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“Thank you,” I murmur, squeezing her hand before tilting my head. A question pops out. “Did you ever have a family or a partner?”
She smiles, turning my hand over and rubbing her thumb across the lines in my palm, no doubt reading them, but she answers my question anyway.
“I did once. We were happy for many years. She worked as a rigger. She was five years younger than me, and we didn’t meet until I was in my forties. She took the job by chance. We were never meant to meet, but she was my very best mystery. For a woman who sees everything through cards, I never saw her coming. It should have terrified me, but she was the best thing that ever happened to me. We spent years together with our family here, happy and in love. She died many years ago now due to illness. I wish I could say it was something I didn’t see coming, but I did. I saw it, and it killed me. There was nothing I could do, and upon her deathbed, she smiled at me. She lived every day like it was her last, and it was one of the reasons I fell in love with her in the first place.” She smiles sadly, her gaze distant.
“Even though she’s gone, I don’t regret it. The happiness we shared lives on with me now, and the memory of our love will keep me going until we meet again. My soul belonged to the cirque, it always will, but my heart was hers and will be in the afterlife. You’re the owner of your heart, Ember. Don’t give this place everything. Keep some for yourself and find your stolen moments, your love.”
I cover her hand with both of mine. “It sounds like you were lucky to have each other, and I have no doubt she’s waiting for you on the other side. I’m glad you found love. You deserve it.”
“As do you,” she murmurs, her eyes softening as we stare at one another.
We are two sides of the same coin, two women destined to know the future through the cards but lost in their own.
She’s right. I walk my own path, and I write my own destiny. I sold my soul to the cirque, but my heart is mine to give, and I already have.
I fell in love with the men from this circus, and no matter what happens, I know this is where I will be until the day I die—not because I’m bound to, but because I want to.
“Enough.” She grins, pulling away. “The past is just that. Let us focus on the future, shall we?”
I nod, letting her focus on that. She spreads the deck before me, and we practice since I’ll be taking over readings from now on and I want to make sure I’m ready. Next, she lays out the other deck—the black one tied to cirque.
“What do you see, Ember? Look into our future.” Her voice is far away as I stare at the embossed, black foil deck, something inside of it calling to me.
I reach out blindly, closing my eyes, and shuffle the cards before I flip them over. My heart hammers as I stare at where all the face cards should be.
There’s nothing but the card of death.
My eyes jerk up, meeting Hilda’s. Her mouth is parted, her eyes wide in fear as she glances from the card to me. “Quickly, Ember. Tell me what you feel,” she demands.
I try to sit back, but she yanks me forward onto the deck. “Do not break the connection,” she hisses.
Nodding despite my fear, I slide my hand over the deck, focusing once more. “They are screaming at me,” I tell her. It grows louder the more I focus on it, and I have to cover my ears. “A warning! It’s a warning!” I yell. “It’s coming. Death is coming.”
I black out, the screaming taking me and my soul.
When I come to, I’m lying on Hilda’s chairs. She forces me to sit up and take a drink, and I meet her eyes. “Does that mean what I think it means?”
She nods nervously. She’s scared.
“Death is coming for the cirque.”
We spend the next hour trying to find out what and how, but it’s useless, and I end up wandering aimlessly through the tents. My soul aches, and I’m scared.
I felt fear in the cards . . . the touch of the grave. They weren’t wrong.
Maybe because of that lingering touch, I find myself at the big top, slipping inside and watching the performance filled with life. Happiness saturates the air, and I wish I could smile and clap with them, but my soul is dark.
I watch the show, but my heart is troubled, my mind on the cards, and the cirque seems to pulse around me, as if to agree with me.
Something is coming, something bad.
I just wish I knew from where or how.
My eyes land on my guys as they bow. Will I be strong enough to protect them, or will this be our final show?
Chapter
Thirty-Nine
