“This doesn’t seem like my kind of thing,” Hallbjorn murmured uneasily. “Those guys look like assholes. And did I ever tell you that I was traumatized by a magician when I was younger? It was a clown who’d come to my friend Krisjan’s eighth birthday party. He had the most terrifying laugh.”
“Of course you were scared of him—he was a clown.” Aria hit him playfully. “Magic shows aren’t my thing, either, but hey—it’s free. We should take advantage of all the perks, don’t you think?” She grabbed his hand. “Besides, we’ll have a funny story about what we did the day before our wedding to tell people ten years from now.”
Hallbjorn shrugged and drained the rest of his champagne. Together they entered the theater, which had psychedelic-print carpet, velour seats that were almost filled to capacity, and portraits of other stars who’d visited—a lot of country music names Aria only vaguely recognized, comedians like Jerry Seinfeld, and about a dozen different Cirque du Soleils—over the stage. The lights lowered just as they plopped down in two seats next to the aisle.
“That Sven Biedermeister is just so handsome!” a blond, pudgy woman who looked a lot like the Rosewood Day school librarian crowed from the row in front of them.
“I’m a Josef Bitschi girl myself,” her companion, a gray-haired woman with lipstick on her teeth, swooned. “I just want to tackle him and smother him with kisses!”
Aria and Hallbjorn nudged each other and tried not to laugh. A beat later, the silvery curtain parted. A line of showgirls in feathered headdresses, tiny tanks, and high, glittering heels marched across the stage with enormous smiles on their faces. They did a kicky dance to the same sort of snarling eighties music that had been on the commercial that afternoon, and everyone cheered. Aria looked at Hallbjorn, shrugged, and started clapping, too.
Mist began to swirl. A kettledrum rumbled. Then two silver panthers strutted onto the stage. Biedermeister and Bitschi sat atop them, waving their arms like cowboys. They’d even put little saddles on the panthers, as though they were ponies.
The audience went wild. The ladies in front of Aria and Hallbjorn looked like they were about to faint. The magicians dismounted their panthers and took a bow. “Hallo!” the dark-haired magician boomed in an Arnold Schwarzenegger accent. “Are you ready to be wowed?”
“Yes!” the audience answered.
Aria tried to exchange looks with Hallbjorn, but his eyes were fixed on the magicians.
The showgirls started kicking again, and then the show began. Biedermeister and Bitschi swirled their capes and made the panthers disappear. With a wave of their hands, one of the showgirls began to levitate. They stuck their heads in the panthers’ mouths and coaxed the panthers to let out a few deep roars. After that, the lights went up and the magicians plopped down on stools and whistled for the cats. Two handlers walked them out on long metal leashes. The cats dutifully sat down next to the magicians as though they were sweet kittens from the ASPCA.
“We rescued Arabelle and Thor from poachers in Africa,” Biedermeister—or was it Bitschi? Aria couldn’t tell them apart—said in a now-it’s-story-time voice. “It was a dramatic mission, but we knew it was right to save them from their brutal fate.”
A screen lowered behind the magicians and showed a picture of a helicopter landing on the Serengeti. The next photo in the slideshow depicted a bunch of people running commando-style through the jungle, presumably to capture the cats. There were more pictures of the silver panthers in the wild, the dens where they lived, and a silver panther pelt hanging in an African market. The crowd booed.
“They were just babies when we rescued them,” the other magician said, patting one of the panthers on its alabaster muzzle. “We nursed them to health. Raised them as our own.” More photos showed the little panthers in Biedermeister’s and Bitschi’s arms, frolicking in a backyard, meeting a golden retriever, and playing with an oblivious-looking child.
“Awww,” the audience cried. The women in front of Aria dabbed at their eyes.
The magicians went on about how much they loved the panthers for a little while longer, and then it was back to the show. They trapped a showgirl in a box, stuck fake knives through an audience participant, and encouraged one of the silver panthers to disappear through a flaming hoop. It reappeared in a glass cage on the runway that extended into the audience. A young girl reached up to give the creature a hug, but one of the animal handlers leapt forward and intervened.
When one of the magicians coaxed a panther to balance on its hind legs and dance with him, Aria began to applaud—it was kind of cute. Hallbjorn kicked her. When she looked over, he was staring at her in horror.
“What?” she whispered.