Master Read online

  The Master

  Alice La Roux

  Contents

  Author’s Note:

  Playlist

  1. Ezra

  2. Delilah

  3. Ezra

  4. Delilah

  5. Ezra

  6. Delilah

  7. Ezra

  8. Delilah

  9. Ezra

  10. Delilah

  11. Ezra

  12. Delilah

  13. Ezra

  14. Delilah

  15. Ezra

  16. Delilah

  17. Ezra

  18. Delilah

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright Notice

  Copyright © 2020 Alice La Roux

  Formatting: FancyFictionFormats

  Proofreading: Dom’s Proofreading

  Cover: Pink Elephant Designs

  All Rights Reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, please contact the author: [email protected].

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  This book is dedicated to the ‘freaks’.

  You are a beautiful mess.

  And that’s okay.

  Author’s Note:

  Please be aware that this book contains themes that some audiences may find triggering as it contains references to self-harm and abuse.

  I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe.

  If I cannot satisfy the one, I will indulge the other.

  ― Mary Shelley, Frankenstein

  Playlist

  My Chemical Romance ─ I'm Not Okay (I Promise)

  Tones And I ─ Bad Child

  YUNGBLUD, Halsey ─ 11 Minutes ft. Travis Barker

  Ronnie Radke ft. Andy Biersack ─ Asshole

  Falling In Reverse ─ The Drug In Me Is Reimagined

  Panic! At The Disco ─ Nicotine

  Boy Epic ─ Scars

  Eminem ft. Rihanna ─ The Monster

  One Ok Rock ─ Taking Off

  Set It Off ─ Killer In The Mirror

  Jack Leopards And The Dolphin Club ─ Look What You Made Me Do (Taylor Swift Cover)

  Billie Eilish ─ All The Good Girls Go To Hell

  One

  Ezra

  We pull up to a shitty little shopping center on the outskirts of town. I wish we didn’t have to stop here, but we required some supplies before tomorrow night. I had always hated places like this as a child, too many people, too many stares. Now I was used to it, sometimes I even enjoyed it. It was my job as Ringmaster to be stared at. To be wanted as I lit the fires in their imaginations. To seduce the audience. But it was all a show. I hated every fucking one of them, clutching their tickets like I was asking them to hand over their souls—no, I just wanted their cash. Their souls were worth nothing. Not to me.

  We begin clambering out of our various vehicles and drawing a crowd.

  “Unless you need something, get back in the fucking trucks!” I shout as I light my cigarette and wait for the groans to die down. We’d been driving for four hours, but we were only thirty minutes away from our destination: Santa Monica Pier. A few of the acrobats start doing tricks in the parking lot while the others cheer and grab their bags. It was only a pit stop for Christ's sake. Children, the fucking lot of them. Grabbing one of the lighting techs, I growl as I shove him back toward the vehicles and resist the urge to laugh as he clambers back in terrified. I nod at Yager, and he begins to herd the rest of them back into their seats. I guess it works in my favor that he feels nothing, it means he doesn’t care about shit like this. Their grumbles and complaints fall on deaf ears as he rounds them back up.

  “Get them to the fucking campsite,” I bark at Jerry, one of our riggers, as I grab my faded black denim jacket and ignore the way some of the performers eye me wearily as they move out of my path. We only need a few trucks to stay behind, the rest can go ahead. “We’ll meet you there.”

  Crispin and Needles join me. She needs some more sewing shit, and he doesn’t like to leave her side when we go out in public. Despite all the freaks in our little family, the mute seamstress is the one we have issues with when we leave the campsite. Go figure. Maia hops alongside them, and together, we head into the shopping complex.

  My skin is burning as we move, it’s the feel of eyes all over my body. Judging. Wondering. I don’t blame them, not really. I have a horn growing out of my forehead, and it’s not like some sort of sexy Halloween prop. It’s rough, black, and you can see the ridges where it’s grown over the years. It’s terrifying. It makes people feel uncomfortable, and I relish that. People can’t take their eyes off me, and I use that to my advantage, that’s my job as Ringmaster. I wink at some chunky housewives staring at me from outside the grocery store. One looks away appalled, while the other blushes. My horn may not be attractive, but I am. It’s not me being conceited either, it’s a universally acknowledged fact. I have dark hair that I keep longer on the top and shaved on the sides, almost black eyes, and a smirk that Satan himself would be jealous of. Add in my ripped jeans, piercings, and tattoos and you have a sinful bad boy. Add the horn and now I’m the monster you either want to kill or fuck. I win either way because you’ve still paid to sit at my table with my freaks—I just can’t guarantee your safety when you do.

  Maia slows down, her hopping changing into a slow walk as she gets caught up in her pain. Those wings attached to her small body are like weights, pulling at her frame, and it’s only when we’re away from Yager and Darryn that I catch glimpses of the agony she’s in.

  My freaks are my twisted little family, some of them found me and some I found after hearing about monsters in the papers. The Carnaval is the only place we can exist without having to hide who we are, without having to apologize for being freaks of nature in one way or another.

  I nod as Crispin and Needles leave for the haberdashery store, and Maia and I get some food supplies. We just needed something basic for tonight, and tomorrow, I’d send out someone to do a more substantial shop. Maybe Yager, just to fuck with him. That boy has attitude in spades, and it riles me the wrong way. He was the only one I regularly lost my temper with. Not that he cared, he didn’t give a shit about anything.

  Maia walks beside me, and I make sure to keep a steady gentle pace. I’m conscious that my long legs mean that my stride can be difficult to keep up with, and in a place like this, leaving her behind would be leaving her vulnerable. The public reception was never something we could gauge until it was too late. However, that doesn’t stop me from turning to the little fairy and telling her to, “Hurry the fuck up!”

  I fill the shopping cart, there are over thirty people travelling with us today, and they’d all need to be fed this evening if I wanted to keep them happy. And if they were happy, they made me money—it was a mutually beneficial transaction. We move down the aisles, all eyes on us, but that’s fine. I straighten up, lifting my chin and squaring my shoulders. I refuse to be intimidated because people are afraid of what they don’t understand.

  A man with greying hair and a pair of thick-rimmed glasses follows us down the vegetable aisle. He says nothing, but his eyes don’t leave us as we move along, picking up potatoes and onions. The frown
lines on his face blur in with his wrinkles, and I just know he’s dying to say something. It’s the horn, it always makes older people nervous. He’s joined by a short fat woman with more neck rolls than a pug doing yoga, wearing a yellow dress covered in the ugliest flowers I have ever seen. It’s almost comical the way her eyes bulge as she clocks what her husband is staring at: us.

  “I charge for pictures, asshole,” I call out with a sly smile, and they shudder. “Double for nudes.”

  Maia chuckles next to me as she tugs on my trouser leg, trying to urge me on as I stare openly back at the rude couple.

  “C’mon. Not worth it,” she hisses as she adds some fruit to our cart. She’s right, I know she is, but I refuse to be intimidated in a supermarket. In a dark alleyway, maybe. Doubtful since I’m the monster that lurks in the shadows. However, in a store where the staff look like they’re barely out of school and the customers are all practically pensioners? Hell no.

  We’re almost at the end of the row when I hear the man shout, “Fucking freaks!”

  I count to ten. It’s the only way I can rein my anger in when we’re in public, and years of experience has taught me that my options are to get angry or to be cold, neither one ideal. Considering I want these people to come to our show, haughty and frosty is the one I choose. Eyebrow raised, I turn on my heel slowly, “Excuse you?”

  I’m aware that it makes me look all the more terrifying, but that’s the point. Who the fuck do these morons think they are dealing with?

  The man coughs awkwardly before his wife elbows his ribs, egging him on. “You heard me, you ain’t welcome here,” he growls, motioning to Maia and me. “Monsters! Filthy fucking midget!”

  “Go back to where you come from!” she chimes in, face red and mottled as her anger grows.

  I share a look with Maia before crossing my arms. “And where the fuck is that exactly?”

  “Hell!” the pig in the yellow dress spits out, waving a bag of pretzels in our direction. Great, religious haters. They’re always my favorite. Not.

  With an exaggerated sigh, I roll my eyes. Do they really think we haven’t heard all of this before? I’ve been running the Carnaval for over ten years now, so trust me when I say I’ve heard some truly unique insults, but they weren't even going to try and put some effort in? Hell, how unoriginal. How uninspiring. How fucking boring.

  “Is there a problem?” a young woman in a store uniform asks as the older woman carries on shouting ‘freaks’ and ‘monsters’ down the aisle at us. Her eyes widen as she looks at my horn, but the blush doesn’t come until she rakes her eyes over my tattoos.

  I offer her a smirk. “Does this lovely man and his pet piggy work for the store?”

  “Um, no?” She tucks a strand of her dark hair behind her ear nervously. “He isn’t an employee.”

  “Do you take cash?” I ask, tilting my head at her. Of course the store would take cash, this was America—everywhere took cash. I just wanted to hammer my point home as I pulled out a wad of bills and gestured at my now overflowing cart.

  “Yes.” She nods eagerly. Money solves almost everything these days.

  I lean in and grin when I hear her sharp inhale. “Then if you want my money, I suggest that you remove this zealot from my sight. I don’t have time for bigotry today, I have a tent to pitch and a show to prepare for.”

  She stammers her apology. “Yes, I’m sorry, sir. Security is on the way.”

  I pull my card out of my wallet and hand it to her with a Carnaval flyer as the older couple are escorted from the store, still screaming insults at us. “Here, if you show this at the ticket booth, it’ll get you and two friends in.”

  She smiles, and I see her eyeing my horn again, but it’s a look I recognize well. She wants to touch it, preferably when she’s touching me. The corner of my mouth moves into a half-smile as I return her gaze. She’s pretty enough, if I see her tomorrow night, I might make her twisted fantasies a reality.

  We leave and the couple are outside still arguing with security, trying to cite their right to free speech and all that shit. Three of the tent riggers spot us and rush forward to help with the bags, leaving Maia and I to walk back to the trucks at our own pace.

  Maia was one of the sweet ones, she was too good and too kind for this cruel world, but that didn’t mean she didn’t have a mischievous side. After a long drive and a handful of slurs being thrown at us, she needed to blow off a little steam, we both did. We have this game we like to play when people piss us off where we perform a tiny act of revenge. Enough to satisfy our petty natures, but not big enough to get us in trouble. I spot a flashy red Ford Mustang, with a rosary hanging from the mirror and a ‘Jesus loves you’ sticker on the bumper.

  “Hey, I bet you ten dollars that the red convertible belongs to Mr. Hell and his piggy.” I nod toward the car as I hand Maia the Swiss Army knife from my pocket.

  Maia grins as she spots it. “You’re on.”

  I keep an eye on the old couple as Maia weaves between the cars, not visible unless you were looking for her.

  “Get a bloody move on,” I hiss as she crouches down with a grin and cuts deep gashes into the tires, the hiss of air therapeutic as their wheels deflate. And if it wasn’t their car, then oh well, it’s no skin off our noses as Maia meets back up with me and we climb into our vehicle.

  We wait for a minute as Yager starts the engine and restarts the navigation system, watching as the old man stands beside the Mustang and looks at his tires, his expression a mixture of devastation and anger. I say nothing as Maia chuckles beside me and slides the money into my pocket.

  Two

  Delilah

  I switch my phone off, ignoring the twelve missed calls from my parents. I’d driven over an hour to get to Santa Monica Pier from Santa Clarita, and I’d spent the whole way talking myself into what I was about to do. I mean, he had to remember me, right? We’d met almost five years ago, but there was no forgetting a man like him. I just hoped he’d remember who I was too. I’d seen them perform before, but my palms were sweating as I parked up and grabbed my purse before heading down toward the pier. I was excited, my heart was hammering away, and every step closer felt more real, like I was meant to be here. I was meant to do this.

  I watch as the crowds of people filter in through the ticket barrier and into the Big Top tent. After that night, I had become obsessed, reading anything I could get my hands on about circuses and carnival shows. It wasn’t a hobby my very conservative parents approved of, but I was stuck, trapped by my life in Santa Clarita, and I wanted nothing more than to run away, to be free. Surely, he’d understand that? He wouldn’t turn me away again, would he?

  I follow the chattering bodies into the stands, the excitement charging the air like electricity as it builds with each passing minute. Finally, the lights dim and everything goes dark before music starts filling the tent. I don’t recognize the tune, but it’s heavy, melodious, and I can feel my chest tightening as it reaches a crescendo. When the last note sounds, spotlights flood the ring, revealing the man I’d been searching for: Ezra Black.

  He’s wearing tight black trousers that shimmer in the light and a red military-style jacket, his own personal spin on the traditional Ringmaster attire. The white shirt he wears is open to his navel, tattoos on display for everyone to marvel at as he strides around with a power that’s almost palpable. He owns everything in this tent, and he knows it. Your heart, your soul, everything: it’s his now. You made a deal with the devil when you bought a ticket to the show, and there’s no turning back as he welcomes you into the darkness. The cane he brings with him glints under the lights as he spins it, weaving a tale of a lonely boy found at the altar of a church and raised by nuns. I know it’s just part of his performance though, it’s all an act as his voice surrounds me, sinking into my skin like teeth that refuse to let go.

  Removing the top hat, there’s an audible gasp from the crowd as they finally see why he’s called ‘The Devil’, a large black horn p
rotruding from his forehead and curls backwards, almost like hair that’s been slicked back. The lighting makes him appear terrifying, and the audience lean in, enraptured by the tales he’s spinning them as he moves. His shadow casts across the canvas of the tent, larger than life.

  “Now that I’ve introduced myself, welcome to the Carnaval des Ténèbres!” His words echo around the stands. “We hope you enjoy the show!”

  He dips out of the spotlight and out of the ring as the music for the next act begins. A small person with wings swings into view, like an enchanting fairy as her body moves to the melody, and while I want to stay and watch—I need to find a way backstage. I need to speak to him.

  I slip out of the tent and ignore the people milling around as I make my way over to an area fenced off and guarded by a big burly man with a reddish mustache.

  “Can I help you, ma’am?” he asks as he stands, folding up his paper.

  “I’d like to speak to Ezra,” I say, forcing some confidence as I try to stop my voice from trembling.

  He makes a clicking sound with his tongue and flashes me a knowing look. “I’m afraid he’s overseeing the show...You should go back to your seat.”

  I cross my arms with a frown. “But he’s done the introductions for this act?”

  The man snorts and raises a brow at me, as if I was just a clueless child. “And he’ll be making sure the next one is ready to go.”