The lands your family saw over were minor, barely above the needed area to gain a landed title in your kingdom.
So it is no surprise that the list of servants and attendants available to your family is short, longer than a title only noble family, but not as long as some of the noble families with bigger land holds or towns under their sway. You have only really become aware of how short the list is when your last ladies maid retired, she'd come to fall pregnant and your family had let her retire, to go raise her family safely.
Now comes the trial and testing stages of finding a new ladies maid.
There were plenty that came and tried, but eventually you settled on one of the few that hadn't come from another noble family's recommendation. They were tall, almost deathly pale, with such strikingly beautiful features that would be the envy of any court lady, yet they took to the overly dark halls of your home like no other, the heavy curtains and candle lit halls almost seemed natural to them, towards the end of their trial they disclose their nature as a vampire spawn, a creature unable to make other vampires and somehow this only made the choice easier.
The family estate is kept far darker than most due to your mother's sunlight sensitivity, as such finding servants that are willing to dwell in the dark with your family tends to be difficult.
However, since your new maid had started you have grown curious, the previous maid you had didn't shy from speaking about topics usually chatted about when bathing or applying the oils to your skin, but this one simply hummed and tended to you like they didn't know how to contribute to the small talk you were trying to encourage.
Some days you tittered at them about how often they go to the stables at night, cooing in jest about being into the stable workers, being surprised when they bluntly say no, it's just for feeding. It's hard to understand if this bluntness is simply nerves or if there is something truly odd about your new maid.
Your curiosity is unintentionally quelled one evening, it had been a complete accident, the chair for your dresser had been moved and you tumbled into it, grabbing onto your maid as you did. Falling into a heap and ending up sprawled across their lap, you're surprised by what you can see under their upturned skirt. The usual stockings greet you, but looking further up your staring at smalls that you had only seen on the laundry lines, ones that you remember being told are for the male servants of your home, something about them being made for 'additional space'.
The maid your family had hired to tend to you, to bathe, oil, and dress you was a man, a beautiful androgynous man.
Time seems to drag on as you awkwardly stare at your maid, while trying to think of what you can say to somehow ease this moment. Helping smooth their skirt before standing and offering them a hand, you only respond to this particular discovery by informing them that good help is hard to come by, and that some differences between the usual ladies maid and themselves shouldn't mean anything at all.
After all, it was already strange having a vampire spawn as a servant, so what's a little more oddity in your home but character building.
It's while you have your head turned mid ramble about how this changes nothing, and you're perfectly fine having them as your ladies maid so long as they're happy to continue working for you, that you miss how red eyes soften and apprehension is replaced with budding affection.
