"The road teaches you who you are when nobody's watching." — Caravan saying
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The second day with the caravan had a rhythm to it. The first day had been learning. This was living inside what he'd learned.
Wake before dawn. The camp was cold. Someone had banked the fire; there were still coals. Kael had slept at the edge, his back to a wheel, his bag under his head. He'd woken twice in the night — once to the sound of the guard changing, once to nothing, just the habit of waking. Help with the horses if you were fast enough to be useful before the farrier got there. Kael had learned to move quickly. Hold the trace. Stand where he was told. The farrier — Bren, they called him — had a way of nodding when you did it right. Not a thank you. Just a nod. Kael had learned to value it. Eat what you were given. Ride in the back with the crates and Tam, who had decided Kael was acceptable and now sometimes sat near him without speaking, just watching the road.
At midday they stopped by a creek. Hella had everyone refill waterskins and check hooves. She moved through the wagons like a general — a word here, a look there — and the caravan moved with her. Kael had never been in an army, but he'd read enough to recognise the type: the person who made safety look like routine. She paused by the farrier's team, ran a hand down one horse's leg, nodded. Nothing said. Everything communicated. Kael refilled his own skin and helped with the horses when the farrier waved him over. Hold the trace. Stand still. The horses were calm. They'd done this a hundred times. He hadn't. He learned. The farrier had a way of touching the horses — not gentle, not rough. Just sure. The animals responded. Kael had watched. Had learned where to stand so he wasn't in the way. Had learned when to step back. It was a language. He was starting to speak it.
By afternoon the sky was the same pale grey it had been for days. The trees had given way to low hills. The road ran empty in both directions, its ruts filled with old rain and new dust. Kael had learned the rhythm of the wagon by then — when it would lurch, when it would sway. He'd learned to brace without thinking. To watch the road without staring. But it was quieter than it should have been. Fewer birds. Fewer tracks at the water holes. One of the guards — the one who didn't talk much — had pointed it out to Hella at first light. "Something's moved them. Migration. Or something pushed." Hella had nodded. "We keep going. Eyes open." She'd said it the way she said everything: no drama, no delay. The quiet sat on the road like a held breath. Kael filed it. Baseline: something had changed. He didn't know what yet.
That evening, when they'd made camp in a clearing off the road, Hella found him. "You can read," she said. It wasn't a question. He'd known she'd noticed — she noticed everything — but he hadn't known she'd use it. "Bren's eyes are going. He won't admit it. Read him the waybill. Tonight. By his fire." So Kael sat by Bren's fire and read out the day's tallies and the next day's stretch. The waybill was a list — distances, stops, river crossings. *Twelve miles to the fork. River crossing midday. Aldmere gate by fourth evening.* Bren grunted at every line.
"Slower," he said once. "That word. What is it?"
"River crossing. Tomorrow midday," Kael said.
"Right," Bren said. The man had a name and a way of spitting into the fire that seemed to punctuate his thoughts.
When Kael was done, Bren said, "Tell Hella I said thank you."
"She said not to," Kael said.
Bren almost smiled. "Then don't." He spat into the coals. "River crossing tomorrow. You read that part?"
"I did," Kael said.
"Good." Bren didn't say anything else. He didn't have to. The waybill had said *Aldmere gate by fourth evening*. Two more days. Two more nights of camp and watch and the quiet that wasn't quite trust. Kael could do two days. He'd done three alone in the forest. This was easier. This had food. This had people who might not turn him in if he kept his head down.
Around the camp, people ate, mended harness, spoke in low voices. No one invited Kael into their circle, but no one drove him off either. He sat at the edge with his back to a wagon wheel and watched. Once one of the merchants told a joke. The others laughed. Kael didn't get it — something about a mule and a tax collector — but he smiled when the laughter peaked. The right beat. The right duration. Nobody looked at him twice. He was part of the machinery now. He'd made himself useful. He was learning to be around people again — not the cottage, not just Aldric, but twelve strangers who didn't owe him anything. It was harder than he'd expected. He had to think before he spoke. He had to remember that not everyone counted seconds or ran baselines or noticed the way a man's hands trembled. He had to pretend to be fourteen. He had to laugh when something was funny and stay quiet when it wasn't. He was getting better at it. Not good. Better. Once Tam had asked him where he was from. Kael had said, "The east." Tam had waited for more. Kael had said nothing. Tam had shrugged and gone back to watching the road. It was the right answer. Not a lie. Not enough to follow. The east was a direction. The east was Aldmere. The east was where he was going. He didn't have to explain the cottage. The fire. The grave. He didn't have to explain anything.
And then there was Oeric.
Oeric was a veteran. You could tell before he opened his mouth: the way he carried his weight, the way his eyes tracked movement at the tree line, the permanent squint of a man who'd spent years watching horizons for things that wanted to kill him. His face was sun-carved and still, his hands scarred in patterns that told stories he didn't volunteer. He'd joined the caravan at the same stop as Kael, or the one before — no one had introduced him. He'd just been there. Another stray. Another person who knew how to make himself useful without talking.
He smelled like leather and old smoke and something else — something sharp and metallic that Kael's newly sensitive channels registered as faintly wrong. A residue. An echo of something powerful that had been near this man and left a mark.
*Like standing where lightning struck,* Kael thought, and didn't like how easily the analogy came. When Oeric passed him once at the water stop, the metallic tang was stronger — close enough to taste. Kael had said nothing. Filed it.
Oeric rode in the back and watched the road unspool behind them. He didn't talk to Kael. He didn't need to. His presence was enough. That night at the fire Oeric didn't sit with the others. He took a position at the edge of the camp — back to a wagon, sight line on the road — and stayed there. Not hostile. Just watchful. Another piece of the baseline. Another person to read. Another reminder that the world was full of people who had survived things and didn't advertise it. Once, when the wagon hit a rut, Oeric's hand went to his belt — where a knife would be — and then relaxed. Habit. The kind of habit you got from years of expecting trouble. Kael filed it. The metallic smell. The way he moved. Another data point.
The next morning Tam brought him a piece of journey-bread without being asked. Kael took it. "Thanks."
Tam shrugged. "Ma said you might be hungry. We had extra." He didn't meet Kael's eyes. But he didn't duck. He went back to his mother's wagon.
The road was quieter. The caravan was a kind of family — not love, not trust yet, but rhythm. Shared work. Shared danger. You ate what they ate. You watched the same tree line. You learned who nodded and who didn't. Kael adjusted. East. Aldmere. The Broken Compass. One day at a time. Tam had stopped ducking. Bren had almost smiled. Oeric still hadn't said a word to him, but the man's presence was a kind of anchor — someone else who knew how to watch. Whatever had moved the birds and the game — migration or something pushed — hadn't shown itself yet. He hoped it stayed that way. He didn't believe in hoping. He did it anyway.
The road ran on. The sky stayed grey. Somewhere ahead was a city and a shop and a man who had been waiting fourteen years. Kael had a letter. He had a direction. He had a baseline. The quiet on the road was still there; he'd added it. When something changed again he'd know. That night he lay with his back to the wheel and ran through the baseline one more time. Twelve people. Four wagons. Hella. Bren. Tam. Oeric with his metallic smell and his watch position. If tomorrow didn't match he'd notice. That was what Aldric had taught him. The waybill had said *Aldmere gate by fourth evening*. Tomorrow was the third day with the caravan. The day after that they'd reach the city. He'd have to find the Broken Compass. Find Vex. Have a story ready if anyone asked. He had two days to think about the rest.
He had a place. Small. At the edge. He'd keep it the same way he'd earned it — useful, watching, no reason to leave him on the road. The fire cracked. The horses shifted. The camp settled. Two more days to Aldmere. The road would take him the rest of the way. Aldmere waited. So did Vex. So did the rest.