by Trudi Jaye
Soon she heard them talking in low voices. She hoped Garth could convince Simon that he was sincere.
Turning back to the Carnival bosses, she glared at each of them in turn. Their faces still reflected the shame of having hurt a child. “If any one of you dares to do anything to that boy, you will have me to answer to. And I’m not without resources.” She flexed her fingers, as if daring them to test her out. Her vision sharpened for a moment, the colors in the room were brighter, and the expressions of shock on their faces were a salve to her anger. “I will be back tomorrow, and you better have this sorted out.”
She stalked down the hallway and out the front door, power swirling around her.
***
“Did you see that? She has magic of some kind. She was trying to use it on us.” Missy’s voice was soft.
“It was nothing, an attempt to pick a fight,” scoffed Milton.
“She’s the Mark. Aside from anything else, we need to keep her happy, to fulfill her wish, not start a fight with her.” Missy’s voice was soft, as if she were thinking it through.
“We’ve got bigger things to worry about than a paltry love Gift,” argued Milton. “What do we ever get from them? And I don’t care about threats from her or Garth. I’m back now, and the Carnival is making its wishes clear. We get rid of the boy.”
Garth stood on the threshold, listening. His skin felt clammy and he was clenching and unclenching his right fist, trying to calm down. Something big had just happened and he didn’t know what to do about it. He’d been trying to convince Simon that he would never let them kick the boy out when he’d felt the pull on his Gift bond. Somehow Maddy, through the bond, had used his powers to make her point to the others. It had felt incredibly intimate and horribly scary at the same time to have her connecting to him like that. He considered telling the others, but as he looked around the room, he couldn’t be sure he had their full support. Not with Milton standing there, smug in his conviction that he was about to become Giftmaster again. It might make his own claim to Giftmaster seem weaker, and Garth couldn’t afford that right now.
Obviously, his father didn’t realize he was there, waiting in the shadows to enter the room. He’d held off entering when he’d heard Missy’s voice, letting her defend his position while he took a moment to compose himself. It was a surprise to hear her so passionately arguing for his cause. But in his absence, of course she would have his back.
He stepped through the threshold. “I think you forget yourself, Dad. You don’t have any power here anymore. The fact that you’re even at a meeting of the Nine is a privilege, not a right.” His voice felt like it was made of stone, but he’d had enough of his father’s interference. It was going to stop right here, right now.
“I forget nothing,” said Milton. His face went a mottled red as he turned to face Garth. “You forget who I am. The Carnival brought me back for a reason.”
Garth took a small step back before he could stop himself. He hadn’t expected Milton’s official challenge quite this soon, despite the realization that it was coming. Something deep inside him, pushed deep down where his younger teenage self had hidden it, had thought his father wouldn’t actually do it.
But of course he’d been wrong. The steel barrier he’d built to protect himself since his teenage years slammed back into place, solid and impenetrable. “If you wish to challenge me, let’s do it.” He kept his face blank despite Maddy’s emotions mixing with his own like oil and water inside his head. She was even more annoyed than before. Although, now that it wasn’t directed solely at him, it was slightly easier to keep under control. But his head felt foggy, as it always did during a Gift, and he had to work hard to stop shaking it to clear the extra background noise.
Not exactly the best time to be defending his territory.
He glanced around the room, trying to gauge the mood of the others. Alfie he knew would support him, and Missy was the same. Viktor, he couldn’t be sure, and for some reason Tami seemed to have a soft spot for Milton. But really, it didn’t matter. It was the Carnival’s choice.
His father cleared his throat, suddenly uneasy. “Son, this isn’t personal. I just want what’s best for the Carnival.”
Garth narrowed his eyes. “Don’t kid yourself, Dad. This is very personal. You can’t keep undermining the running of the Carnival with your comments, and I’m not going to lie down and let you take my position away from me. Let’s sort it out once and for all, right now.”
Milton nodded his head once. “It’s for the best, son.”
Garth wanted to growl in frustration. Milton clearly believed he was about to win this confrontation. Walking to one of the large chairs by the window of the porch, Garth sat down and closed his eyes. He settled into the seat, concentrating on his connection with the Carnival. He clenched his hands—he couldn’t stop this one sign of tension—and let his mind be free.
All at once, a confusing crush of images overwhelmed him. It was like the Carnival had been holding its breath, waiting for this one opportunity to have its say. It pushed everything at him in one frustrated gasp, but it was too much. He struggled to breathe, feeling like there was literally a huge chunk of concrete sitting on his chest, sinking into his very pores, pushing the life-giving juices out of his body. His life force was ebbing away, a victim of the overwhelming power and emotion that made up the Carnival.
And then suddenly, he wasn’t alone. Another force was there with him, light as a feather and holding everything together. He was able to push his way up and out of the crush and stand up to the connection.
He recognized his father, stronger and more powerful than in real life. There was a surge of confidence from Milton, and the colors around them burned just a little brighter.
A burst of fear flowed through Garth. What did this mean? Was his father really there to take over? Was he wrong about everything?
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
His father’s confidence almost broke Garth. As much as he’d wished his father had been around more when he was younger, he didn’t want him back like this. He remembered how he’d chafed at the role of Giftmaster when he’d first had to take over the position at just eighteen years of age, how he’d wished for anything that might have taken it away, allowed him the freedom to be young and free, like any other teenager in the Carnival. But now it was part of him, like a cloak he’d been wearing so long he didn’t know how to take it off. He couldn’t comprehend who he might be if he wasn’t the Giftmaster.
Why would the Carnival bring back his father, other than to take over as Giftmaster? Had Garth really been so terrible at it? In the strange ethereal glow of this other place, it started to make sense, his father’s belief that he was there to save them all from themselves. His whole body, his whole self, started to shake, the tremors jarring his ability to think.
The colors around him blurred, folding together in a tie-dyed wave, and Garth forced himself to focus on what was happening in front of him instead of his own fears. He could easily be lost in here, sucked into the immense energy that was the Carnival in this otherworld. It was a frightening thought, and it made him snap his concentration back into place. The colors softened, and instead of fighting through the thick wave of emotion and energy, Garth was enveloped in a gentle cocoon. He pushed farther into the connection, ignoring the pulsing light around his father.
As he settled, he realized part of his problem was the excess emotion he was dealing with. Being inside Maddy’s head was fueling his instability in the Carnival’s otherworld, and he needed to temporarily distance himself from her so he could concentrate on what was going on right here.
Taking several deep breaths to calm his thoughts, he concentrated on making the fear and anger disappear. As the emotions ebbed from his consciousness, he realized how pointless his fears had been. He was more than the Giftmaster. It enhanced who he was, but it didn’t define him. He would survive if his father won this challenge.
A calm settled in his stomach. The most important thing
was maintaining the Carnival, keeping everyone together and making sure they could carry on. They all needed to work together to make sure the Winter Spectacular was the best show they’d ever put on. If the Carnival wanted him to hand over his responsibilities to his father, he would do it and it wouldn’t be a problem.
Because it would be what was best for the Carnival.
Inhaling another deep breath, Garth felt the cool injection of fresh air into his lungs. He looked again at his father’s representation. While Milton looked stronger and brighter than he did usually, he still wasn’t as bright as Garth was in this place. Garth’s colors reflected back tenfold, making the connection glow like a brilliant moonbeam on a dark night. Most of the color and light in the space was a reflection of Garth, not the Carnival or his father.
Letting out his breath, he went and stood beside the bright colors that represented his father, his glow pushing out against the surrounding light. If there were to be a choice, it needed to be a clear one, something they could both take as a decision from the Carnival.
It didn’t happen often like this for the clowns, with a challenge between father and son. Usually it flowed from father to firstborn son on the death of the father, a simple line that each knew was coming. It was possible for daughters to take the role, but for whatever reason, the firstborn child in their family line had never been a girl in the three hundred years since the shipwreck. He didn’t know if it was possible for the Carnival to control that, too, or if it was just a coincidence.
But what it meant was that he didn’t know how the Carnival would show its approval to the rightful Giftmaster.
Rilla and Jack had gone into the Carousel not knowing what to expect, and for the first time, he understood how terrifying that would have been. It hadn’t seemed that important at the time because everyone knew they’d end up with the right person as Ringmaster. When they’d both emerged as Joint Ringmasters, it had seemed doubly beneficial.
While he knew he would survive, live on as part of the Carnival, a spike of panic thrust itself into his chest at the idea of being without his title. He straightened his spine. He didn’t need some title to define who he was.
A flash of light pulsed from somewhere in the distance, past his squint line and brighter than it was sensible to look at. A bolt of lightning forked toward them, and his heart leaped into his throat.
Pain burst through Garth as the lightning hit him straight on. Bright gasping agony roared through his entire body, from the tips of his toes to the ends of the hair on his head. His eyes felt like they’d bulged out of their sockets, and he desperately wanted to check that his fingernails hadn’t been burned off. If the pain was anything to go by, they’d been reduced to nothing. The smell of burning flesh sizzled in the thick air around them.
It took him a while to understand what the lightning meant. The lightning had only hit Garth. His father stood to one side, his light dimmed slightly, the confidence knocked down a notch.
The Carnival had chosen Garth.
And just like that, the pain disappeared. The burning smells were gone. He felt energized, like the power of the lightning had fused itself into his body. His power blazed bright in the shadow world, and his father’s presence there disappeared.
In that moment of sudden clarity, a question hit Garth. If he was still the Giftmaster, why had the Carnival let Milton out of his prison of the mind? Garth pushed at the connection, trying to make the Carnival explain what it wanted them to do.
But aside from the affirmation of Garth’s leadership, the Carnival remained strangely silent. It had seemed so intent on leaving a message when he first arrived, the crushing weight of its frustration almost taking his breath for good. Now its refusal—or inability—to communicate wasn’t making sense. He could feel agitation in the emotions swirling around him, but for now, the Carnival seemed to feel it had communicated its message.
Garth closed his eyes against the bright light of the Carnival otherworld and sighed. In the wake of the Carnival’s expression of power, he felt drained. He was too tired to do anything other than be grateful he’d survived the bid for Giftmaster. Perhaps now his father would allow that Garth had learned something in the time he’d been in the position.
Slowly he came back, his consciousness flowing into his body. He felt like he’d been hit by a train. The connection with the Carnival always affected him like this—it was difficult to remain in that other place for long. His body felt battered and bruised. It was the longest he’d needed to stay wholly connected to the Carnival for many years.
He opened his eyes, unable to delay the inevitable reawakening any longer. Aside from the heavy, back-to-Earth feeling, the dimmed colors, and the slightly out-of-focus nature of the real world, he knew it was going to hurt.
But what didn’t hurt was seeing Rilla crouching in front of him, a concerned look on her face and a huge bandage around her arm and side. She looked like hell, but she was just what he needed to see.
“Hey,” he said, a crooked half smile on his face.
“About time,” she said. “I can’t leave you alone for five minutes without you getting yourself into trouble, can I?”
“Nope.” He agreed weakly, the thumping in his head making him close his eyes again. “I could say the same for you.”
***
Garth sat looking out over the frozen lake. In the distance, he could see the brilliant red of the big top being erected over the ice. A dull ache was all he had left of the encounter at the Nine meeting. He hadn’t seen his father since he’d left the room, his face drawn with the same aches Garth was feeling.
“Do you think he’ll forgive you for winning?” asked Rilla quietly from the chair next to him.
He shook his head. “I don’t know, and frankly, I’m not worried about it. He challenged me. He thought he would be able to come back in after all this time and just take over.”
“He hasn’t changed one iota.” Rilla moved slightly, wincing as she bumped her shoulder.
“It was easy to forget what he was like when he was this shell of a man at the home,” agreed Garth. “Having the real man back is a shock.”
“I bet.”
“So how are you feeling?” Garth glanced over at his best friend. The flash of a gun going off flickered through his head.
“It’s not every day I get shot.”
“What was he like?” Garth couldn’t imagine how a monster could raise a boy like Simon.
Rilla raised her eyebrows. “Hugo?”
Garth nodded.
“Unstable. Full of himself.”
He shook his head. “Simon’s such a good kid. So different from Hugo.”
Rilla tapped a finger on the arm of her chair, thinking. “Hugo’s power has been declining, and I think it’s affecting him. Imagine if you suddenly lost what made you special. It killed me when I felt my powers disappearing.”
“But you didn’t start trying to hurt people.”
“No. He’s gone in an interesting direction with his reaction to it. But I think he genuinely misses Simon. He mentioned him a few times.”
Garth looked over at Rilla. “Simon’s a good kid,” he repeated. “Our fathers don’t make us. At least not totally.”
“I know that, Garth. You’re not the same person as your father, and Simon isn’t the same person as Hugo.”
“He talks about Hugo in such a glowing way. Like the man we met is completely different from his dad. Something happened. Something made Hugo go crazy in that last year.”
Rilla shook her head. “It could be anything. We just don’t know enough about the curse power Hugo uses.”
“Who does know?”
“I’m not sure. There must be more people out there using powers like ours—Lucietta even said something about it. In the whole history of the world, we couldn’t be the only ones to have found the blessings. There must be others who use curse magic as well. We just have to find them.”
“How on Earth do we do that?”
<
br /> Rilla smiled. “I don’t know, but we’ll figure it out. Or maybe I’ll make Jack figure it out.”
“He does have an interesting perspective on the world.”
“Another interesting perspective is this Maddy woman I’m hearing about. Everyone has been full of stories about her.” Rilla raised her eyebrows at Garth.
“She’s the Mark.” Garth tried to keep his voice even.
Rilla put a hand on Garth’s. “I’m sorry, Garth. That must hurt.”
He raised his eyes to hers, not trying to hide the pain that had been lurking there since she’d appeared in his head. “I don’t know what to do, Rilla.”
“We follow our instincts, Garth. Isn’t that what Dad always used to say to us? It’s not about what you ought to do. It’s about what your heart is telling you to do.”
Garth felt a sting right through his center. “My instincts are to go to her and never look back. They’re telling me to break the Gift. But I can’t leave the Carnival. It’s where I belong. My instincts are telling me two completely different things at the same time.”
She grabbed his hand in a tight hold. “We’ll figure it out. We always do.”
“I hope so. Because this hurts like hell.”
Rilla looked out over the ice, at the big top in the distance. “It feels a little different. The Carnival, I mean. I thought everything would be in complete disarray, that my shooting, and Jack and me being gone would cause issues. But actually, there’s a good feeling around the place. The Winter Spectacular has given everyone something positive to concentrate on.”
Garth nodded. “I feel it too. At first I thought it was Maddy…” Garth took a breath. “But it could also be related to Simon. I think he might be coming into some kind of power.”
Rilla glanced at him sharply. “Is it anything we should know about?”
Garth shrugged. “I don’t know. The Carnival doesn’t seem bothered by it.”
“That’s not always the final word. It only knows what it can see through us.”