Movement No. 3
Yasmeena
When we return to Hel’s Carnival, Khalid and Reina are nowhere to be found. I check their tent, expecting to see clothes strewn about and empty spaces where bags and suitcases once were, but their room is just as it was when we left this morning.
I check in with Robyn, who reaffirms they couldn’t have gone far, but it does nothing to squash the anxiety festering in my chest.
“I’m almost certain they’re just talking by the lake. Give them time,” Draven tells Gemma and me as we get back to our tents.
The midday sun hangs high in the sky. Camp is empty this time of day, the other carnies busy working the stands and rides at the carnival. I know I should get back to work, but the rage bubbling in my stomach says otherwise.
“Fine,” I say, even though I feel anything but fine.
The lie tastes bitter on my tongue, but I don’t have the energy to explain to my equally traumatized friends that I’m a little over everything lately. I lost my parents, I can’t afford to lose my brother too. I’ve just never had the time to relax. Not in years, at least.
When I was born, I was the only child to two loving parents who doted on me and gave me everything they could.
They eventually had my brother, and we spent many years happy and normal.
Governor Cavan took that from me—from us.
He assigned my parents to work as divers, mining for minerals, and it was there they died.
I was thirteen. Fifteen years have gone by, and yet it still feels like yesterday.
I can still smell my mother’s perfume.
Khalid and I worked as divers for a few years too, but we were lucky enough to become street performers, and eventually escape to Hel’s Carnival, where demons and half-demons, felion, humans, and hybrids can live in harmony.
I’ve gotten close to certain people—Lilian is my best friend, Reina and Gemma and Absinthe are my friends and confidantes, and even Draven has grown on me. I’d consider him a friend as well.
I’m not as close to Robyn, Quinn, and Rowan as the others are.
They’re older, and I think it’s different.
They practically raised everyone here. I don’t have the same parental affection, but I do care about them.
I care about everyone in Hel’s Carnival, which is not something I expected when I first joined.
It felt like a means to an end, rather than a beginning.
Making friends wasn’t easy on Ira, we were all exhausted by a broken system, but here on Haeresis, we have community. Not just the carnies, but other felion as well. I have Roxanne and Sofie, Khalid has Kayoda and Ivan. We’re finally able to have a life beyond survival.
It’s been a tiresome existence: grieving my parents, seeking salvation with my brother, and then working as a performer and now spy. I’m proud to be a part of something bigger than just myself, but deep down, I think I envy those who didn’t have to be responsible at such a young age.
Honestly, I envy anyone who gets to wake whenever they want to, make tea and watch the sunrise with their loved ones. I ache for a softer life, but Hel doesn’t seem to know what soft is.
This planet was not designed with felion or lupion in mind—we came here by way of The Convergence. Thousands of years ago, when the planets crashed together, many of my species’ ancestors reproduced with demons, which is how felion were made. We’re the amalgamation of demons and cat nymphs.
From the stories we were told as children, the cat nymphs lived much more peaceful lives.
They were more frolic through meadows kind of cats and less street fight for scraps kind of cats.
But that’s all history. I could spend an entire lifetime studying the past, researching and learning about all the things that made the planet the way it is, but it wouldn’t change a damn thing.
Lives wouldn’t be better, we’d simply have an explanation for why life sucks so bad, and that feels fruitless. I’d rather do what I can and focus all my efforts on improving the now.
Passing through the heavy iron gates, I enter the main section of the carnival. There are couples lined up to ride the Ferris wheel, and a little half-demon holding cotton candy in front of the carousel.
The air around me is sparkling and sweet, like a sugar-coated strawberry after a warm trip to a farmer’s market.
Aida’s wagon sits just thirty-or-so steps ahead of me, and I walk towards it, grateful she’s here right now and not visiting her brother on Earth.
From what I’ve learned, I find Earth to be a strange planet.
Gemma and Aida have explained that on Earth, beings from the same species can have completely different cultures.
Gemma’s family descended from what are considered Italians.
Something about eating tomato-based dishes and wearing golden horns on their necks.
Other humans are different, with completely unique languages and cultures.
Even Aida speaks Arabic, English, and Serpenia. She has customs and preferences inspired by her ancestors. Her heritage. Foods and cultural dances.
Hel just doesn’t work like that. Everything is species-based here.
Although I look somewhat human, and my name has similarities to some human names, there’s nothing human about me.
I know the histories of my demon and cat nymph ancestors, and that’s it.
Even the half-demons and hybrids who are part human don’t know about their heritage, and it’s a shame.
History can teach us some things about the past, but there are still fragments lost to time.
The citizens of Hel mostly speak English, Latin, Vietnamese, French, and Ombrano, so we know Hel crashed into Earth and Umbra.
But where are all the vampires? And how come there are so many satyr and orc hybrids if we didn’t crash into Moonflower or Barac? So much is still left unanswered.
I think the lack of culture on Hel created stagnation, but now there is something unifying some species: mistreatment.
The lupion packs might have different traditions, and the half-demons and hybrids might have separate ancestors and origins, but the mistreatment from the government is what will unite everyone.
It makes me wonder if I’m part of the problem, doing Luc’s dirty work. He says he’s going to force his siblings to reform, but I’m not positive that’ll come soon enough.
Reaching the platform, I traipse up the short staircase and knock on the door.
“Come in,” Aida says, and I continue inside.
Just like my brother and myself, Aida has deep tan skin and golden eyes, but the rest of her could not be more different than anyone in the carnival—or even anyone I’ve ever seen before.
She is a serpentine. They are beings with human-like upper halves, but the lower half of a snake. Aida’s tail is long and black, with faint gold flecks scattered throughout. She moves and presents herself like a goddess.
“Come, my child. There are things I must tell you.”
Aida’s presence alone feels like a warm embrace. She isn’t performative or overly excitable, but she also doesn’t come across negatively either. Her attitude and behavior are typically neutral, which I find comforting.
“What ails you?” she asks while patting the seat beside her.
The bench Aida is perched on is plush and soft, and velvet curtains drape the walls, embroidered with different symbols, including stars that seem to flicker a sparkling gold.
Shelves line the wooden room, crowded with jars of dried herbs and various trinkets.
Bakhoor is burning, and I waft in the warm, woody smell.
“We are trying to find a solution to this problem with the felion and lupion, and we’ve come up with a decent plan, but there’s just one problem.”
“Khalid?”
“Yes. I don’t know how to get him to agree to this, and even if I do, will Reina ever forgive me?”
“Would you forgive her?” she asks, her brows wrinkling in the center.
I shrug, my muscles aching from the stress of everything that’s been weighing me down. “I don’t know. I’d like to say I would, but I think I’d be lying.”
“Do you want to ask your brother to make this sacrifice?”
“No,” I say almost instantly. “No, I want to find something else. What do you see?”
She gives me a look, almost as if she isn’t going to use her powers, but then her eyes turn from gold to white, and I patiently wait.
The seconds turn into minutes and the minutes feel like hours as I watch her, those intense eyes tracking every movement in her mind.
My mind is racing, my heart pounding like thunder in my chest. I can’t help but wonder if Aida sees the same future I’ve been contemplating.
When Aida comes to, she gasps slightly, and takes my hand. “Khalid is not going to make this sacrifice. It is not in any version of the future.”
“Oh?”
“You are.”
Thank goodness. Why would Khalid have to make this sacrifice, when I’m right here? I could marry someone, or at least fake an engagement for long enough to form a treaty. I’m more level-headed than Khalid, and I think I want this more than he does.
Khalid has found someone he loves, I cannot take that from him. For all I know, I might die alone, so why not make a productive choice in the meantime? For the sake of my people.