recovery was a slow dragging process. silvertongue woke often in terror, not with cries or screams, but eyes fluttered open to a body locked by remembered terror and anguish, her gaze the only thing that could move in these moments, darting always for wren. and wren was seldom away, and so when the horror passed and the sharpfang was granted the use of her limbs once more, it was in shaking breath she reached for her lover. still here. still alive. in such paroxysm she awakened now, chest weighted as if by a thousand stones, her immobilization complete down to her ankles and tail. this time, as wren took soft, sleeping breaths alongside her, silvertongue did not panic; she stared at the stars above them and for the first time, she prayed to the clan whom crowfeather had taught her lived among their glowing bodies.