A Caress Of Twilight   ::   Гамильтон Лорел

"And even now all I can think is that I did not know the Unseelie sidhe had sunk so low as to accept goblins into their ranks. Even dying as I am, having seen the last of my people die before me, and I cannot see him as sidhe. I cannot." He took his hand out of Nicca's grasp and closed his eyes, but not like he'd fallen asleep, more like he was trying not to see.

Detective Lucy had been very patient through all of this. "Could someone explain to me what's going on?"

Doyle exchanged glances with Frost and Rhys, but none of them spoke. I shrugged. "Don't look at me. I'm almost as confused as you are."

"Me, too," Galen said. "I recognized either Cornish or Breton, but the accent was too archaic for me."

"Cornish," Doyle said, "They were speaking Cornish."

"I thought there weren't any goblins in Cornwall," Galen said.

Kitto turned from the bed and looked at the tall knight. "Goblins were not all one people any more than the sidhe were merely two separate courts. We were all more than this once. I was a Cornish goblin, because my sidhe mother was a Bucca-Gwidden, a Cornish sidhe, before she joined the Seelie Court. When she saw the form her babe had taken, she knew where to lay her burden down and left me among the snakes of Cornwall."

"There are nests of snakes everywhere in the Isles," Bucca said in a thick voice. "Even in Ireland, no matter what the followers of Padrig want you to believe."

"Most of the goblins are in America now," Kitto said.

"Aye," Bucca said, "because no other country would have them."

"Aye," Kitto said.

"Okay," Lucy said, "Whatever's happening, old home week, family feud, I don't care. I want to know how this Bucca, who lists his name as Nick Bottom, which I looked up — a character from A Midsummer Night's Dream, very cute — ended up here nearly sucked dry of life."

"Bucca," Nicca said softly.

The small figure opened his eyes. They were full of such aching tiredness that I had to look away. It was like looking down a tunnel into something worse than oblivion, so much worse than death.

His accent thickened with his emotions. "I cannae die, you understand that, Nicca, I cannae die. I was the king of my people and I cannae even fade like some did. But I am fadin'." He raised one piteously thin arm. "I am fadin' like this, like some giant hand is squeezin' me down."

"Bucca, please, tell us how you came to be attacked by the hungry ghosts," Nicca said in his soft voice.

"When this flesh I am still clingin' to fades, I'll be one of 'em. I'll be one of the Starvin' Ones.