So different from the man who earned the title of Ember Reach’s greatest traitor.
That….Her gaze lingered on Kaelith a beat longer.That was never really him.
Fenn’s exhale was soft, but audible.
Kaelith glanced between them. “What?”
“Nothing,” Rynna said, turning forward. “Just remembering something you said once.”
“Something’s changed,” Fenn interrupted. Then, more to himself than to them, “The air feels…thinner.”
And as they crossed the final dip of the stone path, the desert dropped away beneath them, breaking open into a canyon, deep and black, like the world itself had cracked.
“Whoa.” Rynna gulped, reaching for both their hands as the three of them approached the ledge, their steps slowing as the ground beneath the walking stones trembled.
At the end of the crevasse, jagged walls of obsidian fell away on either side like the broken pieces of a shattered blade, while wind threaded through the chasm in spiraling currents.
Rynna squeezed Kaelith’s hand. “It’s like the Hearth.”
“If the Hearth had been absent of life, perhaps,” he answered.
Far below, nestled in the shadowed throat of the gorge, lay a structure. It rose from the sand like a spine. Half-swallowed. Crumbling. Its shape was difficult to parse at first—a curve, a dome, half a ring sunken into the earth, carved from black stone veined with pale blue crystal.
Rynna squinted. The front was framed by pillars, most of them shattered, but a few still stood. Between them was an arched entrance, tall and narrow, sealed by a door etched with unfamiliar markings.
“That’s where we need to go,” she said.
It didn’t glow like the path had. It didn’t shimmer or pulse. But something in the stone radiated presence. It wasn’tdead. Not exactly. It was waiting.
Fenn stepped off the final floating stone and let his boots sink into the sand. The grains undulated beneath him, slithering upward in thin, spiraling patterns as if something justbeneath the surface was trying to crawl up his legs before falling away with a faint hiss. He didn’t flinch, just stared into the darkness, expression unreadable.
Kaelith was the next to move. “This place was never meant to be found again.”
“But here we are.” Rynna joined them.
The sand was colder here beneath the surface. She felt it.
“Let’s go.” Fenn moved, following a narrow, winding path dug into the crevasse wall.
Rynna and Kaelith followed, the descent steep and silent.
Beneath their feet, stone crumbled in places, sending loose grit skittering into the depths below. Above, the jagged rim of the gorge faded into darkness, while far below, the structure waited, half-buried in sand and shadow.
At the bottom, they came to a halt before the structure’s massive gate. It was carved from dark stone veined with light, yet the markings across its surface held no trace of the Source. These weren’t symbols to be read. They werefelt, scratched directly into the bones of the world.
Fenn reached out first, laying his palm flat on the door. “It’s like the henges by the Waygate.”
Kaelith stepped up beside him. “More shifter blood is needed, then.”
“But is it waiting for us…or testing us?” Rynna swallowed, suddenly nervous. It couldn’t be this easy.
Fenn turned to look at her, his eye catching the faintest gleam of starlight. “What do you mean?”
Rynna rubbed her temples, heart aching as something stirred behind her eyes—not a memory, not truly, but an echo. A resonance. Like brushing up against the aftermath of a war she hadn’t fought, but whose scars she somehow bore.
She hadn't stood in this place before, but something inside herremembered.
“I think…” Her voice wavered, threaded with uncertainty. “This is where the world nearly ended, and was saved. A long time ago. Probably before I began my work for the Weaving.”
