THE FÜHRER'S DAUGHTER

THE FÜHRER'S DAUGHTER (Episode 3 of 5) Chapter 5

CHAPTER FIVE

THE BAYONET’S TIP PIERCED the skin on Grace’s back. It might have drawn blood, but she couldn’t tell. It was the sting that caught her attention. One of the guards unlinked her from the chain, while another shoved her in the back with the butt of his rifle and hurled demeaning remarks at her. Chaos and confusion swirled around her in that collective surge of terror that filled the camp.

How could Miles and Jack have just abandoned her?

Grace struggled to keep pace with the brash guard.

“Let’s go, Princess! Pick up your feet.”

Princess?

More screaming and pleading rose into the air behind her.

A gunshot rang out.

Grace froze with a gasp.

The guard pushed her forward. “Keep moving, Infekt!”

Grace stumbled forward. Was she next? She glanced around the yard at the terror-stricken prisoners, all of them marching in front of the guards.

As she moved forward, the guards herded their prisoners toward large buildings with towering cylindrical stacks.

All at once, they commanded both men and women alike to disrobe and walk into these structures.

Showers?

They were stripping the people not only of clothing, but of their dignity.

Her face turned hot both from anger and empathetic shame.

But above her, a furnace belched a thick plume of smoke.

Pale ashes flitted downward over the yard.

As if it were snowing.

It was then that she understood.

The putrid stench that had been wafting betrayed the truth.

The guard pushed her forward.

As they passed what she’d thought were oversized bath houses, Grace caught a horrendous glimpse of something through the clearing.

It wasn’t a bath house.

They weren’t being forced to shower.

In the distance lay a pile of bare bodies, men and women strewn on top of one another haphazardly.

Like slaughtered animals.

A chill ran through her body and she faltered.

The guard pressed his gun further into her back. “Keep walking.”

She staggered forward and tried to keep her eyes from the atrocity. Bile crept up in her throat and she struggled to keep from retching.

The guard pushed her again, this time toward a dark cabin, past the commotion transpiring where the prisoners were being stripped and herded to their deaths.

Still walking, Grace turned her head back. “Where are you taking me?”

The guard said nothing, only pointed forward with his chin.

Grace tripped and sprawled to the ground. She grimaced in pain and moaned before the guard grabbed her by the wrist. “Don’t slow down. Hurry!”

She grabbed his hand and pulled herself to her feet, then walked as fast as she could with the shackles constricting her speed.

Did they have a special kind of torture for her, before killing her?