Girl Who Read the Stars Read online

  “This way, if you please,” he says and leads us through the streets.

  I cannot quite figure out what the roads are paved with, and I spend a lot of time trying to, scuffing my shoes over it. Could it be…tin? That is the best I can come up with. There are no cars, but goblins are walking all around us, going about their business. They spare a few curious glances for us, but mostly they are busy with what they are doing, darting in and out of shops and hailing friends. The buildings look as if they are made of silver. Some are highly polished and reflect everything, while others have grown tarnished. It is impossible to drink everything in.

  “Please close your mouths,” Will says to us. “You look like tourists.”

  The streets branch off of each other in a dizzying array. We could be in Boston, except we are underground. I am quickly lost, but I’m really unable to pay much attention, since this whole thing is so absurd. The goblins look just like regular people, only all of them are extremely pretty, to a ridiculous extent. It’s like walking through a city populated with celebrities. They’re all well dressed and well coiffed, and I wonder if it’s some sort of rule, this attractiveness. Maybe they kill the ugly babies; that would seem like an appropriately goblin-y thing to do. It’s true that Brody was pretty hot, at first, but then he turned into a monster, and I don’t quite understand why none of them look like the monster Brody turned into.

  We come to a square with a park in the middle. It looks just like a regular square, only prettier, like everything else down here. The grass is an expanse of smooth and inviting velvet, and members of the populace are sprawled on it, a few of them with rats that appear to be pets.

  “But…how are they growing grass?” asks Kelsey.

  Will sighs heavily. “It’s enchanted.”

  We walk through the park and come at length to a river that seems to be trickling through the city. On the other side of the river, nestled in its own velvet lawns and surrounded by a golden fence, is a gleaming copper palace. It is not tall, not a fairy-tale castle with spires or anything like that. It sits low to the ground, hugging the gardens around it, and it is perfectly symmetrical, with rows of Palladian windows winking at us in the torchlight. And every once in a while, one of the windowpanes is lavender.

  “Lavender panes,” I say, because it is the only thing I can think to react to.

  “Who do you think figured out how to make the glass fade to purple?” Will asks me, and the answer, I assume, is goblins.

  There is a wide footbridge over the river, delicate and pretty, with the same golden fence as surrounds the palace lacing over it. We follow our escort across the bridge and up to the huge golden gates. There is a guard at attention, dressed in a black uniform with a bit of gold braid along the shoulders of the jacket. He looks at us warily as we approach and says to our escort, “What do we have here, Folletto?”

  “Picked them up on patrol,” our escort replies.

  The guard looks at him. “And you brought them here?”

  “Well, you know who they are, don’t you?”

  The guard whistles piercingly, and a little boy in the same black uniform comes running up from a little seat by the bridge that I hadn’t noticed before.

  “Go and tell His Majesty that Will Blaxton and the fay are here to see him,” the guard tells him. “With…others.” The little boy slips nimbly between the rungs of the fence and races up to the palace.

  The guard looks at us with renewed interest. “Really?” he says, as if he had been expecting something totally different.

  I look at Will.

  Will looks bored. He yawns.

  We stand there in silence. Safford fidgets a little bit. I twist the ties of my hood around my finger. And then the little boy comes running out. He slips through the fence again and looks at the group of us.

  “Which of you is Mr. Blaxton?” he asks.

  “Me,” answers Will.

  The little boy bows to him and, when he straightens, says, “His Majesty apologizes for keeping you waiting, sir.” Then the little boy snaps his fingers, and the golden gate swings open.

  “Excellent,” Will says. “I shall tell him not to mention it.” He winks at the guard as we file through the gate.

  CHAPTER 5

  We are in the court of the Erlking. Whatever that means.

  The palace is gorgeous, but I would have expected nothing less. The gardens were beautiful, and the doors opened for us onto a lovely room full of marble and gilding, with a painted ceiling high above us and many sets of French doors opening onto a terrace along which fountains have been positioned, the water catching torchlight everywhere. There is a harp in the corner that seems to be playing itself, not so much a tune as a few notes plinking once in a while. Safford has gone to one of the doorways and is regarding the terrace, but I stand in the middle of the room with Kelsey, uncertain whether we should really be moving. You never know when you might cross a boundary in the Otherworld. It’s exhausting, like trying to determine tipping customs in Europe, only worse, of course.

  Will looks very at home. He is standing by one of the fireplaces, looking at the enormous portrait hanging over it, which is of an extremely attractive man in a black velvet suit and black riding boots, a cape jauntily flung back over his shoulder. He has one hand resting on the intricately jeweled hilt of a sword at his hip, and the other hand rests on a marble table beside him. On his head sits a large bejeweled crown, flattening black hair into cowlicks that peek out from the back of his head. The expression on his face in the portrait is self-satisfied, a smirk dancing around his lips, amusement in eyes a brilliant shade of blue.

  The thing about this portrait is that once you look at it, nothing in the room seems nearly as interesting.

  After a couple of minutes, footsteps sound over marble, far away from us but approaching swiftly. Safford turns from the window, looking wary, and Will takes a step away from the fireplace, looking with interest in the direction of the footsteps.

  And then the man from the portrait sweeps into the room. He is dressed in the same black velvet as in the portrait, the same black riding boots, with the same black cloak billowing out behind him as he moves. It’s what he wore that day outside the Boston Public Library, when we retrieved the book that told us about Ben’s mother. I wonder if he ever wears anything else. I mean, it’s working for him, but still.

  There is no crown on his head, but the sword swings at his side. His hair is that shade of black that seems to almost gleam blue, much darker than Ben’s hair, so dark that it seems impossible and makes me think of silly poetic things like raven’s wings and ebony. It is carefully disheveled all over his head in a devil-may-care sort of way.

  He walks immediately over to Will, arms outstretched, exclaiming, “William Blaxton.”

  Will smiles at him. “Your Majesty,” he says and then hugs him.

  “We have much to discuss,” says the man and gives Will what can only be described as a hard look, belying the joviality of his tone.

  Will pauses. “Yes,” he agrees.

  “First, though.” He turns to me and smiles. “You are the fay,” he proclaims.

  “Hi,” I say warily, a little thrown by his manner, which is halfway between welcoming and imperious.

  “Lovely to meet you formally,” he says, “as there wasn’t time for such niceties when you stole the book from me.”

  “It wasn’t your book,” Will says.

  “It wasn’t not my book,” the man retorts. “But now, now, this is a conversation that should not be had in such an uncivilized manner. There are other guests.” He looks at Safford and Kelsey expectantly.

  “Kelsey, Safford,” Will introduces, “this is the Erlking.”

  He bows very gracefully, pulling the cape dramatically about him as he does so. “Normally I would say, ‘Very much in your service,’” he says. “‘Any friend of Will’s�
� and all that. But recent occurrences being what they have been, I offer you a conditional welcome.”

  “Conditional?” Kelsey echoes faintly. Her cheeks are a bit pink, and I don’t blame her, because the Erlking head-on is a little much to take.

  “Will has explanations to make. If they’re not acceptable, I will, of course, have your heads.” He says it so lightly that Kelsey actually laughs, assuming it’s a joke, and the Erlking looks at her quizzically, as if she is an interesting curiosity, which makes her laughter dwindle to a stop.

  The Erlking looks back at Will. “Shall we dine then?”

  “Of course,” Will responds.

  The Erlking smiles, looking genuinely delighted. I cannot figure out how old he is—he is clearly a king and carries himself with the authority of one, but there is something boyish about him as well. “Excellent. I love a feast.” He whistles, and the same little boy who delivered the message from the guard comes racing into the room. “There you are,” the Erlking says to him. “Please tell the dining room we are having guests for dinner.” The Erlking pauses and looks over at us. He looks suddenly uncomfortable. “I’m so sorry, forgive me, but…faerie or human food?” He looks to Will. “You are in mixed company.” He turns back to us. “Which would you prefer, ladies?”

  “Human food,” I answer. “Definitely.”

  He inclines his head graciously. “So be it.” He turns back to the little boy. “You heard Her Ladyship. A human feast, if you please.”

  The little boy nods. “Yes, Your Majesty,” he says and races out of the room.

  The Erlking turns his attention back to us. The harp in the corner of the room plinks a few notes, and he frowns in its general direction. “Heavens below, what is that thing doing?” He walks over to it and shakes it a bit. The harp jangles in response. The Erlking sighs and turns back to us. “It’s depressed. It’s been depressed ever since I had to send the piano in to be fixed. It can’t even get itself to play proper music anymore, which is at least an improvement over the terrible dirges it was playing before. I keep trying to tell it that the piano will be back soon, but you know how musical instruments are. They never believe a word you say.”

  The little boy comes racing back into the room.

  “Ah,” the Erlking says to him, “is dinner served?”

  The little boy nods. “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  “May I have the honor then?” the Erlking asks Kelsey and me politely, holding out an arm for each of us.

  I had thought it possible that the portrait had exaggerated the blue of the Erlking’s eyes, but if anything, they are more intense. He is undeniably compelling, and I hear myself saying, “Of course,” and settle my hand in the crook of his elbow.

  Kelsey does the same on the other side, and the Erlking leads us out of the room and into the next, which is a large dining room with a beautifully set table. There are two chandeliers hovering overhead, each crowded with hundreds of tapered candles, and the china and crystal and silverware all flash in the candlelight. The table is covered with food, and my stomach audibly growls. I hadn’t realized until that moment how hungry I was.

  “How did they have time to do all this?” Kelsey asks.

  “Time?” echoes the Erlking blankly, as if he doesn’t understand the question. He pulls her chair out for her and seats her, and then moves around to the other side of the table and pulls another chair out. “For you,” he says to me when I stand there stupidly watching him.

  “Oh,” I say and scurry over to him. I’ve never had a guy pull out a chair for me before, and I’m not quite sure that I pull the whole thing off as elegantly as you’re supposed to, but whatever. “Thank you.”

  He sits to my left, at the head of the table, and Will takes the seat to my right, with Safford opposite him.

  A violin comes floating into the room and begins crooning a soft sonata from near the roaring fire in the fireplace.

  “The violin,” the Erlking remarks, “is not depressed. I think it quarreled with the piano and is hoping it never comes back.” And then he holds out his hands expansively. “Please. Help yourselves.”

  I hesitate and look to Will for guidance, and he pulls over a bowl of mashed potatoes and puts a heaping amount on his plate. I follow his lead, and for a little while, there is silence as we help ourselves to food.

  The Erlking is not eating. He is settled back in his seat, cradling a goblet of wine in his hand and watching…me.

  I look at him, self-conscious under his gaze. I am sure I am blushing. “What?”

  His eyes stay on me, and his lips curve into a smile. “You were the reason for Will’s last visit. A fay of the seasons, he told me. And would we consent to have her sheltered in the city above us. And look. Here you are.” He sits up abruptly and sets his goblet of wine down. “And now we discuss it.” He fixes Will with a hard look. “I mean to exist in peace, and you know those are my intentions, but I cannot find myself with any other option than to acknowledge that my people are presently at war.”

  “Not with us,” Will denies.

  “Oh no? Who was it who took the book out of the room? That was the term of the treaty, Will Blaxton: that the book of power would be locked into the room by the Witch and Ward Society.”

  “There was always going to come a time when we would need that book, Kainen, and you know it.”

  “Do you really dare to use my name here?” the Erlking demands.

  “Yes. Because you let us leave with the book. Which is something your people don’t know, do they? And all this is to save face. You know that there are greater issues afoot, or you wouldn’t have let Benedict get away from you. You could have stopped him with a fingertip.”

  The Erlking watches him for a moment, his eyes glittering sapphires in the candlelight. “I have heard rumors.”

  “The rumors are true. We can deny it no longer. The battle we have long suspected is nearly here. Might be here already.”

  “I thought that was what this meant.” The Erlking holds up a pocket watch, face out. The time reads 11:09. I have no idea whether that’s the right time or not. I suppose it’s the right time somewhere in the Thisworld or the Otherworld.

  “Why?” Will asks. “What happened to the time?”

  “Well, it kept time perfectly, for centuries or hours, depending on the time you’re keeping, and then suddenly, today, it stopped.”

  I look up, food forgotten, thinking of the grandfather clock on the landing at home. “It stopped?”

  The Erlking nods. “And then when it began ticking again, it was eleven o’clock. You know what happens when clocks strike twelve.”

  “What happens?” I ask.

  The Erlking gives me a disapproving look. “Don’t you read your histories? The enchantments all end.”

  I think of the enchantment around Boston. “Which means the Seelies will get in.”

  “Exactly,” says the Erlking, replacing the pocket watch and resuming eating as if this isn’t terrifying.

  “But…” I think of the grandfather clock. “We’ll never know how long it will take to strike twelve. It doesn’t move linearly.”

  “It will now,” responds the Erlking, still calmly eating. “It will move through the eleven o’clock hour until it strikes twelve. Of course, we cannot know how quickly that will happen, you are correct, but we know that whatever time is being kept, we are fifty-one ticks away from the twelve o’clock hour. So we are in the middle of a fight for our lives, and you have given the book to the faeries.” The Erlking looks hard at Will.

  I realize at that moment that I have no idea where the book went. There was so much other stuff going on, I managed to lose track of it. I lost track of the book of power. I’m terrible at this.

  Will says, “Do you really think that I would do that? We needed it, for the next step of our mutual defense, so we took it. But they don’t have
it.”

  “Who has it then? Because I’ve already spoken to the Witch and Ward, and they’ve a warrant out for its discovery. And in the meantime, they’ve abandoned the city.”

  This seems to catch Will’s attention. “Have they? Already?”

  The Erlking snorts. “Frederick and Henry were never ones for bravery, were they? You were the one who set the whole thing up, and they just accepted the privilege of lording over it. But they were never going to fight for it.”

  “That is hollow flattery,” says Will after a moment.

  “Which you have always been susceptible to,” says the Erlking and sips from his goblet.

  “Will you fight for it?” Will asks without acknowledging the Erlking’s point.

  The Erlking is silent for a moment. “I let you have the book, didn’t I? I think I’ve made my choice.” He puts his goblet down. “What is it that must be done?”

  “We need your army.”

  “So I assume.”

  “The Stewarts must be protected. They are currently exposed in Boston.”

  The Erlking nods. “We can bring them to Goblinopolis.”

  “And they’ll be safe here?” I ask anxiously. It doesn’t seem like such a bad place. Maybe it’s part of the spell the Erlking is weaving, but it seems much safer than Boston, cozy and protected instead of sharp and cold and exposed. And the Erlking did not stop Ben when he could have, has not yet stopped us. I can feel myself starting to trust him, even though it seems strange that I should trust a goblin more than I should trust faeries.

  The Erlking looks at me. “They’ll be safe as long as there are goblins left to fight. If Goblinopolis should fall, then of course I can guarantee no safety, as I shall be gone myself.”

  He says it so calmly, so simply. I swallow the nervous pit in my stomach and nod and realize that I have entirely lost my appetite. It actually seems a betrayal of my family that I’d had any appetite at all to begin with.

  “There’s something else,” Will says.