Page 21 of Degradation

He looks like he actually wants to strangle her. Her face is going purple, her limbs are thrashing as much as the people holding her will allow.

This isn’t meant to go down like this. Most Chapter Lords don’t do any more than simply place their hands around their bride’s throat.

Someone in the audience screams. Someone else shouts. The guards around me move to subdue them, but I’m not here for them, I’m here to protect Gunther. To protect his bride.

I step forward, just as the orders bark in my ear to hold my position.

“If she dies, she dies.” My commander says nonchalantly.

I’m not sure how our dear friends watching this will react to it if the bitch does die but I stay where I am, watching as Gunther continues to fuck and strangle her at the same time.

Finally, he comes, finally he growls out, jerking before he collapses on top of her. As soon as he does, the Senate drop their hold, someone pulls Gunther off and another is there, checking the girl’s pulse.

The man shakes his head slightly and straddles her body, doing compressions as the whole room sits in shocked silence.

He works away, pushing into her chest, breathing into her mouth. She just lays there, and then another man comes running in, holding a defibrillator.

“Move,” he orders before setting it up, placing the pads on her chest and shocking her.

She jerks, her entire body seems to jump up off the granite and it feels like the entire Cathedral holds its breath. If she dies, I don’t know what they would do but my gut tells me that it won’t be good.

I scan the room, and my eyes meet the blackened ones behind a mask. I’d put my money on it being Magnus. I’d statemy life on it. And I’d also bet everything that he has that smug ‘I told you so’ look across his damned face.

She slams back down onto the granite after being shocked again and this time she rolls slowly onto her side, gasping, choking as she comes back to life.

Orders start filling up my ears. We need to move her, to get her out. I step forward, pushing through the crowd of people that are now on their feet. As I get to her, I can see our Commander has already got her in his arms, that he’s the one carrying her.

Gunther is stood, right in the middle of the carnage and he doesn’t even look concerned, he doesn’t even look guilty, if anything he looks proud of what he’s done. He waves his hand dismissively as if she’s a distraction and he wants her gone.

On the granite I can see that bloodied white sheet and Gunther snatches it up, waiving it about like a flag.

As we carry her out his voice echoes behind us, he’s giving a new lecture now, one about how God chose him as Chapter Lord and therefore, all his actions are divine.

Pailtyn

Iwake up in a bed. I know it’s not my own, that the space I’m in is not my own. I blink, trying to sit up and in the dim light, I can see how ornate this room is. All the walls are covered in mother of pearl panels. They’re intricate, delicate, it must have taken years of craftsmanship to create such a thing. For a moment I’m so awestruck by my surroundings that I don’t register the pain, the bruising, the way it feels like my entire body has been beaten.

My hands wrap around my neck, and I whimper as the flashback hits me.

He strangled me. He tried to kill me.

It has to be a mistake, it has to be, but he didn’t even need to squeeze, my mother said the whole thing was symbolic – what he did was anything but.

I pull my knees up to my chin, huddling under the ridiculously soft covers. I don’t understand why he did it, I don’t understand why he hurt me.

Between my legs there’s an awful, agonising throbbing. I know it’s from the way he fucked me. Shame heats my cheeks at the thought of it, of him on top of me, of the sound of him grunting as he consummated our marriage while all those people watched on.

“Paitlyn?”

I gasp looking up, unsure if it’s relief or something else I feel as my mother’s face peers around the doorframe.

“Mom-ma?” I stammer, sounding more emotionally than I mean. My throat is so painful that it hurts to speak.

She comes in, quickly shutting the door and she strides across the room, her eyes fixed on me. “Oh, sweetie,” She says, holding her hands out to hug me.

I fall into her embrace, needing it to comfort me and before I can stop myself, I’m sobbing again.

“Ssssh, it’s okay.” She says, sweeping the loose strands of my hair back from my face. “You did so good.”