31. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Calista
K nees hit cobblestone with every goblin we passed on our way to the place Astaroth wanted to take me. He acknowledged each one with an affectionate pat on their head. The complete opposite of his cutthroat response to them last night. My hand rose to my neck absentmindedly as the images of my would-be murderers attacked my senses. I could still smell their blood and body odor. Burnt into my nostrils and coating the back of my tongue, the stench permeated me and wouldn’t dissipate. I swallowed down the vomit inching up my throat.
Astaroth said I had the choice to come or not, but he refused to leave my side either way. I couldn’t stand another minute in that stuffy bedroom, suffocating in the silence between us. There was so much I wanted to say but couldn’t. The trauma was too fresh, his actions too vivid and replaying in my mind—a continuous violation of the senses. When he asked if I would like to go, I jumped at the chance to escape it. If he wouldn’t leave me alone to process, then I wanted out of the cramped confines he trapped me in. I wished I could escape the labyrinth entirely.
I thought of home as we walked the streets of the Goblin Circle. My chest ached and my stomach cramped. I missed Kaiden and Gina desperately and wondered how they were. How much time had passed since I was taken from them? I hugged myself and recoiled when the mummified goblin in my pocket brushed my hand. For whatever reason, Astaroth told me to bring it along.
A cloth tote hung across his body, bouncing against his outer thigh as he moved. The only sound between us were our thumping boots and the clacking of goblin corpses in his bag. If I could put a noise to the emotions swirling between us, it would be bloodcurdling screams.
Astaroth turned to the left and ventured into the labyrinth. I followed, wondering if I could run away from him and get lost inside the corridors. It had to be better than being with him. He said there was no way out, but that had to be a lie. The younger, rebellious version of me egged me on. She survived it then; I could survive it now.
“You are safe,” Astaroth said, mistaking my furtive glances for fear. “The beasts don’t travel this close to the city during the day.”
After a few turns, we stepped into a large open space with a massive stone archway. From the side, it would look like a hill. The labyrinth walls continued over the top of it. But from here, it opened and allowed you to enter the dark interior.
Astaroth climbed the stairs and waited at the top for me. Foreign words etched the stone that arched over his head.
“Where are we?”
“The Hall of the Unnamed.” His hand brushed the middle of my spine, and I stepped inside to put distance between us.
Pixie lanterns lined the pristine walls. Their soft glow revealed tiny floor to ceiling alcoves in the stone. When my eyes adjusted to the dim light, I back peddled and slammed into Astaroth. He gently clasped my biceps as he stared past me. His face softened in a sad way that kept me from stepping out of his reach. Wherever he was at this moment, it wasn’t here with me.
“Why did you bring me here?”
“I have a duty to fulfill, and you need answers.” His hands brushed down my arms then walked ahead.
Astaroth reached out here and there, touching different alcoves until he stopped about halfway down. He beckoned me to him. I kept my gaze planted on his boots so I wouldn’t see the tormented faces, frozen with silent screams, begging me to help them. I stopped in front of the empty alcove, and he reached into his bag and withdrew one of the statues.
“Isn’t there someone in charge of this place? Shouldn’t they be doing this?”
He stroked a sorrowful hand over its delicate head like the goblins in the streets, then used his thumb to trace the rough indent where he sliced the goblin’s throat. Astaroth claimed he would kill every last one of them if they hurt me. That was the Goblin King I expected, severe and brutal. Not this Goblin King who exuded remorse for forcing his hand, or the one who cared for me when I was poisoned.
“I created this place. As their king, it is my duty to see to them in all stages of their lives.”
The macabre way he chose to store their dead was odd. Then again, he would probably think the same thing about humans if I told him we buried or burned ours.
Astaroth set him inside the empty alcove, then glided his fingertip along the wall beneath it as if he were writing. A name appeared etched into the stone. I looked at the others nearby, and they also had writing beneath them.
When he stepped over one and pulled the next goblin out, I asked, “Why is this called ‘The Hall of the Unnamed’ if they all have names?”
“These are the names we call each other,” he said and set the goblin inside. His finger ran along the wall before he turned to me. “Not our given names.”
My face scrunched in confusion as he moved to another. “I don’t understand.”
“Neither do we,” he mumbled so quietly I almost missed it. Astaroth stepped back and faced the wall of goblins. A deep breath filled his lungs. He appeared tired and forlorn as he continued with his task. “We have no memory of who we were before we were sent here.”
“From where?”
“Faery.”
My mouth dropped open. “Faery exists?”
Chest bouncing with a silent chuckle, he set a goblin in the empty alcove. “You question that while you stand here with me?”
“No, not really.” I shook my head feeling stupid. “Humans hear stories all the time. I didn’t realize the connection.”
“Understandable.” He gripped the edge of an alcove and patted it with his fingers. “Set yours here.”
I retrieved the goblin from my pocket, conflicted by my first impression of it and what I knew now. “If Faery is your home, why are you here?”
“We were exiled to this place.” His jaw ticked. “The labyrinth is a prison. It is meant to confuse and disorient as it feeds on our life source until we wither.”
I fumbled with the goblin in my hand, nearly dropping it. The walls felt like they were closing in as my breaths came faster and faster. Twisted expressions taunted me from every angle. Horrified, I stared at the goblins around me in their little mausoleums. “You said you brought me here to make a baby, not to have my soul sucked out!”
“Breathe, Calista.” Astaroth cupped my cheeks as I hyperventilated. “This will not happen to you.”
“Why?” I jerked my arm out, pointing at the other corpses with the corpse. “It happened to them. It happened to my brother when he was here! Will you send my mummified body to him or put me up on a shelf in your museum?”
“It won’t happen to you because I won’t allow it.” His thumbs stroked my cheeks as he spoke softly. They slipped over the tears I didn’t notice in my panic. “You will remain as you are, beautiful and infuriating.”
My breath hitched, and I pulled out of his hold. “What? How?”
Astaroth slipped the goblin from my fist and set it in the alcove. “I will stitch you to my magic and prevent the realm from feeding on you.”
“If it’s so easy, why don’t you do it for all of them?”
“They will drain me. If that happens, we all die.”
He watched me as all the bits of information I’d learned clicked into place. Everyone owes Astaroth a debt. “Your magic already keeps everyone alive,” I mumbled.
“It does.” His tired voice reached all the way to my bones. “They are my brothers and sisters. They chose me as their king because they believe I can save them and take them home.”
Home. I’d imagined Kaiden working with a group of D&D nerds to discover a way into the labyrinth. They would teach him about all the fantastical beasts and how to slay them. When he reached me, he would go head-to-head with Astaroth. A fight like no other would ensue until only one of them survived. Unlike me, Kaiden would defeat him, and then he would reveal a magical doorway to take us home.
The goblins were doing the same thing, only they were using Astaroth to save them from the labyrinth. I knew what awaited me when I returned home—Kaiden, Gina, even Patty if I wanted her there, and my tiny apartment. Maybe I even had the hope of living a normal life, but I wasn’t sure if I could after these experiences. The goblins, however, had no idea what lay on the other side for them. That old adage “jumping from the frying pan into the fire” came to mind.
“And you?” I wondered. “Do you believe you can return home? Find your family?”
“This is my home.” A sad smile played at his lips. “I was brought up here, Calista. They are my family.”
“They don’t treat you like family.”
“Things change.”
“Wait. You said you were brought up here. That means—”
“I’ve been here since I was a wee babe.”
Air rushed from my lungs like it was sucker punched out of me. Who abandons a baby in a place meant to suck the life out of someone? You thought about it. No, that was before I knew what the labyrinth did to people, and regardless, I very well couldn’t toss my child to the wolves to save myself. My fingertips brushed the pendant he gave me as I clawed at my chest. While he was trapped here keeping everyone alive, he sent me home to live my life and have everything I could ever dream of. I only had to ask for it.
I cradled it in my hand, the stone pulsing as his words echoed in my mind. “Did you think taking the one thing I ever desired would get you what you want faster?”
He would give me the world and beyond as long as I gave him a family. But would he give me the freedom to roam it?
Astaroth closed the space between us, moving carefully to not spook me. He gently tucked my hair behind my ear, his finger trailing along my jaw to my chin. “You wear your thoughts as clearly as a lissier weaves a tapestry.”
“I have no idea what a lissier is.” I wetted my dry lips and swallowed when his chin dropped, and he smiled.
Don’t get me wrong, Astaroth was breathtakingly handsome—an Adonis in his own right—but sometimes his expressions and mannerisms were alienesque to the point of being downright freakish. And sometimes, they were so relaxed and human my brain would forget who we were dealing with and my body responded.
The closeness. The way he touched me like I was precious and would break. The way he looked at me as if I were the only one of my kind. How he put the care of others before himself. I wasn’t ready to humanize Astaroth or for the reactions it stirred up. I didn’t know if I could give him what he wanted.
He focused on my chest where my fingers stroked the pendant. My heart thrummed in rhythm with it as he drew near, as if coaxing him closer. I wasn’t sure what scared me most, the stone itself or how the stone interpreted what I was feeling. Astaroth said it manifested our deepest desires of the current moment. And in this moment….
Astaroth’s cool fingertips touched mine. “How long will you deny your desire?”
My breath hitched as the stone hummed louder. Vibrations ebbed out from my center through my entire body. I tried to step away, to end the intense assault on my senses, but the wall met my back. Caged between it and Astaroth, he lowered his head as if to kiss me and laid his hand over mine.
The vibration struck one final time so intensely that my knees buckled, and my legs nearly gave out. A warmth like the summer sun blazed through me when he wrapped an arm around me to keep me from falling. The moment our chests touched, the air electrified and turned hazy. Infinity. That’s what I saw when I looked into his eyes. A forever of forevers with endless possibilities. Brilliant white stardust swirled to a tune guiding them. The melody grew louder. It pulsed in my ears as they shot toward an open meadow like a meteor of stars, showering the twinkling bits on the tree from the tapestry. Branches stretched and leaves curled up to catch every speck of dust.
Astaroth tore his gaze away and looked around. I wanted to turn his face back to mine and dive within their depths until I found that secret, peaceful scene again.
“Do you hear it?” he asked with astonishment, clutching me tighter.
His words broke the trance-like state. I focused on the muffled, broken tune. The same one I heard while soaring in his gaze. “Yeah. It sounds like my music box.”
He turned back to me, but the moment was gone—so was the tree—along with all the emotions that led us to this point. Now it felt awkward. I wriggled to get out of his hold. Astaroth set me down, his cheek rubbing mine as he straightened. When I stepped back, the music stopped.
“What just happened?”
A cocky smile tugged at his lips. “I believe the realm blessed our union.”
I clutched at the now-sleeping pendant, desperately wanting it to answer my question or refute his answer. “I need to think about all this.”
His smile turned into a thin line. The king I knew and expected had returned. “There is nothing to think about. It will happen.” It made my stomach sour when he stepped to the middle of the hall. “We should return. I need to meet with Mergle.”
“I finally get some alone time?”
Mirth oozed from him. “Fat chance.”
I rolled my eyes at his use of my phrase. He chuckled and exited the way we came in. His confident strides drew my attention, that warmth filling my belly. It’s only a lingering effect from the pendant, I told myself, not him or what he just declared.
I gave one last look at the goblin I found in the Goblin Circle. “Hey, you forgot to put that goblin’s name beneath him.”
Astaroth called over his shoulder, “He doesn’t have one.”