By a Charm and a Curse(69)



She crumples to the ground. Sidney’s blood creeps toward her, as if, even in death, he can’t bear to be away from her.





Chapter Thirty-Five


Emma

Chaos breaks out among the gathered crowd and in that chaos, I see a point of stillness. Fabrizio Moretti. He is a rock in a surging ocean of people, and he’s staring right at me. With a flick of his fingers, two lines of people move against the crowd surging toward Sidney, headed right for me.

I have to run.

I don’t want to leave the crumpled heap of a body that is, was, Sidney, but I have to get somewhere safe, where the Morettis won’t touch me.

The laborers and performers who had stood idly by are now rushing toward Sidney, as if they know something, some miraculous cure that will bring him back. There is nothing to bring back. But still, they push against me.

Someone shoves me into the railing halfway down the ramp, my hip clanging hard against the metal. I don’t think anything of it until a hand grips my arm. It’s Antonio. His mouth curls up in a slow, sinister grin.

“We’re done doing this your way,” he says.

He yanks my arm, and the crowd parts before him. I see more than a few glances my way that are quickly diverted, like they, too, blame me for this mess. I search the crowd for Leslie or Lars, but Leslie is trying to calm everyone down and Lars is trapped by the rush of people trying to get to Sidney. My feet hit the dirt, and there’s a small gap in the crowd. I yank my arm free and run.

I am empty and hollow inside. I have no breath to fill my lungs. No heart to beat against my chest and thump in my ears. My legs do not burn or ache from running. I have nothing in me, nothing at all. But I do have Benjamin, and I need to get to him. If the Morettis want to hurt me, they might go after him, too, and I cannot let that happen.

I dart between a child and her mother, around Happy the Clown as he runs toward the body. Right into the arms of Fabrizio Moretti.

He spins me around as I try to dodge past, his grip ten times firmer than his brother’s. I slam my heel into his foot; his face twists into a grimace and his fingers tighten like a vise. His eyes skim the crowd, and when he finds his other brother, Lorenzo, he jerks his head to the side and starts to drag me between two tents.

“Help!” I scream, hoping to grab the attention of someone, anyone who might get the wrong idea and decide that Fabrizio is a boy hoping to take advantage of a girl. I see nothing but hostile eyes set in familiar faces, those of carnival workers and performers who I have been slowly getting to know over the last several weeks. Some of them, the ones who nodded eagerly during Fabrizio’s speech the night Gin was hurt, look away. Some of them subtly shield me from the curious eyes of townies who have no idea of the horror lying in front of the haunted house. And some of them join the mob.

I scream, one long wordless, endless note of fear in hopes that someone will feel guilty or heroic or something and help me get away. Fabrizio jerks me down another alley so hard that I fall and am dragged for a few feet before I can get upright again. I twist, hoping to tear myself out of his grip, but fail. Fabrizio pulls me toward a tent, and one of his cronies lifts the flap to let us in. We’re in a food tent, one that sells ice cream. There’s a giant freezer in the back corner, and at a signal from Fabrizio, someone starts to empty the contents onto the ground.

I throw up my fist and graze Fabrizio’s immovable jaw. My legs fling out, trying to catch anyone, but no one is close enough.

“Find the roustabout and get him far away from here, then take care of him,” Fabrizio barks out. “The charm isn’t the problem. The two of them are.”

Antonio tries to grab my legs, and I kick. My shoe connects with his chin, opening up a gash on his lip. “Goddamn it!” He dabs at the blood dripping from his mouth. When he sees the red on his fingertips, he glares, and wraps an iron hand around my ankle. They drop me into the freezer, and the cold pierces me. The twitching starts in earnest, so fierce I can’t hold still long enough to try to pull myself out of the freezer. My fingers claw at the walls and flakes of ice slough off before my hand jerks and I lose my grip.

As Fabrizio lowers the door, the big shiny lock swaying ominously from the hinge on the lid, he stares at me. “Things have been going downhill ever since these two have been more concerned with making time with each other than passing on the curse. We’re going to fix more than one of our problems tonight, boys.” His eyes glitter. “Then we’re going to show Emma what we do to troublemakers in the carnival.”





Chapter Thirty-Six


Benjamin

The world outside of Katarina’s tent is an ocean of confusion. Shrieks and screams pierce the night, and they are not the terror/joy hybrid that comes from riding the roller coaster, nor the delight of seeing Mrs. Potter’s dogs run through their tricks. These are the screams of very bad things happening.

The ground seems to slide out from beneath my feet as I run through the carnival, straight into the flow of people running to get away. I trip but catch myself before I face-plant and get up with only a few scrapes on my palms.

Everything hits me as I try to figure out what’s wrong and where to go. The wind rattles the trees near the edge of the carnival, long trails of Spanish moss whipping around. Everything feels like more—the smell of popcorn and sugar, the bleeping machines, the very air that fills my lungs is heavy and sweet, sugar and pine. People rush past me and down the alley, all of them panicked.

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