Gabriel's eyes opened.
The sky came into focus slowly, branches overhead shifting in a breeze he couldn't feel. Everything hurt. His ribs, his shoulder, the places where his skin had split and bled. The pain was constant, grounding him to the present in a way nothing else could.
A hand pressed against his shoulder, firm but careful. "Don't."
Mera's voice.
Gabriel's head turned slightly, the motion pulling at something torn in his neck. She knelt beside him, dirt smudged across her jaw and throat.
He stared at her for a long moment, something cold settling in his chest that had nothing to do with the wounds covering his body.
She'd been at the apothecary.
The Order had been there.
He'd left her alive.
That didn't mean he trusted her.
He tried to speak, but his throat was raw, the words sticking before they could form properly.
"Water," Mera said, reaching for a canteen beside her knee.
