Free The Summons: A Goblin King Prequel by Shona Husk Page B

orders, though once he’d been at the mercy of his summoners. Now all that was required of him was attendance, and that he could tolerate except for when it interrupted his trip to the cinema. Through films he could live a life denied to him by a druid’s mistaken curse.
    But he wasn’t alone in the bedroom with his crying summoner. A young man leaned on the door, trying to get to her. To help her? To protect her from him? Roan hesitated, his eyes narrowed.
    “I know you’re in here.” The youth jiggled the handle of the closed door where the sobs were coming from. There was no concern or care in his words.
    Roan scowled at the youth pushing on the door that protected the woman who’d called him. She wasn’t hiding from the Goblin King. She was hiding from this lout.
    Something inside his chest stirred. Not the cold lust for gold that had corrupted his soul and kept him chained to the Shadowlands, but something else he couldn’t name. It had been too long since he was human. But this young woman hadn’t called on him for wealth or battle. All she wanted was his help…even though that wasn’t what she’d wished for. The exact words of her wish echoed in his mind.
    I wish the Goblin King would take me away from here.
    She’d wished to be taken away.
    By him.
    No woman had called on him for at least five centuries. And the last one who had, had met a fiery end he wouldn’t wish on anyone.
    The youth stroked the door. “Come on, sweetheart.”
    Roan sent the man sprawling away with a flick of his wrist. The magic of the Shadowlands bent to his will, as much a part of him as the golden lump that filled his chest instead of a heart. The youth hit the carpet like a corpse. The bottle he’d been holding onto spilled, the scent of beer filling the air.
    A grin twisted Roan’s wide goblin lips as the urge to use more dark magic bubbled to the surface. He would make sure the girl behind the door wasn’t bothered again tonight and have some fun. It might almost make up for the summons.
    With a howl of the un-dead he stepped out of the shadows, sword drawn. The youth screamed and scrambled to get up and away. The music was silenced and all lights in the house went out by Roan’s will. The darkness didn’t bother him. He was a goblin, he could see in the dark as well as he could in the light. The youth ran and Roan followed, the black magic of the Shadowlands streaking after him and he made no effort to rein it in.
    Doors slammed and he laughed like a madman, a sound sour enough to curdle milk, the gold and amber beads in his dreadlocks bouncing in a jagged melody. He leapt down the stairs after the youth and into a fleeing crowd of teenagers. They poured out of the house as if their nightmares had come to life. Maybe they had. Nightmares grew in the Shadowlands the way plants grew in the Fixed Realm. And he was the embodiment of the Shadowlands.
    Outside the house streetlights burned, so he stayed in the dark, watching them run. It was one thing to chase after people who couldn’t see him, but another to step into the light and let them gaze upon his goblin body in all its hideous glory. Cars revved and drew away, speeding down the street.
    “Cowards.” In his time men would have stayed to fight, not run like children, and these youths were old enough to be considered men. By the time he was their age he’d been ruling his tribe after years of fighting and killing the invading Romans. By the time he was their age he’d been cursed. His life over.
    Roan sheathed his sword with a snap and let the magic fall away. As good as it had felt to let go of the control he usually kept a tight grip on, he would pay for the reckless use of magic with a piece of his soul. How much was taken and how much he had left he didn’t know, but it was less than he liked, and he knew that when it ran out, the curse would have him in its death-cold clutches forever. Forever was a long time. The nineteen centuries he’d spent fighting