by Rachel Caine
“No. I’m the one who’s sorry, little bird. Everything I did was to protect you from this. I should have told you, but I was afraid . . .”
And then he sighs, wings drooping. He tilts my head as though to kiss me again, but this time he aims for that sweet spot beneath my chin.
His mouth brushes over it, and I utter a sharp cry at a thin sliver of pain twisting though my neck, thousands upon thousands of tiny pinpricks. And then nothing at all.
Until I touch it.
A tiny fire erupts beneath my fingers. “What did you do to me?”
His mouth quirks into a sad smile. “The prickle of pride is something that must be borne. Your sin is now mine.”
A snort sounds from the shadow. “An interesting proposition, lapsis. And unexpected. I accept.”
“Peacock?” Brystion says hoarsely. “Are you sure?”
Nobu sighs. “What else can I do? I love her.”
I blink back a rush of tears. “Nobu?”
“I’m a fallen angel, Mel. But not completely fallen. And thus begins my true descent.” He sets his tea shades on my forehead. “For luck.”
His mouth presses against my ear. “I’ve bought you some time. Use it wisely, because you won’t get a second chance. I’ll wait for you. When you’ve learned how to use your power . . . when you’re ready, come find me.” His voice drops lower still. “The Wild Magic lives within you. It always has. With it, you can do anything. Anything you want.”
“I want you,” I sob. “I wish I’d never picked up this fucking thing.”
“The price must be paid. Now or later—but either way, you will belong to me.”
I sag at the Devil’s words, but a razor-swift hand snatches my chin, pulling until I’m forced to look the Devil in the eye. I can tell you only that He didn’t look anything like the stories said, but more than that I will not say.
It is enough that I saw Him and still breathe.
His fingernail traces the spot where Nobu kissed me. “A gift.” And then pain lances through me, the sweep of magic and brimstone and the hum of what I could only guess was the Wild Magic surging through my body until every limb tingles.
The Devil smiles, and I know no more.
—
“MEL? WAKE UP. Come on, now . . . you have to get up.” Brystion’s voice rumbles in my ears, and for a moment I think I’m still in the van. I rub at my eyes.
Sand and gravel stick to my face, grinding into my cheeks. A deep ache ripples through my mind, the colors a sickening blur. I roll over and retch into the dirt, heedless of whoever is pulling the hair out of my eyes.
“Wha . . .”
“Open your eyes.”
I blink. I’m in the middle of an empty field. Any signs of the fair are no more substantial than a thrown-away popcorn box. I glance down to see the violin beside me. Still glittering. Humming. Crooning.
I touch it briefly, and the power of it sings through me.
“Where’s Nobu? Where is he?”
Brystion squats and throws an arm over my shoulder even as Elizabeth looks away miserably. “He’s gone, Mel. He went with . . . Him.”
I weep.
For a few minutes. An hour. I don’t know. The incubus pats me gently, not answering my soft questions of why. We both know the answer anyway.
Because of me. Nobu is gone because of me. The truth of it startles me out of my self-loathing.
“I’m going to get him.” I roll to my feet, the violin in my arms. “You heard them, right? I can do things with this. I can fight back. . . .” My voice shakes with the edges of hysteria.
“Yes,” the incubus says slowly. “But not now.”
“Then when? I can’t just sit here . . . I can’t . . . I can’t . . .”
Inwardly, I know he’s right. I need time to learn how to use this gift—or curse—or whatever it is. Time to figure out a plan of action.
Time to set my own path.
I swallow hard. “Is the van still here?”
“Yes. Marcus is putting things away. He’s asked us to drop him off in New York.” A twinge of sadness grips me.
Just like that, the band has broken up. I didn’t need to look at Elizabeth’s face to see the I told you so.
I nod, suddenly realizing I have nowhere to go. Certainly not home. And without Nobu? “And you guys?”
Elizabeth slips her hand into Brystion’s, her eyes possessive. He gives me a tight smile. “We’re headed to Portsmyth. It’s a little town in New England. There are a lot of OtherFolk there, but I think you’d like it.”
I exhale softly and draw the bow across the strings. Immediately, those silver notes flare into my vision, beckoning me down a path I couldn’t quite see. Hie away, hie away, over bank and over brae . . .
“All right.” I nod. “Let’s go.”
—
DOOR MAKER, THEY name me.
Player of the Wild Music.
Rumors say I outplayed the Devil for a chance at winning a violin that would grant me the ability to tap into the magic of the very CrossRoads itself.
But rumors are rarely more than exaggeration. Only a few know the truth of it, but I let it lie because it suits me. Even though “winning” is a relative term.
The Wild Magic pulls at me, beckoning me to the dance.
I burn with it.
And one day, it will consume me.
“Recession of the Divine”
Hillary Jacques
The fire had ridden up an unfinished four-by-four wooden post and melted the red rubber covering of the gaming booth. Olivia Sarkis snapped photos of all four sides, then crouched to survey the contents. The roof slumped like a gritty tongue and, in the murk beneath it, cheap, once-plush toys lay about, charred and disfigured.
“Holy thunderballs, what happened to those little bastards?” a woman asked, so close that the humidity of her breath invaded Olivia’s ear.
Olivia jumped to her feet. Beside her a young woman, red hair short and spiked, stuck her thumbs into her pockets and rocked back until she achieved a gravity-defying angle. She was angular where Olivia was curved, short while the other woman loomed, and ethereal where Olivia was solid flesh. An avatar that well rendered, probably even touchable, could only be the result of centuries on the earthly plane.
“Thalia,” Olivia said, her guess confirmed when the Muse’s face lit up. Her pleasure sparked an answering warmth in Olivia. “Why sneak up on me like that?”
Thalia raised a finger. “Better question, Lady. Why allow me to sneak up on you?”
“I’m working.” Olivia tucked stray curls behind her ears. Mortal hair, she had long ago decided, behaved oddly. Thalia bent at the waist and peered under the covering.
“I hate to tell you this, but I think those little bunnies is d-e-a-d dead.” Her eyebrows rose expectantly. “Unless you wish to return them to life.”
“I doubt that performing mouth-to-mouth on melted snouts will raise them to the level of anything remotely resembling life.”
Thalia shrugged and looked around. They stood between shuttered gaming stands, isolated from a seething crowd by a pair of thin ribbons of yellow tape. To Olivia’s left, a man on stilts swung a baton, flaming on both ends. Below, the crowd twitched, pointing like dogs, anticipating misfortune. To her right, excited murmurs followed in the wake of a scantily clad bearded lady as she sashayed near the entrance gate. Performers building excitement for the nightly shows. Only at a carnival would a burned building not draw attention.
Kimball and Son Amusements boasted the largest traveling fleet of rides in the United States, but it prided itself on traditional attractions: performers, mind readers, and weight guessers. Freaks.
Thalia scuffed the toe of her boot over the outside of a distinct circle of clean ground.
“Already got it.” Olivia pointed to a barrel that had been dragged five paces away. “Someone tossed a cigarette at the trash, missed, and hit something flammable, probably improperly disposed-of cooking grease. Are you now t
he Muse of loss control engineers?”
“Is that what you’re pretending to be?” Thalia extracted a yellow and red nub from the barrel. She sniffed it. “Is this what humans subsist on nowadays?”
“It’s a dog made of corn, a rare delicacy. You should try it.” Olivia closed her notebook and pocketed her camera. “I work for insurance companies, reviewing incidents and helping businesses develop safety procedures.” She liked the job, finding and sorting the myriad pieces that contributed to accidents. Cause led to effect, and statistics and analysis produced remedies. It was an orderly, controlled profession, and she found she liked helping people. She’d never been useful before.
“For instance, if someone was eating garbage, you’d tell them it would be a good idea to stop before they got dysentery? That’s genius!” Thalia mimed an awed expression as she dropped the stick onto the ground. “Why don’t you finish up here? There’s a great taco place down the road. It’s been a nymph’s age since we caught up.”
“Down the road?”
“Pasco.”
“Washington State?” She shook her head. “We’re in Kentucky.”
Thalia waved absently. “Those laws of space and time are so . . . human.”
“I need to complete my investigation.” Olivia ground her teeth, then winced. A week ago she’d had a cavity filled, and the tooth was still sore. Discomfort was also a human constant.
“You should investigate more than this fire. This place is a sham.” Thalia flicked open a pocketknife and began carving stylized pictures of birds into the singed wooden post.
“Carnivals sell illusion. It’s sleight of hand on a mass scale. Stop defacing the premises.”
“I don’t mean the show.” Thalia flashed a pair of jazz hands. The blade made the motion menacing. “There’s something nasty under the surface here, something dangerous.” Her eyes widened and her voice turned beseeching. “You should fix it. Isn’t that your job now, to make things safe?”
“Cease your provocation.” The Muse was pushing, using that subliminal encouragement specific to an essential, professional instigator.
Thalia frowned as she closed her knife. “You can’t do this forever, Lady. You may have masked what you are, but you will never be rid of your nature.”
The Muse faded, her image wavering like a reflection on water before disappearing. Olivia’s head buzzed, the binding over her power quivering in response to Thalia’s small trick. To release it meant she would leave this body and disperse like a thread on the wind. She would be stronger, but she would unravel, losing this sense of self she had finally identified and built up. That, she was not ready for.
She bit down, hard, and the resulting pain centered her. Down the lane, a man ducked under the caution tape. He wore pleated gray slacks, a bright white shirt, and thin-soled shoes with real stitching. Her purpose returned to her.
While he had inherited the carnival from his mother when she passed several months prior, August Kimball had the look of a man who, if he didn’t own the business, wouldn’t have pushed through the turnstile once in his entire life.
“Sorry to leave you out here alone.” Kimball met her eyes for a moment before scowling at the ruined booth. “This place pulls me in a hundred directions at a time.”
“Not a problem,” she said brightly. “I’ll send these pictures to the claims adjuster and he’ll get back to you soon.”
“You’re not the adjuster?” Tan fingers tightened around the manila file Kimball held in front of his stomach. He wore a large gold ring inlaid with sapphire on his smallest finger, a token link to some proud university.
“Loss control. And I’m a contractor.” Olivia smiled conspiratorially. “I don’t really work for ‘the Man.’ ” Nobody liked the idea of someone they paid telling them how to run their business, and sometimes it helped to distance herself. “Actually, the carnival was on my list of accounts that could use some help. You’ve had some incidents?”
“Yeah.” Kimball rubbed his forehead and snuck a glance at the bearded lady’s backside. “We had that electrical fire back in July. Wasn’t too bad.”
“And the other?”
“The other.” He drew a breath and held it, his light-blue eyes unfocusing. It was an expression of remembrance, his senses going quiet as he turned inward, walking the steps of moments past.
Images tumbled into Olivia’s mind, silverfish snippets of speech, the soft glide of emotions not her own. August turns away from the collapsed machine, his shaking hands forming fists in his pockets. Behind him, the man yells, “Something has to change, Augie.” Patronizing, like he’s still a child who can be bullied. August is grown up, in charge, but it seems harder every day to resist that voice.
Olivia pulled the camera out of her pocket and fiddled with it, resisting the pressure building in her head, the beehive flurry of whispers. His memories were his own; she had no right to them.
She’d spent a hundred years feeding the power of her essence into the shell of a nut, and around that had built her human form. She was aware of the binding—like she was of this aching tooth—but other than a weak pulse in response to the descendants of Olympians she occasionally encountered, it was quiet. Why now did it threaten to wake?
Kimball turned back and forced a smile, all business. “The other incident was a collapse. It would have been on the front page for a week if we were operational, but luckily it happened during setup. The parts are in storage.” He glanced at the darkening sky. “Would you rather come back in the morning?”
Normally Olivia tried to be flexible for customers, but something about the place and the queer reaction she was having to it made her want to stay. “Sorry. I’m leaving in the morning. I promise I’ll be as quick as I can.”
The hope that she’d stop bothering him had softened his eyes. His expression hardened as he handed her the envelope. “These are our incident reports. I’ll have to call someone to escort you, since I don’t have keys. You can wait in the office.”
“If you don’t mind, I’ll walk around. It’s not often I get to go to the carnival. He can find me at the Zipper.”
She turned away before he could argue. The file was warped, damp from his hands, though the evening air was rapidly cooling. Olivia held the file between her thumbs and fingertips, slightly away from her body. Paper was an effective conduit for memory, and maybe August Kimball wasn’t as worried by the surprise nature of her inspection as he was by the fact that he actually had something to hide.
Olivia dipped under the tape, joining the crowd of fried-meat-on-a-stick-gobbling humanity as it streamed past face painters, walked over spilled popcorn, and gaped and hooted at the attractions. The air beside her shivered.
“You’re still here?” Olivia muttered under her breath.
“Maybe I like spending time with you, despite this boring new character you’re playing.” Thalia materialized at her side. The humans were oblivious. “Do you at least have a secret addiction? Like, do you rescue animals? Are you a hoarder?”
“I’m pretty normal. I enjoy sunsets, long walks on the beach, and snorting copious quantities of cocaine off the backs of the thousands of ferrets I’ve packed into my home.”
Thalia giggled. “At least interacting with humans has given you a sense of humor.”
“I interact as little as possible.” One of the reasons she freelanced was because she could control when and for how long she was among them. “But I read, and watch their films. All the themes they admire and fear distilled and presented in small, repetitive bites.” She hoped to understand the feelings that had sprouted and continued to grow inside her human shell. The unquenchable desire for companionship. The irrational fear of uncertainty. The constant, gnawing need for more.
“You really can’t sense this corruption?” Thalia snagged a bite of funnel cake from a passerby. “You would if you unleashed all that pent-up goddessness.”
“I can’t simply flip the switch. It takes time, preparation.”
The Muses had a bet, the stakes of which grew each decade. Whichever one could lure Olivia back to the Olympian plane would win. She’d been gone for so long that entire cities probably hung in the balance of that wager by now. Their campaigns were subtle. A suggestion here. A hint there.
Pushing her like this, however, crossed the line. Her powers had been neither lost in battle nor bound by committee; she had chosen to renounce them.
“You overstep yourself, Thalia.” She filled her words with ice and dismissal even as her stomach clenched with the knowledge that she was hurting the girl. “Go find a poet to whisper your favor to.”
Thalia looked up from beneath her long lashes, contrite. She raised her hand as though making an offering. “At least allow me to do something for you before I go. Please?”
Olivia hesitated, then nodded. There was no harm in taking comfort. A cool grain materialized on her tongue and worked its way to her tooth, burrowing efficiently inside. The grinding ache numbed.
“That’s better, isn’t it? See you soon.” Thalia winked as she faded.
Olivia made it four more steps before her binding twitched. She stumbled into the person beside her, muttered an apology, and hunched into herself as she wove through the crowd. Their minds and mingled histories pressed against her, a blooming riot demanding entry. Thalia didn’t have the strength to undo her work. Her design was flawless, down to a release in the event she was threatened and her body incapacitated. And yet she saw no threat. Olivia staggered off the path.
The babbling retreated slowly. After a minute her breathing slowed, after another her heart relaxed. She focused on the bodies and objects around her. The field of the midway writhed and spun, a mechanical organism with a hundred limbs soundtracked by hissing pneumatics, rumbling generators, and delighted screams. The crowd split, slipping into orderly lines beneath the machines. The air hung thick, gravid with some foreign quality.