I didn’t end up doing paperwork alone. No, it was worse. I had to handle paperwork while explaining my actions.
Rio grumped nearby, both of us having moved to an office somewhere in the upper floors of the castle. The only noise around her harumphing was a small fireplace, slowly crackling away to stave off the endless chills the woman was emitting like a blizzard.
“So,” she began, churning my stomach with just the first, pointed word, “you and the chef?”
“Yeah.” My voice held level, and the single word was delivered with mentally prepared precision.
“That was fast,” she noted dryly.
“People don’t usually think well of someone for lying. Why dig a deeper hole?”
Rio paused, her jaw set and eyes unfocused. After a moment, she cleared her throat. “‘Dig a deeper hole?’ Are you trying to imply you’re in trouble?”
I gave her an emphatic look. She was obviously upset with me. “I’ve been bracing myself since you first gave me that look back in the dining hall. You’re clearly angry, and that’s how things like this go, right? Sleep with a woman, and the pretty girl turns on you for it.”
“Lilin, we aren’t together. I’m a bit disappointed, but I can’t get angry over your choices when we aren’t in any sort of relationship.”
That brought me up short. It wasn’t in the script. It wasn’t in any script. Her words made sense, but that just wasn’t how humans operated, in my experience.
“Have you ever been in a relationship before?” Rio looked like she had read my mind, and just didn’t believe it. “Are you the sort to only do hookups? A lesbian brothel addict?”
I reddened, looking away. “Just because Asumi made it look so good doesn’t mean I’m someone with loose morals.” Although, loose morals probably could be a phrase used to describe a lot of my actions…
“That was a non-answer! Lilin, you’ve never actually dated someone! Did you base all you know about dating and romance on anime?”
“Humans are complicated!” I winced after the words left my lips, realizing the slip that subtly didn’t include myself as human.
Rio’s expression twisted with concern and pity as she calmed herself visibly. “I’m sorry, you’re right. I didn’t realize you were so introverted.”
I stared at her, baffled at the sudden turn in topic. I literally flourished under the attention and adoration of others. Basking in a crowd was the best way to unwind and show off my superiority. How could anyone call me an introvert?
“We got off topic, sorry.” Rio sat back on her couch and held up a few papers, scanning them as she continued the earlier discussion. “We aren’t dating. I think you’re attractive, but I prefer to seek committed relationships, getting to know a person well before going beyond friendship. We aren’t even on step one of us being in a relationship, so I can’t make unrealistic demands of you, or dictate how you live your life on the chance something ever happens in the future. Why would you assume I’d be angry with you? Really, I’m just a little sad I didn’t get to you first.”
I took a few moments to reevaluate my understanding of human relationships and interactions, then focused a new lens on the issue. Daniella had a bit of a parasitic relationship to Fukushi, while the shorter woman grudgingly went along with it and caught feelings for the high mage. My intrusion had no real impact on Daniella, but it had clearly wounded Fukushi, who assumed the relationship meant something important. Fukushi likely blamed me and Daniella for the betrayal.
It was probably the wrong move, then, to have pushed the high mage to confess to the warrior girl about what their relationship truly was. I dodged the blame aimed at me by foisting it upon Daniella.
I owe her an apology, huh? Damn, my whole perspective was founded on fiction.
On the other hand, Rio could only blame herself for missing out, if I was involved in a relationship with someone else first.
“Relationships are hard,” I mused aloud, somewhat stunned.
Rio nodded, still frowning over some reports we had to make sense of.
We had split the work of going over older documents to see how the issues that arose were usually handled, then we’d have to make a few decisions about the matters raised in the stacks the court mage had brought to my attention.
“So, that’s your type, huh? The youthful, busty sort?” Rio sounded oddly deflated by the idea, and I glanced up from the desk to see her poking at her chest idly.
I fought the urge to sigh. “No type. For me, it isn’t about looks or gender or anything specific. When the mood and timing are right, I just don’t hold myself back. I don’t hold myself to any restrictions, and that’s the only big difference between me and others.”
“Isn’t that the ideology of a cheater, in a roundabout way? I feel like it, so I’ll sleep with them?” Rio seemed slightly put off by the notion. Maybe she’d been cheated on in the past? Another social hurdle to navigate.
“We’ve established that I don’t really do committed, monogamous relationships. I’m not hiding anything from anyone, and I don’t lie about my openness. Can you cheat if there are no rules established in the first place?” There. I laid it all out logically, succinctly explaining my point of view on the subject.
Rio considered that for a minute, her eyes not on the papers she was pretending to leaf through. “I get what you’re saying. Would you ever enter a committed relationship? Would you be able to hold yourself back for just one person then?”
I could at least identify a leading question when I heard it. “Would I ever enter a committed relationship? Maybe. But I think I’d be more comfortable in a polyamorous relationship. I think I’m more the sort who enjoys being the master of the house, with plenty of lively individuals under my roof. If I could live that ideal life, I’d invite you to join in a heartbeat, Rio.”
She gaped at me, her reddened eyes blinking at me in shock. “You would?”
“Of course. I like you, Rio. You’re level headed and capable. And very attractive, obviously. Would there be a reason not to like you?”
Oh, it seems I broke her. Actually, this could be fun.
“Would you enjoy that, Rio? Being a kept woman, living under my roof? I could shower you and all the rest with my affection, and the evenings could get quite… exciting all around.”
She blushed to the color of a ripe tomato, and I could see the scene going through her mind’s eye, because it danced in mine, too. Rio, Daniella, and a few other women, all laying across Queen Verienne’s massive bed, fingers interlaced and sharing in an atmosphere of affection, each waiting for the other to make the first move and devolve things into a mess of heated breaths and rising heartbeats. All of them, waiting for me.
“Riko.”
I blinked away the mental image and refocused. “What?”
“It’s Riko. My actual name. Tanabe Riko.” Her blush hadn’t faded at all. Her gorgeous thighs were pressed together nervously.
“Eileen. You already knew mine, though. Just seemed right.”
She took a deep breath, visibly centered herself, then set her papers down on the coffee table in front of the couch. “Just because I won’t deny the attraction of the idea doesn’t mean I’m going to jump into bed with you. You’ll have to put in the proper effort to win me over. To prove to me you’re not just chasing a fun time and then leaving emotionally wounded girls behind.”
One day, I swore I’d get the story out of her as to why she was so fixated on infidelity.
“Someday, when all this mess is behind us, I’ll make sure you never want for anything.” I beamed at her happily. Not that I let myself get deluded that the topic was settled. Rio—Riko, rather—would need plenty of attention. Winning her over with a dramatic mental image wouldn’t work if the image never became reality.
There was something else I needed her to be aware of, though. “Riko. While I understand the foundations of your view, I think I need to make something clear.”
She turned and looked me straight in the eyes. “Yes, Eileen?”
“Forget Earth’s culture and rules while we’re here. You will have to learn and adapt to a lot of things, whether they seem right or not to you. We don’t know what’s normal out there, and bringing along Earth’s morals of right and wrong will only end one of two ways.”
She gulped, picking up the gravitas in my tone.
“Either you turn into a colonizer, forcing your beliefs on everyone else, or you’ll be torn apart by the angry masses. In that manner, opening you up to polygamy is the safest first step to protecting you that I can think of. Better with me than realizing the people of a new world actually reproduce with animals to make beastkin or something.”
Riko choked, then. It became hard to tell if she was laughing or retching at the idea, so I helped her along.
“Cat people. Dog people. Horse girls? How about deerkin? Rabbitfolk? Pig—”
I chuckled as her expression shifted from amusement to one of confusion, then landed on horror.
“Stop!!!” Riko finally cried. “I can’t believe you! That was all a joke, right?”
I responded with a noncommittal shrug. “It could happen. I know one culture in a different world that… they only have one male per small community. Most of the children are female, and those children move on when they get old enough to survive, but every small group is a tiny harem centered on a single male.”
Her face twisted in abject horror.
“Wow, that’s a reaction. Yikes.”
Riko shook her head. “No, I can see it, and I don’t like it. First, a community of all women doing the most beautiful and romantic things I can imagine. Followed by adding a single man to the equation, which ruins it by turning it gross.”
I frowned at her. “You’re that opposed to men?”
“Y-yeah… they’re kinda…” she grimaced as she trailed off.
“I see. I don’t mind them, but I do agree that women are beautiful. Worthy of worship, even.” I gestured to myself emphatically, trying to replace her revulsion with a more palatable topic.
She chuckled, so mission accomplished. “I’ll try to keep an open mind with the new world and its cultures. Thanks for the warning, Lilin.”
“Lilin again, huh?”
Riko winked back at me. “I like nicknames, and if everyone else ends up calling you Eileen, I’ll feel special using the nickname.”
“So… Rio?”
She shook her head emphatically. “Something else. My fans will be using that!”
“Ah, double standards. Wonderful.”
“You are the one who introduced yourself to everyone by your real name. It isn’t a double standard to want to use nicknames nobody else knows.”
I sighed, then glanced down at the papers scattered across the desk. “We have so much work to do. I think it would be easier to go out and strongarm the nobles into doing their damn jobs.”
“That’s the kind of thinking that got you into this mess in the first place, isn’t it?”
Again, I sighed. “You could stand to be right less often, ya know?”