“How’s practice with Dandelion?”
“That’s, ah, good, too,” she says, but her voice grows soft, as if she’s uncertain. “I make so many mistakes, though. The audience isn’t going to like it if I make mistakes. Everyone else in the circus is perfect.”
“Not perfect,” I tell her. “Practiced. You’ll get there.”
Ryah wrinkles her nose. I hold out my hand to her, showing her all the scars that decorate my skin. There are so many silvery marks that I look like I lost a fight with a barbed wire fence.
“These scars won’t let me ever forget all the mistakes I made. I don’t want to forget them. They remind me of every little thing I learned, and how far I’ve come. And when I’m old and gray and too arthritic even to hold a teaspoon, they’ll remind me of what I could do.”
Ryah takes my hand and examines it carefully as we ride along. Her fingers stroke the marks on my knuckles and wrist, her gentle touch sending sparkles through me. I watch her face, drinking her in. I don’t want to, but I draw my hand from hers and clasp the reins once more.
“No one’s going to throw you out, Ryah,” I say softly, guessing what she’s really worried about.
She glances at me from beneath her lashes. “You met me and took me with you in a matter of seconds. I’m scared that it could be undone just as quickly.”
The circus uproots itself every few days, and the unknown is always frightening. I may have decided to take her with me in a split second, but I would never go back on what I offered her. She lived a life walking on eggshells in her home, never knowing when her father might explode. I want her to understand she’s safe here, for as long as she wants to be here.
“Anouk arrived two years ago,” I tell her. “Elke came four years ago. We’ve gathered many other performers besides. Sometimes people outgrow this place and move on, or it’s not the right fit for them. I don’t regret any of them leaving when it’s the right thing for them. But I would regret it if I lost you.”
She glances up in surprise. “You would? Why?”
I regard her silently. For myriad reasons that I can’t tell her. Because she reminds me of myself when I came to Meriful’s, full of so much pain and hurt. Because the world is cruel and she has no power in it, and there are people who would feed on her innocence and goodness and trample her into the dirt, just like Mirrie was trampled. Because I’m the one who reached down and stole her away, and now I feel in some strange way that she’s mine.
“Because you and Dandelion haven’t even achieved one tenth of the wonderful things I know you both can do, and what a terrible thing it would be for you to turn your back on that.”
Ryah thinks about this for a moment, her sapphire eyes fixed on the road ahead. I clench the reins as I watch her. She needs to be the one to decide to stay.
“I’d like to be able to look back and know that I put everything into this that I could. I’d like to know what it feels like to be under big top with Dandelion.”
I let out the breath I’ve been holding as quietly as I can and allow my shoulders to relax. “Good to hear, sparkle.” I nod ironically to my hands. “Now, let’s just get you there with fewer scars.”
She grins at me. “Maybe one or two scars. They’re pretty badass.”
“No scars,” I counter. “On you or Dandelion. When are you going to debut?”
“Elke and Anouk say I’ll be ready soon. Anouk’s already making my costume. I’m excited, but I keep thinking, what if I fall off?”
“You won’t fall off,” I assure her. “And even if you do, the only thing that matters is getting right up and doing it again.”
We arrive at the next town just after lunchtime. In the early afternoon I’m seeing to Jareth while Daniel, one of the stagehands, decks Snowdrop and Patches out in their performance bridles. I should go and get changed myself, but as I see Ryah atop Dandelion coming toward me, I stay where I am and go on grooming Jareth.
Ryah dismounts a few feet away, flashes me an uncertain smile, and then starts currying Dandelion’s coat. Her swipes of the comb grow slower and slower as she looks wistfully at Daniel leading Snowdrops and Patches away toward the tent.
When she sees me watching her, she plasters a smile on her face, one that doesn’t quite meet her eyes. She puts the curry comb down and draws aside. “Sorry, I’m probably getting in the way.”
I catch her hand in mine and draw her back. Gazing down at her, I try to fathom what’s going on in her head. She seems envious and frustrated, and still unsure of her place here. It hurts my heart to think she’ll feel like this for weeks on end.
I give her hand a squeeze and then let her go. Nodding to Snowdrop and Patches, I ask her, “Can I ask you to do something? Do you think you can get the horses ready before the performances and look after them backstage each night? It would help the stagehands a lot.”
It’s not an interesting job, and maybe she won’t want to, but I’m not finished asking before Ryah’s face breaks into a huge smile.
“Oh, I would love to! I want to learn everything about the circus.” She glances toward the tent. “Do you think if I go and ask Daniel now, he’ll let me help him tonight?”
“Yes, I think he—”
Ryah is off like a shot, hurrying toward the big top. Dandelion and I watch her go, and then turn to look at each other. Accustomed to having all her mistress’s attention, Dandelion twists her ears back and forth, as if to say, Well, what about me?
I chuckle to myself, pat her and Jareth, and head back to my wagon to get ready for the show. “Don’t worry, Dandelion, she won’t forget about you.”
When I arrive at the tent just before dusk in my ringmaster clothes and my hair neatly tied up, all the performers are backstage. Elke and Anouk are standing with their horses and Daniel is showing Ryah around. Her face is shining as she listens to him explain about the schedule and how the curtains into the arena work.
A few minutes later, the show begins. I wait silently as Pamela performs her midair acrobatic dance, and then head out to welcome the audience to the circus.
During the break, Ryah grabs hold of my lapels and cries out, “You’ve got your knives again!”
I look down at myself, startled, and then realize that Ryah doesn’t know how my opening act works, how I disappear in the space of a second as the knives plummet toward me.
“Yes, after the lights go out—”
She presses a finger to my lips. “No, no, don’t tell me. I’ve been trying to figure it out. I knew you had them again by the second act, but I thought you fetched them during the break or something, even though I never see you go out there and ferret through the hay for them. But then I realized they can’t be out there the whole time otherwise one of the tumblers would stab himself with them, wouldn’t he?”
I fold my arms and smile down at her.
She screws her face up, thinking. “I don’t think you had them when Elke and Anouk were performing,” she says slowly, “because I remember your holsters were empty when you introduced the clowns.”
“Correct.” I say.
“So maybe one of the tumblers pick them up for you…? But I would have seen it happen, wouldn’t I?”