The wind should have carried her.

That is the first thing I know.

When I bank my skimwing toward shore, the air is clean, salt-heavy, alive with late light. The hunt was good. My friends are still laughing somewhere behind me, cutting low over the tide line.

I expect to hear it.

The soft scrape of reed against reed. The quiet rhythm of her fingers weaving. The way she tilts her head when the wind shifts direction.

Nothing.

I land hard, sand spraying beneath my feet. I don’t call her name at first. I just walk toward her place.

Her basket lies on its side.

Reeds scattered.

One unfinished strand dragged across the sand like it tried to follow her.

My stomach drops.

Behind me, Rotxo snorts. “Maybe she wandered.”

Another voice adds, careless, “Or maybe she walked into the sea. Wouldn’t hear much from her after that.”

The words hit wrong.

“Are you serious?” I snap, turning on them.

They shrug. To them she is just the blind Wind Trader girl. The one who sits. The one who listens. The one they used to laugh at.

To me—

She is the constant.

I crouch.

My fingers press into the sand where she always sits. Still warm.

I stand slowly.

There.

A line cut through the shore.

Not tide-made.

Not reef-made.

Deep impressions. Broken sand. Dragged heel marks.

Metal boot prints.

Sky People.

The world goes very quiet.

“She didn’t wander,” I say.

They fall silent now.

I follow the drag marks several paces inland. They are fresh. The sand still collapsing inward around the impressions.

They took her.

They took her while she was weaving.

While she wore her basket.

While she faced the sea and listened to the wind.

A blind girl.

Alone.

My chest tightens until it hurts to breathe.

“She won’t have wind,” I hear myself say, barely above a whisper.

Rotxo steps closer. “What?”

“She won’t know where she is.”

I turn sharply. “Get your skimwings.”

They stare at me.

“You heard me.”

“You don’t even know where they went,” one of them argues.

I step into his space, fury rising hot and reckless. “Nobody touches my Blind Wind.”

The words leave me before I can stop them.

Silence falls heavy.

They see it now in my face. This isn’t teasing. This isn’t a hunt gone wrong.

This is mine.

“We should tell your father,” someone mutters.

I shake my head.

“If we tell him, he’ll wait. He’ll gather elders. He’ll plan.”

I look back at the drag marks.

“She doesn’t have time for that.”

They don’t understand the way I do. They don’t stand beside her every morning. They don’t know how she feels the shift of air before she moves. How she counts steps by tide rhythm. How she maps the world by vibration.

If they’ve put her inside metal—

There will be no wind.

No tide.

No reef.

Just engines.

Buzzing.

Nothing she recognizes.

“She’ll be scared,” I say, voice tightening despite myself. “She won’t know which way is open. She won’t know where the walls are.”

That does it.

The laughter is gone.

I run for my skimwing.

The others hesitate only a heartbeat before following.

Wings snap open. Sand sprays.

I mount in one fluid motion, hands tightening around the reins.

“Why her?” Rotxo asks. “Why this blind girl?”

I don’t look at him when I answer.

“Because I don’t have to be anyone around her,” I say quietly. “Not the best rider. Not the future Olo’eyktan. Not the one who has to win every argument.”

I tighten my grip on the reins.

“She can’t see me trying to impress anyone. She just hears me. And that’s enough.”

I glance back at him then.

“You wouldn’t understand.”

I don’t think about permission.

I don’t think about consequence.

I don’t think about whether I can win.

I only think about her sitting somewhere without wind.

Without sound she understands.

Without me.

I kick the skimwing forward.

We launch hard, cutting low over the reef, following the direction of the drag path toward the clearing where Sky People ships sometimes scar the sky.

The air tears at my hair.

My heart pounds too loud.

If this is a mistake, I will answer for it later.

Right now—

She is alone.

And I am not waiting for dusk.