The Gothic Circus

The First Encounter

Oldwood Forest, Ireland 1846

            Ria was running through the forest when she saw a light off to her right. She ran towards it and tripped over a root cutting her knee on a sharp rock. Not caring about the pain she scrambled to her feet looking over her shoulder as she started to run again. Bursting through the trees she saw a circus train stopped on the tracks. It was dark and everyone was asleep. Ria heard rustling behind her so she ran down the tracks towards the engine of the train. Again she tripped on a rock and fell face first into the dirt. A hand grabbed her shoulder from behind and pulled her around. She tried to scream, but a big rough looking man covered her mouth with a greasy hand. He was dirty and looked as if he hadn’t bathed in weeks. He smelled of garbage and sewage. He had short graying hair and fierce brown eyes.

            “Hey you hold her down and I’ll slit her throat,” The man said is voice was rough. Ria looked around the clearing to see who the man was talking to when she saw another degusting man standing nearby. The man nodded and she shut her eyes tightly. She felt the cold steel touch her skin, cutting into her all too fragile flesh. She thought she was going to die. Her mouth was no longer covered and she let out a terrible shriek of both pain and terror. As quickly as the pain had come it was over she was on the ground bleeding, but she was still alive. Opening her eyes, she looked around the clearing once more and this time there was new man punching the two men who were trying to kill her. 

She sat up seeing better what was going on she could see one of the two men was lying on the ground with the hilt of the knife sticking out of his bare chest.  She was too horrified to move; she couldn’t run away or feel her body. All she could feel was the terror from what she had witnessed. Snapping her head up the second man grabbed her collar. His face inches from hers she could smell his breath, it smelled of rotten eggs. Then two hands grabbed either side of the man’s face and snapped his neck splattering blood all over her face. The sound of his neck cracking made her turn her head away as the man fell. She looked back seeing the face of the man who had saved her life. It was cold.

         “Are you alright?” he asked her, his hand bloodied. “I… I don’t need your help,” Ria swatted his hand away. It began to drizzle slightly. The blood on her face started to dribble down her cheeks. She got to her feet and ran from him.