was intolerable.

"If you won't tell me who you are then clearly you are someone of ill-repute. If I scream my brother will have the men of the house out here in moments. You will be caught and hauled before a court for whatever crimes have you hiding in the woods." "Your brother is asleep in his bed. No one will hear you scream. And no one will rescue you from the likes of me."

Grace thought briefly that she should be afraid of him. He couldn't possibly be a nice man if he surrounded himself in such mystery. And that last was a blatant threat if ever she'd heard one. But what could he possibly want with her? She didn't approve of not knowing, so she asked.

"What do you want with me? Why have you been watching me?"

There was a pause as he considered what to tell her. Then he sighed and there was a sound of rustling, as if he had leaned against one of the tree-trunks and it had snagged the material of his clothes.

"I want you to be my wife, Grace. I've been watching you because one of my men reported that you were of marriageable age and might be an appropriate choice."

Grace was stunned. This was not how she thought she would be proposed to.

He continued as if he hadn't just said the most ludicrous thing in the world, "I've been watching you because you intrigue me. You're beautiful and I think you would make an excellent wife for me. I need a good wife; my last wife didn't do so well. I've been waiting for a good opportunity to steal you away from your brother and take you to make you my wife."

Now he paused as if to gauge her reaction. Grace realized she had frozen like a deer before a hunter. Her anger turned inward for a fraction of a second and she used it to form words and reply to this outlandish declaration.

"You cannot be serious." "I certainly can. My people need me to marry and you have all of the qualities I am looking for in a wife." "You know absolutely nothing about me. We haven't even been properly introduced!" "You forget, I've been watching you for weeks, Grace. I know quite a lot about you." "Well, I know nothing of you and I won't willingly marry a stranger." "That won't be a problem." "It won't?" "Of course not, no one expects you to be willing. My bride is a stolen bride, as have been all the brides of my line."

"What are you?"

The question might seem rude but Grace had the overwhelming sense that this creature who taunted her was not human. He wasn't just teasing with a girl alone in the woods. He meant what he said. And she didn't doubt that he could do exactly as he claimed. The fear was back and she struggled to ignore it.

"What makes you think I'm anything different from you or your brother, my Grace?" "I'm not your Grace, no matter what you've decided. I won't marry you against my will. You can't force me, I won't allow it." "You won't allow it? My dear Grace, you're simply splendid. You'll make an excellent queen." This gave Grace pause, it was the first he had mentioned of a title.

"Queen?" "Yes, queen. For I am the king of my people and you will be the king's wife. Does that please you?" "No, not at all. I care nothing for titles, or if I did I would have stayed in town and been introduced at court." "I would introduce you to my court and they will love you." He was teasing her again and it was making her quite angry.

"That's quite enough nonsense for one evening. Go away if you please. I came out here to enjoy to moonlight, not to be harassed by glowing eyes and ridiculous suitors."

She turned away from him then and strode across the little clearing, stopping in the dead center to lie down and look up at the moon.

x

Marak was flabbergasted. It wasn't a state he often found himself in and he couldn't say he much enjoyed the feeling.

He knew very well that Grace had been frightened of him, angry with him, confused by him...

He was accustomed to stirring all kinds of feelings in others, most of which were suitably humble or afraid. Never, in all his life, had someone dismissed him as unimportant.

He had come back for her tonight, intending to capture Grace and make her his wife this very evening. Seylin had reported that she had left the safety of her brother's home with the intent of spending the evening under the stars and Marak was not going to let her slip through his fingers.

He could not force her out of the meeting circle though. She had come to the one spot where he could not force her to come with him. It would not stop him from taking her to his kingdom and making her his wife in the end. She would leave the circle some time. She would sleep. She could be persuaded.

So it would cause no harm to tell her of his plans when she had asked. He was always honest, even if he left things out he never told a lie. Lies were for humans.

But he had never expected her to hear his plans and disregard them, or him, as if he were no more a threat than a leaf on the wind. It made him angry. He was no one to be trifled with. He was the great Goblin King, the most magical of his people! He could frighten this human with no more than a smile on his ugly goblin face. She wouldn't sleep for weeks after. How dare she dismiss him?

Before he could think on the subject more carefully, as a king ought to do, he stepped into the clearing.