The land grew stranger the farther they walked.
Beyond the ruined Cartograph lay no road—only shifting terrain, as if the world had forgotten what shape to take. Stones floated midair, gravity forgot its rules, and trees whispered in voices that weren't their own.
Kael called it "the Fracture's Edge."
Maris called it "the wound."
Elara simply called it *wrong.*
The Heart in her satchel was heavy now—not just in weight, but in burden. Two shards glowed within it, spinning around each other like twin moons, waiting for the third.
And they all knew where it would be.
"The final splinter is at the Door Without a Lock," Maris said, her face unreadable. "The first gate the Keepers ever opened. And the one we were forbidden to seal."
Rin frowned. "Why leave it open?"
"Because it leads to the Unmade."
Silence followed those words.
Even the wind seemed to stop.
They reached it by dusk.
It wasn't grand. It wasn't even tall. Just a simple arch of stone, carved from black rock older than language. There was no door, no hinge, no barrier at all.
Only emptiness beyond—a darkness that rippled when looked at too long.
And before it, standing motionless as a sentinel, was the Ashbringer.
He no longer wore the silver mask.
His face was revealed—young, unlined, eerily calm. But his eyes burned like coals.
Elara stepped forward. "You've waited."
"I never left," he said softly. "I was born at this threshold. And I will end at it."
Maris's voice shook. "Eiden… you don't have to do this. The last splinter doesn't belong to you."
He looked at her. "But it *did.* Long ago. Before the fire. Before I burned the name from myself."
Elara held the Heart tightly. "You used to be a Keeper."
"I was the first."
The sky darkened above them as if night itself were listening.
Eiden stepped aside from the threshold. "The splinter lies inside. But it's not a thing you can take. It's a truth you must *accept.*"
Sira narrowed her eyes. "That's vague and threatening."
He smiled faintly. "Good. Then you understand."
Elara stepped forward. "I'll go alone."
"No," Rin said. "We've come this far—"
"You can't follow," Eiden said. "Only the Heartbearer can walk through without being unmade."
Elara turned to the others. "Wait here. If I don't return—"
"We *burn the whole damn thing down,*" Sira finished, and tried to smile. "But you will."
Elara nodded—and stepped through the Door.
---
It felt like falling.
Then flying.
Then *remembering.*
Memories not her own surged through her—hundreds of lives, hundreds of failures. The first Keepers discovering the threads. The first breach. The first sacrifice.
And at the center of it all: the final splinter.
It wasn't a gem. It wasn't even a shape.
It was a moment.
*The moment she chose to carry the Heart.*
She saw herself—on the tower that day, reaching for the light, when she could've walked away. She saw the choice bloom like a flower. She saw how *all else followed.*
The splinter was not something outside her.
It had *always* been within.
She reached for it—not with her hands, but her truth.
And the world exploded into light.
---
She woke on the other side of the Door.
Whole.
Changed.
The Heart floated before her, whole now, thrumming with all three splinters united.
The Ashbringer knelt before her—not in worship, but in *relief.*
"You did what I couldn't," he whispered. "You carried it *through.*"
Maris wept silently. Rin let out a long breath. Sira only said, "Took you long enough."
Elara stood.
Not just the bearer of the Heart.
But its *keeper.*
The sky split with dawn.
And for the first time, the world beyond Elsewhere stirred awake.