The Atrium

The first thing Jade noticed was the silence.

It wasn't the silence of a hotel room, humming with the invisible electricity of minibars and air conditioning. It wasn't the silence of a recording booth, deadened by acoustic foam. It was a heavy, wet silence, broken only by the rhythmic drumming of rain against glass.

Jade opened her eyes.

She was lying on a low, slate-gray platform bed covered in unbleached linen. Above her, the ceiling soared thirty feet high, a jagged expanse of raw concrete and steel beams. But the walls... the walls were gone.

In their place were floor-to-ceiling panes of glass, misted with condensation. Beyond the glass, the world was a wall of green. Ferns the size of cars dripped moisture onto mossy stones. Towering Douglas firs blocked out the sky, filtering the light into a bruised, aquatic twilight.

Jade tried to sit up. A sharp, hot wire of pain shot up her left leg, stealing her breath.

She gasped, falling back against the pillows. She threw the linen sheet aside.

Her left leg was encased in a heavy, black medical boot. It was elevated on a foam wedge. She looked at her arms. The diamond bracelets were gone. The Cartier watch was gone. Her skin was scrubbed clean of the bronzer and shimmer lotion she wore like armor. She was wearing a pair of oversized, gray silk pajamas that didn't belong to her.

"Easy," a voice said. "The bone is setting."

Jade turned her head.

Standing in the doorway—a sleek, handle-less rectangle cut into the concrete—was Vera.

Vera looked exactly as she had for the last three years of the *World on Fire* tour. She was six feet of solid muscle, her hair pulled back in a severe, dark knot against her skull. She wore a simple black t-shirt and tactical cargo pants. Her face, usually obscured by sunglasses and an earpiece, was bare. Her eyes were a pale, unsettling amber.

"Vera," Jade croaked. Her throat felt like it was filled with sand. "Where... is this a hospital?"

Vera walked into the room. She moved with a strange, rolling grace, placing her feet silently on the polished concrete floor. She carried a silver tray.

"No," Vera said softly. Her voice was deeper than Jade remembered, vibrating in the quiet room. "Hospitals are for sickness. This is a place for healing. We call it The Sanctuary."

"My leg," Jade whispered. "What happened?"

"The paparazzi," Vera said. She set the tray down on the bedside table. "They chased the car after the Vanity Fair party. You don't remember?"

Jade squeezed her eyes shut. The party. The flashes. The champagne—bottle after bottle of it. The feeling of drowning in light. She remembered screaming. She remembered begging. But the crash? It was a black hole.

"Is anyone else hurt?" Jade asked.

"No. Just you. But it was close, Jade. Too close." Vera reached out and brushed a stray hair from Jade’s forehead. The touch was gentle, but her fingers were calloused and rough. "The agency agreed. You needed to disappear. To recover. They put out the statement this morning. Exhaustion. Rehab. Indefinite hiatus."

"Rehab," Jade repeated. It was the standard script. "Okay. Okay. So we're hiding out."

She looked at the tray Vera had brought. There was a glass of water and a white porcelain bowl.

"Eat," Vera said. "You need the protein for the bone knitting."

Jade pushed herself up on her elbows. "What is it? Oatmeal?"

She looked into the bowl.

It wasn't oatmeal. It was a mound of raw, ground beef. It was bright crimson, sitting in a pool of its own blood. An egg yolk, raw and glistening, sat in the center.

Jade recoiled, bile rising in her throat. "Vera, what the hell is this?"

Vera stared at her. She didn't blink. "Steak tartare. It’s pure. No chemicals. No fire to burn away the nutrients."

"I can't eat this," Jade said, pushing the tray away. "I'm vegan. You know that. It’s in my rider."

Vera smiled. It wasn't a reassuring smile. It was a baring of teeth, slow and deliberate.

"Your rider is for the performance, Jade," Vera said. "The performance is over. Your body is broken. It needs blood to build bone. Eat."

It wasn't a suggestion. Vera stood by the bed, motionless, her amber eyes locking onto Jade’s. The air in the room seemed to grow heavier, smelling faintly of wet dog and iron.

Trembling, Jade picked up the spoon.

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