Алекс Калер - The Immortal Circus (Cirque des Immortels)

I stare at Melody for a moment and wonder what got her into this mess. Was she an orphan like me? Or was she running from something else? I sit down on the other end of the bed and put a hand on her forehead. She’s burning up. If she had been running from something, it looked like it was finally catching up. Knowing this…she looks so much tinier, so much more frail. I always expected her to have some magical ability she never let on, something that made her invincible. But she was normal, mortal, and Kingston brought her here. Why? I don’t have time to ask him.

The door opens, and Mab walks in. She’s in her sequined dressing gown, her hair loose and curling down her back. Her face is guarded, but she doesn’t seem wrathful, at least not now. She closes the door softly behind her and raises an arm like she’s throwing confetti into the air. The walls of the bunk glow gold for a moment — the slightest shimmer of light — and then are normal.

“Prying ears,” she says, and steps forward, leaning in between Kingston and me to examine Melody.

For a moment, no one says anything as Mab traces Mel’s outline with her hands. I watch Mab’s face, but it gives nothing away, not a hint of concern or recognition or rage. She is a perfectly painted mask of obsidian eyebrows and crimson lips. When she steps back, she looks at the both of us.

“Which of you found her like this?” she asks, her voice a smoky whisper. It’s exactly what she said when we gathered around Sabina. My stomach drops.

“I did,” Kingston says. “I didn’t leave her last night, after the show. She said she wasn’t feeling well, so I decided to keep an eye on her.” Neither of us mentions meeting on the beach. Neither of us wants to wonder if that’s when she became so ill.

“And in the light of all that has happened, you failed to come to me?” Mab’s voice has a dangerous edge, even though her tone is still perfectly civil.

“You had enough on your plate,” Kingston says. He doesn’t flinch from Mab’s gaze. I’ve never seen the two of them interact before this, but somehow, there’s no sense of a power struggle. They both seem to be on the same playing field. And that field is way, way above me. “I figured it was just a…a by-product.”

There’s a silence in the room, then, one that makes me feel they’re sharing more than I can catch, one that makes me feel like I shouldn’t be there. It makes me wonder if that’s precisely why Kingston came and got me first. I’m the buffer to keep Mab’s rage in check.

“Perhaps so,” Mab says. “But whatever illness has taken her…it's not normal. She has been cursed.”

“I know,” Kingston says. “I can’t break it.”

“Nor can I,” Mab says. “But that’s precisely why you brought her in, isn’t it?”

They both look at me.

“What?” I ask.

“I thought, perhaps — ” Kingston begins, but Mab waves her hand and cuts him off.

“You put your love of this girl,” she says, and a part of me hopes she means me, and not Melody, “before your obligations to the show. Under normal circumstances, you know what that would entail.” She looks again at Kingston, and there’s a sneer, one that says she’s caught on to the game. “But these aren’t normal circumstances, are they? You know I’ll be kind.”

Kingston doesn’t contradict her. He just crosses his arms and stares at Mab like they’re discussing politics over tea. Mab raises her hands and steps away from the bed.

“I’ve taught you well,” she says. Then she looks at me. “Vivienne, if you please?”

“You want me to leave?” I ask.

“No,” she says. “I call upon line 23B of your contract. I request that you break this girl’s curse, or at least discover its maker so I may dispose of him. Though,” she says, looking at Kingston, “I don’t think there’s much doubt that the Summer Court is at fault.”

Something burns inside of me at her words, something that singes through my brain the moment she utters the word contract . I want to say I have no clue what she’s talking about, but the fire is building and burning. And then I’m putting my hands on Melody’s face, one on each side, and I’m closing my eyes. The fire inside is flash and thunder and everything is roaring, roaring, the world ripping apart and filing itself back together. It’s nails on concrete fire in water trees on fire burning through suns and stars and emptiness circling the tunnel of falling, falling, falling into white. Then there’s someone’s words cutting through it all.

“I call upon line 23C. Forget.”

And I’m back. There’s only a ringing in my ears and a heat in my head, but there’s no fire or thunder anymore. I’m sitting on Melody’s bed covered in sweat and shaking. I can’t tell if I’m starving or about to throw up. Mab and Kingston are both looking at me with blank expressions on their faces.

“Well,” Mab says. “That was most…unenlightening.”

“What, what was that?” I manage, though my words are sour in my throat.

“None of your concern,” Mab says. She raises an eyebrow. “Nothing happened, you just aren’t feeling well. Or don’t you remember?”

“I…” But I don’t remember. I just remember sitting in the trailer, listening to them talk about curses and Mel and then feeling faint. “What was I talking about?”

“Nothing,” Kingston says, putting a hand on my shoulder. There’s no magic, this time, but his presence cuts through the sickness anyway. “We should get you out of here, in case whatever Melody has is catching.”

He helps me to my feet and squeezes me past Mab, who is still looking at me like an interesting specimen. Kingston opens the door for me and ushers me out, an arm looped around my waist.

“I…does Mab know what’s going on?”

“Not yet,” Kingston says. He speaks slowly, like the words are hard to find. “But we have a better idea now of what we’re up against.”

“And?”

He looks at me and tries to smile. It slips into a grimace. “And it isn’t good.”

Melody doesn’t wake up for lunch, so Kingston and I spend the meal outside her trailer, dining and talking as the clouds from yesterday’s rain slowly dissipate. He even brought a picnic blanket. It would be romantic, if not for the fact that we’re both waiting for Mel to cry out and need us. I can’t help but notice the way Kingston twitches every time there’s a noise. I’m surprised he hasn’t asked Zal to keep an eye out, but the tattoo is still wrapped around a bare arm. Maybe his familiar can only come out on special occasions?

“You going to practice?” Kingston asks, clearly trying to keep the conversation light. We can see the pie cart from here, and people are slowly starting to meander off to wash their plates and practice or take a quick run into town. I see that Richard and Vanessa have a table to themselves, and seem deep in discussion.

“I don’t think there’s a point in practicing anymore,” I say. It feels stupid, worrying about learning how to juggle when one of my only friends is practically in a coma and we’re all at risk of getting murdered. But, as Mab said, the show must go on, with or without us. Just the thought of being thrown back to the outside world makes my stomach flip. I try not to count the days I have left on my fingers.

He takes a deep breath. “If you want, I could help out.”

The weight of what he says stuns me for a moment. Sure, I’d entertained the idea, but having him actually offer to mess with my mind makes me pause.

“I thought you said you didn’t do that anymore.”

He looks away, toward Melody’s door. “I’ll do what I have to to keep you around. Even if Mab said what she did in anger, she can’t negate it. Faeries can’t lie.”