When Tinker Met Bell

  Why was Heather even still here? Bellamy figured she and her fellow Gothwitches would have been the first to leave.

  “Goblins don’t have fathers,” said Maya. “Or mothers. Or sisters. Don’t you know anything about goblins?”

  “I try not to,” sneered Heather.

  “They’re called Lost Boys because they don’t have families,” said Finn. “Some of us know a little something about that.”

  “Oh, really, Lone Wolf? Was this a story you heard from your cousin?” Heather asked with complete insensitivity. Finn’s cousins did live in the Falls, but he’d only come to town because his original wolf-shifter pack had beaten him and left him for dead.

  Finn stood up with a growl and bared his teeth at the witch. It wasn’t Kai who held him back—of all people, it was Owen. “It’s not worth it, mate.”

  “Tinker has no desire to be in Goblin City,” said Hubble. “Trust me.”

  “He’s going to be a king,” Heather argued. “Who wouldn’t want to be king?”

  “Yeah,” said the first Gothwitch.

  “All hail King Tinker,” said the other.

  Hubble threw his mask and hat on the ground and stomped up to Heather and her cronies. No one held him back. “Have you ever been to Goblin City? Any of you?”

  No one answered. Because no one had. As a child, Bellamy had heard stories from her parents, fairy tales from distant lands, but she could never be sure which parts were true.

  “Goblin City is a trash pile. Kobolds are hoarders by nature, and even we make fun of the goblins. Their population is made up of a bunch of ex-human freak kids no one wanted. The Lost Boys become thieves and ne’er-do-wells who live hard and die young. Their ‘city’ is a dilapidated maze, and their vaults are full of worthless garbage.”

  Now that he had everyone’s attention, Hubble hopped up on the stone wall beside Bellamy and Kai. “Do any of you remember the last time there was a goblin at Harmswood? No. Because there hasn’t been one. Tinker got here on a scholarship because he was smart. Is smart. At Harmswood, he had an opportunity to do something useful with his life. He had the chance to be a productive member of society. Now he gets to be King of Nothing. Yeah. Lucky him.”

  Heather, never one to admit defeat, crossed her arms over her chest. “Fine. Bellamy, what do you want to do?”

  “I agree,” said Lian. “This is all up to Bellamy.”

  “Whatever you need us to do, Bellamy,” said Ace. His gargoyle brethren fanned out behind him, like soldiers. “Just say the word.”

  For the second time that night Bellamy was dumbstruck. She had sat there, coming out of her shock, watching this drama unfold, and only now did she realize why Heather was still in the courtyard. Why they all were.

  They were there for her.

  The cheerleading squad. The sports teams. The masquerade decorating committee. The parade planners. The festival staffers. Every kid in her classes. Every girl on her floor. Every werewolf, witch, and gargoyle she’d ever made a drink for at The Hallowed Bean.

  Bellamy clasped her hands together and beamed with pride. Her circle of friends was so much bigger than Kai and Maya and Tinker and Owen and Finn. It encompassed this whole courtyard. The whole school. This was her tribe. Her true family. Her Harmswood family.

  “What do you want to do, Bellamy?” Kai asked softly.

  “I want to find a way,” she answered tentatively.

  “A way to do what?” asked Sam.

  Bellamy knew her words wouldn’t be as eloquent as Hubble’s, but she got them out anyway. “Maybe Tinker and I have a future together, maybe we don’t, but I have to find out. If Tinker wants to come back to Harmswood, I want to find a way to make that possible.”

  “Being king—no matter what he’s king of—comes with responsibilities,” said Kwasi. The son of a god knew a thing or two about that kind of responsibility.

  Hubble, still perched on the stone wall, gave Kwasi a withering look.

  “He may not be in a position to return is all I’m saying,” Kwasi added.

  “It’s a good point,” said Bellamy. “If Tinker doesn’t want to come back, or if it’s not possible, then I just want to find a way to communicate with him in Goblin City. We lost him, but that doesn’t mean he has to lose us.”

  Bellamy looked directly at Hubble when she said that last part; the kobold nodded in solidarity. She didn’t have to wait long for her other friends to chime in.

  “Yeah.”

  “Tinker’s not getting rid of us that easily.”

  “His stupid jokes actually made Physics bearable.”

  “If I can’t cheat off his paper, how else am I going to pass Calculus?”

  “Our early morning pick-up games won’t be the same without him.”

  “He still owes me ten bucks,” Sam added with a wink.

  “Let’s do it,” said Hubble.

  Bellamy’s smile grew even brighter. Tinker constantly told her that nobody at Harmswood cared about him—she wished he could see this show of support right now. They might not have said so out loud, but the students here loved Tinker just as much as they loved Bellamy. He was, for better or worse, an essential part of their world.

  “I know what we have to do.” Bellamy sat up straight; Kai’s hands fell away from her shoulders. “We’re going to get him back.”

  “When you say ‘we,’” said Kai, “who do you mean exactly?”

  “I can hold my own in a fight,” said Finn. “As can any of the were-shifters.” Every were in the crowd added their agreements.

  “And the gargoyles,” said Ace. “We’ve got strength.”

  “And we’ve got power,” Maya said, indicating herself, Kai, and even Heather.

  Kwasi chimed in. “I’ve got a few tricks up my sleeve,” he said with a twinkle in his dark eyes.

  “With all due respect,” Hubble announced to the crowd, “she means me.”

  “And me,” Sam and Natalie said in unison.

  “They’re right,” said Bellamy. “Hubble and Sam and Natalie are exactly who I had in mind.” For one thing, by the time they made a plan, most of these folks would have departed for winter break. Hubble, Sam and Natalie’s families could only afford to bring them home for the summer.

  There was silence for a moment as the crowd considered Bellamy’s decision.

  “I get why Hubble should go, since he knows more about goblins than any of us,” Finn said to Bellamy. “But—no offense, guys— wouldn’t it make more sense for someone like Owen or me to come with you?”

  Owen puffed out his chest. “I do happen to be brilliant at spy work.”

  “Sam and Natalie are uniquely qualified for this job,” said Hubble. “They have been questing in dungeons with Tinker and me since they arrived at Harmswood.”

  “You mean that game you guys play,” sneered Heather. “Not actual dungeons.”

  “Does it matter?” Hubble asked. “Training is mental as well as physical. We aren’t just a team, we’re a well-oiled machine. Each of us knows how the other thinks. We can communicate without speaking. We can anticipate each other’s moves and play to our strengths. We can get to Tinker—and get him out—in the fastest, most efficient way possible.”

  “He’s right,” said Sam. The gargoyles and weres were also nodding—they knew about teams and packs.

  “We can do it,” said Natalie. In her blood red outfit, with that impressive skull headdress, she looked ready to lead a raiding party. No one was about to contradict her.

  “But we’ll still need everyone’s help to prepare,” Bellamy told her friends. “We’ll meet up with each of you separately as our plan unfolds. In the meantime, we should get some rest. Thank y’all so very, very much. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

  Kai hugged her. “We love you, Bell.”

  “I’m so sorry this happened,” said Finn.

  “We’ll make those dirty goblins pay for what they’ve done,” said Owen.

  Maya squeezed her hand. “A
nything you need.”

  One by one, the rest of the student body bid their personal farewells to Bellamy. Each kind word seemed to heal a piece of her broken heart. Let your friends lift you up for a change, Kai had told her. And so they had.

  “Come on,” Lian said, when there were only a handful of people left in the courtyard. “Natalie and I will walk you back to the room.”

  Bellamy nodded. Despite her instructions for everyone to go to bed, there was no way she’d be getting any sleep tonight. But she had the seed of a plan now, and enough hope to see her through its execution.

  As they crossed the quiet, empty courtyard, the snow began to fall again.

  “Totally off the subject,” Bellamy said to her friends, “but do either of you have any idea what happened to my sister?”

  8

  Tinker opened his eyes…and then slammed them shut again.

  He didn’t want to be awake. He didn’t want this life to be the real one.

  He didn’t remember much of the night before. His non-traditional arrival in the Goblin City had left him spellsick. Unable to stand or speak, Tinker remembered succumbing to the blackness again sometime in the middle of Maker Deng’s magnanimous greeting.

  He didn’t remember dreaming, which was a shame. He would have liked to have been in that snow globe one last time. In Bellamy’s arms. In that perfect moment full of golden hair and glitter and laughter and hope and the possibility of a future together.

  Theirs was a love worth giving up a kingdom for.

  But recalling those moments wouldn’t help anyone right now. Tinker shoved the image of his beloved fairy into a mental vault and locked her there. He needed to show no emotion the next time he met with the Goblin King. Tinker’s feelings would do nothing but give Maker the upper hand.

  Think about something else.

  Tinker slowly rose to a sitting position. Every bit of his body was sore, from the tips of his toes to the top of his head. He’d been moved to a room in the keep, he guessed. Some sort of servant quarters, judging by the considerable lack of “treasures” junking up the walls. It might have also been a guest room. The Lost Boys took over this castle and occupied its grounds hundreds of years ago, but goblins had neither guests nor servants, so the majority of the keep went unused.

  Both the bed and room were bigger than his dorm at Harmswood. Was this to be his chamber now? Like his first year at school, he didn’t feel like he belonged in it. It was too empty.

  And there was no Hubble.

  One tall goblin and one short kobold with very few resources between them still managed to accumulate a lot of stuff. And it had been great stuff. Everything that Tinker and Hubble had amassed over the years had a memory attached to it—the sum of their hoard could retell their lives. As a collection it would have been worthless in the eyes of their fancy-pants schoolmates, but each item meant something to them. Like a 3D scrapbook.

  Everything in Goblin City had been obtained because it held some perceived value to someone else, somewhere else. In Tinker’s eyes, if an object didn’t have personal purpose or meaning—be it a diamond or a gum wrapper—it was junk.

  Certainly not an opinion shared by the reigning Goblin King.

  The image of Bellamy’s makeshift necklace popped into Tinker’s mind unbidden, its flash of dull silver dangling from a blue ribbon. So much faith and love embodied in one heart-shaped piece of tin. He was a fool for ever calling it garbage.

  One goblin’s trash is another fairy’s treasure.

  Oh, Bellamy…

  Think about something else.

  His clothes had been changed, he noticed. The fancy costume was gone, replaced by a threadbare shirt and loose trousers that were too short for his frame. It was for the best. Seeing those ruffles again would have been too painful, for many reasons.

  Sunlight crept in through a crack in the curtains and streaked across Tinker’s bed. There was glitter on his pillow. He left it there.

  There was a cursory knock on the door before Retcher entered with a tray of food. The tray had once been a shield, stolen from some ancient warrior or rescued from some foreign battlefield. Judging by the decadent smell, the food it bore was Aberdeen’s apple cake: a treat Tinker only ever had on special occasions, but a breakfast fit for a prince. There was fresh coffee, too. The bittersweet odor was like a punch in the gut.

  If he couldn’t get back to Nocturne Falls, there would be no more meetings to play Dungeons and Dragons at the Bean. Bellamy would never make coffee for him again.

  Bellamy…

  Think about something else.

  Retcher looked tired.

  “Let me take that, old man.” Tinker moved the tray to his bed and pulled up a chair. “Rest your weary bones.”

  “Not long ago I would have taken you over my knee for that remark,” said Retcher. “But I’m afraid these weary bones have only gotten wearier. And you’re a prince now.”

  “I will always be that ragamuffin baby you rescued from the trash heap,” said Tinker. But as much as he would have enjoyed a convivial visit with Retcher, he wanted to get the lay of the land. “Have you come to deliver me to the king?”

  “All in good time,” Retcher said as he settled into the chair with a grunt. “In anticipation of his upcoming retirement, King Maker has started sleeping in. He refuses to make any appointments before midday.”

  “Midday? What time is it now?” Tinker gave Retcher the side-eye. “After all the king went through to bring me back to the city, he’d rather sleep instead of see me?”

  “Of course. Now that you’re back, the rest comes easier.”

  It made a bizarre sort of sense, when very little in the last few weeks had made any sense at all. “Retcher, what’s really going on? You and I both know I have no business being anywhere near the king’s throne.”

  “Is that why you ignored all his requests to come home?”

  “Mostly,” said Tinker. Which was mostly the truth. Maker did have a tendency to change his mind at the drop of a hat…but apparently not after dropping a Mantle of Majesty.

  Retcher cleared his overly-phlegmy throat. “Well, I for one am glad you’re back.”

  “Where’s Quin?” If Tinker was going to put the original heir to the throne back in his rightful place, he needed to know where to begin.

  Retcher chuckled. “Pretty Boy caught the wrong end of the Goblin King on the wrong day.”

  “Don’t let Maker catch you calling him that,” said Tinker. He and a handful of the boys had started calling Quin “Pretty Boy” in secret. The name never should have caught on, but it was just too fitting.

  Quin had always been the perfect specimen of goblinhood: strong and handsome, and he knew it. But then, the Mantle of Majesty had been bestowed upon Quin at a very young age. It never occurred to Tinker to put two and two together. He and all his goblin brothers just assumed Quin had won the genetic lottery, while the rest of them grew greener and wartier as the years went on.

  “Quin’s ego was always going to be his downfall,” said Tinker. “It was only a matter of time. But what happened that pushed Maker so far over the edge?”

  Retcher cracked his thick, wart-covered knuckles. “Maker found out that Quin was keeping a special squad, separate from the king’s own goblin gangs.”

  “Quin organized his own unit? What did he have them doing?”

  “His bidding, mostly.” The end of the statement was lost in a raspy cough. “You gonna drink that?”

  Tinker didn’t like the sound of that cough. His gaze dropped to the cooling mug of coffee on the tray beside him; he’d completely forgotten it was there. “You want it? It’s all yours. And…wait, is that fresh cream?” He couldn’t remember the last time Goblin City had seen fresh dairy products of any sort.

  Retcher dumped a generous splash of said cream into the mug. “You know how Pickafur’s always been good with animals…”

  “Yeah,” said Tinker.

  “Aberdeen convinced Maker to steal hi
m a cow. So we did.”

  Tinker raised an eyebrow. Over the years, Tinker and Retcher had had many discussions about the merits of teaching the Lost Boys how to legitimately fend for themselves, as opposed to stealing everything they needed to survive. It wasn’t a concept Maker had ever been on board with. Goblins had always been the thieving pirates of the paranormal world, and the Goblin King didn’t see any reason to completely overhaul his people’s way of life.

  “Aberdeen convinced the king?”

  Retcher shrugged and scratched his oversized nose. “I may have had some small say in it, but the final decision was Maker’s alone. And thank goodness. The quality of the apple cake has gone up considerably. Good enough that if you don’t eat yours up right quick, I’ll happily polish it off for you.”

  Tinker was about to offer Retcher the cake, but his stomach growled in protest.

  Retcher pointed at the tray. “Eat! You’ll not get out of this crown prince business by dying of starvation. I won’t let you.”

  Did Retcher suspect Tinker’s plan to “get out of this crown prince business” at the first opportunity? Not that he had a plan yet—there hadn’t been time to make one. But soon…

  Reluctantly, Tinker took a bite of the apple cake. Aberdeen had outdone himself. It was both flaky and moist in the most delicious way. The chunks of apple were soft and sweet. He would have thought changing the recipe in any way was blasphemy, but Aberdeen had gone and made something exquisite. And yet, the flavor still reminded Tinker of autumn, and home.

  Home.

  He had never hated being home before. But then, Goblin City had never felt like a prison before.

  A single tear, sponsored by all the memories he’d tried to lock away, managed to escape. Tinker let it fall.

  Retcher nodded. “Told you it was good.”

  Tinker concentrated on chewing.

  With a groan, his mentor lifted himself up from the chair and swatted at some of the hair that fell into his face. “Come on. Grab the tray. You can thank Aberdeen yourself. I know how much he loves to see you. You always were his favorite.”

  Tinker took up the shield and followed Retcher—still leisurely sipping his coffee—out the door. They passed by a badly-scarred chest of drawers, on top of which sat the Mantle of Malice and the goblin mask that Sam and Natalie had made him.