Watching her do big magic, I feel both thrilled and miserable – but mostly miserable. The extraordinary magic that runs in her veins also runs in mine; it’s a gift, handed down by generation after generation of women magicians. But my mother refuses to teach me how to do big magic. She reckons there’s some law of magic that says I must be sixteen before I can learn even the most basic thing – and that’s still five years away.

Backstage, behind the faded red velvet curtains, Kit and I climb out of the box and peel off our red socks. Kit smiles. ‘I still think you smile just a little too much for someone who’s supposedly been cut in half.’

It’s true, I can’t help grinning. Straight after the sawing trick, I always feel weirdly happy, as if we’ve cheated death. ‘Well, I noticed your big shiny smile for the audience when you had that fall from the highwire last week,’ I say. ‘It’s as if you were absolutely delighted to be falling.’

He laughs and gives me a friendly poke. ‘No! I was hoping my dazzling smile would distract them from my stupid mistake!’

Kit is pretty much the opposite of me. He is shy with strangers and I am not. He’s tall and super muscly for twelve, with a long face and short black hair. I am small, with pale skin and brown hair that’s often in plaits (the best hairdo for hiding knots).

Beside us, Kit’s mum, Li Lin, is stretching one leg up until it points straight to the roof, her knee up near the top of her head. She’s an acrobat and contortionist (she can tie herself in an actual knot), plus she runs the food van. As she warms up, she hums, ‘You are my sunshine’. Kit’s dad – who was also an acrobat – used to sing that song while he warmed up.

‘No aerial hoop act tonight, Kit,’ says Li Lin, lowering her leg.

He frowns. ‘Broken hoop, again?’

She nods and folds forward until her face is pressed to her knees.

Kit rolls his eyes at me. Every show, it seems, something needs fixing. Poor Dad can’t keep up.

Kit and I peek through holes in the velvet curtain. Mum’s still walking along the front row, using a spell to transform everyday things from people’s pockets, like the pencil she turns into a sunflower.

We watch closely, as if we haven’t seen her do it a hundred times. It’s still awesome, to be honest, every single time. She takes a folded white hanky from a man, shakes it, and there, perched on her finger, is a plump white dove. It flutters up to sit on a wire, high in the roof of the big top.

‘Wow, she’s amazing,’ breathes Kit, and I feel more miserable than ever. Five long years until I can learn that.