“Working late again, dear?”
Rethais glanced up from the schedule they were reading, for the next week. Sure, the High General had a free weekend, but after that, they had a lot of work ahead of them, starting off with a meeting at 7am with the Torr, first thing on Monday morning. But they were currently alone, all their guards were outside. Well, they had been alone, up until a second ago.
“Always. I apologise, Lysar, did you want to speak to me?”
“I always want to speak to you and spend time with you!” Lysar grinned. They sneaked up behind Rethais’s throne (they hated that word but had no real idea what else to call it), then stuck an arm around it, thrusting something onto Rethais’s lap. It was a large, wrapped up box.
“What is this?”
“A gift! Since it is Veeyel-En’s Day! And also Saint Valentinios’s Day!”
Rethais blinked. “What is… oh… That first one is a Skyavok holiday, yes? One about loving everyone equally, and looking out for those who get left behind.”
Lysar nodded. “It is. I was… admittedly more aiming at Saint Valentinios’s Day, which is a Torr holiday. Admittedly, it is more of a commercial holiday than anything else, a day to sell tacky romantic gifts to the person you love, but, eh, I thought it would be the perfect time to give you an amusing gift myself.”
“Oh… Well… Happy… commercial holiday to you too?” Rethais half-heartedly replied. “I must apologise, not only have I been a busy, useless poten-partner, but I also did not get you a gift.”
“I did not expect a gift, you sillybutt!” Lysar was smiling a little too much. “I mean, if you had forgotten the Day of Love on April 30th, I would be a little upset, but I cannot expect a busy person like you to remember every holiday of every race! Also you are not useless.”
Rethais sighed. “I am. I am always busy. Very hard to get close to.”
“That is fine. I understand. Now open your gift!”
Rethais sighed again, then did as they were told. However, their expression changed from confusion to amusement to flat out embarrassment.
“What… what is all of this?” Rethais exclaimed. “This is…”
“Silly.”
“Inappropriate! What… these things… these…” Rethais found themselves stuttering as they put the box down. After a few deep breaths, Rethais put their head in their hands, took a few more deep breathes then got up to properly face Lysar. “I appreciate the gift of chocolate and red flower petals, but you also gave me a packet of weird rubbers, what I think may be some sort of vibrating ring and… custom vibrating sex toys of various sizes.”
Lysar shrugged. “Those are the sort of gifts Torr send to their partners. And apparently Skyavok do send sexy gifts to their partners too… Hang on, have you never seen a cock ring before?”
Rethais hesitated, then nodded. “That is what the ring is, yes? I assume it goes around the penis and vibrates to cause pleasure?”
“Indeed!”
“It is an inappropriate gift.”
“It is a silly, harmless gift!” Lysar tutted. “I love you, dear, but you can be a right prude at times.”
“Because I AM prude! I am fifty two years old, and I spent most of my adult years having people only be interested in me so they can attempt to overpower me and try and force me to have kids! I am a prize to be won, a trophy, proof that I am not as strong as others! And it is made worse that…” Rethais paused, then glanced around before continuing. “It is all a lie. Retvik should have been the Bearer all along. I should have been Honour-Held, I should have been…” Again, Rethais trailed off. “I am sorry, Lysar. I am… being stupid. And sad. I… I am not over a few things… And I literally have no idea how to be a good poten-partner.”
Lysar sighed, then gave Rethais a big hug. “It is fine. I am not angry. I am just surprised and worried. I just wanted to brighten your mood with a silly gift.”
“I am sorry. My response was unkind and overdramatic.”
“I accept your apology. But you are not a bad poten-partner. Just inexperienced. And somewhat cursed. You are not the best, you are often busy and distracted, but for understandable reasons. However, there is ALWAYS room for improvement. And I am happy to help you learn. Also I want you to be able to pleasure yourself when I am away on official business, what with me being the General of Hidden External Affairs and often not being present. That is why I made that solid blue, self-warming dildo.”
Rethais went back to blinking in confusion, then turned back to the gift box and rummaged through it. At the bottom of the box was a sealed sex toy that didn’t match the others in colour. As Rethais inspected it further though, they realized that they… recognized it.
“You… bought me a dildo custom-made to match the shape of your penis?” Rethais asked.
“Yes. Shape, size, feel, temperature. Because there are times where I know you want me and I am not present. That is also why I got that DIY Clit-a-cloner for you too. So you can make one for me.”
“That is… very strange but also very thoughtful. I… I appreciate both it and you, Lysar.”
“Love you too, Rethais. Now, are you done with work?”
Rethais glanced at the table by their throne. “I guess so. Not that I can concentrate on work right now anyway.”
“Do you want to come to my place, and we can try out all these toys? And perhaps eat a lot of chocolate and drink a lot of alcohol too? I bought some very nice berry-flavoured vodka that I want to try.”
The awkwardness faded away. Rethais sighed, then smiled and nodded. “You know what? That sounds like a great idea. We should go and do that, right now. And… if I am looking at this DIY kit properly… I might need your help…”
Lysar grinned and packed all the gifts back into the original box. “Wonderful. Come along now. We shall have a lovely time.”
“Yes, we shall…”