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Liliana kept her promises, even when it wasn’t easy.
She knocked on the big wooden door.
The lovely music stopped immediately. Liliana peeked with her fourth eyes and saw the tall, gangly goblin doctor setting the violin down, while Siobhan set aside a modified electric guitar, small enough for her to play comfortably in her not-quite-four-foot, red-headed human form.
The sprite had a look of fear on her face. She scrambled to Doctor Nudd’s bedroom and under his giant bed.
Liliana cocked her head. The sprite feared being found making music with the goblin. Since they were of opposing courts, Liliana had assumed that Doctor Nudd and Siobhan were merely acquaintances under an uneasy truce when she first saw them together. The jam session she interrupted indicated a deeper relationship.
On the other side of the ocean, such a friendship would have gotten them both executed by their respective rulers or lynched by their own people. Even on this continent, seelie and unseelie Fae rarely mixed. There were some who would enforce that separation with violence if necessary.
Liliana’s urge to turn around and go home increased as she saw the goblin walk toward his front door. She focused on the texture of the hand-knitted sweater in her hands and held her ground, even while every instinct urged her to flee. She looked down at the intricate patterns of the weave and tried not to let her nervousness drive her away from the ally who needed her, even if he didn’t know that he did.
Doctor Nudd opened the door.
Quickly, Liliana closed all but her human eyes.
His curly brown hair brushed the top of the oversized door frame. He looked out, then down at Liliana’s five-foot-two-inch form. “Oh, um, hello?” he said, like it was a question.
She’d never heard “Hello” stated as a question. She scrambled for the proper social response but came up with nothing.
Looking into him might have made this less awkward by giving her clues to the meaning behind his words, but she kept all but her two human eyes firmly closed. Her six spider eyes disturbed many people. Liliana did not want Doctor Nudd to be disturbed by her.
She thrust the sweater into the startled goblin’s hands. “I washed the blood out of it. I told you I would give it back.”
“Ah, excellent. Thank you!” Doctor Nudd said with obviously genuine feeling. “I never thought I’d see this again.”
“I keep my promises,” Liliana stated in her usual flat inflection.
“Oh, of course, I didn’t intend to imply that you wouldn’t, um…” The goblin seemed flustered and uncomfortable. She must have said something wrong, but she wasn’t sure what offense he could have taken to a plain statement of her level of honesty.
Liliana sighed with frustration. She should just go home. She was terrible at socializing. But she remembered the image she had seen of the goblin healer dying, a sword thrust through his chest, and the raw grief on Pete’s face when he was minutes too late to save his dear friend. They would both die if she gave into fear now.
The goblin stood in the doorway uncertainly. “Um, well, thank you again. For bringing the sweater back. It really means a lot to me.”
“You’re welcome.” If someone said thank you, she was supposed to say, “You’re welcome.” But she should add something to keep the conversation going. “You gave it to me because I was cold.”
“Indeed. I did,” Nudd said and stopped talking again.
Liliana fiddled with the hem of her cape, running it through her fingers and watching the movement of the bright fabric. She wanted to go into the goblin’s house, but she hadn’t been invited. She knew the rule, but the goblin doctor seemed to have forgotten it.
That was okay. She understood. She forgot that rule, too, sometimes.
“Was there something else?” Nudd asked.
That was close enough. “Yes.” She walked under the goblin’s long arm and into his house.
He closed the door behind her.
She was supposed to say something complimentary. “I like your music. It makes me want to dance in the grass.”
“Um, thank you, I suppose.”
“I didn’t, though. Maybe next time.” Liliana walked into his large, open living room. “I don’t like beer much, but I like tea.” She had seen that when Pete came to visit, the goblin always offered him beer. She sat down on his overstuffed brocade couch near the crackling fire.
“Well, just make yourself at home then,” Doctor Nudd said. His lips twisted funny, and his voice implied that the words didn’t quite mean what they said.
Liliana ignored the possible double meaning and took the words at face value. “Thank you. I like your house.” She closed her human eyes and listened to the deep-toned tick, tock, tick of his big antique grandfather clock while he went into the kitchen and made her tea.
