news about the goblin, and the bread was forgotten, along with everything else, save Dougal.
As the night lengthened, Griffin stayed on the periphery of the activity, fetching wood and water as required, watching over Nessa from afar. She sat at the rough kitchen table, stone-faced and calm, accepting a knocker-full of hard corn whiskey, tossing it back with such ease even Griffin was astonished. Out of Nessa’s hearing, the women argued amongst themselves in lowered voices, alternatively scolding and silencing each other until Griffin wondered how Nessa could sit with such silent dignity. When the last of them had finally departed, it was well after midnight. But instead of going to her bed, she had risen to her feet and rolled her shoulders back in the same stretch with which she approached fire and forge, and reached for the small ax which hung beside the door.
“What are you doing?” he’d asked, puzzled by her obvious purpose. The fire illuminated her tunic. The stains of the day were lost in the play of shadow and the homespun fabric was pinkish in the red light. Her skin was rosy from the fire, color high on her cheekbones, her dark eyes focused with such calm determination, that, as she turned to face him, holding the ax, he was momentarily afraid of her. She looked like the Marrihugh, the warrior goddess, standing there beside the fire, her bare arms round with defined muscle, forearms corded with veins, fingertips still black with soot. Her shoulders were broad, her back was straight. She was not as tall as her father, but she was strong from a girlhood spent hammering molten metal over an anvil. “What are you doing, Nessa?”
“I’m going to find him,” she replied, in the same matter-of-fact tone she might’ve answered a customer.
“At this hour? The woods were searched—where do you mean to look?”
“I’m going into the OtherWorld, into TirNa’lugh. It’ll soon be dawn, and that’s the best time.”
He’d reached across the space that separated them, and grabbed her arm. “Nessie, that’s madness.”
They were just about the same height and she stared back at him, shaking off his arm. “Where else to look? The goblin appears, my father is missing. What else to think but that they are connected? Why else would my father just go off?”
Griffin stared at her, his mind a mad whirl. “Nessie, please—” How to say gently that Dougal might lay dead beneath the water? Dead within the forest? If Dougal had indeed killed the goblin, wasn’t it possible that the goblin had killed him? “Be reasonable. There’s nothing to prove he’s gone into the OtherWorld. What if he’s just lying somewhere—hurt or…even dead?” He whispered the last.
“I won’t believe that.” She lifted her chin in a challenge, her eyes hard nuggets of iron in her flushed face. He had stared at her as she dropped the ax into a leather sack, buckled her dagger around her waist, and wrapped her cloak over her shoulders. Then she slung the sack over her shoulder. “Not one of them—” she dismissed the whole village with a jerk of her head over her shoulder “—would dream of looking for him in the OtherWorld, and it will take an order from the Duke before anyone else dares.” Without another word, she left the house.
He scampered after her, up the hill, in the direction of Farmer Breslin’s sty. She had not replied to any other questions, nor even spoken until just now, when they were kneeling on either side of the goblin. He bit his lip, trying to think of something to say that would convince her to stay, but he knew her in this mood. Arguing was useless. She gripped the goblin’s matted hair and tugged, but the body had hardened into rigor and the head wouldn’t budge. “Then I’ll come with you.”
She rocked back on her heels, regarding him with surprised gratitude. “I know you’d come with me if I asked you to. According to the stories, if I’m alone I’ll have a better chance of getting across the border and into the OtherWorld.”
“And a better chance of getting out if we’re together. What if you run into something like this?” He gestured at the goblin.
“It’s at dusk the goblins hunt.”
“How can you believe the old stories?”
“You mean you can look on this and not?”
He shook his head, mind reeling with frustration and fatigue. “Of course I believe, we all believe now, I suppose. But how do you know the legends are right about everything? What if some of them are wrong? And what if you stumble into a nest of…of these?”
“I can take care of myself.” She patted the dagger which lay in the curve of her waist like a lover’s hand.
“Nessa, will you listen to me? This is madness. You must be moonmazed already if you think you can actually get into the OtherWorld and come back, let alone bring your father back, if that’s truly where he is. I—I mean, the OtherWorld is a big place. Where do you intend to look?”
“I’m going to the Queen, and I’m showing her the goblin’s head. Goblins shouldn’t even be able to get into Brynhyvar. Haven’t you ever heard of Bran Brownbeard?”
“Of course I have but maybe not every story’s true. Don’t you think you should at least talk to Granny Wren?”
“Granny Wren?” Her skeptical tone was a perfect echo of Dougal’s, an octave or so higher.
“She’s a wicce-woman, Nessa, surely you should talk to her before you go—”
“What’s corn magic got to do with goblins? There’s more to this than either of us understand, Griffin. Those visitors last night—the ones who came in so late? Papa recognized one of them, but the other was a sidhe. I saw the eyes when he drew back his hood, just as Papa ordered me back to bed. You think it’s coincidence that one of them comes to the forge late last night, when all decent folk are long abed, and then a dead goblin washes ashore upon our very lake? The same time as Papa disappears? Well, I don’t. For all I know, or you know, or anyone else for that matter, this was all part of some trap to snatch him into the OtherWorld. My mother was lost there, and I won’t lose him, too.” Momentarily her expression melted, as her mouth turned down and her eyes flooded with tears she blinked away hard. She squared her shoulders, mouth set once more in its firm line, and Griffin groaned inwardly. He knew that look. It was the one she habitually wore whenever Dougal set a challenge before them both. “I won’t let them have him. I don’t have time right now to listen to a wicce-woman repeat some ancient story all of us have heard a thousand times. I’ll find Papa and bring him home if it’s the last thing I do, I swear.” She got to her feet and swung the ax over her shoulder. Her hair tumbled down her arms and she thrust it back impatiently. Her father’s insistence that she keep her black curls long was his one recognition of his only child’s sex. “Stand back.”
Aghast by her casual savagery, Griffin moved back as she brought the ax down, the blade grazing the goblin’s slack jaw by a hair. It bit through the flesh and gristle and stopped with a dull thud in the neckbone. She tugged the blade free and raised it once more, heedless of the red slime dripping from it, and in one smooth motion, brought it all the way down again. This time the blade buried itself in the earth, and the head lolled back, rolling slightly to one side on the slight grade. Nessa handed Griffin the ax, picked the head up by the hair and shoved it without flinching into the sack. From somewhere close, a cock crowed experimentally. “I have to hurry.”
She slung the sack over her shoulder and picked up the lantern, as he flung the ax aside with disgust. Easier by far to make a new one, than to imagine cleaning off that gore. “What am I to tell everyone?” he whispered.
“The truth, of course. Oh. Here.” She set the sack down and felt beneath her tunic for the slender cord which held her silver amulet. She bent her head and worked it over her chin and through the tangled length of her hair. “Take it.” She held it out and stamped her foot as the cock crowed again. “I don’t have much time.”
He caught it as it dropped from her hand, then stumbled after her, his mind roiling with disbelief and desperation. With sure steps she strode up the road, through the silent, sleeping village. The crunch of their feet on the cold gravel was the only sound, their breath curling in long white