CHAPTER 209 CONSCIOUS, CONSCIENCE

Claire drifted between what felt like a hollow darkness and a bright haze clouding her vision. It looked like a dream, the kind where she was floating in the air and unable to grasp anything. Her body was heavily weighed down in pain and exhaustion; she could barely move. But now, the fog began to lift off her vision, though her eyelids were impossibly heavy. She took a deep breath and forced it open; the bulb hanging over her head almost blinded her. She blinked numerous times before her eyes adjusted to it. The ceiling above her was unfamiliar, white with wood running across it. She blinked again, her vision clearing. All this while, after she woke up from any little sleep she had, she would see a gloomy cell and iron bars. Now she was seeing white. For a moment, she didn’t move, unsure of where she was or what had happened. Her body ached all over, but it was a dull, distant pain as if she were wrapped in a cocoon, insulated from the worst of it. When the pain was sublim