Алекс Калер - The Immortal Circus (Cirque des Immortels)

“Where’s Melody?” Kingston hisses.

“Safe,” Penelope says.

Fire ignites around Kingston’s fingertips. The heat is blistering and I drop his hand.

“Talk,” he says through gritted teeth. “Talk or I’ll make you beg.”

“Ahh, you see, that is what I was hoping for. It would have been disappointing to go to all that trouble for nothing.”

Neither of us say anything, but I can see Kingston’s resolve falter. Clearly, that’s all Penelope was after.

“I call on line 89F, point three.”

Kingston gasps and crumples to his knees. The heat in his palms vanishes.

“My, Kingston,” she says. “Whoever would have thought that a few words could quench your fire?”

Something snaps inside of me. I leap toward Penelope. The only thought in my mind is the image of punching her square in the face, of making her bleed and beg and suffer like everyone she’s hurt and killed in her quest for freedom. My arm pulls back, aims straight for her pretty jaw.

Then stars explode across my vision as something slams into my gut. I smack face-first into the earth and roll on the ground, clenching my stomach as iron binds itself around my insides. I can’t breathe, can’t move, can’t get the pain to go away.

“As you can tell,” Penelope says, “I’ve quite thought of everything . Your contracts expressly forbid harming me.”

She steps over and kicks Kingston in the ribs. Kingston gasps.

“You, on the other hand, have no such safeguards. Perhaps this will teach you to be more careful with whom you choose to confront.”

Kingston groans. I can barely see him as darkness inks itself around my vision.

“Oh, and one more thing,” Penelope says, her voice perfectly calm. “I think you’ll find that speaking of this to anyone else is a very, very bad idea.” Her words turn simpering. “Contractual, you know.” Then she walks away, humming happily to herself.

The moment she’s out of sight my lungs expand and I suck in a breath so sharp it’s painful. I scramble over to where Kingston’s sprawled out on the ground, his hands clutching his ribs.

“Are you okay?”

“She blocked me. My powers are gone.” He takes a deep breath. “That must be how Senchan did it. She worked a containment clause into my contract and told the bastard the line.” With a wince, he pushes himself to standing. I’m there, helping him up, looping his arm around my shoulder. Zal is wrapped around his arm. The serpent is smudging like mad, now, like those Mom tattoos slowly bleached off bikers’ biceps.

“How could she do that?” I ask. Penelope’s disappeared into the tents and trailers. Even the thought of chasing after her makes an ache creep through my skull. “How can she change the contracts?”

“I still don’t know,” Kingston says. “It shouldn’t be possible; Mab’s the only one who can dictate the terms.”

“So Mab can change them back? Now that she knows what’s wrong?”

Kingston shakes his head. “You can’t just negate magic like that. Power goes in cycles. She won’t be able to change our contracts ’til the next new moon.”

“So there’s nothing we can do.”

He doesn’t answer. Just the thought of yelling out that Penelope’s the traitor makes my throat burn and sting.

“If only you hadn’t signed your stupid contract,” Kingston whispers.

“What do you mean?”

“Your visions,” he says. “They’re the only way we could find Melody. If she was here, we'd be fine. But Mab’s the only one who can get you to use them.”

Another click. The shock in Mab’s voice when she read out my contract: unless deemed necessary by Queen Mab or… There was another. Penelope had changed my contract to allow someone else to summon my powers, someone who couldn’t be linked back to her.

“No,” I say. “There’s another. That’s what set Mab off. Someone else can access my powers.” My mind races. Then the scent of fire and brimstone fills my head, and it’s all horribly clear.

“It’s Lilith,” I say. “When I touched her, I had my vision. I thought it was just a reaction, but maybe…maybe she’s the other one on the contract.”

“Then we better find her,” Kingston says, staring up into the sky. The sun is getting dangerously close to the horizon. We only have a few hours until dusk.

He doesn’t waste any more time. Before I ask where he thinks she could be hiding in this vast cornfield, he’s running across the lawn toward the eight-foot-tall stalks. I’m right at his heels. The tent and all its inhabitants disappear behind us the moment we cross over, the world suddenly becoming heavier, more humid. Kingston runs full stop in front of me, navigating through the corn as though he’s got it all mapped out in his head. I don’t bother asking where we’re going. After a few minutes, he stops so fast I nearly bump into him. He puts up a hand and glances back at me, a definitive say nothing look on his face. Then he takes a few steps forward and motions for me to follow.

We emerge into a small clearing that could have been cleared by a UFO. It’s a perfect circle of trodden corn stalks, maybe twelve feet in diameter. In the center is Lilith, humming to herself and playing with a figure made of grass. Poe stalks the perimeter, staring at us with flat yellow eyes.

“Lilith,” Kingston says softly. “Lilith, it’s me. How are you?”

Lilith looks up at the sound of his voice, her face practically glowing with happiness that Kingston came to see her. She opens her mouth, then catches sight of me standing behind him. The happiness turns to disgust.

“What do you want?” she grumbles, going back to playing with the stick figure in her hands.

“We need your help,” Kingston says.

“Why?”

Kingston hesitates, and I wonder if it’s because he can’t find the right words or if he simply can’t speak them under Penelope’s new rules.

“It’s Melody. She’s gone missing. And we need to find her.”

“Tell Auntie Mab,” Lilith says.

“We can’t. Mab can’t know.” He kneels down at her side and puts a hand on her shoulder. “Please, Lilith. We need your help. I need your help.”

“Why should I?” she asks with a pout. She looks straight at me as she speaks. “You don’t like me. You just like her. Not me. Her. She’ll hurt you.”

I take a step forward but Kingston puts up his hand again without even looking back.

“Lilith,” he says, cupping her chin in his hand. “You know that’s not true. You know I like you.”

“You kissed her.”

“It was a mistake.”

The words come as a punch in my gut. It takes everything I have not to just drop to my knees right there. I can’t believe it, don’t want to believe it. He lied to you about everything else. He could have lied about this, too.

“Prove it.”

He doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t take a breath or ready himself or anything. He just leans in and pulls her lips to his and kisses her. For a brief moment, Lilith’s eyes flicker to mine and the corner of her mouth turns up into a grin. Then she closes her eyes and leans into the kiss.

It goes on for an eternity, the two of them sitting in the middle of the circle in the amber light, and I can’t help but wonder if maybe this is how it’s meant to be. Both of them are powerful, immortal, ageless. What chance did I have with someone like that? What hope did I have against someone like that? I don’t cough, don’t interrupt the moment. And I don’t turn away. I won’t give her that satisfaction. Anger and betrayal and a hundred other emotions roil in my stomach, but I don’t give in. I won’t be weak. Not now, not ever. Not again.