The Claim

*Lyra*

“It’s been eight days. Why isn’t she awake yet?”

The muffled, anxious voice filtered through the heavy, suffocating fog wrapping around my brain. My body felt like it was made of lead, anchored deep into a soft mattress beneath me. A dull, rhythmic pounding echoed behind my eyes, beating in time with my pulse.

Memories slammed into me like a freight train. The pitch-black woods. The roug