Page 48 of The Goblin and The Dancer
Epilogue
The orchestra was tuning its instruments in a throbbing swirl of sound. Grik settled deeper into soft velvet, down into the cranny between cushions and the carved end of the theater seats, leaning forward in anticipation as the conductor stepped into the pit.
Grik was still a janitor of the Metropolitan Dance Hall, but he was not on duty tonight. Tonight, he did not stand in the wings, dancing with a mop: tonight he sat in the audience, dressed in a new suit, carefully balancing his top hat on his knees, and nodding politely to the elves seated beside him.
A few last-minute attendees were arriving, scuttling into their seats. Grik turned his head in time to see Mij waving a program at him excitedly. Grik grinned at him. Rosanna had used her influence to get tickets for Mij and some of his friends. Mij had been chattering about it all day to Grik, with more animation than Grik had ever seen from him.
He turned around in his seat to wave at the row of goblins dressed in their very best and leaning forward eagerly to enjoy the elvish ballet.
The elves seemed surprised at seeing them, but not hostile. Grik even saw one elf very politely offer her purse for the lady goblin beside her to sit on so that she could see better.
The events of the last few weeks felt like a blur now to Grik, a distant dream. And yet, it had changed everything.
After Grik, Rosanna, and Paul had been picked up by that fishing boat, the villagers had kindly fed and cleaned them and allowed them to rest until the next day, when they returned by carriage to the city—and a legion of soldiers, dancers, and goblins that had been worried about them.
The first thing they had done was to report Ratiga to the authorities. The three of them had great fun comparing all the news and rumors they could pick up about the crackdown on the previously unknown underworld operation. None of them were ashamed over their glee.
That had been four months ago, and life had been busy since then. The effects of rubbing the contents of a glow stick on his body had put Grik in a goblin hospital for a short time. But after a few miserable days, he had begun to heal rapidly and had been able to return to his cottage in Stone Town. Daily visits from Rosanna had lent speed to his recovery. The joy of being able to show her his house, of watching her hang up the elven painting he had kept hidden for so long, of showing her around his hometown, where she gave out autographs and smiles to his curious goblin neighbors, who ended up liking her nearly as much as Grik did—it had all made the brief time of fevers like a beautiful daydream.
After his recovery, Grik, Rosanna, and Paul had been interviewed by various newspapers around La Caen and Stone Town about their mysterious disappearance. Paul was the only one of the three who rather enjoyed the notoriety. While the soldier’s pleasure at being in the spotlight hadn’t changed, something else had. Paul had greatly emphasized Grik’s role in the adventure, singing the praises of goblins in general.
Grik had felt guilty during those interviews. Paul’s accolades felt like an exaggeration, and his careful omission of Grik’s sins had troubled the goblin so much he had mentioned it to Paul.
“Only we three really know what we went through down there,” Paul had said, looking at Grik and Rosanna over the tea table in La Caen’s best restaurant. He had smiled. “The best parts of us got out, but the rest of it we left behind.”
He didn’t mean just Grik’s resentment; he meant Rosanna’s insecurity and his own pride.
He was right; it had been their secret, their battle—to be shared with no one else. Paul’s behavior towards Grik had also been omitted from the stories, by silent consent.
But other things were discussed far and wide. Paul’s glowing praise of goblins had caused the elves to look with new interest on their underground neighbors and to want to explore the goblin towns that birthed such heroes.
Goblins were beginning to change too. Grik’s declaration of love for an elf had caused goblins to begin looking at elves in a new light, making them explore the possibility of more generously embracing the elvish culture that lived alongside them.
It was a new beginning for everyone.
Maybe there was a bigger reason for what happened to us.Grik wasn’t sure—it felt like too big a picture for him to look at all at once—but he was grateful to the Power that could see things clearly and arrange them into something more beautiful than anything Grik could have imagined.
The tap of the conductor’s baton echoed through the theater—a hiss for silence—and the chattering audience subsided into a hush of anticipation. Then the ballet began.
It was the role Rosanna was famous for. A lonely servant girl, laughed at and called ugly by those around her, did terrible things to earn love and respect, only to repent later and sacrifice herself to save those who had hurt her. In a magnificent finale, her true love witnessed her sacrifice and saved her at the last moment, declaring that he loved her, in spite of her failing. In his eyes, she was beautiful.
For the first time, Grik was able to watch the story without loneliness or envy. Instead, there was only a growing sense of gladness and gratitude that made him warm all over and also made him feel that he might cry.
It wasn’t just a story; it was real. Redemption didn’t have to be found in death, but it could be gained through forgiveness. True love did change how someone saw another . . . and how one felt about oneself.
Rosanna danced magnificently, shimmering with a new confidence. Her joy of dance had returned stronger than it ever had been before, and she flew across the stage as if she might leap into the rafters. The wound was gone.
The music came to a flourishing crescendo as Rosanna spun to a fluttering halt of gauze and grace, arms outspread and face radiant as the music died away.
Then the audience surged to its feet—the goblins standing on their seats—and burst into wild applause.
This was something everyone, elves and goblins, could agree on.
Rosanna curtseyed and smiled, but her eyes went only on the first row, the third seat from the left, and Grik beamed back at her and clapped for his dancer until his hands ached and the curtains finally closed.
Grik made his way backstage, not rushing, not anxious, merely savoring the sensation of knowing where he was going and the assurance that he would be welcomed when he got there.
“Hello, Grik!” an elf stagehand waved to him.
