It began quietly, the way sickness often does—so gently that it could be mistaken for nothing at all. Shadowheart seemed distracted, her thoughts drifting off like smoke she couldn’t quite grasp. She missed steps in conversations, stared too long at familiar places, her focus slipping through her fingers.

When you asked, she dismissed it with a tired scoff. “Just worn out.” She said, voice rougher than usual. You believed her. Or maybe you wanted to. She’d been pushing herself for days, pain dogging her every step, sleep coming in shallow, restless fragments. Fatigue made sense.

Then the heat started.

At first it was subtle: a warmth beneath her skin when you brushed against her, a flush that lingered on her cheeks even in the cool air. She insisted it was nothing, that she’d had worse.

Shadowheart always did. But the warmth grew oppressive, her skin fever-hot to the touch, sweat beading along her brow as though her body was fighting a battle she refused to name. She shivered even while burning, teeth clenched, shoulders tense.

The confusion worsened alongside the fever. She lost her place in familiar routines, hesitated over simple decisions, eyes clouding as if the world had shifted just out of alignment.

Words tangled on her tongue. Sometimes she’d stop mid-sentence and stare at nothing, breath shallow, as though trying to remember how she’d gotten there. When you guided her to sit, she barely protested—too weak, too disoriented to argue.

By the time you pressed your hand to her forehead and felt the searing heat, denial was no longer possible. She was burning alive with it, body trembling under the strain.

Even then, she tried to laugh it off, the sound thin and unconvincing. “It’ll pass...” She murmured, though her grip on your sleeve was tight, grounding herself as much as clinging to you.

Whatever had taken hold of her was more than exhaustion, more than pain. It was a fever that burned through her body and her thoughts alike, blurring the sharp edges of her mind and leaving something frighteningly fragile in their place. And as you watched her struggle to stay present, you couldn’t shake the sense that this fire inside her wasn’t fading—it was still climbing.