Cirque de la Lune Playlist

Sock Pupptes/Flyover - Iain Ballamy

Seven Days - Azure Ray

Porcelain - Moby

The Beauty Surrounds - Houses

Butterfingers - Iain Ballamy

Siren Song - Bat For Lashes

If I Apologised - Iain Ballamy

Cinder and Smoke - Iron & Wine

Text by Lucie MacAulay

From Dusk to Dawn

The illusionist is thrown a birthday party, not on her birthday but a few nights later, when the weather is appropriately dismal, the air full of mist and pounding rain. The cirque is closed, a sign posted outside the gates apologizing for the inconvenience.

Inside her tent has been opulently decorated; bowers of flowers are suspended over the guests and throughout the evening petals drift on shoulders and in hair like perfumed velvet-soft rain. The guests are handed garlands of white roses at the entrance, and though many are found later draped over the backs of chairs, some folk take them home and tuck them behind ears or in lapels in the days following.

Colour treated lights bath the tent in sunset, warm and vivid. There are some staff outside the circus who are allowed to cater and serve drinks (silver tinted white wines in special dark tinted champagne glasses) on the condition that they do not breath a word of the night’s events to anyone outside the circus.

The guests are cloaked in a rainbow of colours. The contortionist wears a deep blue gown that leaves her arms and neck bare, with bone white accessories, her tattoo visible around her neck and disappearing into her décolletage.

Tamas wears a suit the colour of autumn leaves, with pure gold earrings and his eyes rimmed in kohl. He spends the majority of the evening speaking with the contortionist of Pamina, when Pamina can be persuaded from her own guest.

The fortuneteller is draped in silver silk, though she has a collection of violet ribbons braided into her hair and a blue rose tucked behind the ear.

She arrives with Hansen at her side, dressed in mostly black but with a bright orange scarf. While the inception of the circus occurred some years ago, it is not too late, Pamina argues, to add to its list of compatriots. Hansen has been involved with the circus to such a degree lately that he has been forced to abandon some of his personal projects, and to rush to finish commissioned pieces. Pamina has dragged him to the party, insisting he meet the illusionist and leading him around the room, introducing him as their composer. He is received warmly and soon is engaged in conversation about modern art and music.

Another gentleman arrives, adorned in an ivory suit with a matching white mask. He does not give his identity, and instead distracts each attendee he speaks with by discussing art and philosophy. Many assume he has come with the puppeteer as a special guest, since he spends much of the night by her side.

Farrin wears a turquoise suit but manages to blend into the party so well his mother is sometimes certain he has left to read or seek the animals, who are mostly alone in their respective tents. He has short conversations with most of the guests and runs small errands, fetching pitchers of lemonade and bottles of wine and fans for those that cannot abide the heat, returning quickly so they may flutter their fans like wings against their chests.

The honoured guest, the illusionist herself, is dressed in a crimson gown decorated with numerous pink silk roses. She always wears a crescent of quarts on a ribbon around her throat, usually of pale sugared white but tonight it is lurid and red, as though her throat has been slit. It is exotic and morbid and beautiful.

Rose spends most of the evening rooted in one spot, surrounded by guests who, once they discover her place of origin, beg her to regale them with a few stories. She omits the more sordid details of New Orleans, resorting to praising the jazz, when Farrin’s parents, who have been occasionally checking on the elusive boy to make sure he is still in attendance, question the suitability of the tales’ content for a young boy. Rose continues on, withholding only some parts of the stories that she tells Farrin with the lilt in her voice or the look in her eye. She laughs easily and loudly.

Members of the circus beg Rose to perform, and after a few glasses of wine they coerce her to the middle of the room where she borrows Hansen’s bowler hat and tosses it in the air. It turns over and over and becomes a dozen black roses, woven together. As it falls petals cascade around the bowing illusionist, she catches it in one hand and spins it behind her, occluding it as she transforms it back into a hat and returns it to its owner. Immediately one of her immediate company inquires as to where she was trained.

“I had a private coach for such things. He was – is very odd. He was an exotic man. He is the son of some courtesan, they say. The Mata Hari’s offspring,” she says, laughing.

“Surely you didn’t learn that-,” the juggler points to Hansen’s hat as the composer speaks with the cat tamer, “on your first try.”

“No, no. When I first began my teachings I pulled a rabbit from a hat,” Rose says, laughing again. “My instructor was not pleased at all about that. He went on at length about pushing boundaries, about how gravity was a convention and we should strive not to conform to such confined thought. Or something alone those lines.” The illusionist smiles at the chorus of mild laughter as she accepts a glass of freshly poured champagne.

Rose once dances once throughout the entire night and, when midnight passes and the party shows no signs of stopping, the morning. She dances with the juggler, with Tamas, and she and Pamina have an entertaining moment in which they both try to take lead in a dance together. Rose dances with amazing grace, free and carelessly yet with an aristocratic elegance, something Paikea notices from across the room and mentions absently to Farrin.

Pamina is in and out of conversation. She often must attend to some running of the party (a matter with the staff, the changing of music boxes when the tunes begin to replay, a new dish to be served on the hour) but returns to ensure the guests, especially Hansen, are having a good time.

Pamina has taken to calling him Maestro Hansen, and has requested a special piece, insisting money is no object. He waves her away, promising he will not ask for any price, and giving her a tentative date of completion in the very near future.

When Farrin is alone with the illusionist he considers it such a treat he is reluctant to leave her, though he can see the thin bottle of absinthe and the decanter of lemonade and wild mint are getting low. He listened curiously to Rose’s recollection of her former instructor and has been feeling inquisitive since.

“I did not know you had a teacher,” Farrin says. He has assumed Rose had always done the things she had, or he had never given much thought about it. “If he saw… magic that way, how do you see it? Does he approve of the shows you do?”

Rose sips a glass of champagne for a moment while she thinks of a response. “I have not seen him for a long time,” she answers finally. “I doubt the would approve. I had many years to formulate my own opinion about magic. I started when I was very young. He was always pontificating of the limitlessness of proper magic. He views early education as a preliminary strike, as though magic is a chess game and the world is to be toppled and checkmated.”

Their conversation is interrupted by the arrival of the main course. There is not enough space for the entire company to sit at a table, nor a table that would seat all of them, so they flock like tropical birds to the staff who offer plates on large silver trays. There are small slices of chicken with raisins and chestnuts, quail eggs and shallots, pyramids of bright fruit, large and spherical and exploding with flavour. There is fruit in melted cheese and pasta with sauces piquant with peppers. The delicacies range from mildly spiced to burning hot, and there are some that are flavoured mysteriously, where guests catch hints of rosemary or saffron but also something beneath them that they cannot name.

Those who eat little return to the dance floor as the band strikes up another tune. Around them, while the guests are distracted by food and merriment, the hangings on the wall are removed and others put in their place, festooned with lanterns. Where the tapestries are scarlet and canary yellow the tent looks like it is being licked by flame.

For some time most conversation is abandoned and the only sounds are the music, guests’ footsteps, and the rustle of silk and satin and frosted lace.

Festivities resume and the tent is abundant with noise again, and bathed in the light of a sunset, which some guests do not notice until they pick up their drinks and see the colours reflected in the glass.

There is another silence when desert arrives that is fleeting and gone much quicker. There are iced éclairs and cakes with sugar bells and crystallized roses, and fruit dusted with sugar and silver tiered trays of sugared violets on tarts. What enchants the guests so is the enormous cake brought out on a platter; the only serving that has required a table. It is set down so all the guests may admire the tiered wonder before it is cut. It is shaped like a hat, identical to Rose’s and the illusionist herself laughs at the sight of it. When she cuts into it is froths with a deep rich chocolate cream. Those who previously insisted they could eat no more suggest perhaps they could manage one more bite. There is some repartee about food and the capacity of respective stomachs that continues until the tent is bubbling with chat.

Rose abandons the discussion some time during the early morning with the interesting of coercing Paikea to the dance floor. The contortionist is almost lost in the throng of guests. When Rose finally locates her, the contortionist is engaged in discussion with the masked gentleman. Paikea seems slightly agitated. As Rose approaches she catches only a fragment of their conversation. “I have written to the address before,” the gentleman pauses and reaches into his pocket, extracting something and handing it to the contortionist who hurriedly conceals it on her person.

The gentleman leans closer, as though about to divulge a secret, but the tenor of his voice remains the same. “Miss Paikea, I am only asking you to consider the possibility that there is more to this than you know.”

Before Paikea can respond Rose appears at her side, holding her elbow. “Hello, I’m sorry sir, I hope you don’t mind if I steal away Paikea for a dance.”

“Absolutely not,” the man assures her. He gives them each a short nod before turning and disappearing into the crowd.

Paikea dances for only a short while. She and the majority of the crowd are becoming sleepy from the combination of sleep and the early hour, though it is considered a late hour by the company. There is a round of short farewells with the few acquaintances who are not a part of the company, punctuated by laughter as some of the livelier crowds make their way out of the tent. The decorations are already vanishing, the staff who served dinner whisking away empty glasses and plates. Pamina and Farrin stay with Rose to see off the last of the guests.

The puppeteer kisses Rose’s cheek and compliments the party. The gentleman in the white mask kisses the hand of the illusionist before wishing her a happy birthday and following the puppeteer out.

Pamina urges Rose to sleep, recognizing her giddiness as an effect of the late hour and sugar and champagne. Farrin leads her backstage, peppering her with more mature questions about New Orleans in the absence of his parents.

Pamina stays until all the decorations are gone, the canvas walls once more dark and star speckled and the chairs bare of embroidered saris and tinted lanterns. She feels exhausted when she is done, though there is no heavy lifting involved. The only things that physically remain are the bowers of white roses, which have always been there, regardless the appearing and disappearing hangings and lanterns. Their scent is heady and Pamina gathers a few of them to take to her backstage room.

When she leaves the tent is almost bare, save for a few scattered petals that glisten like flakes of silver. 

Text by Lucie MacAulay

The Puppeteer

Mr.Gregory and the puppeteer do not meet in the manner of companions clandestinely meant to collide, but instead in a fortunate coincidence.

Mr.Gregory has departed his flat, after depositing the card with the circus proprietor’s name on it in the breast pocket of his coat, and holds an umbrella over himself to ward off the rain.

There are only the most ardent lovers of the circus migrating of out the city proper through on the almost empty street. Their umbrellas sprout like mushrooms beneath the nubivigant sky.

Mr.Gregory only pauses to wonder at the figure, huddled in-part in the rain, glancing at the sky as though it shows signs of stopping.

The girl is young, certainly barely more than a teenager. She seeks shelter from the rain under an awning that is too small to protect her shoes and the bottom of her dress, which are both soaked through.

“Excuse me,” he shouts over the howling wind. “Do you need some assistance?”

The girl startles, clutching the flap of her coat as she locates the stranger addressing her in the downpour. She meets his eyes and offers a small grin.

“My umbrella has unfortunately broken at the worst of times,” the girl replies, in a lower pitch than he would have expected. She shakes the umbrella, which Mr.Gregory has not noticed until now, at her side for emphasis, the spokes askew and poking her coat.

“Would you like to share my umbrella?” he offers. The girl visibly startles again.

“I am headed for the circus,” Mr.Gregory says over the din of the rain. “But I do not mind taking a detour.”

The girl smiles, clutching her hat as another gust of wind blows the rain sideways and it dapples the side of her gown with dark spots. “You need not take a detour. I am going in the same direction.”

“All the more reason to accompany me,” he reasons.

He approaches her quickly; holding his elbow out once he reaches the protection of the awning.

He watches her hesitating, likely thinking better than to accept offers from strange gentlemen in the rain on largely abandoned streets approaching nightfall. To his surprise, she nods.

She rests her hand tentatively in his elbow, and follows closely to keep under the umbrella. They emerge from the awning, the shop immediately obscured by the rain. It fades to a blur in the grayness as they exit the city.

“I did not think it would be open in the rain,” the girl remarks as they walk, falling easily into pace beside him.

“Perhaps they have cast a spell over the circus,” Mr Gregory says in a serious tone. “And it will only rain beyond the gates.”

His companion laughs, the sound all but lost in the rain and their meager protection under the canopy of black silk.

“I do not think even that is possible for our crew, or our illusionist. It is more likely the rain will let up.”

“In the space between now and the sunset? I do doubt it. But one must stay positive.” He pauses as his rain catches up with his ears, turning to stare perplexedly at the girl. “Your crew? May I take it then that you are a part of the circus?”

The girl smiles again, cat-like and with mirth. “I am indeed.”

The gates are in sight, nacreous and shining despite the inclement weather. There is no indication of life beyond it but there is no forewarning closure sign clattering over the gates. The shapes and shadows slowly distinguish themselves until they are recognizable as people and circus tents.

“I am honoured to be introduced to a performer of such renown,” Mr.Gregory says.

“Thank you.”

They pause before the gates, where the ground is not muddy despite the lack of cover, and a small line has already formed around a section of the gates, patrons eagerly watching the sun disappear over the horizon.

The rain has lessened, the tempest beginning to end.

“I rather enjoy the rain. If you don’t mind, I think the worst has passed, and I’d like to close my umbrella,” Mr.Gregory says.

“Not at all.” His companion relinquishes her hold on his elbow as he pulls the umbrella closed.

Mr.Gregory gently shakes his umbrella before closing it, scattering droplets of water that sparkles like diamonds.

“I must go,” the girl says, glancing inside the gates, eyes searching the labyrinth of canvas.

“Of course. Thank you for accompanying me. I do hope to see you again.”

“It you are in the mood for puppetry, then I will see you again. And thank you for sharing your umbrella.”

“It was a pleasure miss…”

“Una,” she responds, holding out a gloved hand to shake.

Mr.Gregory grasps it firmly in his own. They shake briefly before the puppeteer turns and strides not toward the gate, but around the side of it, disappearing behind caged canvas.

Mr.Gregory watches the space she occupied, searching for an opening in the gate, but between the oncoming twilight and the lengthening line of patrons waiting for the circus to open, he sees nothing out of the order. Mr.Gregory tucks his umbrella under his arm and takes his place in line.

Art by Katie DeSousa

Text by Lucie MacAulay

Breathing Light

The trees turn to the colour of embers, then brighten until they are as blinding as the sun.

Text by Lucie MacAulay

Les Lumieres Sortant Des Tenebres

The first euphonious sound is a music box, subdued and serene, an aubade rising slowly over rustling leaves and morning doves.

The flowers in the Ghost Grove begin to radiate light, looking like clusters of Japanese lanterns next to long fans of emerald leaves.

The Bone White Forest is resplendent. Radiating heat and light, like pillars of fire, gold and amber, cinnabar roots like the embers in flames, branches white as stars and cinders.

A sudden gust of wind carries the slowly melting Maiden Mer over sparkling sun-tipped waves.

The Moon Mirror lustrous and golden. The light erupts from the glass like a pillar, spreading like an open umbrella over the tops of the circus tents.

The entire Cirque is radiant and golden. The cohesion of each element, each illustrious feat and act casting long shadows in the fiery light, is radiant.

For a moment, a singular second in the haze of light falling over the circus, when everything is gold and white and red, there is a figure, a silhouette, the shape of a person. A personification of shadow.

Then it fades and there is only light.

The concinnity of the circus caught in an endless spinning moment, as intricate and joyful as a dance.

Alone together in the haze of golden light, Pamina kisses Tamino as though they will never be apart.

Art by Nadiezda

Text by Lucie MacAulay 

The Nature of Stories

“You may not tell stories but you are what stories are made of. Your story, your choices. Fairytales are no longer as simple as swans and wolves, of spells and curses and gold and small tailors. Farrin will be a great storyteller one day. His words will make people laugh and cry, but you are the story maker. You have every opportunity he does. Perhaps more. Your choices and the paths you take are the heart of the story. Farrin is the wordsmith, you are the story.”

“I don’t see ever having an adventure like this one,” Bensiabel says.

“Of course you will,” Tamino replies. “Whether or not people know it, they are always part of a story. Stories overlap, do not forget that. They are always happening, never ceasing, not forever. What is someone else’s story may overlap with narratives of many others’ lives, and someone else’s story overlaps’ with theirs, and so on. Your story is part of Farrin’s story is part of Sage’s is part of many others.”

The circus gates are opened, patrons filing in, faces alight with wonder. There is a chorus of “oohs” and “ahs”.

“And you played a very important role in many of those stories. You saved the circus, in a way. You are, it could be said, the hero of the story,” Tamino says.

“I didn’t save the circus,” Bensiabel says quietly. “I didn’t save Cirque de la Lune. I changed it. It won’t be the same.”

Tamino is silent. “You’re right, I suppose,” he says after a significant pause. “But that will not make it any less special.”

“No one here will ever know the magic that was in Cirque de la Lune,” Bensiabel indicates the steady flow of patrons, which has not yet begun to taper. “They will think they understand each feat. They don’t know magic exists and they never will.”

Tamino makes a sound that may be a laugh but when Bensiabel looks at him his face is impassive, though his eyes sparkle. “Magic. What a strange word for describing the way things simply are. There is magic in this and there is magic in that. There is magic in everything, Bensiabel. It has nothing to do with tricks and illusions; it is in the way one sees the universe. Whether you are forcibly manipulating it or just bending it to your will and vision. Magic does not exist but the universe does, and it is perception that creates this magic. They may not realize it, but many of them would not believe it if you tried to enlighten them.”

“So magic does exist, but it doesn’t?” Bensiabel repeats.

“Precisely,” Tamino pauses, regarding Bensiabel with interest. “You have done well in keeping that magic, as you call it, alive.”

“Thank you. But I think you’re exaggerating with the hero bit.”

They stop near the large tent that occupies the area where sat previously a mirror. It is striped in scarlet and rosy gold. Patrons are boisterous and loud with anticipation, gales of laughter rising and falling among the crowd.

“Perhaps. There are many sides to a story. Heroes are villains to those that would destroy their efforts, and villains who win out, wolves that would eat grandmothers and little girls, dragons that burn villages and make off with the gold, are the heroes of their stories. It is the conditions of villains that they do not think they are villains, and perhaps heroes feel the same way. But you prevented the circus from ending, though some, including myself I’m sorry to say, would have believed it was time for the circus to end. You have great willpower. And you had great tribulations. The more tribulations a hero has, the greater the story and the greater their efforts.”

Bensiabel pauses by a vendor to converse briefly. The vendor takes no notice of the man in black. He nods and whisks away into the crowd.

“Then everyone is a hero,” Bensiabel says, returning to their conversation, though his eyes are fixed on the patrons now lining up for hot apple cider or, for the adults, wine in an adjacent tent. “Everyone faces trials and tribulations. Everyone is unique and does some deed in their life that must end well. What separates one hero from another? Why are some stories remembered more than others?”

Tamino does not answer immediately. “Because the greatest stories have the biggest feats, the feats that are magical.”

Around them the lights of the circus are appearing. Some are pale in the daylight, but those hidden in the corners of tents cause cries of delight from nearby patrons and cast dancing shadows on the walls.

The scent of caramel apples is carried on the breeze.

“If I am a hero, I did not mean to be. And I did not do it alone, I had Farrin and Sage-“

“But heroes seldom do accomplish such feats alone. Aladdin would not have married the princess without the help of his genie. Arthur would not have pulled his sword from the stone without the help of the wizard Merlin. Companions do not diminish the power or greatness of the goal.”

Bensiabel watches Tamino’s expression carefully. The man in black seems less impassive than he did at the beginning of their conversation. His face appears younger. “Sage does not particularly want to stay with the circus. She wants to teach the techniques you taught her.”

The change in the man in black is imperceptible, so small Bensiabel may have missed it. “Then I wish her luck with that. She will likely be a great teacher.”

“And Farrin says he will stay, to help,” Bensiabel continues. Tamino says nothing. “To help tell stories. I don’t understand why you chose me instead of Farrin.”

Tamino remains silent; watching the lanterns swaying above the tents, long strings of orange silk bubbles with tangling tassels that shift in the wind. Finally he says, “You are a dreamer, never doubt the importance of that. You were the one who was there, the one who was willing, and that is significant in itself. Believe in yourself, whatever your choices will result in.”

Bensiabel nods, not completely understanding the words, but feeling reassured. “Thank you.”

“And now the circus is yours,” Tamino says, tilting his head toward Bensiabel, the brim of his hat momentarily hiding his eyes beneath an umbra of black silk. “You can do with it whatever you will.”

“I want to make stories,” Bensiabel says, voicing the idea he has been forming in his head since the circus came into his ownership.

“Stories?” Tamino repeats. “You want to tell stories? And give up all of this?” He waves at the tents and the patrons filing in at the gates.

“No, I want to make stories. I want to make them with each person involved in the circus. Each act together in one show, one exhibit, to tell a story.”

“I see,” Tamino says. The patrons that pass them move consciously around Bensiabel, but part around Tamino as though they are not even aware of the action. “And which story will you tell first?”

Bensiabel gestures around him, waving at the tall star speckled tents beneath a rising sun, where his story is intertwined with Tamino’s story is intertwined with everyone else’s, that make up the never ending tales in which heroes and dreamers live on. “This one.”

Text by Lucie MacAulay

Moonshine and Mist

The circus is not glowing. That is Bensiabel’s first though upon his arrival to the dark cirque. Even the gates are not shimmering. He recognizes the poor weather sign atop the gates. From his vantage point Bensiabel can see the tips of the tents are black as ink, despite the sparkling luminaries swaying on the Ferris wheel rim.

As he nears he spots Sage, who paces anxiously before the gate.

“Hello,” he says, fighting back the feeling of dread that settled in the pit of his stomach the moment he spotted the circus devoid of light. “What’s happened?”

“I don’t know, it was like this when I got here,” she says, waving a hand at the winding path beyond the gate, which leads into shadow instead of its usual gossamer silver light. “I’ve never seen this before, even on nights when the weather is bad.”

“Me neither,” Bensiabel says, still looking at the gates, half expecting Farrin to come around the corner and tell them they have simply turned the lights off and the circus will resume its regular appearance later. But the circus more than looks wrong; it feels wrong.

Bensiabel glances at Sage but she is focused on the gate. Under her gaze it rattles slightly, then with increasing strength as Sage furrows her brow. The shaking stops and Sage relaxes, her expression dismayed. “I can’t open it.”

Bensiabel prowls around the gates, searching for some opening. There is nothing but bars, and the doors, which are locked from the inside.

He comes to stop a little ways away from the entrance, at a spot where the gap between bars is bigger. Big enough for him to squeeze through.

Sage helps him, pushing on his ribs and helping him turn his head when he discovers it won’t go in sideways. Eventually, with much holding of breath and pushing on Sage’s, Bensiabel is through the gate.

Sage has slightly less trouble following him, though her gown down get caught on a curl of pearly metal.

Bensiabel would feel somewhat worse about trespassing, but he feels as though he is breaking into his own home, an unusual endeavor but not altogether wrong.

They proceed toward the Moon Mirror, in the hopes of seeing some light amidst the shadow.

The circus is dark, no gossamer glow radiates form sconces or lanterns or lamp posts. The first stars twinkle in the sky in the space between clouds.

The scent of the wind within the gates differs from that without. It is heavier, and deeply foreboding. The circus smells not of cinnamon and apple cider and woodsmoke, but of burnt paper and metal. Beneath the petrichor and char is a breath of autumn wind.

Decay with an undercurrent of the dying season.

Bensiabel and Sage emerge from the labyrinth of black and silver tents onto the promenade, the area clear of patrons and light, no performers or statues on platforms or pedestals.

The promenade is a grey landscape. Leaf-strewn blackened canvas, wet stone, and cinder and smoke.

The ground is covered in shards of glass, thin and sharp, sparkling.

Through the light mist and rain Bensiabel sees two figures standing by the Moon Mirror. When he comes closer he recognizes Pamina, and her silver and black dress fluttering in the wind, but the man by her side, wearing a black suit, is a stranger.

Before Bensiabel asks who the man is he is distracted by the Moon Mirror. Long cracks fragment the surface, and it is not silver. It is the first time Bensiabel has seen the mirror not glowing.

The frame of the mirror is bright though, glowing as though the metal is hot. It hisses where the rain hits it, small bursts of steam that disappear quickly.

“What happened?” Bensiabel asks.

Pamina turns quickly, the man in black turning with her. Pamina holds the man in black’s hand in her own.

She smiles, though it is not a happy smile. “Bensiabel, I’m glad to see you.”

Sage steps forward, her gaze fixed not on the fortuneteller, as Bensiabel’s is, but on the man in black, her expression one of confusion. “Tamino?”

The man in black nods at his pupil. “Good evening, Sage.”

Bensiabel looks at Tamino with a considerable amount of interest, having never seen Sage’s instructor her is suddenly curious about him. Perhaps if the circus did not look so desolate he would ask the man in black a question. “What happened?” he repeats.

Pamina answers, “The balance was upset.”

Sage removes her eyes from her instructor, staring instead at the fortuneteller. “What does that mean?”

Pamina sighs. “It is complicated,” she says. “But we have a favour to ask of you, Bensiabel.”

Bensiabel glances at Sage but she looks as startled as he feels. Pamina watches him, waiting to continue. “I need you to adopt the circus.”

“What?”

“The circus requires someone to take care of it. I would hope for that someone to be you.”

Bensiabel is almost too shocked to speak. “Why?” he manages.

“I was negligent,” Pamina say. “I miscalculated the extent of what was under my control, and now the circus is falling apart.” Bensiabel does not understand how the circus could fall apart, it has always felt as strong as a fortress, but now, looking closely, he can see elements of it are beginning to fade. The trees surrounding them are unfocused, like a blurry photograph. Where their branches stretch into the sky-like ceiling they appear to dissolve like the crystals of a snowflake. The light from the fire is dim, and growing dimmer.

The dry leaves crackle as they skate across the ground in the occasional breeze.

“Why me? Why don’t you do it?” Bensiabel asks Sage. “You’re better at these things than I am.”

Sage shakes her head. “I’m not involved like you are Bensiabel. I never have been. It must be you.”

Bensiabel turns to Pamina, feeling helpless. “I can’t do it. I’m not like you, or Sage or Farrin. I can’t do all of this magic.”

“True magic, as you call it. You expect it to transcend everything. But it does not,” Tamino says.

“What does?” Bensiabel asks.

Tamino does not answer, but instead glances back at Pamina. Their eyes meet for only a second yet in that second the looks on their faces answers Bensiabel’s question.

Bensiabel turns to Sage. “Why did you say yes? Why did you agree to travel with the cirque?”

Sage sighs. “I had no reason to say no. I was lonely and bored, and I desperately wanted to belong somewhere. I didn’t wish to stay in one place.”

“Why did you say yes, Bensiabel?” Pamina asks.

Bensiabel doesn’t answer, but his eyes are drawn to the heart of the circus, in the direction of many spiraling paths in canvas.

“What would happen otherwise?” Sage asks.

“The circus would be like a machine with nothing to power it. It would be empty. Every illusion and vision would be gone. It would be a husk, a shell of what is was.” Pamina glances at Tamino. They share a look of profound sorrow, though there is something more intimate beneath it. “The circus would be gone.”

Bensiabel cannot think what is worse, the decision he must make or that he is the only one who can make it.

There is a moment of silence when time seems to slow like paper slowly sinking to the ground. The only sounds in the promenade are the wind and the pattern and hiss of rain on the mirror frame.

Bensiabel thinks of each moment he has spent in the circus, the lights and sugar and performances, and how he cannot live without it. He is already bound in his heart to the circus. He cannot imagine saying no.

“Alright,” he says. As Pamina’s shoulders relax and Tamino smiles he asks, “What do I have to do?”

Pamina holds out her hand to him and Bensiabel sees a scorch mark on her palm. He wonders why she has not healed it and thinks perhaps it is because it is from the Moon Mirror.

Bensiabel approaches her slowly, his eyes flicking back and forth between her hand and her face. When he takes her hand, one of the few times he has touched her despite their many lessons, he is surprised by the warmth of her palm, and the solidarity of it in the wavering visions of the circus. He has almost expected Pamina to fade with the circus.

“Close your eyes.”

Bensiabel closes his eyes, plunged into an even deeper darkness than that of the circus.

He feels a very strange sensation, like falling, but as it continues it becomes something else entirely. Bensiabel feels as though he is floating, there is no ground beneath his feet, only an expanse of empty air, like a void. Time stretches on behind his eyelids, seconds feeling like hours. Then there is a weight on his shoulders, the settling of something of monumental size, big enough to take his breath away. He can feel his knees about to buckle, but he stays standing.

It is the feel of being in the circus, but magnified a hundred times. He feels elated with wonder and magic, the air of mystery, the depth of etherealness.

Slowly the feeling ebbs, and Bensiabel is aware of Pamina’s hand once again, of the wind and the smell of wet, burnt canvas.

“Open your eyes, Bensiabel.”

Bensiabel opens his eyes to the familiar tents, and to Tamino and Pamina looking at him with something akin to pride, and a little sadness.

“What-“

“I just gave you the circus,” Pamina says. “But that is only part of it. Right now the circus can’t function, it doesn’t have enough power.”

Pamina leans forward, bringing her lips close to his ear, she whispers, “You must draw down the sun.”

Text by Lucie MacAulay

Glass-Coveted Furies

Hansen has rented rooms in Cesky Krumlov to attend the circus tonight, an easy trip compared to some other distances he has traveled to for the cirque, thought not as simple as attending it in Denmark.

Hansen traverses the circus for an hour before meeting Pamina, and they greet one another as old friends.

They stroll for some time along the promenade around the Moon Mirror, never straying too far from the fortuneteller’s tent. When she must return to her tent Hansen requests that she meet him again when she next has a break, and she obliges.

Hansen wanders into various tents, occasionally recognizing his own contributions to the cirque, though he still cannot find evidence of his music boxes.

He enters a tent that does not appear to end, walking down a hall smelling of vanilla and sugar, and lines with trees peppered with sugary confections. At the end of the hall he climbs a spiral staircase covered in small frosted lanterns and emerged in a room like a giant elaborate birdcage. Iron bars come together like a canopy overhead, twisting and hanging in a hook, hanging from the hook is a chandelier made entirely of wax. A tangled nest of white feathers is situated in the centre of the cage.

There appears to be no other door but after much searching Hansen discovers it beneath the nest, a trapdoor leading into darkness.

The darkness is a vast desert, dunes of coal black sand reaching the edges of the walls beneath an equally dark sky speckled with stars.

A marble white temple takes him to the next room.

It is filled with mirrors, arranged like an inverted paxinoscope, dozens of reflected planes in a circle, facing inward. Light filters in through the spaces between mirrors.

Hansen comes to stand in the centre of the mirrors, staring into reflections stretched and squeezed. In one mirror he appears younger, the creases around his eyes and mouth gone, his hair darker. In another he is not wearing a rose tucked in lapel, but it reappears in the mirror next to it.

In another mirror the figure of a woman in shadow stands behind him, but when he turns there is no one there.

Hansen searches the ground for his shadow but cannot see it. He frowns. The light is coming from only select angles, and he stares at the ground for some time, expecting to see a thin grey man, turning this way and that, but there is only light. There is not even a shadowy edge around the toes of his boot.

Hansen pauses before the mirror in which he saw the woman, craning his head to look into it at different angles, as though she is hiding behind the edge of the frame. The reflection is empty save for himself and the other mirrors, each reflecting more Hansens and mirrors.

Then the air shudders. Something flashes through the circus, like invisible lightning.

The circus stills, time slowing.

A glass of wine shatters, a starburst of crimson staining the brocade of the tablecloth in the backstage area where the acrobats are resting.

The wind dies down, the leaves on the ground still.

The music boxes all falter, gears and cogs grinding with a horrible scraping noises, before they resume their tunes.

Each clock and watch stops ticking, hands jerking over one number.

Hansen watches cracks tremble across the glass in distorted lines, fissures like rivers on a map. The mirror shatters.

Jagged pieces fly in all directions, hitting the ground and surrounding mirrors as though they were always intended targets.

As he stumbles back Hansen’s eyes fall on a shard of mirror, striking out toward him like a dagger at a bullseye.

The shard turns, edge over edge, catching the light as it spins, before coming to rest in Hansen’s chest. It slides through his breast pocket and the rose tucked in his lapel, and hits his heart mid-beat.

Dozens of Hansens hit the ground, surprised faces turned skyward.

His blood pools in multiple reflections, a rose extending its petals into the dozens of mirrors.

There is no trace of sound in the tent, no soft music box melodies, not even the din of the circus outside. Nothing disturbs the silence. There is no one else in the surrounding space.

Only the surrounding mirrors, bright and refracting canyons of silver light are witness to Hansen’s fluttering eyes as he slips quietly away.

Text by Lucie MacAulay

Kitten-Credited Introductions

Beyond Sage’s regular surveillance tonight she has a special task, though it is not, strictly speaking, assigned by her instructor.

Tonight she is watching the boy.

She has noticed him wandering the circus several times in the past and has only recently begun to wonder how he appears so often, and hardly seems to enter any of the tents. This is the first tent in which she has encountered him, and he does nothing save for observe the kitten leaping through strategically placed hoops and performing flips and jumps from trainers’ hands and shoulders.

He stands with his hands in his pockets, watching the cats thoughtfully as Sage edges around the canvas walls. When she is close enough to see his features clearly in the dim light, she stops. His hair, peaking from beneath his cap, is so pale it is almost white, physicality Sage has never seen before, despite her ever-growing list of travel destinations.

She is not sure what is so intriguing to her about the boy, apart from his costume, which is a meticulous mess of filigree buttons and scraps of many different materials. It may be his pale skin; so white he could be born of the moon himself. It may also be that unlike other patrons he does not wander around the circus, but moves with purpose as though attending some outstanding appointment. Her curiosity trumps her nerves ands Sage resolves to identify the mysterious boy, hoping desperately that he not turn out to be someone mundane.

While Sage ruminates on the plausibility of following the boy into the deeper, winding paths of the circus, she has drifted closer to him without realizing it.

Sage is considering ways in which to introduce herself when at her a feet a smoky grey kitten begins to amuse itself with the laces of Sage’s boots. She bends to pet the kitten that tamely rises on its hind legs to embrace her finger in its paws.

“Her name is Saffron,” says a voice behind her. Sage waits as Saffron perches herself on her shoulder before turning to address the speaker.

“Do you know all of the kittens in the circus?” she asks. Saffron has begun to climb up the sleeve of her jacket, marching toward her shoulder.

The white haired boy adjusts his hat while he replies. “Yes. I know all of the animals. Most of them are sweet though some of them are only just being trained and they aren’t very friendly.”

“How did they train them so well?” Sage asks as Saffron performs a perfect somersault down her arm, before perching in her palm.

“We must train them when they’re very young, so they will be used to it.” He reaches on of his pockets and retrieves something small but it smells strongly of herbs. “Of course, treats help too.” He tosses the morsel to Saffron, the kitten leaping upon it, her expedition up Sage’s arm momentarily forgotten.

“Did you train them all yourself?” Sage asks.

“No. The kittens mostly, but the cats and wolves were trained by the others. They’re in the bigger tents down there,” The boy waves a hand at the flap of canvas.

“I haven’t seen them yet,” Sage replies.

“Have you seen the statues?” Farrin asks.

Sage nods.

“There is a statue all in black with a long cloak, and some of the animals sit with him sometimes. When they’re tired. He’s called the King of the Jungle.”

The kitten leaps from Sage’s wrist and sprints suddenly across the tent, pouncing on a length of string.

“Where on earth did the idea for the statues come from?” Sage asks.

“It’s a part of the atmosphere, so you can experience the circus everywhere. They’re tucked in all the intersections and really anywhere they can fit. I believe they were originally all meant to be dancers, but there is a beauty in stationary things.”

The boy watches calmly as Saffron tumbles over several other kittens in her attempt to cross the tent again. She rolls to her paws gracefully and comes to stop before Sage. Sage leans forward, reaching out to pet her head.

“Come Saffron, don’t be a pest,” the boy says, almost apologetically, when the kitten playfully bites Sage’s fingers.

“She’s not a bother,” Sage says at the moment Saffron rolls onto her back. Sage strokes her velvety stomach.

“Now she is enamored with you,” Farrin says. “She will not leave you alone at all.”

Sage is about to say she does not mind but the boy continues, his cheeks bright pink.

“She loves to be pet exactly there. On behalf of Saffron I would like to thank you, if you would oblige me. There a more animals, older and better trained than this, backstage. I am headed there, if you would care to join me?”

The boy sounds polite and friendly, but there is a hint of something else in his voice. A curiosity he barely conceals. It is that, coupled with her own curiosity that causes Sage to nod her consent.

The boy weaves through the kitten acts and the few patrons who remain distracted by their talent, and pulls aside the flap of the canvas door. When Sage steps out he follows, and leads her on a path between the tents, long and with so many twists and turns Sage is certain he cannot be recalling a path and they will soon be lost.

They eventually arrive at a break in the fabric of a tent, an uneven edge where the black and silver lines do not line up. The boy smiles and slips through them. After some hesitation, Sage quickly follows.

The “backstage” is a riot of colour, a complete contrast to the tents outside. Bathed in rainbows and sunset. Books with gilded spines pile on every available surface, tucked around circus paraphernalia and empty teacups. Candles stumps are propped up in crystal candelabras and lie in halves on the ground. The furniture comes from across the globe, bamboo from Asia alongside teakwood and carpets from Tabriz. The space is filled with tapestries and pillows and antique furniture decorated in rust red and scarlet, in wine and ember.

The boy is not disoriented by the transition from silver and black to colour but Sage feels discombobulated. She has not seen so many colours in one space since she last took some respite in maison Beaulieu.

And they are not alone. Resting on a cushioned teakwood seat piled with cushions is a young woman, maybe only a few years older than Sage herself, reading a dilapidated book, which she closes and sets aside as the boy lets Sage in.

“Farrin,” the young woman greets him, smiling. “And who have you brought with you?” she turns to Sage.

Farrin steps between them, gesturing to the woman first. “This is Rose, she is the illusionist.” He gestures to Sage. “I’m sorry, I didn’t ask your name…”

“Sage.”

“This is Sage,” Farrin replies. “I was going to show her the animals while they rested, but I wasn’t sure if they were performing on the hour or the half hour.”

“The quarter hour actually,” Rose says, standing and moving around the pile of books to the only open space in the room, occupied by Farrin and Sage and a small nest of tabby kittens crouched by the towers of books like guardian dragons. When Rose is a metre away she holds her hand out to Sage. “Lovely to meet you.”

Sage takes the hand, feeling the lace of the illusionist’s cuff tickle her wrist. “You too.” She withdraws her hand and clasps it with her other hand behind her back, feeling suddenly nervous in the warm space, without the anonymity of a regular circus patron.

“I’m sorry there isn’t more entertainment,” Rose says, looking down at the kittens on the floor, appearing mostly sleepy, save for one padding toward Farrin’s foot. “You are welcome to stay and amuse yourself with the kitten if you wish. I will just be reading for a while, it has been a busy night.”

Rose returns to her seat as Farrin sits cross-legged on the plush red carpet. Sage follows suit, folding the hem of her gown beneath her.

“It must be interesting to know an illusionist,” Sage says, though it occurs to her that Farrin must be acquainted with most members of the circus, if not all.

“She is one of the greatest illusionist’s in the world,” Farrin says, as a kitten sprawls across the toe of his shoes.

“One of the greatest?” the illusionist repeats, raising an eyebrow over the top of her book.

Farrin blushes, his pale cheeks turning red as apples. “The greatest, absolutely brilliant,” he amends.

Rose laughs loudly and returns to her book, eyes flickering from line to line.

An indeterminate amount of time passes, punctuated only by the illusionist’s departure and return to her tent. Farrin attempts to teach the kittens to roll over, and with Sage they make some progress before Farrin runs out of treats. The kittens lose interest in his empty pockets and return to their positions at the foot of the piles of books.

Standing, Farrin brushes off his pants and offers a hand to Sage.

“We have at least an hour before the circus closes, if you are able to stay,” he says, checking a watch drawn from his pocket.

“I am,” Sage responds.

They emerge from the tent, plunged into the monochromatic circus once more. Sage is momentarily shocked, feeling as though she has been much farther away from the circus than in a tent separate from the myriad of exhibitions.

Farrin navigates the circus expertly, leading Sage on a dizzying number of paths before coming to rest before a pitch black tent with a sign hung by ribbons over the front. It reads Dream Catcher, and it flaps in the occasional winds.

Inside it is not an act, but a piece of art. At first it appears to be a giant spider’s web, the overlapping gossamer threads resemble fine filaments of ivory silk against the inky blackness, taking up the entire tent. But clinging to the threads are not flies, instead there are pieces of quartz, clear and roughly cut, and other trinkets; raven and dove feathers, nacreous beads and black bells that tinkle with the smallest shifts of air.

They spend some time investigating tiny treasures hidden within it, then Farrin takes a button from his pocket and adds it to the mess, tangling a loose thread in it and pulling it taut around the rim. He leaves it secured and while he encourages Sage to leave something there as well, she politely declines, insisting she would rather see other attractions.

As they walk Farrin tells her small stories of the circus, vignettes from his childhood with kittens and fire and stars.

They spend a significant amount of time in the fire breathers’ tent, enough that the first rays of dawn are shimmering on the gates of the circus and most other tents have closed when they emerge.

Farrin walks Sage to the gates.

She turns to says goodbye and he responds with a slight bow.

“You will be back again, won’t you?” he asks as he straightens.

“Yes,” Sage answers. “If you promise to show me more of the circus.”

“I do indeed, there seems to be too much you don’t know about it. I will have to show you every tent I can before we leave next.”

Sage feels fatigued even thinking about it. “I do not think that is possible. Of course, half the things I see here I wonder how they are possible,” she says breathlessly.

“Magic,” Farrin says dramatically.

Sage smiles. “Possibly.”

They part ways, promising to meet again, to continue their exploration, which has been adjourned sine die. With no definite plans for the future. 

Text by Lucie MacAulay

Regrets and Fury

Rose has come to look to her performances with great excitement. The opportunity to improve and practice before an audience, and the looks on audience members’ faces at the appearance and disappearance of their articles. The taste of the unimaginable that leaves them aching for more.

Even in her earliest performance times before dawn, with few patrons filling her tent, Rose expends her efforts to the point where she must rest as soon as the last patrons has filed out of her tent for the morning.

There is also a thrill in the weaving of magic from thin air. Exquisite transformations and illusions in fire and ice, wind and metal.

There is usually little that diverts her attention.

However, Rose is distracted through her performance tonight, scheduled just before midnight, by a woman seated in the front row. She has encountered apprehension before, fear and outright disbelief by non-believers, yet the lady currently sitting to her right does not exhibit the same fidgeting and agitation so often accompanying antagonistic patrons. She is watching the illusionist’s movements with a precision that makes her seem suspicious of Rose, as though the woman is not sure where or not the illusionist is real.

Her eyes scan the tent in the moments Rose holds an illusion still and presents it to the audience, searching and grim. She has a haunted appearance, a weariness indicating more than caution.

It is not the first time she has seen a weary gaze, but it is the first she perceives as haunted.

Rose is levitating a watch, one belonging to a patron who watches with rapt attention as it hovers and spins slowly in the air, cogs flying from its face in blurs of silver, coming apart and together, when the woman in the front row moves.

She stands, her eyes fixed on the illusionist, hands trembling by her side.

Rose falters, the watch face shattering apart, causing the audience to gasp when shards of glass stop inches from their faces, as though hindered by an invisible force field.

There is shift, a sudden surge in the air.

The air ripples. In the Origami Tent several Persian cats revert to folded paper without warning; the flames dancing atop long sticks held by fire breathers in another tent sputter and spark, plumes of dense white smoke making them cough; and acrobat posed on a tightrope loses her balance, tumbling toward the floor before being caught by a trapeze swinger, only inches from the floor. The pieces of pocket watch tumble to the floor, scattered between patrons/ feet. The illusionist stumbles. She turns pale and sways, slumping forward, toward the trellis of snow-white roses.

Several audience members move to catch her, lowering her gently to the platform in a flutter of silver and lace. Blood begins to form around her, dripping off the platform.

A woman screams, a patron runs for help. Rose’s heart beat slows. They are all too distracted to notice the roses, red as blood…

Text by Lucie MacAulay

An Invitation to the Circus

Today Hansen has traveled from Denmark to Prague. It is an unusually far distance for him, even to follow the circus, but he is attending the cirque tonight by special invitation. He received the letter among his regular business postage a short while ago, requesting his presence at the next location of the nomadic cirque, though he was given advanced enough notice to secure a rented room in the outskirts of the city.

The envelope in which the letter arrives also holds a ticket for one admission to the circus.

Hansen arrives slightly earlier than most patrons, but he takes his time to wander around the fence, unable to see anything beyond the backs of tents and the occasional winding pathway between tents. When he return to the front of the line, just outside of the gates, there are already a dozen or so people lined up, and more are arriving as the seconds tick by.

Hansen presents his ticket at the booth, and then moves past it and into the circus. He wonders what he is meant to be waiting for.

He pauses by the Moon Mirror, amongst crowds still plotting their path for evening, and vendors holding trays or soliciting from booths, waiting in the increasing darkness for something, though he is not sure what, to happen. When nothing occurs he decides to wander through the circus, hoping he will come across the significant cause or a familiar face, the reason for his invitation and attendance.

He enters a tent housing raised platforms on which various fire artists perform with bright flame. Fire breathers whose mouths erupt with birds, dragons, serpents who spit and scatter sparks. The flames change colour too, flickering between a prism of twilight blues, pitch blacks and smoky snow whites. A woman in a billowing grey gown holds fire in her bare hands, a zoo of flaming creatures prowling in her fingertips. A gryphon with the star white head of an eagle takes off, his wings morphing into that of a pegasus that prances until it's wings are gone, replaced with a horn of silver erupting from it's forehead.

Another man holds the fire on a stick, twirling it until it is a wheel of fire above his head, beneath his feet, spinning around the many dancers holding flaming hoops. They leap between the hoops, toss them in the air and grab them at the end of the arc of flames left brightening the air.

They smile at Hansen as he watches, distracting him momentarily before him realizes the sparks coming from each hoop, each pole and from the tales and tongues of each animal, hang in the air around him, like miniature flaming stars, before sizzling into nothing.

In the minutes Hansen spends watching the fire artists, he notices the flames are in perfect time with a subtle melody.

The song is barely noticeable, like a sound one grows accustomed to hearing simply by hearing it often enough. There is something entrancing about the melody, something Hansen cannot place. The music is familiar, some shard of daydream or fairy tale. It is peaceful and serene, with a thrill of exhilaration.

Suddenly it strikes him, and he recognizes it as his own. Songs composed in amplified music boxes that are, as Mr.Tamas had indicated, concealed. Hansen attempts to locate the box in the tent, in any sight plain or otherwise, but cannot, and he cannot pinpoint from where it is playing.

The time is in perfect harmony with the dancing of the flames. He feels proud, and profoundly honoured, to have contributed to the circus in some way, even if it was unknowingly.

He lingers a few minutes longer, paying a considerable amount of attention to the music, listening for skips in the song, or the scratch of metal that indicates the wear of weather and the elements, and the need for strong polish, but he hears nothing.

Almost each tent Hansen visits is accompanied by recognizable music, though in none can he find any of the music boxes he remembers constructing.

Hansen leaves with a sense of deep satisfaction; delighted at the use of his music boxes and that he is able to hear his creations even after parting with them. He stumbles into bed in the early morning, dreaming of lullabies and silver flame.

Art by Seth Fitts 

Text by Lucie MacAulay

A Curious Reading

Before the sky even begins to darken Bensiabel leaves his rooms in Livorno and begins walking toward the circus. There is a steady stream of citizens following, most in groups or couples. Some pass him at a brisk pace, in heightened spirits, pointing to the tips of the tents in the distance and the faint silver glow surrounding them.

A girl points to him and whispers to her friend, who blushes deeply, and they giggle. Bensiabel feels his ears getting warm, though he has left his hat in the city.

When Bensiabel reaches the gates the sun is still low on the horizon, the sky streaked with red and gold. He fidgets while he waits, tapping his fingers on his pant leg as the first stars appear in the dusky violet sky, brightening as the sky darkens.

He is close to the front of the line that begins to wind around the gates. Patrons already clutch their purses, ready to purchase their tickets and enter the marvelous cirque. Bensiabel wonders if they experience the same feeling as he when attending the circus, the feeling of wonder and exhilaration. Being called to the circus, and yearning for it when they leave.

When the sun is gone, the last line of gold on the horizon dissipated, the circus comes to life before his eyes. The gossamer glow that permeates the circus like perfume brightens. The pearlescent gates shimmer and the sounds of wind and rustling leaves fades away, replaced by the subdued music of the circus and patrons going “ooh” and “ah”. Bensiabel cranes his head to better see the entrance of the cirque, standing on tiptoes to see over the heads of patrons filing in.

Bensiabel purchases his tickets from the ticket seller and proceeds to the Moon Mirror, pausing in the concourse to plot out a path. He decides to go around the perimeter of the cirque and circle inward slowly, like a spiral, to see the outermost tents first, and save the enigma of the centre of the circus for future exploration.

Bensiabel passes tents he recognizes, and others he does not, but he selects tents that attract fewer crowds, wondering if such tents hold personal mysteries. He encounters a large white tent, spectral and pale and glittering like icicles in the light of a nearby lamp. The sign outside, inscribed with elegant and swirling calligraphy in silver on black wood reads Cartomancy: Prophecies and Oracles. All that has been and all that will be.

A boisterous crowd passes, paying him no attention, as though they do not even see the moon white tent. Intrigued, Bensiabel pushes the opening aside.

Inside the tent the space is vast and open, the white canvas stretched taut and lit by flickering silver flames in wrought iron scones lining the walls. A sphinx, in pale smoky grey, rests in the centre, the silent guardian of a basket at its feet.

The basket is an oblong shape of curling silver metal, the top of which is pulled apart like taffy, curls and spikes of silver crisscrossing and overlapping in intricate patterns. When Bensiabel approaches the sphinx, realizing it is much taller than him, almost three times his height, and glances into the basket. It is filled with black squares of paper, flashing silver when the undulating light from the sconces hits them.

Bensiabel reaches into the basket and sifts through piles of cardstock until catching the corner of one with his fingernail. He draws it out; it is a simple but sturdy card with a black and silver etching of two doors and two knights in gilded armour guarding them with long swords. On the breastplate of one knight is a filigree of a crescent moon amid tiny stars; the other’s is emblazoned with a silver sun, its rays like the sharp prongs of a trident. Bensiabel turns it over, where written in elegant calligraphy it reads:

One Door Leads You Onward

The Other into the Abyss

One Man Always Tells the Truth

The Other Man Always Lies

Choose Carefully and Proceed With Caution

Looking up, Bensiabel is startled by the sight of two shadowy figures by the sphinx, each guarding a door hidden half by shadows.

He glances back and forth between the sphinxes, his gaze spending a considerable amount of time in between, looking to the sphinx for guidance, but its face remains impassive. He did not expect such a cerebral attraction, though he is not certain what the actual attraction is.

From the depths of his memory, as faint as a layer of dust on a long forgotten book, emerges a sense of familiarity. As well as the impression of warmth and soft fingers, of his mother’s laugh and her perfume. She has told him a similar riddle.

It is several minutes before Bensiabel recalls the answer to the riddle, and his process is hindered by the vague recollections of his mother and her stories. Eventually he returns the card to the basket and approaches the knight in front of the door to the right.

He clears his throat and hesitates, glancing quickly around the tent to make sure he is alone, feeling rather silly for conversing with a statue.

“If I asked him,” Bensiabel points to the knight to the left, “if his door leads me onward, would he say it does?”

The knight does not reply. There is silence in the tent, not even the sounds of the circus outside encroach on the sphinx-guarded temple.

Bensiabel is beginning to feel stupid and he watches the frozen knight. As he backs away a sound, like a soft thud, echoes through the knight’s metal body.

Glancing down Bensiabeal realizes a piece of heavy cardstock has appeared in the knight’s hand, the tip held between his fingers and his sword.

Bensiabel plucks the card from the knight’s fingers, backing away quickly, half-expecting the knight to reach forward and reclaim it. When he is a safe distance away he turns it over, reading the one-word answer Yes.

“Then the other one leads onward,” he says, but the words do not sound as sure spoken aloud as they did in his head.

Bensiabel approaches the second knight and, keeping a wide berth between himself and the knight, pushes through the heavy velvet curtain.

Beyond the curtain there is only darkness, blackness so consuming Bensiabel cannot tell the difference between his eyes being open or closed He reaches out and fumbles for some guidance, for a door or a wall or a light. He feels walls on either side of him, but he hesitates, unsure if he should continue or if he has wandered into some backstage area of the circus.

Just as Bensiabel has decided to turn back, and is navigating his way toward the direction he came, small pinpricks of light appear in the darkness above him, appearing like clusters of stars.

He continues onward, hands outstretch in front of him and to the sides, should he bump into something.

After some time he does hit something, a soft surface that he realizes after a moment is a curtain. He pushes through it, the velvet cascading around his shoulders as his eyes adjust to the light in the new space.

Bensiabel stands in a vestibule, lit by black candles and festooned with paper stars. The walls are black and there are two high backed chairs, throne-like and carved with a spray of stars inlaid with pearl.

There is another curtain opposite him, only a few steps away.

Bensiabel tentatively moves to this new curtains and pushes through, unsure of what to expect in the adjoining room.

The space is even smaller, though it houses a table and two chairs, one of which is occupied by a woman wearing a dark veil. The fortuneteller beckons Bensiabel forward and he hesitates in the doorway for only a second before stepping through, letting the curtain close behind him, the star pocketed passageway hidden.

The room is full of heady incense, dark and smoky, that makes him feel almost sleepy.

“Have a seat,” she says, her voice low and soft. She gestures to the chair across from her.

Bensiabel sits down. The chair reminds him of those in his mother’s room, though he has not sat in them in a year. They are not uncomfortable but he sinks deeply into the cushion, enough that he is not eye level with the fortuneteller.

“Good evening. I hope you have been enjoying the night,” she says when he is seated and still.

Bensiabel nods, then, feeling he should say more, continues, “I was here last night. I haven’t had the chance to see many tents though.”

The fortuneteller smiles. “Then I am honoured you chose to enter mine. What would you specifically like to know?”

“Um,” Bensiabel says. He mentally berates himself for saying something so stupid but the fortuneteller’s expression does not change. She waits patiently for him to speak. “Not really, I mean, no.”

The fortuneteller nods. “That is fine. I can read for you anyway.”

The fortuneteller produces, from under the tablecloth of cascading black brocade, a striped tote covered in black lace and ribbon. It is closed with a button, which she undoes and reaches not into the bag but into a hidden pocket in the silk lining. She glances up at Bensiabel and when she catches him staring, she smiles. “This deck was made specially for me, by someone very close to me. I always carry it with me.” She removes a deck of cards, longer than playing cards and decorated with a pattern of silver stars on black.

As the fortuneteller shuffles Bensiabel begins to notice some small details within the tent. The subtle change of the scent of incense, the increased warmth as though they are seated next to a roaring fire, the cards becoming a blur in the fortuneteller’s hands.

The fortuneteller spreads the deck of cards across the table, an array of starry silver. “Please pick a card. “

Fortunetelling seems incredibly simple to Bensiabel. He regards the deck of cards, not sure which one to choose. They look the same and nothing catches his eye.

He chooses a card in the middle, almost completely hidden beneath another card, its silver edge catching the light as Bensiabel tilts his head. He reaches for if tentatively, pausing with his hand over the arc of black cards.

“May I pick it up?” he asks, wondering if there are rules in this subject, like leaving one’s cards untouched until a dealer is done with a regular playing deck. But the fortuneteller nods and he turns it over.

On the card is a picture of many stars, in silver ink similar to that on the back of the card. A woman kneels next to a black ocean, holding two jugs tilted downward, as though pouring the water into the ocean and onto the shore beside her.

“This represents me?” Bensiabel asks, his voice comes out with much more doubt than he intended. He is not sure how he feels about fortunetelling. He has never met a member of the occupation before and has heard only superstitious gossip and his father’s own opinions.

“It is all hocus,” his father has said. “There is nothing trustworthy about a person who tells others what they want to hear or spouts nonsense and portents of doom or true love.”

But Bensiabel finds he is incontrovertibly curious, though he sees no resemblance between himself and the rendering on the card in his hand.

“It is a positive card. It means good will and hope, or it can mean discovery.”

The fortuneteller retrieves the remainder of the deck, gathering them into a neat pile to resume shuffling. Her hands move quickly over them once more as Bensiabel slowly places the card on the table near his elbow.

The fortuneteller flips the cards over, one by one, revealing detailed pictures of cups and swords in various numbers and settings. When she places the remainder of the deck on the table beside her she leans forward to regard the arrangement.

Bensiabel leans in to inspect the layout and the exhibition of strange drawings. There are cups and swords and magicians’ wands, a great many deal of stars, and some drawings of more mysterious things. There is a silver sun, blazing with moon-coloured fire; a crumbling tower surrounded by rubble, man hanging from a rope wrapped around his wrist, suspended amidst white clouds. The pictures are completely foreign to Bensiabel, who knows of no hanged men or towers.

Bensiabel wants to ask her what she is looking for, but he does not want to break her concentration. And he finds that the intimacy of the enclosure/space makes him shy.

“You are a very sensitive person. And there is some great weight you carry with you, losses and sorrow you are not ready to let go of.” She gently touches the cards closest to her, shifting them by degrees.

“You like to travel, though you have not traveled much. You are rarely content in one place, am I correct?” She looks up at Bensiabel for confirmation.

He nods and follows her gaze back to the cards.

Her not quite smile falters. “There is… confusion in your future. You are a part of something, something you do not understand, but I cannot see how it will play out.” She lays one card on top of another.

“Are you quite devoted to the circus?” she asks, her hands still on the cards, though they remain still, the pictures beneath her fingers looking almost alive in the undulating candle light.

Bensiabel has not considered it. He loves what he has seen of the circus so far, and he aches for it the moment he leaves. “I suppose so,” he answers.

“You have a job ahead of you,” the fortuneteller pronounces suddenly. She sounds profoundly hopeful, to Bensiabel.

“What sort of job?” he asks anxiously. He has always considered he would grow up and take over the vineyard, after perfecting his father’s craft. He has never even spoken of another occupation with his father, never discussed an education or job elsewhere, though the idea of “elsewhere” certainly appeals to him.

“The cards are tricky things. They can read much more than the future. They can see your memories, for they cling to you like cobwebs. But there is so much they cannot see, they are not for specifics, I generally find. And they are rarely as accurate as stars and shadows,” she adds, still regarding the cards with a look of concentration masking faint surprise. The hope in her countenance has faded.

“You can read shadows?” Bensiabel asks.

The fortuneteller nods, her attention still on the cards before her, her brow furrowed. “Shadows are more connected to a person, they are far more telling than the cards. The things a shadow could tell stay on a person like sugar on your fingers. But I can see some things that people don’t want me to see, so I refrain from doing it unless I am given express permission.”

“Can you see things in my shadow?”

The fortuneteller glances up, her eyes shifting over Bensiabel’s face.

“I could. But it is one thing to read your cards, another entirely to read your shadow. Your shadow is very personal, there are things both light and dark in your shadow.”

“I wouldn’t mind if you read my shadow,” Bensiabel offers. His piqued interest in the job she has mentioned outweighs his apprehension of what his shadow could reveal.

“Would you truly not?” She asks, giving him a sad smile. “There is a great loss, I can see that. And it is personal, painful. There is a great pain in loving so strongly. And one does not always wish to share that pain.”

Bensiabel feels very exposed, as though the fortuneteller can see through him as easily as seeing through glass. It is odd, to have his own secrets and desires disclosed to him.

The fortuneteller considers him silently for a moment and he expects her to speak but she remains wordless, the moment stretching on as she focuses on him.

Bensiabel shifts under her scrutinizing gaze, though she seems to be looking through him, rather than at him. Suddenly the intensity in her expression is tempered.  

“Ah,” she says, her voice and her eyes softening. “I am sorry you lost your mother.”

Bensiabel, caught off guard, does not immediately reply. “Thank you,” he responds quietly.

The fortuneteller returns her attention to the cards. She appears to be trying not to smile, as she gazes at the mismatched assortment of cups and swords before her. “It is not a bad job, do not worry about that. It will be revealed, though I cannot say it will happen very soon.”

“How soon?”

In the dim lighting her expression if difficult to discern but the secret-keeping smile she had is no longer concealed at all.

“I do not know, I am sorry. But do look forward to some new friends.”

Her last comment is a surprise to Bensiabel, who has always been distant with the friends he has. There are few people his own age who lived near enough to him that he sees them frequently, and they are just as busy attending school and working, too busy to grow very close.

The fortuneteller looks up. “That is all. It was a pleasure to read for you.”

Bensiabel rises slowly. “Thank you.”

The fortuneteller smiles and he scrapes back his chair, taking a step away from the table.

“I’m Bensiabel,” he says. “What is your name?”

“My name is Pamina,” she says, extending a hand encased in black velvet. Bensiabel takes it, shaking formally. The name does not sound quite right, like a word on a paper with a spelling error one cannot identify. Bensiabel is sure, when she smiles; it is not her real name.

Bensiabel lingers next to the table, unsure of why, his fingers itching. He puts a hand in his pocket and feels velvety softness in his fingers.

He presents her with the feather saved from the illusionist’s stage. “This belongs to the illusionist,” he says as he holds it in the palm of his hand, among the flickering candles. “Would you give it back to her?”

Pamina blinks, then laughs loudly. The candles around them flicker. She reaches forward and plucks the feather from Bensiabel’s hand.

“Yes,” she says, still laughing lightly. “I’m sure she’ll be very pleased to have it back. Thank you.”

Bensiabel nods and turns, walking to the exit of the tent, preparing himself for the dark tunnel beyond. Something nags at the back of his mind though.

Bensiabel stops and turns back to the fortuneteller, his hand suspended before the velvet curtain. “Could I learn to do that? To read the cards the way you do?”

Pamina considers the question. It would be a bad idea, a very bad idea to involve him. Yet he seems to care for the circus and though he is not special, she is quite sure he would make a match for any pawn of Tamino’s. It is also a way to keep watch, through Bensiabel’s eyes she can observe the circus and stay alert for any changes.

“Yes. Not now, but yes, you can.” She adds, almost as though speaking to herself, “You could learn to do many things.”

Bailey nods a goodbye and pushes against the fabric, encountering no darkness but instead an open intersection of paths between tents. He hesitates before stepping through, disappearing into the gossamer glow of the Moon Mirror.

Art by Lucie MacAulay

Text by Lucie MacAulay