The Night Circus

THE LOVERS

Standing on the platform in the midst of the crowd, high enough that they can be viewed clearly from all angles, are two figures, still as statues.

The woman wears a dress something akin to a bridal gown constructed for a ballerina, white and frothy and laced with black ribbons that flutter in the night air. Her legs are encased in striped stockings, her feet in tall black button-up boots. Her dark hair is piled in waves upon her head, adorned with sprays of white feathers.

Her companion is a handsome man, somewhat taller than she, in an impeccably tailored black pinstriped suit. His shirt is a crisp white, his tie black and pristinely knotted. A black bowler hat sits upon his head.

They stand entwined but not touching, their heads tilted toward each other. Lips frozen in the moment before (or after) the kiss.

Though you watch them for some time they do not move. No stirring of fingertips or eyelashes. No indication that they are even breathing.

“They cannot be real,” someone nearby remarks.

Many patrons only glance at them before moving on, but the longer you watch, the more you can detect the subtlest of motions. The change in the curve of a hand as it hovers near an arm. The shifting angle of a perfectly balanced leg. Each of them always gravitating toward the other.

Yet still they do not touch.

Thirteen LONDON, FRIDAY, OCTOBER 13, 1899

The grand anniversary celebration for Le Cirque des Rêves is not held after ten years, which might have been expected and traditional, but when the circus has been open and traveling for years amounting to thirteen. Some say it is held then because the tenth anniversary had come and gone, and no one thought to have a party for it until after the fact.

The reception is held at Chandresh Christophe Lefèvre’s town house on Friday, October 13, 1899. The guest list is exclusive; only members of the circus and some select and special guests are in attendance. It is not publicized, of course, and though some might speculate that the event has something to do with the circus, there is no way to be certain. Besides, no one truly suspects the infamously black-and-white circus would be associated with an event so full of color.

It is extremely colorful, with both the house and the partygoers adorned in a rainbow of shades. The lights in each room are specially treated, greens and blues in one, reds and oranges in another. The tables dotting the dining room are shrouded in vibrant patterned tablecloths. The centerpieces are elaborate floral arrangements with only the brightest of blooms. The members of the ensemble that plays odd but melodic and danceable tunes in the ballroom are bedecked in suits of red velvet. Even the champagne flutes are a deep cobalt-blue glass rather than clear, and the staff wears green rather than black. Chandresh himself wears a suit of vibrant purple with a gold paisley waistcoat, and throughout the evening, he smokes specially made cigars that spout matching violet smoke.

A spectrum of roses ranging in shades from natural to the unimaginable sits in the golden lap of the elephant-headed statue in the foyer, petals cascading down whenever anyone moves by.

Cocktails are poured at the bar in a variety of oddly shaped and colored glasses. There is ruby-red wine and cloudy-green absinthe. Tapestries of vibrant silks hang from walls and are draped over everything that will stay still. Candles glow in stained-glass sconces, casting dancing light over the party and its attendees.

Poppet and Widget are the youngest of the guests, being the same age as the circus. Their bright-red hair is out in full effect, and they wear coordinating outfits the warm blue of a twilight sky, edged in pinks and yellows. As a birthday gift, Chandresh gives them two fluffy orange kittens with blue eyes and striped ribbons around their necks. Poppet and Widget adore them, and promptly dub them Bootes and Pavo, though later they can never quite remember which of the identical kittens is which and refer to them collectively whenever possible.

The original conspirators are there, save for the late Tara Burgess. Lainie Burgess comes dressed in a flowing gown of canary yellow, accompanied by Mr. Ethan Barris in a suit of navy blue that is about as colorful as he can manage, though his tie is a slightly brighter shade, and he pins a yellow rose to his lapel.

Mr. A. H— arrives in his customary grey.

Mme. Padva attends, after some coercion by Chandresh, gloriously adorned in golden silks embroidered with red filigree, crimson feathers in her white hair. She spends most of the evening in one of the chairs by the fire, watching events unfold around her rather than participating in them directly.

Herr Friedrick Thiessen is there by special invitation, under the condition that he is not to write a single public word about the gathering nor mention it to anyone. He promises this gladly, and attends wearing mostly red with a touch of black, a reversal of his usual attire.

He spends the majority of the evening in the company of Celia Bowen, whose elaborate gown changes color, shifting through a rainbow of hues to complement whomever she is closest to.

There are no performers save the band, as it is difficult to hire entertainment to impress a gathering that is comprised predominantly of circus members. Most of the evening is spent in conversation and socializing.

At dinner, which begins promptly at midnight, each course is styled in black or white but bursts with color once pierced with forks or spoons, revealing layer upon layer of flavors. Some dishes are served on small mirrors rather than proper plates.

Poppet and Widget slip tastes of appropriate morsels to the marmalade kittens at their feet, while listening attentively to Mme. Padva’s tales of the ballet. Their mother admonishes that the content of said tales may not be entirely appropriate for a pair of just barely thirteen-year-olds, but Mme. Padva continues on unfazed, glossing over only the most sordid of details that Widget can read in the sparkle of her eyes even if she does not speak them aloud.

Dessert consists mainly of a gargantuan tiered cake shaped to resemble circus tents and frosted in stripes, the filling within a bright shock of raspberry cream. There are also miniature chocolate leopards, and strawberries coated in looping patterns of dark and white chocolates.

After dessert has been cleared, Chandresh makes a lengthy speech thanking all the guests for thirteen spectacular years, for the wonderment of the circus that had been nothing but an idea more than a decade ago. It goes on for some time about dreams and family and striving for uniqueness in a world of sameness. Some of it is profound and other bits are rambling and nonsensical, but it is considered a sweet gesture by almost everyone in attendance. Many take the opportunity afterward to thank him personally, for the party and the circus. Several make a point of commenting on his sentiments.

Excepting, of course, for his remark about how none of them seem to age save for the Murray twins, which was followed by an awkward silence broken only by the sound of Mr. Barris coughing. No one dares mention it, and many seem somewhat relieved that Chandresh himself does not recall most of his comments even an hour later.

There is dancing after dinner in the ballroom, where lengths of colorful, gold-embellished silk cascade over the walls and windows, glimmering in the candlelight.

Mr. A. H— moves along the periphery, going mostly unnoticed and speaking with only a few of the other guests, including Mr. Barris, who introduces him to Herr Thiessen. The three men have a brief yet engaging conversation about clocks and the nature of time before Mr. A. H— makes a polite excuse and fades into the background again.

He avoids the ballroom entirely, save for a single waltz when Tsukiko coerces him onto the dance floor. She wears a gown fashioned from a pink kimono, her hair piled in an elaborate knotted style and her eyes rimmed in a striking red.

Their combined grace puts all the other couples to shame.

Isobel, clad in clear sky blue, tries in vain to catch Marco’s attention. He avoids her at every turn, and is difficult to spot in the crowd since he is dressed identically to the rest of the staff. Eventually, with the aid of several glasses of champagne, Tsukiko persuades her to abandon the effort, drawing her out into the sunken garden to distract her.

Marco’s attention, when he is not being ordered around by Chandresh or hovering over Mme. Padva, who hits him with her cane when he asks her multiple times if she is in need of any assistance, belongs only to Celia.

“It is destroying me that I cannot ask you to dance,” Marco whispers as she passes by him in the ballroom, the deep green of his suit seeping across her gown like moss.

“Then you are far too easily destructible,” Celia murmurs softly, winking at him as Chandresh sweeps by and offers her his arm. The spreading moss is crushed by deep plum and sparkling gold as he pulls her away.

Chandresh introduces Celia to Mr. A. H—, unable to recall if they have met before. Celia claims that they have not, though she remembers the gentleman who politely takes her hand, as he looks exactly the same as he did when she was six years old. Only his suit has changed, updated to fit the current style.

Several people pester Celia to perform. While at first she refuses, late in the evening she relents, pulling a bemused Tsukiko to the middle of the dance floor and making her disappear in the blink of an eye despite the crowd around them. One moment there are two women in petal-pink gowns and the next Celia is alone.

Seconds later, there are shrieks from the library as Tsukiko reappears in the lantern-festooned sarcophagus propped up in one corner. Tsukiko takes a glass of champagne from a stunned waiter, giving him a beatific smile before returning to the ballroom.

She passes by Poppet and Widget, where Poppet is teaching the marmalade kittens to climb onto her shoulders and Widget is pulling book after book from the library’s well-stocked shelves. Eventually Poppet drags him forcibly from the room to prevent him from spending the duration of the party reading.

Guests move in flocks of color from the ballroom through the halls and the library, a constantly shifting rainbow punctuated with laughter and chatter. The mood remains boisterous and bright even into the earliest hours.

As Celia walks alone through the front hall, Marco grabs her hand, pulling her into a shadowed alcove behind the looming golden statue. The rose petals swirl madly with the sudden shift in the air.

“I’m not entirely used to that, you know,” Celia says. She takes her hand from his but does not move away, though there is not a great deal of room between the wall and the statue. The color of her gown settles into a deep, solid green.

“You look just as you did the first time I saw you,” Marco says.

“I take it you wore that color on purpose?” Celia asks.

“Merely a fortunate coincidence. Chandresh insisted on putting the entire staff in green. And I did not anticipate the ingenuity of your attire.”

Celia shrugs her shoulders. “I couldn’t decide what to wear.”

“You are beautiful,” Marco says.

“Thank you,” Celia responds, refusing to meet his eyes. “You are too handsome. I prefer your actual face.”

His face changes, reverting to the one she recalls in perfect detail from the evening they spent in the same rooms three years ago under much more intimate circumstances. There has been little opportunity since then for anything more than too-brief stolen moments.

“Isn’t that a bit risky to wear in this company?” Celia asks.

“I’m only doing it for you,” Marco says. “The rest of them will see me as they always have.”

They stand watching each other in silence as a laughing group moves through the hall on the other side of the statue. The din echoes through the space though they stay far enough away that Celia and Marco escape any notice, and Celia’s gown remains mossy and green.

Marco lifts his hand to brush a stray curl away from Celia’s face, tucking it behind her ear and stroking her cheek with his fingertips. Her eyelids flutter closed and the rose petals around their feet begin to stir.

“I’ve missed you,” he whispers softly.

The air between them is electric as he leans in, gently brushing his lips against her neck.

In the next room, the guests complain about the sudden increase in temperature. Fans are drawn from colorful bags, fluttering like tropical birds.

In the shadow of the elephant-headed statue, Celia pulls away suddenly. It is not immediately apparent why until the clouds of grey begin swirling through the green of her gown.

“Hello, Alexander,” she says, dipping her head in acknowledgment to the man who has appeared behind them without a sound, not even disturbing the rose petals strewn across the floor.

The man in the grey suit greets her with a polite nod. “Miss Bowen, I would like to speak with your companion privately for a moment, if you do not mind.”

“Of course,” Celia says. She leaves without even glancing at Marco, her gown shifting from grey dawn to violet sunset as she walks down the hall to where the Murray twins are tempting their marmalade kittens with shiny silver coffee spoons.

“I cannot say I find this behavior appropriate,” the man in the grey suit says to Marco.

“You know her,” Marco says quietly, his eyes still on Celia as she stops at the entrance to the ballroom, where her gown is cloaked in crimson as Herr Thiessen offers her a glass of champagne.

“I have met her. I cannot rightfully say that I know her in any particular fashion.”

“You knew exactly who she was before any of this started and you never thought to tell me?”

“I did not think it necessary.”

A bevy of guests wanders into the hall from the dining room, sending the cascade of rose petals adrift once more. Marco escorts the man in the grey suit through the library, sliding the stained glass open to access the empty game room and continue their conversation.

“Thirteen years with barely a word and now you wish to speak with me?” Marco asks.

“I did not have anything in particular to speak to you about. I simply wished to interrupt your … conversation with Miss Bowen.”

“She knows your name.”

“She clearly has a very good memory. What is it you would like to discuss?”

“I would like to know if I am doing well,” Marco says, his voice low and cold.

“Your progress has been sufficient,” his instructor says. “Your employment here is steady, you have a suitable position to work from.”

“And yet I cannot be myself. You teach me all these things and then you put me here to pretend to be something I am not, while she is center stage, doing exactly what she does.”

“But no one in that room believes it. They think she is deceiving them. They do not see what she is any more than they see what you are, she is simply more noticeable. This is not about having an audience. I am proving a point. You can do just as much as she does without passing it off as flamboyant spectacle and trickery. You can maintain your relative anonymity and equal her accomplishments. I suggest you keep your distance from her and concentrate on your own work.”

“I’m in love with her.”

Never before has anything Marco said or did elicited a visible response from the man in the grey suit, not even when he once accidentally set a table aflame during his lessons, but the expression that crosses the man’s face now is unmistakably sad.

“I am sorry to hear that,” he says. “It will make the challenge a great deal more difficult for you.”

“We have been playing at this for more than a decade, when does it end?”

“It ends when there is a victor.”

“And how long does that take?” Marco asks.

“It is difficult to say. The most recent previous challenge lasted thirty-seven years.”

“We cannot keep this circus running for thirty-seven years.”

“Then you will not have as long a time to wait. You were a fine student, you are a fine competitor.”

“How can you know?” Marco asks, his voice rising. “You have not even seen fit to speak to me for years. I have done nothing for you. Everything I have done, every change I have made to that circus, every impossible feat and astounding sight, I have done for her.”

“Your motives do not impact the game.”

“I am done with playing your game,” Marco says. “I quit.”

“You cannot quit,” his instructor replies. “You are bound to this. To her. The challenge will continue. One of you will lose. You have no choice in the matter.”

Marco picks up a ball from the billiard table and hurls it at the man in the grey suit. He steps out of its path easily and it crashes instead into the sunset of stained glass.

Without a word, Marco turns his back on his instructor. He walks out the door at the back of the room, not even noticing Isobel as he passes her in the hall, where she has been close enough to hear the argument.

He goes directly to the ballroom, making his way to the center of the dance floor. He takes Celia’s arm, spinning her away from Herr Thiessen.

Marco pulls her to him in an emerald embrace, so close that no distinction remains between where his suit ends and her gown begins.

To Celia, there is suddenly no one else in the room as he holds her in his arms.

But before she can vocalize her surprise, his lips close over hers and she is lost in wordless bliss.

Marco kisses her as though they are the only two people in the world.

The air swirls in a tempest around them, blowing open the glass doors to the garden with a tangle of billowing curtains.

Every eye in the crowded ballroom turns in their direction.

And then he releases her and walks away.

By the time Marco leaves the room, almost everyone has forgotten the incident entirely. It is replaced by a momentary confusion that is blamed on the heat or the excessive amounts of champagne.

Herr Thiessen cannot recall why Celia has suddenly stopped dancing, or when her gown shifted to its current deep green.

“Is something wrong?” he asks, when he realizes that she is trembling.

MR. A. H— STORMS THROUGH THE FRONT HALL, somehow avoiding tripping over Poppet and Widget, who are sprawled on the floor teaching Bootes and Pavo how to turn circles on their hind legs.

Widget hands Bootes (or Pavo) to Poppet and follows the man in the grey suit. He watches as he crosses into the foyer, retrieves his grey top hat and silver cane from the butler, and leaves by the front door. After he exits, Widget presses his nose to the nearest window, watching him as he passes beneath the streetlamps before disappearing into the darkness.

Poppet catches up with him then, the kittens perched on her shoulders purring happily. Chandresh follows close behind her, making his way through the crowd in the hall.

“What is it?” Poppet asks. “What’s the matter?” Widget turns away from the glass.

“That man has no shadow,” he says, as Chandresh leans over the twins to peer out the window at the empty street.

“What did you say?” Chandresh asks, but Poppet and Widget and the orange kittens have already run off down the hall, lost in the colorful crowd.

Bedtime Stories CONCORD, MASSACHUSETTS, OCTOBER 1902

Bailey spends much of the early part of this evening with Poppet and Widget exploring the Labyrinth. A dizzying network of chambers, interspersed with hallways containing mismatched doors. Rooms that spin and rooms with glowing chessboard floors. One hall is stacked high with suitcases. In another it is snowing.

“How is this possible?” Bailey asks, melting flakes of snow sticking to his coat.

In response, Poppet throws a snowball at him, and Widget only laughs.

While they traverse the Labyrinth, Widget tells the story of the Minotaur in such detail that Bailey keeps expecting to encounter the monster around every turn.

They reach a room resembling a large metal birdcage, with only darkness visible through the bars. The door in the floor that they entered through latches once it falls closed and cannot be opened again. There appears to be no other way to exit.

Widget ceases his narration as they investigate each silver bar, finding no hidden openings or cleverly disguised hinges. Poppet grows visibly distressed.

After a considerable amount of time spent trapped within the room, Bailey finds a key concealed in the seat of the swing in the middle of the cage. When he turns it, the swing itself rises and the top of the cage opens, allowing them to climb out, escaping into a dimly lit temple guarded by an albino Sphinx.

While the temple has at least a dozen doors along its walls, Poppet immediately finds one that leads back out into the circus.

She still seems upset, but before Bailey can ask her if something is the matter, Widget checks his watch and finds they are late for their scheduled performance. The three of them agree to meet up again later, and the twins disappear into the crowd.

Bailey has seen the kittens so many times over the last few nights that he practically has their routine memorized, so he opts to explore by himself while he waits for them to be free again.

The particular path he chooses to wander down has no obvious doors, it is only a passageway between tents, endless stripes illuminated by flickering lights.

He notices an uneven spot in the alternating black and white.

Bailey finds a gap in the side of one of the tents. A split in the fabric, each edge dotted with silver grommets, and a black ribbon hangs just above his head, as though this opening was meant to be laced together to keep the tent firmly closed. He wonders if some circus member forgot to re-lace it.

Then he sees the tag. It is the size of a large postcard, attached to the black ribbon the way one might attach a gift card to a present. The tag hangs loosely a few feet off the ground. Bailey turns it over. The picture side shows a black-and-white etching of a child in a bed covered in fluffy pillows and a checkered quilt, not in a nursery but under a star-sprinkled night sky. The opposite side is white, with elegant calligraphy in black ink that reads:

Bedtime Stories

Eventide Rhapsodies

Anthologies of Memory

Please enter cautiously

and feel free to open what is closed

Bailey cannot tell if the tag refers to the break in the tent, or if it has been misplaced from some other tent. Most of the tents have prominently placed signs in painted wood, and entrances that are clearly defined or marked. This one seems as though it was not meant to be found. Other patrons pass by on their way from one part of the circus to another, too absorbed in their conversations to notice him contemplating a postcard-size tag by the side of a tent.

Tentatively, Bailey pulls the unlaced flaps apart, enough to peek inside to try to discern if this is indeed a separate circus attraction and not the back of the acrobat tent or some sort of storage area. He can make out only several twinkling lights and shapes that could possibly be furniture. Still unsure, he pulls the flaps apart enough to enter, stepping inside carefully per the instructions on the postcard, which proves wise as he walks directly into a table covered in jars and bottles and lidded bowls that rattle against one another. He stops, hoping not to knock anything over.

It is a long room, the size of a formal dining room, or maybe it only resembles a dining room because of the table, which stretches the length of the tent, though there is enough room to maneuver around it carefully. All of the jars and bottles are different. Some jars are simple glass mason jars, others are glazed ceramic jars or ornate frosted glass. Bottles for wine or whiskey or perfume. There are silver-lidded sugar bowls and containers that look rather like urns. They appear to be in no particular pattern or order; they are simply strewn across the table. There are additional jars and bottles around the periphery of the room as well, with some on the ground and some on boxes and tall wooden bookshelves.

The only element that correlates the room with the picture on the tag is the ceiling. It is black and covered with tiny twinkling lights. The effect is almost identical to the upward view of the night sky from outside.

Bailey wonders how all of this might relate to a child in bed, or to bedtime stories, as he walks around the table.

He recalls what the tag said about opening things, wondering what could possibly be inside of all of these jars. Most of the clear-glass ones look empty. As he reaches the opposite side of the table, he picks one at random, a small round ceramic jar, glazed in black with a high shine and a lid topped with a round curl of a handle. He pulls the lid off and looks inside. A small wisp of smoke escapes, but other than that it is empty. As he peers inside he smells the smoke of a roaring fire, and a hint of snow and roasting chestnuts. Curious, he inhales deeply. There is the aroma of mulled wine and sugared candy, peppermint and pipe smoke. The crisp pine scent of a fir tree. The wax of dripping candles. He can almost feel the snow, the excitement, and the anticipation, the sugary taste of a striped candy. It is dizzying and wonderful and disturbing. After a few moments, he replaces the lid and puts the jar carefully back on the table.

He looks around at the jars and bottles, intrigued but hesitant to open another. He picks up a frosted-glass mason jar and unscrews the silver metal lid. This jar is not empty but contains a small amount of white sand which shifts on the bottom. The scent that wafts from it is the unmistakable smell of the ocean, a bright summer day at the seashore. He can hear the sound of waves crashing against the sand, the cry of a seagull. There is something mysterious as well, something fantastical. The flag of a pirate ship on the far horizon, a mermaid’s tail flipping out of sight behind a wave. The scent and the feeling are adventurous and exhilarating, with the salty tinge of a sea breeze.

Bailey closes the jar and the scent and the feeling fade, trapped back inside the glass with its handful of sand.

Next he chooses a bottle from a shelf on the wall, wondering if there is any distinction between jars and bottles on the table and the ones that surround it, if there is an indiscernible filing system for these curious containers.

This bottle is tall and thin, with a cork held in place by silver wire. He removes it with some difficulty, and it opens with a popping noise. There is something in the bottom of the bottle, but he cannot tell what it is. The scent wafting from the thin neck is bright and floral. A rosebush full of dew-dripping blossoms, the mossy smell of garden dirt. He feels as though he is walking down a garden path. There is the buzzing of bees and the melody of songbirds in the trees. He inhales more deeply, and there are other flowers along with the roses: lilies and irises and crocuses. The leaves of the trees are rustling in the soft warm wind, and the sound of someone else’s footsteps falling not far from his own. The sensation of a cat brushing past his legs is so genuine that he looks down expecting to see it, but there is nothing on the floor of the tent but more jars and bottles. Bailey puts the cork back in the bottle and returns it to its shelf. Then he chooses another.

Tucked in the back of one of the shelves is a small bottle, rounded with a short neck and closed with a matching glass stopper. He picks it up carefully. It is heavier than he had expected. Removing the stopper, he is confused, for at first the scent and the sensation do not change. Then comes the aroma of caramel, wafting on the crisp breeze of an autumn wind. The scent of wool and sweat makes him feel as though he is wearing a heavy coat, with the warmth of a scarf around his neck. There is the impression of people wearing masks. The smell of a bonfire mixes with the caramel. And then there is a shift, a movement in front of him. Something grey. A sharp pain in his chest. The sensation of falling. A sound like howling wind, or a screaming girl.

Bailey puts the stopper back, disturbed. Not wanting to end on such an experience, he places the strange little bottle back on its shelf and decides to choose one more before leaving to catch up with Poppet and Widget again.

He picks one of the boxes on the table this time, a polished-wood box with a swirling pattern etched into its lid. The inside of the box is lined with white silk. The scent is like incense, deep and spiced, and he can feel smoke curling around his head. It is hot, a dry desert air with pounding sun and powder-soft sand. His cheeks flush from the heat and from something else. The feel and sensation of something as luscious as silk falls across his skin in waves. There is music that he cannot discern. A pipe or a flute. And laughter, a high-pitched laugh that blends harmoniously with the music. The taste of something sweet but spicy on his tongue. The feeling is luxurious and lighthearted, but also secretive and sensual. He feels a hand on his shoulder and jumps in surprise, dropping the lid down on the box.

The sensation ends abruptly. Bailey stands alone in the tent, underneath the twinkling stars.

That is enough, he thinks. He goes back to the flap in the tent wall, careful not to disturb any of the jars or bottles nearby.

He stops to adjust the tag that hangs from the ribbon on the tent flap, so that it is more easily visible, though he is not certain why. The illustration of the child asleep in his bed beneath the stars faces outward, but it is difficult to tell if the child’s dreams are peaceful or restless.

He walks back to find Poppet and Widget, wondering if they might want to head to the courtyard for something to eat.

Then the scent of caramel wafts by as he walks, and Bailey finds he is not particularly hungry after all.

Bailey wanders down curving paths, his mind preoccupied with bottles full of mysteries.

As he turns a corner, he encounters a raised platform with a statue-still occupant, but this one is different than the snow-covered woman he had seen before.

This woman’s skin is shimmering and pale, her long black hair is tied with dozens of silver ribbons that fall over her shoulders. Her gown is white, covered in what to Bailey looks like looping black embroidery, but as he walks closer he sees that the black marks are actually words written across the fabric. When he is near enough to read parts of the gown, he realizes that they are love letters, inscribed in handwritten text. Words of desire and longing wrapping around her waist, flowing down the train of her gown as it spills over the platform.

The statue herself is still, but her hand is held out, and only then does Bailey notice the young woman with a red scarf standing in front of her, offering the love letter — clad statue a single crimson rose.

The movement is so subtle that it is almost undetectable, but slowly, very, very slowly, the statue reaches to accept the rose. Her fingers open, and the young woman with the rose waits patiently as the statue gradually closes her hand around the stem, releasing it only when it is secure.

And then the young woman bows to the statue, and walks off into the crowd.

The statue continues to hold the rose. The color seems more vibrant against the white and black of her gown.

Bailey is still watching the statue when Poppet taps him on the shoulder.

“She’s my favorite,” Poppet says, looking up at the statue with him.

“Who is she?” Bailey asks.

“She has a lot of names,” Poppet says, “but mostly they call her the Paramour. I’m glad someone gave her a flower tonight. I do it myself, sometimes, if she doesn’t have one. I don’t think she looks complete without it.”

The statue is lifting the rose, gradually, to her face. Her eyelids slowly close.

“What did you do with your time?” Poppet asks as they walk away from the Paramour toward the courtyard.

“I found a tent full of bottles and things that I wasn’t sure I was supposed to be in,” Bailey says. “It was … strange.”

To his surprise, Poppet laughs.

“That’s Widget’s tent,” she explains. “Celia made it for him, as a place to practice putting down his stories. He claims it’s easier than writing things out. Widge said he wanted to practice reading people, by the way, so we can catch up with him later. He does that sometimes, to pick up bits of stories. He’ll probably be in the Hall of Mirrors or the Drawing Room.”

“What’s the Drawing Room?” Bailey asks, the curiosity about a tent he hasn’t heard of winning out over the fleeting thought to ask who Celia is, as he does not recall Poppet mentioning the name before.

“It’s a tent that’s made up of blank black walls with buckets full of chalk so you can draw everywhere. Some people only sign their names but others draw pictures. Sometimes Widge will write out little stories, but he draws things, too, he’s quite good at it.”

As they walk around the courtyard, Poppet insists he try a spiced cocoa that is both wonderfully warming and slightly painful. He finds his appetite has returned, so they share a bowl of dumplings and a packet of pieces of edible paper, with detailed illustrations on them that match their respective flavors.

They wander through a tent full of mist, encountering creatures made out of paper. Curling white snakes with flickering black tongues, birds with coal-colored wings flapping through the thick fog.

The dark shadow of an unidentifiable creature scurries across Poppet’s boots and out of sight.

She claims there is a fire-breathing paper dragon somewhere in the tent, and though Bailey believes her, he has difficulty reconciling in his head the idea of paper that breathes fire.

“It’s getting late,” Poppet remarks as they walk from tent to tent. “Do you have to go home?”

“I can stay for a while,” Bailey says. He has become something of an expert at sneaking back into his house without waking anyone, so he has been staying at the circus later and later each night.

There are fewer patrons wandering the circus at this hour, and as they walk Bailey notices that many of them are wearing red scarves. Different types, from heavy cabled wool to fine lace, but each is a deep, scarlet red that looks even redder against all of the black and white.

He asks Poppet about it, once so many flashes of red have passed by that he is sure it is not a coincidence, and recalling that the young woman with the rose had a red scarf as well.

“It’s like a uniform,” she says. “They’re rêveurs. Some of them follow the circus around. They always stay later than other people. The red is how they identify each other.”

Bailey tries to ask more questions about the rêveurs and their scarves, but before he can, Poppet pulls him into another tent and he is immediately silenced by the sight he is met with inside.

The sensation reminds him of the first snow of winter, for those first few hours when everything is blanketed in white, soft and quiet.

Everything in this tent is white. Nothing black, not even stripes visible on the walls. A shimmering, almost blinding white. There are trees and flowers and grass surrounding twisted pebble pathways, every leaf and petal perfectly white.

“What is this?” Bailey asks. He did not have a chance to read the sign outside the door.

“This is the Ice Garden,” Poppet says, pulling him down the path. It turns into an open space with a fountain in the middle, bubbling white foam over clear carved ice. Pale trees line the edges of the tent, showers of snowflakes falling from their branches.

There is no one else in the tent, nothing disrupting the surroundings. Bailey peers at a nearby rose, and while it is cold and frozen and white, there is the barest hint of scent as he leans closer. The scent of rose and ice and sugar. It reminds him of the spun-sugar flowers sold by vendors in the courtyard.

“Let’s play hide-and-seek,” Poppet suggests, and Bailey agrees before she unbuttons her coat and leaves it on a frozen bench, her white costume rendering her all but invisible.

“That’s not fair!” he calls as she disappears behind the hanging branches of a willow tree. He follows her around trees and topiaries, through coils of vines and roses, chasing glimpses of her red hair.

Bookkeeping LONDON, MARCH 1900

Chandresh Christophe Lefèvre sits at the huge mahogany desk in his study, a mostly empty bottle of brandy in front of him. At one point in the evening there was a glass, but he misplaced that hours ago. Wandering from room to room has become a nightly habit fueled by insomnia and boredom. He is also missing his jacket, abandoned in a previously wandered-through room. It will be retrieved without remark by a diplomatic maid in the morning.

In the study, between bottle sips of brandy, he attempts to work. This mainly consists of scribbling with fountain pens on various scraps of paper. He has not genuinely worked in years. No new ideas, no new productions. The cycle of mounting and executing and moving on to the next project has skidded to a halt, and he cannot say why.

It does not make sense to him. Not this night or any other, not at any level of the brandy bottle. This is not how it is supposed to work. A project is started, it is developed and mounted and sent out into the world, and more often than not it becomes self-sufficient. And then he is no longer needed. It is not always a pleasant position to be in, but it is the way of such things, and Chandresh knows this process well. One is proud, one collects one’s receipts, and even if one is a bit melancholy, one moves on.

The circus left him behind, sailing forth, and yet he cannot turn away from the shore. More than enough time to mourn the creative process and ignite it again, but there are no sparks of something new. No new endeavors, nothing bigger or better for nearly fourteen years.

Perhaps, he thinks, he has outdone even himself. But it is not a pleasant thought, so he drowns it in brandy and attempts to ignore it.

The circus bothers him.

It bothers him most at times like this, in the bottom of the brandy bottle and the quiet of the night. It is not terribly late, the night is fairly young in circus terms, but the silence is already heavy.

And now, with his bottle and his fountain pen drained, he simply sits, dragging a hand through his hair distractedly, staring across the room at nothing in particular. Flames burn low in the gilded fireplace, the tall bookcases stuffed with curios and relics loom in shadow.

His wandering eyes drift over the open doorway and settle on the door across the hall. The door to Marco’s office, tucked discreetly between a pair of Persian columns. Part of a suite of rooms that are Marco’s own, the better to keep him at the beck and call, though he is out for the evening.

Chandresh wonders through an alcohol-soaked fog if perhaps Marco keeps the circus documents in his office. And what exactly those documents might contain. He has only seen the paperwork involved with the circus in passing, hasn’t bothered to scrutinize the details of the thing in years. Now he is curious.

Empty brandy bottle still in hand, he pulls himself to his feet and stumbles out into the hallway. It will be locked, he thinks, when he reaches the polished dark-wood door, but the silver handle moves easily as he turns it. The door swings open.

Chandresh hesitates in the doorway. The tiny office is dark save for the pool of light spilling in from the hall and the dim haze from the streetlamps seeping in through the single window.

For a moment, Chandresh reconsiders. If there were any brandy left in the bottle he might close the door and wander away. But the bottle is empty, and it is his own house, after all. He fumbles for the switch on the sconce nearest the door and it flickers to life, illuminating the room in front of him.

The office is packed with too much furniture. Cabinets and trunks line the walls, boxes of files are stacked in tidy rows. The desk in the center that takes up nearly half the space is a smaller, more modest version of the one in the study, though its surface holds jars of ink and pens and a pile of notebooks, all in perfect order and not lost in a clutter of figurines and precious stones and antique weaponry.

Chandresh puts the empty brandy bottle down on the desk and begins searching the cabinets and files, opening drawers and flipping through papers without any clear idea of what it is exactly he is looking for. There does not seem to be a particular section for the circus; bits of it are mixed in with books of theater receipts and lists of box-office returns.

He is mildly surprised that there is no discernible filing system. No labels on boxes. The contents of the office are orderly, but not clearly organized.

In a cabinet, Chandresh finds piles of blueprints and sketches. Many bear Mr. Barris’s stamps and initials, but there are other diagrams written in different hands that Chandresh does not recognize. In some cases, he cannot even distinguish what language they are inscribed in, though each has “Le Cirque des Rêves” written carefully along the edge of the paper.

Pulling them closer to the light, spreading them out over what little available floor space he can find, he scrutinizes them, sheet after sheet, letting them roll and fall in piles as he moves on to each subsequent piece.

Even the prints that are clearly Mr. Barris’s work have been written over. Additions made in different handwriting, layers placed on top of original designs.

Leaving the papers on the floor, Chandresh returns to the desk, to the neat pile of notebooks next to the abandoned brandy bottle. They appear to be bank ledgers, rows upon rows of numbers and calculations with notations and totals and dates. Chandresh tosses these aside.

He turns his attention to the desk itself. He begins pulling open the heavy wooden drawers. Several are empty. One contains dozens of blank notebooks and unopened jars of ink. Another is full of old datebooks, the appointments filling the days written in some sort of shorthand in Marco’s neat, delicate handwriting.

The last drawer is locked.

Chandresh makes to turn to another box of files nearby, but something pulls him back to the locked drawer.

There is no key in the desk. There are no locks on the other drawers.

He cannot recall if there was a lock on the desk when it was placed here, years ago, when the office contained only the desk and a single cabinet and seemed almost spacious.

After a few minutes of looking for a key, he grows impatient and returns to his study to retrieve the silver knife that is embedded in the dartboard on the wall.

Lying on the floor behind the desk, he all but destroys the lock in his attempts to pry the mechanism open, but he is rewarded with the satisfying click of the latch as it relents to the blade.

Leaving the knife on the floor, he pulls open the drawer and finds only a book.

It is a large, leather-bound volume. Chandresh takes it from the drawer, startled by the weight of it, and drops it with a thump onto the desk.

The book is old and dusty. The leather is worn and the binding is fraying at the edges.

Hesitating only a moment, Chandresh lifts the cover.

The endpapers are covered in an exquisitely detailed drawing of a tree covered in symbols and markings. It is densely inscribed, more ink than blank page. Chandresh cannot decipher any of it, cannot even tell if the marks are broken into words or simply continuous strings of motifs. Here and there he spots a mark that looks familiar. Some are almost numbers. Some recall the shape of Egyptian hieroglyphs. It reminds him of the contortionist’s tattoo.

The pages of the book are covered with similar markings, though predominantly they hold other things. Bits of paper culled from other documents.

It takes Chandresh several pages to realize each bit of paper holds a signature.

It takes longer for him to realize that he knows the names.

Only when he finds the page with the matching, childish scrawls spelling out the names of the Murray twins is he certain that the book contains the names of each and every person involved with the circus.

And only upon closer scrutiny does he notice that they are accompanied by locks of hair.

The later pages hold the names of the original conspirators, though one name is conspicuously absent, and another has been removed.

The final page contains his own signature, a flourish of illegible C ’s, carefully snipped from a piece of paper that might have been an invoice or a letter. Beneath it there is a single lock of raven hair glued onto the page and surrounded by symbols and letters. Chandresh’s hand reaches up to touch the ends of his hair, curling around his collar.

A shadow passes over the desk and Chandresh jumps back in surprise. The book falls closed.

“Sir?”

Marco stands in the doorway, watching Chandresh with a curious expression.

“I … I thought you’d left for the evening,” Chandresh says. He looks down at the book and then back at Marco.

“I had, sir, but I forgot some of my things.” Marco’s eyes travel over the papers and blueprints strewn on the floor. “May I ask what you are doing, sir?”

“I might ask you the same question,” Chandresh says. “What is all this?” He flips the book open again, the pages fluttering and settling.

“Those are records for the circus,” Marco says, without looking at the book.

“What kind of records?” Chandresh presses.

“It’s a system of my own devising,” Marco says. “There is quite a bit to keep in order with the circus, as you know.”

“How long have you been doing this?”

“Doing what, sir?”

“Keeping all this … whatever this nonsense is.” He flips through the pages of the book, though he finds he does not want to touch it now.

“My system goes back to the inception of the circus,” Marco says.

“You’re doing something to it, to all of us, aren’t you?”

“I am just doing my job, sir,” Marco says. There is an edge to his voice now. “And, if I may, I do not appreciate you going through my books without informing me.”

Chandresh moves around the desk to face him, stepping over blueprints, stumbling though his voice remains steady.

“You are my employee, I have every right to see what’s in my own house, what’s being done with my own projects. You’re working with him, aren’t you? You’ve been keeping all this from me the entire time, you had no right to go behind my back—”

“Behind your back?” Marco interrupts. “You cannot even begin to comprehend the things that go on behind your back. That have always gone on behind your back before any of this even started.”

“That is not what I wanted from this arrangement,” Chandresh says.

“You never had a choice about this arrangement,” Marco says. “You have no control and you never did. And you never even wanted to know how things were done. You signed receipts without so much as a glance. Money is no object, you said. Nor were any of the details, those were always left up to me.”

The papers on the desk ripple as Marco raises his voice and he stops, taking a step away from the desk. The papers settle again into disheveled piles.

“You have been sabotaging this endeavor,” Chandresh says. “Lying to my face. Keeping god knows what in these books—”

“What books, sir?” Marco asks. Chandresh looks back at the desk. There are no papers, no pile of ledgers. There is an inkwell next to the lamp, a brass statue of an Egyptian deity, a clock, and the empty brandy bottle. Nothing else remains on the polished-wood surface.

Chandresh stumbles, looking from the desk to Marco and back, unable to focus.

“I will not let you do this to me,” Chandresh says, picking up the brandy bottle from the desk and brandishing it in front of him. “You are dismissed from your position. You shall leave immediately.”

The brandy bottle vanishes. Chandresh stops, grasping at the empty air.

“I cannot leave,” Marco says, his voice calm and controlled. He speaks each word slowly, as though he is explaining something to a small child. “I am not allowed. I must remain here, and I must continue with this nonsense, as you so aptly put it. You are going to return to your drinking and your parties and you will not even remember that we had this conversation. Things will continue as they always have. That is what is going to happen.”

Chandresh opens his mouth to object and then closes it again, confused. He glances at Marco, then back at the empty desk. He looks at his hand, opening and closing his fingers, trying to grasp something that is no longer there, though he cannot remember what it was.

“I’m sorry,” he says, turning back to Marco. “I … I’ve lost my train of thought. What were we discussing?”

“Nothing of import, sir,” Marco says. “Just a few minor details about the circus.”

“Of course,” Chandresh says. “Where is the circus now?”

“Sydney, Australia, sir.” His voice wavers but he covers it with a short cough before turning away.

Chandresh only nods absently.

“May I take that for you, sir?” Marco says, indicating the empty bottle that is once again sitting on the desk.

“Oh,” Chandresh says. “Yes, yes, of course.” He hands the bottle to Marco without looking at it or him, barely registering the action.

“May I get you another, sir?”

“Yes, thank you,” Chandresh says, wandering out of Marco’s office and back into his own study. He settles into a leather armchair by the window.

In the office, Marco gathers up fallen notebooks and papers with trembling hands. He rolls the blueprints and piles the papers and books.

He takes the silver knife he finds discarded on the floor and returns it to the dartboard in the study, stabbing the blade into the bull’s-eye.

Then he empties every drawer in the office, removes each file and document. When everything is properly organized, he locates a set of suitcases in his adjoining rooms and fills them near to bursting, the large leather-bound book cushioned between stacks of paper. He combs through his rooms, removing every personal belonging from the space.

He extinguishes the office lamps and locks the door behind him.

Before he leaves for the night, arms laden with suitcases and rolls of blueprints, Marco places a full bottle of brandy and a glass on the table next to Chandresh’s chair. Chandresh does not even acknowledge his presence. He stares out the window into the darkness and the rain. He does not hear the click of the door as Marco leaves.

“He has no shadow,” Chandresh says to himself before he pours a glass of brandy.

VERY LATE IN THE EVENING, Chandresh has a rather lengthy conversation with the ghost of an old acquaintance he knew only as Prospero the Enchanter. Thoughts that might have drifted away on waves of brandy otherwise remain intact in his head, confirmed and secured by a diaphanous magician.

Three Cups of Tea with Lainie Burgess LONDON, BASEL, AND CONSTANTINOPLE, 1900

Mme. Ana Padva’s studio is a remarkable space situated near Highgate Cemetery, with floor-to-ceiling windows providing a panoramic view of London. Dress forms displaying elaborate gowns stand in groups and pairs, giving the impression of a party with a great many headless guests.

Lainie Burgess wanders through a gathering of black-and-white gowns as she waits for Mme. Padva, pausing to admire one in ivory satin delicately covered with black velvet fretwork, like wrought iron in long scrolling lines and curves.

“I can make that in a color if you would like it for yourself,” Mme. Padva says as she enters the room, her cane accompanying her with a steady beat against the tile floor.

“It is too grand for me, Tante Padva,” Lainie says.

“They are difficult to balance without color,” Mme. Padva says, turning the form around and regarding the train with a narrowed eye. “Too much white and people assume they are wedding gowns, too much black and they become heavy and dour. This one may need more black, I think. I would add more of a sleeve but Celia cannot abide them.”

Mme. Padva shows Lainie around the rest of her latest work, including a wall of recent sketches, before they sit down for tea at a table by one of the windows.

“You have a new assistant every time I visit,” Lainie remarks, after the latest version brings a tray with their tea and quickly disappears again.

“They get bored of waiting for me to die and then they flit off to work for someone else, once they decide shoving me out a window and hoping I might roll down the hill into a mausoleum is too much trouble. I am an old woman with a lot of money and no heir; they are well-coiffed vultures. This one will not last more than a month.”

“I had always assumed you would leave everything to Chandresh,” Lainie says.

“Chandresh is not in need of any of this financially, and I do not think he would be able to manage the business end of things the way I would prefer. He does not have the eye for it. Not that he has the eye for much of anything, these days.”

“Is he that unwell?” Lainie asks, stirring her tea.

“He has lost something of himself,” Mme. Padva says. “I have seen him become preoccupied with projects before, but nothing to this degree. It has rendered him a ghost of what he was, though in Chandresh’s case, a ghost of his former self is more vibrant than most people. I do what I can. I find avant-garde ballet companies to occupy his theaters. I prop him up at the opera when he should be doing the same for me.” She takes a sip of her tea before adding, “And not to bring up a delicate subject, my dear, but I keep him far away from trains.”

“That is likely wise,” Lainie says.

“I have known him since he was a child, it is the least I can do.”

Lainie nods. She has other questions but she decides they are best saved for someone else to whom she has been meaning to pay a visit. For the rest of the afternoon, they discuss no more than fashion and art movements. Mme. Padva insists on making her a less formal version of the ivory-and-black gown in peach and cream, finishing a sketch in a matter of minutes.

“When I do retire, this is all going to you, my dear,” Mme. Padva says before Lainie leaves. “I would not trust anyone else with it.”

THE OFFICE IS LARGE BUT LOOKS SMALLER than it is due to the volume of its contents. While a great deal of its walls are composed of frosted glass, most of it is obscured by cabinets and shelves. The drafting table by the windows is all but hidden in the meticulously ordered chaos of papers and diagrams and blueprints. The bespectacled man seated behind it is almost invisible, blending in with his surroundings. The sound of his pencil scratching against paper is as methodical and precise as the ticking of the clock in the corner.

It is identical to an office that occupied a similar space in London, and then another in Vienna, before it was moved here to Basel.

Mr. Barris puts his pencil down and pours himself a cup of tea. He nearly drops it when he looks up and sees Lainie Burgess standing in his doorway.

“Your assistant appears to be out at the moment,” she says. “I did not mean to startle you.”

“That’s quite all right,” Mr. Barris says, putting his teacup down on the desk before rising from his chair. “I was not expecting you until later this evening.”

“I took an earlier train,” Lainie says. “And I wanted to see you.”

“More time spent with you is always a pleasure,” Mr. Barris says. “Tea?”

Lainie nods as she navigates her way around the crowded office to the chair on the other side of the desk.

“What is it that you discussed when Tara visited you in Vienna?” she asks before she has even taken her seat.

“I thought you knew,” he says without looking at her, keeping his attention on the teapot as he pours.

“We are two different people, Ethan. Just because you could never decide which one of us you were in love with does not make us interchangeable.”

He puts down the pot and prepares her tea, knowing how she takes it without having to ask.

“I asked you to marry me and you never gave me an answer,” he says as he stirs.

“You asked me after she died,” Lainie says. “How could I ever be certain that was a choice you made or one that was made for you?”

He hands her the cup of tea, resting his hand over hers as she takes it.

“I love you,” he says. “I loved her as well but it was never the same. You are as dear as family to me, all of you. More dear, in some cases.”

He returns to his chair, removing his spectacles to wipe them with his handkerchief.

“I don’t know why I wear these things,” he says, looking down at them. “I haven’t needed them for years.”

“You wear them because they suit you,” Lainie says.

“Thank you,” he says as he replaces them, watching her as she sips her tea. “That offer still stands.”

“I know,” Lainie says. “I am considering it.”

“Take your time,” Mr. Barris says. “We appear to have a great deal of it.”

Lainie nods, placing her teacup on the desk.

“Tara was always the rational, sensible one,” she says. “We balanced each other, that was one of the reasons we excelled at whatever we did. She grounded my imaginative ideas. I saw in details while she saw in scope. Not seeing the scope is why I am here and she is not. I took each element separately and never looked to see that they did not fit together properly.”

The clock ticks heavily through the pause that follows.

“I don’t want to have this conversation,” Mr. Barris says once the ticking becomes insufferable. “I didn’t want to have it with her then and I do not want to have it with you now.”

“You know what’s going on here, don’t you?” Lainie asks.

Mr. Barris straightens a pile of papers on his desk while he considers his response.

“Yes,” he says after a moment. “I do.”

“Did you tell my sister?”

“No.”

“Then tell me,” Lainie says.

“I cannot. To explain would involve breaking a trust and I am not willing to do that, not even for you.”

“How many times have you lied to me?” Lainie asks, rising from her chair.

“I have never lied,” Mr. Barris counters, standing as well. “I do not share what I am not at liberty to say. I gave my word and I intend to keep it but I have never lied to you. You never even asked me, you assumed I knew nothing.”

“Tara asked you,” Lainie says.

“Indirectly,” Mr. Barris says. “I do not think she knew what to ask and I would not have answered if she did. I was concerned about her and I suggested that she speak with Alexander if she wanted answers. I assume that was why she was at the station. I do not know if she ever spoke to him. I have not asked.”

“Alexander knows as well?” Lainie asks.

“I believe there is little, if anything, that he is ignorant about.”

Lainie sighs and returns to her chair. She picks up her cup of tea and then without taking a sip puts it down again.

Mr. Barris crosses to the other side of the desk and takes her hands in his, making sure she looks him in the eye before he speaks.

“I would tell you if I could,” he says.

“I know that, Ethan,” she says. “I do.”

She squeezes his hands softly to reassure him.

“I don’t mind this, Lainie,” Mr. Barris says. “I move my office every few years, I hire a new staff. I keep up with projects through correspondence, it is not a difficult thing to manage considering what I receive in return.”

“I understand,” she says. “Where is the circus now?”

“I’m not certain. I believe it recently left Budapest, though I do not know where it is en route to. I can find out; Friedrick will know and I owe him a telegram.”

“And how will Herr Thiessen know where the circus is headed?”

“Because Celia Bowen tells him.”

Lainie does not ask him any further questions.

Mr. Barris is relieved when she accepts the invitation to join him for dinner, and even more so when she agrees to extend her stay in Switzerland before catching up with the circus.

LAINIE INVITES CELIA to join her at the Pera Palace Hotel in Constantinople as soon as she reaches the city. She waits in the tea lounge, two lightly steaming, tulip-shaped glasses with matching saucers resting upon the tile table in front of her.

When Celia arrives, they greet each other warmly. Celia inquires about Lainie’s journey before they discuss the city and the hotel, including the sweeping height of the room they sit within.

“It’s like being in the acrobat tent,” Lainie remarks, looking up at the domes that line the ceiling, each one dotted with circles of turquoise-tinted glass.

“You have not been to the circus in far too long,” Celia says. “We have your costumes, if you would like to join the statues this evening.”

“Thank you, but no,” Lainie says. “I am not in the mood to stand so still.”

“You are welcome at any time,” Celia says.

“I know,” Lainie says. “Though truthfully, I am not here for the circus. I am here to speak with you.”

“What is it you would like to speak about?” Celia asks, a look of concern falling over her face.

“My sister was killed at St. Pancras Station, after a visit to the Midland Grand Hotel,” Lainie says. “Do you know why she went there?”

Celia’s grip on her tea glass tightens.

“I know who she went there to see,” she says, choosing her words carefully.

“I suppose Ethan told you that,” Lainie says.

Celia nods.

“Do you know why she wanted to see him?” Lainie asks.

“No, I do not.”

“Because she didn’t feel right,” Lainie says. “She knew down to her bones that her world had changed and she had received no explanation, nothing to grasp onto, to understand. I believe we have all felt similarly and we are all dealing with it in different ways. Ethan and Tante Padva both have their work to consume their time, to keep their minds occupied. I had not concerned myself with it at all for quite a while. I loved my sister dearly and I always will, but I think she made a mistake.”

“I thought it was an accident,” Celia says softly, looking down at the patterned tile on the table.

“No, before that. Her mistake was asking the wrong questions of the wrong people. It is not a mistake I plan on repeating.”

“That’s why you’re here.”

“That is why I am here,” Lainie says. “How long have we known each other, Celia?”

“Over ten years.”

“Surely by now you can trust me enough to tell me what it is that’s really going on here. I doubt you’d dare to tell me it is nothing, or suggest I not trouble myself with such matters.”

Celia places her glass on its saucer. She explains as best she can. She keeps the details vague, covering only the basic concept of the challenge, and how the circus functions as the venue. How certain people know more than others on every level, though she chooses not to name each individual and makes it clear that even she does not have all the answers.

Lainie says nothing, she listens carefully and occasionally sips her tea.

“How long has Ethan known?” she asks when Celia has finished.

“A very long time,” Celia says.

Lainie nods and lifts her glass to her lips but instead of sipping her tea, she opens her fingers, releasing her grip.

The cup falls, crashing into the saucer below.

The glass shatters, the sound echoing through the room. The tea spills out over the tiles.

Before anyone turns at the noise, the cup has righted itself. The broken pieces re-form around the liquid and the glass sits intact, the tile surface of the table is dry.

Those who glanced over at their table at the noise assume it was their imagination, and return their attention to their own tea.

“Why didn’t you stop it before it broke?” Lainie asks.

“I don’t know,” Celia says.

“If you ever need anything from me, I would like you to ask,” Lainie says as she stands to leave. “I am tired of everyone keeping their secrets so well that they get other people killed. We are all involved in your game, and it seems we are not as easily repaired as teacups.”

Celia sits alone for some time after Lainie departs, both cups of tea growing cold.

Stormy Seas DUBLIN, JUNE 1901

After the illusionist takes her bow and disappears before her rapt audience’s eyes, they clap, applauding the empty air. They rise from their seats and some of them chatter with their companions, marveling over this trick or that as they file out the door that has reappeared in the side of the striped tent.

One man, sitting in the outer circle of chairs, remains in his seat as they leave. His eyes, almost hidden in the shadow cast by the brim of his bowler hat, are fixed on the space in the center of the circle that the illusionist occupied only moments before.

The rest of the audience departs.

The man continues to sit.

After a few minutes the door fades into the wall of the tent, invisible once more.

The man’s gaze does not waver. He does not so much as glance at the vanishing door.

A moment later, Celia Bowen is sitting in front of him, turned to the side and resting her arms on the back of the chair. She is dressed as she had been during her performance, in a white gown covered in a pattern of unassembled puzzle pieces, falling together into darkness along the hem.

“You came to visit me,” she says, unable to hide the pleasure in her voice.

“I had a few days,” Marco says. “And you haven’t been near London recently.”

“We’ll be in London in the autumn,” Celia says. “It’s become somewhat traditional.”

“I couldn’t wait that long to see you.”

“It’s good to see you, as well,” Celia says softly. She reaches out and straightens the brim of his hat.

“Do you like the Cloud Maze?” he asks. He takes her hand in his as she lowers it.

“I do,” she says, her breath catching as his fingers close over hers. “Did you persuade our Mr. Barris to help with that?”

“I did, indeed,” Marco says, running his thumb along the inside of her wrist. “I thought I could use some assistance in getting the balance right. Besides, you have your Carousel and we share the Labyrinth, I thought it only fair that I have a Barris original of my own.”

The intensity of his eyes and his touch rushes over Celia like a wave and she takes her hand from his before it pulls her under.

“Have you come to show me your own feats of illustrious illusion?” she asks.

“It was not on my agenda for the evening, but if you would like … ”

“You already watched me, it would only be fair.”

“I could watch you all night,” he says.

“You have,” Celia says. “You’ve been in every single audience this evening, I noticed.”

She stands and walks to the center of the circle, turning so her gown swirls around her.

“I can see every seat,” she says. “You are not hidden from me when you sit in the back row.”

“I thought I would be too tempted to touch you if I sat in the front,” Marco says, moving from his chair to stand at the edge of the circular performance space, just inside the first row of chairs.

“Am I close enough for your illusion?” she asks.

“If I say no, will you come closer?” he retaliates, not bothering to hide his grin.

In response, Celia takes another step toward him, the hem of her gown brushing over his shoes. Close enough for him to lift his arm and gently rest his hand on her waist.

“You didn’t have to touch me last time,” she remarks, but she does not protest.

“I thought I’d try something special,” Marco says.

“Should I close my eyes?” Celia asks playfully, but instead of answering, he spins her around so she faces away from him, keeping his hand on her waist.

“Watch,” he whispers in her ear.

The striped canvas sides of the tent stiffen, the soft surface hardening as the fabric changes to paper. Words appear over the walls, typeset letters overlapping handwritten text. Celia can make out snatches of Shakespearean sonnets and fragments of hymns to Greek goddesses as the poetry fills the tent. It covers the walls and the ceiling and spreads out over the floor.

And then the tent begins to open, the paper folding and tearing. The black stripes stretch out into empty space as their white counterparts brighten, reaching upward and breaking apart into branches.

“Do you like it?” Marco asks, once the movement settles and they stand within a darkened forest of softly glowing, poem-covered trees.

Celia can only nod.

He reluctantly releases her, following as she walks through the trees, reading bits of verse on branches and trunks.

“How do you come up with such images?” she asks, placing her hand over the layered paper bark of one of the trees. It is warm and solid beneath her fingers, illuminated from within like a lantern.

“I see things in my mind,” Marco says. “In my dreams. I imagine what you might like.”

“I don’t think you’re meant to be imagining how to please your opponent,” Celia says.

“I have never fully grasped the rules of the game, so I am following my instincts instead,” Marco says.

“My father is still purposefully vague about the rules,” Celia says as they walk through the trees. “Particularly when I inquire as to when or how the verdict will be determined.”

“Alexander also neglected to provide that information.”

“I hope he does not pester you as much as my father does me,” Celia says. “Though of course, my father has nothing better to do.”

“I have hardly seen him in years,” Marco says. “He has always been … distant and not terribly forthcoming, but he is the closest thing to family I have. And yet he tells me nothing.”

“I’m rather jealous,” Celia says. “My father constantly tells me what a disappointment I am.”

“I refuse to believe you could ever disappoint anyone,” Marco says.

“You never had the pleasure of meeting my father.”

“Would you tell me what really happened to him?” Marco asks. “I’m quite curious.”

Celia sighs before she begins, pausing beside a tree etched with words of love and longing. She has never told anyone this story, never been given the opportunity to relate it to anyone who would understand.

“My father was always somewhat overambitious,” she starts. “What he meant to do, he did not accomplish, not as he intended. He wanted to remove himself from the physical world.”

“How would that be possible?” Marco asks. Celia appreciates that he does not immediately dismiss the idea. She can see him trying to work it out in his mind and she struggles with the best way to explain it.

“Suppose I had a glass of wine,” she says. A glass of red wine appears in her hand. “Thank you. If I took this wine and poured it into a basin of water, or a lake or even the ocean, would the wine itself be gone?”

“No, it would only be diluted,” Marco says.

“Precisely,” Celia says. “My father figured out a way to remove his glass.” As she speaks, the glass in her hand fades, but the wine remains, floating in the air. “But he went straight for the ocean rather than a basin or even a larger glass. He has trouble pulling himself back together again. He can do it, of course, but with difficulty. Had he been content to haunt a single location, he would likely be more comfortable. Instead, the process left him adrift. He has to cling to things now. He haunts his town house in New York. Theaters he performed in often. He holds to me when he can, though I have learned how to avoid him when I wish to. He hates that, particularly because I am simply amplifying one of his own shielding techniques.”

“Could it be done?” Marco asks. “What he was attempting? Properly, I mean.”

Celia looks at the wine hovering without its glass. She raises a hand to touch it and it quivers, dividing into droplets and then coming back together.

“I believe it could,” she says, “under the right circumstances. It would require a touchstone. A place, a tree, a physical element to hold on to. Something to prevent drifting. I suspect my father simply wanted the world at large to function as his, but I believe it would have to be more localized. To function as a glass but leave more flexibility to move within.”

She touches the hovering wine again, pushing it toward the tree she stands beside. The liquid seeps into the paper, slowly saturating it until the entire tree glows a rich crimson in a forest of white.

“You’re manipulating my illusion,” Marco says, looking curiously at the wine-soaked tree.

“You’re letting me,” Celia says. “I wasn’t certain I’d be able to.”

“Could you do it?” Marco asks. “What he was attempting?”

Celia regards the tree thoughtfully for a moment before replying.

“If I had reason to, I think I could,” she says. “But I am rather fond of the physical world. I think my father was feeling his age, which was much more advanced than it appeared, and did not relish the idea of rotting in the ground. He may have also wished to control his own destiny, but I cannot be certain, as he did not consult me before he attempted it. Left me with a lot of questions to answer and a funeral to fake. Which is easier than you might suppose.”

“But he speaks with you?” Marco asks.

“He does, though not as often as he once did. He looks the same; I think it is an echo, his consciousness retaining the semblance of a physical form. But he lacks solidity and it vexes him terribly. He might have been able to stay more tangible had he done it differently. Though I’m not certain I’d want to be stuck in a tree for the rest of eternity, myself, would you?”

“I think that would depend on the tree,” Marco says.

He turns to the crimson tree and it glows brighter, the red of embers shifting to the bright warmth of fire.

The surrounding trees follow suit.

As the light from the trees increases, it becomes so bright that Celia closes her eyes.

The ground beneath her feet shifts, suddenly unsteady, but Marco puts a hand on her waist to keep her upright.

When she opens her eyes, they are standing on the quarterdeck of a ship in the middle of the ocean.

Only the ship is made of books, its sails thousands of overlapping pages, and the sea it floats upon is dark black ink.

Tiny lights hang across the sky, like tightly packed stars bright as sun.

“I thought something vast would be nice after all the talk of confined spaces,” Marco says.

Celia walks to the edge of the deck, running her hands along the spines of the books that form the rail. A soft breeze plays with her hair, bringing with it the mingling scent of dusty tomes and damp, rich ink.

Marco comes and stands next to her as she looks at the midnight sea that stretches out into a clear horizon with no land in sight.

“It’s beautiful,” she says.

She glances down at his right hand resting on the rail, frowning as she regards his bare, unmarked fingers.

“Are you looking for this?” he asks, moving his hand with a flourish. The skin shifts, revealing the scar that wraps around his ring finger. “It was made by a ring when I was fourteen. It said something in Latin, but I don’t know what it was.”

“Esse quam videri,” Celia says. “To be, rather than to seem. It’s the Bowen family motto. My father was very fond of engraving it on things. I’m not entirely sure he appreciated the irony. That ring was likely something like this one.”

She places her right hand next to his, along the adjoining books. The silver band on her finger is engraved with what Marco had thought was an intricate filigree, but is the same phrase in a looping script.

Celia twists the ring, sliding it down her finger so he can see the matching scar.

“It is the only injury I have never been able to fully heal,” she says.

“Mine was similar,” Marco says, looking at her ring though his eyes keep moving to the scar instead. “Only it was gold. Yours was made by something of Alexander’s?”

Celia nods.

“How old were you?” he asks.

“I was six years old. That ring was plain and silver. It was the first time I’d met someone who could do the things that my father did, though he seemed so very different from my father. He told me I was an angel. It was the loveliest thing anyone had ever said to me.”

“It is an understatement,” Marco says, placing his hand over hers.

A sudden breeze tugs at the layered paper sails. The pages flutter as the surface of the ink ripples below.

“You did that,” Marco says.

“I didn’t mean to,” Celia says, but she does not take her hand away.

“I don’t mind,” Marco says, entwining his fingers with hers. “I can do that myself, you know.”

The wind increases, sending waves of dark ink crashing into the ship. Pages fall from the sails, swirling around them like leaves. The ship begins to tilt and Celia almost loses her footing, but Marco puts his arms around her waist to steady her while she laughs.

“This is quite impressive, Mr. Illusionist,” she says.

“Call me by my name,” he says. He has never heard her speak his name and holding her in his arms he suddenly craves the sound. “Please,” he adds when she hesitates.

“Marco,” she says, her voice low and soft. The sound of his name on her tongue is even more intoxicating than he had imagined, and he leans in to taste it.

Just before his lips reach hers, she turns away.

“Celia,” Marco sighs against her ear, filling her name with all the desire and frustration she feels herself, his breath hot on her neck.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “I … I don’t want to make this any more complicated than it already is.”

He says nothing, keeping his arms around her, but the breeze begins to settle, the waves pounding against the ship become calm.

“I have spent a great deal of my life struggling to keep myself in control,” Celia says, leaning her head against his shoulder. “To know myself inside and out, everything kept in perfect order. I lose that when I’m with you. That frightens me, and—”

“I don’t want you to be frightened,” Marco interrupts.

“It frightens me how much I like it,” Celia finishes, turning her face back to his. “How tempting it is to lose myself in you. To let go. To let you keep me from breaking chandeliers rather than constantly worrying about it, myself.”

“I could.”

“I know.”

They stand silently together as the ship drifts toward the endless horizon.

“Come away with me,” Marco says. “Anywhere. Away from the circus, away from Alexander and your father.”

“We can’t,” Celia says.

“Of course we can,” Marco insists. “You and I together, we could do anything.”

“No,” Celia says. “We can only do anything here.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Have you ever thought about it, about simply leaving? Really, truly thought about it with the intent to follow through and not as a dream or a passing fancy?” When he does not answer, she continues. “Think about it, right now. Picture us abandoning this place and this game and starting over together somewhere else, and mean it.”

Marco closes his eyes and draws it out in his mind, focusing not on the wishful dream but on the practicalities. Planning out the smallest details, from organizing Chandresh’s books for a new accountant to packing the suits in his flat, even down to the wedding bands on their fingers.

And then his right hand begins to burn, the pain sharp and searing, beginning at the scar around his finger and racing up his arm, blacking out every thought in his mind. It is the same pain from when the scar was made, increased a thousandfold.

The motion of the ship ceases instantly. The paper crumbles and the ocean of ink fades away, leaving only a circle of chairs inside a striped tent as Marco collapses to the floor.

The pain ebbs slightly when Celia kneels next to him and takes his hand.

“The night of the anniversary party,” she says. “The night you kissed me. I thought it that night. I didn’t want to play anymore, I only wanted to be with you. I thought I would ask you to run away with me and I meant it. The very moment I convinced myself that we could manage it, I was in so much pain I could barely stand. Friedrick didn’t know what to make of me, he sat me in a quiet corner and held my hand and did not pry when I couldn’t explain because that’s how kind he is.”

She looks down at the scar on Marco’s hand as he struggles to catch his breath.

“I thought perhaps it was about you,” she says. “So once I tried not boarding the train as it departed and that was just as painful. We are well and truly bound.”

“You wanted to run away with me,” Marco says, smiling despite the lingering pain. “I wasn’t sure that kiss would be quite so effective.”

“You could have made me forget, taken it out of my memory as easily as you did with everyone else at the party.”

“That was not particularly easy,” Marco says. “And I did not want you to forget it.”

“I couldn’t,” Celia says. “How are you feeling?”

“Miserable. But the pain itself is fading. I told Alexander I wanted to quit that night. I must not have meant it. I only wanted a reaction from him.”

“It is likely meant to make us think we are not caged,” Celia says. “We cannot feel the bars unless we push against them. My father says it would be easier if we did not concern ourselves so with each other. Perhaps he is right.”

“I’ve tried,” Marco says, cupping her face in his hands. “I have tried to let you go and I cannot. I cannot stop thinking of you. I cannot stop dreaming about you. Do you not feel the same for me?”

“I do,” Celia says. “I have you here, all around me. I sit in the Ice Garden to get a hint of this, this way that you make me feel. I felt it even before I knew who you were, and every time I think it could not possibly get any stronger, it does.”

“Then what is stopping us from being together now?” he asks. He slides his hands down from her face, following the neckline of her gown.

“I want to,” Celia says, gasping as his hands move lower. “Believe me, I want to. This is not only about you and me. There are so many people tangled up in this game. It’s becoming more and more difficult to keep everything in order. And this”—she rests her hands over his—“this is extremely distracting. I worry what might happen if I lose my concentration.”

“You don’t have a power source,” he says. She looks at him, confused.

“A power source?” she repeats.

“The way I use the bonfire, as a conduit. Borrowing energy from the fire. You don’t have anything like that, you work only with yourself?”

“I don’t know any other way,” Celia says.

“You are constantly controlling the circus?” Marco asks.

Celia nods. “I am accustomed to it. Most of the time it is manageable.”

“I can’t imagine how exhausting that must be.”

He kisses her softly on the forehead before letting her go, staying as close to her as he can without touching.

And then he tells her stories. Myths he learned from his instructor. Fantasies he created himself, inspired by bits and pieces of others read in archaic books with crackling spines. Circus concepts that would not fit in tents.

She responds with tales from her childhood spent in back rooms of theaters. Adventures in far-flung cities the circus has visited. She recounts events from her spiritualist days, delighted when he finds the endeavor as absurd as she had at the time.

They sit and talk until just before dawn, and he leaves her only when the circus is about to close.

Marco holds Celia to his chest for a moment before he stands, pulling her up with him.

He takes a card from his pocket that contains only the letter M and an address.

“I have been spending less time at Chandresh’s residence,” he says, handing her the card. “When I am not there, this is where you’ll find me. You are welcome any time, day or night. Should you ever be in the mood for a distraction.”

“Thank you,” Celia says. She turns the card over in her fingers and it vanishes.

“When all of this is over, no matter which one of us wins, I will not let you go so easily. Agreed?”

“Agreed.”

Marco takes her hand and brings it to his lips, kissing the silver ring that conceals her scar.

Celia traces the line of his jaw with her fingertips. Then she turns, disappearing before he can reach out to pull her back.

An Entreaty CONCORD, MASSACHUSETTS, OCTOBER 30, 1902

The sheep are in a terrible mood today as Bailey attempts to usher them from one field to another. They have resisted prodding, swearing, and pushing, insisting that the grass in their current field is much nicer than the grass just on the other side of the gate in the low stone wall, no matter how much Bailey tries to persuade them otherwise.

And then there is a voice behind him.

“Hello, Bailey.”

Poppet looks wrong, somehow, standing there on the opposite side of the wall. The daylight is too bright, the surroundings too mundane and green. Her clothes, even though they are her incognito-wear and not her circus costume, seem too fancy. Her skirt too ruffled for everyday wear; her boots, though dusty, too dainty and impractical for walking across a farm. She wears no hat, her red hair loose, whipping around her head in the wind.

“Hello, Poppet,” he says once he recovers from his surprise. “What are you doing here?”

“I needed to talk to you about something,” she says. “Ask you something, I mean.”

“It couldn’t wait until tonight?” Bailey asks. Meeting up with Poppet and Widget almost as soon as the circus opens each evening has become a nightly routine.

Poppet shakes her head.

“I thought it would be better to give you time to think about it,” she says.

“Think about what?”

“Think about coming with us.”

Bailey blinks at her. “What?” he manages to ask.

“Tonight is our last night here,” she says. “And I want you to come with us when we leave.”

“You’re joking,” Bailey says.

Poppet shakes her head.

“I’m not, I swear I’m not. I wanted to wait until I was sure it was the right thing to ask, the right thing to do, and I’m sure now. It’s important.”

“What do you mean? Important how?” Bailey asks.

Poppet sighs. She looks up, peering as though she is searching for the stars hidden behind the blue sky dotted with fluffy white clouds.

“I know you’re supposed to come with us,” she says. “I know that part for certain.”

“But why? Why me? What would I do, just tag along? I’m not like you and Widget, I can’t do anything special. I don’t belong in the circus.”

“You do! I’m certain that you do. I don’t know why yet, but I’m sure you belong with me. With us, I mean.” A scarlet blush creeps into her cheeks.

“I’d like to, I would. I just … ” Bailey looks around at the sheep, at the house and the barn up on the hill lined with apple trees. It would either solve the argument of Harvard versus farm or make it much, much worse. “I can’t just leave,” he says, though it is not, he thinks, exactly what he means.

“I know,” Poppet says. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t ask you to. But I think … No, I don’t think, I know. I know that if you don’t come with us we won’t be back.”

“Won’t be back here? Why?”

“Won’t be back anywhere,” Poppet says. She raises her eyes to the sky again, scowling at it before she turns back to Bailey. “If you don’t come with us, there won’t be any more circus. And don’t ask me why, they don’t tell me why.” She gestures at the sky, at the stars beyond the clouds. “They just say that in order for there to be a circus in the future, you need to be there. You, Bailey. You and me and Widge. I don’t know why it’s important that it’s all three of us, but it is. If not, it will just crumble. It’s already starting.”

“What do you mean? The circus is fine.”

“I’m not sure it’s anything that’s really noticeable from the outside. It’s … If one of your sheep was sick, would I notice?”

“Probably not,” Bailey says.

“But you would?” Poppet asks.

Bailey nods.

“That’s how it is with the circus. I know how it’s supposed to feel and it doesn’t feel like that right now and it hasn’t for a while. I can tell something’s wrong and I can feel it crumbling like cake that doesn’t have enough icing to hold it together but I don’t know what it is. Does that make any sense?”

Bailey only stares at her, and she sighs before she continues.

“Remember the night we were in the Labyrinth? When we got stuck in the birdcage room?”

Bailey nods.

“I’ve never been stuck anywhere in the Labyrinth before. Never. If we can’t find our way out of a room or a hall I can focus and I can feel where the doors are. I can tell what’s behind them. I try not to do it because it’s not any fun that way, but that night I did when we couldn’t figure it out and it didn’t work. It’s starting to feel unfamiliar and I don’t know what to do about it.”

“But how can I do anything to help?” Bailey asks.

“You’re the one who finally found the key, remember?” Poppet says. “I keep looking for answers, for the right thing to do, and nothing’s been clear except for you. I know it’s too much to ask to have you leave your home and your family, but the circus is my home and my family and I can’t lose them. Not if there’s something I can do to prevent it. I’m sorry.”

She sits on the rock wall, facing away from him. Bailey sits next to her, still facing the field and the incorrigible sheep. They sit in silence for a while. The sheep wander in lazy circles, nibbling on the grass.

“Do you like it here, Bailey?” Poppet asks, looking out over the farm.

“Not particularly,” Bailey says.

“Have you ever wished for someone to come and take you away?”

“Did Widge tell you that?” Bailey asks, wondering if the thought is so strong that it sits on him, evident and readable.

“No,” Poppet says. “It was a guess. But Widge did ask me to give you this.” She pulls a tiny glass bottle from her pocket and hands it to him.

Bailey knows that though the bottle appears empty it is likely not, and he is too curious not to open it immediately. He pulls out the minuscule stopper, relieved that it remains attached to the bottle with a curl of wire.

The sensation inside is so familiar, so comforting and recognizable and real that Bailey can feel the roughness of the bark, the smell of the acorns, even the chattering of the squirrels.

“He wanted you to be able to keep your tree with you,” Poppet says. “If you decide to come with us.”

Bailey replaces the stopper in the bottle. Neither of them speaks for some time. The breeze tugs at Poppet’s hair.

“How long do I have to think about it?” Bailey asks quietly.

“We’re leaving when the circus closes tonight,” Poppet says. “The train will be ready before dawn, though it would be better if you could come earlier than that. Leaving can get a bit … complicated.”

“I’ll think about it,” Bailey says. “But I can’t promise anything.”

“Thank you, Bailey,” Poppet says. “Can you do me one favor, though? If you’re not going to come with us, could you just not come to the circus tonight at all? And let this be goodbye? I think it would be easier.”

Bailey stares at her blankly for a moment, her words not quite sinking in. This is even more horrible than the choice to leave. But he nods because it feels like the proper thing to do.

“All right,” he says. “I won’t come unless I’m going with you. I promise.”

“Thank you, Bailey,” Poppet says. She smiles, though he cannot tell if the smile is a happy one or not.

And before he can tell her to tell Widget goodbye for him if need be, she leans forward and kisses him, not on the cheek, as she has a handful of times before, but on the lips, and Bailey knows in that moment that he will follow her anywhere.

Poppet turns without a word and walks away. Bailey watches until he can no longer see her hair against the sky and then continues to stare after her, the tiny bottle clutched in his hand, still uncertain of how to feel or what to do and left with only hours to decide.

Behind him, the sheep, left to their own devices, decide to wander through the open gate into the field beyond.

Invitation LONDON, OCTOBER 30, 1901

When the circus arrives in London, though Celia Bowen is tempted to go immediately to the address of Marco’s flat, which is printed on the card she keeps on her person at all times, she goes instead to the Midland Grand Hotel.

She does not make any inquiries at the desk.

She does not speak to anyone.

She stands in the middle of the lobby, going unnoticed by the staff and guests that pass her on their way to other locations, other appointments, and other temporary places.

After she has stood for more than an hour, as still as one of the circus statues, a man in a grey suit approaches her.

He listens without reaction as she speaks, and when she is finished, he only nods.

She executes a perfect curtsey, and then she turns and leaves.

The man in the grey suit stands alone, unnoticed, in the lobby for some time.

Intersections I: The Drop of a Hat LONDON, OCTOBER 31–NOVEMBER 1, 1901

The circus is always particularly festive on All Hallows’ Eve. Round paper lanterns hang in the courtyard, the shadows dancing over their white surfaces like silently howling faces. Leather masks in white and black and silver with ribbon ties are set in baskets by the gates and around the circus for patrons to wear, should they wish. It is sometimes difficult to discern performer from patron.

It is an altogether different experience to wander through the circus anonymously. To blend in with the environment, becoming a part of the ambiance. Many patrons enjoy the experience immensely, while others find it disconcerting and prefer to wear their own faces.

Now the crowd has thinned considerably in these hours past midnight as the clock ticks its way into All Hallows’ proper.

The remaining masked patrons wander like ghosts.

The line for the fortune-teller has dwindled down to nothing in these hours. Most people seek their fortunes early in the evening. The late of the night is suited for less cerebral pursuits. Earlier the querents filed in almost nonstop, but as October fades into November there is no one waiting in the vestibule, no one waiting behind the beaded curtain to hear what secrets the cards have to tell.

And then the beaded curtain parts, though she heard no one approach.

What Marco comes to tell her should not be a shock. The cards have been telling her as much for years but she refused to listen, choosing to see only the other possibilities, the alternate paths to be taken.

Hearing it from his own lips is another thing entirely. As soon as he speaks the words, a forgotten memory finds its way to the front of her mind. Two green-clad figures in the center of a vibrant ballroom, so undeniably in love that the entire room flushes with heat.

She asks him to draw a single card. The fact that he consents surprises her.

That the card he draws is La Papessa does not.

When he leaves, Isobel removes her sign for the evening.

She sometimes removes her sign early, or for periods of time when she is tired from reading or in need of a respite. Often she spends this time with Tsukiko, but instead of seeking out the contortionist this particular evening, she sits alone at her table, shuffling her tarot deck compulsively.

She flips one card faceup, then another and another.

There are only swords. Lines of them in pointed rows. Four. Nine. Ten. The single sharp ace.

She pushes them back into a pile.

She abandons the cards and turns to something else instead.

She keeps the hatbox under her table. It is the safest place she could think of, the easiest for her to access. Often she forgets it is even there, concealed beneath the cascading velvet. Always suspended between her and her querents. A constant unseen presence.

Now she reaches beneath the table and draws it out from velvet shadows into the flickering candlelight.

The hatbox is plain and round, covered in black silk. It has no latch or hinge, its lid kept in place by two ribbons, one black and one white, that are tied in careful knots.

Isobel places the box upon the table and brushes a thick layer of dust off the top, though much of it still sticks to the knotted ribbons. She hesitates, and thinks for a moment that it would be better to leave it alone, to return it to its resting place. But it does not seem to matter any longer.

She unties the ribbons slowly, working the knots out with her fingernails. When they are loosened enough for her to remove the lid, she pulls it off gingerly, as though she fears what she might find inside.

Inside the box is a hat.

It is just as she left it. An old black bowler hat, showing some wear around the brim. It is tied with more black and white ribbons, wrapped like a present in light and dark bows. Beneath the knots of the ribbon there is a single tarot card. Between the hat and the card there is a folded white lace handkerchief, its edges embroidered with looping black vines.

They were such simple things. Knots and intent.

She had laughed through her lessons, much preferring her cards. They seemed so straightforward in comparison, despite their myriad meanings.

It was only a precaution. Precautions are wise in such unpredictable circumstances. No stranger than bringing along an umbrella for a walk on a day that feels like rain, even if the sun is shining brightly.

Though she cannot be certain it is doing much more than gathering dust, not really. She has no way to be sure, no barometer on which to measure such insubstantial things. No thermometer for chaos. At the moment, it feels like she is pushing against an empty void.

Isobel lifts the hat carefully from the box, the long ends of the ribbons spilling in a waterfall around it. It is oddly pretty, for being an old hat and a handkerchief and a card tied up in fraying ribbon. Almost festive.

“The smallest charms can be the most effective,” Isobel says, taken aback when her voice catches, almost on the brink of tears.

The hat does not reply.

“I don’t think you’re having any effect at all,” Isobel says.

Again, the hat has no reply.

She had only wanted to keep the circus balanced. To prevent two conflicting sides from causing damage to each other or their surroundings.

To keep the scales from breaking.

Over and over in her mind, she sees them together in the ballroom.

She remembers snatches of an overheard argument. Marco saying he had done everything for her, a statement she had not understood at the time and forgotten soon after.

But now it is clear.

All the emotion in the cards when she would try to read about him, it was all for Celia.

The circus itself, all for her. For every beautiful tent he creates, she builds one in return.

And Isobel herself has been helping to keep it balanced. Helping him. Helping them both.

She looks down at the hat in her hands.

White lace caressing black wool, ribbons intertwined. Inseparable.

Isobel tears at the ribbons with her fingers, pulling at the bows in a sudden fury.

The handkerchief floats down like a ghost, the initials C.N.B. legible amongst the embroidered vines.

The tarot card falls to the ground, landing faceup. The image of an angel is emblazoned on it, the word Tempérance is lettered beneath.

Isobel stops, holding her breath. Expecting some repercussion, some result from the action. But everything is quiet. The candles flicker around her. The beaded curtain hangs still and calm. She suddenly feels silly and stupid, alone in her tent with a pile of tangled ribbon and an old hat. She thinks herself a fool for believing she could have any impact on such things. That anything she ever did mattered at all.

She reaches down to retrieve the fallen card, but her hand freezes just above it when she hears something. For a split second it sounds like the squealing brakes of a train.

It takes a moment for Isobel to realize that the noise coming from outside the tent is actually the sound of Poppet Murray screaming.

Darkest Before the Dawn CONCORD, MASSACHUSETTS, OCTOBER 31, 1902

Poppet and Widget stand by the circus gates, just out of the way of the ticket booth, though the line for tickets has waned in the late hour. The star-filled tunnel has already been removed, replaced by a single striped curtain. The Wunschtraum clock strikes three times behind them. Widget munches on a bag of chocolate-covered popcorn.

“Wufju fay foo im?” he asks, with his mouth mostly full.

“I tried to explain as much as I could,” Poppet says. “I think I made an analogy about cake.”

“Well, that must have worked,” Widget says. “Who doesn’t like a good cake analogy?”

“I’m not sure I made any sense. I think he was most upset that I asked him not to come tonight if he wasn’t going to leave with us. I didn’t know what else to say, I just tried to make sure he understood it was important.” Poppet sighs, leaning against the iron fence. “And I kissed him,” she adds.

“I know,” Widget says.

Poppet glares at him, her face blushing almost as red as her hair.

“I didn’t mean to,” Widget says with a shrug. “You’re not hiding it well at all. You should practice more if you don’t want me to see things. Didn’t Celia teach you how to do that?”

“Why is your sight getting better and mine’s getting worse?” Poppet asks.

“Luck?”

Poppet rolls her eyes.

“Did you talk to Celia?” she asks.

“I did. I told her you said Bailey was supposed to come with us. All she said was that she wouldn’t do anything to prevent it.”

“Well, that’s something.”

“She’s distracted,” Widget says, shaking his bag of popcorn. “She won’t tell me anything, and she barely listened to me when I tried to explain what we were asking. I could have told her we wanted to bring a flying hippopotamus along to keep as a pet and she would have said that was fine. But Bailey’s not coming just for fun, is he?”

“I don’t know,” Poppet says.

“What do you know?”

Poppet looks up at the night sky. Dark clouds cover most of the stars but pockets of them slide into view, twinkling softly.

“Remember when we were on the Stargazer and I saw something bright but I couldn’t tell what it was?”

Widget nods.

“It was the courtyard. The entire courtyard, not just the bonfire. Bright and burning and hot. Then … I don’t know what happened but Bailey was there. That much I’m sure of.”

“And this is going to happen soon?” Widget asks.

“Very soon, I think.”

“Should we kidnap him?”

“Really, Widge.”

“No, really. We could do it. We can sneak into his house and hit him with something heavy and drag him back here as inconspicuously as possible. We can prop him up and people will think he’s a town drunk. He’ll be on the train before he’s conscious, and then he really won’t have a choice. Quick and painless. Well, painless for us. Save for the heavy lifting, that is.”

“I don’t think that’s really the best idea, Widge,” Poppet says.

“Oh, c’mon, it’ll be fun,” Widget says.

“I don’t think so. I think we already did whatever it was we were supposed to do, and now we have to wait.”

“Are you sure about that?” Widget asks.

“No,” Poppet says quietly.

After a while Widget goes off in search of something else to eat and Poppet waits by the gates alone, occasionally glancing over her shoulder to check the time on the clock behind her.

Intersections II: Scarlet Furies and Red Destinies LONDON, OCTOBER 31–NOVEMBER 1, 1901

Though any night at the circus can rightfully be called magical,” Herr Friedrick Thiessen once wrote, “All Hallows’ Eve is something special. The air itself crackles with mystery.”

This particular Hallowe’en night is cold and crisp. The boisterous crowd is clothed in heavy coats and scarves. Many of them wear masks, faces lost in swatches of black and silver and white.

The light in the circus is dimmer than usual. The shadows seem to creep from every corner.

Chandresh Christophe Lefèvre enters the circus without notice. He picks up a silver mask from a basket by the gates and slips it over his face. The woman in the ticket booth does not recognize him when he pays his admission in full.

He wanders through the circus like a man in a dream.

The man in the grey suit does not wear a mask. He walks leisurely, with a calm, almost lazy gait. He has no particular destination in mind, wandering from tent to tent. Some he enters, others he passes by. He purchases a cup of tea and stays in the courtyard, watching the bonfire for a while before wandering back into the paths amongst the tents.

He has never attended the circus before, and he appears to be enjoying himself.

Chandresh follows him, every move, every stop. Pursues him through tents and watches him pay for his tea in the courtyard. He stares at the ground near the man in the grey suit’s feet, looking for his shadow, though he is thwarted by the ever-shifting light.

Other than Chandresh, no one pays him any notice. Passersby do not look at him, not even a glance is spared despite his height and his pristine grey suit and top hat. Even the girl who sells him tea barely registers him, turning quickly to her next customer. He slides through the circus like a shadow. He carries a silver-tipped cane that he does not use.

Chandresh loses him in the crowd more than once, the grey falling into a blur of black and white dotted with color from the patrons. It never takes him long to spot the grey top hat again, but in the intervals between he becomes nervous to the point of shaking, fidgeting with his coat and the contents of his pockets.

Chandresh mutters to himself. Those that pass by him close enough to hear look at him strangely and make an effort to avoid him.

Following Chandresh is a young man he would not recognize even if he were to look him in the eye, but still the man keeps his distance. Chandresh’s attention remains only on the man in the grey suit, and it does not once wander to this other man who bears a passing resemblance to his assistant.

Marco keeps a steady grey-green eye on Chandresh, wearing no mask on a face only Celia would recognize, and the illusionist is otherwise occupied.

This goes on for quite some time. Mr. A. H— tours the circus leisurely. He visits the fortune-teller, who does not recognize him but lays his future out in polite rows of cards, though she admits that bits of it are overlapping and confusing. He watches the illusionist perform. She acknowledges his presence with a single, subtle nod. He tours the Hall of Mirrors, countless figures in matching grey suits and top hats accompanying him. He rides the Carousel. He appears particularly fond of the Ice Garden.

Chandresh follows him from tent to tent, waiting outside the ones he does not enter, drenched in ever-increasing anxiety.

Marco loses track of both of them only briefly, when he takes a few moments to attend to another matter.

The clock by the gates ticks off the minutes later and later, the ornaments upon it twirling and shifting.

October slips into November, a change that goes largely unnoticed other than by those standing closest to the clock.

The crowd grows thinner. Masks are returned to the baskets in the courtyard and by the gates, jumbled piles of empty eyes and ribbons. Children are dragged away with promises that they may return the next evening, though the circus will not be there the next evening and later those children will feel slighted and betrayed.

In a passage near the back of the circus, which is somewhat wide and filled with only a handful of patrons, Mr. A. H— stops. Chandresh watches him from a short distance away, unable to see clearly why he has halted, though he might be conversing with someone. Through his mask, Chandresh sees only the still grey suit, the hovering top hat. He sees an open target with nothing standing in between.

He hears the echo of a voice assuring him that the man is not real. A figment of his imagination. Nothing but a dream.

Then there is a pause. For just a moment, time slows like something falling while fighting with gravity. The chill breeze that has circled through the open paths of the circus stops. In that moment nothing flutters, not the fabric of the tents or the ribbon ties of dozens of masks.

In the tallest tent, one of the acrobats loses her perfect balance, falling some distance before one of her fellow performers catches her, only narrowly avoiding crashing to the ground.

In the courtyard, the bonfire sputters and sparks in a sudden cloud of black smoke, causing those patrons closest to it to jump back, coughing.

The kitten that leaps through the air from Poppet’s hands to her brother’s suddenly twists in the air, landing on its back rather than its feet and rolling toward Widget with an indignant howl.

The illusionist pauses, her seamless performance halted as she stands frozen, her face suddenly deathly pale. She sways as though she might faint, and several attentive audience members move to assist her but she does not fall.

Marco crumples as though punched in the stomach by an invisible assailant. A passing patron catches his arm to steady him.

And Chandresh Christophe Lefèvre pulls the heavy silver knife from his coat pocket and throws it without hesitation.

The knife flies from Chandresh’s hand, blade over handle, spinning in perfect revolutions through the air.

Its aim is precise and steady. As true as such things can be.

Then its target moves.

The tailored grey wool that makes up the back of Mr. A. H—’s suit shifts. He moves ever so slightly to the side. It is a graceful step. An unconscious gesture. A movement of weight in space.

And so the knife brushes by his sleeve, and comes to rest instead in the chest of the man he is speaking with. The blade sliding through his unbuttoned black coat easily, hitting his heart as though it had always been its intended target, the silver handle jutting out just beneath his crimson scarf.

Mr. A. H— catches Herr Friedrick Thiessen as he slumps forward.

Chandresh stares at his empty hand as though he cannot recall what he was holding moments before. He staggers off, wandering back in the direction of the bonfire courtyard. He forgets to remove his mask when he leaves, and when he finds it discarded in his town house the next day, he cannot remember where it came from.

Mr. A. H— lowers Herr Thiessen to the ground, speaking a constant string of words over him in tones too low for anyone to overhear. The scattered patrons around them notice nothing at first, though some are distracted by the fact that the two young performers a few feet away have suddenly ceased their show, the boy in the black suit gathering up the visibly agitated kittens.

After a long moment, Mr. A. H— stops speaking and passes a grey-gloved hand over Herr Friedrick Thiessen’s face, gently closing his surprised eyes.

The silence that follows is shattered by Poppet Murray’s screaming as the pool of blood on the ground spreads beneath her white boots.

Before the shock turns into chaos, Mr. A. H— gently removes the silver-handled knife from Herr Thiessen’s chest and then he stands and walks away.

As he passes by a baffled, still-unsteady Marco, he hands him the blood-covered knife without so much as a word or a glance before disappearing into the crowd.

The handful of patrons who witness the event are ushered quickly away. Later they assume it was a clever stunt. A touch of theatricality for the already festive evening.

THE POOL OF TEARS

The sign outside this tent is accompanied by a small box full of smooth black stones. The text instructs you to take one with you as you enter.

Inside, the tent is dark, the ceiling covered with open black umbrellas, the curving handles hanging down like icicles.

In the center of the room there is a pool. A pond enclosed within a black stone wall that is surrounded by white gravel.

The air carries the salty tinge of the ocean.

You walk over to the edge to look inside. The gravel crunches beneath your feet.

It is shallow, but it is glowing. A shimmering, shifting light cascades up through the surface of the water. A soft radiance, enough to illuminate the pool and the stones that sit at the bottom. Hundreds of stones, each identical to the one you hold in your hand. The light beneath filters through the spaces between the stones.

Reflections ripple around the room, making it appear as though the entire tent is underwater.

You sit on the wall, turning your black stone over and over in your fingers.

The stillness of the tent becomes a quiet melancholy.

Memories begin to creep forward from hidden corners of your mind. Passing disappointments. Lost chances and lost causes. Heartbreaks and pain and desolate, horrible loneliness.

Sorrows you thought long forgotten mingle with still-fresh wounds.

The stone feels heavier in your hand.

When you drop it in the pool to join the rest of the stones, you feel lighter. As though you have released something more than a smooth polished piece of rock.

Farewell CONCORD, MASSACHUSETTS, OCTOBER 30 AND 31, 1902

Bailey climbs the oak tree to retrieve his hidden box before sunset, gazing down at the circus that sits bathed in deep orange light, casting long pointed shadows across the field. But when he opens it, he does not find anything he truly wishes to take with him.

He removes only Poppet’s white glove, placing it in his coat pocket, and returns the box to the tree.

At home, he counts out his life savings, which is a higher amount than he had expected, and packs a change of clothes and an extra sweater. He considers packing a spare pair of shoes but decides he can likely borrow some from Widget if need be. He shoves everything into a worn leather satchel and waits for his parents and Caroline to go to bed.

While he waits, he unpacks his bag and then packs it again, second-guessing his choices of what to bring and what to leave behind.

He waits an hour after he is certain everyone is asleep, and then another hour for good measure. Though he has become rather proficient at slipping in at abnormal hours, sneaking out is a different matter.

When he finally creeps down the hallway, he is surprised how late it is. His hand is on the door, ready to leave, when he turns around, putting his bag down and quietly searching for a piece of paper.

Once he locates one, he sits down at the table in the kitchen to write a note to his parents. He explains as best he can his reasons for going and hopes they will understand. He does not mention Harvard or anything about the future of the farm.

He remembers when he was very small his mother once said she wished happiness and adventure for him. If this does not count as adventure, he is not sure what does.

“What are you doing?” a voice behind him asks.

Bailey turns to find Caroline standing in the doorway in her nightgown, her hair piled on her head in a spiky mess of pin curls and a knitted blanket pulled around her shoulders.

“Nothing you need to concern yourself with,” he says, turning back to his writing. He signs the letter and folds it, leaving it propped upright in the center of the table, next to a wooden bowl full of apples. “Make sure they read that.”

“Are you running away?” Caroline asks, glancing at his bag.

“Something like that.”

“You can’t possibly be serious,” she says with a yawn.

“I’m not sure when I’ll be back. I’ll write when I can. Tell them not to worry about me.”

“Bailey, go back to bed.”

“Why don’t you go back to bed, Caroline? You look like you could use some more beauty rest.”

In response, Caroline only twists her face up in a sneer.

“Besides,” Bailey continues, “when have you ever cared what I do?”

“You have been acting like a baby all week,” Caroline says, raising her voice but keeping it a hissing whisper. “Playing at that stupid circus, staying out all night. Grow up, Bailey.”

“That is precisely what I’m doing,” Bailey says. “I don’t care if you don’t understand that. Staying here won’t make me happy. It will make you happy because you are insipid and boring, and an insipid, boring life is enough for you. It’s not enough for me. It will never be enough for me. So I’m leaving. Do me a favor and marry someone who will take decent care of the sheep.”

He takes an apple from the bowl and tosses it in the air, catching it and tucking it in his bag before he bids Caroline goodbye with a cheerful wave and nothing more.

He leaves her standing by the table with her mouth opening and closing in silent rage as he closes the door quietly behind him.

Bailey walks away from the house buzzing with energy. He almost expects Caroline to come after him, or to immediately wake their parents and alert them to his departure. But with each step he takes away from the house it becomes more clear that he is truly leaving, with nothing left to stop him.

The walk feels longer in the stillness of the night, no crowds of people heading to the circus along his route as there have been every other evening, when he raced to arrive before the opening of the gates.

The stars are still out when Bailey reaches his oak tree, his bag slung over his shoulder. He is later than he’d wanted to be, though dawn is some time away.

But beneath the starry sky, the field that stretches out below his tree is empty, as though nothing has ever occupied the space but grass and leaves and fog.

Retrospect LONDON, NOVEMBER 1, 1901

The man in the grey suit slips easily through the crowd of circus patrons. They step out of the way without even considering the movement, parting like water as he heads toward the gates.

The figure that blocks his path near the edge of the courtyard is transparent, appearing like a mirage in the glow of the bonfire and the gently swaying paper lanterns. The man in the grey suit halts, though he could easily continue on through his colleague’s apparition unimpeded.

“Interesting evening, isn’t it?” Hector asks him, drawing curious stares from the nearby patrons.

The man in the grey suit subtly moves the fingers of one gloved hand, as though turning the page of a book, and the staring ceases, curious eyes becoming unfocused, their attention drawn to other sights.

The crowd continues by, moving to and from the gates without noticing either gentleman.

“It’s not worth the bother,” Hector scoffs. “Half these people expect to see a ghost around every corner.”

“This has gotten out of hand,” the man in the grey suit says. “This venue was always too exposed.”

“That’s what makes it fun,” Hector says, waving an arm over the crowd. His hand passes through a woman’s shoulder and she turns, surprised, but continues walking when she sees nothing. “Did you not use enough of your concealment techniques, even after ingratiating yourself with Chandresh to control the venue?”

“I control nothing,” the man in the grey suit says. “I established a protocol of secrecy disguised as an air of mystery. My counsel is the reason this venue moves from location to location unannounced. It benefits both players.”

“It keeps them apart. If you’d put them together properly from the beginning, she would have broken him years ago.”

“Has your current state made you blind? You were a fool to trap yourself like that, and you are a fool if you cannot see that they are each besotted with the other. If they had not been kept apart it simply would have happened sooner.”

“You should have been a damned matchmaker,” Hector says, his narrowed eyes vanishing and reappearing in the undulating light. “I have trained my player better than that.”

“And yet she came to me. She invited me here personally, as you—” He stops, a figure in the crowd catching his eye.

“I thought I told you to choose a player you could tolerate losing,” Hector says, watching the way his companion gazes after the distressed young man in the bowler hat who passes by without noticing either of them, pursuing Chandresh through the throng of patrons. “You always grow too attached to your students. Unfortunate how few of them ever realize that.”

“And how many of your own students have chosen to end the game themselves?” the man in the grey suit asks, turning back. “Seven? Will your daughter be the eighth?”

“That is not going to happen again,” Hector responds, each word sharp and heavy despite his insubstantial form.

“If she wins, she will hate you for it if she does not already.”

“She will win. Do not try to avoid the fact that she is a stronger player than yours and always has been.”

The man in the grey suit lifts a hand in the direction of the bonfire, amplifying the sound that echoes from beyond the courtyard so that Hector can hear his daughter, repeating Friedrick’s name over and over in increasing panic.

“Does that sound like strength to you?” he asks, dropping his hand and letting Celia’s voice blend into the din of the crowd.

Hector only scowls, the flames of the bonfire further distorting his expression.

“An innocent man died here tonight,” the man in the grey suit continues. “A man your player was quite fond of. If she had not already begun to break, this will do it. Was that what you meant to accomplish here? Have you learned nothing after so many competitions? There is never any way to predict what will come to pass. No guarantees on either side.”

“This isn’t over yet,” Hector says, vanishing in a blur of light and shadow.

The man in the grey suit walks on as though he had not paused, making his way through the curtains of velvet that separate the courtyard from the world outside.

He watches the clock by the gates for some time before he departs the circus.

Beautiful Pain LONDON, NOVEMBER 1, 1901

Marco’s flat was once plain and spare but now it is crowded with an assortment of mismatched furniture. Pieces that Chandresh became bored with at one point or another and were adopted into this purgatory instead of being discarded entirely.

There are too many books and not enough shelves to hold them, so they sit piled on antique Chinese chairs and sari-wrapped cushions.

The clock on the mantel is a Herr Thiessen creation, adorned with tiny books flipping through their pages as the seconds tick toward three o’clock in the morning.

The larger books on the desk are moving at a less steady pace as Marco goes back and forth between handwritten volumes, scrawling notes and calculations on loose sheets of paper. Over and over he crosses out symbols and numbers, discards books in favor of others, and then returns to the discarded ones again.

The door of the flat opens of its own volition, locks falling open and hinges swinging wildly. Marco jumps from his desk, spilling a bottle of ink across his papers.

Celia stands in the doorway, stray curls escaping her upswept hair. Her cream-colored coat hangs unbuttoned, too light for the weather.

Only when she moves into the room, the door closing automatically and locking with a series of clicks behind her, does Marco notice that beneath her coat her gown is covered with blood.

“What happened?” he asks, the hand that had been moving to right the bottle of ink halting in midair.

“You know perfectly well what happened,” Celia says. Her voice is calm but already the ripples are beginning to form in the dark surface of the ink pooled on the desk.

“Are you all right?” Marco asks, trying to move closer to her.

“I most certainly am not all right,” Celia says, and the bottle of ink shatters, raining ink over the papers and splattering Marco’s white shirtsleeves, falling into invisibility on his black vest. His hands are covered in ink but he is still distracted by the blood on her gown, scarlet screaming across the ivory satin and vanishing behind the black velvet fretwork that covers it like a cage.

“Celia, what did you do?” he asks.

“I tried,” Celia says. Her voice breaks on the word so that she has to repeat herself. “I tried. I thought I might be able to fix it. I’ve known him so long. That maybe it would be like setting a clock to make it tick again. I knew exactly what was wrong but I couldn’t make it right. He was so familiar but it … it didn’t work.”

The sob that has been building in her chest escapes. Tears that she has been holding back for hours fall from her eyes.

Marco rushes across the room to reach her, pulling her close and holding her while she cries.

“I’m sorry,” he says, repeating it in a litany over her sobs until she calms, the tension easing in her shoulders as she relaxes into his arms.

“He was my friend,” she says quietly.

“I know,” Marco says, wiping away her tears and leaving smudges of ink across her cheeks. “I am so sorry. I don’t know what happened. Something threw off the balance and I cannot figure out what it was.”

“It was Isobel,” Celia says.

“What?”

“The charm Isobel put over the circus, over you and me. I knew about it, I could feel it. I didn’t think it was doing much of anything but apparently it was. I don’t know why she chose tonight to stop.”

Marco sighs.

“She chose tonight because I finally told her that I love you,” he says. “I should have done it years ago, but I told her tonight instead. I thought she took it well but clearly I was wrong. I haven’t the slightest idea what Alexander was doing there.”

“He was there because I invited him,” Celia says.

“Why would you do that?” Marco asks.

“I wanted a verdict,” she says, tears springing to her eyes again. “I wanted this to be over so I could be with you. I thought if he came to see the circus that a winner could be determined. I don’t know how else they expect it to be settled. How did Chandresh know he would be there?”

“I don’t know. I don’t even know what possessed him to go there, and he insisted that I not accompany him so I followed him instead, to keep an eye on him. I only lost track of him for minutes when I went to speak with Isobel and by the time I caught up with him again … ”

“Did you feel as though you had the ground removed from beneath you as well?” Celia asks.

Marco nods.

“I was trying to protect Chandresh from himself,” he says. “I had not even considered he might be a danger to anyone else.”

“What is all this?” Celia asks, turning her attention to the books on the desk. They contain endless pages of glyphs and symbols, ringed in text ripped from other sources, affixed to one another and inscribed over and over. In the middle of the desk there is a large leather volume. Pasted inside the front cover, surrounded by an elaborately inscribed tree, Celia can barely make out something that must once have been a newspaper clipping. The only word she can discern is transcendent.

“This is how I work,” Marco says. “That particular volume is the one which binds everyone in the circus. It’s the safeguard, for lack of a better term. I placed a copy of it in the bonfire before the lighting, but I’ve made adjustments to this one.”

Celia turns through the pages of names. She pauses at a page that holds a scrap of paper bearing the looping signature of Lainie Burgess, next to a space where an equal-sized piece has been removed, leaving only a bright blank void.

“I should have put Herr Thiessen in there,” Marco says. “I never even thought of it.”

“If it had not been him it would have been another patron. There is no way to protect everyone. It’s impossible.”

“I am sorry,” he says again. “I did not know Herr Thiessen as well as you, but I did admire him and his work.”

“He showed me the circus in a way I had not been able to see it before,” Celia says. “How it looked from the outside. We wrote letters to each other for years.”

“I would have written you, myself, if I could put down in words everything I want to say to you. A sea of ink would not be enough.”

“But you built me dreams instead,” Celia says, looking up at him. “And I built you tents you hardly ever see. I have had so much of you around me always and I have been unable to give you anything in return that you can keep.”

“I still have your shawl,” Marco says.

She smiles softly while she closes the book. Beside it, the spilled ink seeps back into its jar, the glass fragments reforming around it.

“I think this is what my father would call working from the outside in rather than the inside out,” she says. “He was always cautioning against it.”

“Then he would despise the other room,” Marco says.

“What room?” Celia asks. The bottle of ink settles as though it had never been broken.

Marco beckons her forward, leading her to the adjoining room. He opens the door but does not step through it, and when Celia follows him she can see why.

It may once have been a study or a parlor, not a large room, but perhaps it could be referred to as cozy were it not for the layers of paper and string that hang from every available surface.

Strings hang from the chandelier and loop over to the tops of shelves. They tie back upon each other like a web cascading from the ceiling.

On every surface, tables and desks and armchairs, there are meticulously constructed models of tents. Some made from newsprint, others from fabric. Bits of blueprints and novels and stationery, folded and cut and shaped into a flock of striped tents, all tied together with more string in black and white and red. They are bound to bits of clockwork, pieces of mirror, stumps of dripping candles.

In the center of the room, on a round wooden table that is painted black but inlaid with light stripes of mother-of-pearl, there is a small iron cauldron. Inside it a fire burns merrily, the flames bright and white, casting long shadows across the space.

Celia takes a step into the room, ducking to avoid the strings that hang from the ceiling. The sensation is identical to entering the circus, even down to the scent of caramel lingering in the air, but there is something deeper beneath it, something heavy and ancient underlying the paper and string.

Marco stays in the doorway as Celia navigates carefully around the room, mindful of the sweep of her gown as she peers into the tiny tents and runs her fingers delicately over the bits of string and clockwork.

“This is very old magic, isn’t it?” she asks.

“It’s the only kind I know,” Marco responds. He tugs a string by the doorway and the movement reverberates throughout the room, the entire model circus sparkling as bits of metal catch the firelight. “Though I doubt it was ever meant for this purpose.”

Celia pauses at a tent containing a tree branch covered in candle wax. Orienting herself from there, she locates another, gently pushing open the paper door to find a ring of tiny chairs representing her own performance space.

The pages that comprise it are printed with Shakespearean sonnets.

Celia lets the paper door swing closed.

She finishes her tentative tour around the room and rejoins Marco in the doorway, pulling the door closed softly behind her.

The sensation of being within the circus fades as soon as she has crossed the threshold, and she is suddenly acutely aware of everything in the adjoining room. The warmth of the fire fighting against the draft from the windows. The scent of Marco’s skin beneath the ink and his cologne.

“Thank you for showing me that,” she says.

“I take it your father would not approve?” Marco asks.

“I don’t particularly care what my father approves of any longer.”

Celia wanders past the desk and stops in front of the fireplace, watching the miniature pages turning through time on the clock upon the mantel.

Next to the clock there sits a solitary playing card. The two of hearts. It bears no sign that it was once pierced with an Ottoman dagger. No evidence that Celia’s blood has ever marred its surface, but she knows that it is the same card.

“I could speak with Alexander,” Marco suggests. “Perhaps he saw enough to provide a verdict, or this will result in some sort of disqualification. I’m certain he thinks me a disappointment at this point, he could declare you the win—”

“Stop,” Celia says without turning. “Please, stop talking. I don’t want to talk about this damned game.”

Marco attempts to protest but his voice catches in his throat. He struggles against it but finds he is unable to speak.

His shoulders fall in a silent sigh.

“I am tired of trying to hold things together that cannot be held,” Celia says when he approaches her. “Trying to control what cannot be controlled. I am tired of denying myself what I want for fear of breaking things I cannot fix. They will break no matter what we do.”

She leans against his chest and he wraps his arms around her, gently stroking the back of her neck with an ink-stained hand. They stay like this for some time, alongside the crackling of the fire and the ticking of the clock.

When she lifts her head, he keeps his eyes locked on hers as he slides her coat from her shoulders, resting his hands on her bare arms.

The familiar passion that always accompanies the touch of his skin against hers washes over Celia and she can no longer resist it, no longer wants to.

“Marco,” she says, her fingers fumbling with the buttons on his vest. “Marco, I—”

His lips are on hers, hot and demanding, before she can finish.

While she undoes button after button, he pulls blindly at fastenings and ribbons, refusing to take his lips from hers.

The meticulously constructed gown collapses into a puddle around her feet.

Wrapping the unbound laces of her corset around his wrists, Marco pulls her down to the floor with him.

They continue to remove layer after layer until nothing separates them.

Trapped in silence, Marco traces apologies and adorations across Celia’s body with his tongue. Mutely expressing all the things he cannot speak aloud.

He finds other ways to tell her, his fingers leaving faint trails of ink in their wake. He savors every sound he elicits from her.

The entire room trembles as they come together.

And though there are a great many fragile objects contained within it, nothing breaks.

Above them, the clock continues to turn its pages, pushing stories too minuscule to read ever onward.

MARCO DOES NOT REMEMBER FALLING ASLEEP. One moment Celia is curled in his arms, her head resting against his chest as she listens to his heart beating, and the next he is alone.

The fire has died down to smoldering embers. The grey dawn creeps in through the windows, casting soft shadows.

Upon the two of hearts on the mantel, there sits a silver band engraved in Latin. Marco smiles, slipping Celia’s ring onto his pinkie, alongside the scar on his ring finger.

He does not notice until later that the leather-bound safeguard that had been on his desk is gone.