Chapter 12 Talia
TALIA
We keep moving.
No one says it out loud, but Rverre’s words linger like grit caught between teeth. The ground doesn’t like it when you pull away. I tell myself she’s talking about footing, about balance, about how the desert resents hesitation. Anything but us.
The formation tightens anyway.
Not because Korr orders it, not because the terrain demands it outright, but because space has become inefficient.
The wind pushes harder from behind us, warm and insistent, scouring the sand into shallow ripples that steal traction without warning.
Every step costs more than it did a minute ago.
Every breath feels a fraction too shallow.
I focus on the practical.
Counting steps and regulating breathing. Keeping Rverre in sight without hovering. Keeping Illadon from burning himself down by trying to be a shield instead of a child. I can do this. I’ve done harder things than walking through heat with unresolved tension snapping at my heels.
The desert disagrees.
The hum I’ve come to associate with movement—Rverre’s soft, wandering sound—fractures. It stutters once, then fades entirely. I notice it immediately. My shoulders tense before my mind catches up.
“Rverre?” I ask, keeping my voice light.
She doesn’t answer. Her steps haven’t slowed, but her wings twitch in small, uneven movements, like she’s adjusting to pressure I can’t feel. Illadon notices and shifts closer, but he doesn’t touch her.
Korr slows by half a step.
It’s subtle. Anyone else might miss it, but I don’t. His awareness sharpens, scanning not just the horizon now but the space between us. The silence stretches, thin and wrong.
“What is it?” I ask.
Rverre frowns, small brow creasing as she presses her palm briefly to the sand without stopping. The contact is quick, almost reflexive.
“It’s… confused,” she says finally.
Illadon glances at me. “Confused how?”
She shrugs one shoulder, frustrated. “Like when too many people talk at once. And no one listens.”
I swallow and look ahead, pretending the shimmer on the horizon is more interesting than the tightness in my chest. The terrain hasn’t changed. The wind still comes from behind. By every rational metric, we’re fine.
And yet.
The desert feels closer. Not louder. Just… attentive.
Korr gestures with two fingers, signaling a slight adjustment in pace. Slower and more deliberate. I mirror it without comment, irritation flaring despite myself. Not because he’s wrong—but because part of me resents how easy it is to go into agreement with him.
We walk like this for several minutes, tension coiled and quiet. The children between us feel it even if they don’t name it. Illadon’s jaw is tight. Rverre keeps glancing down at the ground like she’s waiting for it to say something it hasn’t decided on yet.
I make a point of not looking at Korr.
If I do, I’ll have to acknowledge how close he’s stayed since the argument. Not touching, but just close enough that I don’t drift without meaning to. Close enough that the desert seems less eager to test me. And I hate that it makes me feel helpless and that I like it at the same time.
“You’re favoring the right now,” I say, breaking the silence before it can fracture into something worse.
“Yes,” he replies.
“No explanation,” I mutter.
“Not unless you ask,” he says.
I bite back a sharper response. This isn’t about winning ground. It’s about keeping it. For the children. For the fragile thread we’re already walking.
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.
Illadon lets out a harsh breath. Rverre’s shoulders relax a fraction, tension easing like a knot that didn’t realize it was being pulled tight. The wind shifts again, not retreating, but less direct, more sideways, as if recalculating. And no matter how much don’t like it, my chest loosens too.
We resume moving.
The new route isn’t easy, but it’s manageable.
The stone ribs give us something to brace against when the sand slips, something solid to press into when the gusts pick up.
I stay close to Rverre without crowding her, matching her pace, watching for the signs that mean she’s listening too hard again.
Korr takes point, but he checks back often—not to command or correct, but to confirm. Each glance feels like an unspoken question. Still with me? I don’t answer it aloud. I don’t need to.
The desert doesn’t feel like it’s fighting us, but it doesn’t welcome us either. It simply allows.
After a while—long enough that the heat settles into my bones again and sweat dampens the back of my neck—Rverre is humming once more. Soft. Careful. The sound threads through our steps, smoothing the rough edges of the terrain like a hand passing over a wrinkle.
Illadon smiles at her, quick and proud, before schooling his expression back into seriousness. He’s growing too fast. I hate that the desert is the thing pushing him too, but this is Tajss. We can only protect the young for so long, survival demands it.
I glance at Korr and it’s clear that he’s listening—not just with his ears, but with his whole body.
The tension in him seems to be easing by degrees as the hum steadies.
When his gaze meets mine, there’s no challenge in it.
No hint of an argument waiting to spark. I nod sharply, sharper than I mean to.
The wind fades to a low murmur at our backs.
We keep walking, not because the danger has passed, but because—for now—we’re moving in the same direction.
And the desert, fickle and watchful, seems willing to see where that takes us.
I don’t notice the silence at first.
The desert doesn’t go quiet all at once, it’s subtle. The hum of wind fades to a breath. The sand stops whispering underfoot. Even Rverre’s low song trails off, the last note dissolving like it was never meant to linger.
That’s when I feel it.
Not danger exactly, more like… absence. As if something that should be here isn’t.
I slow without meaning to. Korr feels it immediately. He lifts a fist, halting us with a sharp, economical motion that Illadon mirrors a heartbeat later. Rverre freezes between us, wings tucked tight, eyes narrowing as she tilts her head.
“What is it?” I ask quietly.
Korr doesn’t answer right away. He crouches, presses his palm to the ground, then drags his fingers through the sand, studying the pattern they leave behind.
“This place is wrong,” he says at last.
That should scare me but I have to be brave for the kids so I dig deep and push down any hints of fear.
“How?” I ask.
“It’s too… clean.” He straightens slowly, scanning the basin ahead. “No tracks. No burrows. No signs of passing.”
Illadon frowns. “Maybe nothing comes here.”
Korr’s jaw tightens. “Everything comes somewhere.”
Rverre shifts, her tail flicking once before she stills it with visible effort.
“It’s holding its breath,” Rverre says.
I swallow.