Prologue
Prologue
Once, many years ago, far too many now for anyone you may ask on the street to remember, there was a show.
‘You sir! You there!’ You may shout at an old, withered passerby, crouched with age and eyes too cloudy to see. ‘Have you heard of a show? Of the finest traveling circus there ever was? With a knife thrower with a tongue sharp as his blade? Of a fire breather who lived and breathed her craft? Of girls who flew through the air on only a string, not near an inch think! Run by the finest, the grandest, ringleader to ever walk the earth? Do you know of what I speak?’.
You may ask all day, but no matter how old, nor how young, none of them will ever remember.
‘You’re just making up stories boy! Best grow up now and fast! Now leave me be, I don’t have all day!'
But it is real, and it seems you, and you alone, know of it. Because it's all true. Even if it lives only in your head now, survived in memory alone. For it would seem no one ever thought to write it down. To make a record of the wonderous feats performed. But somehow, somewhere, someone told you once. And now you know. How unfortunate it is that words passed along by an average man tongue seem to lose all meaning at all. Perhaps they never mattered in the first place. Perhaps whatever happened simply just happened and the people it happened too were just people, with nothing special about them.
FALSITIES! Promise to listen and I’ll tell you a story, the best I ever knew.
Because there was a circus. One with Lions and dancers and a Ferris wheel that could take you to the stars. There were clowns and red coats and magic like never seen before. Oh yes, it's true. The show really did exist. Some say it still does, if you know where to look. If you know who to ask.
Ask around right, and you may find a man. In the darkest of allies, the back of the bar, or on that corner right there. Find him and ask him. Bring alone a gold button and a large silver ring or a dagger sharp as the night. Give him the gifts he seeks, ask him about his friends, and perhaps once weepy and sad, you too may learn.
That there was a show. And it was the finest traveling circus there ever was.