The storm clawed at the longhouse like something alive. Wind howled through the eaves, dragging snow through the cracks. The fire sputtered low in the hearth—thin, flickering, its light the only warmth left in the room.

Four of them sat huddled around it, their shadows long and wavering across the rough-hewn walls.

Halven hunched forward, elbows on his knees, gaze fixed on the embers as if they might tell him a better future. He hadn’t spoken in some time, and when he finally did, his voice was low, hoarse.

“She’s not ready.”

Eris leaned back against the wall, arms crossed, one boot propped up beside the fire. Her face was carved in calm lines, but her fingers tapped against her arm, betraying an edge of tension.

“She has Ashmire,” she said. “She woke it. That counts for something.”

“It counts for fire,” Halven muttered. “It doesn’t count for wind. Or mountain. Or the kind of strength that doesn’t come from a blade.”

Sari stood, pacing. Her brow was drawn, and her hands worked at each other nervously—twisting a thread of leather around her wrist, then letting it slip. Her storm talismans jingled softly with each step.

“She shouldn’t have gone up there alone,” she said, half to herself. “The rites... they’re not just trials of power. They’re language. Spirit has to _know_ you before it listens. The winds don’t bow to strangers.”

“She’s not a stranger,” came a young voice from the back.

They all turned. Weylan, younger than any of them, sat cross-legged on the floor with a half-mended piece of leather armor in his lap. His expression was calm, sure—not naïve, but solid.

“She’s Telaryn of Talpis. She crossed the Mourning Peaks. She survived the Keep. She killed a blood sorcerer with her own hands. If anyone can do this, she can.”

Halven’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t understand what’s up there, boy.”

“I understand enough,” Weylan replied, meeting his gaze. “She’s more than we thought. And I saw the look on your face when she stepped out of the Keep. You believed it then.”

Halven looked away. “Belief isn’t armor.”

Eris tilted her head toward Sari. “You’ve been quiet. Too quiet.”

Sari stopped pacing. “I’ve seen trials like this end in death. Not because the challenger was unworthy, but because they didn’t know _how_ to speak to what they were facing. The spirits aren’t enemies—they’re forces. Old ones. Raw ones. You don’t just swing a sword at the wind.”

Halven’s mouth tightened. “Then she’s already dead.”

“No.” Sari looked to the door. “Not if I go.”

They stared at her.

“There’s an older law,” she continued, “from before our exile. When the first queens of the heights bound the sky to their will, they did not stand alone. They were guided. Aided. The rite demands strength, not solitude.”

Eris frowned. “You’d risk yourself?”

“She doesn’t speak the old tongue. She doesn’t know the binding ash, or the names the mountain remembers. But I do.”

Halven rose, slowly. “And the cost?”

Sari met his gaze. “High. But not as high as what happens if we lose her.”

Weylan stood too. “Then go. And bring her back.”

Sari turned, reaching for her pack, her satchel of storm salt and powdered obsidian, her charms of twisted bone and crystal. Her fingers shook as she tied her cloak, but her eyes were steady now.

“She _is_ the Queen,” she said. “Even if the mountain doesn’t know it yet.”

Then, without another word, she stepped into the white roar beyond the door.

The wind swallowed her whole.