Morning came without ceremony.
The light filtering through the narrow window was pale and thin, the forest outside holding onto its shadows longer than open land would have, and Nathan was already awake before it had fully arrived. He lay still for a moment taking inventory — the neck, the chest, the deep background ache that had become as familiar as a bad neighbor. Both were there. But the quality of them had changed overnight. Amaterasu's warmth still lived somewhere in the architecture of him, doing its quiet work, and what remained of the poison's pressure felt like something glimpsed through fogged glass rather than pressed directly against his face.
He could breathe without it costing him something.
That was enough to work with.
