Kurt watches, building up a layer of cold and detached, as Blaine undoes the buckle to his belt, unbuttons his pants, then pulls them down to his knees.

“Further,” Kurt commands. A visibly shaken Blaine obeys, pushing his slacks down until they reach his ankles.

“Now the briefs.” Kurt fiddles with the long, willowy strip of rattan in his hands as Blaine grabs the waistband of his maroon briefs and shoves those down as well, to his ankles, so his Dom doesn’t have to tell him twice.

“Now tell me, pet” – Kurt begins to walk in a slow circle, observing his sub front and back to ensure that he’s comporting himself appropriately: head bowed, eyes down, hands hanging loose at his sides – “why are you being punished?”

“Because, Sir, I…” Blaine pauses briefly to calm his shaking voice. “I didn’t obey the rules, Sir.”

“A-ha, and what rules didn’t you obey?”

“I…I didn’t eat when I was supposed to, Sir,” Blaine says, talking quickly, mostly out of shame. “And when I did, I didn’t eat what I was supposed to, and…”

“And…?”

“And I stayed up past lights out without permission…Sir.”

Blaine sniffles, and Kurt’s heart aches, but he can’t fold. He set up this system of rules and discipline. It’s the structure that Blaine has lived by since before they moved in together. It has helped Blaine overcome his scheduling anxieties, his organizational issues. It’s a reminder to keep himself healthy. Kurt can’t cave, even if the sound of his sub sniffling breaks his heart. Kurt needs to harden himself against his sub’s reactions by reminding himself that it’s for Blaine’s own good. Blaine is a big boy. He knew the rules, and he broke them. Now he has to be punished.

It’s as simple as that.

Kurt doesn’t launch into punishment right away, hence the questions. He has to know that Blaine understands why he’s doing this, but there’s another reason for the delay. Being caned is awful, no doubt about it, which is why it’s Kurt’s chosen method of punishment for repeated infractions such as these. Caning and rice kneeling, in Kurt’s opinion, are two of the worst. He’s seen Blaine’s response to them. Kurt knows he despises them, too. But the waiting is torture. Drawing out the inevitable. The anticipation. The hope that Kurt might change his mind and pick something lesser. With every answer to Kurt’s questions, Blaine stutters. His voice sounds less sure. His brave front begins to crack.

“Go get your chair, pet,” Kurt says. This last step proof that Kurt has no intention of changing his mind, Blaine complies, shuffling across the room with pants around his ankles to fetch his straight-back wooden chair and bring it over to his Dom. Blaine knows what to do with it. He sets it within a few feet of where Kurt stands, then bends over at the waist and leans his forearms on the seat. He locks his legs at the knees.

Then he waits.

Just a little longer, a few more moments of preparation, and it’ll be time. Like creating the perfect soufflé, Kurt has to give Blaine’s anxiety levels time to rise.

Blaine’s shoulders tremble. His face flushes with blood rushing to his head. He looks about ready to pass out, and still Kurt waits, counting the seconds that pass with a smack of his cane in the palm of his hand, every slap causing Blaine to flinch.

It’s when Blaine stops flinching at the sound of the cane that Kurt decides he’s ready to begin.

Kurt rolls the hem of Blaine’s button down halfway up his back. He brings the cane to Blaine’s backside and taps it, suggesting that the first hit might be there. Then he moves it down to Blaine’s thighs, since the first strike could be there. He moves it again, to the bend of Blaine’s knees, to his calves, then makes the return trip back to his ass. Finally, he pulls the cane off Blaine’s skin completely, and his sub, bent over with his forehead resting on the backs of his hands, holds his breath.

The first hit is light, the cane whistling through the air, but not much of a crack on impact. But Kurt knows it stings. He sees the shudder in Blaine’s body when the cane strikes his skin, hears Blaine suck in the breath he’s been holding. Kurt aims for the fattiest parts of Blaine’s ass – if there is any, which there is, but not much. Blaine’s body is mostly muscle, and his ass is pretty tough. Blaine knows how to take a hit from time spent in numerous stage combat classes. He’s also athletic – basketball, football, boxing, fencing. Kurt knows that the areas he’s focusing on smart, but not enough to get his point across.

Kurt is just warming him up.

Ideally, if Kurt really wants this to hurt, he should have Blaine lie on his back with his legs in the air, tightening the skin to its limits, exposing more sensitive areas, the weight of his limbs constricting his breathing. He’ll choose that position for spanking almost every time, but Kurt prefers caning Blaine standing up. He doesn’t want Blaine comfortable, not one little bit. He doesn’t want to risk the chance that his sub will find a way into sub space, though, at the mercy of Kurt’s cane, that’s highly improbable. He wants to force Blaine to stay standing, wants him to experience everything this cane does to him with as much physical strain and discomfort as possible. He wants Blaine unsettled, at constant odds with his balance and his pain threshold.

Kurt wants to force Blaine to stand, even when the pain tries to bring him to his knees.

If he drops to his knees, they start over. If he moves the chair, they start over. If he falls to the floor, they start over.

Kurt doesn’t like repeating himself, so this is the best way for Blaine to learn. He’ll remember the next time he wants to break the rules - especially one as important as eating the right foods on time - what happens to bad little pets.

Kurt strikes Blaine’s buttocks a couple more times, until Blaine starts shuffling his feet, then Kurt moves down to the skin below his ass, right above his thighs. This thin strip, the most delicate on Blaine’s body by far, Kurt tends to punish ruthlessly.

“Gu-uh!” Blaine groans, the exclamation forced through his lips beyond his control, almost becoming an immediate sob. All of Kurt’s blows hurt, but this one in particular burns like lightening, cutting through his skin and straight to the bone. But he doesn’t move. Discipline. Discipline and obedience kick in to prevent him from disobeying any more rules. But God, is it hard. Another hit, and his body begs to retreat, but Blaine forces himself to stay, to not hop out of the way to avoid the next hit. Each one after the first will hurt incrementally more than the last, and Blaine can do nothing to relieve the agony. That’s why Kurt makes him keep his pants around his ankles. This way he can’t kick his feet, can’t adjust his position as a way to ease the pain. Kurt doesn’t tolerate Blaine moving when he’s being caned. No moving, no dancing, and barely any sound. No talking (except for their safeword) and positively no begging.

Begging comes with a five lash penalty.

Kurt has marks on the floor for Blaine – small pieces of masking tape in the form of an ‘x’ that tells his sub where to place his chair, a habit born from years on the stage. It also lets Kurt know if Blaine’s chair has moved after a caning. Even an inch can mean the difference between moving on, or starting over.

Kurt moves his cane from that space below Blaine’s ass to his thighs, striking swiftly, and Blaine’s knees wobble. Another blow, right above the knees with the edge towards the very tip of the can, and Blaine almost drops to the floor entirely. Blaine’s no lightweight, that’s for certain, and Kurt appreciates that. He enjoys that stamina. He likes to mark Blaine up. On Blaine’s thighs, down toward his knees, on those more sensitive areas of skin, Blaine welts up really nicely – thin, red stripes springing up with every snap.

Kurt doesn’t make Blaine count them off, nor does he give Blaine a definite number of strikes to look forward to. He’d rather keep Blaine guessing. At one point, he asks, “So, how many do you think that is, pet? Twenty lashes? Thirty?”

When Blaine doesn’t answer right away, Kurt swats him again, on a cluster of stripes already welling with blood.

“Uh…I…I don’t know, Sir,” Blaine answers, voice breaking.

“You don’t know, huh?” Kurt says, accompanied by a strike to the thighs. “I think it’s twenty. Do you think that’s enough, pet? Do you think twenty is a good number to learn your lesson?”

This question is a trap. There is no right answer. There’s no good answer either. The only acceptable answer Blaine can give so as not to infuriate his Dom is, “You know best, Sir.”

“I do?” Kurt comes back with a snap of his cane, underneath Blaine’s ass. “Well, then, if I know best, maybe you should have listened to me in the first place!”

Kurt sounds livid, and that tone in his voice makes Blaine wither, but Kurt’s not angry. He’s not taking anger out on Blaine. He’s disappointed, and to a degree, he’s hurt. When Blaine doesn’t follow the rules, it hurts Kurt’s feelings, and it wounds Kurt’s pride. Because if he was a good Dom, Blaine would follow his rules without question. Breaking them would be unthinkable.

Seeing Blaine bent over, a quivering mess of bruises and humiliation, it’s not difficult to remember that Blaine is only human, and humans make mistakes. And that’s what he did by breaking the rules. He made a mistake.

It’s remembering that Kurt is only human, too, that often times rankles Kurt’s nerves.

Traditionally, a military caning consists of twenty-four lashes. Kurt gives Blaine thirty. It’s more than he needs to get his point across. By the time he’s done, the majority of Blaine’s ass and a good portion of his thighs are swollen, several closely grouped cuts are beginning to ooze, and his knees, which he’s locked together, closing the gap in his legs, refuse to stop shaking. Surprisingly though, throughout the struggle in Blaine’s body to keep upright, his chair hasn’t moved (as far as Kurt can tell), and Kurt is impressed.

“Alright,” Kurt says, stepping back and tossing the cane on the bed so he’s not tempted to use it just one more time. “You’re done, pet. You can go to your corner.”

“Y-yes, S-sir,” Blaine whimpers. “Th-thank you, Sir.”

Kurt keeps a close watch on Blaine, for signs that he might drop, or that he could be more hurt than he’s letting on. Blaine has a bad habit of trying to play the tough guy, but Kurt has gotten to a point where he can see through that act.

Blaine bends to raise his trousers, but Kurt snaps his fingers, and Blaine pops upright.

“Keep ‘em down,” Kurt says.

“Yes, Sir.” Blaine’s words don’t shake as much as they did before this began, but there’s a new heaviness to them now, a thickening that comes before tears. Kurt is waiting for them. They need to come so that Blaine can get over being punished and move on.

Kurt watches his pet return his chair to its original spot, then waddle off to the corner with his pants around his ankles, and he quietly sighs. Kurt knows it’s necessary, but he doesn’t like punishing Blaine – Blaine, who tries so hard; Blaine, who’s so devoted; Blaine, who’s under so much stress at times that it makes him sick to his stomach. Hence the rules. They’re not whims. Kurt’s rules about Blaine’s sleeping habits and his diet are in place to keep Blaine from neglecting his health. He gives too much of himself to his job, especially when they don’t appreciate him, don’t see his worth the way Kurt does. These rules, and Kurt being around to enforce them, takes one thing off of Blaine’s plate, so he can focus on defeating other triggers that cause him unnecessary anxiety.

“You get ten minutes of corner time, pet, and then we’ll talk.” Kurt goes to the kitchen and grabs Blaine’s ladybug timer. He turns the bright red bug until its antenna falls on the number ten, and sets it on the kitchen table.

“Y-yes, Sir. Th-thank you, Sir.” Blaine crumbles, shoulders shaking, sobs threatening, but Blaine fights to choke them down. It takes all the strength Kurt has not to react, not to walk over and put his arms around him, not to give him comfort. He will, of course, eventually. Just not right now. Standing in the corner is part of Blaine’s punishment, and Kurt needs to make him do it. He needs to be consistent. Subs need consistency, but Blaine’s requirements for stringency go far above and beyond anyone Kurt has ever met.

Kurt busies himself with random bullshit – sorting mail, clearing expired items from the fridge, attacking a caramelized sugar stain on the stovetop, anything that keeps him lingering close by. The second the timer goes off, Kurt steps up behind Blaine and puts his arms around him, keeping a distance from his sub’s sore behind.

“Now,” Kurt says, “is there something you would like to say?”

“I’m…I’m sorry, Sir,” Blaine says. “I’m sorry for disobeying you. I’m sorry for breaking your rules.”

“Do you remember why we have those rules, pet?”

Blaine nods. “To keep me healthy, Sir.”

“That’s right. And why do I want to keep you healthy?”

“Because…because you love me, Sir.”

“Yes, Blaine.” Kurt bends down and carefully pulls up Blaine’s pants. “Because I love you. And you trust me to take care of you, don’t you?”

It’s not a question. Kurt knows that Blaine trusts him. He wants Blaine to say it out loud, as a reminder to both of them as to why they’re in this relationship together.

“Yes, Sir. I trust you to take care of me.”

“Good.” Kurt takes Blaine’s hand and leads him slowly through the living room to Kurt’s favorite chair. Kurt sits first, then pulls Blaine gently onto his lap.

There will be time for baths and soothing lotions in a minute. For now, there’s something Blaine needs first.

Kurt guides Blaine’s head to rest on his shoulder, and hugs him. The moment Blaine’s temple touches Kurt’s shirt, he begins to sob.

“There, there,” Kurt says. “It’s alright. It’s all over and done with, pet. Go ahead and cry.”

“I’m sorry,” Blaine says, repeating the words over and over in case Kurt doesn’t believe him. “I’m so, so sorry. I should have listened.”

“You’re right,” Kurt says, running his fingers through Blaine’s hair. “You should have. Just…don’t let it happen again. I couldn’t stand it if something happened to you.”