by Cecilia Tan
A half hour later, he backed down from the brink of orgasm for the umpteenth time, biting his fist. Should he stop? He didn’t want to stop. He wanted to come like Mount Vesuvius. But he didn’t want to make a mess, and he didn’t want to give up. He could find the restroom and do it in there, but he would have to turn the light on in there to keep from just making the mess worse, and he was convinced that would somehow give him away. The wisest course of action was probably to just leave his cock alone until the erection went down, then find some corner to fall asleep in for a few hours before going back into hiding just before the building opened again in the morning.
Yeah, right. Falling asleep while as horny as Merlin’s third cousin’s goat sounded about as doable as levitation right now. Alex, you pigfucking son of Circe, this is all your fault...
The restroom it was. Using only the light from his phone he managed to make himself a large wad of toilet paper, which he used in both hands to wank himself quickly to a silent but heart-stopping orgasm. It hadn’t taken long, but he felt somewhat chafed. He stuffed the wad down into a trash bin and wondered what to do next.
* * * *
Four nights later, he had seen Dean Bell twice more, but Bell had seemed unaware of his presence each time. And perhaps it was a good thing Kyle hadn’t found the siren yet, since it wasn’t until that fifth night that he read another account of the amulet he’d made and finally realized the siren wasn’t the one who was supposed to wear the amulet at all. Of course the siren wasn’t supposed to wear it! How would you get something like that around a Sphinx’s neck?
Kyle looped the chain over his own neck, feeling foolish in the extreme.
A few days before term started again, students began to trickle back into the house. The dining hall reopened, which was wonderful, since the weather had continued to be nasty and slogging out once a day to see Alex had been enough of the great outdoors for Kyle’s taste.
He told Alex all about making the amulet and almost breaking his neck getting back into his room, and about Bell stalking the library every other night. “I can’t help but feel he has it in for you somehow,” Kyle said. “At least, that was the impression you always gave me, and nothing I’ve seen has improved my opinion of him.”
But Alex never answered. The stocking was still hanging on the window, even though it was well past the Christmas season now. Kyle didn’t take it down, and neither did anyone else.
At least he had some friends to eat with and hang around in the common room with. The Glads seemed a lot more relaxed and less clique-ish when there were only a few of them around. One night Kyle and Nichols were playing cards when the door burst open and Frost came stumbling into the room, swearing about the sticky door.
Kyle chuckled under his breath, and when Frost had gone through to the stairs to his room, he remarked to Nichols, “I guess I’m not the only one who has trouble with that door.”
Nichols looked at him funny but said nothing, just placed his next card on the table between them.
Kyle examined his hand, then asked, “You’re a year ahead of him. How did he get ahead of you in the pecking order?”
Nichols gave Kyle another look, but one without any malice. “Well, if he hadn’t rescued me on Halloween, you mean. I owe him big time for that.”
“But besides that.”
Nichols shrugged. “I know what you’re thinking. And he’s a foundling too, and not even dating someone in the house. But he always does things that gain him status. That includes top grades in all his classes, for one thing.”
“But there are plenty of people who get good grades.”
Nichols shrugged. “More likely people just respond, consciously or unconsciously, to the amount of power he has.”
For a moment Kyle though Nichols was using the word “power” as a synonym for “status,” but then realized that wouldn’t make sense. “Wait. You mean magical power? How can you tell?”
Nichols winced. “Some of us can just tell. He’s like...dripping with it.”
“Dripping?”
“Just a metaphor. Some people sense things palpably, others see them as if they were visible to the naked eye.”
“You can see how powerful he is?”
Nichols wouldn’t meet Kyle’s eyes. “Yeah. He glows.”
Kyle had to make a conscious effort to close his mouth. “Um.” And then opened it again, seizing the opportunity. “What about me?”
Nichols was forced to look up at him then. “Oh. You...not many people come close to the kind of raw power Frost has, you know.”
“This isn’t about me feeling inadequate next to Frost...”
“It isn’t? But you were just asking me how he got such high status...”
“Nick, come on. Just tell me what I look like.”
Nichols dropped his eyes again. “You’re not easy to get a sense of, and sometimes you seem like you’re almost not there at all, but I can’t tell if that’s just that you’re not projecting? Your power is more like heat to me. It’s kind of like there’s a light bulb inside you, but when it’s on, you can’t actually see it, in there, but you can feel if it warms up. If I just passed you on the street I wouldn’t say, there goes one of us. But that doesn’t mean the power’s not there. Does that make sense?”
Kyle slumped. “I guess. And I suppose to a lot of people I just...don’t seem magical at all?”
Nichols shook his head. “You can’t think that way. But magically speaking, I mean...you went to a normal school until you got here, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, there was a pecking order there, too, wasn’t there? How was it set? Like in gym class, someone had to be picked last for teams, right?”
“Well, you could tell some kids were more athletic than others, some were more coordinated, or they played more sports...”
“Right.” Nichols folded his cards. “And the ones with the most ability tended to do the most sports, reinforcing that image. Well, magical ability is like that, too, and human nature’s the same. So you’ve got to show what you’ve got sometimes, or how is anyone going to know? No one’s got a very high opinion of you, but it’s nothing personal if everyone else is just ahead. You started late, didn’t make the dean’s list, never have performed for tea or anything...”
“I’m organizing the Masque, though,” Kyle put in.
“Which is good. And hanging around with Speyer helps. I never would have gotten on a broom if it hadn’t been for her. Remy never would have picked me.” Nichols shrugged. “Until I came here, I always was the last kid picked for teams, and I never wanted to distinguish myself academically either, because I was afraid I’d be accused of cheating and somehow this would lead to my magic being exposed...It’s been kind of a challenge, learning not to be a wallflower.”
“But doesn’t someone have to be the wallflower?” Kyle mused out loud.
“Not in this house,” Nichols answered seriously. “Honestly, though, you’re doing what you can to move up. You’re smart to just ignore the other freshmen. You’re on a social committee with Speyer. Get Master Brandish to laugh out loud at dinner—as long as she’s not laughing atyou, that is—and you’ll gain some respect from the others. If you really want to be bold, take your tray right over to Speyer’s table and sit down with her. Claim Masque planning talk or whatever. If she doesn’t kick you out, you’re golden.”
Kyle thought about it. “I really hoped I was leaving this kind of...politics behind when I left high school.”
Nichols shrugged. “Human nature doesn’t change. The reason the house is like this is so you can learn how to swim upstream, here where your progress is actually measured. Once you’re out in the real world, you think someone will just hand you a score at the end of the day to let you know where you stand at your job or among your neighbors or whatever? There’s a reason Glads tend to be in leadership positions.”
Kyle sat back. “I never thought of it that way.”
Now Nichols half smiled. “What, never real
ized this is all one big learning experience?”
“I knew that. I just didn’t know it was so structured.” Kyle folded his cards too, his mind no longer on the game.
“Manners, the proper way of speaking, learning to size up whether someone should be addressed as a peer or as someone of higher status...you’re not going to learn that any way but living it. You especially, since you didn’t grow up with it.”
“And here I thought it was just arbitrary stuff to annoy us.”
“Nope. So when are you and Speyer going to announce dance practice?”
“Dance practice?”
Nichols now grinned. “Oh, come on, you aren’t going to hold a formal dance, a Masque especially, without making sure everyone in the house can acquit themselves properly on the dance floor?”
“Um...?”
Nichols sighed and rolled his eyes. “There will be pavanes. There will be sarabandes. There will be contra dance of all kinds. You’ll be expected to go through the courtly dances so you can meet potential partners.”
“Partners?”
“It’s a masque,” Nichols said, as if that explained everything.
Perhaps it did. Kyle remembered what Master Brandish had said about some in Esoteric Studies discouraging masques from being held, ostensibly because of the erotic consequences. “Right.”
“Mark my words. If she doesn’t make the whole house practice, she’ll at least make sure anyone who doesn’t know how, will.”
Kyle didn’t doubt that Nichols was right.
* * * *
The night Jess returned, even a run-in with Frost couldn’t bring Kyle’s mood down. In the Gladius dining hall, Kyle had seen him eating alone. As he’d passed by him, he’d tried to be civil.
“You’re looking well, Frost,” he said. Frost’s cheeks almost looked like they had some color. “Did you go somewhere warm for break?”
But Frost had just glared at him and replied with a sneer, “Nowhere special, but it beat staying here, I bet.”
Whatever. He was probably cranky because he and Candlin hadn’t seen each other in weeks. Kyle could understand that; he’d been pretty moody himself while Jess had been gone. He grinned at Frost, pretending like Frost hadn’t said anything. “Well, enjoy dessert. I’m off to meet up with Jess,” he said, then sauntered away, quite sure Frost was staring daggers into his back.
When Kyle got to Camella House, she was standing on the front step, and a month’s worth of anxiety melted away as she came running up to him before he could even reach her, grabbed him in a huge hug, and kissed him. Through their winter coats it was a bulky hug, but to Kyle that just made it seem all the warmer.
“I missed you, too,” he said.
“Come on, let’s go get coffee and you can tell me all about what you did while I was gone,” she said with a grin.
He laughed and they began walking hand in hand toward the Square. “You mean you can tell me what you did, since all I did was sit around, mope and study.”
“Was it really that bad?”
“Just boring, mostly. I’ll tell you about it once we get settled.”
They ended up with hot chocolate instead of coffee, and a table in the cramped back corner of the coffee shop where their knees touched. Kyle didn’t mind at all. He held his chocolate in both hands, feeling like the heat from it soaked through his whole body from his palms, and listened to her tell stories about her various family members, and the new CD she bought, and a few movies she saw.
When she wound down, he told her he’d been visiting Alex every day, that nothing was different other than he was starting to look kind of skinny, and about how he’d started reading the commentaries for some of the prophecies, which led him to trying to figure out how not to tell her how much trouble he’d had conjuring.
But eventually he got down to the part about the library. “I looked for the siren,” he said quietly, realizing it suddenly sounded like a much stupider and less impressive thing to do than he’d hoped it would.
Especially when Jess seemed less than thrilled. “You what?”
“I didn’t find her,” he said quietly. “Er, it. I did spend the night in the library a couple of times and there’s no siren there. If there is, she...it’s really hiding from everyone. But Dean Bell was there.”
“Dean Bell caught you in the library?”
“No, no. I saw him a few times, like he was looking for the siren, too, and didn’t find anything. Me included.”
She frowned. “Kyle, you could have gotten into huge trouble. Or worse, what if you had found the siren, or the siren found you? You could have ended up like Alex. And if you’re trying to keep your options open, as far as Esoteric Studies goes...” She made a face. “A siren fucking you...it still counts as sex.”
“Oh.” Kyle hadn’t thought about it that way. “Well, but I’m not sure I...” He paused mid-sentence, his brain catching up to his mouth. No, he wasn’t sure if Esoteric Studies was something he wanted to go into, but then again, his big discovery of the past few weeks had been that masturbating and magic seemed to go hand in hand for him. “Well, I wasn’t looking for her to have sex,” he said a bit more defensively.
Jess made a frustrated noise. “That wouldn’t matter to a siren. If they want to have you, you don’t get much choice.”
“Well...” He took a breath and then pulled the chain out from under his shirt to show her the amulet. “I made this. It should keep me from getting attacked by sirens. And Sphinxes.”
“Sphinxes are extinct,” she said offhandedly, lifting the amulet in her palm and frowning as she examined it. “Where did you get this?”
“Um, well, the necklace came from a clothing shop around the corner. The one where you said everything’s ugly?” He pointed vaguely in the direction of the place. “I researched the spell for a couple of weeks.”
She sat back. “Wow. And does it work?” She seemed less annoyed now and he took that as a good sign.
“Hard to say, since I don’t think I’ve met any sirens or part-sirens since making it. No one’s been here, after all.” He shrugged.
She ran her fingers down his cheek. “You’ve really been lonely, haven’t you?”
He just nodded, closing his eyes as she traced his eyebrows with her fingertips. He swallowed, realizing two desires were at war inside him. One side wanted Monica to be there tonight, so he could test out whether she was a siren or not. The other side hoped she wasn’t there, so he and Jess could get reacquainted. “Monica?” he asked.
“Got back an hour before me,” Jess said, sounding a little wistful herself.
“I’ve been having dreams about you.” He tilted his chin forward for a quick kiss.
“I’ll find out when she’s in lab next, okay?” She ran her hand up his thigh. “Can you hold out until then?”
“Not if you keep touching me like th—” His breath caught as her other hand slid warmly up his other thigh and he realized the wicked gleam in her eye meant she knew exactly what effect she was having on him. “Jess...”
She leaned forward to whisper in his ear. “I haven’t got off in a month. I touched myself a few times, thinking of you...but...it just wasn’t the same.”
Kyle wasn’t sure which of them moved first, but it felt like they’d just agreed on their plan of action. He returned their mugs to the bin while she got the key to the restroom. He followed a few moments after her, to the back hall where the two doors were. He tried the handle of the one marked “Women” and it opened. She latched the door behind him, and a moment later he had her pressed against the wall by a hungry kiss.
She had hung her coat on the hook on the back of the door, but he didn’t even remove his from his shoulders as he turned her in his arms, undoing her slacks and pushing them down along with her underwear. He got his own jeans down to his knees and rubbed his bare cock against the cleft of her ass. She pushed back against him, urging him on.
He kept one arm around her while he slicked his cock with spit
and slipped it into the crook of her thighs. She leaned forward, holding onto the handicapped safety bar, making it easier for him to move his cock and to get a nice deep-feeling thrust. He needn’t have worried about friction; she was quite slippery.
“How’s this?” he breathed, pushing her forward and pulling her back on his prick. “Am I hitting you—?”
The noise she made when the head of his cock rubbed her clit left no room for doubt and no reason to hold back. Kyle began moving with short, quick thrusts, and Jess stifled a moan. When he felt like she was getting close, he reached his hand around and spread her lips just enough to get his middle finger right onto her clit. Now he lengthened his thrusts, seeking the rhythm and stimulation that would bring him off quickly, even as his finger worked to finish the job his cockhead had started.
When she came she wasn’t able to keep completely quiet, nor was he, as her muscles clenching sent him over the edge, too, spurting messily onto the wall and dribbling a little down her thighs.
Nothing that some paper towels and some water couldn’t clean up. They rearranged themselves quickly, only slowing down for one moment for Kyle to bury his nose in her hair and take a deep breath of her scent. “I missed you.”
They emerged cautiously, but no one was standing in line, and Jess dropped the key off at the register as she breezed out. They were still a little red-faced from exertion when they kissed good-bye at the door of Camella House.
It wasn’t until Kyle’s post-orgasmic haze lifted somewhat that he realized he still hadn’t tested the amulet on Monica. It would have to be next time.
* * * *
Nichols didn’t have to be prophetic to be right about Caitlyn Speyer. She organized a practice for the afternoon of the Saturday before classes started and Kyle found himself in the common room shuffling his feet with a couple of other nervous freshmen while a few of the upperclassmen explained how the dancing worked.
“Three, count ’em, three. I expect you each to dance a minimum of three times,” Caitlyn said, stalking up and down their ranks like a military sergeant. “If you only master one of the dances, you’ll have to wait until it comes around again. No doubt some of the others won’t know how to dance either, in which case it’ll be your job to walk them through it. We’ll start with the pavane, which is slow and not that hard to figure out.”
