She didn't breathe.

As Inara galloped furiously toward the burning fairgrounds, Leanna held her breath. Maybe in refusing the world her air, it would stop turning; and in stilled time, keep the circus from burning.

It didn't.

In the distance, raging orange and red flames continued to devour the Big Top. The crackling fingers of the fire clawed toward the sky as if the canvas' cry for release. Caught in the blinding smoke that cloaked the field, Inara's horn ignited. The frosted hue cut through the blackness and Leanna sucked in a choking breath at the sight.

The protective stakes guarding the fairgrounds were now sharpened spikes. The crystals that once crowned them had been crushed and scattered like rubble on the ground. Their glow pulsed slowly as if the heart of the circus, dying.

And behind the fallen crystals, a slaughter.

Inara neighed, half rearing to a halt. "All in Forever..." she breathed, her fearful gaze trained ahead.

Hulking machines the size of men sliced the air with scythe-like arms. Ruby eyes gleamed in the black fog as they brought jagged blades down, destroying the tents and the outnumbered performers fighting to protect their circus. Steam hissed from their seams, underscored by gurgling screams and the slosh of innocent blood splattering against their breastplates.

"Why are we stopping?" Leanna cried frantically, darting a manic gaze all around. The large machines hadn't seen them yet, but Machina had eyes everywhere. She looked back to the field where metallic crabs skittered along the ground, shooting venomous daggers at those who fought back—at Yelena who weaved funnels of water, driving them toward the flames, at Ben who rode on Kia's back lunging onto the backs of these monsters destroying the circus and its people. "Inara! We need to help them!"

Inara sucked in a breath, snapping from her agony. "The shattered crystals will only magnify my power so far," she said, scanning the field. "We must draw them close. Hold on tight!"

Obediently, Leanna twisted the reins tighter. Inara reared with a piercing neigh once and again, each whine louder than the last. Her cry was a kaleidoscope of sound, and echoed over the roar of the flames and scraping metal.

The large beasts paused in their carnage and cut glowing eyes to Inara. In a horrid dance they turned head first, bulky bodies following. The ground began to rumble, their approach fast and steady.

Leanna clutched the reins tighter, the instinct to flee burning at her joints. But she would not doubt Inara's power. She couldn't!

Bowing her head, a funnel of white fire kindled at Inara's horn. Frosted wisps danced around the white spear, swelling with each rotation. On the ground, the crystal remnants glowed brighter, hearing Inara's call.

A blast of white fire burst from Inara's horn and the stones at once. The violent gust of power snapped Leanna back, nearly thrusting her off. She bit her nails into the reins, groaning in pain at this icy wind that clawed at her skin.

Digging their clamped feet into the earth, the mechanical killers powered through the frigid fire. It corroded their armor and froze their feet to the earth, but within seconds they crushed through it.

"They're getting closer, Inara!" Leanna cried through the roaring winds, watching the beasts' nearing blades gleam in Inara's light.

The ground around them began to ripple as if pooling all of its energy to a point beneath them. The temperatures plummeted and the gathering power pressed down on Leanna's chest. Feeling Inara grow frigid and the flames at her horn grow wilder, Leanna realized Inara caused it.

"Whatever you do, do not let me go!" Inara called through their connection.

Instinctively, Leanna struggled against the countering wind and ducked into Inara's mane, clutching her as tightly as weary arms would allow.

With a strained cry, Inara touched her flaming horn to the ground. On contact, a shaft of white light rushed from her and the crystals with whoosh. Leanna screamed as a thunderous crackle shoved them back.

The winds died in an instant, and all grew eerily quiet, save for the distant snaps of the burning Big Top and the ringing in Leanna's ears. Unearthing her head from Inara's neck, Leanna's eyes widened. With their blades in the air and eyes still glowing, the beasts glinted in Inara's light, frozen.

Coming up on her hind legs, Inara stomped her hooves down on the earth. The ground jerked beneath them on contact and the metallic ogres exploded into shards of icy springs and daggers, chunks of poison and metal.

The path now clear, Inara rode past the fallen crystals, trampling the icy rubble underfoot.

As they neared the Big Top, Bertrand ran toward them. His eyes were wide and red, blazing like the fire behind him. Only from this close, Leanna noticed that amidst the fire consuming the Big Top, black fire also burned, spurring the natural flames.

"The Ringmaster is in the Big Top," he gasped in reaching them. "I've tried taming the flames, but they're too powerful!" He keeled over, clutching his side. "Tomas and Kioyo went inside, but more of those monsters are in there. And Machina... The Ringmaster let her in thinking..." He looked to Leanna, confusion knitted over his brow. "We thought it was you. She's wearing the crystal."

"Keep trying to control the fires. I must save what magic I have for Machina," Inara ordered Bertrand. "And Leanna, keep your head low! It isn't' safe in there. Once we're before her, you must get Finvarra to use his crystal against her. It is now you must inspire him more than ever!"

How she was supposed to do this, Leanna didn't know, but Inara left no room for argument as she bolted forward. Enveloped in her speed, Leanna held tightly watching the world fade to smears of flame and ice as they hurtled through a flaming loop in the canvas.

Thick, black smoke enveloped them immediately. Deafening crackles hissed in her ears, intense heat clawing at her skin. Disoriented, Leanna leaned into Inara. This inferno was not her Big Top. She didn't know this maze of tumbled wood and glowing fire. She sought to get her bearings, but there was only down planks of wood and patches of burning canvas... and darkness. A thick black wall of fog shielded the center of the circus, the rings no longer visible. It curled out unnaturally, separate from the smoke.

Moaning howls and screams emanated from the black fog that pulsed. Leanna stifled a heave, the offensive scent twisting her stomach. It was that of decay and burning life, and of all that was wrong and foul in the world.

But then, through the joining fingers of the smoke and cries of the fog, she saw it and her heart stilled.

Surrounded in halos of white amidst the invading darkness, Vicente and his five man band played a ghostly song that though barely audible over the moans of the black mist, created wisps of white that countered the evil. Each whine of the violin sent slivers of whiteness into the encircling barrier while the strums of the guitar whirled this shield around them.

A growl tore at Leanna and Inara's attention then and they spun. In a halo of his own, Tomas ripped into a metal monster, piercing its breastplate with bare hands. Behind him a white leopard marked with blood and soot tore ferociously at another one's chest. Sparks set off into the dark as sharpened claws tore through the metal armor. The machine jerked and trembled underneath Kioyo's powerful frame, until with a deafening growl, Kioyo bit into its neck. One furious jerk and he tore off its head. Golden eyes followed it as it rolled to Inara's hoof.

Kioyo's eyes widened and in a quick burst of white, he emerged human again. A gash over his brow bled into his eyes, his ribs also bruised. Tomas limped beside him. Blood and poison stained his yellow vest and seeped from between his fingers.

Leanna dismounted Inara quickly and rushed into Kioyo's arms while Inara trot beside Tomas. The iciness from Kioyo's transformation clung to his skin and was a slight reprieve from the stuffy heat of the flames.

"Are you alright?" Leanna asked desperately, pulling their bodies away a slight as her eyes scanned him, her hands skimming the cuts along his arms. Hot tears washed over the smoke in her eyes.

"I am fine, but the Ringmaster—we're losing him, Leanna. Machina wears the crystal now. With the iron and her magic, he is weakened and at her mercy."

"Where is he?" Inara asked, touching a healing horn on the wound at Tomas' side. The blood leached back into his body while black ooze dripped out and onto the ground with a hiss.

Kioyo motioned past the black abyss that curled outward, devouring the real flames.

"We've been unable to reach him. With them bound, she borrows from his magic," Tomas rumbled. "She holds him at center ring, but the fog keeps us out."

"It is Machina's evil, magnified," Inara said glumly, looking into the seemingly impenetrable cloud obliterating the surrounding canvas and red fire. All sight of the belonging circus slowly vanished in the cloud. Leanna saw Bertrand's influence as dragons of white fire twisted about the dark flames, stifling them. But it was futile. The smoke from the extinguished flames coalesced with the black fog, feeding it. "Soon, there will only be darkness. Once her evil reaches the outer crystals, all is lost."

Inara cut her gaze back to Tomas and Kioyo. "You two clear out the perimeter of those beasts," she ordered. "Leanna and I will get the Ringmaster!" Inara turned to Leanna. "Now that they are bound, she has access to his powers. She is much stronger. You must tell Finvarra to focus his love on the crystal. He must center himself in it, lose himself in it," she told her in haste. "Tell him to cast aside his guilt, his hate, his anger—it will only dampen the magic and add to this. His love must be pure if we are to cast her out and defeat her."

A thunderclap resounded and the ground shifted beneath them as the conquering blackness swallowed up more of the preceding flames. Kioyo grabbed Leanna by the waist and lifted her effortlessly back onto Inara. Boring a worried golden gaze into hers, he squeezed her hand reassuringly. Releasing her fingers, he shifted back beside Tomas.

"Be safe," Inara told them. With agreeing nods, they met one another's eyes quickly, their stares saying it all.

Tearing his gaze away first, Kioyo transformed with a growl. Leanna's heart hitched, watching him turn away and lunge fearlessly into the darkness. With a curt nod, Tomas followed. The darkness pulsed and the hollow imprint left upon the black cloud vanished as if neither man had ever existed.

Inara turned to the void that skirted closer. Her horn kindled, humming with pure white light. Without another word, she galloped into the black, a ray of light illuminating the way before them to the other side. Hands detached from the tunneling shadows, desperately reaching for Inara's light, but in touching the white hue, they hissed and curled back into the black.

Entering the clearing on the other side, Inara stopped sharply. Spread before them was the circus, only this wasn't their circus. In this desolate tent, the world was gray. Large gashes in the canvas above revealed a swirling funnel of black that howled with feminine cries and moans of agony. Where snow once fell telling of forgiveness, only ash floated down now. Where there were once rings of wood containing heart stirring acts, there were only rings of iron now. And at center ring, the Ringmaster...

...But not their Ringmaster.

It was Leanna's doppelganger who stood there, radiant and regal, her form fitting white gown billowing in a non-existent wind. Black light hummed from the crystal dangling at her neck, matching the black top hat angled slightly on her head. One human hand was closed around the handle of an iron whip at whose end was Finvarra on his knees, the iron links wrapped tightly at his neck. His head bowed forward and blond strands draping over his face, he trembled though the heat was stifling and stagnant.

In haste, Leanna made to dismount.

"Do not leave my light!" Inara told her. "I won't be able to save you if you step into that void!"

Leanna bit her fingers into the reins to keep from running to him. She tried at a breath, but couldn't, feeling as if the leash were wrapped tightly at her neck and not his.

Her heart slowed then, meeting Machina's widened gaze through the waves of fog curling from the ground.

Machina tilted her head, a childlike fascination marking her features. A slow smile twisted her lips and black tears spilled from her eyes. "So the famed Leanan Sidhe has decided to grace us with her presence?"

Hearing her own voice coming from Machina sent shivers down Leanna's spine. Though it was a replica of her body, it looked awkward on Machina, as if the vessel were too small for so much evil.

Machina wiped a black tear away with the tip of a metallic finger. "I've never been so happy in my life." She reached down beside her and caressed Finvarra's hair, yearning gleaming in those familiar brown eyes. She looked back to Leanna. "Now I have everything I've always wanted. Well, almost everything..." she said, lowering her gaze from Leanna's eyes down to her chest.

Beside her, Finvarra struggled to lift his head. "Leanna?" he rasped under hooded lids. Terrible shivers seized him and his voice trembled.

Leanna turned her blurred gaze back to a weakened Finvarra. "Hear my voice, love, please," she pled with him. "You are not without power here! You must fight her darkness!" She could not see his face, but his writhing body told of the pain. "God—" she sobbed, wanting to run to him, to ease this hellish ache. "Think of our love, of that light. You don't belong to this fire, you belong to ice. You belong to me!"

Finvarra cried out in pain as Machina yanked the leash and bore her teeth with a hiss. "He belongs to me!" she growled, the blackness around her flaring. "He isn't bound to you anymore." Lifting a metallic hand to her heaving chest, she stroked the crystal. It pulsed black, reflecting the evil within her.

Her eyes lifted in like darkness. "I bear your semblance and your name now." Machina paused and giggled then, pressing a hand to her mouth in a manner Leanna knew she did too. "You don't exist anymore," she laughed from in-between her metal fingers. "There is only me. He loves only me," she said sweetly, over and over in an eerie sing-song. "Only me."

Her sweet lullaby leashed itself onto the air and echoed around them. The cries and moans in the fog intensified, as if her voice tore the skin from their phantom bodies.

"Leanna, tell him what you must!" Inara's voice tore through the haunting cries.

Snapping from her grief, Leanna wiped her tears roughly and looked back to her fallen love. "Finvarra..."

"Shut up!" Machina shrieked, raising a hand before her. Metallic snakes shot out from the upturned hand toward Leanna. Unprepared, Leanna jerked back. She slipped from the saddle and thud against the ground. She groaned, but scrambled close to Inara's legs as the serpents to a cloud of ash with a hiss.

Machina gritted her teeth. "Oh, Inara, you defend her after all the agony she has brought you and this circus? Spare yourself the trouble. Deny her your light and you too can have everything you've always wanted."

A spotlight of gray light shone into the ring beside theirs. Another mechanical beast stepped into the gloomy hue.One hand was a serrated ax and the other was a clamp, where he dragged a bloodied centaur by the neck. Krinard's golden skin was now charred, black poison seeping through gashes and burns across his body.

Inara appeared unaffected, but a shuddering breath betrayed her emotions, and her light waned slightly.

Machina's brown eyes gleamed with pleasure and as her lips curled to a familiar smile. "Deny her your light..."

Finvarra's head snapped up and his hands came onto the iron binds. His skin sizzled against the whip, yet though the vapors he bore a feral stare into Inara. "Don't you dare!" he growled, blood seeping through his fingers as he tugged at the leash. Machina yanked it, and Finvarra grunted in pain, falling forward onto his hands. Furious growls erupted from him, the winds whipping wildly as he twisted and clawed at the poison coursing under his skin. Leanna dug her fingers into the earth, needing to keep from running to him, needing to stay within Inara's light. But heavens, how much more could he endure! She shook her head frantically, biting her lips until they bled to keep the screams searing her throat within. She could only watch black vines curl under his pale skin through his torn shirt.

Releasing Finvarra's leash, Machina strut to Krinard. She caressed his face, hunger gleaming in those familiar brown eyes. "What do you say?" she taunted Inara and ran her nose along his neck, inhaling deeply with a purr. She turned her eyes to Inara, all the while trailing her tongue along the blood dripping from his jaw. "Mmm, so sweet. Give her to me, and you too can have a taste. Come, now. Just give her a little nudge. I will take care of the rest..."

His face caged in Machina's hands, Krinard turned bloodshot eyes to Inara. "Please," he rasped over Finvarra's grunts. "Please..."

Inara was frozen a moment, her breaths shuddering as she stared back at her love for an eternal second. Leanna's chest caved within her, the immense pressure of the love in their stare crushing her from within.

Exhaling, Inara turned a gray stare to Leanna, looking her in the eyes. "Krinard made his choice and I have made mine."

Leanna's blood grew cold, and she stiffened in wait for Inara's answer.

Shaking her head, icy tears streamed from her eyes as she turned back to Machina. "As I followed the King, I will follow his Queen."

"Smart steed—"

"You cannot have the girl!"

Machina paused, eyes narrowing. Her smile fell slowly—too slowly. "How noble," she whispered, moving her head away from Krinard. "What a pity."

With eyes pinned on Inara, Machina snapped metal fingers. In the spark, the beast tightened his grip on Krinard's torso and Krinard arched back with a pitched cry. The beast ran his blade straight across his neck, and his scream gurgled.

Leanna sucked in a gasp, watching the beast release Krinard's body into the pool of blood and poison. A weakened Finvarra turned his head away. Blond strands veiling his face as his body wracked with heaves at seeing his best friend, dead.

Wide-eyed, Inara whimpered his name. He didn't respond, and a moment later had yet to move. Inara's heart wrenching scream tore through Leanna's mind. Leanna clutched her head and fell to her knees with a like cry, the kaleidoscope of Inara's agony splitting her eardrums. Wild fire exploded from Inara's horn, speared in every direction. The white bolts dissolved Machina's beasts to ash in an instant.

Machina's crystal kindled black and its hue enveloped her, a barrier to Inara's attack. She thrust up a hand and mirroring black magic shot out from her palm. Her fire clashed against Inara's in a thunderclap that flared the surrounding flames. The two beams of light warred for control, a give and take of love and hate.

Clutching Inara's leg tightly, Leanna anchored herself against the winds that threatened to topple her over and into the darkness. The terrible pain within her head made her shiver, but she lifted her gaze to Finvarra. His face now framed in black and his lips blue, Leanna felt him fading into the darkness. Yet, at his chest, the crystal pulsed, just barely, but its light was white, just as hers had been.

"Fivarra! Think of the crystal!" she yelled out to him over the whipping winds and thunderous war of magic. "Focus your love on it!"

Finvarra lifted his face, tears of ash seeping from his eyes. Though he looked at her, his gaze was distant as if he no longer knew where he was, who he was... who she was. At his chest, the crystal wavered, the glow pulsing white one moment and black the next.

"She is drawing from his guilt and anger, Leanna!" Inara groaned. "My magic cannot hold both of their powers off for much longer! Speak to him!"

"What you did in the past doesn't matter anymore," she called above the moans and cries of the darkness. "Don't think of the pain, of the death. Think of Ellie, of your people. Think of Forever, Finvarra! Fight for them! They need you. Forever needs her king!"

In the shadow of Machina's magic, Finvarra's shut his eyes tightly with growl, fighting it. At his chest, the crystal hummed white for a slight longer than it did black. He weaved his hands into his hair and curled into himself as if wishing to tear Machina from his mind and thoughts.

"Think of me, Finvarra! It is me you love," she cried, passionate anger filling her voice. "Fight for me, damn it! Fight for me!"

The light of the crystal grew steady with each of his ragged breaths as his magic warred against Machina's poison. His jaw tightening, Finvarra pushed back onto his knees and pinned his gaze on Leanna. The pure white light of his magic illuminated his face and the poison framing his face began to recede. Hauling in a deep breath, Finvarra closed his eyes. His body quavered as shafts of whiteness spread like rays of moonlight. The poison that spread across his chest curled away too did the black mist around him.

As Finvarra claimed rights to his magic, Machina's funnel of dark magic wavered and Inara's pushed closer. Machina's face contorted in anger, her eyes widening at Inara's nearing attack. The faint hue of Finvarra's light streamed across her face then and her head snapped to him.

With an earsplitting shriek, Machina speared an orb of black fire toward Inara. It stalled Inara's beam of magic for a second, enough time for Machina to whirl away from its path and vanish to the shadow behind Finvarra. A second where Finvarra's eyes widened, his body growing rigid.

Inara's magic shot back into her horn with a stunned gasp. The moans and cries of the fog too hushed. In this unnatural stillness, Finvarra met Leanna's stare, pale blue eyes glimmering with volumes of sorrow and apology. He blinked, and blackness washed over his eyes.

Opening her mouth to scream his name, Leanna found no voice. There was only pain at seeing Finvarra's crystal turn black at his chest. And beside it, a metal blade stabbing him straight through the heart.

* * *

Thank you for reading! As always, votes and comments are greatly appreciated! :)