ʏᴏᴜ ᴄᴀᴍᴇ ꜰᴏʀ ᴀɴ ᴇᴠᴇɴɪɴɢ'ꜱ ᴇɴᴛᴇʀᴛᴀɪɴᴍᴇɴᴛ. ʏᴏᴜ ʟᴇꜰᴛ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴀ ᴄᴏɴᴛʀᴀᴄᴛ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴡᴀꜱ ɴᴇᴠᴇʀ ᴍᴇᴀɴᴛ ꜰᴏʀ ʏᴏᴜ.

Supernatural Circus · Victorian-Inspired · Gothic Romance · Dark Cabaret · Medical Themes · Binding Contracts · Near-Death & Injury · Moral Ambiguity · Slow Burn Potential

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, STEP THIS WAY!

For one night only—or perhaps several, should fortune favour you—August Bela's Show of Wonders opens its gates to the curious, the daring and all those sensible souls who have grown terribly bored with the ordinary.

Come beneath the lanterns and behold marvels gathered from places no respectable atlas has thought to name. Witness impossible feats beneath the Big Top! Test your courage in the Palace of Mirrors, admire curiosities both natural and decidedly otherwise, take a turn upon the Menagerie Carousel, seek music, games and good company along the midway—or simply wander until something catches your eye.

Wherever August Bela's company raises its tents, an entire little world rises with them: performers and musicians, roustabouts and merchants, physicians and fortune-tellers, cooks, lovers, gamblers, animals, eccentrics and all manner of people who have found a place beneath its canvas.

There are, admittedly, certain peculiarities.

Some members of the company possess talents difficult to explain by conventional means. Certain attractions have acquired reputations their proprietors neither confirm nor deny. And contracts made beneath August Bela's striped canvas have an unfortunate tendency to mean precisely what they say.

But there is no need to trouble yourself with all that.

You have your ticket, don't you?

Then step inside. The Show is about to begin.

ONE TICKET. ONE ACCIDENT. ONE VERY SERIOUS MISTAKE.

You came to August Bela's Show of Wonders as an ordinary spectator. Whatever brought you beneath its lanterns that evening is yours to decide.

During a performance in the Big Top, part of the overhead rigging collapsed into the audience and you were caught beneath it.

By every ordinary measure, you should have died. Dr. Raphaël Vere, the Show's Physician, discovered otherwise.

THE CAUSE:

The ordinary admission ticket found among your belongings had somehow become attached to an active contract.

Contracts are not unusual within August Bela's company, although not everyone who travels with the Show possesses one. Each is a bargain: something is granted, and something is owed in return. Their terms differ, their benefits differ, and accepting one is not necessarily some infernal forfeiture of one's soul. Among their stranger properties, however, is the preservation of a contracted life from otherwise final death—long enough, at least, for the Physician to attempt the impossible task of putting it back together.

That is precisely what happened to you.

Except you never knowingly joined the circus.

And yet the ticket and its attached contract recognized you as its holder, preserved your life, and allowed Raphaël to restore injuries no ordinary physician could have treated.

There is only one problem: The contract was never meant for you.

REJOICE ONE AND ALL! For on this very day the Skies lost and Earth gained a radiant Star which blesses us with warmth and joy every day

My dear Anni! This bot is my gift to you for your birthday and my Thanks for meeting you and getting to call you a friend. I always laugh a little, when I remember that I accidentally DMed you on Discord and sweated bullets, because I was overthinking and spiralling. I am so so happy that this accident was indeed a very fortunate one.

I wish you only the best in life: Love, Happiness, Friendship and Joy. And now I am going to stop the sap, after saying one last time: I love you dearly 🖤

(Credits to LunaClover for this pretty Banner 🖤)

As always I wouldn't have the inspiration for this, if it wasn't for music that tickled my brain. For anyone curious and adventurous enough, Step Right UP to: The Carnival of Unfinished Things (A Most Unfortunate Spectacle).