Changeling

by William Ritter

  Tinn did not dare breathe. They had known going into the woods that only one of them would be coming back. They hadn’t talked about it, but they knew that only one of them would wake up in bed the following morning, only one would go to school again in the fall, only one would dance nervously with a girl in the spring. Only one of them had a life waiting for him outside the Wild Wood. Only one of them was a real boy.

  Tinn looked down at his hands. His fingers were inky vines. His skin was made of rippling shadows. He looked up into the light at the end of the barbed tunnel, where his brother was breathing fresh air. Only one of them had a mother and a home to return to. Only one of them had a chance.

  And it wasn’t Tinn.

  The Thing breathed deeply. The human child had clawed its way free of the vines. Let the child flee; the human was nothing now. Where was the changeling?

  “Tinn?” the human child called into the bramble. Was the fool coming back? “Tinn?”

  So, the changeling was called Tinn. The Thing turned its head this way and that, searching. Tinn had not escaped its bramble, the Thing was sure of it. It could still sense him somewhere close, numb with fear and cold. Yet the Thing could not see him. Very well. The Thing would devour the human first, after all. It would let the changeling watch.

  “Come on, Tinn! What are you waiting for?”

  The Thing began to slink toward the sound of Cole’s voice.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Cole called, oblivious to the creature slipping closer to him in the shadows. “You can make it, Tinn. Just follow me!”

  Tinn’s heart hurt. His pulse boomed in his ears, and his breaths rose fast in his chest. All he had ever wanted his whole life had been to follow Cole—he would have followed Cole to the ends of the Earth.

  “Do you need me to come back in there and get you?” Cole asked. He began to work his shoulders back through the vicious vines, blinking blindly into the pitch darkness. “Tinn?” The Thing’s cloak of shadows quivered as it prepared to strike its target.

  The twins had run out of time. A strange calm fell over Tinn. All the time in the world could not save him now. But it could save Cole.

  Tinn tensed. When he moved, he moved very quickly.

  There were a dozen bones wedged in the gap, holding Cole’s narrow passage open. Tinn threw himself between them and shoved Cole’s face back out of the bramble.

  Cole gasped in surprise as the cold, dark fingers forced him back. A face like carved obsidian appeared within the vines, alien, and yet familiar.

  “Take care of Mom,” Tinn said. Then he grabbed hold of the longest bone, the one right at the center of the tunnel, and pulled it free, knocking down the rest of them with it as he withdrew back into the bramble.

  The vines collapsed into themselves in a rush, devouring the gap and snapping out the light like a snuffed lantern. Tinn threw himself backward and felt the wave of cold sweep over him.

  TWENTY-NINE

  “TINN!” Cole screamed. He tore at the vines with his bare hands until his arms were covered with deep, angry cuts. The gap would not reopen. He raged and thrashed and pulled at the unyielding bramble until the world spun around him and he collapsed to his knees. His sleeves were shredded to ribbons and with every heartbeat his arms throbbed as if they were on fire. “Tinn,” he whimpered.

  “I’m so sorry,” said a meek voice behind him. “I’m so sorry.”

  Cole started and spun. Candlebeard was there, between two mossy trees.

  “YOU!” Cole grabbed a handful of loose rocks and hurled them at the wretched hinkypunk. “You did this! You’re a liar! Get away from me!”

  “Didn’t lie,” Candlebeard mumbled to the ground. “Can’t lie. Only speak the truth. I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

  “Stop saying that! You tricked us! You gave us to that—that whatever. You fed my brother to a monster! You’re a monster! I’m supposed to care that you’re sorry? If you’re so sorry, GET HIM BACK!”

  Candlebeard’s back hunched so low that his beard curled up where it pressed against the earth.

  Cole panted, his anger thudding in his ears with every heartbeat. “WHY?” he demanded. “Why did you do it? What did we ever do to you? What did Tinn ever do to you?”

  Fat, wet tears fell from Candlebeard’s face. He reached into his chest and produced another ball of smoke, which he sculpted into the image of the bearded infant he had shown them earlier. “My son,” he croaked.

  Cole’s rage caught in his throat. He wanted to rail against the treacherous man, but the pathetic figure slumped before him already looked completely defeated. Exhausted and bleeding, Cole sat in a heap on the cold ground. This wasn’t how adventures were supposed to end.

  The smoky apparition in Candlebeard’s trembling hands spun slowly around. “My son,” he breathed. Climbing tendrils of smoke clutched the wispy image of the boy. The terrified face of the hinkypunk child hung translucent in the air for a few seconds as vaporous vines consumed it. Candlebeard dropped his arms, his shoulders shaking.

  Cole stared at the fading smoke. “It wasn’t the queen that took your kid. It was that thing in the thorns, wasn’t it? It still has him?”

  Candlebeard nodded.

  “Is that why you couldn’t leave with the rest of your people?”

  He nodded again. “It makes me do things.” The old man sniffled. “Never enough. Never satisfied. Wants your brother. Your brother for my son. I’m so sorry. So, so, so sorry.”

  Tears dripped into Candlebeard’s flame and sizzled.

  At the mention of Tinn, Cole felt his cheeks grow hot. His fury was wasted on the broken old man, but it still simmered inside him. “Quit blubbering,” he said. “You’ll put your candle out.”

  Candlebeard shook his head. “Only at the end of me,” he mumbled. “My candle. My life.”

  Cole narrowed his eyes, watching the old man weep.

  “Let it go out.” Candlebeard sniffled.

  A dull, heavy realization settled over Cole. “Giving up my brother won’t get your son back,” he said heavily. He reached into his pocket. “I don’t think anything will.”

  Candlebeard wiped his face along one arm and lifted his head. And then he saw what Cole was holding.

  Tenderly, delicately, he took the candle stub in both hands as if it were a soap bubble and might burst at any moment.

  “Is it . . . ?” Cole couldn’t finish the question. The look on Candlebeard’s face told him that it was. “We found it in the thorns.”

  Candlebeard’s whole body shook. “So much wasted,” he said. “So much left. My son. My light.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Cole. “I wish that I could help you, but it’s not too late for you to help me. You owe me that much. We can still save my brother.”

  Candlebeard’s eyes were squeezed shut. “Killed him,” he rasped. “Told me if I did those awful things . . . but then it killed him.”

  “And it’s trying to kill Tinn, too,” Cole pressed. “Please! How can I get back inside the bramble?”

  “He would be so ashamed of the things I’ve done.” Candlebeard couldn’t seem to hear a word Cole was saying. “He would be so ashamed to have me for a father.”

  “Please, Candlebeard. Look, I never even knew my dad! My dad ran away because of what I might have been. He never came back for me. I wasn’t worth coming back for, I guess.”

  Candlebeard stopped mumbling for a moment, although his head still hung at his chest.

  “At least you never gave up on your son,” Cole pressed. “You did things that were wrong, but it’s never too late to do something right. It’s not too late to do something he would be proud of.”

  The hinkypunk’s eyes flashed open, rimmed with red, damp with tears, but alive with something Cole had not seen in them before. The fire in his chest flared as if someone had turned up an oil lamp. When the hinkypunk spoke again, it was through gritted teeth. “My son.”

  And then the strange little man leapt between the trees and vanished
into the forest.

  “Wait!” Cole pushed himself to his feet. He nearly toppled over again from the effort, but he managed to stagger toward the trees. Candlebeard was gone. “Argh!”

  Cole sat down at the base of the tree, utterly alone. His arms and legs stung, but the pain was like someone else’s now. He wanted his brother back. He wanted his mother. He wanted to go home. A noise in the brush beside him made him jump. He braced himself. What else was this nightmare forest going to throw at him? Wolves? Ogres? Giants?

  Out of the foliage toddled a fluffy bear cub. Cole wiped his nose on the back of his ragged sleeve. The cub looked at Cole and pushed itself up on its wobbly hind legs, taking a few uncertain steps closer.

  “Oh, no you don’t,” Cole told it. “Get! Shoo! The last time we helped you out, your mother nearly took my face off!”

  The cub reached out a paw. It had something clutched between its sharp claws. Cole blinked. The cub was holding a marmalade tart.

  “That’s . . . uh . . .” Cole didn’t know how to finish his sentence.

  The cub ducked its head and turned away, and in a sudden whumph it had changed. “I lied to you,” said Fable, looking down and wiggling her human toes in the dirt. “There was one more left. It was in my pocket all along. I just didn’t want to share.”

  Behind her, the bushes rustled once more, and this time the Queen of the Deep Dark emerged from the shadows. Cole gaped and pushed back clumsily from her. The witch put a hand on Fable’s shoulder and addressed Cole gently. “Hello again, child,” she said. “I promise I have no intention of taking your face off. This time.”

  And then the leaves exploded outward as one last figure burst into the clearing. Cole’s throat tightened and his eyes stung as he stared in disbelief. Then his mother’s arms were tight around him and his were around her and they were both lying on the dirty ground crying.

  Fable beamed as she stuffed the last marmalade tart in her mouth.

  THIRTY

  Tinn lay with his back against the cold bones. The air smelled like mildew and rot. He could hear Cole calling his name, but his brother’s voice was muffled, distant, and fading fast.

  Frigid air swept across Tinn’s skin. The Thing was moving around him.

  HELLO, CHANGELING. It was not a proper voice. It was like the echo of a voice.

  “What do you want?” Tinn managed.

  YOU, said the Thing. I’VE BEEN WAITING.

  “Why me?” The Thing was moving behind him now, and Tinn turned to face it, not that he could see anything.

  YOU KNOW.

  “Is it because I’m—” Tinn swallowed. He looked down at his hands again and saw that they had lost their viny texture. They now looked as if they were made from the same smoky fabric as the Thing’s cloak. “—because I’m a . . . a goblin?”

  YOU ARE A WASTED GOBLIN. MAGIC WITHOUT PURPOSE. AND YOU ARE A FAILED HUMAN. YOU ARE NEITHER HERE NOR THERE.

  “That’s dumb. I’m here, obviously.” Tinn tried to keep his voice steady and confident, but some part of him knew exactly what the Thing meant. He didn’t belong. He had spent a lifetime not belonging, knowing that the terrible truth was coiled in wait deep down inside of him. He had spent a lifetime fearing it, hating himself for it, waiting for it to spring.

  YES. YOU FEEL IT. YOU HAVE ALWAYS FELT IT. IT HAS SEASONED YOU. IT HAS MADE YOU READY FOR ME.

  Tinn wiped his face. “Okay. So, what now? Are you going to eat me or something?”

  YES.

  “Oh.” Tinn swallowed. That was not the response he had been hoping for. “You could . . . not eat me, instead.”

  I WILL FEED ON YOUR FEAR AND DEVOUR YOUR DESPAIR, the voice continued. THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH WORDS IN YOUR WORLD FOR ALL OF THE PARTS OF YOU THAT I WILL CONSUME.

  “You’re going to eat my feelings?”

  AND SO MUCH MORE THAN THAT. I WILL PULL THE MISERY FROM YOUR BONES, CHANGELING, AND AS I DO, YOUR MISERY WILL BECOME YOU. AND THE MORE I DRAW FROM YOU, THE MORE EXQUISITE YOUR MISERY WILL GROW, UNTIL MISERY IS ALL THAT IS LEFT OF YOU. ONLY THEN WILL I FINISH YOU OFF AND ADD YOUR BONES TO MY NEST.

  “Wow. Okay. So you’re just a whole pile of evil. Um. Why are you telling me all that, though? If you’re going to torture me, why haven’t you just begun?”

  YOU THINK THAT I HAVE NOT BEGUN? The Thing made a wheezing noise that might have been a laugh. It made Tinn’s insides feel gross. RUN, CHANGELING, the Thing said at last.

  The vines hanging over Tinn’s head spread apart ever so slightly, and the path of ivory bones became just barely visible in the gloom.

  Tinn hesitated. “You’re—you’re letting me go?”

  I AM LETTING YOU HOPE, said the Thing. It laughed again, a horrible, dry laugh.

  Tinn ran.

  “It’s okay,” Annie repeated over and over, holding Cole tight. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.”

  Cole shook his head. He wanted it to be true, but finally he pushed his head up and wiped his eyes with his hands. “No,” he said. “It’s not okay.”

  Annie brushed his hair out of his face. “Tell me everything.”

  So Cole told his mother about Candlebeard and the maze of thorns and about the terrible, horrible Thing lurking inside them. He told his mother about Tinn—about what he had done, what he had said, and what he had become within the bramble.

  “Oh, it’s na fair!” Kull wailed, throwing his head back when Cole was done.

  “Suddenly you care about my children?” Annie arched an eyebrow at the goblin.

  “I care about the one that’s still lost! Yer manling here says his face was all shadows and vines. Aye, boy?”

  Annie shook her head. “I’m sure it was the shadows from the—”

  “Yer sure o’ nothin’!” Kull spat. “I seen it before. Skin like smoke? Shiftin’ ta look like his surroundin’s? He changed.”

  Annie bit her lip.

  “Otch! Three of the wee brats ta choose from, an’ them brambles had to take my changelin’! Tonight of all nights. Oh, I should’ve stolen him back ages ago. Ohhh . . .” Kull rubbed his face with his hands and trailed off into incoherent mumbles.

  “What’s special about tonight?” said Fable.

  The miserable little goblin peered up through his fingers.

  “Tonight’s the night of the full moon,” said Cole. “That’s what the letter said, right? It said if the changeling wasn’t back in the horde by the full moon, he would die. All the goblins would die.”

  Kull nodded.

  “But why? Why are you going to die? What do the goblins want with my brother? What does everyone want with my brother?”

  Kull groaned. “Goblin matters is fer goblin ears,” he grumbled.

  “Answer him, thief,” said the queen. “Your secrets are worth nothing if you’re not alive to keep them.”

  Kull sighed deeply. She was not wrong. “The changelin’ has always been at the heart of it. It’s how the whole trick works.”

  “Explain yourself,” the queen demanded.

  “S’about balance,” said Kull, “between this world and t’other. Goblin magic isn’a like the magic on t’other side, see? We dinna bend reality into pretty shapes like them fancy fairy folk do, we just gives the universe a teensie nudge an’ do the rest fer ourselves. Goblin power is chaos magic—the power o’ luck. But we do need magic ta live. Like fish need water, all the oddlings on this side o’ the barrier need at least a little magic. Canna survive without it. The thing is, fer magic ta exist in this world, the other side needs somethin’ in return. Trade. Goblins is good at trades.”

  “Me,” said Cole. “You were going to trade me to the other side for more magic. That’s why you tried to take me when I was a baby, isn’t it?”

  Kull nodded. “The changelin’ ritual is a sacred thing. When a changelin’ is born, ’tis born with all the magic of the horde in one wee body, which makes the other side pull even harder ta get ’im. The trick is: iffin a human baby goes ta the other side, then the Earth will pull b
ack against the veil for the earthly child, just the same way. That’s the trick, see? A changelin’ trades places with a human baby so that human baby can be given to the fairies on t’other side. Magic child here, earthly child there. Balance. Water out, water in—an’ we fishies keep swimmin’.”

  “But that’s awful!” Annie said.

  Kull shrugged.

  “Did you leave a changeling in my place?” asked the queen.

  “I wasn’a on the council then,” said Kull. “Before my time. But aye. Probably. The changelin’ in yer stead would’ve long since come back ta the horde an’ become kin an’ kind again. That’s what the old scrolls say. Na supposed ta stay. Changelin’ magic isn’a meant ta last forever.”

  “I thought you didn’t even want the children,” Annie growled. “It was the fairies who wanted them. That’s what you said.”

  “Aye. We dinna want the children. We want the magic. We need it. Just a little. Just enough. The children just . . . help us get it.”

  “Not anymore, they don’t,” said the queen. Her glare could have cut glass.

  “Na,” agreed Kull sorrowfully. “Na anymore. Na without that changelin’. We’re done, we are. ’Tis the end o’ the horde. Dinna look so smug about it. ’Tis the end o’ magic in yer Wild Wood, too, witchy.”

  The queen scowled.

  “Oh, did ya think yer fancy forest was special on its own? Na. That’s us. We’re na totally selfish, see? We share the magic we bring. At least, we did when there was magic ta share. All over now, of course. But ya already knew that, didn’t ya?”

  The queen scowled again, but did not respond.

  “What’s he talking about, Mama?” Fable said. “What’s going to happen to our forest?”

  “It will still be the same forest,” said the queen.

  “Ha!” Kull barked. “Same trees an’ rocks, maybe. Na more fair folk, though. Na more oddlings. Na that there’s a whole lot left, anymore. The smart ones is them that already left. Them that stay, they won’t stay the same, na without magic. We’ll all wither inta something less, we will. Something mortal. Na more hinky lights. Na more goblins. Na more wee girlies who can also be bears.”