The Eighth Court

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The fair was an assault on the nostrils. The press of bodies intermingled with the sickly scent of spun sugar over diesel fumes from the generators, cut by the ozone tang of sparking electricity from the rides, gave him indigestion, not helped by the thumping bass of the music. It had Marshdock feeling sick even before he’d found the meeting place.

One of the oldest of the travelling fairs — originally they’d been a nexus for information exchange and maintaining contacts, but these days they were merely an amusement for those who liked such things. The dark came early this time of year, and the last of the families were drifting towards the edges of the fair; kids clinging with sticky fingers to trophy bears and being rewarded with toffee-coated apples and doughnuts laden with sugar and cinnamon. Soon the families would be gone and a teenage crowd would slip in between the rides and the shooting galleries in search of a different kind of thrill.

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