“I’ll just pick a direction and…” I stopped as a picture flashed through my thoughts, of circus vans, snake-boys and hammocks. “The Cirque Du Freak,” I decided. “It’s the nearest place outside Vampire Mountain that I can call home.”
“A good choice,” Evanna said, and by the way her lips lifted at the edges, I realized the witch had known all along that I’d choose to return to the Cirque.
We went our separate ways as the sun was setting, even though we hadn’t slept and were ready to drop with exhaustion. Vancha departed first, on his long trek to Vampire Mountain. He said little when leaving, but hugged me hard and hissed in my ear, “Be brave!”
“You too,” I whispered back.
“We’ll kill Leonard next time,” he vowed.
“Aye,” I grinned weakly.
He turned and ran, hitting flitting speed seconds later, vanishing into the gloom of the dusk.
Debbie and Alice left next, to return to the city. Debbie asked me to stay with her, but I couldn’t, not as things stood. I needed to be by myself for a while. She wept and clutched me close. “Will you come back later?” she asked.
“I’ll try,” I croaked.
“If he doesn’t,” Evanna said, “you can always go looking for him.” She handed a folded-up piece of paper to Alice Burgess. “Hold on to that. Keep it closed. When the two of you decide upon your course, open it.”
The Chief Inspector asked no questions, just tucked the paper away and waited for Debbie to join her. Debbie looked at me pleadingly. She wanted me to go with her – or ask her to come with me – but there was a huge ball of grief sitting cold and hard in my gut. I couldn’t think of anything else right now.
“Take care,” I said, turning aside and breaking eye contact.
“You too,” she croaked, then sobbed loudly and stumbled away. With a quick “Goodbye”, Alice hurried after her, and the two women slipped through the trees, back to the city, supporting one another as they went.
That left just me, Harkat and Evanna.
“Any idea where the Cirque’s playing?” the witch asked. We shook our heads. “Then it’s lucky that I do and am going there,” she smiled. Standing between us, she looped her arms around my left arm and Harkat’s right, and led us through the forest, away from the city and its underground caverns of death, back to where my voyage into the night first started—the Cirque Du Freak.
ALEXANDER RIBS was sleeping in a large tyre hanging from a tree. He always slept curled up—it kept his body supple and made it easier for him to twist and contort when he was performing. Normally he kept the tyre on a special stand in his caravan, but occasionally he’d drag it outside and sleep in the open. It was a cold night for sleeping outdoors – the middle of a wintry November – but he had a thick, fur-lined body-bag to keep the chill out.
As Alexander snored musically a young boy crept towards him, a cockroach in his right hand, with the intention of dropping it into Alexander’s mouth. Behind him, his older brother and younger sister looked on with impish glee, urging him forward with harsh hand gestures whenever he paused nervously.
As the boy neared the tyre and held up the cockroach, his mother – always alert to mischief – stuck her head out of a nearby tent, ripped her left ear off and threw it at him. It spun through the air like a boomerang and knocked the cockroach from the boy’s pudgy fingers. Yelping, he raced back to his brother and sister, while Alexander slept on, unaware of his narrow escape.
“Urcha!” Merla snapped, catching her ear as it circled back, then reattaching it to her head. “If I catch you bothering Alexander again, I’ll lock you in with the Wolf Man until morning!”
“Shancus made me do it!” Urcha whined, receiving a dig in the ribs from his older brother.
“I don’t doubt he put you up to it,” Merla growled, “but you’re old enough to know better. Don’t do it again. Shancus!” she added. The snake-boy looked at his mother innocently. “If Urcha or Lilia get into trouble tonight, I’ll hold you responsible.”
“I didn’t do anything!” Shancus shouted. “They’re always –”
“Enough!” Merla cut him short. She started towards her children, then saw me sitting in the shadow of the tree next to the one Alexander Ribs was hanging from. Her expression softened. “Hello, Darren,” she said. “What are you doing?”
“Looking for cockroaches,” I said, managing a short smile. Merla and her husband, Evra Von – a snake-man and one of my oldest friends – had been very kind to me since I’d arrived a couple of weeks earlier. Though I found it hard to respond to their kindness in my miserable mood, I made as much of an effort as I could.
“It’s cold,” Merla noted. “Shall I fetch you a blanket?”
I shook my head. “It takes more than a slight frost to chill a half-vampire.”
“Well, would you mind keeping an eye on these three as long as you’re outside?” she asked. “Evra’s snake is moulting. If you can keep the kids out of the way, it’d be a real help.”
“No problem,” I said, rising and dusting myself down as she went back inside the tent. I walked over to the three Von children. They gazed up at me uncertainly. I’d been unusually solemn since returning to the Cirque Du Freak, and they weren’t quite sure what to make of me. “What would you like to do?” I asked.
“Cockroach!” Lilia squealed. She was only three years old, but looked five or six because of her rough, coloured scales. Like Shancus, Lilia was half-human, half-snake. Urcha was an ordinary human, though he wished he could be like the other two, and sometimes glued painted scraps of tinfoil to his body, driving his mother wild with exasperation.
“No more cockroaches,” I said. “Anything else?”
“Show us how you drink blood,” Urcha said, and Shancus hissed at him angrily.
“What’s wrong?” I asked Shancus, who’d been named in my honour.
“He’s not supposed to say that,” Shancus said, slicking back his yellow-green hair. “Mum told us not to say anything about vampires—it might upset you.”
I smiled. “Mums worry about silly things. Don’t worry—you can say whatever you like. I don’t mind.”
“Can you show us how you drink then?” Urcha asked again.
“Sure,” I said, then spread my arms, pulled a scary face, and made a deep groaning noise. The children shrieked with delight and ran away. I plodded after them, threatening to rip their stomachs open and drink all their blood.
Although I was able to put on a merry display for the kids, inside I felt as empty as ever. I still hadn’t come to terms with Mr Crepsley’s death. I was sleeping very little, no more than an hour or two most nights, and I’d lost my appetite. I hadn’t drunk blood since leaving the city. Nor had I washed, changed out of my clothes, cut my nails – they grew quicker than a human’s – or cried. I felt hollow and lost, and nothing in the world seemed worthwhile.
When I’d arrived at the Cirque, Mr Tall had spent the day locked in his trailer with Evanna. They emerged late that night and Evanna took off without a word. Mr Tall checked that Harkat and I were OK, then set us up with a tent, hammocks and anything else we required. Since then he’d spent a lot of time talking with me, recounting tales of Mr Crepsley and what the pair of them had got up to in the past. He kept asking me to chip in with my own recollections, but I could only smile faintly and shake my head. I found it impossible to mention the dead vampire’s name without my stomach tightening and my head pulsing with pain.
I hadn’t said