Wintersong(43)

I went rigid with rage. “It is not for you to judge.”

“But it is for you?” he returned. “Are you responsible for your sister’s virtue?”

“No,” I said. “But I will safeguard her good name.”

“Oh, Elisabeth.” The Goblin King shook his head. “When will you be selfish? When will you ever do anything for yourself?”

I was silent.

“You cannot leash yourself to your sister’s quim and whims.” All pretense of charm or chicanery were gone from the Goblin King. “Someday she must make her own choices. Without you. What will you do when there is no one left to take care of, no one left to look after? Is that when you will finally look after you?”

He had a way of attacking me with compassion. His unexpected kindness, more than his charm or beauty, was seductive. I disliked the truth in his words. And his pity. I did not want his pity.

The Goblin King sighed. “K?the is part of the game. The pieces have been set in motion, and she is one of them.”

“You gave me the days of winter to escape the Underground.” I crossed my arms. “And you’ve gone and married my sister behind my back.”

That smug grin returned to his face. “You are jealous. Well, well, well; that bodes well for me.”

When I did not rise to his bait, he shook his head.

“No, Elisabeth, I have not married K?the. The old laws are binding, and when I take a bride, it is forever. She may never set foot in the world above again. This pretty vision is a spell of her own making, a beautiful fantasy to bring her comfort. I have very little power, you know.”

I scoffed. “You are Der Erlk?nig. You have all the power.”

The Goblin King lifted a brow. “If you think that, then you know less than I gave you credit for,” he said. “I am but a prisoner to my own crown.”

Does the crown serve the king or the king serve the crown?

“Why a bride?” I asked after a moment. “Why—why K?the?”

Why not me? Why hadn’t he come for me?

It was a while before he answered. He ran his fingers over one of the figurines on one of the side tables in the corridor. It was a wood nymph, wide-hipped, buxom, earthy. He traced the curve of her waist, down the hillocks of her thighs, and back up the shape of her leg before resting on the nymph’s collarbones, where the line of her neck met her bosom.

“Shall I tell you a story?” he said at last. He released the nymph figurine and stared into one of the landscapes that hung in the corridor. “A story such as Constanze might have told you and your siblings when you were children.”

I held my breath.

“Once upon a time, there was a great king who lived underground.”

My grandmother’s fairy tales often began this way. I had always thought her stories were her own invention, but hearing the rhythm of the Goblin King’s words, I wondered where Constanze first had learned them.

“This king was the ruler of the dead and the living,” he continued. “He brought the world above to life every spring, and brought it back to death every autumn.”

The Goblin King stared at the landscape as the trees and living things blossomed and bloomed, growing green and bright before withering away.

“The seasons turned, one after another, and with time, the king grew old. Weary. Spring came later and later and autumn earlier and earlier, until one day, there was no spring at all. The world above had gone quiet, dead, and still, and the people suffered.”

The enchanted portrait returned to winter and snow. The seasons had stopped changing.

“One day, a brave maiden ventured into the Underground.” His eyes turned from the portrait back to me. “To beg the king to return the world above to life.”

“Brave?” I laughed, a thin, defiant bark of a laugh. “Not beautiful?”

His lips twisted to one side. “Brave or beautiful, it matters not. Let Constanze tell it one way; I shall tell it in mine.”

The Goblin King moved closer. I held my ground, pushing back against his insistent presence.

“She offered the king her life in exchange for the land. My life for my people, she said. She begged him to accept her bargain. She knew the old laws: life for life, blood for harvest. Without it, the Underground would wither and fade away, taking with it every last trace of green from the world above.”

He hovered over me, his fingers outstretched, reaching for the pulse in my throat. My breathing grew shallow. I waited—wanted—for him to touch me, to seize my lifebeat in his hands and take it.

But he did not. His fingers curled in on themselves and he retreated.

“Her life would sustain the king’s, the king’s life would sustain the denizens of the Underground, and their lives would sustain the earth and make things grow. The king accepted her bargain, and when the new year turned, spring came again.”

In its own way, it was a beautiful story, more like the parables and fables of good Christian martyrs Mother told us than Constanze’s tales of hobgoblins and mischief. Virtuous people, persistent people, people who sacrificed themselves for the greater good of all, these were the heroes of Mother’s stories. Like the brave maiden of the Goblin King’s tale.

But K?the was not the brave heroine of Mother’s stories; she was the foolish, beautiful girl of Constanze’s. Who was the brave maiden of the Goblin King’s tale?