by Chloe Jacobs
Chapter One
Just call me Isaac.
As she stood outside her parents’ house with her fist still poised to knock, she panicked. She hadn’t thought what would happen if anyone called the goblin king by his name. In Mylena, everyone knew the consequences, but here people would laugh if she said that saying Isaac’s name was the same as handing him a first-class invitation into the deepest parts of your soul.
This is a bad idea. How was she going to explain Isaac to them? Not just his name, but…everything?
She heard footsteps coming down the hall on the other side of the door, and the urge to bolt was so strong she had to grit her teeth against it.
Too late now.
The curtain in the window to the far left of the door pulled to the side, and a little face peeked through the sliver of glass.
Her breath blew out in a rush. The chubby little face disappeared again almost immediately, but that tiny glimpse of her brother in the window helped settle a lot of the nerves she’d been fighting all afternoon. Drew had made it safely home. At least she could handle the questions to come without that failure weighing on her soul.
The door took forever to open—or maybe it was just Greta’s imagination that everything had started moving in slow motion.
Isaac’s hand squeezed hers, giving her strength. The images of Lost Isaac were still close to the surface. Every so often, she needed to touch him and see that irreverent grin of his to drive back the worry and fear still hanging over her shoulder.
Her breath caught and held as they waited, and when a woman opened the door, dressed in a simple pair of jeans and a pink blouse, it was like Greta was still thirteen years old.
“Yes?” The question was polite but guarded, and who wouldn’t be guarded upon opening their front door to a group of dirty strangers waiting on the front step?
Greta’s throat tightened. The picture of her mother and father had stayed pretty solid in her head all these years, mostly because she still had the photograph in her locket to remind her of them.
But even in dreams, she’d stopped being able to hear their voices. That was part of the hardship of what they’d been through—her and the boys—the fractured memory. Sometimes Greta would say something in a certain way and wonder if she sounded like her mother, but that was different than actually remembering.
But as soon as the door opened, all that changed. Memories cascaded in, bringing stinging tears to her eyes.
Mom standing at the door, calling out that it was time to come in for supper.
Dad running behind her, yelling encouragement as she learned to ride a bike.
Holding Drew’s hand as they walked to the park together.
“Can I help you kids with something?” Her mother was looking at Isaac, and her grip on the door handle tightened perceptibly.
“Mom?” The aching plea came out in such a weak whisper that no one heard. Greta released Isaac’s hand and took another step forward. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Mom?”
The woman’s gaze widened, and her hand lifted and fluttered at the opening of her blouse, brushing her pale, bare throat.
So many things crowded Greta’s memory all at once: the way her mother used to play with her locket and chain, which had been a mirror image of Greta’s locket, only with a photo of her and Drew in it instead. Greta recalled the way her startling blue eyes—exactly like her children’s—turned dark and sparkled when she laughed. And the soothing sound of her voice singing lullabies at night from Drew’s bedroom. Even though Greta had grown too old for lullabies, she’d kept her door open all the same so she could hear them.
“Greta?” Her mother’s face drained of color. Crap, was she going to pass out? Had she given her mother a heart attack?
“Mattie, who’s at the door?”
Greta gasped at the sound of her father’s voice. At the bus station where she’d skillfully lifted some poor dude’s wallet in order to pay for eleven tickets to Jonesport, they’d quickly discovered that it was Monday, so she’d just assumed her dad would be at work when they arrived. The idea of only having to face one of them at a time had seemed less intimidating, even though it would probably mean explaining herself more than once.
Greta’s mother hadn’t said anything else, but her glassy gaze told a story all on its own. Of a mother’s hope slowly dying with each passing day, only to be revived and then slaughtered again with every ring of the doorbell and every photograph of a lost child the police brought that fit the description of her little girl.
Even if getting tossed into Mylena hadn’t been her fault, she was still to blame for that look on her mother’s face. She hadn’t done enough to get back home. In fact, she remembered the moment she’d given up looking, and the unbearable guilt and sorrow pushed down on her chest.
“It’s me, Mom,” she said softly. “I promise, it’s really me.”
“Mattie?” That was her father’s pet name for her mother, whose full name was a serious-sounding Matilda that had never suited her. The taller figure stepped into the doorway and put his arm around his wife as he looked out at the group, but the moment his gaze met Greta’s, he stopped and stared.
Her mother seemed mostly the same except for a few lines around the eyes, but her father looked very different. She remembered a soft, fun dad who’d dressed up as Santa Claus every year without any trouble pulling it off. He’d lost weight and a bunch of hair, but he had grown a goatee—maybe to compensate—and the contrast was startling.
“Greta?” She didn’t know how he could tell, because she certainly didn’t look much like his little girl, but he knew it was her. He leaned against the doorframe as if he suddenly didn’t have enough strength to hold himself upright. He instinctively reached for his wife’s hand.
“Daddy,” Greta whispered. Her throat ached from holding back the tears, and suddenly they were pouring down her cheeks, leaking into the corners of her mouth, salty and warm.
She still hesitated to take the last step forward, until someone—likely Wyatt—nudged her between the shoulder blades from behind to get her moving…and then she was being crushed in the joint embrace of her mother and father.
“Oh God, is it really you?” Greta’s mother sounded as if she still didn’t believe it.
Both of her parents lowered their heads to hers. She felt the quivering of her mother’s lips against her cheek and the rasp of her father’s chin on her forehead.
She closed her eyes tightly and let herself have a moment, but then she blinked through the veil of tears to the little blond-haired boy hiding behind the table in the hallway with his fist jammed in his mouth. He was looking up at her with absolute terror in his striking blue eyes.
After the tearful reunion and a brief introduction on Greta’s part, her parents ushered everyone inside. They stood in the living room awkwardly, with her family on one end, and her and the boys at the other end.
Her father wanted to call the authorities right away. Greta almost agreed that they should call the police and get it over with. Talking to them would have to happen eventually, and it might be better to tell her bullshit story just once.
But her mother convinced him to wait long enough for everyone to get settled. “Why don’t you take a few minutes to wash up, and we’ll make something to eat. There’ll be time to talk afterward,” she said with a look at each of the boys’ dirty faces.
Greta winced. Yes, they looked like homeless, starving waifs.
So she and Siona followed her upstairs. Greta’s mom bit her lip standing in front of one of the doors in the hallway. “I hope you aren’t upset that we changed your bedroom around,” she said, twisting her fingers nervously. “We always had hope, but…”
“It’s no big deal. I would never have expected you guys to keep a little girl’s bedroom the same for four years. That would have been…” She swallowed hard to stop herself from saying torture, because she was sure there’d been just as many other torturous decisions to make after l
osing their child, and redecorating had probably been the least of them.
“We did keep all of your things, though,” her mom said quickly. “Some of them are in storage, but your jewelry box is on the dresser.”
Greta nodded. “Thanks.” She couldn’t remember what would have been in there.
“Okay, I’ll go grab some towels.” Her mom shut the door with a smile.
Greta glanced around the room.
The jewelry box was in the center of the dresser, as promised. It was a pink and white-striped domed box. A glimmer of memory surfaced, and she knew that when she opened the lid, a plastic ballerina would start to spin, playing a tinny tune.
Siona walked to the window and pulled back the sheer curtain. “Is all of this as you remember it?”
Greta stopped and blinked. She’d mostly been trying not to see it or think about it, because every time she remembered something, her chest ached a little more. “Yes and no,” she admitted.
She walked to the rocking chair in the corner. She had “read” her first books sitting on her father’s lap in that chair, turning the big cardboard pages with the bright pictures and making the story up because she didn’t know what the words actually said.
There was a stuffed bear perched on the wooden seat of the chair. She picked it up, held it close, and allowed the protective vise around her heart to loosen just enough for a small smile to break across her face.
The bear still smelled like roses from the time she’d stolen her mother’s perfume and dumped the whole bottle on it because she’d wanted it to smell pretty, too. No matter how many times the thing had gone in the wash, that scent had never come out completely.
These things were the only part of Greta’s childhood that remained in this room. The rest of it, including her old bed and coverings, her dresser, and the color of the walls, had all been changed, but it didn’t feel wrong. What had once been a young girl’s bedroom was now a sophisticated guest room done up in powder blue and some variation of beige, with a non-descript landscape framed on the wall and a set of guest towels on the nightstand. It had zero personality…which was probably safer for everyone.
She couldn’t blame her parents for getting rid of the reminders of their lost daughter, but it reinforced her feeling of disconnectedness, as if there was still no place where she really belonged.
Thankfully, with the flurry of activity to get everyone washed, she didn’t have time to dwell on all the memories and insecurities that were being dredged up.
Wyatt and Ray coordinated bathing the boys two at a time to save on the hot water. Siona went next. Isaac went after her. When he stepped into the steamy bathroom and looked at the glass enclosed shower stall, Greta stood outside in the hallway, fighting back a grin. He reached out to touch the tile, and she couldn’t help it, she laughed out loud.
She tossed a towel at him and whispered, “You think that’s interesting…wait until you turn that handle and water comes out of the nozzle over your head. Twist it one way for hot water, and the other way for cold water.”
His expression said he thought she was screwing with him for sure.
“Seriously,” she promised.
She knew that the idea of hot water from a spigot in the wall would be irresistible to him. He would want to stay in there for hours and examine how everything worked, his genius brain finding ways to make it happen in Mylena where they still heated snow over the fire and tossed buckets over their heads when washing.
“Remember, I still need to shower, too, so don’t make me have to come in there and get you,” she warned. “You have a ten-minute time limit.”
The gleam in his eyes changed from youthful amazement to hot boyfriend wickedness just like that, making her stomach clench. “Perhaps you should join me.” He grinned. “To prove that this contrivance works as you say it will,” he murmured in a low, inviting voice.
Heat bloomed through her cheeks, and she quickly glanced toward the stairs, very aware of her parents walking around in the kitchen below and the boys all waiting in her bedroom.
She bit her lip and shook her head. “Behave yourself.”
He chuckled and closed the door on her. When she heard the water come on a moment later, her blush only deepened. She turned away and tried not to think about his clothes piled on the floor and his big body being pelted by the water.
She leaned against the wall and waited with her own towel clutched to her chest. When the door opened again exactly twelve minutes later, he’d put on his bottoms but not his shirt, and her mouth went drier than the desert. It was impossible not to look at him, to appreciate the strength and purpose he wore like it was second nature. But half-naked and surrounded by porcelain and chrome, he stood out like a sore thumb.
He would never be ordinary. If her parents came up to see him like this, there would be no ignoring the fact that he was an anomaly and didn’t belong—even if they weren’t quite able to put their fingers on how or why.
She smothered the thought and moved to slip by him through the bathroom door. For a second, they both froze in the threshold, squeezed together like sardines in a tin can. Her breath caught. She put her hand on his warm, still damp arm before thinking about it, and he was leaning closer, pressing her spine to the doorframe with his chest against hers as he dipped his head.
At a distinct throat-clearing, she whipped her gaze around to find Siona standing in her bedroom doorway with both arms crossed, throwing a deliberate look at the stairway.
Someone was on their way up.
Greta swore and darted into the bathroom. She shoved Isaac out into the hallway as quickly as she could. “Hurry up, and put your damn shirt back on,” she hissed as she slammed the door on his familiar, arrogant, self-satisfied grin.
She was quick in the shower, mostly because there was about one and a half minutes of hot water left. But also because she was nervous leaving Isaac, Siona, and the boys alone without her supervision, especially until they’d had a chance to figure out how to explain things to the adults.
She stepped out onto the mat in front of the mirror above the bathroom sink and swiped it with her towel, then wished she hadn’t when she caught sight of her reflection. Even blurry from the steam hanging in the air, her scars stood out in stark relief from her pale face and neck. She didn’t dare look lower, where there were many more.
It couldn’t have been good, all the thoughts racing through her parents’ heads at their first sight of her. She definitely wasn’t the little girl they had been praying to get back.
Greta braided her wet hair with quick efficiency and threw on her clothes, then returned to her room. Everyone was waiting. Wyatt paced in front of the dresser. Siona stood at the window close to him. Ray sprawled in the rocking chair with Jacob on his lap, while the others sat cross-legged on the bed, looking shell-shocked and nervous. Even though they were no doubt starving, none had ventured downstairs without her.
Wyatt was the first to speak, keeping his voice low so as not to carry beyond the room. “So…what do we tell them?”
“The truth,” Isaac said, as if it was that simple.
She groaned. “That’s not going to work. I can’t even tell anyone your name without explaining why they can’t use it.”
“I am the goblin king,” he said with a shrug. “Tell your people this and demand that they help us find the portal back to Mylena.”
Wyatt started to laugh like a frickin’ hyena, which made Greta groan again.
Siona stood off to the side, silent and watchful. She’d been that way ever since her confrontation with Isaac when they’d found themselves on the other side of the portal and he’d accused her of betraying them all.
Greta punched Wyatt in the arm. “You’re not helping.” She turned back to Isaac. “Nobody’s going to believe that we all fell through a portal to another world, or that you’re the goblin king, who happens to enter people’s dreams if they utter his name out loud. Or that I spent the last four years hunting moon-crazed mo
nsters until a power hungry demon corrupted my soul with his evil magick, possessed a homicidal faerie queen, and then sent us all back here so he can lay waste to that world without interference before moving on to the next one…probably this one.”
Ray piped up, his arm holding Jacob’s sleepy head to his chest. “Nobody listened to me back at the cave, but if you’re all so worried about what to tell the adults, maybe we should just go back to the woods. At least then we’ll be ready and waiting if the demon decides to punch another hole through the universe.”
She shook her head. As much as she worried about that very thing so badly, it felt like ice coursing through her veins, they’d been through this before. “There’s no guarantee that if and when that happened, the portal would open in the same spot, or that it will happen soon. But in the meantime, he’s destroying all of Mylena. We can’t just wait. We came out of the woods to find a better way.”
“You know what? I don’t know why I’m supposed to care what he does with Mylena, anyway,” he said with a careless shrug.
Isaac rounded on the bristly teen with a growl, but Siona beat him to it. In the blink of an eye, she was leaning over Ray with a menacing look, careful not to jostle Jacob, who’d just nodded off to sleep on his lap. “You will care, human. Because if the demon succeeds in ravaging my world and making his way to this one, there will be no stopping him. Especially not by you and a bunch of children,” she said in a threatening whisper.
Greta came over and put a hand on her arm. “I know everyone is worried.” Siona and Isaac were worried about the fate of their world; the boys were worried about the fate of this one. Greta worried that she wouldn’t be able to do anything for either world. “But we need to stick together and go forward with a plan.”
Siona stepped back. Ray glared up at her. It had been like that with him for the last few days. He didn’t trust Siona or Isaac, and wasn’t subtle about it. Both Greta and Wyatt had tried talking to him, but he still saw it as humans versus Myleans. He even seemed divided about which camp Greta fell into.
