Rverre suddenly stops like she’s reached the end of a sentence. Illadon halts instantly, one hand lifting without touching her. I’m beside them in a heartbeat.
“What is it?” I ask.
She looks up at me, eyes bright and unsettled.
“The ground doesn’t know who to listen to.”
The words send a chill straight through my chest, freezing my heart.
Korr steps in then, presence solid and unavoidable. “What does it need?”
She looks between us—me and him—small hands curling into fists at her sides.
“It needs you to decide together.”
The wind gusts suddenly, sharp and hot, whipping sand against my calves. The desert doesn’t move forward. It waits.
I meet Korr’s gaze at last. The distance I’ve been clinging to feels even thinner. Less like protection and more like friction.
And for the first time since we left the canyon, I understand with unsettling clarity that this journey will not tolerate divided leadership for long.
The wind doesn’t let us pretend we didn’t hear her.
It surges, sand lifting in low sheets that scrape against my boots and sting my calves. Not a storm, at least not yet, but enough to punish indecision. Enough to make the desert’s point without raising its voice.
I glance down at Rverre. She hasn’t moved. Her feet are planted, wings tucked tight, chin lifted with stubborn certainty that doesn’t belong to someone her size. Illadon stays exactly where he is—close, steady, ready—but he doesn’t speak for her. Good. He’s aware when presence matters more than words.
Korr exhales slowly through his nose, eyes tracking the wind, the slope ahead, the stone ribs breaking through the sand to our left. I feel the calculation even before he speaks.
“Two options,” he says. “We cut right and take longer ground with cover. Or we go straight and let the wind decide how much it takes from us.”
I bristle at the phrasing. Let the wind decide. As if it’s a conscious thing. Rverre’s fingers twitch.
“It doesn’t like that,” she says quietly.
“Which?” I ask.
“Either,” she answers, frowning. “But it likes one less.”
I close my eyes for half a second, grounding myself the way I do when some of the children are being particularly difficult. Breath in, breath out, don’t rush the moment just because it’s uncomfortable.
“Show us,” I say.
She hesitates, glancing at Korr. At me. At the space between us. Then she steps forward and drags the toe of her boot through the sand, not straight, not angled sharply, but in a shallow curve that arcs toward the stone.
“This,” she says. “But not all the way.”
Korr studies the mark. I watch his face, waiting for dismissal, for correction. It doesn’t come. He nods once.
“Split the difference,” he says. “Stone to break the wind. Sand enough to keep our line.”
“That’s what I was going to suggest,” I say before I can stop myself.
I look at him. Really look. His strong jaw clenching tight. His ivory tusks, his deep, dark eyes. The rich emerald of his skin that sheens under the red suns. Something like amusement flickers in his eyes—gone as quickly as it appears.
“Then we agree.”
I bristle at the comment, regretting that I’d spoken out loud the instant he says it.
