It was jagged passing down her esophagus, made her cringe, then groan when the feeling of it hitting a hollow stomach almost made the precious pharmaceutical come right back up. Her fingers quickly readjusted the wool to cover as much of her skin as possible, pulling the reeking smell back over her nose and mouth... but then everything went wrong.

The very air altered and a shot of instinctual fear was the precursor of her greatest nightmare. It was Shepherd, suddenly unnaturally still. She could hear the bones crack in his neck as he turned his skull a few more degrees in her direction.

Sweating profusely, feeling so ill, Claire spoke the instant she felt his attention. "I must speak to you."

He had killed so many people. Even through the fabric around her face, she could smell him; more potent than the others, for certain. But the look in his eyes was far more frightening than the Da'rin marking. Hard, unforgiving mercury seemed to see right through her, shredding away her disguise. Shoulders drooping, Claire felt a rush, a burning scratch in her stomach that turned into painful cramping, total terror left in its wake.

Everything had been for nothing.

Sucking in a ragged breath, swaying as if her legs could not decide which way to run, Claire whispered under her breath, "No... no, no, this can't be happening."

Somehow, all the preparations, the pills, had not been enough. There were too many Alphas, too much of their scent in the air, and she had gone directly into heat. Already she could feel the slick gathering between her legs, the smell of it, of something so laced with pheromones that it would not be masked by the horrid stench she'd purposely dressed in. All those hours she'd thought it had been lack of food, the stink of rotting things, and the weight of the cloak… she'd stood there in the wolves' den like an idiot while the signs had been building: nausea, racing heart, fever... and the biggest wolf of all was staring straight at her.

Claire finally had his attention, and now it was worthless.

She was already becoming delirious, panicked, her voice cracking and accusing all at once. "I just needed to speak with you. I only needed a minute."

That urge—the one she had fought her whole life—was making her tremble and prepare to flee, but there was already a commotion all around. She tried to hold her breath as Alphas sniffed the air like bloodhounds. Shepherd countered her mincing retreat, facing her full on, staring at her with the wide, focused eyes of a predator.

It was his attention—the attention she had needed to save her kind—that drew other eyes in the room. More of that damn fluid began to drip down her legs, saturating the fabric of her clothing, signaling that a rare Omega had appeared out of the blue, and that she was broadcasting a heat cycle.