TWO

The world seemed to freeze. I could not move, but if I could have screamed I would have. My father and sister were trapped out there, with him! What was I to do? I saw my father slowly stand, shielding Journey with his own body, to face the Goblin King boldly. No! I wanted to shout. Run away from here! Quickly! Try as I might, though, no sound escaped my frozen lips.

Then the Goblin King spoke, and his voice sent shivers up and down my spine. It was cold, empty, and as hard as his eyes, with no emotion. "Who are you?" he asked flatly. "Why have you trespassed into my garden? Do you not realize that mortals are unwelcome in this forest?"

"I… Forgive me, sir," my father replied, his voice quavering. "My little daughter…was lost in these woods, and she found her way here. I followed her here to bring her back. We did not know any better. Please, let us go unharmed, and we will never pass through these woods again."

The Goblin King stared at him for a long moment, and then stooped down and picked up the silver blossom that Father had tossed aside. "You dare come into my garden and steal my flowers?" he asked, and his voice was angry now, growling like thunder. "Clearly this is no mortal flower, and yet you have dared to allow your daughter to pluck one as if it was her own? You will both die for this!"

I gasped in horror, thinking, He would kill them over a flower?! It’s…inhuman! My father apparently agreed, for he drew himself up further, anger written in his features. "You would kill a child for an innocent mistake?" he cried. "Have you no heart? You cannot kill a little girl for picking a flower, as she has picked any other flower in her life! How was she to know the difference?"

The Goblin King waved aside Father’s ranting. "Stealing is stealing," he replied, and his voice was now as cold as ice. "But perhaps I won’t kill the child. She may be of use to me. She is very lovely, your daughter, just like my flowers. So, perhaps an exchange, shall we say? Your mortal lives…for her." With that, he reached with a slender hand for Journey, who shrieked in terror and tried to cower in Father’s cloak.

When I heard Journey’s cry, my fear abruptly vanished and was replaced by burning fury. Who was this monster that could steal away a girl just for plucking a flower? It wasn’t right! No longer did I care that he was the Goblin King and that he terrified me. Leaping to my feet, I raced out from behind the bush and planted myself firmly between the Goblin King and my sister. I heard my father’s cry of horror, but I ignored it, for all of my attention was fixed on the creature before me.

"You shall not have her!" cried a strong voice, and I realized with vague surprise that it was my own. "She is only a girl. I won’t let you take her!"

The Goblin King was staring at me with something akin to amazement in his burning eyes, but there was something more, as well. Something much like…hope? His gaze locked onto mine, making me freeze like a startled deer, and I could see it there deep in his eyes, warring with other, darker emotions to break free. But then he growled and closed his eyes, breaking the trance, and when they again opened the hope had vanished as if it had never been there.

"Who be you?" he demanded. I closed my lips tightly, and refused to answer. My courage was failing me again under his gaze, which seemed to peer straight through me to my soul, but I held my ground, if only for Journey’s sake. "Who be you?" he asked again, and this time there was a warning in his tone.

So, lifting my chin as high as it could go, I replied against my will, "I am Gabriella." Then my throat closed over, and I could speak no more. Something else had suddenly appeared in the Goblin King’s eyes that I did not care to see; a kind of cunning, perhaps, like a fox, only much more dangerous. It was more like a snake or a wolf, instead.

"So, Gabriella," he said, and his voice was the slippery caress of a serpent wrapping about its prey. "You love your sister, do you not?"

"Of course I do!" I snapped, before I could think the better of it. I heard Father make a sound of warning, but I already knew that this was a trap; I had fallen into it when I revealed myself to the creature before me.

"And you would do anything to save your sister, would you not?" the Goblin King asked in near a whisper. Immediately, alarms sounded in my head, and I knew where this trap was leading, but I had to answer or doom Journey to her fate. So, hanging my head, I whispered, "Yes."

The smile that appeared on the Goblin King’s face was enough to make my skin crawl. "Then, perhaps," he whispered, leaning close to me so that his beautiful, horrible face was mere inches from my own and I was forced to gaze right into his glowing eyes, "…you can save her."

"No, Gabby! Do not!" Father cried, but the Goblin King quelled him with a single glance.

"And maybe you will save the old one’s life, as well," the brute added coldly, with a feral grin.

I shuddered as I imagined what this creature might do to my family, and to me, but I replied bravely, "If they can be saved, I’ll do so."

At that, the Goblin King laughed a wicked laugh, and straightened up. "Very well, then," he said. "I will let your sister and your father go…if you return with me to my castle and remain there in your sister’s place."

My father made a furious sound and tried to lunge forward at the Goblin King, but the branches of a nearby laurel tree somehow caught him and held him fast. Journey cried and tried to run to me as well, but the thorns of another bush caught at her clothes and held her. I was left to face this demon alone. It was my decision, and only mine. With all my heart I wanted to scream and run in fear, but Journey’s tear-streaked face and my father’s stricken one were what stilled me. After all, I reminded myself, this is my fault, and no one else’s. Had I been watching Journey as I was supposed to, none of us would be here.

The Goblin King looked impatient, and I feared that at any moment he would change his mind, and Journey and Father would vanish. "All right!" I cried. "I’ll go with you. But you must let them go. Promise me you will bring them safely out of the forest, and that you’ll never threaten them again. Promise me!"

"Done!"

In a flash, the Goblin King had me by the wrist in a strong grip, and I gasped at the speed with which he moved, like a striking viper.

"Gabby!" Journey cried.

"Father, Journey, please don’t worry. I’ll be fine," I tried to assure them, although I could feel the tears streaking my own face. "Go back to the house and take care of Willow. Tell her what’s happened, but not to worry."

"Oh, stop it," the Goblin King snapped in disgust. "Don’t be so tiresome. It’s hardly the end of the world. I give my word that Gabriella will not be harmed. She’ll be a guest in my house, nothing more. Go back to your house, old man. Raise your daughters. Forget about Gabriella, and at least try to show even a hint of the courage your daughter has shown me tonight."

"I will never forget this!" Father snapped. "You monster! Were you but a man…"

The Goblin King was little impressed by that threat. He mounted the steed, drawing me up in front of him, and I shrank away when the razor-fanged horse turned its head to me and bared its teeth. "Come, Isolese. Let us be off," the Goblin King said, and the stallion wheeled and reared, nearly unseating me but for the Goblin King’s arm about me. He pointed to a set of gates in the garden wall that had not been there before. "Leave through those and follow the road back to your house. You’ll not come to harm if you stay on the path. Go. Now!"

They scrambled through the gates, looking back at me with stricken faces. "Good-bye," I called. "Please don’t worry. I’ll be all right."

Then Isolese leaped over the low wall, and I had to grip the Goblin King’s arms about me—loathe as I was to touch him—to keep myself from flying off. We pounded away, swift as thought, despite the trees that surrounded us on all sides. It seemed that several times Isolese simply passed right through the trees that rose in front of him, and still kept on in a tireless canter that took us far into the Enchanted Forest. The only things I could see were blurred images from the salty tears that filled my eyes.