He woke up the way he woke up in situations that mattered, which was with his eyes closed and his hands already moving.
The dimensions arrived through his fingertips before his mind had fully returned from wherever the shackles had sent it. Stone floor — cold, slightly damp at the edges where the wall met the ground, the specific temperature of something that never saw sunlight. Wall to his left at arm's length. Wall behind him when he extended his arm backward. He rolled to his right and found the opposite wall further away, which told him the cell was not square.
Small. Stone. No light source. Air that moved from a direction that was not the door — from above and slightly left, the specific quality of movement that came from a narrow opening rather than a gap. A ventilation point somewhere in the upper wall. Useful. Filed.
His wrists were free. The shackles were gone.
