by Trudi Jaye
“Come back, Artemis,” called Celestine. Tears pushed their way up her throat again, and she struggled to hold them back. She didn’t know why it was so important that she didn’t cry. It wasn’t as if anyone else was around. But she hadn’t cried when she’d run away from her home and family; she hadn’t cried through all the lonely months when she’d struggled to make her way, or even after she’d arrived at the Jolly Knight Carnival and discovered she would have to hide herself away to survive.
She’d be damned if she would cry now.
This was nothing. A mere blip on the screen. She would figure a way out of this. As soon as her head stopped hurting, and she could think clearly again.
“Artemis,” she called again.
A figure loomed overhead, on top of the very boulder she’d tumbled over. He was silhouetted against the rising sun, so all she could see was a large black outline.
He looked like Death come to gather her up.
But where was his scythe?
“Are you okay?” asked Death.
Celestine shook her head.
“Stay where you are, I’ll be right there.”
Celestine looked down at her ankle, and the wounds on her hands and leg. It seemed Death didn’t know everything, if he thought she could go anywhere.
The landscape blurred even further, and she wondered if this was what death was really like. A gradual blurring of the focus until there was nothing more than whiteness—or perhaps blackness?—everywhere. The good thing was that the pain in her ankle and hands was losing its force. Everything seemed to be moving away, and for some reason she didn’t mind. What did it matter anyway? She was alone in the world.
And then Death was there with her. At first she flinched away, her instinctual reaction when someone attempted to touch or hold her.
But then, this was Death, wasn’t it? What did it matter if Death touched her?
And so she let his soothing voice calm her. Instead of immediately gathering her up against his chest—as she’d halfway expected—Death crouched down by her ankle.
“Is it just your ankle that’s hurt?” he asked.
Celestine frowned. Surely he must know? He was Death. She shook her head. Held up her bleeding hands. Pulled up her skirt to show the gash on her leg, just under her knee. The grazes over her legs. Tears started to fall as she bowed her head and showed the bloodied lump that had formed in her hair.
Death frowned, and Celestine noticed he was rather attractive, in a shaggy, unshaven kind of way. Not the skull head she’d seen in pictures at all.
“You’re bleeding from that head wound. You probably feel a little light headed.”
Again she nodded. Talking seemed pointless when you were dealing with Death.
“I’m going to check out your ankle first. I’ll try not to hurt you.”
Then he touched her leg.
Celestine screamed, and immediately everything around them went still. The world froze, like they were hanging, waiting for the next moment in time to load. Then lights sparkled across her vision, a rainbow of colors that shone as if the gods had created them. It was so beautiful, and every time Celestine saw them, she wanted to stay just here, in this place, forever.
But she never did.
She was always jerked into the next place.
She felt her body shuddering, and for a moment, pain from her ankle warred with the on-coming vision, and she thought it might not happen. Her heart leaped. This was it. The one time when the visions didn’t rule her over everything else.
But then she was dragged under, and her hope died.
There was so much thick, oozing blood; it was spreading like a virus, covering the ground. There was someone talking, muttering, laughing in the background. A woman. An older woman, wearing a stained and dirty suit, holding a sleek handgun.
Celestine’s heart started racing.
There was a body lying face down on the ground, at the center of that stain. Celestine knew he was dead, but she didn’t know who he was, even though his face was directed toward her. The body was lying in a large warehouse space.
A train running past blocked out all sound for a moment, and time stilled. The overhead bulb shuddered with the reflected vibration.
The bulb swayed toward the corners, and Celestine saw that there were others in the room; she recognized the Ringmasters Rilla and Jack. She knew their faces because she went out of her way to avoid them in the Carnival. There was also another younger woman, and the little girl who’d joined the Carnival in the last week or so. She had an idea they were sisters. In the few times they’d met, the little girl had watched Celestine with a knowledge beyond her years.
She’d made a point of staying away from her as well.
All four of them were huddled down together at the edge of the room. Rilla had her arms around the other two younger women. They were all dusty and dirty, indicating they’d been in the large space for a while. Celestine looked around the room, trying to understand where they were. Boxes were piled high around her.
“I’ve been waiting a long time for this,” the woman said. A gunshot rang out in the darkened room, and Celestine jerked.
Across the room, Rilla fell to the ground, a red stain spreading across her shirt.
“No!” yelled Jack.
Another shot sounded, and Jack grunted in pain as he fell forward. He didn’t move.
The remaining woman screamed.
“This is what happens when you disobey me, Tilly. When you try to take what is mine away from me,” the woman whispered, her voice hard.
Tears welled in the other woman’s eyes—she must be Tilly. She held tight to the little girl, who didn’t seem as upset. She was staring hard at the older woman holding the gun, her face a mask of determination.
“They didn’t deserve to die, Veronica,” said Tilly. “None of them did, not even Sam. They didn’t kill Marco. I did.”
“You all killed him. Every last one of you,” said the woman—Veronica—her voice rising to a fevered pitch. The whites of her eyes were almost glowing in the dark room. “I will not rest until every single person in the Carnival pays for what they have done. And you and your sister are going to watch every one of them die.”
The gun-toting kidnapper walked forward. “And then, when I kill you both, you will understand how I feel, the pain I must live with every day,” she said. “Everything I ever did in my life was for my brother, and you took him from me.”
Tilly cowered back, glancing from the crazed woman in front of her, to the little girl in her arms.
As the vision faded away, Celestine looked down at the dead man lying in a pool of his own blood. His bearded face was visible, as was the green hooded sweatshirt he wore. She didn’t recognize him, but she could see his face.
She would know him if she saw him again.
Chapter 3
Sam didn’t know what had happened. One minute he’d been checking her ankle, which was swollen and probably sprained, if not broken, and the next, she’d fallen back onto the ground, shuddering and shaking like she was having a seizure. Her eyes were squeezed shut, and she looked like she was in pain. He hoped she hadn’t knocked her head again.
He scrambled up to her head, and pulled her eyelid open. Her eyes were fully dilated, only a tiny strip of the most unusual violet-colored iris visible. He vaguely wondered if that discoloration was part of her seizure. Did epileptic fits induce a change in eye color?
Then, just as suddenly as she started, she stopped. Her breathing returned to normal, and her body relaxed into the hard rocky ground. He hovered over her for a moment, waiting to see what happened next.
She opened her eyes. They seemed to glow for a moment in the early morning light, and he blinked.
They were mostly dark blue, but the outer rim of her iris was distinctly violet. He hadn’t imagined the color.
“How are you feeling?” he asked.
The woman gazed up at him. “It was you,” she whispered. Her gaze went to hi
s chest and then back up to his face. “You’re wearing the same green sweatshirt.”
“Pardon me?” She was definitely concussed.
“You’re not Death. But you’re going to die.”
Sam moved back slightly. She was hallucinating. “You’re not thinking straight. We need to get you down this mountain.” Maybe something was going on inside her brain. That knock to the head had seemed okay—head wounds always bled a lot—but you could never tell. He needed to get her to a hospital.
She shook her head. “You’re going to die. Alongside Rilla and Jack. I saw it.”
Sam stilled. Who was this woman? “What do you know about Rilla and Jack?”
“They’re the leaders of the Carnival. I’m part of the sideshow.” She gazed up at him with a confused expression on her face. “Are you part of the Carnival? I don’t know you.”
“I joined recently. I’m a doctor.”
In some kind of adrenaline rush, the woman pushed herself up off the ground, and grabbed Sam by the arm. “You’re treading a dangerous path. If you don’t change it, you’re going to die. And so are Jack and Rilla. I saw it. She had you, some woman named Veronica.” The words rushed out of her, and then she sighed as if it had taken everything she had to say it. Her eyes closed and she collapsed back into a faint.
Sam only just managed to catch her before her head crashed against the rocks for a third time.
He placed her gently back down and stared at her face.
She was pale, probably from the head wound. Her hair was long, a curly reddish brown, although patches of a lighter golden red shone through when the light caught it. She was wearing a long skirt, with a black leather jacket and a tight black T-shirt underneath. Her eyes were ringed with a dark kohl, and her nails were polished a blood red.
He didn’t understand why, but he felt a strong urge to protect her. To make sure she was safe and secure.
He shook his head. He was a doctor, of course he wanted to heal her. That was what he did. He clenched his hands as a wave of misery crashed over him. At least it was supposed to be what he did.
He crouched down again, and put one hand under her shoulders and the other under her knees. The skirt bunched up around her legs, and he almost tripped on a long section that dangled down, until he hooked it over her legs.
His muscles were already crying out in pain after the run he’d put himself through and the climb down the cliff because of his encounter with the bobcat. He glanced around again. He didn’t want to meet it here, especially now he had this woman to look after.
But he was soon distracted by her weight in his arms. She was tall, her long limbs probably almost a match for his own five foot eleven in height. She was perfectly proportioned—as far as he could tell—but she was heavy.
No petite, delicate flower this one.
Trying not to think about his screaming muscles, Sam concentrated on where he put his next foot as he slowly returned down the mountain. The rocky terrain wasn’t that easy around this area. He skirted outcrops when he could and had to circumnavigate several large rocks that he would have just jumped down if he’d been on his own. It was taking him much longer than it had to get up. He was going to be very late for his meeting with Jack and Indigo.
She came to a while later, her wide eyes staring up at him. “Death,” she said. And then fainted again.
He didn’t think she was going to die from any of her wounds, but the idea made him move a little faster. He slid a few times, but his shoes kept him steady, and the tents of the Carnival were steadily getting closer.
When he was almost to the last section of the mountain, movement in the trees twenty yards or so away caught his eye. A black and yellow cat paced silently alongside them. Sam’s heart raced. It was the damn wild cat. It was keeping its distance for now, but who knew when it would decide he was a threat?
All he could do was look forward and keep going. He was gasping for breath, his legs were like jello, and he felt like he was about to collapse. Everything started to look hazy around him, and when he saw two people heading up the main path, he thought at first it was a halucination.
He blinked a few times and his bleary eyes eventually recognized Jack’s tall frame. He stopped, his relief so strong he relaxed his arms; the woman’s limp body started sliding toward the ground. Adrenaline rushed through his veins and he grabbed at her again, clutching her spare frame tightly against his body.
“She’s hurt,” he said, his throat feeling raw.
“I’ll take her,” said Jack as he strode up to Sam, his expression grim. “You look like death warmed over.”
Chapter 4
Celestine gasped, trying to inhale. It was as if someone had taken all the oxygen in the air and replaced it with something she couldn’t breathe. Her eyes felt like they were bugging out of her head, and she couldn’t see. The vision of Rilla and Jack being shot right in front of her kept repeating in her head. Her fear and terror were a reflection of what the people in the room had been feeling; she knew that. But it didn’t help when she was trying to come down off a vision.
A hand touched her forehead, and the vision came into focus again. The blood, the fear, the echo of the gunshot.
The death.
She cried out, trying to make it stop. The hand was removed and the visions receded.
She took another deep breath and managed to calm her thoughts. Looking up, she saw the man from the mountains crouched beside her, his expression concerned. The image of his dead, blood-spattered body lying on the ground superimposed itself in front of the reality. She put one hand up to her mouth, trying to stop herself from throwing up. It didn’t work. She leaned over and vomited over the side of the bed she was lying in, little chunks of her breakfast landing on his running shoes. Her body spasmed and shook.
The man crouched in front of her, watching. He moved forward, then pulled himself back as if afraid to touch her again.
“I’m fine. I just get like this sometimes,” she whispered once the worst of the shaking had stopped. She wiped vomit from her face.
He nodded and handed her a tissue. “It wasn’t an epileptic fit.”
She shook her head. “No. Another kind. Triggered by being touched.”
“Touched?” His eyes widened in alarm.
“Just on my bare skin.” People thought she was eccentric, a little strange, even for circus folk. She didn’t mind that label, as long as she didn’t have to touch them and have visions of their future.
Movement in the back of the trailer alerted her that someone else was in the room. She felt strangely let down as if he’d lied to her or let someone else in on their secret.
“What happened up there, Celestine?” asked a voice calmly. Jack, their Ringmaster.
Celestine blinked, trying to gather her thoughts. “I went walking.” She hesitated. “I took a few risks, I guess. I slipped and fell.”
“Did anyone know you went out walking?” The censure in his voice was clear.
She shook her head and then winced. Her head felt like she’d been run over by a bus.
“You have a mild concussion,” said the stranger.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Sam. I’m the new doctor.” He smiled, and a dimple peeked out on one side of his face. It made him seem a lot younger.
“You’re lucky Sam came past,” said Jack.
Celestine didn’t feel lucky. Sam had seen her having a vision, and she’d blurted it out to him. She never did that. Plus, he was a doctor. He might try to fix her. She shuddered at the idea of someone monitoring her actions. Perhaps forcing her to see the future so he could see what happened. She knew exactly what happened.
“Thank you,” she said, even as she wished he hadn’t been there. She looked around. “Where am I?”
“You’re in my trailer, the new Carnival Clinic.” Sam followed her gaze around the small room. “It still needs a bit of work.”
The camper was run down; the paint was peeling and the mate
rial on the sofas was ripped and thin. “I’m sure you’ll get it running just fine,” she murmured.
“Do you have someone who can keep an eye on you for a while?” asked Sam.
Celestine blinked again. She knew people; she smiled at them and nodded as she set up her fortune telling tent. But would any of them miss her? Would they think to check on her? “No. Not really.”
Jack shuffled slightly in the background, and Celestine winced. It was the last thing she wanted to admit in front of her boss. For some reason she thought he might try to fix that situation.
“You’ll need to stay here for a while, so I can monitor the concussion. They can be tricky.”
A familiar meowing outside the clinic interrupted her reply. Her hand relaxed out of its clenched position—she hadn’t even realized she was worried about Artemis. There was an open window at the side of the trailer, and a large spotted shape scrambled through the opening. Artemis landed heavily on the bed, and meowed at Celestine, taking a step toward her. Then she saw Sam and Jack and hissed.
“Get back,” said Sam urgently. “It must have followed me back.” He grabbed a small wooden chair from beside the table.
Celestine shook her head quickly, putting her hand out to protect her cat from Sam. “Don’t hurt her. It’s Artemis.”
At the same time, Jack moved toward Sam, grabbing the leg of the upheld chair. “It’s her cat,” he said. “It’s fine, just a little wary of strangers.”
“That’s not a cat.”
Celestine glared at Sam. “She’s a Savannah, a breed that’s larger than other cats.”
Sam put down the chair, but didn’t take his eyes off Artemis. “I saw it on the mountain when I was out running. It made me change direction. I thought I’d gotten into its territory.”
Celestine smiled and reached one hand out; Artemis smooched against her. “She was helping me. She pushed you toward me.” Artemis took a couple of delicate steps in Celestine’s direction and then gently head butted her side, rubbing soft fur to clothes. The touch calmed her and Celestine let out a deep breath, leaning back into the pillow.
