Susan and I had come in sprinting down the center aisle between the tables. We must have startled our hosts, who reacted only in time to catch the second batch of intruders to come through—and catch them they had. Some of the largest of the beings, easily weighing half a ton themselves, had piled onto the Ick and held it pinned to the earth. Nearby, the mob of vampires were lumped more or less together, each one entangled in nets made out of some material that I can only describe as flexible barbed wire.

Only Esteban and Esmerelda stood on their feet, back- to-back, between the Ick and the netted minions. There was blood on the floor near them, and two of the native creatures were lying still upon the stone floor.

“Jesus,” Susan whispered. “What are those things?”

“I . . .” I swallowed. “I think they’re goblins.”

“You think?”

“I’ve never seen one before,” I replied. “But . . . they match the descriptions I’ve heard.”

“Shouldn’t we be able to handle, like, a million of them?”

I snorted. “You liked those movies, too, huh?”

Her reply was a smile, one touched with sadness.

“Yeah,” I said. “I was thinking of you when I saw them, too.” I shook my head. “And no. This is a case of folklore getting it wrong. These guys are killers. They’re sneaky and they’re smart and they’re ruthless. Like ninjas. From Krypton. Look what they did.”

Susan stared at the downed Red Court strike team for a moment. I watched the wheels turn in her head as she processed what had happened to the vampires and the Ick, in a handful of seconds, in complete darkness and in total silence.

“Um. I guess we’d better make nice, then, huh?” Susan asked. She slipped her club around behind her back and put on her old reporter’s smile, the one she used to disarm hostile interviewees.

And then I had a thought.

A horrible, horrible thought.

I turned slowly around. I looked at the wall I’d been standing against.

And then I looked up.

It wasn’t a wall, exactly. It was a dais. A big one. Atop it sat a great stone throne.

And upon the throne sat a figure in black armor, covered from head to toe. He was huge, nine feet tall at least, and had a lean, athletic look to him despite the armor. His helm covered his head and veiled his face with darkness, and great, savagely pointed antlers rose up from the helmet, though whether they were adornment or appendage I couldn’t say. Within the visor of that helmet was a pair of steady red eyes, eyes that matched the thousands of others in the hall.

He leaned forward, the Lord of the Goblins of Faerie, leader of the Wild Hunt, nightmare of story and legend and peer of the Queen of Air and Darkness, Mab herself.

“Well,” murmured the Erlking. “Well, well, well. Isn’t this interesting .”

Chapter 36

I stared up at the Erlking, and with my typical pithy brilliance said, “Uh-oh.”

The Erlking chuckled, a deep sound. It echoed around the hall, resonating from the stone, amplified into subtle music. If I’d had any doubts that I was standing at the heart of the Erlking’s power, that laugh and the way the hall had responded in harmony took care of them for me. “It seems, my kin, that we have guests.”

More chuckles rose up from a thousand throats, and evil red eyes crinkled with amusement.

“I confess,” the Erlking said, “that this is a . . . unique event. We are unaccustomed to visitors here. I trust you will be patient whilst I blow the dust from the old courtesies.”

Again, the goblins laughed. The sound seemed to press directly against whatever nerve raised the hairs on my arms.

The Erlking rose, smooth and silent despite his armor and his mass, and descended from the dais. He walked around to loom over us, and I took note of the huge sword at his side, its pommel and hilt bristling with sharp metal protrusions that looked like thorns. He studied us for a moment and then did two things I hadn’t really expected.

First, he took off his helmet. The horns were, evidently, fixed to the dark metal. I braced myself to view something horrible but . . . the Lord of Goblins was nothing like what I had expected.

Upon his face, the hideous asymmetries of the goblins of his hall were all reflected and somehow transformed. Though he, too, shared the irregular batch of features, upon him their fundamental repulsiveness was muted into a kind of roguish distinction. His crooked nose seemed something that might have been earned rather than gifted. Old, faint scars marred his face, but only added further grace notes to his appearance. Standing there before the Erlking, I felt as if I were looking at something handcrafted by a true master, perhaps carved from a piece of twisted drift-wood, given its own odd beauty, and then patiently refined and polished into something made lovely by its sheer, unique singularity.

There was power in that face, too, in his simple presence. You could feel it in the air around him, the tension and focus of a pure predator, and one who rarely failed to bring down his prey.

The second thing he did was to bow with inhuman elegance, take Susan’s hand, and bend to brush his lips across the backs of her fingers. She stared at him with wide eyes that were more startled than actually afraid, and she kept her smile going the whole time.

“Lady huntress,” he said. “The scent of fresh blood hangs upon you. Well does it become your nature.”

He looked at me and smiled, showing his teeth, which were white and straight and even, and I had to fight to keep from flinching from his gaze. The Erlking had a score to settle with me. I had better come up with a plan, and fast, or I was a dead man.

“And the new Knight of Winter,” he continued. “I nearly had thee at Arctis Tor, when the ogres caught up to thee upon the slopes. Hadst thou departed but threescore heartbeats later . . .” He shook his head. “Thou art an intriguing quarry, Sir Knight.”

I bowed to the Erlking in what I hoped was a respectful fashion. “I do thank thee for the compliment, O King,” I said. “Though it is chance, not design, that brought me hither, I am humbled by thy generosity in accepting us into thine home as guests. Mine host.”

The Erlking cocked his head slightly to one side, and then his mouth turned up into another amused smile. “Ah. Caught out by mine own words, ’twould seem. Courtesy is not a close companion unto me, so perhaps it is meet that in a duel of manners, thou wouldst have the advantage. And this hall honors cleverness and wisdom as much as strength.”

A murmur of goblin voices ran through the hall at his words, because I’d just done something impossibly impudent. I’d dropped myself into the dinner hall of the greatest hunter of Faerie—practically thrown myself onto a plate with an apple in my mouth, in fact—and then used an idle slip of his tongue to claim the ancient rights of protection as his guest, thus obligating him, as host, to uphold those responsibilities to me.

I’ve said it before. The customs of host and guest are a Big Deal to these people. It’s insane, but it’s who they are.

I bowed my head to him respectfully, rather than saying anything like, Gee, it’s not often one of the fae gets outwitted by a lowly human, which should be proof enough for anyone that I’m not entirely devoid of diplomatic skills. “I should not wish to intrude upon your hospitality any longer than is absolutely necessary, Lord of Hunters. With your goodwill, we will depart immediately and trouble you no more.”

“Do not listen to it, O Erlking,” called a woman’s clear soprano. It was easy to recognize Esmerelda. “It speaks honeyed words with a poisoned tongue, full intent upon deceiving you.”

The Erlking turned to regard the pair of vampires, still on their feet despite the efforts of the goblins who had initially attacked them. He studied them in complete silence for several seconds and then, after a glance at the fallen goblins near them, inclined his head. “Hunters of the Red Court, I bid ye continue. I listen. Pray tell me more.”