by Renee Rose
“Oh, really?” she said sarcastically. “Worse than they're going?”
His shoulders sagged. This was a situation he couldn't win. She was rightfully bitter about being held prisoner, and if he weren't worried about keeping her safe, he might have thought her retort to Murdock was worth a laugh. But Phillip had just declared he was her official keeper, which meant the worries of both keeping her safe and correcting her behavior fell entirely on him.
“'Yes, sir' is the only appropriate response to me right now, Danewyn,” he said tiredly.
She folded her arms across her chest and glared at him defiantly.
He tilted his head to the side and considered her. “I doubt you want to feel my hand on your arse so soon after the whipping I gave you last night.”
Far from making her repentant, that only served to fuel her anger. The muscles in her jaw stood out as she grit her teeth. “You can go lick a sheep's cunt too,” she spat.
Shite. He sighed. He wrapped an arm around her torso and pulled her down as he sat upon his bedroll. She struggled wildly, which didn't surprise him. He pulled her face down over his lap and flipped her skirts up to reveal her bottom, which still sported several faded lines from the night before. He spanked her bouncing orbs with his hand, and she cried out and cursed him, struggling and kicking her lower legs.
As he spanked, he spoke, “You will speak respectfully to me and to the other men in this camp. If they disrespect you, I will handle it—not you. Understood?”
She refused to answer at first, but when he started spanking harder, she gasped, “Yes, sir!” When he continued spanking, she cried out louder, “I said ‘yes, sir’!”
“I thank you for that, but you're still getting the spanking you earned,” he said calmly, his hand growing hot from the flattening impact it made on her cheeks.
“Stop!” she shouted and renewed her struggle with ferocity.
It was tempting to spank harder, but instead he stilled his hand on her bottom and made his voice very quiet. “Danewyn. You don't want my belt again, do you?”
She froze, not even breathing as she seemed to contemplate his threat. He waited.
“No, sir,” she said in a small voice.
“Then you will lie still and take your punishment.”
She started weeping then, probably more out of frustration than pain, and he clasped her hand with his left and gave her another half dozen spanks. Then he pulled her skirts down and flipped her around to cradle her in his arms. She wept for a moment, and then recovering, reached up to slap at his face. He caught her two wrists in one of his hands and pressed them into his chest, wedged between them.
“Stop that. Shh.” He held her very tightly to his body, not allowing her to push away.
“You heard the Prince,” he told her, by way of explanation. “I'm your keeper. That means I'm the one who has to teach you to mind around here.”
She head-butted his chest twice in fury and then collapsed into sobs. He stroked her hair, her arms, her face. He rocked her and held her until her eyes drifted closed.
After a while, Phillip entered the tent and sat down, taking in the scene without comment. “How's she doing?”
“Not so well. Fairly miserable, actually.”
“Aye,” Phillip said, seeming to understand everything. He was like that—he had an uncanny manner of knowing the most intimate details of all hearts. Ferrum loved him for it. The two had been raised as brothers—both fostered by the Duke of Umbria, who had known Phillip's true identity. The Duke had trained Phillip in leadership and war strategy and Ferrum in arms and combat, knowing the time would come when they would need every bit of it to make a run at the throne.
“Why'd you make me her keeper, of all people?”
“You think I can't tell when you've gone soft on someone?”
Ferrum met his eye at that, surprised. Was he soft on her? He looked down at her delicate form and felt a surge of fierce protectiveness. Aye. He was plenty soft on her. God's teeth, he was lost to this little flower.
“Thank you,” he said to Phillip, and Phillip nodded, standing up.
“Want me to blow out the candle?”
“Nay. I still have to bind her wrists. I thank you, though.”
* * *
She woke to find Sir Ferrum staring at her as they lay, nose to nose, wrists bound together. She blinked at him in confusion. He began unbinding their wrists immediately. “I didn't want to wake you,” he mumbled as an explanation to why he'd been staring at her as she slept. She rubbed her wrists and avoided looking at him, feeling awkward and vulnerable after the last spanking.
“Danewyn,” Sir Ferrum said, turning her gently around to face him and looking at her kindly. She pursed her lips and looked up at him defiantly, but then found herself melting under his warm gaze.
“Aye?” she asked when Sir Ferrum did not go on.
“Peace?”
Some mad part of her wanted to throw herself into his arms, but another part wanted to kick him in the shins. But she did neither. She allowed him to pick up her hand in his large one and watched, her eyes locked on his, as he slowly lifted it to his mouth, brushing the back of it with his lips. His lips were so soft for such a hardened, rugged man. Her heart beat faster in its cage as she stared into his kind eyes, wishing he would touch more than her hand with those lips. He smiled and squeezed her hand before releasing it. She smiled to herself, realizing it was the first time in her life anyone had ever treated her like a lady.
She left the tent feeling warmed and in good spirits, and she passed the day as Ferrum's shadow, observing the practiced way he managed the troops, overseeing their drills and giving them orders for the maintenance of camp. He was truly a knight of great worth to the Red Fox. But the rest of the men were just like the rowdy customers she'd been serving for years, and it seemed it was impossible for her to keep her mouth shut as Sir Ferrum had requested.
“When are you going to share the whore with us, Sir Ferrum?” one of them challenged after supper that night.
Sir Ferrum bristled. “She's not for the taking.”
“Oh, really? That's not what I heard.”
“Did you not hear what I told Murdock last night? She is the Royal Seer. She's not here to whore. No one touches her. Understood?”
“I was just teasing you, sir,” the young soldier said placatingly.
“I don't take 'em as young as you anyway,” she mocked. She held up her little finger. “Too small!” The men roared with laughter as the man she'd insulted sputtered.
Sir Ferrum, however, did not look amused. He gave her a withering look, and only then did she remember his directive to be respectful to the men, even if they were not so with her. He pointed, silently to their tent, and with a flush, she realized he meant to spank her. Anger made her ball her fists. She looked pointedly away, ignoring him. He leaned closer. “Go. To the Tent, Danewyn. Now.”
She turned to face him and stood on her tiptoes to try to look him in the face. “No.”
Sir Ferrum stared at her in shock. She imagined a knight of his size and command was not often defied, but she didn't care—she wasn't afraid of him. He leaned closer so the men couldn't hear. “Do you want me to spank you in front of all the men?” he demanded.
That threat infuriated her even more. How dare he even suggest such a thing? She lifted on her toes again, and before she could heed the signal of warning shooting behind his eyes, she spat right in Sir Ferrum's face. His expression flashed to anger, and she needed no one to tell her that a huge, angry warrior signified real danger. He snatched up the braid at the back of her head and dragged her three paces to a log where he pushed her to her knees. She made a small, terrified cry. He sat down on the log facing her and took a deep breath as if to calm himself. Her body had gone limp with instinctual submission, and she could only stare at him with wide eyes. What had she been thinking? Mayhap it had been his patient punishment that had lulled her into a false sense of security with him, but she realized
now that he was not a man with whom she ought to trifle.
The camp had gone silent, the jeers and laughter replaced by the crackle of tension in the air as they all watched.
“I'm sorry,” she said quickly.
“Wipe it off,” he said in a deadly voice pitched for her ears alone.
She immediately wiped the spit off his scarred cheek, feeling the hard, ropey knots of disfigured flesh under her trembling fingers. “I'm sorry, Sir Ferrum,” she said again.
He nodded. “I am too,” he said grimly, and she feared he meant he was sorry for what he was going to do to her. Would he spank her in front of the men? The thought had enraged her only a moment before, but now she would welcome his public discipline if it was the worst he'd do. She would welcome it if it meant he would forgive her. It was odd to discover she cared about that, but she did. Like it or not, she was the Red Fox's prisoner, and Sir Ferrum was her keeper. He had been her sole protector, and losing his esteem, losing his gentle care-taking, was more frightening than any punishment.
“You're going to kneel here at my feet until I dismiss you, and then you're going to go into the tent for your punishment.”
“Yes, sir,” she said, lowering her bottom down to sit on her heels at his feet. Her body was trembling so much she was sure he felt it where her ribs pressed against his leg. Why had he decided to punish her in the tent rather than in front of the men? Would the spanking be far worse in private?
Ferrum sighed and leaned his forearms on his knees. She waited, her eyes riveted to his face. After a moment, he seemed to recover his temper. “Don't ever do that again,” he said evenly.
“I won't,” she said immediately. “I give you my word.”
“Go into the tent.”
“Yes, sir.” She got up immediately and walked to the tent, feeling the eyes of the men as they pretended not to watch.
“Nobody calls her a whore again—is that clear?” Ferrum's voice rang out authoritatively.
A chorus of “yes, sirs” followed.
She blinked back tears as she ducked her head in their tent.
Ferrum did not follow immediately, which made her anxiety grow. She kept herself busy by straightening his things in the tent, rolling out their bedrolls and making orderly arrangements of his supplies. When she ran out of things to do, she sat on the bedroll to wait. He made her wait a long time, and when he came in, he looked tired and grim. She stood up to face him, twisting and tugging at her own fingers, then shaking them out when she saw him looking at them. He'd brought a stool in with him and he set it down and perched on it. She went immediately to him and knelt again at his feet.
He contemplated her, and gentleness seeped back into his expression. After a moment, he touched the back of her head, where he'd grabbed her braid. “I didn't hurt you, did I?”
Her eyes blurred with tears at the unexpected concern. She shook her head. He brushed a tear that had escaped her eye with the back of his fingers. “I scared you a fair bit.” He sounded regretful.
She didn't answer but placed her hands and her chin on his knee, looking up at him submissively.
“I don't want you scared of me,” he said sadly, and she realized that probably most people in his life were. “Why is it that you wouldn't obey me until you were scared?”
She felt a rush of shame and shook her head miserably. “Because I'm an idiot.”
Sir Ferrum frowned. “Don't say that,” he said sternly.
“I don't know, Sir Ferrum. I didn't want to be spanked again, and it made me angry to know you were going to.” She shrugged. “Sometimes I do stupid things.”
He shook his head. “I'm not going to punish you for spitting at me, because I can tell you're sorry for it. But I am going to punish you for talking like a whore in a tavern to the men.”
She sat back from his knee and glared at him, remorse disappearing with her renewed ire. “I am a whore, Sir Ferrum, even if you've taken me from my tavern.”
He grasped her shoulders and gave her a little shake. “No, you're not. You're the Red Fox's Royal Seer.”
She stood up abruptly, her face flaming with anger. “Nay, I'm just a whore, nothing more. You can't make me into something that suits you, just because you've snatched me away from my home and livelihood.”
In less than a breath's time she was upended over his knee, her skirts flung out of the way and his hand lighting into her bare bottom. He spanked her fast and hard, and she thrashed and wriggled to no avail. The sting was horrible. It occurred to her that his hand was no less formidable than his belt when he laid into her this way. She was certain he was spanking with his full strength. On and on he spanked, first striking the right, then the left, then the middle, over and over again. The fire grew hotter and hotter until the need to escape the pain made her frantic.
“You've been given a gift, Dani. You are special. And it is your duty to use that gift for the good of Briton,” he lectured as he spanked.
You are special. Somehow that completely undid her. She was lying in the most humiliating position possible—over a man's lap, with her bottom bared to him, being chastised like a child—and he was telling her she was special. He was not railing at her about spitting in his face in front of all of his men. He was not even scolding her. He was calling her gifted. She had her mouth clamped shut to keep it all in, but when he started smacking her upper thighs a howl escaped her lips. He never paused, just continued spanking away while she lost her control and started to cry. She was sobbing by the time he finished and then lifted her burning bottom onto his lap, holding her close and rubbing her back. For a brief moment she thought to pull away, but the need to be held won out, and she pressed her face into his neck and wept. He held her and stroked her head and arms, kissing the top of her head.
* * *
She was so small and so soft in his arms, and it made his heart ache to see her cry. He doubted this would be her last spanking over this issue—they hadn't really solved anything. She'd gone from submissive to furious in the blink of an eye—he must have said something wrong as usual—and she'd only relented because she'd just had the daylights spanked out of her. When she'd used up her tears, she sat up with downcast eyes. He brushed the hair away from her face and she reached back to touch her loosened braid. “Do you have a comb I may use?” she asked in a wavering voice.
“Aye, in that saddlebag right there,” he directed her. She climbed gingerly off his lap and over to the bag. He hadn't smoothed her skirts down and they were still tucked up in the back, perfectly framing her shapely little bottom, reddened by his hand. He'd had to distract himself from thinking of how beautiful her curves were while he'd been spanking her, and looking now, he felt a prickle of heat and his balls grew tight.
She must have felt the air on her sex when she bent over because she reached back and touched her bottom, then hurriedly threw her skirts back down, casting an embarrassed glance his way. He tried to appear as though he hadn't been looking, but he couldn't look away from her. They stared at one another for a moment, her wide blue eyes showing a vulnerability that made him want to snatch her back up into his arms. Then she broke the trance and turned back to the bag.
She found the comb and unwound the long blond braid, casting a fan of her silvery blond hair down her back and over her shoulders. It was breathtaking in the lamplight—glowing like the finest spun silk. She spent some time tugging at it with the comb before winding it back into the long braid. Then she stood and held up the comb. “May I?”
He was confused at first, but she moved toward him and he realized what she meant. He grunted an assent, hardly able to breathe as she stepped in close to him and began to work on his tangled mop. Her bodice had come untied during the spanking, and it flapped open now so he was able to see the outline of her pert little breasts through her linen shift. The desire to lean forward and nibble at one of them right through the linen was so strong he had to close his eyes until it passed.
She smelled sweet, like honeysuckle.
Her throat was long and slender, adding to her overall delicate appearance. Like a little flower. She finished the side she was combing and moved in front of him, standing between his legs. He almost groaned aloud, directly faced with the open bodice. His hands itched to reach for her waist, to stroke her side, cup her little bottom.
She spent a long time combing out his tangles, standing so close it pained him. When she finished, she circled back around to the front of him to survey her work, and this time he couldn't resist—his hands reached for her of their own accord. He took her by the waist, molding his big hands to the shape of her slim figure and then pulling her gently closer. She did not resist him.
Though he knew he should not, he kept pulling her into him until she perched on his knee. She looked at him with her big blue eyes. He leaned his mouth toward hers slowly, realizing as he did, she was not looking at his scars—she was looking directly into his eyes. It made him pause, hovering over her tantalizing mouth, wondering how this was possible.
“What?” she asked.
He shrugged and gently brushed his lips across hers, feeling electricity pass between them like a bolt of lightning. She sat up taller, lifting her lips to his, and he lost all restraint. He cupped the back of her head, attacking her mouth with his, forcing his tongue between her lips and groaning at the sweetness of her. Her arms twined around his neck, and her tongue thrust back at him, answering his onslaught with her own. She was so small and so soft, yet he felt her resilient strength matching his own brutish force. Her hand wandered to his cheek and he realized suddenly she was tracing his scars. With a sick feeling, he pulled away abruptly, breaking the kiss and shoving her off his knee to stand.
He couldn't look at her. For some reason, he felt as ugly and shameful as he had the first time he'd ever kissed a girl, back when he and Phillip were still boys, and Phillip had arranged it for him. He stood up quickly, rubbing his face as if he might rub the disfigurement away. “I'm sorry,” he grunted, still not looking at her. “That won't happen again.”