Having your party face down a group of cultists is thirsty work. My glass is empty, so I get up from the table to go to the kitchen for more iced blackberry tea.

Lydia follows me into the kitchen.

"Did you want a refill on your tea, too?" I ask her.

"Actually, I wanted to talk to you for a couple of minutes. Alone. I didn't have the nerve to say this at school. Um. I've never. Um. You and your um. You don't have an open relationship, do you?"

Um.

"That's never come up in conversation," I reply, truthfully. Now that she mentions it, I think it's strange that Magister and I have never actually talked about whether our relationship is an open one or a closed one. Then again, neither of us has been interested in anyone else since we first started seeing each other. "I don't think we do."

"Oh." She looks away. "Do you like me?"

Somehow, I don't think she's asking that in the casual sense of the word "like."

"Yes," I hear myself saying, also truthfully, wishing instantly that I hadn't admitted it out loud. Nothing good is going to come of this, I'm pretty sure.

"May I kiss you?"

Um.

"Yes?" I whisper.

And then her arms are around me, and she's standing on the tips of her toes to reach my mouth with hers, and she tastes sweet, sweet like blackberries and sugar, and before I can stop myself I have her gathered up in my arms, her soft pale hair wound tight in my fist, her pelvis crushed against mine; and she's moaning as I push her up against the kitchen wall, devouring her lips with my teeth and tongue. She clutches me tighter; I force her arms down and out, pinning them against the wall as I grind into her. "Yes," she gasps, "oh God I like that, that's what I want, I never, oh God don't let go," and she throws her head to the side, baring her neck, and I lean down to kiss it and graze it with my teeth before sinking them into her flesh, worrying at her until she cries out. Such soft skin, such need. I think I'm getting drunk on her.

Magister coughs.

Oh. Oh, dear.

Somehow, we all managed to make it through to the end without anyone mentioning or even acknowledging that something awkward had happened in the kitchen; but the guests are gone and it's just the two of us in the apartment, now.

He sits hunched over on the couch. I've never seen him look so small.

"I know I can't meet all of your needs," he says, his voice trembling, "and some of those needs are important enough that they can't be ignored for your whole life. I know you were disowned for loving a woman, and that you like women. I also know that you have always had a strong need to be dominant, and what the two of us have is probably unusual for you. I can't be a woman for you. I might possibly be able to play the submissive for you, sometimes - for one thing, you are supposed to be learning domination from me, and it would give you a chance to practice and to find your own style - although I suspect it would not go as far as you would like. There are certain lines I cannot cross. But eromene, did you have to remind me now?"

"I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking. She kind of threw herself at me, and I kind of caught her."

"You caught her and pinned her against the wall of our kitchen?"

"You never told me not to."

He sighs. "It would have been polite to at least ask my permission."

I feel a lump form in my throat. "I'm sorry. It just happened before I could stop. I didn't mean to do it. Really, I didn't."

"Didn't you?" He finally meets my eyes again. I almost wish he hadn't. "That kiss seemed full of intention, from where I was standing."

"I don't want her. Well. I do want her, in the sense that I think I lust after her, but I don't want to date her. I don't think. I only kissed her. I want you." Then the tears start, and this time, I'm crying not from passion, but from sheer misery. "I love you, Magister. My erastes. I want you. I'll never stop loving you. I'm yours forever if you want. I didn't mean for that to happen..."

"No. You're not."

"What?"

"You are not mine. Much as I often wish you were. I love you, too, eromene," he murmurs, so quietly that I can barely make out the word love, as I realize it's the first time he's ever spoken it aloud in a language that isn't dead; and he reaches for me. "It was partly my fault for not ever having thought to discuss the possibility that you might find an outside partner. Monogamy is a cultural default, but it's not something I should just take for granted. And arrangements of convenience between couples that allow one or both members of that couple to seek play partners outside the relationship are extremely common in the BDSM scene, especially when one primary partner is dominant and the other primary partner is not submissive, or when one primary partner is submissive and the other is not dominant. It happens all the time. Just because two sexually kinked people make a perfect couple in most of the more conventional ways - values, common interests, that sort of thing - does not mean they are going to be perfectly compatible in their specific kinks. We are no exception to this. Nevertheless, I don't want to share you. Is that all right?"

"Yes. Yes, Magister."

"I know it's one of the oldest and most stereotypical male fantasies in existence - having two girls at once, having a girlfriend who is attracted to other women and is willing to do things to another woman in front of you and possibly even let you join in - but that's never appealed to me. It hurt me to see you with someone else. It reminded me of everything I am not, and can never be; and it showed me in no uncertain terms that you can't and shouldn't be truly mine, regardless of how badly I might want you to be mine." His voice has been a near-whisper, and I realize it's because he's trying not to cry.

Meanwhile, I'm crying hard enough for both of us. One way or another, I guess, the tears will all get shed.

"I'm sorry. Forgive me? Please?"

"Se philo. Of course, you are forgiven, eromene." He sighs again. "This was my fault. We should have had this discussion years ago. I can't blame you for doing something you didn't know would cross my limits if I never even told you that I needed monogamy in the first place."

He buries his face in my hair, and we stop trying to patch our wounds with words. Holding each other seems to work somewhat better for mending ourselves, although it, too, only goes so far.

"But now I know I can never be enough for you," he says in a choked voice.

Then his tears start, landing harder on me than blows.

"I'm sorry about the kiss. It was amazing. You are beautiful and taste like heaven. But nothing can come of it; it would hurt Magister too much if I date other people outside our relationship. I'm not sure I have enough time or energy for another relationship right now, anyway. I barely have enough time to sleep."

Thank goodness this is one of those days when the student union is mostly deserted, so we can talk in the temptation-free zone of a public place and yet not be overheard, keeping the conversation itself private.

"Oh. I was afraid of that." She looks up. "He wasn't, you know, mad at you?"

"Of course, he was angry. He was jealous, and it was my fault."

"No, I mean - he didn't hit you or anything?"

"He doesn't do that. Well, not when he's angry. He hits me when we're making love, sometimes, but only because then, it's part of lovemaking. Think of us as being part Klingon."

"You didn't get punished?"

"That's not how our relationship works, except when formal lessons are going on."

I had to hold him while he cried. I suppose that counts as a sort of punishment.

"Oh." She looks down again. "I'm sorry I threw myself at you. I'd say I was drunk, but you can't get drunk on iced tea, can you?"

"I don't think so, no."

"Can we pretend it never happened?"

I sigh. "Yes. Let's do that."

Well. We can try.