I measured my answer here, tempted as I was to wax poetic over what an obvious and egregious slut was the queen of the night, it appeared that this information had value to Oberon. “This I will do,” said I. “She shall not so much as smile at a passing hedgehog that you will not know of it in an hour.”
“And I shall need you to convey me to the Duke of Athens’s wedding tomorrow night.”
“That, I cannot do, Your Grace, for my task at hand is to perform at the very same wedding.”
“You are in service of Theseus?”
“Among others. But when you see me, let us pretend we are strangers.”
“Agreed.”
“And, Your Grace, see to the security of your castle. For having so many goblins at arms, your fortress is as porous as a sieve.”
“I have no fear. I am immortal.”
“So was the Puck, Your Grace.”
Chapter 14
The King’s Dread Pleasures
I pretended to drink, and regaled Oberon with lies of my travels and magical exploits well into the wide posterior of the night, when finally, the shadow king staggered off to slumber and a goblin servant led me to the harem as the king had instructed. Two guards with halberds stood outside the double doors, and between them, on the floor, lay the dead goblin that Oberon had shot with the crossbow. Over him crouched Gritch, his bat-wing ears drooping like wilted leaves. Nick Bottom sat leaning against the double doors, snoring quite loudly.
“Ring the bell,” Gritch commanded a guard, and the goblin turned and pulled a cord strung through the wall over his head. Somewhere on the other side of the door a bell chimed.
“Gritch, you needed only to bring the dead goblin here. You didn’t have to stay.”
“Was my mate,” said the goblin, stroking the dead goblin’s brow.
“This monster was your wife?”
“My friend,” said the goblin.
“Oh, quite right. Condolences.” I reached into my belt and retrieved the button from Bottom’s waistcoat and handed it to Gritch, who took it and stared mournfully at the silver Celtic knot pattern.
The two guards each bent over and regarded the button as if it were a holy relic. Gritch growled at them and they returned to attention.
A small brass portal in the door opened and a painted face filled it. “What?” she said. The face was tarted up, but from the white hair around it I could tell it was Moth.
“It’s Pocket, love. Let us in.”
“What’s the magic words?”
I looked to Gritch. “Magic words?”
The goblin shrugged.
“I don’t know the magic words,” said I.
“Do piss off, then.” She snapped the little brass door shut.
I pulled the bell cord again and gently kicked Bottom awake. “Bottom, why are you locked out?”
The ass-man sputtered and looked around, realizing with some disappointment, it seemed, where he was. “They won’t let us in. No goblins, they said.”
The little brass portal opened. “Pocket!” said Peaseblossom, rather tarted up in her own right. “They painted us and shaved our bits. I hope that goes away at dawn. Methinks climbing trees will be rough with my bits shaved.”
“Let us in, love. We’ve brought the dead goblin Cobweb asked me to bring.” I pointed to the dead goblin, who was still wearing the silver armlet.
“No goblins,” said Peaseblossom. “Eaters of squirrels. Do piss off.” And she snapped shut the little brass door.
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” I said. “Gritch, do you eat squirrels?”
“Squirrels are delicious,” said the goblin, with enthusiasm I’d thought they reserved for silver. The guards on either side of the door nodded in agreement. “Uh, I am told,” Gritch added, rolling his large yellow eyes. The guards shook their heads, evidently having just remembered that they, too, had never tasted squirrel.
“Ring the fucking bell,” I snapped at the guard beside the cord. To Gritch, I said, “How is it that no one nicked that silver armlet from your mate? May he rest in peace. There must have been a thousand goblins horny for silver in that courtyard.”
“To take silver is forbidden,” said Gritch. “Silver must be given.”
“Do you know who gave that armlet to your mate?”
“A human mortal,” said Gritch. “I don’t know which.”
The little brass door opened. This time it was Cobweb. “What?”
“Cobweb, stop messing about and let us in,” I said.
“That the dead one?”
“This one with the crossbow bolt in his heart and tongue lolling out of the side of his mouth? Why, you know, it could be.”
“Sarcasm will make your willy fall off.”
“Open the door, please, we need to be on our way before dawn.”
“What are the magic words?”
“Oh, do piss off, Cobweb.”
“Correct!” She snapped the portal shut and I heard the iron bolt thrown. The heavy doors opened a crack and Cobweb peeked out. “Just you and the dead goblin. Everyone in here is a bit fragile, it seems. Not sure the sight of Bottom might not send them round the bend. Sorry, mate.”
“Do you have anything to eat?” asked Bottom. “Some dried peas or oats would be lovely.”
“I’ll have Moth bring you something,” said Cobweb. “Now, drag him in.”
I dragged the dead goblin in by the arms and Cobweb closed the door behind me. She was painted up like the others, wide blue brows and shadows around her eyes that almost described a mask, her lips painted lavender, lined in black. She wore a simple, hooded robe of black satin that hung to her knees and she was, of course, barefoot. We had not entered a chamber, but simply an antechamber with another set of heavy doors.
As soon as she bolted the door she turned, jumped into my arms, and ferociously snogged me. “Did you see?” she said, pounding my chest with one hand while keeping the other wrapped around my neck. “Did you see me take the piss out of Oberon? You’re right, Pocket, it was bloody glorious. ‘You live in this palace made of midnight while your queen lives up a fucking tree,’ I told him. Felt finer than a frolic, it did.”
The doors opened behind us and I let Cobweb slide to her feet. Peaseblossom and Moth were manning the double doors and had opened them into an expansive boudoir done up in draperies and cushions of black and gold. The floor, at least, was covered in woven wool rugs of red, yellow, and green amid the black, in the patterns of the Persians. Except for my three traveling companions, I saw no fairies at all.
“I know you’re shit at counting, but I expected—”
“Come on then,” Cobweb called to the empty room. “Come on, he won’t hurt you.” She turned to me and whispered, “I think it’s your black and silver kit has them scared. Give them a bit.”
“Why are we here, Cobweb?”
“Finding the Puck’s killer, I reckon,” said Cobweb. “Make your puppet stick talk. They’ll love that.”
Why not? I thought. Since, apparently, I had relinquished authority to a sometime squirrel. I pulled the puppet Jones from down my back. “Nick of time,” said the puppet Jones. “This newt wouldn’t know magic words if they smacked him on the bum.”
Peaseblossom and Moth—actual magical creatures themselves—giggled, clapped their hands, and jumped with joy at my trifling trick.
I had Jones launch into a solemn hymn from my days at the nunnery, “Sister Lilly Oft Yanks Me Willy”:
“Oh, she’s pious as a vicar’s nose.”
The draperies, cushions, and covers began to move, nude and nearly-so fairies emerging from beneath and behind.
“All through vespers, she buffs me hose.”
They gathered around, wide eyed—disturbingly wide eyed—as the puppet sang.
“To fancy a nun, just might seem silly.”
There were, it seemed, a hundred of them, both male and female.
“But I’d give my all, to Sister Lilly.”
I danced a step or two, to
ssed the puppet Jones in the air and caught him behind my back, then bowed with a great flourish. The fairies clapped and cheered. Upon my second bow I noticed hair-thin scars on some of the fairies’ legs. Some were like white threads, some pink, as if fresher, none more visible than the scratch of a kitten, but each fairy was covered, head to toe, with a lattice of scars. Even amid the face paint I could see the white threads, and one or two of them had one eye that was clouded. Not unseeing, but bright blue or green iris paired with a clouded gray one.
I took Cobweb by the shoulder and pulled her aside. “What is this? What are these scars?”
“The marks of Oberon’s pleasure,” she said. “A frolic stops the bleeding. Two or three will bring an eye back, but the new eye doesn’t always match.”
I felt my supper sour in my stomach and rise in my throat. I swallowed hard to force it back down. “I would have never let Oberon send you here if I’d known.”
“I knew,” she said. “Well, I had heard. Moth has a brother here. She’s right troubled about him.”
Moth was touching foreheads with a male fairy with eggshell hair like her own.
“We are leaving, then,” said I. “Oberon has given me passage on condition I become his fool.”
“Ha! He fears you,” said Cobweb. “The Puck trick worked. The shadow king fears my little fool.”
“I am not your fool,” said I. “And things did not go well with Oberon. He doesn’t have the flower I need to take to Theseus to secure Drool’s release, and he doesn’t know how to change Bottom back into normal.”
“We’re not done yet,” said Cobweb. “Help me drag this dead one to the middle of the room.” I did as I was told, since it appeared that Cobweb had settled into her role as my mistress whether I cared for it or not.
“Have a sit by him,” Cobweb demanded. She yanked the bolt out of the goblin’s chest with a grunt and handed it, dripping green with gore, to me. “This will be a cracking frolic with so many. You might be leaping over rivers by morning from the overspill.”
And so she gathered the frightened, painted fairies, who seemed to have no will left of their own, and the frolic began, just as it had with the three of them in the forest before. But now a hundred fairies plus three dropped their robes and danced around me and the dead goblin—light firing in the air like exploding fireflies among them and the fairies rising from the floor until they were a whirlwind of color and life and power. Each hummed a high song that would have been barely audible had there been only one, but now it sounded like a hive of melodious bees, a hundred notes creating an all-enveloping harmony. My muscles and mind sang with the power of it, the life of it. These creatures turned the tides, made the trees blossom, the mare foal, clouds grow fat with rain, lightning crack the sky—these creatures, more than men, together made a god, brought the glory of nature to the now. But still, fucking squirrels at dawn.
And the dead goblin sat up. “What?”
“Ahhh!” said I, somewhat surprised.
The fairies ceased their dancing and gathered round the undead goblin.
“He going to eat us?” asked one wan fellow with a milky eye, a still-healing scar running from his nose to his ear, the point of which had been clipped off by the slash that took his eye.
“Not today,” said Cobweb, pushing her way through. “Oi, goblin, did you kill the Puck?”
The goblin looked around at the fairies gathered round him and even with his fearsome teeth and eyes, it was clear he was terrified—his wits set to go wobbly any second.
“Fetch Gritch,” I told Moth. “He’s outside.”
“No goblins,” said a woman fairy, dark of hair, bright scars across her ribs that might have been gills if she were a sea creature, or the lines made by fingers tipped with blades.
I lifted my jerkin and pointed to my knives. “He’ll not hurt you. I’ll see to it.”
Moth returned, dragging Gritch by a long ear, the goblin submitting completely for the chance to see his dead friend.
A goblin smile is not a pretty thing to see, yet those two, in a pair, nearly brought water to my eyes. Gritch embraced his friend and marveled at the healed wound in his chest. They shared grunts and whispers, and, still holding his friend, Gritch turned to me. I shook my head and pointed to Cobweb.
“Ask your mate if he killed the Puck,” she said gently.
Gritch whispered to his friend, then said, “Yes.”
“For silver,” the reborn goblin said.
“Who gave you the silver?” I asked.
“A human mortal. A little one.”
“A little one? A woman?”
“No, a man. A short man in black. In the forest. He gave silver to kill the Puck. I didn’t want to, but silver.” He touched the silver armlet.
“Did the mortal carry a crossbow?”
“Yes.”
I looked to Cobweb. “Burke, the duke’s watchman. Blacktooth’s leftenant.”
“Those wicked fucks,” said Cobweb.
“Aye,” said Moth. “Wicked.”
“Aye,” said Peaseblossom. “Fucks.” She scratched herself. “Who?”
“They shaved our bits,” explained Moth. She’d put on her black gown. She patted the sash. “I kept the razor. Never had a razor before.”
The resurrected goblin looked around again at all the fairies staring down at him with a mix of dread and scorn. “I don’t want it,” said the goblin. He took the armlet off and held it out, beckoning for someone to take it from him. “The Puck were a shit, but he were good to me. Silver.” He began to weep.
“Did you kill the young Athenian in the forest yesterday?” I asked.
“No.” He shook his head. “No Athenian. Take the silver.”
Cobweb pulled me aside, whispered in my ear, “He won’t last long. Maybe an hour. Maybe less. He was really quite dead.”
“Give it to your friend,” I said. “Give it to Gritch.”
Gritch took the heavy silver armlet but didn’t put it on, only held it in his talon, as gently as if it were a baby bird. I called to him and gestured for him to come away from his friend for a moment. He did. “We need to go, mate. I need to get the fairies out of the castle, off this mountain, before the sun comes up. Will you help?”
He looked back at his friend, who looked the very picture of the goblin forlorn.
“Cobweb says he won’t stay alive long,” I said. “You should say goodbye.”
Gritch nodded. “I will help.”
“Gritch,” I said, grabbing the silver ring in his ear and tugging at it gently with each word. “All the sodding fairies.”
“They are the shadow king’s fairies,” said the goblin.
I held up the crossbow bolt still dripping with his friend’s blood. “All the sodding fairies, Gritch.”
“Talos, my friend, comes too?”
“Of course,” said I.
“All the sodding fairies,” said Gritch.
Act III
Well, God give them wisdom that have it; and those
that are fools, let them use their talents.
—Feste, Twelfth Night, 1:5
Chapter 15
Of Perspective and Squirrels
“There’s the horn,” said Cobweb. We sat at the edge of the forest watching Gritch watch his friend Talos die for a second time that night.
“I don’t hear it,” said I. “Do you hear it?” I asked Bottom.
“I do,” said the weaver, listlessly waving to his long ears. He was pouting, and rightly so, for Oberon had not transformed him back to a man before we left the castle, and I hadn’t the heart to tell him that it would not happen. Although I held some hope for his recovery, as being near the massive fairy frolic in the harem seemed to have restored him somewhat. His hands were no longer covered with coarse hair and his voice was less of a bray than it had become.
“Do you need to go to Titania?” I asked Cobweb.
“I think not. Not today.”
“Will she not visit some wrath on
you?”
“I’ve had enough of the night queen and shadow king and their bloody wrath. We’ll stay with you. Get your mate out of jail. Won’t we, mates?” she called to the other fairies.
“Aye,” said Moth, “she sent my brother and our other mates there.”
“What?” said Peaseblossom. Since reaching the forest, the simple fairy had been fascinated with her newly shaven bits and was resolving a furious wank by an oak tree, her back turned for privacy. “Right. Me too,” she said. “We should find Moth’s hat with the tongues. I quite fancied that hat.”
“Why wouldn’t they come?” Cobweb said, cradling her head in her hands. “They only had to run a little bit and they would have been free.”
Gritch and Talos, both some sort of officers among the goblin soldiers, had cleared a path out of the Night Palace, ordered the guards on duty to stand down and let us pass. Cobweb bade the harem fairies to follow her, but when we threw open the doors they cowered by the walls, backing away from the door as if a monster might come through it any second.
“Come on, then,” Cobweb begged, but the harem fairies hid among the cushions and draperies, as they had when I’d first come into the harem. “The goblins won’t hurt you, go on.”
But they had stayed, terrified to leave, more afraid of the unknown than the familiar horror.
“Cobweb,” I called. “We have to go, love. Perhaps they’ll follow at dawn when they change.”
She strode over to me like she was facing down an enemy, tears of frustration, perhaps anger, in her eyes. “They can’t come out of here after they change. They couldn’t run into a goblin city with no one to lead them, even if they did leave here.” She turned. “Come on, you cowards, come be free of the shadow king’s blades forever. Come to the forest where you belong.”
I put my arm around her shoulders and she shook me off. “Help me with the doors,” she barked. Inside, one brave fairy, the bloke with the clouded eye and clipped ear, peeked out from behind an arras.
“Bolt the doors behind us,” Cobweb called to him, pushing her door shut.
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