By a Charm and a Curse(41)

Pia seems a little embarrassed but speaks up anyway. “We were scrying to see if we could find the event that triggered Whiskey’s fall.” Pia sweeps her curls out of her eyes and shoots me down in an unusually somber voice. “We didn’t get anything. But why are y’all here?”

“We have a question,” Ben says. He gnaws at his lower lip.

“Do you know the charm and the curse are codependent?” I ask.

“Uh, yeah,” Duncan says, as though this was written on a placard at the front entrance to the carnival.

I thought all the shock had been driven out of me the night I found out I was a cursed puppet girl, but apparently not. “You knew? Leslie made it sound like not everyone understands how it all works.”

Pia waggles her finger between herself and her twin. “Umm, hello? Descendants of people who placed the damn things on the carnival in the first place. But Leslie is kinda right. Most people don’t know the two go hand in hand. You know the old game Telephone? Where I tell you something and you tell someone else, who tells someone else and by the end, whatever I said in the first place is all jumbled up? Curse lore is kind of like that.”

“Oh,” I say. “Well, what can you tell us about it?”

The twins share the same expression, eyebrows arched high. “What do you want to know?” Pia asks.

“Anything you can tell us. I know about it, but in a really vague way. We want to know everything.”

The siblings exchange a glance. “Why do you want to know now?” Duncan asks. “You’ve been with us for weeks.” His hands slide across the table until they clasp Pia’s.

Something is off, and I can’t place it. Then I realize—I’m not twitching. The tent actually feels warm. I hold up my hand and see that my fingers are perfectly still. The inside of the tent must be sweltering. When I glance over at Ben, he’s flushed, pink filling up his cheeks and neck. I check the twins, though, and they seem normal. Except for the way they’re staring.

Both of them are gazing directly at me, and their eyes have gone pitch black.

I move to stand next to Ben again, their gazes following me. “Benjamin,” I whisper.

“I see it.”

The twins’ chests rise and fall in perfect synchronicity. The only other movement they make is to blink, and even that they do completely in time.

“Why are you bothering my grandchildren?” The voice comes from their mouths in perfect unison, two voices layering to make up the one I’m hearing. The voice is neither male nor female, and there’s a tremor in it that suggests extreme age.

Two heads cock to the side, and I realize the voice wants an answer. Oh God this is freaky. “I wasn’t trying to bother them,” I say.

“Then why are you here?”

“We were hoping to talk to them about the curse and the charm holding this place together,” I say.

The dark liquid in the bowl ripples, like some invisible stone dropped to the bottom. When the voice speaks, it’s discomfited, and two sets of eyebrows are furrowed at me. “Did they not tell you?”

“No,” I say quickly, not wanting to anger the voice. “They told me. It’s just that I feel like I might be missing something. People are getting hurt.”

Understanding spreads from brother to sister in a wave. Their faces almost seem…relaxed. “Ah. I see. The charm and the curse are, ah, symbiotic, to put it lightly. There is much more I’d like to talk to you about, my dear. Where is the carnival now?”

“Texas,” Ben says. “Due to head out toward Arizona.”

Two heads snap toward Ben. They appraise him, and it’s my turn to give his hand a squeeze. I can feel his pulse thudding madly where our wrists press together. “What’s your name, dear?”

“Benjamin,” he says.

“Hmm. Well, Arizona is no good, Benjamin,” the voice says. The twins shake their heads in dissent. “Who’s in charge of the carnival now? Is it still Franklin?”

“No,” Ben says. “Leslie, his daughter, is in charge now.”

“I remember Leslie. Sweet girl. Tell her to head for New Orleans, the quicker the better.” The voice is fainter now.

“Wait,” I say, not entirely sure if I want the voice to come back. “What’s in New Orleans?”

The corners of both twins’ mouths pick up, and the expression is all the more creepy because I’ve seen a milder version of the same smile on Duncan’s face before. Their heads are loose on their necks, like heavy blooms on weak stems. “Me, deary. I am in New Orleans.”





Chapter Eighteen


Emma


Benjamin and I lie on the great big pile of pillows in my wagon, out of sight of anyone who might report us back to his mom. Above us, through the skylight, the heavy oak branches sway, and light shines through the browning leaves in shades of ocher and caramel.

“Would Leslie do it?” I ask, burrowing farther into his side, his warmth. Some new instinct that’s grown between the two of us has him curling his arm around me to pull me in tighter. “Help us break the curse and figure out what’s going on with the charm?” I can’t believe the thought never crossed my mind. If the curse is broken, then no one ever has to go through this again. And if I’m not beholden to the carnival, then I can leave, I can find Juliet and my parents and brothers and tell them how sorry I am for all this. With that sitting in the distance like a pot of gold, it’s easy to think this could work.