“It will be no easy task to restrain myself, but for the sake of a funeral…I don’t want to be alone. That is, I won’t be alone,” he added, gesturing to indicate all the inanimate objects that would probably follow us. “But I’d like another voice.”
“I want to be there,” I said. “I can’t help but feel that it’s my fault.”
“It wasn’t,” he said. “The witch is a formidable foe.”
Hand in hand, we walked through the halls of the caverns and out to the moonlit fields and hills. The moon was a half circle in the sky tonight, still quite bright in the cloudless black sea of stars. He left behind all the lanterns and candles, so it was just the two of us and the silvery light shining down. His subjects followed us out, all except the few larger pieces like the clock. There was something faintly comical about seeing dishes, brushes, and fireplace tools moving through the grass, but as soon as I considered that they were actually people it wasn’t funny at all.
The whole night was, indeed, tinged with a sense of tragedy, the king and all his subjects reduced to a farce by the curse. I still wondered what he had done to deserve it. Tricked a girl and broken her heart? I knew he wouldn’t be able to answer questions about it, but…I thought he had probably made a mistake more so than an unforgivable act. The fair folk didn’t care much for goblins, in any case, so if he had tried to seduce a water faery’s daughter, her vengeance might have been tenfold what was deserved.
He stopped at the site of a fire pit. The charred remains of past fires marked a large circle. Benches circled the pit, but the grass was quite overgrown, up to my knees and almost hiding the benches, and I started stomping down an area around the fire while he gathered brush and twigs, then crossed a few logs like a tent above the kindling.
“We used to have sheep and goats to keep the grass cut, but they’ve mostly gotten lost or stolen by now,” he said. “My castle defenses aren’t what they used to be. Well, here we are.” He flicked his hands at the fire a few times, murmuring a spell. The kindling caught fire, the flames quickly spreading, lending warmth to the night.
I moved to Nyar’s side, and he put an arm around me. I looked up at the stars. “Looks like my bedroom ceiling.”
“The stars in your bedroom will move, just like the sky does,” he said. “We are nocturnal creatures, so stars are important to us. We use them for navigation, for inspiration, for fortunes…”
“Can you tell me my fortune?”
“I don’t dare.”
We stood there together a moment, his arm around me and my arm around him, watching the fire grow more steady as the first blaze of the kindling seeped into the larger logs, providing low, long-burning flames.
“How do you honor your dead?” I asked.
“Without a body…without my people’s voices…the options become a bit more limited. But we could have a song, although I’m not the best singer in the kingdom.”
“No one’s here to judge you.”
“I hope not.” He raised an eyebrow at me before clearing his throat.
His ragged voice may not have been pretty, but it had a pleasant character all the same, as he sang of the goblin’s body nourishing the land while its soul sailed upon the stars. When he came to the chorus a second time, I sang with him, although I faltered on a few words I had not quite caught the first time.
His hand slipped to clutch mine.
“So strange,” he said, “not to know.”
Something about the size of an animal rustled in the grass, coming our way. To my surprise, it was the lute, followed closely by the pipes, a small drum, and a flute. The instruments began to play of their own accord, rendering the mourning song in a beautiful way. We didn’t try to sing with them this time, but simply let them play, as the goblins gathered closer.
Then they began to play a merrier tune, and Nyar bowed to me, holding out his palm. “I do believe they’d like us to dance.”
“Then, we must oblige them.” I carefully fit my hand to his in a dancing position, avoiding his claws, and he pulled me close. He was already hungry for me again, but I knew this was not the time for that yet. This was a moment to savor the deeper connection that was developing between us. He spun me around, my bare feet twirling in the dewy grass, the firelight casting a glow on our skin.
I didn’t know goblin dances and he didn’t know human ones, but I followed his lead easily. Our bodies understood each other so well. The ghostly instruments kept playing, reels and jigs and frolics, some of them meant for crowds and not for two lonely people, but we did our best with them all the same.
I didn’t know when I had ever had such fun in my life. A cruel voice kept whispering in my mind, This might end! I would quickly tamp it down, trying not to let any tears spring to my eyes and disturb the happiness of this perfect night.
“My beautiful Sabela,” he said, holding me against him. “That is—my clever Sabela.”
“I suppose you’re allowed to call me beautiful in such a moment,” I said.
“I wonder if I will stop aching for you even after the curse is lifted.”
“I hope not. Well, maybe not four times a day, but at least once. Or twice. The feeling has been mutual quite a lot of the time.”
“Why did you come here?” he asked. “For coins, yes, but it was more than that, wasn’t it?”
“I’ve always been curious about you.” I twisted a corner of my apron. “I don’t know why. Even though the other townspeople think you just a lascivious goblin, deep down I knew the real story would be more complicated than that. And…I wanted to know what it was. Besides that, I saw a picture of you in a book, a fair likeness, I might add, and…who knows, maybe I just knew I was meant to come to you. I never cared about the coins.”
“There is one thing I believe I can tell you,” he said. “There is nothing you can do right now to solve the final test. You can’t search for it. It will come to you, with time. So, there is nothing for us to do now but wait for it, and in the meantime, you might as well spend your time with me…if you are willing. I will have to claim you more often. It’s easier to restrain myself when I’m not near you.”
“I told you from the start, you can take me as many times as you like.”
“That is the bargain,” he admitted.
“I don’t think I’ll mind. I want you, Nyar…”
“I have accepted that this might be all we have, but—”
“Don’t say that. I forbid you to talk that way.” I was excited that I no longer had to search the castle in confusion, but so frightened I would fail. The test of the rose was so innocent. The flowers called to me, and I had picked it without thinking. But later, it was the man in the coffin who called to me, and I had resisted him. I wondered if this meant there was something else I must resist. What could it be? When the time came, I would have to know it.
“We have a few more nights,” he said. “I promise I won’t speak of the curse any more. We’ll just make the most of them.”