Showdown

The after-party was still raging in the common area that ringed the small kitchen, from which drinks and snacks poured freely. Tumblers cart wheeled by in celebration, and Colette snapped at them, “Save it for the show.” If the actors drunkenly injured themselves or any other performer, there’d be less celebration the following day. She sighed, rubbing her face. She didn’t mean to rain on their parade, but at the same time, she was utterly exhausted. Running the show with nothing but the power of her voice and presence took a huge toll on her and all she wanted to do was go back to her cabin and banish her demons with a nice glass of port. Or several.

The money from the night’s ticket collection clinked against her thigh, and she patted the bag that hung there before unlatching her cabin’s door. She stroked the worn doorframe as she passed through, calculating the takings in her head. They’d gained quite a patronage tonight by sabotaging the Hirondelle, though she was loathe to admit that stooping to such low tactics had worked. The question now was had they earned enough to keep afloat? They’d certainly not made as much on each ticket as they normally would have, but they’d had more customers tonight than they would have if the Hirondelle had had its way. Not that Jacque had any business being in town. She frowned as her train of thought buzzed unhappily, shed her coat and tossed it over the back of an armchair.

“Such disrespect for your costume? No wonder you always wore through seams so fast.”

Colette whirled, heart thudding in her chest at the sound of the familiar voice. “Jacque.”

The man was leaning against the wall by the door casually, little spectacles propped on the end of his nose, under which lay a neatly waxed moustache. In his hand was the little notebook where Colette kept the circus’s accounts all lined up in her neat handwriting. He was thumbing through the pages lazily and commented, “You seem to be doing quite well. I’m surprised.”

She swallowed hard, anger and fear lodged in her throat. “What are you doing here?”

“Collecting what’s rightly mine. Your man acted out of order, and I believe I am entitled to compensation. It’s only sportsmanlike.”

Colette’s hand twitched towards the moneybag, but she refrained from touching it. Instead she crossed her arms over her chest and widened her stance, tossing back, “A gentleman would not have touched down in another Cirque’s territory. You should move on and cut your losses before your reputation takes another blow.”

Jacque crossed the room swiftly. He was a thin, short man and to anyone on the street he would appear friendly, genteel and entirely harmless. With every step he took towards Colette, though, her mind receded further and Auréle’s persona ripped back through, taking over out of pure habit. Jacque was a dangerous man, a fiend and a killer. She’d always been a little frightened of him, even as a girl, but her brother had never had trouble standing up to him. Never, not even when it had gotten him into trouble. He’d always done the right thing, and now, her brother’s strength flowed through her, mixing with the tang of her coppery adrenaline and false bravado, filling her with a sense of power and control.

Jacque’s face was dark with barely repressed rage. “Yours is the reputation I’d worry about, Lettie.”

“Don’t call me that,” she hissed, wincing as he used her brother’s pet name for her. He noted this, and used it again gleefully.

“You tried to ruin me once, Lettie, and you failed then. Threw my name down on the ground in front of paying customers, in front of my staff… and you expect me to just dig up my stakes and roll out of town? I intend to burn more than just one of your pathetic airships. I am going to ruin your cirque, your name, and as for you.... I am going to bury you. After I take what you owe me.”

He held out his hand, waiting. Colette merely spat at him. “I owe you nothing but a knife in the ribs, after what you did to me. To my twin.”

“Your idiot brother’s death had nothing to do with me, Colette; we’ve discussed this. Don’t try to pin it on me so you can feel better about yourself. I won’t have it.”

Colette pushed into his space, knocking his waiting hand aside. “You killed him. You killed him!”

Jacque growled back. “I did nothing of the sort, Colette, and this pointless vendetta is going to stop, one way or another. If I have to burn your whole cirque, so help me, I will. Gladly, too. Or you can give me my earnings… and then quit. Get out of this business while you still can. It’s already taking the edge off your sanity; any fool could see that. Don’t start a war you can’t win, Colette. Because I can win, and I will, and you will be cold in the ground before I take responsibility for your damn brother.”

Colette felt something twist deep within her, and she shoved at him in senseless fury. He pushed back, whirling her swiftly and throwing her against the wall. She hit it with a slight crack of bone on wood and slid down, biting her lip to keep from whining deep in her throat like a whipped dog. He roared, anger finally bubbling over. “Don’t test my patience, Colette.” He paced in a tight circle, hands clenched and body tight as a violin’s strings. “I had little of it for you when you were a child and I have less of it now that you’ve grown. You are nothing to me but a tick on my side, and I won’t hesitate to pluck you out and set a match to you.”

Jacque broke from his stride and stooped, drawing a short knife from his belt. He reached for the moneybag looped around Colette’s waist. She grabbed at his wrist and he twisted it easily until she bared her teeth and hissed at him from where she was slumped against the wall. The leather thong sliced easily under his blade and he palmed the little bag, turning to leave.

There was a scuffling sound behind him, and he looked over his shoulder like Orpheus after Eurydice.

Only behind him there was no fair maiden, but instead a fiery woman with the devil in her eyes and a curved sword in her hand. Next to her, the umbrella stand she'd ripped it from was tipped to the floor, a bouquet of canes and parasols and a leather sheath spilling out of it.

She brandished the rapier, spitting through clenched teeth. “You are not leaving here with that money, Jacque, if I have to rip it from your dead hands.”

He glowered at her and there was a long moment of tense silence within the little room, which was dim and full of shadows and sorrow. Outside, the clink of bottles and occasional whistle of a few illicit firecrackers could be heard.

Jacque replied tersely, “Fine.” He dropped the bag and the mouth of the leather pouch burst open, spitting little silver and bronze coins across the floor in a violent spray. Colette’s eyes never wavered from his face, though he approached her, speaking in a dangerously quiet tone. “Colette, you’ve gotten yourself into some serious trouble. More than you can handle, I promise you.” There was a glimmer in his eyes. “What time is it?”

Colette made no move to answer, and so he nonchalantly pulled out a pocket watch and checked the little face. “As I expected. Had you simply turned over the money, we could have avoided this whole ugly business. All this mess.”

Colette took the bait, her face twisting with concern. “What mess?”

“The blood spilled tonight will be your fault. Remember that.” He turned with a sinister flourish, and Colette's hand shook, the sword trembling. His hand on the doorknob, he revealed his ace in the whole. “We ringed your perimeter, Colette. You took too long to give us what was rightly ours, and so, we were prepared to take it. Already, my men have moved to begin the… fireworks.”

Though he faced away from her, she could hear the triumphant smugness of his smile. “You think one burning ship causes a stir? Imagine what will ensue after thirty simultaneous infernos. You must be so pleased by your impending celebrity. I imagine it’s far more exciting than anything you’ve ever experienced with your tawdry little group.” He sighed. “Ah, Colette. It’s almost disappointing defeating you. You never did think things through.”
He dropped his head and headed out the door without another word.

He left it swinging wide behind him, open to the night sky, and Colette’s already hard-beating heart ratcheted into double time. What she’d thought to be clinking bottles of champagne and ale, and little sparkling firecrackers were actually the raging sounds of a battle being waged on the grounds. Men tumbled by brawling, hurling whatever was near to hand at their opponents, and in the dark from this distance it was impossible to tell who belonged to which troupe. It was clear though, from the little spitting fires that flared up around the campus that some kind of flammable agent had been spilled and ignited, and if they didn’t act swiftly to put it out, the whole arena might go up in flames. Colette’s eyes widened in horror, and then she was flying out the door.

Jacque had disappeared in a shimmer of silks and shadows and was nowhere to be seen. Colette’s eyes flickered left and right, dazzled by the darkness of the sky and the glimmering orange flames that licked along the ground. She turned to a nearby couple of roustabouts who were locked in a violent dance, and she dove into the brawl.

A few good right hooks worked in her favour, though she earned herself a split lip for her troubles. She spat a thin stream of blood, and then roared at the men that she had caught by the ears. One of them was her staff, and the other Jacque’s, but it didn’t matter now.

“The fire! Put it out, or we’re all going to die!”

She threw the men away from herself, and they stumbled into a breakneck run, though whether it was to warn others or to make for the edge of camp it was impossible to tell.

Colette herself ripped herself away from the pair and ran, screaming the names of her family into the night.

“Marguerite! Marguerite, Alexandra—Asmodeus, help! Please, God, help me—Asmodeus! Asmo—Auréle! Oh, Auréle.” She tripped and fell hard to her hands and knees, a dribble of blood on her face, pain and heat searing her from all sides. A sob bubbled up in her throat as the fires blinded her, and she squeezed her eyes shut, throwing her dirt-stained hands up to her face and screaming her brother’s name into them. She wasn’t made for this. This had been his dream, and it had become her nightmare.

She stayed there for almost an hour as the fight died down, roustabouts dashing to and fro, the fires sizzling and steaming as they were doused and dirt kicked over their embers. The tent had come loose on one side and the edge of the campus flapped angrily under a stiff breeze. Around her, streamers and thin lines of lights were severed and dangling; broken glass pieces littered the area and shone like little scattered diamonds. Jacque’s men had bolted and her own, bloodied and bruised, brought the rage down to a dull roar before deserting the area. Most of the staff had fled to the edges of the camp and were now creeping back, tentatively.

A few formed a nervous semi-circle around her, and she was dimly aware of many staring eyes, but was unable to rouse herself to even run back to her cabin.

A pair of familiar, strong hands reached down, took her shoulders and shook her lightly. “Come on, Colette. Let’s go.”

She leaned heavily against her friend as she was led back to her cabin. She collapsed through the door, making for the little bed tucked in one corner. Halfway across the floor, she hesitated, reaching blindly out with her left hand until her fingers groped at the welcome slim neck bottle of some unknown liquid. She fell heavily to her bed, still in her boots, and sucked at the lip of the bottle. It burned comfortingly. She took a deep draught, throat pulsing as she gulped down several mouthfuls. She coughed slightly, wiping ash off her face and smearing blood and dirt across her cheek in the process.

She took another burning swallow of the alcohol, and fell asleep with the bottle tucked into the crook of her arm.