13 Secrets (10 page)

“Tino, a word outside?” Rowan said coldly.

Tino smiled and opened the door. “After you.”

They stepped out into the night, leaving Tanya and Fabian alone with the remaining members of the Coven.

“What time is it?” Tanya whispered to Fabian, after a couple of minutes had elapsed.

Fabian looked at his watch. “Nearly half-past two. What do you think they’re talking about out there?”

Tanya shrugged miserably. “Rowan’s probably trying to convince him to let us walk out of this mess. She’s right. We shouldn’t have come. All along she was trying to do the right thing, and all we’ve done is made it harder for her to leave. We should have trusted her.”

Rowan and Tino returned a few minutes later. “We’re leaving,” Rowan muttered, refusing to look at them. “Now.”

Tino moved aside as they stepped out of the barn into the chilly night.

Without a backward glance, Rowan set off quickly, heading toward the gap in the hedge they’d come through.

“Slow down!” Tanya hissed, running to keep up. She cast a fearful glance back and saw Tino’s outline, perfectly still, outside the barn door, watching them leave. A shudder went through her and she turned back around.

“What have you done, Rowan?” Fabian asked. “What have you agreed to?”

Rowan squeezed through the gap. Tanya and Fabian followed. On the other side, Rowan had put the fox-skin coat on and transformed by the time they and Oberon had come through.

“I’ve agreed to do what he wants,” she said flatly. “I’m in.”

At eight o’clock the following morning, after Florence had hollered herself hoarse, Tanya, Fabian, and Rowan each managed to crawl out of their beds and down the stairs to the kitchen for breakfast.

“I don’t know what’s got into you three this morning,” she grumbled, setting plates and cups on the table. “You all appear to be half-asleep.”

“That’s because I am.” Fabian rubbed his eyes, unsuccessfully trying to stifle yet another yawn. This in turn set Tanya off yawning, and then Rowan. After trying to resist, Nell also caught it, much to Fabian’s amusement.

“And what were you doing, that all three of you had such little sleep?” Florence inquired, her gray eyes narrowed as she poured herself some tea.

“Reading,” came the unanimous response, earning a disbelieving sniff from Florence.

Tanya watched through bleary eyes as Fabian picked up his spoon and began to bash at a boiled egg a little harder than was necessary. The hearthfay, who had been devotedly keeping it warm, unbeknownst to him, ducked out of the way with a squeak and fled. Tanya’s eyes darted to Rowan. So far she had hardly said a word to anyone, and sat staring at her plate, chewing halfheartedly on a piece of toast.

Warwick came through to the kitchen with the morning’s mail. After helping himself to the newspaper he tossed the rest into the middle of the old oak table, where it landed with a slap. He passed General Carver’s cage, which was open to form a perch at the top, where the parrot sat, leaning out in earnest for a peck as Warwick went by. Unfortunately for the General, the frequency of the pecks meant that Warwick was well practiced in squeezing past unscathed.

“Tricketty,” the General squawked. “Tricketty, tricketty…”

Fabian was the first to notice the blue leaflet tucked in among the drab brown and white envelopes on the table. He pulled it from the pile and studied it, then showed it to Tanya. Bold, decorative violet letters stretched in an arched banner at the top of the page, spelling out
VALENTINO’S CIRCUS
. She skimmed the rest of the page and looked at Rowan. Her lack of reaction told Tanya that the leaflet had been expected. The knowledge sent goose bumps skittering down
Tanya’s arms and prompted a memory of something Rowan had told her before, when she had been hiding out in the secret tunnels below the manor.

There’s a circus that’ll be passing through,
Rowan had said.
I have a contact who travels with them, a fey man….

Tanya leaned forward for a closer look. To the left of the banner, drawn as though holding its edge, stood a man in a top hat and elegant coattails, his face obscured by the hat’s shadow. Drawn behind him was a big top in vivid stripes of mauve and silver. In the darkness of the tent opening, a list of dates was printed, along with directions. It was simple, yet striking. In a heartbeat Tanya understood that
this
was the circus Rowan had spoken of. Its arrival—and that of the Coven—was no coincidence. The two were connected.

“Oh, yes,” Nell commented, craning her neck to read. “I saw the circus folk arriving on Halfpenny Field yesterday, when I took the bus. I’ve never seen them there before. Usually they pitch further down on Bramley’s cornfields, don’t they?”

Warwick lowered his newspaper. “I heard they couldn’t pitch there this year. Not after the fields were so badly flooded—they’d never get the caravans through. It’s still pretty boggy down there.” He glanced casually at Rowan, who avoided his eyes. “The Halfpenny Field is one of the only ones higher up that isn’t still like a swamp.”

“Can we go?” Rowan asked, scouring the leaflet. She seemed alert all of a sudden; the cobwebs of
sleep had been brushed away. “It says the grand opening is this evening at seven o’clock. We could take the bus and still make it back before dark.”

Warwick looked surprised. “I don’t see why not.” He looked at Florence, who gave a distracted nod as she opened one envelope after another.

“I haven’t been to a circus since I was a little girl,” said Nell, looking hopefully at Rowan.

“That’s a shame,” Rowan replied, seeming not to notice the hint. But when she looked up at Tanya and Fabian her unspoken message was clear: they needed to go alone. “We can go to buy tickets in Tickey End this afternoon,” she said. “Then we can walk the rest of the way to Halfpenny Field. It’s not far from the square.”

Nell sat back in her seat huffily, and Tanya felt a small pang of guilt. Rowan was the first to excuse herself from the table, heading back to her room. A few minutes later, Tanya also got up, grabbing Oberon’s leash from the back door and heading out toward the brook.

The fresh morning air and brisk walk woke her up, and as she started back to the manor, she wondered what the circus—and the rest of the evening—would have in store.

That afternoon, Tanya, Rowan, and Fabian were seated in a little booth at the back of Rosie Beak’s
noisy tea shop in Tickey End. On the table in front of them was the leaflet that had come in the morning’s mail and three tickets.

“I hope Tino’s going to pay me back for these,” Rowan grumbled, smoothing the tickets.

“We didn’t have to go to the circus,” said Fabian. “We could’ve just pretended.”

“No, we couldn’t,” Rowan replied. “If Warwick suspects anything, the tickets provide us with an alibi. Besides, I don’t want to hang around for ages doing nothing while we’re waiting for the others.”

“So who
are
the others?” Fabian asked. “And why does Tino want you all to meet at the circus?”

Rowan’s face darkened. “You know I can’t talk about them.”

“Surely you can tell us a little?” Tanya said. “Like how you met them. And some of them aren’t even human.” She glanced about and lowered her voice. “They’re fey. I don’t understand why they’d be involved in this.”

“A few of the Coven members, including Tino, are part of the circus,” Rowan said, relenting. “I met Sparrow first.”

“That’s the scruffy boy?”

Rowan nodded. “He was on the streets, like me, and still is, by the look of things. He was the one who gave me the name Red, because of my hair. He introduced me to Tino. The rest of them, apart from Suki, were already involved. Most of us have been affected by the changeling trade in some way.”

Fabian frowned. “Even the fey ones?”

“Yes. Even fey people don’t take kindly to their children being switched—if the children are loved. Tino lost a niece, Peg lost a son, and Merchant, a sister. But the brothers, Victor and Samson, and Dawn were all changelings themselves—they all grew up in a human family that wasn’t their own.”

“Dawn’s one of the missing ones?” Tanya asked, and again, Rowan nodded.

“What about the other boy… Crooks?” Fabian asked. “Is he human?”

“Yes. Everyone apart from those I just mentioned is human.” She blinked suddenly. “Except me, being half of each.”

“I didn’t like him,” said Tanya. “Crooks, I mean.”

“Not many of us do,” said Rowan. “He’s a professional thief—or at least, he was. He comes from a family of locksmiths. He was recruited after breaking in somewhere and accidentally witnessing a switch. Once Cobbler realized how useful he could be, he convinced him to join us—for a wage.” She wrinkled her nose. “But I don’t trust him.” She stopped speaking and looked around.

“Did we
really
have to come here? We’re getting stared at. I’m sure she remembers me, the old battle-ax.”

Tanya glanced surreptitiously toward the counter. Rosie Beak and one of her cronies were having a whispered conversation, their gray heads bobbing and nodding like excitable pigeons. Every now and
then one of them turned to look in the direction of the table where the three sat in a way that was not at all subtle.

Last summer, when Rowan had been on the run, Rosie Beak had provided the
Tickey End Gazette
with an eyewitness description after glimpsing her in the town.

“So what if old Nosey Beak
does
remember you?” asked Fabian, biting into a scone. With his finger he caught a mixture of cream and strawberry jam oozing out of the other side and popped that into his mouth too. “We’re not doing anything wrong. Just having a nice, civilized tea”—he lifted a white china cup to his lips and sipped theatrically—“and one that doesn’t taste like a grouchy old brownie, for once.”

“All the same,” Rowan growled below the clinking and clattering of crockery. “I wish we were somewhere else.” She cast an impatient look at the clock on the wall.

“We’ve still got over an hour before the show begins,” said Tanya.

“I’d rather wait on the field, then,” Rowan retorted. “And you two are only coming to the circus. You’re not coming to the meeting afterward.”

“Yes, we are,” said Fabian easily. “Otherwise we’ll go back and tell Florence and Rose and my dad what you’re up to.”

Rowan glared at him. “Telling tales? I didn’t think that was your style.”

Fabian shrugged. “It is when it suits me.” He pointed to the leaflet. “Anyway, why doesn’t it list the acts? I thought circuses advertised their best acts on the posters and leaflets. It must be rubbish.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” said Rowan, relaxing slightly. “There are three reasons why Tino doesn’t advertise the acts anywhere. First, in case one of the performers is ill or has to cancel. He doesn’t want customers to come away disappointed. Second, he doesn’t want to make it easy for competing circuses to know exactly what he’s got. And third, he likes the element of surprise.”

“Huh,” said Fabian, unconvinced. “He’s good at coming up with excuses, this Tino, isn’t he?”

“Very,” Rowan agreed. “He has to be. But I promise you, you’ll be impressed.”

“How long does it last?” Tanya asked. “They’re not cruel to the animals, are they?”

Rowan shook her head. “The show never uses performing animals. Just people. The only animals with the circus are the horses pulling the carts and caravans, and the pets of the performers, and they’re all well cared for. It lasts for about an hour and a half.”