I wake like my body is still falling.
Not the gentle kind of waking. No slow return. No stretch. No calm. Just a sharp inhale that drags pain through my skull and flips my stomach like I’m back in that van, braced against metal, fighting nausea and the cold burn of stabilizers still ghosting under my skin.
My eyes crack open and the room swims.
Ceiling first—high, familiar, carved beams that used to mean safety when I was twelve and convinced the Ashcroft estate was the only place the world couldn’t reach. A chandelier hangs above me, dimmed low, spilling warm gold over stone walls and dark wood.
East wing.
My room.
The one that faces the forest.
That’s how I know I’m alive. Cedar smoke in the air. Clean herbs at my temples. The quiet hush of a house built to outlast storms.
Then m
