Denial (Goblin's Kiss Series Book One)

by Cyndi Goodgame

  His runway show walk landed a handbreadth from me. His edged jawline was in a permanent grin. I offered the same look as the rest of his subjects.

  “I just procured the plans for a feast tonight along with entertainment and dancing. It took a little convincing to get the instruments to your liking, but I think you will like it. Is there a particular favorite?”

  My shock wasn’t unnoticed. “You’re asking?”

  His lip lifted a little offering a small amount of genuine pride in doing something good that gained my favor. So maybe he was actually away doing something nice for someone.

  “I will enjoy any music chosen,” I threw my own half-lidded appeal back at him hoping to throw him off his game. He eyed me wearily with suspicion but went with it.

  “Very well.”

  We visited with person after person. As soon as the last person left the room I sighed heavily wondering if I had another day to go and then ached at the thought of days to go. Or a lifetime.

  What if no one could save me?

  “What are you thinking that has you worried?” the deep timbre of his voice drifted over to me.

  The air was thick with more than just worry in the room, but I swallowed and answered with, “Will we have to greet them all like that every day?”

  Thrown off from my real anxieties he assured me it was a onetime thing to get to know their new queen. My slow nod was all I could give in the reminder of who and what I was pushing up the dull ache making camp in my stomach.

  “We can do great things together, Jem.” He crossed his huge leg over his other making his boot sole face me. The name I didn’t know was yet another reminder.

  “Why do you want me?”

  His face went through several emotions before settling on serious and a look meant for me to take his words in closely. “If I’d have known your amount of power, I’d have never let you live away from here. I was told to keep you safe in the human world because of others who would use your power to kill. I only want it to make sure my subjects know what could happen. It will only take a few instances to let them see what you can do and then all will be powerless to conquer me.”

  I forgot to quell my anger. “You can’t make me hurt them. Magical goblin or human or whatever, no one deserves to be a slave.”

  “You don’t understand what you’re talking about. It takes power to run a group if order and peace are to remain. If they question that power, they are punished. Otherwise, they would overrun the system and chaos would emerge. Is that what you want?” He was sitting on the edge of his seat leaning towards me talking with his hands in the air.

  I thought carefully. “I think that a group wants power to keep them under protection and safe, but I will never make the assumption that anyone wants to be forced by cruelty or tyranny. You would do well to realize that any governing body has to have the best interest of that group if they are to win them over.”

  He scoffed with the same regal air that Ames carried with him sometimes, but with arrogance instead. “I have their allegiance.”

  I think he really believes that. “You’re delusional.”

  “And you’re out of line. I allowed this little discussion to take place. But remember that you are here because I brought you and this will just make us act with spite towards one another. We need to make this work in the best way for both of us. It will not do well for the realm to see a malice laced leader who can’t keep her temper in check and acts like a bratty twelve year old. Your little incident was covered up well with a drawn out tale for legends to come, but it will not happen again.” He stopped to take a breath making his face turn red with rage. “You will show me affection whether it is real or not and you will make them think you want everything that I do.”

  If he could only feel my emotions now, they said all I needed them to. I wanted to throw the man against the wall and break his neck. It sure felt like I was making a sordid deal with the devil himself. Joshlin was definitely working for the dark side.

  “Are we clear?”

  “Crystal,” I said crisply. “Am I excused now?”

  “Katelyn is outside the door.”

  I didn’t bow my girl butt at him out of pure defiance. I’d already laid the rotten egg in the room and nothing would save it now. He hadn’t seen any of my real temper yet.

  Katelyn knew from my face that I was hot, potent with a growing anger that would unleash if not stifled. The one who seemed able to calm my instant magical temper was nowhere in sight. Katelyn left me alone after getting me ready for bed. I dressed myself, but she ran my bath and sat in the chair reading.

  I cried myself to sleep knowing no one could see me fall apart. I wanted to leave this place even if it meant blowing it up, but there was something I had to do first.

  AMES

  Trigger flanked the back while I stalked the front door. I didn’t think Brooks would let us get this close without some type of radar alert to his own liking. He had to know we were too close whether he was inside or out.

  “How does a goblin realm king lose the ability to make his enemy unaware of his presence in an attack?” the older voice of a wiser one sounded behind my back. I inched back a half step knowing a dagger was probably in my back and confirmed it with its pointed edge jabbing my shoulder blade.

  “How is it that I am not dead if I am still considered the enemy?”

  “Who said you were the enemy?”

  “Who said—

  “Oh, stop with the crap questions you two and kill each other if you must. We have work to do,” Trigger nonchalantly walked through the front door from the inside.

  “And perhaps a certain watchman of the goblin realm who has been assigned to keep riff-raff from the front entrance should watch his own back when it’s up against an iron blade of his own making.”

  “Wicker, you were always the true pirate of the realm. While I appreciate the sick way of admiring my blacksmithing skills, I don’t care for the comedy routine. I’ll admit you bested me and now we can get on with the reason why you three are risking your necks to execution of the worst kind.” Brooks had his own humor out there in the open despite his outward display of anger. He was only mad if we got caught.

  “You best get inside before any other sees you. Treason won’t help me keep my family safe, nor any of yours.”

  We followed into the warm interior of the cabin. The fire was blazing as if he’d just been inside with the poker standing against the hearth. On the table was a half eaten bowl of soup that was still steaming.

  “Did we interrupt?” I asked ferociously, dying of hunger.

  “Beside the point. For which you need to make fast so you can be gone.”

  I sat in the only chair in the room and told him a short version of where Emma was and why. He knew some of the details from the inside and from what his daughter had divulged from her sneak outs to bring him bread and cheese.

  Wicker’s face lit up at the prospect of Katelyn coming here, but it darkened after he realized she was risking her life to do it. How have I never noticed his interest in her before?

  Wicker asked Brooks her route and I knew all too well the wheels turning in his brain were mapping out where to thwart her from doing it again.

  If I knew women like I did lately, he’d never keep her away. It seemed Emma could finagle around any plan I had if she set her mind to it. Her absence from me was proof of that, though she didn’t choose this aversion.

  “I will help the best I can. Katelyn has a ritual lately. She is due back before this night is through to bring my weekly rations even at my empty threats to punish her. She isn’t a girl anymore and it pains me to know she has a right to make up her own mind. One day she will marry,” Brooks eyed Wicker, “and I will have to let her go. I just want her alive to do that.”

  His narrowed eyes at Wicker making the tension in the room deep and hard to cut away. “If she is hurt trying to help any of you, I will hold each of you responsible.”

  That was not an
empty threat.

  A plan was made. Wicker would handle Katelyn’s visit and get information to her that we were coming in at nightfall the next night. Trigger would make the circles to be sure the routine for the surrounding guards was still all the same.

  I was in charge of weapons. We needed more. Brooks gave me one spare knife, but I needed a long-range weapon. A sword.

  Taking out one guard would be easy. Many would mean backup.

  The darkness without a moon was now obscenely weighing on my patience. Every sound and every tick of the non-existent watch was killing me. I prayed Emma was safely sleeping and no harm had come to her. I knew I had to wait this out for it to go right, but to know another second of her being there meant she might be hurt was eating my insides. I haven’t eaten in two days and it was starting to affect my senses, but I didn’t care. I just needed her safe.

  Wicker returned way too happy with his visit to Katelyn. I didn’t have to ask if she’d come, his face said it all. I didn’t even ask if all was set, his demeanor told what I needed.

  After a good five minutes, he tuned in again. We were sharing a loaf of bread shared by her. “Katelyn told me something.”

  “Get on with it,” I didn’t have any friggin’ idea where this would go.

  “Joshlin means to take her as his bride tomorrow night and make it official without telling Emma. He wants her off guard and forced to say yes in front of the realm so she cannot turn away.”

  I bolted upright into the tree where I was leaned against and shook the tree with every amount of rage I could muster. My fists were bloody by the time I screamed a thousand inappropriate things inside as to what I’d do to that piece of s—

  “It won’t happen, Cahn. We will have her before he lays a finger on her.”

  I knew my face was bulging with something worse than fire, but I knew Wicker was my best hope if only for the boiling rage hidden deep in his heart for years.

  “I know if anyone can do this, you can. I haven’t thanked you, Wicker.”

  “For what? Putting up with your sorry butt or dealing with your wuss ways when it comes to that girl?”

  “And you didn’t just sneak off to go see Katelyn for her wicked ways of meeting daddy with food for no other reason than to get information.” Repressing a sigh I know he was trying to hide, Wicker stated the obvious. “So we’re both whooped. Females will be the death of us.”

  “In some ways we already are, but not in a bad way I think. I think...she makes me stronger, able to stand.”

  “You mean own up to who you are. You’re actually considering taking him completely out, aren’t you?” Wicker had hope in his voice.

  “Yeah. If she does it with me, I will.”

  “Wow, it took a woman to make Ames Cahn see the truth. Who would have guessed?”

  “And you will be alone the rest of your life if you don’t do the same.”

  “Nope.” Wicker’s face stayed in a solid grin like I’d not seen on him. “I told her tonight that I’d like to see her if she will allow it.”

  Wow! He did it. I flipped my head over for just long enough to see that his smile was indeed unlike any facial expression he’d ever given before. “And?”

  “She said yes. If I lived.”

  Ominous, but honest.

  We settled into a comfortable silence and waited for the sun.

  EMMA

  Katelyn shook me awake whispering fiercely in my face like a crow pecking my eyeballs out. My skin pricked against her fingernails biting into my shoulders.

  “What did you say?” I said groggily.

  “I overheard Joshlin telling his men to ready the realm for the wedding. He didn’t mean for three days from now. He means today, uh...when you get up it is today.” Her eyebrows snapped together telling me I was annoying her with my laziness.

  “What? He said today?”

  She sat beside me now making the bed dip. My blurry eyes adjusted enough to see that she was fully clothed.

  “Yes, he said to alert the servants that the dress was to be done by morning and he wanted approval.”

  I shrugged forward, “That doesn’t mean today necessarily.”

  “Yes, it does. He said to have his dress uniform prepared for the ceremony tonight. That only means one thing.”

  I had to assume he only wore it for “special occasions” by the way her voice sounded but it made me too sick to say it.

  “I can’t do that, Katelyn. I won’t marry him.”

  She sighed heavily and even giggled like we’d always been the best of friends. She was so unwillingly and untrusting just a day ago. Two days ago. Whatever. She took my hand in hers. “Would you like to hear the good news or not?”

  Her brown eyes rolled and she smile too big to be upset with the news she just shared. “What could possibly be good about this?”

  Katelyn hopped off the bed and twirled like a little girl making her blonde hair blur through the air like a merry-go-round. “I ran into a friend. Or rather good friend...or,” she sighed stoping herself.

  Oh my. What was going on?

  “Paul Wicker found me outside the realm visiting my father and told me—

  I crushed her arms into my grip and screamed in her face, “YOU SAW WICKER?” I had to whisper yell to not get attention from unwanted guards.

  “Oh, Emma. You doubted me all along. I have known Paul since we were young and in classes together. He is several years older, but I have always known him. Oh, yes. I know him.” The gleam in her eye was sparkly and wet.

  “You like that dry humored sour man,” I accused.

  Her mouth tightened. “You don’t know him. He is sweet.”

  Wicker? “Are we talking about the same man? Tall, dark headed, stern and rigid in every step.”

  “And sexy in every military pose he holds, broody in every word he says with his deep resonant voice, eats like a lion, tracks like a panther, and uses a weapon like he’s in love with it.”

  I agreed with half of it. Sexy wasn’t a word I associated with Wicker, but to each his own.

  “What did you find out?” I asked trying to get back on task. I grabbed my gown and started to dress right in front of her. I kept my bra from my own human life and refused to stop wearing their archaic clothes after the first hours here. I wore their silly dresses, but underneath I was still me. Besides, who would ever admit they were wearing something labeled pantaloons?

  “That Ames is right inside the haze ready to attack today. I told Paul what Joshlin had planned for today and he assured me that it would never take place. He told me that once Ames knew, he would storm the place without delay.”

  No doubt. That left little time. “Look, I need you to do something. I want to know where they have my dress. I have an idea. And I need knives. Any kind.”

  Katelyn’s eyes widened. “What are you going to do with them?”

  “I don’t want to hurt him...well mostly. But I do want to scare him into stalling or not wanting me whichever works.”

  “The not wanting you part won’t work. He wants every woman and you got some power in there. He will never let you go.”

  “That’s what I’m afraid of. So I need a backup plan. Even if Ames and the guys get in, Joshlin has power too. I don’t want to see them dead either.”

  Her eyes went distant for a second, “No. I don’t want them hurt either.”

  She was thinking of Wicker, but it did the trick. “I will get them.”

  She told me where to find the dress and asked what my plan was. I refrained from telling her so she would be as surprised by the rest and wouldn’t be a target. I didn’t want Joshlin hurting her either.

  AMES

  We went in the side entrances that Katelyn leaves by. Wicker was very familiar with the route but didn’t say so. I found it odd that he knew it well, but I had my own quirks in life that surfaced around a certain female that made no sense to him either. Trigger luckily kept his big mouth shut without a single question or comment.

/>   Inside the mouth of the rock-like emptiness we were dumped into, we surveyed our weapons and vowed to plow through if it came to it. At this point it was hard to tell if all had been told of our “betrayal” or if they were secretly hoping someone would “save them all”.

  Here’s hoping they want the latter.

  The first sign of a guard recognizing Wicker gave us reassurance. Jones slapped a hand over his heart in a silent salute to our cause and admitted us on. We were in.

  I checked my watch right before we officially came into the inner walls. Three hours past noon. The hours were dwindling. I had no idea when this plan of Joshlin’s would come down, but I needed it to be before. We waited for over an hour before Jones surfaced and told us the wedding was at sundown. That meant he would start parading around an hour or so before.

  Jones slipped something in my hand. He gave a knowing look and left. I read it. It was the follow up message from the book room research my inside person did to find out about the kiss. Inside the book found, a letter stated that the second generation of our court was foretold to be the longest reigning of our existence. This was the news from last time. But this time...this time my informant found the missing piece I needed. A fortune teller named the ruler. Jem Loggins would rule all the courts combined. She would survive and that’s all I needed to know. I wasn' t in the habit of trusting fortune tellers, but sometimes head games gained one courage. And right now I needed it. Nothing could stop me now. I could beat Caydon for her hand. And if not, she was the perfect queen for this realm either way. Both realms could benefit from her leadership. Not one of them had spent the amount of time she had leading others astray to guard her abilities and avoid detection.

  The second and third guard followed suit without a word and the same salute in question thirty minutes later. The fourth one stopped circling the room diagonal to the courtyard and adjacent to the giant ballroom where he would no doubt hold this fiasco of a wedding.