The desert runs through my blood, and my kin teach me to keep every grain in place. I watch, I wait, and I defend the land with the same patience that my elders taught me. If a storm of trouble comes, I stand like the dunes—steady, unbroken, and ready to protect.

We keep to what the dunes teach us. My kin pass the same watchful eye from one generation to the next, not by elaborate rituals but by the steady practice of guarding. Every guardian learns to sense the wind, to read the sand, to stand when the sand shifts. That’s how the line stays steady—through shared duty, not complicated kinship rules.

The sand was still that day, the wind whispering in the dunes. I had my eye on a young guardian, a pup of the tribe, who had just taken his first steps into the role. He was moving through a narrow corridor of rock and sand, his senses tuned to the slightest tremor. I watched him from a distance, patient as always, letting him work. The ground beneath the rocks had begun to give, a subtle shift that would have gone unnoticed by anyone who didn't keep an eye on the patterns. The young guardian felt it—his body responded before his mind caught up. He planted a claw into the loosened sand, his grip firm, and then he moved the weight of his body to redistribute the pressure. The small rock slid back into place, the sand settled, and the danger was averted before it could grow. When I turned to him later, I saw the pride in his eyes. He had seen what could have been a disaster and, with his calm, steady action, preserved the line. The desert is patient, but it needs guardians who act with the same steadiness. That is how the line never breaks.