"Huffff…"
Elane awoke with a deep breath of air, half panicked. Her heart was beating like crazy, and those last few moments where she was hit and sent flying by the hoplite replayed over and over again in her mind.
"W-Where am I…"
For an awful instant, she didn't even know where she was.
Her body lurched upright on instinct. One hand flew toward her chest while the other clawed at the ground beside her for a weapon that wasn't there. Her bow.
Where was her bow? Where was Rohan? Where was the ruined town…?
Where… was the hoplite?
Only after those frantic thoughts had already surged through her head did the real world begin to settle into place around her.
She was laying in a bed. Her bed.
Her mind began to stabilise, and she realised that her situation was nothing like she woke up thinking it would be.
Elane's breath came harder for several long seconds anyway, because her body clearly hadn't received that message yet. 'I'm safe now. I'm back… There's no need to worry.'
