Liora's POV, Third person.
Liora woke to unfamiliar silence.
It was the first thing she noticed, not the pain, not the stiffness in her limbs, but the quiet. It was wrong. The castle was never this still, not even in the earliest hours of the morning. There were always footsteps, distant voices, the clatter of work being done. But here—there was nothing.
Her eyes snapped open.
For a moment, she did not move. Her gaze darted across the ceiling, then the walls, then the narrow space around her. The room was small, far smaller than anything she was used to within the main quarters of the palace. The walls were plain, the furnishings minimal. A single narrow bed. A wooden table. Shelves lined with bottles and cloths.
This was not her room. Panic rose instantly.
She pushed herself up too quickly, breath catching as her head spun. Her vision blurred at the edges, her hands gripping the thin blanket beneath her as her chest tightened.
Where am I?
