by Anya Allyn
A news crew moved in close with their microphones. My mother held out a hand, using what I called her big voice to tell the reporters to get lost—in no polite kind of way.
Ethan managed a grin. “She’s still the same,” he said to me.
I gazed at him coldly.
His expression faded.
Paramedics brought a stretcher and equipment over. Ethan sat heavily on the stretcher, leaning over onto his knees. A paramedic checked his lungs and clipped some kind of sensor on his finger. An oxygen mask was pulled over his face. Ethan collapsed back on the stretcher.
Breathing heavily, a policeman dressed in heavy gray armor ran up to me. “Are you Cassandra?”
I nodded.
“Is there anyone else down there?”
“Not... alive. You’ll find a skeleton in the tunnel. Jessamine. I don't know if you'll find... the others.” I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment. Would they ever find the bodies of Lacey and Prudence, and The First One?
He gave a curt nod and gave a shout to others near the entry to the shed as he ran back in there. Police reporters got the all-clear to film and photograph the underground rooms, and they moved in with their cameras.
A stretcher was brought beside Aisha's, and I was made to sit on it. I sank down, knees trembling.
Aisha's eyes moved under her eyelids, jumping as though she were having a nightmare. She mouthed the word, no. And woke with a single, clear scream.
Paramedics held her body and arms down as she struggled to rise. Her breaths came in short, rapid stutters.
“Aish,” I called desperately. I moved to place a hand on her arm. “It's okay. You're out of there. We all got out. You're with rescuers now.”
Her head shook from side to side.
“Just wake... please...."
Mom and Detective Kalassi hastened over, Kalassi with a phone to his ear.
Aisha's breathing slowed gradually and she stopped wrestling with the paramedics. Her pastel-green eyes opened to the stars above. She stayed like that for a moment, confusion tightening the curves and planes of her face.
“Yeah, Amy, Aisha Dumaj just woke. Let the family know...." Kalassi held the phone away from himself. “The father's in hospital having an op," he told my mom in a hushed tone. "Had a massive stroke this morning—the whole family's there with him.”
Mom nodded, and knelt by Aisha's side. “It's over. You're going home. Home to your parents and Raif. Cassie's here. This is Cassie's mom. You're all safe.”
Aisha shifted her gaze in the direction of mom's voice. A tear squeezed from her eye. She reached for my hand.
“How?” she whispered.
I bent my head down to hers. “The Dark Way goes all the way through the mountains...."
She frowned deeply. “The serpent …?”
I shook my head slightly, not wanting to tell her what I’d seen, not now.
“Why did you drink the tea?” I cried in a hushed tone.
“Jessamine... told us the serpent had taken you, taken Ethan, told us it was coming for us next...." She startled at the sight of the inserted tube, then stared around at the crowd surrounding her. “Ethan? The others? Did anyone else get out alive?”
“Yes, everyone.” No, no more lies and secrets. “Except Missouri.”
Pain drew her eyebrows down. She began calling for Ethan, and found him on the stretcher near hers. He slept with the oxygen mask still attached to his face.
Detective Kalassi moved closer to us, his mouth in a tight smile. “Is there anything you girls want filmed in particular—anything you want the world to know?”
My eyes watered. “Please film Missouri and Prudence’s drawings—and their writings—if you can find them. One of the cells has Prudence’s stuff. They deserve to be heard.”
Aisha nodded softly. “Yes.”
He stomped away to inform a police cameraman.
Wrapping my arms around myself, I followed after Detective Kalassi. “There’s something else I want you to film, from the underground.”
He examined my face. “Just give the word.”
“Look in Ethan McAllister’s pockets. That will tell you a story—a story of someone who already knew of the existence of the underground and what was down there.”
Thumbing his chin, he waved two police officers over. “When the boy's stable, carry out a search of his clothing. Be quick, and don’t disturb the paramedics or his treatment.”
My mother was summoned by the police to discuss Ethan. I guessed that as a child psych, they thought it best they confer with her.
I stepped back over to Aisha, guilty as I sat beside her. But I couldn’t allow Ethan to get away with what he’d done. He’d already known about the underground, before we’d ever gone down there, and the knowledge of that sat like a stone in my stomach.
A figure was brought out from the underground—completely trussed in blankets. The skeleton of Jessamine. Some of the police and reporters bowed their heads as the figure passed. Other reporters moved in close, trying to capture the best angle of the body.
Aisha stared at me intently, trying to get my attention. I followed her gaze around to the dark woods.
A figure stood there, indistinct and pale in a knee-length dress.
Jessamine. Forlorn and fearful. So different from the Jessamine of the underground. So not of this world.
Why don’t you just go, Jessamine? What’s stopping you?
The image of her faded, until she became darkness.
8. THE SACRIFICE
A slight figure rushed at us from the other direction—long blonde hair flying.
My mind traced the familiar features, but I could scarcely believe the lines of those features. My chest felt as though someone had just thrown a sucker punch.
She threw herself at me. “Oh my God! I’ve been out of my mind! My dad was informed you and Aisha had been found—and he drove me here.”
She turned back to wave at her father—the bulky sergeant in his police uniform.
I hugged Lacey tightly, screaming hoarsely. “I thought—I thought Henry hurt you!”
Her thin body sobbed, damp with sweat. “I was dumped on the street—far away from the mountains. I was found wandering. I had no memory of what had happened.”
Aisha's entire body tensed under the silver blanket.
Lacey bent to hug her, her blonde hair swinging down.
Aisha held her at arms’ length. “Get the hell away from me, servant of the serpent.”
I gaped at Aisha.
Lacey paled. “What?”
Aisha grabbed Lacey’s wrist, forcing her to look down at her silver bracelet. “Who gave you this bracelet? Well?”
“You must be very ill, Aish....” Lacey took a step back.
“Henry made you wear it—didn’t he?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Aisha's mouth drew into a hard line. “As I lay in the bed chamber—slowly dying—my mind ran through pictures of my life. And I saw you, like a puzzle. I finally saw all the pieces of you, and put them together.” Her voice rose in intensity. “You brought us here on purpose, Lily Fair. Yes, I figured out Prudence’s poem. You were the one who comes and goes, while everyone else just went around and around and around.”
Lacey put a hand up, as though to protect herself.
“You put us in a dark, damp hole and you went away. We lived like sewer rats. You lived—out in the sun—while we were left to rot and die—never to see sun again. Scared the rats are going to tell, now that they’re out?”
“No one would believe it.” Her voice was small.
“Lacey.” My muscles clenched, my head spun. I willed Lacey to deny the things that Aisha was saying—things that couldn’t possibly be true.
But a look of knowing crept into Lacey’s eyes.
She wrenched her arm away from Aisha. “You can’t judge me. Neither of you can.” Her body trembled all over. “I was just a little kid. Nine years old. I was on a school
camp in the forests. Henry Fiveash stole me from my sleeping bag. I was taken down to the underground. I woke with my face painted, and dressed like a doll. Jessamine said I was hers… forever.”
I gasped. “You were The First One. It was you!”
Lacey closed her eyes. “I made a deal with Henry. I said I’d bring more girls if he’d just let me go. Well what would you have done? I was a child—alone with a crazy man and a ghost. He had me put back in my sleeping bag before dawn. Two of the horrid doll things carried me through the forest, to make sure I didn't run away.”
She stared down at the bracelet like it was a snake wound around her arm. “So I’d know it wasn’t just a nightmare—he fixed the bracelet to me.”
Aisha shook her head. “Two girls died—girls you brought there. Their deaths are on your head.”
Lacey backed away.
“Why Aisha, Lacey?” I cried. “Of all people, why did you choose your own friend?”
“I didn’t choose her...." A low, pained sigh emitted from her chest. “When... when I took Frances down there, a photo fell from my wallet. It was one of me and Aisha from dance practice, back when we thirteen. Jessamine saw it, and she insisted on having Aisha from that moment on. Nothing could change her mind.... The day of the trek... it was always going to be Aisha. When she ran off by herself into the forest, that's when the toys took her."
I took a step towards her, speaking directly into the traitorous face of The First One. "So why did you even bother stealing and copying Aisha's file—pretending we were going to investigate the case for ourselves... when you knew what happened to her all along... all along...."
"I stole the file so I could see what the police knew. And I showed it to you so you'd trust me, so you'd tell me if you knew anything... about Ethan. You don't know what it's been like for me. All the lies I've had to tell... all the people I've had to hurt. From the day Henry brought me back to the school camp I've barely eaten, I've barely lived. I've had to live with this every single day...."
Something died inside of me. "Why didn't you just... tell someone? Police... your father?"
Pain wound through her gaze. "Henry said if I didn’t do what Jessamine wanted... he’d bring my little sisters to the underground and give them to the serpent.”
Horror caught in my throat.
“So you took the sisters and daughters from other families for sacrifice,” spat Aisha. “I’ll never let you forget what you did.” She stared deep into Lacey’s eyes, hatred etched on her face.
Reporters moved in close, filming, curious at the sight of the intense exchange. Paramedics turned their heads, raising their hands to tell us to let Aisha rest, to tell the reporters to move off. It almost seemed as though Aisha, Lacey and I were in a space all of our own—a toxic, locked space.
In the foreground, helicopters dipped and landed.
Lacey’s eyes closed. Her limbs froze.
The ground rumbled around her.
Reporters and police stared about them in alarm.
A shrieking wind blew out from the underground. Beneath our feet, a loud cracking sounded. Paramedics sprinted, rushing Aisha and me away and into the waiting helicopters. I jerked my head around, looking for mom. I caught sight of her, head held down by a police officer as he ran with her to my helicopter. She climbed the steps and sat beside me, her eyes large and terrified.
The helicopter lifted.
People scattered—fleeing for the forest as the front of the Fiveash house crashed to the ground. The room with the dollhouse sat exposed to the night. In the dollhouse, a tiny window lit—yellow against the darkness.
The house fell in on itself, bricks tumbling and flying out.
The walls of the old shed shot into the air like a pack of playing cards.
The earth began crumbling away.
Lacey stood, immobile, her eyes still shut. As if she could not hear the melee around her. Or knew it wouldn’t harm her.
Detective Kalassi charged headlong for Lacey, tackling her into his arms as he ran.
The house and shed disappeared into the shifting earth—trees pulled down along with them.
I gazed down into a vast hole as the helicopter battled to stay upright in the wind.
Everything was gone.
At the ragged edges of the hole, an immense shadow slithered out onto the ground. It moved like blood—thick, filmy.
The helicopter dipped for a moment, then rose into the clear sky, the whirr of the blades cutting across my mind.
JESSAMINE
1920
9. SPARROW
People say they want to run away to the circus. I want to run away from the circus.
My name is Sparrow. My name is your-entertainment-for-the-night. My name is never Jessamine, except for brief snatches between shows and rehearsals.
The briny reek of the docks saturates the air as the men hammer in the pegs of the big top. The people of New Orleans gather in the darkness beyond the circus lights—undertones of speculation in their voices, always wanting us to give them more. More thrills, more excitement, more danger.
At age fourteen, I’m the youngest and smallest trapeze artist our circus has ever had. I suspect the crowds would pay to see five-year-olds on the trapeze if we had them performing for us. The dangers we face are not real to them. We’re mere performers—circus animals.
I slam the door of my trailer, shutting them out. It would kill grandfather if I ran away. He says I'm all he has left. His only child—my father—was killed on the Wheel of Death four years ago in St Louis. At the exact moment that Mister Magnifico the Knife Thrower threw his blade at the Wheel of Death, Mister Magnifico suffered an aneurysm. My father, strapped to the spinning wheel, witnessed the knife hurtling towards him but could do nothing to avoid it. The blade struck him in the right lung.
High above the wheel, my mother—the graceful Lady Lark in her highwire act—screamed at the sight of blood streaking from my father's chest. She fell like a bird with a broken wing. The net saved her, but just barely. She was never any good after that, not as a high wire act nor a mother. Not that she'd ever been much of a mother to me except in name.
10. THE FORTUNE TELLER
I unpack from my suitcase everything I own. It isn't much. I have six trinket boxes, three dolls, seven dresses and a dozen performance outfits. Circus people must travel light, and I’ve been circus people all my life.
My trinket boxes are filled with things from every state of America and countries around the world. My tiny treasures. I hum as I arrange the dolls on my only shelf. It’s my ritual at every place the circus takes me. The first doll I place is always the small wooden clown from Mexico that looks a lot like a drugstore Indian—daddy gave it to me when I was five. The second one I place is a bear from the Steiff Circus that I begged for in Germany and the third is an exquisite Bru Bebe doll that grandfather bought me for my last birthday. Next, I arrange the trinket boxes on my dresser. In a fortnight, all this will be packed away and all trace of The Fiveash Circus will vanish from New Orleans.
The door of the carriage flings open. Audette stands there with her face like a horse and her bony hips protruding from her leotard. She places her hands on her hips with her many-ringed knuckles turned out. "Jessamine, you're meant to be practicing tomorrow's performance."
"I'm coming in a moment." I turn away and begin humming again.
"What are you doing with those ridiculous toys?" She steps into the carriage. With a sweep of her hand, she knocks the dolls to the floor. She crushes the Bebe doll underfoot before I can rescue it. "You’re fifteen in a month. Time to stop all this childishness of yours. Henry told me you’re refusing to attend a dinner with Mr. Baldcott. He's an important investor in the circus, and he has indicated an interest in pursuing a future with you. You have to stop pretending to be a child.”
I refuse to allow Audette to see me cry at the sight of my ruined doll. My back stiffens as I raise my eyes to her. "I told you before I am not having anything t
o do with Mr. Baldcott. Not for all the tea in China."
She sighs like a creaky piece of furniture. "We're not like regular folk. We're circus. And the assets of the circus are rapidly in decline. The captain has lost control of the ship."
"Don't you dare speak of my grandfather like that! This circus keeps and feeds ninety people—including you, Audette."
Audette crosses her arms tightly against my words. She’s twenty-four but acts more like a child than an adult. "When was the last time you saw your precious grandfather make any kind of decision to do with the circus? It's all been left to Henry."
Cold malice twists in my chest. "Speaking of Henry, perhaps you should go check what's he's doing for the circus right now. Last time I saw your fiancée, he was busily entertaining sixteen-year-old showgirls in his trailer."
Audette's horsey features droop. She storms away in the direction of my cousin’s trailer.
I want to close the door again, but a figure shifts close, like something carried on the dark breeze. She draws a shawl close around her shoulders, despite the warmth of the night.
"Who is that woman! C'est quoi ce cirque?" She waves a hand in the direction of Audette.
Her accent is very French. I know just enough French to know she thinks Audette is as stupid as I do. I shrug at the woman. "Audette is always like that."
The woman blinks and nods in acknowledgment. "I am Madame Celia. I’m here looking for work. A stall holder told me you are the granddaughter of the circus's owner. You can tell me where to find him, perhaps?"
I shake my head. "Grandfather doesn't like to be disturbed at night."
“Very well. I’ll return in the morning.” She takes a step away, then pauses and pulls out a pair of rag dolls from underneath her layers of clothing. I peer closely at them in the dark light. They are the new brother and sister dolls that children are crazy for—Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy. The dolls look handmade, with faces that are more Parisian and haughty than comical.