by Penn Cassidy
I frowned at the lit up building. It looked much cleaner than the rest of the carnival grounds and almost freshly painted.
Across the front façade read, ‘Fun House.’ I immediately got a sinking feeling in my gut.
Lafayette pranced right up towards the building and dipped inside the dark, gaping archway entrance. Glancing from left to right nervously, I wasn’t sure if I should try to follow him. There was nobody around, and everything about this was spooky.
Why the hell had he led me here?
“Don’t go into the fun house, Mori,” I whispered to myself. “This is like every horror movie you’ve ever seen. There’s probably an axe murderer inside just waiting to wear your skin as a face mask.”
My stomach rolled. I knew this was a bad idea, but I needed to get to a phone or a living person and figure out how to get back to the city.
Lafayette couldn’t be leading me into a trap, could he?
Not wanting to be alone again, I decided to follow the little cat, desperately hoping he wasn't about to screw me over.
Inside, it was incredibly dark at first, but once my eyes were able to adjust, I could make out blinking lights in the distance.
Up ahead were a few corridors that split off like a fork in the road, and all of the walls were covered in mirrors of every size and shape. The smell of sawdust filled my nose, making me want to sneeze.
Above the mirrored walls were wooden rafters with dangling Edison bulbs swaying in a nonexistent breeze. That too slow, too low carnival music was even louder in here.
A little black tail whipped around a corner to my left, so I followed as fast as I could, wishing the cat were wearing a bell or something.
I could just barely hear the little tappings of paws on the wooden floor as Lafayette ran away from me, thinking this was a game. More than a few times, I found myself face-planting into a mirror as I rounded yet another corner.
Every single corridor just looked like more of the same. Some of the mirrors were oddly shaped or wavy, distorting my image enough to have my heart racing.
I already looked like someone you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark room, with my white flowing dress stained with blood and my long hair in a wild disarray. My normally almond-colored skin appeared pale and lifeless, the hollows of my cheeks stark and jutting.
Every few minutes, I’d watch as Lafayette zoomed out of nowhere, leaping around corners. At this point, I was one hundred percent sure he was fucking with me, and I was beginning to regret coming in here at all.
It was a dumb idea in hindsight. If this were a movie, the audience would be screaming at me to get out of here and run for help. But this wasn’t a movie, and I was stuck now. I couldn’t find my way out of this maze of mirrors even if I wanted to go back.
It wasn’t until I ran face-first into a mirror for the tenth time in so many minutes that I threw my arms up with a long groan and decided I was doomed.
So I sat on the floor, pressing my back to a cold mirror, and dropped my head to my bent knees. I just needed a minute to gather myself, then I’d get back up and find my way out. Maybe I’d hunt down a pair of shoes, or hopefully a working phone and call…
Who was I supposed to call?
My mom wouldn’t answer the phone, I knew that without even having to think about it. She was probably off on some business vacation with Paul, her new husband, screening calls left and right.
I could call Austin, but I knew it was already going to end badly. I’d been gone for hours, and if he found me in a place like this… I didn’t even want to think about it. Looking the way I did, he’d probably drop me off at the nearest psych ward.
"Bonjour, belle…”
I jolted at the deep voice that broke the ominous music-filled silence. The sound of low chuckling bounced off of the mirrors.
Snapping my head up, I searched the dark for the source of the voice and found a dangling pair of shoes not far above my head. They were black lace-up boots, like combat boots but fancier, and they were attached to a long pair of legs. I couldn’t see much past the shadows that enveloped the owner of the boots.
“Be afraid, lovely. I can taste it, and it's delicious,” said the disembodied voice.
Um. What?
“You mean don't be afraid?” I asked stupidly.
Standing up, I refused to tear my eyes away from the ceiling, unable to pinpoint the shape of anything up there.
A quiet, male chuckle was the only response I got before a dark shape moved above my head. The dangling boots were gone, and in a blink, there was a man standing in front of me, nearly chest to chest.
“I’m sure that’s not what I said.”
His wide lips tilted into a smile. He had a slight hint of a French accent, something not terribly uncommon in Louisiana.
I would have staggered back, but there was only a wall of mirrors behind me. Still, I pressed into it, as if it could swallow me up and hide me from this stranger.
He was unlike anyone I’d ever seen, perhaps twenty-five or thirty years old if I had to guess. He had dark, ashy blond hair that fell to his broad shoulders, and he wore a velvet purple tailcoat with brass buttons. It was hanging open, revealing his bare, heavily tattooed chest covered with dozens of silver and gold necklaces draped around his neck.
His smile was wicked, and his eyes were a sparkling navy blue, rimmed in black eyeliner that winged up on the sides like a cat.
He was perhaps the most beautiful human being I’d ever seen in my life, a mixture of masculine and feminine in the strangest way. Slender without being skinny, he looked solid and muscled. His black nail polish on fingers that were clad with ornate-looking rings, and his pants were tight and leather and slung low on his hips. I noticed belatedly that his belly button was pierced.
“What is this place?” I found myself asking for a lack of a better response to his sudden presence and the way my mouth dried up at the sight of him. We were still standing too close for comfort. I willed my voice not to shake. “This is impossible…”
I was about to ask him to back off a little when he suddenly vanished. I blinked several times and teetered to the side, planting my palm on a mirror to keep myself steady. The man was there one second, and then he just poofed.
“Then how, pray tell, did you end up here?” His low voice came from up above again.
He was sitting casually on a wooden beam up in the rafters, inspecting his black nail polish. One leg dangled and swung rhythmically, as if he hadn’t a care in the world.
“How the—” I started to say but stopped, running my fingers through my hair in agitation. “Listen, I just need to get to a phone so I can call for help. I don’t know how I got here or where here even is, but I need to leave.”
“My my, we do have a problem on our hands then, don’t we?”
He clucked his tongue. Instead of inspecting his nails, he now flicked what looked like an old, stretched out penny between his fingers. It clinked against each ring.
“And how’s that?” I asked witheringly. “You don’t have a phone?”
He hadn’t even asked me why I was covered in blood and smelled like the swamp, so I wondered briefly if this tended to happen to him a lot. Maybe I was simply one of many stragglers who’d found themselves lost in the bayou.
In a heartbeat, the man was once again in front of me, one shoulder leaning on the surface of a mirror and his arms crossed over his chest as if he’d blinked into existence by some kind of magic.
“There are no telephones at Le Carnaval des Ossements, chérie.”
A pit formed in my stomach, and at the wicked gleam in his dark eyes, I felt uneasy. Not necessarily bad, but…off. I felt like the man was toying with me.
“The Bone Carnival?” I asked, eyes flicking away from him, eyeing the labyrinth of mirrors. If any place was going to be called a bone carnival, it was this one.
He gave me a Cheshire grin. “You speak French?”
“I do.”
Well, not fluently,
but he didn’t have to know that.
He disappeared again, and my heart shot to my throat. I stumbled forward, standing in the empty space he’d just occupied, blinking in confusion.
Then to my shock, my long hair moved against my neck, as if some phantom breeze was brushing it aside. I stiffened, feeling his presence behind me in a warm rush of air on my bare shoulders.
“Your skin is like silk,” he murmured into the crook of my neck and shoulder. Fingertips grazed down my right arm, barely a touch. “Such a waste,” he said, tsking.
I pulled away, spinning around to face the man, who I now realized was a lot taller than I’d thought. The top of my head barely reached his shoulders.
“Don’t touch me,” I spat, clutching my palm to my neck where I could still feel the barely there brush of his lips. “Do it again and I’ll scream.”
I had no idea who I’d even scream for, since there was nobody around for miles. This man was clearly…abnormal and maybe even slightly unhinged, especially if he could blink in and out of existence as if it were nothing.
I was a believer in the mystical, having lived my entire life surrounded by that sort of thing, given the fact that my grandmother was a high priestess, but there was a bitter edge to this situation that I was unfamiliar with. There was something sinister about this place.
“I bet your screams would sound lovely.”
His navy eyes brightened with excitement as he reached out, toying with the end of my hair. I held my breath, feeling his knuckle brush against my collarbone.
“Oh the ways I could make you scream…”
My limbs were locked with terror as he stepped into my personal space. His navy eyes wandered over my exposed skin, seeming excited, regardless of the fact that I was covered in swamp sludge.
Behind his smile were secrets, and clearly, he took pleasure in my unease. He might have been beautiful, breathtaking even, but the most dangerous predators usually were.
His whispered words came back to me then.
Such a waste…
Was he planning on hurting me? Killing me? I was totally kidding about the ‘making a mask out of my skin’ thing. Damnit. What would Grandma Anne do right now?
She’d always been tough as nails and could even be a little scary sometimes. She wasn’t just a mambo because she could conjure the spirits. She also commanded respect and earned it every step of the way.
I needed to act more like her and less like the wilting flower of a woman that let Austin beat her down into a shell of herself.
I straightened my shoulders, raising my chin. “You, uh, work here, right? You own this…property?”
Damnit. You sound like a wimp, Mori. Get your shit together.
He had to work here, because why else was he wandering around dressed like some kind of ringmaster? Unless he was just a psychopath slumming it out here in the swamps, lying in wait for helpless victims like me to stumble in.
“Are you frightened of me, blue girl?” he asked without answering any of my questions, as if he could smell my fear and it enticed him to press me further.
Blue girl?
It took a minute for it to dawn on me, and I scowled in irritation, cheeks heating. He was teasing me.
I’d had many nicknames in my life, due to the fact that I had one brown eye and one a pale blue, but this nickname was a first for me. Somehow, the way he said it didn’t really feel like an insult. But I hated it all the same.
My looks weren’t exactly common, and I thought I’d come to terms with that a long time ago. With warm almond brown skin covered in dark freckles, wavy chestnut brown hair, and mismatched eyes, I was used to getting a lot of strange looks and probing questions.
“I’m trying really hard not to be,” I answered honestly. I wasn’t about to pretend I wasn’t unnerved, he’d know I was lying. “Who are you? What is this place?”
Stepping back and letting my hair fall from between his pinched fingers, he said, “You can call me Bael.” He tipped an imaginary hat. “And as for your second question, my lovely, I believe I’ve already told you.”
The Carnival of Bones.
Or was it the Bone Carnival?
Either way, it wasn’t boding well for me.
“This place looks like it’s been abandoned for years," I said, eyeing a cobweb in the corner. "I’ve never seen a carnival in the bayou, and I was practically raised out here." It didn't even make sense for a carnival to be set up in such a remote location. How the hell would they get any customers? "Can you just be straight with me and tell me how to get out?” Then I thought better of it, and quickly added, “There will be people looking for me already.”
I was lying. Kind of.
Grandma Anne would look for me after a couple of days of me not checking in with her, and Austin would probably file a missing person’s report, but I didn’t exactly have friends waiting back at home.
Most of my friends had given up on me after I lost the baby and Austin started to change. Slowly, I pushed everyone else away and they moved on with their lives. I doubted anyone would miss me.
"Why do you sound so unsure?" he mused.
Damnit, he was perceptive. If this guy decided he wanted to bury me somewhere out here, nobody would ever know where to look and Austin would give up and move on, but not before collecting that life insurance policy.
Wow, okay, morbid thoughts…
The thought of Austin sent an ache through me as I realized the idea wasn't too far-fetched. There was a time when my fiancé might have torn the city apart to find me, but now…now things were just different. The spark between us had faded, along with the bruises he'd left on my body time and time again.
“Let’s turn that frown upside down, what do you say?" Bael said, interrupting my thoughts. "Such a tragedy for someone so beautiful to look this sad and lost.”
He reached out a ring-clad hand for me to take, and I just stared at him. His smile was both seductive and wicked.
“You’re not understanding a word I’m saying, are you?” I loosed a long, tired sigh, slumping against the mirror before placing my face in my hands. “Why can’t I just wake the hell up?!”
This had to be a dream. It just fucking had to be.
“Au contraire, chérie, you’re more awake now than you’ve ever been.” I frowned into my palms at his strange riddles. His hand still hovered between us, waiting for me to grasp it, not a hint of uncertainty on his face. "How about a tour?" he asked. "I promise to keep my tongue to myself. That is, unless you ask nicely." With a sly wink, he wiggled his fingers.
My right ear tingled with the phantom swipe of his tongue and lips.
I had a decision to make—I could stay here in the fun house and flail around the labyrinth of mirrored hallways until I eventually found a way out in a year or so, or I could take Bael’s hand and let him lead the way.
As I weighed my options, something soft brushed along my ankle. I jolted but didn’t jump this time as Lafayette swirled around my feet, purring softly.
There was no logical reason for me to feel any comfort that he’d come back for me. For all I knew, he was in cahoots with Bael. But I did feel better. His gentle purring had my muscles relaxing, and I even found my lips tilting into a smile.
After a moment, my fingers hovered over Bael’s open palm, not touching just yet. Our eyes met.
“Are you going to hurt me?”
The words came out smaller than I’d intended, almost whispery. I shouldn’t have asked. It wasn’t like he was going to ans—
“No,” he said sharply, his smile dropping for the first time since he’d come down from overhead. “No, Moria Laveau, I will not hurt you.”
He refused to release my stare, still waiting for my hand, but I stood there in shock at hearing my name on his lips. This was all kinds of wrong.
He knew me. Somehow, he knew who I was, and it only reinforced the notion that I was locked in some kind of bizarre nightmare.
I sucked in a sharp breath as his
lips started to curl.
I should have turned and run in the other direction, taking my chances in the fun house. A smarter woman might have. But instead, I placed my hand in his, trying not to tremble as his fingers closed around it.
Wasting no time, Bael turned, pulling me along behind him. He seemed to know exactly where he was going as we rounded seemingly endless corners towards more identical corridors.
Now that I wasn’t running around with tunnel vision and my heart in my throat, I had a chance to look around.
Some of the mirrors had beautiful frames, while others were jagged and dangerous-looking, like they’d been broken at some point and then haphazardly glued to the wall.
Some of them had little lightbulbs surrounding the glass as if they’d been plucked from a dressing room. Others looked like they were made out of polished metal instead of glass, as they were murky and dark.
I tried not to look at my haggard appearance in the reflections as we passed by, but sometimes it was unavoidable. I was a mess. There were hollows under my eyes that hadn’t been there yesterday, and the soles of my feet were torn to shreds.
He didn’t speak as he pulled me along, but it took less than five minutes before we were coming to a large doorway at the end of a hallway.
Through the door, I could see the night sky and the moon hovering behind tree branches. Instantly filled with relief, I let myself relax, realizing he really was leading me out of here.
But something was wrong—again, I should say.
Bael stopped at the threshold and released my hand before leaning up against the doorframe with his arms crossed casually once again.
I stood there staring, not sure if I should believe my own eyes.
The lights were bright enough that I shrunk back at first. Blinking, flashing, colorful lights.
There was music and chatter, too, instead of silence and crickets. I stepped out of the fun house feeling like my jaw was on the floor.
The carnival was in full swing, looking as pristine and new as if it had just been erected today. The colors were vivid, the rides were bright and gleaming, and the air smelled like popcorn.
