The Immortal Circus: Final Act (Cirque des Immortels)

by Kahler, A. R.

  It’s hard to take it all in. The place is like an oddities museum; every shelf is covered in skulls and vials, arcane books and taxidermic creatures. A golden sarcophagus stands beside a stuffed dragon, its red scales glittering in the light of the candle-filled Hand of Glory next to it. There’s nothing outwardly organized about the place, though it does ring with some unknown logic.

  Mab heads down an aisle and gestures to a rack of swords as she passes.

  “Normally, I would equip you with a weapon, but as you’ve neither innate skill nor time to develop it, such a blade would be more burden than boon.”

  I remember when Mel rescued me from Summer, the sound of pursuit as we escaped. There were creatures in the Wildness, I knew, that would kill just for the fun of it. And that’s nothing compared to the Fey lurking in Oberon’s kingdom.

  “So you expect me to go in there without a weapon?” I ask. “That’s suicide.”

  “Not at all,” she replies, ducking down a side corridor. “You yourself are the only weapon you need.”

  “But you said my powers are locked away.”

  She halts in front of a shelf covered in vials of all colors.

  “Nuances,” she says. She reaches for a flask filled with purple liquid. “Another aspect of your contract I’m surprised you haven’t grasped: your powers are locked away unless your life is in immediate danger. Think of it as a safeguard to your immortality clause.” She smiles as she hands me the vial. I don’t take it.

  “What is it?” I ask.

  “Chimera blood,” she says. I raise an eyebrow, and she continues. “Really, Vivienne. It’s one of the oldest, most potent forms of glamour there is. Faeries may use magic to enchant appearances, but chimera blood is inherently magical. Whoever drinks it becomes whatever they wish for a short period of time. It’s what Melody gave you when she rescued you.”

  I take the vial and slide it into my pocket.

  “What about Kingston?” I ask. “It’s not like I can just get his corpse to drink this.”

  I feel a little sick the moment I say it, but it’s the truth.

  “Patience,” she says. She grabs a small black canister from the shelf. “This is dried chimera blood. It works much the same way as its potable cousin, though you merely sprinkle this on the subject and project your will upon it—it will become whatever shape the caster intends. Be warned, however: there’s only enough powder in here for him. It takes ages for chimera blood to dry. It’s almost as valuable as Dream.”

  “You’ve come up with everything,” I say. Almost like you were planning on this.

  She shrugs. “It is always useful to have a backup for your backup. Show business has taught me that much, at least. It’s why I always keep spare eyeliner handy.”

  “So how do I get in?” I ask. I glance around, wondering if maybe there’s an enchanted map or portal or something.

  “You walk,” she says simply. She notices my expression. “What? Did you expect I could just magically transport you there? Please. This isn’t Harry Potter. There should be enough glamour in those vials to get you in and get you out. No more, no less. This is a recession, after all.”

  I shake my head. “You know what I mean. I have no idea where Summer even is. How do I find it? Hell, if I even manage to get inside, how do I know where to find Kingston? He could be anywhere.”

  “He could indeed,” she says smoothly. “Luckily for you, you’ll have a guide.”

  She holds out her arm. Zal’s feathery head appears from the cuff of her sleeve and slides down into her palm, but it doesn’t stop there. The tattoo bleeds from her skin, coalescing in the air before her hand into a glowing, golden apparition. The feathered serpent unwinds itself above her palm, twining in and out of itself like a living Möbius strip. Sparks or scales flutter down from its body; the quiet hiss reminds me of cinders falling on snow.

  “Zal is linked to Kingston’s consciousness,” she says. “In fact, one might say that he is, at least partially, the embodiment of Kingston’s thoughts. It’s one of the perks of having a familiar—you can be in more than one place at a time. Even in death.”

  Although she sounds pleased with herself, all I can do is stare at the familiar with a sick knot of dread in my stomach. There are so many questions—if Zal was out there, why didn’t he come to me? Why didn’t Kingston try to let me know he was alive? Or was that all a part of Mab’s plan, too, some twisted way of punishing me for trying to usurp her?

  But that’s only part of the panic rearing its head at the sight of Zal. The last time I touched that golden serpent, I was linked to Kingston’s mind. I could hear his thoughts. I could speak to him.

  Will I have that ability once Zal touches my skin? If the miniature Quetzalcoatl melds into me, will I always be in touch with Kingston?

  Again, Mab seems to read my mind. Her voice cuts through my panic, but it doesn’t necessarily negate it.

  “Kingston’s spirit may still be alive,” she says, “but he is far from active. His state is close to a coma. Zal will be able to guide you to him, and perhaps here and there Kingston’s soul will flutter into consciousness enough to form a sentence or two. But for the most part, your boyfriend is still a memory.”

  “He’s not my boyfriend,” I say by instinct. Then I bite my tongue. I don’t know what we are or were, not anymore.

  She shrugs. “You two can deal with the formalities later. In the meantime, I need you to invite Zal in. We don’t have all day.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She sighs. “He needs your permission. He can’t just become a part of you without your offering.”

  “Oh,” I say. I look to the serpent, whose pearly eyes are now fixed on mine. “Sure.”

  It must be enough of an invite, because Zal glides over to me a moment later. My heart races as I watch the familiar move. It feels like a slow panic attack, a train coming down the tracks aimed straight for my chest.

  I don’t know if I can do this, I want to say. But Mab’s right: this isn’t about me and Kingston. This is bigger. Whatever love we had, whatever mess our relationship currently is, it’s all insignificant in light of what’s coming. So I take a deep breath and hold out my arm and let the familiar take root.

  Zal’s touch is delicate at first, the barest brush of feathers, the hint of static and breath. It nuzzles my wrist with its toothy mouth like a kitten. Then it presses into my skin, and the pleasant brush becomes a burn. I scream and clasp my forearm with my free hand as Zal digs into me. I’ve never had a tattoo, but I imagine that’s what this feels like, only exponentially worse. As the familiar transfers to my skin, inking its way across my flesh, I’m overcome by the sensation of burning, the stabbing pain of a thousand blunt needles drilling into my skin. The process is slow. So slow. Zal inches up my arm and every millimeter is agony.

  And then, after what seems like forever, the pain is gone.

  I glance down to my bare arm, to the faded grey tattoo that blurs against my skin. Zal continues to move around, but I no longer feel him. It’s as if he’s trying to find a comfortable spot to settle into.

  I take a deep breath and try to calm my frantic pulse.

  I look at Mab. I open my mouth to say something, probably, That wasn’t so bad.

  Then I hear his voice.

  “Who…who…? Vivienne? Is that you?”

  I fall to my knees, my hands to my chest.

  “Kingston,” I whisper.

  But he’s gone. I know that, somehow; it’s a physical knowledge, like knowing someone’s left a darkened room.

  I look up to Mab. She stares down at me with a mix of curiosity on her face and the slightest tinge of concern.

  “I…” I begin.

  But I don’t know what to say. I can’t handle this? I don’t know what to think about him? I hate him? I miss him?

  “You will get used to it,” she says. Her voice tells me I don’t have a choice—whatever concern there was moments ago vanishes under the intensity of our p
redicament. “And it will be over soon enough.”

  She doesn’t lean over to help me to my feet. Her final words send a chill down my spine. It will be over soon enough. If my visions of burning are anything to go by, it will be over very, very soon. And none of us are going to get out of it alive. The end is nigh. The end is so fucking nigh.

  “Gather yourself,” she says. Her words snap me from the memory of charred flesh, cement me in the ice of the moment. “You have everything you need to begin your journey. It’s time to be off.”

  * * *

  Mab leads me through the twisting corridors of her castle. There are so many turns and hidden doors I can’t keep track of where we’re going or where we’ve been. Not that I’m trying. I can’t stop myself from glancing down at the tattoo now settled across my forearm. I keep waiting for it to move, for Kingston’s voice to shatter me again. But there’s nothing—no burn when I rub the ink, no phantom presence. The tattoo is just an old tattoo, one that badly needs a touch-up.

  I’ve completely lost track of time when we finally step out into fresh air. I glance back toward the door we stepped through and find it doesn’t exist—all that’s there is a pile of stones overrun with tangled black thorns. The walls of the castle looming up behind us are at least a hundred feet away.

  I look to Mab, who stares out at the forest beyond like an elegant Valkyrie surveying the battlefield.

  “As you know,” she says without looking at me, “the Wildness beyond has little regard for the Kingdoms. In my realm, you are protected under my name. Out there, admitting affiliation to either Kingdom is signing your own death warrant. I recommend you keep to the shadows and do your best to stay out of sight. Speak to no one, stop for nothing. And try not to follow the music.”

  “The what?”

  “You will surely find out,” she says. Somehow, she manages to make hearing music ominous.

  She turns to me then, and once more she has that terrifyingly serious cast to her face, a look that says she’s all too aware that the world is coming to an end, and that I’m somehow the only one who can prevent it.

  Maybe.

  “I don’t think I need to tell you just how much is riding on your shoulders,” she says. “And although I’d like to believe this will be a clean in-and-out expedition, I know Oberon will try to persuade you to join his team. You’ve seen what his demons will do to your race. You mustn’t believe his lies.” She pauses, her eyes flickering down. In that movement, in that moment, she looks unsure. Human. “I know you and I have had our fair share of differences,” she says slowly. Massive understatement. “But we are fighting for the same goal, you and I. We both want the same thing.”

  “And what’s that?” I ask, because right now, with everything warring in my head, I find that hard to believe.

  “Freedom,” she says.

  It feels like the bottom of my stomach drops into the icy dirt below.

  “What?” Is she saying what I think she’s saying?

  She nods.

  “I don’t wish to live under Oberon’s rule and neither do you. But if you do this, if you manage to defeat the demons and get Lilith back under control, I will consider your role within my troupe fulfilled.”

  “You mean—”

  “Yes. Do this task, and I will set you free.”

  Chapter Thirteen: Mad World

  Free?

  The word is an alien concept. Just a few hours ago, I was convinced I wasn’t going to make it out of this alive no matter what. There wasn’t anything worth fighting for, not really: I was locked into an endless contract, my family was all dead at my hands. Hell, just a few hours ago the only thing worth living for was a post-circus future with Austin, and Mab had managed to twist even that one against me. Now there’s Kingston to contend with, another possible future with another man I can’t seem to figure out.

  But freedom? The chance to get out early, to live a normal mortal life, to have all this murder and bloodshed behind me? Kingston’s face bubbles in my mind, the promise he made of our potential future, of a castle and children and a thousand granted wishes. It’s almost too good to be true, that future. It’s still impossible to know if he meant it, or if that was part of the snare to bind me to this show.

  With Austin, I know what I’m getting. I know where he’s coming from. Together, we could craft a life worth living. An honest life. One without magic and manipulation.

  That’s when I catch Mab’s omission.

  “No,” I say.

  “No?” She looks at me like she’s amused and a little surprised.

  “If I do this for you, you’re going to need to give me more than that.”

  She chuckles and begins to pace around me, her long dress curling like smoke at her heels.

  “Vivienne. I’m giving you everything you’ve always wanted. If you want, I can make this whole experience just one bad dream, one you barely remember. You’ll be out. Your slate washed clean.”

  “I want Austin,” I say. The words surprise even me. Can I really choose him over Kingston?

  She pauses and gives me the once-over.

  “If he lives,” is all she says.

  I swallow hard and nod. I don’t want this to be a choice between men. I want to convince myself this is for the greater good. “When this is over, you’ll release him from his contract. He came here to find me. There’s no other reason for him to be part of the show. If I’m going back to my old life, so is he.” Just saying it seems to weave Mab’s magic into place; a part of me yearns to wake up some day and have this be a dream. A nightmare.

  This could all be over. Even though it means the loss of Mel and Kingston, I’m too tired from all the fighting and death to hold on to them. I just want to rest. In this moment, I want nothing more than to live in a world untouched by all this madness.

  “Agreed,” Mab says. Her words snap me from my trance. She holds her right hand out in front of her, her nails glinting jade. “You and Austin will be released from my care when this war is over.”

  I hesitate for only a moment. Then, I take her hand.

  Sparks jolt through our skin, spreading up my arms and twining down my spine. It feels like spiderwebs and chains. I gasp; she grips tighter.

  “Should you fail, Vivienne, should you try to revolt, or somehow sneak more than just Austin from his contract, you will be my subject until eternity’s end. No exit clause, no chance of escape. You will win this war and bring glory to my kingdom, or I will make Lilith’s imprisonment in that tomb look like heaven in comparison.” In the corner of my mind, I can hear the furious scribbles of a quill on parchment, as my contract changes to meet these new terms.

  She releases my hand, and it takes everything I have not to drop to my knees. I glance at my palm; the skin is pink, raw. When I blink it’s back to normal.

  Mab steps away and toward a path that I’m pretty certain wasn’t there moments ago. She stares out into the shadows and dancing lights and menacing black boughs.

  “This path will take you through the Wildness to the edge of Summer,” she says. “It is very difficult to tame such a path, and it will not last forever. I suggest you hurry and do not stray, no matter the temptation. Otherwise it may disappear entirely or decide to lead you elsewhere. And paths such as this rarely lead to safety on their own volition.”

  She looks back toward me.

  “Well? Run.”

  I pause for just a moment more. I pat my pockets to make sure I have the glamour for Kingston and me. Then I look out at the path. The path, which seems to be shifting back and forth before my very eyes, undulating slowly like a serpent in the dark sand.

  I follow Mab’s advice. I run.

  * * *

  I’m not an athlete. Unlike everyone else in the Cirque des Immortels, I don’t train for five hours a day, seven days a week. Getting up in the morning is enough of a workout. Putting on Mab’s corsets is my cardio. After about five minutes of sprinting through the dark undergrowth I slow down, my breath
already loud enough to attract whatever big bad wolves are hiding in the shadows. And when I glance back, I realize that there isn’t a path behind me. Just a wall of bare black trees and dancing fireflies.

  Mab wasn’t kidding. This path doesn’t like being in existence.

  Still, I can’t keep running, so I hustle into a power walk and try to keep myself from freaking out over the fact that every time I take a step forward, the path closes up behind me. The forest beyond the path is far from inviting—the trees here are studded with barbs as long as my hand, the ground choked in spiny weeds and glinting shards of stone. Even the faerie lights in the branches have taken on a sickly, menacing lime-green cast. They’re the only light in here, and their constant movement makes shadows shift through the branches and across the ground at my feet. A cold breeze sighs through the boughs, or maybe it’s the boughs themselves sighing.

  Anything could be out there.

  Hell, I’m sure that anything and everything is out there. And I don’t know if I’m not seeing it because the path is enchanted or because the monsters are waiting for me to let my guard down.

  Your powers will come if your life is in danger. It’s a nice fallback. But it’s also not something I want to test.

  A few minutes later, I hear it.

  It’s the sound of wind chimes, the gentle tickle of bells. The notes drift through the trees like an angel’s chorus, sounding terribly out of place in so dismal a scene. Then a faint drum, the tap of a tambourine. The soft tones of a flute. My skin prickles at the noise. The music is distant and near, the memory of a memory, and in spite of Mab’s warning, my feet grind to a halt.

  I look toward the melody and the trees twist away, revealing a path that wends its way through the woods. It’s impossible to see what’s at the end, but there’s a light down there, a warm, summery sort of light, and the moment I see it the cold in my bones grows unbearable.

  Come, whispers a little voice in my head. Come to where the day is warm and your worries are naught. You deserve to rest. You have fought so, so long. Let this be your reward.