After I'd been practicing for over an hour, I felt like I'd successfully managed to create the illusion of breathing fire. I was told that Jimmy had managed to convince Elsa to change her mind regarding the show, but we still had to practice to 'make up for lost time' and also train me as their new act.
Once I was inside the Big Top, which had been all set up for our viewers who wouldn't arrive, it looked like a show that I'd seen as a child. Only this time, no one was allowed in or out aside from the freaks that were performing. The girl with two heads, Bett and Dot were new, like me, and watched without emotion as I clumsily tried to walk and spit fire into the air. Elsa pressed the tips of her fingers to her temples in disappointment. I felt my ego sink down to my toes.
"Stop! Halte! Nein!" She called out for the thousandth time. By now I reeked of gasoline and I was very out of breath from having to spit the gas at a sufficient amount of speed to create the fire-breathing effect.
"Sorry..." I coughed, trying to escape from the taste of gas burning in my throat and causing my nostrils to feel like they were on fire.
"Elsa, let the girl have a break... she's wobblier than a newborn baby horse." Dot sighed when she saw my anxious state. I sat down on a dusty seat while Elsa bickered about how I had to get my role in the show right before the tomorrow, or 'the demon' would have to go. I felt weak as I massaged my horns and tried to ignore Elsa's crude words regarding me.
That's when I saw, out of the corner of my eye, an odd electric-green fog nearing the tents entrance at a sluggish rate.
"Elsa?" I asked in alarm. But I was being ignored as she continued to banter in her famous German accent.
"But anyways, I sink we shall vait until tomorrow to complete her training... she will be a vine edition." Elsa beamed turning around. She didn't see the mist, or, if she did, she ignored it as she'd been ignoring me.
As I watched outside, a figure stood against the fog, wearing a top hat and clad in victorian-age type clothing that made him look very classy. Where had he come from?
Elsa looked up at the stranger and smirked deftly.
"Ah, you're late." She sighed, as if she knew this strange man. I felt an uncomfortable rush of anxiety and fear flow through me while I was in the presence of this man, so I remained quiet while the tall figure examined the inside of the Big Top. I saw that everyone else, including Jimmy had left during this. Why was this man here? Didn't he know that there was no show tonight?
"Run along, Demona. You need your rest." Elsa murmured harshly before beaming up towards the tall stranger.
"That wasn't polite of you, my fair lady." The stranger hissed at Elsa before I rose. I looked over my shoulder before I left the tent and saw an odd shape on the back of the mysterious mans head, the shape and tone of it looking somewhat like a masquerade mask. Perhaps he'd just returned from a renaissance faire? That would account for his lavish clothes and exotic accent.
I didn't waste any time darting outside through the green fog as quickly as possible. My young imaginative mind was depicting worse case senarios of my legs being burnt off, or perhaps suffering dire consequences if I were to breathe in the eerie substance. I darted into the trailer that I'd been given and leapt onto the thin-mattress that had been designated as my bed. I was exhausted and needed rest, so I didn't even bother changing into my pajamas or even getting food before I drifted off into a deep and dreamless slumber. It was pure ecstacy.
"Arise..." A soft voice murmured through the cloak of sleep that I'd encased myself in. I rolled over and opened my eyes, not at all expecting too see who had woke me up so carefully.
It was the Victorian man, and he was standing but a few feet from my bed, his palm just inches from my shoulder where he'd obviously shook me.
I sat up abruptly, wrapping my blanket around me as if it was some sort of shield, a scream caught in my throat.
"What are you doing in here!? You're not allowed back here!" I squawked in alarm, instantly awake. The man only smiled pitifully before sitting down slowly and removing his top hat. The green fog had followed him, and I instantly was horrified all the more.
"My apologies, milady... I do not mean to intrude."
"Who are you?! Why are you here? You're not allowed in my trailer!" I growled, growing more and more aggravated by this mans intrusion as each second ticked by.
He stood up, a wave of relief rushing through me when I thought he was going to leave.
"Pardon, I realize how rude I am being..."
I tried to calm myself, but fury filled me so completely, that calm was all but unreal to me.
"Look, there's no show until tomorrow night. I'll perform then. Now get out of my trailer before I make you get out. I know self-defense and you'll be dead before you can reach the door if you stay here a minute longer!"
"Ah, dear girl... that is my predicament..." He sighed, as if disappointed about something, "I already am dead."
I felt a pang of fear rush up my spine as I stared at him, trying to word together a response.
"But... if... w-who are you?" I whimpered, suddenly cold as I wrapped my thin blanket tighter around myself.
"My name is Edward Mordrake, you may have heard of me."
My mind immediately flashed back to when Jimmy had said that name while telling me about a ghost who would come on Halloween night if we performed...
It couldn't have been real... it was just a man playing jokes...
But somehow, deep down, I knew this wasn't a joke.
"What do you want?" I whispered, tears in my eyes. "Please... please don't kill me.." I whispered, tears racing down my face, "I'm not ready."
"I wouldn't dream of it!" Edward exclaimed before a more stern expression overcame his face. "My request is... is that you tell me your darkest memory... Think back as far back as you can." He said softly. I was soon calmed by his presence as I sat there, blushing profusely as I dabbed at my eyes.
"My darkest memory? Why?"
"Because... I'm on the search for someone I must take back with me..."
"Am... am I the one?" I whispered as I curled up into a feeble position.
"There is a chance... but I must hear your story first in order to find out."
I bit my lip, the tips of my fingers sliding against the roughness of my horns.
"All... all I can think of is my... my family..." I began, shaking like a leaf as I tried desperately to recall every single tiny detail in my past, "Once I was born... I was a perfect child. I was spoilt, given whatever I wanted until I began speaking and talking. I guess, when I started talking, it wasn't normal baby-chatter-turned to words... It was hissing and chants and languages that no one knew..."
I paused, the memories bubbling up like lava over a volcanos edge.
"Go on." Edward replied calmly, listening intently as I relayed my tale.
"Right around when I was five, that's when these," I touched the tips of my horns that scratched me slightly. "That's when these began to grow. They started out like thick freckles, but they grew up bigger and they curled around like a rams horns. My parents hated me after that... they beat me, they would lock me away so that their rich friends wouldn't see me. When they asked where I was... my parents would say I was sick...
"When people wanted to see me, because it had been awhile... my parents lied and said I'd passed away from my illness and they had to bury me. Obviously there were some who wanted to investigate further, but no one knew me enough to actually delve deep into the story.
"I tried to escape. I tried to run away and find someone else to care for me, but my parents forced me away like an animal. Day in and day out, when neither of them had any parties to go to, they set to work trying to cut off my horns and teach me to be what they deemed to be a 'normal human'. But they couldn't find a knife sharp enough to cut away the bones. Then, years later, they told me that they'd found someone that could 'help me' with my problem."
I was in tears by now as I sobbed into my knee. Edward Mordrake was silent as he watched me mourn for my horrid past. I felt the tips of his fingers attempt to comfortingly comb his fingers through my hair and occasionally touching my horns.
"Poor child... You did nothing wrong... Yet they punished you for something that couldn't be helped." He cooed, handing me a handkerchief. I took it gratefully and dabbed at my overflowing eyes.
"They... They'd hired at least a dozen exorcists to 'remove the demon'. I was chained, upright, to a wall and had to listen as the bible was being read. The man said that I was cursed, and it was either I accepted his 'healing message' or die in the worse way possible. I listened, I guess a part of me wanted to believe that they could cure me... but that was before they tried more grievous approaches. They continued reading the bible, but now they were touching me with red hot pokers. They stripped me naked in front of them, and ran hot rods against my skin until I smelled like I'd been on fire.
"The burning was everywhere, though, not just my stomach and arms, but on my face and between my legs, too. After the burning was done, they would douse the blisters with holy water until I was cold and hoarse from screaming so hard."
"But that is not your worse memory, is it? Something worse happened during that time. What was it?"
I looked up at him, dreading the memories that came rushing through me the moment Edward had calmly spoken once more.
"It was... it was late... They'd just finished their session and I was trying to sleep while being upright and against a wall. Two of them walked in late during the night, drunk as hell. They... They said, 'This ones good n' ready for us'. I couldn't do anything as they raped me and abused me in every way possible... they cut me, they bit me... I was close to death... I wanted to die so badly then... but I couldn't..."
I looked up at Edward who looked at me with no emotion. I felt a flame burn in me when I was telling my story and was eliciting no response from my audience.
"That's when they decided I was incurable. That's when my parents threw me out without any money. All they gave me was a dress and a hat to cover my horns. I tried dozens of ways to kill myself, but at the last minute I would chicken out and continue on." I whispered.
There was a long moment before I could open my eyes again. But when I did, I saw a whole manner of other peculiars surrounding me, curious, darkened eyes watching me with subtle interest.
"Who are they?" I whispered, but Edward Mordrake only stood straight ahead, as if listening intently to something. The green mist wafted through every contour of my trailer and I immediately knew it was my time. I curled up into a ball, sobbing aloud, as I closed my eyes, my horns pressed against my kneecaps.
Then, suddenly there was silence.
It took a long while before I assembled enough courage to look.
My trailer was empty once more.