I fingered the fabric of the Third Year choker around my neck, staring at it in the mirror. I murmured to Maverick, "I wish I could read it."
Maverick looked up from his handbook of standard Hanging Boy show scenarios, his expression puzzled. "What do you mean? Just take it off and read it."
I shook my head, still looking at my reflection. "It's not the same. If I take it off, then it's not around my neck anymore." I stirred the other chokers in my dresser drawer, all identical except for their colors — at Academy parties I could choose whichever one went best with my party outfit. Maverick and I had taken to wearing very hot emsembles for the auctions following our party performances. All of mine had the words "Wynn — Property of the Hanging Academy" stitched across the front. "I can see what it says. I want to feel what it says. I want to read it while it's around my neck."
Maverick resumed studying the handbook. "What, can't you read it backwards?"
"I want to see it the way club members at the parties will."
My metal Second Year collar, now discarded, hadn't affected me this way. Probably because the thing was so heavy that I could never forget it was there. Yes, that was it. The feathery weight of the new choker was so imperceptible that I found myself almost unaware that I was collared at all. I had to keep reaching up to touch it to make sure it was there.
I sighed, then giggled. "Maybe we can rig up extra mirrors so my reflection gets reflected." I brushed a fleck of lint from my new aqua-colored shirt, part of my Third Year uniform. I was enjoying my new, exalted status among the students of the school.
But I had lost Maverick's attention. I turned, walked to the bed and sat on it beside him. Maverick couldn't understand my preoccupation with the symbols of my status as a Hanging Boy. To Maverick, the fact of being a Hanging Boy was indisputable, and he didn't need a collar to tell him the Academy owned him.
I put my arms around Maverick's waist and leaned my head on his shoulder. I saw the page Maverick was on. "Captured Assassin? Is that the one you want?"
Maverick frowned. "I'm not feeling it. If I was going to kill somebody, I'd make sure I had the perfect plan and couldn't be caught."
I turned my head slightly and kissed Maverick's cheek. "Hon, you've got to be the Prince. That's so totally you."
Maverick looked briefly at me, then back at the handbook, his lips turning up in a smile. "Why, thank you, loyal subject. So why am I a prince?"
I looked steadily into Maverick's eyes, until he turned to look at me. "Because you have so much in common with a prince. A prince is born to be what he is, just like you were born to be what you are."
Maverick's eyes lit up instantly. "I like that." He reached up, gently pulled my head closer, and kissed me. "And you'll be my servant." The role of the prince's servant was one of those recent additions to the various scenarios since Marshall's day, designed to give Academy students active roles in other boys' hanging performances.
I giggled, mumbling against Maverick's lips, "If I'm still alive." Each of us longed to be present at the other's hanging, But we couldn't both get our wish. We had finally agreed to leave it to chance — whichever received a serious, acceptable offer first would take it, and not fret over losing the chance to see the other hang.
Maverick continued to kiss me, reaching to pull up my shirt, and I started undressing him. We could rarely stop once our physical intimacies had progressed to this point. But I looked up in annoyance as the speaker in our room crackled to life with the announcement, "Wynn Cameron, please report to the First Year dorm parents' room."
I recognized Larry's voice before the message registered. I shook my head as Maverick broke off the kiss. "It's just Larry messing around. He'll probably order us to come over for movies tonight." I had known it would be a mixed blessing when Larry and Leo had been made dorm parents. Leo could be counted on to take it seriously, but Larry was sure to spice up his position of authority with a little playfulness.
Maverick kissed me lightly on the cheek and handed my shirt back. "Go ahead. You know what kind of shit he'll give you if you don't show up."
I put on the shirt, stood and leaned down to kiss Maverick. "Yeah, but he doesn't know what kind of shit I'll give him the next time he interrupts us in the middle. See you in a little bit. Hold my place for me."
Maverick grinned and picked up the handbook again. "I'm your prince. Don't give me orders." As I left, Maverick was turning back pages to examine the Prince Scenario.
I knocked on Larry's and Leo's door. I hadn't generally bothered with that for over two years, but their position now required a greater degree of decorum. I didn't want to lessen their authority if one of the First Years was in their room. I heard Leo's "Come in." I put on my exasperated face and entered.
It was still jarring for me to see my friends in their red graduate uniforms, but it didn't stop me from venting my irritation. "Larry, could you just..." I stopped abruptly — there was indeed a First Year boy sitting in one of the chairs.
The instant I focused on his face, I gasped and blinked. My legs suddenly felt weak. I began, in a whisper, "Mar..." and stopped.
I stared at the boy intently. He did remind me strongly of Marshall, especially in profile now as he shot Larry a puzzled look. He certainly had the same nose and the same high cheekbones, though the shape of his chin was slightly different, and his headfur was a darker blonde than Marshall's, with a curl to it that Marshall's didn't have. The butterflies in my stomach weren't going away. "Larry... is..." To the boy I said, "Are..." before words failed me. I shot a look at the boy's metal collar, forgetting that it would simply identify him as "Slave Boy."
I realized Larry was doubled over in laughter, sputtering, "I knew you'd see it! You've spent a lot more time looking at that face than I have!"
Leo, laughing too, put his hand on the First Year boy's shoulder. "I'm sorry, Marcus, we're not laughing at you, honest. You just don't know how to appreciate the look on Wynn's face right now."
Larry, choking back the last of his giggles, said, "Marcus, this is Wynn Cameron. A Third Year... well, you can see that. Wynn, I wanted to make sure you met Marcus Warren. Okay, you can go on back to your room now." He made a brusque shooing gesture.
I ignored Larry and took a step closer, trying again to speak. At last I managed a choked, "Hi, Marcus."
Marcus's puzzled frown deepened as he saw the expression on my face. Then he spoke and I recognized Marshall's voice. "I'm really sorry... I'm usually good with faces, but... if we've met, I'm just not remembering. Oh! So you knew..." He shook his head slightly. "You couldn't have known my brother either. He was hanged before you started here."
I finally found my voice, and a smile. "There's something... someone, I mean, I think you should see." I looked up at Leo. "You don't need to talk to him anymore, right? Can I take him and show him something?" I corrected myself again. "Somebody?"
Leo grinned. "Oh, sure. Mind if we come along?"
Marcus looked at his "dorm parents" and shrugged, standing. "Is this still part of orientation or something?"
Leo interrupted before Larry could say anything misleading. "Ahhh, no. Marcus, I know you just met us, but trust us. There's a reason we're being so mysterious, but you're not going to be locked in a secret closet or anything like that. Nothing bad will happen, I promise."
Marcus shrugged again, and put on a tentative smile. "Well, okay." He turned to me and said, "You'll have to show me where we're going, of course. I can barely find my way back to my own room."
I rapped softly on the door of our room. Maverick occasionally still violated the neck trainer rule by using it alone, and I hoped no one else would ever find out. "Maverick? You decent? I've got company."
Marcus asked, "So is this your room?" Behind Marcus, Larry's and Leo's eyes were bright with excitement.
I played what Marcus had said back in my mind and responded, "Oh, yeah. Maverick is my roommate," as Maverick's muffled voice came through the door, "Yeah, no problem."
I opened the door, and saw Maverick sitting on the bed with his back propped against the wall, looking up from the handbook to see who was here. I gestured for Marcus to go in, watching carefully for Mav's reaction.
Marcus stopped abruptly, and he and Maverick were both startled, for different reasons. In Marcus's case, it was the usual reaction of anyone seeing Maverick for the first time — in any roomful of sexy men, Maverick would always stand out. Maverick, meanwhile, let his jaw drop open, and instantly shot a wide-eyed look at the shelf on which Marshall's head rested. Great, I thought, even to Maverick it's obvious.
It almost seemed to happen in slow motion:, Marcus turned his head slightly to see what Maverick was looking at.
Marcus's hands flew to his cheeks, and his knees buckled. Crouching, he let a strangled squeak emerge from his throat and then stood in that pose frozen, staring.
I turned to look at Larry, who grinned and gave me a thumbs-up signal. When I looked back at Marcus, he had taken several steps into the room. In an awed whisper, Marcus's asked, "What is he doing here? He should be with the people who bought him."
I thought for a moment about how to answer. "Ummm... he is, sort of. My father bought him, for my brother. My brother... realized how important he was to me. And let me have him." That was basically true, as far as it went.
Marcus whirled to look at me. "You... your family staged his hanging?" His eyes and mouth were wide open.
I stepped toward Marcus and put a hand on his shoulder, unable to stop glancing back and forth between him and his late brother. It wasn't a case of there just being a subtle family resemblance. If Marcus did some things to his headfur, he might easily have impersonated his brother. "The show he put on was really wonderful. I want you to know, your brother is the reason I'm here, at the Academy. I'm not just saying that."
Marcus took a step closer to Marshall, reached out and stopped himself, looking at me. "Is it okay if I touch him?"
I blinked in surprise. "Marcus, he's your brother. Of course you can touch him!"
Marcus reached out again, and rested his fingertips on Marshall's cheek as if his brother were a soap bubble that might pop at the slightest touch. He stroked his brother's cheek softly. Only a few of the other boys who had visited my shrine had actually touched Marshall, but it came as no surprise to me that Marcus would.
Marcus looked back me again. "Could I hold him?"
I made a hand gesture of offering Marshall to Marcus. "Like I said."
Marcus gingerly lifted his brother's head off the shelf, backed up a few steps and felt blindly behind him for the bed, sitting on the edge of it when he reached it. Maverick got off the bed to give him some room, and stood beside me, automatically taking my hand.
Marcus folded his arms around Marshall, clutching his brother's face against him, bending forward with his head bowed, as if he wanted to surround his brother completely.
I looked at Maverick, Larry, and Leo, caught their eyes and pointed toward the door with my eyes. I said softly, "Marcus, we're going to leave you alone with him a few minutes, if that's all right."
Marcus looked up, and I was floored — not by the tears streaming down his cheeks, I had anticipated something like that — but by what he said. Marcus murmured, "I can't be like him."
That could be taken so many ways, I thought. "What... what do you mean?"
His voice quavering, Marcus said, "You saw him hang! You're going to expect me to be like that, and I'll never be anywhere near as good as him!" He sniffled violently to clear his nose.
I sat beside Marcus on the bed, and cautiously ventured, "Ummm... Well, yes, I saw him, but you didn't. How can you know whether you can do it that well?"
Barely stifling sobs now, Marcus wailed, "I grew up with him! Everything was just... so easy for him, so natural! And... and... I did see him hang, once. I mean, not all the way, obviously. But he came home and spent a weekend, you know, in his last year. I tried to get him to tell me how Hanging Boys do it, but he never would..."
Even with his own family, Marshall respected the code of the Hanging Boy, the understanding that he would never talk about the tricks of his craft to an outsider.
Marcus continued, "...But he did kind of a demo for us, just for the family. He wouldn't let us bring friends over. He made all of us, me and my brothers, promise we'd never, ever do it on our own, that if we decided to go to the Academy we'd wait until they could train us. He said he wouldn't do anything until he believed we really meant it when we promised.
"He rigged up the rope himself, and got up on a stool under the rope. After he adjusted the noose around his neck himself, he let me tie his hands. Daddy and the other boys were all watching. Then he squatted down slowly and took his weight off the stool, and I pulled it away."
Marcus had stopped crying for the moment, losing himself in the memory.
"He kicked and twisted around for... well, the clock said it was ten minutes, but it seemed like forever! And then finally he wriggled his foot, and that was to tell me to put the stool back under him, so I did, and he stood up on it. And he smiled at us, and the look on his face was so..."
Marcus didn't seem to have words for it, but I nodded. "I know." I stroked Marcus's back.
Marcus was sniffling again, tears beginning to flow once more. "I saw that look, and I knew I just had to come here. To feel the way he felt. And I told myself..." his voice was wavering, his shoulders heaving, "...that if I could just be half the Hanging Boy he was, that would be enough. And now I'm here, and... it's all turned around now. Now I'm thinking how I can only be half the Hanging Boy he was, and everybody here knows it, and they'll think I'm... like... kind of a fraud, or something..." The sobbing took over, and he bent over Marshall's head again, holding it tightly against his chest.
I looked up at my friends, who were standing and looking on helplessly. I patted Marcus's back. "Listen, like I said, we'll let you be alone a minute." I stood and gestured emphatically for the others to leave, followed them out, and closed the door.
In the hallway, I whispered urgently, "Look, I never had an older brother. I don't know what to tell him. I could use a little help here."
Larry blinked, and whispered back, "Don't look at me. My brothers are younger than me."
Maverick nodded. "Same here. The one."
Leo said, "Two of mine are older, but one got married and is taking classes at the college part-time, and the other is a bed-slave. I'm not following in anybody's footsteps. I'm as lost as you are."
I thought for a moment I might appeal to Maverick's memory of his uncle, but knew that wouldn't be helpful. Maverick had no self-doubts resulting from his admiration of his uncle. And dealing with emotions was, in any case, not Maverick's strong suit.
I sighed. Even now, I could find yet another reason for wishing my brother could have been a decent person.
Larry patted my hip. "Wynn, go ahead. You're good at this kind of thing."
"Define 'this kind of thing.' "
"You know. Making people feel better about themselves."
I rolled my eyes. "I don't have any magic. Sometimes I can manage it when inspiration strikes me." It occurred to me that the boy sitting crying on my bed was holding a large part of my inspiration in his lap — and what was inspiration to me was something of a poison to this boy.
Well, I thought, maybe that tells me the first thing I should do. After that I'll wing it.
I quietly opened the door and looked inside. Marcus was still hunched over Marshall, but quiet for the moment. I walked farther into the room, my friends following me.
I sat slowly down on the bed beside Marcus, and put my arm across Marcus's back. I lay my other hand gently on Marcus's forearm, and with the lightest of pressures, tried to pull Marcus's arm away from around his brother's head, while whispering, "Marcus, I need you to sit up for me... There, that's the way." I continued pulling on the boy's arm, gradually moving it away from the back of Marshall's head. It took little effort — Marcus, in his present state, had almost no will of his own.
I caught Larry's eye, and pointed down to Marshall and then to the bathroom. Larry, understanding, lifted Marshall's head from Marcus's lap, and carried it into the bathroom. Marshall needed to be completely out of Marcus's sight for the moment.
"Marcus, look at me. This is really important."
Like the motion of a glacier, Marcus's face slowly turned toward me, and he looked at me with red, wet eyes.
I smiled at him encouragingly. "Marcus, I know how you feel right now. Not because I had an older brother to think about, but just because I'm here. Every boy, when he first gets here, has these same feelings you're having right now. Thinking they're not good enough, that they don't belong here." I glanced up at Maverick and corrected myself. "Almost every boy."
"Yeah," Marcus sniffled, "But they haven't had it proved to them."
"Well," I responded, rubbing Marcus's back, "This year we're going to disprove it. Okay, listen really closely. This is the absolute truth. Are you hearing me?" I waited until Marcus, eventually, nodded, then went on.
"Some things are different from when Marshall learned how to do what he showed you. More... advanced." I flashed a smile up at Maverick and went on. "I know it's only been a few years, but the... choreography has changed." I spoke slowly now, emphasizing each word. "You are going to learn some things Marshall never saw."
I had Marcus's full attention now. He looked at me wide-eyed. "Really?"
I nodded emphatically. "Really! Listen: I did see Marshall's big performance, and it's the most memorable thing in my whole life. I think about it every day and every night. But you're going to affect people even more."
It occurred to me suddenly that, though I was saying the right things, they were only words, and their power would fade. The words needed some reinforcement, right now.
I grinned at Marcus. "Sit right there. We're going to show you what I'm talking about." I bounced up and hooked the room's hanging platform with my foot, and pulled it to the center of the room, below the dangling noose.
I was about to ask Maverick if he'd do a demonstration for Marcus, but realized that this might well simply create a fresh source of intimidation — none of the students in my class or the next one could perform at Maverick's level, and Marcus would probably sense immediately that he might never do it the way Maverick could. It would be better if I did it myself.
I quickly pulled off my shirt and slid my shorts and briefs down my legs, kicking them away with no remaining vestige of the self-consciousness I would have felt years ago. With Marcus's eyes following my every move, I had Maverick tie my wrists.
Minutes later I was in my ultimate comfort zone, hanging by my neck. I did some preliminary kicking as I built my sexual energy.
Then I began with the hip thrusts, and the enfold-your-lover-with-your-legs movements.
After a few minutes, I spared a small part of my mind to look for Marcus's reaction. He was to my left, so I turned myself in mid-air to face that direction.
Marcus's jaw was hanging open, and his hand, as was nearly always the case when seeing this sort of performance for the first time, was between his legs, his fingers stiffly rubbing his sheath through his shorts, probably unconsciously, considering his intense focus on me.
I brought my own focus back to my moves. I stretched downward and strained stiffly, rippling muscles up and down my body to in waves of wriggling, like a flag blowing in a strong wind, as I used Shaw's "desperate reaching for support" move. I resumed the hip thrusts and leg moves, this time concentrating on my own pleasure, more and more urgently, until the waves of orgasm crashed upon me, filling me from head to toe in spasms of excitement and pleasure.
At last spent, I signalled Maverick to let me down. Moments later, I was grinning down at Marcus, breathing hard, more from the aftereffects of orgasm than from shortage of air, as Maverick removed the noose and untied my hands.
Still naked, I sat again beside Marcus, wanting Marcus to see me without, literally and emotionally, having to look up at me. I'm at your level, Marcus, my position said. I'm like you, not above you. I've just had two years to learn some things. My skin, my face, and my entire being glowing, I grinned at Marcus. "So what did you think? Did Marshall do all that?"
Speechlessly, still wide-eyed, Marcus shook his head.
I did want to be perfectly honest. "Now, some of that wasn't new. Marshall probably didn't make himself come for you, but I saw him do it when he was hanging. All Hanging Boys have always tried for that. But a lot of the stuff I did... It's like I said before. Marshall never saw that. We're doing that now. Not just me. It's the standard stuff now, and we're all learning it. I came here with no experience at all in hanging. You're seeing what I've learned." I looked intently at Marcus, and spoke slowly again. "You will too. I promise. More than Marshall ever knew."
Almost in a whisper, Marcus asked, "Will you teach me?"
I grinned and waved my arm to indicate myself and the others. "We're all teachers here." Larry and Leo, of course, were on the teaching staff as graduates, but Maverick and I had semi-official part-time roles as well — we had conducted classes for what was now the Second Year class, and would be doing the same for the new First Years. "But every student at the Academy is a teacher. Everybody helps everybody and shows them what they can do. You're going to teach your own friends too." I held Marcus's eyes. "You want to be part of all this?"
Marcus breathed out a fervent, "Oh, yes!"