Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. The characters within it are completely fictional. The Wheel of Time universe is also completely fictional. Even the universe you and I inhabit may be partially or completely fictional. The pseudoscience portrayed as serious by this fictional work is completely fictional, and classified government research sites that take it seriously are either completely fictional or complete wastes of black budget money.

Names and characterizations of real-world people, places, and things have been altered to fit this story. There is nothing particularly magical about Atlanta and any work that suggests anything to the contrary is inherently fictional.

The fictional Seanchan were complex villains in the fictional Wheel of Time universe, but were nonetheless villains. Their practices regarding human slavery in myriad forms were villainous. The author does not condone villainy in any forms that are relevant here, including human slavery, condominium owners’ associations, drinking whisky before noon, and run-on expository sentences.

If you are still reading, I salute you and welcome you to the dark, twisted, and seldom-shared corners of my mind.

Chapter 1

Barely an hour had passed between the release of the final episode of season one of The Wheel of Time when Isabel Bauer got the FaceTime call from her—well, whatever they were after two years aside, that was actually a complicated topic—but from Adalynn Shields. Isabel couldn’t hold back a laugh, and also couldn’t completely suppress the butterflies in her stomach. The two summers they had spent together had been wild, erotic, and surreal. But they were still friends, and were both Wheel of Time fans, and Isabel had just gotten done watching the season finale herself, too. After a moment’s hesitation, she took the call.

The moment she saw Adalynn’s face appear on the screen, Isabel was about to ask, are you about to head out for a date? The woman’s hair and makeup were done up far too much for crashing on the couch at 8 p.m. Isabel’s were decidedly not. But Isabel never got the chance to ask what the big occasion was. Adalynn jumped right in.

“Oh my God, did you see?!”

Isabel rolled her eyes. “You mean the ridiculously wasteful use of the One Power to make a tidal wave to attack one girl on an otherwise-deserted beach?”

“Yes, that. Also, the damane!”

“Oh, is that what those were? I couldn’t tell. Given, you know, how not-like-the-books they looked.”

“Adapted for the screen, my dear marath’damane. They needed something big and dramatic for the cameras.”

“As if bright silver collars and leashes wouldn’t have been enough for that?” Isabel ignored the flush of heat and tingle of electricity that spread throughout her body at Adalynn casually referring to her as marath’damane, ‘those who must be leashed.’ Isabel had spent many an evening, and even the occasional entire day, in a collar with Adalynn–or Mistress Lanfear, as the Wheel of Time uber-fan preferred to be called when “in character”–holding the leash. Though of course back then they had both just turned eighteen, and Adalynn had been off to MIT in the fall, and the collar and leash in question had been acquired secondhand from a local Buckhead trophy wife on Facebook Marketplace, and had previously been used on said trophy wife’s trophy dog. It had been pink with white rhinestones.

“Why stop there when you can have a massive torc and magic gag?”

Isabel had spent a certain amount of time wearing Mistress Lanfear’s numerous gags that wild summer before school, too, often in resigned silence, sometimes in helpless mewling as Adalynn drove her crazy. The memory was not exactly helping calm the wild and erotic lightning tingling in her flesh, stronger now than it had ever been when Adalynn wasn’t Mistress Lanfear and wasn’t playing with her in person. Strong enough to raise the most tentative and easily-ignored of red flags in the back of her mind, a reminder of why Isabel had used her safeword for the final time at the end of the one summer that Adalynn had come home for, after her freshman year.

“Of course what you’re really thinking is why stop at a massive torc and a magic gag, isn’t it, Mistress?” Dammit, did I really just slip back into calling her that on a FaceTime call from a thousand miles away? Though, in fairness, the subject matter had a certain effect on her state of mind.

A knowing but sharp smile spread across Adalynn’s face. “Two years and you still know me as well as ever, Isari.”

Isabel blew a long, nostalgic breath at the pet name Mistress Lanfear had given her when she wore the woman’s collar. It might have been a heavy sigh. “We went through a lot together, you know.” It was clear now she was referring to more than just D/s cosplay.

Adalynn’s smile softened, though lost none of its brightness. “I’m well aware, Isari.” Then her soft smile re-sharpened into a smirk. “Looking forward to going through even more together.”

Isabel’s breath caught. “You know we can’t. I can’t,” she said reluctantly.

“You still get the headaches?”

“Yeah. And … you know … the other things.”

“The spasms?”

“Sometimes, but also … you know.”

“I do. And yet you took my call. So the part of you that’s scared of it isn’t the only part of you with a hand on the steering wheel.”

Isabel shrugged, mostly to fight back a tear. “Maybe. It doesn’t matter.”

“There are two schools of thought on that, Isari. Pull the phone back. Pan down your body. Slowly. Show me what you’re wearing.”

Isari’s breath caught. “The fact that I’m a submissive geek doesn’t mean I can be your submissive geek.” she breathed. It would have sounded like a lie even if she had just been talking to the mirror.

“Mistress Lanfear wasn’t asking, Isari. Do it.”

Isabel gulped and took a breath to steady herself, but her hand was already moving, slowly, hesitantly panning her phone’s camera down her body. No one who wasn’t a Wheel of Time geek themselves would know the significance of the fossil-grey maxi dress that Isabel was wearing. It was not an obvious cosplay; Isabel had gotten it from the clearance rack at Belk. But Adalynn and Isabel were Wheel of Time geeks, and Adalynn had a sharp, knowing look in her eyes when Isabel finished and turned the phone screen back so that she could see it.

“Very good, Isari. That’s what I like to see. In fact, that’s what I like to see on what I like to see.”

“Addie, I …”

Adalynn’s eyes sharpened further, and a cold spark flickered there. “What was that, Isari?”

“Mistress,” Isabel continued without missing a further beat, despite the feeling like the fire in her veins had just done an awkward dance, “I wish things could have been different. But, thanks. I’m glad I can still at least geek out with you at a distance.”

“You’re very welcome, Isari. And as a reward for being such a good damane today, I’ll let you see how I just enjoyed the season finale. Oh, and Isari? Don’t look away.”

With that, Adalynn held her own phone back and began to pan slowly down her body. It was apparent in seconds what the woman was wearing, but she drew out the moment nonetheless. The bodice of her dress was soft leather and almost a corset in bold red marked with golden lightning bolts. It had a deep neckline, form-fitting across her breasts and lifting them just the right amount. The leather across the top of her breasts was thicker and flowed up and out to two short wings that stood up from her shoulders. The full sleeves were royal blue, as was the flowing hem of the dress below the waist, with red panels on the sides matching the bodice. And on her wrist, where she let the camera linger longest just to make extra sure that Isabel saw, she wore a silver bracelet attached to a long, thin, coiled silver leash, and thick, elegant silver collar that gleamed so brightly that it practically glowed in the dim light of Adalynn’s surroundings. Isabel was awestruck, and not just at the stunning curves of her erstwhile lover and the way the dress hugged them. That was no close-enough red-and-blue dress from the local thrift store that people sewed a couple of lightning bolts on. It was unmistakably custom-made by someone who knew what they were doing. Even without the a’dam, that was the sort of cosplay that people spent more than a thousand dollars on, and an entire week in the workshop if they were costumers themselves.

And the a’dam itself–that was no repurposed dog collar with a bit of painted rope. It wasn’t even something you’d discover just by browsing the catalogs of some of the higher-end BDSM shops on the Internet, even those who had the means to use genuine silver plating for their more statement pieces. Isabel had spent an aroused evening or two doing just that sort of browsing. The collar and leash hanging suggestively on Adalynn’s hip were more than that, though. The set was clearly a custom-made masterwork. If the show itself had intended to stay more in line with the books, it was something that the costume and set designers of the show would have paid top dollar for.

Isabel gulped, and the tingle in her flesh, especially between her legs and in her now-erect nipples, surged in intensity.

“Like what you see?” Adalynn asked, still panning the phone down her body and showing off her cosplay. She had reached her feet now, revealing that she had taken one small liberty with the books. Sumptuous black leather boots with five-inch heels and a familiar red sole graced her feet, and all of her statuesque legs that Isabel could see, so they at least went up past her ankles. The Wheel of Time books never focused too much on the sort of footwear worn by the sul’dam, the Holders of the Leash. They most likely wore durable, practical footwear because they were often sent into combat by the Seanchan empire they served, but in Adalynn’s headcanon, they apparently wore Christian Louboutin.

“Kinda, yeah.”

“Kinda, yeah what?”

Isabel felt like she was gonna roll her eyes, but they wouldn’t even move, even though the gesture was more than deserved. “Kinda yeah, Mistress.”

“Is it what you like to see on what you like to see?”

Isabel gulped harder. “You know me too well, Mistress.”

“Oh no, marath’damane. I know you just well enough.” Adalynn had by now slowly panned back up her body to her waist, where the a’dam hung coiled from the slender belt that tightly gathered Adalynn’s sul’dam dress against her hips. She had shifted into a pin-up centerfold pose now, too, one leg forward and bent, with her hip held high and prominent, accentuating both hip and the silver leash and collar hanging there. “You want to feel this on you, don’t you? And not just to see how it looks as a cosplayer. You want to feel it, and you want me holding your leash as you kneel beside me, don’t you?”

Isabel was beginning to lose control of her breath, and the red flags that the tentative red flags she had ignored earlier were waving a big more urgently in the back of her mind now. But she still simply couldn’t look away, couldn’t break the connection—and not just the phone connection, either. “Mistress … you need to …”

Adalynn quickly panned back to her face. Isabel realized that Adalynn probably did not have a date tonight. She had brushed out her midnight hair until it practically glowed dark, and done her makeup, just for this FaceTime call. “I’ll decide what I need to do, Isari. And what you need to do. And what you need to do is clear as day on those adorable cheeks of yours, and the way your tits are moving even under that rag. And your hips, too. My God, Isari, you are squirming, aren’t you?”

Isabel said nothing and just continued to squirm and try to get her breathing under control. The fire danced in her blood and the lightning in her flesh.

“I asked you a question, Isari.”

“S … sorry, Mistress, I know …”

“And?” Adalynn, clearly now slipping back into her role as Mistress Lanfear, panned back down and tapped her fingers suggestively on the collar resting on her hip.

More breathing, more squirming, more lightning and fire, strong enough now that it practically sounded in her ears like a roar so deep it was just on the deepest edge of the range of human hearing.

“Lift your dress, marath’damane.”

The dress was long but not tight, and it was not hard for Isabel to slide it up around her waist.

“Pan down. Let me see. Good. I remember those panties. I got you them. Now get rid of them.”

Isabel knew by now where this was going, and still couldn’t muster the strength to say no. She wondered briefly of her safeword, but the part of her that wanted this, wanted the release, wanted to relive the memory even though she knew how it ended, was starting to reawaken and reassert control. Or, more accurately, respond to Mistress Lanfear’s control the way it at all times had. Consequences were only the concern of those with control, and it was so much easier to give it up.

She slid the red lace panties that Adalynn had given her off her hips. Had she known the night was gonna go this way when she dressed for the evening, before the season finale started? It no longer mattered. It never had.

“Still keeping yourself clean down there. Good girl, Isari.”

Isabel’s mouth was dry.

“I said, good girl, Isari.” Mistress Lanfear was clearly prompting her to respond. After another pregnant pause, she continued. “Someone’s Southern manners are slipping. Get off the couch, Isari. Put the phone on top of the TV and start screen mirroring.”

Isabel did so, still wordlessly, her mind still too focused on the chaos inside her to form words. Still, the moment she had actually switched the call to the TV, she blinked at the increased effect of seeing Mistress Lanfear’s powerful face now on a 50-inch screen instead of a phone screen, and hearing her voice in Dolby Atmos.

“Very good. Now, I know you still have some of the little keepsakes I left you two years ago. It’s a special occasion. Bring them out.”

Isabel turned, and with her mistress’ face no longer dominating her view, made one last feeble protest, a last-ditch defense of the red flags that were by now war banners flapping in the storm within her. “Mistress … Addie … those memories … you know how it all …”

The storm was stronger, not to mention speaking with both passion and Dolby Atmos. “Those were the two best summers of my life, Isari. I will have you collared again, marath’damane. You will be mine, and we will be spectacular. What you’re feeling now is only the faintest taste of that.”

“Oh, God, Mistress …” The roar at the edge of hearing deepened, and a single tear for the battle lost, and for the inevitable, leaked from her left eye. She reached under the couch and slid out a small, nondescript storage box of rigid beige fabric. It had a zipper with a lock on it, but Isabel had left the key right next to it the last time she had dared to open it, more than a year ago. Isabel unlocked it.

“Mmm-hmm, and glad to see that you had it so close at hand, too,” Mistress Lanfear’s resonant voice said knowingly. From where Isabel’s phone was perched on top of the TV, Mistress Lanfear couldn’t quite see the contents of the box as Isabel opened it, but she had no need to. She knew everything in there, and had lain awake more nights at MIT than she could count lost in the memories of how they looked on Isabel. “Now, one thing in particular that it looks like the show wised up to was that the sul’dam would definitely want to have a gag on hand to keep a misbehaving damane in line. Or maybe even just to remind them who was in charge. No sense in relying only on the a’dam. Pick it up, Isari. The one with the chinstrap.”

Adalynn had left two ball gags with Isabel when Isabel had broken things off at the end of two summers prior. The first was a dirt-cheap one with an orange foam rubber ball and cord-like strap that Adalynn had bought at a Lion’s Den not long after Isabel had turned eighteen. (Adalynn had turned eighteen a couple of months earlier than that, but neither of them had any money to their name at that point.) The second one was somewhat higher-quality, bought during the summer between their freshman and sophomore years of school. The short straps from either side of the ball attached to small chrome rings. From there, straps with simple roller buckles led both back and down.

“That’s it, Isari. Now put it on. And buckle it as tightly as I would.”

Isabel brought the ball to her mouth and guided it past her teeth, where it settled with a faint pop. The ball was only an inch and three quarters wide, but that was still enough to fill Isabel’s mouth snugly and firmly. Isabel was of average size for the women in her dance club at Emory, but that was not exactly a group of giants. She still could barely believe that this was happening, but since it apparently was indeed happening, there was no room for her to half-ass buckling it just as tightly as Mistress Lanfear commanded. She carefully threaded the strap behind her head, avoiding getting any of her full blond mane caught in the buckle as she buckled it, feeling the straps and the two chrome rings on the sides pull tightly against her cheeks and the ball anchor firmly in her mouth.

“Oh Gaahhhd,“ she mouthed around the ball, savoring the helplessness of her voice already being taken from her even before she buckled the chinstrap, forcing the ball even more firmly down against her tongue.

“Good,” Mistress Lanfear continued, seeing that Isabel had done the job satisfactorily. “Much better. If you’re not going to answer properly when you’re supposed to, this at least gives you a fig leaf of a reason. Though to be clear, I still expect you to do so. I’ll just enjoy the sound more now. And so will you. Won’t you, marath’damane?”

“Hyehf, Mifhwehf.”

“Oooh, I’ve missed that sound so much.” Mistress Lanfear’s voice might not have changed as dramatically as the woman wearing the gag’s had, but it had changed enough from one sentence to the next that Isabel took a closer look at the woman’s face, now screen-mirrored in 4K in her living room. The combination of Mistress Lanfear’s greater emotional control and the greater amount of make-up she had put on for the evening made it slightly harder to tell, but it looked like the other woman’s face was beginning to show a flush, too.

The woman stayed poised enough, though. “Now, on your mat there, kneel and face me.” Mistress Lanfear nodded to the purple yoga mat that Isabel never bothered to roll up and put away, since she tried to do at least 45 minutes every day.

Isabel knelt, naturally assuming the position so familiar from those past summers. Hands resting upright on knees shoulder width aside. Eyes down. Long, loose, blond ponytail draped over her left shoulder. The meditative pose sometimes had a steadying effect on her mind, but with the ball gag she had worn for those wild summers once again wedged in her mouth, and the woman she had at all times worn it for dominating the big screen in her flat–and her–after so long, the calming effect was as muted at she was. And it was clear enough that Mistress Lanfear had no intention of just watching her kneel, much as the woman had enjoyed countless hours of that when they had months together.

“Let’s do this properly this time. Lift your dress, marath’damane.”

Isabel took long, almost heaving breaths, but she slid the fossil-grey dress up her thighs.

“Keep holding that dress up with your left hand. Draw your right finger along your slit. Start at the bottom, work your way up to your clit, slowly. Do it the way I did. Do it the way you wish I was there doing it right now.”