The Nightingale Circus (11 page)

From the end of the car, Anya waved at him.
“This isn’t a costume. It’s a handkerchief,” she was telling Cielo
when he approached them.

Sketches lay spread on the table among
glasses with water, and Nicholas had to agree there wasn’t much of
a costume to begin with. Cielo pushed the sketches away to make
room for his soup, greeting him with a smile. There couldn’t have
been more contrast between the two girls, Anya with her
chin-length, dark hair, fair skin, and sophisticated look, and
Cielo, blonde and tanned and still looking in her teens. Still,
both brown and green pairs of eyes betrayed them as being older
than their years.

“You don’t look well,” Anya said, though
she’d barely glanced at him.

Nicholas leaned back in his seat and stirred
his soup. “I’ll be fine.”

“You don’t deserve to be fine.” Anya glowered
at him.

“Anya!” Cielo gasped, her eyes opening
wide.

“Not for saving her,” Anya muttered with a
roll of her eyes. “We all need to be saved at some point.”

That struck a chord because she had brought
Nicholas to the circus and possibly saved his life back then.
Nicholas lowered his gaze.

“But did he have to bring her
here
?”
Anya stabbed the table with a long finger.

“That was not my call,” Nicholas said
quietly.

“And now she gets the third headline, and
Serioja follows her around like a lost puppy.” Anya tossed her
hands up in the air. “She’s ruining everything!”

Cielo fiddled with her glass. “You can have
my headline if you want.”

“It’s not about the headline!”

No, it was about Serioja, the lost puppy who
used to follow Anya around until recently.

“She’s going to hurt him,” Anya said,
lowering her voice. “I know her type. She doesn’t want him, but
it’s convenient, so she’s going to take him. And then she’ll dump
him, and he’ll hurt because he doesn’t understand her game. And it
will be on
you
.”

Anya’s dark eyes pierced right
through
Nicholas’s soul. Ever since joining the
circus, the Russian ballerina and aerialist had been an item.
Riella’s involvement was going to disturb that, but Nicholas found
he cared more about Anya’s grief than her brain-damaged
boyfriend’s. Unfortunately, it was too late to help either of them.
He’d seen Riella and Serioja together, and Anya had good reasons to
be concerned. Riella had stuck her claws into Serioja, and she was
not going to let go. Just like Anya’s eyes wouldn’t let go of
him.

“Anya…” Cielo said in a pleading voice.

“Right.” Anya straightened her back without
looking at her friend. “Don’t mind me, I’ll be fine.” She sniffed
theatrically and got up. “Please make sure she doesn’t get better
costumes than me,” she told Cielo before leaving the table.

Nicholas followed her progress along the
length of the car, and a small sigh left his lips once Anya passed
through the door.

“She didn’t mean it, you know,” Cielo said,
stacking up her sketches.

“She kind of meant it,” Nicholas said.

“Okay, maybe a little.” Cielo laughed. “But
it’s not truly you she’s mad at. She’s just frustrated she can’t
protect him.” She paused. “Your soup is getting cold.”

Nicholas could have stirred the molecules and
brought the liquid to a boiling point, but it would have been a
waste of his power. Besides, Anya’s speech had cut what was left of
his appetite. He tilted his head. “Is this what you are doing?
Protecting?”

“The circus protects me, and I protect the
circus.” Cielo rolled a shoulder. “This is how it works. Now eat.
Don’t make me make you.” Her smile was playful but also
challenging.

They had been sharing this life for a couple
of years, but still, they had never come to blows. What would have
happened if they had? This wasn’t a good time to find out, so
Nicholas picked up the spoon.

It felt strange to be taken care of by a girl
who most of the time still looked like a child while he was a
grownup—granted, not one as well adjusted as her. “Does it ever get
easier?” He meant the remorse. Attacking was easy, what came after
though…

“No.” Cielo crossed her arms. “But you get
used to it.”

She stayed with him until the last drop of
soup disappeared.

* * *

Each day, it was getting better. The pain
hadn’t bothered Riella much, except for the constant itching once
they had inserted the mask underneath her scalp. As it turned out,
she was allergic to it. The stiffness in her joints gradually
disappeared. The scars were gone, even the ones unrelated to the
recent injuries and fixing, and the strengthened muscle resistance
and flexibility promised to improve her act a great deal. All in
all, Riella was satisfied with the result. So what if it still
ached from time to time?

“What’s wrong?”

Riella winced and glanced at Rake from the
corner of her eye. “Nothing.”

She finished buttoning up her blouse and
tossed her hair back. It was supposed to be a last checkup before
receiving a clean bill of health. She wouldn’t risk being thrown
out if they still found something wrong with her. She liked her new
life at the circus. It wasn’t ideal, but she would make do.

“If you don’t tell us, we can’t fix it.” Rake
stepped behind her and placed a heavy hand on her back. “Here?”

“Lower,” Riella murmured and guided his hand
to the small of her back. “It’s not bad, just a tug from time to
time…”

Rake ignored the plea in her voice and
brought over a hand-held scanner. He ran it up and down her spine.
“It’s a pinched nerve. Lay on your stomach.”

Grimacing, Riella climbed on the surgery
table and did as told. More to add to her long list of debts to
them.

“We might have touched something when we
fixed your back,” Rake said while he pulled her blouse up. “This
one’s on us.”

Riella hid her smile in the crook of her arm
as she rested her head on it. Spinner might have protested against
the extra expenses, but Spinner wasn’t here. She closed her
eyes.

Coldness hit her in the middle of her back
when Rake used a spray to numb her. Thank God she faced the table
and couldn’t see him in the mirror cutting her open and digging
inside her for the—she’d lost count how many times.

Minutes passed, but Riella stayed conscious,
aware of the knife thrower’s imposing presence looming over her.
She’d come on purpose while Spinner was out to find Rake alone.
Despite the common web of scars, they didn’t share many other
traits. Spinner was chatty, friendly, harmless at first sight, but
Rake’s gruff and quiet persona appealed to her more. Still, he
hadn’t made a pass at her yet, and it had been several days. She
would have found it insulting if it hadn’t been for Serioja’s
attention constantly surrounding her.

More coldness hit her on top of the numbness
as Rake sprayed another substance over the incision. She didn’t
feel anything except for the skin pulling tight and sealing over
the wound.

“Done. The nerve should regenerate in a few
days. Come back if it bothers you again, but it shouldn’t.”

Riella gingerly pulled herself up. The
diffuse ache had faded, and no sharp tugs appeared as she moved.
She turned around and took a step towards Rake. A proper thank you
was in order, and not one consisting only of words. Perfect timing
since they were alone and the door was closed.

Rake stood still, watching her approach him.
He made no sign he was going to reject her, but his hands flexed by
his sides.

She reached out to touch his arm.

Then Spinner’s cheerful voice echoed in the
factory, accompanied by a deeper, lower voice with a faint Russian
accent.

“He’s a good man,” Rake said.

Riella let her hand drop and bit her lip.
Serioja was indeed a good man. He was gentle and calm, and he would
never hurt her. And she needed time to heal. She stepped back in
time for the door to open.

Spinner peeked inside. “Your silks have
arrived.”

* * *

Like every time a new act was rehearsed,
Nicholas stood in the aisle next to the front row and watched the
performance, prepared to interfere if something went wrong. So far,
his help had only been needed once, when a prop malfunctioned and
risked hitting someone in the audience.

But Riella didn’t need any help. She slid up
and down the red silks with her loose fiery curls dancing like a
flame around her. The technicians still fiddled with the lights to
get the maximum exposure, but she looked ready to take the world by
storm. Standing in two separate groups, Rake and Spinner, and more
to the side Serioja, seemed to agree as they stared with their
heads tilted back at the body covered in a flesh-colored suit,
moving close to the top of the conical roof, right below the golden
cage that enclosed the nightingale prop.

“She’s good,” a voice said at his left.

Nicholas kept his attention on the target but
risked casting a glance at Anya. She didn’t look upset, more like
resigned
,
the way she stood with her arms
folded and her chin set.

“But I’m better,” she continued with a smug
grin when Nicholas didn’t say anything.

“Are you trying to distract me?” he asked.
“Do you want her to fall?”

“Oh, Nick, is that what you think of me?”
Anya rested a hand on his arm. “Come. Buy me some cotton candy. I
need cheering up.”

“What about…?” Nicholas nodded in Serioja’s
direction.

“They’ll be fine.” Anya waved a dismissive
hand.

Riella was making a heart-stopping descent,
and once her feet rested safely on the ground, Nicholas let himself
be pulled towards the exit. Loud clapping exploded behind them.

“So, cotton candy?” he asked with a raised
eyebrow.

“Yes. And let’s get one for Cielo, too. She
kept her word.” Anya grinned wickedly. “I’ve still got better
costumes!”

The raindrops trickled down Rake’s neck,
soaking his collar and adding to his discomfort. It was too early
in the morning, and all he wanted was to be back in bed with Riella
curled up against him. Instead, he followed Spinner on the path
between piles of abandoned cars and dismantled pieces of machinery.
The junkyard spread like a wasteland around them, a real gold mine
if you knew what to look for and where. Unfortunately, everything
was covered in a film of mud, and they didn’t have a map.

To his right, Spinner leapt with ease,
despite the large tool bag attached to his belt, onto the roof of a
crashed truck. Due to the light rain, he held a hand above his eyes
while he checked his surroundings.

“Anything?” Rake asked. The humidity in the
air acted like sand in his prosthetic joints. He glanced in
irritation at the metal debris all around, longing to turn on the
magnetic fields to provide some relief
.

“Uhh, I swear it was somewhere around here
when I looked from the top of the big wheel.” Spinner shifted in
place.

The truck squeaked under his weight.

Rake shoved his fists in his pockets, used to
Spinner’s lack of orientation skills. It didn’t matter on the
battlefield where they constantly received orders in their
earpieces, but there was no one to give them directions here.

“Aha! There it is!” Spinner pointed at an
even higher pile of scraps. “Now, let’s see … we can go around to
the end of this line and take two turns or—”

“We go straight through.” Rake climbed next
to Spinner and jumped on the other side of the truck before the
roof could collapse under them.

They repeated the procedure three more times,
cutting across the junkyard until Spinner stopped in front of an
elongated hunk of metal tilted on a side. A victorious smile
distorted the web of white lines scattered across his face, turning
it into a creepy mask. “See, I told you it was a train car.”

It would have been if any of the wheels had
still been around. The few windows were busted, but the walls,
despite the scratches and dents, looked solid enough. The circus
could use another car after losing two during the summer tour.
Reluctant to believe such luck, Rake pulled his wet shirt away from
his chest and walked closer to investigate. He squeezed inside
through an open doorway and pulled a flashlight out of his
pocket.

The beam from his flashlight revealed no
compartments. The inside walls had been destroyed by time and
scavengers. The floor was missing, and they hadn’t been able to see
the left wall was absent too because the car half lay on a side,
propped against more pieces of twisted metal. It would cost too
much to replace everything, so it would be better to get a new car
if they ever could afford it. But that wasn’t going to happen any
time soon, not after the terrible season they’d had.

“It’s useless,” Rake said.

“Damn,” Spinner swore under his breath while
he peeked inside. He moved his own flashlight around to add to the
little light that came from outside and stopped the spotlight in a
corner. “What’s that?”

Rake turned and narrowed his eyes. An open
palm rose from the debris. Too big for a human hand, it looked like
metal under all that dirt. He stalked ahead and pushed away bits
and pieces of debris that got in the way. An arm appeared,
connected to the shoulder and, farther down, to the chest made of
the same material. It didn’t react to the faint magnetic field in
his wrist, though the metal objects in the vicinity vibrated. So,
not metal, but something else, totally unknown to him. And Rake
knew his metals.

“I’ll be damned.” Spinner let out a low
whistle, peering from the side. “It’s a bot.” He tilted his head.
“What’s it doing here? The front line is six thousand kilometers
away.”

Rake shrugged. Who knew? It had to be broken
beyond repair, otherwise the Japanese army wouldn’t have abandoned
it. Someone had probably stolen the bot with the intention of
selling it. Bad plan since no one wanted to be caught with such a
hot commodity in their backyard and risk being accused of
sympathizing with the enemy. Still, the bot had travelled a long
way to make it to Kazakhstan. They could still salvage some parts,
anything they could use in their prosthetic side business. The
outer shell was intact, so not everything inside had to be
broken.