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The curtains lifted and the crowd gasped in shocked horror. A scream echoed through the audience, and I shook looking on in terror at the scene set on the stage. The scene was so surreal, confusion quickly set in.
Was this part of the show?
Was she really dead?
She looked like a doll, hanging from the silk ropes. Her eyes had been gouged out; her face held shock as she was placed in an aerial pose. White silk was wrapped around her torso, covered in blood. She’d been posed as if in mid lunge forward, her arms out, held at the wrists by the silk. She looked like a ballerina in the air. Her neck had been slit and the blood dripped, pooling below, turning the wooden platform a deep shade of crimson.
Was this the succubus?
Had we angered her in some way?
Had the child succumbed to something during the night?
All these thoughts ran through my head as the crowd began to cry out and stumble out of the tent. People pushed past me as I made my way through the crowd toward the stage, my eyes fixed on the familiar scene. It was much like the scene we’d witnessed so long ago.
Lazarus and Jin both ran in as I reached up to touch her fingers. They leapt onto the stage, pulling me away. Our Ringmaster walked in, looking shocked and appalled.
“Did you see anything?”
I was too shocked to realize he’d been speaking to me. It wasn’t until he touched my cheek, that my eyes shot to his.
“Did you see anything, my necromancer?”
I shook my head. “Nothing. I saw nothing.”
She was long gone, her soul was nowhere to be found. The Ringmaster looked at Lazarus and gestured for him to take me away. I let him lead me out and back to my tent. He’d hovered over me, sitting me in a chair and getting me some water. After a few minutes, he spoke.
“Talk to me, Imogen. What happened?”
I looked blankly up at him, still seeing that girl hanging in that beautiful pose, knowing exactly what had happened yet unable to speak it.
“I don’t know.”
And I didn’t. I didn’t know why I was protecting him. I didn’t know why I wasn’t saying what I knew had happened. The scene had been too familiar. The scene was exactly how he had pictured it as he’d lurked in the shadows. Once again waiting to prey among the weak.
Lazarus knelt before and I grabbed his hand. “Danger. There’s danger lurking.”
He nodded. “I know. Do you think the demon had anything to do with this?”
I blinked twice, forgetting about the succubus, knowing this would be something she was prone to do, but there was no reason for it. Besides, that bitch killed for enjoyment, leaving the corpses where they lay, she’d never pose it like he did.
I searched for the girl again, allowing my power to surge through the tent and reaching outward, but all I found was emptiness. I leaned back, feeling weak.
“She’s gone,” a tear escaped me as I spoke.
“It’s okay, my love. You can’t save them all.”
“But she deserved to be saved.”
“It wasn’t your fault.”
I stared at his beautiful face. His dark eyes, warm and filled with concern. I stroked the smoothness of his cheek, outlining his lips. It was my fault. I had brought that thing here, to roam around us. The darkness in the shadows I could handle, but this evil. This was my fault.
It saddened me that I wasn’t able to speak my truth.
Not yet.
But I knew that something had to be done.
