Goddess of Loss

by Jennifer Ellision

  I held her close, inhaling her baby smell, and kissed her head before putting her in her bassinet and covering her with a thin blanket. Closing my eyes, I fell into a deep, dreamless slumber.

  Something woke me with a start. I sat up in bed, my heart pounding. I couldn’t see anything, but even in the dark, I knew something was wrong. I strained my ears to hear Fae breathing. When I couldn’t, I felt down to her bassinet, but it was empty. In the turmoil of my mind, I tried to make sense of it. I’d been exhausted when I came to bed. Could I have given Fae to Judith again and not remembered? I scrambled out of bed, but before I got anywhere close to the door to the sitting room, I saw something in the moonlight that sent terror into my soul. There was someone there in my room. This person was much shorter than Judith. It was a small man. In his arms was a baby—my baby.

  “Who are you?” I hissed in a panic, my heart rate accelerating.

  “You know who I am,” he said in a creaky voice. “Come on now, Eliana. You’re an intelligent girl.”

  I took a step closer, but he stepped back and waggled a finger at me.

  “Ah, ah, ah, don’t come closer. You wouldn’t want anything to happen to the child, would you?”

  Now that my eyes had adjusted to the faint light, I could see him more clearly. In his arms, Fae was beginning to stir.

  “Just hand her back, and I won’t call the guards.” My eyes flickered to the door. How had he managed to get past Avery and Williamson?

  “I don’t think your guards will pose a threat to me.” He hopped up and down as if with excitement.

  “What do you want?” My heart pounded. “I’ll give you anything. Gold, I have gold. My mother...”

  He cut me off. “Your mother cheated me all those years ago, but now I’d say this little beauty is mine. It’s about time she paid off her debt. I’ve been waiting a long time for this moment.”

  I jumped forward with the intention of snatching Fae from his arms, but he held his free arm out toward me. A blast of deep purple light shot out, hitting me and sending me flying back to the bed. When I tried to move, I found I couldn’t. His magic was holding me down.

  “This has been fun, but I think I’ll be going now!” He did a little dance and gave an odd laugh that sent tremors up my spine.

  “Rumpelstiltskin!” I screamed. “Rumpelstiltskin!” I screamed his name so hard that Williamson or Avery, whichever of them was currently on guard, must have heard me.

  Rumpelstiltskin smiled a crooked smile as Fae began screaming in his arms.

  “What is owed is owed. A debt is a debt, and a name is a name. It doesn’t matter how loudly you scream it, it will only ever be a name.”

  He began to sing to himself or perhaps to soothe Fae, who was having none of it and was screaming louder than ever. I struggled against his magic, but he was too strong.

  “You can’t take her!” I shouted. “Your rules. You can only take something of mine if you had given me something in return. You’ve given me nothing, and there is nothing I want from you. You have to give her back. You can’t expect me to settle my mother’s score. She promised you her firstborn. She’s never given birth.”

  He looked like he was considering it, and, for a second, I hoped I might have gotten around his warped logic. But then, his grin widened. His body began to change shape, The grotesque, hunched figure shot upward and slimmed down until he was almost six feet tall. Bile rose in my throat as I recognized him. It was the man by the river who’d helped us free the unicorns from the net. He looked so much like Luka I almost cried out, but his face was twisted and mean.

  “I gave you a knife, remember? You told me I could have anything in return.”

  He swished his coat, and the magical bonds holding me evaporated. I stood up to rush over to him, but he’d gone, disappearing into thin air along with Fae. The room was completely silent.

  A glow of purple light hurtled toward the window, smashing right through it and down into the front courtyard of the castle.

  “No!” I screamed, falling to the floor.

  Fae was gone, and so was Rumpelstiltskin.

  16th May

  “He’s taken Fae!” I screamed, running through the door to my suite. Avery stood to attention as I raced past him.

  I didn’t know what I was doing or how to save her, so I ran through the palace to the front doors, screaming Rumpelstiltskin’s name to wake everyone up. The guard on the front door seemed surprised to see me rushing toward him, but he saw the urgency in my face and I didn’t need to yell at him to open the door. He just did it. Behind me, footsteps pounded. Turning, I saw Avery and a number of other guards who’d come to see what was going on.

  At the top of the stairs, my mother’s face appeared. “Eliana. What is it?”

  “Rumpelstiltskin. He’s got Fae.”

  My mother’s face lost all color, but I didn’t have time to explain further. When the thick oak doors had been opened enough for me to slip through the gap, I ran out into the night, my nightdress flapping behind me. Up ahead, the purple light hovered, moving slowly toward the main gates.

  “Stop it!” I shouted loudly enough for the guards at the gate to hear as I pelted toward them.

  Some of the guards, who had been following behind, ran right past me, their swords aloft, chasing after the purple light. They probably didn’t even know what it was.

  “Don’t hurt her,” I screamed. “It’s Fae.”

  The guards stopped and turned around as my mother caught up to me. She grabbed my hand and held it tightly.

  “That purple light is Rumpelstiltskin. He has Fae,” I explained between sobs.

  My mother pulled herself to her full height and walked toward her guards with the swords.

  “Put your weapons down. Whatever you do, don’t lose sight of that ball of magic.” She spoke with authority, and the guards did exactly as she asked. “It is imperative that no one harms it. That is my granddaughter. Do not let her be taken.”

  The men sheathed their swords and began to walk slowly toward Rumpelstiltskin. Ahead in the distance, the two guards at the gates readied themselves for when the ball moved again. The line of guards increased as more ran out of the castle and began to edge their way around Rumpelstiltskin and Fae, circling around the purple light.

  “What’s happening?” Jay said, appearing at my side. He had bits of straw in his hair which told me he’d fallen asleep in the staviary where he sometimes slept.

  I pointed to the magic light.

  “It’s Rumpelstiltskin. He says I owe him.” I heaved a breath and tried to tell him everything, but all I could think of was Fae. I couldn’t even see her, but I knew she was in that light somewhere. I could hear the faint squeals of her cries, even from this distance.

  “I’ll kill him!” Jay muttered, striding forward and pulling a sword from one of the guard’s sheaths. Before I could stop him or explain that the light held Fae, he raced forward, the sword aloft and a war cry on his lips.

  I screamed his name, but he didn’t hear me, so intent he was on hurting Rumpelstiltskin. Over the sound of Fae’s cries and Jay’s screams, I heard the sick laugh and the little tune of Rumpelstiltskin singing his own name to himself.

  I could only watch in horror as the ball of light transformed back into Rumpelstiltskin. With relief, I saw Fae, unhurt but wailing, in his arms. The pair of them glowed with purple light, almost like ghosts of themselves. He danced down the driveway, twirling and taking dainty steps. He was dancing so slowly, and Jay was running at top speed, but they never seemed to get closer to each other. Rumpelstiltskin waved his free arm in the general direction of Jay, who was having a hard time pushing against the Rumpelstiltskin’s magic. The whole scene seemed odd, as if time itself was somehow warped, and above everything else, all I could hear were the cries of my daughter.

  The pain in my heart reached a crescendo, and I pushed past the wall of guards and ran after Jay. I had to get to Fae before the unimaginable happened. Rumpelstiltskin was onl
y holding her loosely with one hand as he danced in circles to his disgusting song with only one word.

  Light still surrounded the pair of them, though as Rumpelstiltskin twirled, it peeled off him, floating into nothing. He was completely surrounded on all sides now. The guards formed a complete circle around us. On the outside of the circle, I could hear my mother shouting. No longer was she the voice of authority, but the voice of a grandmother about to lose her granddaughter. I was vaguely aware of my father’s voice joining the chorus of noise.

  Inside the circle stood me, Jay, and Rumpelstiltskin with Fae. I ran forward, managing to catch up with Jay, but then I felt the force that was driving him back. It was invisible, but it was there. While I couldn’t push past it, Jay kept trying, his legs running swiftly but not moving him an inch.

  I grabbed his hands. “Stop running. You can’t get closer.”

  “I’m not running,” he wheezed. “He’s got control of my legs. He’s doing this.”

  As the circle around us closed in, Rumpelstiltskin twirls got faster and faster, and along with them, Jay’s legs were moving so quickly they were nothing more than a blur. Sweat poured down his face, but his look of determination never faltered. As the guards closed in, there was a flash of light. The bonds holding Jay and me were broken, catapulting him forward so quickly that he went flying, tripped over the cobbles, and rolled right into the guards opposite, knocking some of them over. Rumpelstiltskin turned back into the purple ball of light and drifted upwards slowly before disappearing with a faint pop.

  I stood stock-still in shock, unable to move, barely able to breathe. The night was now dark and eerily silent. Then, just like that, everyone began to shout at once. The guards were in chaos, though one of them was shouting orders to grab the palace horses and unicorns to start scouring the nearby countryside.

  Behind me, my mother’s wails filled the air, but all I could think about was the silence between the noise. The silence that should have been filled with Fae’s cries.

  She was gone. Completely gone. I already knew there was no point in scouring the nearby countryside. If Rumpelstiltskin had run away, then maybe we would have had hope, but he had evaporated using magic. We’d already spent so much time looking for him and found no trace. What chance did we have of finding him now?

  The only other person silent in all of this was Jay. I looked to where he’d fallen to see him lying on the ground. Blood poured through one of his trouser legs, and the other leg was bent at an unnatural angle. It was all I needed to bring me out of my stupor.

  “Call a medic!” I yelled, rushing toward Jay. His skin was ashen, and tears fell down his cheeks.

  “I couldn’t stop him, Lia. I couldn’t stop him. I tried.”

  “I know you did,” I soothed, wiping his forehead with my sleeve. It came away soaked. “You did your best.”

  My parents were at my side in seconds. “Go get the court physician,” my mother barked at one of the guards. “Quick. He’s going into shock.” She turned to another. “Get blankets and supplies... and you—” she spoke to yet another “—get one of the horses and go into town as quickly as you can. The court physician won’t be enough. We need a team of doctors. Bring the best. Wake them up if you have to. Tell them they will be paid handsomely.”

  All around me was a hive of activity. I couldn’t call it chaos, because, thanks to my mother, everyone had a job to do. By the time the court physician appeared with his doctor’s bag, my father was already heading out on his horse to look for Rumpelstiltskin and taking the guards with him. Above us, the sky was filled with unicorns. Only a few lived in the staviary. These were the wild ones we’d saved, ironically, with Rumpelstiltskin’s help.

  I saw Zacharina and shouted up at her, not caring anymore if people thought I was crazy. “Rumpelstiltskin took Fae.”

  She nodded, and in my head, I heard the words, “We’ll find her.”

  As one, the unicorns bolted off into the sky.

  The palace courtyard was now empty, but lights blazed in every window of the palace itself as the staff were awakened by the commotion.

  All through everything, I cradled Jay’s head as he slipped in and out of consciousness.

  The court physician, a small, wispy, gray-haired man by the name of Smith pulled a vial out of his bag and injected the contents into Jay’s arm.

  “It will make him sleep,” he explained as he began to cut the length of Jay’s trousers to get a better look at his legs.

  “He’s broken both legs. I can see that. How badly, I don’t know. He’ll need to go to a hospital, that is certain.”

  “I’ve sent one of the guards to fetch the best medics in town,” my mother said

  “We’ll need a stretcher and a way to transport him. I have a stretcher in my office.”

  My mother looked stunned, and for a second, she lost her composure. “I sent all the horses out. There’s none left to pull the carriage.”

  “We’ll worry about that when the time comes,” the physician said. “Maybe one of your guards will come back. For now, I need the stretcher.”

  “Right!” Without bothering to ask one of the servants that had begun to gather in the courtyard, she ran back into the castle to bring the stretcher back herself.

  “Will he be okay?” I asked, tears streaming down my face. He was completely asleep, which was the only mercy in this night of horrors.

  “I’d not like to say too soon. This leg is fractured badly. The bone has ripped right through the skin. I’ve not looked at the other leg closely yet, but it’s bent at a funny angle. If he ever walks again, he’ll need months of physical therapy.”

  I measured my breaths, concentrating on each inhale and exhale. It was the only way not to have a complete meltdown. Doing that would only take the physician’s attention from Jay.

  My mother was quick to come back with the stretcher. She placed it on the floor next to Jay, but the physician had moved from stemming the blood flowing from Jay’s leg to feeling his wrist for his pulse. I looked up to the skies. The three of us moving Jay onto the stretcher would only hurt him more, I was sure of it. His legs were so mangled that I was afraid any movement would cause more injury. We’d have to wait for the town medics to arrive, but what then? We’d have to waste time hooking the horses up to the carriage. The only person that knew how to do that quickly was Jay.

  I closed my eyes and called to Zacharina with my mind, hoping she was still in range enough to hear me.

  “What is it, my child?”

  “Will you come back to the palace? I need to hook a horse up to a carriage, but the horse isn’t here yet. I need to get Jay to a hospital quickly. He’s in a bad way.”

  “I’ll fly him.”

  “No, I need you to pull a carriage. He’ll be on a stretcher. I know you don’t believe in unicorns working and hauling things for humans, but...”

  “Hush, of course I’ll pull the carriage. I’ll be back as quickly as my wings will fly me.”

  “Who were you talking to?” my mother asked, eyeing me curiously. “You were moving your lips.”

  There was no point in denying the truth now. I didn’t care if anyone thought I was crazy anymore. I felt more crazy now than I’d ever been.

  “I was speaking to Zacharina, the unicorn, with my mind,” I said flatly. “She’s coming back to pull the carriage to take Jay to the hospital.”

  My mother raised her eyebrows in surprise, but she didn’t question me. “Meet her at the staviary and get one of the servants to help you.”

  Leaving Jay almost broke my heart as much as losing Fae had, but getting him help was more important than staying by his side.

  I jumped up and ran around the palace, almost bumping into Williamson, who was still in his nightclothes.

  “I need help. I need to prepare a carriage. A unicorn will be here in a few minutes to pull it. Help me get everything ready.”

  It was a job I didn’t have much experience with, but between Williamson, Zachari
na, and I, we managed to get the carriage out into the courtyard. Epiphany was too small to help, so she cantered alongside her mother.

  The medics showed up not much later, a whole swarm of them. The guard must have knocked on every door in town to bring so many. Between them, they got Jay onto the stretcher and into the carriage. Williamson jumped up to drive and a couple of the physicians hopped up into the back of the carriage with Jay.

  They held the door open, waiting for me to jump up. I hesitated. Even though Fae was gone, leaving the palace made it seem so final, like I was giving up on her.

  “I’ll be here,” my mother said, wrapping her arms around me. “I won’t leave until we’ve found her and brought her back.”

  I choked back the sobs and stepped up into the carriage.

  I barely noticed the time going by as we rushed down the track to town. Both physicians, Smith and one I didn’t know, were busy working on Jay, muttering to each other in hushed tones. I didn’t care what they were saying. I just wanted him in the hospital where he could get help.

  Pain churned inside me as I continued to wipe Jay’s brow, stroking his hair. I whispered words into his ear in the hopes he knew I was with him. But all I could think about was Fae. My breasts ached, full of milk as they were. It was way past her feeding time. Would Rumpelstiltskin know what to feed her? Did he know anything about babies at all? What if his intent wasn’t to look after her? The guy obviously didn’t mind maiming innocent creatures. I felt the bile rise in my throat as I thought about Epiphany caught in a trap laid by him. Thinking of all the sadistic, horrible things he could do to Fae wasn’t helping me stay calm, but it was all I could think of. Grotesque images floated in my mind. I leaned over and threw up on the carriage floor as we came to a stop outside the hospital.

  Williamson jumped down from the front of the carriage and spoke through a window in the back.