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Dreven glanced at the sky again before looking toward Keth. “Wind?”

Keth stepped outside the open gate and raised his face. His mechanical eye contracted as it focused eastward.

“Rising.”

Kesta followed his gaze. “I barely feel anything.”

Dreven looked at her. “That is not reassuring.”

“On Earth, no wind usually means no storm.”

“You are not on Earth.”

She opened her mouth, then stopped. There was no arrogance in his expression. No challenge. He was simply stating a fact.

Kesta folded her arms. “What are you seeing that I'm not?”

Something changed in Dreven’s face. Approval, perhaps.

He stepped closer to the gate and pointed toward the distant black ridges. “The heat distortion has disappeared.”

Kesta narrowed her eyes. He was right. The wavering shimmer she had become accustomed to seeing above the basalt was gone.

“The air is cooling?”

“Above us. Not at ground level.” Dreven pointed higher. “And the carrion flyers have left the eastern ridge.”

Kesta found the ridge after a moment. Empty.

“What does that mean?”

“Salt wind within half a cycle. Possibly sooner.”

Tavi's upper hands paused over the diagnostic unit. “I recommend sooner. The static level has doubled since breakfast.”

Kesta looked at the perfectly clear sky again.

“I would never have known.”

Dreven’s expression softened slightly. “Which is why we are discussing it rather than discovering it outside.”

The remark should have irritated her. Instead, Kesta found herself remembering what she had said during their training session: helping her become harder to protect worked better than simply removing every danger. Apparently that principle could work in both directions.

“How far can we safely go?”

“The outer marker and back if the wind remains stable.”

“And if the human signal continues beyond it?”

Dreven’s jaw tightened.

“We decide when we see the conditions.”

That was not the automatic refusal she had expected. Kesta nodded.

“Fair.”

His eyebrows rose.