Skycircus

by Peter Bunzl

  The police had first broken into the forbidden rooms on the gondola and discovered a safe full of money, hoarded away from all the shows, that was enough to pay everyone for their season of work and buy fresh food for the mess hall. It even turned out there would be enough money to refit the sky-ship.

  There were fewer people aboard and the hybrids and remaining families and circus folk had divided up the cabins so they each had their own space, and had already begun the process of renewing the gondola, first by ripping out a few of the locks and bars and then starting to reorganize one or two of the main spaces. The tables in the mess hall had been moved about to make it feel less like a prison and more like a dining room, and plans were afoot to convert Slimwood and Madame’s old rooms upstairs into a parlour space where people could sit together and relax after dinner.

  When they’d finished their tour of the gondola, Lily and Robert visited the Big Top. There they found that the chaos of the show had been removed too, and Angelique, Deedee, Luca and some of the other performers were busy sprucing up the tent for a new start. Angelique, Luca and Deedee were full of hugs and happy to see them, and Angelique told Lily that things had improved so much that all three of them were thinking about staying. The circus folk had decided to begin performing again, and Lily learned that the plan was to mix the hybrids and humans together into new acts, to create a fresh bill of everyone’s devising. The intention was to wow the audiences of Paris before the new, improved Skycircus went on to change the world.

  Robert, Lily and Malkin spent the rest of the week at the Grand Hotel. Papa thought a holiday in Paris the best way to recover from the horrors of their kidnap, so they spent their time in a blur of treats and sightseeing.

  They bought new clothes in the shops of Passage Jouffroy and at Le Bon Marché – a fabulous department store in the centre of the city – and ate in the finest restaurants. They saw the beautiful paintings in the Louvre, viewed the whole of Paris from the hill known as Montmartre and visited the half-built Sacré-Cœur church – which Lily told Robert meant sacred heart in English.

  They even visited Notre-Dame cathedral – Robert remembered reading about it in a novel by Victor Hugo – and the bird market, where the cages filled with chirping birds made Lily think of Angelique and their days trapped in the circus. She was glad that things seemed to be working out better for them. They hadn’t run from their troubles despite the pain they faced from them in the past, and now that their oppressors were gone, they were making the circus a new home for humans and hybrids alike. Soon they would be changing the minds of audiences day by day and show by show.

  On their last night in Paris, the circus folk threw Robert, Lily and Malkin a party to celebrate the fact that they’d helped rid them of Slimwood and Madame. There was a great firepit built in the centre of the site, and everyone danced and ate and drank to their heart’s content.

  “I’m glad that you brought us together,” Luca said. “Now that Madame and Slimwood are gone, this place has finally started to feel like home. I think perhaps the circus might be destined to start anew.”

  “Although we’ll have to give it a different name,” Deedee said.

  “Perhaps the Fabulous Flying Human Hybrid Circus?” Silva suggested.

  “It’s a bit of a mouthful,” Tolly said.

  “How are you going to fit it on the posters?” Malkin asked.

  “You could come with us, all of you,” Angelique said.

  “I don’t think so,” Robert and Lily replied in unison. Though Tolly had to think about it. He’d taken quite a shine to Angelique in the days since they’d been reunited.

  “We mean,” Lily said, “that it’s probably time for us to go home too.”

  “Well, travelling’s not for everyone,” Silva admitted. “Though I actually think it might be for you two.”

  “What makes you say that?” Robert asked.

  “These adventures you keep falling into. It seems you’ve got a terrible case of the great unrest.”

  “What’s ‘the great unrest’?” Robert asked.

  Silva smiled. “It’s a malady common in circus folks. We go where the wind takes us. Keep moving in a whirl around the world, like a spinning top, visiting new towns and cities, broaching new horizons, travelling from here to there, from A to B to C to Z, seeing the sights and getting into trouble.”

  Deedee raised an eyebrow. “You and Lily both have that in spades,” she said.

  Luca nodded. “Adventure’s in your blood, like a fever.”

  “It’s not that we want adventure,” Robert said. “It just seems to keep happening to us everywhere we go. Sort of by accident.”

  “Nothing’s an accident,” Dimitri said. “And you two, you are meant to see the world together, through good and bad.”

  “You’re like us circus folk,” Silva added. “You love life too much not to live every second of it to the full, even in the times when bad things are happening. I think you should ask yourself, Robert, are the adventures really finding you, or are you finding the adventures?”

  Robert still wasn’t sure. But he knew that he was now a better, stronger, braver adventurer than when he and Lily first met a year ago. He’d helped save a circus, hadn’t he? Helped save the hybrids. And he’d helped save Lily. To save someone else’s life seemed the worthiest cause of all.

  “May I speak with my daughter for a moment?” Papa asked interrupting the conversation, and he took her hand and led her off a little way.

  They sat together on a wooden bench by the fire. His face was lit by the flickering flames as he smiled at her. “It’s beautiful here,” he said.

  “Beauty is found in the places you least expect it,” she replied.

  “Yes,” Papa said. “You may be right for once.”

  “For once?” she said. “Papa, I’m always right.”

  “Not always. But sometimes.” He paused and a clouded look crossed his face. “I’ve been thinking about how things have been between us, Lily. How I’ve treated you, this past year… These past seven years, even. I haven’t noticed you enough. Who you are and how you’ve grown, and for that I can only apologize. Things have been difficult for me too. But you, you deserve more of a chance at life, I can see that, especially with the new friends you’ve made. And I promise I’m going to give you all of the freedom your heart desires.”

  “Thank you.” Lily put an arm around his neck and hugged him.

  “When you come of age,” he added, warningly. “For still, right now, you must take care in the world. Life can be a complex and dangerous thing, as much as it can be beautiful.”

  “I know that, Papa, but you have to let me make my own mistakes. You can’t worry about me flying too close to the sun. Failure is how you learn and how people grow. Angelique has taught me that much. People need to fly on their own – on the wings they make for themselves – not the ones their parents give them.”

  Papa laughed at that. And Lily saw that despite all those years of wanting to keep her true nature a secret, he had finally changed his mind about her. He could see her at last, like the rest of the world could, and understood that he didn’t need to protect her every day of her life, not now she’d learned to stand up for herself. Not now she’d fought so many of her own battles.

  “You realize, this is the first proper party I’ve had for my birthday since Mama was here,” she said. “All those years in between you were trying to keep the fact that I’d survived and become a hybrid a secret.”

  “It was only to protect you, Lily, to keep you safe.”

  “That’s not really the case, Papa,” Lily replied. “We’ve got into as much trouble this past year from secrets as we would have if we’d been honest, I think. It’s like Mama said in her notebook: Truth conquers all. To speak the truth we carry deep inside us, within our hearts, no matter how difficult, is the only way we can be free.” She looked pointedly at him. “I wonder if it’s time things changed? If I can use who I am to help people, and you can use
your knowledge to make them better, why should we keep what we’ve learned a secret? After all, when you wrap someone up in cotton wool to keep them safe, sometimes you can shield them from the good they can do in the world too. Not to mention all the fun things in life they miss,” she added wistfully.

  “Like birthday parties?” he asked.

  “Like birthday parties,” Lily said.

  Papa shook his head. “I never supposed…I mean, I always hated birthday parties myself!” He was trying to make light of it. “But not the presents, eh? No one hates those…which reminds me…”

  He pulled two packages from his pocket that were tied with red ribbon. One a long, thin rectangle, the other short and square.

  “I meant to give you these the other day.”

  Lily opened the thin one first. It was a beautiful fountain pen. She took it out of its box and it shone in the flickering firelight. The second present was a red leather-bound notebook, with a golden ammonite embossed on the cover, just like Mama’s, except this book was filled with blank pages.

  “I thought you could write your story in it,” Papa said. “Just like Grace did in hers. And maybe one day you will continue her studies; you might find other, better ways of helping hybrids than we did. Of helping yourself…”

  “Thank you,” Lily said. She leafed through it. The bare, cream-coloured paper felt a little intimidating, waiting to be filled with words that would take her somewhere, like footprints in the snow. But then she thought of what Angelique had said, about how she could be the one to continue Mama’s story, and she knew this book would be the place to do it.

  She would begin when they got home. That would be her new start.

  She closed the cover of the notebook and glanced up. The circus band was playing in the firelight, and everyone was dancing: Robert, Anna, Tolly and Malkin, Angelique, Luca and Deedee, Dimitri, Silva, the Buttons and the rest of the circus folk. All spinning, twirling and pirouetting together – Silva was even flipping into handstands and acrobatic poses, while Angelique flapped her wings, and created new hovering dance steps. They looked like one big, happy family.

  Lily took Papa’s hand. “Come on,” she said. “I’ll introduce you to everyone.”

  Papa nodded. “Lead on, Macduff – let’s meet them.”

  On their final morning, they woke early to find the sun flooding through the windows of the Grand Hotel. After a breakfast of croissants, jam and pain au chocolat washed down with large vats of sugary black coffee that made Lily’s brain itch, they took a chaise and four to the Eiffel Tower Airstation.

  The glowing sky was reflected in the puddles of water along the street. Horse-drawn carriages, steam-wagons and omnibuses wove willy-nilly around each other on the busy tree-lined avenues, and groups of smartly-dressed women and gents paraded on the pavements. Robert thought about what an amazing week it had been, seeing the sights of the city, and also getting to witness the circus folk coming together after all that had happened to them.

  Anna was talking with Lily, showing her the headline of the morning edition of The Daily Cog, which she had picked up at the hotel’s reception.

  “I filed my latest copy last night via telegraph,” she explained. “I wanted to get the whole story, plus the aftermath too. They’ve given it the entire front page. I wrote about your speech, Lily, and how you and Robert persuaded the hybrids and the others in the circus to rebel, and how the circus came together afterwards. And how Madame and Slimwood were imprisoned and are being investigated for multiple counts of kidnap and murder.”

  “That sounds a lot to get into one story!” Malkin said.

  “And the Cogheart?” Papa asked. “Did you write about that?”

  “I’m afraid so,” Anna said. “I know you wanted me to soft-pedal that part, but I felt I had to include it somewhere. It was in the French papers and by now will be common knowledge. The story’s creating quite a stir in London.” She showed them the paper.

  “Crikey,” said Tolly, reading it over their shoulders. “You’ll be more famous than when we met the queen!”

  “I reckon we will be,” Robert replied. He peered at a smaller article below the main one. It said:

  “And that can’t be good news either,” Robert added.

  Lily folded the paper up and handed it back to Anna. “You know, I’ve just finished living this,” she said with a wry smile. “I don’t think I need to read all about it right now.”

  “Oh, that’s a copy for you and Robert to keep,” Anna said, giving Lily back the paper. “I’ve plenty more back at the office.”

  “Maybe I’ll just save the front page for us then, what do you think, Robert?”

  Robert smiled and nodded, and Lily ripped the front page off the paper and folded it up, placing it in Mama’s notebook with the loose pages, the circus ticket and the card with the What it is that makes you tick? poem written on it, which had started this whole adventure.

  She gave the rest of the paper to Malkin to chew on.

  The autumn sun beamed down from a clear blue sky, and as they passed through the Trocadéro Gardens and approached the Pont D’Iéna, Lily glimpsed the imposing silhouette of the Eiffel Tower Airstation. Small ornithopters were docked on its lowest level. Above, hot-air balloons, sky-ships and dirigibles clustered on the mid-level docking platforms. A fleet of brand-new single-man Santos-Dumont airships and a large commuter zep were coming in from the east, and there, nestled near the pinnacle, was Anna’s patchwork dirigible, Ladybird.

  Anna pointed up at her. “As soon as we get to the top of the tower, we shall be taking her home. I must say, she flew pretty well across the Channel, barely complained at all.”

  “Although your father complained quite a bit, Lily,” Tolly added.

  “Well, I’m used to piloting my own airship,” John said. “I freely admit I still find it quite strange to be flown by someone else.”

  Their carriage pulled up in the square beneath the tower, where the gigantic metal supports stretched out above them like the legs of some looming colossus.

  While Papa paid the driver of the chaise and unloaded their few bags, Lily, Malkin, Robert, Tolly and Anna headed across the square. As they had promised last night at the party, Angelique, Luca, Deedee, Silva and Dimitri arrived in a steam-hansom to see them off.

  “Thanks for coming to say goodbye,” Lily said, as the three hybrids and the other two circus children climbed down to join them at the base of the tower.

  “We wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Deedee said.

  “We’ll be lost without you,” Robert said. “So will Tolly.”

  “You can always visit,” Angelique said to Tolly. “Any time.”

  Tolly blushed. “Maybe I will,” he said. “When I finish up my work in London, with Anna.”

  While Anna had been covering the story and Lily and Robert and many of the others had been off sightseeing, Tolly and Angelique had been spending a lot of time together, rekindling their lost friendship.

  “Well, I suppose this is goodbye,” said Robert sadly.

  “We’re coming up to the platform too,” Angelique told him.

  “It’ll be the first time we get to see the city from so high,” Silva said, “without being locked up in that prison ship.”

  “Funny thing with Slimwood’s,” Luca added. “We travelled the world but never got to see anywhere outside the sky-ship and the compound.”

  “And now we finally can!” Deedee said.

  “Perhaps you should all come and visit us then?” Robert said.

  “Papa says any of you are welcome – for as long as you like,” Lily added.

  “And I can come see you,” Tolly added to Angelique.

  Angelique shook her head. “Maybe some day, but for now we are staying with the Skycircus. Things are different there.” Luca, Dimitri and Deedee nodded in agreement. “The Buttons are in charge and the rest of the acts are happier. Now that all of those old barriers that Slimwood set up are broken down, they accept us an
d treat us like family.”

  “Circus is family,” Silva said.

  Lily watched her papa at the booth paying for the cross-Channel fares, and organizing for the luggage to be taken up to Ladybird. Anna waited a few feet from him.

  “Do you remember when I said that when you’re different to other people they don’t believe you’re as good as them, and that you have to prove it?” Tolly said to Lily, as the group hurried together towards the lift that would take them up to the airship.

  Lily tucked her hair behind her ear to stop it blowing in the wind. “I remember.”

  “Well, I think you’ve proved it, Lily.”

  “It doesn’t work like that,” she said. “The trouble is, you have to prove it over and over again. You have to fight every day to be treated the same, and sometimes it gets so wearisome.”

  “It’s like your story, Lily,” Angelique said. “The one about Icarus. If you fail, if you fall short, you pick yourself up and make stronger wings for the next flight.”

  The lift arrived. Its metal doors clattered open, and everyone crowded in. Angelique tapped Lily on the shoulder and pulled her aside. “I don’t fancy being trapped in another cage, not even for a moment. I think I might fly up instead. Do you want to come with me?”

  Lily nodded. “Of course.”

  The others were already being shuffled into the lift by the crowds. The doors started to close. Papa beckoned to Lily and Angelique. “Come on,” he said, his face a picture of concern. “We have a flight to catch.”

  Lily smiled. “I’m catching a different one first, Papa.”

  She and Angelique stepped away from the crowds. Angelique took off her coat and handed it to Lily. Then she spread her mechanical wings as wide as they would go, until Lily could see every length of wire criss-crossing in complex patterns between the feathers, just like in the gigantic tower behind her. The crowds of people near them stepped back to give them room, gasping in admiration.