Liyana crawled in behind him. There was very little space with two people plus the pack. Avoiding meeting his eyes, she squirmed past him. She tried to keep to the tarp wall, but her hip still brushed against his thigh. She instantly scooted against her pack.

Their breathing filled the silence. She was acutely aware he was only inches from her.

Inside the tent, the air was still, but at least they were shielded from the pounding sun. She unwrapped her headcloth and let her braids fall against her neck. She shook them out, and they sprinkled sand in the tent. She winced. “Forgive me.”

He nodded graciously.

The silence thickened. Liyana had never been alone in a tent with a male who wasn’t family. She couldn’t help noticing how lean, muscled, and handsome he was. Bayla will be pleased with him, she thought.

“I should . . . um, fix the rip,” she said. Twisting to face the pack, she accidentally elbowed him in the side. “Forgive me!”

He rubbed his ribs. “Of course.”

Hands shaking, she pulled out the needle and thread. Mother had sensibly packed the thick sinewy thread, not the silk embroidery thread. Liyana threaded the needle and then pinched the two sides of the rift. She started at the top, making tight stitches, the way that Aunt Sabisa had taught her when she was deemed old enough to not stab herself too badly with the needle. She glanced over her shoulder and saw he was still watching her. She wondered what he thought when he looked at her, if he thought of her or Bayla. She broke the silence. “You didn’t finish telling me about your race. Second race, you flew.”

“We flew on birds, and I won easily. Sendar created a massive condor, large enough to accommodate his substantial girth. Even in the Dreaming, you see, he prefers as many muscles as possible. He likes to match his size to his ego. But I selected an ordinary-size raven and shrunk myself. His condor crashed from the weight, and I flew to the finish line with time to spare.”

Behind her, she felt Korbyn shift, as if seeking a better position. She tried to scoot her feet farther under her so he’d have more room, but that just caused her knee to bump against his shoulder. She flinched as if the touch had burned.

“He chose a horse for the third race, of course, and at the appointed time, he charged forward. He tore across the desert with sand billowing in his wake. Some say he created his own sandstorms. But when he reached the finish line, I was already there.”

The wind teased the edges of the rip, trying to tug the tarp out of her hands. She held it tightly and speared the canvas with the needle. She tried to ignore the warmth of his body beside her. Once Bayla inhabited her body . . .

“You are supposed to be so intensely curious that you ask me how I managed to accomplish such a miraculous feat,” Korbyn said.

Midstitch, she froze. “Please, forgive me.”

He sighed. “You do not need to show me continuous deference. I’m not your god.”

“You’re my goddess’s lover.”

“True,” he said.

She felt his eyes on her, and she wondered again if he were picturing her as Bayla. She wondered if he was evaluating her body. Or imagining it. She tried to focus on the stitches, but her fingers shook. She wondered if he planned to speak again. “Could you please tell me how you won?”

“Since you asked so nicely . . . I won the race by moving the finish line to me.”

Looking over her shoulder at him, she tried to puzzle what he meant.

“Remember, this was in the Dreaming. I simply . . . bent the desert. Sendar believed he was racing straight to the finish line, but in truth, he completed a vast circle. I curved it as he ran until the finish line was at my feet. I never moved from the starting line.”

“That’s brilliant.”

“I thought so. But I’m glad you agree. It will make this journey much more pleasant if you are impressed with my brilliance.” He flashed her a smile.

She laughed. It felt good to laugh, as if her ribs were remembering some old game that they used to be fond of.

“Well, that’s a surprise,” he said.

“What is?”

“You can laugh.”

“Of course I can laugh,” she said. “Life simply hasn’t been very amusing lately, with the exception of the lizard in my aunt’s hair.”

“Your aunt wears lizards in her hair?”

She told him about the lizard that had graced Aunt Sabisa’s hair on the morning of the summoning ceremony and how she had stomped around like a human sandstorm. To her surprise, he laughed, filling the tent with untamed joy. They continued to trade stories and laugh until both of them sank into sleep.

Liyana snapped awake. She blinked once to prove to herself that her eyes were open. She was enveloped by darkness. She felt a warm body pressed against her side. Her cheek lay against the cool tarp of a tent wall. Usually she slept between her cousins, and for an instant she could not comprehend how she had rolled across them to reach the wall. But then she realized that the deep, steady breathing beside her was from a male.

Korbyn.

Like a sandstorm, memory swept through her, and she felt as choked as if she had swallowed sand. She forced herself to breathe evenly as she focused on a sliver of moonlight that gleamed through the door flap. She was aware of how close the man . . . boy . . . god . . . next to her was. She felt his warmth beside her, a sharp contrast to the chill of the tarp. She listened to him breathe. So close, she could smell his skin. He smelled of spices, like an expensive tea.

Still asleep, Korbyn cried out. She felt his body stiffen. His arm, splayed across her, tensed. She flattened against her side of the tent as he made a sound like an animal’s cry. He flailed again, and his arm hit the opposite side of the tent. “Korbyn?” she whispered in the darkness. Louder: “Korbyn!”

The whimpered cry ceased. His voice was soft in the darkness. “You woke me.”

“Forgive me,” she said. “But you were dreaming.”

“I am unused to dreams. In the Dreaming, there is no need for sleep, and therefore there are no dreams.” His voice was conversational, even loud. Outside, the desert was silent except for the wind. “I suppose that is ironic, given the name. Tell me of your dreams, Liyana.”

She thought of the jumble of images that cluttered her dreams. Often she saw Jidali shimmying up a date palm tree. Sometimes he fell. She dreamed about dancing, and she’d wake with her blankets tangled around her legs. Once, she dreamed of a sea of hip-high wheat that bowed in the breeze. “I dream about my family,” Liyana said. “But if you mean bad dreams . . . in those, I dream I’m alone.”

He didn’t reply with details of his own dream. She wished she dared to ask. She wished she could see his face. If he were family, she would have comforted him. She listened to him breathe. Tentatively she said, “Stories say that sand wolves were born from bad dreams.”

She heard him chuckle.

Emboldened, she continued, “Long ago, the rains didn’t come to the hunting grounds of the Jackal Clan. Days were filled with thirst and hunger, and nights were filled with dreams of death. When the jackal god came to them, he filled the wells with water and brought the gazelle to the hunters. Days were filled with water and food, but nights were still filled with dreams of death—the memories of the time with no rain.” She hesitated. She used to tell this story to Jidali when he woke from a nightmare, but Korbyn wasn’t a child. He didn’t stop her, though, and the silence expanded until she wanted to fill it. “One night, the jackal god bade his people to fall asleep, and then he gathered up their dreams and threw them into a storm. There, stirred by the wind, they mixed with the sand and became the sand wolves. And that is why we fear the sand wolves and why they continue to plague us—they are our nightmares and they want to return to us. But they cannot leave their wind to hurt us, just as your dreams cannot leave your mind to hurt you.”