Wintersong(81)

He laughed. There were no sharp edges to him anymore. The mood changed between us, growing heavier, weightier. We continued working in silence, but thoughts and feelings flowed between us without words, the push and pull, ebb and flow of the music gently rocking us with its sound.

Our conversation wound to a close as I finished working through the theme.

“Beautiful,” the Goblin King murmured. “Transcendent. It—it’s bigger than Heaven and the world above. Just like you.”

Roses bloomed in my cheeks, and I averted my head so he would not see.

“You could change the course of music,” he said. “You could change the world above if you—”

He did not finish his sentence. If I—what? Published my music? Managed to get past the barriers of my name, my sex, my death? My final fate hung between us, an invisible but insurmountable obstacle. I would not change the course of music. I would die here, unheard and unremembered. I tasted the unfairness at the back of my throat, bitterness and bile.

“If the world above were ready for me, perhaps,” I said lightly. “But I fear I am too much for them—and not enough.”

“You, my dear,” the Goblin King said, “are more than enough.”

The compliment from another’s lips would have sounded coy, flirtatious, even arch. A pretty sentiment designed to flatter and then bed me. I had heard such blandishments from guests in our inn, directed even to one as plain as me. Yet I did not think the Goblin King intended to flatter; on his lips, the words sounded like unvarnished truth. I was more than enough. More than my limitations, more than adequate, simply more.

“Thank you.” If I had been K?the, I would have deflected the compliment with a coquettish wink or a snide remark. But I was not K?the; I was plain, blunt, and forthright Liesl. No. Elisabeth. Plain, earnest, straightforward, and talented Elisabeth. I took his words for the gift they were, and for the first time, accepted them without pain.

After a long while—hours? minutes?—the first movement of what I was beginning to call the Wedding Night Sonata was done. Despite the anger and rage in its notes, the key was C major. The shape of the first movement was there now, with most of its supporting structure fleshed out. I played it on the klavier to hear it in full, but I could not adequately convey both the main part and the accompaniment with just two hands.

Instinctively, I reached for Josef. But my brother was not there.

A sharp pain stabbed me in the heart, as though someone had taken a dagger and plunged it into my breast. I gasped and pressed my hand there to stanch the wound. I was certain my hand would come away with blood. But there was nothing there.

“Elisabeth!” The Goblin King rushed to my side.

It was a moment before I could recover enough breath to speak.

“I’m fine,” I said. “I’m fine.” I shook off his solicitous hands and gave him a wobbly smile. “Just a fit. It will pass.”

His face was unreadable, opaque, as inscrutable as any one of his goblin subjects. “Perhaps you should rest.”

I shook my head. “No. Not yet. I need to hear this in its entirety. As a whole. It’s just,” I said with a wry smile, “I lack another pair of hands.”

His expression softened. “Perhaps I—perhaps I can assist you. With your music.”

I stared at him. The Goblin King turned away.

“Never mind,” he said hastily. “Just a thought. Forget it; I didn’t mean to offend you—”

“Yes.”

He stopped and lifted his head, looking straight into my eyes.

“Yes, you may,” I corrected. “Please,” I said, when I saw the uncertainty in his face. “I would like to hear this piece played on a violin.”

We held each other’s gazes for a beat longer. Then he blinked.

“Your wish is my command, Elisabeth.” He smiled. “I always did say you had power over me.”

Elisabeth. I was Elisabeth again, and the way he said my name sent a throb of longing through me.

“As you wish, Elisabeth,” he said again, softer now. “As you wish.”





Part IV

THE GOBLIN KING

When all my hopes His promises sufficed, When my Soul watched for Him by day, by night, When my lamp lightened and my robe was white, And all seemed loss, except the Pearl unpriced.

Yet, since He calls me still with tender Call, Since He remembers Whom I half forgot,

I even will run my race and bear my lot.



—CHRISTINA ROSSETTI, Come Unto Me





DEATH AND THE MAIDEN

Everything was changed. Ever since the night the Goblin King broke me open and laid me bare, the air between us was charged with unspoken emotion. I was a woman remade by his hands; he reached inside me and the music came pouring out.

I understood now what it was like to be struck by divine fire. Our evenings now passed in a fever dream, where we did nothing but make music. I no longer marked the passage of time; yesterday was today was tomorrow, an ouroboros of hours that circled back on themselves. I was burning from within, and I needed no mortal sustenance to nourish me. Sleep, food, drink—all were poor substitutes for the music that sustained me. I lived on music and the Goblin King. The notes were my ambrosia, his kisses my nectar.

“Again,” I demanded as we finished playing the first movement of the Wedding Night Sonata for the seventh time. “Again!”