Fear and wonder splashed over her in a cold wave. She sucked in her breath and reached out to steady herself against the car—then stumbled, because the car wasn’t there. Neither was the road; bushes and trees stood all around her, as if she had walked out into the middle of the forest without noticing.
That would have been alarming enough. But none of it astonished her as much as the little lights, the figures, flitting and crawling in the trees, some of them descending toward her.
“No,” she said. “Oh, no. I did not take any path. This shouldn’t happen unless I take your path!” She shouted it up at them, as if defiance might change reality.
Something floated down to the level of her nose. The thing was about the size of her hand, and looked like a frog with wings, its whole body glowing in a nimbus of pale gold light. “You picked up our token,” it told her, in a voice like a tree-frog’s chirp. “That is the same as a path.”
She opened her palm to glare down at the ring. “Well, he didn’t tell me about that.”
The frog thing laughed, as did the others, in a ripple of chittering sounds. The creatures weren’t beautiful, or at least not in a human way, like the faeries in children’s books. Instead they took forms from the natural environment: a clump of lichen ambling down a tree trunk, a foot-long dragonfly with a quasi-human face, a gnome whose hat you could easily mistake for a pointy brown mushroom, a bushy flying twig of spruce needles with a green smile.
They didn’t particularly look like the spooky creature Skye had drawn, but then, apparently goblins could shape-shift.
“What did you do to Skye, and how do I reverse it?” she demanded.
“The goblins enchanted her,” the frog said. “Not we.”
“You aren’t goblins?”
They all reacted again, this time in what sounded like offended grumbles.
“Of course not.” The frog continued hovering in front of her, glowing gold, its wings not even moving, as if they were just decoration rather than a means of levitation. The air wafting off the creature smelled oddly warm and pleasant, like beeswax. “The goblins are invaders. Weeds. They followed the liaison and took over much of the forest. We are the proper fae of this land.”
“Oh. Sorry. I’ve never…well, I never knew any of you were here, exactly.”
“Most humans do not. But you, Olivia Darwen, respect our forests and our waters, and therefore we wish to assist you. You called out, so we are answering.”
Livy drew in a breath. “Good. Are you…well, if I can ask, I know the goblins used to be humans…”
“Yes, most of them.”
“Is that what you are too? Humans who were changed?”
“Only a few of us. For the most part we are merely fae, and always have been.”
She glanced around at the glow-spangled nighttime forest. “And where are we now, exactly?”
“You are in the forest as before, but you have stepped into the fae realm. It is always here, overlaid upon your world, but humans usually cannot see it or enter it.”
“But they can get stuck in it, if someone like a goblin gets hold of them?”
“Yes. That is always a danger. That is why such paths are treacherous.”
“How can I save my sister?” Livy asked again.
“Her enchantment was within magical law. Unfortunately she asked the fae to appear, and the goblins, common weeds that they are, answered her. They showed her a path and she took it. This makes it fair, even if some of us do not like it. They have been taking more than they should, and pushing the boundaries of the rules too far.”
“So what can I do? Is there any way to stop the spell? Or is she just doomed to become one of them?” Livy’s heart wrung itself tight at the thought.
“When the time comes for her to leave you and go to them, then you may act. For then you are the one wronged, to lose your sister, and you never accepted such a deal.”
“No, I didn’t. So when does that happen? When does she go to them?”
“We do not know. Only that it would surely be at night, and probably soon.”
Livy swallowed, fear sweeping over her. “What do I do then?”
“Come to the woods, any woods, and summon us. Keep that ring.” The frog-faery nodded at her clutched hand. “Possessing it enables you to see and hear us.”
“Then what happens?”
“Then you will have to be brave, Olivia Darwen.” The frog looked grave—Livy was beginning to read expressions better on its stretched, wide-lipped face. “We will help you overcome their magic, but it must be you who approaches and infiltrates them.”
“Why me? You’re the ones with magic. I don’t have any.”
“We would like to defeat the goblins. Since coming here they’ve been pests to us. But magic has rules that we cannot break, and the goblins are always out of our reach unless they overstep rules themselves. They do so sometimes, and we do retaliate, but it has only taken their numbers down a little. They build them back up with new victims. They are strong. Weeds always are.”
“Yes.” Livy thought of her battles against Himalayan blackberry, Japanese knotweed, and English ivy. “They are.”
“But you, a human from the tribe who was wronged—you, with our backing, may be able not only to save your sister, but to open a way for us to eradicate the goblins. Are you ready to be so brave, young human?”
It sounded scary. Maybe the kind of thing a person never returned from, like all those people who disappeared into the woods or the water and were never seen again. But she thought of Skye—the Skye who used to laugh, tease, gesture enthusiastically, spend a whole weekend perfecting the colors of a painting while listening to loud hip-hop. The Skye who was already almost lost to her and would never come back unless Livy stepped up.
“Yes,” she said. “I’ll be ready.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
KIT SUCCUMBED TO HIS EDGINESS A LITTLE BIT SHY OF THIRTY MINUTES IN, AND TEXTED LIVY. DOING OK?
While he waited he drummed his fingers on the cover of a fifty-year-old notebook, absently watching Skye and Grady as they stood by the front window, leaning against one another. The water was an expanse of black outside, with a streak of light rippling across it from one passing boat. Wonderful, Kit thought. On top of everything else, his goblin problem was breaking his favorite cousin’s heart. He should never have let Grady stay in this town.
His phone buzzed.
Yeah, Livy texted back, and Kit breathed freely again. Met them, or at least some like them. Will come explain.
That was mystifying, but it sounded like he’d get the story soon. He responded, ok then, see you, and set the phone down. “She’s all right,” he told Skye and Grady. “She’s on her way back.”
Skye nodded to him, relief relaxing her features for a moment. But no smile. God damn it, why hadn’t he realized she never smiled? Livy had even said so.
Not like he could have done anything if he had added up the clues, though. Except beat himself up for being useless, and for being the unwilling reason the goblins were here at all.