by Rachel Caine
She shrugged. “What do I have to lose?”
Charlie stepped close to the clockwork ostrich, saying, “Orangutan posthumous grotesque.” Before she could ask him what he meant, the dancing bird froze. “That’s the passcode,” Charlie explained, stepping under its neck and holding out his hand. With a deep breath, she ducked under the unmoving bird and into the carnival proper.
Everything was different on the other side of the wagons. The air was full of glitter, the lanterns glowed like jars of fairy dust, and music danced on a sugar-frosted breeze. Laughter was everywhere. It was like a dream, like every Christmas morning should have been, like prom looked in movies. And it was contagious. Lydia’s smile broke out, stretching until her cheeks ached. She wanted to be part of this place, this moment, forever.
“You never been to a carnival before, Lydia?”
She shook her head, stars in her eyes. “Never.”
He held out his arm, and she took it. As they walked under a tightrope strung high overhead, the pretty girl balancing there on one leg shouted, “Oi, Charlie! What do you think you’re doin’, lad?”
“Bein’ philanthropic,” he shot back. He gave Lydia a fond but sharp-toothed smile and a look she couldn’t quite puzzle out but that nevertheless made her blush.
Charlie scanned the crowd, nostrils flaring and head cocked to the side like that of a dog hunting for bacon. Lydia danced back when a small monkey made of metal scampered past, tail in the air, but Charlie pulled her along to follow it. They wound through the crowd in giggling pursuit, stopping short when the copper robot scampered into a cluster of velvet-walled tents with fluttering flags on top. A golden rope was strung all around as a barricade, and the curlicue letters on the sign said simply Freak Show.
“Is the boss inside?” Charlie asked the leather-clad man standing by the money box.
“Yeah, but the girl has to pay admission,” the man snapped. Charlie pointed to Lydia’s sparrow tattoo.
“New act.”
The man sneered but let them by. They ducked into the maze of tents, and Lydia barely had time to take in the lantern-lit wall of strange jars filled with horrors and miracles before she heard a ruckus behind the display.
“Lads. Lads. Not again. Which head shall I cut off first, eh?”
Charlie held back a curtain to reveal the strangest scene Lydia had ever witnessed. The copper monkey they’d just followed perched on the shoulder of a seriously sexy ringmaster, who had his fist wound up in the jacket lapels of a two-headed boy while a well-dressed wolfman watched from the sidelines.
“She asked for it, Master Stain. Begged to be bitten, really—”
“Perk of the job—”
“One less vial you got to feed us, right?”
The two heads kept interrupting each other, muttering through bloodstained teeth. The ringmaster tossed the boys to the ground at the feet of the wolfman, whose face looked more like that of a smug Yorkie than that of a wolf.
“I’m not one for upholding the law, lads, but I’m rather against having my caravan shut down, and Pietro caught you fair and square.” The ringmaster fetched a copper coin from his waistcoat and threw it at the wolfman, who fumbled with dark-furred fingers before shoving it in his pocket with a grin. “Catarrh, Quincy. This is your last warning. I know how delicious they are, but if I can abstain, so can you. No more drinking from the customers, or I swear I’ll toss the uglier head to the bludbunnies if I can ever figure out which one is more repugnant.”
The ringmaster turned around, noticing Charlie and Lydia for the first time. Behind him, the two-headed boy stood and launched himself at the wolfman, who yipped and howled and snapped. With a dramatic bow, the ringmaster closed the curtain on the tussle.
“I’m Criminy Stain, proprietor of Criminy’s Clockwork Caravan.” His cloudy eyes traveled hungrily over Lydia’s tattoos. “Welcome to Sang, pretty Stranger.”
Lydia turned to Charlie. “How did he—”
Criminy laughed. “I know everything. Almost. You practically scream it, pet. And you don’t even look gnawed on, so that’s a plus. Where’d you find her, Charlie?”
“Inside the wagon’s circle. By the costumer’s.”
Charlie sounded melancholy, and he was hunched over like a kicked dog. Lydia couldn’t imagine what had dampened him, making him look at his boots instead of meeting the ringmaster’s ferocious glare.
“Well played, lad. I’ll take over from here.” Criminy straightened his cravat and hat, gave Lydia a sizzling grin, and held out his arm. “Care to see a hell of a show, love?”
He was dangerously gorgeous and, frankly, scared the hell out of her. She stepped closer to Charlie, giving his arm a squeeze.
“Charlie’s taking good care of me,” she said, and he squeezed her back.
Criminy’s eyes narrowed, focusing on her throat.
“You got a magic locket?” he asked, voice clipped.
“Nope.”
He snorted and looked down, his cocky confidence exchanged for chagrin.
“Then you’re not the one I’m waiting for. Still, I never thought I’d see the day Charlie Dregs got the girl.”
Charlie growled low in his throat, and Lydia blurted, “Are you hiring?”
Criminy’s mouth quirked up. “That depends. What’s your act?”
She rolled back the velvet arms of her dress, showing full sleeves of tattoos. Magical beasts, flowers, spiderwebs, sugar skulls, all chosen from the same artist’s portfolio.
“Is that all you’ve got?” Criminy’s sharp eyebrows went up as if daring her.
“Not even close.” She hiked up her skirt to show feet and ankles likewise inked. “They go all the way up.”
Criminy whistled and took off his hat to run a hand through ink-black hair. Charlie went on alert as the ringmaster leaned forward to reach behind Lydia’s ear. He pulled out a copper coin and held it out to her. “For a show like that, I’ll be your first customer. Lydia, the Tattooed Lady. It has a nice ring to it.”
She took the coin but not the bait. “So what do I have to do?”
“We’ll have a tent ready for you tomorrow night, right here. The costumer will set you up in the morning, so be prepared to show some skin. All you have to do is sit there and be beautiful while people gawk. You’ll get a hundred coppers per year, plus room and board. You’ll get to see the world of Sang. All your dreams come true—for as long as you last.” He twirled a white-gloved hand in the air. “Et cetera.”
“Wait. As long as I last?”
“I take on any useful Strangers I can find. Some stay only a few hours before disappearing back to your world. Some last forever. Some die. There’s no way to tell how long you’ll be here, so make it count.”
“What about tonight?”
His eyes twinkled, and he grinned. Reaching into his waistcoat, Criminy pulled out a scarf the color of shadows and smoke and tossed it to Lydia.
“Tonight, pet, you have but one assignment: cover your ink and enjoy your first night in Sang. Charlie, the puppet show’s been canceled, and you’ll deliver the lady to Abilene’s wagon before dawn. If you wouldn’t mind?”
Charlie’s answering grin lit up his face and straightened his posture, making him seem more like the lively man who had found her in the field.
“It would be an honor,” he said. Lydia gave Criminy a nod, tucked the coin in a pocket, and turned away to arrange her scarf.
Criminy held back the curtain, displaying the ongoing struggle between the two-headed boy and the wolfman. “Stop fighting, fools. I need my freaks in one piece.”
As Charlie guided her out of the tent, a shiver ran up her spine. She felt hungry eyes on her back, a predator’s sharp smile in her wake. There was danger here, that much was sure. She would have to watch out for Criminy Stain and his dire, unexplainable warnings.
—
AS THEY REJOINED the murmuring crowd outside, Charlie bent close to murmur, “Thank you for that, Lydia.”
Feeling bra
ve, she nudged him with a shoulder. “I know what it’s like to feel invisible.”
He chuckled. “Tonight’s your last night of that. People will pay to see you from now on.”
She looked down. “They won’t see the real me. Just the ink.”
“Isn’t that why you got it? To stand out?”
She pulled back her sleeve to look at the crooked heart on her wrist, the only piece of art that was of her own design. “I always thought beauty was only skin-deep. I’m not sure that’s enough anymore.”
“If they can’t see the beauty underneath, that’s their loss. But tonight is just for you. What would you like to see first?”
She spun, a small cog in the grand machinery of light and chaos. She couldn’t say why, but it felt like she belonged there. And whether Criminy was dangerous or kindly, she would take his advice and enjoy this place, whatever it was, for as long as she could.
“I want to see everything.”
He looked left and right and shrugged. “There’s really no right place to begin on a wheel.”
“Then we can’t mess up, right?”
He gave her the strangest look, as if measuring her in some way she couldn’t understand. Instead of answering, Charlie guided her toward a collection of food and drink carts, each treat more mouthwatering than the last. Leaving her by a roasted-chestnut dispenser, he fussed with a potbellied copper contraption. He soon returned with a steaming paper cup. Lydia took it with murmured thanks, savoring the heat of the thin parchment and sipping carefully. Not until she’d gulped down half the strangely spiced hot chocolate did she remember that drinking things in other worlds was a mythological no-no. Hades, Olympus, the faerie world—most places would punish her for that transgression. But what was done was done, so she gulped the rest down fast, scalding her throat. As she threw the cup away and took his arm to stroll some more, Charlie sighed in relief and relaxed as if he, too, had felt her thirst and was sated.
As they skirted the crowd gathered around the strong man, Charlie said, “What’s your world like, then? I’ve heard stories, but never straight from the source.”
“It’s . . . not that great. I like it better here.”
“No Bludmen, right?”
“No Bludmen. Just humans and animals.”
“Speak of the devil.” Charlie knelt to snatch a black rabbit as it lunged from the shadows toward Lydia’s feet. It kicked violently in his grasp, dangling by its ears with panic in its eyes. Lydia was outraged and opened her mouth to protest the cruelty . . . until it hissed, revealing fangs that would have fit better on a German shepherd. In a heartbeat, she understood that rabbits here were vicious predators, far from the innocent bunnies of her world. A trickle of fear settled in her belly. As if sensing her disquiet, Charlie swiftly twisted its neck.
“One more for the stewpot. Can’t have him hopping around, biting the audience.” He shrugged. “Or you.” Seeing the horror on her face, he slung it over his shoulder, out of sight. “You’re a tenderhearted little thing, aren’t you?”
“I’m a vegetarian.” It came out as a squeak.
“I’m not. Neither was that rabbit.”
Lydia had some familiarity with dangerous predators hiding behind sweet exteriors. But Charlie was the complete opposite. She looked at him, so different in every respect from every man she’d ever known. He called himself a monster, a Bludman, yet his behavior revealed a kind soul with hidden depths. He felt like the missing piece to a puzzle she’d never tried to solve. Something still felt off, but she liked where she was now, liked the warm light of the lanterns and the taste of the wild wind on her spice-dusted lips. And she liked being with Charlie.
Their twined arms took on a new significance, and when Charlie led her into the darkness behind the sword-swallower’s painted backdrop, she thrilled with anticipation.
But he didn’t pull her close for a kiss. Instead, he went to the corner of the wagon to hang the dead rabbit with dozens of others on a hook and put a mark by his name on a chalkboard.
“We get a copper for every ten bludbunnies we bring in,” he explained.
The tangled mass of rabbits twitched, and Lydia jumped back.
“Does it trouble you?” Charlie looked down at her, one fang biting nervously into his lip.
“Not as much as it should, and that troubles me. Where am I, Charlie? And why don’t I feel more upset? More lost?”
Her voice shook, and he drew her down beside him to sit on the steps of the wagon, away from the half-dead rabbits and hidden in the thickest shadows behind the bare wood backdrop. It was strangely intimate, being so close to hundreds of enchanted people skipping through lantern light and yet completely invisible. Without meaning to, she leaned against Charlie, noticing that he smelled of comfortingly forgotten things, of fire-heated wood and old paper and night wind and, vaguely, of red wine. He put his arm around her and set his cheek against her hair as if soothing a child.
“Criminy says most Strangers end up in Sang because they’re asleep in your world, or hurt. So did you go to sleep, or did you get hurt?”
Tears sprung to her eyes when she realized she knew the answer. “I got hurt.”
“What happened?”
“I don’t know. There was this guy, and things went to hell, and then one day I looked in the mirror, and . . .”
“And what?”
“It’s like no one ever saw the real me. I was just so sick of being invisible.”
His arm tightened around her. “I know that feeling. But I see you, Lydia, and you’re beautiful, on the surface and inside. You invade my senses and bewitch my heart. It feels like madness. But better.” He chuckled, and she felt it against her hand, which had crept up to his chest. “It’s as if I’ve been waiting for you. Something about you is just so . . .”
“Right?”
“Right.”
The way he looked at her made her pulse flutter faster, made her remember the day she’d gotten the sparrow Charlie was gazing at with a mixture of tenderness and hunger. She still remembered the way she’d felt, her skin buzzing along with the needle, Jayson’s glove-covered hand pressing over her heart while they laughed together. That had been her first bit of ink, a piece of his flash impulsively chosen from the wall. Over the next year, they’d enjoyed a storybook romance as he reverently branded her body with his artwork, hands, and lips.
Her father had tried to break it up, quoting Michelangelo’s saying about how skin is more beautiful than the garment that covers it. She had replied that beauty is only skin-deep, but ugly goes straight to the bone.
Everything had been perfect until the day she found Jayson in the alley, ramming his tongue down the throat of a skinny freshman with perfectly straight blond hair and mud-brown eyes and not a single tattoo. The look he had given her then—like she was nobody, like he’d never seen Lydia before—it had killed her, and she had reacted poorly. Lydia still loved the ink, but she had come to hate the artist.
She had been so sure that they were meant to be together, and he had betrayed her completely. And, sure, she had flipped out a little. Her father had sent a car to bring her back from college to recuperate at their summerhouse by the shore. It hadn’t helped. She hated it there, hated the money and the perfect, empty house and the way her father stared at her as if wishing she were someone else. He’d always hated tattoos, and she’d always hated him.
“Your mind’s far away, girl. Come back to me.”
Lydia looked up, smacking Charlie in the nose with her hat. With a grunt of annoyance, she untied the limp bow beneath her chin and threw the bonnet on the ground. The shocked look on Charlie’s face was priceless.
“Is that your real hair?”
She dragged a hand through the hot-pink spikes, twisting a few curls to make them stand up. “What, women don’t do weird things with their hair here? Don’t you like it?”
He chuckled. “Lydia, love, you’re in one of the few places in the world where weirdness will earn your supper. I woul
d like your hair no matter what, but the brightness suits you. Perhaps this is where you were meant to be. D’you mind?”
Before she could ask what might she mind, he ran his gloved palm over her prickly hair, his palm caressing her skull. A shiver shot down her spine, a melty sensation spreading through her belly under the velvet.
“They say Strangers can disappear.” He traced her hairline to the nape of her neck, making her gasp. “I hope you don’t.”
The sincerity in his kohl-rimmed eyes drew her in, and she looked down, his hand still warm on her neck. “Charlie, are you real?”
He shrugged with an amused smile. “I think so. Are you?”
Her voice was tiny, unguarded, and raw. “I think so. But I’m not sure. Maybe I’m dead.”
Tipping her head back with a finger under her chin, his eyes traced the lines of her face. “To tell you the truth, when I first saw you, I thought you were a dream. A lost ghost haunting the field. When you spoke, it probably scared me as much as it did you.”
Giving her every opportunity to pull away, he gently touched his lips to hers, a tentative brush of warmth and question. She held perfectly still, afraid that the slightest movement would break the fragile thread connecting them, that either one of them might disappear or lose their nerve. She trembled and closed her eyes as he pulled away.
“That made me feel more real,” she whispered.
Charlie pulled her face closer with one hand at the nape of her neck, and her lips parted. His mouth was firm, bold yet soft and seeking. His thumb gently stroked the ticklish place on her spine where a tattooed luna moth spread bright wings as if forever taking flight, and her shawl fell away. One of her hands found his cheek, the other landing on his forearm, bare where his shirt was rolled up. Cradled between the warmth of his body and the chill of midnight, she shivered. He touched her only where the dress left off, gently tracing the tattoos and lines of her neck and shoulders as if he knew the secret places no one had touched, where planes met planes and the breeze alone could raise goose bumps. As if those places had been his all along.
