There is a bite to the wind, but I am a well-insulated person and I’m just so thrilled by my new surroundings I barely notice the cold.
"Where is your house, then?”
“Up over the hill. You cannot see it from here, but from there you can see all over the valley.”
“Like Direview Abbey.”
“This place is even older than Direview.”
He says that with some pride. I gather that there must be some cachet in having a particularly old and impressive place to live among these so-called brothers.
“Who else is there? Do you have house demons, like Bryn?”
“I would not be caught calling her a house demon,” Thor says. “My mother lives there.”
“Aw, that’s sweet. You look after your old mum.”
“My mother would not be pleased to hear you describe her as old.”
"Oh, so she’s a cool, young mum? A milf?”
Thor's expression is one of pure horror at the term milf. I cannot help cracking up. What a lark this all is.
“You should have warned me you were taking me home to mummy dearest,” I tell him. “I’m not exactly mum safe.”
“Try to be polite. Or at least sane," he says. “She's seen more than you can imagine, and she knows everything you want to know. She could be your greatest ally. Or, if you choose to make an enemy of her, she’ll be useless to you.”
“So you’re saying I should be on my best behavior and try to make a good impression.”
“Can you do that?”
“No. Not really.”
He sighs and palms his face. "You are such a brat. There are not enough thrashings in the universe for you.”
The carriage rocks on its suspension as he drags me over his lap in a last-ditch effort to make me compliant.
“Oh yeah, spank me!”
I feel him hesitate and can’t hide a smile. He’s so easily manipulated. If he thinks I like being thrashed, he's liable to stop it.
“You’re… impossible,” he growls. “How am I supposed to get a grip on you when you absolutely refuse to be…"
“Gripped?” I fill in his words hopefully.
His palm descends on my ass in a solid smack.
“Fuck, yes!”
He spanks me harder. Hard enough to make it impossible to pretend to be unaffected by it.
“Fuck!” I curse one word, and I mean it. My ass is suddenly blazing with heat and aching intensely. Thor repeats that same stroke again and again, making his bloody point with my pain.
“You're going to be respectful, obedient, and lawful. And if you’re not, you can expect to experience pain like this a thousand times over. Direview belongs to the Brotherhood. This place belongs to my family, and you will not sully it by being a…”
“Slattern?”
“Brat,” he finishes, slapping me so hard I cannot offer another word. All I can offer is a cry of pain as the carriage turns and begins to ascend at a quicker pace. The horses like to go faster uphill, for some reason. I guess they like making things harder for themselves, or maybe its the driver making them work harder. I didn't catch sight of them before. I wonder who it is. A demon? No. I doubt it. The world can’t be full of helpful demons turning up at useful interludes. I do miss Crichton already. Funny how you can get attached to someone who saves your life.
I am much more out on a limb now. I am at Thor’s mercy. And he has never been interested in mercy. I think I have gotten lucky, in a manner of speaking, because I have given him so much trouble. He can't keep up with all the insane events he's had to respond to. But there’s a silence out here, a quietness among these barren lands that concerns me. This is a place where people get their comeuppances.
He finally stops spanking when we arrive. My first view of the house is one from a low angle, and with an ache that will stay with me for some time. It is impressive. Of course it is. There is nothing about this man that does not impress.
Thor’s Norwegian home is stunning but heavy and imposing in the same way Direview was. It’s like the Norwegian cousin to the abbey. There is a spire and a tower, not to mention multiple high, gabled walls. Much like Direview, it is oversized and unnecessary unless one has a small army, which I am willing to bet Thor does not.
It strikes me suddenly, though it should have struck me before. It didn't, though, because Direview is such a run down, semi-abandoned, demon-infested mess of a ruin that I never really thought of the inhabitants as being rich. But the private plane and the carriage and the mansion cannot be ignored.
“You are fucking loaded. You could have wired home for money when I took your hammer. You could have paid me ten thousand pounds without it mattering at all. You could have stopped me from becoming a murderer.”