I could not find Aenea. The carnival closed down, sellers packing their wares for the last time, the customers leaving the beach, some glancing at the big top as they did so. Within hours, the canvas tent would be gone, as would we. The wind whipped sand on my dress.
The entire city of Imachara must have heard the celebration at the bonfire.
I lingered, grasping a mug of beer Bethany thrust into my hands, accepting her scratchy kiss on my cheek with a smile. This was my last night at the circus. I could not leave quite yet. I memorized each of their faces, not wanting to forget them if I never saw them again. Bethany and the way she laughed, throwing back her head, shoulders heaving as she celebrated with Juliet, Poussin, and Madame Limond. Tila and Sal whispering and giggling behind their hands, flirting with a few of the Kymri tumblers. Tym idly stroking the head of his favorite otter, Needle, as he spoke with Karla. Karg the strong man reading a book of philosophy by the light of the bonfire until Tin tapped him on the elbow and told him a joke. Rag and the workers throwing pebbles toward the water, swigging from paper-wrapped bottles.
Bil swirled whisky in a glass tumbler, staring at the flames of the bonfire, lost in thought. No one else in the circus had hard spirits. He gave the glass a last swirl and downed the rest of the amber liquid. Through the flames, his eyes met mine.
It was time to go.
But not before telling the truth.
I found Aenea playing a game of cards with Drystan in her cart. I wondered if he only played with her to see if I would follow through and leave as I said I would. "Aenea?"
"Yes?" she answered, putting down the cards. Her rucksack lay on the bed, half-packed with clothes.
"Before we go, I have to tell you something."
Her brows knit together. "About what?"
"About me."
"What's wrong?" she asked.
"Everything," I said.
Drystan hovered uncertainly. "Should I go?"
"You might as well stay," I said. "May as well air all my secrets at once."
I peered out of the door before closing it and throwing the bolt, and it
clunk
ed shut.
"What is it?" she asked.
My throat closed. The time had come, and I did not know what to say. I looked between them beseechingly.
I took a deep breath and forced the words through my throat. "The Shadow who came around asking questions… he was asking about me."
Aenea frowned. "Bethany thought he was looking for that noble girl who ran away months ago? What does that have to do with anything?"
"You don't know?" Drystan's surprise was genuine – he must have assumed that she and I had been sleeping together for months, that I had confided everything to her. Not quite everything. Here was the moment I had been dreading.
Aenea turned to me, and I wished the ground would open beneath my feet and swallow me whole. "Explain, please," she said, fighting to remain calm.
I gaped at her, mute.
"Come on, Micah. Tell her. And then you need to leave the circus before that Shadow comes back." Drystan peeked through the window at the top of the door.
I took a deep breath, tried to force my way through the shock and be somewhat coherent. "I have not been truthful to you about my background."
Aenea now played the mute. She must have guessed that, but not the extent of it.
"My true name is Iphigenia Laurus," I continued, grating the words through my throat. "I am technically ninety-sixth in line to the throne, and my family is in the Third Ring of nobility."
"But you're not a woman," she said, fear in her voice.
"She is–" Drystan started.
She shook her head. "I know he's not. Micah?" she looked at me, and so did Drystan. Neither of them knew the truth. The vice wound tight around my throat. I could not tell them.
I would have to show them.
My numb fingers scrabbled at the few remaining buttons at the side of my dress. I slid the bodice down, my false breasts tumbling to the floor, my Lindean corset on full display. I unlaced the stays and pulled the garment down, baring my small breasts. Aenea looked at them as if I had an extra head sprouting from my chest. Drystan's eyes darted at them, and then away.
I swallowed again.
Turning my head to the side and trying not to sob, I pulled down my petticoats and undergarments. Though I did not see their faces, I knew they were staring at me in horror. After the longest moment of my life, I pulled the skirts up, redid the Lindean binder, and shrugged my shoulders back into the bodice of the dress.
That was it. It was done. The mere act of pushing aside some fabric, and they knew everything.
"What are you?" Aenea asked, and she sounded so fearful that it broke my heart.
"A Kedi," I said hoarsely. I rummaged in my pack and held out the soapstone figurine.
"A Kedi." Drystan looked at me in wonder. "The Byssian demi-god?"
"I'm not magical, or mythical. I'm a freak. Had Bil known, I could have been the star of the freakshow." I laughed, though it was more of a choking noise.
Aenea was looking at me as if I were a stranger. "I am still confused." Her voice fell flat and broke.
I cleared my throat. "I was raised as a girl. I didn't feel particularly feminine, much to my mother's dismay. My entire life, I was dragged to doctor after doctor, specialist after specialist. Eventually, my mother found a doctor who decided he could make me fully female, by slicing me with a surgeon's knife."
They both winced.
"I could not face it, and so I left, and you know the rest." I reached for Aenea's hand, but she stepped away from me. It took everything within me not to disintegrate right there. I was held together by the thinnest of fraying ropes.
"Why didn't you tell me?" she said.
"I wanted to. So many times. There never seemed to be a proper time to do so."
"You could have made a time," she said.
"I know," I said. "I know. I'm sorry. One other person in my past life found out about me. He was disgusted. I was too afraid."
Her eyes filled with tears.
I did not know what to say.
Drystan shook off his own shock. "We need to leave. The sooner the better."
"We?" Aenea said.
"We?" I echoed.
"Aenea can come with us if she wishes. There's no longer a circus. We can be a merry trio, frolicking through Imachara and making our own way." His mouth twisted.
"But Drystan, you and Aenea, you have good lives here… You could take over the circus, save it from itself and from Bil."
Drystan waved his hand. "The circus is too far gone. And in any case, it's not for me. This period of my life is over."
"I'm not leaving," Aenea said. I could not bring myself to look at her.
"I'm sorry, Micah, but I can't." She turned her head away from me. "I just… I feel as if I don't know you. I told you more of myself than I'd told anyone, and all you told me were lies. My life is here. In the ring, and on the ropes."
Her words stung. "I tried to tell you the truth as much as I could." As the words tumbled from my mouth, I knew they were not enough.
"No, you haven't. If you had told me months ago…"
Then maybe things would be different.
Her next words were so soft I could barely hear them. "I feel like… you've made a fool of me."
The words hung in the air. I closed my eyes. She was not Damien. I had not given her the choice to make up her own mind.
Drystan was filling my pack with what little foodstuff I had in the cart. He had barely glanced in my direction since I had shown him what was under my petticoats. Did he hate me too, for keeping the truth from him? I was losing everything important to me.
I listened to the beating of my heart and the muted noises of the funfair drifting up the beach. "I understand," I said. "I am the fool, not you. Never you. And I am sorry for it, Aenea. Truly sorry."
She did not say anything. She gave me one long, searching look, and then her eyes shuttered to me and she walked out the door.
"I'm sorry, Micah," Drystan said.
"Me, too." I looked at him. "Are you sure you want to come with me? Wherever we end up going?"
"Of course I am." He winked, trying for levity. "It'll be an adventure."
He passed me an empty sack. "Here, go steal us some food while I go get my things from my cart. I'll meet you back here in a quarter of an hour, and we'll make our way."
"No goodbyes?"
"No. Best to sneak away and leave fewer ripples."
I took the empty bag. "See you soon." And I crept from my former home in the circus, cursing all the withheld truths that had turned to barbed lies that cut deep.
On the way to the food cart, someone seized my shoulder. I twirled and raised my fist. Before I could register their face, a rough cloth smelling of chemicals was pressed to mine. My scream was dampened by the fabric. The hand behind the cloth pushed harder onto my mouth and I choked.
The world dimmed and darkened and then I was gone.
28
A
UTUMN:
T
HE
R
INGMASTER'S
C
ANE
"There once was a troll quick to anger. He had no friends, and lived by himself by a crucial pass through the Fang Mountains. People would bring him gifts and stories to try and barter passage. Sometimes it worked. Often it didn't, and their bones would scatter the rocks as a warning to others. One day, the troll hurt himself falling down a ledge. He called to a man hiking through the pass for help, but the man only hurried along, grateful that he was safe. The troll withered away, until his bones mingled with his victims'. His anger was his undoing."
"Troll Pass," HESTIA'S FABLES
I awoke, my head still in the grips of a chemical fog. The gag chafed the corners of my mouth and the cotton dried my tongue. I groaned and resisted the urge to vomit as the world came into focus. I stared at the ceiling of Bil's cart, still in Iona's wedding dress, prone and tied fast to the bedposts. The false pearls of my skirt glinted in the low light. I whimpered, each breath a struggle. Outside, I could hear the gramophone's tinny music and the subdued mumble and laughter of the circus folk as they celebrated the last show of the season.
Time dripped past. I shivered, tears sliding down my cheeks. I yelled, the scream absorbed by the cotton in my mouth. I struggled against my bonds, chafing my wrists raw. All was futile. Eventually, the sounds of merriment faded but for the moaning witch of the wind.
The door unlocked and Bil's silhouette darkened the doorway. Even from here, I could smell the alcohol on his breath. He slid in and locked the door behind him.
"A Shadow was lookin' for you,
boy,"
Bil said, closing and re-bolting the door behind him. "Policiers, too."
I said nothing, for I could not. I did not doubt the Shadow might have been looking for me, but the Policiers I saw might have merely been keeping the peace in a place where they could have a little fun of their own.
"Well, I say he was looking for you, but he wasn't looking for someone by the name of Micah Grey, now, was he?" He took a full bottle of whisky from a cupboard, unstopped it, and poured himself another glass. I would never be able to smell whisky again without the memory of fear.
"He was looking," Bil slurred, "for a girl with a funny name. Iffy… something. Last name o' Laurus."
I swallowed behind the gag.
"Iphigenia Laurus. That's what it was. Little noble girl who ran away from her perfect little life."
I glared at him over my gag.
"The Shadow asked some innocent questions, but then I remembered that newspaper article Frit told me about, few months back. That missin' girl. Frit wondered where a noble girl would run, how she'd hide what she was. You know what I said to her? I said, 'Not well, that's how. Stick out like a sore thumb, she would.'" He gulped some more whisky. "But you hid a little better than I thought. Might not a noticed, you know, if you hadn't been Iona in the panto. Too convincing a girl by half, you was." His gaze lingered on my dress before he drained the glass.
"After that Shadow left, I remembered. Remembered the Policiers were offering a reward for you, see."
My nostrils flared. I felt like a cornered rabbit looking into the eyes of a fox. I managed to make a sarcastic grunt through my gag.
"Yea, you'd think the circus would be doing all right, now, wouldn't you? I work hard so the circus folk think that. We've been selling seats, fair enough, but we've been limping along on promises. When Frit left, she took everything. D'you hear me? Every. Little. Thing. All I worked for, to support her, all gone." More whisky sloshed into the glass tumbler.
I stared at him, hatred blazing in my eyes. Again, I thought he was lying. Frit would have taken a lot, but she loved the people in the circus. She did the books. She knew exactly how much Bil could afford to lose. Or had she grown to hate Bil so much that the rest of us did not matter?
"I didn't say nothing to the Shadow because I'm not stupid. He gets you, he gives you to the Constabulary – money's all his. So, you see,
girl,
you got a couple options. One, I give you over ta the Policiers, get the money from them direct, see.
"But I'm not an unfair man. You can buy your freedom. You grew up noble. You probably got a lot of noble friends. Rich, noble friends. You contact the ones you know and trust, get 'em to give you a little more than the reward; you can go on your merry way. I don't care. Can't say ol' Bil ain't fair then, now can you?" His words slurred. He patted me on the shoulder and I flinched. "Shame, as you're a good performer, but I don't need no more Shadows or Policiers in my circus. Think of the circus. Think of your friends. Can't leave them without a job come winter, now, can you? Not as many circuses these days."