Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Yule
My heart dropped further into my stomach with every sentence of her explained confession. When she finished, she was sobbing, and instead of comforting her, I could only manage to stare as I processed the enormity of what she’d done.
Of course the fact that I wasn’t saying anything only made her cry harder.
“I’m so so so s-sorry. I didn’t mean to ruin Christmas. I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t know. I promise I wasn’t trying to be naughty. I just wanted to help!”
“Oh, little elf.” I finally shook myself out of my shocked trance and tried my best to offer comfort. But comfort wasn’t what came out of my mouth. “Rolling snowballs, baby. That’s quite an avalanche of problems you’ve created.”
“I knoooow,” she wailed. “I’m the worst Mrs. Claus ever!
I don’t deserve to wear the apron. Your parents probably hate me.
And the elves! The elves are going to be pissed!
They’ll never forgive me, ever, and if there’s no Christmas, what will they even do?
Where will they live? I’m going to be solely responsible for hundreds of homeless, jobless elves! ”
Oh dear. She was on a whole spiral, and the worst part was, she wasn’t even wrong. If we couldn’t fix it, and get Mrs. Claus’ name off the naughty list, the ramifications would be catastrophic, not just here at the North Pole, but all over the world.
With three days until Christmas, I had enough to do, but this took priority. It needed my full attention. First things first: I needed to stop the spiral and get Crystal calmed down enough to where we could solve the problems at hand.
“Baby.” She kept crying.
“Sweetie.” She cried harder.
“Little elf.” I cupped her face with both hands and made her look in my eyes. “I promise you, we’re gonna fix this.”
“What… if… we… c-can’t?” The words stuttered out on puffs of air.
“We can. Shhh. Shhh. I promise we can. We have the Christmas magic, remember?” I winked at her, and by some miracle, she started to calm down and rested her head against my chest while I stroked her hair.
“I was trying to help,” she explained brokenly.
“The list has you so stressed all the time, and you didn’t even have time to try to fix it.
So I thought if I could just peek at it, I might be able to figure out a way.
” She’d said all this already, but she seemed to need to say it again, so I just let her.
“Mmmmhmm. Your heart was in the right place. But how did your name end up on the naughty list?”
“I put it there.” The admission was a broken whisper.
“If I couldn’t solve the problem and give you more free time, I figured I could at least get some time.
I miss you.” Her voice pitched into a wail.
“It was so stupid and selfish. I don’t know what I was thinking, except I wasn’t really thinking. I was just doing.”
“It’s okay. We got our time together, and you’re right, I have been too stressed out, and I did need a break. I feel mostly better now.” And it was true. I did feel better. Or at least as better as one could feel when one’s wife was on the naughty list.
“But now… now everything is ruined.” It was a husky whisper, not a wail, and tinged with hope. Hope that I was right, and that as I’d been promising, I, as her Santa Daddy, could fix it.
“We can fix it,” I repeated. “But you know I’m going to have to spank you.”
I didn’t expect an argument, and I didn’t get one. “I want you to!” she cried, jumping off my lap and starting to strip. “I need you to. I deserve to be punished for my selfish, thoughtless stupidity.”
Hearing such words out of my pretty wife’s mouth about herself made me cringe. She was right, she deserved to be punished, but more than that, she needed to be. Otherwise, she wasn’t going to forgive herself, or accept my forgiveness, or anyone else's.
And it couldn’t just be any old spanking either, it had to be the granddaddy mother of all spankings. One she would never forget.
I had to use Santa Daddy’s belt. With a sigh, I stood, my hands going to my waist, as I unbuckled the thick strap of leather. Crystal froze, her gaze meeting mine, her whole body shuddering. Then she nodded. “It worked last time. So that means it’ll work this time, too, right?”
“Right.” I nodded too, but I didn’t feel quite as confident as I sounded. There was no precedent for this. Mrs. Claus was not supposed to be on the list at all. But for her to be on the naughty list now that we were married was unheard of.
She’d made some mistakes, but she didn’t deserve it, and I knew that I would do my level best to get her name off, no matter what it took. Her heart truly had been in the right place.
“Okay, little elf. Do you need to use the restroom first? Drink some water? Do anything? We might be here for a while.”
She groaned, then tipped her head to the side, considering. After a moment, she rushed down the hall, only to return a few minutes later. “Okay,” she said, “I’m ready now.”
“Good girl.” I sat back down on the couch, and patted my lap. When she was close enough, I took her hand and guided her over my knees.
Her bottom was still mottled with tiny pink splotches from the night before, and it would be red-hot and swollen before the morning was over. I rubbed my hand over the still cool flesh, then gave each cheek a gentle squeeze.
“Daddy’s little elf has been very, very naughty,” I lectured, my tone stern.
“Messing with top-secret North Pole documents, lying to Daddy, trying to erase evidence of your naughties, sneaking out, using magic for nefarious purposes. All of those things alone are enough to get you on the naughty list. And this spanking should be what gets you off. Are you ready?”
“Yes, Daddy.” She was already sniffling, and the sound of her quiet cries made my heart clench in my chest. She’d be sobbing by the time we were done.
With nothing else to do, but warm up her bottom for my belt, I lifted my arm into the air.
Crystal
I was crying before Yule’s hard hand exploded across the center of my bottom, and I was already so distraught, I welcomed the pain. Craved the absolution that I knew would come with it. That didn’t mean, of course, that it didn’t suck.
His hard hand came across my bottom like an onslaught, swat after swat after swat with his paddle-like hand, and I knew this was just the warmup. When it came to the naughty list, there was no absolution without Daddy’s belt.
How had I messed everything up so severely when I’d just wanted to help?
I’d hated seeing him so stressed out and exhausted all the time, complaining about outdated systems with no time to try to fix them.
And yeah, changing the list to put my name on it had been selfish, but I’d just wanted some attention, some time.
I hadn’t wanted to cause a whole avalanche of problems. But I apparently had, and I felt awful.
Awful enough that I managed to stay stoic over his lap while he warmed up my ass with his hand, a flurry of incessant smacks, in one spot, and then another.
I could feel the skin getting warm, could feel the pain taking root deep in the muscles.
But I stayed still, and took each crushing blow across my bottom, because I owed him penance and I didn’t know how else to give it.
And then he started lecturing. That’s when I broke. The tears fell faster, harder, as I took in the agony his voice, the pain he felt at having to punish me so sternly.
“Babygirl. I am so sorry you felt so neglected that you felt you had to go to such extreme lengths to get my attention. Knowing that breaks my heart, but you are Mrs. Claus now, Santa’s wife.
Actions have consequences you couldn’t even begin to comprehend.
Things you’d never think of and I’d never expect you to think of.
So you must be careful, you must be mindful.
You cannot use Christmas magic for nefarious purposes, you cannot use things that belong to the elves without asking permission, you cannot alter the naughty list, and you cannot, must not lie to Daddy. ”
“I knowwww,” I cried, my tears soaking his velvet pants. “I’m sorry, Santa Daddy. I was just wanting to help, and then it all went sideways.”
“I know babygirl. Things often do. You know what they say: The road to heck is paved with good intentions.” His voice dropped an octave. “I know you had good intentions, but you were very naughty.”
“I’m sorry!” I cried again, as he peppered the entire surface of my bottom with more hard swats. By the time he finished, I was limp, heartbroken, tear-stained, and very, very sorry. My ass was throbbing.
And I still had a date with Daddy’s belt.
He rubbed my aching butt, with his warm hands, massaging the tortured flesh and told me how good I was doing, then stood with me still in his arms, when I’d expected him to order me up and over the arm of the couch.
Instead, he flipped me over so I was facing him, grabbed his belt, and carried me up the stairs to our bedroom.
Once inside, the reprieve ended. Yule went full stern Santa Daddy mode. “Over the end of the bed, ass up over a pillow.”
Despite my burning ass and knowing that it was about to get a lot worse, I scurried to obey.
A moment later, Yule was standing behind me, his belt doubled over in one hand while the other rubbed comforting circles on my lower back. “You’re doing so good, babygirl. This part is gonna suck, hard, but it won’t last forever, and it should do the trick.”
He sounded confident, but I could hear the concern in his voice and it made me cry harder.
“Okay, baby, shhh, shhh. I can’t spank you when you’re crying this hard. You won’t be able to breathe.”
“I just… I…” My words came out in broken gasps. “I’m just so sorry.”
“I know you are, baby. I wish we could be done already, but we can’t. I need you to take your punishment like a good girl for me.”
“Y-yes, Daddy!”
“Do you want to know how many, or do you just want me to do it?”
Ughhhh. There was nothing I hated more than counting, and if anything, I felt like having a set number made it worse. I trusted Daddy to know what was best. “Just do it please.” I worked on my breathing, drawing deep racking breaths, until the sobs had turned to whimpers.
When I was calm, I felt Yule shift behind me, and braced myself. I didn’t have to wait. His thick leather belt lashed across my butt, ripping a cry from my lungs.
“Owie! Owiieeee!”
The belt fell again before I finished speaking. Each slap of the leather across my poor bottom seemed to fall harder than the last. Each lash lit me up from the outside in, a thousand stinging bees that seemed to make a nest deep in the tissues of my gluteal muscles.
My hands clenched into fists, gripping the bedcovers beneath me, as if they had relief to offer, as if they could squeeze my hands in comfort. They couldn’t and there was no comfort to be had. Not for my ass and not for my heart.
The only relief would come in absolution when the spanking was over and my sins were forgiven, and I was, hopefully, off the naughty list. I didn’t know what I’d do if this didn’t work like it had before.
I couldn’t imagine it. The alternative was too terrible to fathom.
So I took every stinging lash of the leather, let my ass rise up to meet it, tried to stay stoic, tried my hardest to relish the pain, and let it soothe my tortured soul.
Yule didn’t lecture, so there were no words to focus on, nothing but the pain to hold my attention. And it did. It had a stronghold on me. Every wave of it rolled over me, bringing my naughties and all the ways I’d messed up to the forefront of my brain.
When I thought I couldn’t take it anymore, when I was actually crying so hard that breathing became difficult, Yule paused the onslaught, rubbing his hands over my scorched cheeks.
And as nice as it felt, as much as a relief as it was, I knew I wasn’t done. Couldn’t be done. Hadn’t yet felt that soul-freeing relief.
“You’re doing so good baby,” Yule whispered in my ear. “Just a few more. Can you do it for me?”
When he signaled that it was, indeed, almost finished, the angst that had been choking my soul seemed to fade, just a little. Did I feel like that was enough? I didn’t, but I trusted my Daddy to know what was best. I hoped he did anyway.
“I can, Daddy,” I squeaked. “Just a few more? Are you sure?”
“Very sure, baby. Your bottom nearly matches my Santa suit. We’ve done our very best to get your name off the list. How are you feeling?”
His kindness and encouragement was helping. I sniffled and wiped my eyes with the comforter. “Okay, Daddy. Ready for it to be over.”
“Me too,” Yule whispered, right before getting back into position.
“Get ready,” he warned. I braced myself, squinting my eyes to keep tears from falling, focused on the rise and fall of my chest as I inhaled deep centering breaths.
And the first lash fell, so hard I couldn’t help but jump from position, but I knew better, and I wanted this to be over soon, so I quickly got back into place without having to be told.
“Good girl,” my Santa Daddy praised.
I didn’t feel like a good girl.
And yet, as the belt landed four more times in quick succession before falling to the floor, I knew I was forgiven.
My bottom throbbed and ached, but the tension in my shoulders relaxed. The knot in my stomach diminished. The elephant that had been sitting on my chest became a butterfly.
And Daddy’s arms wrapped around my middle to scoop me into his arms.