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Bernulf seized Bernegilde by the wrist, and she let herself be led. He liked to feel in control even in private, and they were not in private. It had been made very clear to her that when they were in public, as they were now, he had a reputation to keep. In private, he liked a little bit of defiance, enough to feel that he had earned her obedience. In public, that obedience had to be absolute and unquestioning. So it was. She had let him manhandle her, and speak down to her and over her head, and do whatever else he pleased. She had a reputation too, and she took a strange, obscure sort of pride in it. People said their names together. Like a matched set, as Bernulf had said when he gave her the name Bernegilde. Those were not the names they used here, of course, but even so. She was the product of his ministrations. So, in public, she affected an air of unbothered obedience, obeying commands without a hint of hesitation, but with a personality of her own. She was not quite an extension of him. Matched, and his tool to use, but she did have her own will. It pleased her to follow him, so she did. She was his charming, yet deadly, protégé.
In private she stripped down to her shift, and let him look long at her. She had, he had told her, a kind of cold beauty. She liked that. Liked that what Bernulf saw in her to desire was not the illusion of softness but the hardness and stubbornness that lay underneath. He knew very well what she was capable of, and that was why he kept her around. He touched her less, in private, for there was no need for him to make a show of his control.
When it was just them, all pretences could be abandoned. They stepped out of the other parts they played, and stood before each other simply as Bernulf and Bernegilde again. They were two people constructed from fragments and shards, for whom the true self was a distant, unreal thing. But Bernulf and Bernegilde were at least comfortable roles to play. It was a little like coming home, to become Bernegilde again. She was after all her longest held role.
Bernegilde could, and did, speak back. Not exactly without consequence, but she would be listened to. Within reason, Bernulf would consider what she had to say. She knew the limits well, and she followed them faithfully. She acted, always, to make him proud.