by J. E. Keep
“Oh shit,” he muttered.
“What is it?” said the taller man, already undoing his own belt as he pinned both of her arms above her head with his free hand.
“Oh man... oh fuck,” came his enthusiastic voice. “She’s a fuckin’ virgin. I told ya!” He nearly shouted so loud it could’ve awoken the camp, though the other man struck him in the back of the head and he muttered excitedly in the quiet, “I told ya, she’s a fuckin’ angel.”
“Lemme feel,” he insisted, and she felt the contest of hands for her cunny, pushing the thicker digits away as the first man prodded that thin sheath of her hymen. “Well, I’ll be damned, he said, and she could see the gleam off his teeth in the dark night. “Oh, baby,” he said, leaning in towards her ear, his voice harsh and hoarse. “I ain’t never gonna forget poppin’ yer cherry.”
“The shit you are!” the other man said, obsessing over her, the two looking almost ready to fight it out over her body. “Y’know there ain’t nobody wanted this beauty more’n me.”
“And you can have her after,” intoned the first, as she heard the jangle of his belt, his pants coming undone. “Treat her all sweet if ya want, I don’t give a shit.”
Caslian’s knees trembled and she kept trying to back away, to stop feeling their hands all over her delicate sex and her smallish breasts, but there was no escape. Instead, there was just the cool concrete behind her and it kept knicking her tanned flesh.
She could taste herself on her panties, but she didn’t dare relinquish them. Her face burned as she held back a cough, her throat aching from his brutal treatment.
She wanted to go home. Back to her family.
Even back to the medical tent, to helping people in trouble.
Yet there was a sense of inevitability. Levek had warned her, hadn’t he? That she needed to get out. That she needed to run away from this all, but she’d been too proud. She was serving her people, and that was so important to her.
During her own inner turmoil they’d decided their order. “On the ground,” commanded the taller one, and together they dragged her onto the well-trodden sod, the cold earth against her back as they spread her out like some long-sought platter.
“Don’t fuckin’ ruin her,” complained the larger as he pinned her shoulders down.
“Now how could I ruin such a perfect beauty as this?” remarked the other with his cruel smirk, and she could barely make out the shape of it as he knelt between her knees, cock in hand as he bent forward and began to prod his crown against her. “Damn, you are pretty,” he murmured to her as she felt that slick, precum-greased tip stroke against her, press into her tenuous maidenhood.
Her body was so tightly wound, her muscles aching with tension as she looked up at the burly man with pleading eyes. This couldn’t happen to her. Not by these men.
She was supposed to be safe, as safe as she could get on the front lines. She was protected from the enemy — though not their munitions — but something like this wasn’t supposed to happen to her.
These were her brothers. People she was supposed to be able to count on. To trust.
She tried to clamp her legs shut, her pelvis thrusting into the air as she sought to escape his hardness.
It was too little too late though, he was already betwixt those slender legs of hers, and the other man had her two arms pinned with one hand as he reached down and groped her petite chest with the other. The gleam of lust in his eyes was so obsessive, not like the cruel desires of the man who then shredded through her innocence with one hard stab and a loud, “Ahhhh!”
He seared into her, and she screamed around her panties. Anguish and panic coursed through her body and she thrashed on the ground. It was no use. The small woman was pinned between two men, held in place so securely.
Even with the material in her mouth, her cries were heartbreaking. She was so scared, so sad that these men would hurt her in such a personal way. She could only see through a haze as her head thudded with pain. She tried to squirm back, into the arms of her second assaulter, just to get away from that all-consuming pain low in her belly.
So as that tall, cruel man gave her a few sharp pains more to remember him by, the other put his arms about her head and neck, keeping her own limbs pinned beneath a leg. “Hey, she likes me,” he said, kissing her cheek messily and shushing her softly. “It’s okay. It’s okay, now it’s your and my turn.”
“All yours, bud,” he said, wiping off his dick on her pants and slipping away to take her arms in his place.
How did her body feel so tender and limp? She could barely even fight, shake her head no. She was just relieved that the cruel man was done with her, even though she knew her ordeal wasn’t anywhere close to over.
Everything about her felt foreign and strange, like something was deeply wrong.
They moved around her body in that dark alley, and she could only watch as that thick, strong man undid his own trousers, freeing his own manhood. “Oh, honey, you have no idea how much I need you,” he said, lowering himself down to her battered and used slit. He was breathing heavily as he leaned in towards her face. “I think I kinda love you,” he said before he pressed that thick knob into her slippery quim, pressing it in deep with a deep groan of satisfaction.
This wasn’t love.
She knew love. Affection.
It surprised her, though, that in her darkest hours her thoughts had turned to Levek and not her family. Perhaps she’d mourned them, too. Now there was only him, and she knew he’d never be able to treat her like this.
If he was still alive.
That thought, that single moment was what made her begin to cry in earnest. More than the pain of losing her virginity, or the fear of being accosted by the two men. More than her terror and rage. It was the thought of never seeing Levek again.
It was hard to say if that made it easier or harder to bear the thick, strong man rutting atop her. For despite his pleas of obsession with her, of loving her, he was hardly gentler than the first man.
“Fuck,” he cursed. “Fuck yer so damn beautiful.” And he pawed at her face and breast as he pumped into her again and again, forcing messy kisses around her stuffed lips. “I’ve been dreamin’ of a perfect girl like you all my life, and now yer mine,” he said in a groan, his dick throbbing so wildly inside her as he rutted her like a immoral animal.
She wasn’t his.
They could do what they wanted to her, but she’d never be able to commit herself to such a selfish and cruel man. There was a piece of her that not even they could touch. Not with their hands or their bodies or their cocks.
She lay still, too exhausted to fight them. It was over anyways. She had lost.
“Such a perfect lil’ pussy! Oh gods... oh gods... never felt so good!” Each sickening refrain signalling another surge of thick seed as he emptied his loins into her too.
It was surreal when he was done, and she was used by them both. She could hear a loud noise in the distance and both men began to jump. “Shit,” they both cursed, but when the rain began to fall they realized it was just a storm coming.
“Toss her shit,” commanded the tall one, though he didn’t wait for it to be followed. He gathered up her clothes into a bundle in his arms and gave it a throw off over the roof of the building beside them. “Let’s get outta here!”
The larger man pulled out of her, looking down at her reluctantly as he gave her breast a final, almost tender stroke. “I’ll find ya again,” he said, as if that promise would be reassuring.
Though as the deluded one did up his pants, the first one knelt beside her, grabbed her hair hard, and hissed between his teeth. “Don’t fuckin’ say a word to anyone,” he threatened. “Or this’ll just be the start.” And she thought, for one split second, she knew what “this” was. It was the horrible violation she’d just suffered. What they had robbed her of. But when that knife cut across one side of her face, she knew better.
The pain blinded her. It was like time stopped for a mo
ment. One second she was wondering how they expected her to stay quiet when they threw away her clothes, and the next there was nothing.
Just agony.
Her head felt like it was going to split in two, her eyes already searing from the gritty tears, but that was nothing. All of it was nothing. Everything else melted away to only leave room for that one, singular focus of him tearing into her skin with that blade.
She didn’t hear them scurry away into the night. As she lay there, her body split in agony from her head down across her torso, the burn of the raindrops — tainted by some foul reagent from the rockets — seared her wound and there was only pain.
Chapter 26 – The Rebels
Days of travel through the forest. Endless walking over uneven ground was exhausting in a way that Rosa was totally unaccustomed to when she set out, but her calves and thighs had hardened from the journey in so short a time already.
The quiet rebel, Marin, led the way as always, bringing them through the woods and then into a strange part of the forest. It took Rosa a while to realize what was wrong with the picture. Everything was so green, and covered in vines, but it wasn’t trees that surrounded her, she realized. They were buildings, or mostly what was left of them. A wall here, a part of one there. Piles of rubble all about. And everything covered in moss and vines so that it blended into the forest seamlessly.
She paused and felt her muscles go taut as she looked around, her brows knitting. “What’s this?” The blonde noble had never seen anything like it before, and it was almost like walking into a fairy tale from her childhood.
Evening had not yet descended, and the sounds of life resounded about them. Birds and crickets filling the area with their chatter, the noise of some larger animal she couldn’t place off further into the heart of the strange ivy-ruins.
The rebel stopped and turned back towards her. “It’s your destination,” he said, gesturing up and around with his arms. “Welcome to the City of the Outcast,” he stated with a crooked smile. She could see how it was once a city, but to call it that then...
Still, she didn’t screw up her nose like she wanted to. She was just relieved to be there, to be surrounded by some kind of civilization. “Do they come here?” she asked before realizing she’d balled her hands into fists, just at the thought of those things she couldn’t look at.
He didn’t answer as such but curled his fingers in a “come here” sort of manner before turning and leading her on through the ruins. Despite what he’d said, the journey didn’t seem at an end, for he took her on quite a trek, the old city seeming large as she passed by some former buildings that still managed to extend up a few stories high. Though still, no sign of inhabitants, other than the noise of birds and insects.
At last he took her into one of the structures. It wasn’t even one of the more remarkable ones, a small thing, with three walls still standing, and much of another. “Here we go,” he announced, brushing aside some hanging ivy and opening an inclined cellar door in the floor. “Shut the door after you,” he told her before moving down the incline.
She looked at it skeptically but did as she was told. It was becoming sort of a habit now, truth be told. She was so eternally grateful for what he’d done for her that she couldn’t think to try to push him away once more. It was a miracle he’d come back for her at all. He could have left her to her own doom too many times for her not to respect him.
So together they descended down, and all went dark the moment she shut that door behind them.
Panic nearly set in, but before she could react she felt a hand reach out and take hers. “This way,” he said to her softly, and guided her along. The passageway was smooth stone by the feel of it scuffing her boots, but she had no idea where they were going. All was dark to her, and he didn’t bother lighting a torch or anything.
Twisting and turning, at last she heard something: the sound of stone grating on stone. Then things changed. He led her into a whole other world. An upside down world, it seemed.
She stepped out into what was apparently the inside of an office building. Old and worn, bereft of those things that made it fit for offices, but so similar in style. “One last climb,” he told her, leading her on down some stairs. It was there she got the chance to peek out an open, glassless window and onto the city below.
It was like a miniature version of the capital, submerged beneath the ground. Lights emanated from below, where an old railway track still remained, so similar to the one back home. The brassy metal still shining in the dark. People bustled or milled about, and the sounds of it reverberated through the place.
She never expected anything like this. Her eyes widened and her mouth dropped open with surprise, and she felt excited for the first time since she’d taken on the contract to kill the Queen. “This is amazing,” she whispered, afraid to draw attention to herself.
Marin pulled off his hood and shook his chin-length blonde hair free. “C’mon,” he said with a slight smile for her on his strikingly handsome face, “there’s a lot more to see.” The climb down the stairwell was long, but compared to the journey she just made, it was easy. At the bottom a pair of large men dressed in old shorts and breeches greeted the rebel with a smile and a slap on the back.
“This one’s with me,” he said gesturing back to her. “Another wayward soul brought to sanctuary.”
They eyed her up and down with interest then stepped aside. “Leave it to Marin to bring in the pretty ones.”
“You just say that because he brought you in,” replied the other guard.
Rosa flustered, but she dipped her head down and let her blonde ponytail fall into her face. She felt anything like pretty. Her legs ached, her stomach felt tight, and the leather outfit she wore was too tight in some places and too loose in others. It had fit perfectly when she’d had it custom made for her.
Marin laughed at the two men. “I’ll catch you two at the tavern later.” Then he checked for her to follow him as he headed off into the streets.
It took a while for her fascination with the strange, underground town to wear off enough for her to realize the buildings were mostly askew, positioned at odd angles, and though everything was maintained, and buttressed where necessary, some seemed to have suffered damage at a time long ago.
Though as she watched a brass trolley, loaded with materials, hauled along the tracks by a pair of oversized lizard-beasts her attention was stolen away again.
Her head tilted to the side, and she stopped, staring quite rudely. It wasn’t until she realized he was getting ahead of her that she trotted after him, her voice louder than she intended. “What are those?”
Taking a moment to realize what she meant, he looked to the lizards as they scurried on ahead along the fixed track. “Oh, pack lizards,” he said. “I guess you don’t see ’em very often further west than this,” he acknowledged and led her on.
As her mind reeled with the odd sights and sounds, she began to notice the strange dichotomy in the humans and elves she saw. There were some very pale ones, and others more healthily coloured. It dawned on her that those paler inhabitants probably rarely got out of the underground city.
“I’ll take you to meet the town’s leader,” he said to her, the two nearly side by side again. “Or, at least the closest thing this place has to a leader.”
“Are they going to punish me?” It was what she’d feared since he saved her. That he’d play the role of the saviour, of the man that had got her through this ordeal unscathed, only for her to be more strictly punished by those he followed.
He furrowed his brow and looked at her with confusion. “Punish you?” he asked. With a shake of his head he said, “They aren’t going to punish you. They didn’t even know you existed until the scouts up above must’ve seen us coming.” He smiled just slightly, a bit sad perhaps. “This isn’t a rebel town, Rosa. This is just a haven for the outcast. There’s no rebellion here, just surviving. Thia wouldn’t allow it.”
That name immedi
ately rang a bell. For what young literate of the capital didn’t know about the bawdy tales of Thia, elven seductress, printed on cheap papers and distributed to every nook and cranny of the city?
Her nose crinkled and her head dropped. She wasn’t even welcome with his kind, and she didn’t know why the realization bothered her so much. She had to be with the people that took anyone, she supposed, and she inhaled deeply.
“So this is, like... the best I can hope for, huh? Bottom of the...” She stopped herself before saying something she’d regret. “So this isn’t your home?”
He simply looked ahead, taking a while before he shrugged his shoulders and responded. “As much of a home as I have. We don’t settle down in one place for too long. But I have ties here,” he remarked, and she noticed that he was guiding her towards a large marble building. It looked like it was a government building in times past, but now was painted and given life and flair beyond anything the Capital could’ve dreamt of.
“It’s a good place,” he added. “About as good as it comes. And don’t show that attitude to Thia,” he remarked disapprovingly of her sulking. “She has no time for someone looking their nose down at her domain.”
“Yeah, I’ll be good,” she promised, rubbing her bicep with some embarrassment. “Just isn’t what I expected. What will I do here?”
Marin shrugged his shoulders again and brushed some of his hair back, betraying his half-elven nature. “That’s something you’ll have to work out on your own. Maybe Thia can help, but,” he remarked with dark humour, “she’s even less forgiving of inconvenient scruples than I am.” He stopped at the entrance. “I know you don’t want to sell sex, so you want my suggestion?”
“I asked for it,” she said, her face feeling so warm. Her skin was pale, like most of the other pampered nobles who wasted their life away indoors and under parasols, and every time she blushed she hoped it wouldn’t show.
