And the only reason they went to so much trouble to take me alive, she thought, was because they want me for something.
She shivered, helplessly. The temperature had been dropping for hours now, ever since she’d been taken from the airport and dumped into a prison cell, but none of the guards had offered her anything more substantial to wear. Her bra and panties, already torn by the repeated strip searches, provided no protection at all. She couldn’t help wondering if she would catch her death of cold before the SS started torturing her, then decided the cold was probably part of the torture. Horst had warned her that they would do everything in their power to break her will, but his words hadn’t been anything like enough to convoy the sheer sense of helplessness and futility pervading her body and soul. Her life was definitely no longer her own.
The cell itself was completely empty, save for a bed and a bucket she was too chained up to use. She suspected it was yet another humiliation, although they hadn’t fed her anything like enough for it to be a real problem. And they hadn’t made any attempt to hide the cameras either, hanging four of them from the ceiling and wrapping them in steel mesh. Absurdly, the sight almost made her giggle. She was chained — and even if she hadn’t been, she was too short to reach them, even if she stood on the bed.
But they might have taller prisoners, she thought, Horst was a head taller than her — and she knew the SS prized height. For all she knew, Horst was a dwarf compared to some of his former comrades. Besides, the Slavs she’d seen had all been short and ugly, but was that true of all Slavs? And they clearly don’t want to take any risks.
She forced herself to relax, even though it was futile. Her wrists and ankles ached; the metal belt they’d wrapped around her hips dug into her flesh and she was hungry, terrifyingly hungry. She’d never really gone hungry in her life, even though some of the food she’d had to choke down at school was barely a step or two above the slop fed to prisoners and Gastarbeiters. Now, she couldn’t help feeling as though she didn’t have the energy for anything. It wouldn’t be long, she suspected, before she died…
…And the hell of it was that a quick death would probably be a relief.
The cell door opened. Two burly male guards stepped through, glaring suspiciously at her as if they expected her to have vanished somewhere in the last hour. Gudrun resisted the urge to rattle her chains at them; instead, she just waited — reluctantly — as they glanced around the cell, then yanked her to her feet and shoved her through the door. They didn’t speak to her, they never did. Only one of her captors had spoken to her since she’d been taken prisoner and Gudrun hadn’t seen her for days.
She forced herself to stand still as they ran their hands over her body, telling herself — desperately — that it was Horst who was touching her. But it was hard to believe it — truly believe it — when their rough fingers were pinching at her flesh and tugging down her panties to check that she hadn’t managed to conceal something between her legs. And this time, they were worse. Their hands were rubbing at her clit as if they expected her to enjoy it, their breathing growing deeper and deeper with anticipation as they pushed her over to the table and bent her over. She realised, feeling a surge of fear, that she was about to be raped…
“That will do,” a cool voice said.
The guards started, then let go of her. Gudrun twisted her head and saw Hauptsturmführer Katharine Milch standing there, looking grim. The older woman — the first woman she’d seen wearing a uniform — looked hellishly intimidating. If she had a right to wear that uniform, Gudrun thought, she wouldn’t just be as good as a man, she’d be better. And she’d saved Gudrun from a fate worse than death…
…Or had she?
Did they really plan to rape me, Gudrun asked herself, or was she always meant to save me from them?
It was impossible to tell. She knew just what horrors awaited prisoners, but she found it hard to believe that the SS guards in Germanica were so undisciplined that they would rape a prisoner without permission. And yet… she couldn’t help feeling relief, clinging to Katharine like a drowning man would cling to a lifejacket. But had the whole incident been set up to make her cling to Katharine? She had no way to know.
She cursed under her breath as Katharine pulled her panties back into position, then helped Gudrun to walk slowly towards the door. It was hard, so hard, to walk with a chain wrapped around her ankles. If Katharine hadn’t been holding her, she would have fallen over several times. And yet… what was Katharine doing? Where were they going?
It was a relief to be out of the cell, but the interior of the building wasn’t particularly reassuring. She couldn’t help remembering the interior of the first prison she’d visited — and her old school, which had probably been designed by the same person. Grey walls, solid metal doors… no signs on the walls, let alone paintings or anything else that would give the building personality. It was completely soulless… she shivered, again, as they reached an elevator and stepped inside. The air was, if anything, growing colder. It was all she could do to keep her teeth from chattering.
She hadn’t wanted to talk to Katharine, but she couldn’t help herself. “Where are we going?”
The older woman gave her a cold look. “Someone wants to see you.”
Gudrun winced as the elevator came to a halt. She had a nasty feeling she knew precisely who they were going to see. The doors hissed open, revealing a carpeted hallway leading down to a pair of heavy wooden doors. She stepped gingerly out of the elevator, silently relieved to walk on something other than cold stone; Katharine helped her down the corridor, snarling at her whenever she looked left or right. And yet, Gudrun couldn’t help herself. The walls were decorated in portraits of the honoured dead, all looking too handsome and muscular to be real. She caught sight of a man who looked like Horst, drawn against a burning panzer and wondered, suddenly if he was a relative. Horst had never said much about his father, merely that he’d died in the wars…
Two SS stormtroopers stood guard outside the doors, their eyes barely flickering over Gudrun as she approached. They didn’t even seem to be aware that she was practically naked! She felt a sudden flicker of anger as Katharine spoke to the guards, realising that she’d been right all along. The guards who had dragged her out of her cell had been acting, giving Katharine an opportunity to play the hero… she pushed the thought aside, sharply, as the doors opened to reveal the largest office she’d ever seen. A single wooden desk was positioned at the far end, a man she recognised from his photographs sitting behind it. And seventeen men were standing against the wall, staring at her.
Gudrun had to fight to keep from cringing. She’d been brought here — chained up, almost nude — to humiliate her in front of the men. Karl Holliston, sitting behind the desk, had planned the whole thing. He didn’t think of women as fit for anything, save for being mothers, daughters and housewives. Exposing her was merely the first step towards undermining everything she’d done. It would be hard for any of the men to respect her after they’d seen her in such a fallen state…
She shivered. Two years ago, a girl she’d known — vaguely — had been expelled after allowing her boyfriend to take nude photographs of her. Gudrun and her girlfriends had been horrified. How could she have allowed her boyfriend to take photographs that might — easily — fall into the wrong hands? No one had ever looked at her the same way again. In the end, she’d emigrated to Germany South, where all that mattered was the right bloodline and the ability to bear children. Gudrun had no idea what had happened to the poor girl after that.