Page 82 of Beds and Blades

I held up both hands, a short distance apart. Then I moved them further apart. Then a little further.

Varia’s eyes went wide. Then she laughed. A real laugh, the kind that arrives without warning and takes the whole face with it.

“I knew it,” she said. “I absolutely knew it.” She leaned forward with focused intensity.

“Consider it confirmed,” I said.

“And the”—she gestured at the distance still implied between my hands—“adjustment required?”

“Managed,” I said. “With impressive attention on his part. He was thorough.”

Varia looked at me and nodded, receiving exactly the confirmation she had hoped for.

“I heard you being thoroughly attended to,” she said, without a trace of embarrassment in either direction. “My quarters are down the hall. Senior lieutenant. Four years at this posting means my quarters are close enough to Skip’s that I can be at his door in under a minute if something requires his attention.” She grinned. “Earlier this morning, nothing required his attention. His attention was very thoroughly allocated elsewhere, and the stone walls of this fortress are, I will say, less soundproof than their construction implies.”

She said all of this with ease. It was factual. “In Mytharo this is not a source of shame. Yravel’s principle: desire is sacred, the flame burns completely. You should know that being audible about the sacred is considered entirely appropriate.”

“I will keep that in mind going forward,” I said.

“You already demonstrated a thorough grasp of the principle,” she said.

She paused, with the look of someone about to say a true thing directly.

“I found it—quite affecting.”

I looked at her.

I understood what quite affecting meant. In my world, the admission would have required significant unpacking. Here it was only honest information from a culture that had resolved the issue of sexual shame differently than mine had.

I found, somewhat to my own surprise, that I did not mind. There was something pleasant about the idea of being heard and the hearing being welcomed rather than managed. There was a slightly exhibitionist quality to the whole thing.

“How did he take you?” she asked, with directness.

This was girl talk at a level I had not previously encountered. I had done coffee and academic complaints. I had not done this. I was doing this now.

“He had my legs over his shoulders,” I said. “At the moment the claiming sealed—the ring glowing, the bond completing—we were looking directly at each other. It was, I will say, the theologically optimal configuration for a claiming.”

Varia’s smile was warm. She understood exactly what I meant.

“Yes,” she said. “It would be.”

She reached for another piece of bread. I picked up the tea.

“I am looking forward,” I said, “to a comprehensive exploration of additional positions.”

Varia laughed again.

“You are going to fit in here,” she said, “extremely well.”

She took my hand and looked at me with warmth.

“You are a lucky woman.”

I was in an excellent mood. I was also discovering that I was the type of woman who enjoyed saying these things out loud to someone who laughed in the right places, asked the right questions, and did not require anything to be managed or softened.

I had not previously known I was this woman. Apparently, it had just taken the right conditions. The conditions were, I noted, excellent.

“On that point, you are correct,” I said.