The canyon narrows as we press forward. The walls close in, high and jagged. Shadows pool where the suns don’t reach. My boots scrape thin lines across the sand and dirt, too loud in the stillness.
Harlan mutters curses under his breath, low and steady, like each one keeps his legs moving. Joran doesn’t bother to hide his misery. He stumbles often, cursing louder, throwing sharp looksat the scarred warrior’s back as though blaming him for every empty breath.
The younger Zmaj keeps pace near the rear, wings half-furled, eyes flicking to every crevice and ridge. He’s restless but alert, and for once I’m grateful for it.
I stay near the scarred warrior. His stride is long, unbroken, never faltering. He doesn’t look back, doesn’t waste words, but his silence is a kind of shield I can walk inside of. The memory of his nod this morning, the way his hand steadied mine when he bound my wound, lingers stronger than hunger.
The land itself feels sharper. Plants I don’t recognize jut from cracks—thin stalks tipped with faintly glowing flowers, their petals pulsing like they breathe. A low vine threads along the stone wall, its thorns glinting silver. I give it a wide berth; beauty doesn’t mean safety on Tajss.
The air grows heavy as the suns climb higher. Heat beats down in waves, driving sweat across my back, but still a chill hangs in the narrow pass. It seeps from the stone, curling around my ankles, reminding me too much of the tunnels we escaped. Harlan stumbles again, catching himself with a ragged curse.
“We’ll starve out here,” he grinds out, glaring at the scarred warrior. “Better to risk poison than?—”
“Better to keep walking,” the younger Zmaj snaps, his voice sharp enough to cut. “You’ll find nothing by sitting still.”
Their words scrape, but I keep my eyes forward. The canyon seems endless, every bend revealing another stretch of stone and shadow. My arm throbs beneath the bandage, and hunger claws deeper, but step by step, I move.
The scarred warrior never slows.
The canyon winds on, jagged and endless. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth, every swallow scraping raw. The bandage on my arm has soaked through, with the venom burn pulsing hot and angry beneath. Each heartbeat feels like it carries the ache deeper, winding it through my veins.
Harlan and Joran bicker in ragged bursts, their voices too thin to carry a real fight. Joran’s curses slur now, his steps dragging more each time. Harlan mutters prayers between clenched teeth. The younger Zmaj snaps at them once or twice, but even his wings droop, twitching less with each mile.
I keep my eyes on him.
The scarred warrior’s stride cuts through the canyon with the same certainty he carried into the fight. His back is straight, his shoulders steady, every movement deliberate. Not arrogant—just unshakable, like he belongs to this land in a way the rest of us never will.
My chest aches, not just from the wound or the hunger, but from the way he fills the silence without a word. It should frighten me, the stillness of him, the certainty. Instead, it steadies me. Every step feels possible if I match it to his.
My vision blurs once, then sharpens again when I blink. The ground wavers, shimmering at the edge of sight. I stumble, catching myself with a hiss of pain. His head turns. Just a fraction, one dark eye cutting back to me. The look holds long enough that my breath snags. He doesn’t stop, doesn’t ask, just waits that heartbeat to see if I’ll rise again.
I do.
He turns forward once more, and I press harder into the burn of my arm, the bite of hunger, the rasp of my breath. I won’t let him see me falter again.
The canyon stretches on. Shadows deepen, walls closing tighter, but my gaze never leaves the broad line of his back.
Not the hunger. Not the ache. Only him.
6
KARA
Iwake to a sound I don’t recognize.
Not the snapping pop of dying embers, not the shuffle of boots or wings. It’s softer, stranger—like sand being sifted through cloth. A whisper over the canyon walls. For a moment, I think I’m dreaming, but when I open my eyes, the sky is wrong.
Tajss doesn’t have skies like this. Not in my memory. The twin red suns usually blaze against endless red and gold, heat beating down, hardly broken by the hint of a cloud. Even at dawn, the light is sharp and clear. Now, though, the suns are muted. Veiled behind a layer of shifting gray. Clouds. Heavy ones. The sky wears them like armor.
My stomach drops. I’ve seen clouds before. Simulated in the open parks of the generation ship and on old Earth vids. Where weather changed with the turning of a season. When Earth still had oceans and rain. But here? On Tajss? The air has always been hot and bare, burning away anything soft enough to fall. Clouds are an anomaly. They don’t belong here.
I sit up slowly, letting the blanket slide from my shoulders. Sand clings to the sweat on my skin, gritty and cold in the morning chill. My arm throbs where the venom splattered. The bandage is darkened and stiff,but that ache is almost background noise compared to the unease crawling over my nerves.
Around me, the others are stirring. Joran mutters first, his voice hoarse.
“Tell me I’m not the only one seeing that,” he says, jerking his chin at the sky, eyes wide and bloodshot.
Harlan spits into the dust, though his mouth must be as dry as mine.
