Irene Adler, professionally known as "The Woman", was a brilliant dominatrix who has an apparently romantic attraction to Sherlock Holmes. Whilst Mycroft is telling Sherlock about Irene, he states that she is a dominatrix who gives out 'recreational scolding' to people. She has been in the middle of two political scandals in recent years, one of them involving a famous author, in which she had an affair with both sides. She is presumed dead, with the only information on her given by Mycroft Holmes, mentioning that she was capture by a terror cell and beheaded.