His second knife hit the first and ricocheted off, landing on the ground.
“Fuck, he’s got good aim,” I mumbled.
Bobbitt finally glanced up when she finished twisting her balloon into a dinosaur.
“Oh, yeah, Zero’s aim is impressive alright.” She clicked her tongue. “The only thing sharper than those knives is his temper.”
I scoffed a laugh. That checked out perfectly.
He launched blade after blade at the target, barely pausing in between. If he wasn’t performing right in front of my eyes, I would have sworn it was some kind of CGI effect. His movements were impossibly graceful, and he looked like some kind of hilarious assassin.
When he was finished, the knives wedged in the target made a perfect smiley face, the one dead center marking the nose.
With one last glare toward where I sat in the stands, he walked off the arena floor. A shiver worked through me, but I tried not to linger on it much. I could always dwell on it while I lay awake that night on the clown bus, feet away from the psycho fucker.
For now, there was still more circus to see and one final alpha to perform.
“Do you believe in magic?” Hallow’s voice echoed through the space yet again. They addressed the empty stadium as though it was packed, but their eyes kept landing in mine and Bobbitt’s direction.
They might have wanted me to see the show, but something told me it wasn’tmethey were looking at.
“Our last alpha act will have you questioning reality and second-guessing your senses,” Hallow went on, pointing their cane straight at us. Bobbitt grinned wide at their acknowledgement. “Their act defies reason and gives new meaning to the wordunbelievable.A word of advice…”
They paused dramatically, a crooked smile lighting up their face. “Don’t blink.”
Before I could even register the warning, every light illuminating the arena blinked out, casting the entire performance area in darkness. I caught my breath, wondering if something had malfunctioned, but then a wave of sapphire light spilled over the entire hall. The music shifted to a slower, more ominous track, and hundreds of tiny white lights sparked to life across the ceiling. They glowed serenely like stars in the night sky.
That was when it sank in.
This was Night’s performance.
As though thinking his name conjured him into existence, a figure appeared in front of the carousel. I wasn’t sure if he’d materialized between one blink and another, but I couldn’t recall how he got there.
He was justthere.
The lights played over his features, glinting off the metallic mask that covered half his face. He looked just like the picture of him on the flyer, down to the blazer and top hat he wore. He was the epitome of what a magician should be.
I’d seen magic tricks before, both at birthday parties when I was a kid and on television. Card tricks, sleight of hand, vanishing objects. I thought I knew what to expect from a circus magician, but I was wrong.
Night’s performance wasn’t just magic; it was an experience.
From the lights overhead twinkling in and out of existence at his command, to him vanishing and reappearing, to fireworks exploding out of his hat. He walked through walls, escaped a lock box that an assistant locked him in, and even shattered the mirrors on the carousel, only for them to be intact moments later.
He was one person, but he somehow filled the entire hall with his energy. With hismagic.
I knew magic wasn’t real, it was a fallacy people used to escape the harsh truths of real life, but by the end of the alpha’s performance, I found myself questioning everything I’d seen. Surely, for how spectacular it was, some of it had to be real…
No, that’s silly.
Still, I couldn’t help but entertain the idea.
At the end of the show, there was a grand finale, complete with fireworks and a choreographed dance. By the time everyone had bowed and made their way off stage, I was sad it was over. I wanted to watch it again and again, to lose myself in the whimsy that was the Knotty Sideshow.
“So whatdaya think?” Bobbitt giggled. “Was it amazing, or what?”
“Yeah, I think you might be right,” I breathed, staring down at the empty arena. “I’m pretty sure that was the best show on Earth.”
“Told ya!” She nudged me playfully with her elbow.
