Ariane:
I shot up, drinking in lungfuls of air as I shoved the tangled sheets away, pushing past their reaching arms as I stumbled from the bed.
I was already moving—crawling, stumbling, falling. My hands hit the cold stone floor as my stomach twisted, dry-heaving once, twice. I tasted bile but forced air into my lungs, clinging to the sound of their voices like lifelines.
The scent of smoke, blood, and death still clung to me like oil. The dream… no, the vision—it hadn't felt imagined. It had happened.
Varek was at my side in an instant. He didn’t speak at first; he just knelt and gathered my trembling form into his arms, holding me as though he could shield me from whatever nightmare still clung to my bones. His skin was soft against my cheek, his scent grounding, a tether in this ra
