Donna’s POV
The first thing I felt was warmth.
Soft, steady, and gentle like sunlight through closed curtains. The second was pain, dull but constant, spreading across my temples and down my spine.
My eyelids fluttered open slowly, the world swinging in and out of focus until the ceiling above me took shape.
White carvings. The same canopy. The same bed.
I was back in my room.
My head throbbed when I tried to sit up, so I stayed still, listening instead. Somewhere close, two voices whispered, low and urgent.
“She shouldn’t have collapsed like that,” one said. Leona’s voice, calm but threaded with worry. “Her fever came too fast.”
“I know, my lady,” Clara answered softly. “She said she wasn’t hungry, but I tried to make her eat. She did, just not enough.”
There was a pause, and I
