Chapter Text
It’s not a retreat , Ellen told herself. Castle Leoch is still my home, where else would I go? Dougal can order me back inside all he wants, it’s of no consequence.
But, I meant it. I willna let him have the satisfaction…
She knew very well what sort of satisfaction her brother got from gaining any sort of physical dominance. Dougal latched on early to the idea of playing to one’s strengths. Indeed, it was brute strength which had always been where he shined, so Ellen couldn’t really blame him when he followed those instincts.
Marching back toward the castle, cutting through the tall grass off the path, Ellen kept her head high and jaw resolute. She could feel her brother’s eyes burning into her back, and that was just as well.
After their all-too-brief meeting, Brian Fraser and the odd Sassenach servant girl he’d sent to fetch Ellen from the castle had disappeared between the trees and into the black night. There was no way in Hell she would give any sign that her guts were churning in fear, but thanks be to God, the sound of Dougal’s boots crunching on the grass behind her meant he was following her, and not them.
It was a victory, but a brief and minor one. His threat to take a strap to her if she did not get back inside was not toothless. She knew he was mad enough to try to goad her into confrontation, and both knew who would be overpowering whom in the end. That was why Ellen nearly jumped out of her own skin when her brother caught up to her in a few long strides and got a death grip on her upper arm.
“Let go, ye great, rock-heided beast!” Ellen shrieked, trying to yank her arm away, but failing miserably as Dougal pulled her closer to his side and resumed the quick-paced march across the field with a minimal breaking of his stride.
“Ye like to think I’d take some pleasure in giving ye a proper skelped arse,” Dougal growled in her face, forcing each word out with precise articulation.
“And you would not be entirely wrong about it.”
Ellen stumbled across the uneven ground as she struggled to keep up with his long strides, while also continuing to wrench and jerk against his grasp on her upper arms.
“So that’s it, then? Ye’d beat me just because you are allowed?” She panted, outraged.
The sudden stop almost had Ellen sprawled in the dirt. Dougal’s face came within an inch of hers, the moonlight reflecting an iron fury in his narrowed eyes.
“We’ll get one thing straight here and now, Ellen Mackenzie,” he said, firing every word like a pistol blast. “If I were to redden your backside, I would have plenty of reason for it beyond my own satisfaction.”
Ellen tried to turn her head away in defiance, and Dougal gave his sister a hard shake.
“I dinna ken what yer scheming or playing at, being out after dark, but the innocent act can stop right here! Not being where ye should be has caused more than enough mischief already. Now, I spoke plainly, I’ll have enough of this.”
Without further eloquence, Dougal released his grasp on her arms. Ellen barely had time to blink before he seized her again, this time snaking one arm around her waist and another at the back of her legs, boosting her over his broad shoulder like a sack of corn.
Ellen shrieked incoherently, kicking out at the air in front of him, to little effect other than flipping the tails of her outer coat over her head. “Let go of me! Na bi a’ cluich gu garbh rium , a bhrathair! ”
The flat of her brother’s palm came down upon the back of her skirts with a solid impact. It just barely crossed the line into hurting her, but Ellen thrashed and roared in outrage as if she were a wildcat in a snare.
“A mhic na galladh! Marbhaidh mi thu!”
Dougal tugged at the bunches of her skirts, spreading the layers of petticoats across the wide curve of her hips as they were forced to an angle over his shoulder. Presenting a smoother target now, he delivered half a dozen more ringing slaps to Ellen’s bottom. He kept an inescapable grip on her upper thighs and balanced her weight on his shoulder, bracing for her mindless resistance. After a few seconds of flailing, during which she lost a shoe, Ellen let out a deflated groan, and slowed her kicking.
“I’ll stop to do that every five yards between here and your bedchamber, if I must,” he promised. “Do yourself the favor, and yield.”
Still not ready to do anyone any favors, Ellen balled her fists and pummeled Dougal’s back, too outraged to have much aim or effect, but making one good, solid contact with his left kidney. His knee wobbled beneath them, nearly collapsing both siblings in a heap on the grass. With a grunt like a laboring cow, Dougal steadied himself and did not lose his grip on his sister.
True to his word, he covered about five yards in a few long strides and paused again. “I’m not the one you want to be testing, mo phiuthar !”
Six more sharp blows across the fleshiest parts of her upturned backside came down from his massive hand, the thudding crack of each one rattling through the air into Ellen’s ears. That was enough to lay a good sting, and the humiliation no longer seemed worth the fight.
Ellen decided to save her strength. It would do little good, anyway. While an excellent horsewoman and generally braw, Ellen’s father never placed expectations of strength and competence in physical combat upon her, while it had been non-negotiable for her brothers. To try to outmatch her brother, the newly-minted War Chief, in a purely physical fight would be madness. Tears stung her eyes, fury at being so helpless in Dougal’s clutches welling up inside her until she feared she’d burst.
“Do what ye must, then, ye great dog!” Ellen muttered, then fell silent to the sound of crunching grass beneath the thudding of Dougal’s boots.
God only knows what he’d do back at the castle, but he’d made his intentions clear about what would happen if they remained outside, wasting time in a ludicrous, one-sided combat. The ache in her bottom from the blows of his hand was beginning to bloom into a mildly radiant warmth under the skin, and her matching pink rage rose up into the curses crossing her mind.
One day, brother , Ellen thought wickedly, may ye one day be no more than skewered meat on a dirk!
…………………
(part two coming soon!)