Kael crouched at the edge of the Mire and pressed his palm to the wet stone. His eyes flared gold. The current ran deep, faster than he'd ever felt, pulling toward a source he meant to find. Pip chittered beside him and pointed a small claw down the slope, where a great stone arch loomed in the mist, its frequency arrays humming a low warning. He approached the checkpoint. The carved glyphs pulsed and the air thickened against his chest. No handle. No seam. Just a sealed threshold and a faint scan-light that swept his face and dismissed him. Kael stepped back, jaw tight. Someone had passed through here. Someone always did. He turned toward the lantern-lit shacks at the Mire's rim. In the nearest doorway, a broker turned a crystalline token in her fingers, its etched sigil catching the light. She watched him approach and smiled like she'd been waiting. Kael reached for his coin pouch. The dead end had just become a door.