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**Chapter Three: Isoba's Edge**
The mountains rose like teeth out of the earth—sharp, silent, and watching.
By the time I reached Isoba's Spine, my legs ached and my thoughts were quiet. Not numb exactly. Just… waiting. Like the moment before lightning strikes.
The path curved through jagged stone and moss-covered ruins. I saw no birds, heard no insects. Only the wind, whispering the same syllables over and over.
*Ember-born.*
I clutched the pendant beneath my shirt. It had grown warmer with every step toward the cliffs, as if pulled by something just ahead.
The map Maama left had shown a marking on the ridge. I didn't expect to find anything but snow and silence—but then I saw it.
Carved into the rock face: a spiraling sigil, old and half-swallowed by moss. My breath caught. I had seen it before—at the corner of the storybook's title page. I reached out.
The moment my fingers grazed the stone, the world *shifted*.
Not in sound. Not in sight. In *feeling.* Like the mountain had opened one eye… and now it saw me.
A pulse rippled out from the sigil. Dust scattered. Then the stone split open—not violently, but with ancient grace—and revealed a narrow passage leading down.
I hesitated.
Everything in me screamed to turn back. But I stepped forward.
Inside, the air was warmer. Flickers of golden light danced along the tunnel walls, though no flame burned. The walls pulsed faintly as if they remembered touch. And on the far end of the chamber stood something… impossible.
A statue. Ten feet tall. Female. Her arms outstretched and her face wrapped in cloth. At her feet were words carved in old tongue, but somehow I could read them:
**"Only those bound in flame may pass."**
As I stared, the pendant around my neck lifted on its own, glowing brighter than ever before.
The statue stirred.
Not fully. Not like flesh. But her fingers moved, and a spark ignited in the air between us. It formed a symbol—a mark that branded itself into the stone floor.
Pain bloomed across my chest. I fell to my knees, gasping, the pendant scorching hot.
When the pain faded, a mark had appeared over my heart. A burn, shaped like that same symbol. And I understood—this was not just my journey anymore. It was my inheritance.
Then a voice—not the statue's, not mine—whispered through the chamber.
**"She called down the fire to save you. Now walk the path to find him."**
I didn't ask who "she" was. I already knew.
The chamber fell still again. The passage at my back sealed shut. There was only one door now—carved into the far wall, opening into darkness.
So I stepped through.
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