*Marcus*

I didn’t care what the Healer said. I didn’t want to hear it.

It was the first time that I felt that way. But Arealla had to recover. She had to get better. Which meant that I had to ignore the words she had just spoken. To accept it would be to give up, and there was no way that I would ever give up on Arealla.

I glanced at her pale and bruised form. Her breathing was so shallow and sparse that it was barely there. Seeds of despair were already ...