Chapter Three: Cheryl
Cheryl had never had to take care of her hair before. At the temple, the acolytes would pass a hairlight rod over her hair, infusing it with various vitamins to ensure that it grew strong and healthy. The gentle pulses of light would automatically detangle her curls, and the acolytes would style it.
The shrine did not have hairlight rods. There were only these slabs of plastic with stiff spikes that emitted a sonic frequency. It just made her hair stand on end all around her head. In the end, she gave up trying to tame it and merely clipped it back from her face.
Hardly had she done so when Bjorn and Maskin entered her cabin. They glared at each other as their shoulders bumped.
Cheryl unconsciously began fingering the necklace Maskin had given her the previous day. As much as she appreciated the gift, she wasn't so sure about what he had told her. Changing everything about their society was so frightening… Would it have been better for her to have been raised with choices?
If the choice were hers, she could eat as much as she wanted. She could cut her hair. She could run down the stairs and read for hours.
"What are you doing here, Hero?" Bjorn asked, the title sounding like an insult on his lips.
"I am going to walk with Cheryl above the valley."
Maskin was, as usual, wearing his studded armor. He looked like he was about to charge into battle. The only thing missing were his blasters, but those were not permitted on the shrine grounds. The only technology allowed here were things that had already been developed when the shrine was founded. At that point in history, the only guns available were projectile ones, rather than the energy-based weapons of today's age.
Bjorn, on the other hand, had two fine daggers strapped to his thighs. Even his nanite armor was allowed. But then, nanites were in use before space-flight was developed. Cheryl knew this because of the history that Priest Quincy always made her study.
The prince frowned. "I am going to take Cheryl down into the valley."
"She's coming with me, Prince."
They were going to start fighting if she didn't do something. Cheryl gulped in a quick breath. "Actually, I'm going to walk by the lake."
Both men turned to stare at her with surprised looks. The human blushed. Her hands shook, but she nodded as she stood. She had been wanting to get closer to the lake, anyway. Now was a good time, wasn't it?
"I'll go with you," Bjorn said.
"As will I." Maskin glared at his rival.
Bjorn reached her side first, offering her his arm. She tucked her hand into the crook of his elbow. Maskin was soon on her other side, gripping her small hand tightly in his thick, calloused one. Having both of the big Temadians on either side of her had her heart skipping a beat. She could feel their strength and determination.
That neither of them had bedded her yet surprised her. She expected to be stripped bare and spend the whole two months until the moons' alignment being ravished by the first one and then the other. Perhaps the reason was they couldn't agree on who should have her first. Like this walk–they never would have agreed to back down if she hadn't made a choice.
Was the sex her choice as well? To decide who and when had her? But how was she meant to decide?
Her heart rate increased as they left the food pavilion, walking under fragrant, purple-leafed trees towards the lake. The path was paved with cobblestones. Cheryl's feet were used to padding on carpeted floors in temple slippers. Even the shoes she had been given for this trip made her toes ache. Still, she wasn't going to complain. She wanted to go see the lake, after all. With both of them.
Both of them. Should she tell them that it was the only way they'd bed her as well?
Heat rose in her cheeks and swirled in her lower belly as she considered it. Taking both at the same time. The first time she had dreamt of sex it was with two men. If she did indeed have a choice…
It was as though Maskin could read her mind. "Have you decided which one of us you want first?"
The trees faded away to a wide green field dotted with flowers, the lake in the distance. Cheryl concentrated on admiring the view instead of thinking about Maskin's question. The sky was a beautiful blue, deeper than the color of Maskin's skin, almost the same shade as her own eyes. The eyes that had determined her fate to be queen one day as a child.
"Yes," Bjorn said, his hand sliding around her waist. "Have you decided? I know this must be an uncomfortable topic for a temple virgin—"
"A what?" Maskin interrupted, brow furrowed.
Bjorn rolled his eyes. "How can you expect to be king when you don't even know your own culture? All of our queens are virgins until they are claimed by a king. I doubt this pretty Lapis Lazuli has even been kissed before, have you?"
He gave Cheryl a kind smile that made her blush as she shook her head. Maskin, however, looked shocked–and angry.
"Abominable. It's abominable that a woman with such starlight in her eyes has never experienced physical pleasure."
He stopped and pulled her roughly towards him. The human opened her mouth to protest but he pressed his lips to hers. He swallowed her startled gasp as he kissed her hard.
A hot feeling pooled in her lips, slipping down her throat to settle in her breasts and lower in her belly. His calloused hands caught her face, pulling her closer as he thrust his tongue into her mouth. Cheryl grasped his wrists, but not to pull him away. Her legs were turning into jelly, and she needed to hold him to keep herself on her feet.
In the next second, she was physically torn away from him. The scrape of his callouses over her soft skin made her cry out, and then she was in Bjorn's arms. He kissed her as well, eliciting the same exciting heat inside her. His hands were not still, though. They roamed her body, touching her in places nobody had ever touched before.
Growling into her mouth, Bjorn grasped the neckline of her dress and yanked. The fabric caught against her skin as it tore open, letting her breasts fall out. They were soon made prisoner to his hands. Cheryl gasped, her head falling back. Bjorn's mouth moved to her neck.
Her lungs were heaving as his kneading hands built heat in her. She loved every feeling he was giving her, but it was too much. It was too good, too hot. She was going to burn from the inside out.
And then she was being torn away from Bjorn. Maskin's rock-hard arms were around her, pinning her arms to her sides. She looked up at him, hopeful and frightful that he would pick up where Bjorn had left off. To her dismay, though, he wasn't looking at her, but rather glaring at the other man.
"You think you can just take whatever you want, Princeling? Not this time. The queen is not for you to take. Her rose is mine. The Gods granted me with strength to defeat all my opponents until I got to you, and it was only through your fancy nanite armor that you could stand against me. If you weren't such a coward, I'd have beaten you."
Cheryl shook her head. "I think—"
"Coward? Me?" Bjorn's eyes narrowed. In an instant, his two daggers were in his hands. He flipped one over and offered it to Maskin. "Remove your armor and I will remove mine."
"No," Cheryl protested, but both ignored her as Maskin took the proffered dagger.