Elira's POV

The world around me was blurred, edges soft and unreal. I blinked, aware of the tension coiled in my head, worsened by the sharp metallic beep that punctuated the silence like a ticking tock, relentless and impossible to ignore.

Slowly, my eyes fluttered open. A hospital. I was in a hospital.

The scent gave it away, a sterile antiseptic, heavy and almost metallic scent mingling with the faint coppery tang of blood still sticking to my skin.

My skin.

Memories came rushing like a flood. Julia's girlfriend, Corbito's dead body, Matteo. I sat up in an instant, and the blinding pain that shot through my nerves served as...