Marionette

Chapter 6 -Cages

Zachary

Alice made it here.

She looked hazy, like a ghost. Like a dream. The only time she truly came alive for me was at night.

During the day, she was with Hugh. He thought she would never look his way, but I had seen the way she looked at him as I lurked in the deep shadows where nobody could roam. There was genuine fondness there. However, nothing good could come out of all this. Hugh and I both knew that, but it wasn’t enough to deter us from looking at the new arrival.

Observing her movements. Pining for her.

It wasn’t romantic. We were curious for fresh blood. Fresh meat.

Mr. Crow came to see me the night he arrived. It wasn’t arrogance that made me aware that he always sought me first, right after having his usual check-in with Madame Yora. He had often made it clear that I was one of his special acquisitions. Of course, he’d say that considering my profession was barely legal in some parts of the country. It didn’t matter that magic was involved. s*x was, too, and the payment that came before or after it. The circus manwhore. A gigolo.

“She came,” the Ringmaster said, sitting in my room’s lone chair, his boots resting on my plain, wooden desk. We didn’t have real properties in the circus. We were the pieces of property, little pawns with a salary that was somehow given to make things feel a little better. The motherly way Madame Yora managed the circus sometimes made us forget what we were, but the Ringmaster’s presence often made us remember. It didn’t matter that his voice and tone were often smooth and calm. There was something about his seductive tone and the way he could easily make his way into anyone’s bed. Man. Woman. Or any other gender in between.

Weirdly enough, the gigolo and the ringmaster had not been in bed together.

Yet.

Everyone seemed to believe that it was only a matter of time, but I hadn’t. There was no way I would let the Ringmaster claim more of me.

“Yes,” I grunted noncommittally, sucking deep at the cigar Mr. Crow brought for me. He knew that I needed this, a little bit of safe fire. It was why Mariska, the fire breather, was a friend with benefits, an off-and-on lover who made things slightly normal. f*****g people for money was starting to get old, but somehow Alice’s arrival made things more exciting. It was also the other night that I realized what she was.

An empath.

Empaths were known as the void, too. They were malleable, formed by what they could get. It was a scary thought that she was absorbing a lot from me. s*x. Lust. Transactional pleasure without love. Soon, she would also be witness to violence. Some women liked being tied up. Some liked being choked.

Alice should be with Hugh. She needed his kindness. She needed his sunlight, not my darkness. An ordinary girl would choose me over Hugh, but I trusted she was special. Oh, she was so special.

“What do you think of her? Is she what we are waiting for?”

“We? What we are waiting for?”

“You know you’re waiting, too,” he said, a smirk forming on his face.

Mr. Crow was much older than he looked, even though he appeared like a man in his mid to late thirties. When he found me on the streets twenty years ago, a boy of five, he already looked the same, but he told me that I could be so much more than he ever was. His words, not mine.

“There’s nothing for me,” I muttered, blowing circles of smoke in front of me. They looked like fancy streams of light against the dark backdrop.

“She feels it when you f**k your clients,” he said, matter-of-factly. “She’s the one we have been looking for.”

“No, she can’t be,” I insisted, but there was something about her. She was in my dreams even before she arrived here, and Hugh knew when to wait for her by the gates at dawn. He rarely appeared at night, but he did then when he felt she was so close. We did it for her. We knew that we should protect her innocence, and we couldn’t do that if I were the one waiting. With darkness giving me strength and she enveloped in desperation, I would have just taken her then and there, her virginity be damned. So, I knew how to stay away even though the night should have favored me.

“Alice Woodhouse is either yours or mine.”

The words felt like a threat. He might be the closest I had to a father figure, but he had never behaved like one. If I weren’t so valuable to him, he might have already made me bend to his will in bed when I was younger. Right now, he no longer had any f*****g chance with me. With me taller, stronger, and more aware of my identity, he could only hope for something more consensual. Something I wouldn’t give.

“Never say never, Zachary,” Madame Yora had once told me. She was one of the Ringmaster’s favorite lovers.

“I’ve served this circus enough,” was my response. It was true. They brought me lovers of all genders, all ages, and all kinds. The circus was paid crisp banknotes for it, and when I turned twenty-one, I started receiving a fair share. It started with 30%. Now, I claimed 50%.

“It serves you well, too. You’re richer than any circus worker here.”

There was a “but” there somewhere. I couldn’t leave. I should be set free, instead, and I knew it wasn’t going to be easy.

Back in my dimly-lit room, the Ringmaster continued to stare at me slyly. He was waiting for me to take the bait.

Did I want Alice for myself?

I wasn’t sure yet. Oh, she was willing, but being a voyeur and being the one f****d were two completely different things. She took the best parts of it whenever she watched through the peephole. The pleasure passed from me to her, without even touching. Who knew if we could survive the actual act?

She was too pure and fragile for me, with her virgin scent and background of abuse.

Did I want Mr. Crow to have her?

No. f*****g no.

“She’s mine,” I said, my nose flaring.

“Ha!” Mr. Crow exclaimed. I tensed. I knew him well enough to know that it wasn’t as easy as me claiming Alice. “It will be a battle between you and me and Hugh.”

He laughed at his little joke, even though he was the one who named Hugh in the first place. He named me, too. It was a little package.

“Hugh could win the whole thing,” Mr. Crow continued.

“If he wins this, it means that I -.”

“No. Stop right there, Zachary. A girl like Alice Woodhouse will choose only the one who can give her freedom. She’s not looking for Hugh’s kindness or the pleasure you can give her. And she can only choose one.”

I shook my head in disbelief.

He never stopped reminding us that we were all living in invisible cages.

**

Hugh

Mr. Crow always arrived at night. We didn’t wonder about this anymore. I believed he was the Devil himself, and was thankful that he visited Zachary first each time. I had time to prepare myself for whatever it was he had to offer.

The man couldn’t hurt Zachary, not when he brought money to the circus. Significant money. I knew, though, that it wasn’t just about the gold and the coins. Whenever Zach went through a transaction, something else happened. Every time, the circus came out stronger and more vibrant, even though it was made up of the same tired people.

Beautiful. Alice was beautiful.

I looked at myself in the mirror. I was a large man of over seven feet tall. My hunched back was getting better, thanks to Zachary’s growing power. It wouldn’t be enough, though.

My face was too ugly for her, with its rugged planes. My blind eye was a testament to the abuse that I had gone through when my mother tried to abort me. Zachary was the survivor – the brother who had all the beauty and mystical power, while I was the brawn, and nothing more.

Alice liked me, but only because I was kind. Zachary was afraid that he would sully her purity, but he couldn’t help but be drawn to her, too.

“Would you like to share her with me, brother?” Zachary asked, his voice sounding as if it were coming from beneath the water.

“Share? She’s a person.”

“You and your scruples. Where were they when we f****d Mariska together?”

“Mariska’s different. She’s bored, and she’s been with us for so long.”

The fire breather didn’t only play with literal fire. She liked dangerous games, like provoking the beast that lay and hungered within Zachary and me. She was one of the few in Crow’s Nest who was privy to our secret.

“She likes your big cock.”

“Yours is big, too,” I said uncomfortably.

He laughed then, a little bitterly, echoing what I was feeling. I wanted Alice for myself, but I knew she would want someone like Zachary – handsome and seductive. Who wanted the ungainly giant with the hunched back, blind eye, and pockmarked face? I saw how the excitement faded into disappointment on Alice’s face when she saw that the one lurking in the shadows, only to glimpse at her, wasn’t Zachary, but me.

Hugh.

You.

“You tame the lions,” Alice said in wonder.

“I don’t. It’s the Ringmaster’s job.”

“Hugh! Really? You’re the one cleaning the cages and scrubbing their mane. How do you do that?”

What could I tell her? That I knew what it was like to live in a cage just like these lions? That it was difficult to tame the wildness in me – the one that had to be let out for hours?

My body is a cage.

The Ringmaster has the key.

No matter how large I am,

Am I half a man?

And the other half?

It rattles the cage harder.

But it can only bring evil.