William Alexander - Goblin Secrets

The audience of children laughed at something on the little stage. Rownie shook his head, trying to shake out the shadows, and paid better attention.

Semele’s voice sang a story about the lady puppet, who lived alone with a witchworked mirror. The mirror on the stage wasn’t actually a mirror. It was just an empty picture frame with another puppet behind it. The Lady looked inside, and the matching puppet behind the frame mirrored her movements perfectly for as long as the Lady was watching—and then waved at the audience whenever the Lady looked away.

The mirror had been witchworked to show the Lady a young and childish reflection early in the day and an ancient reflection in the evening. The Lady learned how to reach into the mirror in the mornings and yank her own reflection through the frame and onto the floor. She did this several times, morning after morning, until many child puppets bustled around the stage with her.

Rownie wondered how Semele could possibly move them all at once. She was the only one in the wagon, so she had to be the only puppeteer, but each of the several puppets moved as though directed by a living hand. It was easy to believe that they were alive themselves, even though Rownie could see that each was a thing made of cloth and wood, carved and painted.

In the story, the Lady kept all of these mirror children as slaves and servants.

All the little puppets bustled offstage again. The Lady stood alone and put both wooden hands beneath her wooden chin. She looked harsh—mostly because of the way her sharp eyebrows were painted on. Then she shivered, her small arms wrapped around her puppet frame. The windows of her chamber grew dark and gray. Rain pattered against the back of the small stage. One of the young reflections came in with a broom, and the lady puppet loomed over her.

The next part of the show was unsettling to see. The Lady reached into the chest of her smaller self and removed something red. The little puppet fell over. There was no stage blood, or any other gruesome special effect, but Rownie still felt uncomfortable. He shifted his weight between one foot and the other. Some of the more squeamish local children squeaked.

The Lady put the heart into her fireplace, where it gave off a warm glow. She rubbed her hands together, enjoying the warmth. Then she placed a single metal gear inside the girl’s chest. The little puppet stood up again—stiff and straight—and began sweeping the edge of the stage.

This was monstrous. Everyone knew what coal was and where it came from and what it was for. Everyone knew that automatons couldn’t move without a lump of coal in their metal innards—or, in Horace’s case, several tiny lumps of fish-heart coal. That was bad enough. To heat your house on a rainy day with coal, when any piece of wood would do just as well, was a monstrous thing.

Rownie noticed that Jansin didn’t squeak or flinch or turn away. Instead he drew himself up to stand more stiffly, and clenched his fist a few times.

The little puppet reached through the picture frame and pulled out a twin.

The puppets made more and more of themselves. Then the Lady returned with several slave-selves behind her.

They all fought. Puppets flew everywhere, tossed back and forth. When the fight was over, only three of them still stood—two rebel girls and the Lady. One of the girls pinned the Lady’s arms behind her. The other girl reached into the lady’s puppet chest and took out her large heart. They tossed the heart into the fireplace, where it burned briefly, and then went out. All the other little stage lights dimmed with it.

Rownie noticed, out of the corner of his eye, that Essa and Thomas were quietly returning the mule to its wagon hitch. The dead tree had been hauled aside. The road was clear.

Semele’s song came to an end.

There was silence. Then the little crowd began to cheer. “Blood and guts! Blood and guts!” said the smallest one, jumping up and down and clapping both hands together.

Jansin did not cheer or clap.

“My family takes hearts,” he said. He did not shout, but his voice carried. It silenced the applause around him. “We take hearts from traitors and criminals and people who deserve it. We make them into coal. We should rip out your goblin hearts, but they probably wouldn’t even burn.”

Jansin took one step forward, and then Rownie kicked him hard in the back of the knee. Nobody deserves to be made into coal , he thought, but didn’t bother saying so aloud.

The older boy went down. Rownie ran. He pushed other children out of his way and took Essa’s hand as he reached the driving bench. She pulled him up. The puppet stage closed with a snap. Thomas cracked the reins, hard, and the mule launched itself into a gallop.

Their former audience shouted and threw stones, but the wild and angry noise soon faded behind them. After that Rownie heard nothing but the rattle of the wagon and the thud of Horace’s hooves against the road, and he saw nothing behind them but trees.

SEMELE CLIMBED THROUGH a hatch in the front of the wagon. The whole troupe sat together on the driving bench.

“Slow down, yes,” she said. “We are well away, and it is becoming dark and dangerous to ride so very fast. I will drive, I am thinking.”

Thomas handed over the reins, but not without protest. “You can hardly see,” he said. “You aren’t even wearing your spectacles. How is it any less dangerous to let you drive?”

“This road is a very old road,” Semele said, unconcerned. “I can drive along it well enough from memory.” She slowed the mule down and steered it around a turning. “Please be letting me know if any new and unusual obstacles present themselves.”

Thomas tugged his hat down over his face. “You should have let me give that insolent prig a warning cut. It would have been shallow.”

Essa made noises of frustration and disgust. “Sure. Perfect. Good idea. Shed a few drops of blood from a rich kid, at a crossroads, at night. Give that rumor legs and let it run around for a bit, and by the time we get back to the city, every single person will think that we ritually murder innocent children at crossroads in order to raise up an army of dead criminals with which to conquer all of Zombay. People already think we’re child-thieves, so we really should try to avoid attacking any children. Even if they deserve it.”