Chapter 12 Kara
KARA
Sand lashes my skin raw, scouring every exposed inch. My blanket is useless—ripped at, torn thin, grit pouring through until it’s just another weight dragging me down. Every breath tastes like dust and blood. My throat burns as if the storm has crawled inside to scour my insides too.
I stumble. My foot slips, sinking deep into shifting grit, knee buckling. The storm seizes me in that instant, shoving sideways and tearing me from the others. The world tilts, blurs, disappearing—
A hand clamps around my waist.
The scarred warrior yanks me upright, one brutal tug that jerks the breath from my chest. His grip is iron, steady against the shrieking chaos.
For a heartbeat I’m pressed flush against him, his scales rough, his silence heavier than the storm itself.
His hand around my waist pulls me forward, half-dragging me back into the line of shadowed shapes stumbling through the grit.
I choke down air thick with sand. My lungs burn, tears streak mud down my cheeks. I hate that I nearly fell. I hate that I needed him to pull me up like some child too small to stand.
But more than hate, there is a hot coil of need curling low in my chest. A need to be worthy of that hand—to be someone who can keep pace with him instead of a burden dragging behind.
I square my shoulders, grit biting through cloth, and force my legs into motion. Each step sinks, drags, but I keep moving. Faster. Harder. If I fall again, it won’t be because I let the storm take me.
The scarred warrior doesn’t look back. He doesn’t need to. His hand leaves my waist, but the phantom of it lingers like a brand, keeping me upright.
I grit my teeth, vowing that next time, I won’t need saving.
The storm howls so loud that the world feels split apart, but through the grit I keep moving, feet sinking, legs screaming. The scarred warrior carves a path ahead, broad shoulders bent into the gale, his silhouette the only steady thing in the chaos.
Behind me, a shout rips through the wind. I jerk my head so fast that it wrenches my neck, just in time to see Joran stumble, dropping to his knees in the grit. Sand whirls over him in a wave, threatening to bury him alive. He hacks and chokes, his curses breaking into ragged coughs.
“Harlan—!” he calls, his voice shredded by the howling winds.
Harlan falters too, one hand pressed to his chest, eyes wild with panic. He staggers, blown by the gusts, nearly vanishing into the sandy-white blur.
Without thinking, I lunge for them. The storm slams me sideways, stealing half my breath, but I shove through. My knife is clutched tight in one hand, but I need the other free. I grab Joran by the collar, hauling him up. He fights me, cursing even as he coughs, but I don’t let go.
“Move!” I scream, the wind tearing the word from my throat. “Get up, damn it!”
I shove him forward and lurch for Harlan, fingers closing around his arm. He’s trembling, lips moving fast in prayer, eyes glazed with fear. Sand cakes his lashes, his lips, his beard. If I let go, the storm will take him. Silently cursing, I put my knife away and grab Joran’s collar.
I drag them both, step by punishing step, lungs burning. My wounded arm throbs, venom-scar screaming beneath the bandage, but I grit my teeth and pull harder.
Ahead, the scarred warrior glances back.
His black eyes lock with mine through the storm’s blur. For the space of a heartbeat, everything else falls away—the grit, the wind, the weight. His gaze is steady, cutting through chaos, and I know he sees.
Not weakness. Not failure. Not the girl dismissed and shoved aside.
He sees me dragging men twice my size through the teeth of the storm. He sees me refusing to fall.
Something twists in my chest, and warmth flushes over my skin. It’s not pride, not exactly. It’s fiercer. A need that burns worse than hunger—to keep that look on me. To hold it. To deserve it.
The storm surges, sand battering harder, but I square my shoulders and shove Joran and Harlan forward again.
Let the storm try. I’ll drag them all through it if I have to.
The storm drives harder, shrieking in our ears, pressing grit into our eyes until every blink feels like knives. Each step is a fight, but I don’t let go of Joran’s collar or Harlan’s arm.
“Faster! You crawl like hatchlings!” the younger Zmaj shouts, his voice cutting through the storm.
His wings snap open, buffeted by the gale, forcing him sideways before he regains balance. He snarls, teeth bared, and pushes forward recklessly, half-vanishing into the white swirl.
“Stay with the group!” I scream, throat raw, but he ignores me.
His silhouette surges ahead, only to be swallowed again by the blowing sand.
“He’s going to get us all killed,” Joran coughs out, spitting mud-dark sand.
Harlan mutters faster, words breaking into jagged sobs, his body trembling against my grip. His feet stumble, nearly dragging me down with him.
Panic surges hot in my throat. If the younger Zmaj tears off into the storm, if the humans collapse, if the group splinters, we’ll all be swallowed.
“No!” The word rips out of me, fierce, sharp enough to sting my own ears. “Stay together!”
The sound shocks even me—my voice doesn’t crack.
It doesn’t vanish under the wind. It carries.
For what feels like the first time, no one is talking over me.
Joran stiffens, coughing, but he keeps pace.
Harlan’s mutters slow, his steps steadier under my pull.
Even the younger Zmaj, a shadow in the grit ahead, glances back.
And then the scarred warrior is at my side. He doesn’t speak, only braces us against the storm. His gaze cuts across the group, black and unyielding. The younger Zmaj falters, his reckless push slowing. Joran mutters, but quieter now. Harlan keeps breathing.
The line holds.
It isn’t just him. It isn’t just me. It’s us. Somehow, between his silence and my shout, the group bends back together, stumbling as one through the storm’s teeth.
And deep in my chest, something shifts. Not just survival. Not just stubbornness. A thread of steel weaving into my voice, into my spine. For the first time, I feel like more than an overlooked girl dragging behind. I feel like someone who belongs beside him.
The storm worsens, becoming a wall of grit so dense I can’t see more than a foot ahead.
My lungs scrape raw, every breath a fight.
My legs feel carved hollow, but I don’t let go of Joran or Harlan.
Step by step, we keep moving, following the dark bulk of the scarred warrior as he carves through the chaos.
The younger Zmaj surges a little ahead again, wings twitching, but he doesn’t break away fully this time. He glances back once, then snarls and lowers his head into the gale. Even he’s learning—the storm doesn’t forgive.
My body aches, every muscle trembling, but I refuse to stumble. I refuse to be dragged again. I want him to see me as more than weight to carry. I want to deserve the look he gave.
A darker shape looms through the grit. At first I think it’s a cliff, jagged and sharp against the storm. Relief surges, sharp as hunger—we’ve found shelter—but as we stagger closer, the outline shifts.
The shape curves. Not stone. Bone.
It’s taller than a house, arching overhead, half-buried in sand. Another rises beside it, jagged and cracked but unmistakable.
Ribs.
We push forward, and more emerge—massive arches of pale fossil jutting from the canyon floor, forming a hollow half-sheltered from the storm. A skeleton so large I can’t grasp it, the bones of some ancient beast the desert swallowed long before us.
Joran curses under his breath, voice ragged. Harlan gasps out something that might be a prayer or a sob. Even the younger Zmaj goes still, his wings folding tight against his back.
The scarred warrior leads us inside the skeletal remains. Wind shrieks through hollows, whistling high and sharp like a scream. The storm funnels through the ribs, alive in its voice.
The storm hasn’t just driven us to shelter. It’s driven us into something else.
Something waiting.