[] CHAPTER 4 []
/\ SWITCH TRACKS /\
The Eternal Circus, despite all of its excitement in the dead of night, was relatively peaceful in the mornings.
The performers were dead asleep, exhausted from their night of work, and the crowd was gone, having left the building to go about their own lives.
On mornings like these, Elijah was preparing.
He was young for an Immortal-22 that summer-but he still carried all the duties that his father, Syrpinys, couldn't bother to do.
On this morning, Elijah was preparing for a night away from the ever-moving circus within a realm that only the Immortals-and the unlucky souls brought here by them-could access. There was a ceremony that one of the performers had been set to go to, but Syrpinys was supposed to go in his stead.
He never did.
Instead, he sent his only son to go for him. Elijah himself was in his room in one of the rotating platforms near the top of the tent, big enough to be an apartment in its own, with windows and a glass spot in the floor that allowed him to look down at what would usually be the unending swing of the circus.
Even now, it was still going, with a few of the performers who hadn't gotten to perform that night practicing their act. The Immortals weren't particularly picky about how they were to be amused, but they'd better be amused, lest the performers find their existence cut rather short.
Elijah had never truly cared either way. All of the performers had done some sort of wrong against either a God, Demigod, or beloved of an Immortal, and in his eyes, they'd earned their place in the Eternal Circus.
The Immortal Audience didn't know about the solemn air in the Circus on those mornings. Elijah felt like he was suffocating, the sorrow of the performers below choking him like a noose. It was hard to be impartial when those mortals were all so sad.
But as the son of the Ringmaster, impartial was what he had to be.
Elijah himself didn't perform or take any role in the Circus, his only tie to it being his father, Syrpinys, and his trips to the Mortal Realm, Eylfar, to be present for events and ceremonies, despite Syrpinys trying to train him to become the next Ringmaster.
Being the center of a circus, eternal or not, was never really Elijah's calling. What was, however, was history.
He spent hours in his room, away from the suffocating Circus, reading stories about how Eylfar-the Mortal Realm-was separated from Eldfar-the Immortal Realm. He loved learning old languages, like how the Immortals, before they first came to Eylfar and, eventually, Earth, had their own language, resulting in the names of the realms; Eld meaning old, Eyl meaning new, and far meaning world.
But most of all, he loved the history of music.
He loved reading about how the creation had manifested in both realms, with the Immortals having it written into their very existence and the humans finding it in every facet of their world. He loved learning about how the Immortals and their descendants could find their influence in human music, and find human influence in their own.
He was currently picking out a suit-he preferred white ones-and twisted, looking over at himself in the mirror. Dark curls fell over his ears and down his neck, ending at his shoulders, and his eyes, which shone with a fierce gold that was a sign of his immortality, held the mirror with an air of confidence and strength, framed by jet-black square glasses. Two horns poked out from his temples and spiraled up towards the roof, small ridges along them shining with a dark, almost black purple. His skin was pale, moreso than a humans' could possibly be, but his cheeks still held a tint of rose that signaled towards something like life. He was currently wearing a white tailcoat with wristcuffs and gold buttons that accentuated his eyes beautifully, matched with white pants. Elijah took a moment to decide whether or not he'd use that one before changing into a more comfortable pale yellow sweater and leaving the room. He stood at the balcony, watching the practicing performers from above as he and his room rotated slowly, floating high in the air. Tonight, he'd be far away from that shining ball, far from the crowd of cheering Immortals that roared like thunder.
Elijah knew very well that the thought was not supposed to be so freeing.
.
.
.
