◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

Cover art coming soon!

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ PROLOGUE ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

The one thing civilisations everywhere so often fail to realise is that change typically comes from those they shun. It’s with the individuals who yearn for a better life in a world where that dream seems nigh impossible that the very foundations of a society are inevitably shaken to its core.In the centre of a reasonably large cavern, in the heart of the city Khaliis, located on the planet Akaara in a solar system far from your own, sat a circus tent. Surrounded by a shallow ditch and facing a half-circle of tiered seating already packed with the eager bodies of Akaaran inhabitants, anticipation built as they waited for the show to begin. The cavern buzzed with their excited voices as each clamoured to be heard over their peers.The soft glow of cyan lichen hanging from the cavern’s ceiling illuminated the domineering form of the circus tent as it seemed to breathe with a life of its own. It towered over the audience, keeping a watchful eye on the archae and dreer in the stands.Separating it from the crowd, on the side of the ditch facing the audience, several vrahl soldiers stood at attention. Their fingers lay lax on the triggers of their lowered guns, prepared to quell any onlookers who became too boisterous.A sudden spark to the left of the tent flickered to life and flared into an inferno. It roared around to fill the ditch with a blazing wall of fire and the crowd to devolved into a swell of raucous howls and cheering.Without appearing to have been touched, the entrance flaps of the circus tent rolled upwards, exposing a deep mass of shadow within. The darkness seemed to shudder; and then, with his metal-tipped cane beating a steady clack, clack, clack rhythm against the ground, the blue-grey form of a vrahl emerged. He paced forward, head high and eyes narrowed, and surveyed his audience with a patronising smirk. From his shoulders hung an intricate red and gold showman’s coat that billowed slightly in his wake.The audience’s roars of excitement rose to a crescendo as they watched the Ringmaster come to a stop in the middle of the stage. One final clack rung throughout the cavern, and the vrahl paused for a moment to bask in their attention.Then, with a dramatic flourish of his four arms, he swept into a low bow.He held his bow for a moment while the crowd hollered. When he straightened, he slammed his cane down against the ground twice in quick succession and waited.The audience let their voices peter out as they leant forward in anticipation.With a sly grin on his face and slight raise of his arms, the Ringmaster began to speak. “Greetings! I extend a warm welcome to all vrahl, archae and dreer here today. If this is your first time attending, well… let us just say that I certainly have an interesting show lined up for you.”With his cane punctuating each step, the Ringmaster began to pace. “As you all know, there is nothing in Khaliis – or on Akaara – quite like what you are about to witness. I have made it my mission to gather the most outrageous freaks from all corners of the Underground for your entertainment today. Freaks with deformities. Degenerates who have undergone repulsive procedures to alter their appearance. There is even one who is the bastard offspring of an archae and dreer!”At the gasps and muttering that rippled through the crowd, he spread his arms to either side, pacing slowing minutely. “I know! Tragic times indeed when such filth can even think to walk our tunnels and pollute our society. But alas, it is more common than you would believe, and I have only the most pathetic to show before you today. But I am sure you are all eager to witness these monstrosities yourself, no?” As a low murmur spread through the crowd the Ringmaster raised his voice. “Well? Do you want to see them?!”The Ringmaster raised an arm, gesturing to the audience and cocking an eyebrow. They responded with a resounding roar of “YES!” and he chuckled, motioning for them to fall silent once more.“Then you shall wait no longer!” With an exaggerated swish of his coat the vrahl turned to the side and moved to stand at the tent’s entrance. He extended his cane to point within. “Without further ado, allow me to introduce… SIDESHOW…”From within the circus tent’s depths, figures began to move.The first to emerge was a dark grey archae adorned with white and red markings. He lacked the horns and iider-limbs typical of his species and instead sported a mane of long red hair. His movements were fluid as he twirled twin fire sticks between his hands as if they weighed nothing.As Sideshow stepped further out of the tent, he leaned forward to breathe fire in a wide arc towards the audience, falling in line before the Ringmaster when the roaring flames flickered down to a more controlled smoulder.“…FREAKSHOW…”The hulking figure of a massive dreer lumbered from the tent next. Her brown and cream fur accentuated her sharp amber eyes, and her clawed fingers dragged across the ground as she hunched forward, burdened by her own weight. She bellowed to announce her arrival, and several dreer in the crowd cringed back from the sheer magnitude of sound she emitted.“…NINEPIN…”Juggling long circus pins with two hands – instead of the four his species usually possessed – a dark brown and gold hornless vrahl followed Freakshow out. He barely had to look at his props as he tossed them around with an impressive degree of coordination.His face was devoid of emotion, but as Ninepin moved to join the rest of the crew, he dipped his head in a graceful acknowledgement of the Circus’ spectators.“…PARADE…”The whirlwind of ribbon and fluttering fans that strutted purposefully from the tent next heralded the arrival of a white, orange, pink, and cyan dreer.Shameless and alluring, Parade’s mere presence ensnared the audience. He smiled cockily at the crowd and pirouetted to flaunt his body to the judgemental eyes of his onlookers, bathing in every morsel of attention – the positive and the negative – directed his way.“…CAROUSEL…”Following Parade, the next to timidly step from the tent was a young beige-coloured archae, back adorned with countless iider-limbs that moved and jittered in a mesmerising display. They flickered in front of and around her, distorting her outline to make her seem larger and more dangerous; but despite her attempts to look bigger, Carousel herself seemed to shrink under the prying eyes of the crowd. She hurried to fall in line.“…DAREDEVIL…”In an explosion of movement and colour so drastically different from the crewmate before her, the shape of a red, white, and yellow dreer-archae hybrid rocketed from the tent. As she launched herself into the air to complete a dramatic mid-air somersault, the small wings on Daredevil’s back fluttered.When she landed, the hybrid barred her teeth into a devilish grin and pounced to Carousel’s side, tail sweeping side to side playfully. She seemed oblivious to the scornful muttering that swept the crowd at her appearance.“…and JESTER!”Last to stalk from the tent was a black, white, and red vrahl who lifted his head defiantly to gaze out over the audience, challenge in his eyes and confidence in his steps. Although he lacked his horns – a symbol of pride and status for those in vrahl society – the knives he flicked between his four hands with delicate mastery marked him as no less deadly than his brethren. A knife sash hung from his left shoulder, and with the precision of a trained killer he punctuated his entrance by throwing each of the weapons into the bullseyes of targets strung high above the audience’s heads.As the crowd roared for action, and with all introductions finished, the Ringmaster turned back to his onlookers and splayed his hands to the sides. He took a moment to bask in their growing excitement, his circus freaks displayed for all to see.Here, in the bowels of the planet Akaara, beneath cyan-coloured lichen and the heat of a thousand howling bodies, is where our story begins: with seven outcasts, their keeper, and a circus tent. Oblivious to war and the true circumstances that led them to be here, they perform, day in and day out, for those that mock their existence. Although none are aware, everything they know about their world, themselves and each other is – not for the first time – about to change forever.In a lull of the crowd’s cheering, when the fire surrounding them burns bright and dangerous, the Ringmaster chuckles lowly and tosses his head back, smile crazed. “Welcome…” he says, and the audience frenzies, “…to the Novelty Circus!”

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 1 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

Of the millions of Akaarans forced to flee their homes and rebuild hundreds of feet below their planet’s surface, only eight could say their lives hadn’t changed all that much. After all, to ‘rebuild’ you must have already had and lost something worth keeping. Without that, the process of moving from one place to another was nothing more than a test of how easily you could adapt.If there was one thing the Novelty Circus knew how to do above almost all else, it was adapt.With narrowed eyes and clenched jaws, Freakshow and Parade slowly circled each other. The air hung heavy between them. Despite being the same species, both dreer were as different to each other as the sun was to Akaara’s moons.Freakshow, despite her enormous size, moved with incredible fluidity. Her lumbering form was the perfect balance between brutishly threatening and terrifyingly precise, footsteps heavy with the weight of keeping her tall frame upright but carefully calculated in their positioning. Her long claws emitted a low hsssssss as they furrowed lines in the sandy floor of the circus tent, knuckles almost brushing the ground as she hunched into a more comfortable and defensive gait. A low growl rumbled deep within her chest.In a stark contrast to the larger dreer, Parade moved with the grace of the wind and the cockiness of someone who always got his way. In his right hand he held a fan which he used to obscure the lower half of his face, while his left hand held a stick that guided a long red ribbon through effortless, never-ending arcs around his body. His spine was straight, shoulders pushed back to puff out his chest, and as he walked he seemed to sway back and forth as if caught in an invisible tide – not unlike a dancer waiting for a cue to lapse into their next sequences of elegant moves.Around and around each other they tread, until, with little preamble, Freakshow suddenly halted and lunged in Parade’s direction. She added power to her sprint by thrusting off the ground with her massive hands. Her low growl rose in volume, rhythmically broken by huffs of exertion as she drew closer to her foe.With a flutter of his fan, Parade ceased his pacing and turned to face her. He held his ground, fearlessly staring down the bigger dreer, while around him the ribbon picked up speed.The air began to hum as the fabric cut through it. Parade’s body rocked side to side as he pushed himself to move the ribbon faster and faster.Just as Freakshow crouched lower in her stride, intending to launch herself at Parade, the ribbon – which moments before had seemed to be everywhere, weaving a chaotic sphere of fabric around its wielder – seemed to completely vanish as Parade quickly drew his arm back and snapped it forward and back again with such a tremendous amount of force that—CRACK!Freakshow clumsily skid to a halt as the ribbon ripped through the air mere inches from her muzzle. She scrambled to lurch out of the twirler’s range, massive claws now hindering her attempt to flee.With a satisfied flutter of his fan, Parade raised his head high and smirked. His ribbon began weaving loops around him once more – until, with a grunt of surprise, he himself staggered back when Freakshow gathered her paws beneath her and abruptly changed direction.The ribbon, now only moving at a fraction of the speed it was before, was too slow to stop Freakshow as she ducked through a window in its curve and jumped, ready to bodily tackle Parade to the ground.Reacting fast, Parade leant backwards and let his body drop. He swiftly folded his fan and placed it in his mouth before planting his hand beneath him, keeping his body suspended mere inches above the sand and dirt of the ground below.Freakshow was too late to stop her momentum as she soared over the dreer, through where his torso had just been and close enough that Parade could feel the air tickle his fur in her wake. She skidded to a stop a few feet away when she landed and whipped around to face her foe as his ribbon hit the ground.Using the force of his fall to push himself back upright, Parade gracefully spun to face Freakshow. He flicked the fan from his clenched teeth and snapped it open with a flutter, ribbon once more whirring to life in a buzzing storm of fabric around him.Freakshow hunched, growl returning, and braced to leap a second time. Parade crouched slightly, prepared to again snap his ribbon out at his enemy. But as the twirler began to draw his arm forward and Freakshow snorted, ready to lunge, the flame-engulfed end of a firestick sheared through the air between them and brought both to an abrupt stop.Sideshow stepped forward, eyeing each dreer carefully.They backed off and began circling each other once more. Both pairs of eyes stayed glued to the archae’s figure in the middle as he raised the firestick and let it spin into rhythm with the second burning prop he wielded.The fire dancer spun the sticks in small, fast arcs. The quicker they moved, the more the flames seemed to weave an elaborate tapestry into the very air around him.Parade and Freakshow were mesmerised.The spinner performed like this for a moment, a beautiful display of flexibility and fire. The sticks twirled, faster and faster.Just as it didn’t seem like they could pick up any more speed, Sideshow extended the right stick behind him, brought the left up to his face, and breathed out a roaring arc of fire as he pirouetted in a neat circle.Parade and Freakshow stumbled away from the flames and fell to the ground, heads tilted away in deference.When his pirouette was complete and the flames sputtered out, Sideshow straightened.He raised his head and puffed out his chest, shoulders angled back, chest heaving. He splayed the firesticks to the sides of his body, and after a few seconds of holding the pose the archae stooped into a low bow, panting hard.There was complete stillness inside the circus tent for a moment. Everything around the three had faded into the background, thoughts quelled by the rapid pumping of blood and their own laboured exhales. Their lungs fought to regain enough oxygen.It was the blissful moments like this – basking in the aftermath of exertion and the emptiness of the mind that came with it – that almost made the three forget why they needed to engage in such faux fights in the first place.Almost.“They’re so cool! That practise was perfect!”The hushed voice, high in pitch and full of unconcealed awe, jolted Sideshow out of the trace-like state he’d entered when he, Freakshow and Parade first began their mock performance. A small smile wormed its way onto his face, and he twitched his ear in amusement as his consciousness gradually came back to reality.The fire dancer looked up to see Freakshow clambering to her feet, Parade flat on his back a short distance away. His hands were dramatically splayed over his face while he caught his breath.Beyond them, the wide eyes of Carousel and Daredevil – the crew’s youngest members – stared at the trio in wonder. Daredevil’s mouth hung open in a goofy grin from where she had whisper-shouted the words to her friend, and Carousel was nodding her head vigorously in agreement.Sideshow rose from his bow. He was about to open his mouth to gently remind the kids to return to their own rehearsal, when he glanced right and caught the eye of Ninepin, the crew’s juggler. The vrahl, who was flicking carnival pins between his two hands as effortlessly as Sideshow spun his own firesticks, gave the archae a sharp look and flicked his eyes to the entrance of the tent and back again.Sideshow’s heart froze and the words died in his throat. A weight dropped in his stomach as he remembered why he and his crew were backstage rehearsing in the first place.With a shaky breath in, the fire dancer quickly schooled his expression and turned. Around him, he could feel the air grow thick with tension as the rest of the crew noticed the new presence nearby.In the doorway of the tent, just inside the entrance flap that had rolled down to shroud him from the eyes of the departing audience outside, was Puzzal Novelty – current Ringmaster of the Novelty Circus and, in Sideshow’s humble opinion, the biggest prick on Akaara. The vrahl’s two pairs of arms were crossed, eyes narrowed and expression scornful as he pinned Sideshow with the raging, furious glare he specifically reserved for his crew.When Puzzal saw the archae looking, he pushed off the support beam he had been leaning on and stalked toward the fire dancer, eyes alight with anger. He thrust his cane – the one he used in all the Circus’ performances, either as a prop or to keep the crew in line – harshly against the floor, trying to make it clack threateningly. The attempt, of course, failed spectacularly when instead of meeting a solid surface, the cane sunk into the sand and dirt beneath his feet and muted any noise it might have otherwise made.If Sideshow didn’t know any better, and if he wasn’t mentally preparing himself for what came next, he might have laughed.…scratch that, he definitely would have laughed.But he did know better. And seeing as he was currently too occupied bracing for the Ringmaster’s next move (avoiding eye contact? Check. Bowing head in humiliating submission? Check. Levelling breathing? Getting there. Relaxing muscles? Could be happening faster) he kept his face carefully neutral to not give anything away. Sideshow had been in the circus far too long and valued the lives of his crew far too much to make such an idiotic mistake.“‘Perfect’,” the vrahl mocked with a sneered as he stormed closer. “I will say, Sideshow, that practise looked better than the trash you usually perform. It certainly looked better than the disaster you and your rejects just put on stage. First show back in Khaliis in a year and you have already made me look like a fool!”The ‘disaster’ Puzzal was referring to were two missteps Parade and Sideshow made during the performance they had just finished: the same performance the Ringmaster had only just wrapped up by reminding the crowds to spread the news the Circus was in town.It had happened during the same act that Sideshow, Freakshow and Parade had just rehearsed – which was why the trio had been practising that specific set right after showtime in the first place. Sideshow knew that if Puzzal had come backstage after dismissing the crowds and didn’t see the crew trying to rectify their mistakes before the next show, they would have been in for a much larger world of hurt.The mistake Parade made had been when Freakshow went to double back and launch her ‘surprise’ attack. Parade, who was supposed to drop to the ground, put his fan in his mouth and catch himself with the same hand, had instead fumbled the actions, successfully biting down on the fan but failing to put his hand beneath his body in time. He had hit the ground hard, and although it was a simple mistake – one which barely impacted the performance considering the ribbon-twirler had swiftly rolled to his feet as if nothing happened – it had been enough for Sideshow to catch a glimpse of Puzzal’s outrage.Sideshow, of course, had to mess up after that, too – although unlike Parade, his mistake was intentional. When it came time for him to breathe out his arc of flames, instead of spinning anti-clockwise like the Ringmaster had drilled into him countless times before, he had dropped to one knee and awkwardly shuffled in a clockwise direction.He hadn’t done it because he didn’t know the routine – Fer knows he’d performed it enough times to have every action ingrained in muscle memory – but rather that, as the crew’s de facto leader (because Puzzal was decidedly not their leader, he was their keeper), it was Sideshow’s duty to keep the others safe.If the Ringmaster insisted on meeting mistakes with disproportionately severe punishments, then Sideshow would much rather shoulder those punishments himself than see his crew suffer.The archae knew that Puzzal knew what he was doing, but the vrahl didn’t seem to care. He and Sideshow had been playing this game of cat and mouse for years.Sideshow deliberated messed up to overshadow his crew’s accidental failures, and Puzzal used him like a punching bag.That was just the way things went.Honestly, Sideshow was starting to think the beatings were personal.At least he knew the Ringmaster wouldn’t cause any lasting damage on the first day of their tour in a new city.“The city is going to think the Novelty Circus is pathetic,” Puzzal snapped, coming to a stop before Sideshow, “and whose fault is that?”Sideshow found it vaguely amusing that the vrahl subconsciously thrust his chest forward and raised his arms in an attempt to appear bigger than he actually was. It wasn’t very effective considering the archae still dwarfed his height by at least a foot.“Mine, sir,” Sideshow said clearly. He looked to the ground and kept his head ducked in a half-hearted attempt to appear smaller.Best to let Puzzal get his power trip over and done with as fast as possible.The Ringmaster evidently didn’t think he looked apologetic enough – as if saying sorry and rolling over like a dog would fix the imaginary shambles his reputation had fallen into – because one minute Sideshow was standing, and the next a loud TWACK and blinding pain to the side of his calf sent the fire dancer tumbling to the ground.Sideshow yelped in pain and cringed away. The Ringmaster drew back his cane for another strike. Seconds later, it cracked down against the soft flesh between the archae’s shoulder and neck. Sideshow groaned and coughed, vision swimming.“Yours,” the Ringmaster hissed. He started to slowly pace around the downed archae. “It will be your fault if Akaara sees the Circus as anything less than the saving grace it was meant to be.”Between the way his eyelids threatened to flutter shut, Sideshow could see the rest of his crew turn from the scene and go back to their rehearsals. They all wore matching expressions of barely concealed bitter hatred.Good. They didn’t have to like what was happening, but staying out of it was better than getting involved in a situation they couldn’t change.“So I will not,” the Ringmaster continued, stopping behind Sideshow and cracking his cane against his spine, “tolerate another mistake like that again,” he brought it down a second time, and Sideshow screamed. “Is that understood?”When Sideshow failed to nod quick enough, mind too preoccupied with processing the pain radiating from his back, the Ringmaster brought his cane down once more. The archae gritted his teeth around a muffled howl.“I said, is that understood?”Sideshow jerked his head yes and grunted a strangled confirmation. Puzzal stepped forward and aimed a brutal kick to his skull. The fire dancer couldn’t stop the whine of agony that escaped his throat as his tongue was flooded by the metallic taste of blood.The vrahl knelt and pulled Sideshow’s head up by his long red mane of fur. “Good,” he sneered, leaning closer with a hushed voice, “because if you want your pretty little family to stay safe, make sure no other mistakes happen for the rest of the Khaliis tour.”With that, Puzzal stood up straight, tossed Sideshow away, and stormed to the back of the circus tent. As he neared his sectioned-off quarters, walls made of the same fabric as the rest of the tent around them, the door automatically rolled up out of the way. It swiftly closed once Puzzal was inside.With the Ringmaster gone, silence descended on the crew.Sideshow shakily pushed himself into a sitting position. He brought a hand up to massage where the Ringmaster’s foot had connected with his jaw and winced when he touched the furred skin.Ouch. That was going to bruise.After a few tense moments of silence, a soft creak sounded from the tent around them, and the crew immediately sprang into action.Freakshow and Parade rushed to Sideshow’s side. Freakshow gently helped him stay upright as the archae swayed precariously, vision still swimming from the lingering pain of the cane on his spine. Parade knelt to check his shoulder and calf, exhaling in relief when he deemed them not too badly injured. He quickly moved to check the archae’s back.

Ninepin shifted closer, eyeing Sideshow critically. A short distance away, Carousel ran to pick up Sideshow’s firesticks – he didn’t even remember dropping them – from where they had been kicked away during Puzzal’s beating. Two ends had sputtered out, and a third was close to dimming, but the fourth was still going strong.The acrobat quickly collected both and dumped them into a water basin nearby. Around the crew, the circus tent seemed to sag in relief now the burning open flames were gone.A disapproving sigh came from behind Sideshow as Parade lightly touched his back. “Blood,” the dreer said at the same time Sideshow hissed and flinched away. “Only shallow, but we all know how annoying back wounds are.”They did know. If anyone in the crew hadn’t suffered one themselves, they’d seen Sideshow deal with them many times before.Performing with back wounds was a pain because it was almost impossible for the injury to heal properly. The continuous aggravation as the circus member twisted and stretched meant that the cut would take weeks to heal, when normally it should only take a few days.Sideshow let his head droop in annoyance and leant further against Freakshow.At Parade’s words, Daredevil scrambled to the fringes of the tent and rifled through a satchel full of plants. She withdrew a few clumps of moss while Jester strode over to fill a small bowl with water from the basin. They returned to Parade when each had their respective items and laid them by his feet.The dreer nodded his head in thanks, picked up a small portion of the moss, dipped it in the water, and began gingerly mopping Sideshow’s injuries.The crew gathered close as the fire dancer grit his teeth and tried not to whine every time the moss touched the cut. The pain was starting to dull, and it wasn’t like this was the worst injury he’d ever received, but the aftershock of Puzzal’s beatings always made Sideshow’s mind feel annoyingly… floaty. It was hard to focus on anything but the stinging sensation.He realised that he needed to speak – to reassure his crew that he was okay, everything was alright – but words seemed to slip through his mind like water in a sieve.Thankfully, Jester spoke first.“I am going to kill that vrahl someday,” the knife-thrower spat. His eyes burned with anger as he stared at the bowl Parade was using to rinse the moss. The water had started to tinge red.Ninepin, ever the most logical and straightforward of the group, was the one to respond. “We have been over this, Jester. If you lay a finger on anyone outside the crew, you will most certainly be executed.”“I do not care!” the black and white vrahl snapped back. “Puzzal’s punishments are cruel and unfair. How does he expect us to perform his shows perfectly if he constantly injures us?”Ninepin narrowed his eyes. “The severity of our punishments is—"“Don’t fight,” Sideshow interrupted hoarsely, finally finding his voice. Ninepin and Jester fell silent. The latter glared frustratedly at the ground and former watched with indifference. “The Circus might not be fair, but it’s the way things are. At least we get enough food, water, and protection to survive.” His words were tired. They had been over this topic a thousand times before. “I hate Puzzal just as much as you, Jester, but it’s okay. He didn’t hurt me that bad, see? You really think I’d let that arrogant vrahl keep me down?”A glimmer of understanding flickered in Jester’s eyes. His lips quirked slightly as Sideshow shot him a goofy, slightly pained grin. The knife thrower relaxed minutely and shook his head in wonderous disbelief. “Of course not, Sideshow. Nothing he does seems to keep you down for long.”“Exactly,” Sideshow agreed. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Daredevil and Carousel deflate from where they had been tensed together. His faux cheery demeanour seemed to put them at ease, which was exactly what the archae had hoped for.He was glad Jester picked up on his plan. The less anxious and wound up his crew was, the less likely they were to make mistakes; and if the threat Puzzal had just given him was real, which Sideshow was sure it was, he wanted to make sure none of their previous mistakes – or any new ones – followed them into the next performance.Sure, the places the cane had struck stung bad enough to bring tears to his eyes, but Sideshow was nothing if not perseverant. Receiving similar lashing for years might not have made the pain any less sharp, but it had made the aftermath easier to cope with.Confident that Daredevil and Carousel weren’t about to go into a panic, Sideshow glanced over to Ninepin. “Now, Nine – anything to share?”That phrase was their cue to enter the short debrief period Sideshow and Ninepin conducted after every show.Ninepin, who had one of the least active roles of the crew, would observe from his spot on the sidelines and report back if anything notable cropped up during a performance. Sideshow appreciated his criticisms because the vrahl didn’t hold back when stating his mind, and in the Circus – where the improvement of one act could mean the difference between whether you completed the rest of a city’s tour painlessly or painfully – it was well worth the brutal honesty. Everyone in the crew had learnt not to take his words personally long ago.Ninepin stood straighter and nodded. “You already know of yours and Parade’s mistakes, but the things the Ringmaster did not pick up on were that Carousel needs to improve her footwork during the tightrope act, and Daredevil needs to be more expressive during their trapeze act. A few extra somersaults or backflips would liven it up and garner a bigger reaction from the audience.”Carousel and Daredevil nodded at his words. Their eyebrows narrowed as they contemplated how to change their act to accommodate the advice.Ninepin continued. “Freakshow should be louder. Her roars seem powerful enough from the stage, but the Khaliis arena is larger than the one we performed in at Suudnval. The very back row of the audience should feel just as intimidated as the front.”Freakshow, Parade and Daredevil all winced at the thought of how loud an even louder Freakshow would be. Her regular roars hurt their sensitive dreer ears enough; louder ones were going to be deafening.“Jester’s aim is good, but he has performed the same act for three city tours now. It might not happen today, but it would be worth changing his set for the rest of the Khaliis trip.”Jester nodded in acknowledgement.As Ninepin finished speaking, Parade finished covering Sideshow’s wound with moss. The archae quietly muttered his thanks.With the vrahl’s analysis of the crew’s first Khaliis performance concluded, the fire dancer looked around his crew. “Everyone good with that? You each know what to improve for your next acts?”At their hesitant nods, Sideshow cocked an eyebrow. “I asked is everyone good with that?”This time the crew nodded more confidently, chiming in with verbal confirmations.“Alright then. Go make sure you’re all prepared for the next show,” Sideshow ordered. “We’ll focus on organising dinner after today’s performances.”At his command, the crew dispersed. Sideshow was content to sit and watch for a moment.He wasn’t worried about Puzzal disrupting them again. Once the Ringmaster had completed a show, he never emerged from his quarters until the next show was ready to begin. Sideshow had no idea what the vrahl did through each three-hour period of downtime, but he was glad it gave his crew some respite from their Ringmaster.Daredevil bounded off outside the tent to check if her trapeze equipment needed replacing. Jester moved to Carousel’s side, quietly asking her a question that made the younger archae smile thankfully and nod. Ninepin strode over to a low table and swapped his current juggling pins for heavier ones.Sideshow turned to where Parade was still kneeling by his back. The dreer was glaring at the ground, and Sideshow could tell he wanted to say something, but when a few moments passed and Parade hadn’t opened his mouth the archae decided to let his friend be. He turned back and gave Freakshow a gentle tap on the arm.Freakshow rose to her feet, dragging Sideshow up with her. He winced a little as his wound stretched, but the expression was quickly overtaken by a soft smile when Freakshow bumped her muzzle against his forehead affectionately.He headbutted her shoulder back and slipped past her with a sigh. The next performance would start soon, and Sideshow had new firesticks to prepare.As he left, Freakshow turned to Parade. The smaller dreer had raised his eyes and was now staring vacantly after the fire dancer.‘Need a hand?’ Freakshow signed, stepping closer to extend a paw.Parade’s head moved slowly toward her. He looked lost for a few seconds, glancing between her face and outstretched hand, until the words finally registered, and his expression darkened into a look of contempt.Parade climbed to his feet without assistance and took several steps away from his crewmate.Freakshow’s mouth thinned in annoyance. She lifted her hands to sign something, but Parade ignored her and sauntered deeper into the tent.With a frustrated growl, the larger dreer turned away. She bent to collect the abandoned bowl of bloodied water and lumbered off in the opposite direction, intending to dispose of its contents outside.A short distance away, Sideshow watched the interaction from where he was withdrawing his now-ruined firesticks from the crew’s water basin.He knew why Parade was being so hostile to Freakshow, but that really wasn’t a conversation he wanted to start right now – not when the resulting talk would likely set Parade’s nerves on edge even more than Sideshow already suspected they were.No, Sideshow had bigger things to focus on. Namely, figuring out how he was going to perform the next show properly whilst dealing with a back wound.Unfortunately, irrespective of how much Sideshow wished the opposite to be true, it was as the Ringmaster always said:The show must go on.

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 2 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

The rest of the day’s shows passed in a blur. To the crew’s relief, no other mistakes were made.At least, none the Ringmaster noticed.It was usually easy to conceal the small slip-ups at this point. Their time in the circus had forced them to become crafty, hiding their exhaustion from all the relentless travelling, rehearsing, and performing behind overexaggerated flourishes and distractions.For the most part, when his attention wasn’t required during a show, Puzzal had ignored them. He’d only spared the group – most notably Sideshow – venomous glares in passing; and when the last show had finished and the audience dispersed, he did what he always did; walked into the tent, entered his quarters, retrieved a bag of shards that had been collected from circus’ attendees as the entry fee (enough that purchasing most anything wouldn’t be an issue), and left the crew behind as he made for Khaliis’ city centre.This part of the Ringmaster’s routine was most of the crew’s favourite time of day because it was then that finally, finally they could take a moment to simply relax.Puzzal would leave at exactly 30:30 on the dot, and wouldn’t return until 10:00 the next morning, giving the crew a whole sixteen and half hours of respite from his scrutinising glowers and limited patience. It was perfect for them to quell the hunger they’d had since breakfast, wind down in each other’s company, and get the sleep they so desperately needed.But while most of the crew would say this free time was fantastic, Parade would beg to differ.If you asked him his thoughts, he would say those hours were, in fact, almost more torturous than performing in the shows themselves.Of course, that was an exaggeration.…Maybe.But the point was that Parade hated when the crew had down time, because then there was nothing to distract him from the whirlwind of memories that plagued his mind.Honestly, how was a dreer supposed to repress his own thoughts if not by being the centre of everyone else’s attention?He knew, realistically, that his body needed the break – had learnt it the hard way from too many nights locked in the fetal position, unable to move after how far he’d pushed himself – but that didn’t mean he was happy about it. In fact, Parade was rather pissed. His body should instead decide to simply be better. He hadn’t spent all his money on looking this damn good only to be seen five times a day and still feel guilty about his emotions. People should be fawning over him ‘round the clock and he should be basking in it. Was that really so much to ask?Apparently the universe thought ‘yes’, because here he was standing by his stupid travel pack near one of Tent’s inner walls, scowling furiously as he tried to stop his stupid brain from imploding. He’d finished packing up his stupid fan and stupid ribbons for the day and was now leant against the stupid table they were arranged on, glaring at the stupid countertop like it had personally offended him.So maybe it hadn’t offended him yet, but it could! He had to be cautious. Had to be prepared. You never know when a table will get in your way, and Parade had to make sure it knew who was in charge. What would happen if he turned to walk away from someone and boom, table? He would look like an idiot. A fool. A joke. He couldn’t have that, not in the slightest. The tables needed to know he wouldn’t fall for their tricks so they would never have the audacity to stop him when he wanted to go somewhere. It’d pay off in the long run, he was sure.And— wow, okay, maybe Parade was better at distracting himself with his thoughts than he realised. Talk about unhealthy ways to deal with your emotions. Venting his personal grievances against a piece of wood had to be a new low, even for him.With a long-suffering sigh, Parade decided to stop using tables as a scapegoat for his feelings and confront his problems in the least confronting way possible. And that was by glaring at the dreer that had made his brain run laps in the first place.Freakshow was talking with Ninepin, who seemed to be giving her tips on an error he’d noticed in her last performance. The vrahl helped adjust her stance to try and make it as steady as possible, but Parade could see that Freakshow was exhausted from the day’s performances. Her knees were bent low, and she shifted her shoulders every few minutes in an attempt to relieve some of the back pain Parade knew she would be feeling by now.It seemed he wasn’t the only one who noticed her struggling, because at that moment Sideshow, who had been seated cross-legged a short distance away crafting new firesticks, rose to his feet and trotted over to the pair. He signed something with his hands that Parade didn’t bother reading, and when Freakshow dipped her head in relieved thanks, Sideshow changed his course to where the crew kept their larger supplies. He gathered two objects – Freakshow’s crutches – in his arms and handed them off to the larger dreer when he returned to her side.Freakshow’s crutches were still somewhat of a new addition to the crew’s daily routine. Carousel had made them the month prior after realising Freakshow had been struggling more and more with the back and leg pain she’d already been dealing with for years, and Parade had to admit, the craftsmanship on them was superb.Although there were a few in the crew that had birth defects – or mutations, as Akaara had taken to calling them, such as Carousel’s extra iider-limbs and Sideshow’s lack of iider-limbs altogether – Freakshow’s was by far the most extreme.While it was common for older dreer’s bones to ache later in life – especially those with shoulders too turned-in, or those who had spent their entire lives in cramped tunnels expanding Akaara’s Underground system – it was not at all common for a dreer to get that pain so early into adulthood. Freakshow was an unfortunate exception, and it wasn’t any wonder why she suffered such pain; her mutation made her far larger than dreer anatomy was built to support, and the extra weight, especially in her torso, meant that the large dreer’s lower back and knees struggled beneath her own weight.The crew had found that keeping her flexibility high and making sure she stretched before, in between, and after shows had helped, but even then the good days were still hard when Puzzal didn’t feel like the reason for her lacklustre performances was a decent enough excuse.Fortunately, ever since the crutch’s creation, they had seemed to help immensely. Parade could admire the work Carousel put into them. Between their initial flaws and general wear-and-tear over the weeks, the mobility aids must have gone through a hundred revisions by now, but each revision meant that the crutches grew more reinforced and much stronger than their original design.Parade knew Carousel liked to tinker with metal scrap when she got the chance, but he hadn’t expected her work to be this impressive. It had been several days since the acrobat had last needed to adjust them and, judging by how indestructible the crutches now looked, Parade couldn’t anticipate the them needing repairs any time soon.Freakshow had become more cheerful since she received the gift. Her actions were less sluggish, and her eyes appeared less dimmed by the glimmer of perpetual ache. And Parade was happy for her.Really, he was.As she slid her claws into the slots the crutches provided and Sideshow and Ninepin did up the buckles that would hold them in place, Parade was glad she found something that gave her momentary relief.As the leather of the crutches formed makeshift gloves that wrapped over her knuckles and pressed bars firmly against her palms so she could transfer weight off her legs and onto her arms, he was appreciative that she had received the help she desperately needed for her worsening situation.Parade was happy for her.He was.He had to be.She deserved happiness, after all. After everything she’d been through, she deserved to find joy – in the crew, in her crutches, in her enjoyment of Akaara’s history and legends.Of course, though, her enjoyment of those little things could never compare to the happiness Sideshow brought her.And that, dear readers, was exactly where the problem reared its ugly head.Because Parade knew he was supposed to feel happy for her, but to be brutally honest, he didn’t.Regardless of how much Parade was and should be happy for Freakshow discovering her own joys in life, it was all but buried beneath the insurmountable ocean of bitterness and jealousy that battered his heart whenever he saw her with him. And he hated himself for it.Yes, logically, he knew she had done nothing wrong.Yes, his brain told him that treating her with scorn and ignoring her existence was petty and cruel and unjustified when her only crime was loving someone who loved her back.But there was a disconnect, some pathway rotten, between Parade’s brain and his heart, and in a case most unfortunate for those around him, his heart was what dictated his actions. In a battle between acceptance and jealousy, jealousy won out.The three once-friends hadn’t been the same since the happy couple told Parade about their relationship.He had initially tried to hold onto the good thoughts rather than his jealous feelings, but quickly that spark of bitterness had roared into months of scowls and cold shoulders. And now, Parade was at the point where he had no idea what to do.When Freakshow attempted to fix their broken friendship, he swatted her efforts away. When Sideshow tried to speak about it, Parade scoffed and turned his back. Instead, the dreer further forced apart the rifts between them – between himself and the only two people in the entire Fer-damned Underground that had ever truly got him – and raged along his own path of self-isolation and jealous self-destruction.His head whispered memories of everything they’d ever done for him, the kindness they always showed, but his heart screamed betrayal and pumped baseless anger through his veins.He might’ve now come to his senses enough to realise how horrible he’d been to them – how horrible he’d been to Freakshow, especially – but Parade was still too prideful to admit his wrongdoings straight-up.In the moments where he thought that finally he could quash his jealousy enough to apologise, he would see them bump heads or brush up against each other and all that jealously would come flooding back.Because he had wanted that, that happiness, with Sideshow, and he had been told no.So his heart kept pumping acid. His actions kept him ensnared in the familiar cloak of resent he had willingly adorned. And the more he let things fester, the greater his self-hatred became.Sideshow gave him space to accept and respect their choice between his words of hope that Parade would realise his actions from an outside perspective and learn to understand. Freakshow gave him opportunities to do better, be better, and wouldn’t let up in her determination that Parade would come to his senses.Parade would resist, and resist, and resist, and let his issues mutate into sharp words and self-destructive tendencies that he knew would one day blow up everything around him.In a way, this had always been their relationship. Parade was always the one too emotional, too attached, too different from Sideshow to ever have stood a chance with him. He wasn’t sure why he never saw their relationship coming, or why he thought his friendship with Sideshow would ever amount to anything more.He also wasn’t sure why he continued to let his head run circles, or why he trauma dumped his own trauma to himself every single time he saw Sideshow and Freakshow share an intimate moment.Parade’s consciousness jolted back to awareness as he snapped out of his brain’s spiralling thoughts. He blinked rapidly to try and dispel the lingering floaty sensation moments like this always made him feel.Good lord. No wonder he hated the hours he wasn’t performing. If this was how easy it was for his mind to fall into its default monologue of woe and self-loathing, he never wanted a moment to himself ever again.…that was an exaggeration, of course. Again. Parade did a lot of exaggerating on things that didn’t matter.Damn did post-breakdown clarity make him realise how wild his mid-breakdown self was.What a dramatic bitch.It took a moment for Parade to realise his head had dipped toward the ground during his daze. It took another moment before he registered that something was rubbing slow, soothing patterns against his right shoulder blade to help pull him from his thoughts. He let out a breath and looked up to see the source of it – a long strip of red and white fabric that had curled out from the circus tent’s wall and morphed into a vaguely hand-like shape.“Thanks Tent,” he mumbled as the fabric stopped its massaging and moved away to rest on the table like some strange animal.The hand tapped a finger in acknowledgement against the wood. Around them, Parade could hear the fabric of the tent shift.He wasn’t sure if cloth noises could convey emotion (how were you even supposed to refer to the sound fabric makes? Rustling?), but if it could Parade thought that noise in particular would sound like concern. He’d been getting better at understanding the intent behind the fabric-creature’s ‘vocalisations’ over the last few months and suspected that Tent itself had been trying harder to be understood.The dreer huffed humourlessly and stretched, ridding the last of the airy sensation from his body. “Yeah, yeah, I know, I’m fine. Sorry I made you worry. You know I can’t always help when my head gets like that.”The hand drummed its fingers against the table. Parade rolled his eyes. “No, I definitely was not thinking about Sideshow again. You wound me, Tent.”The fabric around him rustled. Parade could practically hear the prick of a sentient rag say, ‘oh really?’ and he scoffed, lightheadedly pushing the hand off the table. It retreated and disappeared altogether as the fabric rearranged itself to blend in with the rest of the circus tent’s wall.He was about to shoot a retort after it – something stupid, probably, that wouldn’t make any sense (because it’s not like he knew what words were going to come out of his mouth. He liked to keep himself on his toes just as much as the people around him) – but it was then that a sharp whistle cut through the air. Parade looked over to see Sideshow standing in the middle of Tent with Ninepin and Freakshow at his side, waiting for the rest of the crew to gather around.Parade sighed and pushed himself off the table. He fluttered his fingers in a wave toward the wall where the hand had disappeared, although really he could have waved anywhere considering Tent surrounded him on literally all sides, and began to amble toward the group.He snorted in amusement when he saw Daredevil drop to the ground from where she had been swinging from cloth hoops Tent had formed along the ceiling for her, Carousel slower to follow as she set down a contraption she had been working on. Jester, who had been practicing his precision by throwing knives into various targets also formed from Tent’s fabric, emptied the rest from his knife sash before following suit.Soon enough Parade joined them, and the crew stood in a rough circle, Parade wedged between Jester and Ninepin.Sideshow cleared his throat.“Good job today, everyone,” the archae said, eyes skimming around the group. Parade tried not to overthink it when his gaze lingered on the dreer just a second too long.Heavy emphasis on the word tried.“You all know the drill by now – chores switch-up. Ninepin and Freakshow were on market duty in Suudnval, so that means it’s Daredevil and Carousel’s turn.” Daredevil whooped in excitement. Carousel looked unsure for a moment before smiling hesitantly at her friend’s antics. “Jester, you go with them. Get enough meat and spices to last the week.”

Jester nodded and easily caught the small bag of shards Sideshow threw his way. Parade knew there wasn’t much in there – mostly just enough for food provisions, although he hoped that market prices would be good enough today that some money would be left to stash away. It was always a good idea to have some cash in reserve.When Daredevil saw Jester was ready, she whipped around and bounded out of Tent. Carousel was hot on her heels, yelling at the white, yellow and red ball of energy to wait up. Tent moved some of the targets Jester had been using closer to the vrahl, and with a nod of thanks the knife-thrower withdrew his blades to refill all the sheathes in his knife-belt.Tossing the shard bag into the air and catching it again to test its weight, Jester sent a quick two-finger salute to Sideshow and followed the kids out in the direction of Khaliis’ marketplace.“Ninepin and Freakshow,” Sideshow said, and Parade stiffened, refocusing his attention on the archae, “you two get everything ready for cooking.”With a dip of their heads, the vrahl and dreer moved to grab the crew’s cooking supplies and set up a campsite out the front of Tent, in the sandy area they usually performed on. Freakshow’s eyes lingered on Parade for a moment as she turned away, but Parade was too focused on his hammering heart to notice. He braced for what came next.“Which means, Parade…”Parade reluctantly made eye contact, and damn it, he was really hoping to be paired up with almost anyone else.“…we’re on moss duty.”Of course they were.Parade let out a huff and tossed his head in defeat.Surely nothing could go wrong with this.◦▹ // ◃◦So many things could go wrong with this. Parade was a moron. He should’ve come up with an excuse to get out of moss duty, even if it took breaking his own foot in a freak accident that would most certainly put the Ringmaster on the verge of an anger-induced cardiac arrest.…Okay, so maybe that actually wasn’t a great idea. He quite liked having his limbs intact, thank you very much. And like, breaking a foot? That would suck. Who would be the star of every Novelty Circus show if Parade couldn’t walk or dance on stage? Not to mention the Ringmaster would take his anger out on him, then take it out on Sideshow for not stopping him, then also take it out on the rest of the crew because Fer, why not?Honestly, Parade should really just come up with better brilliant ideas to threaten himself – and only himself – with.Obviously breaking his own feet was now crossed off his personal ‘things to threaten myself with in times of peril’ list, which was, like, terrible. Mournful. Absolutely devastating news to hear. But what was a dreer to do; life was just hard like that.And yeah, so what if Parade was trying to distract himself from reality again, huh? What of it? It definitely beat the hyper-awareness he otherwise had of Sideshow walking just two steps in front of him, carrying a basket for the two to collect moss in while Parade trailed behind wishing he could do literally any chore but this one.Oh great, and now he wasn’t distracting himself anymore. Wasn’t that just perfect. The absolute audacity he had to face his own problems head-on like a real dreer. Really, this whole situation was messed up. Stupid Sideshow and his stupidly perfect windswept hair that made Parade’s heart flutter. The bastard probably did it on purpose. It definitely couldn’t have been the result of his acts earlier in the circus’ performances. Nope. This had to be strategic. Targeted hair styling. Parade wouldn’t put it past him.Parade also wouldn’t put it past himself for this entire internal ramble to be complete fiction.Actually, you know what? He had a job to do. This was distracting him from the task at hand. Sideshow was distracting him. He wouldn’t fall prey to the bastard’s sick mind games. What a cocky guy, thinking this would work on Parade. Parade was built too different for it to work. He would simply do his job and then they would leave, and he could go back to ignoring Sideshow’s existence except when convenient and in every spare moment he had to think about the life they could have shared if Sideshow had just accepted his feelings and—Nope. No. Not going down that mental hell-slide right now. That was for future Parade to cope through. This Parade would have none of it. Get absolutely emotionally devasted, Parade-to-be, because this Parade wasn’t dealing with it.With the loudest sigh he could muster, Parade refocused on his surroundings: a small tunnel they were currently walking through that connected the circus’ performance area to a smaller cave. Sideshow glanced over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow at the noise. Parade huffed, furrowed his eyebrows, and looked away. In his peripherals he could see Sideshow’s brow furrow before he turned back to look ahead.Parade thought that was the end of it. Of course, he was wrong.“It’s been two and a half months, Parade.”Parade turned his head to stare at Sideshow. “What?”The archae didn’t look back, but Parade could see his jaw clench. “It’s been two and a half months since Freakshow and I told you we were together.”Oh. Right. To be honest, Parade hadn’t really been paying much attention to how long had passed since they told him the news. He was too busy wallowing in self-pity and bitterness.It was that same bitterness that now stained his next words with sarcasm. “Ah, congratulations. Two and a half months. Huge milestone for relationshippers everywhere, I’m sure. Great work making it.”Sideshow let out an annoyed huff. “You know that’s not what I meant.”“Then what do you mean, Sideshow?”Sideshow looked over his shoulder to level the dreer with a frustrated expression. Parade glared challengingly back.Of course he knew what Sideshow meant. He just wanted him to spell it out.Sideshow shook his head in exasperation and turned away again. Parade couldn’t help but feel irked at the lack of reply, but before he could say anything the pair stepped out of the tunnel and found themselves in the small cave.For all its downsides – the lack of basic respect, lack of autonomy, and occasional lack of food and water when the Ringmaster was feeling particularly prickish – the one thing the Novelty Circus absolutely did not lack was notoriety, and it tended to present itself in the most bizarre ways.Parade had seen many things, from people trying to run onto the stage mid-performance (out of hatred or reverence, Parade was never sure and didn’t wish to find out), to Akaarans get modifications to look like members of the crew (an eery and absolutely idiotic decision in his opinion, because that was just asking to be an outsider for your entire life. And for what? Temporary infatuation with someone the world laughed at?), but the one aspect of their notoriety that he and the rest of the crew would forever be grateful for was the Crewgardens.They had first started to appear a couple of months after Akaara’s mad rush into the Underground. In a time where the population’s morale was at an all-time low, having left behind everything to escape the chemical plague that had swept across their planet’s surface, the Novelty Circus was the only public beacon of entertainment people could flock to in the hope of temporarily escaping the harshness of their new lives.Akaarans would come distract themselves from a world collapsing, instead choosing to live suspended in the midst of an audience so loud it drowned out all except what was right there in the present; and the strategy had worked, for the most part. Parade could remember how out of control each of those initial Underground shows felt. Before the fighting rings existed and the Blackout Districts were carved, the Circus had allowed people to forget, if only for a while, what was going on around them.That had been when the crew’s popularity skyrocketed from that of a small-time attraction to the most anticipated touring group on Akaara.The Crewgardens themselves started a few months into their new tour schedule, after everyone had moved Underground and after the Circus had been granted its own designated cavern in every major city, specifically for them to perform in. Crazed fans had noticed how exhausted the shows were making the crew – had seen how they almost looked thinner than the viewers themselves – and had made it their mission to create small communal spaces for edible lichen and moss to grow in.After all, they had come to the circus to escape their problems; not see those problems reflected back at them.Before long, every one of the Circus’ performance caverns had a small tunnel branching off to a Crewgarden. Sometimes the larger cities even had multiple. Inside, a variety of plants were cultivated specifically for the crew’s consumption, ranging from small clumps of mushrooms to entire walls covered in thick algae. There was even the occasional gift left by a fan, but finding those was rare. Squatters tended to use empty Crewgardens in the months where the Circus toured other cities. A hungry Akaaran wouldn’t object to swiping a present if it meant living longer.This particular Crewgarden that Sideshow and Parade had entered was, thankfully, empty of unexpected guests – but that wasn’t surprising considering the raucousness of today’s shows. Anyone who might’ve been inside would have long been alerted to the Circus’ presence and left to wait somewhere else until the crew departed once more.Where some gardens Parade had seen were biased toward growing certain plants, this one wasn’t. Instead, it sported plenty of different luminescent lichens, mosses and fungi for he and Sideshow to collect.When they stepped inside, Sideshow walked over to place the basket he had been carrying in the centre of the small cavern and then moved to start tearing handfuls of moss off one of the walls. A cursory glance told Parade that there were no fan gifts left out for the crew, so he moved to a wall opposite the archae and started to rip lichen off the low ceiling.They worked in silence for a moment. The algae’s dull cyan light made Parade nervous.He wasn’t sure whether to say anything more to Sideshow or not, but before he could decide the fire dancer made the choice for him.“I just want us to go back to being friends again,” Sideshow muttered. Parade almost didn’t hear it over the sound of his claws pulling moss off the walls.Parade frowned and remained quiet.It wasn’t like he wanted to completely stop being friends with Sideshow – and Freakshow, for that matter – but it was just so hard when every time he looked at them he felt nothing but jealousy. At this point it was better for everyone if Parade just shut his mouth and—“I miss my brother.”Oh, and now that was a slap to the face, even if Sideshow hadn’t intended it to be.Parade knew that while what he said was technically correct – they weren’t brothers, not by blood, but they were by circumstance and a promise they’d made as thoughtless kids – he still hated that it always came back to that damned oath. Sideshow was all too keen to keep the promise they’d made years ago alive, and Parade was all too desperate to forget it.The dreer gritted his teeth. “I’m not your brother.”Sideshow didn’t respond. When the silence dragged on too long, Parade floundered for a way to fill it.“When will you forget about that promise, Sideshow?” he snapped. “It was a mistake. We never should’ve made it.”He could hear Sideshow’s thinly veiled heartbreak when the archae replied. “I don’t regret it, Parade.”The dreer whipped his head around, growl building in his throat. “Well I do.”Sideshow stopped and dug his claws into the wall.Parade scoffed. “We were stupid kids who didn’t know any better. When are you going to realise that oath meant nothing? We’re not brothers and we never will be.”Parade thought Sideshow wasn’t going to answer for a moment, but then the archae clenched his hand and dragged his claws across a huge part of the wall. He whipped around to face Parade and Parade flinched back in surprise as Sideshow strode over and threw his armful of gathered moss into the basket.“It might have meant nothing to you, but it meant everything to me,” the archae hissed. Parade tried to ignore the way his eyes sparkled with hurt.Instead, the dreer swallowed dryly and squared his shoulders, glaring up at his not-friend. “Well then maybe you need to stop getting so attached. It only hurts you in the long run.”And just like that he knew Sideshow realised they weren’t just talking about the promise.The archae hissed out a breath of frustration. “Parade, I’m sorry that we’ve made you so mad at us, and I’ve done everything to give you enough time to process and respect our decision, but Freakshow and I don’t know what else we can do. Every time I give you space you drift further away and every time Freakshow tries to go back to how things were you get angrier.” Parade let his growl build. “How do we fix this? How do we go back to how things were?”“We can’t!” Parade snarled. Sideshow’s eyebrows twitched. “There’s no going back, Sideshow, not now.”“Then at the very least can we act civil with each other?” Sideshow retorted. “You don’t need to be ecstatic for us, but you could at least treat Freakshow with some decency. You act like she’s barely better than the Ringmaster.”Parade saw red.Of course this was about Freakshow. Of course Sideshow wasn’t having this conversation to smooth things out with him, but to make life easier for his girlfriend. He was an idiot for thinking Sideshow gave a damn about him. “Why should I?” he sneered. “What’s she done to deserve it?”Sideshow curled his lip. “Besides be your friend? Besides being nothing but supportive and kind? Besides trying her best to make sure you and everyone else is alright, even if she sacrifices her own comfort in the process?” He bared his teeth. “Besides helping you recover from your addiction?”Parade could see Sideshow’s regret as soon as the words left his mouth, but it was too late. The dreer flinched back like he’d been hit.Sideshow knew his past was off-limits. He knew Parade didn’t like talking or even thinking about the days from before he’d been brought to the Circus. He knew, and yet he still weaponised that fact in an argument it had no place being mentioned in.“Parade—” Sideshow started. He stepped forward and tried to reach out, guilt plastered across his face, but Parade jerked back and dropped the lichen he’d been collecting to the ground.“Don’t touch me,” he snarled.Sideshow was panicking; of that much, Parade was aware. He was staring at Parade with wide eyes, but the dreer could barely process anything except for the way his own head was starting to get blurry with memories from before.Parade’s breath caught in his throat and he staggered back. “Don’t follow me,” he managed to croak.Sideshow opened his mouth to say— something— but the dreer didn’t hear it.Instead, he whipped around and took off down the tunnel.◦▹ // ◃◦When Parade came back to his senses, he found himself curled on the ground behind Tent. The cloth-beast seemed to be beside itself with worry as tendrils of fabric twitched around the dreer, unsure of whether to try and comfort him or give him space.He gave the creature a low hum to let it know he was okay, which seemed to calm it down significantly, but he wasn’t really focused on Tent right now. All Parade could think of was how he was both relieved that Sideshow had listened when he said not to follow him, and hurt that the archae hadn’t even attempted to make sure he was okay.He honestly didn’t know which option he would have preferred, but he knew that Sideshow not being here made him feel even worse.Screw Sideshow. Of course the bastard had to use Parade’s past against him.…but wasn’t like Parade could really be angry with him. After all, he’d had a point.Parade already knew Freakshow didn’t deserve to be treated the way he treated her. He knew it because every single time his heart acted before his brain could tell it otherwise, that self-hatred came flooding in and made his throat seize around his own venomous words.

He felt guilt after every one of his snide remarks, and he felt it now, too.Parade sighed and curled his claws over his head, willing himself into an even tighter mimicry of the fetal position.Of course Parade was the one to blame.Of course he was the problem, the root of the disease, the reason why every situation he touched became miserable. He was the poison that afflicted everyone around him.His heart ached for Sideshow.His brain told him to stop being stupid.He knew he deserved to be alone.He knew all he did was hurt the people who cared.He knew all of this.He just wasn’t sure why he let himself forget.

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 3 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

Freakshow had been called many things in her life. A monster, a burden, a brute, a shameful blight of a daughter. All four in the span of one breath, once, on a particularly bad day for her biological mother.(That had been the last time Freakshow had ever seen the dreer that birthed her.)(She refused to call her birth parents ‘family’. They weren’t, not by a long shot.)(‘Family’ was a word reserved for the people that cared, not those whose only claim over her was the blood in her veins.)But in spite of that, if Freakshow were to say anything of herself it would be that she was proud of the dreer she had become.You’d think that a kid whose first words were a repetition of all the nasty little names she’d been called would have grown up to be a wreck. Insecure, anxious, probably depressed beyond belief. That kind of relentless, pervasive onslaught of loathing is just too much for the developing mind of a child to comprehend, much less withstand.And by all rights, Freakshow should be a mess. Dirt was brown, cavern moss was cyan, and Freakshow should have broken long ago.But she hadn’t.Maybe it was the thick skin she’d been forced to grow, or the way her mind always felt slightly skewed to the left (she could never really describe it in a way that made total sense, but she felt that perhaps her empathetic connection with the world wasn’t quite the same as everyone else’s). Maybe it was just that she was naturally dispositioned to not care about the opinions of people who didn’t care for her.Whatever it was, Freakshow was simply not the kind of dreer who let emotions get the better of her. Insults ran off her heart like water, prejudiced words weren’t permitted to define her story. Anyone that tried to belittle her confidence would soon live to regret it.(Some of the names she was given were true. She didn’t think of herself as fractured, but she also didn’t pretend that ‘monster’ wasn’t a name she bore with grim pride.)(Perhaps the meaning of the word had changed since she’d first heard it, but Freakshow knew that was through no fault of her own.)(The world is content to ignore the discriminated until they fight back.)It was only a lucky few who were allowed to see beyond the metaphorical wall of stone she’d long since built around herself. Fewer still were allowed to push past the rocks and make a home within. But it seemed that once they managed to tuck themselves below her aorta, this kind of intense pressure flickered to life in her chest; it grew when she looked at the person the feeling corresponded to, and it was, rather frustratingly, impossible to quell.It had taken Freakshow a while to put a name to the feeling. Eventually, after exhausting all other theories, she’d concluded that it must be ‘love’ – or at least something close to it.(She had, to some extent, thought ‘love’ was nothing more than a myth adults told each other when they wanted something, or when they needed an excuse to justify the unthinkable.)(In an environment where everything was transactional, love was just another commodity.)(It took a long time to realise how priceless and unconditional love truly is.)Love defied all assumptions Freakshow had of it. It wasn’t surprising to find out that love – her love – was not an easy thing to gain, but it was surprising to know it didn’t get any easier to feel no matter how many people she let in. It was hard, and it was tiresome, and each individual had so many different facets about them that constantly changed the definition of what Freakshow thought love was supposed to be that sometimes she questioned whether it was really love she felt at all.In truth, Freakshow found that there were only ever two constants:The first was that love was terrifying.The second was that she could never regret feeling it.Regret, however, was not the same as hesitancy, and as much as Freakshow was hesitant to admit it, the whole Novelty Circus crew had managed to worm their way behind her barriers one way or another.Loving the youngsters had taken the least amount of time. In fact, she had practically known from the very first moment she saw them that she adored the kids.Her maternal desire to protect Carousel was more instinctual than it was logical (each time Carousel retreated into herself or flinched at a noise too loud, Freakshow braced to tear the world apart, hating whatever had made the pup so frightened in the first place), and the way Daredevil marvelled at every unturned rock or unexplored tunnel was so pure that Freakshow would easily sacrifice herself if it meant that wonder never faded.Watching them grow, and their friendship together flourish, was the closest Freakshow thought she would ever come to unequivocal happiness.Loving Jester and Ninepin had surprisingly not taken long either, although the love she had for them was closer to a profound respect than it was anything emotional. Considering they were vrahl, she hadn’t expected to get along with them at all (historically, her and their respective species had never mixed well) – but seeing Jester’s fierce determination to protect Carousel and witnessing the way he had pledged his unwavering loyalty to Sideshow, to an archae, had made her realise that, as individuals, vrahl could be vastly different from the image the rest of their species presented.Although Ninepin fit more into that image, his ability to maintain a level head in stressful situations had saved the crew from the Ringmaster’s wrath on more than one occasion. His commitment to helping each performer fix their mistakes and perfect their acts, as well as the way he wordlessly assisted where needed, had meant the difference between a furious or satisfied Puzzal after many shows. Freakshow could admire the benefits his dedication and attentiveness brought to the crew.Compared to the straightforward, blunt nature of her love for them, loving Parade was… complicated. In a way, it could only be compared to loving a raging fire.On the surface it was dazzling and powerful, a flurry of beauty that could swirl into a blaze or ebb into coals at the slightest gust of wind. But beyond its allure, it was wild and untameable thing; liable to scorching its surroundings, spiralling out of control if given the right fuel, and hell-bent on burning itself out.The first time Sideshow had dragged Parade to the Circus, Freakshow was reluctant to help someone she deemed a lost cause. The second time, she’d faltered when she’d watched the dreer drop his façade late one night thinking no one was watching, and realised he thought of himself just as much a burden as she did.Five years later, Freakshow was beyond relieved Sideshow had refused to give up on the radiant dreer who bore such horribly hopeless eyes.Parade might be a stubborn, headstrong bastard, but he had become their stubborn headstrong bastard. He had his flaws, had his moments where he needed someone to guide him back to the right path, and sure, maybe he needed that help more than most did. But where he was conceited and unstable and blunt, he was equal parts funny and considerate and confident. He had come further in five years than any of them had thought he could, and by now he, Sideshow and Freakshow had all gone through too much for Freakshow to ever consider abandoning him again.(The roles had been reversed once. There had only been two actors then, not three, and the story had been slightly different, but its essence was the same.)(Freakshow dreaded to imagine what might have happened had Sideshow not shown her the exact same kindness he had shown Parade.)(When she came to this realisation, she resolved to never pre-emptively give up on new additions to the crew ever again.)(Remorse left a bitter aftertaste.)All this was to say that throughout her life, Freakshow had a complicated relationship with love. Once she’d acknowledged it was there, it yelled and whispered, reduced and amplified, but never did it abate completely.On the days she thought she finally understood it, love would slip through her fingers and morph into something new; the same components, just arranged in a different pattern with a slightly different texture. It was hard to keep track of, but eventually Freakshow could notice the trends.Arguments made love sharp. Resent made love hurt. Humour made love light. Intimacy made love strong. Each person carried their own unique signature of love; to figure it all out, Freakshow only had wait and feel.For the first time in her life, love wasn’t a foreign concept. Now it was a tangible presence she could stoke deep within her chest. Of course it didn’t always listen to what her head wanted, but she had been learning to accept that love and logic didn’t always align.So then, why was love so relevant to the story now?It was relevant, because at this very point in time Freakshow’s love was being tested. Specifically by one very particular archae.Sideshow was many things: a great leader, a comforting voice in rough times, a great role model for the crew’s younger members.Loving Sideshow was also many things, but perhaps most of all it was difficult. Freakshow would go as far as to say it was the most difficult thing she had ever done in her life.He was the first to find her after she fled from her biological parents.He was the first to kindle those beginning ounces of love in her heart back when she didn’t have a name to call it by.He was also the first to show her that a bigger world existed beyond the crumbling clay walls of the house she had been kept in for too many years.But regardless of how long she had known him (and try as she might to understand how he thought, felt, and acted), Sideshow’s love signature was something she couldn’t even begin to unravel. It was an enigma that refused to follow any kind of consistent pattern, texture or shape.On some days it swelled in her chest until she felt like she would explode, and on others it was a gentle thing, akin to water placidly lapping against the palms of her hands. It constantly gnawed at the back of her mind like a parasite that wanted its presence known, and when she paid it any heed it would get stronger, even if Sideshow himself had done nothing to provoke it.She was aware it wasn’t Sideshow’s fault that love was so confusing – was aware that, at the start, he didn’t even realise she had these feelings at all – but it was hard to manage and articulate something she had never experienced before and, hence, knew nothing about. The only thing she did know was that, after a while, the love she had for him had gone from being a quiet thing built of curiosity and thankfulness, to something loud and demanding that couldn’t be contained within any one specific expression.She had been relieved that when she finally brought these confusing feelings to him late one night, long after the others had fallen asleep, Sideshow had understood and quietly reassured her as she haltingly spoke about the thoughts clouding her mind.Eventually they had both reached the same page. He reciprocated her love, and although his way of feeling it wasn’t quite like hers – like each of their hearts spoke different languages that came from the same source but evolved separately – they had found that it didn’t really matter.Sideshow’s love for her was quiets songs hummed under his breath and pretty stones he left in her carry-pack when she wasn’t looking.Her love for him was curling by his side at night to keep him warm and doing what she could to take the burden of leadership off when it became too much to bear alone.They appreciated each other’s expressions of affection.They were happy.So, as Freakshow had already stated, Sideshow was many things.He was her rock; the stone that lay unmoving in a riverbed.He was stained glass that painted the world in colours Freakshow had never seen.He was the one who had helped her invent an entirely new language she could speak with her hands when he realised she couldn’t talk, and the one who encouraged the whole crew to learn it too so Freakshow would never be left out of a conversation.And he was also, most importantly, standing in front of her right now gripping a basket of moss and lichen with so much force she could hear the poor thing splintering from four feet away.It didn’t look like Sideshow had collected as many plants as he usually would. That combined with the significant lack of a certain Parade by his side told Freakshow almost everything she needed to know.She hoped she was wrong.…but if she wasn’t, it wouldn’t hurt to make Sideshow own up to his idiocy.Freakshow raised an eyebrow.Sideshow’s head drooped in shame.“I brought up Parade’s addiction and I don’t know where he went,” he mumbled.Freakshow let out a long, weary sigh and graciously decided she had never wanted to kill an archae more than she did right now.◦▹ // ◃◦After giving him one of the most extensive beratings of his life, Freakshow escorted Sideshow outside the tent and motioned for him to sit on one of the logs surrounding the small campfire she had made while he’d been out. She took off her crutches before beginning to speak.‘You messed up,’ she signed to him, ‘and you’ll apologise for it later. Parade will be back when he’s ready. Just give him time to wind down.’Sideshow sighed and bowed his head. He ran a hand through his mane in agitation. “I know, Fi, but I feel like I should’ve gone after him. I only asked him to come with me so I could have a private moment to make him realise nothing’s going to happen between us – I didn’t mean to send him into damn a panic attack.”Freakshow snorted sarcastically. ‘And you had to talk about his addiction to do that?’ she signed between arranging kindling inside the ring of stones that marked the campfire’s borders. Sideshow clenched his jaw and turned his head away. ‘Why did you even bring it up?’Sideshow’s brow furrowed in frustration. “He said you’ve done nothing to deserve his thanks. After everything we’ve both done to help him leave the Districts, he just wants to pretend like you weren’t one of the reasons he finally got out.”Freakshow grunted. ‘Parade doesn’t owe us anything. You said that when you first brought him here.’“I know, and he doesn’t, but that still doesn’t give him the right to be a jerk when you’ve be nothing but kind.”Freakshow finished arranging the sticks and turned to her partner. ‘Sideshow, Parade’s jealous. Jealousy isn’t something you can just get over. He’s taking it out on me because he loves you too much to be mad at you.’ She eased herself back to rest against the seating log next to Sideshow. ‘It sucks that he’s cutting me off, but I don’t need you to try and protect my honour or whatever it is you think you’re doing.’Sideshow opened his mouth to rebut her statement. Freakshow cut him off with a wave of her hand. ‘No, Sideshow. I know you’re being protective, but this is something Parade and I have to work out. Don’t try to settle it for us – it’s only going to make the rift between you two bigger.’When Sideshow begrudgingly shut his mouth, Freakshow nodded. ‘It might take us a while. I won’t say that it won’t. But we both know how easily Parade’s emotions control him. I’m not going to let what he says or does get to me, because I know he doesn’t mean it.’ She sighed and rolled her shoulders. ‘When he’s ready to settle things and put his emotions for you to the side, then he and I will talk. Until then, we just need to let him work through it himself.’Sideshow slid off the log and sunk to the ground next to Freakshow with a dry chuckle. “I distinctly remember being the one that helped you figure out emotions, Fi, not the other way ‘round. When did you become so wise?”Freakshow laughed. ‘When I used logic and didn’t let my heart rule my head.’Sideshow looked offended. “I do not let my heart rule my head.”‘Maybe not all the time, but your talk with Parade today says otherwise.’Sideshow was about to retort with a light-hearted quip when the banging of metal startled them. Craning their heads, the pair saw Ninepin emerge from Tent carrying two large metal pots.

“Welcome back, Sideshow,” the vrahl said as he placed the pots next to the campfire. He straightened, removed a piece of flint and metal from top pot as he did, and tossed them both to the archae. Sideshow caught them with ease. “Where is Parade?”“Oh,” Sideshow started guiltily, “Parade’s—”“Right here,” the dreer in question said as he walked out from behind Tent. He made his way over to the group, avoiding eye contact all the while, and plopped down on a log opposite Sideshow and Freakshow. His fur was ruffled, and Fi could see dirt smearing his right side.Sideshow opened his mouth to speak, but Freakshow put out a hand to stop him. He sent her a confused look and she shook her head softly. ‘Not now. Later.’The archae looked conflicted, but eventually nodded. Instead of speaking, he leant forward and use the flint and steel to light the campfire.The clacking of stones was the only noise to break the awkward silence that descended on the four. Ninepin looked between the other three with a raised eyebrow and moved to sit on a log between them, but otherwise remained quiet. Parade shuffled in place when Sideshow stooped to gently blow on a spark that caught alight. When he’d managed to coax it into a fire that burned without assistance, the fire dancer settled back in place next to Freakshow.Much to the group’s discomfort, the crackling of the fire did little to break the tension in the air. Out of the corner of her eye, Freakshow saw Sideshow open his mouth again (to say what, she didn’t think even he knew), but before he could speak the pounding of feet drew their attention.All four looked up in time to see Daredevil bound into the cavern from the tunnel leading toward Khaliis’ city centre. A sack swung wildly from her mouth, and she giggled around it as Carousel chased after her.“Daredevil, give it back!” Carousel laughed. Daredevil slid to a stop and faced her with a cheeky toss of her head.“Nuh— uh!” she answered, voice muffled against the fabric. She grinned wickedly when Carousel tried to lunge for her. The young archae missed by mere inches as her friend nimbly danced out of the way, cackling all the while.Carousel’s playful growl in response trailed off when Jester, who had followed the kids in at a much slower speed, called out. “That’s enough you two,” he said, smiling wide. “No one wants a dirt-filled stew if you accidentally drop that sack.”Daredevil whined in protest. While she was busy pouting at Jester, Carousel darted forward and gently yanked the sack from her mouth.Daredevil squawked in surprise but was too slow to get it back before her friend ran to sit cross-legged by the campfire, clutching the sack to her chest protectively like it was a great prize. Daredevil rushed to sit beside her, trying to push her muzzle under Carousel’s arm, but the young archae just laughed and used her many iider-limbs to keep softly shooing her away.The unexpected amusement the kids brought was enough to lighten the mood of those already around the campfire.Jester’s eyes were full of mirth as he sidled up to Sideshow and sat on a log nearby. “Here,” he said, leaning over to pass the fire dancer some shards. “The market prices were good today, so we did not have to use all of the money you gave us.”Sideshow dipped his head and took the colourful rock chips. “I’m glad. Always better to conserve the spending where possible.”Jester hummed in agreement.After all, less money spent on food meant more money spent on medical supplies. With the Ringmaster as their keeper, and considering the back-to-back shows they performed every day, the crew was no stranger to injuries.“So how was the trip?” Sideshow asked after he’d stashed the shards underneath the log behind him. He’d put them aside with the rest of their meagre savings when the crew moved back inside Tent later. “Carousel and Daredevil give you grief?”Jester snorted in amusement. “Do you know who you are talking about?”Sideshow snickered and shook his head affectionately. “Of course. I don’t know why I thought they wouldn’t.”The pair watched as Carousel upended the sack into one of the pots. A leg of meat rolled out and thudded into the metal. Daredevil, who was pressed too close to Carousel’s side from her previous attempts to steal the sack back, accidentally inhaled one of the herbs that fell out with it. She began to sneeze uncontrollably, and Carousel burst into laughter.“They did well, though,” Jester said, staring at the two with unconcealed affection. “Carousel is getting better at handling crowds, which is good. Still had to calm her down after we came too close to a patrolling troop, but at least now she can be in the same area as them.”“Mm,” Sideshow hummed in agreement. He shifted to sit cross-legged. “What changes have there been in the city since last year?”Jester paused at this. Sideshow glanced over to see the vrahl in deep thought.The Novelty Circus tended to complete one loop of Akaara’s major cities roughly every year. It had only been about two years since the planet’s inhabitants had been forced to move Underground permanently (and, hence, since the Circus had started touring), and in that time everything had been in a constant state of change.When the crew had been in Khaliis a year ago, most of the houses were dug out of the cavern floor, with the space above left for market stalls and tiny above-ground burrows only the most desperate used. When they’d entered the city this time, it had been obvious the extent to which that arrangement had changed.Now there were more houses dug out of Khaliis’ cavern walls than Freakshow suspected were below their feet. Tall warehouses had appeared in place of previous small shacks, sporadically interspersing chaotic streets that had been built in a way that made the city feel almost maze-like.But all this – the new architecture and housing – was easy to observe. What Freakshow knew Sideshow was really interested in was learning whether there had been any shifts in power since the last time the Circus was in town.It was unlikely the crew would ever be affected by vies for political power (the Circus existed under the jurisdiction of the vrahl, effectively making it immune to any archae or dreer governance), but in a world that had literally been torn apart and was in the process of rebuilding itself, one could never be too cautious.“There have not been many changes with the dreer,” Jester said eventually, still looking thoughtful. “We already knew the chieftain of the Eastern Dreer Clan became Kromak after he won against Balamar while we were in Suudnval. Kromak seems content to run things the same way as his predecessor for now. The archae Family here – the Needleclaws – are not much different either. Apparently they are the ones that own most of the warehouses we saw coming in. I do not think their Lord has changed since we were last here.”“I was meaning to ask how that works, actually,” Carousel piped up. Sideshow glanced over and saw her staring at him and Jester curiously, obviously intrigued in their conversation.The pot she had dumped the meat into had been pushed over to Ninepin, who had filled it with water and some of the moss Sideshow collected. The vrahl was now seasoning the meat with some of the herbs they had bought.Next to Carousel, Daredevil had brought the second pot closer and was filling it with water and plant matter too. Half the water appeared to be on the ground rather than in the pot.Jester cocked his head to the side. “How what works?”“The dreer Clans,” Carousel said, “and the archae Families. I don’t get how they choose a new leader.”Jester glanced at Sideshow, an unspoken question of who would explain.Sideshow turned to Carousel. “You already know that the dreer are divided into five clans,” he began, “the Northern, Southern, Western, Eastern and Central. They each focus on different things – for example, the Eastern clan specialises in agriculture. It’s why a lot of the food prices here are so cheap compared to what they were in northern cities like Azworh.”Carousel nodded her head. Sideshow continued. “Well, any dreer from a Clan can challenge their leader – their Chieftain – to become the new leader. It’s a battle of strength. In dreer culture, only the strongest are fit to be in charge. It’s why Kromak, who used to be a farmer, could challenge the old Eastern Clan chieftain Balamar, who was the son of the chief before him.“Every year the Clan’s Chiefs convene and fight to see who’s the strongest among them. The winner becomes the High Chieftain of all dreer. It’s supposed to demonstrate that strength can come from any Clan,” Sideshow muttered, “but the winner for the last few years has been the Central Chief. He hasn’t been beaten by any of his own Clan’s challengers yet, either.”“The archae are different,” Jester continued. “They have Families instead of clans, and there are more of them – fifteen to be precise. They also have different specialisations, but where the dreer focus on farming and constructions, the archae focus on fine goods and technology. The Metalworker Family, who rule over the archae in Nynmor and Tynct, make metal casings for a variety of other Families to use in their goods, and for the Northern Dreer Clan’s construction projects. Their products are not so useful for Families like the Needleclaws here in Khaliis, but for Families like the Nimblelimbs in Lyona, their smaller casings are useful in jewellery making.”Carousel’s mouth formed an ‘oh’ shape and Sideshow again picked up the explanation. “Archae power is passed down through blood relatives. The position of Lord, or head of the Family, will pass on to the former Lord’s eldest child when the Lord retires or dies. The Lord’s children can also challenge the Lord to step down early if they don’t think their parent is doing a good enough job running the Family. The strongest Lord becomes the Arch-Monarch of all archae. It’s kind of like dreer, how Lords can challenge the current Arch- ruler for their title, but unlike the dreer it’s not something that is regularly fought for. Lords only challenge the Arch-Monarch if they truly think the old ruler is doing a poor job at ruling, and even then they’re usually content to just govern their own Family.”“The dreer, archae and vrahl all share the same land,” Jester added, “they just do different things and have different borders for their territories.”Carousel nodded slowly, taking a moment to digest all the information Jester and Sideshow had unloaded on her. “So then what about the vrahl?”Sideshow and Jester exchanged a glance. Jester began explaining how vrahl leadership worked, but was quickly cut off when Daredevil abruptly thrust her hands into her pot and caused a wave of water to crash out over Carousel. The younger archae shrieked and shot to her feet as Daredevil started choking on laughter, and she promptly decided to tackle the hybrid to the ground.The pair rolled dangerously close to the fire before Freakshow rumbled a warning, and in a flash Daredevil shot off to run circles around the crew, Carousel hard on her tail trying to wrap the younger in a hug so the water would brush off against her fur. Sideshow and Jester shared a bemused look.“I guess she is not getting an explanation on the vrahl yet, then,” Jester said, smiling at the kid’s antics.“Not today,” Sideshow laughed. It took a moment for him to nudge the conversation back its earlier topic. “But you didn’t finish – you mentioned what’s changed with the archae and dreer, but is there anything new from the vrahl?”In an instant Jester’s mirthful expression became unsure. “I don’t know,” he admitted, “I feel like something big is happening, but I do not know exactly what.”Sideshow narrowed his eyes. “What makes you think that?”“There seems to be a lot more vrahl than usual patrolling the city,” the knife thrower said, brows furrowed. “I noticed it when we arrived in Khaliis, too. Normally they only send out one troop to cover a certain area, but I saw at least three troops per area while we were in the markets. It was difficult to keep Carousel away from them. I’ve never seen so many vrahl sent out to patrol at the same time.”An uneasy feeling started to brew in Sideshow’s gut. In the pause between Jester’s statement and Sideshow trying to determine what exactly to ask him next, Ninepin spoke up.“Jester, can you help me with Daredevil’s stew? We need to get these on to boil, otherwise it will be too long before the food is ready.”Jester nodded to the juggler and spared Sideshow a tight smile. “I am sure it is nothing that will affect us,” he said. Sideshow could only nod and hope he was right.The next few hours passed quickly. The crew talked while the stew simmered. Sideshow tried to keep thoughts of the increasing vrahl numbers out of his mind.When the food was finally ready, Ninepin divided it into bowls for each of the crew. Food from the pot containing the leg of meat got passed to Sideshow, Carousel and Daredevil, while the stew from the pot containing strictly plant matter was given to Freakshow and Parade. Ninepin and Jester drank the leftover broth.After everyone had eaten their fill, they took a moment to relax in each other’s company. Carousel and Daredevil had huddled side-by-side near the campfire, basking in the warmth it emitted. It was Daredevil who broke the companionable silence that had fallen over the crew.“Freakshow?” she asked. The large dreer hummed questioningly. “Can you tell us the story about the moons again?”Freakshow leant forward a little from where she had been resting back against her log and raised her eyebrows in amusement. ‘Again?’Daredevil nodded energetically. Carousel nodded along at about half her speed, but no less enthusiastically .Freakshow snorted. ‘Alright. Try not to fall asleep this time.’“We won’t!” the two youngest crew members chorused back immediately.Freakshow cracked a small smile, flexed her fingers, and began the tale.◦▹ \ ◃◦Long ago, in the early days of Akaara’s history, when the archae and dreer were nothing but small tribes that fought over land and resources, there lived an archae called Fer and a dreer called Ghiisa.Fer was the best hunter in her tribe. She could take down mighty beasts with nothing but a spear and knew how to track all the animals in the land.Conversely, Ghiisa was her people’s best healer. She knew Akaara’s flora like the back of her hand, and knew the best way to care for each plant to ensure a bountiful harvest.Their tribes weren’t separated by much – a couple of rivers and a forest at most – so when the cold frost of winter first started to make itself know each year, their people would battle over food and the best places to take shelter. Fer would join the archae frontlines, fighting tooth and nail to protect herself and her loved ones, while Ghiisa would wait for the injured dreer to return home so she could heal their wounds.It went on like this for a while. Fer and Ghiisa both grew into strong adults, each with vastly different paths and goals in life, and for the most part their lives remained consistent. Fer would hunt. Ghiisa would farm. Fer would fight. Ghiisa would heal.It was in early Spring on a year like any other when things finally changed. Fer had been out hunting near the border between her tribe and the dreer’s when a bloodtusk – a large bovine creature with near-impenetrable skin, sharp hooves and razor tusks – charged at her from the underbrush.Caught off guard, Fer didn’t have time to dodge before the monster’s tusks ripped through her stomach. She was tossed to the side like a plaything, and when she hit the ground she didn’t get back up, legs too weak to support her as she clutched her midriff in agony. When the beast realised she no longer posed a threat, it fled.It was by chance that on that day, Ghiisa had been scouring the forest for herbs. Her supplies had been running low since the last territory skirmish and she wanted to restock while Spring was in such plentiful bloom.

Ghiisa heard the sound of something large trampling through the forest. She caught a glimpse of a bloodtusk running, seemingly startled, but hadn’t paid it much mind. She was halfway through crouching down to drink from the stream that separated her tribe from the archae’s when she heard someone weakly crying out for help.Immediately Ghiisa was alert and ready to assist whoever was in need, but when she realised the pleas were coming from the opposite side of the river she hesitated. Trespassing on archae land could spark another border war.The begging got quieter as the injured archae’s strength dwindled.Ghiisa made a choice.Leaping over the stream and pushing through bushes as fast as possible, Ghiisa came across a small clearing. In the middle, surrounded by a pool of her own blood, lay Fer. Ghiisa ran over to assess the damage.Fer was so weak that she didn’t respond when Ghiisa picked her up and brought her across the river onto dreer territory.Once there, Ghiisa quickly hid them both in some bushes and ripped open her satchel of newly collected herbs to create a poultice that would quell Fer’s rapid blood loss.Three days passed. Ghiisa stuck resolutely by Fer’s side, intent on healing the hunter. She thanked whatever gods might exist that Fer’s tribe didn’t come looking for her, likely assuming the archae to be on a long hunting trip, and that Ghiisa had told her own tribe before setting out that she might be gone a number of days while she checked on the various crop farms scattered throughout their land.On the third day, Fer finally awoke from the unconscious state she had fallen into shortly after Ghiisa had found her. She tried to scurry away from the dreer, spitting curses, only to clench her jaw in agony when the movement pulled out the stitches Ghiisa used to sew the wound shut.After a while of Ghiisa promising she meant no harm, telling Fer that she would die if Ghiisa didn’t immediately put more stitches in, and firmly reminding Fer that she wouldn’t have bothered healing the archae if she truly wanted Fer dead, Ghiisa got Fer to lay still long enough to restitch the wound.“Why help me?” Fer asked when Ghiisa had finished. “Me and my people have killed so many of yours. Our tribes are enemies. Surely my death would mean more of your warriors live, so why keep me alive?”Ghiisa sighed and shook her head. “My people have spilt just as much archae blood as archae have spilt dreer’s. You choose to fight for your tribe, and it is in honour to die on the battlefield surrounded by comrades, but there is no honour in a lonely death. If you died in battle, your tribe would take your body home and give you a warrior’s funeral. If you died in the forest, your body would forever be lost to the undergrowth. Only someone cruel would deprive you of the chance to join your ancestors in the afterlife.”Another day passed. Ghiisa caught Fer giving her strange looks when the archae thought the dreer wasn’t watching. On the fourth night, Fer asked Ghiisa another question.“Do you think my people are evil?”It made Ghiisa pause.“No,” she said, “I do not think your people are evil because I know you only do what it takes to survive. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t evil in your actions. Evil is there in every needless death that makes a husband a widow, or a child an orphan.”“The same could be said of your tribe,” Fer retorted. “Evil is what makes wives scream when their partners’ bodies are put on pyres. Evil is what forces parents to bury their children six feet deep and a lifetime too early.”“Then maybe life would be better for both our peoples if we were more mindful of the evils our actions inflict.”The pair’s makeshift camp had been quiet after that.The fifth day arrived, and although Ghiisa would have preferred to keep Fer under her care just a few days longer, if neither of them went back to their tribes soon people would worry. If a search party set out and found the two together, both would pay a price.They stood on the border of their territories, one either side of the river, and said their goodbyes. Ghiisa wished Fer a quick recovery. Fer thanked Ghiisa for her help.It was a month before they saw each other again. Fer’s wound had healed, and she’d returned to the river day after day in the hope of finding the gentle dreer who’d saved her life. Ghiisa had ventured out on a rare mission near the river’s banks to collect the last of Spring’s herbs before Summer made them wilt. When they saw each other, Fer was the first to speak.“I owe you a debt,” she said. “You saved my life, and I don’t know how to repay you. Tell me what you want, and it will be yours.”Ghiisa had shaken her head sadly. “What I want is impossible.”“Tell me anyway.”Ghiisa had been hesitant, but she did as Fer asked. She spoke of a peace between their tribes, a mutual understanding and respect that would finally put a stop to the endless bloodshed once and for all.“I am sick of healing the injured,” Ghiisa said. “I am sick of seeing their scars. No adult is unmarked by our peoples’ feud. Too many children have seen their parents die. I wish only to heal broken bones and coughs, not severed limbs and spear wounds.”Fer had wordlessly contemplated her request. With a nod of her head, she asked Ghiisa to meet her along the border more frequently.Over the following years, Fer and Ghiisa convened to discuss their tribes’ situations often. Ghiisa suggested they meet every time Akaara’s largest moon reached its peak in the sky, and Fer agreed. Ghiisa was content to wait for each cycle as it came, but Fer was less patient. She found that by tallying the rise and fall of Akaara’s smaller moon, she could count down the days until their next meeting.As their determination to make two tribes one grew, so did the respect and admiration each had for the other. Eventually they weren’t meeting purely out of duty, but because they genuinely enjoyed each other’s company. A deep connection formed between the pair.Fer was the first to suggest that if they became leaders of their respective tribes, they might have enough status to make Ghiisa’s wish a reality. A handful of years later, her suggestion proved true.Although it wasn’t easy, and although they faced great resistance, they at last found themselves stood by that river once more. Fer and Ghiisa shook hands over the water to symbolise the union of their species, and a new era of peace was ushered in.Tensions still ran high between the tribes. Dreer kept to dreer and archae kept to archae. The past could never be forgotten, but at least now they both walked toward the same future. At least now there was less blood on everyone’s hands.The two leaders continued to meet every month. They spoke in gentle voices and reflected on how far they had come. They helped each other bear the burden of leadership, and when conflicts arose between their people, they resolved it with negotiations and compromise, never harsh words or weapons.Many, many years later, after generations of peace had blossomed and flourished across Akaara – and certainly many years after both Fer and Ghiisa were too old to continue leading their people – the pair found themselves in a small house by the side of their river. It was a peaceful way to spend the rest of their lives.Ghiisa passed first. Fer followed soon after.To remember and honour their dedication in making Akaara a place of tranquillity, the people of the land immortalised both in the moons.Fer became the smaller, running laps across the sky as she hunted and waited to meet with Ghiisa. Ghiisa became the larger, ever steady in the healing her people, consistent in her love of Fer.Some say the stars are a symbol of their love – that they represent every month the pair met in life, and every time they’ve passed each other in death since.Whether true or not, the stars certainly provide a beautiful backdrop for their eternal celestial dance.And so it was that Fer and Ghiisa, moon and moon, were united in death just as they were in life.◦▹ // ◃◦As Freakshow came to the end of the story, she glanced up to see Carousel and Daredevil huddled close together. Their eyes were just barely open enough for them to read the story as Freakshow signed it, and when she finally let her hands drop to her lap they let their eyes slip shut with happy sighs.“I like that story,” Carousel said sleepily. “It has a happy ending.”“Mmm…” Daredevil agreed. “It’s good. Doesn’t really make sense, though.”Freakshow’s eyebrows raised in surprise. Across from her, Jester leant forward.“Why not?” he asked curiously.Daredevil let out a big yawn and curled a little closer to Carousel. Freakshow could tell she was just about ready to fall asleep.“Because they were an archae and a dreer who loved each other, right?”When Freakshow made a hesitant noise of confirmation, not sure where this was going, Daredevil continued.“Well, if they loved each other then, and you and Sideshow love each other now, why does everyone think an archae and a dreer falling in love is a bad thing?” A beat of silence. Then, “why do they think hybrids like me are disgusting?”Freakshow felt her heart shatter.She opened her mouth to respond, forgetting for a moment that she couldn’t speak, but was at a complete loss for what to say anyway. It didn’t seem to matter; Daredevil was already asleep, and Carousel had drifted off a few of minutes before.In truth, the answer wasn’t an easy one. It was an ugly series of too many setbacks their species had experienced throughout history. There was no succinct way to address it without getting into far too many controversial topics for a campfire gathering this late at night.So Freakshow let her mouth fall shut, and when she looked around at the other adults she saw that they looked just as heartbroken as she felt.Sideshow let his head drop. It looked like he was about to say something, but the sharp turn of Ninepin’s head towards the performance cavern’s entrance made the words die before they even left his mouth. Everyone (excluding the kids) immediately snapped to attention.“Oh damn,” Ninepin hissed, standing up smoothly. “The Ringmaster has come back early.”“What?!” Sideshow exclaimed, climbing less gracefully to his feet. Freakshow, Jester and Parade quickly followed suit with matching expressions of alarm. Something like this was unprecedented – the Ringmaster never came back early.Ninepin moved to kick out the fire and neatly arrange the pots the crew had been using next to the pit. “I was not vigilant in checking for his presence during Freakshow’s story. It was only when she finished that I realised how close he was.”“How long do we have?” Sideshow asked, making eye contact with Jester and jerking his head toward the kids. Ninepin’s eyes glazed over for a moment as Jester hurried to wake the two tired children. Freakshow would have laughed at their sleepy complaints if the situation wasn’t so unexpected.“A minute,” came the brown vrahl’s response, eyes once more focusing on Sideshow. The archae’s ears angled back in distaste but he quickly smoothed his expression and nodded.“Everyone get in a line,” he said, and they all moved to do as he ordered. Carousel and Daredevil were a little slower, the two still clambering to their feet with confused expressions, but when Jester quietly muttered what was happening they were quick to wake up fully and fall in line with the others.They heard the clacking of his cane before they saw him. Still in his usual red and goal jacket, wielding the same brown and gold cane the crew so despised, the Ringmaster looked faintly surprised when he entered the cavern and saw the whole crew already standing at attention.He was quick to mask his expression with his usual scowl, but Freakshow could tell something was… off. For the first time in her life, she thought the stiffness in his posture might not be anger, but something more desperate.He came to a stop before the crew and quietly glared up and down their line. After a moment of consideration, his gaze finally snagged and stayed on Sideshow.“My presence had been requested in Kaaraka,” Puzzal stated. Barely concealed alarm flashed across Sideshow’s face. “Get everything ready. We leave in an hour.”“Kaaraka? But we only just—”Puzzal stepped forward and twisted his fingers into the fur on Sideshow’s chest, yanking the archae down until Sideshow was at eye level. Sideshow didn’t make a noise and met his glare with a perfectly blank expression. Freakshow felt a flicker of pride over her partner’s refusal to be the first to look away.“Whether we just started a new city tour or not does not matter,” the Ringmaster grit out, “our presence has been requested directly by the Mother herself.” He pushed Sideshow away forcefully. The archae didn’t stumble as he took a few steps back.Puzzal turned to rake his eyes around the group. “We are to perform in the Capitol in fifteen days for the presentation of a new Empress,” he announced, and shock rippled throughout the crew. With a sneer, the Ringmaster waited a beat for them to process that information before continuing. “Of all the shows I have done, this is the most important. Appreciate that the Mother has given you the rare honour of being amongst the first to lay eyes on a new vrahl Queen.” He scoffed. “Not that any of you deserve it.”Puzzal took a step forward. The tip of his cane dragged heavily across the ground. “If any of you make this performance a failure,” he said, and Freakshow didn’t think she had ever heard him sound more dangerous, “it will be the last show you ever do.”He waited until grim understanding settled in each of the cast’s eyes before he straightened his posture and stalked away. The clacking of his cane finally stopped after he disappeared inside Tent and headed to his quarters, but even when he’d vanished from sight the crew remained still while they fully digested what they’d heard.It was Sideshow who moved first after a few seconds of contemplative frowning. He shook his head in a way Freakshow knew meant he was putting his thoughts on hold until later and pivoted to face his crew.“Alright everyone,” he said, “you heard the Ringmaster. Start packing.”Ninepin, Jester, Parade and Freakshow all gave varying degrees of stiff nods and moved to follow Puzzal inside to pack up their supplies. Carousel went to follow, but stopped when she saw Daredevil staring at Sideshow with huge eyes.“What does he mean, Sideshow?” the hybrid asked. “A new vrahl Mother? I thought there was only one?”Sideshow hesitated, then knelt to meet Daredevil’s height where she was crouched on the ground. Carousel trotted a little closer, ears perked to listen to Sideshow’s response.Freakshow paused to watch.“There was,” Sideshow affirmed, “but even though vrahl live for a long time, they don’t live forever. When a Mother – an Empress – gets close to the end of her lifespan, instead of making more male children like Ninepin or Jester, she makes a female that will take her place. That child will continue to make more vrahl and become the new Mother when the old one is gone.”Daredevil narrowed her eyes carefully and considered what he said. “Is the birth of the new Empress a good or bad thing?”Sideshow took a deep breath and glanced over to where Ninepin, Jester and Parade had faded into the shadows within Tent. “I honestly don’t know.”Daredevil looked like she wanted to say more, but Freakshow chuffed to get the kid’s attentions. She tossed head over her shoulder when they glanced her way, indicating for them to follow her. ‘Come on,’ she signed, ‘I’ll help you pack.’Carousel and Daredevil scrambled to join her, and Sideshow shot Freakshow a thankful smile. Her face softened and she gave him a small nod in return.There would be many days to discuss what the presence of a new Mother meant for the crew when they were on the road; right now, they were wasting the short amount of time the Ringmaster had given them to get ready to leave.

As she and the kids turned to begin the laborious task of preparing to travel, Freakshow saw Sideshow’s face drop into an expression of deep worry. She heard him release a long breath, and her ear twitched in sympathy.
She would be lying if she didn’t say she felt the exact way he looked.
The crew had gone through many challenges before. Every performance was a fight to appease the Ringmaster. But this? Performing in front of not one but two vrahl Mothers?Puzzal’s expectations would be unfathomably high, and Freakshow couldn’t help but think this was nothing more than a suicide mission they couldn’t escape.So much for the increased vrahl patrols being ‘nothing’.

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 4 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

Jester’s hands were shaking.It was a fact he was resolutely aware of as he knelt on the sandy ground, trying to slot his knives into their case while around him the rest of the crew busied themselves with their own packing.The third time the knife he was holding failed to slip into its sheathe, Jester frustratedly tossed it aside and knocked the knuckle of his index finger against his brow. With a hiss of annoyance, he frowned down at the ground and took a moment to process the news the Ringmaster had brought.A new vrahl Mother. Fer, he had known the increased vrahl patrols meant something, but he did not think anything could have prepared him to learn it was that. Their current Mother – the High Empress, as the archae and dreer usually called her – had been around so long he never would have considered the fact she would eventually need an heir.In all honesty, Jester had no idea what to think this of… any of this. The Mother had spent centuries being eternal, an infallible and unbreakable constant, so much so that the notion she might one day be none of those things was like a bucket of ice water being thrown at his face.No one on Akaara had lived as long as she had. Generations had been born and died within her lifespan. So the thought that someone – that he – could very well outlive the end of her life now was…It was…Well, it was a lot to process.The knife thrower was so deep in thought he did not notice when Sideshow shuffled up beside him, nor when the archae sat cross-legged on the ground and shot him a concerned glance. He only jolted back to reality when Sideshow leant forward and tried to catch his eye.“Hey, Jes,” Sideshow said softly. “You alright?”Jester huffed in fond exasperation and looked away. “Yes. Do not worry about me, Sideshow. You already have enough to fret over in your crew.”Sideshow scoffed. “Unless I’m mistaken, you’re part of the crew too. Of course I’m going to worry about you.”A small, somewhat bitter smiled wormed its way onto Jester’s face. “You are too good to me sometimes.”“You’re deserving of it.”An awkward silence fell between them. With the announcement of the New Mother still so fresh in mind, Jester did not have the energy to refute his claim. It would be a pointless argument anyway; the two had been through the same conversation countless times already. He was almost relieved when Sideshow decided to shelf that topic for later in favour of dealing with the situation at hand.“So what’s the matter?” the fire dancer asked, only to pause a moment and correct himself. “Well, obviously I know what the problem is, but do you want to talk about it?”Jester exhaled harshly. After a moment of hesitation, he shuffled around to sit more comfortably next to Sideshow. “No. Yes. I…” he sighed in frustration, “I do not know. My thoughts are… clouded.”“Well, beneath all the clouded thoughts, what are you feeling right now?”Now that was a question Jester knew well. It was an exercise – if you could call such a simple question an exercise – that Sideshow had started after Jester first arrived in the Circus. It was almost laughable to think that something so straightforward could get the vrahl in touch with his emotions, but hey, there was a reason why the archae never asked anything else. The simpleness just… worked.As he closed his eyes to try clear his mind, Jester became aware of just how tense his posture was and forced his body to relax.If he cut out everything – all the whirling thoughts, all his worries over what the future would bring – how did he feel right now about the situation?He contemplated it for a moment. Sideshow sat patiently by his side. Eventually Jester lifted his head, eyes still closed.“Angry,” he muttered, “and… apprehensive.”Sideshow tilted his head. “Why are you angry?”Jester opened his eyes and glared at the ground. “Because I did not warn you and the crew ahead of time about the Ringmaster’s return, or of his announcement.”Sideshow narrowed his eyes. “Jester, that’s not your fault. None of us blame you for not wanting to be connected to the vrahl’s Hivemind. You couldn’t have predicted the Ringmaster’s return without it.”Jester’s brow furrowed in frustration. “That is exactly the point. You have said before that you and the crew do not mind, but if I did not choose to keep it suppressed and instead scouted it for information, like Ninepin does, then we would have known something before Puzzal came back. We could have two pairs of eyes keeping a look out on the vrahl’s movements instead of one.”“And at the expense of what?” Sideshow asked. “All the progress you’ve made to separate yourself from your kin?” When Jester clenched his jaw and did not respond, the archae sighed and leant forward. “What the vrahl do isn’t important enough to risk the work you’ve put in to be your own person. You know that being connected to the Hivemind subdues your emotions and forces you into following the Commander’s orders. Wanting to have your own thoughts and feelings separate from your superior’s control isn’t anything to be ashamed of.”“I know that,” Jester hissed, “but I do not think my individuality matters when the cost is the crew’s wellbeing. If I let my mind connect itself to the Hive once more, if I was able to hear the vrahl Commander’s orders and sense my nearby brethren, would that not be a benefit for us? Would it not be a good failsafe?” Sideshow looked conflicted and Jester pressed on. “Ninepin’s foresight because of his continued connection has helped us avoid the Ringmaster’s wrath many times in the past. I could do the same.”Sideshow’s lips pressed into a thin line. “It might be a good failsafe for the crew, but it wouldn’t be what’s best for you, Jester. Do you want to go back to being another mindless soldier?” He paused until Jester hesitantly shook his head no. “Then it’s not worth it.” The archae adjusted his posture and frowned thoughtfully. “Ninepin made up his mind to stay connected to the Hivemind a long time ago. He never wanted independence from the rest of the vrahl, unlike you, and there’s nothing wrong with that. It just means he has nothing to lose by monitoring it for us.” He looked pointedly to where Carousel was finishing up her packing with Daredevil. “You do.”Jester let out a weary sigh and did not reply, instead looking fondly toward the younger crew members. The sense of duty he felt to keep the crew safe swirled restlessly inside his chest.After giving the vrahl a moment to process his words, Sideshow continued.“Just give it some thought before rushing into things, yeah? If you regret the decision it won’t be easy to undo.” Sideshow paused. “Carousel needs someone she views as a parental figure more than she needs another guardian.”And that was the crux of the issue, was it not? Because regardless of how unqualified Jester felt – how unqualified vrahl by their very nature were to be any kind of parental figure in a child’s life – Carousel had latched onto him more strongly than any other member in the crew, excluding Daredevil. It might not have been an intentional choice on either of their parts, but seeing as Carousel had been separated from her real father when she was little more than an infant, it was understandable why she would seek that comfort from another source. Jester just so happened to be the closest person available.That fact was something he would always feel guilty about.“What about the apprehension?” Sideshow asked, cutting through the vrahl’s inner turmoil. At Jester’s bewildered look, he elaborated. “You mentioned you also felt apprehensive. Do you want to talk about why?”Jester snorted. “Not really, but if I do not then you will keep pestering me.”Sideshow raised his eyebrows and made a noise of protest. “I’m not going to force you to talk about anything you don’t want to.”The vrahl rolled his eyes. “No, but you will worry, and then you will keep checking in to make sure I am okay, and then I will have to explain it – not to make myself feel any better, but to make sure you do not drive yourself into an early grave from all your stress.”Sideshow had the sense to look guilty over that.Look, it was not that Jester did not appreciated his friend’s worry, but he would be lying if he did not say it could be a little overbearing at times.“Sorry,” Sideshow muttered.Great, and now Jester felt bad. Curse his bluntness.“It is okay,” the vrahl started awkwardly. “It just… is hard when vrahl are taught as hatchlings to reject everything emotional except that which brings glory to our race. It…” he huffed in frustration. “Well, that is actually part of the apprehension.”Best to lay it all out now rather than the let the thoughts fester, Jester supposed.“I cannot just… not be happy that a New Mother has been born. Her birth is a topic spoken of with the highest degree of reverence by my people. I am excited the Mother finally has a successor, and I am devastated that it means her life is coming to an end… but I hate both those feelings because I know they mean nothing.” He stabbed the tip of his knife into the ground. “The High Empress will train her replacement to be her clone, the vrahl will continue to be in control of Akaara, and archae and dreer will continue to die unjustly under my people’s ruling. It will be the greatest event my people will ever celebrate, and it will mean nothing because nothing will change.”Sideshow tilted his head. “Why not? The High Empress might be training a replacement, but the New Mother isn’t just another soldier. She must have some degree of autonomy if she is to lead your people after the Mother’s death.”“The High Empress will not just be training an heir, she will be training a copy,” Jester scoffed. “She has been around too long to let the work she has done making Akaara pliable go to waste. That is why I am apprehensive,” he said. “If there was ever a time for the vrahl to change, to ease up on how harshly they punish Akaarans for minor transgressions and stop vying for more power, it would be now. But that will not happen while the successor is being moulded into a duplicate of our Mother. And it means that, for us, the Circus will remain just as harsh as it has always been.”Sideshow was silent at that. They both were, for a few seconds, until Jester decided their conversation had gone on long enough.With a long sigh he leant forward and slipped the last of his knives into their case, re-adjusting the ones on his crossbody knife belt so they sat more comfortably across his torso. It was good that, at the very least, the conversation had distracted him enough for his hands to stop shaking.“Regardless, talking about this is pointless,” he said. “What happens between the vrahl Mothers cannot be altered by anyone except the Mothers themselves. We have larger things to worry about – such as getting through this show without making any mistakes obvious enough Puzzal to kill us.”Sideshow hummed in agreement and looked around to where the crew had mostly finished their packing. Carousel and Daredevil were sitting a short distance away conversing quietly – or, perhaps conversing was not quite the correct word when Daredevil appeared to be doing most of the rambling while Carousel fiddled with a small, segmented cube that clicked when she pressed on different sides. Nearby, Ninepin and Freakshow were bundling up the few remaining crates they had left to pack, and further away Parade was placing the crew’s equipment in an even rectangular layout.“Yeah,” the archae agreed solemnly. “With any luck the Ringmaster will want us to perform a routine we already know by heart.”The two rose to their feet. Jester stretched to try and relieve the last of his stress from his muscles. “When will he be ready to depart?” he asked as he walked toward Parade and placed his knife case with the rest of their supplies.“Pretty soon,” Sideshow replied, glancing over to where Tent had shrunk down into a smaller gazebo-like shelter within which Puzzal still had not emerged. “The hour he gave us is almost up. We’ll be on the road soon.”Sure enough, a few minutes later the rustling of cloth and dull thudding of a cane against the sandy ground indicated to the crew that the Ringmaster had emerged from his quarters. As soon as the vrahl was a decent distance away, crew lined up and waiting before him, it was finally time for Tent to move.With a slither of fabric and the bellowing of fluttering textile, the gazebo unravelled itself into a mess of red and white strips. Additional material seemed to fold into existence out of thin air as the cloth stirred into a whirlwind of whipping shapes that rose to tower above the Circus cast below.Deft swoops of cloth and thin threads of fabric reached out to sew alternating sections of the creature together. The more the fabric layered and knit itself into larger shapes and patterns, the more prominent the hulking form of a gigantic red and white beast started to make itself known.With a head not unlike Freakshow’s, four unseeing eyes similar to an archae’s, a mess of mane-like strips around its neck and a long, pointed tail, Tent’s new form absolutely dwarfed not just the crew but most things in the Underground. Its claws and paws shook the ground as it shuffled in place, adjusting to its new quadruped form. Upon its back the shape of the circus’ iconic performance tent popped up into existence, and between its horns the small shape of the gazebo reappeared.Barely waiting for Tent to reorientate itself in its new shape, the Ringmaster began to stalk forward away from the crew. The creature hurried to lower platforms of cloth before both Puzzal and the performers, and the travellers quickly stepped onto the fabric.After wrapping tendrils of thread around their legs to ensure they would not fall, Tent raised them into the air. Puzzal’s platform moved to the back of the gazebo, where he confidently stepped off and into the shelter. The rest of the crew were taken to the mouth of the circus tent structure, where they made their way inside with less conviction, feet unsteady on the slop of Tent’s back.As the crew got settled into the space of their new living arrangement, Tent’s underbelly peeled open and arms of cloth reached down to wrap around the rectangular arrangement of their supplies below. The limbs swaddled crates, barrels and various loose items in layers of material to ensure they would remain securely in its grasp before it hoisted everything into the air and retracted the equipment to sit safely within the hollow of its ribcage. More expanses of fabric unfolded themselves from around the yawning cavity and stitched together with fabric from the opposite side, making it appear as if the creature’s underbelly had never opened at all.Once the supplies had been stored, the beast’s giant head swung toward the tunnel leading out from the performance cavern into Khaliis. With a flutter of its mane and the deep groan of taunt cloth pulling against itself, Tent began to amble along the path to Kaaraka.

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 5 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

Carousel blearily opened her eyes, yawned, and promptly devolved into a fit of coughs when the weight on top of her rolled over and filled her mouth with fluffy red fur.What in Fer?! Carousel thought as she tried to crane her head back far enough to get the furred mass away from her face. It took a second of rapid blinking and cleaning the sleep from her eyes with her iider-limbs for the archae to faintly make out the form of Daredevil sprawled on top of her, tail twitching slightly as the stunt performer snored loudly in her sleep.Carousel huffed in amusement and strained to get her hands free from beneath where her friend had pinned them to the ground. After a moment of struggle, she finally managed to lug Daredevil off, where the hybrid slid unceremoniously onto the floor in a way that looked extremely uncomfortable. Carousel felt bad for a moment, but all her friend did in response to her relocation was stretch in her sleep, curl into a ball, and keep happily snoring.Carousel giggled. She sat up and yawned again, this time thankfully without inhaling half of her friend’s mane, and looked around at her surroundings.Oh yeah. We’re on the road.It was hard to see in the dim light of the circus tent’s interior, but she could vaguely make out the figures of the rest of the crew sleeping peacefully around them. Beneath her she could feel the soothing vibrations of Tent’s feet hitting the ground as the fabric beast steadily plodded along.Carousel thought she was the only one awake for a moment until she realised that someone was missing from the pile of sleeping bodies.Where’s Jester?With a frown on her face and the help of her many iider-limbs pushing her up, the young archae stumbled to her feet and looked around again.Yep. No Jester here.She wasn’t worried. Really, she wasn’t. He was probably just outside – there was no reason to stress.It couldn’t hurt to check, though.On unsteady legs Carousel trotted in the direction of where she guessed Tent’s tail was. It was the only place Jester could be, after all, since there was no room for him to be on either of Tent’s sides and he probably wouldn’t have wanted to risk running into the Ringmaster at the front of the beast, regardless of how unlikely it was for the vrahl to have emerged from his gazebo quarters.Reaching one of the circus tent’s walls, Circus timidly knocked on the fabric. “Hey Tent? Can I go outside?”She was met with a rustle of fabric a short distance away as a strip of red cloth peeled upwards and rose high enough to let the archae walk underneath.Carousel smiled. “Thank you!”With quick steps she made it to the doorway and peaked around the edge, trying to see if Jester was outside before she herself went out. The light of the cavern lichen that clung to the Underground’s ceiling, while not that bright, made her squint after emerging from the almost complete darkness of inside the circus tent.Looking up, Carousel realised that Tent had morphed its legs to be facing the roof of the cavern instead of the floor. The crew was on the ground no longer – instead, the fabric on what was previously its feet was now wavering at the edges as it formed and reformed the mess of its limbs constantly, threads and ribbons reaching out to latch onto any available surface as it lumbering along the roof high above the city below.Carousel glanced back down and looked around for her guardian. When she didn’t immediately see Jester, her anxiety rose and the fur on the nape of her prickled until a flicker of movement caught her eye.Nestled between the folds of fabric at the base of Tent’s long tail sat Jester, one knee pulled to his chest and his other leg dangling over the ground below. He was subconsciously throwing a knife up and down as he stared off toward some point in the far distance.Carousel suspected he wasn’t looking at anything in front of him at all, but rather seeing something that only lurked within his memories. It was something the knife thrower did often, though he never wanted to talk about it. Carousel had asked before.The archae blew a breathe of relief and tentatively stepped out of the circus tent, shuffling over to Jester. Her feet sunk slightly into Tent as she walked, and tiny threads reached up to curl around her ankles with each step to ensure she wouldn’t fall. Despite knowing Tent would catch her if she stumbled, Carousel still kept her hands slightly raised on either side of her in an attempt to maintain balance as she tried not to look at her surroundings.The twitch of his head in her direction told Carousel that Jester had sensed her coming. When she was only a few steps away he finally tore his gaze from the landscape and looked up. He smiled.“Hello, Ellie,” Jester said warmly. He caught his knife, sat up a bit straighter and shuffled to the side so Carousel could sit down next to him.Carousel took a hesitant step forward and quickly sunk to her knees, reaching down to grab fistfuls of fabric to steady herself. “Hi, Jester.”She looked down to try and determine the best way to sit in the folds of fabric, but as soon as she did she couldn’t stop her eyes from sliding over to stare at the environment surrounding the two crewmates.Beneath the hulking figure of Tent, the vast expanse of Khaliis stretched on for miles in each direction. From the ground rose massive pillars that reached up to support the cavern’s roof at haphazard intervals, and embedded in the ceiling in a more uniform pattern were hundreds of ventilation systems. Each pumped out air that, at this height, Carousel could feel slightly ruffling her fur. It was warm and smelt like dirt, but Carousel relished how clean it felt compared to what she knew the air quality in the city below was like.Speaking of the city, Carousel had to take a moment to ogle at just how different Khaliis was since she had last been there. She had overheard Jester telling Sideshow last night that much had changed, and of course she, Daredevil and Jester had gone into the city yesterday to buy food, but on the ground Khaliis had felt familiar; no different than other city they had passed through on their tours around Akaara. From the sky, the changes the city had undergone were impossible to ignore.The holes that once littered Khaliis’ floor, marking entrances into different dens and houses inhabited by archae and dreer alike, had been completely covered by rows and rows of cramped, shabbily built structures. There was no specific floor plan – streets wound amidst and around each other at random, linking at irregular spots and forming dead ends at others.Most of the buildings appeared to be made of mud, many of which were already crumbling despite being obvious new additions to the terrain. They stacked on top of each other with an almost complete disregard for structural stability that made Carousel’s ear twitch in stress just thinking about. Interspersed between houses were the thick canvas awnings of market stalls and the occasional metal reinforcements of factory walls. Although it was the standard for houses now, Carousel hated how depressingly claustrophobic the entire city looked with its lack of windows and absence of colour.On the horizon, Carousel could see the tall, thin towers that marked the Needleclaw Family’s residence. A few miles west lay of it lay the giant boulder-like shape of the Eastern Dreer Clan’s Khaliis residence.The archae was so absorbed looking at the landscape that she forgot where she was for a moment, only remembering to jerk away from the edge when a few of Tent’s threads slithered up her arm and firmly pulled her back.Jester snorted as she frantically scooted herself closer to him and huddled beneath the folded cloth of Tent’s tail. “Khaliis has changed a lot since we were here last year, has it not?”Carousel nodded rapidly. “I thought the other cities we’ve visited had changed a lot between trips, but none of them come close to being as different as Khaliis is compared to last year.”Jester inclined his head. “It is unique to see the dreer’s skill in construction being used like this. Most of the other Underground cities already had many buildings in them before the Calamity arrived. Seeing a new city without that prior architecture change so drastically and so fast is certainly a sight to behold.”Carousel hummed and shifted so she was pressed up against Jester’s side. Jester unconsciously wrapped one of his right arms around her shoulders and soothly scratched at the top of her head with the other.Carousel let her eyes close. Her iider-limbs clicked in soft contentment behind her back. “Do you think the Calamity will ever go away enough for Daredevil and I to see the surface?”Jester’s scratching didn’t faulter, but he was silent for a moment. He let out a long sigh before he replied.“I do not know,” he said regretfully. “I hope for the answer to be yes, but the fact is that the Calamity – Tent’s sky-vessel – leaked so much Corruption that even if we did find a way to cure it, there will not be much life left up there. Whatever you see now would be far from what it was.”Carousel grunted a sad affirmation. “I think it would have been nice living up there. I know Underground’s the only place safe from the corruption, but it sucks down here. The air always smells funny.”Jester turned to look at her with raised eyebrows. “That is the only complaint you have about the Underground?” he asked incredulously. “That the air smells funny?”Carousel opened her eyes and flushed. “Wha— N— No!” she stammered, “no, there’s other stuff! That’s j— that’s just the first thing that came to my head!” She tucked down her head and mumbled, “it’s not hard to figure out what the other bad things are, anyway.”Carousel’s head was too low to notice the look that crossed Jester’s face at that.He turned to stare back out over Khaliis. “Unfortunately you are correct,” he muttered. “I wish I could have shown you what the surface looked like before the Calamity drove us Underground. It was…”A pause, like Jester couldn’t quite figure out the right word.“…beautiful,” he settled on.He was quiet after that.Oh no, Carousel thought as she wracked her brain for a way to change the topic, I came out here to find and cheer him up, not make him sadder!“It’s not all bad,” she finally squeaked. Jester tilted his head back in her direction. “After all, I have you, and the crew, and Daredevil!”Carousel could sense the mistake before she even felt Jester get that sly smile on his face.“Oh, Daredevil is not just included as part of ‘the crew’? She gets her own special announcement?” he said teasingly.“W—Well yeah!” Carousel fumbled, “she’s my best friend! You got your own announcement too, so you can’t say anything!”“Mmm…” Jester hummed disbelievingly, “I have never seen you slide an extra hunk of meat into my bowl at dinner time.” Carousel whipped her head up to stare at him, eyes wide. “Nor anyone else’s bowls, either.”“You saw that?!”Jester cracked a grin.“W—Well you don’t eat meat!” Carousel rebutted, “so I never had a reason to give you extra food! A—And the others…”She searched for an excuse too long. Jester chuckled.“Carousel, I would be blind if I did not notice the way you look at her—”“I do not look at her! I’ve never looked at her!”That was enough to bring Jester to a complete stop. Carousel realised what she’d said at the same time Jester devolved into a fit of laughter.“Wait, n—no, I mean I do look at her, of c—course I do, she’s my friend, I—I can’t just… not see her? B—but I don’t look at her like that!”“You really are not helping your case right now,” Jester wheezed.Carousel opened her mouth to refute his statement, then snapped it shut again when she realised nothing would change his mind. Her cheeks flushed hot and she huffed out a playful, slightly panicked whine.“O—Okay, fine!” Carousel admitted, “but you can’t tell anyone!”“Oh, so you do—”“Please, Jester,” Carousel pleaded, headbutting him in the arm. “Promise me you’ll keep it a secret.”“Ellie, I am not—”“Please promise me!”Jester held up all four of his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay, I promise,” he chuckled. “It is not my secret to share, anyway.”Carousel slumped in relief.Phew.“I can’t keep anything from you,” she complained meekly.Jester snorted. “Nope, I know you too well by now.” After a moment he climbed to his feet and offered her a hand. “Come on, I can hear the others starting to wake up. It is about time we have some food and talk about what awaits us in Kaaraka.”Carousel perked up and flicked her ears in the direction of the circus tent. Sure enough, she could hear low talking and rustling as the rest of the crew rose from their slumber.“I was wondering when we’d talk about that,” Carousel said, grasping his hand and allowing Jester to pull her upright. “There’s a bunch of things me and Daredevil are both confused about.”“I am sure there is,” the vrahl replied. The pair trekked up Tent’s back toward the rest of their crew. “We have not talked about the vrahl’s culture in much detail before, have we?”Carousel shook her head. “Only the simple stuff. I know their leader is the High Empress, and I know they have ten territories around Akaara that are lead by different Commanders, but I don’t know much more than that.”Jester hummed thoughtfully. “You also know that we vrahl call the High Empress our Mother, and that we refer to the ‘territories’ as ‘divisions’. It is good you know the basics, but there is much you have yet to learn.”They reached the circus tent and Jester knocked twice to ask Tent to let them inside. While the cloth beast unravelled a doorway, the vrahl turned back to Ellie. “We will have time enough to discuss it all later. For now, go ask Sideshow if he needs any help preparing the food.”Carousel ducked her head in understanding, but paused before she entered the tent. Jester raised an eyebrow questioningly. The younger archae’s nose wrinkled in disgust.“Ugh,” she said, “I just remembered that we’ll be on travel rations now.”Jester rolled his eyes and sighed. “Here we go.”Carousel gasped in mock outrage at the knife thrower’s exasperation. “What?! I have a right to feel disgusted! Travel rations suck!”“You say this every time we travel, Carousel.”“Because it’s true! We can’t make fires on Tent to warm anything up so that means cold meat! Do you know how awful cold meat tastes?”“Considering vrahl do not eat meat, no, I do not.”“Well it sucks!”“Yes, you have said that. Multiple times on every single travel route we take, in fact. We eat rations all the time after our city tours finish, have you not grown used to it by now?”Carousel crossed her arms and sent Jester the best death glare she could muster. It wasn’t very intimidating considering her iider-limbs twitched playfully behind her.“It’s not my fault we’re travelling again!” she complained, “I thought we were going to be in Khaliis longer! We only had time for one warm meal! One! After all those days of cold food on the path from Suudnval to Khaliis!”Jester laughed and reached out to ruffle the fur on Carousel’s head. Carousel squeaked and tried to gently swat him away with her iider-limbs.“You will not die from a few weeks of travel rations, Ellie,” he said. “Now go on. The others are waiting for us.”Carousel shot him a faux murderous scowl. Jester patted her on the shoulder and steered her toward the tent’s entrance. Ellie maintained her glower until she was in front of the opening, at which point Daredevil spotted her from inside and started loudly demanding to know where her friend at been.Jester snickered as Carousel tensed in surprise. She looked flustered for a moment before she remembered where she was and composed herself enough to trot toward the rest of the crew.With a fond shake of his head, Jester followed.◦▹ // ◃◦“Hey. Hey. Hey, Ellie.”Carousel glanced out of the corner of her eye to see Daredevil’s face mere inches away from her own.Her heart skipped a beat.She kept eating her rations.“Yeah, Evi?” she mumbled around her food.“What were you ‘n to Jester talkin’ about?”Carousel choked on a crumb and Daredevil danced back, expression immediately going worried. “Ellie! Are you okay?”

Carousel banged a fist against her chest and took a moment to make sure she wasn’t dying.“Y—Yeah, I’m fine,” she wheezed.Daredevil opened her mouth to ask another question, but before she could Jester spoke up.“Carousel asked about the New Mother,” he said. Ellie shot him a thankful smile. “I told her we should wait until everyone was awake before I answered her questions.” The vrahl looked around the crew, who were sat in a circle on the floor of the circus tent to eat. “Now that everyone is, should we discuss it?”Daredevil frowned and glanced back to make sure Carousel was okay before she promptly plopped back in her place. “I have questions, too,” she declared.Sideshow swallowed his last bite of rations and nodded. “Yeah, I think it’s about time we talk things through. I’ll admit I’m not sure where to start, though.”“We could let the kids ask what they want and go from there?” Jester proposed.“Oh! Me! Me! I have a question!” Daredevil said excitedly.Sideshow smiled and inclined his head. Daredevil squirmed in her seat.“I thought the vrahl lived forever. Why is the High Empress dying?”Carousel saw Ninepin go a little tense at the blunt phrasing.Sideshow snorted. “Right into the heavy topics first, I see. Jester, Ninepin, you two probably know the most about this – do you want to answer?”“The Mother might be coming to the end of her lifespan, but that is not necessarily a bad thing,” Ninepin said before Jester could speak.Carousel flicked her ear as she heard Parade scoff and mutter, “there’s something we can agree on,” under his breath. She could tell Freakshow, Sideshow and Jester heard it too, what with the way their eyes swivelled to him before flicking back to Ninepin, but if the vrahl himself noticed the remark he didn’t react.“It is natural for our Mothers to come to the end of their lives eventually,” the juggler continued. “Their ability to produce healthy vrahl eggs deteriorates over time until, towards the end of their existence, they start to produce more defective offspring than functional. There is no need for a Mother producing defective eggs, so she will choose to birth a female vrahl instead of a male.”“Vrahl might live long lives, but we are not immortal,” Jester interjected. “It is hard for us to die, but it is not impossible.”Ninepin looked slightly miffed at the interruption but continued his explanation. “When the replacement Mother has been trained appropriately, the previous Mother’s life will gradually come to its natural end to make way for the New Mother and her children.”“Wait,” Carousel interjected, “the New Mother and her children? So—are you and Jester—are you both brothers?”Jester blinked in surprise. “Have we not talked about this before?”Carousel looked bewildered and shook her head. Jester glanced at Ninepin.“Yes,” he said simply. “We call the Mother our ‘Mother’ for a reason. Every vrahl on Akaara was once an egg she made.”“So the New Empress is your sister, then?” Daredevil asked with wide eyes. Jester nodded. “That’s so cool! Your sister will be the next person to rule all the vrahl!”“What happens to the defective eggs?” Carousel asked.Jester looked pained. “Vrahl culture is… it is all about what a vrahl can do to serve their Mother best. If an egg or hatchling is defective, they are…” he winced, “…disposed of, for lack of a better word.”Carousel seemed a little taken aback by that, but Daredevil was undeterred.“What about all the old Mother’s kids?” she asked. “If the New Mother comes along and makes new babies, what happens to the vrahl already here?”Ninepin spoke up once more, “they serve the New Mother. Once a new Empress is born, a vrahl’s loyalty switches to the replacement, not the parent. The New Empress is the one who will ensure our species’ survival; her life is worth more than any vrahl’s, including our Mother’s.”“Our numbers will also change slightly,” Jester said. “I think I have told you both about it before, but when every vrahl is born they are assigned a number according to what order they hatched. My number is 198230. Ninepin’s is 224259.“Each Mother chooses a short word to represent her, and when she dies our numbers will gain that word as a prefix. In the High Empress’ case, the rough translation of her word between our native languages, from Vulliin to Akaarian, is similar to ‘Genesis’.“This means my number will become ‘GENESIS198210’ – only, it will usually be pronounced in Vulliin, not Akaarian. This allows the New Mother’s children to be assigned numbers starting from one instead of from whatever the number of the lastborn GENESIS-era vrahl will be.”“And the last digit of your numbers determines which Division you get placed in, right?” Carousel asked. “That’s why you came from Division 10, and Ninepin came from Division 9.”Jester nodded. “Correct.”“So what happens if the Mother dies without making a New Mother?” Daredevil piped back up.Jester and Ninepin exchanged an uneasy glance.“Well, there would be no way for our species to continue growing,” Jester said grimly. “Eventually we would all die, and vrahl would become extinct.”“We won’t let that happen!” Daredevil announced, stamping her foot. “Maybe the other vrahl will die, but Ellie and I won’t let you or Ninepin be killed.”Jester chuckled. “That reassures me. Thank you, Daredevil.”“You’re welcome!”“Will the celebration for the New Mother be a massive event?” Carousel asked anxiously. “Like, will there be a lot of people watching us when we reach Kaaraka?”Ninepin shook his head. “Most vrahl will remain in their Divisions and keep patrolling their designated regions in each of Akaara’s cities. The birth of a New Mother is important, and as such the High Empress and her Commanders will be there to witness her official induction into training under the old Mother, but ultimately there will be no widespread celebration amongst my people. The New Mother’s eventual coronation will be seamless enough that the vrahl’s current patrolling schedule will not be interrupted.”“Why are we performing for her if there’s no big celebration?” Daredevil queried.“The High Empress probably wants to show the New Mother what the Novelty Circus is firsthand,” Jester answered. “She did create it, after all, to bring entertainment to the people of Akaara. Seeing as the New Empress will inherit ownership of the Circus when she is ruler, it is important for her to meet Puzzal and understand why the Circus exists.”“So then if there will be no celebrations…” Carousel began thoughtfully, “and if nothing much will change after the New Mother comes into power… why is her being here such a big deal?”“Because,” Sideshow said, re-entering the conversation, “the vrahl aren’t the only ones who live on Akaara. The High Empress has been the vrahl’s leader here for close to three hundred years. A shift in power like this will…” he paused, looking for the right words. “…well, it’ll mean lots of things. Most importantly, though, there’s a good chance the archae and dreer leaders will see this as a way to try and manipulate the new Empress for more power.”“Yes,” Ninepin agreed. “I suspect a change like this will unearth the old territory disputes between the vrahl and dreer that initially made the dreer dislike us so much.”“That’s not why we dislike vrahl.”Everyone startled and turned to look at the new speaker. Parade was sitting rigid, glaring defiantly at Ninepin.“Territory disputes aren’t the reason why my species doesn’t cooperate as well as vrahl and the archae do,” he restated.Ninepin tilted his head. “If that is not the cause then what is?”Parade scoffed. “Are you serious?”Ninepin narrowed his eyes and remained silent. Parade glanced around the circle. When he saw everyone looking at him with varying degrees of confusion and curiosity his gaze hardened.“You’re kidding me. Not a single one of you know our history?”Carousel and a few of the others shook their heads. Parade’s jaw clenched. He glanced at Jester. “Your egg-keepers didn’t teach you it as hatchlings?”Jester’s brow furrowed. “We were told it was because of the territorial conflicts. The egg-keepers never mentioned anything else.”Parade’s lip curled. “Why am I surprised?” He levelled Ninepin with a glower. “Dreer don’t care about sharing territory,” he grit out. “Maybe it was an issue long ago, but it hasn’t been a problem for hundreds of years, at the very least. Archae use land differently to how vrahl use it, and vrahl use it differently to dreer. There’s no need for jealousy if we’re each using the same space for a variety of things that contribute to the same goal of staying alive.”“Then why…” Carousel dared to ask. Parade spared her a softer look before turning his scowl back on Ninepin.“We hate the vrahl,” he said, voice dripping in venom, “because of what their meteorite did to the Western Isles.”Ninepin’s frown deepened. A vague look of understanding crossed Jester’s face, but it was still mostly clouded by confusion.Daredevil leant forward. “What are the Western Isles?”“Fer, have we taught you kids anything?” Parade muttered. “The Western Isles were a dense cluster of islands off the western coast of Akaara. They were primarily inhabited by dreer colonies. Not many archae tribes lived there.” It almost sounded as if he was reading from a textbook. His gaze snapped back to bounce between Jester and Ninepin. “Do you want to take a guess at what happens when a meteor hits the dead centre of an archipelago?”Ninepin opened his mouth to respond, but Parade ploughed ahead.“Earthquakes. Tsunamis. Explosions. There was a cloud of ash that covered the sky for weeks, not to mention how the crater it left sunk more than half of all the islands.” He laughed condescendingly. “The dreer living there were completely unprepared. It killed millions. And then to really top off the whole ordeal, the archae turn around and become buddy-buddy with the pests that crawled out of the rock that caused all that damage.” He sneered. “Typical.”“Parade, that is unfair. It was not the vrahl’s fault we arrived on Akaara,” Jester butted in. “We lost almost our entire species because of that collision, not to mention our ancestral home. We could not control the comet’s trajectory any more than you can control this planet’s orbit.”“At least we didn’t immediately make ourselves comfortable enough to try and conquer what was left of your species,” Parade shot back. “We never tried to take away your beliefs, or your people’s way of governing. We never built weapons and tried to force you to conform to our way of life. You know who did?” Parade snorted. “Take a wild guess. I mean, just go take a look outside!” He made a wild, broad gesture with his arm. “It’s pretty hard to miss when vrahl enforcers swarm every street looking for the slightest misstep to crack down! All they do is reinforce fake laws and false rules your Mother made up to keep my people in check, as if you had any right here in the first place!”The crew was speechless. Parade was known to be passionate about his opinions at times, sure, but they’d never seen this level of fury radiating off him before, nor had they seen him rant like this with so little provocation.Across from Carousel, Ninepin’s expression darkened. “Without our involvement Akaara never would have progressed to the point it is at now,” he hissed. “We have helped your people grow and evolve beyond everything you thought possible. Our work with the archae has built machines you would have once thought unimaginable. It is a lie to claim we have not been beneficial to you or Akaara.”“We never asked you to do that!” Parade retorted. “Who is your Mother to come here, produce an army of emotionless soldiers and then use force to put us down if we don’t obey her every command? Akaara could have turned out the same way without your involvement, for all you know. Fer, it could have turned out better! But our chance at that future was robbed before we even knew what was truly happening!”“Okay, Parade, let’s just calm down, yeah?” Sideshow asked, eyeing the dreer and vrahl carefully.Ninepin looked as close to genuine anger as Carousel had ever seen him get, which was terrifying for a vrahl that almost never displayed emotion. Jester looked uncomfortable. Parade looked absolutely enraged, and it made Ellie cringe away, ears pressed flat in uncertainty.She had never seen this level of vengeful passion bubbling in the dreer’s blood before. It was honestly scarier to see than Ninepin’s fury.“Me calm down?!” Parade demanded. “I have a every right to be angry! Almost three hundred years of them being here and the vrahl have never once apologised for the carnage they wrought on the Isles, much less on our planet. Three hundred years and they’ve never tried to do anything but enslave us!”Daredevil pressed against Carousel’s side. Carousel hadn’t realised she was shaking until then.“We are not trying to enslave you, we are trying to make your species better than it was when we arrived,” Ninepin retorted. “We protect your land and people from harm and this is the thanks you give us?”“You’re protecting us from what—a few street thieves? A handful of murderers?”“Yes! Exactly!”Parade’s eyes flashed. “Our thieves wouldn’t steal if the vrahl hadn’t commoditised our right to survive. The murderers wouldn’t murder if they weren’t forced into situations where they felt they had to defend themselves, else get turned over to a vrahl squadron that would do far worse than simply kill them.”“If those things did not go unpunished the entire Underground would have collapsed on itself by now!“Things have only gotten worse since—”“That’s enough!” Sideshow commanded.Ninepin and Parade fell silent, shooting each other death glares.“Look, I don’t know where all this anger between the two of you came from, but tensions are already high enough with the Kaaraka performance coming up,” the archae snapped. “We can’t afford to be fighting amongst ourselves like this!” He gestured around at the crew. “Your fight doesn’t just impact both of you, it impacts the confidence of the entire crew. There’ll be time enough for you both to hash this argument out after the show. Don’t do it now, a week before the most important performance of our lives!”There were a few moments of silence before Parade rose to his feet and turned to exit out the front of Tent, stalking in the direction of the cloth beasts’ head. The fabric parted to let him through and closed with only a whisper of rustling material. Still sitting in the circle, Ninepin clenched his fists and grit his jaw, glaring straight ahead.The crew sat uncomfortably silent for a few seconds.‘…well, I think we’ve learnt more than was necessary today,’ Freakshow signed awkwardly after a moment. ‘I get the feeling the kids are already overwhelmed enough as it is by everything we’ve talked about.’Carousel jerked her head down in an unsure nod, relieved that Freakshow had noticed how tense she and Daredevil had become.‘We have a long way to go until we reach Kaaraka, so find something to keep yourselves occupied with over the next week. Ask Tent to bring up any equipment from storage you might need. You know the drill. We’ll have today’s second round of rations at 26:00 tonight.’As everyone split to go about finding something to do, Daredevil turned to Carousel. She seemed to notice how shaky the archae still was, because after taking a moment to reassuringly bump her head against her friend’s shoulder, Daredevil bounced around in front of her.“I want to see the city!” she proclaimed, grabbing Carousel’s arm and tugging her toward the entrance. Ellie staggered to her feet and let the energetic hybrid pull her forward.It was in times like this that Carousel was most thankful for Daredevil’s determination to provide distractions when she knew Ellie needed them. The instant mood change was whiplash-inducing, but it worked to move Carousel’s mind away from the tense atmosphere of the argument and into something more playful. Fer knows Carousel needed to relax her nerves before the Kaaraka performance.“I’m coming, I’m coming!” Ellie laughed, allowing Daredevil to take the lead in exiting the tent.

Once outside, Daredevil let go in favour of skipping forward to lean as far as she dared out over Tent’s back. She cooed in wonder as Khaliis passed them by below. “Everything looks so cool from up here!”Carousel stood by anxiously, content to stay as far from the edge as possible. Her iider-limbs clicked in worry. “Be careful,” she warned.Daredevil glanced back. Upon seeing her friend’s hesitation over her being so close to the massive plummet from Tent to the streets of Khaliis below, she turned and gave a reassuring grin. “It’s alright, Ellie!”Carousel relaxed when Daredevil started to bound back in her direction, only to tense up again when her friend crouched low and flashed her fangs in a devilish smile.“Evi, no—” Carousel started, only to be abruptly cut off when the hybrid launched herself at her friend and knocked the two of them flat on their backs.They tussled for a while, both laughing at the other’s antics, until Daredevil rolled off Carousel and laid down next to her. Ellie propped herself up on one arm and Evi curled into a ball, little wings flapping happily as she let out one last snicker.“I’m gonna sleep a little longer out here, I think,” Daredevil said with a yawn. “You can stay if you want.”Carousel snorted in amusement. “You’ve already slept for, like, ten hours.”“Yeah, but now I’m sleeping outside.”“That makes a difference?”“It does! Tent’s too stuffy – no offense, buddy—”Tent let out a low groan.“—so if I get the chance to sleep out here, I absolutely will.”Carousel hummed and put a hand over her forehead dramatically. “I suppose if you require my presence so badly then I can’t say no to my best friend…”“Your bestest friend, actually. Get it right.”Carousel smiled. “My bestest friend. My bad.”“Mhm. Don’t get it wrong again.”Carousel flopped onto her back and folded her hands over her chest, smile lingering. She gazed up at the cavern moss which clung to the roof above. At certain angles, she could almost pretend it looked like the stars Freakshow had once told her about.It would be nice if Evi liked me the same way I like her, she thought, but if it means ruining the way our friendship is now, I think I would rather keep my secret.Carousel could hear Daredevil’s breath slow down as she began to doze off. There was one more question she wanted to ask before her friend succumbed to sleep, though.“Hey, Evi?”“Yeah?”Carousel lifted a paw to trace the patterns of the moss in the air as Tent passed it by.“Do you think we’ll ever get to see the moons ourselves one day?”A hum.“I hope so.”Carousel smiled and let her hand drop back onto her chest.“I hope so too.”

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 6 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

Daredevil was bored.This wasn’t a particularly unusual occurrence – she could never seem to get herself to focus on anything for longer than fifteen minutes, meaning that hobbies never stuck around long enough to let her pass the time quicker – but what was unusual was that Ellie was currently asleep. And Daredevil, resolutely, was not.After all that teasing of ‘Oh Evi, you’ve already been asleep for ten hours!’ and ‘Why do you want to sleep outside in the cool open air instead of the hot, stuffy Tent?’ Ellie had the audacity to fall asleep herself! And now Daredevil had woken up, and Ellie hadn’t, and Daredevil wanted to let Ellie sleep, but without her awake she had nothing to do. It was a right con-un-drum.Daredevil let out a long groan and flopped over to squint at Ellie. The archae didn’t move, even when Daredevil let out the biggest huff she could muster to make the air ruffle her friend’s fur.Hrm.Tail lashing behind her and wings fluttering with barely suppressed energy, Daredevil pulled herself into a sitting position and looked around for something to keep herself occupied. Above her head, Tent’s feet made dull thumping noises as they latched onto rocks and dirt and ventilation grates, pulling the creature along the ceiling.She supposed she could ask Tent to create some hoops and hanging bars for her to practice her acrobatics on inside the circus tent, but where was the fun in that? Without Ellie there to grab her hands as she swung both of them through the sky it just wasn’t worth it. Besides, Daredevil hated asking Tent for things while they were travelling. The fabric monster already had enough to focus on with trying to secure footholds on the ceiling of all places. He didn’t need to be bothered by Daredevil just because she was bored.She was very bored, though.Daredevil blew a stray strand of fur out of her face and considered her options.Ellie was asleep. Unfortunately.Sideshow and Freakshow were probably off doing whatever lovebirds did in their free time. Daredevil didn’t want to interrupt the rare moments they got to relax away from the rest of the crew.Ninepin was Ninepin, and Ninepin never wanted to do anything except sit there with clouded eyes as he monitored the Hivemind. He’d probably just get annoyed with her anyway, so no point bothering him.Daredevil could harass Jester, but Jester had looked like he was bordering on a crisis when they all parted ways after The Talkᵗᵐ, so Daredevil didn’t really want to interrupt whatever was going on there.That only left…Hm.So… maybe Parade had been little scary during The Talkᵗᵐ, but Daredevil knew he wasn’t actually terrifying. Like, as a person. He was pretty chill most of the time. Well, excluding whatever was going on between him, Sideshow and Freakshow, but Daredevil didn’t think that was really any of her business.The only thing that mattered was that Daredevil thought Parade was cool, Parade (hopefully) thought she was cool, and they had a pretty great friendship. So, theoretically, Daredevil would be fine if she was to go and annoy him.Besides, he probably felt sad being all by himself after a discussion like The Talkᵗᵐ.She’d just start a little bit of playful banter. Perhaps engage in some light counselling if Parade was still mad. How hard could therapy-ising someone be, anyway?Daredevil nodded her head decisively. It was settled.Onward to un-sad-ifying Parade.◦▹ // ◃◦Okay, look. It wasn’t Daredevil’s fault she was in this situation.So what if she didn’t want to take the boring, normal way to get to Parade and instead decided to climb over the roof of the circus tent? It had been a good idea in theory! Get to the top, climb over the flagpole and then slide all the way off the roof to whenever Parade was sitting. Honestly, the concept had been flawless.And yeah, maybe the execution had been… less flawless, but that was all part of the fun! Now she could practise one of those daring escape acts she’d always wanted to try.Granted, she hadn’t anticipated hanging upside down off the roof of the circus tent to be her first attempt at escape artistry, nor had she thought the ribbon almost completely restricting her movement would be this tight, but… uh, how did that saying go again? ‘Be big or move home’?Well, Daredevil was already in the only place she could even vaguely call ‘home’, which meant that left only one option, and she fully intended to do only the biggest things. Things like start her daring career as an escape artist on the hardest difficulty possible. She was a fast learner anyway, so she’d probably— no, she’d definitely get the hang of it in like… ten more minutes. The ten minutes she’d already spent trying to escape didn’t count because………they just didn’t count, alright? She could do this.Daredevil wriggled her fingers, which were slightly poking out the top of her accidental straightjacket, and snapped her teeth playfully as Tent moved a few tendrils of cloth closer to start loosening the fabric keeping her suspended. “No! I got this Tent, gimme like five more minutes, okay? I’ll get out, you’ll see.”The cloth-tendrils moved back and tilted to the side in the most disbelieving movement Daredevil had ever seen physically unemotive fabric display. She very reasonably gave up on trying to escape and instead squawked in protest, attempting to swing her unintentional cocoon close enough to the tendrils so she could bite them. If she could just sink her teeth into the material to show Tent who’s boss that would surely teach it not to doubt the great Daredevil and her masterful escape artist-ing. No questions asked.It was on the third time that Daredevil swung and missed the sentient rag that she heard someone laugh and try to cover the noise with the clearing of their throat. Craning her neck all the way down and behind her hanging body, Daredevil could just make out Parade standing below looking up at her with a smile he desperately tried to hide behind an unimpressed expression.“Daredevil,” he said, like a casual morning greeting.“Parade,” Daredevil replied in her best adult voice.“You need a hand?” he asked.“Nope.”Three minutes later, with the help of Parade and Tent, Daredevil was finally back on solid ground.“So what are you doing out here?” Parade asked after he’d found a spot in Tent’s mane to make himself comfortable on, watching Daredevil bounce around between the giant fabric flaps on the cloth-beast’s neck.“Came to see you,” Daredevil replied as she rolled off a flap and thumped to the ground, looking up at him with a grin. “Thought you could use a friend.”Parade paused at that. Daredevil turned away and stalked as close to the edge of Tent’s body as she dared, peering down into the tunnel below. At some point during the nap she had taken with Carousel, the crew had finally entered one of the large passageways that connected Khaliis to Iiken, the dreer capitol city they had to pass through to get to Kaaraka.Daredevil always loved gazing down to civilisation below from Tent’s back. It was funny seeing all the random Akaarans crane their heads up to get a glimpse of the Novelty Circus as they trudged along the ceiling. She giggled as she saw hundreds of them doing that exact movement right now, and laughed harder when one guy, who hadn’t bothered to stop walking while he looked, ran face-first into the side of a market stall.“What about Carousel?” Parade asked.Daredevil turned and cocked her head. “What about her?”“Where is she? You guys never split up.”“Oh!” Daredevil brightened and abandoned her spot street-gazing, instead trotting over to sit in front of Parade. “She’s asleep right now. Can you believe that? After all that stuff she said about how much I sleep, she just turned around and passed out right there on Tent’s back!”Parade cracked a smile and laughed lightly. “Did she now? I thought she hated the idea of sleeping outside.”“She does! I couldn’t believe it either!”Parade hummed in amusement. He let the conversation sit silent for a moment, Daredevil fidgeting in place and humming a happy tune, before he turned his head slightly to look up toward Tent’s head. “Honestly, I’m surprised you came to see me. The others avoid being out front because they don’t want to risk running into the Ringmaster. You aren’t worried about that?”Daredevil shook her head
aggressively. “Nope!”“Why not?”“Well you’re out here, aren’t you? If you’re not afraid I don’t see why I should be.”Parade didn’t really have a response to that.He didn’t need one, though, because Daredevil decided she’d had enough of that conversation and wanted to change the topic.“So, Paraaaaaaaade,” she said, drawing out his name and scooting a little closer in a way she knew Parade knew meant she was about to ask a question he may or may not enjoy answering.“Yeeeeees, Daredevil?”“Can I ask you something?”“Technically you just did.”Daredevil huffed in faux annoyance. “If you keep using that comeback every time I want to ask a question I’m going to bite you.”Parade snorted. “Just ask your question, then.”“Okay. But don’t say I didn’t give you a chance not to answer.”Parade suddenly looked very alarmed at whatever Daredevil was about to query, so before he could change his mind she ploughed ahead.“How did you join the Circus?”Parade seemed pretty taken aback by that. When he didn’t answer straight away, Daredevil elaborated.“I mean, obviously I know that Sideshow found you somewhere and brought you here, but what happened before that?”Parade opened his mouth, expressions rippling through so many different emotions Daredevil couldn’t keep up, but when he tried to speak no sound came out.Daredevil suddenly felt like maybe she’d made a mistake.She’d wanted to ask something to distract him from the fight earlier, but in hindsight……well, if she really thought about it, the people in the Circus who had told her about how they became part of it didn’t have the happiest tales. It very well could have been the same for Parade.……now Daredevil felt horrible.“You—uh, you don’t—you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” she stuttered, trying to fix… this, “I was just wondering but, like, if you don’t—don’t want to talk about it then that’s—that’s okay, sorry if—”“Hey, Daredevil, Daredevil,” Parade hushed, “it’s alright.” When Daredevil stopped stumbling over her words and snapped her mouth shut, waiting for him to continue, Parade grimaced. “Look, I won’t lie… I didn’t have—” he took a breath. “My life before the Circus wasn’t… great. There are a lot of things I don’t think I’m ready to talk about. But I guess there are a couple of things I can tell you.”Daredevil nodded her head softly and gave the dreer a second to compose his thoughts.“There was…” he hesitated, then decided to press on. “One time, when I was pretty young, my sister and I had enough of sitting inside all day listening to our tutors rant about things we thought were boring. We decided we were going to run away from home – just for a little while, maybe a few hours, so we could see what the city was like instead of only being able to see it from our bedroom windows.”Daredevil’s mouth was gaped awe. “You have a sister?”Parade chuckled weakly. He couldn’t meet her eyes. “I did.”Daredevil didn’t know how to respond to what his words implied.Parade took a moment before continuing. “We managed to get away without being spotted and made it into the heart of the city. My sister swiped some shards from our mother’s dresser on the way out so we’d have money to buy ourselves something while we were there.” He laughed. “She was younger than me, but even back then she was smarter. The thought of getting money so we could actually do something didn’t even cross my mind.”A faint smile crossed the dreer’s face. “We walked all over the city looking at all the cool shops they had. This was when we lived on the surface,” he clarified, “so getting to see everything the city had to offer in a few hours was feasible. The Underground cities we travel through are a lot bigger than the ones on the surface. You’d be lucky now to cross even the smallest one on foot in a couple of days.“Anyway, my sister made us stop walking when we reached a bakery with the most divine smell wafting from it. I can’t remember the name of it, but I remember it being run by one of the nicest archae I’ve ever met. She let us pay less than normal price for the honeysuckle puff treats we bought, and even gave us a free berry pastry to share on top of it.“We took the food to this little alcove of trees on the city border and watched the land get darker as Fer passed overhead. Seeing all the glowing plants come to life at night was beautiful.” He grimaced. “I wish you and Carousel could have seen it. I think you two would have adored the surface. We adults took it for granted.”Daredevil, who had been listening quietly until now, hummed gently.“Yeah,” she said, “but if we had of been alive to see it like the rest of you, I don’t think we would have taken it any less for granted. We might have loved it, but you can only really appreciate something the way you appreciate the surface now after you’ve experienced life without it.”Parade’s eyebrows raised and he looked at Daredevil with an expression of impressed shock. “Fer, Daredevil, that was pretty grown-up of you.”The hybrid puffed out her chest in pride. “I’m always grown-up. I look adults in the face and say ‘yeah, I’m better’. A real good thinker, I am.”The dreer snorted. “And now you’ve ruined it.”“Have not!”“Have too.”Daredevil headbutted his shins and Parade reflectively bent forward, laughing as he gently shoved her away.She grinned up at him and flapped her little wings cheerfully. “Well, I’m glad that worked.”“Glad what worked? That you just proved how much of a kid you are?”“I’m not a kid!”“Your answer to me saying you ruined the grown-up image was to try and amputate my legs.”“Okay first of all, that’s the biggest exaggeration I’ve ever heard, and second of all, no,” the tip of her tail twitched happily, “I’m glad because you’re not in a bad mood anymore.”Parade paused and seemed to think about it for a moment. “Huh,” he snorted softly, “I guess you’re right.”When he didn’t say anything else right away, Daredevil turned to the side. She was about to move over to the edge of Tent to look down at the city again, but Parade continued in a serious voice that stopped her in her tracks.“Thank you,” he said, and Daredevil could tell he genuinely meant it, “for coming and speaking with me. You’re a good kid. Carousel is too. I hope you both know that.”Daredevil beamed and sat up a little straighter. “You’re not too bad yourself,” she said cheekily.Parade smiled.

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 7 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

The crew had been on the road for a little over two full days and Parade could already confidently say this was the worst trip he’d ever been on.It wasn’t just the fight he’d had with Ninepin (although that was certainly a large part of it) – it was the sheer degree of suspense he was left in knowing that for every step they took away from Khaliis, the crew was that much closer to Kaaraka.That fun tidbit of knowledge sitting in the back of his mind mixed with the very prevalent storm of emotions still roiling in his gut over Sideshow and Freakshow did not, in Parade’s humble opinion, make this journey a fun experience at all.Daredevil had left a while ago, babbling about how Carousel would probably wake up soon and how stressed the acrobat would be if she opened her eyes and didn’t immediately see her friend, and while Parade appreciated that she had taken the time to check up on and distract him for a while, he couldn’t completely forget about what the hybrid had been trying to distract him from.The dreer huffed and brought his knees closer to his chest, gazing out over the cavern below from his perch nestled between the folds of Tent’s mane.He might not be angry anymore, but he was frustrated. Nothing, not even Daredevil’s attempts to cheer him up, was going to change that.Look, hindsight sucked, and Parade could admit that maybe he’d taken things a bit too far. But to be fair, the lack of education the rest of the crew had on a topic so pivotal to his species – to the whole of Akaara’s history – had really rubbed his fur the wrong way.While he was regretful to have broken the fragile layer of peace the crew had been trying to maintain right before such an important show, Parade couldn’t say he hadn’t seen this coming. He’d kept his mouth shut about political topics concerning the vrahl for years now in a bid to not start any inter-Circus dramas. This was bound to happen sooner or later.Don’t get him wrong, it wasn’t like Parade didn’t understand how important Ninepin and Jester were to the crew. He understood it just fine.He understood that Jester was one of the main lifelines Carousel had to cling onto.He understood that Ninepin’s advice at the end of each performance was one of the only things allowing the crew to largely escape the Ringmaster’s brutalities.He understood that Jester had fought tooth and nail to escape the brainwashing his species – his Mother – had put him through.He understood Ninepin was just the opposite, clinging desperately to his last connections with kin that had thrown him to the curb when he was no longer useful.Parade understood all that, and yeah, he could admit that maybe his anger earlier about how the vrahl initially came to Akaara had been misplaced. But he was right about everything else, and he knew it. Everyone’s blatant display of historical ignorance had just been what finally snapped the last strand of Parade’s patience.To be honest, he couldn’t really say he regretted it.More than anything else, though – more than his anger, more than his disgust that Akaara’s society had fallen so far as to forget such an important part of their history – everything Parade felt funnelled back to fuel that overwhelming sense of frustration bubbling just beneath his skin. More specifically, it was the frustration that Sideshow had put a stop to his and Ninepin’s fight.He understood why he had, of course – it really was nonsensical for the crew to get into such a large and nuanced argument so close to such a crucial performance – but he still hated that he and Ninepin hadn’t been allowed to hash out their grievances.There had been bad blood between the two since the moment Ninepin had come to the Circus. Perhaps Parade should have felt more sympathy for him – after all, the only reason the vrahl was there was because he had been run out of his old troop after a catastrophic accident forced his second pair of arms to be amputated – but Ninepin was just so… vrahl.He embodied everything Parade hated about them: their blind obedience to their Mother, their lack of empathy, their refusal to acknowledge that their actions were wrong, morally, no matter how many laws they invented to say otherwise. Ninepin never attempted to be anything different, not like Jester had; in fact, he had actively tried to lean into the distant, borderline cruel behavioural patterns that his species followed, in an attempt to not lose what Parade suspected was his only purpose in life.Ninepin was everything Parade hated; and so because of that, Parade had decided he wouldn’t even attempt to be subtle about his dislike of Ninepin or his species in front of the juggler.The dreer assumed that Sideshow hadn’t noticed their bad blood before because both Ninepin and Parade had come to an unspoken agreement that their only interactions would be in the moments after shows, when Ninepin was handing out advice on the quality of their performances. Parade might not like the vrahl, but he couldn’t argue that he was right, sometimes, when it came to the topic of improving an act.It just… it was just annoying, alright? Ninepin was a constant, active representation of everything wrong with Akaara, so sue Parade for finally having had enough of him. The vrahl deserved it, anyway. Every single time he opened his mouth to praise his beloved Mother or preach about how right the vrahl were to have invaded Parade’s homeland, Parade wanted to punch him in his stupid, forgettable, expressionless face.Parade dug his claws into his forearms and growled.Sideshow might have stopped them before they could get into any real argument, but Parade wasn’t going to let this go, especially since he knew Ninepin wouldn’t either. The vrahl might pretend he had, but Parade knew that the next time the Mother got brought up he would go straight back to putting her on a pedestal. As if the ruler in charge of the majority of Akaara’s issues was entirely blameless for the sorry state of despair the Underground had fallen into.So what if it was a stupid idea to hold a grudge this close to the crew’s biggest performance? Parade didn’t care. He knew he could perform flawlessly with or without the burning resentment that sat heavy in his gut. He’d performed with worse emotions buzzing beneath his skin.Anger and frustration were child’s play, and he had a right to feel angry.Right now, though, in this exact moment where Parade was curled into himself amid Tent’s mane, the dreer felt the reigns of anger and frustration starting to slip away. He’d pick them up again later, he was sure, but right now he just… he was just breaking, right there at the seams, from all the stress of everything that had happened in the last two days, and there was nothing he could do about it.Despite how it may look, despite the farce and tough act he put on, Parade actually didn’t deal well with confrontational situations. Not mentally, at least. They left a sour taste in his mouth and barbed wire in his throat. Even though he knew he was right in fighting against Ninepin and correcting his misinformation, the aftermath of the argument – of any argument, really – only made Parade feel sick.As his furious internal monologue over the fight sputtered out, Parade let his mask drop. He couldn’t bring himself to feel anything but self-pity.Everything was just so exhausting.First it had been finding out about Sideshow and Freakshow. Then it had been Sideshow bringing up all those nasty little memories he tried to quash for years. Then it was the Circus being summoned to Kaaraka, and the fight with Ninepin, and all of this wasn’t even beginning to touch on all the baggage he had from before the Circus that he was still trying to keep repressed.It was just a lot, and Parade wished that, if only for a day, the world would give him just a moment to simply breathe. He wanted to know what it was like to exist, without the weight of the future or past folding itself around his shoulders, threatening to reach just a little higher and wrap its suffocating grasp around his neck.It was an unfortunate fact, however, that Parade was never granted such luxuries.The dreer could feel his heartbeat picking up speed as he thought about the crew, Akaara, and his place amongst both.Sideshow and Freakshow probably hated him. He shouldn’t be as terrified of that fact as he was, considering he was the reason for it.Ninepin definitely hated him, although Parade was, unsurprisingly, rather okay about that since the feeling was mutual.Jester also probably hated him. Parade couldn’t see why he wouldn’t. The vrahl might have made an effort to distance himself from his people, might have fought to maintain his own identity and all the painful little emotions that came with it, but at the end of the day he was still vrahl, and Parade had repeatedly vocalised his dislike of his species mere hours earlier.He hadn’t even thought to specify that Jester was exempt from his hatred. For all Jester knew, Parade hated him. It was only natural Jester would return the sentiment.As for the Ringmaster, well, he definitely hated Parade, although, again, there was no surprise there. The Ringmaster hated everyone. Parade wasn’t special.Carousel and Daredevil… honestly, he didn’t think it was possible for them to hate anybody, but if they knew how he ended up in the Circus they probably, at the very least, would dislike him.The people he’d grown up with hated him. They made that clear before he left.The people he’d left behind had every reason to hate him.Akaara as a whole hated him, it just disguised the hate better under an audience’s worth of cheering and applause.Hell, Parade even hated himself, probably more than everyone else combined, so what hope was there for anyone to like him if he could despise his own being with such vitriol?His heart kept picking up speed. Parade was only distantly aware when his breathing started to stutter.It wasn’t just the opinions of everyone else that were getting to him either, but the crew’s entire Fer-damned situation. There were so many things just going wrong.
They were walking into a suicide mission. If the High Empress didn’t like their performance, the kids could die. Tent was always a breath away from being burnt to ash. The crew was getting far too close to the Western Dreer Clan’s border for Parade’s comfort (he hadn’t expected to be there, and so hadn’t prepared himself). The New Mother would inherit her throne, and nothing would change.Nothing would change.And to top it all off, when Parade had woken up this morning it had been to the realisation that the lacquer on his nails was chipped and his mane needed a re-curling.Everything was not alright.A constant pressure rubbing circles on his back and squeezing his arms to his sides was what eventually brought Parade down from the verge of his panic attack. The dreer got a sense of déjà vu when he came back to reality and saw tendrils of Tent’s cloth hovering around him, much like the situation from only a couple of days earlier. Or was it yesterday? Parade didn’t know. Time had dragged on so much since the Ringmaster’s announcement. The dreer was honestly too tired to tell how long had passed any more.“Sorry, Tent,” Parade whispered, voice hoarse. “Another panic attack so soon after the other one? I’m really giving you a run for your money.”Tent squeezed his shoulders lightly, as if trying to tell him it was okay. That he didn’t need to apologise.Parade could only manage a weak smile.At least there was someone who didn’t seem to hate him.The dreer sighed and rubbed at his eyes, burying his head in his arms.Fer, he was exhausted.◦▹ // ◃◦Carousel’s call for the first round of the next day’s rations ended up being what roused Parade from his spot curled in Tent’s mane.He’d contemplated skipping the meal, like he had yesterday’s second round of rations, but the growling of his stomach and Tent’s gentle ushering finally prompted him to re-enter the circus tent and confront the crew. He regretted the choice a second later when, after pushing the canvas flap of the circus tent’s entrance aside, the tension in the room skyrocketed.Parade wished he could do literally anything else but be there.Slipping back on his perfect mask of confidence, Parade raised his head and walked toward the centre of Tent.The crew was sat there in a rough circle, just beginning to dig into their rations. Sideshow and Freakshow were next to eat other, fur brushing; Sideshow avoided Parade’s eye. Freakshow made sure she caught it.Parade was the first to look away.Ninepin was on Sideshow’s other side and was resolutely ignoring the new presence in the tent, which was just fine by Parade. He tore his eyes from the vrahl to ignore him, too.Next to the juggler, Carousel was picking through her rations, tossing stray herbs and plant matter over to Daredevil, who was making a game out of trying to catch the food in her mouth. Beside her, Jester was absently twirling a dagger around in his untouched soup.Parade hesitated slightly when he drew closer, unsure of where to sit. His pause must have caught Daredevil’s attention, because she turned away from Carousel and scooted further from Jester, motioning to the now empty space. She grinned reassuringly at Parade, and he returned the motion with a small smile and thankful dip of his head.The dreer cautiously sat down between his crewmates, intentionally taking a seat closer to Daredevil than Jester. When he was settled, the vrahl raised his head and sent Parade a small smile. Parade couldn’t determine whether it was out of courtesy, or because Jester didn’t hold a grudge about the fight earlier.He looked away when Carousel reached into the middle of the circle and pushed Parade’s rations toward him.An awkward silence descended on the crew. The only noise was the low rustling and creaking of Tent from the cloth around them as the fabric beast kept steadily plodding along the roof of Iiken’s cavern city.Parade honestly thought death might be preferable to whatever this was.Daredevil – wonderful, kind, heroic Daredevil – was the one to eventually break the silence."M’kay, I want to know something," she proclaimed boldly, head high and eyes closed. She cracked an eye open to look around the crew when no one immediately replied. Parade cracked a smile at her antics.Across from him, Sideshow too wore a small grin. “Yeah, Daredevil? And what would that be?”“Well, it’s two things, really,” she said. “Number one: rations suck.”That got a chuckle out of the crew.‘That wasn’t a question,’ Freakshow signed, eyes glimmering with laughter.“Oh, I know, I just wanted to inform you all in case anyone was unaware.”Jester chuckled beside Parade. “I do not think anyone would contend you on that.”“Good,” Daredevil nodded in satisfaction.“What was your second question?” Sideshow asked.Daredevil sat up a little straighter. Parade could see her tail twitch in anticipation of the question.“Well,” she said, drawing out the word, “I realised before that Carousel and I don’t really know how we got here. Like, you guys always mention the surface, but I don’t think I’ve heard anyone really explain why we’re all…” she gestured around vaguely with a clawed hand, “…Underground?”The crew was silent for a moment, contemplating how to answer.Sideshow glanced at the vrahl members of their group. “Well, I can explain what I’ve heard, but it wouldn’t beat a first-hand account. Nine? Jester? Were either of you there at the crash site?”Before he’d even finished, both were shaking their heads.“No, I was further south in Commander Nine’s territory at the time,” Ninepin said bluntly.“And I was in Ten,” Jester added.Sideshow sighed. “Yeah, it was a bit of a stretch to ask. Most people who were close to it either died or were evacuated before—"“I was.”It took a moment for Parade to realise that it was he himself who said the words. The eyes of the crew swung to stare at him and he lifted his head a bit higher in an effort to hide the way he flushed at the attention.

“I—” he cleared his throat, “I was there when it happened. Near the impact site, I mean. I was one of the ones who got evacuated.”“You were?” Daredevil gasped, eyes wide. “Tell us! Tell us about it!”“Well, I…” Parade floundered as Daredevil crawled closer and sat in front of him with rapt attention. Carousel shimmied forward a little too, eyes as wide as her friend’s.“You haven’t mentioned that before, Parade,” Jester remarked, leaning forward in interest.Parade looked down at his hands. “It’s not a particularly enjoyable tale,” he huffed. “I didn’t see the point in reliving it.”Carousel face flickered in hesitation. “If it’s not something you want to talk about you don’t have to tell us,” she said quietly.Parade shook his head. “No, no it’s good you both want to know. You deserve to hear what happened, and I can probably give you the best retelling of it. You’re the ones living in the after-effects of it, after all.”The crew was quiet as Parade frowned down at the ground, trying to work out where to start. After a moment he let out a long sigh and looked up, eyes fixed sightlessly on something in the distance that only he could see.“I was in Nirk at the time,” he began, “the version of Nirk on the surface, not in the Underground. There was… a house, of sorts, I was staying in, on top of a hill. From there you could just make out the middle of Akaara’s biggest lake, Lake Gristu, in the distance between the tree canopies.“I didn’t see the crash, but I heard it. There was a split second where it sounded like a thousand trees were being uprooted at once, then a loud boom and water falling.” Parade’s ears twitched. “At first I thought some kind of gigantic thunderstorm had spontaneously appeared and started tearing up the land, but when me and my… companions finally reached a spot where we could look out towards the lake, there weren’t any clouds. There was just a gash in the earth, hundreds of meters long, where trees once stood. It almost looked like some kind of monstrous beast had raked its claws across the ground.“Some people I knew got in contact with Eight, the vrahl Commander in charge of Nirk, to ask what happened,” he continued. “We eventually learnt about the great metal bird that flew in from the sky and crashed on Akaara. They said it came from somewhere high above the trees, soared across the ground, destroyed everything in its path and finally came to a stop when it was submerged by Lake Gristu. We were told the vrahl were monitoring the crash site and trying to recover what they could from it.”Parade inhaled and blinked a few times, snapping out of his daze. He looked up with a small, unamused smile. “If you didn’t know,” he said to the kids, “that was where they found Tent. He was in the metal bird’s wreckage.”Carousel and Daredevil’s eyes looked like they were about to pop out of their heads.“Wait— Tent came from the sky?” Daredevil asked in disbelief. Parade huffed out a laugh and nodded. “But how? Is there another land in the sky? Is that where it came from?”Parade shrugged. “I don’t know. Tent's never told me. If only it could speak and tell us itself, eh?”The sound of rustling fabric echoed around the crew. Carousel scooted a bit closer to Parade, eyes shining with wonder. “So what happened next?”“Well, I didn’t meet Tent until I joined the Circus, but before the people of Nirk were evacuated I heard tales of a great canvas monster that rose from the water.” He raised his eyebrows and looked down at the kids with a faux incredulous look. His voice became hushed. “They said it was made of every colour and pattern imaginable. They said the vrahl realised it was weak to fire too late. They say it killed fifty soldiers before the troops managed to burn most of it away, leaving only the red and white stripes of Tent.”Daredevil and Carousel’s eyes got even wider, and they let out sounds of disbelief. Behind them, Ninepin sat a bit straighter, and Jester looked vaguely uncomfortable. Parade didn’t notice how around them, Tent itself seemed to go very still.“Fifty vrahl?!” Daredevil repeated in disbelief. “But nothing can hurt a vrahl! How did Tent kill fifty?”Parade opened his mouth to reply, but Ninepin interrupted.“It was thirty-seven,” he said stiffly. “not fifty. Thirty-seven soldiers died that day.”Parade looked up and shrugged nonchalantly. A spark of bitterness flared inside his chest. He narrowed his eyes maliciously at the juggler and let resentment shape his words. “Still an impressive number.”The dreer could feel the way everyone immediately tensed. A sick sense of rotten satisfaction curled its way around his heart.Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sideshow lean forward a bit, ready to step in if another fight broke out between Parade and Ninepin. In front of him, Jester glanced at his kin, gauging his reaction.The juggler, who had kept his head down for most of Parade’s retelling, looked up and clenched his jaw. He levelled Parade with a contemptuous glare. “I thought you above disrespecting the dead,” he spat. “Those vrahl were good soldiers. They died bravely getting that beast under control.”Parade’s brow rose higher, and his mouth cracked into a hollow grin. He watched Ninepin realise he had walked right into Parade’s intention for him take the bait.“That ‘beast’,” the dreer drawled, “is the same ‘beast’ you’re currently sitting in.”The low tension that had kindled grew, abrupt and exponential.Parade knew that putting their mortality into perspective – that making the crew aware they were quite literally surrounded by a creature that had managed to kill thirty-seven vrahl, soldiers notorious for being near indestructible – would be a startling realisation, especially for the vrahl whose kin it was Tent murdered.“Parade,” Sideshow warned. The fur on his neck was raised. “Don’t.”Parade huffed and rolled his eyes.Whatever.He might not care for Ninepin, and he might have been hoping to reignite some kind of debate from the previous day, but when Parade looked down and saw that Carousel and Daredevil had shifted closer to each other, he had the decency to feel guilty. Their eyes were wide, alarmed at what he’d said.He had made them afraid.…Parade decided to drop it for now.The dreer leant back in his seat and pretended to be oblivious to the unease he’d created as he continued his story. “After a while of holding Tent captive, the Commanders decided they’d had enough of observing it. There was no more knowledge left to gather considering it couldn’t speak. They had many debates over what to do with it, but eventually decided to keep it alive since a creature with as much strength as Tent might eventually be useful as a weapon.”Parade didn’t need to specify why the vrahl might want a weapon like that. He wanted to, but he didn’t need to. Everyone’s expressions already told him they knew plenty well what a weapon like Tent might be used for.It certainly wouldn’t be used against the High Empress’ own people, that was for sure.“Despite deciding to keep it alive, the High Empress didn’t want to expend resources keeping it contained. As a compromise, she decreed that Tent was to be handed over to Puzzal for ‘monitoring and obedience training.’” Parade snorted. “Not sure how well that’s coming along, but the Ringmaster’s managed to turn Tent into a glorified mount and keep it from killing more soldiers, so the Commanders probably count it as a win.”“But why doesn’t Tent just leave?” Daredevil asked. “If it came from the metal bird and if it doesn’t want to be here, why can’t it just get back on the bird and fly away?”Parade grimaced. “There wasn’t much left of the bird when the vrahl finally managed to bring it above water. I doubt it could fly. Tent probably realised that; that’s why it didn’t try to fight back.” He sighed. “Besides, even if Tent did decide to fight back against the vrahl, they know it’s weak to fire. I doubt it would get very far before one of the troops arrives with flamethrowers.”“How does all this relate to why we’re Underground, though?” Carousel piped up. “I mean, it’s interesting to learn about how Tent got here, but how does the metal bird relate to anything?”Parade nodded his head. “Thanks for getting us back on track, ‘Sel.” He flexed his claws. “No one realised it until the people living on the beaches of Lake Gristu started to get sick, but the metal bird was leaking some kind of poisonous chemical into the water. The vrahl didn’t know it was there because they weren’t affected by it.“If the bird had crashed anywhere else, they might have been able to contain the chemical, but…” he shook his head. “The thing about Lake Gristu is that it sits at a higher altitude than most of the rest of Akaara. The only things that sit higher are the Tilino Mountain Range in the south-east, and the Ekinrow Ridge in the west. The rain that falls on both runs off into the Lake, and the Lake, in turn, runs off in hundreds of rivers all around Akaara. So when the water of Lake Gristu got poisoned…”“…the rest of Akaara got poisoned, too,” Carousel finished, grim realisation dawning on her face. “Oh.”Parade nodded. “Exactly. It killed most of the plants, and the plants that didn’t die became fatal to eat, which killed the dreer that tried to eat them. Most animals that ate the plants also died; those that didn’t became fatal to the archae instead, because it made their meat tainted.” The dreer looked down, eyes harrowed. “Everything got even worse when a rare weed called a Clouder started to turn the chemical into a breathable gas.”The kids looked mortified at what Parade was describing. He was tempted to stop now, but there wasn’t much more left to the story.“Historically, Clouders were a pest most Akaarans killed the instant they found them, because Clouders would convert minerals in the ground into evaporated versions of themselves,” he explained. “They were already a dangerous plant to be around – breathe in the fumes a Clouder emitted, and you could have crystals growing in your lungs, or cancerous tumours forming in your throat.” Parade swallowed dryly. “They were troublesome because they were an invasive plant species that spread fast. If you didn’t kill it the moment you saw it, it would keep growing and spreading its spores to grow more copies of itself.” He clenched his jaw. “With that in mind, I think you can imagine how much worse they became when their roots were saturated with a chemical already dangerous in its liquid form, and when the dreer and archae that would normally be around to kill them started dying themselves.”“Ghiisa,” Daredevil breathed. “That sounds terrible.”“So that’s why we have the vent systems built into the cavern roofs,” Carousel said slowly, understanding dawning in her eyes. “I thought they were just there to make sure everyone got enough oxygen in the Underground, but they’re doing more than that, right? They’re filtering out the poison.”Parade nodded, surprised Carousel had caught on so quickly. “Correct.”To his left, Jester spoke up. “You are certainly knowledgeable about the situation on the surface,” he said. “There are some things you mentioned that not even I had heard of.”Sideshow nodded assent. Parade averted his eyes down toward his rations. “Like I said, I was with people who had connections,” he muttered. “They preferred to be well informed of what was happening in Akaara from first-hand sources, rather than leaving their knowledge up to rumours and common hearsay.”“The evacuations must have been scary,” Carousel said in a small voice. “I can’t imagine what it must have been like.”Parade smiled, expression tight. “It definitely wasn’t something I want to go through again. I think I speak for everyone else as well when I say that.”Jester, Ninepin, Sideshow and Freakshow all nodded. Although they hadn’t been as close as Parade had been to the impact site, they had dealt with their own evacuations in different parts of Akaara, and none of them had been pleasant experiences.Parade fell quiet now that he was at the end of his tale. He picked at his rations and mumbled a soft, “you’re welcome,” to the kids after they thanked him for sharing his story and moved back to their places in the crew’s vague seating circle.When his crewmates started to talk about other, less impactful topics, Parade barely paid the conversation any attention. Instead, he pushed his food half-heartedly around his plate.His appetite was gone, and his mind could do nothing but mourn a time where everything, as painful as it had been, was normal.

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 8 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

One of the best parts of being in the circus was the travelling. It was a hard thing not to love. Being stationary meant the exhaustion of back-to-back shows and thousands of eyes watching the crew’s every movement for hours at a time. Compared to that, trudging between cities far above most Akaaran’s heads was as surreal as being on a leisurely vacation.Unfortunately for the crew, these ‘vacations’ always ended far too soon.“We’re here!”Sideshow looked up from the conversation he’d been having with Freakshow in time to see Carousel’s head disappear back outside the entrance of the circus tent.The crew had been travelling for about eight days now, and finally they’d made it to the outskirts of the vrahl’s capital city. Sideshow wasn’t sure whether to feel relieved the journey was over, or pensive knowing it meant the really challenging part of their trip was only just beginning.Probably a bit of both, he reasoned.With a deep breath he glanced over at his partner. Freakshow nudged his shoulder, and they both rose to their feet. Together they trotted after Ninepin, Jester and Parade, who had already moved ahead of them to exit the tent.Sideshow stepped outside and squinted for a moment in the light of the luminescent cavern lichen above their heads. When he finally managed to blink his eyes into clarity, he felt his heart drop in a way that only heights could make him feel.Beneath Tent, the Iiken-Kaaraka passageway the crew had been travelling through abruptly transitioned from a decently large tunnel to a gigantic, yawning cavern.The cavern itself seemed to be carved into circular tiers that progressively stepped lower and lower into the ground. Covering every square inch of available floor space were streets and houses, crammed in appearance but more orderly arranged than the residential sectors the crew had seen in Khaliis. Surrounding these buildings and lining each tier’s walls were thousands of vrahl pods connected by narrow walkways.The pods were small, chamber-like things; dwellings for each vrahl soldier assigned to a troop in their capitol city. From what Ninepin had told him, there was barely enough space inside each for anyone to lay down in, let alone use as a conventional living area.“Pods aren’t designed for comfort,” Ninepin had said, “they are merely a place to rest your body until your Commander calls you to your next patrol.”At the centre of the staggered tiers, right down at the lowest point in the cavern, sat the sprawling vrahl Palace. It was difficult to see details from a distance, but Sideshow could make out its pentagonal shape and some parts of its strangely crafted architecture. A broad slope in the north-east led down from the tier above towards the Palace’s grand gates.“Wow…” Daredevil, who was clinging to the side of Tent, whispered. Carousel wasn’t far behind, looking down at the city with just as much awe.“I’ve never seen construction work like this before,” the young archae exclaimed. Her iider-limbs clicked in intrigue. “Why is it so different to what the other cities look like?”“The Mother had it specially commissioned from the Central Dreer Clan when we went Underground,” Jester replied, moving closer to Carousel to look over her shoulder and get a better view of the city. “I am not exactly sure why, but I think she may have wanted it to vaguely resemble the Kikharri Crater – the place where my species’ comet collided with your planet.”Sideshow glanced at Parade, but the dreer was either too absorbed looking over the city to have heard the knife thrower or had simply decided not to react.‘It’s a beautiful view, isn’t it?’ Freakshow signed next to Sideshow, drawing the archae’s attention back to the sight in front of him.He dipped his head. “It certainly is.”Part of Sideshow wished the crew could stay like that forever, basking in this little bubble of peace they had found far above the heads of other Akaarans; but unfortunately, as he had come to learn long before now, good things were doomed to never last.The rustling of fabric back in the direction of the circus tent was what alerted the crew to Puzzal’s presence. Quickly they shuffled to the centre of Tent’s back and formed a rough line, waiting for their Ringmaster to appear. They didn’t have to wait long.With the sound of shifting cloth, a red-and-white striped platform made its way down to the crew from the direction of Tent’s head. The circus tent between them fluttered and deflated slightly, parting to the sides to allow the fabric platform to travel straight through where it once stood.On the platform, upper hands folded over the rounded top of his cane and lower arms clasped behind his back, was Puzzal. As he drew closer, Sideshow could see the vrahl’s narrowed eyes on them, watching for signs of inattention.Tent lowered the Ringmaster down to be in line with the crew. When he was low enough to step off, he picked up his cane and strode forward. He came to a stop a few meters from the gathered performers and raked his eyes and down their line. Everyone was silent for a few moments before he spoke.“As I am certain you have all realised,” he said, “we have arrived at Kaaraka.”He paused, as if waiting for a reaction, or perhaps waiting for someone to challenge his observation. When no one did, he curled his lip and continued.“I would like to remind everyone that if any of you do anything to make this performance any less than perfect, you will all pay for the mistake.” He levelled Sideshow with a deathly glare. “Dearly.”He didn’t have to spell out what he meant. It was crystal clear to the entire crew.If they messed up, the Ringmaster would not settle for a routine beating.The Ringmaster looked up and down the line of waiting performers once more and snorted in contempt, then stepped forward and shoved the top of his cane against Sideshow’s chest. The archae took half a step back.“Your crew looks atrocious,” the vrahl sneered, “no better than the street rats your people eat. Fix it.” He withdrew a small pouch of shards from his coat and threw it at Sideshow’s feet, “I do not want to see a single strand of hair out of place on any of your mutt’s heads.”Sideshow stooped to grab the pouch and kept his head lowered when he rose back to his full height. Puzzal scoffed and snapped his fingers.The platform that Tent had brought him down on, which had been waiting motionlessly behind the Ringmaster while he spoke to the crew, shifted and melded into the fabric of Tent’s back. A ripple of threads squirmed towards the performers, and within a heartbeat the platform had reappeared once more beneath Puzzal’s feet. With a rustle, it and the vrahl rose into the air, suspended by dozens of thin ribbons. The ribbons rolled like waves to push the two out over the side of the cloth beast’s body. Once clear of the creature’s mass, the platform began to descend towards the street below.When the Ringmaster was out of sight, Sideshow let out a breath and turned to face his crew. A quick glance told him that although the performers didn’t look as bad as Puzzal claimed, they certainly could do with appearing a little neater.He opened the pouch and tilted the bag around. The little translucent triangular chips of blue, green and red rock shards inside clacked against each other as he counted out roughly how much money they had.When he had a relatively good idea, he nodded his head, drew the drawstrings of the pouch closed again, and looked up at the Circus, who were waiting his direction. “Alright everyone,” he said, “looks like we’re heading into the Blackout Districts to get our alterations touched up. Since you all know how easy it is for large groups to get separated in the Districts, we’re going to do this in two groups. Ninepin, Parade and I will go in the first group. Freakshow, Jester, Carousel and Daredevil, you’ll all go in the second.”The crew nodded in understanding. Daredevil nodded more vigorously than the rest and trotted forward a few steps.“Hey, Sideshow!” she piped up, eyes hopeful. “I know the Ringmaster probably just wants us to fix our recolourations, but is there enough money for any new modifications?”Sideshow glanced down at the pouch.Alterations were a versatile thing. By definition, they were anything that altered the appearance of an Akaaran’s body to look different from its natural appearance. Whereas recolourations were the most common form of alteration – being anything that dyed an Akaaran’s fur a different colour, or tattooed their skin a different pattern – modifications were… somewhat more permanent.They were also a lot more dangerous.In all honesty, there probably was enough for Daredevil to get a new modification – if they were to find a cheap enough modifier. But cheaper modifiers were exactly where Sideshow’s problem with modifications in general lay. Choosing the cheapest option when the modification process literally involved undergoing cosmetic surgery was a recipe for disaster. Sideshow had heard the horror stories about half-done jobs, and Akaarans who left modification clinics clinic healthy, only to die a day later from stitches pulled open, or heart attacks induced by fast-forming blood clots.All that risk, and it didn’t even begin to touch on the true reason why the modification industry was so despised by the general public in the first place. There was a reason why those who entered the Districts were seen as lesser than the rest of Akaara’s inhabitants. It was the same reason why seeing a modified Akaaran with only one modification was so rare, and it had everything to do with how the tools used in modification procedures were intentionally designed to be addictive. Sideshow wasn’t entirely sure how it worked, but he knew the root cause of the addiction was due to the vibration frequency a modifier’s surgery tools emitted.When modifications had first come into existence, they were barely talked about and largely avoided by anyone with common sense due to how life-threatening the procedures were to get. Patients had the choice of either staying awake and feeling every agonising incision, or being knocked out by something heavy and forceful enough to cause serious long-term brain damage, if not instant death.No one had ever anticipated them becoming popular. At least, not until a group of archae modifiers invented what came to be known as ‘spins’ – tools that buzzed with a vibration low enough to completely override an individual’s sense of pain and instead replace it with utter euphoria.Spins did miracles for the modifications industry. They were extremely useful in relaxing patients enough to perform long operations with no physical side-effects, and as such modifications became more popular amongst those unsatisfied with their looks; but the mental and emotional consequences were devastating. It may not have been an intentionally designed caveat, but the reason spins became so addicting was because they generated enough dopamine in one’s brain to create a bliss-induced high.In the face of a crumbling society burning itself out on capitalism, it wasn’t surprising when spins clinics eventually started popping up across the Underground so Akaarans could feel the tool’s effects without actually having to go under the knife. They were a larger attraction in the non-District sections of Akaara, where archae Nobles and high-earning dreer had easier access to them in more public locations. But those places were designed to be a sinkhole for the wealthy. For the less fortunate, but no less addicted, modifications were the cheapest way to feel that buzz.Modifications, in the eyes of those who looked down upon the Districts, were a poor man’s gamble. They represented everything that everyone is always fighting both themselves and life to never be. They were for the indisposed, and the suffering. The shamefully addicted, and those ungrateful for the hand life had dealt them. They were for the malcontent, the desperate, the despised. They were for the filthy, and the uncontrollable. They were for those everyone would rather forget exists, and those that no one aspires to be. And over time, this perception had extended to both recolourations, and the Blackout Districts as a whole.There were still risks attached to each procedure, of course. One could still die from surgery complications, or inexperienced modifiers, even with the presence of spins to lessen the pain. But at least now a dying patient would be blissfully unaware of their demise, even after they drew their last breath.For many, it was a worthy trade-off.For Daredevil, it was a pitfall Sideshow never wanted to watch her fall into.The archae had already seen first-hand what a spins addiction could do to someone. He never wanted to witness those he loved go through that utter absence of everything again. Daredevil was already at risk of it, seeing as she had already gone through one modification before to turn her under-developed iider-limbs into the little wings she now so happily fluttered on her back. Sideshow couldn’t live with himself if a second procedure was what led her to get that glassy look in her eyes, and feel that distinct separation of mind and body that would dog her day in and day out, removing every ounce of wonder from her body until she was nothing but a husk of her former energetic self.Sideshow lifted his head from Daredevil’s pleading eyes and saw Freakshow regarding the hybrid with a look of deep sadness.“Sorry Daredevil,” the fire-dancer said after a moment, looking back down at the kid with a tight expression. “I don’t think we have enough. Besides, any modifications you get today wouldn’t heal in time for the show.”Daredevil huffed playfully and blew a strand of fur out of her face. “Fiiiine,” she drawled, tail tip flicking, “maybe on the next trip, once the Mother’s performance is over.”“Maybe,” Sideshow echoed, non-committedly.There would be a proper time and place for Sideshow to have a discussion with Daredevil about why he didn’t want her getting more modifications. But right now, less than a day away from their performance in Kaaraka, it was neither.Beside Daredevil, Carousel seemed to sense that there was more Sideshow wasn’t saying. She glanced at the money pouch the archae was holding, then up to his face, searching his expression for… something. Sideshow wasn’t sure what she found, but after a moment the look in her eyes shifted, and she turned to Daredevil, betting that the hybrid couldn’t beat her in a race back inside Tent.When the kids had both taken off, eager to prove each other wrong, Sideshow raised his head once more to look around at the rest of the crew. Ninepin seemed unbothered by what had just transpired. Jester was watching the kids scuffle, lips pressed into a thin line. Freakshow was leaning on her crutches, watching the youngsters in much the same fashion.To the side, Parade had turned away and walked closer to the edge of Tent’s back, waiting for he, Ninepin and Sideshow to start their trek into the nearest District.◦▹ // ◃◦After being lowered from Tent’s back to a relatively uncrowded side street below, Sideshow, Ninepin and Parade set off in the direction of the Iiken-Kaaraka tunnel intersection.“I’ll lead us to the District entrance,” Parade said, stepping forward to spearhead their little group. “I’ve been here before, so I know the way.”Sideshow dipped his head. “Be my guest. Beats getting lost trying to find it otherwise.”The three of them stepped out of the side street and into the main thoroughfare. Sideshow grunted as he was roughly shoved by multiple people hurrying past him in the bustling passage. He took a moment to steady himself and pressed forward through the crowds, tailing Parade, who had already managed to get a decent head start despite how difficult it was to navigate the crowded streets.

Struggling through the masses upon masses of Akaarans flitting through the intersection, Sideshow was reminded of how much he appreciated travelling between cities up in the air on Tent’s back. It had been a while since he’d needed to journey on foot, and this short trip was enough to reinforce why.The shouts of market stall owners trying to sell their wares to passers-by was grating; the raised voices of potential buyers as they haggled prices with merchants even more so. The people that pushed past Sideshow seemed to suffer all manner of afflictions; some were missing arms, legs, fingers, ears; others hacked their lungs up and teetered in place as they tried to hobble through crowds that showed no mercy in knocking them to the ground. Many had unkempt fur full of dust and parasites, with watery eyes and bloodied gums where their teeth had rotted out of their skulls. Most were emaciated, ribs prominent beneath fragile skin littered in cuts and bruises.It was a brutal and jarring sight. Especially in contrast to how comparatively well-off the crew was.Sideshow knew well that it was hardly the people of Akaara’s fault they had come to look like such twisted, living corpses, something almost indistinguishable from the bodies apathetically kicked to the sides of most roads the crew travelled. Rather, it was the situation the entire continent had been placed in that made them so sickly.Still, despite knowing this, the archae couldn’t help but feel a guilty sense of relief that he didn’t have to live amongst them.It was funny, in an ironic sort of way, how Sideshow’s living conditions hadn’t really changed much throughout his life – yet somehow, they’d gone from being considered almost barbaric on the surface to something on par with true luxury in the Underground.That fact – the fact that the crew was lucky to have the resources they did, and that they should be grateful for it – was perhaps the only thing Sideshow and Puzzal could agree on. It might have been the bare minimum, and of course it came with caveats Sideshow thought no one should ever be subjected to, but truth be told things could have been a lot worse. The Underground itself was all the proof Sideshow needed.That was one of the reasons why he felt so indifferent to taking on punishments the Ringmaster intended to inflict on others. He already had it easy enough; he could deal with making life easier for others, too.Sideshow snapped out of his thoughts when Parade came to a stop in front of him.He hadn’t realised the trio had reached the cavernous edge of the intersection until he glanced up and saw a narrow-mouthed hole in the wall leading off into a series of dark, twisting tunnels. A few archae and dreer were huddled off to the sides of the passage, faces cloaked in shadow as they curled in on themselves and buried their heads protectively behind arms and knees. Some looked deathly still in a way that made Sideshow’s skin crawl.“This is it,” Parade said softly.Sideshow glanced over to see an unreadable expression on the dreer’s face. Looking back at the tunnel, he stepped a little closer to peer through the narrow entrance, trying to make out anything in the near absolute darkness. “Do you want me to lead?”Parade shook his head and rolled his shoulders with a deep breath in. “Nah, I’ll navigate. I know a recolouration expert in here who’ll touch up my alterations at a discounted price.”Sideshow moved aside and inclined his head. “Alright, then. We’ll be right behind you.”Parade huffed out a breath. He took a second to steel himself, then nodded decisively. Without so much as a glance back at his two companions, he turned slightly to the side and shimmied in through the gap. Sideshow followed, and Ninepin took up the rear.The three shuffled through the winding passages, moving on sound and touch alone when the tunnel became too dark to see in. At one point they had to awkwardly press themselves as far as possible against a wall to allow four strangers coming from the opposite direction to pass. Although he couldn’t see them, Sideshow swore he felt a series of small, teeth-like spikes on one of their arm bracers rub against his own arm as the group squeezed by.Eventually, after what felt like hours but was probably no more than a few minutes, a faint light appeared at the end of the tunnel, growing brighter as the three crewmates approached. Parade stepped into the larger and brighter space first. Sideshow wasn’t far behind.Sideshow had been in Blackout Districts many times before, but somehow he still always felt unprepared for just how much of a cultural shift they were compared to the rest of the Underground.Wherever you went in Akaara, there was almost always guaranteed to be an entrance into a Blackout District somewhere close by. Although they didn’t take up anywhere near as much space in the Underground as the majority of Akaara’s main tunnel systems did, there was still that ever-present maze of too-narrow passages and suffocating architecture hidden just out of sight, either behind major thoroughfare walls, or beneath the feet of the unassuming.Don’t get Sideshow wrong, the maze-like streets and suffocating architecture was still just as prevalent throughout the rest of the Underground. But in the Districts, that sensation felt amplified. The crowds teeming through the rest of Akaara’s tunnel system might be ridiculous, but the passages they passed through were made to hold that many people. The Districts’ weren’t. Whereas you might be able to move at a faltering shamble everywhere else, in the Districts, getting anywhere through the cramped crowds was like trying to hold back a wall of water with your fists. It just didn’t work.In addition to the increased sense of being confined, the architecture in the Districts was certainly… different. Houses and market stalls were still cobbled together with whatever materials people could get their hands on, but they were fuller than the lifeless, monotonous structures everywhere else. It wasn’t necessarily a good nor bad kind of full, but a full that screamed of people who hadn't given up; people who were trying their best, despite their circumstances, to get by.Almost every building was covered in a mess of crates and cloth, a testament to just how little space was inside the buildings themselves. Graffiti covered almost every free surface and vied for attention, boldly proclaiming that someone was here, someone made their mark, someone wanted to be remembered. Little candle lights flickered in doorways and hung on ropes between rooftops, providing barely enough light to see by. The people in the streets were cast in shadow, an unsteady sea of shuffling, shouting bodies trying to pass through.Shopkeepers were quieter, sometimes silent, more so than their counterparts in the rest of the Underground as customers sought out sellers instead of the other way around. Buyers asked for their usual orders, or introduced their friends to long-time favourite merchants as if they were old acquaintances. Brawls broke out between strangers, the occasional unlucky bystander getting caught in the crossfire.In the darker, less travelled alleyways, shadows flitted out of sight behind sharp corners. Beggars pressed themselves against dusty walls to stay out of the way of food vendors selling meats Sideshow didn’t want to imagine the origins of. Aggravated scuffles broke out between those with grudges against each other, the loser’s unresponsive body left to rot where it fell in the wake of glinting blades and split knuckles. Days old corpses no one mourned for were dragged off into shadowed doorways no one dared to approach.The air in the Districts was always heavy and hard to breathe in, soured by a compound of nauseous smells Sideshow refused to decipher.A bump against the archae’s arm jolted him back into awareness of his immediate surroundings.Sideshow looked away from the overwhelming everything to see Parade motioning that they needed to move right. With a shaky inhale, the fire dancer nodded and joined his crewmates as the three of them entered the throngs of Akaarans pushing their way through the District’s streets.The trio spent what Sideshow guessed was close to an hour struggling to move anywhere before they eventually came across an old store carved into the wall of a dog-legged bend in one of the District’s main thoroughfares. Overhanging its entrance was a tattered awning that looked one bad gust of wind away from completely collapsing. Beneath it, a sign propped up by bricks proclaimed the shop to be ‘ARALO’S RECOLOURATIONS AND TOUCH-UPS’. Both the sign and awning looked to have once been a vivid mix of red and orange hues, but the colour had long since faded into a rust-like brown.When they managed to get off the main road and stand in a huddle just outside the store’s door, Parade turned to Sideshow and Ninepin. Sideshow tossed him the Ringmaster’s money pouch. Parade caught it with a small mock salute.“I’ll be back soon,” the dreer said. “Aralo’s one of the best in the business. It won’t take too long for her to do my touch-ups.”“No worries,” Sideshow said, leaning against one of the old wooden posts that kept the shop’s awning upright. It emitted a loud, concerning creak under his weight, but it didn’t break, so Sideshow counted that as a win. He decided to keep resting against it, albeit with a little less pressure. “I don't think ‘Pin or I need any work done this time ‘round, so we’ll wait here until you’re finished.”Parade nodded and turned to walk up the few short steps leading to the shop’s low doorway. Sideshow watched him duck beneath it with practised ease and heard him loudly greet someone inside. The other person, assumedly Aralo, welcomed him back with an equally boisterous tone.When they quieted down, the archae turned to Ninepin, who was looking at the shop’s entrance quizzically.“Is this ‘Aralo’ person someone Parade visits frequently?” the vrahl asked.Sideshow shrugged. “Dunno. I didn’t go with him last time we toured Kaaraka, but if I had to guess I’d probably say she’s someone he knew from before he joined the Circus.”Ninepin hummed distractedly. The conversation fizzled out there, with Ninepin seemingly pre-occupied in his own mind while Sideshow considered him thoughtfully.After a few beats of silence, Sideshow decided to ask something that had been on his mind. “So, what do you think about all this, ‘Pin?”Ninepin blinked and glanced at the archae. His brows furrowed slightly in confusion. “What do I think about what?”Sideshow motioned vaguely with his hands. “What’s waiting for us in the Palace. Obviously I can guess you’re excited to perform for a New Mother, but do you have any thoughts on how our performance might go?” He shifted his weight from foot to foot and gazed out over the strangers coming and going in the street around them. “I know the crew can handle it, but I’m… I’m worried. We haven’t had to perform for anyone this important before. If their nerves get the best of them, we’re screwed.”“You better make sure they act nothing but perfect, then,” Ninepin said stiffly. “The Mothers shouldn’t be privy to anything less than exceptional-quality entertainment. The crew deserves whatever punishment Puzzal deems necessary if we do not live up to their expectations.”Sideshow’s head swivelled to look at the vrahl incredulously.That was… blunt. Even for Ninepin.It was also something Sideshow didn’t agree with. Primarily because he knew that if they messed up this time, they wouldn’t be able to get away with persevering through some standard, routine beating. Puzzal wouldn’t go that easy on them.No, this time messing up could very well prove to be fatal.Had Ninepin not processed just how much was at stake?“Well, yeah, but it wouldn’t just be a normal punishment, Nine. If we mess this one up, I don’t know what the Ringmaster would do.”After holding his gaze for a moment, Ninepin looked back to the bustling street without a response. His eyes clouded over a little, the action a tell-tale sign of him peering into the vrahl’s Hivemind.Sideshow was left baffled and with his worries very much not quelled.What in Fer? Ninepin had never acted this closed off to a discussion about the archae’s concerns over the crew before. Was it the impending pressure of performing in front of the Mothers? Maybe their proximity to the vrahl’s capitol?Before he could think of a way to reignite the discussion or start on a different topic of small talk, another conversation across the street caught Sideshow’s attention. His ears swivelled toward a small booth tucked away beside a food stand where the occupants were talking in loud, drunken voices.“…n’ I told ‘im it was a bad idea! But did ‘e listen to me? Nooooooo…”Sideshow tilted his head to see a short dreer sitting across from a ratty-looking archae who was in the middle of downing a mug full of murky alcohol. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ninepin follow his gaze and take notice of the same people.The archae finished sculling their drink and thunked their tankard against the wood of the booth’s table. “What are ya even sayin’?” they slurred, “’yer just started talkin’ ‘bout the people down south like I even know what’s happenin’ there.”The dreer leant closer to his drinking pal and tapped his index fingers against the table pointedly. “All’at stuff happenin’ ‘round Nynmor and the Crater. You haven’t heard?”“I ain’t go down south!”The dreer scoffed. “No, you just ain’t pay attention to anythin’ happenin’ in the Underground,” he said exasperatedly. “Folks’ve been talkin’. ‘pparently there’s some strange fella callin’ ‘imself The Bookkeepper takin’ crimbim— criningm— crimilin— crimbals— Fer, you know what I mean! ‘E’s takin’ them wrong-uns from Nynmor and hidin’ ‘em out ‘round the Kikharri Crater! Under the ol’ Western Isles!”The archae laughed in disbelief and the dreer slammed his fist against the table.“I swear it’s true!” he shouted.“You wan’ me to believe some fella called The Bookkeeper is out there helpin’ criminals?” the archae chuckled. “Why? He’d be riskin’ trouble with the vrahl for no reason. And in the Crater of all places? The storms out that way’ve made the Isles a death trap since the Empress crawled outta her rock. No way that’s true.”The dreer shook his head. “It is. My buddy, the one I told to be careful, told me ‘e saw Commander Nine send a troop out to the Crater to check. You know what they found? A giant metal door. Built right there in the side of the Crater!”“Now I know you’re lying,” the archae growled. “Ain’t no way anyone could build a door in the Crater without being stopped by the vrahl.”“If my buddy was lyin’ then why did the vrahl come ‘n take ‘im away for talkin’ ‘bout it, huh?” the dreer retorted. “’sides, why couldn’t there be a door there? It ain’t like the soldiers’ve been out that way since they made their home on the mainland.”“Even if someone could build a secret door in the Crater, why would they?” the archae asked, growing a bit more serious. “You said this Bookkeeper fella is takin’ crimbinals there Underground, right? He ain’t got a need for some big door in a death pit, ‘less he tryna kill off them criminals ‘imself.”The dreer shook his head firmly. “No, I ‘eard—” he glanced around quickly, as if suddenly self-conscious of being overheard, and leant forward. He didn’t lower his voice though, so Sideshow failed to see how the closer proximity changed anything about the privacy of their conversation. “I ‘eard ‘e only takes the criminals ‘e thinks are innocent. Those buggers tryna escape from things they say they didna do and the like, you get me?”The archae shoved their tankard to the side and also leant forward. “Ya wanna be careful who ‘ears ya say that,” they said, while also not attempting to speak quieter at all. Seriously, were these guys trying to be eavesdropped on? “Ya know ‘s well ‘s I do that if the vrahl say yer guilty, yer guilty.”“Yeah, but—”“And that still ain’t explain why there’s a big ol’ door there!”

The dreer flopped back in his seat and crossed his arms, glaring. “Yer no fun. You ain’t find even the idea of it curious? You ain’t wanna know more ‘bout what it means?”“No, and if ya don’t wanna end up like yer buddy with the vrahl cartin’ you off to Fer-knows-where, you’d be wise not to ask after it. Now let’s forget we ever had this talk.” The archae swept up their tankard and held it above their head, trying to get the attention of the barkeep. “Ay, Barboy! Come ‘n give me ‘n my pal a top up!”As the barkeep walked over to refill the patron’s mugs, Sideshow glanced at Ninepin. The vrahl’s bluntness from earlier was temporarily forgotten, and the juggler himself once more had clear eyes, free from the Hivemind’s influence.“Did you catch all that?” the archae asked.Ninepin nodded distantly, brows furrowed. He seemed to be standing more rigidly than he had just a few minutes ago, although Sideshow wasn’t sure why. “I caught enough to figure out what they were talking about.”“You ever heard of this ‘Bookkeeper’ person?”The vrahl hesitated. It wasn’t for long, but it was noticeable enough that when he said, “no. Never,” Sideshow narrowed his eyes in confusion and turned to face his friend a little more, unconvinced.It seemed an innocent enough question – Sideshow wasn’t actively discussing this ‘Bookkeeper’ like the dreer’s friend supposedly had, and it wasn’t like there were any vrahl other than Ninepin around to hear what he’d asked – so he was confused as to why Ninepin would bother lying over something so trivial. And he was lying; the hesitation told him clear as day that the vrahl was being dishonest. Ninepin never hesitated over anything.With a feeling of unease over both their interactions crawling up his back, Sideshow opened his mouth to ask Ninepin what he wasn’t telling him – but before he could speak, Parade exited the recolouration shop, sung out a goodbye to someone inside on his way out, and trotted over to meet them.Ninepin took a step forward, refusing to look at Sideshow. He inclined his head in greeting when the dreer got closer. “Those touch-ups definitely made your recolourations look brighter and neater,” he said.His two companions paused and looked at the vrahl with expressions of confusion.“Uh, thank you…?” Parade said slowly, eyes narrowed and staring at Ninepin like he’d grown a second head. Sideshow couldn’t blame him; Ninepin and Parade hadn’t willingly spoken a word to each other since the night Parade talked about the metal bird, and beyond that Ninepin never complimented anyone on anything. It just wasn’t something he did.The fur on Sideshow’s neck was standing on end.Everything Ninepin was doing was way too out of character. In failing to respond like his usual self and trying to avoid answering Sideshow’s earlier questions, Ninepin had only signalled more alarm bells.It might have seemed like such a subtle change of personality, but Sideshow had known Ninepin for almost two years now and this just… something didn’t feel quite right. There was something more to this ‘Bookkeeper’ person. Something Ninepin was hoping Sideshow would ignore.The archae tore his eyes away from the vrahl and saw Parade staring at the raised fur on the nape of his neck. When he realised Sideshow was looking, Parade glanced up to make eye contact with an expression more serious and alert than any Sideshow had seen him wear for weeks.Sideshow forced himself to look away and make his fur lie flat again.If there was information Ninepin was withholding, about this ‘Bookkeeper’ or otherwise, that was something Sideshow could ask in private. It wouldn’t do to have Parade spread rumours amongst the crew over something Sideshow could simply be overreacting about.“Let’s go,” the fire dancer said abruptly, spinning on his heel and heading off in the direction of the Blackout District’s exit. He heard his friends shuffle to keep up behind him.They walked in silence for a few minutes, navigating twisting streets and deafening crowds, before Parade was able to draw ahead of Ninepin and sidle up beside Sideshow.“You alright?” the dreer asked, voice as quiet as the busy streets around them would permit. He ducked out of the way of an archae carrying what looked to be a long carpet over their shoulder. “What happened back there?”“It’s nothing,” Sideshow replied, “don’t worry about it.”Parade frowned. “Look, Sideshow, I know I’ve been a bit of a jerk lately, but if you need—”“I said don’t worry about it,” Sideshow snapped, harsher than intended. He instantly regretted it when a look of shock swept over Parade’s face.The expression didn’t last long; it morphed into a sneer and eyeroll before Sideshow could explain that he didn’t mean to sound angry, he was just preoccupied thinking about what Ninepin—“Yeah, whatever, Sideshow. Sorry I asked.”Sideshow couldn’t do anything but stare, frustratingly helpless, after Parade as the dreer moved back behind Ninepin. The crowds around them kept pushing the archae forward and were loud enough that when he called out for Parade to come back, his voice was instantly drowned out by the surrounding clamour.Ninepin shot him and Parade a quizzical look as the dreer walked past, and Sideshow huffed in self-targeted irritation. He turned around and kept pushing his way towards the exit.The crew just needed to get through the next couple of days.After that, Sideshow could sit down and have proper conversations with both Parade and Ninepin. Maybe both at the same time, if he thought they could handle it without attempting to tear each other’s throats out. Then, at least, they could try to move past whatever this bizarre grudge was that they’d spontaneously developed against each other.Sideshow suspected it was the stress of the upcoming performance that had caused all… this to happen in the first place; or, if not the cause, it was at least an amplifying factor for why relations between his crewmates seemed to be on such thin ice right now.He couldn’t blame them. It was stressful to even think about, let alone process the fact that they would be standing on stage before the Empresses and vrahl Commanders tomorrow.Just a couple more days and it would be over. They would fix things, and everything would go back to normal.Just a couple more days.Sideshow had to believe it.

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 9 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

When both Sideshow and Freakshow’s groups had finished getting their alterations touched up in the Districts, the Circus once more hit the road. Only this time, instead of Tent travelling across the ceiling, the cloth-monster turned its tendril arms into paws and claws and plodded along the stone path leading down toward the Imperial Palace.It took a while for the crew to get from where they entered the cavern in the city’s south-west all the way down to the north-eastern side of the cave’s lowest tier. Even though the vrahl in Kaaraka were far more coordinated in moving out of Tent’s way than the residents in any other place the Circus had toured through, the archae and dreer who lived in the city still had a habit of accidentally getting under the creature’s feet, which meant that Tent had to take its time weaving between crowds to avoid crushing anyone.Up high on Tent’s back, Freakshow hated how her heart anxiously stuttered more and more the closer the Circus drew to their goal. Each one of Tent’s steps shot ice-cold fear through her veins. Every breath she drew in felt just slightly depraved of the right amount of oxygen she needed. Every glance down revealed hundreds – no, thousands – of vrahl eyes staring silently up at her. And the silence was honestly the worst part of the whole ordeal.Freakshow hadn’t known it before, but Kaaraka was quiet. Horrifically so. It made sense why – after all, the vrahl didn’t need to verbally speak when they could communicate telepathically via their Hivemind. But despite the logic behind the lack of noise, Freakshow couldn’t even begin to articulate how terrifying the absolute nothingness was.For most of her life, she had been totally surrounded by bustling cities and yelling. Karaaka was, and had, neither.The only noise that rose from its streets was the sounds of clicking exoskeletons and Akaarans physically moving throughout their daily chores. Even the dreer and archae who lived in Kaaraka seemed afraid to break the almost reverent silence. They spoke in clipped sentences and hushed whispers, and only when it was necessary for them to speak at all.For Freakshow, to be thrown into something so completely out of her depth when she had spent so long becoming accustomed to constant noise and chatter, especially with no notice beforehand that she would be dealing with such a drastically different environment… well, it had thrown her completely off her game to say the least.She couldn’t stop thinking about how hungry the probing gazes of the vrahl below looked. It was as if they were keenly waiting for the crew to step out of line so they could have a valid reason to beat them into submission. Freakshow wouldn’t put it past them for that to be their exact train of thought; and so she tried her best to settle down as Tent kept moving towards the heart of Kaaraka, acting as unremarkable as possible to avoid drawing any unwanted attention to both herself and her crew.When Tent was within easy walking distance of the Imperial Palace’s outer walls, the fabric creature slowly deflated its size and used platforms of cloth to gently drop the Ringmaster and his performers off in front of the Palace Ground’s entrance.Puzzal thrust his cane against the stony ground twice in quick succession when everyone was on their feet, and the crew scrambled to fall into a neat line behind him. Tent shifted into something not too unlike a flatter, longer, and narrower pancake with hooked claws, and draped itself across Sideshow’s shoulders.Freakshow swallowed past the lump in her throat as she stared up at the looming figure of the High Empress’ Imperial Palace before her.The crew had performed in Kaaraka in the past – of course they had, it was right at the start of their now standard tour route throughout the Underground – but never had they performed anywhere even remotely close to the Imperial Palace. Their shows had always been on the fringes of the city, tucked away in caverns halfway between their next and last tour stops, servicing only the archae and dreer that lived in the outskirts, or those who had travelled from deeper within.There was no reason for the Circus to perform anywhere else in Kaaraka; after all, despite being created by the Mother, the Circus didn’t exist to entertain vrahl, and vrahl didn’t find it an amusing way to spend their time regardless. There was no point to performing in the heart of a city populated by the one species that wouldn’t attend their shows.So, despite having seen the vrahl’s Capital building from a distance and in passing, Freakshow had never been able to make out any solid details. Not before now, at least.Now, standing daunted before the main entrance to the Imperial Grounds, Freakshow realised that it was breathtaking in a foreign, alien way. She didn’t think there was anything else quite like what she was witnessing in this moment anywhere else on Akaara.The wall encircling the Palace was comprised of five long, low sides, with the north-eastern section being where the giant archway into the grounds was situated. At each junction of the pentagonal shape stood a looming guard tower. They were wide at the base, curved in on an even slope, then flared sharply back out again to make a jagged roof that rose sharply into a cone-like point. Each of the towers was twisted slightly, following a spiral curve around from bottom to top, and were made of an abrasive mix of stone and minerals that made the towers look jarringly uneven.Made of the same rocky material and running between each of the towers, the walls were topped with overhanging, spike-lined pathways. The exterior edge of the path had a high, chest-level barrier that Freakshow presumed would be useful if defending against a siege, whereas the interior edge had a low handrail that only reached about knee height.As the crew kept walking towards the Palace they passed through a pair of gigantic rectangular doors, and an escorting troop of ten vrahl soldiers, who had been waiting for the Circus by the Palace entrance, moved to fall into step around them. Freakshow tried to ignore the way her fur stood on end when they got a little too close for comfort, guns hoisted and probing glares ushering the Circus into the Palace Grounds, as if entering wasn’t already the crew’s plan.To try and distract herself, Freakshow instead focused back on looking at the gigantic doors separating the rest of Kaaraka from the inside of the Imperial Palace Grounds. The two giant hunks of stone and metal were currently pushed out in the direction of the city, but Freakshow guessed that most of the time they would remain stoically closed. Each seemed to be reinforced by crosshatching bars and spikes that Freakshow could imagine were made to keep people out.Freakshow was so preoccupied scrutinising the fortress-like architecture of the Imperial Palace’s defences that she didn’t take note of the Palace itself until the crew had emerged out the other side of the north-eastern wall. When she finally looked up, her breath caught in her throat.In the centre of the Imperial Grounds, a series of massive spires – not too dissimilar to the guard towers, but more intricate and with a greater twist in their spiral-like design – pierced the air. There looked to be ten of them in total. They surrounded a single, much larger spire, the tip of which almost brushed the cavern roof high above, and the walls of which were chiselled into a bafflingly intricate display of various patterns, images, and textures. Freakshow could barely focus on just one part of the building for any longer than a moment before her eyes were drawn to another, just as complexly carved aspect of the display.Hanging off and connecting each of the large spires to the central tower was an intricate assortment of twisting pathways and buildings. They were connected to the spires haphazardly, with no apparent rhyme or reason, and looked almost fleshy – as if they weren’t merely made of stone or wood, but something more parasitic in nature. Freakshow thought that it – whatever it was – looked almost akin to what one might see inside the anatomy of a body. Perhaps the inner workings of a heart, or the marrow of a bone.Freakshow hadn’t realised she had halted in place to stare at the Palace until someone bumped into her from behind and let out an apologetic squeak. She felt claw-like appendages brush against her fur, and when the dreer looked back she saw Carousel.Carousel’s iider-limbs wrapped themselves firmly around Freakshow’s arm. She shuffled a few steps closer, expression caught halfway between awe and anticipation, and clung to Freakshow like the dreer was a lifeline as her head swivelled this way and that in an attempt to process the grandiose display before them. Freakshow let a low, reassuring hum rumble deep within her chest; the young archae’s grip tightened as the older Akaaran began to walk forward once more.When Freakshow turned back to the scene ahead of them, she glanced up at the Palace again – and narrowed her eyes when a flicker of movement caught her attention.In the distance, on a balcony built into the side of the main spire far above their heads, Freakshow saw a slender dark green vrahl emerge from the platform’s open archway. The darker-coloured claws interlaced across her chest alerted Freakshow to who she was instantly.The High Empress – Mother of all vrahl, and, in Freakshow’s distinctly unwanted opinion, Supreme Prima Donna of the Modern Age – clasped her hands together and rested her arms on the balcony’s handrail. Her face was utterly devoid of emotion as she looked down upon the new arrivals.The Mother’s amber eyes flitted coldly over the Circus, and Freakshow felt a shiver shoot down her spine when the High Empress’ gaze raked over her fur. Judging by the way the rest of the crew seemed to bristle at the same time Freakshow herself did, the dreer could tell everyone else had either sensed or noticed the Mother’s presence, too.A moment later, Freakshow felt Carousel’s grip intensify and the simmering anxiety of their small group broil when a pale figure followed the Mother out onto the balcony. She stopped behind and slightly to the left of the High Empress, head tilted upward and void-like eyes staring emotionlessly down at the newcomers. The figure had one pair of hands neatly clasped in front of her; the other pair mirrored the same position behind her back.“Is that the New Mother?” Daredevil breathed to Freakshow’s right, voice so soft the dreer almost missed it.Freakshow glanced toward where the hybrid was looking up at the Mothers with wide eyes. When Daredevil spared the dreer a glance to see her response, Freakshow inclined her head ever so slightly. The stunt performer’s eyes grew comically wider, and she turned her head to stare at the Empresses once more – before she abruptly remembered where she was, and quickly ducked her head down to stare at the ground. Best to avoid doing anything that could potentially anger the Mothers, no matter how innocent or insignificant the action appeared to be.When the crew was a few dozen feet inside the gate, the vrahl escorting their group came to a stop and snapped to attention with an obviously well-practiced salute. Freakshow raised her eyebrows and looked beyond the soldiers toward the large doors in the Palace’s main spire, trying to find the reason for the vrahl’s formality. She had to do a double take when she saw exactly what – or rather, who – had caused their sudden reaction.“Is that Eight?” Parade asked from behind her in a low, disbelieving voice. To her right, Ninepin nodded slightly in confirmation.Striding towards the group, all four hands interlocked behind his back, was Commander Eight. The leader of the vrahl’s Eighth Division had his head tilted upward regally, and his chest was puffed out by what Freakshow could only guess was his own inflated sense of self-importance. His mottled orange-yellow exoskeleton seemed to shimmer slightly in the uncertain light of the cavern, and his murky red eyes glared holes in the already paper-thin confidence of the crew.“Fer, that’s gonna make Puzzal mad,” the ribbon twirler whistled softly.“Why?” Carousel whispered.“Because being greeted by him is just straight up disrespectful,” Parade replied. “The Commander’s importance is ranked based on their numerical order. Usually, anyone who’s been explicitly invited to the Imperial Palace by the High Empress Herself, especially at a time when all ten Commanders have convened, would be greeted by a boy scout One through Five. But sending out Eight? She’s basically stating that she doesn’t think the Circus is worth her time.”“Which is weird,” Sideshow interjected, “considering that, like Parade said, she invited us. We didn’t come to Kaaraka of our own free will. We didn’t even know that a New Mother had been born before she explicitly requested Puzzal’s presence. Inviting the Circus, then greeting us with this level of disinterest? It’s bizarre.”The crew went quiet as Eight drew within earshot. A few steps later, the Commander came to a halt. The troop of ten vrahl soldiers that had escorted him into the Imperial Grounds fell into a rough semi-circle formation behind him.In front of Freakshow, the Ringmaster signalled for the Circus to stop walking. He strode forward a couple more feet alone and swept into a low bow before Commander Eight. Puzzal paused as he waited for Eight to speak first – but when the Commander only stood and watched the vrahl with narrowed, critical eyes, Puzzal took that as his cue to initiate the conversation.Freakshow had to re-orientate herself when she realised she couldn’t understand what the vrahl was saying. Even though, logically, she knew he was – and always had been – able to speak his people’s mother-tongue, actually hearing Puzzal talk in Vullïn wasn’t something the crew had heard often, if at all. There wasn’t any reason to, after all, considering that the Ringmaster performed all of the Circus’ shows in Akaarian – the mother-tongue of the dreer and archae, and Akaara’s common language.Freakshow felt Sideshow shift a little to her left and lean closer to Jester, who was stood on the archae’s other side. She strained her ears to hear their hushed voices.“Can you translate what they’re saying?” Sideshow breathed, eyes fixed on the vrahl and mouth barely moving so as not to draw attention to the crew.Out of the corner of her eye, Freakshow saw Jester nod slightly. “Puzzal is sucking up to the Mother and Commander Eight…” he whispered. “…he just confirmed that we are performing tomorrow…”The juggler trailed off as Eight began to talk, then started to translate while the Commander was still speaking.“…orders for you and your Circus to perform before Her remain true, but I believe it is you, Ringmaster who will be the one doing the entertaining.” Eight took a step forward, eyes narrowed in displeasure. “To insinuate that your presence within Her Imperial Palace would be unpleasurable enough for the Mother to have to ‘entertain your presence’ Herself is a poor way to commence your stay here. Especially since She has been so gracious as to allow you and your—” Jester stumbled a moment, as if hesitant to translate. “… to reside within Her grounds.”“Uh-oh, trouble in paradise,” Parade muttered sarcastically. Freakshow shot him a look over her shoulder in an attempt to remind him to keep his voice down, but the warning fell through when she couldn’t stop the way her lips tugged back into an unwilling smile. Parade noticed her struggle and barely concealed a smirk of his own.“What does that word mean? The one you didn’t translate?” Daredevil whispered to Jester, leaning forward so her head poked out between him and Sideshow.Freakshow snorted softly. Good to know that apparently the whole Circus was eavesdropping.

Jester looked mildly uncomfortable. After sparing the hybrid a quick glance, he kept his eyes trained straight ahead. “It is, uh… not a nice word,” he breathed. “A slang way to refer to Akaarans of a… much lower class. I am surprised Eight even knows it. I have only ever heard troops who patrol the Districts use it.”One of the soldiers that arrived with Eight glanced away from the Ringmaster and settled his piercing gaze on the crew. Everyone immediately stopped talking and cast their eyes down towards the ground. After a long moment, the soldier glanced back at Puzzal, but not before he purposely jostled his gun to draw the crew’s attention to it.They all understood his message perfectly. Be quiet, or else.Unfortunately for this soldier, there were more Vullïn conversations Sideshow needed translated, and Jester was one Fer of a persistent bastard.While they’d been talking, the Ringmaster had gone very still, formulating a way to respond to the Commander that would let him climb out of the hole he’d dug himself into. “My apologies for misspeaking, General. That was not my intended implication. It… appears that I may have spent too long using Akaarian in my performances. The archae and dreer’s casual phrasings seem to have carried over into my Vullïn. I will rectify this error immediately.”“I should hope so,” Eight responded, lip curled. “Use such language before the Mothers, and I will cut your tongue from your skull myself.” He took a threatening step forward, lips twisted into a sneer. “The Mother has already made Her displeasure with how the Circus has been performing clear to us Commanders. I imagine she will make it clear to you soon, too. Speak to her with such disrespect, and I imagine She will find it and your failings reason enough to replace you, like She did your useless successor.”Freakshow wasn’t convinced that Puzzal could feel emotion beyond the self-righteousness of his own ego and an occasional baseless rage, but if he could she imagined that his blood would have run cold at Eight’s words. As it was, the Ringmaster simply dipped his head lower, back tense as he maintained his bow, and replied with a monotone, “Of course, Commander.”Eight made a satisfied clicking noise deep in his throat. The pair stood still and silent for a moment while Eight considered the Ringmaster with narrowed eyes. Although he must have felt his superior’s sharp gaze on him, Puzzal refused to look up from his bow. The impasse finally broke when the Commander turned away and motioned for both his guards and Puzzal to follow.“Come. Arrangements have been made for your Circus to stay in the Grand Hall, where you will perform tomorrow.”Eight’s soldiers fell in line behind and to the sides of their Commander. The Ringmaster hurried to unfold from his bow and fall into step after them. Around the Circus, the waiting vrahl troop stepped forward to close the distance between themselves and the performers. They prodded the crewmate’s backs with their guns to urge them forward behind the small entourage.As the Commander, the Circus, and their respective escorts stepped deeper into the Grounds and approached the Palace’s main spire, the giant stone and metal doors behind them slowly began to close.Freakshow felt her breath catch when she glanced around the barren Imperial Courtyard and saw it crawling with nothing but troops upon troops of soldiers. The heaviness of their glares – Fer, there must have been hundreds of them, all staring at the Circus – weighed heavily on the crew’s backs.If Freakshow didn’t already feel like the Circus’ current predicament would get them killed, the resounding boom that echoed around the Courtyard once the doors slammed closed was the final nail in her coffin.◦▹ // ◃◦The inside of the Imperial Palace was a nightmare to navigate. Or at least, it was for Freakshow. She tried to keep track of all the paths and corridors they took, but seeing as the floor plan of the main spire’s structure was as chaotically complex as a large anthill, she could barely remember the first five turns they had taken, let alone the last twenty. Each hallway looked the same, and with the sheer number of times they twisted, turned, doubled back, and looped around to reconnect with pathways the group had already tread, Freakshow had to admit defeat before the headache that was building inside her skull became too much to bear.She supposed that Ninepin and Jester would have an easier time navigating the corridors than she did. They were vrahl, after all, and had grown up, lived in, and served inside similar structures. But when Freakshow turned her head to ask Jester if that was the case after failing yet again to make any sense of their route through the Palace, she found his expression pinched into a look of pure concentration. He was mouthing what looked to be directions to himself and appeared to be growing more frustrated by the minute.Okay, so scratch that. Perhaps the vrahl were just as confused about their own architecture as Freakshow was.Commander Eight didn’t seem to have any problem, though. He led the way confidently, and without so much as a glance back to make sure the Circus was keeping up. The practised ease with which he walked through the labyrinth of tunnels told Freakshow that he had moved through these halls hundreds, if not thousands of times before. Either that, or he was incredibly good at looking sure of himself whilst choosing hallways at random. Freakshow kind of hoped the latter was the case, even if common sense said it was the former. It would have been just a little bit funny. Or at least, it would be funny if Freakshow wasn’t currently stressing over how tomorrow could very much be the crew’s last day alive.After what felt like hours of trekking up and down winding corridors that seemingly had no end, the crew finally came across a pair of largeish iron doors. Two of Eight’s escorting troop broke away from the group to push the doors open, and the Commander strode inside, followed closely by Puzzal and the rest of the Circus.Freakshow wasn’t sure what she expected the interior of the Grand Hall to look like, but somehow this room ticked all the boxes on a mental checklist she didn’t even know she had. Really, she didn’t think that the vrahl could ask for anything that looked more vrahl than this.The most notable thing about the space was that the describing words of Grand and Hall were both perfectly accurate. The area was huge, but huge in a rectangular sort of way that made it look more Hall than room. Freakshow distantly noted that this was actually a bad thing. Considering the Circus was used to setting up and performing in vast open spaces that had plenty of room to spare on all sides, the relatively narrow width of the Grand Hall could prove to be troublesome.The roof of the Hall was comprised of two sides that rose to a peak above the group’s heads. The slant of each half was almost obscured by the hundreds of small stalactites that hung from them in varying lengths and jaggedness, and Freakshow thought it looked rather like a vast maw of endless teeth waiting to crush those below. The thought did absolutely nothing to help calm her mounting nerves.Along the walls of the Hall were shallow alcoves lit by glowing lichen and burning braziers. Every few feet a stalagmite rose from the floor, piercing the space between alcoves like some kind of ornamental display. Patterns and textures similar to those on the outside of the Palace’s main spire were carved into the sides of each.And there, at the opposite end of the Hall to where the Circus and vrahl were standing, was a raised platform. A short staircase led up to it, flared wider on the bottom-most stairs than those closer to the top.A long, ‘V’-shaped table, with its point the furthest away from the crew, occupied the entirety of the platform’s space. Twelve throne-like chairs were positioned along the ‘V’, with five along each arm and the remaining two at the flattened head of the table, side by side.The thrones were all painstakingly carved and designed out of a dark-coloured rock. Each had its own unique appearance, but the two at the head of the table had by far had the most effort put into them. Patterns that bordered on nonsensical wound up and down each; messy in a cohesive, intentional way that made the thrones look domineering and unsettling. Freakshow had never in her life seen craftsmanship quite like it.Behind the two most prominent thrones, a pair of large, carved doors, more intricate than the ones the crew had entered through, stood open. Beyond them, Freakshow could see more winding passages that presumably led to other, more secure parts of the Imperial Palace.The sound of iron scraping and thudding shut jolted the dreer out of her fascination with the Grand Hall’s architecture. She turned her head to see the doors behind her had been closed, and realised that the troop of soldiers who had escorted the Circus into the Palace in was nowhere in sight.They must have remained outside the Hall to guard against people coming in, Freakshow realised. Or, more likely, to ensure that we don’t get out.As the dreer shifted back around to face the rest of the Hall, she watched Eight stop in the middle of the space and turned to face Puzzal. His escort fell into two lines either side of him. Freakshow saw Jester lean closer to Sideshow, ready to translate.“This is where you are to perform before the Mothers,” the vrahl said. “Your performance tomorrow is to begin at eighteen-hundred hours exactly. My guards will alert you an hour before Her Majesty, Her Highness and the other Commanders are to arrive. Until then, you may choose to spend your time in Kaaraka however you wish.”The Ringmaster dipped his head in thanks.The Commander briefly turned to glance contemptuously over the crew. “Your crew is not permitted to leave the Hall unless supervised by a troop. If they require any supplies before your performance, they can speak to one of the guards outside the doors we just entered through. A troop will escort them to an archae-dreer marketplace just outside the Palace walls.”Puzzal bowed. “You are too kind, Commander.”“Save your flattery,” Eight scoffed.Puzzal straightened. When Eight stamped a foot against the ground and clacked his arms across his chest with the sound of exoskeleton meeting exoskeleton, the leader of the Novelty Circus responded with a formal salute.“Pledge Eternity to the Mother,” Eight said.“Eternity to the Mother,” Puzzal replied.With that, Eight turned in place, marched up the raised platform’s stairs, and disappeared through the open archway at the back of the Hall. His escort followed, and the last two soldiers to leave closed the carved doors behind their troop on their way out.The instant the doors were shut, the Ringmaster spun in place and stormed off in the opposite direction, back out the way the Circus had entered the Hall. “Eighteen-hundred hours tomorrow,” he snapped, not sparing the crew a single glance. “You will be ready to perform.” He yanked open one of the doors the crew’s escort had closed behind them, pulling it shut with a loud clang of metal that made most of the crew wince.And then Puzzal was gone, and the crew was left alone to prepare for the biggest day of their lives.

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 10 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

The Grand Hall was unnervingly silent without the crew’s quiet chatter to fill it. If vrahl were able to feel any temperature at all, Jester imagined he would have felt a shiver run up his distinct lack of spine in the absence of warmer bodies around him.Maybe it was the architectural style of the performance hall that reminded him too much of his early days in the vrahl’s military. Perhaps it was the fact that, for the first time in the years since he’d deserted, he had been under the direct scrutinising glare of a Commander. Whatever it was, Jester couldn’t get over the yawning pit of wrong that sat deep in his gut.It permeated his brain, making his body restless, and his eyes shift anxiously around the room, fixated on nothing in particular for any longer than was necessary. It felt as if he was preparing to fight enemies who hadn’t declared themselves as enemies yet – and in a sense, Jester realised somewhat belatedly, that was exactly the case. The vrahl might not have made any moves to harm the Circus yet, but Jester was just as aware as the rest of the crew that even the slightest misstep would be all it took for the Commanders – or, Fer forbid, the Mother herself – to crack down on them, and crack down hard.In fact, Jester probably understood better than even Sideshow how volatile their situation currently was. There was a reason, after all, for why he had deserted his former troop and life as a soldier. A reason he tried very hard not to think of right now, lest he make his already high-strung anxiety even worse.With the rest of the Circus out, having only departed about half an hour earlier to collect last minute supplies from the nearby archae-dreer marketplace (and for the kids to explore the area just a bit, since once their nerves had settled they had begged to see what the centre of an almost all-vrahl city looked like), Jester and Tent had been left to their own devices in the Palace’s Grand Hall. Sideshow had asked them to look after and finish unpacking their existing supplies before he and the others had been escorted out by a vrahl troop – but given that the primary carrier and organiser of said supplies was a limitlessly strong sentient Tent who had already gone through those motions a hundred times over, the whole unpacking process had only lasted a few minutes. Now there was nothing left for the pair to do other than wait for the rest of their crew to return.Jester dragged his whetstone down one of his daggers slowly. His knee bounced erratically up and down, and his foot tapped softly against the crate he was currently sat on. The dagger he held was already sharp enough and definitely did not need to be sharpened further; but the aforementioned wrongness that Jester felt from being in this place would not let him sit still, and being in possession of a weapon made him feel slightly more in control of his situation. Not that a knife like this – or any knife, for that matter – would be all that effective against a vrahl. His people’s carapace-like bodies did not damage that easily.Behind him, Tent was not in its usual circus tent form. Instead, it seemed to be testing its form-shifting abilities by twisting itself into increasingly larger and more elaborate knots, then quickly breaking the shape to shrink back down into a loose pile of threads splayed against the ground.Jester had seen the creature do the exercise before, and still did not really understand why the fabric-beast did it. Given that Tent had a distinct lack of muscles, it seemed unlikely that it needed to keep active to remain strong or flexible. Jester also doubted that not using its abilities would have any kind of other negative effects, seeing as there had been many times in the past Tent had sat dormant in a singular form for weeks on end, and the creature had never shown any signs of discomfort. If anything, and if Jester did not know better, he would say the creature was merely doing it for fun.After puzzling over the answer himself for a few minutes, Jester was just about ready to call it quits and simply ask Tent what it was doing. Before he could open his mouth, however, a scuffling sound just barely became audible from the hallway outside the Grand Hall. It was quickly followed by the louder sound of a heavy door sliding open.Jester turned his head away from Tent and towards the noise, brows furrowed, and head tilted as he tried to work out who it could be. He figured it was most likely the crew – but given they weren’t due to return for another hour at least, he could not confidently assume it was them. Maybe they had forgotten something and were coming to retrieve it. Or perhaps it was not them at all, and instead some vrahl soldiers coming to check that Jester and Tent had not left their stations inside the Hall.The first thing the vrahl did not expect to see when he looked up was that the Grand Hall’s main doors remained unopened. Instead, the sliding sound was coming from a smaller, more carefully hidden doorway that Jester had not previously noticed. It inched open a few feet to the left of the main entryway, and when it was open enough for the Grand Hall’s faint light to seep inside, it revealed the second thing that Jester absolutely did not expect to see.The New Mother’s eyes meet Jester’s gaze as she drifted through the concealed doorway. When she realised she had been spotted, she halted and stared at him with an intrigued expression. Jester was so caught off guard by her sudden, unannounced appearance that it took him an embarrassingly long time to react to her presence.After a couple of seconds of shocked silence, Jester jerked to his feet. His knife and whetstone clattered to the ground, and he immediately dropped into a kneel. He leant forward and pressed his head firmly against the floor in a poor attempt to bow as low as possible. Really, his body language was more that of clumsy grovelling than it was respectful acknowledgement, but Jester could scold himself for his inelegance later, when he was sure the New Empress wouldn’t have his head for his delayed reaction.Behind him, Jester could hear Tent freeze. Then the soft patter of fabric falling against stone sounded as the beast obviously decided that being in a smaller and less intimidating form – likely the same bare pile of threads it had been switching between earlier – was better than looking too large and threatening.“Heiress,” Jester said, in a pitch an octave higher than he would have liked. He softly cleared his throat to wrangle his voice into something more monotone. “My apologies. I was not expecting to be graced by your presence today.”The knife thrower held his breath as he heard the Empress softly close the door behind her. She stepped forward, footsteps so impossibly light that Jester struggled to track her proximity to him. He faintly heard her come to a stop a few meters from where he was bowed.There was a beat of silence. Then, “Rise,” and Jester was not sure what he had expected her voice to sound like, but it certainly had not been a tone that soft.He hesitated briefly before he rose to his feet. As he straightened up, he moved his arms into the familiar vrahl military salute to demonstrate his deference to, and respect for, the Empress. His upper left fist clenched over his heart, upper right rose to cradle his right elbow, and the hands on his lower pair of arms neatly clasped behind the small of his back. His head remained downturned, eyes fixed solidly on the ground at her feet.It had been a long time since he had taken on a posture so formal. A soldier did not need to salute unless speaking with a vrahl superior to them, and whereas Jester largely elected to ignore this rule for the Ringmaster (much to Puzzal’s chagrin), doing anything else in the presence of the New Mother would not only be an act of great disrespect, but heresy. Even though he wished he could disappear from this moment entirely, Jester did not have a death wish.The juggler refused to make eye contact with the New Mother out of deference, but out of the corner of his eye he saw her tilt her head slightly to the side, watching him with unmasked curiosity. Jester felt vaguely uncomfortable by how intently she was scrutinising him as he waited for her to announce the reason why she was here, of all places.After a few beats of silence, the New Mother spoke. “Raise your head. I would like to see eyes as peculiar as yours.”This time, Jester did not know what to do. The request may have been a direct order from the Heiress herself, but every ounce of training Jester had gone through as a hatchling told him that raising his head in the presence of his superiors was a sign of defiance, and so was an act that would not be taken kindly. Since he was currently in the middle of the Imperial Palace surrounded by his volatile kin – who would be more sensitive than ever about disrespect shown toward their New Mother – Jester was not sure if potentially displeasing the Empress was a risk he was willing to take.“Empress,” he stammered, “it is not my place to look up at one such as yourself. I am nothing but a lowly Circus performer.”There was a pause before the Heiress hummed. “While that may be true, your status has no bearing on my curiosity. Raise your eyes.”Put like that, Jester did not really have a choice. The knife thrower slowly lifted his head, careful to fix his vision on a point just over the Empress’ shoulder. This way he could keep his gaze high enough for the Heiress to see his eyes, but still ensure he avoided direct eye contact.“Fascinating,” the New Mother marvelled. She stepped forward to get a better look as Jester remained frozen in place. “I have never seen another vrahl in the Palace with multi-coloured eyes like yours. Nor have I seen another with the arrangement of markings you have. Why is it your appearance is so different from the rest?”Jester kept his gaze focused straight ahead. “A result of spending too much time in the Blackout Districts, I am afraid, your Highness.”The Heiress cocked her head to the side, like she did not quite understand what Jester had said. “Why are you afraid? Are the Blackout Districts a fearful place?”Jester barely kept back a snort of laughter at the hilarity of her misinterpretation. He took a moment to school his features into a stoic expression once more, and when the New Mother did not call him out on his impoliteness or prompt him to speak before he was ready, he answered. “Uh, no. The Districts—” he paused and reconsidered his words. “Well yes, actually, sometimes the Districts can be an unwelcoming place. I am not ‘fearful’ of them, though. That was simply a figure of speech.” When the Empress did nothing but stare blankly at him, Jester continued. “In that context, to say you are ‘afraid’ of something in Akaarian means instead that you wish to express it was regrettable.”“I see,” the Empress said. “My apologies. I am still quite new to learning the common tongue.”And wow, if that did not throw Jester for a loop then he did not know what would. A Mother did not apologise to anyone for anything, especially not to someone like Jester and certainly not for something so trivial. If anything, Jester should have been the one grovelling at her feet, pleading for forgiveness for having initially lost his composure when she misunderstood his phrasing.“I can speak Vullïn if it makes your Highness more comfortable?” he offered tentatively after a moment of shellshocked silence.The Empress shock her head. “No. Mother instructed me to improve my Akaarian, so I will use this conversation as an opportunity to do so. It is good to put my learnings into practice with someone who seems more well versed in the tongue than most other vrahl I’ve met in the Palace.”Jester felt vaguely dazed at the praised. “Well if it is any consolation, your Highness, I think your Akaarian is already quite advanced.” It felt strange to be complimenting a Mother so directly, but in an odd way Jester felt like the Empress was seeking validation. He would be daft not to offer it. “You hold conversation well.”He was not sure what kind of reaction he was expecting, but it definitely was not for the Empress to nod her head and continue speaking as if the topic of dialects had never been brought up. “So you found your time in the Districts to be regrettable?” she queried. She stepped around Jester, and he tilted his head slightly to track her movements.Jester considered his reply. “…Well, no,” he said truthfully. “I would not say it was regrettable. There were some… less than pleasant moments, sure, but overall I am grateful for the experience the Districts provided. It led to me joining the Circus, after all.”The Empress stopped a little behind the juggler and stared down curiously at where Tent was still splayed against the floor. It wiggled a few tendrils in her direction and her eyebrows shot up. “Then why would you insinuate your time there was regrettable if you do not feel it was?”Jester winced. She had him there. “…May I speak plainly, your Highness?”“You may.”Jester tried to swallow the dryness in his throat. “Most vrahl find the Districts to be somewhat… unclean. Inferior, and not worthy of their time, nor attention.” He turned his head back to stare directly ahead of himself. “I did not wish to make your Highness feel uncomfortable by suggesting they were anything else.”“You do not share the same belief?”Jester shook his head slightly. “I believe the Districts have more than their fair share of issues, but they are beyond a mere gathering space for the misfortunate. They may be largely unregulated by vrahl troops, but the lack of our people’s presence does not inherently make them less valuable.”Behind him he heard the Empress hum, and she walked back into his field of vision on the opposite side from where she had vanished. “What would you say does give them value?”Jester shuffled in place and raised his shoulders in a noncommittal shrug. “I am not sure it is exactly my place to say, because the Districts were not originally intended for my nor my kind’s benefit.” He pondered the question thoughtfully for a moment while the Empress continued her slow pacing to stop in front of him once again. “They mean many things to many people. For some, they are the last remnants of archae and dreer culture that has remained almost untouched by vrahl influence. For others, they are a haven for freedom and expression that cannot be found elsewhere in the Underground. Their significance varies depending on who you ask, and what their individual story has been up until the point you ask them.”The Heiress nodded her head slowly and studied him carefully. Eventually, she said, “You are quite an interesting vrahl. Others I have met in the Palace and asked for honesty from tend to double down on telling me the things they think I want to hear, rather than their own personal truths.”Jester could not decipher her tone. A strange sort of defensiveness rose in his chest for his kin then, though he did not know exactly why. “I do not think that is entirely their fault,” he said delicately, testing the waters to see how she would respond. When she inclined her head for him to continue, he obliged. “We are taught as hatchlings that it is a gross act of defiance for us to have our own values and beliefs. Our Commanders reinforce that there is no greater honour than unquestioning carrying out their orders to enact our Mother’s will. It is likely that the vrahl you have spoken with do not know any other way to act than to make sure they are in complete agreeance with whatever your Highness may personally believe.”The Empress hummed in understanding. Jester was beginning to realise it was a sound she made quite a lot when she was processing new information. “Perhaps that is what the Commanders prefer, but I’ve found I much rather hearing individual truths than whatever lies others may concoct for my perceived benefit.” She cocked her head slightly to the side. That was another action Jester was beginning to realise she did frequently. “It is interesting to hear the thoughts of someone who apparently has no such inhibitions about speaking their mind.”

Jester dipped his head in… thanks? Was her comment a compliment? She may value honesty, but in a situation as delicate as this he was not entirely sure whether he should express gratitude for no longer being as brainwashed as his kin, or express remorse that he was no longer under his superior’s control. If he spoke truthfully, he would be vocalising complete heresy. If he lied… well, the Empress had already made it clear how she felt about that.In the end, he opted to stay silent. It was likely the best choice he had at making it out of this conversation in one piece.When the New Mother realised he was not going to offer her a response, she moved on from the topic to ask something else Jester suspected she had been waiting to question him on. “What is your egg number?”Jester grimaced. “198230,” he droned, “but in the Circus I go by the name Jester.”“You were a part of Commander Ten’s legion, then. Why do you not go by your number in the Circus?”Jester glanced upwards a little, trying to formulate the best answer to her question. “Well, I am not technically permitted to call myself by my number any longer. Once I deserted my former troop, I was stripped of the right to identify as a vrahl,” he explained. “I was nameless until I joined the Circus. One of our hatchlings gave me my name.”The Empress hummed curiously. “Which hatchling was that?”“Carousel. She is the young, beige-coloured archae.”“Why did she choose that name for you?Jester could not stop the small smile that flitted across his face. “She said it was because I was the ‘funniest vrahl she had ever met’,” he answered earnestly. “Not that she has met many vrahl. Honestly, I am not sure exactly what it was about me she found humorous, but I was not going to reject her suggestion. I was in need of something to call myself.”Out of the corner of his eye, Jester saw the New Empress’s head tilt slightly as she studied his expression. Then her own mouth moved to ever so slightly mimic his smile. Jester may have found her lack of any real emotion off-putting if he was not too busy feeling vaguely shocked over the fact that he just saw a Mother smile.“Which do you prefer?” she asked. When Jester made a clicking noise of confusion in the back of his throat, she elaborated. “Your name. If you had the choice, would you have preferred to have kept your number, or your newer Circus name?”Jester paused. It was not a question he had ever been asked, or even one he had personally considered, before. He had not had a choice but to lose the right to be called by his number when he deserted, so everything that had happened after that had just been… a serious of inevitabilities, really, that were part of an unstoppable chain reaction. He had not found it particularly important to dwell on what could have been when he had been too preoccupied by the instinct to survive and keep the kid in his arms – a much younger Carousel, then – alive and out of harm’s way.Thinking of the question now, Jester found that the conclusion was not all that difficult for him to come to.“My Circus name,” he said.“And why is that?” the Heiress queried.Jester swallowed and took a second to think about how truthful he wanted to be with her.On one hand, she had not shown any offense to the comments he had already made that were more out of line than most vrahl would tolerate. On the other hand, she was a Mother currently being trained by her predecessor. Surely they had already covered vrahl etiquette and the rigidness of their people’s rules, right? There was only so much Jester could get away with saying before the Empress decided she had listened to his disrespect long enough and punished him for it.A handful of words Sideshow had said to him right before the Circus left Khaliis whispered through the juggler’s mind.“Why not? The High Empress might be training a replacement, but the New Mother isn’t just another soldier. She must have some degree of autonomy if she is to lead your people after the Mother’s death.”…maybe, just maybe, Sideshow had a point.Jester drew in a deep breath and took a gamble.“Because I do not believe I was living an honourable life when I went by my number,” Jester said, voice full of faux bravado. He tilted his chin up slightly to look more confident. Confident, and defiant. And probably a bit suicidal. “I was asked to do despicable things. I harmed more Akaarans than I could ever feasibly count, and most of them did not deserve it. My number was nothing but a way to track my expendability, and is tied to a lifetime of violence, brutalities, and injustice that I will spend the rest of my days trying to make amends for.”Curiosity got the better of him, and he flitted his eyes over to meet the Empress’. She did not look offended; rather, it appeared as though she was carefully contemplating each word he spoke, like she could peer into the past and see the exact atrocities he had committed if only she pondered his words long enough.Her lack of outrage motivated him to continue. “‘Jester’, though – that was a name given to me by someone who thought I was worth something. Something who still thinks I am worth something. She did more than just give me a name; she gave me a second chance. To be better. To be good.” He dipped his head in a small, confident nod. “So I will wear the name proudly and hope I live up to her expectations.”The Heiress did not say anything right away. She simply stood there and continued to consider him with contemplative eyes, searching his gaze for any signs of untruthfulness. Jester forced himself to maintain eye contact until she eventually nodded softly to herself.“I see,” she said gently. Then, “Thank you, Jester, for your honesty. I hope you are able to say, one day, that you used your second chance well.”Jester smiled faintly. “As do I.”The Empress let her gaze wander around the room, and she turned slightly away from him. “It is about time I depart,” she said, and Jester could almost swear that her voice sounded regretful. “I managed to sneak away from my guards earlier. If I do not meet up with them again soon, they will alert Mother and the Commanders that I am missing. And that will cause more problems than it is worth.”She looked over at Jester and inclined her head slightly in respect. Jester was so caught off guard by the gesture that he almost forgot to return the nod, albeit with a much deeper dip of his head and tightening his clenched hand over his heart to show his deference.“Until we speak again, Jester,” she said, and with that she turned and glided out of the room, opening and closing the concealed door gently behind her with only the softest noise of stone sliding across stone.The moment she was out of sight, and he was sure the New Mother wouldn’t return, Jester felt all the energy drain from his body. He took a staggered step backwards, and Tent leapt up from its huddled spot on the floor to cushion his fall as he slumped to the ground.“Okay,” Jester said, his voice shrill with leftover anxiety. He planted two hands against Tent to keep himself steady, and raised his other two to rub at his temples. It was a valiant attempt at self-soothing, but the gesture did not really help. “Okay. That was… that was unexpected.”Beneath him, Tent rippled in agreement.“I cannot believe She let me speak like that,” the juggler croaked. “Do you know how much I just disrespected Her? If my Commander – if any Commanders were here, I would already been dead ten times over.”An arm of fabric broke off from the rest of Tent’s form and draped itself comfortingly across Jester’s shoulders. Jester took a stuttered deep breath in and barked out an astonished laugh.“I guess Sideshow had a point,” he wheezed. “Maybe this New Mother will be different from the last.” He shook his head in disbelief. “Maybe.”And that was exactly what Jester told the archae in question later, after the rest of the crew had returned from the market and settled down by the campfire to hear the vrahl recount his conversation with his unexpected guest.As they listened with wide eyes and slack jaws, Jester could not help but think that this was the first time since leaving Khaliis the Circus performers looked almost hopeful about the tomorrow’s performance.He just hoped their rekindled confidence would not be for nothing.

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 11 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 12 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 13 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 14 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 15 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 16 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 17 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 18 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ CHAPTER 19 ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll

◦▹ BOOK ONE ◃◦

✶ EPILOGUE ✶

CHAPTER QUICK SELECT
COVER > PROLOGUE
1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19
EPILOGUE

lolooooooll