Chapter 3

The moon thrived in the time of the silver millennium.

As a boy I'd grown up in the wilderness without even the rudiments of civilized technology. Had someone told me that in the cities you can turn a knob and hot water would flow out of a wall and into a basin, I would have thought it was the work of demons. Or that I could speak into a tube and my voice would carry for almost a mile. Or that I could turn a small wheel and my room would fill with heat and light from a far distant fire.

Yet, by the standards of the moon, even these small miracles seemed like the sad parlor tricks of a toddling civilization. We landed in a field of flowers. It was daytime on the moon, and the cites were places of colored light and giant screens with moving faces and flashes of unicorns, rainbows, and kittens and other cloyingly sweet things. The moon cities served as a backdrop for the moon palace, which rose up forever, water spraying from flower shaped spires. The air was warm, spring flowers bloomed, and yet a lake of ice stood before the palace, with people skating across it. The women on the moon wore very little, their tiny skirts sometimes fluttered up, bearing the full length of their legs. Occasionally I saw a flash of tiny white underpants, but the women made no blushes and no attempted to cover themselves in our presence, unconcerned by either cold or modesty.

I couldn't decide if I approved of this or not, but as a hot blooded young warrior I had to watch. As did Endymion who tilted his head to get a better look, even though Beryl scowled at him and bit her lip. Many of these women held little tablets in their hands. They ignored us to gaze upon portraits of human faces like the ones on the screens within the city. The skaters spoke to them as if they were real people and not merely a face on a slab small enough to hold in their hands. Many of the girls without these slates smiled at the prince, and the ones that didn't smile at him smiled at me.

This was nothing new. With his tall build, handsome face, clean cut onyx black hair, and sapphire blue eyes, most girls found him attractive. The ones who didn't tended to prefer men like me, with my muscular build, long silvery hair, tan skin, and ice blue eyes.

But this was the first time we were being openly ogled by girls who were practically nude by earth standards.

Beryl looked down at her now dowdy dress, and tightened the stays at the bodice so that her chest stood high and tight, straining at the neckline. When she saw this wasn't enough, she tore the cloth panel beneath the strings away completely, so that you could fully make out the shape of cleavage, trussed up like hams for the smoke house, bared to all onlookers, all the way to her now exposed navel.

At long last, the Queen of the Moon approached our landing party, carried in a moon shaped sedan chair carried aloft on long poles by a group of young beauties in golden helmets and tiny golden armor over pure white tunics. As they reach the king of Earth, the young women lowered the seat and knelt before our king. One of these young amazons held up her hand to help her queen descend from her chair. The king of Earth stepped forward in his crown and ermine robes. "Allow me," he said.

The queen took his hand and descended like a moth, tall and pale and ageless and slim in a white dress, with hair even fairer than my own, done up into two puffs on either side of her head with the remainder trailing ankle-length to either side. "You do me great honor, my lord."

"Nowhere near as great as the honor you do me, Your Grace."

Queen Serenity looked about. "So where is that handsome son of yours? I hear his beauty is nearly as legendary as his valor."

"He is here," the king said, pulling Endymion forward. "It is my fondest wish for him to take a moon maiden for his wife, and it is my fondest hope we will align our two planets by marriage."

The young women giggling with a mocking lilt behind their hands, but the queen gave them a warning look before smiling at the king again. "Forgive them. They find humor in your words only because marriage is no longer practiced in my realm, and has not been for some several thousand years."

The king's face fell. "No marriage?"

"The people of the moon have very long lifespans," the queen said. "We feel marriage is akin to slavery since it binds one person to another, even beyond the point when it is no longer their will to be together."

This made sense to me. I saw no point to marrying except to establish paternity of a lineage, and since I had no plans to father any sons of my own, I had no desire to marry.

The king scratched his head. "But who provides for your women during childbearing?"

The young ladies did not bother to laugh at this, they lowered their faces as if deeply offended.

The queen slowed her speech as if speaking to a simpleton. "I provide for everyone. The moon does not have much in the way of natural resources, but between trade and magic, there is more than enough for everyone. All of our wants and needs are met and nobody does without."

"So there is no money either?" the king guessed.

The queen smiled. "Yes. We have no monetary system, and no need for money."

"So what is to stop your people from being lazy?" the king asked.

I thought it was a perfectly good question, but the girls clenched their fists and looked angry. Even the queen didn't bother to smile. "Why would anyone choose to lazy?"

A long silence fell over both parties, the queen's women looking bemused, the king's people agitated as if trying to puzzle out what great faux pas had occurred. I myself did not care either way. It appeared to me that both sides were behaving childishly. But my role here was to serve the king and protect the life of the prince, and it didn't seem to me there was any danger. Unless someone did something truly stupid.

At long last, the king chuckled and slapped the prince on the back. "I see I have a lot to learn about life on the moon, but with such charming beauties as I see before me as our teachers we shall be more than delighted to learn."

I worried this might cause deeper offense. The few warrior-women I'd encountered on earth would have considered such compliments to be belittlement. However, the queen looked delighted by the king's words, as did her ladies who blushed and whispered to one another behind their hands.

"And it appears I have much to learn about your earth customs," the queen said. "So we will learn from each other. And while we are on the topic of learning, I understand you've brought a young apprentice-maid in need of training?"

Beside me, Beryl winced as if she had been struck by a whip. Those slights I understood at least. I don't know which part offended her most. The expectation she was young, that she was an apprentice, that she was a maiden, or that she 'needed' training. Beryl stepped forward and bowed.

The queen's big blue eyes opened wide and the warrior maids averted their own. At first I thought it was because she realized how different Beryl was from her preconditioned ideal, but then I saw a few of the queen's women in the back pointing and snickering openly at Beryl until she turned deep red and tried to cover her mammoth breasts with her hands.

On Earth it was considered obscene for a woman to uncover her legs. Apparently, the moon had a similar taboo when it came to breasts.

The moon queen patted Beryl's head. "Your room is near the stables. We've left the door open for you. Find me in the training room after you've changed into something more suitable," the queen wandered away to dismiss Beryl who just stood there with her head low and her shoulders quivering in shame.

As we begun the long trek to the moon palace I hung back a little to drape my cloak around Beryl and draw her close. She sighed and leaned against me.

"Thank you," she whispered, as we followed behind all the others.