White the Cursed

03 - The traveling circus

He was feeling bad. He was feeling really bad. He had not known such guilt in years, but still it was drowned under the thrill of adventure, prohibition, and this surge of freedom.

He had kept the circus ad on him and had waited to go back to the farm in the evening so he could think it over. The village wanted to keep the secret of what had happened to the pond, they didn't want rumors to spread about a curse or the 'ice demon'. So going to see the circus was risky, and dangerous. Then why did he want this so bad ? To commit the forbidden ? In try to escape, if just for one night, this cold and hostile mood he had been living through since the accident ? Or simply just for fun, to prove himself he was still alive ?

He didn't know why exactly, only that he had taken the risk. And here he was in the forest, at the beginning of the night, walking the path heading from his village to Burgess. He was wearing the same outfit as usual, the same pants ripped at the bottom, the same strippes around the calves to try and keep the pants in place, the same a-bit-too-large shirt, the same hooded cape to hide his face. But what was making him feel so guilty was the handful of coins he had stolen from Jonathan, along with the dye for clothes he had taken from Mary's belongings in try to make his hair look a natural color.

He was afraid of the following day. He was afraid Jonathan would notice the missing coins – if the boy managed to not spend everything at the circus – and he was afraid the dye would not wash off. This brownish color had turned his hair almost back to their original color, and he knew looking that much like their supposedly-deceased son was not going to please the couple. He was fearing a violent reaction from Jonathan, and he didn't want to see Mary's heartbreak. It was because he was scared out of his mind of the following day, that he decided to fully enjoy this night.

When he was younger, on several occasion he had accompanied his mother to the city, so he knew where to head, even if the forest was dark and gloomy by night. It didn't took long for him to cross it and follow the city's lights, however he didn't need to enter it as he saw people leaving it to follow another path to the woods. A distant music was playing, and other lights piercing through the trees. It had to be the circus.

A large smile spread on the boy's pale face, before he swiftly followed a five-person family on the path. The kids seemed to be roughtly ten to twelve years old, except for the younger who was six at most. He felt his heart sink as he compared the excited giggle of the girl to Emma's own laughter. She also had the same way of pulling her mother's hand in try to go on an adventure.

The boy lowered his head and slowed down his steps so he could put some distance between this family and him, hoping that would be enough to sooth his nostalgia. His thoughts roamed so much he ended up loosing the group. He sighed and told himself it was no big deal, he didn't need them to find his way to the circus. He just had to follow the lights.

So he kept on walking the path, slowly growing back to enthusiasm and thrill as the music was getting louder. Soon, two tall torches came into view, marking the entrance of the circus judging by the signs they were lighting up. His smile came back to life and he quickened his steps to enter, but someone stepped in to block him.

The young woman, who seemed in her early twenties, was not much impressive. Granted she was taller than the boy, but she was not very large. Okay, she was clearly larger than the skinny boy, but she was far from bulky. Her long braided blond hair reeked fish oil and her smirk didn't seem a good omen.

''Hi kiddo, you seem young for a circus like this. We don't do child price.''

The pale boy felt a bit relieved this woman could be part of the circus troup, for a second he had thought she just wanted to mug him or extort money from him. Still he didn't like her last statement. He knew he had juvenile traits that made him look younger than he was, but still he was seventeen. He was not a child anymore. By the way, he would turn eighteen in a couple of months, even if he knew noone at the village would throw a party for his birthday. His parents would light up a candle but it would only be to honour their dead son. Ignoring the stinging pain these thoughts was waking up, he clenched his fists and focused back on the present.