Алекс Калер - The Immortal Circus (Cirque des Immortels)

“Don’t play dumb,” Kingston says. “I know you’ve spent your life pretending to be a daft bitch, but I’m on to you now. You’ve been changing our contracts. You’re the reason everyone’s dying.”

“That, my dear, is an awfully strong accusation.” She draws the brush through her hair one more time, then sets it down. “Do you have any proof?”

Kingston opens his mouth, then closes it.

“Precisely,” Penelope says. She reaches for a tube of lipstick and glides it over her lips, making the perfect pucker in her mirror. “I suggest you come back when you have more concrete evidence. Or evidence of any kind, for that matter. ” She sets down the tube and turns around in her chair. The fire in Kingston’s hands is simmering, but I can tell he feels precisely as I do; there’s no doubt that Penelope did this. If anyone in the entire troupe would be looking for a way out, it would be her — it explained her reaction to seeing Senchan in the field, her talk of finding an exit clause. But who would believe it? She was just so perfect.

She stands and walks over to us.

“If you don’t mind,” she says. I don’t step aside. I want to punch her.

“Melody is missing,” Kingston says through clenched teeth. “If you have any humanity left, you’ll tell me where she is.”

A look crosses Penelope’s face, the mildest of concern.

“I assure you,” she says, “I have no clue where Melody is. But the tent’s still in one piece. Take comfort in that.”

Then she steps past us and opens the door. It slams behind her, leaving us alone and aimless.

“Fuck,” Kingston says. He punches the trailer wall, making the whole thing shake.

“What do we do?” I ask.

“She’s right,” Kingston says. “There’s nothing we can do. We have no proof.”

I glance around the room and something clicks.

“Maybe we do.”

He looks at me in confusion as I walk across the room to Penelope’s nightstand. I’m praying that she didn’t think ahead, that she wasn’t thinking we’d storm in here like this. I open the drawer. There, nesting in a little brass bowl, is the necklace. The black diamond glints like a raven’s eye.

I pull it out by the chain and hold it up.

“What is that?” Kingston asks.

“I don’t really know,” I say. “But according to Penelope, she can store her memories here. If what we need is a confession, it’s probably in here.”

Kingston’s eyes go wide as he crosses the short space between us.

“You’re a genius,” he says. I blush. A beat passes and I’m staring at his eyes as he stares at the necklace. “How do we use it?” he asks.

I take his hand and turn the palm up.

“I think we just ask,” I say, and drop the diamond into his palm, clasping both our fingers around it at the same time.

The room spins.

Shadows are everywhere.

There’s a man in the shadows. A man with white hair.

“I want out,” Penelope says. She stands in the shadows, too, her body pressed against the trunk of a tree. She’s in a dark cloak that hides every inch of her, but her voice is clear.

“Out?” Senchan says. “Is that why you called me here?”

Penelope hesitates. “I’ve been under Mab’s control for centuries,” she says. “I cannot bear it another day.”

Senchan smiles sadly. Is it moonlight filtering through the trees, or is he really glowing like that?

“I feel your pain. Truly I do. But I’m afraid things just don’t work like that. Your contract is quite binding. In order to break it, well, you’ll have to do something for me. ”

“Anything.”

Senchan’s eyes widen. “A bold promise. You would truly give anything for your freedom?”

“I have nothing else to live for, nothing left to give. Everything has already been taken from me. Name your price and I will see it met.”

Senchan takes a deep breath.

“We want the Trade to end.”

“You know I don’t have the power to shut down the show.”

“No,” he says. “But that is our price. End the Cirque, and you will be free. We don’t care how you do it, only that you deliver. Unless you think the price is too dear…”

“No,” Penelope says. She glances around. “I may have a way.”

“Yes?”

“Kassia.”

Senchan takes a step back, as though Penelope punched him in the gut.

“Kassia is dead.”

“No,” Penelope says. There’s a fervent heat in her words. “She’s still alive. I have seen her. Mab is hiding her.”

“If that is true, then the Blood Autumn Treaty is broken. The circus would be forced to shut down.”

“I would not lie.”

“We cannot attack until there is proof,” Senchan says.

“If I give you proof, if she reveals her true nature, will that be enough?”

Senchan nods and holds out his hand.

“Expose Kassia and Mab’s treachery, and you shall have your freedom. A good bargain, if I do say so myself.”

Penelope reaches out her hand.

“You will tell no one,” he says. She nods as they shake.

Light pours out between their fingertips. The light fills my vision.

I blink and I’m back in the trailer. Kingston is staring at me with his eyes wide and lips open.

“That’s it,” he says. “We have her.”

“Who’s Kassia?” I ask.

Kingston shakes his head.

“I can’t say. Contractual…”

He pockets the necklace, turns away from me, and takes a step toward the door. Then he turns around and pulls me toward him, presses his lips to mine in one quick kiss that fills me with fire. He pulls away and smiles.

“You’re a genius,” he says. Then he’s out the door. I follow right behind.

We’re not even a few steps outside the trailer when we spot Penelope. She’s not in line with the rest of the troupe. She’s standing near the edge of the chapiteau, staring out at the field beyond. Kingston pauses and stares at her. The air around him shivers.

“Kingston, no,” I say. “Let’s just go tell Mab.”

“No,” Kingston says. “I’m going to make the bitch pay.” He stalks toward Penelope and I stand there, torn between running to Mab and running after Kingston. The choice is easy; I run to Kingston’s side and take his hand in mine. His touch tingles.

Penelope turns when she sees us. Her gaze takes us in, the linked fingers, the set in our eyes. She smirks and turns away.

“Back for another round of false accusations?” she says.

“We know,” Kingston says. He holds up the diamond necklace. “We know everything.”

I expect Penelope to gasp, to yell, to do any number of things the bad guys do in movies when they’re found out. Instead, she laughs.

“Well done, Vivienne,” she says. “I was hoping you’d remember that. This would have been so anticlimactic otherwise.”

My heart drops. Penelope looks over her shoulder at my silence.

“What?” she asks. “You truly believe I accidentally left you in my trailer? Please, I’m not truly a — what did you call me? — a daft bitch .”

Kingston drops the necklace in his pocket.

“Why?” he asks.

“Because I want you to understand that my intentions were never to hurt people. I just wanted freedom. This was the only way.”

“If you’ve been changing the contracts,” I say, “why not just change yours? End your contract early? Why kill everyone?”

“You saw what happened when Paul’s contract finished early. Time is a force no magic can change. I couldn’t take the chance that the same would happen to me. No, the only sure way to be free was to end the circus. Then, I wouldn’t be dodging a contract. The contract would simply no longer exist.” She almost sounds sad about it, like she’s upset she had to get her hands so dirty, but Kingston and I are far beyond pity.