Page 72 of Bride of the Enemy Alien

“You want to feed it an impossible Kessa.”

“I want to feed it a Kessa who makes bad choices.”

Maro says, “That seems easy. I have notes.”

Lio elbows him. I hide a smile because it’s absolutely not the time for humor, which makes it more necessary.

“Throw mineral specks. It will confuse the signal,” Rhazek says.

I stare for a moment, trying to decipher his reasons and reasoning both, but I can’t see anything beneath the words so I nod.

“We move in two lines,” I say, signing as I speak to fracture the pattern. “False sign first. Real feet second. Lio and Maro mark the impossible route with mineral dust thrown from a distance. Nobody steps on it. Nobody bleeds on it. Nobody yells my name unless the sky actually falls.”

“Define actually,” Maro says.

“You can figure that one out.”

Rhazek rises from the salt circle. It costs him. He catches his breath, then steadies himself. The relay pulses, softer now that it is smeared by salt and ash.

“You should remain here,” Syin says.

Rhazek looks at him. “No.”

“Your body is the line.”

“And if the receiver pings while I’m out of sight, you will not know which direction it pulls.”

Syin’s tail scrapes the stone. He hates the logic. I know because I hate it too, and not just because he’s right, though that doesn’t help.

“He walks,” I say. Rhazek looks at me. I don’t look back. “Not because he gets to make another secret decision. Because I need the compass where I can see it.”

“I am honored,” he says.

“You are equipment-adjacent. Don’t get sentimental.” He gives me a dry look, then the relay pulses. I point at him. “Also stop enjoying this. It’s bad for signal discipline.”

Even Syin looks away as we leave the hollow and move toward the dust line.

The desert shifts from red to white underfoot. Salt crust breaks with soft snaps. The heat becomes brighter, meaner, bouncing up from the ground until my vision swims. Lio and Maro move ahead in staggered bursts, tossing small puffs of dust along the impossible route, marking a ghost path no sane runner would use.

The receiver pings.

The dust path answers, not because it’s alive, not because it believes our lie, but because the mineral flecks Rhazek told us to scatter catch the pulse and throw it back wrong. Green light flickers beneath a flat stone south-east of us. There.

Not where the dust line pointed. Where it came from. I grin despite myself. Rhazek sees it and looks deeply concerned.

“What?” I ask.

“You are pleased.”

“I like solving problems.”

“You also like danger.”

“I like danger contained in useful boxes.”

The flat stone clicks.

Once.