Lucivar shifted in his cot and listened to the bugs chirping in the night, trying to sleep. All he could do was count down the seconds, waiting, because he knew that they would come tonight. He still hurt from the last time, from fighting so hard, but he knew he had to keep fighting back. They pushed, he'd push back. It was the only way he could live with himself at all. Even if they always won; so much older than him and so much stronger.
One day he'd beat them. It was one of the reasons he spent so much time practicing, getting stronger and better every day. Because he wanted the satisfaction of winning, one night, even if that night was years in the future.
The sound of shifting gravel under feet and the murmur of voices, then that hateful hiss that he heard, sometimes, in his nightmares. "Yaaasssi!"
He said nothing, clenching his jaw as they laughed, the voices he knew and the faces he did not. He said nothing, just waited. Waited waited waited for the interminable moments as they prowled outside, shadows creeping at the edge of a small fire that didn't really hold off the cold, until the first loomed in the entrance to the tent, the only thing visible sharp golden eyes.
Lucivar launched himself upward, a lanky, ungraceful adolescent to the power and ease with which these older Eyriens moved. But Lucivar had ferocity and a savage unconcern for himself, tackling the first man to the ground and pounding his fist into his face until he heard his nose crack.
They fought in eerie silence, both knowing that neither dared call out. Lucivar called in his war blade and snarled softly and then someone had an arm tightly around his neck, cutting off his breath. He choked.
"Don't move or I'll kill you." Lucivar froze. He didn't have to ask for the sincerity in that voice he knew and the face he never saw. Accidents happened, in hunting camps. For one bastard half-breed to turn up dead wouldn't mean much to anyone here.
"Mother Night," someone else muttered. "Bastard smashed up his face pretty good." Lucivar could hear the labored breathing of the man he'd hit first and felt a little surge of hot satisfaction. At least he'd hurt one of them badly enough to make a difference. The others gathered, circling like hyenas, cornering him with their narrow golden eyes. There were spots in his vision and the air was swimming oddly.
"Let up, he's going out. That'd ruin our fun." A hideous leer, but the arm loosened and Lucivar gasped a breath, pulling it in with desperation and feeling his stomach turn over, his hear thudding faster.
"Let me go," he rasped. "Let me go or I'll kill you."
A laugh. They laughed. That hateful sound, soft and deadly and so intimate like stroking fingers in his ear. He tensed, drawing his shoulders up. "I don't think so," the man holding him crooned, and then let him go and shoved him, hard, another knocking his feet out from under him so he fell hard to the floor, his cheek slamming into the rough carpet at the entrance to his tent. One of them tethered his wings as he struggled and another pressed a knee into his back. He strained uselessly to rise, baring his teeth, snarling his defiance uselessly.
The ease with which they stripped him of the little he wore to sleep was humiliating and rasped against his pride. He struggled more and was cuffed for it until the first, the one who'd shoved him forward, dropped to his knees behind Lucivar. His voice was taut and eager with anticipation. "Hold him steady," he said quickly.
The invasion was quick and nasty, two fingers plunging into him and then out, smearing something thick and oily on his skin. He tried to worm away again, even knowing how useless it was, sweat beading on his skin even in the chill of the evening. "No," he said desperately, hating how pathetic it sounded. "No-"
He was hard pressed not to scream, clamping his teeth down on his tongue as with a grunt the big Eyrien's hips slammed into him, ramming his cock with brutal force into Lucivar's body. Drawing back, and again, feeling like his insides were being ripped open and turned inside out with this cruel invasion of his body. He swallowed hard to force back the scream as the man settled into his rhythm, thrusting against Lucivar's body, grunting with exertion. Lucivar spasmed, trying to free his wings, but only succeeding in bending them painfully and eventually gave in and lay flat, feeling oddly detached from the beating in and out of his body, focused on the rough cloth beneath his cheek, the soft jeers and noises of encouragement from the males holding him down, the tears of shame he had to fight to hold back and the screams he swallowed before they could become more than a vague sound in the back of his throat.
One final thrust, hips bucking against him, and with an explosive breath it was over. Lucivar heard one soft whimper as the man withdrew, redoing his trousers, and hated himself bitterly for it even as the tears spilled over his eyelids and down his cheeks, wetting his face as he panted, trying to catch his breath.
They didn't give him time.
He let his mind drift after the third mounted him, pain burning in his groin and his stomach churning violently, nausea washing over him in waves. There were more of them, perhaps – or perhaps it was worse because he had hurt that man – they fingered his balls roughly, joked loudly about cutting his wings. He gave up trying to escape, gave up suppressing the little cries that came as his body jerked with their movements, cruel and unstoppable. The rug beneath his face was wet with tears that streamed down his face uncontrollably. Oh Mother Night, it hurt, and he was ashamed and sick and breathless with every violation.
It was several long moments of silence before he realized that it was over. They were sprawled throughout his tent, indolently, one of them resting his feet on his back. Lucivar tried to rise, but he was locked in place, cramped, sick, exhausted. He couldn't see their faces and didn't want to. His body ached and he thought he could feel blood on the inside of his thigh. He felt the whimper more than heard it, his ears buzzing as they stood.
"Time to go, Yasi," said one of the voices, dark and cold and lifeless. "I hope you had fun." A soft laugh, then the sound of trousers unzipping and the sharp smell of urine in the air, some of it splattering on his cheek where it hit the mat inches from his face. They laughed. Lucivar clenched his jaw and refused to give them the satisfaction, closing his eyes until their voices, their hateful voices, faded into the quiet singing of the crickets.
The moon was spilling on the grass outside. He dragged himself to his hands and knees and crawled to the tent opening and outside, forcing himself up and a few steps before he doubled over and vomited everything in his stomach, then retched again, nausea sweeping through him, weakness making him sway. Blood was trickling from his nose where someone had hit it at some point.
He stumbled back to the tent and fell exhausted into his cot, pulling the blankets around himself and shivering. They gave him a week, sometimes, between visits. A week to practice, a week to get stronger.
Lucivar curled up under the blankets and closed his eyes, ignoring the tears squeezed out between the lids. One day. One day he'd beat them and they'd never come back again, the voices without faces. One day when he was no longer small and young and scared. Then he would kill them.
He lay under his blankets and shivered, the blood from his nose clotting on his lip. His room stank of sweat and urine and blood, but he couldn't summon the energy to care. Slipping down into sleep, he thought heard the step of a foot on gravel and moved immediately, only to realize that it was only the call of a frog, somewhere in a distant marsh.