The Night Circus journal - The Illusionist & The Birds

The Illusionist is wearing a long ivory cloak over a midnight-black dress. She raises her arms, palms turned up to the canvas roof. Her cloak seems to shiver, then it fractures into a hundred scraps of white, birds leaping upwards as if startled by a farmer’s gun. They fly in formation around the tent, dipping and swirling and changing direction, until finally the Illusionist calls them with a gesture. They sink around her and she is cloaked once more. What just happened here? the tent is still filled with the whisper of their wings. The audience sits in silence for several seconds, uncertain of what they’ve seen. Then the applause crashes like a wave

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