Chapter 7: Trio

We left Quelanas as the sun was breaking over the horizon the next day. Atheria had put her silvery armor back on and had her weapons with her. She led the way for us, her amazingly blue eyes scanning the woods for any signs of danger. Her long blonde hair was tied back into a ponytail.

Gianna and I walked behind her, side-by-side. Sometimes we held hands, sometimes not. Every once in a while, one of us would move up to walk beside Atheria and chat with her.

The first day of our journey to find the wizard Altholos took us through the woods surrounding the elvish town. By midday, we had left the woods and came into a series of gently rolling plains, rock formations dotting the land here and there. I found it strange that we didn't follow any roads, and when I asked Atheria about it, she told me that she wanted to us to remain as hidden from other eyes as possible. She navigated us widely around homes, inns, and villages, and so that entire first day, we never saw any other people.

As we stopped for a light lunch of fruits that Danala had packed for us, Atheria began showing me the proper way to use the sword that hung at my side. She stood behind me, hands holding mine, as she showed me how to hold the sword and how to swing it. I was aware of the curves of her body pressed against my back, and I was having a hard time concentrating on the training. Gianna watched us, smiling and sometimes laughing at me when I messed up.

As night approached, the terrain around us had become more hilly. Rock formations were more common. We set up camp next to a creek. Gianna and I gathered some sticks and got a fire going. Atheria handed out the last of the fresh fruit we had to eat. The rest of the journey, we'd be eating hard tack, unless we found more fruit on the way. I asked Atheria about the possibility of hunting animals for food, but she explained that elves were vegetarians and it was against their beliefs for them to kill an animal to use it for food. I was disappointed, but I didn't say anything since she was our guide and protector.

After we had eaten, Atheria returned to training me with the sword. Unfortunately, she wasn't standing right next to me, spooning her body against me like she had that afternoon. She instead used one of her own swords to show me how to block attacks. I like to think I did pretty well, but Atheria constantly rebuked me. She was hard to impress.

When it had gotten too dark to train anymore, I sat down in front of the fire with Gianna. Atheria sat down opposite us, and the three of us talked for a short while. Gianna and I didn't last long before we got tired from having walked all day. We moved to the bedrolls the elves had provided us, and lay next to each other. Atheria remained sitting next to the fire for a while longer, then moved into the darkness around us. She didn't have a bedroll, so I had no idea where she was going to sleep.

Gianna and I were both too tired to even fool around. We drifted off to sleep, her head on my chest.

I heard someone call my name in a soft voice. My eyes opened and I looked around. Atheria was nowhere to be seen, and I didn't see anyone else around. I listened for the voice to call my name again, but the only sound I heard was the fire crackling.

I was going to go back to sleep, but I needed to pee. I slid out from under Gianna, who woke up.

"Go back to sleep," I told her, kissing her forehead.

She clearly had no problem with that, as she laid right back down and closed her eyes. I'm sure she was asleep before her head hit the bedroll. I moved away from the camp and into the night's shadows, going to the creek that we were camped by. I found a tree and relieved myself. I looked over at the creek as I took my leak.

Atheria was in there, bathing herself. The water only came up to her knees, and I could tell even under the scarce moonlight that she was naked. Her back was to me. I was done with my business, so I tucked myself back into my pants and moved closer to the creek, hiding behind another tree.

Though I couldn't see much in the dim moonlight, I could see that Atheria's form was more curvy than Gianna's. Her breasts and hips were fuller, her waist more narrow. Her blonde hair had been untied, and it flowed like waves down her back and shoulders, reaching below her ass.

"I know that you are here, young Lucas," she said, without turning to look at me.

Shit, I thought to myself. I came out from behind the tree, my face burning red in the darkness.

"I'm sorry," I told her. "I had just come down here to relieve myself, and..."

"No need to explain," she said. "Elves are not ashamed of our bodies like you humans. I am not angry with you."

"You... you're not?"

"Why should I be? I take pride that you were admiring my body."

I sat down at the edge of the creek, dipping my feet into the cool water. Since she didn't mind, I continued staring at her.

"Atheria, are all elves so... liberated?"

She nodded her head. "We have hundreds of years to live our natural lives, and we are the embodiments of physical beauty and grace. Why should we not do what we wish with our bodies with whomever we desire?"

"You have a point there," I conceded, my throat becoming dry.

She turned to look at me. "You are curious why Danala performed upon you with her mouth when she barely knew you?"

"Um..."

"She told me what she had done. She saw that you had a need, and she found you attractive. She knew you were not yet well enough for full intercourse, so she did the next best thing."

"I'm starting to wish there were elves back where I come from," I told her.

She came and sat down beside me. She peered into my eyes, and I could see her eyes shining blue, even under the moon's dim lighting.

"I, too, find you attractive, young Lucas. You and Gianna both."

"Gianna?"

She nodded. "As I said, why should we not do what we wish with whomever we desire? Almost all elves desire both males and females. The sex of the person we desire is not important to an elf."

Back home, I knew about lesbians and gays and bi-sexuals. But this is the first time I had ever actually met someone who I knew wasn't straight. I felt kind of awkward inside. I wasn't repulsed, I was just thinking of Atheria differently than I had before.

"Lucas, I desire you and Gianna, but I know that you humans commonly develop feelings of jealousy when your mates indulge in pleasures with another. I do not want to do anything to create jealousy between you and Gianna."

"I don't really know how she's going to react to this," I told Atheria. "The subject of having a three-way hasn't exactly come up yet."

"So she's in love with me? With both of us?" Gianna asked me.

I shook my head. "I don't think it's love so much as wanting to have sex with us. Both of us. Probably at the same time."

Gianna fell silent as we kept walking. Atheria was several paces ahead of us. We had awoken that morning to an overcast sky. It looked like it was going to rain at any moment, but it hadn't yet. The wind was cool, but still comfortable. It was a nice change from the hot weather we had been having.

"I've never heard about elves wanting to have sex with both men and women," Gianna said, to break the quiet.

"It makes you feel awkward, doesn't it?"

"Somewhat. She is beautiful, I can't deny that. But I don't know if the thought of having sex with her appeals to me. And I'm really not sure about the idea of her having sex with you."

"There's something I need to tell you," I began. "After we were taken to Quelanas, when I woke up and Danala was bathing me... she gave me what back home is called a blowjob."

"What's that?" she asked, looking at me curiously.

"She put me into her mouth and sucked me until I came... until I was done."

She looked back ahead of her, thinking about that. Then looked back at me. "Women do that?" I nodded.

"Do you want me to do that?"

"Well, I wouldn't complain..." I said with a grin. "There's something I can do for you. I kiss and lick you between your legs while you suck me. It's called sixty-nine."

She thought about that for a moment. "I'd like to try that."

"You're not mad about Danala?"

"Actually, no. Not really. I should be, but I'm not." She furrowed her brow as a thought came to her. "Do you think that means that maybe I wouldn't mind if Atheria... joined us?"

"Gianna, sweetie, I think you're the only one who can answer that."

When we stopped for a quick lunch, Atheria continued training me with the sword. She was less sharp in her criticism of me today, and I felt like maybe I was starting to impress her with how I handled a sword and how quickly I was learning.