"How long have you been there?"
"A while."
"You're supposed to be on patrol."
"I am on patrol."
"This is Axan's patrol."
"This is my territory."
Her eyes narrow. Not buying a single word.
"The southern border," Kestria offers from somewhere behind me, "apparently has a different section that happens to overlap with this exact trail."
"Very convenient." Her arms fold.
"Isn't it?"
I look at my sister and she looks at the sky.
Axan has stopped walking, leaning against a tree and watching this.
"Keep moving," I tell him.
He pushes off the tree. "Thought we'd take a break at the stream. Another half mile."
He starts walking and doesn't wait for agreement. Melori falls in beside him and they pick up a conversation about Graw—how big his pack is, how long the border tension has been building. Easy back and forth. Asking things nobody else asks him.
Kestria walks beside me again, close enough that her shoulder almost brushes my arm.
"He's doing this on purpose." Low. Just for her.
"Axan? Being helpful and informative and good with people? Yes.Terriblehabit."
"That's not what I mean."
"I know what you mean." She looks at me. "Maybe try being helpful and informative and good with people. See how that works."
I grunt, low, not looking at her.
"Or keep lurking ten paces behind her. That's also a strategy."
"I'm not lurking."
"Oh, you're lurking."
The stream cuts through a low clearing—shallow. Good water. Clean.
Axan calls the break. Kestria drops onto a flat rock near the bank and pulls her boots off, one hand pressing her side—gone before anyone's supposed to notice. She tips her head back and closes her eyes.
Melori crouches at the water's edge.
She rolls her sleeves up, forearms pale and freckled in places, colorful stains climbing past her wrists. She cups water in her hands and splashes it over her arms, scrubbing at the stains. They don't come off. They never come off.
She tries anyway.
She splashes her face, pushes her hair back, the white braid loosening and pieces falling around her neck. She pulls the whole thing off her shoulders, twists it up, holds it with one hand.
