Page 22 of Shadow's Claim

The details are too specific, too accurate to be fabrication. Julian is real. Those details are correct. Which means...

"He told us everything before he died," Kael continues, watching my face with predatory intensity. "About the resistance cell operating from the demolished zone. About their specialized omega program. About you."

I feel the blood drain from my face. If Julian broke, if he revealed everything...

"Then why bother interrogating me?" I ask, grasping at logic to counter the rising panic. "If you already know everything?"

"Because confirmation is valuable," Kael responds easily. "And because I want to know if what Julian revealed under extreme duress matches what you know." He leans closer, shadows darkening around him. "He spoke of a resistance leader. Someone who coordinates the omega extraction network. Someone you report to directly."

Constantin. He's fishing for information about Constantin. The implications are staggering. If Julian revealed the existence of the omega network but not its leadership, it means the resistance's compartmentalization strategies worked. Not everyone knows everything. Which means not all is lost—yet.

I force myself to shrug with a nonchalance I don't feel. "If your prisoner told you everything, you wouldn't be asking me."

Something shifts in Kael's expression—the barest hint of respect, perhaps, for my refusal to break easily. "True enough. Let's try something more... direct."

He moves with that uncanny shadow demon speed, suddenly looming over me on the platform. Four hands position me with ruthless efficiency—wrists pinned above my head by one pair while the other pair spreads my thighs wide. His prehensile tongue extends to trace along my claiming mark, the direct stimulation sending unwanted heat through my core despite my exhaustion.

"Your mind might fight me," he murmurs against my neck, "but your body remembers who it belongs to."

To demonstrate his point, one hand moves between my thighs, fingers tracing through embarrassing wetness that forms despite myself. My treacherous body responds to his touch with Pavlovian immediacy—pulse accelerating, skin flushing, inner walls clenching around nothing with automatic hunger.

The physical response creates momentary distraction from mental defense, fragmenting my concentration across too many fronts. He exploits the vulnerability instantly, cold tendrils of psychic pressure finding hairline fractures in my carefully constructed barriers.

"Fight me or surrender," he growls against my throat, fingers delving deeper as psychic pressure intensifies. "Either way, I'll have what I want."

I renew my mental defenses even as my body arches into his touch. The dual battle—mind resisting while body surrenders—creates unprecedented strain that tears ragged gasps from my throat.

His prehensile cock emerges, pressing against my entrance with insistent demand. The tip circles, gathering evidence of my body's betrayal before pressing inside with deliberate slowness. Unlike the frenzied claiming during heat, this penetration is calculated—measured, precise, designed to wring maximum response from nerve endings still raw from days of use.

"Every secret you keep," he says, sliding deeper with excruciating patience, "is just another wall for me to break through."

Inside me, his anatomy changes—ridges forming along the underside to rake against sensitive spots with devastating accuracy, the tip flaring to press against my cervix with gentle insistence. The sensation sends sparks of unwanted pleasure radiating outward, further fracturing my concentration.

"Stop," I gasp, though I'm not sure whether I'm ordering him to stop the physical invasion, the mental pressure, or my body's traitorous response to both.

"Your mouth says stop," Kael observes, rolling his hips to press deeper still, "but your cunt says 'more.' Which should I believe?"

The crude observation lands with painful accuracy. Even as I mentally reject him, my body welcomes his invasion—inner walls clenching around his length, hips rising to meet his thrust, slick forming with shameful readiness.

He establishes a rhythm designed for maximum distraction—slow withdrawal that drags those ridges against my most sensitive places, followed by deep thrust that stretches me to capacity. Each cycle weakens my mental barriers further, cold psychic tendrils finding new cracks to exploit.

"I can feel your mind opening to me," he murmurs, four hands working in perfect coordination to extract physical pleasure that undermines mental resistance. "Just like your body opens for my cock. So perfect. So made for this."

When his knot begins to form, locking us together with familiar pressure, I make a final desperate attempt to shore up mental defenses. But the biological imperative of omega response to alpha knotting creates perfect vulnerability—pleasure cascading through neural pathways designed by evolution to surrender completely during this moment.

The culmination of physical pleasure coincides with complete mental breach—cold tendrils slipping past shattered barriers to access everything I've fought to protect. Faces of resistance contacts. Locations of safe houses. Communication protocols for emergency extraction. Everything flowing from my consciousness to his with unstoppable momentum.

"Perfect," he groans as his release floods me with cold fire, physical claiming synchronizing with mental violation. "So perfect for me. Taking everything I give you."

When we separate—physically and mentally—I curl into myself, tears streaming as I face the magnitude of my failure. Not just my body surrendered but my mind violated, my resistance connections compromised, years of careful work undone in moments of overwhelming pleasure.

"Such valuable information," Kael says, four arms gathering my trembling form with unexpected gentleness. "Though not precisely what I expected."

The cryptic statement barely penetrates my despair. "What happens now?" I ask, voice small and unfamiliar to my own ears. "Now that you have what you wanted?"

Kael's expression shifts to something I can't interpret as violet eyes study my face. "What I wanted," he repeats, the words somehow weighted differently than I intended. "An interesting assumption that accessing your memories was my primary objective."

Before I can question this statement, he lifts me from the platform, shadows extending from his body to wrap around my trembling form. They absorb my tears with uncanny efficiency as he carries me to a massive pool of steaming water in an adjoining chamber.

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