Morning light found the gate still quiet. The violet pulse along the stone was slow, almost thoughtful, like something that had decided to wait and see what the little humans would do next.
The two messengers were already a full day gone. Mara stood with her spear planted in the dirt and shook her head the moment Selene finished laying out the plan.
"You're leaving the door with only two of us and a wounded man," Mara said. "That's not a plan. That's a prayer."
"We're leaving it with the rods still holding and a fragment of the name that made the gate notice us in the first place," Selene answered. She kept her voice even.
"If we sit here guessing at the rest of that name, the next real push kills every one of us. The carvings point east of east—to a place the old script calls the Name-Stone. If the full name is written anywhere, it's there."
Mara looked at the gate for a long time. Then she looked at Jor's pale face under the lean-to. Then she looked back at Selene and Aiden.
