Алекс Калер: The Immortal Circus (Cirque des Immortels)

Mel gives me a nod before taking the coffee cup Kingston hands her, as if he’d been waiting for her arrival. I guess it was too much to hope the spare was for me. Her eyes are shadowed. She shrugs deeper into her loose knit cardigan, in spite of the early summer heat. She looks like she hasn’t slept in weeks.

“Why not?” I ask. It’s not like many people wander around the fields our show usually haunts. Besides, I can’t imagine there being a killer that…artistic in rural Iowa.

The two of them exchange a quick glance, and Kingston answers.

“Because it’s in the contract. We aren’t allowed to harm other troupe members.”

“Right,” I say. “Because people always do what their contracts say they will.” If that was the case, going postal wouldn’t exactly be a phrase, now would it?

“Maybe not where you’re from,” Melody says, taking a long sip of her coffee. “But in this company, yes.”

I bite back my witty retort and wonder if I’m the only sane person working here.

“Is this what you really want?” Mab asked.

Her voice sounded sincere, but it was impossible to know; an hour wasn’t nearly enough time to figure out her tells. If I were judging books by their covers, she’d be one of those smutty romances you keep hidden in your sock drawer. All I’d gauged of Mab was that she was powerful, mysterious, and probably a ball-breaker. That said, I felt a hell of a lot safer with her there.

We sat in her trailer, candles flickering from skull-and-crystal sconces along the wall. It seemed larger inside, as though stepping through the rickety aluminum door had led to somewhere…else. I could have sworn I heard wolves howling in the distance, even though this was the middle of the day.

In Detroit.

“Yes, I’m sure,” I said, though my wavering voice was anything but.

Running away, joining the circus — that was what I really wanted. I needed to get the fuck out of Dodge, and this seemed like the most reliable way. My nerves had me shaking like I was in a caffeine crash. It felt like I’d been running a thousand miles and hadn’t stopped to breathe. I couldn’t keep my fingers from rattling the pen she handed me, its nib tap tap tapping on the ornate ebony desk. I could see the ghost of myself reflected in the glass, the rings of shadow under my eyes from too little sleep and too much fleeing. A smudge of something dark on my pale cheek. The half-reflection made me look even more pallid, more worn-through than I felt. And that was saying something.

Mab grinned like one of her skull sconces and raised one hand. With a snap of her burgundy-manicured fingers, a book floated down from a shelf behind her. I couldn’t hold back the gasp. I knew from the moment I saw her on the street that she wasn’t like everyone else; somehow, the rain seemed to bend around her, leaving her red silk dress and bone stilettos perfectly dry. As the book settled in front of her and opened to a page covered with names, I knew without doubt I was stepping into something big. I didn’t care; I just wanted as far away from…whatever I was leaving…as possible. At the bottom of the list, my name was inking itself into being, scrawled by some ghostly hand in ink as dark as blood.

“Well then,” she said. “Let us examine the terms, shall we?” Her finger paused beside my now-completed name.

Vivienne Warfield.

My name had never looked so menacing, so concrete. Everything else blurred as she began reading through the contract, line by line. Only two things stuck out. One was my name. Her words eddied around it like it was a stone in a stream. The other was the growing calm that came with knowing that the crazy I was stepping into was far less dangerous than what I was leaving behind.

Or so I thought at the time.

At noon the troupe starts to warm up in preparation for tonight’s shows. Kingston was right; Mab wasn’t canceling anything. You'd think that after a murder there would be a whole hell of a lot more crying and a bit more fear. But everyone looks calm. Maya walks back and forth on her practice tightwire in suede boots, earbuds firmly in place. The three jugglers — I still haven’t caught their names — are doing cartwheels and catching whirling clubs. The remaining two contortionists are stretching out on a panel mat in the shade. Even from here, I can tell they’re trying to come up with a new routine. I can’t help it; I’m impressed by everyone’s resolve. And a little weirded out by the ease at which they gloss over not only a murder, but a concealed killer. Just the thought makes goose bumps prickle over my freshly sunburned skin. I try not to keep looking over my shoulder every time I hear a noise.

“I still don’t get it,” I say.

“I’m shocked,” Kingston replies.

He and Melody are facing each other, going over a new magic act for the show — something lighthearted. Something that doesn’t involve their usual daggers-through-the-heart bit because, as Kingston said, there’s been enough death for one day. Melody has a handful of roses in one hand, and on each of Kingston’s shoulders perches a white dove.

“Seriously, though,” I say. I lean forward on the wooden crate I’m calling my front-row seat. The boards are digging into my ass, but there’s only so much shifting I can do without it being obvious. “Why isn’t anyone, I dunno, searching for the killer?”

Melody flourishes the roses in front of Kingston, who studiously ignores the romantic gesture. One of the doves ruffles its wings.

“Because,” she explains. “Mab’s on it.”

“But you said it couldn’t be one of us. Why isn’t she calling the cops to hunt whoever it is down? He could be hiding anywhere, maybe even in one of those barns out there. You know, just waiting for a moment of weakness. Like when one of us goes to a Porta-Potty.” I’m trying to keep my voice light and witty, but I can’t lie to myself. The questions are honest, and so is wondering if someone is lying in wait to strike again.

Kingston raises his plastic magic wand and raps Melody’s knuckles. The flowers explode in a flurry of red petals and sparks. Judging by the eyebrow Melody raises, I’m not the only one who’s reminded of Sabina’s unnatural end.

“We’re called The Immortal Circus for a reason,” Kingston says. He sighs and waves his fingers in a lazy circular gesture, as though he’s more annoyed by having to explain this to me again than the fact that there’s reason to bring it up. The petals on the ground swirl in a gust of wind and then, with a small burst of fire, become a dove that flies up and lands on his finger. Most magicians spend years trying to make their tricks look like real magic. Kingston, I quickly learned, has precisely the opposite problem. He answers in his bored-yet-amused voice, “So long as we’re under contract, no one and no thing can hurt us.”

“So how was Sabina killed?” I ask. Because if that’s the case, murder is a pretty huge breach of contract.

“That,” he says, lifting the bird to the top of his head, “would be the million-dollar question. Someone found a loophole in Mab’s magic. You’re welcome to bring that to her attention, if you like.” He flashes me a grin, and even Melody looks amused at the notion of pissing off our ringleader.

“Aren’t you worried, though? That you’ll be next?”

“If anything, I’d be more worried about you.”

Something clenches around my heart, that old feeling of fight or flight. I adjust my position on the crate in hopes of stifling it. It doesn’t work. “You think they’ll go after me?” My voice squeaks. I’m grateful neither of them looks to see the blush rising on my cheeks.