Clockwork Angels: The Novel by Kevin J. & Peart Anderson

assistant manager of the town orchard with a beautiful girl in his heart, the daughter of the local newsgraph operators.
    He finished his breakfast, wiped his mouth with a napkin, and didn’t have the slightest idea what to do next or where he should go. Without asking, he helped scrub pots in a basin of dishwater, and no one complained that he wasn’t scheduled to do so. It was unsettling but liberating. Then he looked around for some other way to earn his keep and repay their hospitality.
    Afterward, hoping to find a way to fit in here, he asked Louisa, “Is there any way I could help you with your show?” He did not want to leave, not yet.
    She smiled beneath her lavish beard. “Oh, I’m not a performer, young man, I’m just a showpiece. People stare at me and move on.”
    Ahead, they heard a clang of metal plates as Golson, the burly strongman, flexed his muscles, bent over to slide two more iron disks onto his barbell, and strained to lift it. Golson did not acknowledge them, though he seemed to draw strength from having even this small audience. He had loaded his bar with every weight on the stack except for the last two, which rested off to the side, bound with a chain and padlock.
    Finding this very curious, Owen whispered to Louisa, “Does he have a story?”
    “Everyone has a story, but not all are worth telling or listening to.” She smiled and continued, “Golson is just a performer’s name, a patchwork of Goliath and Samson, because he says he draws the best qualities of both. His mentor was the greatest weightlifter of all time—our previous strongman.” Louisa lowered her eyes and dropped her voice. “Golson could be even stronger, I think, but he won’t push himself—he refuses to.”
    “Why not?” Owen asked.
    “It’s fear, plain and simple, although we all sympathize. His mentor was killed when he pushed himself too hard and tried to beat his personal best. He added more weight than he could tolerate, managed to lift it . . . but he couldn’t hold all that weight. He was crushed right there in front of a large audience.”
    “That’s horrible!”
    Louisa nodded. “And that’s why Golson keeps those last plates padlocked, so he’s never tempted to go too far.”
    Owen swallowed hard. When he had first attended the carnival, he had seen these performers as bright distractions, but now he realized they were people with their own lives, their own tragedies. Maybe some of them had their own picture books given to them by mothers who’d gone away early in their. . . .
    Tomio emerged from his private wagon, which had several small shuttered windows. Tiny smokestacks and air vents protruded from the roof. The wagon had its own motivating engine and large tires balanced on an intricate network of springs, so as to minimize shocks from a rough road.
    The graceful swordsman concealed something in the palm of his hand; when he hurled it down at the ground, a bright flash of light was accompanied by a puff of purple smoke. “Presto!” He strutted along, brandishing his thin sword and tossing tiny packets with the other hand; he timed his cuts and thrusts to punctuate them with colored smoke. “Presto!” When he had expended his packets of powder, Tomio ducked back inside his trailer to continue more experiments.
    Life was so much more exciting outside of Barrel Arbor, Owen realized.
    “Francesca!” The bearded lady waved, and the dark-haired acrobat came over from her practice area. Owen’s heart started beating more rapidly. “Owenhardy wants to participate in an act.”
    “I . . . didn’t exactly say that,” he said, but before he could make further excuses, Louisa left him. His tongue suddenly became stupid, connected to a brain that could not remember how to form conversation.
    “You’ll have to earn your keep if you’re going to stay with us,” Francesca said. “Plenty of work to do.”
    Owen was caught off guard by the implicit invitation. He hadn’t planned on staying