...The caravan wound through the Pass of Thorns, dust rising behind each wagon like memory. Bronnal's priests walked at the front and back, ensuring the blessings held, that the wells they'd depended on would not run dry at the final hour. Every traveler carried some version of his mark; a rune carved into the sole of their boot, a prayer spoken before dawn. The desert tested everything it touched. It taught you whether you were real or merely pretending at solidity. Bronnal had learned those lessons in his wandering and had decided that the journey through hardship was the only truth worth keeping.

When the sun finally descended and they made camp, the water was enough, the shelter adequate, the fires warm. And that was all the comfort anyone needed who understood that rest was only the breath between movements, and that tomorrow would bring the road again...