Winter brought its own problems, though. Her tail was warm against her butt, and her long mane protected her back, but her legs and chest were naked and exposed to the cold winter wind. Her arms were protected by the soft leather arm binder, but she'd have rather had her hands free, just for a few seconds.

"It happens every time he puts my arms behind my back! It doesn't matter whether it's handcuffs, chains, rope or the arm binder, as soon as I can't reach my nose it starts to itch."

Buckeye, the paint gelding, was standing next to her, slowly munching away. He was the calmest and steadiest of the other ponies, and Gadget decided he was her best bet. She walked up to his left side carefully and was able to rub her nose on his neck. She felt better, now. Buckeye didn't mind the attention, but he was curious about Gadget. He sniffed her tail for a while, but what really intrigued him were the two small bells hanging from Gadget's nipple rings. First he sniffed them, and then he nuzzled her breast to feel the golden decorations. His rough whiskers raked her tender nipple, and she flinched away.

"Oh great," she thought, "now my nipple's itchy."

The other two horses saw Buckeye playing with Gadget, and decided to join the pair. Rusty the quarter horse gelding was the biggest, and wasn't about to be left out of anything. Just who was this strange two-legged pony, and why did she have long purple feathers on her head? He was used to seeing ponies with a bit and bridle, of course. But he was an old barrel racer, now retired, and never wore feathers. Gadget stood quietly, though, and let him examine the plumes.

The last horse, Gizmo the white Arabian stallion, watched warily as Buckeye and Rusty checked out the newcomer. He was the smallest of the three horses, but as the only stallion he believed he was the natural leader of the herd and responsible for them all. It was his duty to check out the newcomer, strange feathers and all.

As he got closer, he picked up a definite female smell; this pony looked strange, but there was something that aroused the stud to assert his natural rights. He turned to Rusty and shooed him away from Gadget.

Gizmo was Gadget's favorite horse at the Ranch. He was small, but he was the only stallion; she didn't mind his attention at all. But as she turned toward the white horse, Gizmo was spooked by the feathers on her head and galloped away.

Through it all, steady old Buckeye just stood quietly and munched grass.

By now, Gadget was starting to get cold; it was below freezing and she was scarcely dressed. She had no interest in munching on grass, and even if she wanted she couldn't reach the ground with her arms bound. She paced around the field trying to generate some muscle heat, but the snow and ice began to stick to the metal shoes on the bottom of her pony boots. It was like trying to walk in stilts.

"I guess I got what I asked for this time," she mused.

"How long has it been since we really played?" Dee challenged Mick.

Mick was her husband, master and owner, but that in no way meant that Dee was quiet, passive or inhibited about expressing her opinions on most subjects. But one thing she did not like to do was make requests, demands or suggestions about BDSM play. Slaves just didn't do that, in her opinion, and she wanted to be a good slave. For her to make any kind of remark meant that she was really upset.

Mick knew that meant she needed to do something really extreme. It had been a long time since they had set aside a whole day for play, and even though he needed to work in the shop today, he knew Dee needed an all-day play session and she needed it now.

He couldn't leave her tied alone in the house all day, and the shop was too full to have her with him while he was working. That left two options: the barn and the outdoors. Dee really loved outdoor play, but in the dead of winter in Pennsylvania it was a challenge. There was already three inches of snow on the ground, and the forecast was for more snow this morning. The barn was dry but almost as cold as the outside, but at least the barn was close to the shop and Mick could check on it throughout the day.

Mick made his decision quickly...if she wanted to really play, he'd make sure she got what she wanted.

"Okay, go into the bathroom, put your hair up pony style and do your makeup." Mick told her.

"Why?" she asked. Her ideas about what made a good or a bad slave didn't prevent her from questioning or complaining.

Mick didn't answer, and Dee knew that even if he tolerated questions and complaints, delay or disobedience was not a good idea. She was already naked...it was hard to keep clothes on her, unless they locked. So she went into the bathroom and gathered her long curly hair into two large strands, one above the other. The top strand gave height and fullness to her pony "mane", while the lower strand reached straight down to the middle of her back. The two together gave the impression of a flowing mane of ginger curls.

"That takes care of the hair," she thought.

While Mick was rustling around in the toy closet, she applied her makeup: moisturizer, highlighter and powder, plus a bronzing blush for her cheeks. She did her eyes the way Mick liked for a scene, with heavier brown eye shadow and darker eyebrows. She completed the look with a sienna brown lip liner and lipstick.

As she came out of the bathroom, Mick was pulling parts of her pony costume out of a canvas duffel bag. He held up her shiny purple and black corset and told her to turn around. She zipped up the front and he proceeded to tighten the laces one by one. For over a year now he'd been able to completely close a 24-inch corset on her, so he'd custom ordered this corset with a 22-inch waist. She exhaled sharply as the tight leather compressed her waist. But instead of closing it completely, he left a one-inch gap. She'd be wearing this all day, he thought, and he didn't want her fainting in the snow.

The next items from the bag were a matched pair of two-inch diameter steel rings. Dee's nipples were pierced with 8-gauge barbells and stirrups, perfect attachment points for a lead line or a leash, but for pony play he always added the larger steel rings. These were tied to the stirrups with a single strand of heavy-duty thread. The theory was that in the event of a fall or other accident any excessive force of the leash would break the thread and pull the larger ring free rather than ripping out a nipple piercing. As an added touch, each large ring sported a small bell that would jingle whenever Dee's nipples moved.

Next came a pair of knee-high Kayser pony boots, complete with chromed steel horseshoes. As tall as high heels, but with only metal tee-shaped extensions on each horseshoe, they had no heel. With dozens of eyelets on each boot, it took Mick some time to lace and tie each boot. Until this point, she was only wearing fetish clothes. But the boots meant pony. With them she was taller and prouder; the lack of heels changed her gait from human to equine and she started to feel like a pony.

After the corset and boots came her least favorite part of the pony costume: the steel chastity belt. The belt served three purposes; first since it went over the corset, it served to lock the corset in place. Second it completely contained her sex and made sure she could be left in the paddock at pony events with studs like Trigger and Spike without having to worry about any future foals. And the third reason was the simplest: it looked really hot on her.

Since she'd be wearing it all day he installed only the vaginal plug...a six-inch long two-inch thick rod of rounded acrylic that would keep her filled as long as the belt was locked. He left off the smaller anal plug in case she had to add her own small pile to the collection of horse manure that was a natural part of the scenery at any horse ranch.

Once the chastity belt was locked he took the long pony tail wig that just exactly match her hair color and texture and clipped it to the strings of her corset. He chuckled slightly remembering the questions from the saleslady at the wig store wondering why Dee would need a wig that merely duplicated her own natural hair.

Mick then buckled her bridle and bit-gag into place and snapped the blinders on each side, limiting her vision to just what was in front of her. He left off the small locks that he normally used to secure the head gear, but he did attach the foot long purple and black feathered plumes that marked her as a show pony.

He then placed her hands together behind her back and pulled the soft leather arm binder up past her elbows and ran the straps around her shoulders, locking her arms behind her. Horses don't have hands, she thought, and now neither do I.

Mick clipped two short purple leads to her nipple rings and ran the straps through the rings on her bridle and back behind her to the ring on her arm binder. Now if she shook her head or arms too much she'd feel it immediately in her nipples. Two longer leads clipped onto her bridle.

The last item from the bag was a leather-lined steel collar with a chevron-shaped fringe of small chains.

With hooves instead of feet, a bit in her mouth, and no hands, Dee the slave girl was transformed into "Gadget the Purple Pony."

"Come on now, there's a girl," Mick said softly as he took her leads and headed for the front door. "I've got a lot of work to finish in the shop today, so you get to go play outside. Gadget tried to stand her ground, but one sharp tug on the bridle shook her nipples and she quickly decided to follow Mick out the door.

Right into a blizzard! Gadget tried to stop again but Mick continued to lead her down the road toward the barn. "Oh no, little pony, you don't get to stay in the house today" Mick told her. Ordinarily the metal shoes on the bottom of her pony boots would have made sharp "clopping" noises on the gravel surface. But with three inches of snow on the ground already, her steps were silent.

At the gate, she could see their three horses already out in the pasture. "At least he waited until the stable hand had fed the horses," Gadget thought. Early every morning a hired hand came to feed and water the horses and muck the stalls. Gadget shuddered to think what he would have thought at seeing his boss bound up in pony gear and walking naked in the fields.

"I have to go work," Mick told her. "You go and play with the other horses, and I'll check on you in a little while." He grinned to himself as he saw his wife trudge slowly through the gate and into the pasture. He latched it and headed off to the shop. At least he could see the fields through the window, so he could keep an eye on her as he worked.

Gadget had been outside nearly an hour when Mick reached a good stopping point in his welding. He'd been watching Gadget milling around with the other horses, and she was starting to look a little blue. If she really got into trouble, she had a regular safeword for when she wasn't gagged, and an emergency signal for situations like this where Mick couldn't hear her. The old Boy Scout emergency signal: three. Any motion repeated in a pattern of threes: three grunts, three shakes of her head, stomping her feet three times. Mick would come running and get her out immediately.

Mick never intentionally let thing go that far, and he decided it was a good time to get her out of the wind. By now the snow had stopped and the sun was shining. Mick put down his tools and went through the barn to the back door. "Gadget!" he called as he slid the door open.

Gadget was cold and tired, but the prospect of getting warm in the barn was enough to get her trotting. Mick could hear the bells on her bridle and nipples ringing. "Get those knees up higher!" he yelled as she headed for the barn.

Dee was glad to be inside, and she stood quietly as Mick removed the blinders from her bridle. But her relief was short-lived as he guided her into a stall and slid the door shut. Mick held a bottle of water with a straw to her lips, and she drank slowly; drinking with a bridle and bit was a tricky business. Mick set the bottle in the feed trough where she could reach it.

"I'll be back to check on you later," he said, and went back to the shop.

Gadget paced around the stall. The stall door latched on the outside, and she couldn't reach the latch with or without the arm binder. There was a feed trough on one wall, and with a little bending and reaching she could get a drink of water. The side walls of the stall were bare, and the back wall had only a window with swinging shutters. The floor was covered in fresh, dry sawdust from the local mill. In the center of the otherwise empty space sat a pair of hay bales. The other three horses would be thrilled to get a whole bale of hay, let alone two, but they didn't do Gadget much good. Too short for a bed, they at least made a decent place to sit.

"Almost done," thought Mick as he put down the welding torch and took off his helmet. "Gadget's probably ready for some attention," he decided, "and I might as well have some fun today, too!"

He headed back to the barn, wondering if Gadget had tried to get some sleep. No TV or Radio in the barn, and with the other horses outside, she didn't even have any company. But as he looked in on her stall he saw her pacing still. Next time he'd try to remember to leave a blanket on top of the hay bales to make her more comfortable.

"Hello girl," he told her as he opened the stall door, "time for a good brushing." Mick clipped the lead lines back to her bridle and led her into the middle of the barn. He took the two yellow cross ties hanging there and clipped one to each side of her bridle, securing her in the spot normally used by the blacksmith on his bi-monthly visits to the barn. Mick couldn't remember when the blacksmith was coming next, and hoped it wasn't today.

That could be really interesting...

Mick took a relatively new and very soft brush from the tack room and proceeded to brush every exposed part of Gadget's skin. The brush would have felt better if it was warmer, Gadget thought, but any kind of attention was better than sitting alone in her stall all day.

Mick then took a cloth and wiped the melted snow from her pony boots. He noticed that one of the screws holding the horseshoes on the soles was a little loose, so he fetched a screwdriver to fix it. He could have worked on it in the barn, but he thought it would be more fun to use the anvil. Every farm has a few relics lying around unused, and the Luvbight Ranch had a beauty...an old anvil.

Mick unclipped Dee from the cross ties and led her through the front door of the barn to the block of stone that held the massive piece of iron. He patted the back of Gadget's leg and she instinctively raised her foot. Mick placed the foot on the anvil and proceeded to tighten the loose screw.

"Let's put you in the riding ring and you can test out that repair while I feed the other horses." Mick told her. He led her into the oval-shaped arena and unclipped the lead lines. "You get some exercise and loosen up those muscles while I feed the other horses."

Mick went back into the barn and poured a bucket of horse feed into the buckets in the three other stalls. Since it was winter, he had to dump the frozen blocks of ice out of each water bucket and refill them. "Horses are so much work in the winter," he remembered.

After letting the horses into their stalls, he headed out to retrieve Gadget. She'd made several trips around the ring, but it was still too cold for her to work up a sweat. He lead her back into the barn to say goodbye to the horses...she lingered in front of Gizmo's stall, and the two shared a moment.

As Mick led Gadget back up the road to the house, Gizmo poked his head out of the window in his stall and whinnied once. Mick chuckled at the gesture, and wondered if the white stallion had any clue about chastity belts.

As they neared the house, Mick unclipped the leads from Gadget's bridle and pointed her to the front of the driveway.

"Head up to the mailbox and see whether we have any packages."

Gadget just looked at him incredulously. You couldn't see the barn from the street, but the mailbox was right on the pavement. Mick just smacked her on the ass and sent her down the driveway.

Gadget walked up to the box as fast as she could, looking up and down the road to see if anyone was coming. "All clear so far," she thought. She saw no packages by the box, and with no hands she couldn't have carried them, anyway.

She walked slowly back to the safety of the house, cold, tired, and hungry. And she couldn't help but wonder, what would it be like to spend a week as a pony?