[Standard Content Warning: This is an ABDL story blog, that means stories on this page contain diapers, diaper usage (like, lots of it), infantilism and the like! In addition, mental and physical manipulation, bondage and nonconsensual or dubiously consensual employment of all of the above themes and many others may also apply. Viewer discretion is advised.]
“You want to become a woman?”
Your eyes get big and you stumble back a step. You were aware of a heat in your face and a pricking in your neck the last minute or so, around the time she started pressing you on why you took the tiara, but now you’re definitely sweating.
“What?” The word slips out of your mouth and the Queen quirks an eyebrow.
“What do you mean what?” She asks.
“Why would I - why would you-” You’re breathing heavy, now. And you can tell she’s noticed.
“You said you stole it to use it,” the Queen says. “Didn’t you?” She doesn’t look suspicious. She looks confused.
“No - no, I didn’t - I didn’t steal it to use it!” You say, very aware that 30 seconds ago, you did, in fact, say that you stole it to use it. “I stole it to rub it in the princess’ face!” You shout out, suddenly remembering the entire reason you came here. Supposedly. “She said - she said she was asking you for it. So she could study it. I wanted to steal it from you before you could give it to her, so I could rub it in her face. So she’d have to ask me for it!”
“Ohhhh, that’s so much more embarrassing than either of the other explanations….” Madris murmurs from a few feet away. The Queen turns around and shushes her. She puts a hand over her own mouth and waves at the Queen in apology.
“So. You, in your travels as a burglar, encountered that nice young princess whose kingdom neighbors my own. She told you of her plans to petition me for this,” she spins the tiara on her finger. “You decided to intercept those plans, embarking on a single-minded single-person heist into the tower of the Witch Queen as a bit of…” She tilts her head back and forth, searching for the right word. “Chicanery?”
Well, when you put it that way, it just sounds ridiculous.
“Yeah.” You gulp. You try to sound more confident this time. “Yeah. That’s why I did it.” It doesn’t really work. The Queen considers this for a moment. She looks at the tiara.
“Now, this feels a rather silly question. At this point, I’m annoyed that I even have to ask, but, I do.” She holds up the tiara. “What did she tell you that this does?” You blink once, then twice. That wasn’t what you expected.
“She told me that if you put it on, that with a single thought, you can change yourself into anything you want, and the world will change for it to be true.”
Nobody says anything for a second. The Queen digests what you said. She puts her thumb on her lips.
Then her mouth turns upward and she lets out a single laugh.
“A burglar and a princess. What an interesting relationship you two have,” she says cryptically. She looks at the tiara. “This tiara does indeed change the wearer and change the way they are perceived. I would not describe it as changing the world around them or changing what everyone in the world believes them to be. It is a powerful grouping of near-permanent charms all layered together very elegantly to cross physical shapeshifting, mental perception, memory alteration and some very slight hypnotic suggestion to keep it all flowing smoothly. Immaculately crafted for its purpose, to be sure.”
She looks back at you.
“But it was crafted for a single purpose. You were told this is a ticket to any life the bearer so wishes. It is not. It is a means to end. A tool, intentionally designed to fulfill a goal.” She rubs a thumb over the jewels set in the tiara. “It will not turn you into anything you want, it will turn you into exactly one thing. This tiara turns its wearer into a woman.”
You can feel yourself sweating again.
“What?” You ask.
“A humanoid woman, to be exact. It was crafted by a great dragon, who at various times needed to deal with the more diminutive two-legged races on relatively even ground. She felt that flying in with her full size and causing damage with the gusts of her wings and the swiping of her tail created an unduly tense atmosphere. She of course had such command of her power that shapeshifting into a human form was easy, but her children had less aptitude for it. She had this crafted so one of her daughters could come with her on her trips to the human kingdoms. A fascinating piece of history between our races, a beast of great power who wanted to meet us on our level, but also a mother who did not want to be separated from her children in doing so.” She turned the tiara over in her hand. “I always thought it fascinating. A symbol of how we’re more alike than we are different. And now, however briefly, it’s passed into your hands. To be sold, for spite and to be used, you’ve all said, but can’t seem to decide.”
The explanation slowly sinks in. You run a hand through your hair as you stare at the ground
It has dawned on you that the princess, to put it lightly, played with the truth.
“That’s what it’s for,” you murmur to nobody in particular.
“That’s what it’s for,” the Queen confirms. “Now that we all understand each other perfectly, I think I’ll ask this just once more, and I do expect the truth, this time.” She tilts her head as she stares at you through the bars, trying to study anything about your expression. “Why did you come here and try to steal this tiara?”
You don’t say anything for a moment. You grip the bars tightly. You bite down on your bottom lip so hard, you’re afraid you’ll draw blood. Nobody says anything. Nobody moves. The Queen doesn’t urge an answer from you. She just watches. This moment won’t end until you say something.
So you force yourself to say something.
“….I wanted to use it,” you say in a quiet voice.
“You wanted to use it,” the Queen repeats. “For what?”
“I wanted to use it….”
You breathe in.
“To become a woman.”
You swallow. You feel yourself burning up inside. The longer it goes, the more the silence feels like a giant weight on your back.
“Why?” The Queen asks. You can feel your hands shaking on the bars.
“Because I am one,” you say, your voice wavering. “I am a woman, and I’m tired of pretending to be a man.” Your voice cracks. “I just…wanted to make the rest of the world see me the way they’re supposed to.”
You’re vaguely aware of tears falling from your eyes. You don’t open them.
“I just want to see myself the way I’m supposed to.”
The dungeon is silent as a crypt, except for your breathing and the cracks in your voice. Until you hear the sound of shifting iron and suddenly stumble on your feet - your hands had a death grip on the bars of your cell, and with the door opening, you briefly lost your footing. You open your eyes to see the Queen entering your now open cell. Her Queensguard quickly move to catch up to her, she stops them with a single hand.
The other hand is turning the tiara over, back and forth.
“It does seem like there might be at least one person who does see you the way they’re supposed to,” she says. You…have started to figure that out. Maybe you already knew for a while, on some level. Maybe that’s why you kept going back to her room, over and over.
“Yeah. Maybe,” is all you can say.
“I suppose at the end of the day, I was planning on granting her petition. If I’m correct about the motivations behind it, this is…more or less the same thing, except I don’t have to send a courier and one of my guards to make sure it arrives safely.”
She extends her hand and the tiara, to you. You stare at it. You look at her. Your mouth hangs open and for a second, words fail you.
“You’re giving it to me?” You ask.
“I am.”
“But…I tried to steal from you.”
“You did.” She nods. “You traveled into my land and committed a crime. As Queen, it is my purview to decide judgment.”
You don’t know what to say. So you don’t say anything. You slowly reach your hands out. You touch the white tiara tentatively, afraid it’ll vanish into dust like the shackles you were wearing earlier. But you lift it out of the Queen’s hands and it’s there. You look around.
The Queensguard are all staying back, at their Queen’s behest. Madris is leaning forward as far as she can without actually taking another step forward, her eyes lit up. The orc watches with a hand on her chin, interested. The elf is turned away, arms crossed, nose up. It would be a very convincing, haughty image of somebody who wants no part of this if he didn’t keep stealing quick little half-glances back in your direction.
Your eyes fall back to the Queen. She says nothing, she just smiles and gives you a nod.
When you imagined this moment, you have to admit, it wasn’t like this. For one thing, it was above ground and there was a very picturesque sunrise going on. There was also some birds. And, you’re realizing, whether you wanted to admit it or not, you imagined she would be here.
It definitely wasn’t in an underground dungeon, surrounded by people you just tried to steal from, but who have somehow, seemingly, forgiven you?
But if this experience has taught you anything, it’s that life doesn’t go how you expect it.
You turn the tiara around. You bring it up and you place it on your head. The sides of it tuck into your hair and rest above your ears.
You feel something right away. The tiara starts to glow and you feel a warm light radiating from it. You’re thankful for how instant it is, even a second of hesitation would’ve been enough for you to worry this was all for naught. The warmth blossoms from your forehead and spreads down through your body, heating you up. You try not to move, you just. Breathe in and breathe out.
And then, in a second, it’s done.
“Did it work?”
Your hand comes up to your mouth. Your own voice surprised you when it came out. You start to touch your own body, turning this way and that way, looking at yourself. It feels different. After a few seconds of watching you poke at yourself, the Queen chuckles into her hand.
“Our burglar is going to have some difficulty appraising things in their totality in a dank place like this. Let’s escort her to a place with a mirror, shall we?” She asks her Queensguard. You blink once, your eyes getting a little big when you realize she was referring to you when she said ‘her’.
“Yes, your Grace,” the orc says. “…some place specific?”
“Mmmn.” The Queen nods. “The chamber next to the Queensguard’s quarters should suffice, I think.” All three Queensguard are instantly surprised.
“Oh, wow…” Madris murmurs.
“My queen, are you absolutely cert--” The elf starts to say, but stops. He looks at you. You two make eye contact for a second. Then he looks at his Queen and nods, resolutely. “Of course, my Queen. Come…. …burglar.”
You’re practically in a trance as you follow them. You stare at your own hands for most of the walk. You almost trip on the stairs a couple times. You’re vaguely aware of the tower’s occupants staring at you and whispering to each other. You guess word of your exploits must’ve quickly spread after you were caught. Out of the corner of your eye, you catch one spellcrafter with a giant bump on his head. You grimace and shrug apologetically. He crosses his arms and turns away with a harumph.
By the time you’re done walking, you realize you’ve scaled most of the tower. This is the third floor from the top, directly under the Queen’s chamber. You briefly stopped here to sneak into the Queensguard’s quarters and steal the key to the vault. You’re led past the Queensguard’s chamber, into a chamber next to it. The room is big - the first thing that strikes you is the size of the bed in the corner, a giant thing with four posters. It looks like it could handle four or five people, easy.
The orc touches your shoulder and points you towards a mirror. You walk towards it - for a second, you almost hesitate. Almost afraid that the things you think you’re seeing and feeling won’t be there. But, for some reason, that nagging fear just doesn’t get a chance to plant its claws in your brain. Not this time. You step confidently towards the mirror and stand in front of it.
And…it’s you.
Your shoulders aren’t as big. Your arms and legs are shorter. Your face is rounder.
Your hair isn’t any longer. Your build is still about as stocky as it was. You pull up your sleeve, you arm is different, shorter, more narrow, but still about as muscular as it was before.
You breathe out and your voice sounds different. You touch the front of your neck and it’s smooth, not feeling the bump you’ve felt there your entire life.
You see the Queen in the mirror and turn your head to see her standing next to you.
“How do you feel?” She asks. At first, you’re not sure how to answer, but you figure it out quickly.
“Like myself.”
“Good.” She reaches a hand up and touches the tiara. For a second, you feel a little spike of fear.
“Will it still be like this, even if I take it off?” The Queen pauses for a second. Then yanks the tiara off in one motion. You let out a squawking noise. She just chuckles as you try to grab it back for a second, before you look in the mirror again and realize that it is, in fact, still like this.
“The tiara cast its charms on you the second you put it on. The magic is within you now and it’s close to permanent. There’s some minor upkeep to make sure everything stays in place, but that’s easily handled.” You don’t see her look off to the side and make a gesture with her head to her Queensguard, or see her orc guard nod and leave.
“So I’m really like this, for good,” you say. It sounds almost too good to be true.
“Mmn. Some with extremely powerful magic senses will be able to…observe certain things. My Queensguard and I are unaffected by the memory alteration and hypnotic suggestion, for starters. But to 99% of people, they will look at you and believe this is what you have always been,” she explains. You look at the two Queensguard remaining in the room. You’re pretty sure you can live with that. The Queen looks at you as you go back to appraising yourself in the mirror. “I know you must have had a name up until this point, but I never asked. Will you be bringing it with you?”
“….no, I don’t think so,” you say, quicker than you expected. But when it comes out, it feels right. The name you had before you put the tiara on, you realize pretty quickly that you’re done with it.
“Then may I assume I have the pleasure of being the first to ask for your name?” And you would’ve expected this to take a long time to decide too, but, no, it comes to you surprisingly quickly. You’re starting to notice your head feels a lot clearer. It’s helping you make decisions a lot quicker than you normally would. Maybe you knew for a while and just never really thought about it.
“Rain.”
The Queen nods.
“I’m glad to officially meet you, Rain.”
It feels good. It feels good to say it, it feels good to hear it. You keep looking into the mirror and watch as a smile crawls onto your face. You don’t notice the Queen gesturing to her guards again or see the elf guard already writing something down as he leaves.
Part of you wants to just stand in front of this mirror all night. Partially because for once you’re actually enamored with your own reflection. Partially because you’re afraid of what’ll happen when you ask the question that’s on top of your mind, but.
If there was one correct thing you did in this whole adventure, it was facing your fears. So, you ask anyway.
“So, what happens now?”
“Hm?” The Queen doesn’t look at you, continuing to admire your two reflections.
“You’re not really just going to let me leave and go back home, now, are you?” You ask. Her generosity in letting you use the tiara at all already feels impossible. You’re not optimistic enough to think it’ll go any further than that.
“Why would I do that?” The Queen asks nonchalantly while she picks at a bit of your hair, trying to straighten it out. She sounds as if she doesn’t understand the question. Right. Of course. Whatever relationship she has with the princess and whatever miracle of sympathy she felt for you made her decide to help you, but, it was never going to let you get away with breaking into her tower and trying to rob her.
“Yeah…yeah, you wouldn’t,” you say, resigned. You take in a breath. Alright, time to face the music. “So I’m going back into that dungeon, I guess.” If she doesn’t just decide to take your head, after all. There’d be a grim irony in that, you suppose.
“What?” The Queen says, again, distracted. She finally stops playing with your hair. “What do you mean?” You stare at her. She stares at her. You both look confused, then after a second, realization dawns on her face.
“You just said-”
“Ohhhhh. Oh, right. You’re talking about the robbery. I was on a completely different train of thought!” She waves a hand. “No, I was asking, why would I have you leave to go home?” You realize after a second that she’s expecting you to answer her.
“Because…I live somewhere else? In a different kingdom?” You say, tentatively.
“Hmn.” The Queen lets out a noncommittal noise. Now, she turns towards you and looks you in the eye. “Whose chamber do you think this is?” You stop and look around, not sure what she’s getting at. You look at the expensive looking furnishings and the giant bed and the first thing it reminds you of…
“I guess it kind of looks like…” You start to say.
“Your friend, the princess’ bedchamber?” She supplies.
“Yeah, it does, I-” You stop, then look at her. Your eyes get bigger, then narrow. “I don’t understand.” The Queen doesn’t seem surprised by that, she just nods.
“It is a bit much to take in, especially with the events of the day up to this point.” Then, she does something you definitely weren’t expecting, raising her hands up and firmly planting them on your shoulder. “Here, allow me to elucidate things a bit.” She leans forward and before you know what’s happening, she’s planting her lips on your cheek. She leaves them there for a moment, hands staying on your shoulders to keep you in place. You can’t remember the last time you let somebody get this close to you. You can’t remember the last time you shared a moment this tender with anybody.
She releases you and pulls back. You stare at her, not sure what to say. You feel yourself getting a little choked up. You still don’t understand, well, a lot of things, but, most of all, why she’s being so…nice to you.
She lightly touches a hand to your face and wipes away a tear you barely realized was forming. You look at yourself in the mirror and see a dark purple mark on your cheek from her lipstick. You look back at her and the warm, inviting smile on her face.
“…why?” You ask.
“Many reasons,” she says. “I told you as Queen, the decision of your judgment belongs to me. And there have been other decisions. Decisions that necessitated others. Plans that must be made and kept, a good deal of coincidence and good fortune and through all of it, a vacancy in need of filling and I believe, a person in front of me who may be just the one to fill it. But, stripping all of that away….” She places a hand on her cheek. “It is my duty to help who I can, and I saw someone who needed help.”
Your breath wavers on the way out of your mouth and….this time you approach her, taking a step towards her. She welcomes it, placing her arms around you as the two of you embrace. She strokes the back of your head a couple times. You don’t say anything for a moment. There’s still a lot you don’t understand, least of all exactly what’s happening. But despite it all, you just feel a well of gratitude towards the Witch Queen.
“—nn.”
And then you feel something else. Your hand goes to the back of your neck as you feel something like a small shock.
“Guh!”
You feel it again, your body twitches. It feels uncomfortable.
“Hhhuuh…”
Then, before you know it, your legs are giving out under you. You drop to one knee before you can stop it. You look around, the Queen has already beckoned for Madris, who is approaching.
“It’s started. Let’s get her into bed,” the Queen says. Madris lifts you back up onto your feet. She’s basically carrying you, because you can’t put any weight on your legs. Madris and the Queen take you towards that giant bed.
“What’s happening? I feel….weak…” You murmur.
“It’s mana. I infused you with a bit of mine.” She reaches a hand up and wipes the lipstick mark on your cheek. She lets out a sigh. “I kept it small, but, it seems it’s still overwhelming the mana in your body.”
“I don’t…I don’t have any mana…” You mutter as Madris lifts you onto the bed on your back. You blink a couple times, seeing spots in front of your eyes.
“Do you think it was the amount you infused or the method?” Madris asks as she places a hand on your forehead.
“Both,” the Queen says and lets out a frustrated sigh. “This probably would’ve happened no matter what, her mana’s been dormant for her entire life. Her body simply isn’t used to it.” You shake your head and try to tell her again that you don’t have any mana, but it just comes out as a bunch of murmuring this time. “Go get a pair of spellnurses, then come back here,” she orders.
“Yes, my Queen,” Madris says and leaves immediately. The Queen sits on the edge of the bed next to you.
“It’s alright. What you’re feeling is normal, you’re going to be fine,” she says and despite the weakness sweeping through your body, you believe her. You take in a deep breath and try to sit up - you instantly fall back down. “It’ll be alright. Just rest, now.”
And for lack of anything better to do, you decide to listen. Some part of you thinks you should be intensely fearful, right now, but, for some reason, you don’t believe anything bad’s going to happen. You let your eyes start to slide shut. You see the Queen wiping lipstick off and then leaning forward and planting another kiss on your forehead. The last thing you hear before sleep takes you is her words.
“Welcome home, Princess.”
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