For Ashlynn, the world around her faded away, leaving her mind adrift in a sea of darkness. Within the dark, she could feel her own heartbeat along with the distant echo of Nyrielle's heartbeat. When she focused on the heartbeats, trying to count beats and gain a sense of time in this dark space, she found it impossible to keep track. Numbers slipped away from her along with any other sense of time.
She wasn't asleep but she wasn't awake either. Instead, she drifted in a world that was empty of everything but her.
Eventually, light began to filter into the dark space, revealing a familiar room that she hadn't seen in several months.
