Rage....And pain.  There was nothing left in him.  His soul is filled with nothing, except the constant of a pure white hot anger and the pain of his broken body.  It was not always this way.  He was not always broken.  But he has not always been a slave.<br/><br/>---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br/><br/>It was a decent life, for a time.  He worked hard and was treated well for it.  It was at eight when things began to change and before he knew it, he was sold.  Chains, and manacles.  He'd never been in bonds before.  Not once.  The noise of the links of his irons almost drove him to madness before he was brought before her.  His new mistress.  "You are mine now."  He didn't know what to think of the smile she gave him.<br/><br/>---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br/><br/>His mind slipped in and out of consciousness.  The blissful darkness of concussive sleep without feeling.  Without the dreams of madness.  The pit and all its horrors usually crowded conscious thought as well as nightmare filled slumber.  Awake he was a groaning, bloodied and battered wreck.  When he was awake, he didn't remember much of the last day or so. He did remember lashing out at the guard before being chained to the wall with more broken bones then he had when he came in.  But every time the guard made his rounds, the baleful glare was rested on him.  "Yer damn lucky that the lady is gonna pay me enough ta keep yer sorry red skinned arse alive.  Lest wise I'd pitch ye in with rest o' the fools." The glare turning into a malicious grin as he adds, "them that be daft enough ta go against crown are ta be tossed in the pit with the crocs."  The last thing he heard was the laughter of cruelty aimed at him.<br/><br/>---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br/><br/>He had absorbed, learned and fought his way through the ranks of every fighter Malora had. Had beaten or submitted everything that she had thrown at him.  That smile he had learned was two things.  That was the smile of greed.  Ringing of coin is what she heard when she had smiled at him that day.  Taryn is what some would call a half breed.  His skin is a deep rich red, a long thin tail and a set of horns comes with his breeding.  That first meeting, that first day she had mad clear to him what her intentions were.  "Yes, Taryn, you are mine.  To do with as I wish.  My wish is this, you will become a fighter of the pit.  A arms man for my banner, to spill the blood of your enemies for the glory of my house."  In the telling of those few sentences her smile widened just a bit as his new master stood and began to circle around him, brushing by the guards without so much as a look, a lazy finger trailing over his upper body as she completes her circuit.  She eventually comes to stand before him.  The guards stepping forward and forcing him to his knees with a clatter as the manacles on his wrists hit the floor. "You will learn what you need to survive in the pit, darling, and if you learn well enough you will earn the glory (a seeming lascivious grins slipping to her face) as well as the rewards of victory.  If not, then you will die and be tossed into a heap of those not worthy."  With a nod to her men she turns away.  "Take him to the pens.  His training begins on the morrow." He is roughly jerked to his feet and taken through a side exit and shown his home for the foreseeable future.<br/><br/>---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br/><br/>The clatter of a key rouses him from his bliss.  Taryn felt just good enough to open his eyes as the door to his cell is swung inward.  The grimy face of the jailer studies his own as he is rolled over. "...aye, he still lives."  The next thing that enters his vision is a woman. Rustles of skirts and fabric assail his ears as she fusses over him.  As soon as her hands touch him the piercing agony begins to slowly fade.  His face softens just  a bit as the etched in granite look of pain eases.  His arm is thrown over her shoulder as the unbearable weight of shackles falls from him.  He is guided out of the cell as she whispers something near unintelligible, though with a note of reassurance.  He is weak and near starving. To run or try to fight is a vague and long distant image in his mind.  Not one to be acted on at the moment.  He merely slumps heavily against her as he leads her away.