Athena's consciousness rose like something pulled from the bottom of a lake—heavy, resistant, unsure of the surface it was breaking through.
Her eyelids fluttered once, twice, unable to decide whether light was friend or foe. A thin wash of gray seeped in anyway. The world was blurred, made of softened outlines and indistinct shapes, as if she were seeing through wet glass.
She tried to stay in it, in this murky half-life, but the weight pulling her down was stronger. The dark folded over her again, quiet and absolute.
The next time she surfaced, it was with a sharp inhale, as though someone had wrenched breath into her lungs. Her eyes—dull from exhaustion yet sharpened by instinct—snapped open. What they found first was Ewan.
He was across from her, tied to a chair, slumped slightly in a posture that would have been casual if not for the ropes biting into his wrists and chest.
