Master

by Alice La Roux

  I shrug as I cover myself. “Again, it’s not a conversation. It’s you telling me what to do, except this time I refuse to comply. Respectfully.”

  He snorts before narrowing his eyes at me. “You don’t do anything respectfully.”

  “Ezra-” the man standing by the tent flaps says, voice low.

  The Devil growls before leaving, bellowing, “Yes, I heard you. I’m coming.”

  The others make me stay up after the show with them to celebrate my first performance, and we drink and play cards in the mess tent. As the night turns into morning slowly, the others begin to peel away and back to their own trailers and tents.

  “Alina, will you help me fix my hair?” I ask softly, laying across a bench and resting my head in her lap as she deals another round of cards for rummy, even though it’s only Darryn, Wren, Jerry, Alina, and I left and no one is playing properly.

  “Of course, what color would you like to go?” She strokes my dyed black hair, looking at me carefully.

  “How about pink?” I mumble, my eyes heavy. I’d had too much to drink, and I was ready for my own tent and my sleeping bag. I needed to curl up, inhale the scent of coffee and nicotine, and drift away.

  Alina claps her hands together and squeals as I stand and slide the cards she dealt me back toward her. “We’ll find a salon tomorrow, it’ll be my treat to celebrate your first performance!”

  “Really? You don't have to do that…” I grin, was this what it felt like to fit in somewhere? To have real friends? To make your own decisions without the threat of punishment looming?

  “You’re one of us now,” Darryn says with a wonky smile, and I know I’m not the only one who’s had too much to drink this evening.

  “Fine, it’s a deal. Now, I’m off to bed,” I say, still smiling as I weave through the other tents and trailers, tripping over a guideline or two as I go before finally falling through the flaps into my own.

  Stripping off my clothes, I pull on my oversized T-shirt and a pair of shorts, before cocooning myself in my sleeping bag. Tonight had been a success. I was finally fitting in, and even Ezra seemed to be warming to me, even if he still didn’t trust me. I drift off to sleep, dreams of flames and blood filling my mind as I slip away.

  The smell of smoke wakes me, and it takes me a few moments to realize that the air in my tent is thick and heavy. I can hear a faint crackling noise and people shouting as I inhale, but it’s suffocating, and I sit up, panicked. Fire! I scramble toward the back of my tent when I realize that the front is engulfed in flames. I hear the others outside, grabbing the fire extinguishers and trying to put out the flames, but I don’t plan on waiting on them to be rescued. Grabbing my backpack, I pull out my knife and cut a giant slash in the canvas and crawl through it, stumbling onto the ground and landing at Ezra’s feet.

  “What the fuck is going on?!” he yells, pulling me up by my T-shirt.

  Jerry runs over to us, still in his red flannel pyjamas, lugging a bucket of water, which he throws on my tent. “Thank the gods that you’re okay, we thought you might still be inside.”

  Ezra crosses his arms and watches as they fight the flames, but it’s spread to the storage tent next to mine. “How did this start?”

  “We don’t know.” Jerry shrugs. “One of the lighting techs noticed it when he got up for a piss.”

  Ezra’s face is stony as he turns to me, dark eyes reflecting the fire, and he has never looked more like a devil than he does in this moment. “Delilah, did you have something to do with this?”

  “What?” I can’t help the frown that slips onto my face. Why would I do this?

  He grabs my arm and pulls me to face him. “Where are your fans? And the gas? Were you practicing while drunk, is that it?”

  I don’t like the tone he’s using with me, or the way his eyes are narrowing as he drags them over my face. “No, I left them with the rest of the equipment after the show.”

  “Why don’t I believe you?” He places two fingers under my chin and tilts my head up to look at him. It’s hard to believe that a few hours ago he was on his knees before me, drinking my blood like a fucking vampire, and yet, here he was on a witch hunt.

  I shake my head and break our contact. “Then don’t. But why would I set my own tent on fire?”

  He runs his hand through his hair and lights up a cigarette. That’s when I notice he’s wearing a white shirt, unbuttoned, and a pair of black trousers. Why was he still awake and dressed at this hour? The corner of his mouth tugs up into a smirk. “Because you’re fucked in the head.”

  I scoff at his pathetic reasoning. “Isn’t everyone here fucked in the head? Isn’t that what you’ve been warning me about this entire time?”

  Snatching his cigarette from his mouth, I stamp it out on the ground before jabbing my finger into his shoulder. “How do I know you didn’t start it, Ezra? You’re the one who’s desperate for me to leave. Did you think this would make me run away?”

  He raises a brow at me, unimpressed as he swats away my hand.

  “I am not running. Not anymore,” I snarl as I hug my backpack to my chest. He was going to have to drag me off this campsite himself if he wanted me gone.

  Nine

  Ezra

  Delilah stormed off with Alina as they finished putting out the rest of the fire, and I’d never wanted to strangle anyone so much before. I head back to my trailer, hissing and swearing as I think back to how she spoke to me. Insolent child. Poking my head into Lottie’s room, I pause, closing the door again when I hear her heavy breathing. I sink into the sofa, grabbing the remnants of the whiskey I’d been drinking when I first heard the shouts. I’d drifted off into an uneasy sleep on the couch earlier, Delilah playing on my mind as I drank and dozed. I wanted to cut her up into little pieces and help put her back together again, running my tongue over the seams of her body as I did. I clearly needed her gone, but part of me demanded that she stay. I wasn’t her savior, and I couldn’t take away her pain—just like I couldn’t save Charlotte. Was I just a masochist surrounding myself with broken women? Was this my punishment for being born a monster? I take beautiful, fragile things and destroy what’s left. That’s what I’m good at.

  I groan, throwing my glass at the wall and watching as it shatters. No, I can’t destroy what’s already broken. Pity wasn’t going to become my default emotion. I promised freaks and monsters a place to live, a chance at a life, and she was no different. I’d treat her the same as I would the others, like an employee, a way of making money, and that would be the end of it. I wasn’t going to be sucked in by those big blue eyes or the creamy map of her body. She was just another freak, and I was the master. Closing my eyes, I get lost in the memories of her dance as I finally fall asleep.

  When I wake, Lottie is sitting on the other end of the sofa, watching me with wide eyes. Her dark hair is tied back with a ribbon, and she’s wearing a pale lavender dress that falls softly to her knees.

  “There was shouting last night.” Her voice is solemn, and her pink lips are drawn into a tight line. “And lots of flames. Was someone hurt?”

  She tilts her head, brown eyes hazy as she begins to hum softly to herself.

  “No, Charlotte,” I sigh gently, rubbing my face. “No one was hurt.”

  It was always strange seeing her like this, she was here...but she wasn’t here. It was like she was lost in her own world as she reverted back to a child-like state. I envisioned it like a woman, floating along in a small boat, occasionally dipping her fingers into the water. Charlotte was the woman, soaking up the sunshine, living in her safe haven, and reality was what lurked beneath the surface of the lake. Occasionally, she was lucid, touching the darkness, but usually she was unaware and just floating along.

  “Oh.” Her eyebrows draw together, and she plays with the ribbon tie on her dress.

  Sitting up, I take her hand in mine, asking softly, “Did you want someone to be hurt?”

  Charlotte never had a violent or malicious bone in her
body, she was the light to my dark. All our lives, she had protected me, and protected others from me. Before her accident, she’d reined me in, otherwise disrespectful little fucks like Yager would be dead already. But when she’d been hurt, it was like the boundaries faded away. Especially when I’d looked for her attackers. The police were fucking useless, saying that there were no witnesses. No CCTV footage. Nothing.

  Lottie smiles and shakes her head. “No, the Carnaval is my family. I only want the bad people to be hurt.”

  The bad people. That’s what she called the sick fucks who’d kidnapped her after a show and kept her hostage for five days. They beat her, raped her, and cut her body like they were trying to fillet a fish. Burned her. For five days. I don’t know why, maybe just because they could. Maybe they thought she deserved it, for being a freak. When she’d been picked up, wandering along a riverbank in a different state, naked, with her feet bleeding, the only thing the police could get out of her was that she had been suitably punished, but she didn’t know what for. Religious zealots. They were the freaks here, not us. She didn’t speak for almost a year after that, and when she did, it became clear that my Charlotte was gone. My sister was a shell of a person, and it was my responsibility to get revenge. I’d chosen Santa Monica for a reason, it was where she’d gone missing from the first time. I don’t know what I was hoping, it had been five years, but I thought maybe she’d remember something or perhaps they’d come to the show, and I would just know. I had nothing, and I needed a glimmer, just a tiny shard of hope that I could get retribution for my sister. I wouldn’t fail her a second time.

  I’m busy all afternoon overseeing the arrival of new equipment, tents, and a new trailer, to replace the three tents that were destroyed last night in a fire that no one is taking responsibility for. It’s amazing how quickly you can get shit done if you throw enough money at it, and I’ve decided to dock Delilah’s wages until her trailer is paid off. Meaning, she is essentially working for the next year, for almost nothing. Let’s see if she still wants to stick around when she has to work hard for no money and owes me a debt.

  “What are you smirking at?” Yager asks as he walks past me, throwing me a look I would almost describe as disgusted, except I knew better than that.

  “What the fuck has it got to do with you?” I cross my arms, smug, as I think about the ways Delilah can pay off some of her new debt. “Go help Indigo.”

  “It has nothing to do with me, but I think it’s something to do with her.” He nods toward the car park, where Alina and Delilah are grabbing several shopping bags out of the boot of Alina’s car.

  I pause, I mean, I know it’s Delilah. But it doesn’t look like Delilah. Her badly dyed black hair is gone, replaced with a soft pink, almost the color of cotton candy, and it’s been cut so that it falls in a way that gently frames her face. Her lip ring isn’t the only piercing, she’s now sporting a nose piercing too, and where she used to cocoon herself in clothes, today she has a skirt on, sans the tights. She still has a long-sleeved blouse on, but it’s a vast improvement. And that makes me feel uncomfortable. I want to fuck her, but it feels like more than that. I want to own her. To mark her.

  Once again, my mind fits back to when I first saw Delilah, back to when I thought she had it all. She was just a teenager, who thought the freak show was a place to escape.

  Charlotte’s wood nymph routine had finished, it was one she spent all winter carefully working on, making the backdrops and the props herself. Wearing a soft green jewelled leotard, with chiffon sleeves, and a wrap skirt, she’d done a gymnastics routine that had the audience awed. It was like her body weighed nothing as she’d moved from an elbow stand with stag legs into a bridge for her finale.

  I raced out into the ring to drum up a final round of applause before introducing Yager, his routine the darkness to Charlotte’s light. He liked to break himself, push the boundaries in front of a live audience. He says that he can’t feel pain, but he feeds off their reactions. He doesn’t need to feel when he can live through them.

  I decided to go outside for some fresh air and a smoke, the tent was ram-packed that night, which meant that under the lighting it was hotter than hell. I’d dumped my jacket over the rails and wandered amongst the booths, until I stopped outside the palm readers and lit my cigarette. I stayed there for a while, one thumb hooked on my brace, the other holding my cigarette as I watched the crowds, and that’s when she approached me.

  “Mr. Black?” a petite blonde girl with cornflower blue eyes called nervously. She looked skittish as she pulled her cardigan tighter around her. She was pretty, but too young for my tastes, even though at twenty-seven I wasn’t exactly old myself.

  I exhaled lazily, blowing out a plume of smoke that makes her cough. “It’s Master.”

  This was my playground, my business, and it had taken me five years to get to this point, where I could offer safety to the other freaks like me. Five years and fuck load of hard work.

  “Master?” Her voice trembled as she looked me up and down, eyes lingering on my horn. It was a dark, twisted growth that reminded me every day where I came from. Who I was. I could have it removed, if I wanted to—but why? It was the root of my suffering, but it was also the price of my freedom.

  “Master Black.” I took another drag of my cigarette. “Are you lost, kid?”

  She took a deep breath and straightened up, lifting her chin to look me in the eye. “No, I’ve been waiting for you.”

  She bit down on her bottom lip, nervous again, and I laughed. “Then you are definitely lost. If you go back to the ticket booth, they’ll help you find your parents.”

  “Wait.” I moved to turn my back on her, but she grabbed the back of one of my braces. “I want to join the Carnaval!”

  Slowly turning, it was my turn to look her over. Her hand was still fisted around my brace, meaning that as I’d turned, we were now standing in an embrace of sorts. She was wearing a soft pink button-down sundress that hugged her curves with a cardigan, her flat ballerina shoes made me scoff, but it was the hairband nestled in her golden locks that just summed the whole thing up: she was a cute, virginal American sweetheart. I didn’t have time for that, not in my Carnaval. I offered a home to the sick, the depraved, those who wore their sins on the outside, not angsty teenagers who wanted an escape from homeroom.

  Leaning down, I closed the gap between us so that our lips were almost touching. She smelled like soap and vanilla, and I wasn’t surprised. “Go home, kid.”

  “My name is Delilah,” she growled. I moved to pull away, but she pushed her hand into my back, keeping me in place. “No, wait. I need this. I need you.”

  I grinned. “There’s your first mistake. You shouldn’t live your life needing anyone. Especially not someone like me.”

  Dropping my cigarette, I took her chin in between my index finger and my thumb, before running my thumb over her bottom lip. Innocence usually didn’t appeal to me, but something about her made me want to corrupt her, just a little.

  “I will do anything. Just let me stay.” She breathed the words, but instead of tasting like desperation, they were tinged with desire.

  “Anything?” I wrapped my arm around her waist and pinned her up against the wall of the tent, pressing one of my long legs between her thighs, my free hand coming up around her throat.

  Her eyes flashed with something I didn’t recognize as she offered herself up, what a silly lamb she was as she murmured, “Anything.”

  “Those are dangerous words, little girl,” I hissed as I brought my knee up, and she pressed herself against me. Her blue eyes were locked with mine, and there was that flash of determination again. She was a stubborn one.

  “I am not afraid of you, Master Black.” Her hand reached up, and she tenderly moved her fingers along the grooves and ridges of my horn.

  Above the background noise, a deep voice carried on the breeze. “Delilah! Delilah!”

  Almost like water had been poured on her, Delilah froze
in my arms and gone was that fiery spark, instead she seemed to shut down. It was like a wall had come down as her arms dropped to her sides and her face went blank. “I can’t go back…”

  “Where is that wretched girl? Delilah!” The voice cussed, and I leaned, peering around the side of the tent to find its owner.

  An older couple, both perfectly middle class, the gentleman in his slacks and a sweater with his wife in a demure tea dress, stood trying to find their daughter in the crowd, never once imaging she was hidden in the shadows with the Ringmaster.

  I looked down at the blonde girl, and as much as I wanted to play with her, it appeared that our little exchange was over. “Time to go, kid.”

  “Don’t make me.” Her voice was quiet, and there was something there, but it was none of my fucking business.

  I pinched her cheek patronisingly. “This is not a place for children, come back when you’re a little older.”

  Grabbing her wrist, I pulled her back out into the streams of people emerging from the tent after Yager’s performance. Her parent’s eyes widened as they saw us approach, and I knew they were judging me, fuckers like them always did. It was almost like I could see their thoughts on their faces as they thought ‘monster’, ‘freak’, ‘abomination’.

  “I believe this is yours,” I said coldly, thrusting Delilah forward, and her mother grabbed her, pulling her close. The woman looked terrified of me, and it made me laugh.

  “If you hurt her…” her father threatened, stepping toward me. His eyes were almost an exact replica of Delilah’s except they were dead, soulless even, when he was trying to intimidate me. There was no love there, just emptiness. I may be a monster on the outside, but this man was hollow on the inside.

  Smirking, I pulled out a cigarette and lit it up. “I didn’t lay a finger on her, now, my horn on the other hand…”