A Circus of Ink

by Lauren Palphreyman

  She laughs. ‘We’ll see.’

  ‘Yeah. We will.’ I stroke her stomach, and soon, I feel sleep wash over her—her breathing slowing, her body relaxing. I smile. I never smile, but it seems I can’t stop nowadays. When did I become so pathetic?

  My eyelids are heavy when my body stiffens. The ink in my veins burns. I feel as if scalding metal is being pushed onto the spot above my heart, branding me like cattle. I try to calm my breathing. I try to make it stop.

  She makes a muffled noise.

  I wince. ‘Shh. Go back to sleep.’

  Her breathing steadies, and I pull her closer. I let out a long breath as the pain ebbs away.

  The Blotter and the Twist. It won’t end well. It can’t.

  But right now, with her asleep in my arms, it doesn’t feel so bad. In fact, I think I might even feel a flicker of happiness somewhere in all the darkness—which is a novel fucking feeling. I exhale and kiss the back of her head.

  ‘You’ll be the death of me, little Twist.’

  We spend the next three days in the motel. I spend the nights watching her at the nearby black market, making sure she doesn’t get into any trouble. She makes it clear she’ll go without me if I don’t come, so what else am I supposed to do?

  ‘Once, there was a world. And the world was grey . . .’

  She tells the story standing on the bench of an old steel factory amongst stalls of forbidden things. The rank smell of the river drifts through the broken windows, and I can just about see the outline of Draft Three beyond it.

  I keep my tattoos covered, but the small group of people who gather around her eye me cautiously as if they can sense what I am.

  I’m dangerous.

  They’re idiots though.

  I’m not as dangerous as her.

  ‘No flowers had grown for centuries. The people had forsaken them for practical things like cities, and skyscrapers, and powerful men. They had forgotten what flowers were . . .’

  She listens too, for word that her dandelion seeds are spreading.

  I hear the whispers first, on the second night, as she talks to a larger group with faces smeared with dirt. A man talks in hushed tones to a vendor selling fake ID cards about a painted symbol on a killing block.

  ‘But one day, there was a hurricane. The hurricane stirred something in the earth long forgotten . . .’

  She gets bolder as the night gets darker, encouraged, I think, by the growing crowd—curious eyes that drink in her stories of flowers and storms and dragons. Her face glows, expressive, hands gesturing around her as she captivates audiences who should be afraid while the air smells like damp and home-brewed alcohol.

  I get it though. The fascination. Because she tells me stories too, later, as we lie panting on the dirty mattress. She tells me about a girl locked away in a tower and a man with a clockwork heart, and I don’t want to listen, but at the same time, I do.

  ‘It was a dandelion clock. And as the winds blew, they started to spread its seeds . . .’

  She insists on visiting other places in Draft Two as well, spreading more seeds. It’s madness. And on the third night, before she heads to the black market, I have to drag her, struggling, with a paint can in her hand, away from a House of Truth she planned to graffiti.

  The Sacred Stylus buzzes above its open doors, and there’s a Teller inside the bare atrium of the tower, telling a crowd of people the story of the first sin—curiosity—and how all Twists must be Cut in order for the Creators to gift the people the foretold Ending.

  It’s only a matter of time before we’re Cut. I don’t know how the fuck I’m going to keep her safe. She’s reckless. Naïve.

  She’s dangerous.

  ‘And as the seeds took to the earth, they started to grow. When they bloomed, the world was no longer grey. It was full of colour. It was beautiful . . .’

  It’s on the third night that we run into the Canary, as Elle tells her stories standing on a crate by a smashed window, black mould creeping up the frame behind her and broken glass glittering in the firelight.

  The Canary dresses like a man, in the grey uniform of the factories, and has dark hair tied back from a severe face. There’s a tattoo of a songbird inked onto her skin beneath her sleeve. She tells us a story about a group of women in the old days who would sing songs to sailors to lure them to shore before stealing their ships as we share beer and stale bread in the factory’s old breakroom.

  Bullshit, I think. But she has a boat we can use to cross the river.

  She tells us to meet her the following nightfall at a certain point along the riverbank. There are abandoned warehouses on the other side, she tells us, where we can shelter until we’re ready to move on.

  ‘And the people remembered what they had lost. They remembered what had been taken from them . . .’

  Elle insists on telling her story one more time before we head back to the motel. She gathers the biggest crowd yet.

  We shouldn’t have stayed though. Strained grey light crawls up over the river when we leave, and there are more Blotters around than usual, patrolling the streets between the buildings and flickering billboards and standing by the steel bridge.

  I don’t understand why we’ve not been caught yet. It must not be written. But why?

  I yank her arm roughly as I pull her inside the motel, past the sleazy guy behind the reception desk.

  And yet it’s just an act. I’m not angry. I’m not scared.

  I think a part of me is glad I took her to the market—as dangerous as it was.

  Elle’s story rings in my ears.

  ‘They remembered to fight.’

  Chapter Thirty

  Elle

  Slowly, I open my eyes. Evening light strains through the barred window onto our bodies. It’s our fourth night here, and we need to meet the Canary soon so we can pass across the river.

  Jay is asleep, I think. His warm, steady breaths brush against the back of my neck. One of his tattooed arms lies heavily over my side, pinning me to the mattress. The other lies beneath my neck. His skin is damp, and his chest sticks to my back as it rises and falls.

  What I’m feeling right now is not logical. Not when I’m supposed to be dead and people are coming to kill me. Not when I have created. Not when I have painted dandelion seeds on the killing blocks and killed Blotters with twisters and hurricanes. Not when I am lying naked beside the man who has my death inked onto his skin. It’s a feeling I have not felt in a long time. Warm, it swells and spreads unbidden through my body.

  I feel safe.

  And it makes no sense.

  Because I am not safe. Neither is Jay. Neither are Raven and Sylvia and the others who are travelling across the Drafts to meet us. None of us are safe.

  We weren’t before. And we aren’t now.

  It is dangerous for me to feel any other way.

  Yet I don’t want to push the feeling away. Not yet. I want to bask in its warmth the way I would bask in the glow of the Final City lights when I was a child, when my father would visit and tell me stories of dandelions and dragons and Circuses and little girls with hair wilder than hurricanes who could change the world; create their own destinies.

  So I lie there as twilight trickles between the bars of the window onto the dirty bedsit and the springs of the mattress dig into my aching muscles. I sink into his cocoon of heat, his scent of salt and sweat. I let his rhythmic breaths wash over me, as steady and unfaltering as the beating of a clock. Every now and again, he twitches. He says Blotters don’t dream, but I think he does. I wonder what he is dreaming about.

  This is new to me. Being with a man this way.

  I have had sex before—back at the Circus, not long before I left for Draft One. Clumsy and awkward: gnashing teeth and caught hair and hesitant hands. Rami and I had giggled after, hurriedly pulling on our clothes, cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

  We had sex because we wanted to know what sex was like. Not because we wanted each other.

  It was
n’t like this—this insatiable urge to be closer to someone. This yearning to feel the heartbeat of another pounding to the same song. This need to use each other’s bodies to purge ourselves of the building violence.

  This feeling of finally finding something solid, something to cling onto while everything is chaos all around.

  But it is dangerous to feel this way. I have things to do, and I cannot be distracted.

  We need to get ready for our crossing into Draft Three.

  So I shift beneath his arm.

  The change in his breathing is instant. His muscles harden against my back. He flattens his hand on my stomach.

  ‘Where do you think you’re going, little Twist?’ His words are thick through sleep, and they vibrate against my skin.

  I try to shift him off me, but he’s like a dead weight. Unmovable. Softly, he bites the back of my neck. I can feel him, hard, against the back of my thigh.

  ‘I told you what was going to happen when we woke up,’ he mumbles.

  He did. This morning, when we fell asleep in each other’s arms after the visit to the black market.

  I swallow. It’s almost nightfall, and shadows extend like fingers from the barred window. I need to go. I need to keep moving. I need to get into the next Draft.

  I need to get to the library to find the Book of Truth I’m searching for.

  But I don’t move. Because I need him too.

  ‘We need to get going,’ I say.

  I feel his smile against the back of my neck at the lack of conviction in my words. He slides his hand down my stomach and between my legs. My breathing hitches as he strokes me softly. The conflict between what I should want and what I actually want disappears. I just want him.

  I press my body into his, reaching for the back of his neck and pulling his face to mine. He kisses me and groans against my mouth.

  In a sudden movement, he grabs my thigh and puts my leg over his, spreading me open to give him more access. He shifts so he can see my face, his eyes dark with curiosity. Then he slips a finger inside of me, and I moan.

  ‘Fuck,’ he groans.

  He is gentle at first, but then he moves his hand harder, faster. Short breaths tear from my lips. I move my hips against his hand, the room dissolving around me—everything dissolving around me. There’s only him and the pressure building between my legs. It’s too much.

  ‘You are mine,’ he says softly.

  ‘Jay—’

  ‘You said you weren’t. But you are.’

  I can’t argue because I can’t think; I can’t focus. He nips my earlobe with his teeth.

  ‘You’re mine to protect.’

  And then I’m falling, shattering. My back arches against his chest, and I cry out. His breathing is ragged, and I’m panting and wet. I can smell him, masculine and raw. Even though he’s cupping me possessively and his fingers are there inside, he’s still not close enough. He’s never close enough.

  I reach behind and take him in my hand. He groans as I guide him to me. There’s a moment where I feel a mixture of pleasure and pain. Then the crescendo starts to build again as he thrusts into me.

  Afterwards, when he stills and my body feels like liquid in his solid arms, he looks at me, his eyes refocusing. Hand around my neck, he kisses me, his mouth hot, his skin damp with sweat.

  Then he pulls out and rolls onto his back. Both of us sigh.

  I want to stay here like this. I want to spend the rest of the night in a tangle of limbs and muscle. I want to hear the noise he makes when he lets go again and again. I want to take charge for once, because he still hasn’t let me fully take control of his body the way I want to. I want to see what would happen if I took him in my mouth. I want to study every inch of him, count the tattoos on his body and understand what they mean.

  But we are in danger.

  And I have things to do.

  I shuffle off the mattress and tread barefoot across the threadbare carpet. My legs tremble a little, my skin wet and sensitive. He sits up too, knees up, resting his arms across them. He frowns as I hurry to the bathroom. When I come back, I pull some grey factory overalls out of my rucksack.

  ‘We need to go,’ I say.

  His cheeks are flushed and his body covered in a sheen of sweat. He runs a hand across his mouth. ‘Do you think this Canary will come through with the boat?’

  ‘You don’t trust her?’ I ask as I pull on my clothes.

  ‘No. She’s operating outside of the One True Story. She’s a Twist.’

  ‘You still think Twists can’t be trusted?’

  ‘No one can be trusted.’

  ‘You’re wrong.’

  He shakes his head, exasperated, opening his mouth to scorn me. But then a loud rumble vibrates like thunder through the small room, and he is on his feet, striding to the window.

  ‘Fuck,’ he says as I come to stand beside him.

  There are black Blotter vans crossing the steel bridge over the river. A whole convoy of them coming towards us. A spark of panic ignites in my chest, and I try to push it away.

  Jay’s jaw clenches into a hard line. ‘Fuck. They know we’re here.’

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Jay

  The walls are closing in on me. There’s a weight pushing down on my chest. I can’t breathe; I can’t swallow.

  It’s not the bars on the window or the rumble of the Blotter vans crossing the river or the damp, suffocating air of the motel room that’s making me feel as if I’m in a prison.

  It’s her.

  I’m staring ahead, but I’m hyper-aware of her by my side. It’s been the same since the moment I first laid eyes on her. I can always sense her, feel her, smell her. I think she says something, but all I can think about is what they’ll do to her if they catch us.

  If I were on my own, it wouldn’t matter. I don’t give a shit if I live or die. But I’ve never had to think about anyone other than myself before, and any decision I make could make things worse. I’m stuck. I don’t know how to get the fuck out of this.

  I grip onto the window ledge, cracking the plaster.

  She touches my arm. ‘Jay.’ She shoves my jeans into my chest and raises an eyebrow. ‘Get dressed.’

  She looks wary. But not afraid.

  She should be afraid.

  ‘Jay,’ she snaps when I don’t move. ‘Would you rather fight Blotters with your clothes on, or completely naked?’

  I release a breath. ‘Don’t really give a fuck either way.’ I snatch the jeans though and pull them on. My vest is folded on the dresser, and I grab it and pull it over my head.

  I scan the room for something to help me and glance at the rucksack on the floor. The Twist has a knife in there. I open it and pull it out.

  ‘If they don’t know we’re in the motel, it’s safer here,’ says Elle, staring out of the window. ‘But if they do know, we need to go. Now.’

  ‘Yeah, well, there’s the dilemma . . .’ I lace up my boots and then cross the room to tower behind her.

  The vans have come to a halt on the bridge. There are ten in total. Two of the Blotters guarding the bridge approach the window of the first.

  ‘What do you think we should do?’ she says.

  And that’s the thing: I don’t know. I don’t make decisions. I just do what the ink tells me. There’s a part of me that wonders if she’s already made a decision and she’s just winding me up, trying to make me do something she knows I can’t do. She certainly looks as self-assured as always, with her straight posture and her shoulders pulled back. I crack my knuckles.

  ‘Are you trying to piss me off? Because now’s not the time.’

  ‘Course I’m not.’ She turns her head. ‘Don’t be defensive with me, Jay. It’s not the time for that either.’

  ‘Don’t—’ I frown and step forwards, my chest touching Elle’s back. ‘Is that the twat from downstairs?’

  Together, we watch the shadow of a man walk towards a few of the Blotters on the bridge.

  Sh
e stiffens against me. ‘Piece of shit.’ Elle sounds so outraged that I smile. She can’t comprehend that someone would sell out one of their own. Naïve little Twist. He’s known there was something off about us ever since she started to tell him that story.

  I told her to keep her mouth shut.

  His actions have the opposite effect on me though. I feel as if I can breathe again. The fog in my brain clears. The decision’s been made for us.

  I grab her arm. ‘Time to go.’

  We cross the room, Elle throwing her rucksack over her shoulder as we pass it. I listen at the door and then turn the brass key in the lock. We head out into the murky corridor. We’re halfway down the stairs when I push Elle back into the wall. There are men in the lobby.

  ‘Fourth door on the left, sirs. Please understand I thought he was one of you, sirs. I would never have . . .’

  ‘Shut up. Upstairs.’

  Footsteps thud across the carpet.

  ‘Get back to the room,’ I say as a Blotter appears at the foot of the stairs.

  I launch forwards before he can raise his gun. We land on the floor in a cloud of dust. I grab his head and smash it repeatedly into the floor. I’m seeing red, hearing nothing but my heartbeat, as I charge at the next. It’s all a blur as I break a guy’s jaw, stab someone in the gut, and slit the throat of another.

  Then a gun clicks. ‘Calm down, lad, or we’ll kill the girl.’

  I freeze.

  ‘That’s it, lad. Easy now.’

  My breathing is ragged, a knife clenched in my fist. I try to focus. Try to clear the rage clouding my vision. There are eight more Blotters to kill. One of them stands over Elle.

  My insides turn to ice, and my grip on the knife tightens.

  She’s on her knees with a gun pointed at the back of her head. Her breathing is quick. Her hair falls over her face, and there’s a tear in her sleeve where someone has grabbed her. Her eyes lock onto mine.

  ‘Get the fuck away from her.’ My voice comes out like a growl.

  ‘It’s okay, lad. Calm down.’