A Short Leash (7 page)

There was a large tree next to the house. It stood twenty times taller than Sierra at least and was clothed in thick branches covered in smooth bark. To a citizen it was just a leaf-dropping inconvenience; to Sierra it was a stairway to the stars.

She ran to it, planning to scoot the ten or so feet to the first branch, take hold of it and propel herself up from there onto the roof of Master Kade’s house. That would show him. She grabbed hold of the trunk, wrapped her arms about a third of the way around it, and put her feet to the bark. In the past she would have been able to haul herself up it easily with a run-up, but she found her hands slipping and her feet scrabbling and instead of a grand ascent she slid unceremoniously down onto her sore bottom, landing with a yelp at Kade’s feet.

“You might try listening to me and believing what I say,” he said mildly. “You will need training to get back to your old strength.”

Sierra’s eyes filled with tears, not because the landing had hurt, but because she had lost so much more than she realized. Her health, her looks, and even her strength.

“Don’t worry,” he said, reaching down to run his fingers through her hair in a way that soothed her. “You will be back to your old self before you know it. Your mind remembers how to do these things and your muscles do too, they just need a little more care.”

She nodded and blinked back the tears. She was tired of crying and feeling sorry for herself. It was time to work, not whine.

“There is more to be done,” Kade said. “I’m going to train you as a house pet, so you will be able to have the run of the house and have as much freedom as possible as well as being able to perform basic chores.”

Sierra snorted. “I have long dreamed of performing basic chores,” she said, her voice dripping with heavy sarcasm. “Do you think, if I work very hard, I might one day be able to make beds and clean floors?”

Kade lifted a brow at her, suddenly looking quite stern. Sometimes she forgot the real nature of their relationship—him as master, her as pet—because he was friendly and gentle most of the time. But he could remind her without a word. All it took was body language and energy to let her know that she was getting ahead of herself.

She looked up at him, then down at the ground. Annoyance began to set in. She did not want to be a house pet. She had no interest in chores, or anything to do with the way citizens lived.

“Sierra, I can feel your defiance from here,” Kade drawled. “I think you might need a nap. There has been a lot of excitement today.”

“I am not sleepy and I am not tired,” Sierra refused. “I am unhappy, and I don’t think sleep will fix that.”

“It may not, but going to your room will prevent you from getting into trouble,” he said. “You’re heading for it, Sierra, and I don’t want to have to smack that bottom of yours right now. I don’t think you’d like that very much.”

“I don’t think I like anything very much,” Sierra replied. “I haven’t liked anything in a long time and I am tired of not liking things. I am not going to be a pet anymore. I am my own person and I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to.”

“Sierra,” Master Kade said. “Everyone has to do things they don’t want to do. Life is made up in large part of doing things we don’t want to do. For instance, I don’t want to have to take my best leather to your behind, but if you don’t check your attitude I will do it anyway.”

Sierra set her features in a scowl and stayed where she was, her buttocks safely pressed against the ground.

“I’ll leave you out here for a little bit,” Master Kade said. “Maybe the outdoors will calm you down. Remember, stay away from the fences.”

He went inside and almost instantly Sierra crept to the fence line, looking over her shoulder to make sure Master Kade was not watching. He would almost certainly punish her for disobedience. When she was certain that he was not watching, she touched the fence and was promptly kicked by an unseen horse. Swearing, she retreated from the wire, clutching at her hand. There was definitely no horse in sight, but something had dealt her a serious whack.

Sierra tried the fence again with much the same result. It was more painful the second time around. She pressed one hand to the other and swore vengeance against the invisible beast beating her. She knew somehow this had to be connected to Kade, so she sought him out to tell him precisely what she thought of his aggressive fences. She found him inside the house, watching one of the moving pictures citizens enjoyed so very much.

“That was mean!”

“Hmm?” He raised a brow at her.

“Your compound is attacking me,” she frowned, rubbing her hand against her thigh.

“You’ll have to be a little more precise, Sierra.”

“The fence kicked me. You made it kick me.”

“The fence is electrified, Sierra, that’s why I told you to stay away from it. Which you clearly didn’t. You must be getting your strength back; you’re becoming extremely defiant.” He patted his lap. “Come here,” he said. “It’s time for you to go over my lap, my girl.”

Sierra did not agree that it was time to go over his lap. She thought it was time to go back outside and make another attempt at climbing the tree. Propelled by the desire to avoid a spanking, she managed to actually make it up into the lower branches, an achievement she followed with a loud shout of triumph.

Master Kade came out and stood below, his arms folded over his chest as he looked up at her. “Well,” he said. “Looks like you just needed the right motivation. Don’t think this means you’re out of trouble.”

“I’m not in trouble,” Sierra said. “Because I’m not going to come down. I’m going to live up here.”

“Sierra, don’t be ridiculous,” he said, his tone lowering as he became serious. She was learning something about him. He truly did not like to be disobeyed. “If I have to get you down from there, you’re not going to be a happy pet.”

“I’m not a happy pet now!”

It wasn’t entirely true. Sierra was experiencing her first rush of physical prowess in a long time. She had almost forgotten how good it felt to be able to move throughout the world with grace and speed, and to look down on those who weren’t as gifted.

“Sierra. Down. Now.”

She might have obeyed the order if she thought there was any way he could enforce his will, but she was well out of his reach. Walking along the edge of the roof, she let her foot dangle over the side with each alternate step.

Master Kade did not say anything more. He went back inside the house and Sierra clapped her hands, thinking she had won. Oh, how wonderful it was to be a little more powerful than the man who was master.

She was mid-step in a little victory dance when hard hands clamped onto her from behind, one on the back of her neck and the other on her hip.

“Next time I tell you to come down, you come down,” he said, slapping her bottom hard. His palm cracked across her cheeks several more times, making her feet dance against the rooftop as she emitted a squealing sound.

“Do you understand me?” He gave her a little shake, turning her to face him. “I will not tolerate disobedience,” he informed her. “I especially will not tolerate defiance.”

Butt stinging, pride wounded, Sierra was not in the mood to meekly agree with the man holding her. She didn’t know how he’d managed to get up on the roof, but getting up on the roof was not the only feat she was capable of. With a swift bite to his wrist, Sierra managed to get Kade to loosen his grip long enough for her to make an escape back down the tree. Now he was on the roof with an angry red mark on his wrist and she was on the ground, rubbing her bottom.

“How long do you want to play this game, Sierra?” Kade growled the question down at her, his looming presence more intimidating than a crouching mountain lion. “You’re in very, very big trouble, my pet. I would not suggest making it any worse.”

“I don’t want to be in trouble,” Sierra said. “So I will not be.”

“That’s not how it works.”

“Yes, it is. If you can decide that I’m in trouble, I can decide that I’m not.”

Master Kade’s expression performed antics of confusion alternating with annoyance and eventually settled on stern. He turned and walked back out of her sight. Sierra backed away from the house and tree, not sure where Master Kade was likely to reappear. He seemed to have all sorts of secret ways of getting about the place; he had certainly materialized on the roof almost silently.

When he didn’t appear immediately, Sierra crouched and waited. He was coming. He had to be coming.

Almost fifteen minutes later she realized that he was not coming. She looked in through the house windows and saw him sitting on the couch. He was working with something in his hands, but other than that he was not so much as looking at her.

Another fifteen minutes later Sierra pushed through the door and looked at him, maintaining a careful distance. “What are you doing?”

“Waiting for you to come receive your punishment.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because you know you deserve it,” he said. “Because you know you’ve been a bad girl and you know you’re due a spanking. When you’re ready, come tell me.”

Sierra squirmed in the doorway. It was somehow more difficult when he wasn’t chasing her down. She didn’t know what to do with herself; she certainly wasn’t going to take herself over to him and let him punish her.

Kade did not pay any further attention to her. He went about his business as usual, made a meal as always, and even served a portion for her. She was a little reluctant to come eat it lest he grabbed her and started spanking her, but he showed no sign of doing that.

They ate together in silence. Sierra had never noticed how much they chatted in their everyday life. Each meal was accompanied by a conversation on some matter or another, usually a debate on the life of a citizen vs the life of a wild one. But Kade did not say so much as a word to her and she was not inclined to try to start a conversation that he would not entertain.

“When you’re finished, you can go to your room,” he said, breaking the silence. “Unless you’re ready to face your punishment.”

“What if I said I was sorry?” She looked at him under her lashes, hoping he might relent.

“You’d be lying,” he replied. “You’re not going to be sorry until we’re done, and you’re not going to be properly forgiven until I’ve dealt with this matter. You bit me, Sierra. You put your teeth on me. You don’t ever do that.”

There was something in his voice she didn’t like. It wasn’t anger, and it wasn’t frustration. It was something else, something almost sad but not quite. Disappointment. He was disappointed with her. The realization hit Sierra like a rock. From the moment she’d arrived he had cared for her and implicit in that care was a kind of approval. He exuded warmth that she didn’t even notice until the very moment it went missing.

A little whimper rose to her lips as she finished the last bite of her meal. He ignored it, choosing to clean up the plates as Sierra sat on her stool and wished she’d never misbehaved in the first place. She especially regretted biting him, as he seemed to be most upset by that.

“What will you do?”

“Give you exactly what you deserve,” he said, washing the remnants of food from the plates. “I’m going to give you a taste of leather.”

“You’re going to make me eat leather?”

The dimple in his cheek made a brief appearance. “No, I’ll strap your disobedient backside with a leather strop until I’m satisfied you’ve learned your lesson.”

“You would do that to me?”

“I won’t enjoy it, Sierra, but I will do it. What you did today wasn’t acceptable. I need to know that you’ll obey me when you’re not under my direct control. I need to know I can keep you safe, and I can’t do that if you think it’s funny to disobey me.”

“But I climbed the tree,” she pouted. “Isn’t that good?”

“It’s good for your muscles,” he replied. “It’s not going to be good for your hide. Go bend over the back of the couch. I will tend to you when I have tended to these dishes.”

Sensing that this was an opportunity to get back on his good side, Sierra got up from her seat and walked obediently over to the back of the couch. She sat on the back rather than bending over it, but that was better than not going there at all and she figured he might be happy about that.

He looked over his shoulder and made a swirling motion with his finger. Clearly sitting on the back of the couch was not in fact the same as bending over it. She reluctantly let her feet down until they touched the floor, then turned around and bent over the back of the couch, her hands on the soft cushion. The position was more comfortable than she’d thought it was going to be. The back of the couch was well padded and she could swing her legs back and forth in a way that was somewhat amusing.

“Stay still,” Kade said, a growl in his voice, but the glimmer of a smile on his face. He was having a hard time staying angry at her. Sierra hoped that would translate into clemency later on.

She stilled her legs and held position, waiting for the clinking of dishes to stop and the smacking to start. It was not a pleasant wait. She did not like the idea of tasting leather, even if she was going to be tasting it with her butt.

“Good girl,” he said, some of the warmth returning to his voice. He seemed to genuinely appreciate her submission. Finishing the dishes, he crossed over to her and patted her bottom with affection. “When this is over, we will start over again,” he said. “And you will have learned something important.”

“I will have learned that annoying you is a bad idea. I already knew that.”

“You will have learned how very important it is to obey me,” he said, peeling her panties down over her hips to bare her bottom. His hand landed shortly thereafter in a harsh slap, which was followed by many, many more. Kade wasted no more time in conversation; the spanking had begun in earnest and his hand was moving in a blur, whacking her cheeks so hard and so fast Sierra didn’t feel the swats as separate slaps but as one continuous burning heat.

She let out a yowl, but that did not stop the punishment. It went on and on until her bottom felt as though it burned as hot as the sun. She kicked and wriggled and squirmed, but Kade showed her no leniency at all as he spanked her to a crescendo of whimpering and sniffling.