The Kingdom of Shadows Read Online Free PDF

It had seemed then that the schnapps had no effect on her, that her anger burned it way as fast as it could be swallowed – but then the room downstairs had tilted and swayed sickeningly, and the faces of the other girls and the men with whom they had paired off had turned to laughing animal masks, laughing at her. Her hands had felt thick and swaddled as she had clutched at Heinrich, trying to keep from falling.
     
    That was all she knew about him, his first name. Besides the fact that he was ready. He had been ready as soon as they had gotten into the room. He had slammed her against the door – everyone down the hallway must have heard – and started pawing her, his wet mouth at her throat, a hand rucking up her skirt to grip her thigh above the top of her stocking.
     
    She had been able to push him away, stumbling backward with the bottle in his other hand. There was still enough of that coldly sober part awake in her, that she wanted to make sure this idiot didn’t tear her nice clothes. She had sat down on the bed – harder than she’d intended, her feet slipping out from under her – and had started undressing, while Heinrich goggled and drank.
     
    “Come here.” She grabbed his belt and pulled him closer. She worked at the buckle, his trousers finally sliding down around his ankles. Men always looked so stupid and trapped like that – she had to keep herself from laughing. They hated that, she knew from experience.
     
    “ Scheiß  . . .” Now he wasn’t ready. He looked as if he were about to topple over. The empty bottle dropped from his hand, his eyes rolling back in his head.
     
    Liesel tugged him down beside her and kissed him, his jaw slackly open under her mouth. His flesh swelled in her hand. Nothing would interfere – she had been humiliated enough already, downstairs, in front of everybody. The infuriating memory came again to her, of the other girl’s face, shadowed by Obersturmführer Stoehr as he had made a small, courtly bow to her. Liesel’s fingers tightened, the man’s blood encased in their grip.
     
    Her foot touched something cold and heavy in the tangle of his uniform on the floor. She reached down and picked it up, holding it between herself and Heinrich. It took her a moment to even see what it was: his ceremonial dagger, the emblem of his membership in the SS. She tugged on the ornate handle, and the glittering blade emerged from the scabbard.
     
    “No . . .” Heinrich’s smile soured. “That’s not . . . something to play with.” His clumsy tongue could barely get the words out.
     
    She dropped the empty scabbard. The blade had words engraved on it. Meine Ehre heißt Treue . “‘My honor is loyalty,’” she said aloud. And laughed – she couldn’t help it. She held the dagger up, close to her face, and looked at him. “Are you loyal, Heini?”
     
    He watched, eyes half-lidded, as she licked the dagger blade, drawing her tongue slowly along its length. The sharp blade cut her tongue. She didn’t feel anything but the warmth trickling at the corner of her mouth.
     
    She let him knock the dagger out of her hand; it clattered against the base of the wall. It didn’t matter. He was already on top of her, his hands pinning her wrists above her head, her blood smearing on his greedy face.
     
    * * *
     
    He lay against Marte’s side, head resting on her bare shoulder. He seemed to be asleep; the hand at her breast hadn’t stirred in a long time.
     
    Warm under the blankets; she breathed slow and shallow, to not disturb the bedcovers snugged around the two bodies. Everything had happened the way her father had said it would. If the girl, the lace-trimmed dress gone now, looked in the mirror, Marte wouldn’t feel sorry for her. No one could say that the girl hadn’t done what was expected of her.
     
    And even so . . . there had been one moment, like a spark of light falling in a sky without stars. When she had been falling beneath him.