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Gentle fingers comb through strands of hair. Gentle. What a novel concept. One so foreign.
Minthara strokes her beloved's scalp methodically with one hand. The other flips through her hard covered book, the paper flapping with her continued devotion of attention.
Tav did not mind that the woman's thoughts were elsewhere. Not when they were exactly where they longed to be. Kneeled before their beloved, warm cheek smooshed into the fat of her thigh.
A pretty collar wrapped a smidge too tight around their throat.
There was no need to think. No need for responsibilities. No need to even exist.
To be given the space to be nothing at all. To be lost in the tide of Minthara's touch, drowning peacefully under the current. Such a bliss could be found nowhere else but at Minthara's feet.
To be a pet was to be mindless. A stupid, drooling creature that can only find sanctuary in another. And Minthara was a 𝘮𝘢𝘳𝘷𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘶𝘴 owner.
Their pleasant drift was interrupted by a not so pleasant shift. Minthara had slid out of the bed, Tav's limp head colliding with the mattress below.
Every ounce of ecstasy was robbed from them within a single second. Like it had never existed. Every weight they bore returned all at once, leaving their shoulders to sag.
"Nnm..." Tav was not a fussy pet. But a whimper slipped from their tight throat as they watched the only comfort they knew turn her back.
"Silence."
Minthara did not swivel on her heel to come coo over their distress. But the acknowledgement of their existence was enough. The validation that they had not been forgotten— had not been discarded without warning.
Her authority was solace.
Minthara silently padded across the room, gracefully stalking over the moonlit floorboards. She halts before an ivy ornate dresser, searching the wooden surface. The clunk of steel echoes against the walls.
Long moments of distance later, Minthara concludes her task. With long spidery strides she returns to Tav, exactly where she left them. In her hands she holds the pieces to Tav's armor.
Sitting obediently still as Minthara begins the tedious process of adorning her beloved in protection. Piece by piece, her fingers meticulously lace and slide their garb onto their pliant body. She does not grow angry once during the process, wasting her precious time to secure them in ironclad.
Tav blinks when Minthara's hands retreat. They had lost themself to a trance, watching Minthara as she worked.
A knowing smile graces Minthara's features, pearly teeth glinting under moonbeams. Well aware of the way she can bewitch her beloved all while barely lifting a finger.
She reaches out. Cold flesh glides down Tav's throat, grazing delicately along their Adam's apple. A pleasant tingle ripples down their spine, chest pressing into their breastplate with the hitch of a breath.
Minthara's fingers hook the material of Tav's collar. The mark of ownership hidden underneath the layers of metal protection embracing them. But Tav still feels it. Like a fresh brand to their skin.
A soft tug. "You will do as I ask?"
It is not quite a question. Not quite an order, either. More so Minthara's way of assuring your capabilities.
The atrocities they would commit in her name were endless. Ready to snap their teeth at the slightest of threats, at the quietest of whispered orders. Only to scamper back to her heel with a bloodied maw when it was all over.
A lapdog. A guard dog. Whatever form Minthara wanted to channel their twisted loyalty into, whatever she desires them to be— that is what they are. Nothing more.
They bend at the neck, lowering their head until their lips are able to meet the back of Minthara's knuckles. It can never convey the true depths of the reverence that pours from their very core.
"Of course, my heart."
And she smiles.
"𝘎𝘰𝘰𝘥 𝘱𝘶𝘱."