37. Karma
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
KARMA
Everyone is already on stage when I step into the limelight. The music is loud, the crowd is going crazy as the performers all do their last pieces with each other, and confetti is dropped from the ceiling when the sparklers go off.
Kreo spots me approaching him. He smiles wide and opens his arms to present me to the world like he does at the end of every finale. Like a showgirl. Like a toy.
“And here comes—”
I launch a kick into his stomach that sends him flying across the floor. The performers all turn to watch what’s happening, and the crowd starts to quieten to a shocked murmur.
Kreo looks up at me from the floor. “Karma, what are you doing?”
A body slams into my side, and I stumble.
Baxter.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he shouts.
I don’t give him a verbal response. I hate this clown. I hate everyone in this fucking circus.
They mocked me. Left me out. Made me feel lesser.
My teeth sink into his neck before I comprehend my own actions. I pull back to rip out his flesh. He screams, the circus performers start panicking, and the crowd erupts into chaos as blood sprays across my face. I have no stitches in my lips; this smile is all evil and mine.
I focus on Kreo despite the people running around me, trying to get away. He’s staring at me like he’s seen a ghost, a memory, and he’s realised I’m not his little pet anymore.
A fire-eater is shoved aside as the performers scramble to get away from me. He falls into the fabric of the tent. His stick of fire catches the bottom of the tent, and the flames attach to the material like a cat up a tree.
The screams get louder. The excitement in me grows stronger.
One of my guys calls out my name, begging me to come with them, to get out of here.
But I have something to do first.
“You thought you could keep me tamed?” I yell at Kreo, grabbing the tightrope walker as she tries to run with her brother.
She screams when my hand wraps around her throat, and I claw at the flesh, tearing it to shreds.
Her brother stares at me with the most horrified expression I’ve ever seen, and I can sense he’s about to lunge and avenge his sister, but he’s thrown to the floor.
My pussy clenches at the sight of Spiral jumping on his back, slamming his head against the floor with enough force to splatter blood. “Don’t ever look at my dead girl again,” he shouts.
I turn to find Soren shielding Arlo from the flames licking up the rest of the tent, and Micha is a part of the bloodlust, punching anyone who gets close to his stepbrother. A weird sense of comfort and pride twists in my chest; I have people at my side.
Moxie pulls Dolly into the stands, glaring at me with her one working eye like I’ve murdered her personally. She’s too busy trying to get herself out of the burning circus to do anything with that anger, though. Good riddance. I’m glad she’s out of my way.
The tightrope walker’s body drops to the floor with a thump, landing beside her brother, and I stare at Kreo as he watches his circus die.
The audience has become a sea of anarchy. They scramble to flee before the fire reaches them. The performers are trapped on this side of the tent by how quickly it spread.
Above the disarray, the ringmaster’s showgirl and his second-in-command are killing everything they can get their hands on.
“Happy now?” I scream.
Kreo’s eyes are wide, terrified, watching me walk closer and closer.
“W-what have you done?” he says on an exhale.
“What I should have done the moment you tried to control me. You made me for thisss, Kreo. I am your karma. Your karma to your chaos.”
I repeat his diary entry back to him.
He snaps out of it, turning to scramble away, but I’m quicker.
Screams from the performers fill my ears, but Kreo is silent. I jump on his back and slam him to the ground.
“I read your diaries,” I confess in his ear, pulling his head back to stretch his throat. “I mean nothing to you. Ssspiral means nothing to you.”
“Not… true…” he manages to rasp, but I pull his head back harder, silencing him.
My pink sparkly jumpsuit has turned red, covered in blood. Far more fitting, really.
“Tell me how to cure Spiral,” I demand, lowering his head enough to give him the chance to answer.
“Let me go, child. I created you. Gave you life. This is no way to—”
“How do you fix him?” I screech. “Tell me.”
“Not if you don’t release me. Let me live, and I’ll tell you.”
“He’s lying!” Spiral shouts, using the end of a fire-eater’s stick to impale the owner in the stomach.
There are dead bodies everywhere; the last of the performers are trying to find a way out of the blaze.
Moxie is smart; she didn’t panic and figured out the way through the audience stands to the entrance. These fuckers are brainless with fear.
“I’m not. I promise. Let me live, and I’ll tell you exactly how to help him. You want his pain to go away, right? I’ll tell you. Just let me go, Karma.”
I hesitate.
He’s lied before.
But if he doesn’t tell me, I’ll have no way to help Spiral. As badly as I want to spend the rest of my days with his cocks permanently inside of me, logistically, that would be hard, and I have three other men to keep satiated too. I need to find a way to get rid of his pain for good.
“Karma!” Soren shouts, coughing through the smoke. He drags Arlo with him, and Micha is trying to tug Spiral off a dead body as he punches it into the ground. “We need to get out of here. Now!”
The fire has consumed most of the tent, but I can see it starting to die out. There are no more performers to escape. They’re all dead or choking and dying on the floor.
I lift Kreo to stand and put a sharpened nail tip at his throat.
“Tell me, or I’ll cut you open.”
He gulps. I feel it bob. “How did you get like this? You were supposed to be my saviour.”
“Then maybe you shouldn’t have named me Karma,” I hiss in his ear. “No more games. Tell me how to cure Spiral.”
“Karma, leave it. It’s okay!” Spiral yells as one of the poles behind us comes smashing to the ground. This whole thing is going down. “We need to get out of here!”
The distraction is enough for Kreo to slip his hand into the pocket of his red show coat. I see the small object in his hand before I hear the noise.
Three clicks.
I release him on a dominating instinct and step back, the urge to cover my ears overpowering.
Memories flash in my head.
“This is a precaution,” Kreo whispers as the clicks bounce around me. Three times. Then another three.
“Pleasssse. Sssstop,” I whine, hating the noise.
“It has to be done, child. You won’t ever overcome your demonic needs otherwise.”
Three more clicks make me fall to the floor.
His failsafe.
A clicker.
“Stop that!” Arlo shouts, but he ceases his running to me when Kreo holds up his hand.
“Another step and another click.”
“You’re hurting her,” Micha seethes.
“She is mine,” Kreo announces. “Look at what she’s done. I should have known she would snap one day. You broke my trust, Karma. I thought better of you and your primal, innate desires. And you, Spiral. I’m hurt to see how you’ve betrayed me.”
“You lied to me, Kreo. Ten years of lying.”
Their dispute fades to background noise as I fight the urge to return to Kreo on my hands and knees. The clicks are effective. Any more, and I’ll struggle to fight them.
They make me want to retreat to his side. To submit.
I shake my head, my bells ringing around my head, distracting me from the clicks when Kreo taps the little object three more times.
“Come here, Karma. I’ll help Spiral if you come back to me.”
“He’s a liar, Karma!” Spiral shouts. “Please, don’t listen to him.”
“If any of you take another step, I’ll kill her,” Kreo warns.
This breaks through the hold he has on me.
Another lie.
“You can’t,” I laugh. “You don’t know how!”
His face contorts. Fear.
He realises that I know too much.
He goes for his clicker, and Arlo throws something.
A… shoe?
It hits Kreo in the side of the head, distracting him from his failsafe.
It’s enough for me to dive forward. His eyes widen, and I shove him to the ground, the clicker falling aside and rolling away.
“Your creations are the death of you, Kreo.”
My snake tongue doesn’t rattle.
I’m fuelled by certainty.
The electricity inside of me comes to life at my fingertips.
Fire blazes wildly as it catches onto the next strip of the tent, and my sharp teeth sink into the side of Kreo’s face. He screams out, his blood leaking into my mouth, but I feel no satisfaction as I pull him apart. Just like he pulled me apart.
But he won’t be stitched back together.
I rip my collar off and drop it. It lands beside his head.
That’s all of me he gets.
Soren pulls me away, but I fight to tear Kreo apart further.
“He’s dead now, darling. It’s over.”
The sound of light rushing footsteps distracts me.
My head snaps to look in Spiral’s direction.
My lips part to warn him, to yell, but it’s too late.
Moxie rushes forward with a knife, digging it into the back of his neck with one thrust.
I scream.
Someone else screams.
My dead heart breaks.
“Traitor,” she spits as he falls onto his knees. “That’s for Kreo.”
I can’t move, internal pain overtaking me as I stare at his dying body on the floor. Micha holds onto Arlo tightly, Soren holds onto me tighter, and Moxie spins and runs before sense returns to my head.
Spiral’s name leaves my mouth in an anguished, throaty yell, and I fight free from Soren’s grasp.
Arlo is sobbing. Soren is trying to tug me away, but I crawl across the floor, desperate to reach my evil clown. I trample through dead bodies and leaking blood. The fire reflects across the side of his face.
“No!” I weep, dragging his head onto my lap. His black eyes are lifeless. “No, no, no!”
I can’t think of all the ways I’ll kill Moxie when I find her; I’m too occupied with rocking his dead body.
This is all Kreo’s fault.
Spiral is mine. Ours.
Arlo slumps to his knees. Tears cascade down his face. “Please, no.”