A Lesson for the Cyclops Read online

  “Stupid freak, look what you gone and done,” he mumbled. Then he kicked her once in the thigh and staggered off, leaving her half-naked beside a pool of vomit.

  She never was sure which haulman had tried to rape her, so in her mind they all were potential rapists. That's why when the haulman called out to her from Marco’s tent, she felt the familiar dread she'd felt since that horrid event whenever any of them took note of her.

  She considered pretending not to have heard him, but he called out to her again, louder.

  “Dammit, freak! Get in here!”

  She lifted the flap with a trembling hand and entered the tent. The attractive stranger lay shirtless and pale on a cot, his brow dotted with perspiration. The dark-haired haulman stood beside him, hopping from foot to foot.

  The Cyclops stared at him in confusion. “Why are you—?”

  The haulman rushed at her. She flinched, anticipating a blow to her face, but he knocked her aside.

  “Out o’ me way, dammit!” he said. “I’ve had t’ drop a load for over an hour now and the guy who’s suppossa relieve me didn’t come.”

  He pointed at the bucket and then at the stranger. “You, stay here. Keep him cool until I get back. If any asks, I tole you to do it.”

  Before she could reply, the haulman hobbled off in an odd crablike gait, cursing and pleading with his bowels for patience.

  Now she was alone with the shirtless stranger. He lay on the cot, seemingly dead to the world. His chest rose and fell rapidly—too rapidly, it seemed—and his body was perspiring profusely. Anyone else would've looked terrible, under the circumstances.

  The Cyclops approached him hesitantly. “Hello?”

  He did not respond. She extended a shaking hand to his forehead and winced. He was so hot, it hurt to touch him!

  She settled into the chair beside the cot and located the rag that the haulman had been using to dampen the stranger’s face. She wrung it out over the dirt floor and dunked it into the pail, drenching it thoroughly. She applied the dripping rag to his forehead, blotting the wetness out of his eyes with her sleeve.

  The stranger moaned once, almost a whimper.

  Encouraged by this, she wet the rag again. This time, she ran it along the sides of his neck and under his chin. He had what looked to be a week’s worth of stubble on his face, and it scratched the back of her hand.

  She stole a timid glance at his chest. At first, it had appeared to be hairless, but she now realized it had a light fuzz of nearly blond hair. She thought about touching that hair with her index finger, but decided that would be too brazen.

  However, he was still sweating, so she wet the rag again. Feeling giddy at her boldness, she ran the rag over his chest. She marveled at the shape of it, the way it rose and fell so powerfully. The image of one of the circus’s lions came to mind.

  She noted an assortment of scars on his chest. The quantity and variety led the Cyclops to believe he had lived a very interesting life for someone so young. She could only speculate as to what sorts of adventures might have produced the individual scars.

  Now she glanced at his belly and was astonished to see how developed those muscles were. He hadn’t seemed very strong when he had stumbled into camp half-dead, but she imagined that muscles like those didn’t develop by chance. This man had used his body for something difficult. Could he be a laborer? But then she would have expected his chest, shoulders, and arms to be bigger.

  She was acutely aware of the sheet that covered him from his belly button on down. She took a furtive look at the tent opening, and then with a mischievous smile, she lifted the sheet for just long enough to take a good, long look. She inhaled sharply and felt her cheeks grow warm.

  She decided she had better stick to cooling his face and chest.

  She dunked the rag into the pail again, but her mischievous smile remained.

  Chapter 5

  The Cyclops was on display when the word reached her that the man had regained consciousness. The day was swelteringly hot, and even in the sheltered half-darkness in the Freak Show’s maze of rooms, the heat was enough to make her head ache and to bathe her in sweat.

  After the last mark departed and before the next one would arrive, one of the midget twins leaned over and quickly whispered the news. The Cyclops’s heart pounded. In fact, she was so excited that she almost forgot to get into character as a man and a boy idled up to her cage to gawk.

  The Cyclops smiled and twirled her hair with her finger. She whistled a tune and danced in place for a few moments, emphasizing the swaying of the hem of her gown.

  “Papa?” the boy said, his voice hesitant. He was perhaps around ten, his hair blond and raggedy. “Is that a man?”

  His father, a plain man in middle age, scrunched up his face at her. “I think it’s a girl, Leilano. I ain’t certain, but that’s how it looks to me.”

  The comments from the marks never stopped hurting, not even after nearly a decade as a freak. She smiled broader, squeezing her eye tightly to hold back the tears. She began to hum a sweet song, as a young lady might do.

  “Papa, why don’t she got no nose?”

  The farmer shrugged. “Son, some people are just born ugly. The gods must hate them, I guess.”

  Chapter 6

  Conchinara was with the man by the time the freaks arrived. As the Cyclops entered the tent, Conchinara was laughing gaily at something he had said.

  “Oh,” she said, fanning herself with a feathered hand-fan, “I must remember to be careful around you. You have a wicked tongue, sir.”

  He sat on the cot in which he had slept the last three days. His skin was still pale, but the redness around his eyes had gone, and he seemed to be in fine spirits. Too fine, actually, judging from the way he looked at Conchinara.

  “My lady,” the man said with a lascivious smile that made the Cyclops’s heart ache, “I can assure you that my tongue is the least wicked part of my body. I know; I’ve looked. Twice.”

  Conchinara laughed again, her voice every bit as musical as the Cyclops’s wasn’t. Her dark eyelashes fluttered coquettishly. She leaned toward him conspiratorially, revealing an expanse of perfect olive skin and a deep, inviting cleavage. The Cyclops did not want to be in the same tent with such beauty. She was hideous enough on her own, but when compared to Conchinara …?

  “But perhaps you’d prefer to check for yourself,” D’Arbignal said to Conchinara with a wink. “Just to be sure, you know.”

  “The gentleman mocks me!” Conchinara said, placing a slender hand upon his.

  “Mock you?” he said. “Never. Tease you, perhaps, but I’d never mock a lady as beautiful as—ah, company!”

  He smiled broadly and waved his hand in a theatric gesture of welcome.

  “Come in, come in!” he said. “The sun is blistering out there. Come into the shade!”

  Conchinara did not look pleased at the intrusion, but they were just the oddities. She must know they were no real threat to her.

  “Hoow … how are you feeling?” Pahula said, her eyes lowered and demure.

  “Never better!” the man said. He tested his shoulder by swinging his arm and winced. “Well, rarely better, anyway.”

  His audience laughed at his jest. He had the natural charm of an entertainer; it was obvious he was in the trade. An acrobat? Thespian? Some kind of showman, in any case.

  Conchinara squeezed his hand. “I’m so glad you’re feeling better. I was very worried about you.”

  “Fear not,” he said, grinning. “It’ll take more than that to get me to quit this world!”

  “How did you get your wound?” one of the midget twins said.

  A roguish sparkle shone in his eyes. “Why, in a duel, of course!”

  “A duel?” the Cyclops said, incredulous. “With arrows? And you were hit in the back!”

  “I didn’t say it was a fair duel,” he said, and again, his audience laughed. “But I’ve been remiss. We haven’t been introduced.”

  He p
erformed a little bow and flourish from his cot. “I am D’Arbignal: sailor, singer, a fair dancer and a terrible poet, an occasional philosopher and an itinerant adventurer. I am also the greatest swordsman in the world! And you, my lady?”

  The Cyclops blinked in astonishment. His words bounced around her head, and she tried to take it all in.

  “Me?” the Cyclops said. “My … uh … my name is Maria.”

  “It is a great pleasure meeting you, Maria,” D’Arbignal said.

  One of the midget twins whispered to the other: “Did you know that her name was Maria?”

  “But speaking of swords,” D’Arbignal said, returning his attention to Conchinara. “I recall stumbling into camp crazier than a 400-year-old mage who’d summon a demon to protect his village. I remember swinging my rapier at people, and that they were brave enough to take it from me. I thank you for that, and if it’s not too much trouble, ask that you reunite us.”

  Conchinara flashed a guilty expression at the Cyclops.

  “Um,” Conchinara said.

  All present were staring at the Cyclops. She wished she could vanish into the ground.

  Instead, she said, “I did that. I held your sword for you.”

  D’Arbignal grinned and his eyes sparkled. “Did you now?”

  Only then did the Cyclops realize the unintended double entendre’.

  “Not like that!” she said, her face warm.

  “Fool,” Conchinara muttered. “Of course it wasn’t like that.”

  All the people looking at her made the Cyclops uncomfortable in a way being in the Freak Show never had. “I’ll … uh … I’ll go get it for you. And your bag, too.”

  The Cyclops fled the tent. As she ran across the grounds, she fervently hoped D’Arbignal would not repeat that bit about being the “greatest swordsman in the world” within earshot of Alfredo.

  Chapter 7

  The sun was setting as the Cyclops approached the tent she shared with Pahula. Her thoughts were in turmoil, and her heart pounded. An odd mixture of exhilaration and melancholia filled her. It was as though she could half-see the future, and it would be exciting yet tragic, much as her life had been.

  She entered the tent, only to discover Alfredo ransacking her belongings. The tent was a shambles, with her possessions strewn all over the ground. Alfredo had taken a knife to her pillow and was shedding straw everywhere as he dug into it. Under his breath, he was cursing.

  “Damn her, damn her, damn her,” he mumbled.

  She gasped and Alfredo spun, his knife at the ready. As soon as he recognized her, he sprung at her and placed the side of his knife along her face.

  “Where is it?” he said, his breath foul. It was the closest any man had stood to her in years. “Where did you hide it?”

  She knew to what he was referring, of course, but she stammered, “Hide w-what?”

  He pressed the blade against her face and she inhaled sharply.

  “Don’t play coy with me,” he hissed. “You’re not smart enough, and as sure as the sun will rise tomorrow, you aren’t pretty enough. Now where did you put that rapier?”

  Trembling, she raised her arm and pointed to a spot beside her cot. The rapier was not there.

  “Don’t lie to me, freak! Where is it?” He pressed the knife harder, and she felt a rivulet of blood run down her cheek.

  “It was th-there!” she said, terrified yet oddly aloof from her fear. “I sw-swear it!”

  Alfredo glanced at the spot one more time, and then withdrew the knife. She had started to relax when he backhanded her across the face. She collapsed to the ground.

  “Fool!” he said and stormed from her tent.

  After a minute had passed and Alfredo had not returned, the Cyclops opened the trunk at the base of her cot. Its contents had obviously been routed through, so it took her a little while to find what she sought.

  She withdrew the small mirror she had buried at the bottom of the trunk, and looked at her reflection for the first time in recent memory.

  She was hideous, as always. The small nick Alfredo had taken out of her cheek did nothing to worsen her already appalling ugliness. Her stringy white hair was useless to conceal the ghastly pallor of her skin, the obvious absence of a nose and second eye, but she tried her best. She arranged her hair this way and that, but it was to no avail. She was the most hideous thing on two legs, and no amount of primping could change that.

  She returned the mirror to her trunk and headed for the opening in the tent. She stopped before exiting it, however.

  She fished her hand up under her skirt and retrieved the burlap sack from around her waist: D’Arbignal’s bag. She reached into that bag and withdrew D’Arbignal’s rapier.

  Alfredo had been half-right: she certainly wasn’t pretty enough to play coy with him. She was, however, smart enough. She had known that the one place no sane man would ever search had been beneath her clothes.

  Chapter 8

  “… so all I could do was roll.” D’Arbignal’s voice filled the campsite as the Cyclops approached Marco’s tent. It sent a pleasant chill through her, and she shivered with excitement. “So I rolled to the left and I rolled to the right, keeping them off-guard and unable to land a single true blow. I snatched my rapier from the brigand holding it captive, and rolled my way to victory!”

  The Cyclops heard Conchinara’s laughter, like the tinkling of musical bells, and her heart sunk. Conchinara was still with him?

  The Cyclops despaired at the unfairness of the situation. Conchinara already had a man, and now she had two, while the Cyclops went to sleep at night with nothing but her now-shredded pillow to give her comfort. She knew it was too much to ever again hope that a man as worldly and handsome as D’Arbignal could ever desire someone as hideous as herself, but was it too much to hope for a male friend, one who could somehow tolerate being in her presence without first extinguishing all the lights?

  Oh, wait. Of course it was too much to hope for, or hope to deserve.

  “Now I know that story can’t be true, Mister D’Arbignal,” Conchinara mock-chided him. “I think you think me naïve.”

  “Not at all,” D’Arbignal was saying as the Cyclops entered the tent. “I swear the entire story is true! Indeed, you must have an ill impression of my character, if you think—ah, my rapier! And my bag!”

  He looked like he was recovering nicely, though he was still pale, and his forehead was dotted with perspiration. His shirt was still off, and the Cyclops caught herself marveling at his muscled and nearly hairless chest. And oh, he was lean! Just beautiful, functional muscle everywhere and not a bit of fat anywhere to be seen.

  She entertained a brief fantasy. She would like to fall asleep with her head resting on that chest. Oh, to feel his heart beating beneath her head, to be lulled to pleasant dreams by the rhythmic rising and falling accompanying his breath.

  D’Arbignal coughed.

  “Ah, my rapier!” he repeated, only louder. “And my bag!”

  Conchinara laughed, and the Cyclops blushed, realizing she had been caught daydreaming.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “What?”

  “Ah, my rapier?” D’Arbignal said. “And my bag?”

  “What? Oh!” The Cyclops realized she was holding D’Arbignal’s gear. Idiotically, she extended them towards him as an offer.

  “I guess it’s time to get up,” D’Arbignal said, moving to sit up in his cot.

  Conchinara placed a gentle hand against his bare chest, and left it there. “No, Mister D’Arbignal. No, no, no. You need to keep resting.”

  She pointed at the rapier and the bag.

  “Cyclops—” she started to say.

  “Maria,” D’Arbignal said.

  “Pardon?”

  “I believe the lady said her name was Maria.”

  “What? You mean—Oh, of course.” Conchinara recovered quickly. “Maria, please leave Mister D’Arbignal’s possessions on that table.”

  Conchinara gazed at D’Arbigna
l with lustful eyes. “And then, please leave us. We have much to … discuss, he and I.”

  “We do?” D’Arbignal said, grinning.

  Conchinara placed her hand on his chest again, and then traced her fingertips softly over its surface.

  “Oh,” D’Arbignal said, reconsidering. His eyes were on Conchinara’s, shining. “Yes, I’m sure we can find something to fill the idle hours this evening.”

  The Cyclops felt transfixed by heartbreak and humiliation that left her rooted to the spot upon which she stood.

  “Excuse me, uh”—Conchinara fished for the Cyclops’s name—“Maria. Would you be kind enough to give us our privacy?”

  Overwhelmed with shame, she moved to depart.

  “Thank you, Maria,” D’Arbignal said. Strangely, there was kindness in his voice. And my, how it thrilled her to hear him speak her old name!

  “It was nothing,” she said, thinking of her destroyed sleeping quarters and the hours of cleaning and repairs she’d have to put in before she could sleep. “Nothing at all.”

  As she left the tent, D’Arbignal was saying softly, “Now, what shall we speak about, I wonder?”

  “I’m sure we could think of something,” purred Conchinara.

  A single tear trailed down the Cyclops’s face, and she brushed it off as the tent flap closed behind her. She turned to head back to her tent, and was startled to find Alfredo standing before her, glaring.

  “I take it the man’s rapier found its way safely back home?” he said.

  “Y-y-yes,” the Cyclops said. And then, not to spare Conchinara but to spare D’Arbignal, she added in a loud voice, “Your wife had me leave it on the table for him until he’s feeling better.”

  Alfredo shook his head in disgust. He shoved the Cyclops out of his way.

  As she started towards her own tent, she heard D’Arbignal’s voice from within the tent: “Wait … wife?”

  Chapter 9

  The Cyclops was cleaning up the shambles in her tent when she heard the sound of ringing steel outside. She ran out onto the grounds prepared to beg for D’Arbignal’s life. Alfredo loathed her, and likely, she could turn his fury from the wounded D’Arbignal onto herself. He’d be cruel to her, of course, but she’d weathered worse on many occasions.