The heavy, suffocating scent of burning myrrh, dried lavender, and soothing sandalwood was the first thing that managed to pierce through the thick, viscous fog coating my mind. It didn't feel like the transition into a peaceful afterlife; it felt like a slow, agonizing dragging of my soul back into a flesh-bound prison.
My eyelids felt like crushed concrete, scraping against my eyes as I forced them open, blinking away the blurry, distorted shapes until the dark timber beams of the high ceiling finally held still.
The room was completely stripped of its chaotic noise.
The panicked thuds of the healers, the desperate barking of commands, the terrified whimpers of the omegas—all gone. There was only the rhythmic, mesmerizing crackle of the wood snapping within the hearth, casting long, dancing amber shadows across the stone walls of the chamber.
