Claire spat full in her face.
The look of disbelief, the instant rage that someone would dare such a thing, was something Claire was only able to enjoy for a moment before Svana reached up to wipe the wetness from her cheek with her sleeve.
“You know what I have learned, little one?” Svana giggled under her breath, her tongue darting out to lick at the spittle nearest her lips. “It’s to let the men always underestimate you. Let them think you are flawed, that you need them. Do you have any idea how many times I have stood in your room and watched him fuck you? Neither of you knowing I was near enough to touch. When your eyes were closed, when he buried his face in your neck, sometimes those fingers carding through your hair were mine.”
Claire’s mask cracked; it was impossible to keep the revulsion from her face. Feeling Svana chip away at the little courage she could manage, the Omega knew in that moment the exact type of wickedness Shepherd spoke of when he spoke of the true evil that had been cast in the Undercroft. It was all there, a conglomeration of vileness in the woman running her nail up and down the slit where Claire was still slippery from Shepherd’s last ejaculation.
“It has been unpleasant, the way things have gone,” Svana pouted, her mouth heading towards a cold tightened nipple. “But I have done Shepherd a favor in this. You are a whore, desecrated and as disgusting as this city—unworthy of a man like him. But like all men, he is weak.” That single finger slipped easily inside Claire, no matter how her muscles clenched to deny her entry. “They all bow to this. Premier Callas, Shepherd, even my dead uncle. It’s a pity I was not born Omega, I would have ruled the world ages ago.”
Once the initial penetration had passed, Claire did not fight; she lay passive knowing Svana desired her resistance. Drugged as she was, she had no energy to fight, had extreme difficulty even focusing her eyes, and embraced the wave of chemical euphoria over the terror of what was taking place.
Swallowing back a shriek, unwilling to cringe when the hated woman lapped at her nipple, Claire lay still and fixated instead on her son’s fluttering movement deep inside her. Everything else was shut off.
“Now,” Stroking Claire’s black hair affectionately, Svana smiled as if they were old friends, still pumping in and out of the Omega’s body, “I won’t be able to stay and watch. Far more important things than you require my attention.”
With a lingering kiss on Claire’s mouth, a little flick of the tongue forced between her lips, Svana pulled her fingers from Claire’s body, licked them clean, and made her goodbye.
“I want you to know,” Claire called to Svana’s back before the woman exited the cell.
Svana turned, eager to hear the Omega beg, “Yes, dear?”
It was not even difficult to say, “I want you to know that I love him. That even after everything, I learned how to do it. And that is something you could never achieve.”
Svana laughed as if the very concept were absurd. She stood a moment, taking in the view of her enemy bound and at her mercy, the tip of Svana’s tongue licking over the edges of her teeth. One more chuckle, and she opened the barred door, leaving Claire naked and bound on a musty bed, while three men covered in Da’rin markings entered, smiling and eager.
Claire knew what was coming; a monster like Svana would require degradation and horror before death was achieved. Claire could smell the two putrefying corpses piled up in the cramped cell’s corner, could see from the withered limbs and small frames that the poor woman had been Omega.
Death was coming for her. Death was coming for her baby. And it was all there in the smiles of the Alpha outcasts who circled like sharks.
The instant the first one touched her, Claire knew she would not be able to hold back her screams for long.Brigadier Dane had to fight her way through the mob clogging the tunnels. The streets were chaos, having made it hard enough to get close to nearest underground access point, but navigating underground through the confused throngs was almost impossible. Some of the city was wise; a portion of citizens chose not to engage in the war, but to retreat to the Undercroft, away from the bitter cold already leaching the life from the city.
Or they were just plain cowards.
The farther Dane moved underground, the more she believed the latter. From all directions, a cacophony of voices, of screams, wails, and outright shouting was so loud, was amplified so greatly by the tunnels, that Dane could palpably feel the tremors of their fear
She’d only stomached it for less than an hour. This place had once been crammed full of tens of thousands of castoffs. What would five years trapped in the Undercroft do to a mind? It would unhinge a person, that’s what it would do.