My eyes cracked open. The first thing I saw was a blinding flash of sterile white. Panic instantly shot through me.
For a terrifying moment, I thought I was back in that facility—that everything had been a hallucination, and I was still trapped in one of Esther’s experiments.
My heart rate spiked, and I tried to sit up, only to feel a sharp pain in my abdomen that forced me back down with a gasp.
“Easy there,” a familiar voice said, and relief flooded through me as Matilda’s face came into view, her kind eyes crinkling at the corners. “You’re safe now, Hazel. You’re at the pack infirmary.”
I took a shaky breath, trying to calm my racing pulse. If Matilda was here, that meant that I was finally back in Emberfang grounds.
“How long have I been out?” I croaked.
