Author's Note: Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed! It meant the world to me. And special thanks to my wonderful beta, who I hope is reading this right now.

Any quotes, lyrics, poems, etc. that are used in this fic are either in the public domain or otherwise legal. Oh, and here's a promise: Kurama will never, ever, ever fall in love with his rapists. That includes Toguro. Just because he doesn't hate him with the burning, fiery passion he reserves for the others doesn't mean that he wouldn't kill him if he had half a chance. That's what makes their relationship interesting, right?

Warnings in this chapter: AnixKurama, so all possible warnings you can think of.

Disclaimer: Yu Yu Hakusho is © Yoshihiro Togashi, Funimation, Shounen Jump, ADV Films, etc. I don't own Yu Yu, I just play around with the characters (and I'm not earning money by doing so).

"You save yourself or you remain unsaved."

Alice Sebold, from Lucky (her memoir of life after rape).

Poet to Bigot

By Langston Hughes

I have done so little

For you,

And you have done so little

For me,

That we have good reason

Never to agree.

I, however,

Have such meager

Power,

Clutching at a

Moment,

While you control

An hour.

But your hour is

A stone.

My Moment is

A flower.

To Kurama's tired glance, the way Toguro's body could barely fit through the small doorway made him look bizarre and almost hilariously out of place. To Karasu's embittered eyes, however, the mismatch of door and man made him seem even larger and more imposing than usual. Their reactions to him were a strange paradox - the weaker and smaller of the two was able to summon a shadow of mirth, but the larger and more powerful one saw Toguro's entrance with an edge of fear he would never admit to.

"Karasu, Sakyo's trying to sleep. Stop fucking the fox in the bedroom and take him to the torture chambers. This is why we have torture chambers."

Toguro's countenance was an imperturbable mask, and his careful, measured air supported him. 'I'm doing a job I don't enjoy, but one I'll do regardless,' that air said. Karasu recognized it, and hated it. He unfolded from his gleeful position and tried to control his mounting resentment as he saw just how unperturbed Toguro was. As his handsome visage twisted in steadily increasing increments, the outrage he felt slowly ascended to greater heights. Toguro quirked his lips a little, amused by the look on Karasu's face; aware that Karasu caught the motion, but also aware that he didn't care for even a second what Karasu did or did not catch.

Toguro stopped regarding his employee so calmly for a moment, glancing curiously around the room instead. It was unusual for him to come into Karasu's chambers; Karasu usually understood the fine lines of living in an employer's house, and handled his toys with more subtlety and restraint - largely because in the instances where he didn't, Ani had a tendency to break them. The fox must be a special acquisition to Karasu, Toguro thought, for him to act so excitedly.

"This is none of your concern, Toguro," Karasu hissed, breaking his ruminations.

"It became my concern when you interrupted my employer's sleep. Now let him go or take it to the dungeons."

Toguro felt no need to explain properly. It wasn't Kurama who was breaking Sakyo's sleep: it was hurried phone calls from Sakyo (or rather, Toguro)'s most trustworthy guards, each assigned to an individual acquaintance, both to be their dog's body and to watch them. Toguro had gotten royally sick of forwarding them, and went to deal with the problem directly. He left a pouting Ani and an enigmatic Bui (pulled from his rooms for the task) to guard Sakyo. That contemplation caused Toguro to suppress a rueful smile. Most people hearing about an incident like this would think that the guests wanted to help the screaming victim; in this case, however, the opposite was true. If one of Sakyo's famously gory spectacles was underway, they wanted in on it.

Neither youkai paid any attention to Kurama's dry, helpless sobs, though he was barely aware of the neglect. He gasped and wheezed, fistfuls of blood-soaked red hair clutched in his hands as he tried to suppress, control, and redefine the pain.

"It isn't necessary!" Karasu said mockingly, hatred transforming his violet eyes to an angry red.

Hearing the whine in his captor's voice, Kurama roused himself. His brain might be rusty and bent, and the voices around him might be sounding with a slight ring, but that still wouldn't undo him. Tipsy and sick, he grappled out of the stupor and began to look on the conversation with fear. He knew whom Karasu's anger would be taken out on, and further, who would suffer for Toguro's transgression. Panic, his ever-present friend, reached within him once more and told him in no uncertain terms that he had to get out of there.

"Of course it's necessary. You need to restrain yourself, Karasu." Toguro grunted in a businesslike fashion. Privately, he viewed this scene between Karasu and his prize with a rush of bitterness. He could easily see that Yuusuke Urameshi's failed attempt to kill him and save his friends was personified in the broken victim who knelt at Karasu's feet.

"I don't," Karasu spat. "You have no power over this. It seems only right that I use my prize in any way that I wish."

Karasu tried to keep his tone lofty, but his eyes crackled and exploded under his rapidly lightening hair, and his lips slowly degenerated into an animal-like snarl. The skin around his temples became harrowed with sharp tussocks and miniature valleys of skin and veins. In an everyday setting, Karasu could contain the hatred and antipathy he felt towards his employer, though it was a struggle; but when enjoying the body of his prey, he expected a certain level of independence. He wanted, at those times, to rise above Toguro's bondage and into a world of vicious domination and searing pleasure.

Toguro seemed to have missed this nuance in their relationship. Then again, nuances were never paramount in Toguro's mind. To him, Karasu was his worker until he or Bui became strong enough to argue. Employment like this had few rules: there was no such thing as special provisions; perks included anything Toguro's employers didn't want, and then it had to be light enough to carry or able to walk on its own; and between jobs, nothing was expected except grudging obedience. Toguro's requirements were simple and straightforward, and, though he didn't hide the fact that he disliked his employees, he still treated them with general respect and didn't usually attempt to hamper their movements.

Kurama took full advantage of the pause, and pulled out the mop. Each inch of wood, gently removed from his ass, was in some new way, and on some new level, more and more agonizingly painful as it dragged through his rectum and out of him. More splinters flicked from the mop and embedded in his flesh as Kurama sank white teeth into an arm to stifle the screams. In no time at all he tasted blood. When the mop was out, and carefully placed on the floor, he steeled himself for the next part in his frantic plan.

Getting up for Kurama was a bit like the efforts of a ball on a ship to stay still. He staggered to his feet, and immediately stumbled to his feet and hands, his heels jerking in the air and his ass thoroughly on display for Toguro and Karasu. Youko groaned from his favorite part of the brain, the occipital lobe, seeing amusement on Toguro's face from between his legs as he struggled to get to relative safety.

He managed a few forward motions like this, then pushed upright and limped, humiliated by his tipsy balance and by the other men's presence, into the bathroom. Kurama sighed, his usual pride wounded at how ridiculous he must have looked, running away from Karasu with nothing even resembling grace or dignity. He slammed the door and locked it with fumbling fingers, hearing the bang in the same way one hears the closing of a coffin lid. He wondered why Karasu hadn't followed him.

Kurama staggered again, fell, and finally crawled into a corner, jerking into a kneeling position (with the help of the wall and sink), and feeling drunk with pain. As he turned to lean into the wall, he let the weight of his body rest on his knees, trying to relieve his excruciatingly torn ass. Youko realized that he had been reduced to the posture of a trapped animal and groaned again, but Kurama ignored his alter ego and focused on getting out of this predicament. It was looking worse and worse the more he thought about it. The monster would displace his aggression onto something easy to handle, and Kurama was the nearest helpless thing able to fulfill that role. Kurama shuddered at that thought, and put his considerable intelligence to finding a way to reinforce the door.

"Fox." The promised voice was quiet and sinister with suppressed violence. "Open the door."

For a moment, Kurama froze in fear; but he quickly rallied, sucking in a breath to make a desperate bid for cold reasoning. "Don't take it out on a bystander! I have nothing to do with Toguro, I've done nothing to you. Don't torture me in his name!" He hoped that would get through to Karasu, if nothing else could. It was a bleak sort of hope. He knew in the back of his mind that nothing he could do would stop, or even hinder, the assault.

"I," Karasu began, obviously trying to control his rage, though Kurama found himself unable to breathe, "will not be spoken to like that. Get out here, or I'll go to the dungeons and have a little taste of your mother."

Kurama blinked, stared at the door, then blinked again. His mouth opened completely outside his control. The sudden onslaught of knowledge and cruel images made Kurama sickeningly glad he was in a bathroom, as his eyes widened to waif-like proportions. Bile began to burn his tongue before he realized, in the same all-or-nothing way he had realized the extent of Karasu's threat, that seconds were precious.

Kurama's form blurred as he whipped open the door, ignoring his pain, ignoring Toguro (who still stood in the front doorway), and knowing that all the heat his body had been subjected to was gone - replaced instead by a chest-full of sinking, icy cold.

Botan and Koenma's assurances were for naught. They had his mother. That phrase kept repeating in his mind, like a fearful litany: they had his mother. Kurama's eyes became wider and more livid as implication after implication spun through his head. Anger tightened his muscles until they bulged, and blood poured from his stressed wounds. The mature Shuuichi Kurama was taken over completely by the vicious Youko within him, and Kurama gorged himself on his newly reborn strength and resolve.

Karasu shivered to see him like that, all the humanity melted from his face and his eyes shining gold with ferocity and bloodlust; but Karasu couldn't allow himself any weakness in front of Toguro, and he refused to lend strength to Kurama's foolish assurance. He forced a sneer, allowing it to widen as he realized that Kurama, no matter how apoplectic his rage, was still helpless, and still vacillated on some level between terror and anguish. Shame, Karasu realized with a burst of acrimony, had run its course.

"I hate - I despise - I revile you," Kurama snarled. He put all the sentiment he had built up since the first time he was forced down and fucked into submission behind those words. Kurama's voice was lower and rougher than usual, and hoarse from screaming, lending the words an ambiance that sent chills down Karasu's spine. Immediately upon recognizing his fear, however, his rage reached new heights. Bombs began to hang like jewels in the air around Kurama's stolid body, threatening his wellbeing as Karasu, bit by bit, lost control. Kurama didn't care; he met the violet gaze levelly.

"I will not be spoken to like that, you little whore." Karasu moved with all the speed of his fury, grabbing Kurama by his hair and jerking his head back roughly; but Kurama was beyond pain.

"If I'm a whore, then you, Karasu, are nothing more than a disease-ridden pimp; and a lackluster one at that. Now, and for all time, keep your god-damned manicured hands off my mother!" Kurama's helpless rage caused Youko to surface fully for the first time in a long time.

Karasu let out a growl and slammed Kurama's defiant form into the doorway, digging his back into the wood paneling. Kurama bared his teeth at him, and Karasu, his sanity disintegrating, detonated bombs haphazardly, focused only on which parts of the body they should hit. Despite fierce resistance, every time a bomb struck a strangled cry sounded from the base of Kurama's throat. Karasu brought all his acrimony into an open, taloned palm, and slammed it into Kurama's stomach with enough force to make Toguro stagger, decimating what was left of Kurama's lower ribs while jerking his head to the side. He was rewarded with a spout of vomit and blood. Karasu stepped back and flung Kurama to the floor, and was on him again in an instant, giving Kurama no time to bounce. He straddled him, wrapping spidery fingers around the graceful throat.

"Hurt me. Kill me. Rape me," Kurama choked, his anger unabated. His voice, a light baritone usually, now scratched from his throat with only a smidgen of grace. "Take your anger out on me until there's nothing left, until I'm an empty husk. But for every bruise on her body, I will show you pain a thousand times more horrific than what you have given to me."

For a second, Karasu's eyes burned, incensed and crimson: but then a cruel smile lightened the brutality of Karasu's unmasked face. The halo of blond, kinky hair began to recede back to black, marking his more sane insanity's return. Karasu would not allow Kurama to win, and causing him to fight on his slave's terms was tantamount to him winning. He ignored Kurama and addressed Toguro.

"I'll gag him, I suppose; though this is the last time I take orders about my cute little fox-boy." His eyes gleamed with a sickly light as he saw Kurama twist at that nickname. Kurama obviously wanted to destroy him even more after hearing Yuusuke's term of endearment dribble from his bloodless mouth.

Toguro chuckled deeply, the timber of his voice thrumming through all present. It wasn't clear who or what he was laughing at, only that he found something about this situation darkly amusing.

"Good night, then." After that terse goodbye, Toguro left Kurama to his tormentor. Karasu got up.

"Get on your hands and knees and crawl to your clothes," he purred, his anger now carefully sublimated into sadism and faux restraint. "Bring back the underwear and that pretty kimono. Oh, and your little weapon. We can't forget that, now, can we?"

Kurama felt his eyes and face go dead as he struggled to his clothes like a dog, the position and the movement hurting more than he thought he could possibly describe. He was Elmire, he was Chrysippus, he was Lucy (1); it was his lot to suffer the degradation Karasu offered. Through the haze, he supposed that Chrysippus was the most apt allusion. Kurama was the Peloponnesian boy, kidnapped by his tutor and raped so brutally he died because of it. It gave him perverse pleasure to imagine Karasu as Laius. Karasu would destroy him, leaving nothing left, and no one could stop him - but perhaps Inari would create misfortune as punishment for the bastard's callous arrogance. He knew it was an empty hope, but he wished it all the same as he crawled, clothing in hand, to Karasu's original seat.

The pain escalated to an anguished wave after seeing Karasu perched like the sparrow he was, toying with his own sleek hair. Kurama knew that he'd never abhorred anyone in either of his two lives with the intensity that he despised Karasu. The edges of his mind were indistinct from blood loss, but he hardened himself, knowing that he would only lose more.

Karasu undid his pants to spite Kurama, with a flourish that he convinced himself was elegant, but which was to Kurama's mind disgustingly pompous and unlike the suave crow. As a rule, he didn't wear underwear.

Karasu watched in twisted, manic glee as Kurama sat on his haunches, the cock dripping, reddish-purple with blood, rock-hard and throbbing with need only half a foot from Kurama's grimacing face.

"You know what I want, lovely."

Kurama carefully placed the dirty, blood-soaked clothes and wood to the side of himself, taking as much time as he could with that simple task. When he was finished fiddling with the silk and cotton (not wanting to even look at the soiled wood), he summoned his Youko detachment into his heart and mind and mustered an expression of misery and wide-eyed innocence. The fear and submission he'd felt before were gone, leaving him achy, and empty of anything except fury and pain.

All that was inside him was a rock in his chest as he slowly licked the shaft from base to tip, wincing at the taste of musk and precum. Karasu groaned shamelessly as that rose petal mouth opened wide and engulfed him. His hands threaded through vermillion strands, and then fisted, forcing his shaft all the way to the back of Kurama's throat.

Kurama reached up and desperately fisted the base, trying to keep the cock from choking him. Karasu grabbed the hand and drew it away, then forced himself forward. As Kurama gagged and struggled for breath, Karasu pushed open Kurama's throat and shoved his dick the final distance. No sooner was he seated then he began to thrust, using the hand still entwined in Kurama's hair to hold him in place so he could fuck his mouth. Pleasure exploded in front of Karasu's eyes, increased by the feeling of Kurama swallowing him and his throat tightening from his blatant inability to breathe. Kurama fought the urge to vomit with his entire mind, focused on pleasing the sadist, the bastard, the anathema that held him in place with a bloodless grasp. Right then, with blood loss and deprivation of air dulling his mind, it was all he could do. He would start attempting to discover the veracity of Karasu's claims after that.

"Yes, yess. That's perfect, darling, just like that."

Kurama used his tongue half-heartedly, but towards the end, as he felt the cock tighten in his throat, he found he was too dizzy to do much but hang and let his mouth be raped.

Kurama gagged as acidic saline assaulted his nose and throat, forced down into his windpipe by Karasu's long, sadistic thrusts. The cock twitched, then receded from his mouth. Before he could lean over to cough up the fluid, the hand in his hair dragged him upwards to a waiting mouth. Kurama scrabbled, trying to get his feet placed, but Karasu kicked them out from under him so that he hung suspended in midair. Karasu's hard lips muffled his grunts of pain as a tongue dragged itself through Kurama's bruised mouth, swabbing for cum. Kurama coughed and wheezed as he tried to get air into his lungs. The lips receded, only to be covered by a hand, two fingers of which delicately pinched his nose closed.

"Swallow, pretty. Swallow, and then you may breathe."

As always, as was becoming a repulsive habit, he acquiesced. A grimace of disgust filled his face as he ingested the noisome liquid. Finally, as his chest began to sear in earnest for want of air and as spots exploded in front of his eyes, the hand receded and he was allowed to crumple into a fetal position on the floor, hack up the semen, and suck in the much-needed breaths.

His vision cleared, and he watched out of the corner of his eye as the mop handle and an ornate, lacquered hashi were brandished.

"Do you know what sounding is, lovely?" (2)

Kurama's eyes widened, and then dulled. He nodded his head wearily, worried that his captor might want confirmation. He had known that Karasu wouldn't be so easily sated, but he had no choice. It was either him or Shiori, and that was no contest. His mother had always and would always mean more to Kurama than his own pride and happiness ever could.

It was going to be a long night. He cringed as Karasu got up from his chair and bent over him, already erect again. A long, long night.

The next day, Kurama shifted in pain as he sat, a pile of books wedged between his hands and his chin and a few scrolls tucked untidily under his arms. The library was a charming room, he thought; it provided a welcome change of pace from the dreary debauchery of Karasu's quarters. Here and there along the long chamber were little clusters of baroque fauteuils and varnished tables, which created artistic, disagreeable places to read. They were lightened by fresh flowers and uncoordinated vases Kurama routinely stole from around the mansion and used to brighten up the room. Solid pine bookcases were almost marginalized by the expanse of amber carpeting, which was pleasant and soft to Kurama's bare feet. The library was beautiful, really, and Kurama admired whoever had decorated and built it. He had no inkling that the architect was none other than his captor's employer, Sakyo; he was understandably biased against any member of Team Toguro.

It was afternoon already, and the sun shimmered down at Kurama through the high windows, warmly radiant when compared with the subdued lighting of Karasu's room. He'd slept through the day after his homecoming session with the bastard had finally, thankfully ended late last night. Kurama carefully suppressed memories of himself lying on the floor, spent, used, and covered in disgusting fluids. He suppressed further the images of crawling to the bathroom and scrubbing his body, trying to keep his sobs low enough that Karasu couldn't hear him.

He vowed he would never remember again the pain and humiliation of reaching inside his own rectum to remove the splinters, piece by piece. He'd had to pull them out one at a time as he healed his flesh in a wedge, doing it in such a way that the splinters were pushed out and down to a place where his two fingers could nab them. He could still feel a few, up beyond his reach, small and annoying as they poked at his flesh; but he contented himself that the tears had healed without garnering an infection. He had been almost certain the unsanitary conditions would have caused one. The bacteria that thrived in his colon would usually love a chance to taint the body that housed them, and the damage had been extensive. Karasu had been in an adventurous mood, especially when it came to that damned collar.

Kurama tore his awareness away from those memories once more, and focused on distracting his mind. He thumbed the worn, tattered cover of the book he'd chosen, a Makaian volume categorizing thousands of different poisons and ki solutions and their effects, and started flipping through it methodically. He wasn't surprised to find a demon book in Sakyo's library. The man had obviously done many dealings with many youkai, and certain Makaian books were well known to be worth the money.

Kurama sneezed, his sensitive nose offended by the dust and grime that soiled the engraved human skin. His other hand, now that the rest of the books had been safely stacked to his side, fiddled with the collar locked around his neck. Kurama had already figured out the supposedly impossible yoki lock that Karasu had ordered for him. It was shameful, really: all he had needed was a letter opener and an enchanted magnet (found in a desk in one of the spacious offices that dotted the mansion), and it had come undone like a charm. Now he could take the collar off at will, but that was almost pointless. It was probably imbued with a tracking charm he had to neutralize or trick. Unlike collars created with ningen electricity, something as simple as water or blunt force wouldn't do it. He'd have to find a solvent that was safe for (admittedly more durable than usual) human skin, yet lethal to yoki charms; further, one that he could order, steal, or make for himself with his limited resources. He'd been thinking of this since he woke up, along with the decision of which youkai to service or drug in return for a look at his mother.

"Even a look would do no good," he sighed.

As a kitsune, he was adept at recognizing fakes and illusions; but without access to his ki it was just a matter of guess and check. If Karasu really splurged when buying the illusion, it would lock and copy directly from his memories and create an almost perfect match, even in personality and memory. Usually it was necessary for a shape-shifter to touch someone to replicate so perfectly, but there were illusions that had the same basic effect. These were easily dispensed with, though - all that was needed was a touch where the person was thought to be, and they were gone. In short, he'd have to get inside the dungeons.

It would take careful planning and all the cunning he possessed to outsmart his captors and verify that his mother was really his mother. In that case, he thought, how was he going to escape with her? While this conundrum played itself out in his head, he decided that in the meantime he needed to destroy or reroute the tracking charm. That was the first step.

Kurama itched to be far from here, safe in a protected ningenkai with his mother and stepfamily. He longed, cliché though it may seem, to run: just to run. He wanted to jog and dash and climb in a forest, perhaps in the suburbs around his ningen home; but certainly, and with no qualms, to run. Sometimes he thought it was the confinement that unnerved and destroyed him more than anything else. He was going insane from shame and boredom, each in its irregular place. Kurama recognized Youko's influence in this; he'd felt this way before he was old enough to walk stably. Still, it was worse now. He hadn't been outside for weeks, and in his kitsune heart of hearts, he missed direct sunlight and the out-of-doors. The forcefield keeping him in place was a wide sphere, and the bottom of the first floor and the grounds were not included.

It was then that he came up with the first of his many daily schemes, stoppers to keep himself from going insane in the asylum.

Toguro was as unflappable as always on the outside. On the inside, however, beneath the veneer, he was mystified. He'd been summoned to the library by a panicked aid, and made his way there with limited understanding of what the gibbering demon meant by "slaves attempting to escape." Normally he wouldn't bother with such a mild issue, but Sakyo had no need of him for an hour or two, and candidly, he was sick of listening to the obsequious kowtowing of Sakyo's 'acquaintances' (lackeys, his mind first supplied). He'd decided to go along with whatever problem had arisen, and tersely told Bui to get Karasu and guard Sakyo. He almost regretted the trip now that he saw the bookshelves knocked over and cleverly rearranged, despite the fact that each was approximately twelve feet in height. It was a great showing of mind over matter, and the burly man allowed a smile, impressed in spite of himself at the escapee's daring.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Nothing," a mildly familiar voice replied. Rustling sounds filled the air, before the lovely young man came walking from the outside of the window and back into view. There was a soft thump as Kurama landed closer to Toguro, a hateful sneer adorning his face. Toguro's visage became a fraction of a millimeter more enigmatic at the sight of that bitter countenance and the sound of that glacial voice. Kurama, sharp-eyed as always, noticed this and wondered at it. Had he triggered something? It wasn't important.

"I'll ask again. What are you doing?" This time there was a threat tingeing Toguro's voice. He was more than a little annoyed that he would have to wade into Karasu's mess once again, and he had no time for empty shows of defiance.

"...Sunbathing." Kurama said, put off by Toguro's tone. "I find myself without access to any places with sunlight, and so I... made one."

The bookshelves, all formerly austere and filled with dry tomes on everything Sakyo's decorator thought impressive (the useful books were hidden in the back), held up one shelf that reached out of the window and wall (how had he managed to break a wall? Toguro wondered), creating an extended platform. It was unclear to Toguro how any of this had been done, though he did see that some ropes and pulleys had been used. The books were half in the shelves and half in clumsy piles along the floor.

Kurama hesitated, and then began to climb back up the shelves. He had to stop this time. A moderately bearable night's sleep hadn't healed all his internal and external wounds, and he was in a catastrophic amount of pain. His bravado was just that: bravado. He felt fear begin to curl along his face as his façade cracked and restructured itself.

"I'm showing him my back," he thought. Instincts began to kick in. "He could hurt me, he will hurt me, he has that power and I could never stop him."

Somehow, it seemed worse to him that he was at the mercy of Yuusuke's murderer than that he was at the mercy of his own. He would die readily before letting Karasu realize this, but selling him to other people, sharing his degradation around like so much wine, scared him more than anything Karasu alone could possibly do. Kurama returned to himself and went back to his perch, struggling to hide the pain he was in, and the terror he felt. Unfortunately, concealing them from a fighter of Toguro's caliber was useless.

Time passed, as immutable as it always was, the silence between the two men making the minutes both crawl and fly. Toguro was confident enough in Karasu and Bui's abilities to allow himself a few minutes to find a book. It could be boring as hell, working for Sakyo.

He realized he'd left it too long when a grating voice snickered, "Brother! Here you are."

Kurama grimaced and immediately began to climb the rest of the bookcase, intent on getting as far away from the nauseating metamorph as he could. His bare feet pattered softly against the wood and leather, and he almost reached a dip he could hide behind before the voice jangled his nerves once again. Aniki Toguro would not be so easily shied from.

"And the little fox, too! How droll. Tell me, child, have you missed your daddy?"

"My... who?" Kurama's mind refused to compute that information. His father? His... daddy? The very idea of someone fulfilling that hyper-sexualized role (as Ani made it clear he was intending) filled him with boiling, seething, rollicking brands of hatred and ever-deepening disgust.

"Karasu. Your dear father." Aniki couldn't keep a straight face, and started to giggle uncontrollably. Kurama wanted to vomit. He was filled completely with the urge to destroy the bastard and grind his bones to dust. "Your dearest father who left, and has returned home gloriously! Have you been a good boy while he was gone?"

Kurama deadened his face and stared straight ahead as tentacles reached out. He kept his chin up and his disgust open as he was dragged painfully down the bookshelf and over to the front of the annoying little monkey he was unable to fight. He filled himself with the knowledge of how he would fight, were he able to. He had seen the bastard sparring against various demons in the indoor training ring, and Kurama thought the sin tree would do great justice by the repulsive primate.

"Karasu will not be pleased." Toguro had just found a book he'd enjoyed many years ago and settled in. He was a man as well as a professional, and he had a good sense of when he was actually needed and when an employer was relatively safe. Toguro stood against the wall near the record player and tape set. He'd moved the bookcase that formerly blocked his view, wanting a look at all entrances and exits at one time. He'd put the room back in basic order, working around the bookshelf Kurama was sitting on, but there was nothing to be done for the hole Kurama'd made in the wall.

"Why not?" The castrato's voice sounded maniacally pleased by this line of questioning. "He's just going to give his uncle a little kiss, that's all!"

Kurama hissed in rage. He thought vengefully of the sin tree, and the pain it would create; he thought of the shoulder-monkey locked in the tree's crushing embrace. He thought of Aniki screaming in pain, howling, begging for the torment to end... "I'm not a child," he said, through clenched teeth.

"Then shall I kiss you like an adult? Maybe do other adult things to you? My tentacles are almost endless in potential." Kurama snarled and kicked out vigorously with his unrestrained legs. They didn't remain unrestrained for long. He shuddered and jerked as his legs were secured, forced open and guided so that they wrapped around the smaller youkai's waist. The larger tentacles pressed Kurama's tensed and resistant body to his own, draping the thin form against himself. With their height difference, such intimacy would not have been possible had his legs not been wrapped so securely.

Kurama wanted to kill. Homicidal rage bubbled up from within him, filling his lungs and blocking his air passages. Instead of destroying the ugly little man, though, he schooled his features into a grimace of disgust and stared at a convenient spot far above the shoulder-monkey's head. He couldn't resist a choice shudder, though, as he felt something very erect and obviously ballooned press against him. It seemed even more dangerous and grotesque than Karasu's, but he would suffer through it. At least it didn't have the repugnant intimacy of Karasu's touch.

Kurama turned his head further up and looked at the ceiling, beginning to sweat with fear and hatred. He barely noticed as Otouto Toguro left the room, and just focused on the vaulted ceiling, where an elegant pattern of gold leaf welcomed Kurama's escaping mind.

He ignored the almost human mouth that bit idly at his throat. The yellowed teeth didn't care; they grazed his fluttering pulse, and a decayed tongue swabbed the salt off his skin. Kurama grimaced further as the tongue lengthened, dispelling any illusions about humanity as it reached up and traced his lips. He curled his face as his sensitive nose picked up the rotting fetidity of Aniki's breath.

Ani panted in excitement, his lust increasing by the moment as he saw the ugly look he brought onto that beautiful face. He moaned in anticipation, pleased by the pretty boy and his sweet-tasting skin. Neither the rapist nor his victim noticed the man who had been summoned by the younger, larger brother's stoic command.

"Toguro, if you wanted the fox you could've asked me. We might've reached a nice agreement, you and I."

"Come back a little later, Masky." The sneering indentation on the nickname sent a spasm of hot rage through Karasu's narcissistic body.

"Your abilities as a nomenclator are astounding." He was sneering right back. "And why should I leave? That's my property you're molesting."

"Oh, you have that nice little virginity charm on him. What can some fun do to that? You'll hardly notice the difference, I promise. Our sweet kitsune will be just as sweet. But maybe a little more frightened, hm? A little more compliant? A little more traumatized?" The levels of impiously maniacal glee that were folded into Ani's voice were terrifying to behold.

Karasu hesitated for a moment, but at length decided to join in with Ani's taunts, unable to pass up a chance to put his slave back in his subservient place. "What do you say, darling? You're always so vocal when I'm nearing this point. Perhaps you'd like Ani better than me? Perhaps you'd enjoy him inside of you? He can give it all kinds of textures, you know."

Kurama spoke for the first time since Karasu had entered the room. "I'm... trying not to vomit, actually. But really, you or him, it makes no difference." He turned his head to the side, disdaining both his tormentors in lieu of destroying them.

"Your bravado will get you nowhere. You're shaking; trembling like a little girl about to be hit. And I doubt you have such a look of revulsion on your face when Karasu beds you." Ani sounded as though he had just been told it was Christmas for a week, and he was getting a barely legal masochistic whore for his present.

Karasu almost broke it off then, his greed solidifying inside him; but he remembered Kurama's arrogance the night before. Rage mounted inside him as he thought of the burning, vibrant eyes and the snarled insults. Kurama watched in steadily increasing terror as, once again, Karasu's sanity flew out the window. This is the perfect chance, he thought. I can punish the little bitch for angering me last night. Smiling to himself, he stalked up to Kurama, ordering an ecstatic Ani to let him go. Ani frowned, not wanting to give up his new play-toy or obey an underling's orders, but a virile grin widened across his face when he saw the light in Karasu's eyes.

Kurama fell flat on his ass, but was on his feet and backing away in an instant, his fear compounded by the sight of Karasu's searing gaze. He felt Youko curl up in his hypothalamus, attempting to stimulate it to rage instead of terror as he backed off, wide-eyed, trying to keep both of the older men in his line of sight as they advanced on him. Suddenly, in a burst of speed, Karasu was there, gripping the shoulders of his kimono in tight hands. Kurama blushed bright crimson with shame all along his resistant body as the kimono was dragged down to his hips.

Kurama now thoroughly regretted his decision not to wear any of the underwear (most of which fit more comfortably under the term fetish panties or thongs than the staid moniker 'underwear') Karasu had chosen. He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply through his nose, trying to calm himself and keep his mind on more important matters than what the sadists did to his body.

The deliberations that came to mind were too horrible, however, and the surroundings equally so, so he dissociated once more and became a listless doll in Karasu's embrace. Karasu felt the torpor overtake his toy, and laughed viciously as he flung him into Ani's waiting arms. Tentacles wrapped themselves around him and in no time at all he was being slammed against the bookcase next to the wall uncovered by Otouto Toguro's former whims. He bit the wooden shelf between his teeth, tasting the sinuous texture of pine as he felt his legs being spread and his arms being secured.

Ani slid an approximation of a hand along the supple back and thighs, marveling at how smooth the skin was, and yet how hard the muscles lay beneath. His hand strayed to Kurama's ass, enjoying the tremors his ministrations left behind.

Kurama whimpered in fear, Youko having removed himself from all active parts of the mind and curled up in the parietal lobe, as something pulsating and warm was fitted over his flaccid shaft. He bit into the shelf so hard he left permanent indentations as two more approximate hands spread his buttocks. Something pressed against his hole, and he shivered, closing his eyes tight. He was being held so securely he couldn't struggle, but his mouth was unrestrained as Karasu spoke up from the side.

"That's all, Ani? I would've thought there'd be spikes!"

"You're quite right, Karasu." Ani sounded delighted by this turn of events, Karasu equally so. Both youkai were enjoying Kurama's abasement and fear at the depravity he had no choice but to succumb to.

Kurama released his locked jaw and pulled away from the wood, finally managing to speak up as terror filled him. He remembered the pain the mop handle had shown him, and he knew that this plot would reap similar rewards. "You'll kill me, dammit! You'll kill me! I can't lose any more blood, I haven't replenished enough yet. For Inari's sake, look at my wounds!"

It was true. Both of them could see that he was paler than usual, and the partially healed rents were bold strikes against his skin.

"Fine then, child." Ani sounded put out. "I'll give you a nice texture that won't hurt, hm? You'll like it, I promise." He didn't bother seeming even remotely sincere. Kurama tried to protest that he was, in truth, older than Aniki, but only found his mouth restrained.

With Karasu, rape was a slow, winding process, drawn-out and terrifying. He escalated and escalated, until finally he had reached the height of pain and humiliation that he sought. With Ani, rape was disgusting: more disgusting than usual, at least. Kurama supposed there were other words for it. It was unsanitary, it was tacky, it was almost pedophilic in its nuances, and it made Kurama want to vomit on principle. He endured it with the forced patience of a trauma victim trying to cross the street.

Finally, after eons and eons of grief, it was finished. Ani yelled Kurama's name over and over again in wanton delight, while he pumped the studded dick (now shrunk back to its usual unremarkable proportions) in and out. Kurama groaned helplessly into the elastic flesh, the studs creating a pleasurable sensation that sent his mind into spasms of horror. He thanked Inari that Ani was a premature ejaculator, which he was sure was a beloved favor from his god as he swept his eyes around the bright room.

Ani didn't seem to care that Kurama was still partially erect (never having become fully hard) as he slipped out of that impossibly tight hole. He ordered Kurama to clean off his cock with his tongue, expecting terrified and wavering obedience. Karasu was off to the side, anything but hard, yet still pleased by the look on his slave's face.

"I refuse." Kurama had reached snapping point long ago, but there was little or nothing defiant he could do while so thoroughly restrained. In his ecstasy, though, Ani loosened the bonds on his mouth and body, and Kurama twisted free and stalked, or rather limped, over to the raunchy-looking kimono that was his only clothing.

"You . . . refuse?"

"Yes. Wipe yourself off on a book, if you must. I won't clean you." Kurama felt woozy and disoriented by blood loss, a feeling he was beginning to become familiar with. Ani had tried spikes anyway; halfway through, when Kurama noticed with fierce joy that the shoulder-monkey was having trouble staying legitimately hard.

Kurama's hand reached for the clothing, but was stopped by the heel of Karasu's boot. Metal plates, attached to the sole and toe for usage in kicks, crushed and shattered his wrist as they slammed down. Kurama screamed, all the anguish he'd been keeping inside during Ani's rape now streaming out. His mouth formed a perfect chasm as he howled his pain and misery in the air.

"You'll wipe my dear teammate off, pretty, with that talented little tongue of yours. If you don't do that," oh how Kurama had begun to hate those words, the bargaining, the way he forced him to choose. "Then I'll put a leash on you, and, naked as the day you were born, you'll come with me to a nice dinner with Sakyo's associates. We'll see what happens there. Do you understand?" Kurama despised those words, hated them oh-so-much. Do you understand that one day I'll kill you? Kurama thought. Do you understand that, crow?

"Put the leash on, then. I won't fraternize with this enemy any more than I can help. Though you could have the decency to allow me a bath first." Despite his snarled words, there was a glazed look in his eyes and he was shaking.

"A bath sounds lovely. We'll take it together."

As the leash clicked onto the collar's ring, Kurama sighed hatefully. He'd walked into that one.

"Stop touching me."

"Oh, fox. How could I? Your flesh is so beautiful, so delicate, and..."

"I'll clean myself, Karasu. You're free to clean yourself as well, but I'm not cleaning you and you're not cleaning me."

Karasu chuckled lustily, and grabbed Kurama's forearm with hard fingers. As Kurama instantaneously resisted, Karasu backhanded him sharply.

"You're so dirty, lovely." Karasu was starting to sound like a character out of bad pornography, in Kurama's opinion. It would've been funny if it hadn't made him feel so soiled and degraded. "We need to clean you." Kurama was privately sure that it would take something along the lines of acid or steel to cleanse him properly.

Karasu's hands dipped down to the flesh hanging between Kurama's legs, and carelessly massaged it. As he felt the organ respond blearily to his ministrations, he smirked and grasped the shower nozzle in bird-like hands.

"Dirty, dirty. How shall I clean you?" He waved the nozzle menacingly, the titanium rope swinging from side to side with an eery glint. Kurama tried to battle the feelings of lowness and uncleanliness, of being dirty and disgusting; he would withhold any victory he could from the greedy bastards. He swallowed and felt his teeth grind a bit, wishing he could beat Karasu to death with the very implement he was holding. Kurama glanced at the long coil rope that connected water to spout, and decided that it might be easier to strangle him. Karasu smiled when he saw him look.

They both stood in the frontal outer shower that led the way into the ofuro. The baths were one of the few truly Japanese touches in a mostly Western mansion, and were separated from the Western toilets (which were also comfortable and spacious) by two or three doorways. The powder blue tiles of the open, waterproof floor were elegantly inscribed with various patterns, some Chinese in origin, some Japanese, and some even Korean. In front of the shower nozzles was a bamboo bench, carefully rounded and beautified, an expensive commodity that was used as a seat for bathing. It was uncomfortable, but it lent an ambiance to the room that Kurama usually admired.

There was a small line of steps, covered with wood lattice, leading up from the shower room and into the marble ofuro, which currently steamed with torrid, bubbling water. At Karasu's request a servant had drawn a bath; but the servant had left a while ago, with furtive looks towards the two men who cleansed their bodies before relaxing in the bath. Kurama was privately sure that in this instance the cleansing would leave him more disgustingly filthy than he had been before it started.

Karasu slammed Kurama's body down on the bench, causing him to arch and clench his teeth in pain. Blunt force was all that was needed to reopen the wounds that ripped his insides apart.

"We need to get you clean, yes?" The sickly way Karasu was treating him and the crude look in his eyes brought the familiar taste of gall to Kurama's throat and mouth. Kurama closed his eyes and forced himself to endure as Karasu finished lathering a washcloth with ginseng-and-ginger soap, and used it to slowly, erotically, and wickedly cleanse his body. The cloth teased his nipples into an erect position, and bathed his face. The washcloth and the washcloth's owner didn't bother caring about the way that face turned bright red with fuming rage. Ironically, the spicy smell of the soap rejuvenated Kurama even as the eroticism of its motions dulled his spirit and violated him.

Shudders came again as that almost gentle, yet terrible hand wrapped around his shaft and began to pump. Kurama's chin jerked with hatred and fear as he grimaced in ever-deepening disgust. He stood up suddenly, wincing and shuddering as the hand didn't release his phallus, but instead twisted it in a painful, businesslike manner.

"Karasu, do you want to taste Aniki Toguro the next time you... the next time you rape me? I'll clean. You can get in the bath." Kurama refused to deign the eldest Toguro with a nickname. He closed his eyes and shuddered again at the pause his mind had supplied before saying the word 'rape.'

"Your insolence is never-ending, fox. Fine, then: I'll leave you to it. But there is one place I know you'll forget to clean, and since it's the most important place of all, and the one place I don't want to find any bits of Ani in, do you mind if I wash it for you?" It was a rhetorical question. His voice was as velvety and smooth as always.

Kurama began to shiver harder as he was rearranged and leaned against the bamboo bench. He shut his eyes tight and whispered prayers to himself as he felt something smooth and metallic press against his opening. Karasu hardened with lust, seeing those legs tremble as he placed the shower nozzle, a small cylinder, against the semen-stained entrance. We can't have that, now can we? He thought to himself. He turned the power on the side of the head to its highest frequency, and then, gently, using his hands and the showerhead, cleaned away the cum. When the entrance was once again pert and uncontaminated, and the ring of muscle once more beautifully tensed, he decided to escalate himself again.

Kurama was in hell. He whimpered and wheezed in terror and shame as the shower head was pressed into him. He shut his eyes, only to open them again as the nozzle was misused, cleaning him in a way that made him feel as though it were motor oil that hit his skin instead of water. He suppressed that thought, and groaned aloud as he realized that all he had done recently was repress, repress, repress. It was a basic rule of psychology that all repressed urges eventually exploded; perhaps it was the same with repressed feelings? Kurama didn't know, and he was suddenly distracted as the shower nozzle was fitted in.

Karasu was, as always, uncaring of the soft sounds of pain and protest from Kurama's perfect mouth as he fucked him with the showerhead, cranked up to full. Kurama twisted and whined, scrabbling and bucking as Karasu reached beneath him to fondle his retracted balls, curious of them. Semen and blood mixed with the water, and was scooped out of Kurama's ass by casual flicks of the wrist. Occasionally, the water or the metal brushed up against his prostate, eliciting aroused grunts from deep within him.

Kurama tried to relax, attempting to control the pain of his wounds tearing around the new intrusion. He felt battered and broken by the constant stream of trauma; his nerves were wearing thin, and his emotions were spinning out of control. He tried to restrain his desperate need to fight back - there seemed to be something so wrong about trying to kick when a foreign object was violating his rectum. Of course there was nothing wrong with fighting back, but in this case... he couldn't. He didn't know why, but he couldn't. He could only endure, and hope to garner revenge in excess.

The shower nozzle was taken away when Karasu was finished. Kurama was flipped around and forced to lie on the bench, his position moved so that he was on his back. His hair hung in curled masses of crimson that pillowed his head, shining with health that he didn't feel. His penis was half-erect, blushing with unwanted desire and turgid from revolting pleasure. His skin was dampened by water, his nipples hardened, and his eyes shined with misery and bleary hate.

In short: he looked stunning. So stunning, in fact, that Karasu was barely aware of himself as his cock took the shower nozzle's place. Kurama's legs were spread harshly to the sides, levered from the hips and knees and held in place by stone grips on the rosy insides of his shins. Karasu didn't waste any time before thrusting forward, not giving Kurama time to adjust before moving. He groaned, feeling Kurama's tight warmth surrounding him and sending heat coiling along his body. Kurama shut his eyes tightly and screamed as all his wounds, all his many, many wounds tore around the monstrous, familiar invader.

Kurama gulped and gasped, his back screaming, his legs screaming, his insides screaming, his head rebounding with screams, but most of all his mouth screaming. He was terrified, he was in pain, and he couldn't quite place why what Karasu was doing was so much worse than what Ani had done. It had something to do with the... the intimacy, the way Karasu made him feel like everything inside him was exposed for the world to see. Karasu made things personal; he didn't just treat him like a whore, he treated him like a treasured love-slave. The difference was astounding, horrifying, and more than a little confusing.

But he would never be foolish enough to mistake these absolutely wrong, in every way despicable feelings for love or lust or longing of any kind. The only thing he felt for Karasu was hatred and fear; those, though, he felt in droves.

Finally, he felt the familiar warmth of Karasu releasing his seed deep within his unwilling victim. The only parts of his body that had been touching Kurama were his hands, hips and cock, which receded with a slippery-wet 'shlick.' His legs where unceremoniously dropped, and he was pushed off the bench with no care or finesse. Kurama hit the floor with a sickening thunk and lay there dejectedly, trying to recover himself as Karasu cleaned, briskly and efficiently. Karasu finished quickly, and climbed the stairs to relax in the ofuro, content that his slave would soon join him.

Kurama picked himself up slowly. He crawled, aware of his lack of an audience, to the metal claw Karasu had replaced the shower nozzle into, and began to clean himself. Black spots danced across his vision. He leaned against the bamboo that had lacerated his back and wrenched out his hair, and cursed the gods, cursed Toguro, cursed Karasu, and cursed his luck. He honestly didn't know how long he could hang on like this. He tried to get up, tottered for a bit, and was aware of the floor rushing to meet him as everything dissolved into darkness.

To be continued.

(1) Elmire: The lusted-after wife of the dupe in Molière's Tartuffe. She was almost raped at one point, and had to suffer through the humiliations offered to prove to her husband that Tartuffe was an imposter. It's a very funny play, but quite horrible if you think too much.

Chryssipus: Wikipedia can offer you information on his story, but the gist is that he was kidnapped, held hostage and raped by his tutor, Laius, who went on to father Oedipus. (Yes, that Oedipus. This, actually, is the crime Oedipus' father was being punished for). The story Kurama talked about is actually a more rare and apocryphal one, which I used because it fit better with my fic. In the other versions, Chryssipus kills himself or is killed by his jealous half-brothers. The second one I've never quite understood, and I doubt Laius could rape him to death, so, morbid as this explanation has gotten, we're left with the second explanation for his untimely death. Need I mention that it's a very sad story?

Lucy: Benjamin Barker's wife from Sondheim's play Sweeney Todd. She was drugged and raped, and her daughter was taken from her. She went insane after a failed suicide attempt.

(2) "Hashi" is the Japanese word for chopsticks, which I always thought sounded better. Sounding is when something is inserted into the penis directly.

Another thing to clear up:

This is definitely an AU. In canon, Sakyo didn't know who Karasu and Bui were; they were kept secret from him. This arrangement suits the fic better, though, so I'm leaving it.