Ringmaster by Brianna Hale

Author:Brianna Hale [Hale, Brianna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-05-12T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

Cale

He was really pushy about me trying out things with him. I didn’t like the way he looked when he was holding the whip.

Thunk.

Someone made Ryah feel afraid, and it happened right under my nose.

Thunk.

She didn’t come to me for help.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

I throw four knives in quick succession at the tree trunk, and then just stand there staring at the handles gleaming in the moonlight.

I fucked up.

Ryah being my partner should mean she can come to me about anything, big or small. Instead she turned away from me and dealt with her fears about Tanno by herself. She was terrified by herself.

What does she see when she looks at me? Ringmaster, sure. I hoped she saw me as a friend. I grimace as I remember my “you do know I’m your boss” comment. She hit a nerve with the knife-throwing and I’m kicking myself now. If I want her to trust me then I need to sort myself out, but how can I expect that when she doesn’t really know me?

I wrest all the knives from the tree and shove them into their holsters. Tonight, the past feels too close. I scrub a tired hand over my face and go to bed.

November finally ends, and good riddance. But December? December is magical. We set up in a market town a few miles west of Crewe, just south of Liverpool and Manchester, and perform matinees every day, mostly for schoolchildren. The big top is packed and merry. The early shows get everyone going early, so we’re warm most of the day and we have the evenings to ourselves to sit by the fire, hole up in our wagons with a hot water bottle or eat in the pub.

Three weeks later we’re skirting the Peak District, a landscape of wild, treeless hills thick with heather. Villages of stone cottages sit clustered by icy streams, and late afternoon sun turns the hills purple and gold.

We’ve had excellent shows all week. At sundown, just after three in the afternoon, Ryah and I are tending to the horses and giving them all a damn good curry comb and picking stones and dirt out of their hooves.

“Where are we going next?” she asks me, combing tangles from Jareth’s mane.

“Next, it’s Christmas, and we’re all going home. My parents have a farm just south of Huddersfield, and that’s where the wagons and horses will winter until February. I’m dying for my mother’s Yorkshire pudding and roast beef.”

I notice that Ryah’s stopped combing and turned chalk white.

“Ryah?”

Then it clicks. I said everyone’s going home. She thinks I’m going to send her back to her drunken, abusive father. “Ryah, you’re coming with me. Of course you’re coming with me.”

She breathes a hard sigh of relief and blinks several times.

I go to her and clasp her upper arms, ducking my head so I can look in her eyes. “I should have explained it better. The crew and performers who have homes and families go to them, and everyone else comes with me.

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