Silence reigned in the vast, decaying factory hall, broken only by the drip of unseen water and the skittering of tiny scavengers in the deep shadows. Hours had bled into each other since Elena had departed with Alex, the brutal monument to her cruelty already forgotten. Pinned against the cold concrete foundation by thick, cruelly bent lengths of rebar, Clara's form lay utterly still. Dust motes danced in the thin shafts of light piercing the grime-coated skylights high above. Her breathing was imperceptible; blood had dried dark where the metal pressed cruelly against her skin. She appeared lifeless, another broken thing amidst the industrial wreckage.

  Then, a flicker.

  An eyelid twitched, fluttering weakly against the pale skin of her cheek. A soft, ragged gasp escaped her lips, barely audible in the cavernous space. She shifted fractionally, a movement born of pain rather than conscious effort, her head turning slightly against the unyielding concrete.

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  As that faint gasp echoed and died, something else happened. One of the thick steel bars pinning her shoulder – a heavy length of rebar that Elena had bent with impossible ease – seemed to shift. It was almost imperceptible, a slight groan of stressed metal, a fractional outward bend no more than the width of a fingernail.

  Then, stillness returned. Clara’s breathing remained shallow, ragged, barely there. The silence pressed back in, heavy and watchful, holding the faintest, most ambiguous hint of change.