Chapter 101 Wonderful.

Chapter 101: 101 Wonderful.

"Master! I require your entire morning! Just us! Nobody else! I have things to show you and feelings to express and possibly some crying to do, and I would prefer to handle all of it before dinner!"

Well that was an interesting wakeup call.

Ayra was sitting at the foot of the bed in full combat gear when I opened my eyes.

Granted, her combat gear was more anime waifu attire than anything that actually appeared logically defensive, but still.

Her war hammer was propped against the bedpost and her floppy ears were almost standing straight up, but her tail was completely still.

In my weeks of knowing Ayra, I’d seen happy, excited, scared, and sleepy versions of that tail, but I’d rarely seen it just stop.

Through the emotional bond, I felt what was underneath all that enthusiasm, and it wasn’t the same insanity I’d gotten used to.

It was something quieter and more solemn, I guess is how I’d describe it.

She needed something from me today, and whatever it was, the routine couldn’t deliver it.

Elsa mumbled a protest from her fortress of pillows and golden hair.

Juniper opened one crimson eye, assessed the situation, and closed it again.

She gave a tiny nod against her pillow as a sort of permission for me to abandon the Siberian sleep system.

"Yeah," I said, stretching and sitting up. "Let’s do... that."

We threw together some breakfast quickly and headed outside, leaving helpings behind for the others whenever they decided to rise and shine.

The late autumn morning was cold enough for a jacket, but I didn’t bother.

I was a pretty tough cookie these days, and that apparently extended to weather hardiness.

Ayra walked beside me instead of bouncing ahead or trailing behind, and the silence between us was comfortable in an almost new way.

She led me to the open field where the portals usually manifested.

The grass was still flattened from last night’s fight, dark stains marking where the monster of the evening had dissolved.

"I want to show you something I don’t show people, Master! And before you ask, it is not my bottom this time!"

She picked up her war hammer and held it at her side with the head resting on the ground. "Yet, anyway. Now watch very carefully, because I’m only doing this once and I expect to be praised extensively afterward!"

She went at it for a solid twenty minutes, and I’m not exaggerating when I say it was the most technically impressive martial demonstration I’d ever witnessed.

Ayra ran through form after form, each one rolling into the next without pause.

The hammer spun, arced, and crashed through invisible opponents, and every movement looked like it could kill you—but also like she could do it in her sleep.

Her body moved so precisely that I found my eyebrows properly raised for much of the duration.

It was nothing like how she fought during our chaotic midnight portal battles, though that didn’t really surprise me.

Training drills and reality rarely mixed when it came to the martial arts, but the more I watched the more I did see familiar moves in her display.

She finished the final form, planted the hammer, and looked at me.

She wasn’t even breathing hard.

"Ayra, that was incredible." I meant every syllable of it. "Good girl."

"Thank you, master!" She giggled sweetly. "I wanted you to understand something about me that I don’t think you did until now."

I arched an eyebrow at her quizzically. "I was just about to ask why you were showing me this all of a sudden."

"You see, master, I was the best in my generation. The High Priestess said I had hands blessed by the Moon Mother herself."

Her ears lifted halfway. "But she worried about me because I have an unusual disposition."

"I see."

"I got the feeling that you looked at Elsa and Juniper differently. Like, you understood why they were part of the party, but not me."

Her tail gave its first twitch since the demonstration started, and she sat down in front of me, patting the ground a moment later.

"I never thought that," I said, sitting down across from her. The grass was cold and slightly damp, but I didn’t care. "I do wonder about... your masochism, though, if I’m honest. It’s a little unusual, that’s all. So if you’re getting judgy vibes from me, it has nothing about your utility as a party or your role as one of its maidens," I clarified, patting her on the head. "I just don’t really know how to handle the, uh, spanking requests sometimes."

She blushed. "I am different from others in my clan. I was drawn to surrender from the time I was a pup. Not because I was weak! I was so strong, Master. I could out-fight, out-heal, and out-train every female in my age cohort. I once broke a training dummy so hard it flew through the temple wall and struck the High Priestess in the bosom!"

She clasped her hands together and her eyes went huge and glistening. "But when I imagined my future, I didn’t picture myself standing over a kneeling mate. I pictured someone powerful standing over me. Someone strong and unafraid to brutalize my rump in the name of love. And then for some reason everyone called me a deviant, a pervert, and I had to do laps of the temple on all fours as punishment, which, I must confess, I enjoyed a little. Oh, the vicious abuse I suffered! Pah-tooey!"

She spat at the ground.

I stared at her for a good five seconds, trying to figure out what to say.

"Did you just say they made you do laps on all fours as punishment for wanting to be submissive?"

"Yes! Of course there was no man until you that I would ever dream to call my master, but I wasn’t secretive about my aspirations. They thought running laps would humiliate me into compliance!"

Her tail started wagging proudly. "It did not work even a little! My hindquarters were so strong by the end of it, Master. You could bounce a coin off my succulent peach of a bottom. Go on! Try!"

She turned around and lifted her skirt, presenting her naked ass in a very familiar way.

I rubbed the back of my neck. "I’ll take your word for it."

Still beaming, she sat back down. "They called me names," she continued, and her tail went still again. Her voice got quieter too, and the happy-go-lucky tone dropped out of it. "The other pups, the instructors... even the High Priestess once when she thought I couldn’t hear. ’Defective Ayra, who wants to be a pet instead of a predator.’ I heard it through the temple wall."

She looked down at her hammer and traced one of the runes.

I didn’t say anything to that. Sometimes you just shut up and let somebody have their moment, and this was one of those times, I figured.

"But then!" She looked up at me and the brightness snapped right back on, just like that. "Seer Morvain’s chrono crystal chose me for the Hero’s Party, and nobody dared argue with the crystal! I was fated! I was necessary! For the first time in my life, someone wanted me exactly as I was!"

Her tail was going again, picking up speed. "And then I crossed dimensions and met you, and you were the person I’d been imagining since I was a pup. Strong, evil, cruel, wicked, and in possession of hands that deliver the most righteous and devastating spankings the Moon Mother has ever witnessed!"

"I’m sure she’s very proud," I said, because what do you even say to that? "For the record, I’m not evil or cruel."

"I know you aren’t, Master, and I would never suggest otherwise!"

I was getting whiplash from all the mid-conversation contradictions, but before I could make sense of it, Ayra grabbed my hand with both of hers and leaned forward. "Master, you set a safe word and asked about my boundaries before viciously abusing my firm yet supple bubble booty. Your cruelty and wickedness knows no bounds, and I loathe to serve at your whim, but you are also the kindest and most gentle man in all the world to me."

My eyes narrowed as my head started hurting. "I cannot follow what you’re saying, Ayra, but sure."

"What matters is that I know I’m right to love you."

She squeezed my hand, and underneath all the bouncing and barking, the bond was showing me something different. The frenzied energy had faded, and what I was getting from her now was just gratitude. "I think you know I’m putting on a show most of the time. The routine, the ’Pah-tooey!’ thing, presenting my gloriously round and juicy buttocks at every possible opportunity while playing your unwitting victim. I never tire of our game."

Her tail slowed to a gentle wag. "But the thing that matters most is that I know that underneath all your brazen cruelty and hateful words and deeds, somewhere deep in your cold, dark heart, there is a speck of love for me."

I squeezed her hand back. "It’s more than a speck," I agreed. "Again, though, I need to be clear that I’m not abusive."

"Oh yes, so very abusive! And I would happily receive ten thousand spankings from you and nobody else, though I loathe your harsh hands so! Pah-tooey!" she spat.

Her eyes were genuinely wet now, which was a hell of a thing to witness in the context of this conversation.

She threw her arms around me and pressed her face into my chest. "I just want to say thank you, Master. Despite how much I hate you and your evil domination over me, I love you very much—more than anything."

I wrapped my arms around her because honestly, what else was I going to do?

She was insane but she was also, very clearly, baring her heart for me, for better or worse.

And yeah, okay, maybe I was erect, but so what?

Anyway, if you took two seconds to actually think about it, Ayra wasn’t even that weird.

People liked what they liked, and Ayra liked what she liked, and the Packlands could eat my ass for making her feel bad about it.

So she was mentally ill–so what? She was my mentally ill dog, and she deserved love.

And abuse.

No, I mean—well, it’s complicated, but you get it.

By this time her tail went still against my back, and the bond confirmed what I could already feel in her breathing.

She’d finally stopped running hot, and what I was getting now was just plain old peace.

We sat like that for a while. I held her and she let me, and it was very nice.

When she finally pulled back, her eyes were bright and her tail started up again at a reasonable speed. "Can we stay out here for a while, master?"

"Yeah. We can do that."

"Wonderful! I shall lay my head in your lap and you shall stroke my hair, and if your hand accidentally wanders to my bottom, I shall endure whatever dastardly, hateful actions you have planned with great—"

"Ayra."

"Right. Just the hair for now. Arf!"