"Dace?"

"Hnuh?" Her words surfaced as a strangled snort.

"Ah, are you okay?" Two pale green eyes stared down at her.

"Wonderful." Dace grabbed Eliot's shoulder and hauled herself up, head throbbing.

The clown regarded her with concern as she struggled to her feet and, with a hand that kept flinching back, he began to brush the dirt off of her shoulders.

"Ah, sorry." He bit his lip as his palm hovered over the bark-gold hue of her skin. "Hey, have you had anything to drink since you got here?"

"Don't think so." Now that he'd brought it up, she was parched. Dace couldn't remember the last time she'd drank anything.

"That'll be why..." Eliot's eyes flickered away from what was surely a gargantuan bruise on her forehead from the fall to the ground, and he withdrew a metal hip flask embellished with a full moon. "Here, have some of this."

Dace shot him a look of disgust. "Excuse me? Is that alcohol? I'm seventeen, I'm not allowed to—"

"It's orange juice, miss songstress." Eliot's sheepish little grin was back. "I don't drink either; it messes with my vision."

Dubious, but certain this night couldn't get much worse, Dace took a swig.

It was orange juice. Nice orange juice, at that, although she was sure she could taste something sharp lingering beneath it. As Dace handed Eliot back his flask, her headache began to thaw and she finally remembered why she had fainted.

"The Ringleader!" She called out, head darting around the empty circus ring. "Where did he go, I need to ask him what the hell-"

"He went to deal with the corpses." A voice rose from behind the two of them and Dace instinctively softened before common sense caught up with her. She turned around to face Matt with a snarl.

"I can't believe you."

"I'm glad you're still with us." Matt still didn't meet her eyes and instead focused on the bundle of bright gold fabric tucked under one arm. It had been lining the tent half an hour ago; now the performers were clearing up around them. The circus, and all evidence of the killings that had taken place within it, would soon be little more than a story to the people of this town.

Dace was not so fortunate. "I want to leave," she told Matt firmly, "please. If this is the sort of circus you're running, where you're totally fine with kids dying and animals being slaughtered, then get me the hell out. I never want to see any of it, or any of you, ever again."

The girl ran a hand through her fair beard, tearing through its knots with a vicious callousness. "You think any of us really want to be here?" Her tone, despite the warning carried in her words, was upbeat and almost patronising. "You have no choice, Dace Livigin. You're a circus freak now, so get used to all of this. Get used to us."

Dace happened to cast her eyes downwards at that moment. She saw how Matt's hands trembled by her hips. Well, Dace didn't care if she'd made her angry. Shrugging off something as grim as death was nothing to feel victimised over.

"Eliot, would you find Dace a room? There must be a spare bunk somewhere." With the Ringleader absent, Matt seemed to be the one giving orders around here - Eliot nodded obediently and gestured for Dace to follow him out of the tent.

The two of them walked in swiftly-broken silence back to the train.

"How's your head?"

"Fine. Almost back to normal." Dace felt the non-existent bump. She wished her emotions could be rectified just as easily: each step she took brimmed with frustration and each breath was sharp and anxious.

"I'm sorry you got such a jarring introduction to this place." Eliot spoke into the night, unfazed by the cold even in a loose shirt.

"I still don't understand what happened." Dace thought back to the Ringleader and his – his dark feathered wings... "There was a giant wolf! That elephant went mad for no apparent reason! How much do you know about all this?"

Eliot shrugged. "Not a lot. Certainly more than most folks around here, though. I'm fairly intuitive; and that just heightened when I woke up on the train."

"You too, then?"

"Yeah, you arrived here just like the rest of us—in the queue to be initiated by Joy. We got a few days to adjust, however, before being pitted against our first monster."

"You're a circus who fights demons. What more is there to adjust to?" Dace tried to flush out her nerves with a laugh.

Eliot guided her up the slated wooden steps and into the train. The rest of the performers were heading back here too. Some carried disassembled parts of the tent into the back three coaches and some led suspiciously obedient wild cats to their cages.

"That wolf could come back any time, you know." Dace shivered as they slipped down the lantern-lit corridors, "What if it tries to attack me?"

"It probably won't." Eliot said cheerily as he stopped outside a door marked 7-1.

A piece of torn notepaper stuck to the wood read: Must be this attractive to enter. Below it was taped an old photograph of Audrey Hepburn, kept company by a laminated selfie of Beyoncé and a snap of Leonardo DiCaprio that could only have come from Heat Magazine's Torso of the Week.

"Anyone in?" Eliot knocked cheerfully, voice raised against the backdrop of girly chatter. Once again Dace wondered how no one else was bothered at all by the double murder of the night.

The compartment's door slid open to reveal a tight candlelit room packed with two sets of pine bunkbeds.

With their conversation broken, two pairs of eyes stared out at Dace.

"Oh look," one girl sprung down from a bunk, tossing back her sheet of dark hair, "it's Freakshow and the elephant girl."

Dace tensed up, once more aware of how her body took up the entire doorframe. This was a circus. Of course it would be full of slim, vindictive performers who thought that skinny was the ultimate fashion accessory. She came to her senses only after the frown crossed her face, realising that of course the girl was referring to her subduing of Athena.

"That was kind of cool," the petite girl stretched, her tight black T-shirt gliding up her smooth belly as she did so, "we don't have anyone who can sing. What was your name?"

She spoke monotonously and looked up at Dace with an obsidian glare, so Dace was finding it difficult to read the girl's intentions. Was she being sarcastic, or...?

"This is Dace Livigin," Eliot announced quietly from behind her, "Miss Wisely wants her to take the spare bunk."

"Ooh, I'll move my things right away, sorry!" A low voice, akin to the steady hum of a cello, sounded from behind them and the candy-floss haired young woman swept into the room with a musical excuse me, my lovelies and came to a rest next to her small companion. 

Immediately it struck Dace how impossibly beautiful she was. Her hair was a baby pink halo around her head, her button nose was flat and wide with not a blemish in sight and her long limbs were rose-tinted beneath her ebony complexion. Even the way she poised herself on the side of one bed – daintily as if each move was part of some elaborate dance - suggested she was descended from nobility, or perhaps she was some up and coming supermodel, or even -

"You can pick your jaw up off the floor, love," the black-haired girl huffed, "we're all left speechless by Vanity, it's juuust wonderful."

"V-Vanity?" Dace squeaked, "Your parents named you that?"

"It's a nickname." Vanity played with one of the coils of her hair and arched an eyebrow, "Apparently taking pride in one's appearance is something to be frowned upon."

"I never said that." The small girl growled, white cheeks streaked with colour.

"This is Violet." Vanity squeezed her companion's arm, only to have it wrenched away.

"Violent. With an N. N as in: need we do this every single time someone new joins?"

"But Violet is so much prettier!"

"Yeah, I'll be frickin' gorgeous when I rip off the head of the next person to get my name wrong."

Even though it looked as if Violent's stormy mood was about to literally erupt into a full-on hurricane, Vanity gave her a cheery pat on the head and got up to remove the pile of extravagant dresses on the other bunk.

"Dace, are you feeling okay?" Vanity's voice was soothing. "I know that when I got here, it was all a bit strange. How much do you know about – um – this circus?"

"She doesn't know a lot." Eliot answered quickly. Despite his bright red hair he had blended into the background like a faded painting. "I think the Ringleader plans on briefing her tomorrow morning after her evaluation."

"My what?" Any flicker of concern at Eliot's secrecy was lost at the mention of some sort of test.

"We need to work out whether or not we can shamelessly use you as a human weapon." Violent muttered, silky strands of hair falling in her face as she rummaged around in a duffel bag at the foot of the bunk.

"What she means is you may have skills other than your gorgeous singing." Vanity tucked her clothes under her bed and turned to Dace with a smile.

"Ugh, are you flirting? I thought we put some restrictions on that." Violent huffed, before stalking out of the room with a towel strangled beneath one arm. As her bony shoulder knocked Dace out of the doorway she realised that she'd been stood rigid in the same spot for the past five minutes.

"I should go," Dace felt Eliot's hand on her shoulder, "but my quarters are just to the left if you happen to need me."

"Why would she need you?" Violent's face appeared by the doorframe as she fixed Eliot with a petty glare. "Miss Elephant, you're here, so you've clearly made some shitty decisions already today, but I'd advise you to stay away from Freakshow."

"But he's been so—"

"Don't worry about it, Dace," Eliot sighed as he followed Violent down the narrow corridor, "She'll think what she likes."

Detestation for this bitchy little girl gnawed away at Dace's stomach as the door to the room slid shut, leaving her alone with Vanity and the mousy blonde who had kept silent throughout the entire back-and-forth.

"I suppose we're bunkmates," the blonde mumbled with a shy smile.

"Yeah," Dace was feeling more unsettled by the minute. Everyone here was either insane or out to get her. Even this quiet teenager probably had something to hide.

***

There was a spider dancing back and forth on a string of silk. It seemed to glow like fine silver in the moonlight cutting through the curtain.

Dace stared up at it, eyes dry and aching. She had no watch, so it was impossible to know how long she'd been watching the insect spin its web in the corner of ceiling above her bunk, and when she finally sat up and looked over to the other side of the room the two young women were still beneath their blankets. With her scowl softened in sleep, Violent looked far younger.  Vanity's features were contorted into an endearingly unflattering grimace as she snored away.

With a huff of frustration—the suffocating woollen bedding had drenched her in sweat—Dace swung her legs over the side of the bunk and slid down before gingerly pulling the door open.

At night the corridors felt even more claustrophobic; they might as well have been infinite hollow tunnels in the dark and the perpetual movement of the train didn't help Dace's coordination one bit with no light to watch where she was going. Even so, she crept forwards one bare foot at a time, wearing nothing but the shirt she had no choice but to sleep in and a blanket that was wrapped around her whole body like a patchwork cloak. Violent had said something just before blowing out the candle about clothes shopping tomorrow, but Dace was sure she'd been joking.

Barely ten steps into her late-night wanderings, Dace heard the screaming.

At moments it seemed like a human whimper of pain but then it shifted into a harrowing screech before mellowing out into a low growl. The first scream had barely flushed all the warmth from Dace's body before it was followed up by a second, and then a third, until Dace was frozen rigid by an awful sound that wasn't dying down. It was a painful reminder of what Athena had suffered as she was shot to death by a heartless killer. 

Dace thought back to that sickening moment when death looked almost certain: following the sound would be just as bad as staring a demon-posessed Elephant in the face. She fought with her better judgement for a few seconds before cursing herself and pacing towards the howls.

Hers was the seventh carriage along the train; the howling—which was now accompanied by an infrequent hammering as if something was trying to tear the train apart—was loudest when Dace stood between the eleventh and twelfth carriages. The passage that would have taken her further down the train was wide open, but from within the closed doors of carriage twelve's compartment the screams continued and beneath them—barely strong enough to weave through the heavier howls—came someone's warning hiss.

"This can't continue. People have died!"

Heart racing, Dace pinned her back against the wall as the door swung open and Eliot was thrown from the room by a snarling blur of white that disappeared like a gust of wind down the corridors. The ivory fur seemed to fade away and the thick-limbed canine's bones retracted until the barely visible figure was unmistakably human.

They disappeared into one of the rooms along the distant hall.

Unable to even breathe Dace followed, vision flooded with memories of the poor child the wolf had dragged through its jaws. The corridors were utterly silent as she dragged her feet across the floorboards, wondering if tailing a human was any safer than trying to track down a wolf. All the doors were shut, the bolts jittering against the metal locks as the train moved, but one a few yards from Dace was wide open.

She'd barely taken a step towards it when a hand clamped around her wrist and pulled her into the dark, and her bare toe caught against a loose floorboard flooding her insides with sickness as her free hand instinctively curved around to hit the figure that stood behind her—

"Dace, hey! Ow!"

It was Eliot.

"Oh, gosh, I'm so sorry!"

"Don't be," The boy let go of her, curls stuck to his forehead with sweat, "I thought you were going to follow it, so I had to try and drag you back. If you died here—well, that couldn't happen!"

"You saved me." She whispered, only just realising the stupidity of her actions. What on earth would following the monster have achieved?

"It's not so much saving as prolonging," Eliot rubbed the shoulder he'd fallen against with a pained expression, "You're still here. You're anything but safe."

Despite the pessimism conveyed in his words, Eliot looked up at her with a curved grin. Its familiarity was reassuring. Just like Dace he was unsettled, body shaking as he leaned against the wall for support.

"What were you doing out here?" Dace had spotted the deep gash in his cheek, "What made you think you were okay to follow it?"

He replied after a measured pause before uttering the eight words that would effectively alter the remainder of Dace's life significantly.

"I had to find out who it was."

A chill blew through her. "I didn't imagine that, then."

"No." Eliot slumped over, lowering his voice, "That thing is a Werewolf. And they're destroying our circus one member at a time from the inside."

"Did you see who it was?"

Eliot shook his head angrily. "If I'd been able to hold them back, maybe I could have used my Act to restrain them, but..." his voice trailed off.

"If I can calm down an elephant, maybe my Act will work on the wolf," Dace shrugged as she sat down next to him in the hall, still shivering slightly. "I could help you."

Eliot exhaled in a quick cackle of laughter, "You know, I think you're the only person I've met in this damned circus who cares about something other than their own skin."

Dace met his eyes, noticing for the first time how dark the boy's eyelashes were. "You're the only person I've met here who's acted like a friend."

The clown suddenly became very interested in a strand of red hair that had escaped from behind his ear, twisting it nervously around one finger.

"You could get hurt." He muttered shortly.

"No. I couldn't." Dace said darkly, "Because I've come to a conclusion."

"What?"

"I'm dreaming." She gave Eliot a simple smile.

"So..." Her new friend smiled incredulously, "I'm a dream?"

"It's the only logical conclusion. Why else would any of this be happening?"

Eliot didn't correct her. "Well then, as your dream boy, I'd be honoured if you helped me to capture the monster."

"Oh, shut up." As he raised a dark eyebrow teasingly she went to give him a friendly punch on the shoulder, only to have the dull thud of fist against bone drowned out by yet another powerful howl from some distant carriage.

Dace's personal hunt for the wolf had begun.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

my new year's resolution is to update more often... it shall undoubtedly fail

please vote, comment and share if you're enjoying this story, feel free to take a guess at what's gonna happen next

((and let me know what you think of all the characters bc there are gonna be a few so hopefully they're all distinctive enough? Never written an ensemble cast before))

-ellie