A Circus of Ink

by Lauren Palphreyman

  ‘No? I’m the best option you—’

  She holds up her hand to silence me. ‘I know. Just . . . quiet. I’m thinking.’

  I clench my fist and rest it by my mouth. Even now, with the taste of her lingering on my lips and her smell fading on my skin, she still finds a way to drive me fucking crazy.

  When Elle looks at the others, the emotion is gone from her face. We’re back at the Circus when she saved me, in control, in command. Her head is high, and her breathing is steady.

  ‘We’ll cause a distraction,’ she says. ‘Draw some of the Blotters out so the way is clear for Jay to get out.’

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘There’s no—’

  ‘Shh.’

  Sylvia is drumming her fingers against the table, her eyes fixed on Elle. ‘What are you thinking, sweetie?’

  ‘We spread some more dandelion seeds.’

  Sylvia frowns. ‘It’ll be dangerous.’

  ‘Yes. That’s why I’m not letting Jay do this alone.’

  I stand up so I’m towering above her. ‘Letting?’

  ‘Yes. Letting.’

  My lip twitches despite everything that’s going on and everything that’s about to happen. ‘And you could stop me, could—?’

  ‘Okay. That’s enough of that.’ Sylvia gets up. ‘Reconvene in the entrance hall in thirty minutes. Mary, load up the van. We’ll need weapons, petrol, and all the paint you can spare.’

  Before she follows the others out of the room, Sylvia stops in front of me. This close, I can see the creases in her black jacket and the smudges beneath her eyes. I can smell that slight note of fear in her sweat too. She’s tired and afraid, though she is doing a good job of hiding it.

  ‘You sure you can do this, Blotter?’

  I hold her gaze, and I think we understand each other: Either I bring back the Darling, or I die. Either outcome works. And we keep Elle safe. Can I do this?

  ‘Yeah.’

  She nods. ‘Okay. Let’s go get our girl back.’

  She leaves me and Elle alone. I exhale slowly. It’s strange. I know I’m going to my death, but it relaxes me somehow. The inevitability of it maybe. The newfound purpose. The fact that when I die, the shadows die with me.

  ‘You’re not leaving me. You know that, right?’ says Elle.

  I can’t meet her gaze. Instead, I look at the foaming sea that vandalises the wall behind her. It shouldn’t be here—it’s forbidden and unnatural, but it’s beautiful too, in a way.

  She puts her hand on my chest, just above my heart. I swallow as I tilt my head down and move my hands to her hips. She’s warm, and when our eyes meet, hers are filled with fiery, misplaced belief. The darkness comes back. She shouldn’t look at me like that. She needs to prepare herself.

  ‘Elle, listen—’

  ‘You’re coming back to me.’

  She slides her palms up my chest then clasps her hands around the back of my neck. She pulls my mouth to hers. I groan as I kiss her back, sinking my fingers into her hips and pulling her closer. I want this bad feeling to go away. But I want to come back to her too.

  I rest my forehead against hers.

  ‘If you get caught, I’ll come and get you. You know that, right?’ she says.

  Something clenches in my gut. I don’t want it to be true. It’s too heavy to bear.

  But her words flood me with another sensation too. Unbidden and warm, it spreads through all the ink and the darkness and fills up the hollow spaces inside my body. I don’t know what this feeling is, but I know she’s telling the truth. She will come for me.

  ‘You shouldn’t do that.’ My words are gruff, and they scrape against my tightening throat.

  ‘But I will.’

  I pull her into my chest. ‘I know.’ I lightly brush my lips against the top of her head. ‘Crazy little Twist.’

  The road to the promenade is empty, but I can hear voices ahead.

  I walk along it with my hands stuffed into the pockets of my jeans. It’s dark. Small droplets of water sting my face, carried by a wind that howls against the off-white skyscrapers. The air smells like the ocean—salt and rotting vegetation—and waves crash against the cliffs in the distance.

  When I get to the end of the road, I lean against the wall of a House of Truth. I drag my teeth over my bottom lip and taste salt and the kiss I took from Elle before the van drove off. There are at least a hundred people already gathered in the square ahead. They’re congregating around the raised platform in front of the sea where Raven will be executed in a few hours. The white stone statue of Creator Michael looms over them.

  I count around twenty Blotters. Some are stationed at the entrance of the Black Sea Bridge that stretches across the ocean. Others are moving through the crowd.

  I breathe out slowly. If I get caught, Elle will come for me. It raises the stakes. Makes this harder. I need to actually succeed.

  I remove my hands from my pockets, crack my knuckles, and walk towards the high-security cell that’s built into the foot of the bridge. I changed into a vest, so my tattoos are visible, and people cower away from me. No one is guarding the doors when I get there. I put my hand on the ice-cold handle, ready for someone to stop me. Then I push it down.

  The door screams as it scrapes open.

  I step into an empty corridor and frown. It’s unusual for one of these places to be completely unguarded. Where is everyone? I push the door closed with my back, and all is silent. The air carries a metallic scent.

  Something’s not right.

  Muscles tight, I turn around. There are two dead Blotters in an alcove to the left, their heads twisted at unnatural angles. What the fuck?

  I’m stepping away from them when something plunges into my neck from behind. With a start, I turn, grabbing onto the vest of a man as my legs give way beneath me.

  ‘Hello, lad,’ he says.

  That Blotter from the motel swims in and out of focus above me as I land on my knees. Everything’s going blurry, but I can make out the syringe in his hand. I blink.

  Fight. Have to fight it.

  ‘I thought it was about time we had a chat.’ He crouches down, and I swipe my fist at him but miss.

  ‘Fuck . . . you,’ I mumble.

  He produces a small penknife from his pocket and flicks out the blade. His lips twist into a smile. ‘But first,’ he says. ‘I want to see you bleed.’

  Everything goes black.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Jay

  Everything is dark. Peaceful. Water is dripping somewhere.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  I breathe in time with it.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  It reminds me of something. The sound. Something from when I was young, maybe. Ink. I think it reminds me of ink.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  It starts to piss me off though.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  It starts to bore into my skull.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  And fuck, my head is killing me. Throbbing.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  I groan and thrust my hand to my temple.

  Only I don’t. I can’t. I can’t move.

  My eyes jolt open.

  ‘Hello, lad.’

  I jerk forwards. Something metal bites into my wrists, which are bound behind my back. My ankles are tied to the chair legs, bolted to the concrete floor. I’m in a small, dark room. There are no windows and one door. A pipe is dripping from the ceiling.

  The Blotter from the motel is here, leaning against a wooden bench littered with sharp objects. A smile spreads across his face and pulls at the burn mark across his cheek. His eyes linger on my chest as it heaves up and down.

  ‘Calm down, lad.’

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  He picks up his penknife and turns the blade to the dim light coming from a buzzing bulb.

  I don’t understand. I don’t understand why I’m not dead. I don’t understand why two other Blotters were dead at the door. I don’t understand w
hy he seems to be enjoying himself. He’s playing with me. But Blotters don’t play. We kill.

  ‘What the fuck are you doing?’ I say, and my mouth is dry.

  ‘You’re surprised.’

  He crosses the room and stops so close to me I can smell his sweat. He grabs my chin between his finger and thumb and forces me to look at him. All the while, that dripping sound bores into my skull, and the handcuffs bite into my wrists.

  ‘You’re curious too,’ he says. ‘Curious about what I want. Curious about what I’m going to do to you.’

  His eyes move with interest over my face, then down my neck, lingering for too long on my chest and body. I swallow.

  ‘My eyes are up here, mate.’

  He chuckles. ‘Curiosity. And surprise. Such unusual traits.’

  ‘If you’re going to kill me, just get on with it. I don’t need to hear your fucking monologue.’

  He lets go of me. ‘I told you, I want to chat first. And with the unfortunate ends that met the two Blotters standing guard, we have ourselves a little privacy. For now at least. You see, I’m curious too.’ He studies his knife. ‘When I cut you open, what will I see? Blood? Or Ink? They say you’re nothing but a misbehaving Twist, but I don’t believe that. You are a Blotter, aren’t you, lad?’

  ‘Ye—’

  ‘Shh. You’ll ruin the surprise.’ He pulls down my vest, and my breathing roughens.

  ‘Get the fuck off me.’

  I’m going to kill him. I’m going to kill this bastard.

  Except I’m not, am I? I can’t move.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  I control myself. It doesn’t matter. I just need him to do it fast. I need her to know it’s a lost cause. If I’m dead, she won’t come for me.

  ‘Get on with it then,’ I say.

  He studies my chest then moves his fingertip over the dandelion seed etched above my heart. My skin crawls. I jerk back, but there’s nowhere to go. The Blotter pushes the cool, flat side of the blade against my skin.

  A gruff sound vibrates against my throat as he slices through my flesh. When he’s done, he raises the knife and holds it to the light so he can study the glossy substance covering it.

  Ink runs down the blade. It drips onto the floor by his boots.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  A smile broadens on his face. ‘I thought so.’

  Slowly, I meet his gaze. ‘What do you want?’

  He wipes the knife against his vest. ‘I told you, I’m curious.’

  He grabs another chair from across the room and drags it in front of me. He sits down, his posture casual as though we’re two Blotters in a tavern after a day of Cuts. He fiddles with his penknife.

  ‘I could just kill you now. But aren’t you curious about what I’m curious about?’ he asks.

  I stare at the floor marked with my blood. There’s a part of me that just wants this to be over. There’s a part of me that wants him to kill me and be done with it. Then it ends. All of it. This hollow fucking feeling, this weight in my stomach, this constant feeling of being too empty and too full at the same time.

  But another part of me is curious. Another part of me wants to live. Another part of me wants to get back to her.

  You’re coming back to me. You know that, right?

  Slowly, I meet his gaze. ‘Yeah.’

  My voice is so quiet it’s barely audible, but the Blotter grins. ‘You don’t disappoint, lad. I’m curious about your girl.’

  My muscles tense, and it sends a sharp pain through my chest. ‘You stay the fuck away from her.’

  He chuckles. ‘I’m curious about you too. We crossed paths once before, you know—’

  ‘In the motel.’

  ‘Before that. You were just a little lad at the time—I doubt you remember me. You’d just taken quite the beating.’ He looks at the scar that cuts across my eyebrow. The one Elle’s father gave me. ‘I remember though. I was in my thirties at the time.’

  I look pointedly at his greying hair. ‘You do look a bit past it, mate.’

  ‘Yes, lad. I’m old for a Blotter, I know. They don’t usually let us live so long. But you see, the Creators have become rather fond of me. And that being the case, I’ve spent a lot of time in the Citadel. When you’ve done that for so long . . . well, lad, you start to learn things. Things you shouldn’t know. You get an eye for the bullshit. There was no hurricane scheduled for the Draft One black market that day. The Creators took credit for it, said they’d written it into the One True Story, but they didn’t. Did they?’

  He looks at the knife in his hands, turning it over between his fingers. ‘I remember when the Creator who gave you that scar started to change some of his opinions. It was about nineteen years ago, give or take, wasn’t it?’ He looks up slowly. ‘How old is your girl, lad? I’d say she’s about nineteen years, give or take. I imagine something as precious, as innocent, as a baby could cause a father to look at the world in a different way. What do you think?’

  My fists clench behind my back. I remember her story about the clockmaker—a cruel man who changed when he was given the dandelion seed.

  ‘Another curious thing. You were assigned to Draft One around five years ago, weren’t you? That’s a strange move for a big lad like you. Wasn’t that around the time the same Creator who gave you that scar’—he points the blade at my eyebrow—‘was executed?’

  I swallow hard, fighting against the tightening of my throat and the rising weight in my gut.

  ‘And isn’t Michael your patron?’ He touches Michael’s mark—a cross—on my bicep with the tip of his blade. ‘He was the one who had the most to lose if that particular Creator who gave you that scar was allowed to continue spreading his new stories. Am I getting close to the truth?’

  I purse my lips together. I’m not telling this bastard anything.

  ‘There are ways I can make you talk, you know?’

  ‘No,’ I say, ‘there aren’t.’

  He sighs. ‘There’s no need to play the hero, lad. There’s no point. There are no heroes; no villains. No right; no wrong. No good or evil. There are only stories. And those with the power to wield them.’

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I want your girl to come for you.’

  I jerk forwards, but the bastard doesn’t so much as flinch. ‘You stay the fuck away from her.’

  ‘A Blotter and a Twist. Such a curious thing. But she’ll come for you, won’t she, lad?’

  There are voices in the corridor. His gaze moves back down to my body.

  ‘I wonder what stories I could find written on your skin.’ He stands up and flicks the blade back into its case. ‘Perhaps another time. If you survive tonight.’ He turns and walks to the bench across the room then returns with a small medical kit. ‘But for now, let’s get you cleaned up. For appearances. Can’t have the others knowing what you really are.’

  ‘Fuck off,’ I say through gritted teeth as he cleans the ink from my chest then tapes some gauze over the wound.

  He’s setting the kit back down again when the door bursts open and two Blotters enter the room.

  ‘All right, lads,’ he says. ‘Caught us the fake Blotter. He killed the two guards outside, got a hold of a knife, and tried it with me too. Put him in the cell next to the Darlings. I need to find a Teller so we can amend the story that’s being broadcast through the Draft. At midnight, he’s going to burn with the others.’ He looks over his shoulder at me and smiles. ‘And we want to make sure his friend knows we have him.’

  ‘No.’ I thrash in the chair, the handcuffs biting my wrists and my blood pounding in my ears. ‘Fuck you.’

  He walks to the door.

  ‘Wait!’ I roar. ‘I’ll tell you anything you need to know. Just kill me now. Kill me now.’

  ‘Oh, and I’d tranquilise him first if I were you,’ he says as he exits the room. ‘He’s a little upset about what we’re going to do to his girlfriend.’

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Jay
>
  My cheek is pressed against the floor. The air is damp. My chest throbs, and my eyelids are heavy. I groan. I feel like shit.

  Where am I? What time is it?

  I blink a few times. Then it all comes back to me.

  Elle.

  I get up, and my legs aren’t working properly. I stumble forwards and slam my hands against the stone wall to get my balance. I close my eyes and take deep breaths. I need to get it together.

  It’s twenty minutes past eleven. I feel it in the ink pounding through my veins.

  I have forty minutes until I die.

  I have forty minutes until she comes for me.

  Fuck.

  ‘What are you doing here, Blotter?’

  Raven is standing in the cell beside mine, looking at me through the bars. There’s congealed blood on her forehead, and it glints in the flaming torchlight. She doesn’t look impressed to see me.

  ‘I’m here to rescue you.’ My mouth is dry, and I clear my throat.

  ‘Yeah? How’s that going for you?’

  ‘Pretty fucking shit.’

  The corner of her lip quirks up.

  I exhale and slide down the wall into a sitting position, resting my forearms on my raised knees. Raven does the same. She’s close enough I can smell her sweat. It’s slightly acrid, fear sweat. She looks calm though.

  ‘I hear we face the firing squad at midnight,’ she says.

  I look up at the damp ceiling and sigh. ‘They can’t let anyone see me bleed. They’re burning us now instead.’

  She raises her eyebrows. ‘Oh. Well, thanks a fucking lot, Blotter.’

  My lips twitch. I laugh. Then Raven laughs. It builds until I’m laughing so hard the muscles in my stomach hurt and my eyes water, and tears roll down Raven’s face. I don’t even know what’s so fucking funny.

  When it finally fades, we just sit there side by side in the damp cell, waiting for death.

  ‘Do you think she’ll come for us?’ Raven says.

  ‘Yeah.’ I run a hand over my mouth. ‘But I wish she wouldn’t.’

  ‘She’s with Sylv?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Good,’ she says. ‘Maybe she’ll stop her.’

  ‘Hope so.’