When Tinker Met Bell

  Tinker considered the situation. They all expected him to dole out some sort of punishment, that was for sure, but someone else’s suffering had never brought Tinker any pleasure. A side effect of Bellamy’s influence, to be sure.

  Think, you fool. Think. He needed to come up with a punishment that wasn’t really a punishment, and quickly.

  And then he saw Snot sneak Essie a reassuring pat.

  Tinker’s heart immediately went out to Snot, a lonely little goblin whose one joy was sharing candy with his best friend the cow. Tinker could almost hear Bellamy in his head: That poor sweet boy doesn’t need a kick in the pants; he needs a hug.

  “Nasty Word!” Tinker called out before his emotions could get the better of him.

  “Aye.” Nasty Word stepped out of the crowd. He was a rough specimen of goblinhood, with a long, angular face and one eye considerably larger than the other. He was also one of the best goblin squad leaders, second only to Retcher.

  “It’s not time for the report,” Pickafur argued. “You haven’t finished with me yet.”

  “I didn’t say I had,” Tinker said in as regal a tone as he could muster. “Nasty Word, could you make some room in your unit for Snot?”

  “Maybe,” Nasty Word said noncommittally.

  “Wonderful,” said Tinker, because no one refused the Goblin King. Or the almost-Goblin King.

  Snot stood tall—being appointed to a goblin squad was a promotion, not a punishment.

  Yet.

  “In addition to his regular duties,” Tinker added, “I’d like to put Snot in charge of candy acquisition. Make sure he collects enough to share with all his brothers.”

  Snot held his smiling chin so high, Tinker thought the boy might fall over. Pickafur harrumphed. Nasty Word sneered. The rest of the goblins in the room cheered at the prospect of more candy. Tinker caught Maker’s eye, and the Goblin King nodded his approval.

  For a moment, the cheering reminded Tinker of all the parades Nocturne Falls was famous for. The amount of candy and trinkets thrown into the crowds lining the streets was enough to keep Goblin City in candy for a year. Tinker refrained from mentioning this to the horde, however—all the Falls needed was a sudden influx of wild goblins stealing candy from babies.

  Bellamy had performed in every single one of those parades. The year the Harmswood cheering squad had done their routine on a float, Bellamy had spotted Tinker in the crowd and tossed him a salted caramel square—his favorite. She had selected the candy carefully and she hadn’t just thrown it to anyone. She’d chosen him.

  Oh, Bellamy. His heart ached.

  “Well, now that’s settled. Pickafur, please get your stinking livestock out of my castle,” said the Goblin King. “Nasty Word, what do you have to report?”

  As each of the squad leaders reported in, Tinker stepped back to a spot behind Maker’s throne. Once he became the true Goblin King, he’d have control of all the magic beneath the city. Somehow, there had to be a way to use that magic to contact Bellamy. Could he conjure something as innocuous as a phone call? How would that work? And even if he found out how to make it work, would she answer? It would be winter break at Harmswood now—had she gone home to her family in South Carolina?

  Winter break. Tinker had officially missed all of his midterms. He was actually sad about that. He wondered how the Romeo and Juliet skit had gone over at the festival. He wondered if they’d added new seasonal drinks to the Bean’s menu. He wondered if the weather had changed.

  He wondered if anyone missed him at all.

  The melancholy stayed with him until after the audience, when they retired to Maker’s chambers. The Goblin King tossed his crown on the table. He ran a hand over his short hair and massaged his temples. “I think that went well. Don’t you?”

  Tinker shrugged. “I’m trying my best to follow your lead, but I still feel like I’m just making it up as I go along.”

  Maker gave Tinker a dashing, gap-toothed grin. “I’ll tell you a secret: I’ve been making it all up since the day I got this job.”

  “Really?” Tinker had a hard time imagining Maker as a young goblin, receiving the Mantle of Majesty and similarly having no idea what to do with it. But he must have been in that situation at some point. The idea that Maker didn’t always know exactly what he was going to do next did lift Tinker’s spirits.

  “Just always remember to have fun.” Maker pulled a face at himself in the ornate full-length mirror, and then laughed heartily. “The moment it stops being fun, that’s when you know it’s time to step down and move on.”

  Every time Maker mentioned moving on, it sounded like the day was fast approaching. “There’s still so much I don’t know,” said Tinker.

  “How long have I been king? There’s still a lot I don’t know,” said Maker. “No one warned me that we might recruit a boy who was so smart that his mentor would have to get a scholarship to send him away to school. Though to be fair, Retcher did warn me about you. Maybe that’s not the best example. Oh! I know. I had no one around to tell me what to do when intruders came to the city. Had to figure it all out on my own.”

  “That’s because no one in a hundred years or so has ever traveled here to take back a Lost Boy,” said Tinker.

  “Except now,” said Maker.

  “What?!” Tinker was so surprised he almost screeched the question.

  The Goblin King led Tinker back to the table where he’d thrown his crown and pulled away a silk cloth. Beneath it was a crystal ball the size of a large candy apple from Delaney’s. Maker picked up the ball and said, “Show me the intruders.”

  The surface of the crystal went cloudy, silver, and then dark, before lightening to reveal a scene somewhere in the Myrkwood outside the city. Quin Merchero led four figures through the dense trees. One of the bodies was rather short and one was fairly tall. All wore hooded cloaks that shielded their faces from the scrying ball.

  Tinker had an inkling who those figures might be, but he was too afraid to hope. “Quin’s out of the oubliette?” he asked instead.

  “The intruders helped him escape, apparently,” said Maker. “As far as I can tell, one’s a kobold, one’s a were-shifter of some sort, and the other two appear to be human girls. As we don’t have any kobolds or weres among the Lost Boys, I can only assume it’s the girls who have come to ‘rescue’ one of our boys.”

  “Any idea which boy?” Tinker’s heart was pounding so hard he could barely breathe. The kobold and the were-shifter—how did Maker know Sam was a were?—could only be Hubble and Sam, which meant the taller of the girls had to be Natalie. Tinker prayed that the other traveler was Bellamy. She didn’t have pointed ears, the telltale marker of most fey, so she might have been mistaken for human. There could still be fairy wings hiding under that cloak.

  “No idea who they’re after,” said Maker. “Maybe one of the newer recruits? I could have Nasty or Retcher pull a list together, not that it matters. Besides, I’d think you would be more concerned with Quin coming back to fight you for his rightful place.”

  “Oh, I am,” Tinker lied. “I am absolutely worried about that. What do you suggest I do?”

  “Bah. Don’t worry,” said Maker. “I switched the marker at the last fork they took. Quin thinks he’s leading them back to the castle, but I’ve sent him to the trolls instead. If your luck is good, they’ll all be eaten up and you won’t have to deal with Quin. Or any of them.”

  “Joy,” Tinker said with no joy at all.

  “If your luck is bad, you’ll probably end up having to fight Quin to the death.” The Goblin King looked almost giddy at the prospect. “I’m incredibly tempted to stick around to see which way it goes! But I’ve seen goblins fight before. Know what I haven’t seen? Butterflies.”

  In one smooth motion, Maker tossed the crystal ball to Tinker, snapped his fingers, and—with a small bow—stepped backward through the shimmering mirror.

  By the time Tinker caught the ball, the Goblin King was gone.

 
Tinker stared at the crystal ball. Then he stared at the crown on the table. In truth, the Goblin King hadn’t gone at all. King Maker Deng had exited Goblin City…and left King Ranulf Tinkerton in his place.

  Tinker was now the Goblin King.

  He had absolutely no idea what to do.

  Ignoring the crown on the table, Tinker sat down in the nearest chair. As of this moment, he was the Goblin King. I am the Goblin King, he tried to say aloud, but even thinking it sounded ridiculous. In his hands, the scene still played out inside the crystal ball. The five tiny figures tromped through the Myrkwood, ever closer to their doom.

  Bellamy.

  The first thing he had to do was stop Bellamy from being eaten by a troll.

  “Bellamy!” Tinker screamed at the crystal ball. “Hubble! Sam! Natalie! Quin!” Try as he might, no one heard him, not even his goblin brother. Tinker wracked his brain, trying to think of a way to help them. He growled in frustration. Now that he was king, he should be able to harness the magic beneath the city. But how?

  Physics.

  Magic was a chaotic force, but it still had to follow certain laws of the universe. Laws that he’d studied in school…

  There was at least enough magic running through his body to keep the crystal ball activated. He decided he probably shouldn’t let it go, in case it stopped working and he couldn’t turn it back on again. One by one, he focused on every single one of his friends, trying to communicate. He concentrated on the Myrkwood itself, trying to alter the direction of the path, as Maker had done. He closed his eyes and imagined the magic below the city coming up through the soles of his feet, into his body, out through his hands, and into the crystal sphere.

  “Bellamy!”

  Nothing.

  Tinker paced the room, focused on the crystal. He tried standing and sitting and lying down. He called out every magic spell word from every book he could remember; he even made up some of his own. All he got for his efforts was a splitting headache.

  Eventually he laid down with the ball on the pillow beside him. His friends were building a campfire and getting ready to sleep. Quin stood at the edge of the clearing, glancing into the wood with concern.

  He knows it’s not the right path back to the castle, Tinker thought. How do I convince him to trust his instincts?

  Tinker wasn’t looking forward to a fight with Quin. But he’d rather face a deathmatch than watch the people he loved become a troll’s dinner.

  His head on the pillow, Tinker began to think about the ball itself. His mind wandered back to Professor Hagar’s class, the day after he’d been given the Mantle. The lesson on reflection and refraction. If Tinker could summon even the tiniest bit of magic through the crystal, it was possible that the curve of the sphere would amplify it. If the magic stayed trapped inside the crystal, it might bounce around and amplify further. Totally just a theory, of course. Tinker still couldn’t summon any magic at all. But Professor Hagar would have been proud of him for remembering how it was supposed to work.

  Exhausted by his efforts, Tinker fell asleep pondering that lesson. Instead of magic, Tinker dreamed that he sent himself inside the crystal. He stood over Bellamy’s sleeping form. Her cloak was pulled tightly around her body. Shadows of the firelight danced across her face. Tinker bent down to touch her, but his hand passed right through her hair.

  Stupid dreams.

  “My, my, my.”

  Tinker whipped his head around. Bellamy’s dream-self stood before him in a white silk dress. Her golden hair and luminous wings gleamed like something that belonged on the top of a Christmas tree. And she still wore that tin heart—Tinker’s heart—on a ribbon around her neck.

  “I’ve made a wish to dream about you every night since you left us, but this is the first time it’s actually happened. What took you so long?”

  Tinker rushed to Bellamy and tried to take her in his arms, but it wasn’t the same. He could feel the pressure of her dream essence against his, but it was an odd, tingly feeling. Nothing like an actual hug.

  “This is so not fair,” Tinker groaned.

  “I know.” Bellamy’s dream fingers caressed the essence of his cheek.

  “You…you came.” He pointed to the bodies sound asleep around the small campfire. “You all came. Why?”

  “Because you didn’t say goodbye.” Bellamy smiled mischievously. “Silly boy. We love you. There was never a question of whether or not we’d come after you. Goodness, the entire school was fightin’ over who was gonna bring you back.”

  “But I…I’m sorry. What about the school?” Surely he hadn’t heard her right.

  “I’m pretty sure Natalie has video of the whole thing, if you don’t believe me. All of Harmswood wanted to come rescue you—students and faculty. We wouldn’t even be here without Professor Blake’s help. Ranulf Tinkerton, you are loved so much more than you realize.”

  Tinker didn’t think anyone outside this campfire cared for him that much, never mind the Head Witch or anyone else at Harmswood. Under the current circumstances, however, he wasn’t sure how much it mattered any more.

  “Bellamy”—it was so annoying not to be able to take her hand!—“I’m king now.”

  Her hands flew to her face and her wings fluttered. “Oh my goodness! Since when?”

  “A few hours ago, maybe? It all happened so fast.”

  Futile as it was, Bellamy’s dream-self hugged him again anyway. “Tinker, that’s wonderful! I am so proud of you. We’ll be at the castle soon, and you can tell us all about it! I guess this means we can’t properly rescue you, and that’s a shame. Everyone at school will be so disappointed. But we’ll be able to set up some proper lines of communication, won’t we? King or not, Mister Tinkerton, I refuse to let you be gone from me forever. There has to be a way for us to keep in touch.”

  Tinker was so overwhelmed by the sheer Bellamy-ness of her answer that he almost lost control of the dream. They’d been apart for such a short time, but he missed her light and optimism like a choking man missed oxygen.

  Tinker also knew Bellamy better than he knew himself. The rapid-fire pace of her congratulations meant she was nervous. Finding out he was already king devastated her as much as it did him, but she’d still put a positive spin on it. She’d also thrown him an easy way out of their relationship with all her talk of “keeping in touch.”

  “Bellamy,” he interrupted. “I don’t want to be king.”

  “You don’t?”

  “No. I never did. I want to go back to school. I want to be with you.” He put his dream hand on hers and merged their essence. “I want to be rescued.”

  The smile she gave him then mended every crack in his broken heart.

  “I don’t know enough about the goblin magic yet to be able to bring you straight to the city. I’m sorry.”

  “That’s all right.” The tone of her voice was so very sweet. “We’ve made it this far; we can make it the rest of the way.”

  Not if they got eaten by trolls first. “Bellamy, the Goblin King changed the direction of your path before he left. You’re going the wrong way. Quin knows it.”

  “Quin. He was the one who was supposed to be king, wasn’t he? I guessed that.”

  “Yes,” said Tinker. “So…any chance he still wants the job?”

  Bellamy nodded. “Oh, yes. I think so.”

  For the first time in a long time, Tinker felt the first stirrings of relief. “I suspect he still has more of an affinity with the goblin magic than I do. Just please tell him to trust his instincts.”

  “I will.”

  “But before you come to the castle at all, I need to ask you a really important question.” Now that he had her alone, away from Hubble and school and everyone else, there was no better time to have this conversation.

  “Of course! Ask away.”

  “I’ve had some time to think while I’ve been here and I realized: you and I have always been pawns in someone else’s game. We were thrown together when we were just kids,
and we keep being thrown together. Hubble orchestrated that whole thing at the masquerade—”

  “My sister had a hand in that too,” Bellamy mumbled.

  “—even Professor Blake got you here. But there are reasons goblins and fairies aren’t supposed to be together, beyond the allergy thing. I mean, you’re going to live a long and fruitful life; I’ll be lucky to get another fifty good years.”

  Bellamy’s brow furrowed. It was obvious she hadn’t stopped to do that math either.

  “The day we met, you looked at me and didn’t see a pathetic, sniveling goblin boy, you saw the amazing person I could be. You saw the Goblin King before I even became him. Loving you meant never being able to hug you or hold your hand or wipe away your tears or kiss you beneath a starry sky, but for me, just being with you was enough. If we could only meet like this, in our dreams, forever, I would sleep my life away.”

  There were dream-tears in Bellamy’s eyes. “Tinker, what are you askin’ me?”

  “Do you want to be with me? We became friends because we were victims of circumstance—maybe we still are. And I might have an idea about how to make things work out. But I don’t want to do anything until I know that you’ve come all the way to Goblin City because you want to be with me, not just because you can.”

  “Oh, Tinker.” Bellamy shook her head; the dream curls of her rainbow-streaked hair floated around her in slow motion. “All I know is, I love you. Maybe everyone else had somethin’ to do with us meetin’ and maybe not. But I have loved you since that moment, and lovin’ you was no one’s decision but mine.”

  Tinker smiled at the fairy who loved him. “I really want to kiss you right now.”

  “So do I,” she said. “Soon. In the meantime, tell me a little bit about your plan. Are you goin’ to give the crown back to Quin?”

  “Seems like a better plan than fighting to the death,” he said. “But the goblins as a people still need a lot of help. Having lived most of my life outside Goblin City, I can see the issues so clearly now. I think I can serve the goblins best if I become a bridge between the Goblin King and the outside world. I’m just… I’m just not sure about the details.”