“But the man could marry another wife,” she pointed out. That was what Father had done to replace himself.
“Very good,” said Marak approvingly. “Yes, that will help, but will it help enough?”
He brought out two more pins. “Here’s the new wife, and she has a child. Now we have two children, that’s true, but look, it took three parents to make them. You can see that you won’t ever have more elves later if the mother dies. You’ll always have fewer and fewer. But we know that the elves went the other way, that there were more and more. That happened because elf women were having two, three, and four children apiece, and that means elf women aren’t supposed to die in childbirth.”
Sable stared at the pins in excitement. It all made perfect sense. She knew that there had been more elves in her father’s day. Even she had seen the band shrink in her lifetime. Soon, none of them would be left. Surviving childbirth. Who would have imagined that a goblin would teach her that?
Marak watched her excited face, pleased with his quick pupil. “Aside from this, did you have any other concerns?” he asked. “Do you have any objection to marrying Tinsel?”
“I won’t marry anyone else,” declared Sable forcefully. “He’s kind.”
“He is, indeed—very kind,” agreed the goblin King. “Tinsel’s always been amazingly nice. Since you have no objection, we’ll hold the marriage shortly, and now I’d like to test you for magical ability.”
He stood up and walked around the table toward her. Sable jumped up and drew back in alarm.
“Magical ability?” she asked. “What do you mean?”
“Your ability to work magic, of course,” he said, amused. “What else would I mean?”
“But women can’t work magic,” she protested, taking another step back, and the goblin King gave a chuckle.
“I’m afraid your upbringing has been absolutely appalling,” he said cheerfully. “No one has bothered to teach you anything but lies. Not only can elf women work magic, but certain kinds of elf magic were always worked by the women. Hold out your hand, and I’ll show you.”
Sable held out her hand, looking away and shuddering with disgust as he put that corpse’s hand over hers. He pointed absently at the lamp above him, and the room darkened. Her hand began glowing with a bright silver light, and a single ray like a moonbeam shot from the end of each finger. The beams played around the shadowy room as she moved her fingers, and the silver light didn’t fade for almost a minute.
“I knew it,” gloated the goblin King, pointing at the lamp again. “You’re powerfully magical, probably as magical as Seylin is. I’ll start teaching you magic myself right away. You and Irina can learn with my wife; she’s a beginner, too. Most magical people have a special talent. My wife’s is killing people. I wouldn’t be surprised, Sable, if yours is healing, and that’s why you were so upset by the childbirth deaths. It would be wonderful if you were a healer; a talented elf healer could do a lot of good in my kingdom.”
Sable flexed her hand, staring at it, and thought of Thorn and Rowan and Willow laughing over her working magic. And all the time, she could do it. She just needed to be taught. The goblin King opened the door, and she walked out, but she wasn’t the same woman who had walked in a short time before. Her head was high, and her eyes were shining. She wasn’t going to be tortured, and she wasn’t going to die. She was going to learn magic.
“Your turn, M,” announced Marak.
The second she was inside the door, Emily threw herself into his arms. “I’ve missed you so much!” she cried.
“Well!” exclaimed Marak, hugging her in return. “I’d like you to remember that this is an official elf bride’s interview. You’ll want to save these disruptive demonstrations for a more appropriate moment, such as the next time I’m trying to hold court.”
Emily released him. “I count as an elf bride?” she demanded.
“Seylin went out hunting for a bride, and it seems to me that he’s found one.”
“I went out hunting for Seylin,” countered Emily with a grin, “and I’m the one who found what I was after.”
“You were seeking your human nature,” corrected the goblin King, smiling. “Tell me, how did that go?”
Emily sobered up, thinking about what she’d found on her quest, about the elf girl’s book and her goblin son’s disastrous war of revenge.
“I found out that you don’t just grow up into the person you should become,” she said. “I always thought that it happened on its own, but it actually takes a lot of work. And sometimes”—she thought about Whiteye standing on the battlefield reading his mother’s book—“sometimes it doesn’t happen at all.”
Marak watched her pensive face, a little surprised.
“That’s certainly true,” he remarked. “What else did you find out?”
“I found out that if you learn enough about something you can’t hate it even if you want to. That’s why Ruby couldn’t hate the human twins.” She paused to consider that and gave a little sigh. “And I suppose that’s why I couldn’t hate Ruby, either. What did you decide, Marak? You’re letting her keep the children, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I am, until they grow up,” replied the goblin King. “Then Jack will have to leave. I’m not letting him bring a wife down here and start populating my kingdom with humans. I’ll have him taught the merchant’s craft, and he can make trading trips with the men. That’s something that should help him in his world. Ruby is settling down with them on a farm across the valley. I should have known that if I sent her out with you she’d never do any more teaching.”
“Ha! I was good for her,” retorted Emily. “I made her think about new things.”
“That I believe,” said Marak. “You never think the same old things that the rest of us do. I’ve missed you, too—very much. No one else causes me such interesting problems. And let me add that seeing you and Seylin married will fulfill my fondest hopes for you both.”
Emily stared at him in astonishment.
“Marak!” she exclaimed. “I never knew that.”
“I know,” he observed. “You never asked me. I’ve lived more than three times as long as you have, you know. You might ask my advice on occasion.”
Marak opened the door and called in the rest of the group. Then he sat down on the throne again and lifted a large book onto the table. He flipped through the book until he came to the first blank page, produced a bottle of ink, and selected a quill pen from the drawer.
“The registry and marriage of elf brides,” he informed the small crowd before him, “is a simple ceremony with three distinct parts. I’m going to perform each part for all three of you before moving on to the next one. M, you’re first.”
He beckoned Emily and Seylin up to the table. Then he positioned one of Sable’s golden pins before them and set a small golden disk beside it. “Prick her finger,” he directed Seylin, “and squeeze two drops of blood onto this disk.”
Emily was preparing to question whether this was really necessary, but Seylin had her finger pricked before she could protest. The King covered the small disk with his six-fingered hand. When he removed it, the disk had changed color. It was now almost entirely bright red, but one small sliver appeared to have been marked off with a straight line, and beyond that line it was white.
“There, M, is your human blood,” explained Marak, pointing to the red part with his quill. “And there’s the elf blood,” he went on, pointing to the slim white section. Emily studied it unhappily. No wonder her magic spells never worked.
Marak picked up his quill and dipped it, entering her into the registry. “Your age?” he asked.
“Eighteen,” answered Emily. He entered it along with the results of the test and then added Seylin’s name and age below it.
“Humor me, Seylin,” said Marak as he wrote. “I want to test you, too.”
Seylin obediently pricked his own finger and squeezed blood onto a new disk. When Marak lifted his hand from it, Seylin’s d
isk showed three colors. Almost the entire disk was white, but a small section was red, and the tiniest of slivers was black.
“You see,” said the King, “you’re not an elf at all. Here’s your elvish blood.” He pointed to the white section. “That’s quite a bit, but elves aren’t like goblins. They never marry other races if they have any choice at all, and only the women can. An elf man couldn’t have children with an elf cross, not even one as powerful as Kate. No elf would ever call you an elf. Do you see this?” he added, pointing to the tiny black section. “That’s your goblin blood, so you’re a goblin. One drop is all it takes.”
Irina’s disk was totally white.
“Now, that’s an elf,” observed Marak with satisfaction. “Is she seventeen, Sable?” And when Sable nodded, he entered her age. Then he wrote Thaydar’s information below hers.
“Sable,” continued Marak. “Sabul,” he added, writing the characters. “‘Igniting the red flames.’” He paused and put down his quill to study the black-haired elf woman before him.
“In the reign of Aganir Halbi, the elf King named Winter Frost,” he said, “and in the reign of my ancestor Marak the Antlered, the goblin King’s military commander claimed the honor of an elf bride, and he and his men attacked the Top Shield Star Camp. The camp lord fell in that battle, and so did his son, but a young elf turned the tide. He fought so fiercely that he killed the goblin commander himself, along with a number of the Guard, and no elf brides were taken that night. As a reward, the elf King gave that young man the lordship of the camp along with a new name, Sabul, the Raging Fire because he had fought like a raging fire among the goblins.”
Sable stared at the goblin King in astonishment. “How do you know that?” she asked.
“I read it in the chronicles,” replied Marak. “Both of them. We have the elvish chronicles, too, for that span of years.”
Sable didn’t even feel the prick. A raging fire. Sabul. She remembered her father with a surge of compassion. He’d been hard on them, but he’d been hard on himself, too, and she wished she could find his spirit somewhere and tell him about the first Lord Sabul.
“Pure elf,” commented Marak, glancing at the white disk. “How old are you, Sable?” She came out of her daydream with a jolt.
“I don’t know the number for it,” she confessed, ashamed.
“Tell me what you know about it,” suggested Marak. “We can probably find the number.”
“Irina and I share the same birthday moon,” began Sable slowly, thinking about numbers. “We were both born in the middle month at the summer camp. When I reached my marriage moon, that meant I was eighteen, but at that same moon, Irina was only twelve. She won’t be eighteen until that moon comes back next summer.”
“Very good,” said the goblin King. “You were eighteen five years ago, so that means you’re twenty-three now. Next summer, you’ll be twenty-four.” He wrote down her age and Tinsel’s information below it. Sable stared at him in awe and thought about all the things he knew: elvish and reading and writing and magic and enough numbers to count the stars in the sky. She wondered what it would be like to know so much, and how long it must have taken to learn.
“That completes the registry,” said Marak, blotting the page and setting the book aside. “Now I need to put a magical symbol on you so that the doors know not to let you out.” He took a bottle of gold ink and a small paintbrush from the drawer and worked the magic on Irina. “And remember, Sable, that I’ll let you out for the full moon. Don’t try to fight the spell.” He worked the magic and studied the letter, but Sable didn’t show the burning that Kate had after her own wedding ceremony.
“Very good,” said Marak, putting down the ink and brush. “Now we come to the Binding Spell, which is the actual marriage. Seylin and M, you’re first,” he added, coming over to them. He plucked a hair from Emily’s head and wrapped it around Seylin’s right wrist. Then he plucked a hair from Seylin’s head and wrapped it around Emily’s wrist. As he wrapped the hair, it seemed to vanish from his fingers, but the hair could still be seen, deep under the skin, encircling the wrist like a thread. Irina came closer to look, and Emily held out her wrist so that she could see.
“This magic,” explained Marak, “ensures that the goblin genealogies are accurate. As long as the married couple remain true to each other, those hairs can’t be felt. If a spouse commits adultery, the hair begins to itch, and a rash spreads up and down the arm. That itch only stops when the spouse names the other guilty party in front of the King, so I can correct the genealogies if necessary, and in front of the other spouse, so he or she can decide on a suitable revenge. But the worst revenge is that the entire kingdom knows about it,” he concluded cheerfully. “The confessions always take place at court, and they’re very well attended.”
The goblin King turned to his new couple.
“Congratulations on your marriage,” he said pleasantly, “and because you certainly won’t want to take her back to your Guard quarters, Seylin, the goblins have decorated M’s quarters instead. That required doing some cleaning, M, so if you can’t find anything, ask Kate where she had things put. Seylin, come see me tomorrow about new employment that will change your living quarters.”
The young pair received the congratulations of the others and left the room, going back through the stables and down the corridor that had been Emily’s first view of the goblin kingdom. They paused to lean out a window together, as they had done on that first night. The view of the lake valley, crossed by twinkling lights, seemed one of the most beautiful sights in the world.
Marak performed the Binding Spell on Thaydar and Irina, and now Irina had a hair of her own to study, black against the whiteness of her slender wrist.
“Congratulations on your marriage, old friend,” said the King, “and, Irina, I hope you’ll be very happy. Kate left some clothes in the dressing room for you to try on until you can have your own clothes made.”
Thaydar and Irina left the room together, leaving Sable rather stunned.
“But—she isn’t married now, surely?” she asked in confusion. “Irina’s still just a child.”
“It’s all right, Sable,” said Marak reassuringly. “I know that rule about waiting until the marriage moon is very important in elvish society, but it’s never been true among the goblins. Of course, if Irina were younger, she wouldn’t be ready for marriage, but she’s seventeen, and that’s old enough.”
As Sable mulled this over, the goblin King performed the Binding Spell, and she was soon captivated by the sight of a thick silver thread shining around her wrist. She raised her arm and turned it, watching the silver sparkle in the bright light, and Tinsel smiled at the serious look on her face.
“Congratulations to both of you,” said Marak. “Tinsel, spend the week with your wife, and keep her away from crowds. You’ve been moved into the most elaborate of the elf-bride quarters, on the green level. You’ll find that your role as husband to an elf lord’s daughter is more important to the kingdom than your role as a member of the King’s Guard, and I know you’ll treat it as such. I hope you’ll both be very happy. In fact, I insist on it.”
The goblin King watched the sober young pair leave the room hand in hand. As they went through the large square room, he saw Sable glance apprehensively at the ceiling, and he made a mental note to check up on her claustrophobia after a couple of days. Then he turned and surveyed all the clutter the ceremonies had created. Tomorrow, he would come back and retrieve the elf brides’ registry and the magical items. He still had one more important errand to perform before he could sleep tonight.
Richard had managed to elude all adult supervision. Emily had left the stable convinced that he was with Brindle, and Brindle was sure he had seen the boy with Emily. It was hardly surprising that Richard could accomplish this. Even without an expert illusionist for a father, he had lived long enough on the streets to know how to make himself disappear.
Once Richard’s companions left, goblin servant
s emerged to take care of Dinner. They examined the new horse carefully, gave him a thorough grooming, and prepared him a hot mash to eat. While he enjoyed his meal, they argued over his various features and faults. Finally, they turned him loose in a princely stall of his own, cleaned up the area, and left. Richard watched everything from behind some grain sacks, taking care not to attract attention.
As soon as the stables were quiet, he hurried back to the iron door and felt all over its smooth surface for a latch.
“What are you doing?” inquired a booming voice. “Didn’t I just let you in?”
The boy looked around the empty corridor, but no one was there.
“Which one of you said that?” he demanded bravely.
“Which one of us?” The voice was puzzled. “I just see you and me. And stop that!” it continued as he slid his fingers over the hinges. “I’m very ticklish!”
Richard’s mouth formed an O.
“I don’t believe it!” he breathed. “It’s the blinking door, isn’t it? Well, if you’re the door, then you can just let me out!”
“Sorry,” replied the door officiously. “No minors allowed outside without their parents.”
“But I’m not one of your miners!” exclaimed the boy. “I’ve never been in a mine before now!”
“You’re confusing me,” remarked the door. “I never open when I’m confused.”
Richard began pounding on the iron surface.
“I’m built to withstand that,” it observed stoically.
“Listen, if you don’t open up right now, I’ll—”
“Good evening, goblin King.”
Richard froze, his heart in his mouth. The authorities had him at last.
“Good evening, door,” replied a pleasant voice. “Good evening, Richard. Why are you beating up my door? Are you going so soon?”
The terrified boy huddled against the iron surface, his eyes tightly shut.