'Ethea.'
Soren opened his eyes, only for the world to instantly vanish into a heavy crimson. Thick fluid smeared across his retinas, obscuring his vision and turning the interior of the vehicle into a useless blur of red shapes.
His eyelids instinctively clamped shut against the wet film. The dark offered a brief shield against the spinning room, though the mental noise inside his skull still throbbed with a terrifying weight. He held his breath, pinning his remaining clarity down by sheer grit, and forced his head to turn.
Every tendon in his neck strained and locked. He dragged his chin around blindly, tracking the layout of the car entirely from memory until he felt his face align with the space of the backseat.
With a final surge of willpower, he forced his bloody eyelids back open.
His sight swam through a narrow, dark-rimmed slit. The red film distorted everything, but as his vision briefly cleared, he froze.
