By Any Other Name Ch. 01

This story features nc hypno, ace (no sex) femsub/femdom, and, perhaps, an overabundance of roses. As if there is any such thing. :P

Disclaimer: Real-world consensual nonconsent play requires deep trust and a lot of care, but we skip over that for the sake of the story. The fantasy of hypnotic nonconsent we play with in this story is just that: A fantasy.

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Volunteers were probably Lilra's favorite little discovery to make while gardening.

That said, she wasn't quite sure what to make of these.

They were something like roses, the botanist decided, biting her lip as she delicately felt the stem. Thornless, it seemed, or at least the thorns weren't strong enough to do more than tickle anything tougher than a caterpillar. Carefully, knowing the perils of unknown plants, she took a sniff. Very fragrant, and they certainlysmelled like roses—exceptionally sweet ones, at that—but their complex inflorescence reminded her more of something like marigolds, bachelor's buttons or dandelions.

Lilra felt a little self-conscious as she looked around, making sure there was nobody nearby before she dropped to her knees in the mud. She wasn't sure why she always checked. Nobody ever came up to her little cottage—a sick villager, sometimes, but usually the village folk just took their problems to the alewife up the road, who didn't live quite so perilously close to the Evergreen Forest's borders.

Herbalists, brewers and Rangers were in high demand from just about all corners—the villagers always needed their help and the creatures of the forest tended to view them as 'fun challenges'. Nobody really bothered a botanist—not a lot to gain, practically speaking.

This hadn't stopped the random fey from paying her a visit over the years—dryads, satyrs, fauns, even a few nymphs at one point. The fey were gorgeous, salacious creatures, if you were in to that sort of thing. Lilra wasn't, really. Fey were always charming company, and they found her quite easy to fluster most of the time... but when the 'hypnotic breasts' and 'mindmelting pleasure' and that sort of silliness came out of the bag, they always quickly found her a fairly unimpressed receptacle.

She was just too strong-willed for them, frankly, though she didn't like to boast about that. A couple particular Toxin Rangers were still a little prickly about how easily she'd resisted the same nymphs that had turned them into mewling boytoys in minutes.

Overall, she had come to prefer the privacy. This way, there was less chance of someone making fun of her for silly things like dropping to her hands and knees and getting her clothes muddy just to look at some interesting new flowers.

But these were interesting. She wrinkled her cute freckled duchess nose as she gave another cautious sniff, and was rewarded with a little waft of dizziness.

Mild witched pollen, she mentally noted, and allowed one last small sniff. Another wave of dizziness hit her, and she actually felt a little bit dazed for a moment. Make that moderate-to-powerful.

Her cheeks flushed as she pinched her nose between her thumb and forefinger. Careful. The sweet, distinctly rosy scent was deceptively addictive; too many breaths of that pollen, and she'd be flying on clouds the same color as these flowers.

That color. The colors, actually. The petals cycled through brilliant mixes of red and pink, forming a gradient so delicate it might as well have been a painted sunset.

She paused and looked around. She was still alone. Only jays, juncos and the odd robin could be seen hopping about, pecking at the numerous colorful bird feeders she'd added to the trees around her cottage over the years.

Keeping her breaths shallow, she turned back and leaned forward to give the stem a curious little lick. A mild bitterness greeted her tongue, and she relaxed her shoulders, realizing how tense she'd gotten.

Mundane hypnotic plants tended to only produce hypnotic pollen, or mind-melting sap, or dazzling petals, or animated tickling roots, and so on. Magicked hypnotic plants engineered by nymphs or mages tended to produce all of the above and then some. The sap tasted mundane.

She hadn't been too worried, of course. She leaned away from this formerly empty flowerbed, rising up to her knees and surveying the scene. She had hoped to plant some honeysuckle in there, to help out the hummingbirds. She had intended to pull the volunteer plant out a few weeks ago, when it was just a shoot. But now that it was blooming, and it was some sort of flower she didn't recognize... a hypnotic flower, at that...

She bit her lip. Lilra couldn't quite tell if it would be more responsible to keep the potential discovery or to... well, remove a potential temptation.

Not that she was tempted. Lilra had plenty of hypnotic plants in this little garden, she told herself, frowning slightly. She'd never once sampled any of them. She'd never succumbed to the... to the temptation that did not exist, she told herself, feeling her cheeks heating up a little bit.

"You know, I'll bet your cheeks can match them if you really put your mind to it, darling."

Lilra jerked fully upright so suddenly she almost fell right on her back. She whirled around, struggling to her feet, heart kicking into a racing beat. "Wh—where did—"

Leaning against her old patina-green fence gate was a strikingly lovely young woman who did not, Lilra was instantly positive, hail from the little village. In fact, Lilra was momentarily speechless with the realization of how certain she was. She was... she was far too pretty, for one thing. Far too pretty. Lilra had done her share of blushing and stuttering when addressed by pretty village girls, but if the village girls had been as gorgeous as this woman, with her unusually pale burnt sienna skin, brilliant crimson locks bouncing down her cute heart-shaped face, rosy valentine dimples, big bright green eyes, thick lashes and breathtaking smile, Lilra was pretty sure she would have burst into flames years ago.

For another thing, she was simply... far, far too classy.

Lilra had never seen a woman of great wealth or status out here, so far into the wild lands near the Evergreen Forest. She'd heard stories of the fanciful ladies and lords and nobles of Nyaska, of the Honeycomb Courts, of Silverspring, but she'd never heard of anyone like that having any reason in the world to come here. It boggled her mind to even imagine a prissy noblewoman or spoiled princess setting foot in the mud and dust of a village like this one, much less coming anywhere near a grubby cottage like this one, with its muddy, crumbling stepping stone path or its dull, uninteresting owner...

Lilra cut back the thought, biting her lip. Anyways, she had never seen a woman of much standing, and now she was certain she had. What else could explain the way this woman positively sparkled in the sunlight, or the way this woman's lips were such a beautiful, striking shade of rose red, as if she had dozens of handmaidens to see to her every need? Her pretty heart-shaped face was framed by a delicate-looking paper parasol behind her head, the kind of dainty thing that would break if you breathed on it but was worth more than your final breath, decorated with pretty little red briar rose designs.

The botanist had no idea what to think of this woman, who's eyes sparkled with heavy-lidded disdain, as if she was used to seeing common things, perpetually disappointed in a world that had nothing as rich and distinguished as herself. Even the fey who had visited her before couldn't compare to this woman's... poise, the command that her posture and eyes radiated.

Lilra again cut off the thought, and realized she was staring. "H-Hi," she mumbled uncertainly, straightening. She tried not to ogle the woman's clothing, a gorgeous pale sky blue dress that flowed down her lithe body like spilling water and seafoam. It was further decorated with numerous little glittering precious stones, any one of which was surely worth more than every item in Lilra's rustic little cottage. And her immaculately-styled hair, it—

She tried to collect herself. "Um, I'm very sorry... can I help you, Miss...?"

"Gallica will do," the woman said, her voice and accent dripping with sophistication, as if sparing even a single syllable for a commoner like Lilra was a great gift, a mighty act of generosity—though, judging by the slight smile crossing those ruby-red lips, not one she seemed to resent one bit. The botanist felt herself flush.

"Miss Gallica, that is," the woman added. "And a good afternoon to you, blossom." She twirled her parasol behind her with a demure smile. "Who might you be?"

"Um..." Lilra glanced around her. She couldn't shake the sense that surely this woman had to be talking to someone else, that surely this woman wasn't talking to her. But she swallowed and gave a big, confident smile. "My name's Lilra, ma'am," she said, affecting an awkward curtsy—her plain skirt, still muddy from her little exploration, caught under a foot, and she almost stumbled.

Hearing the lady giggling, she blushed and straightened again. "I'm the, um..." Oh, goodness, Miss Gallicia's eyes were certainly very pretty. She was looking at Lilra with a distinctly amused expression, as if Lilra had done something both wrong and amusing. Perhaps the thing I did wrong was being a peasant, Lilra tried to think wryly, but the smirk made her feel even more self-conscious. She found herself avoiding Miss Gallica's eyes. "I'm the botanist," she said lamely after a moment's pause.

"I see!" Miss Gallica put a finger to her lips, distinctly intrigued—or at least doing a good impression of acting like it. Lilra felt a little better. "The village botanist, you say? Not a Toxin Ranger?"

Lilra gave a sheepish smile. "The... the village doesn't see a Ranger visit often, ma'am. The Lodge is sorta... sort of shared, m'lady, by a few Rangers that stop by every—"

"Yes," Miss Gallica said, smiling with the measured patience of one who was accustomed to silly peasant girls like Lilra wasting her time, and didn't mind one bit, but was eager to cut to the chase. "Yes, of course. And you're not a witch? I did think that this village had a witch, but a witch would... well..." She continued that enigmatic smile.

She had such pretty dimpled cheeks, Lilra noticed uneasily, as she kicked her feet. She was so... she spoke with such precision, and despite all her informal years of teaching, Lilra felt distinctly uneducated next to such an individual of taste. "Not a witch, m'lady." She found herself curtsying again, and this made her cheeks flush rosy red. Gods, what was wrong with her? It was an excuse to avoid the lady's pretty eyes, at least. "I'm... I'm afraid I'm just a mundane botanist. I just study the plants, is all. Is all, I... I should think."

A pause. Lilra's cheeks burned. She knew that botany was not generally seen as a particularly worthy pursuit to pursue as a full profession. Plant experts in the village were expected to join the Rangers, or become witches or wizardesses, or... or, well, to learn to brew something that could get people nicely drunk.

"Oh, that's quite alright!" Miss Gallica laughed again, and Lilra felt better. Miss Gallica had a musical laugh, like ringing silver bells, and her rosy red dimpled cheeks rose up to her eyes as she regarded Lilra with obvious delight. "As a matter of fact, that's perfect, my darling. I honestly find those witches and Rangers to be awfully tiresome. No magic, then?"

"No." Lilra kept her answer deliberately short this time, embarrassed at how she kept babbling.

"And no training? No Order's complex codes?"

"... No?" Lilra wasn't sure what the direction of these questions meant. She frowned, though, staring intently at Miss Gallica's left cheek, feeling like she was being interrogated.

Which she was. But she was being interrogated by a gorgeous noblewoman, and for some reason, it was awfully hard to muster any objection to that. "I-I mean," she added, biting her lip, "I do have training. I attended a Songboat School for... for a short while. As many of my peers did."

"Really! A Songboat School!" Miss Gallica beamed. "I didn't know the bards bothered sailing all the way down here. How kind of them! Well, then, I'm positive you must know many useful things, my darling, mustn't you?"

"Y-Yes." The compliment caught Lilra off-guard. People didn't give her compliments too often—or if they did, the people giving the compliments weren't people whose opinions mattered. She very rarely received compliments that... stuck. "I mean... well, I mean, I learned some history, and I learned to fiddle—not, um, not very well, although I think I was quite good a little while ago." She knew she was babbling again, but Miss Gallica just kept smiling at her, blinking those thick-lashed eyes, and she just kept talking. "And, and I really did enjoy it, and they taught me some cooking and quite a lot of fencing lessons that I didn't really have any use for, m'lady, begging your pardon—"

"Indeed! I think it seems quite sturdy as it is!" Miss Gallica giggled, tapping the fence with her knuckles. "A fine fence. You were a good student, I take it!"

"I-I..." Lilra took a pathetically long time to register the pun. "Y-Yes, m'lady." She found herself giggling. "Yes, of... of course, hee! Yes, I must have been!"

"How delightful." Miss Gallica tilted her head, cheek resting against her fingertips, and seemed to look Lilra up and down. The botanist felt very strangely vulnerable beneath that gaze. She swallowed and nodded slightly, feeling almost as if she should curtsy again.

But the eyes held her. She blinked slowly and waited, sensing that Miss Gallica had something to say.

She waited. Her heart was racing. She had a million questions right now. Who was this woman? Why was she... was she flirting with Lilra, or just being friendly to her? Did Lilra have something Miss Gallica needed?

It felt suspicious. Especially, she realized slowly, far, far too slowly, this close to the Evergreen. Her mind quietly raced, trying to guess if this was a fey—surely this was a fey, but she couldn't imagine a fey could be so casually beautiful... why would a fey bother with her little cottage when there were far more important villagers just up the way?

These thoughts swirled uselessly in her head, very uselessly indeed, as she stared into Miss Gallica's shimmering green eyes. They were incredibly pretty eyes, as green as fresh blades of grass in the springtime, eyes that sang of revels and warm kisses and sunny rainstorms and... and things that made Lilra feel simultaneously awfully lightheaded and strangely... heavy.

Heavy. She blinked slowly as Miss Gallica did the same. Heavy lids. Heavy head. She stared into those shimmering, shimmering, glittering pretty green eyes...

Oh, gods, I'm staring, she thought, feeling horribly hot all of a sudden. I'm staring at her. She's going to think I'm que—odd. She's going to think the heat's getting to me. Am I blushing as much as I feel like I'm blushing? Why is she smiling like that? Why can't I look away?

"Um," she managed, her tongue leaden in her mouth, her lips fumbling on her words, "so, um... what... what can I..."

"Do for me?" Miss Gallica supplied sweetly.

Lilra shut her mouth, suppressing a tiny whimper of embarrassment, and nodded.

"What a lovely question, my darling!" Miss Gallica smiled at her, reaching down with a casual, dainty hand and undoing the latches, swinging the fence gate open. "What an excellent, clever question. I was certainly wondering when you would manage to think of it." She swayed forward, positively flowing in her dress as she came to stand before Lilra. She was just a little bit taller than Lilra, but standing next to this sophisticated, positively royal being, Lilra felt very, very small.

"I." Lilra sensed that she had been insulted, and she wanted to retaliate. But Miss Gallica was very, very close. The sooner she tells you what she wants, the sooner she can leave, a stubborn voice told her. "I, um. I..."

Miss Gallica watched her stumble over her words, still smiling that sly, smug smile. Lilra felt herself positively melting with embarrassment. The air was so hot, and so sweet, and her simple clothes looked like rags next to Miss Gallica's gorgeous silken gown, somehow untouched by the mud.Surely she was fey, surely she couldn't be human, surely, surely—

"You want to know why I'm here?" Miss Gallica supplied again, batting her eyelashes.

Lilra felt a little swoony at the woman's tone. Miss Gallica's voice was as sweet as her pretty eyes, as delicate as her fluttering lashes, and yet there was an unmistakable air of... superiority.

Smugness. Confidence. A certainty Lilra had never possessed.

"Y-Yes," Lilra managed, biting her lip. She felt so strangely dizzy right now, and it surely didn't help that Miss Gallica's perfume was so... so... overpowering. So sweet. It made her head spin when she breathed in, and she couldn't help but breathe in, even though she was trying so very hard not to breathe through her mouth—she was just so panicked, so flustered, rendered so very breathless by Miss Gallica's whole manner—

"As it happens," Miss Gallica said smoothly, flashing Lilra a little smirk, "I happen to be looking for an addition for my garden. I haven't had occasion to add to it in... oh, a few years now, I should think." She smiled down at the positively quaking Lilra. "Your little garden is quite charming, and I thought... perhaps you might be able to help me settle my problem."

"O-Oh." Lilra stared up at Miss Gallica and took a step back, nodding slightly. "Oh! Yes! Yes, of course!" She could feel a smile spreading across her face, and sheepishly, she brushed a stray golden lock from her eyes. "Of course, of course!" she babbled, gratefully turning away to survey her garden, intensely, pathetically grateful at the opportunity to stop letting Miss Gallica stare her down. "I—did you have anything in mind?"

Of course Miss Gallica wasn't here for her. Of course Miss Gallica was here to purchase a flower. That was the only real reason anyone other than Rangers came up here, anyways. Aside from the odd visit by a nymph or two, who, actually, were generally also interested in blossoms, come to think of it.

Of course that was what Miss Gallica was here for. Lilra felt intensely relieved that it wasn't... wasn't anything that she needed to be flustered about. Flowers. She knew flowers. She could handle flowers.

All the same, she felt a tiny pinprick of disappointment. She felt embarrassed that she'd even thought... but Miss Gallica had seemed so forward, and... so flirty... but wasn't that how noblewomen always were?

"Hm. Do you?" Lilra felt her certainty start dripping away as Miss Gallica's lovely tone filled her with the pangs of doubt. That voice positively dripped with suggestion.

"I. I..." Why wasn't Lilra's tongue working right? She stared into Miss Gallica's bright, shining green eyes and swallowed her nerves. She couldn't work out what she was supposed to say, but she knew she needed to saysomething. What did Miss Gallica mean? What did that question... imply?

She wasn't used to this. Miss Gallica was too confident, too sure of herself, and Lilra was just too... too caught off-guard. Too slow.

"Aw." Miss Gallica gave another sweet, musical laugh, shaking her head slightly. "Oh, I'm dreadfully sorry, darling, I think I became distracted." She reached forward and, almost making Lilra jump, gave her a friendly pat on the arm. "You were saying, darling?"