Page 16 of Knot All Is Ruined: Part 1

“If you want to believe that, I can’t stop you,” Jan said with a shrug. “You don’t give that man enough credit. He does truly care for you. The only reason you don’t see the signs is because you don’t want to.”

“We’re not having this conversation again, Jan. I like you, really I do. If you keep pushing this matter, I’m going to show you just how good my right hook is,” I warned.

Jan put up his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay, I’ll drop it. But, Dani, I’ll warn you, the longer things go without you getting pregnant and the Commander being gone more… it’s not going to be the outcome you want. He’s all that’s standing between you and being chained to a bed upstairs, and I don’t want that for you.”

“I know, you don’t want that for any of us. Yet here we are,” I pointed out. “Thank you for the warning. I’ll keep it in mind.”

Jan reached out and gave my arm a reassuring squeeze then left the room. The snick of the lock told me I was being put in time-out for the rest of the day. Oh goodie.

Chapter nine

Babaka banished me to work alone in her rooms for the remainder of the day and only allowed me to join the others for dinner. Coral and I were placed on opposite sides of the room to ensure neither of us incurred any more damage. Tori sat next to me, and Violet was across from us, absently picking at her food. My heart broke for her. I wanted to rage, fight, and scream about how all of this was pointless. What good did it do to take the child away from its mother?

Was this why everyone in this country was so cold and heartless? They never knew the love of a mother or what it felt like to be held and cherished. The General wanted them strong and fearless, so he’d rather train them from the moment they took their first breath to when they took their last on the battlefield. It was senseless, and I don’t know why I was the only one who saw it.

“Dani, are you okay?” Tori asked in a low voice. “Those scratches look like they hurt.”

I gave her a warm smile and squeezed her hand. “I’m fine, nothing to worry about. The doc looked at it, made sure it was good and clean, then warned against scratching so I didn't get a scar.”

Tori nodded and returned to her bland, tasteless soup that had been made for dinner. The food shortage this time was the worst it's ever been. Normally we’d have enough to make it through before we ended up at the point we are now. We were down to grinding up beans and potatoes to make this weak, watery soup that we added essential vitamins and minerals to so we didn’t get sick. The shipment was supposed to arrive two weeks ago, and I know Lucian had been talking with the general about it. From the stormy looks on his face when he ended his phone calls with his father it wasn’t an answer any of us wanted to hear.

The soldiers were given the better food, such as dried jerky and hard-tack biscuits that never seemed to go bad. You needed to soak them in water to gnaw on them, but it was better than this gruel we had. Last year we tried to make a garden, saving the seeds from the vegetables, but nothing survived other than the potatoes and onions. It also used up more of our water supply than was worth it. We kept up with the potatoes and onions, which is what was saving us right now.

When Lucian warned me about learning to get used to being hungry, I’d thought he’d been using it as a scare tactic. Now I understood he was telling the truth. When the clawing pain stopped, I lost all body fat, and one meal a day could last me until the next I fully understood what he’d been trying to say. There was no way to prepare for that though, when all you’ve known is having enough. The three of us chatted, talking about Oscad and a few others who had been sent before us adding in.

“Remember that one teacher who had to clear his throat every five minutes? It used to drive me up the wall,” Erica said with a groan. “What did he teach? I can't remember, it was hard to pay attention.”

“Oh that was Mr. Otterbe, he taught health and wellness I think,” Violet answered, joining in the conversation after just listening to us talk. “He used to say it was because he was allergic to milk and that we never had soy milk or lactose-free for him to use in his coffee.”

“God, he had the worst coffee breath ever,” Tori blurted. “He’d lean over my shoulder to look over my work and his breath was just deadly.”

Everyone laughed at that, making the Asturg women glare at us. They never got an education, there was no reason for them to learn anything other than to read and write. It amazed me how limited their knowledge was of the outside world and what was happening around them. They didn’t even know there was another country until the first wave of Omegas started to get sent to Oscad. I tried not to pity them, but the fact the general was using his peoples' ignorance to keep them stuck here was just fucked up.

“Would you all shut the fuck up?” Coral snarled. “No one wants to hear about your past life. Clearly, your country didn’t want you, so they shipped you off here where nothing you learned is ever going to be of use to you. Unless you plan to bore the men fucking you so they finish faster.”

Tori slammed her spoon on the table. “Why do you have to be such a bitch, Coral? None of us asked for this. We were drugged and put on a bus without our knowledge. Now we’re stuck here in hell.”

“You better watch your fucking mouth,” Coral sneered, shoving up from her seat. “Don’t you dare speak like that about this country.”

“Really, why is that? What’s it ever done for me, or you for that matter?” Tori shot back.

After losing her baby, the sweet shy Tori had vanished and she reminded me of me. No longer was she going to let people walk all over her. She was standing her ground, and it was heartwarming to see.

“You don’t know what you're talking about. This country has done everything to take care of me,” Coral argued. “Without them fighting and protecting the border, the Southerners would have taken over and slaughtered all of us.”

Violet let out a huff of laughter. “You have to be fucking kidding me? Is that what you believe? Your own fucking general is doing that already while you just line up and beg to be picked for battle. Besides, your country chose to do everything for you since they never allowed your mother to care for you. They ripped you out of her arms and stole you away.” Violet was yelling as she said the last part, her hand gripping so tightly around her spoon that her hand turned white.

Reaching out for her, she jerked away and knocked her bowl off the table where it shattered on the floor. Tears streamed down her face as she hurled the spoon at the wall and stormed up the stairs to where their rooms were. Generally after dinner, the men would start arriving, and Babaka would have stormed after Violet to deal with her. Luckily, Lucian had ordered the breeding house closed to soldiers while he was gone. He’d taken half the unit with him on this mission telling me it was a big deal. With so many gone, It would be too dangerous to have men distracted with getting their dick wet when there was less of them to cover for each other.

“You Oscad bitches are fucking crazy,” Coral muttered as she took her seat and resumed eating.

“She’s not wrong, though,” I shot back, standing up and taking my bowl with me as I joined Violet upstairs. Tori was also hot on my heels with the remainder of her meal. We couldn’t let Violet not eat so soon after having a baby, it could get her sick.

Violet was in the bunk room where the rows of beds were set up. This was where they slept, and no males were allowed in here. There were other rooms that they used for fucking since not all the girls would be available all at once. Apparently, they found even for Omegas that our vaginas needed a break every so often. Even face down in her pillow, I could hear her sobs and it was like someone had reached in and grabbed my heart squeezed tightly. The rage that simmered under my skin fought to break free seeing my friend so broken.

Setting the bowl on the nightstand between the beds, I climbed in behind her and cuddled her to my chest. Wrapping my arm around her, she clung to me as she cried. Tori joined us on the other side, so we cocooned Violet in between us doing all we could to protect her from the world. I sang softly to her, knowing she’d told me that her mother used to do that for her if she had a nightmare. While I didn’t have the world's best singing voice I was passable, and right now, I was willing to do whatever it took to help her. I was surprised that Babaka hadn’t come to yell at us for leaving the table and the scene that Violet caused, but something told me she knew the first child was the hardest to recover from. The old bat might be a hard-ass Alpha when she needed to be, but the more I got to know her, I discovered she actually had a heart.

At some point, the three of us fell asleep after Violet finally calmed down, only to be awoken by screaming. Shooting upright, I rubbed my eyes to clear the sleep out of them and looked around the room. It was dark, and the girls had all come up to bed but, like me, were now waking up at the sound. Just when I thought I might have been hearing coyotes or something the sound of gunshots were heard followed by more screams.