Nathan came back like a man breaking the surface of deep water — gasping, sudden, the dream shattering around him as his eyes flew open and his body lurched upright before his mind had caught up with where he was.
"Haagh—"
The sound tore out of him rough and involuntary. He was drenched. Sweat ran down his bare chest and neck in thin rivulets, and every muscle in his body felt wrung out, emptied of whatever had been holding them together. He pressed the heel of his palm against his forehead as the headache announced itself — not a gentle thing, not a dull ache, but a splitting, white-knuckled pressure behind his eyes that made the room tilt unpleasantly at its edges. He breathed through it. Long, deliberate, painful breaths.
The dream clung to him. His father's voice. The dojo floor against his palms.
