"Well why couldn't we go to the beach?" Benaret asked, drying his arms off from washing dishes. "My arms have already had a swim, and I think the rest of me would appreciate it."
Lirris tried to hide her dissapointment. "Well, alright, if you want to. I was kind of hoping we could spend the evening... alone. It'll be a while before my parents are gone again, and we should use what time we have."
Benaret grinned. "What better way to use our time than together? I don't care what we're doing, so long as we're together, and swimming sounds nice. Plus, there are plenty of private little spots to dry off and warm up after a swim."
Lirris blushed and slapped his arm playfully. "You're as bad as Gilla and the rest of them! Jiraye was suggesting you should skinny-dip for all of us."
Benaret gaped in mock-astonishment. "Lirris! I didn't know you would share me!"
"Did I say I would?" Lirris chuckled. "Besides, there're be plenty of other guys there for them to flirt with. You're mine."
"I certainly am," Benaret agreed, slipping an arm around Lirris' waist. "I assume you weren't considering skinny-dipping either, so we have to go get bathing clothes, huh?"
"I really should slap you for that one," Lirris told him, smiling up at him as they walked.
Benaret grinned down at her. "Where?"
"You're worse than the rest of them!" Lirris announced. "Let's go get you a nice, big bathing cloth. Prefrably pants."
Lirris enjoyed the walk to her quarters and then to Benaret's corner of the drudges' quarters more than any time she'd ever spent with anyone. With other guys, she'd taken for granted the privelege of walking around for everyone to see that they were a couple. Now, walking with Benaret, she realized how much she missed it.
As they took the long path down to the beach, Lirris' flit, Talmur, a sixteenth birthingday present from her father, appeared scolding her and showing her an image of her parents as he landed on her shoudler, putting himself between Lirris and Benaret's heads.
"Silly flit, they won't get mad at me, they're gone for the sevenday, remember?" Lirris chuckled, showing the flit an image of her parents on the green dragon who was about to wink between.
Talmur still sent feelings of uneasiness about Lirris and Benaret being seen together and stayed between them.
"Protective little thing, isn't he?" Benaret chuckled. Lirris had the feeling he was grinning, but she couldn't see over Talmur's raised wings.
"Just doing what flits are supposed to and watching out for his human," Lirris replied. "He is a little overprotective for a male though, females are supposed to be the ones who mother you."
Talmur stayed between them until they reached the beach where the lure of the ocean and playing in the waves with the other flits of the Hall was too strong. With a happy trill, the copper-silver launched himself off his human's shoulder and landed in the waves.
"You are so lucky to have Talmur," Benaret sighed as they continued their walk down to the beach. "He's the perfect companion, besides me of course."
Lirris grinned. "Of course. Just don't let Talmur hear you say that, he'd probably try to attack you."
Benaret chuckled. "Probably. At least I know you're well-protected when I'm not around." He pulled her a bit closer. "I don't know why I'm thinking of this now, but I don't know what I'd do if something did happen to you, even if Talmur is protecting you."
Lirris looked up at him, suprised. "What could happen to me? I'm the one who should be worried about what my father will do to you if he finds out about us."
Benaret was about to reply when Gilla came running up to them. "Why are you still in your clothes?" she asked angrily. "Get changed and get into the water! We're about to have a water fight, and we need you two to even up the teams!"
"You're not putting us on different teams, are you?" Lirris mock-gasped.
Gilla rolled her eyes. "Of course not. Wasn't thinking about it. Our team is two players short. We were going to play girls against boys but then we realized you two were coming. Now go get changed and don't take too long about it!" she gave them a shove towards a stand of bushes and ran back to the water.
"Well, I suppose we should get changed then," Benaret said, starting towards the bushes, bathing cloth in hand. Lirris followed, working her way barefoot through the thick sand.
Lirris was almost changed when a scrap of hide came sailing over the wall of bushes between where she was changing and where Benaret was changing. "Uh, could you get that for me?" he asked from the other side of the bushes.
Lirris finished tying her top then stood up. "You mean this?" she asked, waving the bathing cloth around.
Benaret's head and shoulders appeared on the other side of the bushes. "Yeah, that," he asked, reaching for it. "Give it!"
"How bad do you want it?" Lirris asked teasingly, snatching it back before he could reach it.
"C'mon Lir, I'm naked over here! Give it!" Benaret pleaded.
Lirris chuckled and tossed the hide right outside of the bushes. "Oh, what a pity."
Benaret glared at her but ended up breaking into a grin. "You're evil, you know that."
His head and shoulders dissapeared and Lirris heard whistles and clapping from the beach. When Benaret came back, his face was beet red. Lirris struggled to keep from laughing.
"Next time," he threatened as they walked towards the water, "it's you who're going out there to get your clothes."
Lirris shrugged. "You could have just put your pants back on."
Benaret grinned mischeviously. "That would have taken all the fun out of it, now wouldn't it?"
The water fight was long and very satisfying, and in the end everyone ended up on the beach, soaked, exhausted, and not sure who had won. Gilla had gotten her revenge on Jiraye by hitting her with a glob of wet sand, to which Jiraye had replied with a dead fish. The two, suprisingly, seemed to be on better terms now.
Someone had the idea to build a bonfire and so everyone now sat around, mostly in pairs, warming themselves. Talmur was curled up in the sand, half asleep, humming happily low in his throat.
"I don't know about you," Benaret said, "but I think this was more fun than a night alone would have been."
"Definetly," Lirris replied, shivering as a cold breeze blew through. "Though I'm a bit cold."
"It just so happens that my lap is cold too," Benaret chuckled and, sitting up, pulled Lirris onto his lap. "Better?"
Lirris leaned back into his warm, muscled chest. "Much."
"Hey! You two need to find a clump of bushes if you're going to do that!" Gilla called from where she was sitting with a journeyman named Theriall.
"Do what?" Benaret asked innocently. "Can't a girl sit on a guy's lap without everyone making such a big deal over it?"
There was a collective chuckle from everyone around the bonfire and more shouts of "find a bush" or "get a room!". Talmur decided it was too loud and bugled loudly, which only brought more laughter.
"Let's give them something to shout about," Benaret suggested in a low voice, leaning down towards Lirris so that no one else would hear them.
"What did you have in mind?" Lirris asked in an equally as low voice.
"This," Benaret replied and, pulling her down on top of him, leaned back into the sand. "Now kiss me!"
Lirris grinned. "If you say so." She leaned down and kissed him soundly. There were whistles and more shouts from around the bonfire. Someone, two someones, probably, scooped up a bucket of cold ocean water and dumped it on them.
"Stop that!" Gilla bellowed in between giggles. "Or continue it, whichever, just somewhere private, for Faranth's sake!"
Lirris rolled off of Benaret into the sand. "What? Are we making you jealous?"
Gilla blushed and ran back to Theriall, who was still holding the now empty bucket. "Maybe," she called back, and everyone laughed. Someone threw a shirt at Lirris and, laughing, she through it back.
"I know when we're not wanted!" Benaret said, dodging a pair of pants. "C'mon Lir, let's go."
They left, Talmur following, whistles and cheers following them. "Well, I think that wasn't a bad night at the beach," Lirris said as they collected their clothes from the bushes where they'd changed.
Benaret shook his head. "Not at all. The other drudges won't believe me tonight when I tell them how I spent my night off."
"Who says you're going back to the drudges' quarters tonight?" Lirris purred.
"Are you inviting me to your quarters?" Benaret asked, raising any eyebrow.
"They are a bit more private than yours," Lirris pointed out. "And I bet my sleeping furs are softer..."
The next morning...