Amelia couldn't remember ever waking up and sleeping with cold perspiration. Tonight was no exception. When the first thin blade of light cut through her ceiling, she stood there facing it as if it had its breath caught waiting to be sucked in by her. Out there, the world was strangling with an unearthly silence, too clean, too antiseptic, as if that of a motionless human who did not breathe.

She balled herself up, her knees drawn up into her arms, recalling it all that had transpired last ...