Vagabond Circus Series

by Sarah Noffke

  The acrobat walked until the tide was only a few feet away. Finley considered going to the edge and allowing the ocean to lap up on his feet. He shook his head. Not today. Today he wanted to remember as the day he met the sand. Another day would maybe be reserved for meeting the waters of the Pacific. He shouldn’t overwhelm his senses or overwhelm the memories he was creating.

  Finley took a seat in the sand and immediately realized the stuff was going to be all over him. Such was sand. It found its way into every spot and liked to be carried away from the ocean, hiding in places to be discovered later. He looked down at the cuff of his jeans and realized sand had already adhered into the fabric and folds and would travel back to Vagabond Circus with him.

  The acrobat hadn’t been seated for more than a minute when a man came and sat next to him. A bit off put by the closeness of the sudden stranger, Finley turned and then realized it wasn’t an unknown person at all.

  “Did you follow me here?” he said to Ian, who had his long legs in front of him, his arms resting on them.

  Ian’s gaze was fixed on the waves rising and falling in front of him. He simply shook his head.

  “Well, how did you know to find me here?” Finley said, studying Ian’s face. The man had a round face and reddish stubble had formed on his usually clean shaven chin. He was half Jewish and half Irish, which was where he got his curly blond hair and large build. Now he hardly remembered the mother who his appearance took after so much. Really he’d only gotten his once crooked teeth and wide nose from his father.

  Ian gave a dry laugh. “How did I know to find you here?” Another laugh. “I realize we haven’t known each other long, but unfortunately for you, I know you better than you’d like. I know everybody better than they’d like usually.”

  “So what, you saw a future where I came to this spot?” Finley said, crossing his legs tailor style in front of him. He hadn’t even known he was going to end up in that spot until he did.

  “Yes, and I know what you’re eating for dinner and that you’ll accidentally stub your toe in the morning. Move that chair away from the side of your bed to avoid that,” Ian said, lisping through his braces.

  “Hmm,” Finley said, directing his gaze out to the ocean. It seemed to go on and on, like time itself, each second endlessly ticking by.

  “So, I’m sorry to interrupt your first real break in…well, forever, but I needed to tell you something,” Ian said.

  “You really do know everyone. Is that from seeing people’s futures?”

  “I now see the past too. The past and future of everyone I’m connected to,” Ian said, his voice carrying stress in it.

  “What do you mean ‘now’? You didn’t used to?”

  Ian nodded and squinted as his eyes swerved up, following the flight of a seagull. “My visions are increasing. Lacing together.”

  “I wonder why?”

  “It’s just the evolution of my type,” he said, thinking of his dead mother. Her visions had overwhelmed her at the end. However, it had taken longer for that to happen to her, since she knew fewer people than Ian. His involvement with Vagabond Circus had been a blessing and a curse. It had gotten him away from his Middling father, who never took the time to understand his son, the Dream Traveler. However, it had given Ian dozens and dozens of people to be connected to and therefore he was overwhelmed by the visions of their lives. His mother, who was mostly a recluse, didn’t take her life until she was thirty-five. Ian didn’t think he could wait another decade.

  “What do you have to tell me?” Finley said, not sure he wanted to know.

  “I have to share your fate with you. I’ve only ever shared this type of fate with other people twice and in each instance the results had assorted effects.”

  “Why are you making this sound like something major?” Finley said and took his eyes off the mesmerizing ocean to stare at the clairvoyant beside him.

  Ian only shrugged his shoulders. “It very well could be major. But for me to tell it to you I want your permission. I can’t share a future of this magnitude with someone without first being granted that.”

  “Look, maybe you got it wrong this time. You’re acting like what you have to tell me can make a huge impact. If you’ve seen my past and my future then you know that I’m not some great hero with the ability to make changes. I’m going to live and I’m going to die, and unlike Dave or most people at Vagabond Circus, I’m not full of some greatness,” Finley said, and realized he had directed a fair amount of the anger he’d harbored recently at the guy beside him.

  “Most people aren’t destined for greatness, Finley,” Ian said, irritation in his voice. His once pleasant manner was gone, washed away by the ever-increasing visions of other people’s futures. “Most people aren’t going to go on to live great lives. They are just mediocre. They will love and be loved, but do nothing of significance. Still they are important in their mere role to just survive life.” Ian realized this was different than what most people had been taught. Not Finley, as he’d only been taught how to survive with a beautiful agility. However, most people are told they are special. That they are unique and adding something special to the world. And in Finley’s case this was actually true. “But you,” he said, pointing directly at Finley, “you, I believe could actually be destined for greatness.”

  Finley regarded him with a skeptical glare. “Then why do you say it like it’s a curse?”

  “Because usually greatness is achieved alone and takes an incredible sacrifice. Those who achieve greatness lose much in the process, which is why few actually obtain it,” Ian said.

  “And you see a future where I obtain greatness? Where I do great things?”

  “No,” Ian said, his tone dropping into one of regret. “I actually see one where you fail. Where you stop just short of your goals. Where you die.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Because you’re unwilling to make the ultimate sacrifice,” Ian said, and the last two words he said with a strange bit of drama.

  “What? How is dying not the ultimate sacrifice?”

  Ian gave a small sadistic smile. “Oh, that’s no sacrifice at all. Leaving this world is usually a relief, I believe.”

  “Then what’s the ultimate sacrifice?” Finley asked.

  “Love, of course.”

  “What? You mean like giving your heart to someone?”

  “No, I mean the opposite,” Ian said. “It is usually easy for people to love a person. Natural. We are born to love one another. A sacrifice is made when we turn our backs on love. When we deprive ourselves and others of what we need to thrive.”

  “I have been depriving myself,” Finley said through clenched teeth, thinking of how many times he’d looked at Zuma with scornful eyes and a burning desire in his heart.

  “Oh yes, I’m fully aware,” Ian said, his mind spinning with too many futures. They were shifting though. But would what he was about to say change them enough? Would it bring about the future he told to Dave, the one where Zuma was actually given happiness? “However, in the future you aren’t so restrained. You do something to protect her, because your love is so strong for her.”

  “You mean Zuma? I protect her? And it gets me killed?” Finley said, looking without seeing, his mind blanketed by the idea of this future.

  “Exactly,” Ian said. His eyes also weren’t focused on the physical world, but rather watching the visions streaming through his head.

  “But if I don’t protect her, then what happens to her?” Finley said.

  “That is something I don’t know since it’s not what you do in the future. All I know is that if you step in, then you die.”

  “And if I don’t then I leave her to fend for herself, don’t I? I leave her in danger,” Finley said.

  “Yes, the ultimate sacrifice for you will be to turn your back on her when she needs you most,” Ian said.

  “Why are you telling me this? I didn’t think you told people how to avoid death.”

  �
��I’m telling you because if you die, then the greatness you could do will too,” Ian said and then leaned in close, too close, to Finley. “I fear if you die, then Vagabond Circus does too. That is what I see as of now.”

  “Okay, tell me what I must do then,” Finley said.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Jack’s hands were white under the weight of his body. Both were pinned on either rail beside him.

  “Come on pretty boy. It’s fairly simple. Babies can do it, put one foot in front the other,” Sunshine said, standing at the far end of the rails.

  Jack bit down on his lip and willed his foot to rise the same way he had in his dream travel.

  The foot remained cemented to the ground. “I-I-I,” Jack stuttered.

  “Say you can’t and I’m going to push you down and walk away. You’ll remain there until you figure out how to get up or wait for Fanny to return,” she said.

  “Seriously, Sunny, I’m never going to do this if you’re so soft on me,” he said through tattered breaths, his face red with focus.

  And then something ever so slight sprung to Sunshine’s face but she corrected herself before it fully developed. How stupid she would have felt if that smile had fully unfurled. “Look, I only signed up to help you with this physical therapy because watching an acrobat struggle seems like a brilliant way to spend my time.”

  “That’s sweet, but I think I prefer Fanny a bit more for these PT sessions,” Jack said.

  “And she’d be here if the crew wasn’t killing each other with fist fights.”

  Jack grimaced. “This is all Knight’s damn fault,” he said, and his foot floated up an inch. The space below it felt like a million miles from earth. He looked up at Sunshine with astonishment and then lost his balance on the unsteady supporting foot. His weight shifted and his leg buckled under him and Jack slipped down, his arm catching the rail as his tail bone hit the ground. “Dammit!” he said, looking up at Sunshine as he untangled his arms from the railing.

  “That was pretty ungraceful, Mr. Trapeze. At this pace you won’t be catching Finley doing the quadruple in this lifetime. But don’t worry. He’s taken over catching since Jaz was murdered. He and pink streak are quite romantic as a flying trapeze act. Does it bother you that he catches your fiancée while you lie around?”

  Jack narrowed his eyes at the girl, feeling lame looking up at her. “Don’t joke about Jaz.”

  “I’m not joking, Jack. I’m angry as hell about it. That could have been me or you or Oliver. And it still could be. The man has to be stopped.”

  “How do we do that when he has Sebastian mysteriously kill people who resist his power?” Jack said.

  From the doorway, Zuma said, “I’ve got some ideas.” She’d been there longer than she was going to admit. The two had been so focused on each other that they didn’t notice her there.

  “Well, speaking of your sweetie,” Sunshine said, crossing her arms in front of her and lowering her chin.

  “How long were you going to let him sit there?” Zuma said, walking over to Jack and taking the spot behind him. “On the count of three,” she said and hooked her arms under his armpits. “One. Two. Three.” And then she pulled him up using his help until he was standing again. She didn’t release him until he had his hands firmly pinned on the rails.

  Sunshine watched all this with a quiet hostility. “I actually had no plan of helping him up. That will teach him not to fall in the future.”

  Zuma shook her head at the girl and then came around to face Jack. “Are you all right?” she said.

  He nodded, his forehead beaded with sweat. “Mostly,” he said.

  “Well, I can take over, Sunshine,” Zuma said, not looking at the girl, her eyes firmly on Jack, who was building up his confidence again.

  “Thought you had practice with Fin,” Sunshine said, not having moved.

  “He cut it short,” Zuma said.

  Sunshine didn’t leave, but rather kept her curious eyes on Zuma’s back. “Say, Z, why don’t you tell me something else about Finley, like what you all did while you were rescuing Jack?” Sunshine said. Between sessions with Jack and meals with Finley she knew most of what happened after Dave’s death. And she knew what they weren’t telling her too. What the three acrobats were lying about.

  Zuma whipped around, her eyes red. “I don’t think that’s your business and right now I’m trying to work with Jack.” Zuma paused her gaze on Sunshine. The empath had a cunning look on her face. “What?” Zuma said. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “Oh, no reason,” Sunshine said with a nonchalant shrug. “And please continue. I want to watch Jack fall again.”

  “You’re a real sweetheart,” he said and blew out a breath.

  “You can do this, Jack,” Zuma said.

  He nodded and then closed his eyes to visualize. “Give me a minute, please.”

  “You know he’s only mean to you to keep you at a distance,” Sunshine said to Zuma.

  “What?” she said. “Jack isn’t mean to me.”

  Sunshine rolled her eyes. “No, blondie, I wasn’t talking about Jack. By cut your practice short did you mean Fin was tired of giving you the cold shoulder?”

  “Sunshine, don’t,” Zuma said, realizing Sunshine was rummaging through her emotions which were sitting on the surface, fresh and raw from stifling too many tears related to Jasmine and Finley and everything that was wrong at Vagabond Circus.

  “He doesn’t hate you,” Sunshine said when Zuma turned back to look at Jack, who still had his eyes closed and seemed to have tuned the girls out.

  “I know that!” Zuma snapped. “Would you shut up?”

  “He’s in love with you,” Sunshine said, a teasing tone in her voice.

  Zuma spun around fully and faced Sunshine. “Stop it,” she said, tears on the edge of her voice, but this reaction made Sunshine appear way too pleased to consider stopping.

  “And you’re in love with Finley,” Sunshine stated.

  “I am not. I’m in love with Jack,” Zuma said.

  “Oh, you and Jack care about each other, but you aren’t in love,” Sunshine said and turned her gaze to Jack, whose eyes had just sprung open. “That’s right, lover boy, I know you two are faking it. So now I want to know why.”

  Zuma looked at Jack, whose arms were slightly shaking from the effort of supporting most of his body weight. She then turned back to Sunshine. “It was a lie that got out of control.”

  “Oh, well how much longer are you both going along with it?” Sunshine asked.

  “It doesn’t really matter right now!” Zuma yelled. “There’s other bigger concerns, like helping Jack walk. So if you wouldn’t mind…”

  Sunshine waved her off. “Please continue. I’ll shush for the moment.”

  “Thank God.” Zuma turned back to Jack. “You ready?”

  He shook his head. “No, I need a break actually.”

  Zuma nodded and grabbed the wheelchair to the side and placed it behind Jack and then hooked her hands under his armpits again, helping him to sit back into the chair.

  “Quitter,” Sunshine said, giving him a repulsed look before stalking out of the trailer.

  Jack looked up at Zuma standing behind him. “Thanks, Z.”

  “Anytime,” she said and leaned down and kissed his sweaty forehead.

  He then looked at the door which had just closed. “She’s delightful, isn’t she?”

  “Yeah, a real ray of sunshine,” Zuma said dryly.

  He laughed at this as Zuma came to rest her elbows on the railing beside Jack. “So I’ve been putting a plan together for taking Knight and his minions down.”

  Jack raised a cautious eyebrow at his friend. “Zuma, you can’t be serious?”

  “Of course I am,” she said.

  “You know how dangerous that is. What if he finds out? He will have you murdered too.”

  “Then what’s the alternative? Just allow him to control us? Ruin us?”

  Jack sl
ipped his hand on Zuma’s arm. “I can’t lose you too. The circus can’t lose you.”

  She picked up her other hand and placed it over Jack’s as a tear peeked out of her eye. “I’m not going anywhere but I have to do something.”

  “Let Titus do it.”

  Zuma then looked up from where her haunted eyes were resting on their clasped hands. “We are working on it together.” And there was a hint of pride in her voice. “We don’t know how it will all work but Ian is helping.”

  Jack nodded, his eyes distant. “I want to do more.”

  “And you will.”

  “Is that what Ian says? Am I going to walk again?” Jack hadn’t had a chance to speak to the crew member.