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“That was incredible,” Layla says, appearing beside me with a bottle of water. Her teal and purple hair is twisted into an elaborate updo, strands escaping to frame her face. “You’re a natural on the ring.”

I take the water gratefully. “It feels natural somehow.” I smile despite myself. When I’m suspended above the crowd, my body twisting and floating through the air, I feel a freedom I’ve never known before.

She smiles knowingly, “That’s the magic of this place. Awakening things in you that were always there, just dormant.” She leans closer, her brown skin still shimmering under the lights from the gold dust of her fire performance. “Hey, some of us are gathering when we are done. You should come.”

“I don’t know ...” I hesitate, thinking of earlier today. Kenan and Tobias’s cryptic words, the fact that I’ll never see Evelyn again. I still haven’t let myself process it, because while I know she’s gone … no — and I can’t ignore the feelings that seem to erupt every time I’m around Kenan and Tobias.

“You’ve earned it, if I was right about what your training consisted of today,” Layla insists. So I was right, most are forced into what the boys insinuated earlier. “Besides, you might hear something useful. People talk when they’re relaxed.” She winks. “Just saying, Kenan might have mentioned you have ... questions.”

“Where and when?” I ask, curiosity winning out.

“The carousel, probably around three. Follow the lanterns with blue flames, or if you forget, the ribbon will guide you. Just think of the carousel.” She squeezes my shoulder before sauntering away.

As I make my way back to Tobias’s tent to change, I feel eyes following me. Some gazes hold a bit of curiosity, others suspicion, and a few burn with something darker. There’s a hierarchy here — some have power, some want it, and some are just like me, with nothing.

I’m wondering where Tobias and Kenan fall into that.

* * *

The carousel is alive with color and sound when I arrive just after three, blue-flamed lanterns illuminating a gathering that feels both magical and dangerous. The painted horses have been transformed into makeshift tables with bottles of liquor balanced precariously on their backs. Music drifts from somewhere — the bass thumping loudly into the night.

Layla spots me and waves me over, her smile bright against the blue light. She’s changed into a flowing dress that shimmers as she moves.

“You made it!” She presses a glass into my hand filled with an amber liquid that smells like cinnamon. “Drink. It helps ... with everything.”

I take a cautious sip, hissing as the liquid burns a path down my throat and settles warm in my belly. “What is this?”

“Special carnival brew,” She grins. “Makes the In-Between more bearable ... actually no, it makes everything more bearable.”

As I scan the gathering, the social landscape of The Carnival becomes clearer. Near the center, Rosie holds court, her pink hair now cascading down her back. The contortionist and one of the fire-eaters flank her like sentinels. Others cluster in smaller groups, some still adorning their painted faces.

“That’s the inner circle ... well ... all but one,” Layla whispers, following my gaze. “Been here the longest, closest to The Ringmaster.”

“And us?” I ask, taking another drink, looking towards the acrobats to my left who laugh loudly into the night. A woman with butterfly wings tattooed across her back is tangled with a man with golden scales covering his arms, they both turn away once I meet their eyes.

“Somewhere in the middle,” she says, taking another shot. “Though you — you’re something else entirely, I think.”

Before I can ask more about that, a couple comes up beside me. The man wears a clown mask, he leans in close to my ear, his breath sour and hot.

“You won’t last,” he whispers. “Claimed by both knife and illusion ... your mind will leave you soon enough.”

I pull back startled. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

He merely smiles, tapping the stamp on my arm before melting back into the crowd.

Layla rolls her eyes. “Ignore William. He’s been here since close to the beginning and thinks that makes him important ... it doesn’t.”

I down the rest of my drink, following her as she weaves me through the crowd, and a woman grabs my arm. Her pale blue skin and silver tipped fingers slide between me and Layla.

“You’re the one they’re whispering about. When The Carnival claims you fully— careful which pain you embrace.” She whispers around me and then she’s pushed out of the way.

“Go away,” Layla says. “Sorry about that. Selene ... sees things sometimes ... best to not dwell on them, half of it’s crazy talk.”

“Why do they keep talking about me?”

“It’s rare,” she says, stopping to refill my glass from a bottle that appears from nowhere, “having two guardians instead of one. Most of us only get marked by a single performer. And to be the one with both Kenan and Tobias —” she takes another drink. “Hmm.”

A woman runs into me, and I don’t think it was an accident as she mutters. “Poor thing. The Carnival always does take the brightest souls.”