Chapter 6: The Jeweled Trap
The click-clack of dice on scarred wood was the only sound in the sudden silence of the common room.
Emily’s d20 had come to rest against the leg of a toppled soda can. A single pip glared up from the white face. A natural one. Critical failure.
Across the table, Sarah’s grin was a blade in the lamplight. Her cleric, Lyra, a figure of serene grace in flowing silvery robes, had just proposed the wager to Emily’s rogue, Silfrína: a simple game of chance, three throws. Not for gold. For “acts of divine service.” Emily, flushed and buoyed by the secret knowledge of what her body had done with Cody that afternoon, had accepted. It felt like play-acting, an extension of the thrill still humming under her skin.
Now, the play was over.
“Oh, dear,” Sarah said, her voice sweet as poisoned honey. She leaned forward, her eyes locked on Emily’s. “A binding failure. The terms are forfeit.”
Mark, from his DM’s throne at the head of the table, steepled his fingers. A faint, knowing smile touched his lips. “The magic of the wager takes hold. Silfrína feels a… compulsion. To serve.”
“What does that mean?” Emily asked, her voice smaller than she intended. Her heart was doing a strange, double-time beat against her ribs.
“It means,” Sarah said, standing up, the chair legs scraping the linoleum, “time to pay up.” She walked around the table with a slow, deliberate pace. The other players—Jake the fighter, Leo the wizard—watched, curious, vaguely amused. This was just Sarah being Sarah.
Sarah stopped beside Emily’s chair. She didn’t look at the others. Her focus was absolute. She reached down, her fingers encircling Emily’s wrist. Her grip was firm, warm, undeniable. “Come on, Silfrína,” she murmured, using the character’s name like a secret between them.
Emily’s mouth went dry. She allowed herself to be pulled to her feet. Sarah’s other hand came up, plucking the character sheet from the table. “We’ll be right back,” she announced to the room, her tone breezy, normal. “Just gotta… adjudicate the divine service. It’s a clerical thing.”
Mark gave a slow, single nod. “Don’t be long. The Lich King’s crypt awaits.”
Sarah pulled Emily toward the door, into the dimly lit hallway. The sound of the common room—the rustle of chip bags, the low murmur of the guys resuming their strategy talk—faded behind them. The hallway was institutional, silent but for the hum of fluorescent lights overhead. It smelled of old carpet and bleach.
“Sarah, what are you doing?” Emily whispered, a nervous laugh bubbling in her throat. Her wrist was still captured.
“Collecting my winnings,” Sarah said, not slowing. She pushed open the door to the single-stall gender-neutral bathroom. It was stark, clean, lit by a single harsh bulb. She tugged Emily inside, kicked the door shut with her heel, and flipped the lock. The click was deafening in the small space.
Suddenly, they were alone. The vibe from the game table vanished, replaced by something more intimate, more charged. Sarah leaned back against the sink, crossing her arms. She hadn’t let go of Emily’s wrist.
“So,” Sarah said, her eyes scanning Emily’s face. “A critical failure. That’s pretty binding.”
“It’s just a game,” Emily managed, but the protest sounded weak, even to her.
“Is it?” Sarah’s eyebrow arched. “You were pretty into it. I saw your face when you rolled. That wasn’t just disappointment. It was…” She tilted her head. “Excitement.”
Emily felt exposed, as if Sarah had glimpsed the memory of her on her knees for Cody just hours before. She looked at the floor, at the white subway tiles. “What do you want me to do?”
Sarah was quiet for a moment. Then she let go of Emily’s wrist. “Tell me what happened. After you left my room yesterday. After you read that manga.”
The question was a grenade. Emily’s head snapped up. “What?”
“You devoured it, didn’t you? You missed class. I checked.” Sarah’s voice was gentle, but relentless. “And then Cody came over. I saw him heading to your dorm.”
“We just… hung out.”
“Emily.” Sarah pushed off from the sink and took a single step closer, invading the small square of tile between them. The air felt thin. “Your collar’s messed up. And you’ve got a faint mark right here.” She reached out, her fingertip barely brushing a spot on Emily’s neck, just below the ear. A spot Emily hadn’t even known was tender. A ghost of a hickey, a souvenir from Cody’s mouth.
Emily flinched as if burned. Her secret, her thrilling, filthy afternoon, was laid bare under the bathroom’s unforgiving light.
“Did you show him?” Sarah pressed, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur. “The manga?”
A wave of heat crashed over Emily. Shame, yes, but underneath it, a defiant, pulsing pride. She met Sarah’s gaze. Her chin lifted a fraction. “Yeah. I did.”
Sarah’s eyes widened, a spark of pure, unadulterated delight flashing in them. “And?”
“And…” Emily’s breath hitched. The words came out in a rush, unbidden. “He… he made me tell him about it. The library one. Where the guy just talks. And then he… he did things.”
“What things?”
“He made me say what I wanted. He made me… show him.” The confession was a floodgate opening. “He was different. Not mean, just… in charge. And I liked it.” The final admission hung between them, shocking and true.
Sarah exhaled, a long, slow breath. “Mmm,” she murmured, appreciatively. “I knew it. I knew you had a subby little heart in there.” She didn’t say it as an insult. She said it like a discovery.
The word subby landed in Emily’s gut, igniting something. It was crude, reductive, and yet it felt terrifyingly accurate. A label for the nameless want that had been growing inside her.
“So,” Sarah continued, her tone shifting back to the playful, dangerous one from the game table. “You understand wagers. You understand terms. Silfrína lost. She owes Lyra a service.”
A velvet pouch appeared in her hand.
Emily’s mind blanked, then filled with a cascading series of images: the jeweled plug from Sarah’s own manga, the cold stone of the imagined dungeon, the public humiliation of the Flesh-Market, being held down, being watched.
“I… I can’t,” she breathed.
“You can,” Sarah insisted, her hand coming up to rest lightly on Emily’s shoulder. "In fact, you want to. Desperately."
The pressure was a current, pulling her under. It was the same compulsion she’d felt rolling the dice, the same surrender she’d felt with Cody’s hand in her hair. Her resistance crumbled.
“I thought…,” she began, her voice barely audible. “When you showed me that other one, with the… the plug. I thought about Silfrína. In the game. Getting caught. And instead of fighting, they… they’d use something like that on her. To shame her. Where everyone could… could guess.”
Sarah’s smile was a slow, private dawn. “That,” she whispered, “is a spectacular image.”
Her fingers worked the drawstring of the velvet pouch. The sound was soft, final. She upended it over her own palm. The jeweled plug tumbled out, catching the harsh bathroom light. It was exactly as Emily remembered from the manga: amethyst, gleaming, intimidating in its delicate craftsmanship.
“You’ve been thinking about this a lot,” Sarah observed, not asking.
Emily could only nod, her throat too tight for words. Her mind spiraled, connecting fantasy to this stark, real moment in a fluorescent-lit bathroom. The compulsion from the game felt real, a taut wire pulling her spine straight.
Sarah lifted the plug, holding it between thumb and forefinger. She studied Emily’s face, her own expression unreadable. Then, without breaking eye contact, she brought it to her lips.
Her tongue slid over the smooth, cold stone in a long, deliberate stroke. She turned it, wetting every millimeter. The intimacy of the act was more shocking than anything Emily had read. This wasn’t a drawn fantasy. This was Sarah’s saliva, her intent, making the thing glisten.
“Turn around,” Sarah said, her voice low but casual, as if asking for a pass of salt. “And lean on the sink.”
The command bridged all worlds—the game, the manga, the raw truth of the afternoon with Cody. Emily’s legs moved on stiff, mechanical hinges. The cold porcelain of the sink bit into her palms. She stared at her own wide eyes in the mirror, seeing Sarah move behind her, a shadow wielding a jewel.
She felt the hem of her t-shirt and the waistband of her jeans being tugged down, just enough. The cool air on her exposed skin was a violation. She trembled.
“Easy,” Sarah murmured, her free hand settling on the small of Emily’s back. It was not a gentle touch. It was a pinion, holding her in place. “This is just the service. The first installment.”
The rounded, slick tip of the plug pressed against her. Not where she expected. Lower. A place untouched, clenched tight with panic.
Emily gasped, a short, sharp intake of breath that fogged the mirror.
“Relax,” Sarah coaxed, but there was steel beneath the word. She applied steady, teasing pressure. It was a foreign, impossible fullness, a burning stretch that made Emily’s knuckles whiten on the sink. Sarah worked it slowly, a fraction of an inch, then retreating, again and again, until the resistance began to soften, betrayed by Emily’s own traitorous body.
With one final, firm push, it seated itself fully. The sensation was overwhelming: a deep, filled ache, the cold stone warming inside her, the jeweled base a conspicuous, shameful anchor against her skin.
Sarah’s hand smoothed her shirt back down. The weight remained, a secret lodged in her core. In the mirror, Emily’s reflection looked utterly transformed—flushed, terrified, and alive.
“There,” Sarah said, her lips close to Emily’s ear. “Now you can go back to the table and face the Lich King. And the whole time, you’ll remember exactly who you serve.” She gave the jewel a light, proprietary tap through the denim.
A shudder, half-dread, half-electric pleasure, racked Emily. The game room, the guys, the dungeon crawl—it was all a distant facade. The only reality was this deliberate, humming fullness, a truth her body couldn’t deny.