“Anything else, Mistress?” The slave, tall and dressed very handsomely, bowed to Lady Lillian.

“That will be all, thank you, Brandon.” She dismissed him with a flap of her hand, negligent and casual.

“As you wish, Mistress.” He bowed again and retreated to the cushion in the corner of the solarium.

Lady Lillian turned back to her guest, an older Baroness from the next Barony over. “Isn’t he a dear?”

“He seems awfully – placid, I suppose, for an American.” Lady Rose pursed her lips. “Is he wearing a shock collar?”

“Nothing like that, no, of course not.” Lady Lillian giggled. “No, he’s a volunteer.”

“A… what? I didn’t think we had those.”

“Oh, yes. Morganna’s been working with a few underground organizations. Gay people, transgender, submissive… they can’t be who they are, in America.”

“So they submit to our collar? Tch. Are you sure he’s a lamb, dear? The way he looks, that’s more like a lion than a ‘submissive.'”

“Oh, you know how Americans are. Even their submissives have trouble giving up control. But he’s a nice boy. Speaking of nice boys, wasn’t Cody ap Gwydion visiting you last week…” Lady Lillian changed the subject deftly, and just as tidily kept her guest talking and giggling for hours.

When she had finally seen the Baroness Rose to the door, Lillian flopped on the settee. She was staring at the window, but her eyes barely tracked. Brandon picked up around her, then knelt at her feet, exactly as she had trained him to do.

“Does it ever tire you out? Pretending to be vapid and blank?” The question, unlike the kneeling, was contrary to every bit of training he had received.

Lady Lillian turned to look at him. Something like a smile crossed her lips.

“No more, I suppose, than it tires you out, pretending to be the perfect servant. And it keeps the peace.”

If he had been kneeling peacefully before, Brandon was frozen now, even his breath seeming to stop. When he found his voice, it was a croak. “How long have you known?”

“Since I found you ‘tidying’ my office. But I’d almost doubted it, until I saw you that afternoon in the garden.”

“And…” He coughed into his shoulder and tried again. “And you said nothing? Mistress?”

“And I said nothing.” She caught his chin in her hand, a gesture she’d done time after time. Neither of them missed that it was different this time. “And I will continue to say nothing, and so will you.”

Written to corvi‘s prompt.

This is in my Tír na Cali setting, but with new characters.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/828509.html. You can comment here or there.