Page 89 of Fae Crown

Not even the size of a hummingbird, she jabbed her tiny hands akimbo and scowled at the goblin. Though her face was small, there was no mistaking the ferocity of her condemnation. If looks could bitch-slap a goblin, hers would have smacked him until his head spun.

“Whaddya think you’re doing, swatting at me like that? Like I’m somepest?” she hissed.

Edsel shrugged. “Ye said it. Not me.”

The fairy sucked in a breath so sharp, so affronted, it was a high-pitched whistle. A hand smacked to her chest. Her eyes widened to their fullest grapeseed size. Her brows, thin as a pencil line, jumped up her forehead. “Did you just call me apest?”

Edsel crossed his arms and leaned against the foot of my bed, disapproving stare pinned on her as if she were some dangerous ruffian he didn’t dare take his eyes off. “Well, ye surely are acting like one.”

“That’s only ‘cause you swatted at me!”

“Uh, she kinda has a point there,” I said neutrally, trying for diplomacy.

Edsel onlytskedand flapped a dismissive hand. “Ach, all parvnits are pests. This one’ll be no different, ye’ll see.”

Theparvnit’s mouth dropped open, and for several seconds she did nothing but gape. Eventually shehmmphedwith an air of haughtiness. “Goblins are mannerless brutes who are only good for doing what they’re told. Your opinion of me doesn’t matter one bit.” She added a finalhmmph.

I was busy noticing how Edsel had gone still. Too still.

The cords of his forearms bulged. Also those along his squat neck. His nostrils widened in his big nose. When he scrunched his whole face, its many lines deepened into ravines.

His words were too calm, too even for the tempestuous granddoody: “Goblins are not brutes. And we surely ain’t made to take orders an’ do what we’re told. Do ye hear me?”

Moodily, the parvnit harrumphed. “Can’t help but. You’re loud as a rumbling ogre.”

“And just as deadly. Ye might wanna keep that in mind.”

At last, the fairy had the sense to appraise the goblin who, while half my size, was like a hundred times hers.

“I’ll keep in mind what I wanna keep in mind, not what you tell me. I’m aparvnit,” she said with more of that arrogance. “I do what I want, how I want, when I want.”

Edsel chuckled meanly. “Oh, is that why ye’re hiding away, unwilling to show yerself till now?”

“No,” she snapped. “I’m hiding away ‘cause my magic allows me to.” Her reply was too swift and too defensive.

With all the places in the Mirror World she could go, why in dragonfire would she be hiding in my room?

“And if I say I’m going with you,” she added, “I’m going with you.”

“No, y’ain’t,” Edsel said. “Ye shouldn’t have heard any o’ that. But since ye did, due to yer sneaky ways, well then … still nay. This quest we’ll be going on, it’s serious.”

The fairy tipped up her chin. “I know it’s serious. I heard all about it. And I’m coming.”

“Y’ain’t.”

“Am too.”

“No. Y’ain’t.”

“Yes I am!”

I drew in a deep inhale, searching for some patience … but didn’t find enough.

“Over my dead body will ye be coming with us on such an important mission,” Edsel said as he slappedhis hands to my bed and leaned over it. “This is the fate o’ the entire Mirror World we’re talking about. Not silly little games for silly little girls.”

“Uh! I amnota silly little girl! I’ll have you know that I’m fourteen, going on fifteen, and I have plenty to contribute to this stupid quest of yours that I don’t even want to go on.”

Edsel arched his bare brow as if to saygotcha. “Good. Ye aren’t going.”

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