The Goblin's Crown

Chapter One: Hunger

My belly roared its frustrations, the noise muffled by the wool of my skirt, as I walked past a small bakery near the heart of the city's market. My feet stalled in place by the store's windows and I stared helplessly at the dozens of fresh goods that lay on display. I sucked in the pleasant aromas that saturated the atmosphere, gritting my teeth at another wave of excruciating hunger pains. It had been nearly two days since anything of more substance than water had passed my lips and I was swiftly reaching the limits of what my body could withstand.

I tucked myself into a little alcove between the bakery and the building next to it and waited. I watched the wealthier people of the city tauter their fat, bulging bodies into the bakery and come out with baskets and arms laden with sweet scented bread and pastries, still steaming from the heat of the oven. I eyed each and every one, my trained eye searching for the easiest targets, while my heart grew heavy with disdain. Finally, an older gentleman swaggered out of the bakery, carrying a selection of sweet rolls. He glanced towards me, smiling. There was a look in his eye that I had grown to know quite well, a look that marked him as easy prey. I made my way towards him, smiling sweetly, making sure to untie the top laces of my bodice for good measure. Thirteen years had passed since my father hung for petty thievery and I had all those years to learn the craft myself.

"Good Sir," I began, pitching my voice higher than my normal speaking voice. "Might you be in need of a woman's company this evening? I'm so hungry. I'll do anything in exchange for just a bit of bread. It's been days since last I ate." I sniffled, folding my hands in front of me and looking down at the ground to seem meeker and more desperate, all the while strategically pressing my breasts together to make them look bigger. What I had seen in the man's eyes was wanton need. Now I felt those same seeking eyes roaming over me, noticing my cleavage and the way my thin rag of a dress clung to my hips and thighs.

"Let us go somewhere we can speak more privately." The man spoke quietly, lowering his feathered cap over his eyes.

I smiled in gratitude and took him by the arm. I pulled him off the main road and through the labyrinth of alleys that snaked through the city, where the poor lived in squalor and criminals did as they pleased out of the nobles' sight. Finally, I came to the place I had called home all my life. It was a tiny, ramshackle one room house made of wood so rotted it was a miracle it was still standing. "Here." I said, coaxing him inside. I ducked in first and he entered right behind me.

Just as he passed through the doorway, there was a loud crack and the man cried out as he crumpled to the ground.

"Good work, Matilda," chuckled Rhys as he tossed a bloodied board to the side. His double, Rolland knelt over the man's body, emptying his pockets of everything of value.

"He's not dead, is he?" I asked, slightly concerned. He was awfully still.

"Naw, the swine's still breathing." Rolland grinned, revealing a mouth full of yellowed, broken and missing teeth.

"We'll fix that, once we get him to the docks." Rhys finished.

I snatched up a sweet roll from the man's overturned basket, too hungry to care if it was covered in dirt. "Good." I muttered through a mouthful of bread. "I don't need you getting blood all over my nice, clean floor."

"Yes, Ma'am" The twins teased me in unison. With Rhys taking up the man's head and Rolland with the feet, they had no trouble carrying the old man to the docks. They would tie a heavy stone to the man's ankles and toss him in. He would probably still be breathing when he went in; the twins rarely gave their victims the mercy of a swift slice to the throat.

They returned about an hour later, neither one bloodied nor even sweaty, and promptly joined me at the table for a game of cards. Perhaps it would be strange for people who have just committed a murder and a robbery to ease so swiftly back into their regular lives in other families, but in mine this was an almost daily occurrence. I was a skilled pickpocket, but I rarely got more than a few coins out of each try, so sometimes, when we were well and truly desperate, we resorted to this kind of thing. I would act as the bait, play the part of a whore and lead some twit straight into an ambush. The twins would kill them, dispose of them in the river, and we'd make off with everything of value that person had. It was a trick that worked, but it was also one that our eldest brother, Jasper, did not condone.