Rikan's voice was sometimes patient, but at this moment it was sharp with precision, just like his sword strikes whenever we sparred. Though Rikan used the bow and arrow, he was also quite skilled with the sword.
"No, Micah. This mark here doesn't mean sand. It means endless sand. The difference in that tiny mark changes the meaning of an entire sentence."
I frowned at the page in front of me; the Blistering Sands script, twisting like snakes across the parchment, reminded me of Arabic script.
The wet ink shimmered faintly, as though mocking my struggles.
I muttered, "Why not just write a lot of sand instead?"
Rikan gave me a rare, amused glance. "Because our ancestors liked to make things complicated."
"Your ancestors sound like assholes," I grumbled, drawing a line with my finger over the curved characters.
"You've learned to stab people with frightening efficiency," he countered smoothly, "but one curve on a page unsettles you?"
