The Midnight Circus by Jane Yolen & Theodora Goss

Author:Jane Yolen & Theodora Goss [Yolen, Jane && Goss, Theodora & Yolen, Jane && Goss, Theodora]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Fantasy, Dark Fantasy, Fairy Tales; Folk Tales; Legends & Mythology
ISBN: 9781616963408
Google: LV5UzQEACAAJ
Amazon: 1616963409
Publisher: Tachyon Publications
Published: 2020-10-02T04:00:00+00:00

“Come into the bedroom. I can’t hear you from here.”

“I don’t know the way, Grandma.”

I hear her take a deep breath, thick with smoke, rattling with disease. “Follow my voice. You’ll remember how.”

And suddenly, I do remember. Three steps forward, nine steps left. Reach out with your right hand and push through the thin door.

“I am here, Grandma.”

Outside, there are disappointed yips as the wolves reach the front door and the end of my trail.

“Come closer, Red. I can’t see you from here.”

“Yes, Grandma.” I step into blackness and there she is, lying in the bed. She is bigger than I remember, or maybe I am smaller. The quilt puffs around her strangely, as if she has muscles in new places. A bit of drool dangles from her bottom lip.

I look down at my empty hands. My nakedness. “I haven’t brought you anything, Grandma.”

She smiles, showing bright, pointed teeth. “You have brought yourself, Red. Come closer, I can’t touch you from here.”

“Yes, Grandma.” I take one step forward and stop.

The wolf pack snuffles around the outside of the house, searching for a way in.

Grandma sits up. Her skin hangs loosely on her, like a housedress a size too large. Tufts of fur poke out of her ears, rim her eyes.

“No, Grandma. You’ll hurt me.”

She shakes her head, and her face waggles loosely from side to side. “I never hurt you, Red.” She scrubs at her eye with a hairy knuckle, then scoots forward, crouching on the bed, poised to spring. Her haunches are thick and powerful. “Sometimes the wolf wears my skin. It is he who hurts you.” Her nose is long now.

“No, Grandma.” I stare into her dark green eyes. “No, Grandma. It’s you.”

She leaps then, her Grandma skin sloughing off as she flies for my throat. I turn and run, run through the thin door, run nine steps right and three steps back, push open the front door, hear her teeth snap behind me, severing tendons, bringing me down. I fall, collapsing onto the paving stones.

Howling and growling, a hundred wolves stream over and around me. Their padded feet are light on my body. They smell musty and wild. They take down Grandma in an instant, and I can hear her screams and the snapping of her brittle old bones.

I think I will die next, bleeding into the gray stone. But leathery skin grows over my ankle wound, thick gray fur. My nose grows cold and long and I smell Grandma’s blood. Howling my rage and hunger, I leap to my four clawed feet. Soon, I am feasting on fresh meat with my brothers and sisters.

I wake, not surprised to be tied down again. Seven points this time, maybe more; I can’t even move my head.

“Jesus, Red, you killed him this time.” It is Alby, drifting into view above me.

“Go away, Alby. You aren’t even real.”

She nods without speaking and fades away. I go to sleep, I don’t dream.

Next morning, they let me sit up. I ask for my journal.

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