The desert did not sleep.
Lindarion realized that sometime before dawn, lying half-awake with grit pressed into his cheek and the weight of the sky pressing down harder than it should. The stars had shifted again while he rested, not enough for the others to notice without instruments, but enough that his instincts kept scraping against the wrongness of it.
'He's not just awake,' Lindarion thought, slow and careful so the thought would not echo outward. 'He's adjusting the board.'
Nysha was already up when Lindarion rose, sitting cross-legged near the fire pit with her blade across her knees, methodically running a whetstone along its edge. She did not look tired. She looked coiled. The kind of stillness that came from someone who had accepted that the next stretch of road would not forgive hesitation.
"You were listening again," she said without looking up.
"Yes."
"Anything new?"
