Chapter 11 Talia
TALIA
Iwake with the uncomfortable certainty that I slept longer than I intended.
The first thing I register is heat—not the punishing crush of midday, but the creeping warmth that tells me the suns are climbing. The second is stiffness. My muscles protest as I shift, a dull ache blooming through my calves and lower back. I wince and sit up slowly, blinking grit from my eyes.
I scan the small hollow automatically. Rverre is already awake, crouched near Illadon as he tightens the straps on her pack with quiet concentration. Relief loosens something tight in my chest. Good.
I don’t look for Korr.
The thought comes unbidden, sharp enough that I recognize it for what it is and clamp down immediately.
I busy myself instead by reaching for my canteen, checking the seals, taking a measured swallow that barely dents the dryness in my throat.
I inventory supplies I already inventoried last night.
I adjust my cloak even though it doesn’t need it.
Control first. Feelings later.
The desert around us is waking too. Wind whispers low across the sand, rearranging the surface just enough to erase the certainty of our footprints. The sky is bleaching toward that familiar, unforgiving brightness.
I push myself to my feet and stretch, rolling my shoulders, ignoring the faint throb at my temples that tells me I should have taken epis earlier. I’ll do it once we’re moving. No sense wasting it while still.
And still I don’t look for him.
It’s easier not to. Easier to pretend that the snap in my voice last night was nothing more than fatigue. Easier to pretend I didn’t jolt awake with my heart trying to tear free of my ribs. That I didn’t see a door sealing in my mind so clearly it left a phantom ache in my chest.
I tighten the strap on my pack and turn just in time to catch Illadon watching me. He doesn’t look accusing, just observant. He’s too good at that for someone his age.
“You okay?” he asks quietly.
“Yes,” I say immediately. Too fast. I soften it a fraction. “Just stiff.”
He nods, accepting the answer without pushing. Bless him for that. Rverre steps closer, peering up at me.
“You were loud.”
My stomach dips. “Loud?”
“In your sleep,” she clarifies. “Then quiet again.”
I force a smile that feels convincing enough. “Bad habit.”
She studies me for a second longer than I like, then turns away, attention drifting back to the ground beneath her feet. Crisis averted.
For now.
As I finish my checks my awareness catches on the empty space where someone should be. Where someone always positions himself with an eye on the horizon and his back to stone, except he isn’t there.
Relief and something like disappointment collide in my chest, leaving me oddly unbalanced. Good, I tell myself. You don’t need—
Movement at the edge of my vision cuts the thought cleanly in half.
Korr emerges from beyond the rise, moving with purpose, scanning as he walks. He looks… ready. As if the desert never stopped being his problem to solve. His gaze flicks over the group—children first, then me—quick and assessing, before returning to the horizon.
No comment. No reference to last night. That should make this easier, but it doesn’t.
I drop my eyes and reach for my pack, lifting it with more force than necessary. If I keep moving, keep doing, I won’t have to think about the way he said my name. Or the way he looked at me when I snapped at him like he’d done something wrong by noticing I was breaking.
We fall into motion without discussion. Packs on. Lines forming. The fragile pause of night dissolving back into purpose.
As we step out of the hollow and into the open sand, I tell myself—firmly and repeatedly—that today is about the journey. About the children. About the city that may or may not exist.
Not about the massive, emerald alien man walking a few paces ahead of me. Not about the way distance suddenly feels like something I’m actively choosing instead of something that simply exists. Not about how much harder that choice is becoming with every step.
The terrain turns against us almost immediately.
The sand loosens underfoot as we crest the shallow rise, giving way to a slanted stretch that looks firmer than it is. The surface holds just long enough to invite confidence, then shifting and stealing traction with quiet malice.
I adjust my stride, shortening it, angling my weight the way I was taught when footing becomes optional. It helps. A little.
The wind picks up from behind us, warm and dry, carrying grit that stings when it catches bare skin. Not dangerous yet, but insistent.
Korr signals a tighter formation without breaking stride. A subtle shift of his arm. A change in pace. Illadon responds instantly, drifting closer to Rverre, positioning his body so the worst of the wind hits his back instead of her face.
I see him. I always. He’s growing up too fast. Or not.
He is of an age to be becoming ‘aware’ of girls as different for sure, but there is more between the two of them than that alone.
The first two hybrid children, they’ve learned to rely on each other and share a connection I can only pretend to understand.
We move in this formation for a while, careful not to burn strength too early. The suns climb higher, the light flattening everything into glare and shadow. Sweat trickles down my spine, dampening the fabric of my cloak. My mouth is already dry again.
I reach for my canteen and take a sip, careful not to waste any. As I lower it, my boot slides.
It’s not dramatic, no flailing, just a sudden, sickening loss of purchase as the sand gives way beneath my weight and my balance tips forward.
I have time to register it. To think, I’ve got it.
I don’t.
A hand closes around my forearm—strong, unyielding—and hauls me back into alignment before I can even gasp. The contact is brief, efficient, and entirely too real. Heat flashes up my arm, awareness snapping sharp and immediate.
I’m suddenly very close to him. Too close.
Korr releases me at once, already turning back toward the path ahead as if nothing happened.
“Watch your footing,” he says, voice calm and infuriatingly even.
“I had it,” I snap, the words out before I can stop them.
He glances back at me then, expression unreadable. “You didn’t.”
The honesty in it—unsoftened, unapologetic—hits harder than any rebuke could have. I bristle, anger flaring hot and sharp, even as my pulse refuses to slow.
“I didn’t ask for help,” I say.
“You didn’t need to,” he replies. “You were falling.”
“I wasn’t—”
“Talia.”
The way he says my name—low, deliberate—cuts through my protest. We hold each other’s gaze for a beat too long. The wind presses in around us, sand whispering across skin and fabric, the desert pretending very hard not to notice the tension snapping tight between us.
Then Illadon clears his throat and I break eye contact first.
“I’m fine,” I say tightly, more to myself than anyone else.
I step past Korr and back into motion, forcing my stride steady even though my arm still hums where he touched me. Behind me, I hear him exhale—slow, controlled. We move on.
No one mentions it. Rverre hums softly, the sound threading through the air like a grounding line. Illadon stays close to her side, alert but calm. I keep my eyes forward, my jaw clenched, my thoughts a tangled mess I refuse to sort through right now.
Because the truth—sharp and unwelcome—is this that for one unguarded second, I hadn’t been afraid of falling. I’d been afraid of how quickly it stopped mattering when he caught me. And that is not a risk I’m ready to take.
The ground firms again a few minutes later, stone like ribs breaking through the sand just often enough to lull us into a dangerous sense of rhythm. My pulse settles. My breathing evens out. I tell myself it’s because I adjusted to the terrain.
It isn’t and I know it. The truth is it’s because he’s close.
I hate how easily my body seems to recalibrate around that fact—how the constant low-level vigilance eases since he’s within reach, how my shoulders drop without permission. It feels like a betrayal of everything I’ve built to survive.
So I try to put distance back. Subtle. No point in making it an announcement. This is, after all, about survival and nothing more.
I drift a step to the side, widening the space between us under the pretense of better footing. Despite my attempt to be subtle, Korr notices. He doesn’t comment, but he adjusts the line so Illadon and Rverre remain shielded.
Efficiency and acceptance without ego. It shouldn’t irritate me, but by all that’s ever been considered holy it does.
“You don’t have to hover,” I say after a while, pitching my voice low to keep it from carrying.
“I’m not,” he replies.
“Yes, you are.”
“No,” he says calmly. “I’m compensating.”
“For what?”
“For variables,” he says. Then, after a beat, he glances back at me and adds, “Including you.”
The words come across sharper than he probably intends. I stop short, forcing him to halt with me. Illadon and Rverre pause a few paces ahead, turning just enough to check in without intruding.
“I am not a variable,” I say.
He turns to face me fully, expression serious but not angry. “Everyone is.”
“That’s not what you meant.”
“Isn’t it?” he asks. “You are human. This world taxes you differently. Acknowledging that is not insult.”
“I didn’t say it was,” I snap. “I meant you don’t get to manage me like terrain.”
Something flickers in his eyes that’s not quite irritation, more like strained restraint.
“I manage risk,” he says. “You are taking this personally.”
“Because it is personal,” I shoot back. “You grab me without asking, then talk like I’m something that needs accounting for.”
“I grabbed you because you were falling.”
“And then you let go,” I say. “Like you were afraid you’d touched too much.”
His jaw tightens. For the first time since we left the canyon, something close to emotion breaks through his careful control.
“You think I don’t know restraint?” he says quietly. “You think this is me failing at it?”
I hesitate, only for a breath, but it’s enough. Rverre shifts uneasily, her humming faltering. Illadon steps closer to her, eyes flicking between us, uncertainty creeping in.
“This isn’t helping.” I say, exhaling sharply and taking a step back.
“No,” Korr agrees. “It isn’t.”
We stand staring at each other for a moment longer, heat and silence pressing in, the argument unfinished and poorly timed. I’m feeling the weight of my own reaction—too sharp, too defensive, driven by something old and bleeding into the present.
“I don’t want to be treated like I’ll break,” I say finally, quieter now. “I’ve already survived that.”
He studies my face, gaze searching in a way that makes my chest tighten.
“You are not breakable,” he says. “You are… unguarded.”
Before I can respond, Rverre speaks.
“The ground doesn’t like it when you pull away,” she says softly.
Both of us turn toward her. She looks between us, brow furrowed, wings twitching in small, uneasy motions.
“It tightens,” she adds. “Like it’s waiting for you to stop arguing.”
Illadon frowns. “You’re not supposed to listen to grown-ups’ moods.”
She shrugs one small shoulder. “I don’t listen to them. I feel them.”
That breaks the moment. Whatever heat was building between Korr and me drains away, replaced by something colder and more sobering. This isn’t about pride or irritation or who caught whom. It’s about the children and about what our tension costs them.
I nod once, swallowing the rest of what I want to say.
“We’ll keep moving,” I say. “No more stops.”
Korr inclines his head, accepting the truce without comment.
We fall back into motion, the space between us narrower now—not because I chose it, but because the desert left us no room to pretend distance doesn’t matter.
The argument isn’t resolved and it sure as everything isn’t finished.
And as the wind shifts again and the horizon shimmers ahead, I know with a sinking certainty that this is only the beginning of what we’re going to tear open between us—whether we’re ready for it or not.