Claiming His Human Wife (6 page)

“I know you are,” he replied, still drawing circles with his hand, “and I want you to take this punishment without fighting me like you usually do. Understood?”

“Yes, Edwin,” she said, wanting the whole ordeal to be over with as soon as possible. She just wanted to feel him cradling her in his arms and kissing the top of her head.

“Good,” he said, and delivered a sound smack across her bottom in the next moment. He alternated cheeks, spanking with vigor and not pausing between slaps.

Rhiannon’s bottom was stinging something fierce, but she kept her legs and arms as still as possible while Edwin continued the punishment. She panicked when he began to spank her upper thighs, fearing that she would yield to the pain and begin a struggle against him.

“Spread your thighs,” he commanded. Rhiannon complied, though it was utterly humiliating. Her sex was now on full view and Edwin continued to slap her thighs, paying particular interest to her inner thighs closest to her womanly folds.

Despite the pain, she ached for him to touch her there, tenderly or roughly—it didn’t matter. There was a burning ache between her thighs that sought release. She knew that her lips were probably swollen and gleaming with moisture, betraying her arousal even as he continued to spank her bottom hard.

At some point, Rhiannon noticed Edwin had begun pausing between the slaps, caressing her bottom and upper thighs in between lighter spanks. It was sensual and she understood that the pain was now over, but that didn’t necessarily mean the punishment was. She wondered if she would be forced to spread her bottom cheeks apart so that Edwin could thrust a finger into her bottom hole.

“Spread your thighs even wider apart,” he commanded. Rhiannon opened her legs as much as she could and was pushed farther over Edwin’s lap.

Finally, his fingers reached her moist folds, stroking them gently and swirling upon her sensitive bud. With one hand, he held her folds apart. With the other hand, he stroked and probed her aching womanhood. Rhiannon moaned and resisted the urge to buck against his hand.

Then, Edwin did something that caught Rhiannon by surprise. His probing hand left her folds for a moment, and in the next moment slapped lightly against her throbbing center. She gasped, but not from the pain. It didn’t hurt the way she would’ve imagined. The slight sting proved a most erotic sensation and left her yearning for more. Edwin slapped her sheath lightly with his hand again and again, filling the room with the sound of sticky slaps. Her warm slit was on fire, and she could no longer resist bucking against his punishing hand. The tips of his fingers landed upon her sensitive bud during each slap, bringing her to the edges of ecstasy. Just when she thought she was going to drown in a sweet release, Edwin stopped.

Without a word, he led her to the table. Knowing she deserved the belt, she vowed to take the rest of her punishment without protest. But to her surprise, Edwin laid her down on her back with her legs spread and lifted upon the table. His blue eyes were misted over with darkness, and she wondered if his arousal equaled hers. The bulge inside his leather pants suggested that he was about to take her and pound his manhood into her upon the table without mercy.

When Edwin began to unfasten his belt from around his trim waist, Rhiannon’s feet fidgeted and she stared at him with wide eyes. Surely he wouldn’t use the belt to…

Before she could complete this thought, Edwin spoke. “Spread your folds apart for me and hold perfectly still.”

Rhiannon felt her heart pounding in her chest as she reached down to comply with Edwin’s demands. She held herself open, completely exposed as he held the punishing belt. He stepped closer and trailed the tip of the leather between her breasts until it dangled between her increasingly wet folds.

“I think you’ll find the belt can bring you as much pleasure as it has brought you pain,” he said, lightly snapping the tip of leather against her slit. Rhiannon moaned and bucked through each snap of leather against her moist bud, lost in a haze of unbelievable pleasure.

Edwin leaned closer to her spread folds, creating a steady rhythm of slaps with the tip of the belt until she moaned and bucked under a violent release. Her hands were moved away from her center and she gasped for air. He dropped the belt and trailed kisses along her spread thighs. His eyes flashed as he removed his pants and thrust his stiff manhood deep between her quivering folds. She held onto the edges of the table while he drove in and out of her, until he found his own release and collapsed atop her.

* * * * *

Rhiannon hummed while she brushed her long, black hair in front of the little mirror in the washroom. Edwin had left before sunrise to check the rolabear traps on the other side of the mountain, so she had the liberty to dawdle this morning. The past few days had been glorious since Edwin hadn’t had to leave the cabin thanks to the lucky catch of blue turkeys. While they still had a few turkeys left, he’d announced that the Crigon dream spirits had urged him to check the rolabear traps.

Though she’d been bitter over Edwin’s long hunting trips at one time, she vowed to never allow herself to behave so selfishly again. She thought of all the men from her village in the Land of Zertrin, knowing none of them matched up to Edwin. She was the luckiest woman alive, she decided. It was also a comfort to know she would never know the pain of death since she would walk straight into the immortal world.

Outside, the snow had begun to melt, slowly but surely. Come the short springtime upon the Cold Top, it would be time to complete the trip to Stretta—if Rhiannon carried a child in her womb. She touched her stomach and wondered if she would recognize the signs of being with child. Without the aid of a healer like her grandmother, it would be difficult to know for certain.

Later in the morning, she stood at the window and sent prayers to both Retta and Stretta, the sister goddesses, that she would soon conceive a child.

Edwin returned in the early evening from the rolabear traps on the other side of the mountain, looking deeply troubled.

“The Crigon dream spirits have never before led me astray,” said Edwin. “Yet there were no animals in the traps.”

Rhiannon paused as she knelt to remove his boots. “What do you think this means?”

“I’m not sure. But only two scenarios could explain this incident. Either there is another person who has been banished to the Cold Top and robbed the rolabear traps, or a shapeshifter from the Land of Holon is drawing near and influencing my dream spirits to play tricks on me.”

She felt the blood drain from her cheeks. Neither of those scenarios sounded good. “Which do you think it is?” she asked.

Edwin pulled her up into his lap, surrounding her with his large arms. “I’m not sure. Have your dreams been strange lately?”

“No. Completely normal. Although, I rarely recall any of my dreams. My grandmother always said my dream spirits were scared away when I almost drowned at the bottom of the Yetsin Waterfall.” They both chuckled at her misfortune.

She stroked his face and leaned against him for comfort. The coming days would be hard, much more difficult than they had been previously, she sensed it in her heart.

“Come,” Edwin said, standing Rhiannon up with him. “Let us eat this wonderful meal you have prepared.”

The uncertainty of the danger outside on the Cold Top weighed on her mind, and dinner was a quiet affair. When the meal was cleaned up and Edwin had finished tending the fire for the night and rechecking the locks on the door and all the windows, they sat together on the bearskin bed. Rhiannon felt at peace and protected in her husband’s arms, but his own worry left her nervous. He was the strongest, bravest man she’d ever met, and to see him fret over the future put the danger they faced in perspective.

“I killed five men in the Land of Holon,” Edwin finally said. “A Holon Tracer may be on the Cold Top looking for me. Or a Holon shapeshifter is biding his time, masquerading in my dreams.”

Rhiannon kept her head nestled against Edwin, but she rubbed a hand soothingly against his bare, muscled chest. “Should we leave the Cold Top now?”

“No. The melting seems to have begun, but that’s not to say it won’t snow yet again this season. The true springtime isn’t due for around forty more days,” he said. “It’s best we wait here, lest we run into a snowstorm on the way to Strellia.”

Rhiannon thought for a moment. “Edwin, if I’m not yet with child, what shall we do then? What shall we do if we cannot enter the gates of Strellia?”

Edwin stroked her hair gently and placed a kiss atop her head. “Then we will travel to the abandoned Palace of Lights inside the Whispering Forest. It’s safely far from the Land of Holon, but close enough to Strellia that the journey there will be short once you are with child.”

Stories of the Palace of Lights came back to Rhiannon, along with childhood songs and rumors of the devils who’d taken over the once grand Whispering Forest sprung into her mind. “But the devil spirits,” she said, “Won’t they absorb our souls and turn our bodies to ash?”

Edwin laughed. “Do those from the Land of Zertrin believe every story they hear?”

“So it’s not true?”

“No, not at all. The royal Crigons who once lived in the Whispering Forest and dwelled within the Palace of Lights marched toward Stretta as one to join our waiting ancestors and become immortals with our kin from all the lands of Earth. There was no plague of devils that drove us out. Again, those from the Land of Holon would have you believe such lies.”

A huge weight fell from Rhiannon’s shoulders. Most of the terrifying stories of life outside the Land of Zertrin seemed to be myths perpetuated by those from the Land of Holon. “Why do they spread such lies to us? Why do they wish all in Zertrin to live in fear?” she asked.

Edwin studied her face. “The Land of Zertrin is powerful, but it is not vast. Those from the Land of Holon only fear that your kind will one day seek to expand into their lands, so they spread lies about roaming Crigons and devil spirits to keep you all in a state of fear. The spice traders and hunters who come in contact with the Holon folk are merely unsuspecting instruments in their game of misinformation.”

Rhiannon smiled. “I was so sure all the stories were true. I can’t believe I used to hate Crigons. I can’t believe I once hated you and feared your simple touch.”

With his eyes smoldering, Edwin leaned forward to place his mouth at Rhiannon’s ear. “The only thing you must fear from me is the sting of my hand or belt upon your bottom when you’ve been disobedient.”

Rhiannon shivered and her bottom clenched involuntarily. It had been several days since the last punishment at Edwin’s hands. Her pulse raced when she thought of his belt snapping lightly against her swollen bud upon the table. Before she could respond to Edwin’s threat, she found herself flipped upon her stomach, her dress pulled up to bare her buttocks.

“Edwin?” she asked hesitantly as his hand caressed her mounds. She hadn’t disobeyed him in the least since that last punishment. She thought hard, trying to recall if she’d done anything to offend him during the day.

“Shh!” he commanded. “Stay right there.”

It was hard to obey, but Rhiannon stayed put, even as she felt Edwin’s hand slap her bottom lightly. It stung, but it wasn’t really that painful. He continued to spank her lightly, moving from cheek to cheek and rubbing her bottom in between slaps. Soon Rhiannon found herself burning for Edwin, felt the moisture pooling between her thighs as everything below her waist ached with need.

“Have I done something wrong?” she finally asked.

“No,” replied Edwin as he moved to slap her thighs lightly.

“Then why am I being punished?” It was hard to call it that—a punishment—but Edwin had never once spanked her without her actually deserving it.

“I told you once that I enjoyed spanking you, didn’t I?” he asked.

“Yes,” she answered, suddenly understanding that this was a prelude to lovemaking. She had had no idea husbands and wives partook in such naughty pleasures.

The spanks suddenly became harder, prompting Rhiannon to gasp aloud. She tried to keep still for Edwin, but it was difficult. Her bottom was soon throbbing and she was wriggling underneath his steady hand. Just as she considered begging, his hand moved to stroke her wet folds and the delicate area within. Her hips ground against his ministrations, even as he slipped a finger into her bottom hole, as he often did during a punishment. Rhiannon’s back arched as he built a momentum inside her, using the moisture from her womanly folds as lubrication.

When Edwin shifted his body behind hers, Rhiannon expected him to enter this very hole, as he sometimes did after a belting. But his finger remained submerged in place, even as his manhood entered her moist center. The pleasure was indescribable, and she moaned with abandon and gasped for breaths.

After their simultaneous releases, they fell fast asleep upon the bearskin rug while the fire glimmered into the night.

* * * * *

The melting upon the Cold Top ceased and another snowstorm swept over the lands, leaving it impossible for Edwin to even venture out hunting. Fortunately, they had a decent supply of blue turkeys and a butchered rolabear to survive on. Edwin had also found a huge supply of grains in an abandoned neighboring cabin, so Rhiannon would always be able to bake fresh bread.

“Did you see if there were books in any of the other cabins?” Rhiannon asked over breakfast one morning. She was dying for something to do; perhaps there would be a healing book so that she could continue the studies she had begun under her grandmother.

Edwin took a spoonful of soup but said nothing. Fearful that she had offended him, she immediately lowered her eyes. The last time she’d mentioned books had been right before he’d called her out for murmuring insults and rolling her eyes at him. She looked up quickly, ready to apologize, when she realized he was attempting to suppress a smile.

“What’s so funny?” she asked.

Edwin sat his spoon down and pushed away from the table. “Well, I was going to wait until tomorrow, since it’s your twentieth birthday, but I suppose you can have your present early.”