Bright smiles, a loving family, everyone sitting around a table in front of a warm hearth. It ended as soon as it began as Daniel awoke with a start to the loud noises coming from outside his small rundown hut.

“Shit, I overslept again” – said Daniel in frustration.

The noises grew louder as Daniel continued to curse his bad luck. It was obvious to Daniel who was approaching his humble abode

‘I bet it’s Cale again come to amuse himself, I have to get away fast’

Before he could even get himself fully dressed the front door to his hut flew open and a large boy no older than 16 summers walked in, followed by him 2 lackeys. His broad shoulders and large body built from years of field work since he was young easily filled Daniels small doorway. With an impressive height for a 16-year-old of 5’9, Cale was easily one of the biggest youth in the village. Taller than Daniel's modest 5’4 by a large margin. Although he thought it was above average for his young 14 summers.

“Well if the little shit isn’t still sleeping all cosy in bed while the rest of the village works” – Said Cale with an ugly sneer on his face as he proceeded to harass Daniel.

Cale had a modest face, sharp chin, high cheekbones, but a crooked nose and a nasty scare covered his face and squinty eyes from a kick by a mule when he was younger, and light brown hair slicked back over his head to keep it out of his eyes.

‘Serves the bastard right’

Just as Daniel thought that Cale’s two lackeys added their two cents,

“Well if his father’s anything to go by then it’s a miracle he hasn’t stolen all our gold and skipped town, sure was strange he never came back from that hunting accident” - ???

Said a fat little boy, a year older than Daniel, but he only stood at a pathetic 5’1. He looked like a pig on a hot summers day, with rolls of fat hanging everywhere, and a mop of greasy black hair upon his head. It was a miracle if you could get any features off his face with the amount of fat he held.

‘I bet he’d last the whole village a week or two in winter, twig there could probably live off him all year’

As Daniel finished his thoughts the taller of the two lackeys chimed in,

“He’s already getting his sleeping practice in just like his whore of a mother!” - ???

Yelled a boy who stood at 6’1, but without an ounce of muscle or fat on him, if Daniel had to envision a human broom, this boy would fit perfectly, he even had bristly yellow hair sticking out of his headband.

“Hey Twig, Blob, leave the poor kid alone, I’m sure even he knows he’s not going to amount to anything in this life, he’ll probably die in a ditch somewhere with no one to care about him!”- Laughed Cale as he referred to Marcus and Rake by their nicknames.

Amusingly enough Rake lived up to his namesake. Throughout this Daniels rage had slowly been building, he’d learnt to ignore them most of the time, but the one thing he couldn’t stand was people slandering his mother. She’d worked hard to feed and clothe him when his father had died. He refused to believe he’d just left them and taken everyone’s money. His mother had passed away a year ago due to poor health, and Daniel at the time had no money to afford medicine even though he worked like a dog for the village. Often replacing horses whilst ploughing the fields.

“AAAAAAARGG!!” – Yelled Daniel as he leapt forward with a scream and unleashed a punch to Cale’s already broken nose. He was rewarded by a satisfying crunch and a howl of pain from Cale.

“OOOOoWWWW! NGHET DAT BASHTERD!” – Raged Cale as he fell backwards clutching his nose.

Daniel knew he’d messed up when both twig and blob ran around Cale and slammed into him. Blobs larger body knocked him down despite his shorter height, and twigs arms held a surprising amount of strength, more than enough to hold him down.

“Shouldn’t have done that you little twerp” – Twig said with an ugly sneer on his face as he shifted his grip on Daniels legs to keep them steady.

“Ooo youre in for a beating now boy” – Echoed Blob as he all but lay on Daniels outstretched hand to keep them still.

Daniel struggled for all he was worth, wriggling back and forth but to no avail, there was just no way to shift the two older boy’s grips, or in blobs case his considerable weight.

It was at this point that Cale had recovered enough to stand, he had a look on his face that screamed murder.

“haven’t I told you before to respect your betters you whoreson” – Growled Cale as he picked up a two by four.

Daniel was well and truly fucked now. At least it was nothing he hadn’t encountered before, he just had to tough his way through it.

“Hold him still boys, this brat is about to get what’s coming to him” – commanded Cale as he lined up his shot.

The stick came hard and fast straight into Daniels stomach, winding him and making the next hit much worse. Cale continued to beat on him as he lay there grunting through the pain. Every time the plank hit his body it would show a nasty purple bruise, and some especially hard hits even split the skin and started bleeding. His face was a mask of purple and yellow, leaking blood from most places.

“ugh boss, I think this is enough” – Voiced a tentative twig, looking at the damage done to Daniel.

“yeah boss, you’ve made your point, he won’t be able to move for a while anyway” – Agreed a pale faced blob, they’d never seen Cale get this worked up before. Had something happened, or was he truly enjoying himself as he hit Daniel?

“Let that be a lesson to you, you little pisstain, I better not see that attitude from you again” – Remarked Cale as he dropped his plank and marched out – “Come on, lets go!”

Blob and twig hastily left a groaning Daniel on the floor.

‘Fuck, they got me good this time. I don’t think anything broken but I can’t move a muscle’

Daniel was in too much pain to speak. He could only talk to himself inside his head and try to rationalize a way out of this. Daniel had always had a calm mind, and he prided himself on his ability to keep his thoughts clear. This was why he was so mad at himself for losing his cool and breaking Cale’s nose.

‘At least it felt good’

Daniel tried to smirk but it just hurt his already split lip.

‘guess I’ll just have to make do with my emergency rations and hope I can move by tomorrow’

With that morbid though, Daniel managed to crawl over to a loose floorboard where he’d hidden some jerky, hard bread, a water canteen and even some chees he’d managed to steal one time.

‘only got enough to last 2 maybe 3 days, I better be ready by then or I’m in a real tight spot, well, no use thinking about it now, better try and get some sleep in’

With that Daniel crawled the rest of the way into bed, leaving the door open and hanging slightly off its hinge. He didn’t have the strength to close it today.