Giovanni sat at his father’s bedside. He had been a poor, rebellious son, but not so bad that his father did not trust the whole world to him. “You’ll grow up,” Father said. “A little sooner than I planned, but you will. Take care of Titania. Take care of Baklovani and the rest.”

“I will, Father,” Giovanni said, though he wondered who the rest might be.

“You are the Don, now,” Father told him. “The title that was given to my father by the Doge I now give to you. Don Giovanni, the third of that name.”

“Yes father.” Giovanni said. He wanted to say many things, but his mouth would not cooperate so he sat there in silence, listening intently.

“Son.” Father grabbed Giovanni’s arm. He could feel it in his sleep. “Don’t let the circus die. Don’t let Corriden take over. He is too greedy, too selfish, too mean, and unfair to the others. He will kill the show, and maybe kill the whole idea so there will never be another circus.”

“Don’t worry, father.” Giovanni lied. “It is all arranged. The show will go on for many years to come. It is the Don Giovanni Circus.”

“The Greatest Show on Earth,” Father said with a smile.

Giovanni returned his father’s smile, and thought as far as Corriden went, he had already taken the whole circus to his new winter camp several miles away. They were building tents and things and planning to continue the tradition, at least at this point.

Where would they go? Giovanni wondered. He decided they would probably follow the same pattern of towns and cities the circus always followed. Giovanni decided he had to get out in front of Corriden.

He thought about the ones who stayed with hm. They wanted nothing to do with Corriden, especially Baklovani the wolfman. Baklovani and Corriden hated each other and used to argue all the time. Then there was Madigan the musician. He swore Corriden cheated him once too often, and Constantine, the tightrope walker; but he would not say why he stayed. Titania, he knew, stayed because she was secretly in love with Giovanni’s father, and sometimes mothered Giovanni.

“We will rebuild our circus,” he told everyone. “We will find acts and make the Don Giovanni Circus better than ever.”

“There is no Don Giovanni Circus left.” In a moment of honesty, before they gathered at the graveside, Madigan growled. “I might do better on the road by myself, like the old days.”

That was when Oberon, Goldiwig, Sabelius and Madam Figiori showed up. They really did save the circus. They had enough to build on then. One half-troll, two dwarfs and an elf come all the way from Avalon.

He smiled in his sleep and watched his dream turn to Avalon, the home for all his little ones, all the elves, ogres, dwarfs, and fee that were given into his care in ancient times. Avalon. and the seven isles, and the incalculable isles beyond rested in the Second Heavens like the layers on an onion, taking up the same space, but separated by time and the unique properties of the Second Heavens.

Giovanni woke.

He thought he heard something, but all seemed quiet and still in the night. Was there trouble in Avalon? No, he decided it was only his imagination. He got up quietly and drew back the window curtain, opening the shutters at the same time. The moonlight fell on the sleeping girl. She looked ideal, angelic, lovely. He stopped and shook himself. She was circus now and he did not sleep with circus women. As young as he was, he had already had more than his share of women, sampling the wares up and down the Italian shores. But he never touched the circus women. He imagined he would have a hard time and no show at all if everyone started sleeping around.

But sweet Jesus, she was beautiful. He stood, stepped to the door, and looked outside taking in the moon and the stars in a clear night sky.

“Boss?” Sabelius was there.

“Watching over her?” he asked. “Making sure the watch does not come back?”

“I am,” he admitted.

“I’ll be back,” Giovanni said, but instead of walking to the outhouses as Sabelius might have expected, he ran to the nearest shore point and tossed himself into the sea. I needed a cold shower, he told himself. Since it was early spring, he found the water plenty cold. But when he came out, he was still filled with desire for the child sleeping in his bed. He thought of Madam Delfin. She was a noble lady. She would know what to do and do it very well besides.

He shook his head. He surprised himself. He hardly knew the girl, but he already knew no other woman would satisfy the longing he felt. “Good while it lasted,” he mumbled and stopped at the outhouse before returning to the wagon where in a matter of minutes he fell asleep again and dreamed.

This time, he dreamed of witches. There were two, floating about ten feet off the ground, sharing thoughts with one another and cackling. It was true. They were cackling, cliché though that was. Suddenly, a streak of power came from somewhere behind a building. They were in a town. The witches shrieked and flew off, and the Flesh Eaters came to the town square. They put their weapons away and started grabbing the people who suddenly appeared in the square. They shot out their tongues and attached their tongues to the people, usually in the neck, and sucked out all the blood neat as a vampire. Then they started eating the people.

Giovanni wanted to turn away, but as often happens in dreams, he was stuck, unable to so much as close his eyes, until the Flesh Eaters saw him. They chased him. Many abandoned their feast and chased him, blood and torn flesh still dripping from their sharp toothed mouths. They kept jutting their tongues out at him like they were smelling his blood in the air.

Giovanni’s feet could move, but not fast enough. They were going to catch him. He felt sure he would be caught. He ran through the streets, transitioned to fields, some fallow, some filled with wheat. He ran up the side of the hill and down the other side into a dark and spooky forest full of monsters. It was the haunted forest Greta went through. It was the forest with dead water where Festuscato faced the Grendel. It was the mist filled forest where Gerraint found Arthur after his indiscretion with Mordred’s mother. He expected to run into blue painted faces in the mist, men ready to ambush him. It was the forest where Margueritte took an arrow in her side that almost took her life.

Giovanni tried to break out of the dream. He tried to wake up, but all he did was find himself in a box canyon. He reached the wall—the cliff face. The Flesh Eaters, Succubus, hags of Abraxas, and even the witches were nearly on him. He would have to climb the cliff, but he really did not like high places. Oddly enough, he thought if he fell to his death that would deprive all of his pursuers from getting him. With that thought, he woke up. The sun was rising. His mouth felt completely dried out. He smacked his glue-like lips, put one hand to his stomach, and decided he was hungry. He paused.

He looked at the girl and sighed before he pulled the blanket up to cover the girl. She responded in her sleep by pulling the blanket under her chin and smiling. Her eyes never opened, so Giovanni went out quietly to see if Gabriella started cooking breakfast.

While he walked, he wondered why he never checked on the Flesh Eaters. He wondered more about the succubus, and the hags. Now that Abraxas was gone over to the other side, there were no more hags. He wondered more about the witches. He did the calculations in his head and concluded the Other Earth, the source of what many called magic energy, phased out of range of his earth some twenty three years ago, and it would stay out of range for three hundred years. Presently, the amount of magic energy leaking between the two universes was negligible and getting less. There were no more witches or wizards on Earth unless they carried the magic in their blood. He would have to think about that.

Giovanni thought about Avalon, that special place that the Kairos called home. Of course, he was presently the Kairos, so for the time being it was his home. Alice, a life of his who would not even be born until far in the future lived there and had lived there since 4500 years before Christ. He shook his head. Making sense of his own life or lives could be hard to follow, even for him.

With Avalon he thought about the innumerable sprites that inhabited the world and went to Avalon for a time of rest. He wondered why he had not called on any of them to help him in his times of need. Well, he had two dwarfs, one elf, and a half troll. But just as well. As Kirstie said, so he needed to work things out in the human world with human beings the best he could and should not depend on the little ones who had their own work in the world to do.

“Up for breakfast?” Gabriella interrupted his introspection.

“You are up plenty early,” he responded.

“I get up every day at this time, but you would not know. You usually sleep in.”

“Only because of so many late night hours,” Giovanni excused himself, accepted a plate of breakfast, and sat at a table thinking again. He wondered if his father was really in a better place. He believed he was.