Someone has bandaged my wounds.
Carefully and curiously, I grasp the end of one of the bandages, just beneath my hip, and slowly start to uncoil it. I gasp and drop the gauze when I see that my wounds are entirely healed. Where I was sure there would be mangled, burned flesh, there is now only a swirl of fresh pink-and-white skin. It’s new and slightly tender. But the pain is gone.
How long have I been in this room?
And how did I get here?
I suddenly recall how fast my wrist healed when I attempted to dig out my tracking device—less than an hour—but that was a small gash. This is different. That fire devoured my skin. Ripped at me like a ravaging animal with razor-sharp teeth. I don’t think there was much left when …
When what?
What happened after that? Before I woke up here?
I remember the witch trial. The mob of angry people. The blazing fire. And then …
My locket.
It was tossed into the flames with me.
I just managed to clasp it beneath my toes and unhook it, activating my transession gene before the smoke and pain and panic finally won the tugging battle with my consciousness and I passed out.
But how did I get here? In this bed.
And where is my locket now?
Desperately, I feel around my chest and collarbone. There is nothing but bare skin. I lift the covers up and peer toward the bottom of the bed, wiggling my bandaged toes.
I work quickly, unraveling the dressing until both of my new, healed legs are free and bare.
It’s only now that I realize I’m still wearing my thick and heavy seventeenth-century clothing, minus the kerchief. Half of the skirt is gone, burned in the fire, leaving me with a jagged, blackened hem just below my knees.
I glance anxiously around the room, searching for any sign of my locket. Wherever I am, however I got here, I need to leave. I have to get back to Zen. I can still save him. I can transesse to the day they brought him back to the Pattinsons’ home, after I was arrested. I can get him out of there. He doesn’t have to die.
The word die, even in my silent thoughts, makes my stomach retch and my head spin. I lean over the side of the bed and gag, my stomach heaving. But nothing comes out.
I apparently haven’t had anything to eat in the past few days.
I command myself to think. Focus. Come up with a plan.
I scan the room, noticing a door in the wall behind me. I have no idea what’s on the other side of it but it doesn’t matter. I can’t very well stay here. I have to find my necklace. That is priority number one.
Without it, I am trapped again.
I swing my legs over the side of the bed and test them separately, putting a little weight on each foot, pausing to check for pain or discomfort or for my newly grown skin to suddenly peel right off and slip to the floor like a heap of discarded clothes.
So far, everything seems to be working as it should.
I eye the door, preparing myself for what might be on the other side. I rise warily to my feet but am suddenly stopped when I see the door start to swing open with a low creaking sound.
My heart leaps into my throat.
I ready myself to pounce. To take down the intruder by any means necessary. I don’t know who brought me here, I don’t know who bandaged my wounds, but if they stand in the way of me finding my necklace and getting back to Zen, then I will have no choice but to hurt them.
A foot enters the room first, housed in a shiny black shoe. A modern one. Not the smooth leather boot or buckled mule of the seventeenth century. I can tell by the size and style that it belongs to a man. My gaze ascends as his leg crosses the threshold next. It’s muscular and thick, cloaked in dark gray fabric. I cautiously move my eyes farther up as the rest of him appears around the corner of the door. An untucked, creaseless black cotton shirt with buttons and a collar, sheathing an impressively formed muscular chest. A long, sturdy neck. And then I finally land on his face. And that’s when all the sensation in my head and hands and feet and fingers and toes and lips simply evacuates my body.
I’m completely unable to move. Except to fall back onto the bed.
It’s by far the most exquisite face I’ve ever seen.
His skin is smooth and satiny and unblemished. The color of ripe wheat bathed in sunlight. His features—nose, chin, cheekbones—are angular and appear to be chiseled out of fine marble. His dark blond hair cascades in loose, glossy waves around his temples, tickling the tops of his ears. And his eyes are the most breathtaking shade of iridescent aquamarine.
He looks young. Possibly the same age as me. Maybe older. And he’s carrying a trayful of food.
I try to hide my reaction to his stunning features but I know immediately that I’ve failed. He, on the other hand, is perfectly composed. His expression is as bare and emotionless as these white walls.