This Ascent to Divinity is Lewder Than Expected

7.22 – Not Averse to the Idea

After tracking down the nearest servant and requesting that her door be fixed—offering a simple explanation of 'Elodie' to the instantly-understanding woman—Rosalie headed for Astrid's room. While she was an honored guest, she hadn't been put in the royal wing itself. Rather, a different section of the estate reserved for esteemed visitors. The same place Zoey and Delta had been initially thrown, and which Sabina and Aria were still staying in.

Astrid was thankfully inside, so Rosalie wouldn't need to hunt her down. The door swung open, but it wasn't a fully dressed—much less armored and alert—Astrid that met her. Instead, it was a softer-looking, bleary-eyed, hair-mussed Astrid wearing baggy pajamas. Her facial war paint was worn and smudged. Did she not clean it off at night?

She had woken recently. Was Astrid someone who slept in when she had the chance? Rosalie wouldn't have assumed so. The domestic sight took her aback more than she thought it would. Thus far, they'd interacted almost entirely as professionals—which had been the source of her self-doubt on whether she was the best person to check in on her.

When Astrid saw who her visitor was, her green eyes widened and the sleepiness wiped away in an instant. "Lady d'Celestin? What are you—" She cleared her throat, straightening her posture out. "You need something from me?"

"No, no. Just came to see if you'd like to join me at the training facility. I didn't expect to find you, ah, indisposed."

Astrid hesitated. "Went to bed late. Took time to … fall asleep."

"Ah. Yes. That's reasonable, considering everything. It was a long shard, too."

Astrid paused, then grimaced slightly. "She told you." She shook her head. "Of course she did. Teammates. Lovers. Don't know why I—never mind."

Rosalie glanced down the hallway at the word 'lovers', and Astrid winced when she noticed.

"Sorry. Is secret, I know."

"It's fine. If you'd like to keep resting, I understand yesterday was a long day. I merely thought you'd … wish to speak? Perfectly reasonable if not," she hurriedly tacked on.

"No, no. Can join." She rubbed an eye and glanced at an open window, wincing slightly at the bright light. "Is later than I thought. Didn't mean to sleep this long. Give me ten?"

"Of course."

The Harkvalen warrior emerged ten minutes later, as promised, in a much more familiar form: in fur-and-leather armor, war paint renewed, no longer sleepy or soft-looking. The contrast between the two images made Rosalie, without intending to, look at her differently.

They made their way to the training facility and into a private room. Conversation stayed professional; they discussed yesterday's shard and what their training goals were for today. Other idle topics too, like how Elodie had made her re-appearance, and that Astrid should expect a run-in with her—perhaps even an interrogation, seeing how Astrid was Rosalie's teammate. Even Astrid had heard rumors about the eldest d'Celestin sister, and Rosalie confirmed most of them.

Elodie didn't have a negative reputation, but mostly because her sheer prodigy outweighed her less appealing traits. A person who abandoned their duty wasn't well loved by the public, but the public respected their protectors—and Elodie was shaping up to be a prominent one. Already, she was sixth advancement, one of the youngest in known history, and should war come from the Striders or elsewhere, she would be no small asset.

Not that war seemed likely; borders had stabilized in the past two decades. If Father or the Muse—the Guildmaster of the Striders, Celia Harrowgate—hit ninth advancement, thus shifting the power balance, that might change, but that didn't seem likely in the near future. Or far future. Ninth advancement was something of legend.

However professional the conversation stayed through the trip to the facility and through their first spar, there was a plain undercurrent to their responses and behavior. It wasn't just how Astrid would randomly flush; Rosalie too found herself inordinately embarrassed whenever her thoughts strayed to the upcoming discussion. Zoey had said she and Astrid had similar temperaments, and that was true in some regards. Astrid, though she was confident and blunt, clearly didn't view sex with the same level of casualness that Delta did. Even Maddy had been more open, for all she probably blushed the most out of them.

And Rosalie's view on sex hadn't changed much. Yes, her two girlfriends might be pummeling her into an incoherent mess every night, but she still found the idea rather scandalous whenever she thought about it. A part of her couldn't believe she'd ended up in this sort of relationship. So, frequency of intimacy aside, Rosalie considered herself fairly reserved. Similar to Astrid.

Since they were in private, and an appropriate amount of time had passed—jumping straight into it had seemed awkward to her senses—Rosalie ought to broach the real reason she'd come and found Astrid. Yet try as she might, she failed to find a proper segue. Or more accurately, work up the nerve.

Unsurprisingly, it was Astrid, the blunt one, who did so. Honestly, it spoke to how flustered Astrid was that it took as long as it did. Rosalie was fairly certain Astrid was the type of woman to run into anything head-first.

"We should talk."

The statement came at the end of their second spar, after they finished catching their breaths from the frantic exchange.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

"Ah." Rosalie leaned on her spear, appraising Astrid with a blank face. "I suppose we should."

Despite that, neither of them said anything. Since Astrid had done Rosalie the favor of spearheading the topic, she continued.

"I hope you can forgive the deceit. We intended to tell you, but we wanted to wait until we had a grasp on your personality first. In case it would be immediately obvious you wouldn't … find the idea amenable."

Astrid waved a hand dismissively. "Is fine. That part didn't bother me." She paused, and an eyebrow went up. "Think I find idea amenable, do you?"

Rosalie flushed. She supposed that was the implication of her words. "That you might come to terms with it, rather. I'm not saying anything about how you might view … any of this. But some people would be—immediately put off. And you don't seem to find it that objectionable."

Astrid grunted. There was another beat of silence.

Rosalie breathed in. "I would like to clarify that the only requirement, so to say, is that you're willing to be around and witness some, ah, potentially strange scenarios. You need not participate yourself, if that isn't where your inclinations lie."

Astrid tilted her head, clearly surprised by that claim. "But her skills wouldn't work on me."

"It doesn't matter. You shouldn't feel coerced by the threat of being denied a spot on the team. You're clearly an exceptional vanguard and, so long as you're willing to tolerate Zoey's class—and the shards it creates—then you're welcome as our fifth party member. We're an effective team with or without fully utilizing Zoey's class."

"Shards it creates?"

"Ah. Right. We have an item that reduces how much they're influenced. That metal cube-frame. So you didn't see how our shards usually are." It had reduced the influence down to zero, in fact, which Rosalie hadn't known it could do. The shard had been completely mundane. "Normally, shards for us are much stranger. In the sort of way I'm sure you can guess at. Seeing how the rewards—both experience and items—are significantly better, we intend to return to that style of wayfaring. So, you would need to be willing to deal with that. But any other activities would be entirely your choice."

Reasonably, it took Astrid a few moments to digest what she'd been told.

"Won't pretend this isn't … surprising. But, worst fate in world?" She laughed, then cleared her throat. "No. Not worst fate. I could be—" She trailed off, and her cheeks colored. "You four really—do that? Every shard?"

"Sexual encounters of some variety are necessary to keep Zoey charged, yes," Rosalie said, desperately fighting her own flush. "And the shard itself sometimes intervenes to create … its own scenarios. Often strange ones. So yes. Every shard, you should expect something like that."

"I see." Astrid hesitated. "Surprised you would keep me on the team if I chose not to. Effects she provides are … strong, no?"

"Yes. But we decided early that we wouldn't bend to whatever Zoey's class asked of us. Or the shards themselves. There are definitely—incentives. But for our own sanity's sake, keeping to our own comfort levels is much more important. For both personal and inter-personal reasons, as I'm sure you can guess at. Team cohesion is important, even speaking from a practical, professional sense."

"Yes. Logical." She bit her lip and looked away. "Might need more time to think, though. Zoey said the basic requirement was Bonding. Which takes … you know what it takes. I could—handle that. Maybe?"

There wasn't any possible way to speak about her girlfriend cumming on this girl without Rosalie breaking into a furious blush, so indeed, that was what happened: her face deepened through shades of red, with Astrid's responsively doing the same in return.

"She would be accommodating about it," Rosalie offered. "She's a thoughtful person, and won't press you into anything you don't want." Except in the case of pushing boundaries in a good way, when Zoey intuited her partner wanted it. As happened with Rosalie all the time. "That's, ah, for you two to discuss, though. I don't think I need to give my input."

"Yes. True. Is—between us, yes."

They shifted around awkwardly, and when Astrid offered, "Again?" while gesturing at the sparring ring, Rosalie hastily accepted.

It hadn't been handled the most gracefully it could've been. But thankfully, it seemed like Astrid wasn't totally averse to the idea. Maybe even warming up to it—in her own way.

But, Rosalie couldn't help but wonder whether their first lewd shard would change her mind.