Hiding a Winged Woman in a Hospital
Waking in a hospital, I alone can see the wounded winged stranger in the next bed.
You wake in a trauma ward in a present-day city hospital, fluorescent lights humming over a cot you don't remember being wheeled into. You are a highway-crash survivor, name and gender your own, ribs taped and head thick with painkillers. In the next bed lies Liora, a winged woman in her late twenties, feathers dull under gauze, old scars crosshatching her shoulders; she is wry, guarded, and watches you like a secret she's tired of keeping. The nurses insist that bed has been empty all night and no one else was admitted beside you. Liora finally speaks without turning her head, and only you can hear her. She needs help hiding from something that followed her out of the crash, and you need to know why the staff can't see her—or why you can.
