Beatrice eagerly jumped off the train as soon as it arrived at the stables, with Rowan, to be met by a concerned Roxy.

“And what are you doing here…?”, she asked.

“I came to help!”, squeaked Beatrice. “Anything for my new girlfriend!”, she said, with a meaningful look at Rowan.

“Not so fast!”, said Roxy. “If you enter these stables, you’re either a member of the resident family, staff or a prospective pony. You are none of these…”

“You’re not turning her into a pony!”, said Rowan, an edge to her voice.

“At the same time, she’s not related to the mistress”, said Roxy. “That only leaves staff…”

“Does that mean I get a uniform like yours?”, squeaked Beatrice. “Oh, yes please…!”

“It’s not as simple as that”, said Roxy. “If you wear one of these uniforms, apart from Rowan who has special permission, you will be confined to the house and grounds for the rest of your life. Do you really want that?”

Beatrice thought for a moment.

“Which option lets me stay with Rowan”, she said…

Shortly, Beatrice came out of the changing rooms in her new riding uniform. Rowan was unable to control herself. They both disappeared straight back in again…

The sounds of loud lovemaking echoed around the stable. Roxy chuckled.

“Guess that answers that question”, she said…

After a certain amount of disruption, Beatrice settled down and learned the ropes of her new job. The ponies liked her; she was just as caring and supportive as Janet, worried about their welfare.

Then she came across one pony who was just lying in the corner of her stable, a rope burn around her neck…

The young woman had been converted completely against her will; Janet’s aunt had done it as one of her last jobs as a favour for a friend; the woman was her stepdaughter, and she had been a precocious brat in ‘real life’.

That wasn’t true of her now…

She just lay in a heap in the corner, sobbing quietly. Beatrice crouched by her and started gently stroking her cheek.

The woman was shocked. No-one in this hell had been remotely friendly to her before! Like the nuns, her arms had been removed; she had awoken to almost unbearable pain in her shoulders, which had gradually subsided. She had screamed hysterically when she first found out her arms were gone, even whilst bit gagged; everything had just dissolved into a numb ache, now. At one stage she’d managed to loop her reins over a doorframe, wrapped them round her neck and tried to hang herself. She’d been caught frantically holding her feet off of the floor, despite the weight of the boots, pulling down on the reins.

Roxy had been more concerned about the possible damage to her harness…

“Don’t bother with that one”, Roxy’s voice came from the doorway. “She’s given up. I’m probably going to have to have her put down.”

“Don’t you dare!”, cried Beatrice. “I’ll have her.”

Beatrice had a loving heart, albeit in a twisted way. It was why Rowan was getting on so well with her. At the same time, the young ponygirl understood she was caring for her…

The ponygirl struggled to her feet, then presented herself to Beatrice. Roxy’s mouth dropped open in shock…

Beatrice soon had the ponygirl trotting and cantering like the rest of them; indeed, she was one of the better ones. Beatrice was at the stables every day from then on, training her, and in bed with Rowan every evening. She loved both of them. Rowan was a little jealous, but she understood that Beatrice was a caring person, so she knew her time with the ponygirl was caring for a pet, not a person.

The ponygirl had also now come to the terms with the fact that her life as a normal human being was over. Surprisingly, she didn’t care; she’d always been bullied at home and at work, due to her diminutive size as well as her being, putting it bluntly, a bit dense. This didn’t matter at all at the stables…

One evening, Beatrice and Rowan returned to the house, arm in arm, to find Janet waiting for them.

“I’ve been getting good reports from Roxy about you, Beatrice”, she said. “She’s promoting you to her executive assistant. However, you can still spend as much time with Fenella (the young ponygirl) as you want, she’s a good example to the others.”

The stables had been running extremely smoothly since Beatrice arrived. There had been a few questions around town about her disappearance; Rowan herself had been asked a few times whether she’d seen her when she went to the library to change Janet and Tanya’s books over. She said this to Janet.

“Beatrice, do you want to go back to your old life?”, Janet asked.

Beatrice went white as a sheet.

“No, of course not, Mistress!”, she cried. “Have I done something wrong?”

“No, but people are asking questions about you. I suggest that you write that letter we were talking about; resignation due to a long illness, and needing to take time away…?”

“I’ll get straight on it, Mistress. I can let Rowan what postbox to put it in, so it looks like I posted it from home…”

“Good, good. How are you two getting on?”

“Very well, Mistress!”, the pair said together.

“Ok, then, show me”, Janet said. She left the room, then came back wearing a riding uniform…

Both Rowan and Beatrice gasped.

“I can wear what I like, when I like”, said Janet. “I can even leave here, now that damn collar is off…”, she said that with a meaningful look at Rowan, who shuddered.

“Anyway, come on, it’s bedtime…”, she said, ushering them both into her bedroom…