Given that John had fully expected to die bleeding within the first hours of his newfound servitude, there was a certain bone-quaking relief that came over him when he awoke on his eighth morning as Bane's manservant and listened to the deep, even rasp of Sir Bane's breathing.
He could not deny that he still feared the man. He kept his own counsel in most things, and acted with merciless resolution in service of his lady's safety. Two days before, a would-be assassin had been found skulking in the kitchens; Bane questioned the man (scarcely more than boy, and pissing with fear), his rich voice reassuring and just faintly wrong, stroking the lad's shoulder in a skin-crawling mockery of soothing before simply twisting his neck like a key in a lock and letting the corpse crumple.
And he had yet to see Bane's face, though every night he averted his eyes as the man stripped his enormous bulk and sprawled out on his cot like a collapsing mountain. Bane ate; but John was not permitted in the room while he ate. Was there a mechanism to the mask, a hatch that permitted the entry of food? Or did Bane wait until he was alone in his room to strip away the leather and metal and devour his food like a normal man? Was he scarred, wax-skinned from burns, gashed and gouged from battle, or was he merely a man in a sorcerer's mask, with lips and teeth like any other man?
Three days after that, he summoned his courage and asked: "Why do you wear the mask?"
"Pain," replied his master, as though the word both amused and disappointed him.
"They- the men in the yard say it gives you powers," continued John, in the grip of fear like a rabbit, but hungry to know.
"Perhaps it does," mused Bane. "Do we live in pain, unknowing, waiting for chance or fate to lift that pain and let us be men again? Or are some of us born to greater pain than others?"
"We are all born to pain," responded John, his fear blending with memories of past fears and the dull constant certainty of grief. "Even hope is pain, stored for later."
"Well said," replied Bane. "And some of us have hoped more, and filled our storehouses for winter."
The next day after that, his lumpy bedroll was replaced with a second cot.
Bane regretted the cot within a single night's span. He retired to his room exhausted, sore-muscled from swinging weighted weapons in the training yard; worse, he had spent much of the day drilling his contingent (the mere twenty men he had been permitted to bring into Bruce's palace), and while they still adored him fiercely, they had neglected their training of late.
And now he lay on his cot, struggling to sleep while every few minutes the miserable creak of Blake's cot reminded him that his manservant was nearby, and awake.
Perhaps it was old training that kept Bane awake, too cautious to drift away with an enemy- no matter how deferent to his needs- so close by. Or perhaps he was still charged with the frustration of re-drilling months' worth of work with his lads.
Either way, he was grateful when Blake seemed to find a comfortable spot, and he had nearly fallen asleep when he heard a different creak from Blake's cot: a rhythmic creak, just the slightest shifting of the wooden joints.
Bane found himself instantly wide awake, frozen in place, peering through the dark toward his manservant's dim figure. The faintest glow from the brazier traced golden threads of illumination over Blake's shoulders and chest, touched his dark hair with bronze (he had turned his face to the wall, although the rest of his body lay supine)... and made the flicker of movement apparent, the unmistakeable gestures of a man seeking relief by his own hand.
Bane had been to war; he was a soldier, and soldiers knew the unspoken code, the tacit agreement of feigned ignorance. A man needed relief, sometimes, and it was a breach of propriety to call attention to it, or to acknowledge it at all. And Bane had never been one to seek out another man's flesh, to pretend that hard muscles were the same as soft skin, the way men sometimes did after battle. One could not maintain discipline that way; to share flesh with a man, knowing that he might someday be a deserter to be slaughtered, or that Bane himself might need to lash him half-flayed next week for a breach of conduct...
Now, though, he lay watching, heart pounding, a sickening thrill rising at the base of his spine. Across the room, Blake let out a shuddering breath, and as his hand moved faster under the draped sheet, the skin-on-skin whisper rose to Bane's ears.
Bane could not move. There was a poetry to this, the way Blake's slim shoulders tensed and relaxed, like the grace of a man in battle. And more; it kindled something dark inside Bane, some aggressive need that stripped away the careful structures he had begun to build around Blake.
He had treated Blake, his enemy, as if he were one of Bane's recruits. He had been polite, only cuffing him when discipline was necessary; he had almost begun to look at Blake as a protege to be trained, a possession to be polished and maintained for maximum usefulness.
Now he watched Blake's head fall back, revealing his profile; Blake's lips parted, wet in the brazier-light, and his eyes and brow tensed into a pleading expression. He was a beautiful thing, Bane realized, and his beauty was nothing Bane could control or even touch, and Bane's chest burned with that knowledge.
Finally Blake pulled at himself frantically, a flurry of creaks and groans coming from the rickety cot, and a low, helpless moan spilled over Blake's lips as he bucked up into his hand and spilled his seed. The scent of him filled the air, clean and masculine, and Bane felt his own cock twitch in sympathy- how long had he been hard, watching this- before Blake slumped back into relaxation, breathing already slowing into sleep.
Blake's cot didn't creak again, but Bane still lay awake long into the night, wrestling with this strange violent desire, struggling to fit Blake back into the convenient mold of enemy-manservant. There was no safe place for anyone in this part of him; even Talia, lovely and perfect, he kept separate from his lusts. Talia was pure, an angel with a clever heart; this thing that Blake had stirred inside him was dark and angry and possessive, and it burned in his belly and made him ache in his balls.
Blake would suffer for this.
"My lady," called Selina, tapping at the door of Lady Talia's boudoir. "My lady, a message from the Commander-"
The door creaked open, revealing an empty room. Selina paused, brow creasing; she had seen Talia enter, not twenty minutes ago, and she knew her mistress had not slipped out- not with Selina embroidering on the lounge outside the door, quietly pretending not to listen. This time, no voices could be heard, and no sulfurous scent curled under the door.
And yet, the Lady Talia was missing. Selina made a quick round of the boudoir, checking behind tapestries and under furniture; and finding no sign of her mistress, she went out into the bedchamber, calling as she went.
The bedchamber was empty; the writing nook and the wardrobe-closet likewise. Selina lowered herself onto the lounge, confused and not a little afraid, and jumped like a hare when the door of the boudoir suddenly closed.
Lady Talia stood with her back braced against the door, a high flush in her cheeks, staring at Selina with wild eyes. "You disobeyed me," she said, but her voice was strained with some emotion that only touched anger at the edges.
"There was a message," replied Selina, lowering her eyes. "Urgent, from the Commander. You didn't answer- I thought you might be hurt."
"I wasn't hurt," said Lady Talia, distantly, and she began stripping away her clothing, letting fine silk and muslin crumple on the floor as she crossed to the bed and climbed into it.
"My lady, are you well?" Selina rose from her couch and gathered up the fallen clothing; this was nothing like her fierce beautiful mistress. She half expected Talia to weep, but Talia simply lay on her back atop the duvet, arms spread out, face terribly empty.
The shift in Selina's arms was wet, sticky with some milky-clear fluid. Selina dropped it.
"You've been with Bane," she said, keeping her voice neutral; inside, an unwanted torrent of emotion welled up, anger and nausea and... jealousy? She could not be jealous; she was no mere lady's maid, smitten with her mistress, reading too much into the acts of relief that Talia requested. She was good with her mind as well as her fingers; she was a rational creature, not given to love.
"Bane," said Talia, with a hollow chuckle. "Don't be ridiculous. I could no more... he loves me, Selina. I am a wicked, wicked woman, but even I have my limits."
"Then who," said Selina. Her hands itched with the knowledge of a stranger's semen, and she clenched her fists.
"Selina, my gods, I would tell you. I should tell you," said Talia, and she struggled upright, the numbness in her voice dissolving into bitter regret. "Please, please understand me: I can say nothing without putting you in danger, and I- I will not sacrifice you, Selina, for something so foolish and wretched as this. You know I must have a child. Does it matter so much whose child it is?"
Selina shook her head, not trusting her voice. I would keep this secret, of all your secrets, she wanted to say. I report to Auld Fox to keep you safe, to preserve your rule, to guard your body- as I have since we were maidens playing at kisses in the garden, since we thought of kingdoms and thrones as games for men, since you rode on your great brute knight's shoulders like a prince on his steed, laughing in the sun while I learned in the shadows. And now you speak of sacrifice?
She knew that once, when Ra's al-Ghul was a young man in hiding rather than a dread sorcerer, Talia had been a child born in prison, protected and rescued by Sir Bane. There were rumors of rape and torture, whispers of Bane's inhumanly disfigured face; but Selina knew by bittersweet experience that Talia did not make love like a woman accustomed to violation, and she suspected that Bane had borne more torment in Talia's defense than he would ever tell.
And if Talia at least held Bane's love sacred enough that she would not defile it completely, it was small comfort, now that Selina understood: during all these years of loyal servitude, her lady had seen her as an asset, a loose end with too many secrets. Only now had she counted the cost; only now, with a man's seed in her belly and a kingdom at her feet, had she understood what loose ends meant, and called it sacrifice.