Spectacle (Menagerie #2)(37)

More than they’ve paid for. My skin crawled at the thought.

The coordinator gave us a quick lecture on the Savage Spectacle’s serving procedures and showed us how to balance a semifull tray with one hand. Then he made us practice with trays of water-filled plastic stemmed glasses. I sloshed three times in a span of five minutes—even in my normal human life, I’d never waited tables—which got me demoted to hors d’oeuvres, along with Zyanya, because those were harder to spill.

While we practiced, the professional servers came in and out of a set of swinging doors on the left every few minutes as they set things up in the next room.

An identical set of doors on the opposite side of the kitchen presumably led to another room on our right, but nothing was going on in there.

About an hour after our engagement briefing, the coordinator disappeared into the party room and the quiet buzz of activity in the kitchen became a tense bustle. Music poured from the other side of the swinging doors. I glanced at the huge clock high on one wall and saw that it was five minutes until 9:00 p.m. The party was about to start.

A minute later, the swinging door opened again, and this time a man in dark slacks and a green button-down shirt followed the coordinator into the kitchen. His gaze slid over thousands of dollars’ worth of top-shelf alcohol and gourmet appetizers as if they were everyday fare, and I realized that he was not a Spectacle employee.

“Mr. Lansing, these are the cryptids we’ve prepared for your party. We have Belinda, an echidna, and a female werewolf named Clarisse.” The coordinator gestured to the first women in our row.

“Echidna? Isn’t that a snake woman?” Lansing lifted Belinda’s chin as he studied the painted scales trailing down both sides of her face. “Where’s her tail?”

“She doesn’t have one in this form.”

“But she’ll shift later?”

The coordinator nodded. “If that’s what you’d like.”

Lansing grunted. “The freakier the better. What are these two?”

“Zyanya is a cheetah shifter. Notice her eyes and her teeth.” The coordinator grabbed her chin and tilted her head up. “She’s a gorgeous specimen.”

Lansing’s gaze lingered on Zyanya long enough to make me nervous.

“And her?” The client stopped in front of me. “Is this the siren?”

“No, Lenore is our siren, and she’s ready to lend a unique aura to your party.” The pair of men moved past me.

“I look forward to hearing her,” Lansing said. “Are we ready to go?”

“Yes. Let’s go show your guests in.” The coordinator escorted Lansing out of the kitchen.

Minutes later, voices rang out from behind the swinging doors. The guests had arrived, and they sounded as excited as I was horrified.

The coordinator stepped back into the kitchen and glanced at each of us in turn, evidently looking for flaws in the presentation. “Everybody ready?”

No one answered.

“You four each take a tray, and Lenore, you’ll follow them into the room, then head for the stage. They’re all set up for you.” When no one moved, he waved his arm impatiently. “Let’s go!”

We picked up our loaded trays and the coordinator pushed open one of the swinging doors and held it back with his body.

“Gentlemen, welcome to the Savage Spectacle!” he called out as we entered the room. “Where your most exotic desire is our pleasure to provide!”

I wanted nothing more than to crawl back into my menagerie cage and cry, and the truth of that thought killed something fragile deep inside me.





Rommily

The oracle sat on the floor of a bright, cold room, with her spine pressed into the corner. She didn’t like this room full of cold tile and steel cots. She didn’t like white coats and rubber gloves.

She didn’t like men with guns, or the collar around her neck, which sent pain throughout her body, like being shocked with a cattle prod from the inside.

“It’s definitely broken,” the man in the white coat said, as he pressed on the sides of Mirela’s swollen nose. Mirela flinched, and tears filled her eyes, but she made no complaint. “You’re not going to be able to use her for a couple of weeks, at least.”

“Wonderful.” The woman in pressed pink pants touched something on her tablet, and the light it reflected on her face changed. “Less than a week off the truck, and she’s out of commission.”

Rommily traced the grout between the white tiles with her finger, wishing it were dirt. Wishing it were grass, wet with dew, shining in the sunlight. She missed the sunlight. She missed the wind and the smell of fresh hay and wandering barefoot through the sawdust.

She missed Eryx, with his silent strength and comfort.

“They’re both oracles? What’s wrong with that one, Dr. Hill?” the woman in pink said, and when Rommily looked up, she found herself pinned to the corner where she sat by the woman’s cold gaze.

“Physically, nothing that I can see,” the doctor in the white coat said. “Not that I can get close enough to examine her.”

“She doesn’t like to be touched.” Mirela’s voice sounded oddly nasal as she pressed a tissue to her bloody nose. As if she’d been crying.

“Well, that’s too bad. This is not a hands-off facility.” The woman in pink clacked closer in heels that reminded Rommily of carnival clowns on stilts. Her thin nose wrinkled. “Why does she smell?”