The journey from the subterranean vaults of Hampi to the dusty plains of Central India was a blur of exhaustion and desperate hope. To travel as normal citizens was impossible; the Weaver's silver moths were everywhere, sniffing for the scent of sandalwood sap. Aryan, Mira, and Sarah had to disappear. They found their sanctuary at a lonely crossroads under a blood-red moon, where a line of painted wagons waited in the mist.
This was the Cirque des Ombres—the Circus of Shadows. It was a traveling masquerade of the broken and the beautiful. Here, every performer was a "Masterpiece" that had either escaped the Master's workshop or been discarded as a "failure." There were giants with skin like cracked porcelain, acrobats with clockwork joints that hummed like bees, and fortune-tellers whose eyes were polished opals.
"They won't ask questions," Mira whispered, her voice a dry rattle. She was wrapped in a heavy cloak, her face hidden, but the violet rot of the silver threads had now reached the edge of her jaw. "In this caravan, being a monster is the only requirement for entry."
Aryan approached the lead wagon, which was draped in velvet curtains that seemed to absorb the light. Standing on the steps was a man—or what used to be a man. He was tall and thin, wearing a tattered tailcoat and a mask that was fused to his face. One side of the mask was a crying comedy face; the other was a laughing tragedy. This was the Clockwork Jester.
"The Seed seeks a shadow?" the Jester asked. His voice didn't come from his mouth, but from a small brass speaker embedded in his throat. Click-whirr-click. "We have heard the trees whispering about a Mahogany King walking the earth again."
"We need passage North," Aryan said, his mahogany arm hidden beneath a thick poncho. "And we need a place where she can rest." He gestured to Mira.
The Jester tilted his head, the brass gears in his neck grinding. He stepped down and approached Mira. He didn't touch her; he simply listened. "Silver rot. The Weaver's kiss. It's a slow symphony of silence, isn't it?" He looked at Aryan. "Vikram's boy. You have his eyes. But you have your mother's fire."
Aryan froze. "How do you know my father?"
The Jester gestured for them to enter the wagon. The interior was a chaotic library of strange artifacts and ticking clocks. On a small wooden pedestal sat a jar containing a single, glowing emerald leaf.
"Vikram Khanna was the one who wound my key when my springs were broken," the Jester said, sitting on a trunk. "But more than that... he left a piece of himself with me. A soul-anchor."
"What does that mean?" Sarah asked, her eyes wide as she traced the mechanical gears on the Jester's arm.
"It means," the Jester said, his voice dropping into a low, mournful tone, "that your father knew he wouldn't be around to answer your questions, Aryan. So he gave me a memory. A living one."
The Jester reached into a hidden compartment in his chest and pulled out a small, tarnished silver key. He inserted it into a slot behind his ear and turned it. Crank... crank... crank.
Suddenly, the Jester's opal eyes stopped swirling. His posture changed. The frantic clicking of his clockwork slowed down into a steady, human-like rhythm. When he spoke again, the brassy, mechanical rasp was gone. It was the warm, deep voice of Vikram Khanna.
"Aryan... my brave, stubborn boy."
Aryan gasped, his heart leaping into his throat. "Papa? Is that you?"
"It is a shadow of me, son. A recorded echo tied to this machine's soul," the Jester/Vikram said. He reached out a wooden hand, touching Aryan's mahogany arm. "I see the wood has claimed much of you. I am sorry. I tried to build a world where you would never have to grow bark. But the Weaver's thread is long, and her spite is longer."
"Papa, Rhea is alive," Aryan cried, the tears finally breaking through. "The Weaver has her. She calls her a 'lead dancer'. I'm going to Hampi—no, I mean the Loom. I'm going to save her."
"Listen to me carefully, Aryan," the voice said, growing faint as the spring in the Jester's head began to unwind. "To save Rhea, you must understand the 'Treasure of the Grove'. It isn't a heart you find; it's a heart you remember. The Master thinks humanity is a weakness to be purged, but it is the 'purity of the flaw' that gives wood its strength. Do not let the Weaver make you perfect. If you become perfect, you lose the Seed."
"But Mira is dying!" Aryan shouted. "How do I save her without becoming a puppet myself?"
"The answer is in your mother's diary," Vikram's voice was fading now, becoming mechanical again. "The Jester has it. Read the entry from the night of the Blue Moon... the night you were born. You were never meant to be just a bridge, Aryan. You were meant to be the... the..."
Click. The key stopped turning. The Jester's eyes began to swirl again, and he let out a long, metallic sigh. "The spring is old," he rasped in his own voice. "It takes a week to rewind the soul-anchor."
He reached under the trunk and pulled out a small, leather-bound book. It was wrapped in the same yellowed silk Aryan had seen before. "Your mother's diary. Vikram told me to give it to you when the wood reached your shoulder. It seems the time is exactly right."
Aryan took the diary with his human hand. It felt light, but the weight of the secrets inside made his arm ache. He opened it to the first page. The handwriting was elegant, slanted, and filled with a mother's love.
"January 3rd. The moon is blue tonight, and the mountain air is still. Vikram says the Great Grove is restless. Today, I felt the baby kick for the first time. It didn't feel like a kick; it felt like a root taking hold. I am afraid, but I am also hopeful. We will call him Aryan. The one who is noble. The one who will carry the forest in his veins and the sun in his heart."
Aryan sat in the corner of the wagon, the dim lamplight flickering as the caravan began to move. The rhythmic swaying of the wagon felt like a cradle. He turned the pages, skipping ahead to the night of his birth.
"He is here. He didn't cry when he was born. He simply looked at the wooden ceiling of our cottage and smiled. But Vikram's face is pale. He saw the mark on Aryan's chest—the sign of the 'Heart of Flesh'. The Master will come for him. We must hide the boy's true heart. We must wrap it in layers of wood and shadow so that the Master sees only a puppet, while the man sleeps inside."
Aryan touched his chest, right over his heart. He had always had a small, star-shaped birthmark there. He had never thought anything of it.
"The wood isn't a curse," Aryan whispered, his eyes wide with realization. "It's armor. My father didn't let the wood grow to kill me... he let it grow to hide my human heart from the Master's sensors."
Mira looked at him from the shadows, her violet eyes dimming. "Then... the more you become a puppet, the safer your soul is?"
"But if I become too much of a puppet," Aryan said, "I might forget how to wake up."
Suddenly, the caravan came to a screeching halt. Outside, the sound of horses neighing and the clash of metal erupted.
"The Rival!" the Jester shouted, leaping to his feet. "The 'Collector's Menagerie' has found us! They don't want the Seed—they want to harvest the whole Circus for parts!"
Aryan stood up, his mahogany arm glowing with a fierce, protective light. He looked at the diary, then at Mira, then at the Jester.
"Let them come," Aryan said, his voice echoing with the strength of a forest. "I've spent my life being a character in someone else's story. It's time I started writing my own."