Nothing stirred inside the tent. No sounds of laughter or capering or even of five graceful men changing costumes or grumbling about their work. Worse, the gap between the tent’s flaps was dark, seeming to absorb the light from the torches, the sound of the circus, even the night breeze.

  Yvette reached for the opening. Her hand paused, almost without her instruction.

  “Claude, I must see you,” she pleaded.

  From behind, Hugo called her name. “Come away from there,” he said quietly.

  Yvette snatched at the tent flap.

  The white face loomed out at her, as if nothing existed in that darkness save for that face, those delicately painted lines, and wide eyes too red to be anything but furious. Yvette yelped and staggered backward, heart stuttering, as the whiteface clown emerged in full.

  “Go away, girl,” the whiteface said. “We haven’t time for you tonight.”

  Yvette straightened her spine and faced him. Something bumped her and she let out a little shriek before she saw it was Hugo, come up to stand beside her, so that she did not have to confront the whiteface alone.

  “She’s here for her brother,” Hugo said. “We saw him enter the tent. Your mime.”

  “Claude!” Yvette called, trying to see into the yawning, unreal darkness behind the whiteface. The tent flaps revealed only impossible depths of shadow.

  “There is no Claude here,” the whiteface said.

  Anger flared within her. “I saw him,” she insisted. “Let me through, damn you. He won’t thank you for this.”

  The whiteface lashed out a hand. Grabbed her throat. Shoved her, gasping, backward until she pinwheeled her arms and fell sprawling in the dirt. Hugo cried out in alarm and fury at and rushed toward the whiteface.

  Yvette wanted to shout at him to stop. She had felt the strength in the whiteface’s hand, and something else besides—the unnerving shift of bone and flesh beneath that greasepaint, a shifting that suggested that, strong as he was, he might not be entirely there. Not entirely solid. Something tickled the back of her mind and she thought it must be madness creeping in, because surely that was impossible.

  Hugo punched the whiteface in the jaw. A solid thump of knuckle on chin implied she had imagined that feeling, but still her gut churned and her skin crawled, and she looked in the maw of that tent and thought something whispered to her from within.

  The twins emerged. Their red costumes seemed more tattered somehow, as if time had passed. The fabric had gone threadbare in places, and there were rents in their clothing. Their makeup seemed smeared and askew, as if it had been taken off and then poorly restored.

  “You fools,” one of the twins said sadly, as if he grieved for her and for Hugo.

  It was that sympathy, that pained understanding, that moved Yvette more than anything. The other twin grabbed Hugo by the hair and the whiteface took his ear, twisted his head, bent in to glare into his eyes and whisper dark promises of the things Hugo would suffer for his presumptions, but Yvette saw the first twin’s sad eyes and knew Hugo had been right all along. Hugo, and the witch, and the feeling in her gut that she had been trying to deny.

  She picked up a fistful of dirt, threw it into the cruel twin’s face, then lunged and raked her fingernails across the whiteface’s eyes. He let out a roar of pain and reeled backward, even as Yvette took Hugo by the arm and pulled him away.

  Then they were running, the two of them. Running the only place she could think of, the only place they might be safe...into the main tent, where hundreds of people would be there to witness any vengeance the clowns might take.

  Claude, she thought, hoping that he might yet burst from the tent and scold his brother clowns, take up in her defense, be the brother she had always believed him to be. But like the mime he pretended to be, he was silent.

  Yet as they ran toward the tent, her chest burning and her legs pumping, fear icing her veins, one image seared into her mind. Her fingernails, slashing the whiteface clown’s temple and cheek, digging deeply enough to draw blood...but finding only more greasepaint.

  9

  The sisters emerged first. They were either twins or so close in appearance that the differences mattered not at all. Tall, lithe acrobats, skin the color of moonlight, clad in costumes that showed every ripple of muscle when they were flying through the air inside the big tent, yet dark enough to get lost in the shadows high up in the ether. Hugo remembered those shadows, and the way the highest parts of the tent seemed to be a part of the night, or a hole in the black sky, even though the heavy fabric blotted out the sky altogether.

  A hole in the world, then.

  The crowd inside the main tent cheered. The music tapered off, and the twins pushed out through the performers’ entrance. The sisters wore broad smiles as they stepped out into the torchlight, but the moment the large flap of the tent closed behind them, those smiles vanished as if they’d been torn away, leaving behind faces of harsh, razor-edged beauty with no joy or mirth.

  Hugo’s heart stuttered. He and Yvette would be seen. They were fifty feet away. The clowns might yet pursue them. They needed to get inside that tent.

  Yvette snatched his hand and tugged him to the right, and they padded quickly into the darkness between two of the performers’ wagons. From inside one of those wagons came a clink of glassware and a booming guffaw. Words of camaraderie, the kind of warmth that seemed so at odds with this place, rose from within.

  Hugo pulled Yvette alongside another wagon, this one painted in bright, peeling colors. The stink wafting from inside the wagon made him gag, bile rising in the back of his throat. Beneath it all was a filthy human stench, the odor of damp, unwashed bodies, combined with mold and decay, with a hint of rusting metal. Layered on top, the aroma of bouquets of dead flowers, a smell that seemed to match the bright but fading, peeling paint.

  His head swam. He glanced around, locking his gaze on Yvette’s. They needed no words to communicate their desperation.

  Yvette lay down on the ragged grass and dirt and peered beneath them, back the way she and Hugo had come, perhaps watching for clowns in pursuit. Hugo peered around the edge of the wagon and spotted the twin acrobats sliding from the torchlit path, headed for a bone white tent not far from the one where the clowns had been. As he began to withdraw, someone else emerged from the main tent—a short little man, with a top hat, and a tiny monkey that sat on his left shoulder. The monkey chittered and jumped up and down, but the little man behaved as if he might not even be aware of the creature’s presence. Its antics perturbed him no more than the beating of his own heart.

  The man strode the torchlit path toward the clown tent. His top hat tilted precariously to one side, but did not fall. The whiteface clown stood on the path as if waiting to greet him—as if that had been the clown’s reason for emerging tonight all along.

  Hugo remembered this entrance—it was where the performers had exited after the Finale. He had rushed through it, searching the circus grounds in search of Oskar. He had seen so many of the performers that night, clowns and animal trainers and acrobats and more, but he had not seen this man. He was sure of it.

  In the wagon, that boisterous voice rose again. The whole thing shifted and creaked, as if someone very large might be moving about inside. Hugo ducked his head and went to peer through a corner of the window. Inside, he saw the strong man. Fury filled him. The place felt empty—he had anticipated an air of hope, some sense that he would find Oskar and go home, but he remembered the regret in the strong man’s features, and the man’s inaction when Oskar had vanished.

  The strong man’s wagon creaked again and it appeared he was headed for the door. Hugo dropped to the ground and rolled beneath the wagon with Yvette. Together, frightened, they heard the door ratchet open and watched the strong man’s boots on the steps. The little fellow in the top hat greeted the strong man, and they paused outside the wagon for a brief exchange, their voices low murmurs, words barely decipherable.

  The monkey stopped its chittering.

  The little man swore, cursed the little beast, and half-tossed him to the ground. The monkey spat and scratched and span in the dirt, glaring up at its master.

  Then it looked underneath the wagon. It went still and silent, cocking its head in curiosity. As the strong man and top hat moved away from the wagon, walking together in conversation, the monkey crept nearer to them, yellow eyes gleaming with malign intelligence.

  Yvette rolled out from beneath the wagon, emerging on the other side. Hugo scrambled after her, his heart roaring, his ears catching the music inside the big tent as the time for the Finale neared. They ran between two other wagons, toward a tent very different from the others—octagonal, heavy, and as clean as if it had been made that very day, it seemed to belong more in the Arabian desert, housing some harem, than here in the forests and mountains of Europe.

  Loud chittering erupted behind them. Hugo glanced over his shoulder to see the monkey had followed them under the wagon and now stood in its shadow, peering out, following them with its malignant, yellow gaze. It seemed to be raising an alarm, shouting at them, or both.

  The entrance to the octagonal tent was around the other side. Hugo threw himself on the ground, lifted the hem of the tent wall, and scrambled under. As he rose to his knees, he turned to help Yvette through.

  “Is it following?” she asked as she stood and backed further into the darkened tent.

  Hugo held his breath. “I don’t hear that godforsaken screeching. Perhaps it’s lost interest.”

  Yvette took his hand and clutched it tightly, still watching the tent wall. “And the clowns?” she whispered. “Did any of them see where we went?”

  He couldn’t bring himself to reply, for there was no answer. All they could do was stand and wait to see if they would be pursued. The image of that whiteface clown swam up into his thoughts and he shivered, but somehow Claude’s makeup unnerved him more. There seemed something so haphazard about that mime face, as if the white had been smeared on hurriedly, and unfinished. Claude wasn’t the dangerous one, though, that much was clear.

  “Hugo,” Yvette whispered.

  Her voice cracked with emotion. Perhaps it was fear, but it sounded more like grief. Hugo turned and saw Yvette stood in the well-trodden grass and dirt in the middle of this tent. Starlight slipped in through vents in the tent roof, and through the gap between the entry flaps. In that meager illumination he could see the statue beyond her. A winged, serpentine figure towered over her head, nine feet tall at least. It had a thick, coiled lower body, but its upper half seemed as much man as reptile, with three-fingered claws, spines on its head, and scaly, sagging wings that seemed on the verge of folding shyly inward.

  A single glance at the statue stole the strength from his legs. His knees buckled and he gave way, falling to the ground. He landed on his hands and knees, breathing deeply, fighting the sudden fatigue that had washed over him. Nausea twisted in his gut and he glanced away and was sick in the dirt and grass.

  While there, on his hands and knees, he saw what could only be the impression of a child’s footprint in the dirt. A quick glance showed him others, along with copper brown residue on blades of grass that might have been blood.

  When he’d gotten sick, Yvette called out to him and rushed to his side, but now he saw her paleness in that leaking starlight and knew she was also unwell. He knew he should tell her of the footprints, but his fear for Oskar burned brighter than ever and he could not even bring himself to speak the words. A spike of pain shot through his head. His breath came in ragged gasps and he had to force himself to turn and stare again at that statue.

  “I’m bleeding,” Yvette said quietly.

  When she wiped at her upper lip, he saw a trickle of blood smear across it, a line of red that ran from her nose. Hugo took her arm and she helped him to stand. Breathing deeply, steadying himself, he faced the statue again—with Yvette this time.

  The starlight bleeding through the vents and the entry flaps dimmed, as though a shadow had crossed the moon. His pain and nausea abated a moment and he forced himself to take several steps nearer to the statue, but upon closer inspection he saw the intricacy of its scale pattern and the gleaming obsidian blackness of its eyes and for a terrible moment he wondered if perhaps it was not a statue at all.

  “What is it?” Yvette asked. “How is it—”

  A burst of angry chittering made them both jump. The starlight flared and the pain and sickness returned, making Hugo stagger. He and Yvette turned to see the little monkey scamper a few feet into the tent from its entry flaps, but it wasn’t the monkey that bled all the hope out of him. Behind the little creature stood the whiteface, with the twin clowns behind him.

  The monkey lunged at Hugo’s face.

  The clowns only laughed.

  10

  “Don’t scream.”

  Yvette stood with her back pressed up against the metal bars of the tiger’s cage. Hugo sat slumped against the bars a few feet from her, blood leaking the gash on his forehead. The whiteface clown had beaten him, taken out a cudgel, and smashed him in the head, then kicked him in the side and back when he went down. Yvette had fought, clawing at one of the twins, punching him in the throat, but in the end they could only thrash and threaten as the clowns beat them and dragged them to the cage.

  The tiger’s eyes were the color of a harvest moon. It watched her, watched Hugo. It had not moved since the clowns had shoved them into the cage and clanged the door shut, but she noted its interest with heart-stopping terror. The beast inhaled deeply, chuffed out that same breath as if uncertain what it might be smelling. It purred down in its chest, a rumble that seemed to resonate in the air like gentle thunder.

  Hugo had told her not to scream.

  If the tiger came for her, she would scream to wake the dead.

  As if summoned, it climbed lazily to its feet. The cage stank of its urine. It watched Yvette, tilting its head curiously as it stalked slowly toward her. Hugo groaned, though out of fear or pain she couldn’t be sure. He shifted on the floor of the cage, shuffled against the bars, and she realized he planned to lunge to intercept the tiger if it should come for her.

  “Don’t be a fool,” she whispered.

  The tiger froze. Its eyes narrowed and it lowered its head, slinking toward her even more slowly. Outside the cage, the clowns breathed heavily, but now they began to grunt as if in brute arousal. One of the twins gave a bright, little-girl titter in the grip of madness or perverse cruelty, or perhaps both. She spared a single glance toward the clowns. The whiteface had his face pushed through the bars, almost squeezed between them, and his eyes were the same harvest moon orange as the tiger’s, with the same slitted pupils.

  “Delicious,” he said.

  The tiger leapt. It landed with an impact that shook the cage. Yvette screamed and it roared in return. She stared into its open mouth, no longer capable of screaming.

  Its breath stank of dead things. The tiger turned from her and went to Hugo. He hadn’t lunged after all, out of fear or wisdom or simply too slow, but now the tiger stood beside him and simply breathed on him, its chest a bellows. The clowns cackled.

  The tiger’s tongue unfurled from its jaws and scraped across Hugo’s forehead, lapping up the blood there.

  He swore under his breath.

  The tiger roared in his face. Hugo’s eyes went wide and then he roared back.

  The tiger blinked. It lifted one massive paw.

  “Enough of this!” a voice barked. “Solomon, away!”

  The tiger hesitated. Yvette felt certain she saw disappointment in its eyes, a glitter of intelligence that she would never have imagined, and then it exhaled loudly. Its head drooped and the beast turned to slink away and settle back into its original spot. It lifted its head and pointedly looked the other direction, as if dismissing them.

  “What are you doing?” that same voice demanded.

  Shaken, trembling with the nearness of death, even though it had abated, Yvette turned slowly to see the whiteface clown shoved away from the cage. He stumbled and nearly fell, but she had forgotten him instantly, forgotten his orange eyes, upon sight of the new arrival.

  “Claude?” she breathed.

  The mime froze—although could she think of this clown as a mime now that she’d heard his voice? Yvette recognized this as an absurd thought even as it skittered around inside her head. She watched his eyes shift toward her, watched the recognition dawn on his face, and she could not fight the tears that welled in her eyes.

  “Yvette? Sister?”

  Swearing, he pushed the twins aside and rushed to unlock the cage. As he did so, she fell out into his arms, surrendering entirely to the relief that shuddered through her. She hated to sob in front of these clowns, these painted bastards who had frightened and unsettled her so, who had beaten her and Hugo, but as she felt Claude’s embrace she felt all of her pent up emotions release.

  Shaking, she told him the news of their father’s death and felt Claude subside into her own embrace, felt him sink down the way she’d seen the tiger do moments before.

  “You’re all I have,” she said quietly, despising their audience. “I had to find you.”

  Claude stroked her face. Despite the greasepaint, his eyes were still his own, and she felt the old connection between them reborn. “I’m so glad you did. You’re not alone, sister. Never think that.”

  While they’d been embracing, the twins had helped Hugo from the cage. Once on his feet, however, he tore himself away from them. They had beaten him, after all, and she couldn’t blame him for his fury. The whiteface glared at Claude, but he marched over and locked up the tiger cage again. Within those bars, the tiger Solomon refused to acknowledge they were still in his vicinity.

  “Have you forgotten what you’ve seen with your own eyes, Yvette?” Hugo asked, tensed as if ready to defend himself, or try. “Your loving brother saw you, just minutes ago, before he went into that tent. Before these other lunatics came after us. He saw us—you know he did.”

  Claude nodded. “I did see you, and I noted the resemblance to my dear sister, whom I haven’t seen in many long months and who had no reason to be here, so far from home. We thought you intruders. Only as I lingered in our tent did I start to wonder, and then I came looking.”