Bessie Bell and the Goblin King

by Charlotte E. English

  Neither did Mrs. Adair, once she reached the door, for some invisible force appeared to prevent her from leaving through it. She walked directly into something solid, though impossible to discern, and stopped abruptly, with a little cry of surprise and pain. All her subsequent attempts to discover a way through were of no avail.

  ‘I do apologise,’ said the fetch, with blatant and smiling insincerity. ‘But you see, it is to be an evening of marvels! A ball unlike any other! It would be too, too bad if you were to miss out on the festivities.’

  Mrs. Adair looked as though she would like to protest further. But she looked, first, at her husband, and whatever she saw in his face evidently persuaded her to reconsider. Instead of bursting into an angry tirade, as she clearly wished to do, she forced an affected laugh instead, and said in a brittle tone: ‘Well, Mr. Green. Your eccentricities grow more interesting hourly.’

  This little exchange interested Bessie, and she wondered how much Mrs. Adair knew about her husband. That she was a little afraid of him was obvious; that the children would follow their parents’ lead was equally evident.

  The fetch smiled silkily. ‘I pray you will proceed to the ballroom. You will find refreshments awaiting you there.’

  The Adairs departed thither without another word, and the fetch proceeded to welcome the next wave of incoming guests. There came in another flow of lively, excited, chattering and human guests, shaking the chill from their hair, and the wisps of mist from the folds of their cloaks.

  Bessie felt no right of interest in the arrivals as would justify her in retaining her place at the host’s side, so she removed herself to a dark corner of the hall, and continued to watch. She knew who was expected to attend, for she had been deeply involved in the composition of the guest list. It interested her very much, however, to observe who had accepted the invitation; how they were treated by the fetch, and who appeared to be personally known to Grunewald’s sister; and how they behaved. The majority of the families, she judged, were unaware that their host was anyone other than the Mr. Green she was pretending to be, and had no notion that anything untoward was occurring at the ball. They came merely to be merry, and to dance a great deal, and Bessie’s anointed left eye detected nothing unusual in the majority of the great families of the neighbourhood. She knew, though, that the Aylfendeanes and their friends were in the ballroom already, and poised to further observe and question as opportunities presented themselves. If secrets were hidden anywhere within these visions of mundane humanity, they would be discovered over the course of the evening.

  But two points of interest occurred. Late in the process of arrival, when the stream of guests had at last begun to slow, a gaggle of mismatched attendees appeared in a haphazard group. They looked full ordinary enough, in Bessie’s right eye; but her left revealed that they were in truth a party of goblins, most likely of various tribes. Among their number was one lone Aylir, a woman with ice-white hair tinted with blue and a glitteringly cold, beautiful smile to match. Some signs of secret recognition she discerned, between these guests and the fetch. Were these among the associates Balligumph suspected her of having ridden to awake? If so, what was their purpose here, and why had they been drawn forth from the Torpor?

  Soon after the arrival of this group, the noise and bustle of carriages drawing up outside and disgorging their beautifully-dressed inhabitants ceased. All seemed arrived for the ball, and the fetch may now consider herself free to abandon her post in the hall, and attend her guests in the ballroom.

  But herein lay the second point of interest, for the fetch seemed disinclined to leave the hall at all. She paced up and down, glancing often towards the door as though still awaiting someone; someone much hoped-for, but who had not, thus far, appeared. The list of guests to be invited had been so long, and the flow of incoming dancers so chaotic, that Bessie could not guess at who had failed to arrive; and she certainly could not conjecture as to why the appearance of one family should be of such importance to the fetch.

  Furthermore, she muttered to herself under her breath as she paced about. ‘Not them,’ she said, more than once. ‘Not him. But if not them… who?’ Bessie’s questions went unheard and unanswered, and she was obliged to speculate for herself as to the meaning of this behaviour. The person referred to must be Mr. Adair, surely; the elder, with his unexpectedly Aylir appearance. He was the only person who had seemed at all out of the ordinary. But in what way had he failed to satisfy the fetch? What was he not?

  At length the fetch was obliged to abandon her vigil, for strains of music began to be heard from the ballroom. Soon the dancing would begin. The fetch ceased her pacing. ‘Come, Bess,’ she said, offering her arm. ‘It is time for the show to begin.’

  Bessie found herself in the ballroom before one particular curiosity fully penetrated her awareness. She could have little familiarity with the music typically chosen for such events as this, but still it occurred to her that the melodies she was now hearing were something out of the common way. Indeed, even the instruments upon which they were played seemed somehow other. There was a violin, assuredly, but it sounded full strange – as though it might, perhaps, be made from glass, or its strings wrought from spider’s webs. A pipe played; or three, or even more? And they were no ordinary pipes, for the tones ringing rich and pure in Bessie’s ears teased oddly at her senses.

  She could scarcely see the musicians in the crush of the ballroom. Indeed, she could not imagine how there was to be room enough for any dancing, for it seemed that every inch of the floor was occupied by a different pair of slipper-shod feet, a different silken train sweeping the ground.

  But the fetch-as-Grunewald stepped a little forward, and cleared her throat. Nothing more was required. All of the guests ahead of them stepped aside, united in some deeply-felt but inexplicable impulse, and the way through to the centre of the room was clear.

  At the far end, Bessie beheld the musicians. Not a one of them was human, nor bore a drop of human blood. Two were Ayliri: the fiddler’s too-white skin gleamed like mother-of-pearl, and his long, ice-white hair was bound back in braids. There was a second fiddler, as dark of skin as the first was pale, his hair a halo of wispy, night-black curls decked with gems. These two were tall and proud of posture; they were dressed in waistcoats and knee-breeches of silks shimmering in too many colours, with spider-gossamer stockings clinging to their shapely legs and coats of leaves and moths’ wings hanging from their shoulders. With them stood a trio of pipers, each much shorter than the fiddlers. Different creatures, these, with their overlarge hands and ears; their figures were gangling and ungainly, though they danced with a grace that would put the most elegant of debutantes to shame. They wore velvet caps and jerkins in riotous hues, and they played their pipes – odd, curling instruments of glass and silver and gold – with an infectious glee.

  There were others, but Bessie had not the time to examine them all. The band of musicians was attracting a great deal of notice from the assembled guests, and excited chatter threatened almost to drown out the music.

  The fetch led Bessie into the centre of the ballroom, released her hand, and bowed to her. Too late, Bessie realised what was intended.

  ‘No!’ she hissed in desperation. ‘Whatever gave you the idea I’d know how to dance!’

  The fetch merely grinned at her. ‘But of course you do.’

  She had not time for further objections, for the musicians struck up a new melody. These new strains caught hold of Bessie in a fashion indescribable, but instantly every nerve in her body longed to dance. This effect was universal, she judged, for every single one of the fetch’s guests ceased their chatter at once, formed themselves into pairs and began, in unison, to trace the steps of a dance unlike any ever seen in that hall before. Bessie was at no loss to follow the movements, though they led her to turn and whirl in an arrangement so complex, she could scarcely have learned it if she had tried. But all such reflections rapidly fled from her mind; there was only the music – the v
iolin and the pipes, and the rustle of a hundred silken gowns keeping time; the glimmer of jewelled ornaments, glinting in a thousand colours; the perfumes of lilies and roses, of clear summer waters and chill, damping fog. Time passed, Bessie could not have said how much. She was barely aware, focused upon nothing save the whirl of the dance.

  It came to a halt, so abruptly that Bessie was left gasping in shock as her feet stilled and the music died away. She required fully half a minute to collect herself enough to look about her and determine the source of the disruption, for such a delicious, terpsichorean frenzy could not have come to such a cease by itself.

  She noticed, firstly, that changes had been wrought to the ballroom during the course of the dancing. The ceilings, previously bare of adornment, were now hung with trailing vines sprouting ethereal, pallid leaves, and flowers paler still. But these, in fact, were not hung there at all; they grew there, winding their way over the expanse of plaster in a fashion oddly possessive. Moths and butterflies in jewelled colours flitted lazily among them, and some had drifted down to rest upon the hair of the dancers below. Tendrils of vines coiled their way down the walls, and must soon claim all the ballroom for their own.

  Bess saw little else, at first, but the crowds before her parted as they had done for the fetch, and a cluster of new arrivals stood revealed. Two pale-haired Ayliri women were dressed for the dance, in gowns of moss and rose petals anointed with dew. A third Aylir, a man, attended both of the women, for he had offered both of them his arms. He wore a robe of silk and starlight, and his auburn hair flowed long and loose.

  With them stood four goblins: each, Bessie guessed, of a different tribe, for their appearance and height and attire were full varied. These, too, came prepared to dance, if she could judge by the finery they wore, the jewels punched through their ears, and the soft dancing-slippers upon their feet. Like their companions, they had dispensed with Glamour and stood as themselves, unabashed in such a throng of human company.

  But the late arrivals were not all of Aylfenhame. One human stood among them; one human woman, whose finery was unquestionably worthy to stand alongside theirs, wrought though it was of mere human velvets and silks, and adorned only by the gems and embroideries of mortal earth. Her vivid red hair was built up high, almost in the fashion of the previous century, and it glittered in some odd way, as though strewn with diamonds. She was young, though perhaps a few years older than Bessie herself. That she was used to presiding was obvious from her straight-backed posture, air of confidence and the high tilt of her chin. Awed by this vision, Bessie closed her right eye; but she saw nothing altered with her anointed left.

  Bessie had never seen her before, but her name was soon supplied, for a whisper of awed surprise spread through the crowded guests. Lady Thayer. Lady Cassandra Thayer. Lady Cass!

  Then came the fetch, walking past Bessie to greet this assortment of latecomers. In her alacrity, Bessie felt there could be no doubt: these were the people for whom the fetch had been waiting. Perhaps they were the ones for whom she had ordered rooms prepared – or, at least, those of Aylfenhame, for Lady Thayer stood a little way apart from them, as though she had merely chanced to arrive at the same time.

  It took Bessie a little longer to notice the pipe the lady held. It was simple in design, straight and rather short, but it was made from delicate, iridescent glass. With a smile of mischief, Lady Thayer raised the peculiar instrument to her lips and played a brief, rippling tune.

  The fetch had gone first to her apparent friends among the Ayliri and goblin arrivals, and had looked but briefly upon Lady Thayer. But this changed the moment she began to play that strange little pipe. The fetch’s head whipped around, and she fixed Lady Thayer with an intense stare. Her gaze took in the sumptuous red hair, every inch of her ladyship’s finery and, most especially, the pipe that she held.

  ‘Play again,’ she commanded.

  Lady Thayer lifted one delicate brow by the barest fraction, and stared back at her host – Mr. Green in appearance, if not in fact – with cool displeasure. ‘I beg your pardon?’

  To Bessie’s surprise, the fetch grinned with swift, fierce appreciation. And then… bowed. ‘My apologies. It would please me greatly if you would play that melody again, Lady Thayer.’

  Her ladyship waited a few perfectly-judged moments before she graciously forgave the dictatorial manner, and granted the request. The melody rang out, clear and bright, and the fetch’s excitement grew. Swift as a snake, she stretched out a hand and seized one of Lady Thayer’s. Something silver-bright and sharp flashed in the candlelight; Lady Thayer gasped in sudden surprise, or perhaps pain; and Bessie saw a glint of shocking red. Blood.

  The apparent Mr. Green proceeded to shock his company by lifting his own hand, smeared with Lady Thayer’s blood, to his lips. He sampled some of it, delicately, like a man urged to try some new delicacy of which he is suspicious. But as he tasted the blood, a terrible smile crept into being upon his face, and his stolen bright-green eyes flashed with eager triumph.

  ‘It is you!’ he cried. ‘Everything is in agreement! Your hair! Your eyes! Your music. And the blood. The blood confirms it.’

  Lady Thayer’s cool confidence was gone, replaced by a mixture of anger and bewilderment. ‘What can be the meaning of this!’ she cried, cradling her wounded hand. ‘Had I known I answered your entreaty of attendance only to be so treated, I should never have come!’ And she turned, ready to sweep out of the ballroom in disgust. But the three Ayliri blocked her way, and the four goblins with them. She was forced to turn back to Mr. Green, which she did with enviable poise, as though she had chosen to grant him a further audience of her own accord. But Bessie saw the hint of fear in her eyes.

  Mr. Green stepped forward and took both of her hands, careful of the pipe she still held as he did so. ‘I apologise. But you cannot know how I have searched for you.’

  Lady Thayer only favoured him with a look of strong reproof mingled with enquiry, and withdrew her hands.

  ‘You are of a long, noble lineage,’ he continued – or she in fact as well as appearance, for Bessie realised with a start that the fetch had let the Glamour that disguised her as Grunewald fade, and now stood revealed in all her part-human, part-goblin glory.

  Lady Thayer inclined her head once, very slightly. If she was surprised by the transformation of her host into a part-goblin, she gave no sign of it save a slight widening of her eyes.

  ‘I speak not of your human lineage,’ said Grunewald’s sister impatiently. ‘Though it is not wholly irrelevant. Daughter of an impoverished earl; wife of a wealthy viscount. Oh, I have studied you. But further back! Decades of your years — more than a century. You have an ancestor most noble.’

  Bessie received an inkling of the fetch’s meaning. She drifted closer, studying Lady Thayer intently with both of her eyes, and this closer inspection rewarded her with some few, small signs that she had missed: a degree of faint, fae otherness about Lady Thayer’s green eyes, almost as vivid in hue as Grunewald’s. The barest shimmer of otherworldly copper threaded through her hair. Her ears, so close to human as to pass all but an informed examination; but then one might discern a hint of strangeness in their shape and form.

  Her Ayliri blood had not bred as strongly in her as in Mrs. Aylfendeane, but it was discernible, if one knew how to recognise it. It was also evident in the music she played, for her melodies bore something of the strange allure of the Ayliri pipers and fiddlers.

  But these observations were insufficient. The fetch spoke as though she referred to a particular ancestor; not merely the inherent nobility of Ayliri blood itself was spoken of.

  ‘He is long lost to time,’ said the fetch almost in a whisper. ‘Even to me, once among his most favoured! And though I have searched, I cannot find him. We cannot find him. But with your help, all shall be changed. All shall be won.’

  His Ayliri and goblin compatriots had, during the course of this speech, come to regard Lady Thayer with new interest. ‘Can i
t be true?’ said one of the women.

  The man in the starlit robe frowned his disapproval, and shook his head. ‘Your blood-magic leads you astray, Rasgha. There is nothing of him in this woman. Do you imagine he would so sully himself, as to lie with a human?’

  The fetch – Rasgha, named at last – smiled maliciously at her doubting friend. ‘Perhaps you were not so favoured as I, Torin. Perhaps I alone was trusted enough to receive this confidence. And do not think I do not notice, or will not remember, that slight.’

  Torin glanced at Rasgha in faint surprise, as though he had forgotten her human heritage. Perhaps he had. ‘He confided in you, did he?’

  ‘He spoke of a dalliance, once. Once only. And he did not speak of a child, but I hoped… I hoped.’

  Torin’s lip curled. ‘He, of all people, to dally with a human! Well I remember his disdain of them.’ Torin’s arrogant gaze swept over the assembled guests, whose chatter swelled with indignant protests at these words. He ignored it all.

  ‘A most superior human,’ said Rasgha, with a contempt that Bessie found puzzling. ‘A woman of the highest birth, among the nobility of England and Ireland! And of the rarest beauty! Such a dalliance could bring him no shame. So he said.’

  Torin shrugged his shoulders. ‘We may make the attempt. At worst, it can but fail.’

  The close, heated atmosphere in the ballroom abruptly vanished under an onrushing wave of cold night air. The dancers turned as one, Bessie with them, to seek the source of the sudden chill.

  The outer wall had disappeared, or mostly so. Some vague, flickering remnant of it shimmered still in Bessie’s left eye, but it proved no impediment either to sight or movement. The vast expanse of the spangled night sky lay fully revealed beyond, and the ragged lawns below. These were barely glimpsed before the all-devouring fog gathered its might and descended upon Hyde Place, swallowing it whole in the space of a mere few breaths.