Climbing the trellis down from her balcony had never been easier. Briallen wondered if her mother had accounted for that, but given the way she had forgotten whose room they were even in… Her mother had probably been too angry with her to think. Her mother reminded often that Briallen had that effect on people.

And anyway, her mother had said no to a tower and a dragon. Anyone who had been truly thinking it through would have considered the idea that if nothing was keeping Briallen in, she might just go out. It was like her mother wanted her to sneak out at that point.

Not that Briallen planned to run away. Not actually. Not for long. The afternoon, at least. Overnight at the latest, to take advantage of the whole goblin thing. She could worry about breaking the curse after that. When it stopped feeling fun.

And loping through the shadows of the castle grounds on all fours in only her nightshirt was very fun. Of course, she still couldn’t let anyone see her; Briallen didn’t relish a repeat of the broom incident, nor did she think any of the castle guards would stop at just brooms, but eventually people would have to know. Gran Milly hadn’t been very clear on what the conditions for reversing the curse were—she hadn’t even sounded very confident that love had stayed out of it, which was concerning—but there wasn’t any way it could get broken in the next afternoon, or even the next week. Her parents would simply have to explain why their darling daughter had finally become the creature everyone always said she was. They’d still probably lie to save face, but it would be difficult for them.

That, also, would be fun.

Briallen scurried under the tall hedges that surrounded the castle’s ornamental garden, the one with the pond. Her hair snagged on branches, but when she came out the other side, muddy and with twigs and leaves peppered through her hair, it was worth it. All of this was worth it. And really, it was what her parents wanted, or would be in the end. Briallen would get all her most gremlin-like behavior out of the way, and then, when she was ready to give it up for good, she’d break her own curse and settle down.

But first she was going to try catching fish out of the pond with her own teeth.

✨

For as catlike as Briallen felt now, she wasn’t any quicker. When she was twelve, her tutor had made the mistake of mentioning spear fishing when going over the histories of certain villages and towns within the kingdom. Of course Briallen had borrowed a pike from the armory to try her hand at it. She had been twelve, after all. What else was she supposed to do when presented with that kind of information? Her parents hadn’t understood back then, either.

Being eighteen now and a goblin was not going any better for her, although it never had really been about the fish. There was a lot more splashing involved when you actually dove at the fish. A lot more water up your nose and murk in your eyes. Briallen resurfaced for the fifth time and shook like a dog.

Something loomed in her expanded peripheral vision. Briallen cringed as she turned to face whoever it was. She expected maybe one of the gardeners, or that she’d been right about the castle guard; worst case, her mother again… But it was just Cal. He had his shoes off, like he planned to go wading again without her. If that was something he really did on his own, he should have told her.

Briallen froze like a stunned deer. She shouldn’t have. She could have darted away even before he could be sure he’d seen her… But now she needed to know how he would react. She was stuck until then.

And all he did was sigh. Like of course this happened. Of course she would be a goblin right now.

Briallen grit her pointy little teeth. That wasn’t the reaction she’d wanted. Cal specifically she had hoped would have learned about her current state and hightailed it back to the keep from whence he came with that same tail between his legs. This was his fault, after all.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“So, what?” Briallen broke the silence, and if Cal had any doubts about it being her before, he couldn’t now. Briallen still sounded like herself, a bit to her own disappointment. “Have you and my mother been talking about me again? She thinks you’ll still show up at the harvest moon ball with me looking like this.”

“No.” Now he sounded offended, but Briallen couldn’t tell to which he was saying no. She hoped it was the still taking her to the ball that would show her mother and serve her right if they had been talking about Briallen behind her back. “Were you like this before or…?”

“No.” Briallen matched his tone as she sloshed her way back to the pond’s edge.

“So it was my fault?” He asked carefully. Like he might believe that it really was. Good.

“Yes!” Briallen hoped he did believe it, until she watched outright fear grip him, not remorse. That wasn’t right. He was just supposed to feel guilty and reconsider treating her like a problem that could be solved. Not hyperventilate about it. “No… Kind of. I don’t know.”

“I’m sorry.” And he sounded like he meant it. “Nobody actually thought- Well, I never thought-”

“It’s not your fault.” Briallen growled, annoyed at herself and her indecisiveness. She sat down hard at the edge of the pond. This would have been better if she really didn’t like him. “I mean, it’s not your fault it happened, but you were my final straw.”

“That’s not how it works.”

“What do you mean that’s not how it works?” Briallen snarled and popped back up to her feet. It turned out, not being eye to eye with someone, especially when you were arguing with them, was incredibly frustrating. “You don’t know how to break curses any more than anyone! If you broke one before, you’d be married by now.”

“I have more experience with them than you!” Cal leaned down to meet her where she was, then settled on just sitting. “Er, had. I will concede you definitely have more experience than I do now.”

Briallen scowled at him. That still didn’t make any sense to her.

Cal sighed and struggled to find his explanation. “My brother is cursed. Why do you think they sent me and not him?”

“On purpose?” Briallen didn’t think about how insensitive that might sound until after she had asked it. “I mean, what’d he do? To get cursed.”

By the way Cal frowned at her, Briallen didn’t think she’d amended her original question much at all.

“I’m sorry.” She mumbled.

“He deserved it.” Cal sighed, then seemed to feel he had something to amend. “I don’t think you did. I didn’t really mean what I said before; I was just repeating what I’d heard.”

“I know.” It was just too bad that she hadn’t known how de Rais felt when he had been there. Cal didn’t seem like he would relay any of this properly at all. “I asked for it.”

"No, you didn’t.”

“Yes, I did. I asked my fairy godmother to do it. She let me help brew it and everything.”

“Oh. Well then.” He sounded bitter. Maybe about being wrong, maybe about his brother still. “Did she tell you how you’re supposed to break it?”

“Not really.” Briallen nervously scratched at her arm. She really should have worried about that more. And whether or not Gran Milly would be asked to leave before it was broken. “I don’t know. I’m not worried about it right now.”

“You… want it to be broken though, right?”

“Gods!” He really was annoying sometimes. “Yes, obviously.”

“Do you want me to-”

“No!”

Cal leaned back as if Briallen had really lunged at him—she'd thought about it. “What do you mean, no?”

“You’re only doing this because you want to brag about breaking the curse.” She guessed in some convoluted way he might be doing it to try and solve it for his brother too. Not for her, clearly, but that was good.

“So? You’re only doing this so that nobody actually loves you. You’ll win anyway.”

Maybe. But he didn’t have to say it like that. He still didn’t have to say it and think of himself as the potential exception. Briallen was pretty sure she hated that more than the idea of him being onto her.

“Great.” Briallen hopped down from the rock she had been standing on—it hadn’t helped. “Make sure you tell my mother you’re still taking me to the ball even though I will still look like this.”

“Where are you going?”

“The woods.” Briallen shrugged, but she didn’t stop walking. It meant Cal kept following, unfortunately, but she could fix that easily thanks to being able to crawl through the hedges.

“Aren’t you worried about being out there alone?”

Briallen rolled her eyes, even if Cal couldn’t see it. No one had been this persistent before; she could at least give him that. “It’s the woods. The biggest thing out there is probably a black bear.”

“And you’re like two feet tall now.”

“Right! I’m so much harder to catch now.” Briallen looked over her shoulder so that he could see her flash a grin of pointy little teeth before diving through the hedge.