epilogue

Ten Months Later, October 31

Nix

“Okay, next set,” Carl says from his perch on the rolling scaffold ladder situated at one corner of the ceiling, working a swag free from its hook. A few inches above him, a series of fresh air skylights spans the entirety of the roof. Since the day is off to a clear start, they stand open to invite afternoon light and a cool breeze into the tearoom.

The scent of autumn leaves mingles with the perfume of flowers from Juniper’s adjacent boutique. Combined with the aromas of hot tea and baked goods from our present locale, I feel simultaneously hungry and nostalgic. Although Juniper and Uncle’s joint shop has already added seasonal tea-dainties to the tearoom menu and striking fall arrangements in the boutique, we closed the tearoom early today to decorate for my school’s Halloween fundraiser.

After the blackout on Cannon Beach last year disrupted their carnival and affected funds, the PTA decided that for this year’s event, they would do something closer to home and enlist local shops along the historic district to take part in a block party. All participating owners will hang special jack-o’-lantern banners in their windows to announce complimentary bags of candy and Halloween-themed gifts—jewelry, soaps, candles, T-shirts, home goods, toys, and greeting cards, all crafted by students—will be included with each store-bought purchase by patrons in costume. In turn, the shops will donate a percentage of their profits from the evening back to the school. Wisteria’s Enchanted Tearoom & Arboretum was one of the first shops to sign up.

Things have changed from this time last year . . . ​honestly, from my entire childhood. No more fear of Halloween for me or my family—ever.

I can hardly contain my excitement for what this season entails: masks, trick-or-treating, costume parties, haunted houses, cheesecloth ghosts, jack-o’-lanterns, and monster movies galore—give me all of it! I’m almost sad I won’t be here to attend the block party, considering Clarey and I are seniors and it’s the last year we’ll get to participate before moving next year to California. Clarey didn’t hesitate altering his original plans to move to New York once we both earned scholarships in LA—Clarey to the MUD campus for SFX prosthetic design, and me to the School of Visual Arts and Humanities. But since tonight we’re slated to attend a very special All Hallows’ Eve/birthday masquerade in my honor, the regret of missing this last hurrah with our classmates is more than bearable.

Overhead, Carl releases twin swags of sheer pink-and-cream chiffon from their hooks after unplugging their corresponding strands of white fairy lights. The panels and tiny corded bulbs fall, sweeping down to the center of the room, still strung up by a hook on the other end.

A dozen such sets of streamers hang festoon-style across the ceiling of the fifteen-hundred-square-foot tearoom, so during the day sunlight can filter through the colors, warming the expanse to a soft pink haze. When it’s overcast or evening time, the light strands serve the same purpose.

Dahlia and I sit at one of the patinaed-copper bistro tables, twisting together twelve sheer orange-and-black panels around ghost-shaped light strands to replace the usual Victorian motif.

Life-size murals in rose, cream, and caramel sepia tones, illustrating scenes from the Goblin Market poem, stretch across the white stucco walls, seamless along all four sides, painted by my hand in stages over the past ten months. Now that they’re finished, the stumpy, beak-nosed goblins and anthropomorphized beasts climbing on two Alice in Wonderland–esque girls and tempting them with salivating fanged fruit—depictions more in line with my mother’s picture book than the eldritch creatures of real-life acquaintance—serve not only as decor, but also as a private reminder of where I came from and where a part of me will always belong.

Carl wheels the ladder to the other side of the room and climbs up to pluck the remaining end of the set free so the swag drapes half across a table and the brick floor. “Number five. You gals going to be done anytime soon?”

“You still have a few to go, mister,” Dahlia teases, gesturing toward the remaining seven.

He huffs. “When did interior designer become part of my job description? I have baking to supervise.” A strand of sunlight pierces an exposed skylight pane, reflecting off his bald head.

“No problem,” I tell Carl, cocking a pierced eyebrow at the sixth swag he’s now removing. “Lydia and Joel are using the cookie carousel to save time. They’ll likely be done preparing tonight’s inventory before you even finish here.”

I snort at his disgusted expression, full knowing that my renovated cookie-press conveyer belt is a subject of contention for our head baker. The other cooks appreciate the tool, but Carl’s an old school artisan, and pastry is his medium of choice.

Since our grand opening back in January, business has been booming. Uncle and Juniper have hired over thirty new employees between them—cashiers, servers, bussers, bakers, flower arrangers, and gardeners. Since I’m associate manager, Uncle asked me to pitch in some names, so I added a few responsible people from school to the flock who were seeking part-time jobs to save up for college, Jin and Brooke among them.

Once Uncle announced that the garishly colored wildflowers growing inside our botanical garden—which seem immune to both withering and weather—were in fact exotic classes of peonies, elderflowers, nasturtiums, pansies, and dandelions provided by the same supplier who once kept Eveningside Enchanted Delights stocked with fruit for our defunct Goblin-Roonies and Fairy-Cakes, people came in droves to sample the new products.

Although the tearoom itself provides meringue tea-dainties in a variety of colors and flavors alongside specialty teas served in pastel striped plates and cups shaped like daisies and tulips, the boutique side provides gifts to take home, the most popular being the Wistfulness Mixed Bags. Each one is made fresh to order and contains cut flowers, loose tea leaves, and marzipan-embellished dainties—arranged beautifully in a compartmentalized white cardboard box, which is bagged in tissue paper and tied at the top with bright ribbon curls. The mixed bags are set apart by the various color patterns of flowers, teas, and dainties chosen for each theme: Circus Visit, Building Sandcastles, Ice Cream Truck, or Trip to Aquarium—to name just a few. They’re local favorites because people adore the feeling of childlike nostalgia they experience when they take them home and place the long-lasting flowers in a vase, brew a cup of hot tea, or indulge in a melt-in-your-mouth dainty.

“Ready when you are!” Dahlia teases her husband, who’s taking down swag number seven. She and I exchange a grin then tie off the fabric on both ends of our final panel, leaving the ghost lights free on the plug side so it can be lit upon hanging.

“Doddie!”

A yip and an infectious giggle burst through the room as Dahlia and Carl’s one-year-old daughter, Calandra, totters through, chasing Flannie’s wagging tail. The dog and child duo duck clumsily under the swags scattered on the floor and tabletops. Then, with a clickety-clack, the border collie’s mechanical leg shifts gears, giving her the speed to escape into the courtyard out back. I smirk, having made the adjustment to her prosthesis a few months ago for this very reason. Now that we have a toddler about, Flannie needs a superpower so she can escape if she ever feels cornered.

“Doddie, c’mere!” Calandra starts to follow, the catlike makeup on her face making her look even more mischievous than usual.

“You come here, my itty little girl.” Dahlia captures her daughter and spangles her whisker-chalked cheeks with kisses.

“I’m a itty kitty! No girl!” Calandra sputters as her mother kisses her triangle nose.

“Then where are your ears and tail, huh?” Carl asks, having climbed down the ladder to gather up a few orange-and-black swags. He kneels by his daughter, holding her palms and frowning in amusement. “And cats don’t have thumbs, do they?”

Calandra attempts a meow, which collapses to a snicker when Carl gathers her into his arms for a daddy-bear hug.

Clarey steps in from the courtyard with pink pawprint mittens, ear headband, and tail belt in tow. His sharply pointed SFX teeth stretch on a wide grin upon seeing the tot with her parents. Once he catches my eye, his dimples deepen to frame full lips I’ve become very accustomed to tasting, making me ache to be alone with him now so I can sample the flavor of the ebony-frost balm staining them.

His costume is almost complete. The pencil-striped gray suit, with metallic silver shirt, navy tie, and asphalt-black ankle boots, fits his sleek, toned body like a glove. His dual-toned eyes glitter from inside the silvery-chiseled cheekbones wrapping them in a craggy half mask. Once he finishes applying the glisten-gray makeup, draws fissures into the stonelike visage, and glues his pointed ears and horns in place then adds the mechanical large-span bat wings I engineered for him, he’ll be the hottest gargoyle this side of Astoria.

He hands the cat costume remains to Dahlia. “She ducked out before I could finish.”

“Well, her makeup looks great! As does yours! Anyway, Nix and I are done here. I can help my itty kitty finish dressing for trick-or-treat.” Dahlia takes Calandra from her husband. “See you at home soon?” she asks him.

He squints upward at the empty ceiling. “Hope so. If I’m late, you gals start without me. Be good, silly bird,” he says to his toddler, tweaking her nose.

“I’m a kitty-snat ’at chase doddies!”

“Uh-huh. You can chase the doggie tomorrow. Tonight, we’ll be chasing monsters around the block party.” Dahlia winks at me on their way out.

“Bye, Calandra!” I call, unable to contain my smile. When I first learned that Carl and Dahlia had named their daughter after a special kind of lark with an unusually strong bill, a pale eyebrow, and an almost otherworldly wingbeat that gives it the appearance of a much larger bird, my heart swelled with gratitude. They couldn’t possibly have known how fitting a tribute it was to my twin—whom they’d never met. Dahlia and Carl simply wanted to keep my “deceased” sister’s memory alive for Uncle and me out of kindness and respect for us.

But it reached beyond that, because every time I see their small, dark-eyed girl, with the black curls and impish grin, I can’t help but think of my twin who was also born on Halloween, some nineteen years ago, and how grateful I am that she’s actually still living, even though only three other people in this world will ever share that knowledge.

“Nix, since you’re done, we should head to your place so we can get your costume ready for that thing tonight,” Clarey suggests. He captures my hand, latching us together. We still have several hours until it will be time to go, and since the entrance to our destination is in my own backyard, it’s obvious Clarey wants some alone time with me as much as I do with him.

I tighten my fingers through his so his wrist presses to mine. His soft brown skin and the heat of his pulse point beating against my own loosen a swarm of expectant butterflies through my gut. Hopefully he won’t mind reapplying his lipstick.

I turn to our baker as we’re headed toward the front exit. “Carl, as soon as you finish the swags, please clock out. The baking’s under control and I scheduled Jin, Brooke, and Pete to staff the fronts. Also, Uncle and Juniper will be back after their break.” Our guardians were both invited to come with us to the masquerade but opted to let it be a night for the “young couples,” in Uncle’s words. He and Juniper felt they should stay behind since it would be a busy evening for the shops.

“This is Calandra’s first Halloween.” I wrap up my request to Carl. “You should be there for every second of it. Make it a treasured family tradition. Okay?”

Carl offers me a kind, sad nod, obviously thinking I’m missing my sister. I am, but not for long. “You got it, boss. You two have a good time yourselves.”

Clarey and I exchange knowing smiles.

“You bet we will.” He answers for both of us, wrapping his arm around my waist as we step out the door into the crisp autumn breeze.

Lark

“ArchMajesty, I would be a harpy—if it would please thee.” Angorla bows her ram horns low and I smile at the hobblegob’s request, my fang tips pressing into my lower lip. With just a tilt of my head, her form shifts from goatlike to a half-woman and half-bird creature with storm winds fluttering the feathers of her wings.

Screeching in delight, she takes to the soaring heights of the ballroom ceiling already aflutter with pack rat fairies, piskies, and sprites in the guise of miniature basilisks, fire-breathing dragons, Pegasuses, and eagle-beaked griffins, among others. Along the floor beside me, an eerie, glowing mist swirls at the feet of our remaining denizens, whom I’ve altered at their request to the forms of terra-bound beasts of lore: cyclopes, hydras, mermaids, and minotaurs, to name but a few.

“That was the last one,” I say, turning to Perish, fondling the pulsing beads at my neck. “Now for me.” With a slow blink of my eyes, my long gilt hair twists into braids, hardening to scales of jade. Awakening on the ends, serpentine heads strike out in all directions.

Perish’s fangs shimmer with a smile. “A gorgon. What a perfect choice for one once made of stone herself. You’re both terrifying and exciting. Although that’s nothing new.” He clasps my hand and kisses my fingers where brassy talons have materialized, basking in the intimacy that was never allowed between an Architect and Goblin King before his reign.

Historically, Architects were revered as untouchable to any of the eldritch, as their bloodline was to be preserved for purity’s sake. An Architect had to be born human, through and through, to retain talents and imagination. But with me, having a body forged and rooted in Mystiquiel paired with a human’s mind and spirit makes me a new creature, blessed with the inheritance of both worlds.

So with me, the rules no longer apply. And Perish and I have been taking full advantage. Ten months ago, upon the placement of the permafrost crown atop my head, I became his partner in every way. Queen to his king, bride to his groom. And if I have any say, the honeymoon will continue well into our eternity together.

His lips climb my wrist—warm breath and a scintillating nibble of fangs. His knowing touch melts through me, a delicious heat that tingles all the way to the tips of my wings—which upon remembering, I form to angular appendages sprouting forth from a gown and robes of gilded gold.

I pull my hand free of his with marked reluctance. “Stop distracting me. They’ll be here before we know it, and you still haven’t decided what you’re going to be.”

“Who says I haven’t? I’m simply holding off till the last minute, for dramatic effect.”

I glare at him teasingly.

He smirks back. “Let’s see how the guest of honor is faring.”

I hold up a brassy fingertip. “Wait, we need to let them know we’re looking. Privacy is paramount.” Perish nods, and I beckon the living tattoo over. Filigree accompanies her companion and perches on Perish’s forearm, watching the serpents weave along my head as Tat settles atop my wrist. “Okay to open a window?” I send the question into the inky bird.

Since Clarey’s BAHA already picks up the tattoo’s transmissions, I tweaked Tat so we could also receive messages from Clarey. We use the system as a walkie-talkie of sorts, so as never to infringe on any private moments taking place in the mortal world.

Clarey’s response travels through Tat’s beak a few minutes later. “All clear here.”

Perish and I stand back as he beckons a viewing window into place along an empty space in the mirrored wall. Clarey and Nix appear. She looks stunning in a wig of long fiery-red waves. A form-fitting bodysuit adds heat, with tiers of sequined feathery flames hugging her curves and a set of matching mechanical wings flapping behind her shoulder blades.

Clarey leans over her, tilting her chin up as he contours shades of burgundy and orange over her face, slanting her eyes to the angular sweeps of a bird’s and her nose to a long, thin beak. He adjusts the feather neckband that matches the plumes of her lashes—glittery orange and red bright. When he finishes, the two of them turn in our direction, giving a thumbs-up, letting us know they’re on their way.

Perish vanishes the window. “So, the phoenix is ready to rise.”

“Yes, which means you need to get ready so we can meet them at the entrance.”

Perish lifts a white-and-burgundy brow, his golden forehead glistening in the orange moon I hung in the domed slope of the ceiling, to set the perfect mood for my sister’s birthday festivities.

Since I was technically reborn on Christmas Day, Nix and I no longer share a birthday. So tonight is in honor of her alone. When she told me she wanted to have Clarey make her a flaming feathered phoenix costume so she would become her namesake upon stepping across the veil, it inspired me to have a mythological-beasts themed party, and to allow all our subjects to become any creature of human lore they wished to portray for this one night. I’m thinking we might make it a tradition here. Our own version of All Hallows’ Eve.

In turn, Perish opted to string the antiquated masks taken from our historical hall—worn by the humans from centuries before who were tempted with goblin fruit to serve here as Architects—along the sconces, in tribute to their service, and to honor my family’s sacrifices over the years.

With the mirrored effect of the tungsten walls, the masks appear to multiply, as if an infinity of disembodied trick-or-treaters are looking down upon us—a truly macabre spectacle, ideal for a Halloween night spent in Mystiquiel.

Nix and Clarey will love it.

“Well?” I ask Perish. “Are you going to glamour yourself, or should I do it?”

He taps his strong chin with a razor-sharp fingernail. “Much as I like to feel your magic crawling through my blood, reshaping my flesh and bones, I’ll do this one myself.” Fingers of lightning spear across his antlers and crown as he alters his form.

The second he’s done, I double over, laughing. “Santa Claus?” I snort, taking in his rotund belly under the red suit with white-fringed cuffs and trim. His head remains the same—antlers, crown, and beautiful gold-gilded feral features—but he did manage a white-and-burgundy cottony beard that matches his hair, and a complementary moustache to cover his fangs. “You’re kidding, right?”

He shrugs broad shoulders. “You said any creature of human lore.”

“My-thi-cal,” I enunciate the syllables between snickers.

“What could be more mythical than a good-natured human who gives presents without expecting anything in return? Now to practice my catchphrase. Row row row.”

“Ho, not row.” My eyes water with blissful tears.

“What, doesn’t he fly a magical galley ship? And he’s named all his oars. Things like Vixen and Nixon, and Prancer and Necromancer?”

“Please stop!” I struggle to catch my breath. “You’re killing my snakes.” The serpents hang limp from my head, hissing with laughter as they feed off my glee.

Perish’s belly shakes against me when he pulls me close for a hug.

I snuggle into him, inhaling that sweet scent of beast and man, then let my gaze rove above and around us, admiring what we’ve wrought together: a weird, wild, and healthy populace, and a world ever changing at our fingertips.

Life with my Goblin King is already everything I ever hoped for—and I’ll never have to question where I belong again.