Budding Friendship
Days passed since Katie arrived and joined in with the Cirque, and she was settling well, she and Rebecca had become really close friends in this time. One night, they were all sitting around a fire, talking and laughing at some tricks and jokes that the others made. Katie was watching from her tent like she normally did, and she seemed to be daydreaming.
"Hey Katie, come and join us." Rebecca shouted over, from where she was sat with Darren, wearing his jacket as she leant into him.
Katie snapped out of her daydream and she thought about it for a few minutes, then she took a deep breath and walked over, moving to sit on the floor since all of the chairs were taken.
"So, Katie, what do you do?" One of the other freaks asked, who Katie had found out to be Corma Limbs.
"I'm an elementalist." Katie told her.
"What's one of them?" Rebecca asked her.
Katie sighed and stood, she knew this was going to happen. "You guys might want to take a few steps back." She took off her jacket, revealing scarred arms, and she threw it a good distance away as she watched the others move away. "If you have heart problems, please look away now."
She extended her hand towards the fire pit, and she closed her eyes, when they were opened again, they were a mixture of orange and red flames, and the flames started to dance towards her arms. When they touched her arms, they turned into two balls of fire and she made them from one, before she started to play with them like they were an ordinary ball instead of a ball of deadly fire.
Evra watched the show that she was given, and he marvelled in the look of concentration on her face as she showed them when she could do. And he noticed dirt and rocks starting to move towards her as well, but they stayed on the ground.
"What is going on here then?" A voice asked, and Katie's concentration was broke, the ball of fire hitting the floor, and as the things around her caught fire, she stamped it out.
"Damn in, don't break my concentration like that Hibernius." Katie told him, as she looked at Mr Tall.
"It's Mr Tall now Kate." He laughed. "Do you still do your acrobatics?"
"Yeah, I've incorporated the two now." She shrugged.
Everyone looked between them, and there seemed to be some form of close bond between the two individuals, and everyone vowed to find out what. Evra watched the pair, and he felt a sudden burst of jealousy as how close they were, but he tried to push it back, when Mr Tall left.
"Is that all you can do Katie?" Alexander Ribs asked her, as he cuddled with Corma Limbs, looking at her.
"Sort of, I can bend other elements too, such as water and the wind, but the wind is really hard to control." She told him. "Fire is my best element."
"I thought that fire could kill a vampire." Darren asked.
"It can, she's a freak so it doesn't affect her as much." MrCrepsley told them, as he suddenly grabbed one of Katie's arms, showing them the scars. "Burn scars, they look fresh, what have you been doing?"
"Why do you care?" Katie asked him, pulling her arm back, before she slid her jacket on, to hide her arms.
Crepsley was about to comment on it, but couldn't as a black car pulled up – Mr Tiny was back.
Mr Crepsley walked over to Darren, Rebecca and Evra as Mr Tiny and the Steve boy got out of the car. Although, both of their eyes suddenly fell onto Katie, and Mr Tiny suddenly clapped his hands with a happy smile on his face.
"Ah, young Katie, back with the Cirque I see." He walked over to her, holding a hand out to her.
Katie raised an eyebrow, looked at his hand and then looked back at his face, folding her arms across her chest. "I don't believe that we have met."
"Ah, of course, my name is Mr Des Tiny, and this is my assistant Steve Leonard." He gestured for Steve to walk over.
Steve walked over to the girl and Mr Tiny, though his eyes looked the girl up and down and if he could, he would probably be drooling right about now.
"Steve…" He held his hand out to her.
"Yeah, he's just told me." Katie shook his hand, though she pulled it away soon after.
"Why are you here, Mr Tiny?" The question came from Mr Tall.
"I just came to see how your new freak was settling in, and well I can see that she is settling in just fine." He smiled a devilish smile at Katie.
Katie simply raised an eyebrow, and she took a step closer to Mr Tall, which caused Steve to bare his vampire teeth, and Katie to do the same.
"Don't even think about it." Katie told him. "Because if you touch my friends, I will actually end you." She warned him, her voice dark.
Steve just gave her an evil smirk, before he retracted his teeth, and Mr Tiny told him to stop.
"Come now Steve, let's not pick fights with a girl."
Steve rolled his eyes, before he followed Mr Tiny as he went to look for the Little People, and he looked unamused when they all ran to him and nearly broke into a brawl with each other, just so they could see and touch him.
Katie watched them go, before Rebecca, Darren and Evra walked to her, Rebecca hugging her for some reason that Katie couldn't exactly comprehend.
"Are you alright?" Rebecca asked her when she had finally let go of Katie.
"Yes, why wouldn't I be?"
"Well, Mr Tiny is pretty ruthless." Evra explained.
"Yeah, but it looks like Steve has his eyes set on you." Darren told her, though this just made Katie even more confused.
"Oh god Darren, don't confuse her." Rebecca told him and she looked at Katie "He means that Steve likes you."
"Do you think so?" She asked, causing Rebecca to giggle.
"Most definitely, and Darren knows when Steve likes someone." Rebecca giggled.
Katie didn't think anything of it after that, instead she walked towards where Evra and Darren's tent was.
When they were all huddled around inside, with Katie sitting on the floor with Rebecca and Darren who were cuddled up together, and Evra was sitting on a stool with his guitar, did they all stop talking. Through the silence, Evra played his guitar, it wasn't his usual electric one, but instead a soft and ordinary acoustic one. He played the songs that everyone requested, and Darren and Rebecca requested much more than Katie did, and they sang all of the songs – not in perfect tune, but at least they knew the words. Katie just leant back with her eyes closed, listening to Evra play, and in truth, she admired him for it, because he was really good, not to mention really handsome – despite his green snake scales.
"Come on Katie, do you have anything to request?" Rebecca asked her, as everyone looked at her.
Katie looked at them. "Not really, I'm afraid that I don't know much modern music."
"Well then, it shall be my job to educate you." Rebecca laughed.
Katie simply raised a delicate eyebrow. "Can you show me how to play sometime?" She asked Evra, who immediately went shy and nodded, whilst Katie smiled. Eventually, Katie and Rebecca walked back to their tents, and they stopped outside of Rebecca's tent.
"Hey, you and Evra seem to be getting along really well."
"What makes you say that?" She asked.
"Well, I'm not sure really, you two just seem to have a close connection." She shrugged, unzipping her tent with her tail. "I guess I'll see you in tomorrow evening then."
"Yeah, I'll see you tomorrow evening." Katie nodded, walking the short few steps to her tent as Rebecca went inside and zipped hers up. when she was safely shut in her tent, she went about her usual ritual of washing her face and then changing into some comfier clothes, before she climbed into her coffin, fixing her pillow and pulling the blanket over herself, before she pulled the lid down and stared at the lid. only thing - or person - on her mind was the snake boy, she had started to like him, but she knew that it wouldn't be possible to be in love with him.
"I'm being ridiculous, why would a snake want to be in love with a leach?" She asked herself, before she closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.
A few days passed, and one night, Evra and Katie were sitting in Evra's tent cross-legged on the floor and Evra was showing Katie some chords on a guitar and he watched her repeat his motions on the guitar that she had hold of. it surprised Evra by how fast she could learn, and they were soon playing a song together. They seemed to be pretty happy, enjoying their moment of peace and music together, that they didn't notice Crepsley watching them from afar. Crepsley watched his daughter with almost fascination, he hadn't ever known her to be around people like she was with Evra, and if he was honest, he didn't like their closeness.
"Will you stop watching them?" Madame Trusca told him, as she came up behind him as slid a hand down his chest.
"I don't like them being that close." He told her, not taking his eyes off of Katie and Evra.
"After all this time, you never stopped worrying about her safety, did you?"
He shook his head and sighed, looking at her. "Her mother died, I didn't know that she had been born until she was a few months old, I became a vampire at this time, and I looked after her as best as I could. Then I found out about her ability, she could control any element, with ease and it was wonderful for me to watch her." He told her, sitting on some pillows with her when they went inside her tent, and Madame Trusca listened intently to her lover. "I brought her here, when Mr Tiny found out about what she could do, but he followed us here, she wouldn't remember him because she chose not to and it has been centuries. I knew that he wanted her to join the Vampaneez, so I made the first move, when she reached eighteen, I blood let with her. She completed the change on her own, killing another freak in rage."
"That doesn't mean that she will do the same now. Larten, don't worry so much about her, it has been centuries, allow her to make friends and have fun."
"I don't feel that I am able to do that, she is my daughter, and I know that she doesn't like me, but I still feel as though I need to protect her."
"Why does she hate you?"
"Because after I promised that I would stay with her, I left her when she needed me the most, when she needed her father I ran. I was a coward, and I've jeopardised the nice and easy relationship that I had with her, because I was scared to die for her."
Madame Trusca sighed, she wasn't used to the look of fragility in him that he was now suddenly showing, to know that he had disobeyed his daughter's trust and left her for his own selfishness was killing him. to think, he had been burdened with this all these years, just wanting to find her to make sure that she was alive and well, but not knowing where she was living - or even if she was alive at that point. She didn't want to imagine what that felt like, not now and certainly not ever.
"Maybe her life will pick up now, hers and Evra's budding friendship will certainly become strong, I have seen it. Just as I have seen that you and Katie will reconnect, and form the relationship that you both treasured. You just need to give both it and her time." She soothed.
Crepsley thought over what his lover said, as they lay together and talked, he decided that he would try and make it up to Katie for what he did to her all those years ago, and he even decided to see where hers and Evra's new relationship would take them - though he hoped that it wouldn't become anything serious for a very long time.
