[b]Rose[/b]

You can feel the eagerness of your subject as you work. It's perhaps the highest compliment you could hope to receive. She's letting you indulge, she's in fact intensely paying attention to [i]you[/i] and everything that's making you feel happy and strong and powerful in this moment. But at the same time, she's not just doing this to give you a chance to feel good, oh no no. She is bursting with excitement beneath you. She shivers at your touch and it runs through her whole body. You feel a couple little kicks as she squirms and can tell that your little Chen is just barely resisting the urge to make those stronger kicks that might push your full weight onto her. Because she wants that. She wants you. 

In this first part, there is no swearing of revenge. Really, there is a complete squandering of use of Chen's last moments of unencumbered speech this night. She's far too busy taking turns being enraptured and letting out noises when you touch her that bring a blush to both your cheeks. How fortunate that you'll never remind her of this in the future for any sort of embarrassment, isn't that right? Of course that's right! You'll certainly never bring up the gasp that escaped her when your fingers brushed her stomach and moved just a little further down, no that will never come up again ever. 

It's only when you're done and admiring your handiwork that she offers a little different side of herself. For all of Chen's other issues, you can see clearly that shame in her body isn't one of them. She squeaks and blushes at how exposed she is to you, but so too does she touch her own thighs and run a hand along her chest invitingly. Does that bring a blush to your face? What a lucky thing that you'll be binding up that misbehaving hand very soon! 

And here too, she dons the impish smile she can wear and whispers to you: "I can't wait to pay you back double for all this. My little flowerbud~" And oh, it won't do to let that little mouth keep running at all, will it now? Not when she's practically begging you to get on with it. 

So hop to it Rose, your girlfriend is getting impatient! 

***

[b]Yue[/b]

Chen's look is excitement. Nerdy nerdy excitement! It's the excitement of having someone else be excited about your thing! Her face lights up and for a moment she gets lost in her own fantasies. Time spent working with Yue on honing her craft, building the right muscles and practicing things like grip and follow through, teaching the balance exercises that form the basis of strong swordsmanship air or ground. And time spent talking and comparing notes and coming up with plans and counter-plans, and just sitting and laughing. Sharing a meal and using the little bendy straw as a makeshift sword to gesture about something that just came into your mind! And then going back to it over time and pushing each other. Coming up with totally new moves in the heat of the moment, pushing each other to always be better but without that harshness that comes with needing to be the best. 

It's not that Chen imagines everything happening just like that (has Yue even seen a bendy straw in the countryside?), but she lets herself indulge for a moment in the fantasy. Yue doesn't know it, but this is so much of what Chen had wanted with Qiu before. Qiu was already so skilled, so Chen hadn't thought of herself as the teacher there, she could have melted into Qiu's world and been her peer. But she had wanted that shared fun and excitement, that support for each other and shared growth out of it. She maybe still wanted that too, but she wasn't sure if that was something Qiu was up for. She'd seen a different side of Princess Qiu at the step pyramid and gearing up to meet that on its own terms was part of what Chen was working towards now. 

But, in the meantime, here was Yue surprising Chen! First it had seemed like she was a master because of the armor and the spirit and the gleaming, so much gleaming! And then it had seemed that she was a novice and she had a lot going on and so much to take in and Chen knew that Keron wanted to have her trained properly but there were a thousand thousand variations of what a handmaiden could decide to focus on. So, so obviously Chen couldn't have expected Yue to delight in their shared training or to go in for the swordsmanship or to have this expression, this look! So let her nerd out for a moment and just have this whole fantasy!

Okay, moment done, moment over. Now's the time to teach Yue about good practice schedules and cooldown exercises and how you need to balance learning something to perfection with taking a break from it to let your muscles rest and your brain process and then going back again. But...she was laughing at...the rear joke and...oh no. I-it wasn't that funny. It wasn't! And Chen had already been suppressing her giggles before at her own joke, and then when Yue shouted "another word for butt!" Chen just lost it herself. Because obviously, but she was just getting it, and it was so silly, and they were both floating and she was and they were and and it meant butt! Pffffffttt ahhahahahaha!

And so poor Kat is left to fend for two completely disabled girls rolling about laughing and gasping for breath like fish out of water. Never fear, though, there will be tea. Good tea with honey and maybe some lemon because Chen's been working in the gardens for her duties this week and might just have noticed a ripe lemon that nobody would miss. You won't tell Keron, right? Or you can, that would be okay too. 

***

[b]Hyra![/b]

It's cherry blossom festival day! The perfect time to open a door in a suit, but also the perfect time to show off all the handmaids and dress them up for the season. Rose, of course, finds herself in absolute pleasured disability as a show of Keron's indulgence and power. Chen, for her part, is positioned nearby to strategically show off a Princess in submission for the room. She's got a costume matching Rose's. Cute little wooden sandals with pink straps, and then a pink and short shrine-maiden's skirt that doesn't even reach her knees much less hide her thighs, though the pleats and ruffles give it a nice full look with some shadow mixed in as well. Above that, she's got the lace shirt with fabric embroidered with lovely pink cherry blossoms around the stomach and lower chest. But the shirt parts far below her neck, leaving plenty of skin to show off her entirely appropriate collar, necklaces, bracers and earrings all in the same rose-pink gold of Rose's outfit. Chen, not presently being doted on, also has her face veiled with thin pink silk. 

But, Rose is in her full splendor today, and so Chen's barely bigger than half Rose's size. This means that Chen looks very much like she's wearing the kid's matching set to Rose's festival outfit, the little princess all dressed up to match to be shown off for the court! It's incredibly cute and embarrassing, a carefully calculated choice to both make Chen blush and emphasize the prize that Keron has captured and has fully under her control (we won't discuss the lemon theft!).

And on top of that, Keron needs somebody to wait on her. So Chen is loaded down with a big silver serving tray that she needs both hands to keep upright. On it are plates and saucers with all manner of treats: fresh nuts and candied fruits, little cakes and cookies, tiny crustless sandwiches with cucumber, and three different types of tea all freshly brewed. You can smell the scent of jasmine as you come in, and that floral one must have some cherry in it for the day! Other handmaids have been adding and removing items as they're indulged in by Keron or the entourage, while Chen has to keep everything steady and not spill a drop or a crumb, lest she face Keron's displeasure and add to her own embarrassment. She's managing with all the grace of her years training (and some past maid-play that nobody needs to be thinking about right now!), but it's clear the task takes her full attention, especially with how she's strategically positioned to both wait directly on Keron and constantly glance at Rose, the latest of which has brought a bright blush to her face. 

It's not exactly the well-armed, gallant, and full-powered hero squad, but then it never actually is with these sorts of stories, isn't that right? The real trick is that the squad comes together at the last minute with a little combo of readiness and luck mixed with a generous dash of chaos. It's unexpected and exciting and just the sort of thing that a handmaid on a gallant rescue wants to set in motion like a line of dominoes.