Show Stopper Read online

  For Mark

  Contents

  Cover

  Dedication

  Prologue

  1. Ben

  2. Ben

  3. Hoshiko

  4. Ben

  5. Hoshiko

  6. Ben

  7. Hoshiko

  8. Ben

  9. Hoshiko

  10. Ben

  11. Hoshiko

  12. Ben

  13. Hoshiko

  14. Ben

  15. Hoshiko

  16. Ben

  17. Hoshiko

  18. Ben

  19. Hoshiko

  20. Ben

  21. Hoshiko

  22. Ben

  23. Hoshiko

  24. Ben

  25. Hoshiko

  26. Ben

  27. Hoshiko

  28. Ben

  29. Hoshiko

  30. Ben

  31. Hoshiko

  32. Ben

  33. Hoshiko

  34. Ben

  35. Hoshiko

  36. Ben

  37. Hoshiko

  38. Ben

  39. Hoshiko

  40. Ben

  41. Hoshiko

  42. Ben

  43. Hoshiko

  44. Ben

  45. Hoshiko

  46. Ben

  47. Hoshiko

  48. Ben

  49. Hoshiko

  50. Ben

  51. Hoshiko

  52. Ben

  53. Hoshiko

  54. Ben

  55. Hoshiko

  56. Ben

  57. Hoshiko

  58. Ben

  59. Hoshiko

  60. Ben

  61. Hoshiko

  62. Ben

  63. Hoshiko

  64. Ben

  65. Hoshiko

  66. Ben

  67. Hoshiko

  68. Ben

  69. Hoshiko

  70. Ben

  71. Ben

  72. Hoshiko

  73. Ben

  74. Hoshiko

  75. Ben

  76. Hoshiko

  77. Ben

  78. Hoshiko

  79. Ben

  80. Hoshiko

  81. Ben

  82. Hoshiko

  83. Ben

  84. Hoshiko

  85. Ben

  86. Hoshiko

  87. Ben

  88. Hoshiko

  89. Ben

  90. Hoshiko

  91. Ben

  92. Hoshiko

  93. Ben

  94. Hoshiko

  95. Ben

  96. Hoshiko

  97. Ben

  98. Hoshiko

  99. Ben

  100. Hoshiko

  101. Ben

  102. Hoshiko

  103. Ben

  104. Hoshiko

  105. Ben

  106. Hoshiko

  107. Ben

  108. Hoshiko

  109. Ben

  110. Hoshiko

  111. Ben

  112. Hoshiko

  113. Ben

  114. Hoshiko

  115. Ben

  116. Hoshiko

  117. Ben

  118. Hoshiko

  119. Ben

  120. Hoshiko

  121. Ben

  122. Hoshiko

  123. Ben

  124. Hoshiko

  125. Ben

  126. Hoshiko

  127. Ben

  128. Hoshiko

  129. Ben

  130. Hoshiko

  131. Ben

  132. Hoshiko

  133. Ben

  134. Hoshiko

  135. Ben

  136. Hoshiko

  137. Ben

  138. Hoshiko

  139. Ben

  140. Hoshiko

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Prologue

  HOSHIKO

  The cries of the audience pound in my head as I stand, poised, above them. I’m a hundred feet off the ground but, if I try, I can make out individual faces in the sea of bodies below me.

  I begin swinging. Backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards. Gaining momentum, gaining pace, becoming rhythmic: backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards.

  There is only me now; only the arc and the fall. If I let go too soon I won’t reach the wire; too late and I’ll loop right over it.

  Just as I am perfectly level, I pull my legs inward and upward, on to the wire. I crouch there, both feet gripping, as the twanging vibrations ease. My breathing gradually steadies. I’m in control once more, back in my element. Time to give them what they want.

  Balancing easily, I lift one leg off the wire, higher and higher, leaning my body forward until the line of my legs is completely vertical, like a giant letter T. I stay poised for a moment or two and then somersault, again and again and again, feet landing back on the wire each time.

  I look down at the cheering throng below then lower myself down so that I’m sitting, legs split, resting on the wire either side of me before I grip on to it and let myself spiral, above and below, faster and faster and faster, whirling the crowd into a frenzy. Eventually, when their screams feel like they could raise the roof, I stop and pull myself up on the wire again. Time for the highlight of my little show.

  Reaching over to the wings, I am handed a stool. I raise it aloft, my feet curling round the wire as I balance, feeling my way back to the middle of the tightrope. There’s a tense silence as the audience holds its breath.

  I rest two of the stool’s legs on the wire. I mustn’t rush it, it’s all about balance now. Balance and instinct. I climb on to the stool, sitting on it. Legs crossed, arms thrown out wide. Finally, I curl my legs in and straighten myself, so that I’m standing on the stool. I elevate one leg, rise up on to the point of my toes and spin. Round and round, high above the world, defying gravity. Defying the odds they’ve given me yet again. The band strikes up, a grandiose crescendo of celebration. Fireworks explode all around me, cascading down like stars. Far below in the arena, a band of gymnasts in white tumble and leap while I, the pinnacle, the centre point, reign supreme.

  It’s then, out of the corner of my eye, that I see Silvio watching from the platform. He looks furious. Why? My blood runs cold as I realize.

  He wanted me to fall.

  He’s concealed from below by the great curtains billowing either side of the platform.

  I’m the only one who can see him.

  Our eyes meet as he reaches out one hand and clasps hold of the tightrope. Grinning wickedly, he jerks it back and forth, sending his message of execution down the wire.

  I can’t maintain my balance and I fall, hearing the collective gasp of the audience as I plummet head first to the ground.

  BEN

  I can’t take my eyes off her, hanging there. She must be one hundred feet up, but I can see the expression on her face so clearly. She doesn’t look frightened; she looks angry. Why?

  Without warning, she swings. The spotlights catch on the sparkles in her costume as she pendulums back and forth. A human glitter ball, casting patterns over the arena. Her long black hair is alive and dancing, the light reflecting off its glossy waves. Springing on to the wire, she’s so agile she takes my breath away.

  Around me, they’re all caught up in the excitement. Mother, Father, Francis, even the bodyguards, actually jumping up and down in their glee, so hard that I feel the box shuddering beneath my feet.

  I look back at the girl, now flitting effortlessly across the wire. She starts to dance up there, as if she’s not on a wire at all. She’s up on one leg, and then down, spiralling, a blur of light and motion.

  Someone hands her a stool. I can’t believe my eyes when she somehow balances its legs on the wir
e and sits on it. If this was on TV, I wouldn’t believe it; I’d think it was all a fix, just down to clever camera work. She’s sitting on a stool. A stool on a tightrope.

  She rises upward. Surely she’s not going to? She is. She stands on it. This can’t be real. How is she doing it?

  She spins on one foot, whirling round and round and round. Everyone’s on their feet now, stamping and clapping: a thunderous applause.

  She’s not smiling though. Her dark eyebrows are arched disdainfully and she’s so close I can see the blaze in her eyes as she spins, lashes lowered, glaring down at the crowd.

  I stop cheering.

  I’ve never seen anyone like her before. I can’t stop staring at her face. I see her eyes shift to the side. See them widen in horror. See her slip backwards. See her falling…

  BEN

  The Cirque coming is all anyone’s been talking about for weeks. As soon as the adverts appear online and in the papers, there’s a buzz of excitement in the air, so electric you feel you could touch it. It’s been over ten years since it was last in London and I was too young then, really, to care that much when Mother and Father said we couldn’t go. I remember afterwards how the older kids at school couldn’t stop talking about it in the playground, and we all gathered around to listen. There was a big crowd of us, straining forward to try and catch their words. I must have only been five or six, but I can still hear them now.

  “It’s magic,” one boy said. “Not fake magic, but real magic. It must be, the things they can do in there!”

  And there was a girl, her eyes glowing when she joined in. “It’s like a dream,” she said. “It’s like a fairy story.”

  The day it’s due to arrive, it seems like every kid in the whole school is heading over to the fields straight after the bell to watch it turn up. I have this ridiculous fantasy in my head that I’ll be able go too, but as soon as I turn to Stanley, my bodyguard, lingering discreetly at the back of the classroom, his mouth tightens and he shakes his head. I know exactly what he means: Don’t even think about it.

  I ask my twin brother, Francis, about the circus in the car on the way home from school.

  “Are you annoyed that we can’t go and watch the circus coming?”

  He looks at me like I’m mad.

  “Why would I want to watch that? Why would anyone want to watch a load of Dreg scum coming into town?”

  I don’t know what to say. I just shrug and stare out of the window.

  Once home, I don’t even go into the kitchen to ask our servant Priya for a snack. I head upstairs straight away, right up to the library at the top of the house. You can see for miles around up here and all the way down into the city below. The main road into town snakes away to the left. That’s where the circus will head in from.

  I can see the other kids, dozens of them, all perched on the fence posts which line the fields. I’ve got a far better view from up here but I’d rather be down there, with them, huddled up for warmth, legs dangling down on the fence, exhaling smoky puffs of cold air every time we laugh.

  It looks much more fun where they are. It looks like freedom.

  Nothing happens for ages and then four huge lorries come winding their way up the hill.

  Six Dregs and a guard jump out of each one and the Dregs begin assembling great iron fences, cordoning off four fields. They work quickly and efficiently and before long the fields have vanished from the view of everyone down there at eye level.

  It makes it all seem even more mysterious and secretive. If you want to see into the Cirque, you pay your money like everyone else. There aren’t any free viewings, not unless you’re way up here, and there aren’t many people whose status makes them important enough to live as high above ground as us.

  Once they’ve finished, the men jump back into the lorries and drive away, leaving all the kids staring at the miles of iron fences.

  The Cirque must be absolutely massive if it’s going to take up all that space.

  Everything goes quiet again after that. Some of the kids get bored and wander off home for tea, but they’re replaced by others, and then they return again, and still there’s no sign of the Cirque itself.

  I don’t go downstairs at dinner time so Priya sends my food upstairs on a little tray. I don’t eat much though; I’m too busy craning my neck out of the window.

  Finally, twinkling and shining its way up the hill, I see it.

  The procession.

  None of the kids can see it at first, and then, as it makes its way over the crest of the hill, they’re all suddenly up on their feet, standing on the fence posts, jostling for position.

  Six white horses all dotted with fairy lights trot along at the front; on their backs stand girls and boys in illuminated, spangled costumes. They spring up in the air, tumbling again and again and landing, incredibly, on their two feet.

  After them comes a gleaming Palomino horse, much bigger than the others. You can sense its restrained energy in the way it moves: legs rising high as it trots, neck arching forward.

  There’s a man standing on its back, all dressed up in a funny little suit, with a monkey on his shoulder. He’s carrying a big box and he tosses handfuls of sweets from it to the kids, who are all jumping up and down, crying out to him desperately with outstretched hands.

  After him come dozens of pretty little pastel-coloured wagons, huge trailers of equipment, and then even bigger trucks – which must house the Dregs and the rest of the animals, I suppose.

  Last of all is a huge open trailer, lit up with hundreds of multicoloured lights. It’s full of people – the performers – all waving to the crowd of children. Clowns are juggling balls, more acrobats are tumbling and there are two fire-eaters devouring angry tongues of flame.

  Way above them, there’s a girl, a tightrope walker, somersaulting and spiralling.

  A bright white spotlight follows her as she darts and weaves through the inky sky.

  The wire she’s on stretches between two high poles, connected across the dozens of carriages. She twists and turns along the whole length of the procession, fluid like water.

  Lasers dance all around her, and fireworks soar up into the sky, framing her in golden stars.

  Her image is projected as dozens and dozens of holograms way up into the air, so that everywhere you look replicas of her arch and tumble and somersault, lighting up the darkness.

  People must be able to see her for miles.

  One of the images is right outside the window, inches below my head. She looks up suddenly and I stare back into her eyes. There’s a steely look in them; she’s beautiful but there’s something about her that makes me shiver. I know it’s not really her out there looking in at me, but she feels so close, like I could touch her. I open up the window as far as it can go and stretch out my hand, straining it towards the light radiating from her, but my fingers clasp at nothing.

  It’s when I see her, dancing across the sky, that I make the promise to myself. Whatever happens, whatever Mother and Father say, I’m going to the Cirque.

  HOSHIKO

  The children lining the fences all cheer and shout as we arrive. Most of them are actually jumping up and down with excitement, their hands clasping for the sweets that Silvio cascades into the crowd.

  I beam my smile down at them as I tumble, waving and blowing kisses every time I land back on the wire.

  I hate them.

  I hate them all.

  I think about spitting on them.

  This is it, then: London. It’s been ten years since the circus pitched up here – just before I was selected. It can’t be later than five o’clock but it’s dark already and the buildings stretching out all around me twinkle with a million lights.

  Right up in the middle of the vast sprawl, towering over the labyrinth of skyscrapers and office blocks below, rises the famous Government PowerHouse. It’s bathed in yellow light and is so huge that I can make out every detail, even from up here as I flip and dance. It’s just like Amina
described it. From the bottom, in gleaming black ebony, hundreds and hundreds of sculpted bodies rise up in a great column. Coiled around each other, on top of each other, entwined with each other, crushing each other: a massive pyramid of writhing Dregs.

  On top, right there on the peak, gleaming and glistening above the world, a huge gold statue stands supreme, supported by the hundreds of clustered, crouching bodies beneath. A man – a superman – rippling muscles, face smiling tenderly down at the city below him.

  I shiver, and feel my feet wobble as I lose concentration.

  It stands for everything that’s wrong with the world, that statue. It stands for dominance and pride and power. It stands for oppression: the many being crushed by the few. It stands for evil.

  I can’t tear my eyes away from it. I keep staring at it as the trailers wind their way through the great metal gates which then slam shut with a resounding clang.

  At least that will be the last I see of it until we leave. That will be the last any of us see of the outside world for two weeks, until we dismantle and pack up and make our way to a new destination. It shouldn’t really matter where we are, what town we pitch up in; the people who flock here night after night are the same wherever we go.

  But it feels different, being here, right at the centre of it all: right where the laws are made, right where the PowerHouse squats.

  I shiver again before I jump down from the wire.

  As soon as the gates shut, Silvio disembarks his Palomino stallion. “Round them up and get them building!” he orders the guards. “Time is money!” The smiling, benevolent bestower of sweets has vanished and his lips are curled impatiently.

  I try to reach Greta and Amina but I can’t get to them quickly enough. They’re herded off to one field and I’m left behind with another group.

  Crack! A whip lashes across my back as we’re herded over to a big pile of building materials.

  “What are you waiting for, you fools?” Silvio shrieks at us, his whip catching me again, catching all of us as we huddle together while it rains down relentlessly. “Get down there, crawl on your hands and knees and start building!”

  BEN

  All that evening I sit up in the library and watch as a vast walled town is erected before my eyes. Huge scaffolds, great metal walls, all nailed and hammered together painstakingly by dozens of Dregs. The billowing fabrics of golds, silvers and reds which are finally pinned on give the illusion of dozens and dozens of tents, all with domed roofs reaching up into the sky; but they aren’t tents at all. They are real solid structures built like that to keep the animals in, I guess, and the Dregs too.