Her small medical chamber felt chilled...not to mention a little lonely. The only source of light it had this late was the dim flickering coming from the hall.
There was a simple round clock mounted on the wall above her metal-framed cot. But once the midnight hour had arrived, it quietly and steadily chimed thirteen times instead.
The heavy cotton curtains circling her station stirred lightly upon the secret entrance of the King. He was mildly surprised by how still everything appeared now, for a place that was usually filled with panic and dread.
His eyes slid onto her sleeping form then. Though he studied the calm paleness of her features and ignored the present needles. The coiling wires.
Of course he had kept on a sharp (well...sharper) watch over her after the accident occurred. Stupid mortal men and their reckless intoxicated driving. Really, of all automobiles on the road...
For two entire months according to the Aboveground calendar, he sat cooped up in his Throne Room, glancing in at her family in order to gather new bits of information. Sometimes he would see her father stay the night for a few days straight—other times Toby would run in with a fist holding a bouquet of wild flowers and a book to read to her out loud—her huffy stepmother visited too, however, she complained about the unclean floors above everything else.
But when it was clear at last, that she wasn't about to pull of her stubborn registered coma on her own—he just couldn't resist his selfish urge to intervene any longer.
She was only eighteen. An age of womanhood, yes, but she was too young to be taken away from daily life nonetheless.
Leaning down closer, he laid a tender gloved hand across her forehead.
Actually touching her, even in the slightest way, ached to his core. The effect this girl had on him was truly incredible.
"It's time to wake, precious one," he whispered against her lips.
Then, he kissed her momentarily and vanished into another gust of wind as soon as the rhythm of her heartbeat increased.
Beep...beep...beep...beepbeepbeepbeep...BEEEEP!
Sarah's emerald eyes opened at the sudden impact, and she gasped, gulping in air which seemed like her first breath in a thousand years.
Taking in her surroundings straightaway, she merely found herself sitting up within a strange bed under a soft white sheet, showered with a mass of silver stardust and curled ivory feathers.
"Oh, thank heavens your awake, child!" The female nurse who rushed in soon after, must have been on her post when Sarah's breakthrough alerted her. "What a miracle! You had to be kissed by an angel."