Chapter 1

Lucille's nightmare only gets worse

Right outside of Frankfort, Kentucky

Lucille Nightleaf, the Clown of Cats, walked the circus grounds late at night looking for Stanely, who was off hunting some field mice or going to Miss Hades looking for a treat and not coming to bed as she called out to him. There was always an odd feeling when Stanley wasn’t around, as if a part of her was missing and as if she was walking through the world in a dream. She didn’t understand the feeling, and most of the time it scared her, which was the reason she was up in the middle of the night looking for the cat.

                “I’m going to kill em,” Lucille mumbles to himself. Stanely knew better than to leave her alone while she was sleeping, but boys will be boys, and he was off getting into trouble. She always feared that without him, she wouldn’t wake up out of some dream wrapping her mind while her eyes were closed. She feared it even now, walking between the trailers of all the acts in Azrael’s Circus of the Bizarre, the people the rest of the world would call freaks, but the people Lucille would call family.

                She was the youngest member of the circus, about sixteen, and had one of the best jobs, if you asked her: she got to be one of the main clowns who welcomed people into the Big Top. She was known as the Clown of Cats, as she would order cats to do her bidding, and often made them dress up and run the place with her. The cats wore funny little outfits and face paint, just as she would when she was a clown.

                It made the children laugh a lot. It made a lot of the adults do the same thing.

                But most of all, maybe, the only thing that mattered was that it made Lucille feel as if she had a home. Like so many people in the circus, she was a runway, and like so many people hiding in this odd place, she had a past stalking her.

                “That’s right, kitten,” a deep and demonic voice echoed between the darkness of the trailers. It causes Lucille to jump, spinning to look for the man whom she had been trying to flee all her life. She searches the bitter darkness with her cat-like green eyes, stopping on a shape in the shadows. She locked her jaw even if everything in her was screaming as the large and fat shape of the devil staring at her.

                She took a step back from the shape, blinked, and shook her head, hoping her eyes would find him gone. The shape wasn’t there. The past hadn’t come racing back for her, and even if it did, one day it would; he would have to face Azreal.

                No one was sure what Azreal Odd, the Ring Master, truly was, other than he looked like a pale man with a mighty strong body and deep red eyes like a devil, but he was no devil. He was kind and sweet like a father, and he held deep magic.

                A couple of weeks ago, the Diva of Hues, Kal ‘Vilas’ Inkk, the circus’s main singer, who brought in a lot of people, took off from the grounds one night after some old boyfriend tried to get her. It scared Vilas bad as the man was a part of a crime family. She went running, hoping it would keep trouble from the circus, but Azreal sent Benjamin ‘The Cardinal Blade’ Solomon and Thomas ‘The Minotaur’ J. Henry to bring her home.

                They got her back. She was still worried about the crime family, but Azreal had it under control. No one was sure how he did it. All anyone knew was the Ring Master had some deep magic, and he wasn’t a man to be messed with, which was the reason Lucille let her mind settle for a moment before she started to walk back into the darkness.

                She started to head for Miss Hades' cart and trailer, almost running to find Stanely there. She had her mid-length black hair pulled back into a ponytail; she didn’t keep it past her shoulders, as it was easier to hide under a hat when she dressed like a clown. Sometimes, she thought about growing it out like Vilas, but then she let the idea fall away.

                She would also study Vilas' hourglass body on stage, or sometimes when they were bathing in the river or lake, wishing and hoping that one day she would have such a body. Lucille never doubted she had a sexy body for men; the younger boys and sometimes, the men, would stare at her shape, but she had nothing like Vilas.

                It was amazing to see such a woman walk the world, and they both had the same color of skin, a light pale, except now Lucille was getting sun-kissed all over her arms from working outside. Vilas never worked outside if she could help it.

                Lucille had heard Charon Lewis, the Tremendous Magician, call Vilas one too many times Luna, but the singer would shake her head, putting her hand on her friend’s shoulder and said, “You’re drunk.”

                “I am,” he would nod in agreement.

                “Come on,” she said, pushing him off to his trailer, “let's get you in bed.”

                Lucille had no idea who Luna was, and she thought about asking as she headed to the back of Miss Hades’s place, but there was one big rule in the circus: never ask. Everyone here had a past, and everyone here was trying to escape it.

                No one asked about one another’s past. They let those doors stay closed. It was for the best.

                Lucille heard something moving between the trash cans, making her stop with fright for only a moment before she put her hands on her hips and ordered, “Stanley, get your butt out here right now.”

                The black-and-white cat meowed in protest and slowly started to stroll out, with eyes matching Lucille's hue. He was protesting being called out while licking his lips.

                She narrowed her eyes at him and started wiggling a finger at him.

                “Now, you know better,” she said, “running off like that. I do declare - “

                There was more to remark, but she didn’t get to say any of it as a scream of pure terror came from the trailer. The shout of fear caused Lucille to jump as if someone had set off a gun, and before she landed on the ground, Stanely was in her arms, staring hard at the back door of the trailer.

                “No,” Miss Hades roared from inside, “don’ take my Jermey. No.”

                Lucille stood there in the dark, looking around, not sure what to do until Miss Hades came bolting out of the back door with tears in rivers of fear rolling her larger round face, stopping only for a second to stare at Lucille and then spun on her heels, taking off for the Ring Master.