Chapter 30. The Last Gate

Night no longer fell the way it once had.

It hovered instead—low and simmering—an unsettled gray that clung to the sky as if the mountain itself refused to surrender to sleep. Seraya stood beneath that hollow stretch of cloud, a bandage bound tight across her ribs and ash smeared along her forearms. Much of the blood on her skin was not her own, and what had dried there pulled faintly when she moved.

Around her, the survivors worked in quiet, methodical motions. Some tended wounds with hands that shook despite their care. Others rebuilt shattered fire rings or searched the ground for what could still be salvaged. Names were being counted now—the ones that would answer again, and the ones that would not.

Some names were whispered into cupped palms. Others were shouted into the dark until the sound broke.