Valeria
The flame bent the wrong way.
Valeria closed her hand before it reached the dry leaves at the upper mark.
Smoke drifted back across the cleared strip.
"Wait," she said.
The worker with the hook stopped.
Across the protected edge, Elara held up one hand to keep the next crew from advancing.
Valeria watched the smoke.
The wind above the trees was moving one way. The air beneath the low root arch was moving another.
She had checked it before beginning.
The cleared edge gave her room to stop without sending the workers through active flame. She used it.
The first patch still smoked at its front. Valeria waited for that smoke to show the movement beneath the arch again before deciding where to restart.
The mark on the sketch had not moved. The air had.
She looked toward Elara, who kept the next crew behind the line, then at the keeper. They were waiting for a direction she could defend from what she saw now.
