Exploring the complex power relationships in the female slave narratives "The Bondswoman's Narrative" and "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl." For the mistress the female slave was both a companion and a competitor; both dependable and a nuisance. The Bondswoman’s Narrative by Hannah Crafts explores this relationship, and its inherent, subtle deviance. It is queer in the mutual dependence and isolation felt by the women, and sado-masochistic in the enjoyment a mistress has in the abuse of a young slave girl, and the comfort a slave may gain in being the favorite of an abusive mistress. It would be easy to associate the sado-masochism in the narratives with the Gothic conventions of whippings and sexual violence, but rather it manifests in the perverse dependence the women have for each other, the deceptive power relationships, and in the way the slave condition normalizes violence in the domestic sphere.