'Don't wander off', Ciel had commanded before you had promptly lost yourself in the crowd. The circus is heaving with starstruck children and amused adults, spending every last halfpenny on sweets and popcorn and interactive stalls.

The coconut shy catches your eye and you're about to make your way towards the vendor but then you hear a very distinct hiss from the grass. A snake. There's a snake. Not a grass snake, no, that would be too easy to explain, it's a rattle snake.

You don't have time to scream before a pale hand comes into view and rescues the snake from the ground. Then you see who the hand belongs to: silver hair, slitted serpentine eyes, skin mottled with patches of scales. A snakeman, the snake charmer. He's pretty.

"Snake! You have rescued me!" The man's voice comes out as a perky chirp then switches to another, more docile tone that's his own. "Says Jonathan..."