By Joshua Vise – April 19, 2025

Published in the anthology Circus of the Dead by Wicked Shadow Press. Lulu: Paperback or EPUB

Gerry Morecant followed the other performers as they exited the circus ring, the thunderous applause of an ecstatic crowd still audible behind them. Edward Berry, the production manager of the Blue Moon Big Top travelling circus, was waiting for the group in the staging area. His enthusiasm matched that of the crowd as they filed in.

“Great show out there, everybody! Tremendous show!” he said, clapping his hands enthusiastically. “No notes for today. Does anyone have anything to report?”

The assembled group of clowns, acrobats, and animal trainers looked at each other, each secretly hoping that nobody had any comments so that they could finish up early. After a moment’s silence, Edward continued.

“Just remember, we have the 2 p.m. call for the matinee performance tomorrow, and then it’s off to Toledo.”

The post-show meeting concluded, the performers filed away to their separate areas of the tent to disrobe and pack their things. The clowns and acrobats rushed for the limited number of dressing room mirrors, while the animal trainers stowed away their props. Needing none of these things, Gerry slipped silently past the others and made his way towards the rear. One of the few stipulations in his contract was space to park his own private trailer at each venue. Edward was more than happy to oblige, seeing as how Gerry paid for the trailer himself. It was also because his act was one of the highlights of the Blue Moon.

Like many of the other clowns, Gerry’s performance involved a lot of parading near the grandstands, making silly faces at audience members, and involving himself in absurd escapades with the other clowns. What set his act apart was the finale; more than a tumbler, Gerry had a peculiar knack for taking dramatic hits and falls that would have killed other performers. Previous tours had seen him stepped on by elephants, shot from cannons, and swinging from ropes into walls, always with a comedic setup to produce the maximum amount of laughter in the audience. On this particular tour, Gerry’s performance involved leaping from a crow’s nest suspended from the big top pole and attempting to come to rest on an elephant’s back, with the gag being that the elephant would always step away right before he landed. His faceplant into the dirt never failed to draw audible gasps from the crowd, until he relieved the tension by jumping to his feet and dramatically pretending to scold the hulking grey beast.

The other clowns attributed Gerry’s strange abilities to the unique costume he wore while performing. While still baggy and colorful like his compatriots, a closer look would reveal a thick layer of padding, made from some unspecified material, that wrapped his limbs. His torso was similarly protected, being stuffed with something soft and vaguely human shaped. Most bizarre was the silicone mask that covered the entirety of his head, upon which he had painted the traditional garish makeup that clowns were known for. Some of the others had asked about it, hoping that by wearing a mask they could avoid having to reapply their makeup for every show, but they only received a curt response that he had made it himself. Eventually, they stopped asking, having convinced themselves that Gerry would never reveal his trade secret.

Before he could step out of the tent, Gerry felt a hand grab his shoulder gently. He bristled at the contact before turning to find Edward, eager to speak to him.

“Really great job out there,” he said, notes of praise evident in his voice.

Gerry only nodded in return. Though tremendously animated while in front of the crowd, Gerry was an extreme recluse offstage, rarely uttering a word to others unless absolutely necessary.

“How did you feel tonight?”

“Good,” Gerry wheezed in his typical harsh, frosty voice. Edward, accustomed to a tone that would have sent a shudder down another person’s back, continued.

“Need anything for tomorrow?” Edward added. “Sarah’s gonna make a run into town. She can pick something up for you.”

“No,” he hissed.

“Alright, then,” answered Edward, still cheerful. “See you at two!”

With that, Edward turned and walked away, congratulating the other performers individually as he passed. Not wanting to risk another conversation with anyone, Gerry stepped out of the tent and quickly made his way to his trailer, taking extra care to lock the door behind him after he entered. 

Having reached the safety of his own private space, Gerry sat down heavily on a small stool in the center of his room. He didn’t bother to turn the lights on; he hadn’t needed much light to see for some time. Moreover, the darkness would keep him covered in case someone accidentally stumbled into his trailer, a not uncommon occurrence given the way that some of the performers drank between shows.

His ritual was the same each night after a performance, both externally and internally. As he gently removed his colorful, billowing outerwear, using slow deliberate movements to avoid snagging or tearing the padding underneath, his mind invariably turned to memories he wished he could suppress. 

Of all the things I can no longer recall, he thought to himself, why do these thoughts remain?

*****

Before the court heralds could properly announce his arrival, King Alwin burst his way into the great hall, the heavy oak doors creaking on their hinges before slamming hard against the adjacent stone walls. Known for an insuppressible temper that could vacillate between the deepest rage and an extreme, manic joy at a moment’s notice, such an entrance would normally have sent shivers down the spines of the assembled courtiers, Gerry included. However, the news of their army’s stunning triumph over the peoples of the north had spread throughout the town that morning with a remarkable quickness. By the time King Alwin had readied himself for his official proclamation of victory, his announcement, as well as his current emotional state, were foregone conclusions.

Clothed in his usual finery, King Alwin marched to the front of the room and took his place on the dais, standing just in front of his extravagant throne, and overlooking the assembled crowd.

“My people!” 

A respectful silence descended upon the room, though the jubilant atmosphere was still evident in the wide grins of gathered masses.

“The cursed people of Enbriorn are a threat no more. Their raiding parties shall no longer ravage thee, and their evil magic shall no longer plague thee…”

He paused for dramatic effect, his booming voice still reverberating against the heavy walls as his eyes surveyed his adulatory audience. After a moment, he continued.

“For on this day, our mighty armies hath met with victory!”

At this proclamation, the crowd erupted into a cheer. The air was peppered with raised fists and chalices, while cries of ‘Long live the king!’ punctuated the overwhelming roar. The din continued until King Alwin had drank his fill of adoration, and then he silenced the crowd once more with an upraised hand.

“Behold! Grimhild, Lord of the Northlands…no longer!”

There was a soft shuffling as the guests in the great hall turned towards the entrance. From there appeared the slumped silhouette of the conquered leader, flanked on either side by Alwin’s strongest soldiers. They dragged their ward contemptuously through the room before pushing him down at the foot of the dias, where Grimhild fell roughly upon his hands and knees. His mud smeared tunic still displayed the Enbriorn coat of arms, and though his long, dirty locks obscured his features as he stared at the floor, deep cuts and bruises could be seen across his face.

With the appearance of Grimhild at the foot of King Alwin, time seemed to stand still inside the hall. The previously euphoric atmosphere retreated, and in its place intruded a cold sense of unease and foreboding. Many had suffered firsthand as a result of Enbriorn raiding parties, and yet the supposed magic of these mysterious people existed as little more than a rumor, passed along through whispers shared between people who knew someone who knew someone who had witnessed their sorcery. Now, in the presence of Enbriorn’s most powerful mystic practitioner, the audience began to fear Grimhild’s potential for harm despite his defeated state. Even King Alwin’s earlier confidence had shrunk somewhat, though it would have taken someone very familiar with the king to be able to discern the faint glimmers of fear intruding upon his otherwise confident visage. 

It was moments such as this one that Gerry truly felt the weight of his own power. In his role as the court jester, he had a freedom to speak and act in ways that few others dared to do in the presence of the king. He relished this privilege, as well as the attention that naturally came with it, and Grimhild’s effect on the audience provided Gerry with the perfect opportunity to break the tension, mock his country’s enemies, and claim the limelight he so craved. With an exaggerated gait, he strolled to the front of the room, the ornamental bells on his colorful costume jingling as he leaned in close to Grimhild.

“Dost thou pretendeth to be a sheep? On thy feet!”

His exclamation was accompanied by exultant cheers as the celebratory atmosphere immediately reestablished itself. 

“Or perhaps it is thy wish for a mount!”

Great peals of laughter emanated throughout the room as Gerry climbed onto Grimhild’s back. As his ridicule of the abject prisoner continued, the crowd roared at each clever insult, and clapped and hooted as he used their once fearsome enemy like an absurd prop for his antics. Gerry drank in their attention, basking in the love of his people and the approval of his king. Throughout the mockery, Grimhild displayed no emotion, nor did he attempt to resist Gerry’s prodding. After much laughter, King Alwin raised his hand yet again, and the crowd heeded his command for silence.

“Grimhild, for thy crimes against the crown, thou art sentenced to death by beheading, to be carried out on the morrow!”

A tremendous cheer followed King Alwin’s pronouncement, interspersed with insults and hoots of derision directed towards Grimhild. Feeling slightly envious at having lost the interest of the crowd so suddenly, and eager to reclaim his place in the spotlight, Gerry stepped forward. With a grand sweeping motion of his hand, he pretended to swing an axe, then grabbed the point of Grimhild’s beard tightly.

“I claimeth thy beard to rebristle mine own broom!”

Before the audience had the chance to react to Gerry’s outlandish joke, Grimhild retaliated. He violently pushed away the guards on either side of him, and they clattered to the floor amid gasps from the audience. Grimhild thrust his hands in the air, and a bright orb of blue light materialized between his palms.

“You shall claimeth no such honor!”

Grimhild thrust his hands forward, and the ball of energy exploded outward, striking King Alwin squarely in the chest. The monarch staggered backward, a loud moan escaping his lips as he collapsed onto his throne. His courtiers rushed to his side, only to find him dead. While the attendees rushed for the exit in a panicked scrum, the guards leapt to their feet and seized Grimhild’s arms. Grimhild fought against their grip, his face contorted in rage as he snarled at his captors. When Gerry joined in to help restrain him, he found himself mere inches from Grimhild’s face.

“I shall perish a king…” he roared into Gerry’s stunned face as he struggled. “And thou…”

A second orb of blue light began to coalesce, emerging from Grimhild’s chest as the guards continued to hold him tightly. A thunderous rumble resounded in the air, swelling as the sphere’s glow intensified.

“Thou shall live a jester!”

At this pronouncement, the blue orb detonated, radiating a painful, sapphire-colored energy into Gerry, the guards, and into his own body. The blast threw Gerry to the ground, and the last emotion he remembered feeling just before losing consciousness was an intermingling of dread and confusion.

*****

Sitting in his trailer, Gerry tugged at the velcro straps holding the thick neoprene around his arms. It pulled apart with a familiar tearing sound, and the padding fell to the floor, revealing his slender, mummified arms. Cracks and fissures crisscrossed his flesh, which had long ago turned a tarlike black from age. He held his hands in front of his face, studying the bony prominences of knuckles wrapped impossibly tightly in desiccated skin. After a moment, he slid his fingers beneath the edges of his silicone mask and slowly pulled it up and off of his head.

Six hundred years had passed since the fateful day Grimhild had martyred himself for his people. The violent conflagration that consumed Grimhild’s body had also claimed the lives of the guards, reducing them to piles of charred bones inside of plate armor. Only Gerry had survived the blast 

In the tumultuous days following the death of the king, Gerry had marveled at his own survival, remarkably without injury, or so he thought. He ruminated over the events of that day, yet no matter how often he replayed the scene in his mind, he never understood exactly how or why he had been able to cling to life while everyone around him died. Tiring of a thought process that led nowhere, he eventually attributed his fortune to a characteristic good luck that had been with him since he was a child. It was only through the passing of time that Gerry came to realize his true fate.

Since that time, Gerry had ceased to age. Instead, his body had engaged in a process of ceaseless, churning decomposition. A fetid malady took root in the hand that had gripped Grimhild, and spread in an unremitting creep across his limbs and onto his torso, eventually extending to his face. Already viewed as a pariah in his community because of his role in the king’s tragic demise, Gerry was cast out of the kingdom, the putrefaction having cemented his reputation as a harbinger of disaster.

The silicone pulled away from Gerry’s face and scalp, a sticky tearing sound accompanying the motion as it turned itself inside out. He carefully readjusted the disguise, and set it on a mannequin head before turning his sight to his own vanity mirror. Small slivers of light, either from the full moon or from the circus outside, snuck their way past the edges of the curtains, and their thin rays reflected off of the mirror’s smooth surface, faintly illuminating a face covered in six hundred years of disfigurements and decay. It had been centuries since he had closed his eyes, his eyelids long ago having shrivelled and receded to the edges of his orbits. As he always did at this time of night, Gerry gazed unblinkingly into the glass, searching for some elusive hint of what his cursed future might hold. Yet the mummified face that stared back at him bore no resemblance to the man he had once been, and if it were possible to discern any potential future from his appearance, the ability to do so eluded him. 

Just as time had robbed Gerry of any likeness to his former self, so too had it stolen from him the ability to feel, both emotionally and physically. Happiness, anger, compassion, pleasure, relaxation, excitability, sadness, and love no longer existed for him except as a collection of symbolic actions, actions that he parroted on stage in order to project the emotion to the crowd. It was the secret behind his tumbling act; he was never injured because he couldn’t be injured, never in pain because his body no longer registered pain. The padding he wore, the padding that the other performers thought protected him from injury, rather protected them from the sight of his emaciated, corpselike body. The only sensation Gerry could discern as more than just an abstract concept was a deep, terrifying distress he felt when not performing to a crowd. 

The slight relief he felt on stage disappeared immediately after his antics ended, though, leaving him to suffer silently until the next curtain raised. This feeling had followed him as he moved from one court to the next, entertaining first kings, then lesser royalty, until the great monarchies of Europe disintegrated and birthed a more modern world. It had followed him as he crossed the ocean, ruining his hope that distance could rid himself of his curse. It had followed him as he toured the theaters along the coast, as well as when he joined the travelling acts of the wild west. It had followed him through vaudeville, national acts, and country fairs. For six hundred years, this suffering had followed him, with no redemption in sight, no sign of an end, a cure, or a death awaiting him. And it was with him that night as he recalled Grimhild’s damning curse, the voice of the long dead king ringing clearly in the shriveled remnants of his ears.

“Thou shalt live a jester.”