“Are you really that good of a bodyguard?”
“Truthfully, no. I usually just save myself the trouble and let them kill me.”
At home, such a morbid joke wouldn’t sit well at the moment. But I’m not at home. I don’t feel like home Sorina.
“Fine. You can walk me back to the Freak Show tent.”
We step outside into the green light of the Downhill. It’s roughly three in the morning, the high point of the night for business. The air smells of torch smoke and sweat, even though Cartona’s forests provide cooling shade. Rhythmic music plays from somewhere behind us. It sounds like a party Venera might attend. There aren’t quite as many people on the paths as there were earlier, as most of the visitors have found their ways into the tents of prettywomen or taverns by now, where they will remain until Skull Gate closes at dawn.
“Do youactuallyknow everyone in Gomorrah?” I ask.
“No. Maybe a fifth or so directly, and about half through information.”
I smirk. Not quite as impressive as he makes himself seem.
“And you get all your information from...prettymen and prettwomen?”
“A lot of information but not quite. I also make friends with everyone who sells necessities, like food, water, the tax collector. Because if you know them, you’ll have a connection to everyone in Gomorrah.”
“I suppose that makes sense. But why bother with any of this? Why are you a gossip-worker? You don’t get paid for it, like you do for your shows.”
He shrugs. “Like I said, the people here interest me. They’re nothing like the people at home, who are bound by the rules of Ovren andpurity.” The bitterness gives his voice a sharper edge. His walking stick clacks against the shards of a broken beer bottle, and he kicks it. “You know, now that you’ve seen one of my shows, maybe I should see one of yours. When is the next one?”
“Probably once we reach the next city.” No one feels in the mood to perform without Blister or Gill, but unfortunately, we’ll run out of money if we’re not generating ticket sales. Villiam gave us the rest of the time in Cartona off, but once we reach Gentoa, we’ll need to put our performance smiles back on.
We pass a bordello tent nearly five stories tall, leaning to the side and looking like a strong wind could blow it over. The tent is entirely bright pink, and dancing outside the door is Yelema, the prettywoman who was having tea with Luca when I first walked into his tent. She waves at him, and I try not to stare too much at her dancing, even if I’m a little transfixed by her suggestive routine.
Luca waves back with barely a passing glance.
“I’ve heard there’s a man at your show whose hair is made of nails,” Luca says.
I pull my gaze away from Yelema’s hips. “That’s Crown.”
“Now, I don’t know a lot about how illusion-work is done, but I’m assuming you came up with that idea. My question is...how?”
“Not exactly. I imagined all my illusions in vivid detail before creating them, but I never imagined them to be, well, freaks. That part is beyond my control. I don’t know why. Villiam thinks it’s my subconscious.”
“Your subconscious?” he asks.
“I’m a little unique.” I tap my mask. “So I tend to like people like myself, apparently. And it’s hard to run a Freak Show if we’re all normal.”
“I can see the sense in that. People who are different—freaks, as you say—tend to enjoy the company of those like themselves.”
We near the stake fence at the edge of the Downhill, with all its trash and charms. Lightning bugs blink throughout the Uphill, gathering around the glowing paper lanterns or along the dewy grass. Luca reaches out and cups one in his hand.
“I used to put them in jars as a kid,” he says. “Don’t worry. I let them out afterward. I recall your sentiments about cockroaches.”
“There are huge lightning bugs in the Great Mountains called blinking beetles. They’re the size of hummingbirds.”
Luca lifts up his cupped hands and peeks at the lightning bug inside. “Another bit of information I’ll never need to know.” He lets the bug go, and it hovers between the two of us, blinking.
“As if spying on people and learning every detail of their lives is somehowuseful information.”
“I do notspyon people,” he says haughtily.
“Then what do you do?”
“I...” He pauses. “I also do other things, besides my gossip-working and being publicly killed. I like stargazing. I know quite a bit about stars.”
