Carnival of Souls

by Nancy Holder

  “Ours is number seven,” Buffy told her mom as they zoomed backward on the exterior of the massive wheel. Chilly night wind blew in their hair.

  “How lucky,” Joyce teased, sitting back.

  Drunk, in a full fury, Giles had stripped down to his pants. He was bare-chested and barefoot, and he meant business.

  Teach her a lesson. Make her sorry. Make them all sorry. Make them pay.

  He was sweating and dizzy, and so drunk he could barely think straight. But he knew what to do.

  Surrounded by candles, Giles swayed in the center of the pentagram he had drawn on his carpet with melted wax and blood. He had retraced the pentagram on his chest, with a knife. The letters of the profane name of Astorrith formed from the cuts, and threw glowing black light against the walls of his condo.

  Shadows moved over the ancient maps and framed photographs of home, hissing and whispering. The minions of Astorrith had been awakened.

  Blood dripped from Giles’s hands; he had performed the sacrifices and uttered The Names That Must Not Be Spoken, thrice, thrice, thrice.

  “Baal! Cthulhu! Jezebel! Wake your brother Astorrith! Bid him come! I command thee!”

  Lightning flashed across the front window, blacked out in part by a shape—a figure wearing a small pointed hat. Giles figured it was a minion, stepping through the veil. A sign that his spell was working.

  That meant that the dark god would come to him directly. The time was at hand.

  He raised his arms and threw back his head.

  “Astorrith, Dark One! Lord of Revenge and Retribution! I have been wronged and I have suffered! I have been insulted and humiliated! See the slights heaped upon thy acolyte and wreak havoc on my enemies! Vanquish all who plague me!”

  He bent down—it was a long, shaky road—and plucked up the Blade of Astorrith in his right hand and his grimoire in the other. He began to read.

  “Ta-mir-o,” he began. “Dark God of Shadows and Tumult, I summon thee! From the depths of confusion and tumult, rise up! Bring the Wild Ones with you and smite my blood enemy, Buffy Anne Summers! Wreak havoc on her land! Fill her days with storms and monsters!

  “It is Buffy the Vampire Slayer of whom I speak! Bring doom upon her! Make her long for her own death! Destroy all that makes her smile!”

  He sliced the air with the blade. The veil of reality was diced into chunks, like jagged pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. The edges of the world inside his condo began to bleed, and the first chunk slammed against the floor two yards away from Giles’s bare feet.

  The floor buckled beneath the oppressive weight. Giles stayed inside the pentagram, riding it like a surf-board as one half of the floor splintered, while the other rippled and broke apart.

  The walls cracked like frozen glass dropped into boiling water.

  The plumbing burst. Water geysered upward.

  The stairs pulled away from the loft. The ceiling bowed downward.

  “Torment her!” Giles yelled, dropping to his knees.

  “Isn’t this a lovely view?” Joyce asked Buffy as they dangled at the top of the Ferris wheel.

  All of Sunnydale was spread below them. Buffy felt a fierce rush of pride. All those lights, those toy-looking houses, those antlike people. She protected them all, night after night. How many would have died by now, if not for her?

  “It’s like Paris,” Joyce said dreamily. “There’s a Ferris wheel near the Eiffel Tower.”

  “You’ve been to Paris?” Buffy asked, surprised. She hadn’t known that.

  Joyce leaned Buffy’s head against her shoulder and stroked her hair, the way she had done when Buffy was a little girl.

  “No, but I would like to. I wonder if I’ll ever get to. But you…you have your whole life ahead of you, Buffy. You’re so young.” She sighed. “I envy you.”

  “Well, about that,” Buffy said. “I’ve decided to move out.”

  Joyce’s hand stopped in midstroke. “What?”

  “Yeah. Listen, I’m…really strong and I can…ah, become a boxer. Or something like that. Get back into my skating.” She smiled at her mother. “I’m ready to live on my own.”

  Joyce lowered her chin and peered up through her lashes—mom face, the face of dawning suspicion. “When you woke me up in the kitchen, did you look at my papers?”

  “Your bills,” Buffy confirmed. “Yes, I did. Without me around—”

  “Oh, Buffy.” Joyce put her arms around her daughter and held her closer. “You are so wonderful. But I’ll take care of you, sweetie. You don’t need to worry.”

  “Mom, I’m not worried.” Buffy’s words were muffled against her mother’s shoulder.

  “I’m so proud of you,” Joyce continued.

  Well, of course you are, the Slayer thought smugly. Isn’t everybody?

  “You’re such a dear.” She jerked. “Did someone just take our picture? Oh, I feel a little dizzy.”

  “Are you all right, Mom?” Buffy asked, turning her head to look at her.

  “Yes. I’m fine. I’m just so…relaxed.” She leaned her head back. “It’s nice to just sit and do nothing.” She chuckled. “I feel so lazy.”

  That was when the wind began to blow.

  Xander began to blow.

  He was sick, sick to death, and that was before he had eaten the candied apple and the four hot dogs.

  He didn’t remember how he’d dragged himself to the carnival. Last thing he could remember, Giles had dropped him off at the lovely Harris estate, where his parents were “watching TV,” which was what they called drinking and arguing.

  Retreating from the combat zone, he had hunkered down in the basement, hurling, and figured he would have to skip tonight’s further exciting adventures at the carnival.

  But he was back, and sicker than sick, staggering down the midway.

  And clowns were following him.

  An entire pack of them, in your typical clown garb with your typical clown accessories—a horn with a big rubber ball on the business end, a spray bottle, and a terrifying air of menace.

  He didn’t like those guys.

  Why did I eat that apple? Giles told us not to eat anything here. I couldn’t stop myself. It…called my name. And I think I mean that literally.

  And he remembered now that the night before, he had eaten some cookies. About seven of them. He couldn’t stop.

  I didn’t ever remember eating them. And the cat food…and all the Cheez Doodles I had stashed in my nightstand…and the stale Oreos I found in my backpack…. I have eaten so much crap in the last twenty-four hours and I can’t stop myself. I want more.

  He doubled, clutching his stomach.

  Overhead, thunder rumbled. A wind began to blow.

  “Buffy,” he whispered. “Someone. Help.”

  He looked back.

  One, two, three, four clowns. They strolled toward him with their frozen, terrifying smiles and their flappy feet and their big, gloved hands.

  And everything in him told him to keep the hell away from them.

  But he was fading. He could hardly walk.

  The wind picked up.

  Okay, still in the mood for love…so where is she?

  Angel paced around the gravestones and headstones, the monuments and the tombs of Blessed Memories, listening to the calliope as fierce wind whipped at his coat. With a shriek, it snatched the note he was carrying and skipped it away like a stone on a river. The note was from Buffy, on girlie paper decorated with cows; he had found it taped to his door and all it had said was “Meet me near du Lac. B.” He recognized her girlish handwriting, the B finished with a little swirl.

  But Buffy was nowhere to be seen. Maybe he had misunderstood. He had figured this rendezvous was to continue where they had left off—though of course, he would have preferred it to be continued in his apartment. Or someplace equally nice and cozy.

  Of course, slayers got detained on business more often than not.

  The haunting notes of the calliope whispered on the wind. Sweet and
tantalizing…like Buffy.

  What was I thinking, denying myself the pleasure of being with her?

  It was great to feel lusty and vigorous. He felt like a man again, not a shadow. Not someone set apart—a vampire, yet more than a vampire. And yet, not just a man, either.

  The things I can do for her, with her….

  Whoever said that the blood was the life, was wrong. It was the flesh.

  Maybe she’s at the carnival.

  He turned around and began walking in the direction of the calliope’s sound. Giles’s condo was nearby. Maybe he’d stop in, see if he had seen Buffy.

  Then something changed.

  The wind howled, hard; it picked up and became a gale, ripping leaves right off the trees. Yanking branches and flinging them into the air.

  Dirt and pebbles pelted Angel as he lowered his head and walked into the wind. It was a full-on storm such as he had never seen in southern California unless…

  Unless something is very wrong.

  His coat streamed behind him like wings as he pushed forward. The gale force pushed back at him.

  Then from out of the maelstrom, something padded toward him. He smelled it rather than heard it—it reeked of the sulphurs of hell, and of death and decomposition.

  It smelled of evil.

  And it had no heartbeat.

  Squinting, Angel ducked behind a headstone, and braced himself to meet it.

  Chapter Nine

  Cordelia’s head was throbbing.

  She moaned.

  Or tried to.

  As she slowly came to, she realized that there was tape across her mouth. And her hands were tied behind her back.

  The moon had moved, but enough light still streamed through the skylight of the jewelry store bathroom for her to realize the horrible truth: Someone had attacked her, tied her up, and dragged her in there, placing her next to the clerk that she herself had attacked, tied up, and dragged in there.

  She pushed her chin against her chest, trying to feel the choker around her neck.

  Nada.

  I’ve been robbed, she thought, panicking. Someone took my choker!

  Ignoring for the time being that she had also stolen the choker, Cordelia zoomed into high anxiety. Her cat allergy made her nose stuffy and it was very hard to breathe.

  Oh my God, what if they took my watch, too?

  She blinked and stared hard at the salesclerk. The woman’s head was bent to the side, revealing her pearl earring.

  She calmed down a little.

  At least I can still have the earrings, she consoled herself. Maybe she’s still got on her pendant, too.

  Then she frowned as she listened hard to what sounded like a terrible wailing, or shrieking, or…

  It’s wind, she realized. Are we having, like, a tornado?

  Angel peered above the shield of the headstone.

  A pack of things crab-walked toward him, scrabbling over the tree roots, headstones, bushes. They flowed like mercury, then snapped back into six compact forms that resembled mastiff-size dogs. Their bodies were covered with dozens of bloodshot eyes surrounded by fangs that blinked and snapped.

  Demonic minions.

  Then, of all things, two clowns appeared, whooping and dancing in their mufti attire. One carried a seltzer bottle, which it aimed at one of the minions. The creature shrieked, leaping straight up into the air, and erupted into flames.

  The clowns doubled over with laughter. Sniggering, the one with the bottle aimed it at another minion, but its aim went wild and the spray hit a tree. The bark ignited.

  The other clown danced a little jig, and then the two slammed their huge bottoms together.

  They hadn’t noticed Angel. Taking advantage of their distraction, he clambered on top of the du Lac crypt and flattened himself against the roof. Below him, a minion sniffed eagerly, honing in on a new and different scent.

  The pack moved on, and the clowns with it.

  That was close, Angel thought.

  Then the roof of the crypt began to rumble, a subsonic vibration Angel felt through his whole body. The trees trembled, shaking off leaves that the wind whisked away.

  He looked down the hill as the shaking grew worse. There. In the vicinity of Giles’s condo complex, a shadowy figure emerged from the building and rose into the sky like someone hunched over, then straightening up. A massive, dark tube shape, it towered maybe fifty feet into the air. The head was elongated and covered with horns. Its long neck sat on shoulders that were hooked, and arms covered with talons. The rest of the body was snakelike, with tentacles undulating from its long, cylindrical body.

  Calliope music and battering winds combined with screams of terror from the humans below as the creature swayed above them.

  One of the tentacles unfurled and snapped downward, like the tongue of a frog. When it snapped back, a struggling human being was caught in its grip. The tentacle brought the writhing victim toward the mouth, which opened wide to reveal a huge bonfire and smoking, charred teeth.

  The human was tossed in.

  The mouth closed.

  Smoke emanated from the horns on its head.

  It’s Astorrith, Angel realized. He had never seen the demon before, but Darla, his sire, had. She had described him as a tentacled creature wearing a horned hood…fearful to behold, impossible to defeat.

  “If you ever see him, Angelus, you must run,” she had told him, as together they dined on a fat Spanish grandee. “Never go up against him. It would be insane. And fatal.”

  Another tentacle reached down. As it moved, the sky around it…cracked. Pieces of the ebony sky flared, and then became darker still. It was the weirdest thing Angel had ever seen; he had read about black holes and wondered if that was what the dark places were.

  Whipsaw fast, the tentacle wrapped around another human and hoisted it into the air.

  He could hear Darla whispering, “Don’t do it.”

  Never one to listen, Angel leaped off the tomb and ran toward the creature as fast as he could.

  As the Ferris wheel spun crazily in the windstorm, Buffy held on to her mother and stared wide-eyed at the monster looming above Sunnydale. It had appeared out of nowhere, along with the wind. And it was killing people.

  What is that thing?

  Then the wheel zoomed downward; the ground flew up to meet them, and Buffy curled herself protectively around Joyce.

  “Brace yourself!” she cried to her mother.

  Joyce screamed and clung to her. Then their car zinged back up and around, like a hamster in a wheel. Buffy anchored herself with one hand wrapped around the metal restraining bar across their laps as she held on tightly to her mom.

  They reached the top again and began to bullet back down. As they sailed down, Buffy looked over the side of the car.

  “Oh my God, Xander is down there!”

  He was lying flat on his back on the ground next to Buffy and Angel’s make-out bushes. The girl from the coin toss was bending over him, and four clowns bent over to grab his arms and legs.

  It was Slayer time. But what to do? Abandon her mother on the Ferris wheel or let the clowns get Xander?

  Mom, Xander, Mom, Xander.

  But there was no choice, really, and Xander would understand. Plus, maybe the clowns were going to help him.

  And if you believe that, you deserve no new suede boots, she told herself.

  She kept hold of Joyce as the Ferris wheel jittered and scraped, not yet free of its moorings but threatening to be. The vibration set her teeth on edge.

  All she could think of to do was wait until their car came unbolted, and then wrap herself around her mother like a human escape pod and eject from the car.

  That might kill us both, she thought, but she wasn’t sure what else to do.

  She got ready, and said, “Mom, listen. Here’s the plan. When I say go, get ready to jump.”

  “What?” Joyce cried.

  “Yes, on the count of one. Two. Thr—”

  But
at the last possible moment—the double e’s—Buffy spotted a red-painted hand brake beside the girders of the supporting base. It was about two feet long and clearly marked: PULL IN CASE OF EMERGENCIES. An arrow pointed in the same direction the wheel was spinning.

  Just as they were about to swoop past it, Buffy reached out and grabbed it, preparing herself to lose an arm as she yanked the brake hard……and ripped the brake free.

  “Bad design,” she muttered, scowling at the red handle in her grip.

  But it got the job done: The brake mechanism had engaged; and there was a noticeable drag on the wheel’s momentum. It was stopping. Buffy felt confident she could climb down instead of jumping.

  And so could her mother.

  “Mom,” she said, prying Joyce off her.

  Her mom’s eyes were as big as, well, Ferris wheels.

  “Oh my God, Buffy, are you all right?”

  “Of course I am.” Buffy was mildly piqued. “After all, I’m…who I am.” She had to remember that her secret was still a secret.

  “Mom, we need to get down. We’re only about twenty feet above the ground.” She pointed over the side of the Ferris wheel. “Can you climb that?”

  “I…I think so,” Joyce said.

  “Good. Let’s go.”

  Buffy raised one leg out of the car and put her foot firmly on the thick metal supports that extended from the wheel. The wheel groaned. The car swung wildly.

  As she reached for her mother’s hand, she glanced down at Xander. He was on his back, flailing his arms and legs like a tipped-over insect, trying to fight off the clowns. But he wasn’t going to win.

  “Mom,” she said. “You need to keep climbing. Do it slowly. I have to go help Xander.”

  “Buffy!” her mother cried, her eyes widening with fright as she half-stood in the rocking car. Then she took another deep breath and nodded. “I’m okay. Go.”

  It was quicker to cling to the support and move hand over hand, so the Slayer did so. Once her feet found purchase on the elaborate structure of the wheel proper, she worked her way in toward the center, and then shimmied down until she found another support. It was like playing a life-size version of Chutes and Ladders.