Worth so much more.. (rated M for Mature)

[realize.real.lies]

Closed to Shin.

What happened, where am I?

Karina felt a sharp pain in the back of her head, a small whimper parted her lips. Opening her eyes brought an entirely new throbbing pain throughout her skull. Her breaths were more like gasps of air as her eye sight slowly started to focus. The room was lit poorly so Karina had to squint to see her surroundings. A small strangled sob came from her as it all came back to her in waves. She had been body snatched, she was walking home from the market place and the next thing she remembers is a sharp pain in the back of her head.

Waking up the first time she was tossed over a man's shoulder bound and gagged. They arrived at some small village in the middle of the night. The house was fairly large for such a small village and had a red door which was peculiar to Karina. She started to scream, that earned her a sharp smack across the face. She could still faintly feel how it felt like her skin was on fire and the taste of her ow blood in her mouth. "You're ours now bitch, we are gonna make sure we use you then when we grow tired we are gonna sell you as a sex slave"

The tears had been hot on her alredy stinging cheek, "I'll kill you if you fucking touch me again." She screamed at him spitting a mouth full of blood in his direction. Chuckling he started to rip at her clothes easily ripping her long sleeve v neck shirt into pieces and her denim jeans. Thrashing only made it worse and earned her another hit but this time to the gut which sucked the air right out of her lungs. Gagging and sputtering for air she bent over she would have fallen to the floor had a man not been holding her up.

"Enough Raashad you're gonna mess her up too badly! Take her down stairs for now." Everything went dark probably from a blow to the back of the head.

So here she sat chained to a pole in a cold, nasty basement. Looking herself over she noticed drag bruises and cuts, her body ached and she hadn't eaten in days it felt like. The hurt of her body didn't compare to the gut wrenching fear that went through her when she heard the basement door open. The man that had stopped Raashad from beating her any more came down, dressed slightly wealthy to be from such a tiny village. "Sorry about earlier but you are a slave now and speaking to your Masters that way will get you punished."

"Go to hell!" Karina hissed her voice dripping venom as she tried to lung for him. He chuckled before swiftly moving and gripping her long brown mane. Hissing from the pain she was forced to look up at him his other hand stroked her exposed neck. "I am going to enjoy breaking you piece by piece. You are mine, I own you and you will do as I say." With each word he gripped her neck tighter until there was no air flow and she was sure she was going to pass out. "O-o-Kay.." She forced out as his grin grew large creating crinkles by his brown eyes. "Okay, what?" He purred into her ear causing a shiver of fear down her spine before releasing the grip on her neck.

"Okay, Master.."

[Shinsou Vaan Osiris]

The prize was a box.

Shinsou Vaan Osiris, leader of the Brotherhood of the Castigars, was struggling to capture it, while a messenger belonging to the slaver ring he had been tracking for months across the Salvic wastes had been ordered to protect it with his life. The slaver had been unleashed to the task; told that he could destroy or kill whatever or whoever got in his way, and it was a task he took to with enthusiasm. Even being chased by his Telgradian pursuer through the daunting winterscape of Salvar’s harshest lands and having to evade the attention of the not only the Brotherhood but the Salvic patrols wouldn’t put him off.

The strongbox itself was a chest made of a wood so old it appeared as black and shiny as coal, a solid oak that was bound with two iron bands that, though tainted with ancient rust, were still strong. The old chest was two feet long, eighteen inches wide and as many inches high. It was locked with two hasps that were fastened with brass padlocks. The joint between the humped lid and the chest was sealed with red seals, some of them so old that they were now little more than wisps of scarlet wax imbedded in the grain. An oilcloth had been sewn around the chest to protect it from Salvar’s weather, or rather to protect the location of the slaver ring and all their associates that lay hidden inside. On the second week, Osiris had almost captured the strongbox. He had ridden like hell on the back of his trusty mount, Slepnir, and had caught up with the Brotherhood close to the city of Knife’s Edge. The slaver and his escort had only escaped by retreating and climbing into the highest part of the frozen hills where Shinsou was forced to abandon his horse. No mount could climb the steep, ice-slicked tracks where that bastard sought refuge.

It was winter, the worst winter in memory in these parts and the worst time to be in the hills, but the pursuing Telgradian had given the slaver no choice. He knew Osiris was resolved to stop the slave rings at any cost, and so the messenger had fled with his precious cargo just one hour before the enemy horseman had entered the area.

Shinsou was angry, determined and relentless. On his watch, three girls he had sworn to free from the rings had died in captivity. Now, reports from his contacts said a nameless fourth had been kidnapped from a market place and hadn’t been seen since. The chest which the messenger and his men carried through a desolated and frozen Salvic countryside contained a list of contacts, of safehouses and accounts of the bastards involved, and when Shinsou got his hands on it there would be hell to pay. Now, though, the Telgradian had to traverse the hills. Snow thickened in the passes he tried to navigate, and when there was a thaw it only came in the form of rain; a pelting, relentless rain that turned the paths into icy mud which froze hard in the long nights. Frostbite threatened to decimate his mission. In the worst of the cold, Shinsou sheltered in caves or in deserted outposts on the hillside.

He would not be deterred.

On one such day, when the wind drove a bitter snowfall from the west, Shinsou hunched in the miserable shelter of a narrow gulley high on a hill’s crest. The Telgradian lay at the gully’s rim and stared into the valley through a long barrelled telescope.

He stared at his quarry, and the men he had rendezvoused with.

Brown cloaks hid the pale green smocks of the slavers. These men had been followed by Shinsou every inch of his bitter journey but, while he struggled in the highlands, they rode in the valleys where there were roads, food and shelter, all the while evading the attention of their Salvic counterparts. On some days the weather would stop the slavers and Shinsou would dare to hope that he would catch them, but whenever the snow eased for a few hours, the dreaded shapes would always disappear again. Now, lying in the shivering wind, Osiris could see the bandits unsaddling outside a particular house in a small village at the hill’s base. The slavers would have fires and food in the village, their horses would have shelter and hay, while he suffered because of the cold that lashed the highlands.

Bastards. Enjoy the warmth for now, assholes. Your days are numbered… Shinsou was staring directly at two horsemen in the village street. One of them was the messenger with the strongbox, gaudy in his scarlet pelisse and dark green overalls. The other wore no uniform; instead he was dressed in a black, tight waisted riding coat above white boots. Shinsou regarded him more than the messenger, for it was he who guided the slaver’s escape. The black-coated man knew where the other slavers were, he knew where they could stop for rest, and he knew the importance of the object that was hidden in the ironbound box.

Most importantly of all, the black-coated man was the man responsible for the escort of supplies to his captors. The Telgradian watched with interest as his target dismounted and bellowed orders at his men, who proceeded to unload sacks of food into the house they had tethered their mounts to. Only one person, the black-coated man, entered without emerging. The rest stood guard outside.

Shinsou observed quietly, his telescope sweeping the square below.

That’s got to be the place. She’s in there.

[realize.real.lies]

It felt like days, they fed Karina only bread and small pieces of cheese here and there as a reward. She had learned over the last few hours that the ring leader was indeed the man in the fancy clothing. His name only uttered a few times by his men, Thurin. The thought of him still made Kara's stomach flip with uneasiness. It had been a couple hours that anyone had come to check on her, maybe they forgot about me, or were caught? Karina hopes slowly crushed as the door opened and down walked Raashad, he was handsome in the face which was what was so perplexing to her. Why would he have to steal woman when he had handsome qualities to his face? The sick sinister grin laid across his thin lips as he unchained her from the pole.

"Wh-what are you doing?"

Her voice was as small as she felt in his tight grip. He only answered with a short cackle that sent her heart racing beating brutally against her breast bone. He dragged her towards a room that she hadn't even known existed. As much as she struggled it was no use and no match for his strength. "Please, no..." Her pleading turned into sobbing as she thrashed to try and break free, the door opened and any hope for escaping was obliterated to nothing. The room was like a sick twisted torture chambe, a mattress laid on the floor but that wasn't what made her want to heave up the small portion of food she had eaten. Tools of all sorts lay on the table and chains hung on the ceiling rendering the person in them helpless. Raashad guided her towards the mattress as he started to undo his pants, small whimpers came from Kara as she shook like a small leaf in a wind storm.

Looking around her eyes landed on a hammer like thing, quickly she dashed for it catching the big brute off guard. Swinging with all her might she connected with his side as he let out a holler. "You fucking bitch I am gonna gut you like the worthless wench you are!" Oh Goddess think! Think, think! Her mind was frozen and she couldn't seem to process anything besides run, wiping the door open she ran up the stairs almost making it too the door before being flung down the stairs like she was nothing. She laid there in a crumpled heap at the bottom as groaned in pain, she was pretty sure her shoulder was dislocated. Thurin and Raashad came down the stairs bickering at one another but Karina's head was ringing too badly for her to understand.

"What the hell, how did she almost get upstairs?" Thurin snapped as he gripped her hair dragging her back to the room of hell.

"Please, stop!" She hollered in protest but he seemed to not even register she was there. Tossing her on the floor she screamed in pain falling on her dislocated shoulder, she only had a moment before she was thruster into the chains. The angle popped her shoulder back into place roughly, her hair yanked back so that she could see Thurin. "I have to punish you know princess I told you what would happen if you did anything to defy any one of your Masters."

Releasing her mane she hung there the searing pain in her shoulder as she tried to turn and she what he was doing. The first crack of the wipe nearly stopped her heart as it met her flesh. The feeling as if someone pour acid against their skin, the scream that came from her was blood curdling. The next couple of wipes were just as bad the scream stopped as head lulled, her body jolting with every lashing. Soon after the fourth lashing her skin split open and blood started to seep from the wounds. After about the tenth lashing a loud thud interrupted Thurin causing him to stop. Karina struggled to breathe as she was slowly fading in and out of consciousness, the blood loss slowly starting to creep in.

"Stay here with the bitch while I go see what that is."

Thurin left the room as Raashad hobbled closer till his face was mere inches from her own. "This is only the beginning of your punishment whore."

[Shinsou Vaan Osiris]

Shinsou crouched in the snow next to the village entrance.

The man didn't look like the commander of the Brotherhood anymore, nor a triumphant hero in waiting. He was swathed in a cloak that were made from common sacking. his face, boots and hands were wrapped in frosty rags. Yet, beneath his makeshift shawl he wore the red and white of a Brotherhood officer, and Osiris was as hard and efficient as any man who would dare undertake such a poisonous vendetta against the slavers who plagued Salvar.

Shinsou stared into the square ahead. Driven snow blurred the view, but he could see the splash of the scarlet pelisse hanging from the slaver messenger's right shoulder.

No cloak, eh? the Telgradian grumbled to himself, He's showing how tough he is. Fucking show off...

Osiris shifted his eyes to see yet more horsemen coming to the village. Some of the company of slavers led limping horses, and all carried heavy duty sabres and flintlock rifles. The Telgradian slid down from the bank of snow. He had a smooth, handsome face but an expression hardened by snow and wind, a pugnacious visage, saved from coarseness by the golden eyes that could spark with humour and understanding. Now, as he shivered in the narrow gully, those eyes were rimmed with red.

It was then the cries came across the town. An officer marched to the messenger, sword under arm.

"How much food is left?”

“Enough for two days, maybe.”

“If I didn’t know better,” The officer’s voice was scarcely audible above the wind’s noise, “I would think the gods had abandoned her. Tough. Tell Thurin we need to move on.”

A gust of wind snatched snow from the crest and whirled it into a glittering billow above Shinsou's head. The bastards ahead, he thought bitterly, would be helping themselves to food, firewood and bedding in that town. Meanwhile, the girl he had just confirmed captive here would starve. All the while, children would be pointing the slavers to the hills. The men in the village would be interrogated to reveal whether or not they had seen a man in white hunting a chest. They would truthfully deny any such sighting, but the man in the black coat and white boots knew Shinsou would still be in the area. What the men missed, the children playing in the street had seen with their own eyes.

Osiris closed his eyes. He had not known what it was to hate until this campaign against people trafficking had begun, and now he didn’t know if he could ever root the hate out of his soul for these bastards. The same people who had carved through Am'aleh's convent with their bloodied swords and their lust were about to destroy another life. Shinsou, despite his agonizing tiredness and the cold that leached into his very bones, found some enthusiasm to get to his feet. Shivering beneath his ragged cloaks, he spat to show his opinion of the gang that he had chased across the frozen wastes for what seemed like an age.

The Telgradian eased himself to the crest of the bank once more and stared ahead at the village. As barbaric as they were in their ideals and their actions, they were also smart - the men had picketed the road ahead, but now, at the fall of the sun, the guard was changing.

Time to fill hell with the souls of these dogs.

The next hour passed as Shinsou waited for darkness to creep. The Telgradian had patience in abundance; a calm rationality in the face of something completely irrational. After another twenty minutes, Osiris watched with surprise as the black coated man carried the box he sought to the west. The slaver dragoons that had roped up suddenly saddled their horses and abandoned the village that had been plundered for resources and from which smoke funnelled into the sky from chimneys below.

All that was left was the house guarded by a handful of lightly armed men.

They're leaving her here to die. Shit. I can't leave her, but where's the box going?! Dammit.

There was no more time to waste as Osiris darted over the snowbanks. The two slavers guarding the door spotted the running Telgradian and marched closer, rattling their curved sabers in an effort to warn off their would be assailant. It worked; as they lumbered forward quickly, hands instinctively drawn to the pommel of their swords, Shinsou stopped, a palm rested on Stygian's hilt.

“Where the fuck are you going?” There was an air of confidence in the first guards voice. To his left, a far smaller man held a lantern before him.

Two strikes later, both guards were down, dragged behind a cart, and Shinsou had entered the house.

[realize.real.lies]

Karina whimpered her head felt so heavy as she desperately attempted to hold it up. The only thing that held her poor tattered body up were the chains wrapped tightly around her wrist. Her chest rose and fell in shallow breaths. She could feel Raashad's rough hands grope her breast, his breath fanned against her neck and ear. "You feel so good," he breathed heavily into her ear. The feeling of his hands running over her flesh woke her up slightly. "No..." She pleaded trying to wiggle as if the chains would magically give way and she could fight his wondering hands away from her exposed body.

"You broke a couple of my ribs princess it's only fair that you make me feel better." He slowly unchained her wrist, she fell into him crying out as the searing pain in her back flared up from the movement.

"First we are gonna seal your wounds up so you don't die in the middle of me fucking you."

His words made the bile rise in her throat as her eyes watered. Tossing her on the bed Karina could hear him moving stuff around her as she laid on the mattress. Closing her eyes she tried to imagine that she was at home in her own bed. She could feel him over top of her, ripping the rest off her shirt off she groaned in protest. "S- stop..." He rubbed some type of mud like stuff on her back at first she felt nothing but after a moment she could feel a burning sensation all over again. A blood curdling scream parted her swollen lips as she withered in pain on the bed. "Hurts doesn't it bitch, it's paste that will slowl the bleeding down. Cauterizes most of the lashes to close them but painful as hell." He chuckled as she curled into a small ball as if the smaller she got maybe some how she would just disappear from this hell hole.

The pain was too much as she started to see black dots dancing in her vision. The feeling of his lips over her bear breast was faint as the blackness slowly started to consume her. The sound of the door breaking was so faint along with people yelling. Karina tried so hard to open her eyes but her body wouldn't obey her. She felt someone wipe the hair away from her face causing her to flinc, arms slid behind her knees and shoilders. A small groan came from her as she tried to protest. "Let... me..... d-die." Her voice was so horse and barely a whisper before the black abyss took her once more wrapping her in a blanket of nothingness.

The darkness surrounded her as if she drifted in the waves of the void. Voices sounding so far away as she tried to reach out to grab it. "Come get... the bitch.." Who was that and what are they talking about. She clung to the mans voice trying to will herself back to consciousness. Come on Karina!! Wake the hell up you are gonna die!

Slowly the pain washed over her as she cried out meekly. "W-what's going on.." Her head lulled with heaviness as she saw the person that held her was Thurin. Her heart sunk as fear crept deep into her bones as she tried to push away from him only for him to drop her on the floor. The jolt and searing pain ran through her body as she cried out. Her hair gripped at the base of her skull, pulling her head back exposing her neck. The cold feel of metal pressed against it. Sucking her lowe lip she was nervous that if she allowed her lip to quiver the knife that was being held at her throats would slice her.

"You want this worthless cunt so bad come get her, come out of the shadows you coward!"

Thurin's voice roared threw the small cottage, Karina forced to her knees as he drug the blade across her neck. "Please please you don't have to do this!!" She cried out begging him, the bastard simply laughed at her for bedding him for mercy. "Oh but I do so that whoever the prick is that took out my men comes out of his hiding spot." She could feel her blood start to trickle down her neck, rolling over her exposed breast.

"I'll give you until the count of three for you to show yourself if not than I'll slit her theoat and watch her choke on her own blood." He called out to the empty room.

"One..."

"Two!"

Karina squeezed her eyes shut tightly as she softly whimpered the tears freely flowing down her bruised cheeks as she came to terms she was going to die.