I glance at him, really looking this time. Sweat darkens the ridges of his skin. His shoulders are tense, his posture rigid in a way that has nothing to do with the heat.
“You’re afraid,” I say before I can stop myself.
He doesn’t deny it. Doesn’t confirm it either. He just exhales slowly, eyes forward.
“I am alert,” he says. “Fear implies distraction.”
“Not always,” I say quietly. “Sometimes it just means you care about the outcome.”
He doesn’t respond right away. The silence stretches, filled with the sound of our footsteps and the low hum Rverre has picked up again—quieter now, almost soothing. Finally, he speaks.
“You mistake distance for safety,” he says.
“And you mistake control for certainty,” I shoot back.
He stops, not abruptly, but decisively enough that the rest of us halt with him. He turns to face me fully, blocking the sun enough to cast my face in shadow.
“This is not about control,” he says, voice low. “It is about responsibility.”
“And I don’t have any?” I ask, heat flaring sharper than the sun overhead.
“You have too much,” he replies without hesitation. “You carry it whether it is yours or not.”
The words hit hard enough that I have to look away. Rverre’s humming falters. Illadon shifts, glancing between us, uncertainty flickering across his face. I force myself to breathe. To soften my shoulders. This isn’t the place. This isn’t the time. Not in front of the children.
“We keep moving,” I say at last.
Korr holds my gaze for a beat longer, then nods once and we resume moving. But the distance between us has changed. Like a fault line has shifted beneath our feet, subtle and irreversible.
And as the heat bears down and the horizon wavers ahead, I can’t shake the sense that we’ve crossed something invisible. Not into danger, but into understanding.
The land begins to rise again.
Not into shelter—nothing so generous—but into a long, shallow ridge where stone breaks through the sand often enough to remind my feet what solid feels like. The change is subtle, but my body registers it immediately. My stride evens out. My breathingsteadies. I hadn’t realized how close to my limit I was skating until the edge pulls back. As if understanding it more than I did, Korr signals another halt.
Rverre drifts toward a patch of stone without being guided, her steps slowing as if the ground itself has reached up to meet her. She kneels, presses her palm flat, and closes her eyes. The desert wind slides over us, warmer now, carrying the faintest metallic tang.
Illadon crouches beside her, silent, attentive, letting her lead.
I hang back, rolling my shoulders, forcing circulation back into stiff muscles. My earlier sharpness has burned down into something quieter—still there, but no longer sparking at every contact point. The argument hasn’t resolved, but it has… settled. Like sand after a shift.
Korr stands a few paces away, watching the horizon.
I should be grateful for the distance. Instead, I feel the strange pull of it—like a word left unfinished. Rverre opens her eyes and looks directly at him.
“We’re close to something,” she says. Not excited or afraid, but certain. “Not the place. The edge of it.”
Korr inclines his head. “How far?”
She tilts her head, listening inward. “Not today.”
Relief slides through me before I can stop it. I hadn’t realized how tightly I’d been holding the hope that we wouldn’t find answers too quickly. Answers change things. Commit you to paths you can’t back away from.
“Then we make camp before dark,” Korr says. “Here or beyond the ridge.”
Rverre considers, then points just past the crest. “There. The stone curves.”
I step forward, peering where she indicates. She’s right. The ridge dips and folds in on itself, creating a shallow bowl that might block the worst of the wind when night settles.
