Tamora slid the key into the lock and slowly, quietly, opened the front door. Dad should still be sleeping. He didn’t usually wake up until late afternoon.
She tiptoed inside, waved Karina in after her, and gently pressed the door shut. “Shoes off,” she whispered, removing her own and setting them beside the door.
From upstairs came the faint grinding of Dad’s snores. She relaxed slightly. But where were Mac and Gulk?
“Your house smells funny,” said Karina. Before Tamora could respond, she added, “I like it.”
All she found in the living room was a snoozing sheepdog and Mac’s Lego mermaid. The kitchen was empty as well. She looked out through the window, but saw nothing in the backyard.
“Is this your family?” Karina was looking at a large framed photo hanging in the hallway. “What are you wearing?”
“A hanbok. That’s from my hundred-day birthday.” Mac, then barely two years old, held her in his lap while Mom and Dad leaned in from either side. Dad still kept the tiny gown, with its red skirt, green top, and rainbow sleeves, in a box in his closet. “The picture next to it is from Mac’s.”
“He was such a cute baby!”
Farther down the hall, Smoosh paced back and forth in front of the door leading to the basement. Tamora scooped the cat up with one arm and opened the door.
From downstairs came a familiar squeaking sound. Relief eased her muscles. “Mac’s in his quiet room.”
Smoosh kicked and squirmed to get free. Mac must have brought Gulk into the house, awakening that primitive part of Smoosh’s brain that believed he was a mighty jaguar instead of a snot-nosed housecat.
Tamora waved Karina through the door and followed, pausing only to shut the cat out. She wasn’t sure what would happen if Smoosh got into a fight with Gulk, but it wouldn’t be pretty.
A dehumidifier sat beside the bottom of the steps. To the left, the washer and dryer sat on peeling linoleum. Dusty storage bins lined the shelves. A narrow door led to the sump pump room, which kept the basement from flooding during rainstorms.
Brown carpeting covered the rest of the basement, which had been turned into a play area. The walls were painted white and covered in crayon and marker drawings. Dad painted over it every spring to give them a clean canvas, at which point Tamora and Mac decorated all over again.
Karina traced the outline of a thick, curving beanstalk Mac had drawn. It stretched from the floor to one of the glass-block windows at the top of the wall. “I got grounded for two weeks for writing my initials on my bedroom wall,” she said softly.
A pair of green army blankets were strung up like curtains near the back, past shelves of old toys. This was Mac’s “quiet room,” a small, fort-like area he went to when he felt overwhelmed or overstimulated. Inside, he had a little exercise trampoline, a set of noise-canceling headphones, a bungee chair, some Lego sets, and a handful of other things to help him calm down.
“Mac? It’s me.” She held up a hand for Karina to wait, and peeked around the edge of the blanket.
Mac sat in his chair, a tilted metal frame threaded with thick, stretchy straps woven together like a giant net. He was bouncing in place, creating the squeak she’d heard before. He wore his headphones and was facing away, so he might not have noticed her yet.
Gulk sat in the corner. He looked up at Tamora and sagged in visible relief. “This human found me,” he said sheepishly.
“I see that.”
The goblin turned to Mac. “I think he’s broken.”
“My brother is not broken.” She stepped into the quiet room and let the blanket fall shut behind her. “Hi, Mac.”
Mac rocked his head and body in what might have been a nod of greeting. He wiped his hands on his pants and reached for his iPad, which was resting against the wall. He swiped a finger across the screen and began to type. “This is Gulk. He was in Appa’s doghouse. He says he knows you.”
Before she could answer, Karina stepped through the blankets.
“Hello, Karina,” said Mac. “Why are you here?”
Karina simply stared at the goblin.
Gulk jumped to his feet and sniffed the air. His finger stabbed accusingly toward Karina. “Magic!”
“Told you so,” grinned Tamora. “He can smell it. You’re not going crazy. You’re doing magic.”
“Most people would say that’s crazy,” murmured Karina, never taking her eyes off Gulk. “Or else I’m dreaming again.”
Tamora turned to Mac. “I ran into Karina at Cornerside Pizza. She’s trying to find her brother, and she…she knows things. She knew you were going to text me before you did.”
“Why does the goblin call you King Tamora?” asked Mac.
She spun back to Gulk. “Huh?”
“You beat goblins in battle. Saved Gulk from shaggy dog with big teeth. Brought magic food and bubble drink.” He blinked at her like he couldn’t understand why she wasn’t grasping such an obvious concept. “Goblin King rules and protects goblins. You Goblin King.”
“I’m not your king. I’m not a goblin. I’m not even a boy!”
Gulk moved closer and looked her up and down. “You’re not?”
“No!”
He sniffed her. “Boy. Girl. Hard to tell with humans.”
Mac giggled softly as he bounced in place.
“It’s not funny,” Tamora snapped. “Shut up!”
He tapped his iPad. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
“Gulk needs better clothes.” Karina walked away, adding, “He looks like a blue hobo.”
“What’s a hobo?” Gulk asked, watching Karina like he expected her to cast a spell and summon a horde of hungry beagles at any moment.
“Never mind,” said Tamora.
Mac continued to bounce and rock in his chair. “Where did he come from?”
“According to him, the roots beneath the palace. I found Gulk and his friend last night, digging through the trash behind the rink.” She explained how she’d chased them through town, and how they’d followed her home.
“Then Queen Tamora unleashed giant wooly beast!” said Gulk. “Hail Queen Tamora. Wielder of the hooked stick. Bringer of little salty fish.”
“You fed him anchovies?”
“He liked them,” she said defensively. “Mac, he says Andre, Kevin, and Lizzy are part of a prophecy, that they’re fighting monsters in another world.” She trailed off, realizing how ridiculous that sounded.
Mac tapped his screen. “Cool!”
Before she could figure out what to say next, Karina returned carrying an armful of wrinkled clothes from the laundry. She studied the goblin, held up a pair of jeans, and then set them aside. Next, she grabbed a pair of yoga pants. “These look about your size, and the color should work with your complexion. Try them on.”
“Wait!” Tamora shrieked, but the goblin was already yanking his tarp over his head. Thankfully, he wasn’t naked underneath. A rope belt around his waist held a tattered brown loincloth, making him look like a scrawny blue-green Tarzan.
Gulk pulled on the pink and black zebra-print pants. They were a little tight, and looked ridiculous over his loincloth, but he didn’t seem to mind. He pinched the fabric between his fingers. “Soft.”
“I know,” said Tamora. “Dad got them for me as a birthday present last year.”
Karina was sorting through shirts, discarding one after another, until Gulk pounced on a purple T-shirt with a fringed bottom and an owl made of silver and gold sequins.
“I don’t think so,” said Karina. “Not with those pants or that skin.”
Gulk was already tugging the shirt over his head. He struggled to get it past his ears. Once his arms found the proper holes, he looked down at himself and preened. He touched the sequined owl and whispered, “Silver armor for Gulk.”
“It’s not armor—” Tamora started.
Gulk jumped back and wrapped his arms around his chest. “My armor!”
“It’s mine, actually,” said Tamora. “That’s one of my favorite shirts.”
The goblin stretched the collar and used it to wipe his nose.
“But you can keep it,” Tamora finished.
Mac continued to rock as he typed. “Tell us more about the privy?”
“Privy?” Gulk flinched. “Couldn’t find privy. Used back of doghouse instead.”
“Not privy. Privy! Stupid autocorrect. Tell me more about the prophecy.”
Karina began to speak in a low, steady tone.
“The hands of human children three shall end the Dead King’s reign.
Against the monsters they defend our world, while evil fights in vain.
To break a thousand years of war, the kings and queen of Earth
Will unite elves forevermore, to raise their spears and venture forth.
And on that day the signs portend a land that’s cleansed of evil’s stain.”
“How do you know that?” asked Mac.
Karina blinked, then flushed. “I’m not even sure what I said.”
“Against the monsters,” Gulk muttered, twisting his fingers into the bottom of his T-shirt. “Monsters like Gulk. All cleansed. Cleansed to death!”
“Nobody’s going to kill you,” Tamora promised. Though a cleansing wasn’t a bad idea. Gulk had wiped the dog poop off his foot, but he still stank.
“The prophecy mentioned Earth,” Mac said, his hands shaking from excitement. “That means gulch’s world and ours must have been in contact before.” He frowned and slowed his typing. “Gulk’s world. We have so many stories about elves and goblins and fairies, and mortals who circle fairy hills and find themselves in magical lands.”
“Aren’t elves the good guys?” asked Karina.
“Ha!” Gulk snorted so hard that a glob of snot shot out of his nose onto the front of the T-shirt. The goblin was as bad as Smoosh.
“You’re saying goblins are the good guys?” asked Tamora.
He snorted again. Thankfully, this one was snot-free. “No. But stupid elves not, either.”
“He’s right,” said Mac. “In some of the older stories, elves were vicious, spiteful, nasty, selfish creatures. They treated mortals as playthings, and they weren’t gentle with their toys. The ballad of Thomas the Rhymer mentions the Queen of Elfland, and talks about a tithe the elves pay to the devil. A tithe of human beings. The Grimm brothers had a tale, ‘The Servant Girl Who Stood In as Godmother for Them,’ about a girl who agreed to serve the elves for three days, but they tricked her into seven years of slavery. If you assume elf is a broader term for fairies in general, there are even more examples—”
“If that’s true,” Tamora interrupted, “how will they treat three kids from our world?”
Nobody answered.
“We’ve got to find them,” she continued. “To do that, we need to find the portal and the key to open it.”
“Can’t Gulk take us?” asked Mac.
“He won’t say where it is,” said Tamora.
“Couldn’t find it anyway,” Gulk muttered. “Human roads all look same.”
Tamora turned to Karina. “Where was your brother last seen? If we can figure out where he, Andre, and Lizzy disappeared, maybe we can make a map of where the portal might be.”
“He was home.”
“Where exactly is home?” Tamora pressed.
Karina ducked her head so her blonde hair curtained her face. “We live at the end of Coolridge Road, on the north part of town.”
Tamora’s jaw dropped. “You mean you live in that mansion?”
“My father inherited a lot of money from his parents,” Karina mumbled. “He had that place built before Kevin and I were born. It’s not really a mansion. It’s just, you know, big. Too big, really.”
Tamora and Andre had skated up Coolridge together a few times to gawk at the huge house at the end of the road. “Well, it looked like a mansion to me.” She looked over at Gulk, excitement boiling in her chest. “And if you were a goblin, it probably looked like a palace.”
* * *
Tamora and Karina watched through the living room window as Dad walked down the driveway to meet a tall woman wearing a blue blazer and white-rimmed sunglasses. He’d been reluctant to let Tamora and her brother visit the home of a family he didn’t know, so Karina had called her nanny.
“Don’t worry,” said Karina. “Ms. Anna’s great. She can charm honey out of a stone.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about.” Lying to Dad about skating home after practice was one thing. Lying about goblins and kidnapped children felt wrong. It felt dangerous. With Gulk, they had proof of magic and other strangeness. But Karina had insisted on keeping the goblin a secret, saying, “If you tell your Dad, he’ll tell mine. My father would send Gulk to a lab to be dissected.”
Mac sat on the floor, seemingly uninterested as he disassembled his Lego mermaid one brick at a time. But he squeezed each brick in his hand before putting it away, using the pressure to help his own anxiety.
“As long as Gulk keeps his hood up, Mac’s plan should work,” said Karina, misunderstanding Tamora’s unhappiness.
Tamora turned her attention back to the window. She’d been imagining a stretch limousine driven by someone who looked like a Secret Service agent. Instead, Anna Sterling had shown up in a silver minivan, and she looked more like a middle-aged schoolteacher than a bodyguard.
She and Dad chatted for several more minutes, after which they shook hands and the nanny handed him what looked like a business card. Dad came inside a short time later. “Have fun. I want both of you home by six.” He kissed Tamora on the forehead, hugged Mac, and smiled at Karina. “It’s good to meet you, Karina.”
“You too, Mr. Carter.” Karina extended her hand, a model of manners and propriety.
Dad gripped her hand and smiled. “I know it’s been a rough summer. You’re welcome here any time.”
“Thanks.” As they walked to the van, Karina beamed at Ms. Anna and raised a hand. “And thank you for picking us up.”
With a bemused smile, Ms. Anna exchanged a high five with Karina. “You seem rather chipper.”
Karina glanced over her shoulder. “Mac and Tamora have a nice house. I like their pets.”
“Be thankful Smoosh didn’t sneeze on you,” said Tamora.
The minivan was immaculate, and smelled like vanilla and lavender. Karina climbed into one of the middle seats, while Tamora and Mac took the back. There were fold-up video screens in the ceiling and a built-in rack of movies. On the other side of the van she saw a gaming console and a basket full of games and controllers. Andre would have loved it.
They’d driven less than a block when Karina perked up and pointed out the window at a hunched figure standing on the corner. “That’s my friend Greg. Can we pick him up too?”
“Do I look like your chauffeur?” asked Ms. Anna.
Karina grinned. “Yep.”
“Well, all right then.” Ms. Anna chuckled and pulled to a stop.
Tamora held her breath. “Greg” stood with his hands stuffed into his pockets, his shoulders hunched so high they touched the sides of his head. In addition to the owl T-shirt and zebra-striped pants, they’d dressed him in an oversized green hoodie and a pair of fur-lined Ugg boots.
The goblin backed away, looking ready to bolt. The sliding door slid open, and Karina beckoned him inside.
“Come on, Greg,” called Tamora.
Gulk dropped to all fours to peer beneath the van, then jumped up and poked it with one finger. A finger covered in cheap foundation to make it appear human. The make-up was Mac’s idea. Karina had taken the dusty make-up kit Tamora had gotten from her grandmother last Christmas and done a surprisingly good job of transforming Gulk into a skinny goth boy with black lipstick and eyeliner. Gulk had refused to let Karina do his nails, though.
The goblin cocked his head, sniffed, and sneezed three times, sounding like a train chugging out of the station.
“Are you all right?” asked Ms. Anna.
“He really likes cars, that’s all.” Tamora unbuckled her seat belt and climbed out to haul Gulk to his feet.
“Lips taste like candles.”
“Next time we’ll use the pink watermelon-flavored lipstick.” She dragged him inside and shut the door.
Ms. Anna adjusted the rear-view mirror. Tamora couldn’t see her eyes behind those sunglasses, but it looked like she was studying them. Tamora pulled Gulk into the seat between her and Mac. He kept his head down while Tamora fastened his seat belt.
“Do your parents know where you’re going, Greg?” asked Ms. Anna.
Tamora elbowed him and whispered, “Say yes.”
“Yes!” Gulk squealed.
Mac bounced in his seat as they pulled away from the curb. Tamora was tempted to do the same. It had worked! They were off to the mansion—to the palace—and hopefully to the portal that would help her find Andre, Kevin, and Lizzy.
Mac was typing as he squirmed. He’d muted the app, and showed the screen to Tamora so she could read what he’d written.
“The prophecy said the humans would end a thousand years of war. If we bring them home, does that mean the war continues?”
“I don’t know.”
He cleared the screen. “Prophecies in stories are tricky. There’s a chance interfering could make things worse.”
“We have to help them.”
“Even if it means condemning another world to war?”
Tamora had no answer to that.