Алекс Калер - The Immortal Circus (Cirque des Immortels)

Who the hell did this?” Kingston whispers, staring at the corpse.

Sabina’s body is on the pedestal she uses in the show, and she almost looks like she’s performing. Almost. Her legs are tucked behind her ears in a perfect backbend, her fingers laced under her chin. She’s even smiling, her brown eyes fixed on a point far away.

I’m right beside Kingston, doing everything I can not to vomit on his black Chucks, run from the tent, or do an embarrassing mixture of both. Right then, I’d give my left kidney for him to wrap an arm around me to shield me from the atrocity before us. But he’s not mine, and probably never will be. And even if he were, he’s not the comforting type. I can feel his heat against my arm. I don’t know why that sticks out at the moment, but maybe that’s just the way shock works.

We’re both standing in the dust of the center ring. The rest of the troupe quickly filters in with gasps and screams. Sabina looks perfect — poised like she’s holding a pose for the audience’s applause. Except her sparkling unitard is usually white, not stained a wicked crimson. The long gash across her throat is a second smile leaking its secrets into the ring.

Someone is crying behind me. I don’t look back. I don’t look at anyone. I just look at Sabina and wonder what sort of shit-show I’ve gotten myself into.

I hear a shout and look up to see Mab storming into the tent. Her wild black hair is in disarray and the sequins of her midnight-blue dressing gown sparkle in the lights. Not for the first time, I can’t help but think that she looks like an early incarnation of Cher. Her porcelain face is flushed, and when she catches sight of her star contortionist, she stops dead. Mab’s perfectly manicured hands clench and unclench at her sides. After a deep breath, she stalks forward, stepping over the ring curb and into the spectacle. She goes right up to Sabina and lightly puts a hand on the girl’s knee. I see something flash across Mab’s face — the tightening of her eyes, the barest strain of her lips. Then she withdraws her hand and faces us, her company.

Her minions.

“Which of you found her like this?” she asks. Her voice is deep and smoky, like an ex–jazz singer’s. Even though it’s a whisper, it carries to every wall of the big top.

A woman to my right steps forward. I've never asked her age but she looks like she's in her forties, maybe younger, with aquamarine eyes and fiery red hair that falls to her waist. Her skin is as pale as pearls, and even though she wears a rumpled blue bathrobe, she looks ready to take the stage. I can’t help but glance down at my own wrinkled pj’s, and hate her for it.

“Penelope?” Mab asks.

“Yes, my Lady.” Penelope’s voice is crystal clear. Everything about her screams vintage pinup model, even the way she’s holding her robe closed with one hand. It’s like she practiced how to be perfectly disarrayed. “Not five minutes ago, I was making coffee when I noticed the tent lights on. I thought…I thought someone was practicing.”

“And she was…like this?”

“Yes. Exactly so.”

Mab stares at the body, the corners of her mouth barely tilting into a frown. She’s not staring at Sabina like she’s sad over the death of one of her troupe. No, Mab’s expression is purely calculating, like she’s facing a particularly frustrating Sudoku puzzle. One that might, at any moment, piss her off.

“I assume no one knows who did this?” she asks.

No one speaks. No one even breathes.

I mentally prepare myself, waiting for her to fly into a rage. Not that I’ve ever seen Mab in a rage. But it doesn’t take a genius to know there’s a storm brewing under that well-maintained facade. I can only imagine that “Hell hath no fury” refers to her. But instead of ripping us a new one, she strokes the corpse’s short brown hair. Things are clicking behind Mab’s green eyes, things that subdue everybody — even her. A crowded tent has never been this quiet.

“Well then, my loves,” she finally whispers, almost to herself. “It appears we have a murderer in our midst.”

She lifts her hand. Like ash scattering to the wind, Sabina’s body dissolves, collapsing in on itself in a hush of glitter and smoke.

There is still a great deal of congestion near the grey-and-blue main tent, but it’s pretty quiet at the pie cart, next to the forgotten bacon and boxes of cereal. Kingston stands by the serving table, grabbing a coffee before the rest of the troupe shakes itself from their post-murder stupor. He looks like a rock star at the peak of his glory days, all pale and angular and assured. His black hair is sticking up in the back from sleeping on it funny, and there’s a line of stubble on his jaw. His white T-shirt hangs loose over lithe muscles; through it, I can see his lats. They curve under the fabric like wings, highlighted by the faintest shadow of a large serpentine tattoo. I shouldn't be staring. Melody would kill me if she knew.

Damn circus performers and their perfect bodies. Damn them to hell.

“I guess this doesn’t happen very often,” I say, trying to focus on the fact that someone has just been killed, and not on the way Kingston’s triceps cord when he starts pouring coffee into a second cup.

“Never,” he says, still facing away.

“Do you think Mab will cancel tonight’s shows?”

Kingston chuckles humorlessly. He turns around and stares at me over his mug, one eyebrow tilting up like I’m a complete idiot. His eyes are dark brown, almost black — the same color as the coffee steaming in his hands. I look away.

“Don’t count on it, Vivienne,” he says. “Mab doesn’t cancel a show for anything. Ever.”

“Even if someone here is a killer?”

“Especially if.”

He looks toward the tent and sighs. He’s only a couple years older than me — Mel told me in secret that he was twenty-four — but sometimes, when he gets all quiet like this, he seems much older. “The show must go on.”

If this was one of those perfect movies, this would be the moment for him to shake himself from his reverie and come over, say something comforting to the new girl or at least give her a hug. But like I said, Kingston doesn’t act like that with me. If he has that soft side, he hasn’t really shown it. He’s funny, yeah. Dependable, definitely. But comforting? I’d have better luck trying to warm up to Mab.

I stuff my hands into my pockets and look back to the chapiteau in time to see a huddle of men carrying out the contortion pedestal. Sparkly purple dust wafts off it as they move it to the backstage tent. The sight brings Sabina’s dripping body back to mind. For the second time today, I’m glad I didn’t eat breakfast.

“Why do you think Mab suspects one of us?” I ask.

“That’s the thing,” answers another voice. “It can’t be one of us.”

I look back to see Melody walking over. She’s twenty-two, the same age as me, though we look nothing alike. We share the same slight build and hazel eyes, but that’s where the resemblance ends. She has angular features and is an inch or two taller than me, not that I'm short. My ash-blonde hair reaches my back, while her brown hair is styled in a pixie cut. She looks like the type of girl you'd expect to find in some Bohemian cafe, reading poetry and chain smoking hand-rolled cigarettes. Less Hepburn, more hippie James Dean. Whereas I'd probably be the girl serving the coffee, the one you smile at but forget the moment you have your triple espresso — pretty, normal, but utterly pass-over-able. She's Kingston’s assistant onstage. And offstage, wherever one goes, the other is sure to follow. I hate to admit it, but they’re the perfect couple — always teasing, always thinking of the other person, and never dipping into the PDA.