the Ritual. Only those with the sign have the ability to open the door to the Cavern of Grace. The woman usually enters first and waits for the man. The door leaves the light of her handprint on the surface to let the man know she’s inside. We’ll go together since you don’t know what to do.”

We step towards the door, but I don’t see a knob or handle to open it. Sash presses the palm of one hand against the surface, so I do the same. Yellow light flares around our hands, gradually recedes, and the slab swings inward. After we pass through the opening, the door closes behind us with a loud thud.

As we walk through a narrow tunnel, the radiant amber from our veins reflects in the smooth, dark walls. We soon reach a small, high-ceiling cavern shaped out of glossy black stone.

Falling from the domed ceiling, flakes of colored light float down through the air. Like a gentle snowfall of every color imaginable, the points meander to the ground. The flakes end their descent with a gentle splash in a shallow pool of water that covers the ground. A myriad of color reflects in the circular walls of the cavern around us.

In the center of the cavern, seven thick vines hang from the highest point of the ceiling, each of them vibrant with a different color of the rainbow. Intertwined with one another, they form a single massive pillar roughly the size of a sturdy tree trunk. With her face bathed in multi-colored light, Sash turns to me.

“The Vines of Life,” she says. “We need to take off our clothing.”

We both lift our shirts over our heads and slip our pants down our legs. After laying our clothing on the tops of two granite slabs that reside on either side of the Cavern entrance, we step inside.

“Wait here,” Sash says quietly.

She walks through a nebula of swirling color. With each step she takes, ripples glimmering with brilliant reflections spread outward in the shallow water around her feet. When she reaches the Vines, she kneels in front of them, rests her hands on their base, and bows her head.

“Kneel behind me,” she says, her voice echoing inside the cave.

I walk through the inch-deep water while the sparks of light in the air prickle against my skin. When each twinkling flake touches me, it sends pulses of pleasure through my nerves. After stopping behind Sash, I get down on my knees behind her. Resting on all fours, Sash extends her backside to me. I slowly run my hands over the curves of her hips.

“You’re not allowed to touch me with your hands,” she says. “Keep them at your sides and press your midsection against me.”

Lowering my hands as she instructed, I lean my stomach against the firm curve of her rear. She reaches one hand between her legs and softly caresses me. Her fingertips feel as though they’re reaching through my skin and deep inside my body. Once I’m fully erect, she takes me in a gentle grip and guides me into her warmth.

“Slowly move inside me,” she says, returning her hand to the ground, “and then remain still.”

A tranquil smile comes to my face as I slide inside her wetness. Once I’m as deep as I can go, I remain perfectly still. For the first few moments, I feel calm and relaxed. But out of nowhere, a sudden jolt hits me that literally lifts my knees off the ground.

Like being electrocuted by a power line that falls in a swimming pool, thousands of volts surge through me. With my muscles clenching out of my control, my body convulses until I realize that I’ve been forced to climax inside Sash. Excruciating pain swells in the center of my stomach and shoots outward through my extremities. I slam my hands to my gut and collapse on my side. Squirming in the shallow water, I try to focus my eyes.

“Sash!” I wail.

Oblivious to me, she bows her head to the Vines, whispers a few inaudible words, and stands to her feet. With a somber expression on her face, she looks down at me. The amber light in her veins slowly fades away.

“I’m sorry it has to be this way,” she says. “The pain will soon pass. I’ll wait for you in our habitat.”

Chapter 4

Sash stares at me for several seconds and then walks to the cavern entrance. I can’t even call out to her while I writhe on the ground. Each time I think the pain is about to recede, another wave of misery burns through me. I’m not sure how much time passes—maybe an hour, maybe a little less—but it seems like much more. I spend every second of it tucked in a ball with intense pain needling through my body.

When the agony finally recedes, I’m exhausted, cramped, and sore. Hopeful that this warped Krymzyn experience is behind me, I hesitantly stand to my feet. As I limp through the water to my clothes, my leg muscles feel like they’re tied in knots.

I learned early in my visits to Krymzyn that casual sex between people doesn’t happen in the Delta. The innate desire doesn’t even seem to exist here. With the most extreme Pavlovian response I can imagine just programmed inside me, if a man is chosen for the Ritual of Balance, I now understand the negative reinforcement that’s forever embedded in his mind.

After dressing as rapidly as I can, I exit through the dark tunnel. The door at the end of the passage swings open for me on its own. Since the granite slab is now absent of light, I look down at my arms. The amber that glittered in my veins an hour ago has entirely left my body.

Once I step out to the grass-lined gully, the door behind me slams itself shut. Feeling aches in every muscle, I jog out of the gorge. It takes me a few tries to merge with the light,

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