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Chapter 1. The Smoke of a Summer That Won't Wait

The scout headquarters smelled like dust and old paper and the faint sharpness of paraffin, the kind of smell that clung to your clothes long after you left. Kalina pushed through the heavy wooden door just before nine, her backpack digging into her shoulder, the morning light falling in pale rectangles across the scarred floorboards. She'd come early on purpose. Not to help, exactly, but to have a reason to be there when he arrived. She'd told herself she was being practical, that she wanted to go over the route before the others showed up, but the lie tasted thin even as she thought it.

The maps were spread across the table like a patient's chart, their corners weighted down with a chipped coffee mug and a compass that looked older than she was. Kuba stood at the head of the table, his back to the door, one finger tracing a line along the Bug River's winding path. He was already in his field jacket—the olive one with the worn collar and the pocket where she knew he kept his dog tags—as if he'd been there for hours, as if he'd slept in it and simply never taken it off. His hair was a mess, black and windblown, and there were dark circles under his eyes that made him look like he'd been awake all night reading, or thinking, or whatever it was he did when he wasn't being watched.

Kalina let the door fall shut behind her and watched the soft thud of it go unnoticed. He didn't turn around.

"Didn't think anyone else would be here this early," she said, and even she could hear the way her voice pitched a little higher than intended. She dropped her backpack by the door, the way she always did, and walked toward the table with a confidence she did not feel. "You're making me look bad. I came early to be helpful and now I just look like I'm late."

Kuba glanced up, just briefly, and then his eyes went back to the map. "You're not late," he said, and his voice was low and quiet, the kind of voice that made you lean in to hear it even when you didn't need to. "I got here at seven."

"Seven. Of course you did." She settled across the table from him, letting her elbows rest on the wood, the surface rough and scarred from years of knives and spilled tea. "What's the route look like? Do we get to do anything fun, or is it just another year of walking in a straight line and pretending we're learning something?"

His finger traced a second line, this one heading east toward the forest. "I was thinking we go through the old trail. The one that runs along the ridge."

"That's not even a trail anymore. It's a suggestion of a trail. It's barely a rumour of a trail."

He almost smiled. Almost. "That's the point."

Kalina felt something shift in her chest, something warm and completely unwelcome, and she looked away to hide it. She pulled a pen from her pocket, one of the cheap ones with the chewed cap, and started making a show of examining the map. Her eyes wandered across the faded paper, the old borders that didn't match the new ones, the tiny symbols for churches and fords and places that had probably been abandoned decades ago.

"You know," she said, trying to keep her voice light, "when I said I wanted to help with planning, I meant sitting somewhere with coffee and letting someone else do the actual work. Not standing over a map at eight in the morning before the caffeine has even kicked in."

"You're not standing. You're sitting."

"I'm leaning. There's a difference." She tapped the map with her pen. "And this route you've got here, it's like you want us to get lost. Which, I mean, fine, I'm not opposed to getting lost if there's a point to it, but is there a point to it? Or are you just trying to make the new kids suffer?"

Kuba straightened up, and suddenly she was very aware of how tall he was, how he seemed to fill the space even though he barely moved. He met her eyes for a full second, and she forgot what she was going to say next.

"There's a spring about halfway," he said. "Good water. And the ridge gives you a view of the whole valley. It's worth the walk."

She raised an eyebrow. "A spring. You're selling this on a spring."

"It's a good spring."

"Kuba. We're not in a survival manual. We're going camping. People want to eat sausages and complain about the weather. Not drink from a spring."

"No one's stopping them from complaining." He turned back to the map, but there was something in the set of his shoulders, something almost amused, and she clung to it like a lifeline. "I'm just saying it's a better route. If you want to argue, I'll draw a map of the easier one and you can lead that group."

The challenge hung in the air between them, and Kalina knew exactly what he was doing. He was giving her an out, a way to step back and let him keep the distance he'd been carefully maintaining all week. She'd spent three years watching him do this—watching him retreat, watching him fold himself into something small and manageable, watching him turn every moment of proximity into a reason to leave.

She wasn't going to let him.

"I think the ridge route sounds great," she said, letting her voice drop into something like sincerity. "Lead the way. I'll follow."

He went still for a moment, his finger frozen on the map, and she watched his jaw tighten. He was counting. She knew he was counting, the way she sometimes counted her breaths when she was too close to him, the way she'd count the seconds between his glances and pretend it meant nothing.

"Good," he said, and it came out flat, controlled. "Then we're done."

He started folding the map, his hands careful and precise, and Kalina felt the shame rise up in her throat, hot and sharp. She'd been too bold. She'd pushed too hard, made it too obvious, and now he was retreating the way he always did, folding himself into his field jacket and his dog tags and whatever silent world he lived in when he wasn't being watched.

She could feel herself offering something and him refusing to take it, and there was no graceful way to walk that back, no way to pretend she hadn't just put herself out there in front of him like a sketch she knew was incomplete but had to show anyway. She opened her mouth to say something, anything, but he was already moving around the table, his boots heavy on the floorboards, his shoulder brushing past her as he headed for the door.

"The others should be here soon," he said, and she hated the way his voice was so even, so in control. "Get the rest of the supplies from the back."

And then he was gone, and Kalina was standing alone in the quiet room with the map half-folded and the morning light getting brighter through the window, the smell of dust and old paper settling around her like a shroud.

She had tried. She had done what she came here to do, and it had worked—mostly, maybe, a little—but it had also left her with a bitter, sinking feeling, the kind she got when she drew something and knew it wasn't quite right but couldn't figure out why. She touched her headphones, the familiar weight of them around her neck, and tried to breathe the feeling away.

It didn't work.

But she didn't stop either.