━━━ ꧁ད ✶ ཌ꧂ ━━━

CHAPTER 08

━━━ ꧁ད ✶ ཌ꧂ ━━━

My brothers walked through the fair. Lost in my thoughts, I automatically followed them, managing to keep up with their pace. My legs didn't feel as bad anymore.

"The Circus of Dreams," Vincent scoffed. "We're too old for this kind of nonsense, don't you think?"

I couldn't believe what I just heard. Did he really think they were acting like big kids?

"The old man lost it," Josef commented, and he was partially right.

I was tormented by the crazy thought that Dad was suddenly doing this for us. If that were the case, I couldn't refuse or find a way to escape. Besides, he canceled his appointment with the electrician to bring us here. I had to give him some credit. His idea of spending time together was pretty obvious, but there were other ways. So why did it have to be a circus?

"Let's go in this one!" Vincent's excitement startled me, but I didn't care much. A man with a blood-stained coat welcomed us to The Coffin. The reason for the name became clear when I spotted the entrance to the horror establishment, which turned out to be a coffin with an inverted cross in the center.

The stranger knew he had us because the twins couldn't hide their excitement.

"Sounds good." Josef tried to cheer me up with a pat on the shoulder.

"I prefer to stay out of this," I said, giving way to the boisterous Vincent, who rushed to pay for the tickets.

Josef shrugged, and I was relieved not to have dealt with his persuasive counterpart.

While they counted the bills, I discreetly stepped back, moving away from the area before they could think of dragging me in.

While we waited for the time we planned to meet Dad again, darkness fell quickly. But I felt safe amidst the crowd and under the string lights hanging from one stall to another.

I walked through the crowd, quickly browsing through the establishments that caught my attention. Most of them were challenging games. One shooting game, another with fishing ropes and a magnet. I even found one where you had to throw glass spheres into tiny hanging hoops on metal columns. None of them I had seen before.

I stayed a bit longer than planned in front of a green triangular stall. It didn't catch much attention. It had a couple of shelves on each side, but it was the objects stored inside that made me feel slightly nauseous.

People didn't wait or line up to enter. In fact, it was empty, and it was easy to see why. The prizes weren't dolls, candy, or even money. Instead, they were medallions of different shapes and colors.

The man with the cowboy hat, who had just appeared, tilted his head as he saw me surveying the place. His illuminated blue eyes told me he had just found a piggy bank with legs: me.

When he turned around to introduce himself, his long white hair cascaded down his back like a waterfall. He also held a cane of the same color, which brought back memories of a certain ghost.

"Welcome," he said as he leaned forward in a sophisticated greeting, scratching the stubble on his chin.

Unable to resist my curiosity, I approached a little closer.

"It seems to be your lucky day," he said.

It wasn't surprising that he mentioned something like that. He must have noticed my interest in the medallions.

"Do you think so?" I asked ironically.

His crystal-like eyes briefly connected with mine, giving me a strange feeling of trust. But it had a greater effect when he smiled. It was as if he suddenly saw something through me.

"Why don't you give it a try?" He extended his arms, welcoming me to what I assumed would be a trap show. That's how the attractions at the fair worked. "Very few possess the magic for this."

I found it funny the way he said it. He was trying hard to convince me.

With a gesture, he indicated the strategically positioned bottles on a sloping platform. They all remained still, zigzagging down the slope and waiting for someone daring enough to risk their money.

"The first round is on the house. How about that?" He must have noticed my lack of desire to play.

"The thing is..." I pretended to have a mental block. "I thought maybe I could talk to someone who knows about this."

His eyes, at that moment, could have blinded me with their intense interest in me.

I should have known he only cared about the money, so I decided to give up.

And what was I planning to do? I wasn't going to ask about a medallion, a circus, and a trapeze artist ghost-killer in the middle of it all. He would think I was crazy, or worse, take advantage of the situation to convince me to take home a few similar objects.

It was better to walk away as if I hadn't been about to confess something crazy, but before turning to continue my way, I heard him say:

"You have something fascinating there, my girl. Otherwise, you wouldn't have ended up here."

I caught a glimpse of his smile. The same smile that suddenly sent chills down my spine. And his fingers tapping on his cane, without any particular rhythm, unsettled me.

"I didn't know there were girls with interesting tastes these days," I heard a voice say from behind. I immediately turned toward the new voice. It belonged to a guy with a chiseled jaw. His black eyes were as dazzling as his perfect set of teeth. He almost seemed unreal. He was at least fifteen centimeters taller than me and had a body sculpted with lean muscles. On the other hand, he wasn't even wearing a shirt.

The boy looked at the medallions, and it wasn't easy for me to take my eyes off his body.

Pleasant surprises were what one could find at the fair.

"The show is about to start. Are you coming?" the boy asked, handing me a flyer where the title, The Circus of Dreams, took up almost the entire space, along with the description: A mind-blowing spectacle that will awaken your fantasies.

There was a reason for all his displays. He must be part of the event.

"I'll wait for you," he said, winking and trotting away.

Another great discovery: he was barefoot, and his loose cream-colored pants hung from his waist to highlight a phenomenal backside.

What kind of circus and show was it exactly?

As I remembered that I was negotiating with the stranger in the hat, I turned to search for him, but he was nowhere to be found.

After ten minutes, back in front of the circus tent, the crowd was difficult to avoid.

With the ticket in one hand and the flyer in the other, I pushed my way through the excited people who wanted to enter first. I would have liked to know the reason for such enthusiasm.

No matter how much I searched, I couldn't find my family. The people didn't make it easy, either.

I moved to a corner, to a wooden box that I managed to climb with some effort. From that spot, I had a perfect view of everything around me.

"I thought you wouldn't come," the familiar voice interrupted my inspection. It was the same guy who gave me the flyer a few minutes ago. "Who are you looking for?"

Curiously and a bit unpleasantly, he climbed the same box as me, almost like a spider. It wasn't that big or spacious, so I took a step to the side, trying to keep my distance from his spectacular bare torso, but ended up stepping on air.

My body swung in a desperate attempt to hold onto something to avoid falling, and at the right moment, I found his arm, which pulled me back against him. His touch was rough, different from what I could imagine.

Pressed against his figure, I stood still. I would have avoided touching his skin, but he was so careless.

"Shall we look together?" he offered.

And as if I wasn't already disturbed enough, I heard someone say my name in the distance.

"... Please," the same voice added.

I tried to search in the nearest darkness until I finally found him.

That top hat, and thanks to the relaxed position of his body resting against one of the tent's supports, I couldn't mistake him.

It was Ashton.

"Stay away from him, Zara."

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