I fold the map and shove it back into my pack before I can change my mind. Then I stand.
Too fast.
The shade tilts.
No.
The world tilts.
Red stone slides sideways. Heat flashes white at the edges of my sight. For one impossible breath, the basin, the sky, Kavor, everything stretches thin and far away.
My knees forget their profession.
Kavor moves.
He doesn’t grab. Not this time.
He rises with me, one hand hovering close enough to catch me, not touching until I sway forward. Then his hand closes around my upper arm. Firm. Careful. Allowed by gravity, if not by pride.
“Sera.”
His voice comes from somewhere closer than the rest of the world.
“I’m fine.”
The lie has no bones in it.
His grip tightens just enough to remind me I am attached to a body. Mine, unfortunately.
“No,” he says.
It’s a single word. Soft. Devastating.
I blink until the basin returns in pieces. Stone. Shade. Kavor’s hand. My boots. The map strap against my thigh. The taste of root and dust in my mouth.
Humiliation arrives after. Hotter than the sun.
“Do not,” I whisper.
He says nothing. I force my knees straight and Kavor lets me.
His hand remains until I am steady, then he releases me before I can make him. That is also worse. Everything is worse when he learns. I stare at the route ahead because looking at him might break something I need.
“We go,” I say.
Kavor remains silent at my side. Not arguing. Not forgiving. And definitely not forgetting.
The third site waits near the quiet place and my body has just betrayed the math.
12
KAVOR
Sera hates the weakness of her body more than the dizziness.
I see it in the line of her mouth, the hard set of her jaw, the way her fingers close into a fist before opening again. Not because she has recovered. Because she refuses to look as if she has not.
Pride can keep a body standing for a while. Then the body collects what pride owes.
