The Silver Council wouldn’t think that was a great comparison. Humans were selfish, individualistic creatures who gave into all their destructive whims and fancies. Unicorns had a responsibility to aid them, but they weren’t supposed to envy them.
Iris had certainly done her share of envying. But even at her most rebellious, she had never ventured into the outside world and tried to take a human lover.
Part of it had been sheer nervousness. Sure, she had passed as human for short stretches of time, and no one in Al’s Tropical Fish Emporium had gawked at her, but getting someone into bed would probably require a lot more conversation than shopping did. Would she seem normal? Or would they be able to tell just how far her background was from theirs?
But fear hadn’t been the only thing holding her back. The truth was that despite everything, some part of her genuinely did like the idea of making up a sexual script with her future partner as they went along. She’d liked the idea of being with someone and just doing what felt right in the moment, regardless of how well it mapped to statistically average sex. They could shape what desire meant to them, with no outside interference.
Without the Council looming over to remind her that all this sex was for the good of society, that actually sounded good to her. Freeing. Kind. It felt like what she wanted.
Although she had to admit that she wasn’tcompletelyunprepared. She had done some ... solo experiments, before the accident. But for the most part, she was new to this.
She didn’t know if that was true for him. She was overwhelmingly glad that he had, in so many ways, escaped the Council’s hold on his mind and started coming to his own conclusions about the world, but she couldn’t think of a good way to ask what conclusion he’d come to aboutthis.
Be brave, her unicorn whispered.Be bold. And trust him.
Iris didn’t know if she could do the first two parts of that, but she could handle the third. She loosened her tongue.
“I don’t know about you,” she said, “but I haven’t had sex before. Not with anyone besides myself. But for the record, I don’t mind at all if you have. It just means you have to tell me if I’m doing something, well, weird.”
Keith had looked as tense and guarded as she’d felt, but now he relaxed. He was like an ice sculpture melting to reveal the world’s most beautiful smile.
“I haven’t either,” he said. “But whether I had or not, whatever you want to do won’t be weird. It’ll be perfect.”
He stroked her cheek, the callused pads of his fingers a maddening tease against her sensitive skin.
Keith said, “All I want is you. I want you however you’ll share yourself with me.”
There was no way she could keep from kissing him after that. This time the kiss had an intoxicating sense of anticipation to it, because they both knew what was on their minds—and on their schedule. There was nothing to get in their way now, and no reason to stop if they didn’t feel like stopping. And they didn’t. They were going to push the gas pedal right down to the floor.
It felt like there was a drumroll rattling between them, like arousal was its own kind of suspense. The feeling made her toes curl against the floor.
She knew with a dizzying certainty that when he said he wouldn’t think she was weird, she could take him at his word. She could ask for what she wanted without any sense of shame.
“Can I see you naked?”
“Of course.”
Keith sounded a little hoarse now, and a kind of proud satisfaction prickled in Iris’s blood.
Shehad made him sound like that. She couldn’t believe it.
“I’d like to see you too,” Keith said.
The sense of satisfaction turned into pure molten arousal.
“Of course,” Iris said, sounding hoarse and husky now too.
They both undressed slowly. Part of her felt like she should do it as if she were putting on a show for him, but mostly she was just so keyed-up that she had trouble getting her fingers to do what she wanted them to. They slipped around on the zipper of her dress.
She turned her back to him and gestured at the little metal tab at the nape of her neck.
“Can you unzip me?”
Keith made a noise that must have stood in for a yes, because she felt the warmth of him crowding close to her. His hand settled on her shoulder, his thumb holding her dress in place as he drew the zipper down with his other hand.
A long panel of cool air opened up at her back, and then Keith was skimming his fingers down her spine, sending out another flurry of sparks.
Iris shrugged out of her dress and wiggled it down over her hips, letting it fall to the floor.
