In the center, women in white skirts and top hats over Raggedy-Ann-red hair juggled. The jugglers parted and two women were spun on separate wheels while jesters in matching blue, red, and gold costumes threw knives at them.

The act was familiar to anyone who had attended a simple street carnival. In a whoosh, a dozen women rotated a giant wheel in place at the center of the ring. The women were a strange sight, their otherworldly crimson tresses trimmed to resemble yard hedges—one with a tidy single cone above her head, like a tipped ice cream cone; the other with two cone peaks projected above her ears; their faces ghostly white with exaggerated Cupid’s bow lips to match their hair.

After a flurry of set changes, the spotlight panned and a woman and man emerged holding hands before taking their places.

As Edvard Grieg’s “Hall of the Mountain King” began, a man donned a blindfold while a woman stepped onto the wheel. Without much fanfare, the man gathered his arsenal into a leather satchel that he slung from his left shoulder and in one movement both turned and emptied his collection of knives and axes at the tall, smirking blonde. Metal scraped as the blades left the leather bag and then thunked as each hit the intended target. Rather than savoring each throw, the thrower dispatched his blades much like bullets from a gun. Lara watched as the audience, so sure they knew what was to happen next, settled back in their velvet chairs. Anyone standing in the alcove could hear the clinking of glasses as the bored patrons in the darkened hall took sips of their champagne. In the dimly lit seating area, Lara could make out the faces of the audience—they were bored, as if this act was nothing spectacular. Hell, the opera was better.

The thrower removed his blindfold and admired his handiwork, allowing the dramatic moment to hang for an intended beat too long. Somewhere near the top of the stands, a man coughed as if to prod the thrower to get on with the next reveal—which of course had to be the unveiling of the woman, stepping off the wheel without a scrape on her.

Except it wasn’t.

Like an adjustment the eye makes from light to dark, Lara saw the woman on the wheel come sharply into focus. The patrons in the front row nearest to the spectacle sat forward in their seats, sure their eyes were playing tricks on them. Next came audible gasps, Lara’s included. The scene came into focus, spreading backward and catching the throats of the audience, until the full horror reached the very top. Lara swooned with them, bile rising again in her throat.