The last thing Issa remembered was that she fell asleep. And before that, she remembered having a maddening itch, the physician's bitter liquid, and then a sudden, sharp pain that shot through her body, a pain so intense that it seemed to tear her body apart. After that, nothing else. Just blackness.

Slowly, gently, she began to wake. It wasn't like waking from normal sleep. It was like floating up from the bottom of a deep ocean. Her body felt light, and almost weightless. The pain was gone. ...