The heavy, electronic doors of the VIP wing at Riverbend General Hospital remained closed, but the air outside them felt like a battlefield where the smoke was finally clearing. Serena Ashford stood frozen, her hand hovering inches from the latch of the suite where her daughter lay. Her mind, once a fortress of logical deductions and bitter survival instincts, was now a chaotic whirl of conflicting realities.
She had just heard the hospital director, a man whose entire career was built on the cold foundations of modern medicine, admit to a miracle. She had seen the Grand Healer of the Realm, a man whose name was synonymous with the Imperial Sage’s inner circle, kneeling at her husband’s feet. And yet, she could not—would not—let herself believe it.
"Why is she here?" Serena whispered, he
