Realms of the Goblin King (The Realm Trilogy Book 3)

by Lisa Manifold

  I felt heat rise in my cheeks, and my heart begin to pound when I thought about what had been going on when the asshole burst in. We were in bed together. Nowhere to hide a mirror.

  “Well, we’d only just woken. If he had time to grab it—I don’t know. Someone grabbed me and knocked me out. Not with a punch, or anything!” I saw them both come towards me with expressions of worry. “But everything went black until I woke and saw that Brennan was gone. You know,” I added, “I am getting pretty sick of being knocked out with the magic punch when it’s convenient for everyone else.”

  Drake and Taranath both smiled.

  “Then that is where our next lesson shall be,” Taranath said. “We will make sure that no one can do this to you again.”

  “But he might have the mirror?”

  I hated to dash the hope that I could hear in Drake’s question. “It’s possible. I don’t know. I don’t know anything.” I held the mirror in my hand, afraid to speak to it, afraid to put it away without even trying.

  “Give it to me. Better that anyone else who might see this see me rather than you. We don’t want to advertise that you are no longer in the Castle,” Drake said, reaching over me to get the mirror.

  I reluctantly let him take it. I didn’t like to let it go to anyone else, even though I could see the sense in what he said.

  “Bren?” He asked quietly.

  Nothing.

  “Brennan?” A little louder.

  Still…nothing. I could tell all three of us held our breaths, and everyone moved closer to Drake and the mirror in his hand.

  “Brennan?” Drake’s voice was strong. No more hiding then.

  He hissed.

  “What? What is it?” I wanted to grab the mirror.

  “There’s something moving in the mirror, even though it’s dark. Like it’s bouncing around.”

  I stared at the mirror, frustrated. Something nagged at the back of my head…what was it?

  “Will you let me see it for a moment?” I asked Drake, trying to keep myself calm.

  He handed it over slowly.

  “Brennan, is this your stuck on the boat moment?” I asked.

  I could see the darkness wiggle. As though it was in a pocket, and he couldn’t get to it.

  “We’re coming,” I whispered. “I love you.”

  Drake snatched it as the mirror went slack in my hands.

  “Be strong, brother. We’re coming.” He put the mirror into his pocket.

  “Hey! That’s mine!”

  He took it from his pocket immediately and held it out. “I wanted to end the connection. He’s not able to get to it, but he heard it. Is that what you think?”

  I shook my head a little, trying to clear it. Everything happened so quickly, and then here Drake was, asking my opinion.

  “When I was out with my parents and Mara and Heath, Brennan called me. I couldn’t answer at the moment, so I tapped on the mirror to let him know I had heard him. We had a big fight about it,” I could feel the tears in my eyes, and my throat hurt, trying to keep myself from fighting.

  “Well done, your Majesty. We know that he’s alive,” Taranath came closer and patted me on the shoulder. “That is a step in the right direction.”

  “Do we even know it’s him?” I asked, my voice breaking.

  Drake smiled, and I could see the animal side of him. “It doesn’t matter, does it? If it’s in the hands of someone else, I would think they would have responded in some manner. Even if they had the sense not to, we know he’s there. With the mirror. No one else could have taken it from his chamber. So we know that we’re in the right direction.”

  “Yeah, but where is the right direction?” I shouted, not caring that we were supposed to be discreet.

  “First, the Dwarf Realm to see what Dhysara knows, and then we make our decision from there.”

  The look on Drake’s face didn’t bode well for Dhysara. I knew I ought to be more bothered, but I wasn’t. Her man had taken mine, and planned to kill him. I had to save my sympathy for those not trying to kill me or those I loved.

  “Let’s go,” Drake said.

  I tucked the mirror into my back pocket, not wanting to put it back in the bag and lose my connection with Brennan.

  The three of us cleaned up the meal quickly and in silence. Then after a boost for me, we rode back onto the road.

  Brennan was alive! Please, please, please, let him still be alive!

  Brennan

  He felt the mirror vibrate, and did his best to discreetly tap the mirror. He heard…it was Drake! Drake had gotten the mirror from Iris! He rubbed his finger across where the mirror lay in his pocket, watching as much as he could at Cian across the room.

  He couldn’t see what the bastard was doing, but it wasn’t good. It would probably hurt. But he felt hope as he’d not felt in days. Drake had located him. Knew he was alive. Which meant that Drake would not stop until he’d found Brennan and killed Cian.

  The thought made him smile through cracked lips. He was thirsty, and water was not easily given here.

  “Brennan, is this your stuck on the boat moment?”

  Her voice whispered across him like the sweetest wind. Iris! She was alive, and well. He tapped at the mirror again, shuffling his feet as he did so in order to keep Cian hearing the voices in his pocket. It wouldn’t do to lose the mirror now.

  “We’re coming. I love you,” Iris said.

  Then Drake spoke. “Be strong, brother. We’re coming.”

  Hope and panic flared through him sharper than any of the pain that Cian had inflicted so far. They couldn’t come! The thought of rescue was intoxicating, but if Iris came here, Cian would hurt her, kill her, and his life would be over.

  Even these thoughts didn’t dampen the hope that hearing the voices of the two people he loved most.

  He must have smiled once more. He didn’t realize it, and cursed himself when Cian approached him, an evil grin in place.

  “What is so amusing, brother? Is this too gentle? Well, we shall have to address that, won’t we?”

  With a laugh, Cian moved out of Brennan’s eyesight, and Brennan closed his eyes.

  Chapter Five.

  Iris

  Once we were going again, I didn’t try and stop the tears. He was alive. It could be someone else, but I knew, with everything I had, that he was alive. And he’d heard me. I hoped it would give him strength—for whatever he was going through. The thought of Cian hurting him made me cry harder and want to kill the guy all at once.

  Taranath rode up beside me. “Please, your Majesty, take this.” He held out a small square of cloth.

  I took it and mopped at my face. I wanted to blow my nose, but that would ruin the thing forever.

  Taranath always had something like mind-reading going on. “It’s yours to keep. It washes easily, and we’ll be able to do that tonight if needed.” He smiled at me and rode ahead to the space next to Drake.

  I blew my nose. No sense in being snotty while ugly crying. I had a sneaking suspicion that it wouldn’t be the last time I cried. It would, however, be the last time I cried in front of anyone else. I didn’t really know what the protocol was, but having met Nerida, and Ailla—these royal families didn’t cry in front of other people. What was it Brennan had told me? That fae rarely cried at all. So I needed to confine my tears.

  That might be hard. Practicing keeping it together around a friendly audience would be best. I inhaled deeply, and pulled my shoulders back. Well, as best I could while riding a horse.

  And a horse! What the hell? I hadn’t expected this when I thought about traveling. I wished we could portal, but I trusted that Drake and Taranath were making the best choice to allow us to sneak around.

  We rode in silence, all lost in our own thoughts. I wondered what we were in for when we found Dhysara. Brennan told me that she seemed very protective of Cian, and that he’d behaved in a way that said he cared for her—so what was he doing with Ailla the psycho?

 
Well, he was a psycho as well, so there was that. I felt the brief welling of sympathy for her, remembering Drake’s expression when talking about her.

  The silence was broken by Taranath. “Your Majesty, would you like to go over some of the spells we’ve been practicing?”

  “Can I practice on Drake?”

  I saw the twitch of the shoulders in front of me, and smiled.

  Taranath smiled a little. “Well, he’s probably not the best target, your Majesty. We might have need of him later.”

  Even I didn’t miss the snort from Drake. I’d been worried that this would be uncomfortable, and in spite of my backside concerns, it was nice to discover that travelling with these two wasn’t horrible.

  If one could forget why we had to travel in the first place. Which I couldn’t. It lurked there, in the back of my mind.

  Thoughts of how this would help Brennan in the end, no matter how tedious Taranath could be on doing things right, kept me focused as he and I walked through what I’d learned so far.

  That night, we stopped and made a little camp off the road we’d been on all day. I fell asleep instantly, Brennan’s face in my mind.

  Please be all right, I thought. To whom, I didn’t know. I could almost feel him next to me, his presence, his smell. I missed him so badly at that moment, I nearly cried out. Where are you? I thought. Please be all right.

  I could hear the breathing of the others slow and deepen. I lay on the hard ground, missing my husband. The ground didn’t bother me—I’d slept outside plenty of times when we traveled. The deck of the boat was just as unforgiving as the ground. That wasn’t what kept me awake.

  It was worry, and how wrong this felt to be here, without Brennan. Not that I didn’t care for both Drake and Taranath. There was no one else I’d rather have with me to go and find Brennan. It was that I wasn’t with him, and it made me feel off-kilter.

  I’d felt this way all day, but between worry and my aching backside, I didn’t have the time or the luxury to mull it over.

  The night sounded different here, too. There was no water, and in spite of being on land while Mom was undergoing treatment, I was used to going to sleep with the sound of water in the background. It hadn’t been as noticeable or as bad when I was Brennan. His presence brought me a comfort, a sense of security that it was okay that I didn’t have all the things I was used to.

  But now, with him missing, and me being unsure when we’d get him back, or what shape he’d be in—I couldn’t contemplate any other outcome—all the things that were so different from what I was used to loomed large.

  I rolled away from the small fire, pulling my blanket up and trying to muffle my tears. I had to be strong.

  Tomorrow, I would be. Now, I let the tears fall and missed my husband.

  Chapter Six

  Iris

  When I woke, I could feel that my body wasn’t happy at this sleeping on the ground thing. I sat up, and stretched. My butt hurt, as expected. My eyes felt dry and scratchy. Be strong, I told myself. Brennan needs you to be strong. You have to be as strong as Taranath and Drake. You can do this.

  “Taranath?” I asked.

  “Yes?” He was behind me, somewhere.

  “You got anything for aches?” I hoped that my eyes and heart fell into the aches category.

  He laughed. “I can help, I think.”

  “Thank god,” I breathed. Why hadn’t I thought of this yesterday? For all his talk of being serious when using magic, if it helped my aching backside as well as my other hurts I would take the heat for breaking the rules. Which brought another thought to mind.

  “Taranath?” I asked again.

  “Are you in need of assistance this moment?”

  “Yeah, whenever, but no, I had another question.” I tried smiling, and hoped he didn’t notice my face.

  “Yes?”

  I saw that Drake was busy over a small fire, cooking something that smelled good. This was like camping. So much for the advanced ways of the fae, I thought to myself with a snicker. We lived easier on the boat.

  “We were talking about the cost of magic yesterday, and I was wondering how Cian, and Ailla, and her dad, and whomever else, was managing with this there’s a cost for everything idea,” I sat down near Drake. He was also making tea, which was the preferred hot beverage here. I’d take it.

  As if reading my mind, which he probably was in a sorta-kinda way, Drake handed me a cup. I wrapped my hands around it carefully.

  Taranath finally spoke. “I don’t know. There is a cost to all that we do, as there are consequences for everything. Perhaps that is why Cian is still scarred. He is not a good person, and hurts others. He could heal via magic, most fae do. But he hasn’t. I honestly do not know. As I have told Drake, and the Fae King, there is much here that is being used that is old, and not well known.”

  “The dragon magic?” I asked.

  “Perhaps. They were the most dangerous but there are many forms of magic which have been lost, or are not in common use. Most fae use magic to make daily life easier, and that’s about it. While we’re all concerned with it, it’s not something the majority of those in the Realms worry over.”

  “Wouldn’t that be nice?” I sighed. The thought of all I—we—didn’t know gave me a great deal of worry.

  Another thought struck. “What do you think will happen if Dhysara is there?” I asked.

  This time, Drake answered. “I don’t have the impression that she is like Ailla, going by the reports I’ve heard. She was very fierce in her defense of Cian when Brennan and I tried to apprehend him but—”

  “Even though he’s nutters I can understand being fierce in the defense of those you care for,” I interjected.

  Drake nodded. “That’s my thought as well. If he’s not there, and I don’t think he would be, since my intelligence suggests that Dhysara is not aware of how close Ailla and Cian are, she may be reasonable. I suspect, although I could be wrong, that she may not even know that he’s taken Brennan.”

  “I hope not.” I was feeling bad for my lack of charity the night before towards her. “But if we’re wrong—”

  “Then she shares the fate of all who are allied with Cian,” Drake said in a hard voice.

  There was no arguing with that. We ate in silence, and when the little camp had been packed, we mounted up—after a little healing spell shot towards me, thank god—and rode away.

  I tried to calm the butterflies in my stomach. We’d reach the cottage in the Dwarf Realm today. I really hoped it wouldn’t be a repeat of the last time. From what Brennan had told me, it had been a near thing, and Cian had hurt him. I hoped Cian wouldn’t be there.

  Brennan

  The dark brought comfort. For the moment, it meant that no one hurt him. When he’d been younger, some of his training had concerned times like this—how to withstand pain and make it to the other side. But that was long ago, and he felt the strain of protecting himself from Cian.

  It took him several days—what he thought was several days—to decipher what Cian planned. He wanted Brennan’s magic.

  Without warning, a memory from the time before swept him up.

  “You’re not special. You’re nothing at all,” Cian’s voice hissed.

  Brennan lay in the dark, hands behind his head. He’d been going over the lessons of the day, and where he’d made so many mistakes.

  He and Cian no longer shared rooms. What was Cian doing here?

  “I’m tired, Cian. Leave me alone,” He didn’t want to argue.

  “I saw you today, parading around with all your new teachers,” Cian continued as though he hadn’t spoken. “Talking like you were one of them. You’re not. You’re nothing. You’ll never be anything other than the Goblin King!”

  “That’s why I have lessons. Being the Goblin King has different responsibilities than those of the Fae King.”

  “Of course it does,” Cian sneered, a snicker breaking out in his voice. “Because you’re going to have to deal with
nasty goblins and probably a nasty goblin wife. I’d need magic lessons too!” His voice changed, and Brennan felt fear. “Don’t ever think you’ll be more than me. I will be King of all the Realms! You’ll die in that nasty goblin-infested pest hole! And so you don’t forget,” A light flared, and Brennan felt a sting to his face, “This is just a taste of what will happen if you do.”

  He rubbed his face and his eyes, trying to not cry out. Not only from the obvious pain, but how hard had Cian’s words hit him. What had happened to his brother? They’d always been the best of friends. But Cian treated him as an enemy now.

  Once the pain began to subside, he listened. He was alone again. He waited a few moments more, to be sure.

  Only then did he let tears come. When would this end?

  It had never ended, Brennan realized. All those years, he’d thought Cian dead, and himself at some sort of resolution with the matter. No peace, but resolution that he couldn’t change his past. It’s why he’d tried hard to make his Realm better, make relations with the surrounding Realms better. To keep women from getting too close, because he never wanted to hurt another ever again. All his life he’d tried to be better than that time from his childhood.

  When in reality, he’d never been as bad as he thought, and Cian had always been there. Still angry, still plotting, and still a spoiled, bratty, over-indulged mean child.

  Cian now was no different than the Cian he’d known over six hundred years ago. It was tragic that Cian hadn’t chosen to change himself, and enjoy being alive, and apparently loved by two women, both of whom were strong, impressive women. Ailla was horrid, but she was not weak. Dhysara loved him in a way that Brennan would have envied, before he’d found Iris.

  And yet all the man wanted to do was exact revenge for old hurts that were not even real. Cian didn’t seem to care that he’d toss all the Realms into complete upheaval. Brennan knew, even if Cian couldn’t see it, and he doubted that his brother could, due to the madness upon him, that the Realms would not survive what Cian had planned.