Kael reached into his pack and pulled out a sealed glass vial of Delta river water. He placed it on the line. "Don't open it. Just hold the glass. It’s warm. It tastes like the sun hitting the mud."
"The chemistry is too different," Kael sighed, leaning as close as he dared. He could feel the cold "wrongness" of her region radiating off the rocks. "My father says back in the Old Days, people could walk until their feet gave out. They called it 'traveling.'" Kael reached into his pack and pulled out
"Sounds exhausting," Elara joked, though her eyes were sad. "I just want to know what the water feels like. Up there, it’s all ice and mist." Just hold the glass
He had a "Border Friend," Elara. She was a High-Stepper from the peaks. Every Tuesday, they met at , the invisible line where the spongy moss of the Delta met the dry, obsidian shale of the Highlands. He could feel the cold "wrongness" of her
"I brought a sky-lily," Elara said, her voice sounding thin in the pressurized mountain air. She slid the flower toward the line. As the petals touched the Delta air, they withered into gray ash instantly. "Still won't take, then."