Wintersong

by S. Jae-Jones

  The variations were not particularly inspired, nor his execution on the klavier especially clean. For a man of myth and legend, the Goblin King’s playing was astoundingly ordinary. But his touch on the keys was light and nimble, and he had a wonderful sense of rhythm, moving in and out with the rise and fall of the melody.

  My fingers twitched, and a hitching sensation clawed its way out of my breast. I wanted to go to him, to suggest a different variation, to sit next to him on the bench and share in the act of creation. I wanted my hands on his, I wanted to guide those long, slim fingers, and I wanted to change the tenor of the music, to push here and draw out there. The Goblin King sensed me watching him, and the faintest blush of pink tinted his cheeks. His fingers slipped on the keyboard.

  “Well,” he said once he had finished. “I hope that was to your satisfaction, my dear. I have not your gift for improvisation, and my hands are much more accustomed to the feel of strings and a bow beneath them.”

  “Who taught you to play?” I was trembling, but I was not cold; I was hot. I could feel the heat rising from my cheeks, my throat, my chest.

  His only answer was an enigmatic smile. “And now it is your turn, Elisabeth.”

  From too hot to too cold. A wash of fear drenched me from head to toe in a nervous sweat. “Oh no.” I shook my head. “No.”

  Annoyance began to harden his face. “Come, Elisabeth. Please. I am asking nicely.”

  “No,” I said again, a little more firmly.

  The Goblin King sighed, and rose from his seat. “I don’t understand,” he said. “Why are you so afraid? You were always so fearless, so brazen in your own way when it came to this. You never held anything back when we played together in the Goblin Grove.”

  The small tremors in my body had grown into bone-shattering shakes. The Goblin King studied me, watching my complexion change from pale to flushed to pale again, and walked over to me. His hands took mine and I let him lead me from the couch to the klavier.

  “Come.” He sat me down on the bench and set my hands on the keyboard. I snatched them away as though I’d been burned, hiding them in my lap.

  “Elisabeth,” the Goblin King said. “It’s just us.”

  That was the problem. It wasn’t just me. It was me and the Goblin King. I could not play for him. He was not Josef, who was the other half of my soul. He was another person, whole and entire.

  I shook my head.

  He made a frustrated sound and moved away. “Here,” he said, pushing a bundle of white silk at me. “Why don’t you play what you were working on before? This—”

  The words died in his throat as he spread the fabric before his inquisitive eyes. Too late, I saw it for what it was: my wedding gown with my smudged-ash composition. I leaped to my feet, but he was too quick, or I was too slow, for he read every last bit of me on that dress.

  “Hmmm,” he said, scanning the marks on the gown, the music I had notated there. “You were angry when you wrote this, weren’t you? I can see the rage, the impotence, in your notes.” Then he looked up. “Oh, Elisabeth,” he breathed. “You wrote this on your—on our wedding night, didn’t you?”

  I slapped him, hard, across the face. My aim was sure, and he staggered back, hand on cheek.

  “How dare you,” I said. “How dare you?”

  “Elisabeth, I—”

  “You make me give up my music, force me to sacrifice my last bit of self and sovereignty to you, and you throw it back in my face?” I asked. “You have no right! No right to look at my music like that.” I reached to snatch the wedding gown out of his hands, to rip the fabric to shreds, and to throw the pieces into one of the hearths, but he held me back.

  “I didn’t mean—I mean, I just thought—”

  “You thought what?” I returned. “That I would be grateful? That you can bring an instrument like this—so beautiful and so perfect—out of nowhere and expect me to be all right with it? I can’t—I cannot—” But I did not know what it was I could not do.

  “Isn’t this what you wanted?” Color slashed his cheekbones. “Isn’t this what you wished of me? Your music? Time to compose? Freedom from your responsibilities?” He dropped the gown and stepped closer to me. The Goblin King was slim, but tall, and he towered over me. “I’ve given you everything you’ve ever wanted. I’m tired of living up to your expectations.”

  “And I’m tired,” I said. “Of living up to yours.” We were so close we could feel the brush of each other’s breaths on our lips.

  “What have I ever asked of you?” he asked.

  Sobs choked my throat. “Everything,” I hiccoughed. “My sister. My music. My life. All because you wanted a girl who ceased to exist a long time ago. But I’m not that girl, mein Herr. I haven’t been in a very long time. So what do you want from me?”

  Stillness overcame him, the calm in a storm, but I was the rage and wind and the fury. “I told you what I wanted,” he said quietly. “You, entire.”

  I laughed, a high and hectic sound. “Then take me,” I said. “Take all of me. It is your right, mein Herr.”

  The Goblin King sucked in a sharp breath. The fury inside me changed key, minor to major. The sound of his breathing transformed me, and I stepped closer.

  “Take me,” I insisted. I was not angry anymore. “Take me.”

  I yearned and I burned. There were scant inches between our flesh, separated only by the thinnest layers of silk brocade and linen. Every bit of my skin leaped and hoped for his touch; I could feel the radiance of his warmth against my skin, the space between just as alive as we were. My trembling hands seemed to lift of their own accord, fingers sliding along the buttons of his waistcoat, burying themselves in the lace cravat at his throat.

  “Elisabeth.” His voice quivered. “Not yet.”

  I wanted to tug at the lace at his throat, to pull him to me and crush our lips and our bodies together. But I didn’t.

  “Not yet?” I asked. “Why?”

  I could feel how much he wanted me, wanted this, but still he held back. “Because,” he whispered. “I want to savor this.” One hand twined itself in my hair. “Before you are gone too soon.”

  I laughed bitterly. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  The corner of his lips twisted. “The longer you stay, the sooner you leave.”

  That damned philosopher again. “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “Life,” he said softly, “is more than flesh. Your body is a candle, your soul the flame. The longer I burn the candle…”

  He did not finish.

  “A candle unused is nothing but wax and wick,” I said. “I would rather light the flame, knowing it will go out, than sit forever in darkness.”

  We both stood in silence. I waited for him to close the distance between us.

  But he didn’t. Instead, the Goblin King gently pushed me away.

  “I said I wanted you, entire.” He pressed a finger against my breast, where my heart beat erratically beneath his touch. “And I will have you, when you truly give your all to me.”

  Again, that hollow place within me echoed with pain.

  “When you finally free that part of you that you so desperately deny,” he said, cupping his free hand around the back of my neck, “the part of you I have wanted ever since I first met you, then I will have you, Elisabeth.” He leaned his head close to mine. “You, entire.”

  I could feel the feathery strands of his hair against my lips. I turned up my face to meet his, mouth half-open to receive his kiss.

  But he did not kiss me. Instead he withdrew, leaving me bereft and empty.

  “Only then,” he said. “I won’t settle for second best. I won’t settle for half your heart when I want your whole soul. Only then will I taste your fruit, and savor every last drop until it is gone.”

  I shuddered with the effort of holding back my tears. His smile was crooked.

  “Your soul is beautiful,” he said softly. His eyes swept over the wedding gown on the klavier. “And the pr
oof is there. In your music. If you weren’t so afraid to share it with me, if you weren’t so scared of that part of you, you would have had me long ago.”

  And then the Goblin King was gone, gone in a swirl of silk, and the faint scent of ice on the breeze.

  * * *

  I sit at the klavier, minutes or hours later, fingering the smudges on the fabric of my wedding gown. The words of the Goblin King echo in my mind’s ear—you, entire; you, entire—a refrain I cannot shake. It is not my body he demands; it is my music. I am more than the flesh and bones that house my spirit. I want to give him that innermost part of me now, more intimate than any carnal knowledge we could learn together. But I do not know how. It is easier to give him my body than to give him my soul.

  I pull a sheet of staff paper toward me and pick up the quill. I dip it into the inkwell, but do not write. I see the marks I made on the night of our wedding, but the notes blur together. This is all so secret, so sacred, and I do not know if I can bear to share it with anyone else. I am my wedding gown—fragile, flimsy, ephemeral—the ash smudges that are my music will fade and disappear with time. And still I cannot bring myself to write.

  Tears, along with drops of ink, stain the paper before me, dotting the staff like a measure of eighth notes. Somewhere in the distance, on the other side of the far wall perhaps, a violin begins to play. The Goblin King. I bring my hands to the klavier and follow. Without our bodies to get in the way, our true selves take flight and dance. His is intricate complexity and mystery; mine is unconventional and emotional. Yet somehow we fit, harmonious and complementary, contrapuntal without dissonance. I think I’m beginning to understand.

  I dip my quill into the inkwell once again, and join up my teardrops into a song.

  CHANGELING

  Liesl!

  Someone called my name, and I struggled against the weight of darkness pressing me into sleep.

  Liesl!

  The voice was familiar—dear—to me, but I could not remember where I had heard it before. When I had heard it. With one great effort, I wrenched my eyes open.

  I was in the Goblin Grove. A bright red shape walked toward me and I knew her before I even saw her face. Who else would steal my red cloak?

  Käthe! I called, but I was voiceless.

  My sister scanned the forest, as though she had heard some echo of her name. But her eyes did not settle on me, did not find me standing in front of her.

  Käthe! I tried again, but I was invisible.

  “Liesl.” Käthe paced the Goblin Grove. “Liesl, Liesl, Liesl.”

  My sister chanted my name over and over, a summons or an incantation. With shaking hands, she reached into her satchel and withdrew a sheaf of papers. My heart leaped in my chest. It was the piece of me I had left behind, the composition I called Der Erlkönig.

  Then Käthe reached into her satchel again, drew out a piece of foolscap and a lead pen. To my surprise, the paper was covered with little figures—hands, eyes, lips, dresses. I had not known my little sister could draw, and draw well.

  Resting the foolscap against her knee, Käthe began scribbling furiously. I leaned closer to see what she was sketching—a tree?—but Käthe wasn’t drawing; she was writing.

  Dear Josef.

  A letter. She was writing a frantic, hurried, panic-filled letter.

  Liesl is gone. Liesl is gone. Liesl is gone.

  Käthe ignored both her spelling and her penmanship in a rush to get down her words. Liesl is gon and no one rememburs her name. I am not going mad. I am not. I hav held the pruf of our sister in my hands, and I am riting nao to entrust it into yurs. Pubblish it, Josef. Play it. Play her music. Then rite me bac, rite Mother bac. Tell everyone that Liesl exists. That Liesl lives.

  She did not even bother to sign her name. Then, holding the letter before her like a precious artifact, Käthe took one trembling, hesitant step beyond the Goblin Grove.

  A strangled, inarticulate cry ripped through the forest. I jumped back as Käthe tore the foolscap in her hands, violently, angrily. She threw the pieces away and they scattered about her like falling petals. Bits of paper floated toward me, and I reached out to touch one, afraid I would pass through it like mist.

  The paper was solid in my hand. I gathered them all, and tried to piece them together; a bit of a hand, the tip of a finger, the corner of a smile, the shine of an eye. I searched for me, for evidence of my existence, but there was nothing. Only blank, empty space where my name used to be.

  The world grew dark around me. I covered my face, and wept.

  * * *

  The sound of a violin. My heart thrilled, recognizing its sweet strains, its exquisite emotional clarity.

  Josef.

  I removed my hands from my face. My brother and François stood before me, playing for an audience. As they finished together—in sync, in unison—the audience leaped to their feet. I could feel the applause but not hear it; I could see the cries of Encore! Encore! etched on their lips, but the room was as silent as a tomb.

  After a cursory bow, Josef removed himself from the salon with an abruptness that bordered on rudeness. François said something placating to the confused listeners and then hurried after Josef. I followed them into an adjoining chamber, small, private, and intimate. François furiously gestured to the audience outside. The boys argued, François agitated and incensed, my brother curiously laconic and morose. Josef shook his head and said something that stopped the black boy short.

  Liesl.

  I did not hear my name, but I felt it, resonating in the chambers of my heart. Josef repeated my name, and François softened. He went to Josef and gathered my brother up in his arms. He let my brother cry, smoothing away his tears as I might once have done. Then François began to kiss him, but not as I would have done; with passion, with tenderness, with artfulness. I averted my eyes to give them privacy and drifted back outside, where my brother had left his violin, his bow, and his music score open on the stand.

  Für meine Lieben, ein Lied im stil die Bagatelle, auch Der Erlkönig.

  My heart gave a queer jolt, as though someone had reached into my breast and shaken it in their fist. My music. My brother was playing my music, not just for himself, but for the world to hear.

  I smiled. I sat down at the klavier and ran my fingers over its shining ivory keys. I began to play a Mozart sonata, one Josef and I had practiced for ages when we were both little. Little by little, with each note I played, sound began to return.

  Behind me, I could sense someone pick up the violin and join me in the music. I turned to face him and smiled, my pixie smile.

  Sepperl.

  He was as beautiful as ever, my baby brother, his golden curls shining in the light of some distant sun, his blue eyes large and bright. His face had lost much of its baby fat already, the angles of his cheekbones and jaw chiseled and sharp. We played together, just as we always had, but there was something different about his playing.

  Sepperl’s music had always been crystal-clear, a bell-drop of a sound, exact and transcendent. His playing was of another world, a clarity that was almost ruthless in its precision. So, so beautiful. So ethereal. So otherworldly. But as he drew closer, the tenor of his playing changed. It grew warmer, more languid, more mysterious, more … human. My fingers faltered on the keyboard.

  The music pushed me, prodded me, lifted me up. This was not Josef’s voice; it was mine. It was the voice I heard in my head when I composed, the voice I listened to when I was angry or joyful or sad. I squinted into the haze; was it not Sepperl after all? The figure playing the violin resembled my brother, but as he moved closer, I wondered how I could have made that mistake. Golden curls gave way to a silver mane, blue eyes to contrasting gray and green.

  The Goblin King.

  But was it the Goblin King? Or Josef? They resembled each other, though they looked nothing alike, the way the men in the portrait gallery Underground were individuals, yet were all Der Erlkönig at the same time. My hands slipped from the klav
ier. The violinist drew closer and smiled, pointed teeth and sly lips. His eyes faded from blue to gray and then disappeared altogether into the opaque, solid black of goblin eyes.

  * * *

  I awoke with a gasp. The remnants of a song broke apart, vanishing along with my dream. I was playing with someone—Sepperl? No, someone else. Someone tall and slender, someone who shaped the sounds inside me in a way that was utterly foreign and achingly familiar all at once. An unsettling realization stirred within me, but I did not want to think of it, to bring the revelation into the light and examine it. I chased it away, along with the remnants of sleep.

  Despite the blazing fire that roared merrily away in my hearth, I was cold and sheened with sweat. I sat up in my bed, my body aching and trembling, as though I were recovering from a bout of influenza. I was thirsty and hungry, but moreover, I was painfully, desperately homesick. I wanted to call for my mother, have her bring me a mug of warm milk with herbs, wrap myself up in the soothing touch of her work-worn hands. Mutti, Mutti, I wanted to sob. Mutti, I am unwell.

  Back in the world above, Mother and Constanze would have chastised me for lying abed so long. The sun doesn’t rest, and neither do we, Mother always said. Even on my worst days, the days when my monthly courses pressed down upon my womb with an iron-hot weight, the days when the futility of my existence threatened to suffocate me, I always found the strength to face the next hour, the next task, the next chore. It was easier not to think of the long road ahead, lest I drown in the mire and muck of my mundane life.

  Now without purpose, without responsibility, I did not know how to order my unlife. How to arrange my hours into something meaningful, something worthwhile. The thought of the klavier in the next room taunted me; the notes stained onto my wedding gown cried out to be recorded, remembered. Write it down, a voice inside me urged. It sounded like the Goblin King. Write your music down.

  I wanted to. I absolutely wanted to. But a part of me was too raw to even think about looking at the notes I had scrawled on the silk, the rejection, humiliation, and frustration I had laid there. The music I made with Sepperl was safe; my brother had been there to guide me through my errors and correct my mistakes. The bagatelle I had written for him, the piece I had named after the man who inspired the both of us, was also in Josef’s more educated, capable hands. But this—the beginnings of this wedding night sonata—was too shameful.