The Viking's Captive(18)

A fraction of a second before the sole of his shoe collided with her left buttock, she was aware of the air shifting. Instinctively she tensed, then cried out as the burning pain spread over her flesh.

The sound of it shocked her too. A resounding snap, like a whip being cracked, and it echoed around the room.

She’d barely registered the first strike, when the second one came, in exactly the same spot.

Again she jerked within Halvor’s grip. Heat shot over her skin, as if a swarm of angry bees had landed on her buttocks and stung over and over.

“No, no,” she cried.

“Be still, woman.” He clamped her closer to his side, his body and arm holding her hostage. “We’ve barely started.”

He spanked her with the shoe again. “This,” he said—another whack—“is to teach you.” Smack. “To be…”

“Ouch!” She bucked upward, thrusting her ass into the air then away. The pain was growing, each hit layering up the heat.

“More careful when cooking.”

“Yes, yes, I will,” she cried out. When would this stop?

“A spanking will not kill you, Duna.” He paused and stroked his hand up her back and neck then over her hair, almost caressing.

She shook her head, not wanting his soothing touch.

“So there’s no need to wail as if you’re being murdered though it is quite amusing.”

“You,” she panted, “are not the one having their hide tanned.”

“No, because I am Master. And if I’d been cooking, I would have seen to it you were fed.”

“I wouldn’t have eaten it.” She gripped his leg harder, hoping her fingers were hurting his flesh. She doubted they were.

“Which is why you were cooking,” he said. “Because it was the only way I thought you’d eat.”

Thwack.

She jolted forward. But this time, didn’t cry out. She didn’t want to give him the satisfaction.

Thwack.

Grunting, she squeezed her eyes closed, moisture had built up within them. Battling against him was futile.

As he continued to spank her left buttock, raising it to a temperature she’d never experienced before, she tried to release the tension.

“Good girl,” he said, finally pausing, and again smoothing over her flesh.

She winced as his rough warrior hands slid over her tender skin, then pursed her lips and blew out a breath.

“I believe you’re beginning to understand the nature of our relationship, are you not?” he asked.

“Yes… Master.” She was panting. Her throat was tight, and her chest ached.

“And it’s taken the reddening of one cheek for that to happen. Perhaps when the other matches, you will not only accept the nature of our relationship, but also understand it.”

“Understand that I have to obey you, until my dying day?”

“That is the fate the runestones have delivered you.”

Runestones?

Before she could ask what he was talking about, a spank on her right buttock had her jolting forward. It seemed now it was the turn of her previously unblemished cheek to be slapped red.

She bit on her bottom lip, tried and failed not to lurch within his grip as another spank was laid over the first two.

Again she closed her eyes, and wished she could make her buttocks relax. Because he’d been right; tensing them did seem to make it worse. She consciously released the muscles, hoping to ease her torment.

“Ah, you’re trying.” The shoe was replaced with his hand. “I’m impressed, because I think this is your first admonishment as an adult woman and relaxing into it isn’t easy.”

“How would you know this is my first… admonishment?”

“Is it?”

She said nothing; instead she kicked her legs, hoping to get enough leverage to stand. But of course it was futile. She was going nowhere.

“Is it your first taste of a man’s hand on your rear in discipline?” he asked, louder this time and finishing his words with a slap with the shoe.

“Yes, yes, it is.”

Smack.

“Ouch!”

“I’ve spent many a long hour on longboats,” he said. “What do you think Vikings talk about?”

“I don’t care to know.”

“Well, you will.”

Slap.

She grunted, tensed for a moment then allowed her buttocks to relax.

“They talk,” he said, “about slaves, and sex, and food, and what they will pillage next. Of course they do. But they also discuss pleasure, providing for their women, their children, and tending animals… because contrary to what you might think, I am not an animal, I am a carer.”

He struck her with the shoe again; three hard spanks that once more brought tears to her eyes. The heat was intense, as if real wild fire had stroked her ass.

She whimpered and hung her head. Her brow was sweaty, and strands of hair stuck to her cheeks. When would this end?





Chapter Eight


Halvor surveyed the rouged buttocks over his lap. He couldn’t deny they were lacking in meaty flesh, but still, they were perfectly round and they had been of the most delicate white he’d ever borne witness too.

But not anymore. Now they were as red as crab apples. Each time he’d delivered a swat another depth of color had arrived. And now… now she glowed a stunning scarlet.