Goblin King

by Kara Barbieri

  “Okay, now what?” he asked, panic creeping into his voice at the incoming heat.

  “Trust me,” I said and took out Diaval’s chalk, drawing a marking on the palm of my hand and another on Soren’s. Clasping them together, I shouted. Not a word I knew or a word I didn’t; no one had taught me it and it sounded foreign to my ears, but I knew what I’d be able to do when I said it and that was enough to trust it.

  Slamming our clasped hands to the ground, the snow began to dance around Soren and me, around Diaval and Lydian, Rose and Seppo, faster and faster and faster until I had to close my eyes before I threw up. I held on to Soren as tightly as my muscles allowed.

  Then suddenly it stopped, and we were all spewed out back into the courtyard of the Erlking’s palace, exactly where Diaval had created her original portal. From there, a bunch of people, goblin and human, rushed up to us as Tanya called everything to order.

  Soren was lying on the ground with his face toward me, and he had a bloody grin from where he split his lip on the landing. His eye shone. “How did you know how to do that?” he asked, nearly giddy.

  “Around the time you left, after the first fight with Fjalar, it hit me. Suddenly I felt everything. There were no more walls. I think—I think it has to do with you lying on the roots of Yggdrasil, if I’m honest. Because all of a sudden, I knew—I was forcing myself to keep each part of me separate. But there is no separation. There is no Janneke the stag and Janneke the human. There’s Janneke.” I gave him a goofy smile back, blood pumping through my veins fast as I realized I finally did it.

  I crawled forward to embrace him, but someone grabbed the back of my hood. “You’re hereby forbidden to move until I give the say so. All of you.” Tanya’s eyes swept over the group and scowled a bit at Lydian’s flickering body. Back in Midgard, him sustaining a corporeal form wasn’t as easy.

  After trying to convince Tanya twice of my health but only hearing jumbled words come out, I succumbed to her and her healers.

  * * *

  IT TOOK THREE days of nearly nonstop healing sessions before Tanya declared me fit for the world again, and the moment she said it, I was out of my sickbed like a wildfire and running to Soren, who’d been actually the best off out of all of us if you didn’t count losing an eye, as he gazed at the sleeping figures of our friends. Tanya had moved all of them into one room so she could keep an eye on them all together.

  “Janneke,” Soren said happily, and I got the feeling he’d rush over to grab me if it wouldn’t jostle the cot Diaval was sleeping on.

  “How are they?” It hurt to see the three of them in such broken states after all they’d done for us. Whether or not they survived, I would never be able to pay them back for the help they gave us, the loyalty they showed. I never thought I’d have actual friends in the Permafrost, but I did, and anxiety churned in my stomach at them lying in front of me, injured and powerless.

  “Seppo is mainly fine. Some wounds but he used too much power when fighting Fjalar—the whistle attack you mentioned—and he should be awake in four, maybe five days, but he will spend a month or two needing to build back his ability.” He paused before continuing. “I can’t tell if Satu is proud of him or furious at him, or if it’s some odd mixture of both.”

  I nodded. “Sounds like her to me.” Seppo looked so peaceful. It would be good when he woke up again. I was going to yell at him for being so stupid and trying to sacrifice himself, but that was kind of how my relationship with Seppo went. He annoyed me, I yelled, he continued to annoy me because he found my yelling hilarious.

  “And Diaval and Rosamund?”

  “Diaval’s the worst,” Soren said, casting a soft look at the magic-wielding goblin. “She’s lucky she didn’t lose her leg, let alone die. If the infection had lingered any longer…” He trailed off. “Anyway, Tanya says it’s just a matter of time until she wakes up. She’ll wake up. We just don’t know when.

  “I really hate having to say this, but we were lucky Lydian was there. He saved her life, most likely, with the maggot thing he did. But I guess I have to give credit where credit is due. I’m grateful for him in that aspect, anyway,” Soren continued.

  I nodded. “I feel the same. It’s conflicting. What about Rose?”

  “Rose is very lucky his spine and skull aren’t broken, and managed to get out of the entire fight with a few broken ribs and a broken leg,” Soren said. “I’m glad. I’m starting to like the idea of having blood relatives who aren’t always trying to kill or torment me.”

  “Speaking of blood relatives…” the voice that came from the corner of the room hoarsely spoke. Lydian.

  “I thought you were asleep,” Soren said. “Or whatever shades do to rest.”

  “You thought wrong. And to answer your question, shades who are corporeal can sleep.”

  I crossed my arms. “What do you want?” I asked. “Not that I’m unappreciative of your help, but it still doesn’t change much.”

  He made a sound almost like a chuckle. “I didn’t expect it to. No, Hel will still be after me. I’m technically a runaway soul. All I ask is you burn my heart and whatever pieces of me are left over and give the ashes a proper burial, so I can truly reside in Hel’s realm. It might calm her.”

  “You want us … to kill you?” Soren said. “And make sure you get proper rest?”

  “I know what you two are going to say. I don’t deserve it. And you’re right, I don’t. But Hel still needs my soul, and well, I doubt she’s going to make my afterlife any fun. You don’t need her breathing down your neck with a war going on.”

  War. Gods, we set out to kill Fjalar before its three world-ending shrieks but failed to stop the first. Somewhere, the ship of the dead was being readied to turn to the unholy sea.

  “Your request is accepted,” I said. “We’ll hold the burning later tonight.”

  He nodded and coughed, wincing in pain as he did so.

  Soren looked at me. “Do you think we’re prepared for it? War?”

  “We have to be,” I said. “Look on the bright side, it’s the Naglafar. Everyone will be undead, and how much can a ship made of nails hold, anyway?”

  Lydian raised his eyebrows and gave the two of us a glance that could only be read as exasperated. “The world is doomed.”

  “Right, onto burning your heart and ending both of our miseries,” Soren said with a matching expression.

  * * *

  THE FIRE BURNED low in the coals, barely lighting the brazier, but the heat danced on my skin like the warmest sun. I couldn’t take a proper breath, not with my chest this tight and my head this full of air. In truth, I could barely believe what was happening. That someone who’d tormented me for years, even after death, would finally be silent. Finally.

  I wasn’t unaware the memories I had would still return at random. I wasn’t deluded into thinking that my nights would forever feel peaceful or that I would end up never again flinching at fast movements or that I’d ever love the feel of someone’s skin on my skin. But it was a step forward. Maybe tiny, but all steps were good steps.

  My heart was high in my throat as I waited for Soren. I’d refused to actually carry the still-beating heart. A part of me couldn’t take it. It may have been the last of Lydian, but I still couldn’t touch it, didn’t want to be near it at all.

  Whatever I had been through with him in the past few days, Lydian was still a demon who lurked in my nightmares. And at first seeing him in pain brought up a wicked feeling of vengeance, but it slowly wiled away down to nothing. This man was nothing to me. Alive, dead, half-dead. Now, with his entire physical form burned away from the world, he was truly, truly nothing.

  The doors to the burial room creaked open; they were brass and heavy with carvings of runes all around them. I still couldn’t read most of them, but I had the sense they spoke of the afterlives. With Hel, Freya, and Odin. I didn’t need to vote on who I thought was taking Lydian away.

  Soren carried the plate the heart had been placed on.
In all my imaginings, it looked giant, but in reality it was slightly smaller than a fully grown, human male heart. That was interesting—for creatures who hovered above humans in every way, from ability, to speed, to fighting, to biological features, the small heart broke some illusion of their superiority.

  Finally, he came to me and offered me a part of the plate. I swallowed my disgust and took the plate by the ends of my fingertips where no blood nor flesh could reach. Together, we dumped Lydian’s heart into the coals and watched as it crackled and blistered as the flames took over.

  The lump in my throat was now gone, and a weight lifted off my chest and shoulders like thousands of boulders rising up and away from my body. There was a soreness in my heart, a bruising where I’d been forced to carry that weight—forcing myself to carry it for my own undeserved penance.

  It all rose up into smoke as the heart burned to ashes and finally, finally, standing by Soren’s side, despite what was coming for us, I was completely, fully safe.

  Epilogue

  THE NAIL SHIP

  SOMEWHERE IN THE deep bowels of Hel, there was a deafening crack of iron and rust and a chain unrooted from the earth. Thousands upon thousands of men, corpses filled with holes and half-eaten bodies and maggot-covered faces, those made up solely of bone and those so new that the skin had barely broken, they all pushed the sharp ship made from their nails into the sea of the dead. A serpent’s head rose up to meet them, before moving on through the waters of life and shaking every world above him as he did.

  The ship floated in the water as corpses rushed inside, and it held together despite the capacity of dead compared to its size. Because what was size when it came to the wicked, and what could they do other than sail for days and nights on end without tiring.

  The Naglafar was coming and spreading its oily darkness into the water and sky where it passed. For every world, every realm, it would spread darkness like an endless night until they were all full of coldness and despair.

  Acknowledgments

  There are so many people to thank for getting this book out. First, I wanted to thank the lovely Caitlin and equally loved Kat, who really helped when I was approaching the deadline and having problems with the writing. You guys helped save this book.

  Obviously, Eileen, my editor, deserves a huge thank-you as well for all she does and how hard she works. I wouldn’t be here without her.

  I’d like to thank the other important staff at Wattpad and Wednesday Books who’ve helped so far, Aron and Tiffany and many others whose names I can’t recall because my memory is worse than Soren’s ego. But just know, you all rock and I’m so very grateful.

  Katherine, you’re also mentioned in the dedication, but you’re such an amazing friend and I love speaking to you whether it’s about politics or writing or our fur babies, and I’m so glad I met such a wonderful person like you. You add so much to my life.

  The same goes for Erika, or as I know her, Xenoclea, from Wattpad. She’s White Stag’s first major fan and has been waving the encouragement flag for me ever since. The fact that you’re willing to talk to me for two hours in the middle of the night about Permafrost is not something I haven’t noticed. I’m very lucky to have your friendship.

  Of course there are also many other users on Wattpad who I have to thank. Just to name a few: Saintc, Mal, Absentminded_Artist, Kyle, DracoNako, CholorplasticCandence, FantasybkLover, Delia, Elle, astrophile, and many other members too numerous to name. Your love and support and enthusiasm for my writing is why I’m where I am, and I hope Goblin King impresses you the same way White Stag did.

  Of course, I must thank my doctors and therapists for keeping me sane and healthy during hard times, especially during the pandemic. I’d also love to thank all my friends from Twitter who amuse me and make my life fuller every day and sometimes teach me things I had no idea about.

  I can’t not thank my family for putting up with me while writing Goblin King. Thank you, Mom, for allowing me to take over your house for two months, and Elaina for understanding I was on a deadline and couldn’t do some of the things we wanted to do together. Thanks to Chris, my mom’s partner, for being chill with me working in the basement at two a.m. with the lights on while he tries to sleep in another room. Also for being an excellent cook.

  Special shout-out to Lady, my kitty I adopted in September after my old kitty, Kanu, died. You’re such a sweet thing when you want to be and an absolute hellcat when not. I love your cuddles and kisses, and I’m glad you came into my life so soon after my old buddy left. You’re wonderful even if you bite all my toes.

  And of course, the best for last, thank you all, readers and supporters of the Permafrost series. You guys are wonderful and make it possible for me to do what I do, and I can never express the amount of gratitude that I have for you all. I love reading your tweets and seeing your images and thoughts about the book whether positive or negative and finding a community of fellow trauma survivors doing what it takes every day to get out of bed. You all are champions.

  Also by Kara Barbieri

  White Stag

  About the Author

  Kara Barbieri is a writer living in the tiny town of Hayward, Wisconsin. An avid fantasy fan, she began writing White Stag at eighteen and posting it to Wattpad soon after under the name Pandean. When she’s not writing, you can find her marathoning Buffy the Vampire Slayer, reviving gothic fashion, and jamming to synthpop. You can sign up for email updates here.

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Prologue

  Part One. The Stag

  1. Visions

  2. The Man in the Caves

  3. The Flaming Arrow

  4. The Killing Sight

  5. The Madman’s Confession

  6. The Catalysts

  7. The Worldenders

  8. The Gnawing Serpent

  Part Two. The Woman

  9. The Vow

  10. Dwellings

  11. Sister Spirits

  12. Sins of the Father

  13. The Yawning Grave

  14. What Is and What Never Will Be

  15. The Worthy Dead

  16. The Corpse Eater

  Part Three. The In-Between

  17. As Above, So Below

  18. The Gauntlet

  19. Life Boat

  20. The Stag and the Erlking

  21. We all Fall Down

  22. Odin’s Other Eye

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  Also by Kara Barbieri

  About the Author

  Copyright

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  First published in the United States by Wednesday Books, an imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group

  GOBLIN KING. Copyright © 2020 by Kara Barbieri. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Publishing Group, 120 Broadway, New York, NY 10271.

  www.wednesdaybooks.com

  Cover design by Olga Grlic

  Cover art: crown © Melanie Goulish; texture

  © Artyustudio/Shutterstock.com

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:

  Names: Barbieri, Kara, author.

  Title: Goblin king / Kara Barbieri.

  Description: First edition. | New York: Wednesday Books, 2020. | Series: Permafrost; Book 2 | Summary: As Janneke struggles with her new powers and Soren adapts to bein
g Erking, the world they know is on the brink of ending, and freeing Janneke’s tormentor’s spirit from Hel may be the only way to prevent Ragnarök.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2020030037 | ISBN 9781250247605 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781250149619 (ebook)

  Subjects: CYAC: Goblins—Fiction. | End of the world—Fiction. | Hell—Fiction. | Fantasy.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.B3705 Go 2020 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020030037

  eISBN 9781250149619

  Our ebooks may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or by email at MacmillanSpecialMarkets@macmillan.com.

  First Edition: 2020