The front of the settlement reminded him of Icy End's wall, though smaller in scale.
It rose from the earth like a carved extension of the mountains themselves, built from the same pale stone that lined the cliffs behind it. The wall was perhaps half the height of Icy End's defenses, yet it did not feel weak. If anything, its compact shape and heavy construction made it appear stubborn, as though it had been built to endure rather than to impress.
There was no conventional gate.
Instead, a massive stone slab rested within a framework of beams and pulleys. Thick ropes, each as wide as a man's wrist, ran upward through wooden wheels mounted on a crude but sturdy scaffold. The slab itself hung slightly above the ground, held in place by the tension of the ropes.
Below it were spikes.
Heavy iron spikes had been fitted along the bottom edge of the stone, their points angled outward. If the slab were ever released, it would drop like a hammer and crush whatever stood beneath it.
It was an intimidating sight.
Cendre studied the mechanism as the riders approached. The stone gate slowly lifted as men above worked the ropes with practiced rhythm, hauling the massive weight upward just enough to allow horses to pass beneath.
The riders entered first.
Cendre followed shortly after, guiding the borrowed horse beneath the looming slab of stone. For a brief moment he felt the instinctive urge to quicken the animal's pace, imagining the ropes snapping and the slab crashing down upon him.
But the mechanism held.
Once inside, he drew the horse to a slower pace and allowed himself a longer look at the settlement.
It truly was a city.
Stone houses lined the interior slopes, their shapes angled sharply against the wind. Roofs were slanted and layered, built in ways that encouraged snow to slide away rather than gather and collapse the structure beneath. Thick stone walls surrounded each building, trapping warmth inside while blocking the harsh winds that swept down from the mountains.
The space near the entrance was lively.
People moved between rows of stalls arranged along the main path. Tables and wooden racks displayed goods that would not have seemed out of place in the markets of Icy End. Slabs of smoked meat hung from hooks. Bundles of leather were stacked in neat piles. Crafted tools and ornaments lay arranged across blankets.
Cendre noticed something else as well.
Not everyone dressed in thick furs.
Several among the crowd wore lighter garments dyed a deep green, patterned with stripes of red that ran along the sleeves and collars. The colors stood out vividly against the gray stone and pale snow.
More surprising still was the warmth.
He could feel it even through his armor and cloak.
The air inside the settlement felt strangely mild, as though the biting cold of the tundra had been pushed back beyond the walls. The ground beneath the horse's hooves was damp rather than frozen, thin wisps of steam rising between cracks in the stone paths.
The woman rider guided her horse beside his.
"My name is Tarja," she said. "I seem to have forgotten from all the excitement."
Cendre nodded slightly.
He had not asked for it, but he appreciated knowing the name of the person guiding him through a city that should not exist.
Tarja gestured toward the ground as they rode.
"The warmth you feel comes from below," she explained. "Lava flows beneath these stones. It heats the ground and keeps the frost away."
"Lava?" Cendre repeated.
He glanced around the settlement again.
"There is a volcano here?"
Tarja tilted her head slightly.
"Volcano," she repeated, tasting the word. "Is that what the folk below call the burning mountains?"
"Yes."
He paused before adding, "And when you say 'the folk below'… you mean the North-folk of Icy End?"
"Yes," she said.
Her tone carried an odd mixture of curiosity and quiet satisfaction.
"We of the Ja-kin have always been curious about them. About you. To think there would come a day when we could finally interact with our kin."
Cendre frowned faintly.
"I do not understand."
He nudged the horse forward so it walked alongside hers.
"Your people clearly know of Icy End," he said. "If that is the case, why have you never made contact before?"
Tarja's smile faded slightly.
"We have tried," she replied.
Her gaze drifted toward the mountains behind the settlement before returning to him.
"And you have already seen how that recent attempt ended."
"The misunderstanding," Cendre said.
"Yes."
Her voice carried a hint of bitterness now.
"Our riders traveled south to present ourselves. But something happened along the way. Something that turned that meeting into bloodshed."
Cendre studied her carefully.
"Forgive me," he said, "but it is difficult to believe your people never visited Icy End before. The distance is not impossible."
"Not impossible," she agreed quietly.
"But forbidden."
She gestured toward the distant peaks rising beyond the city.
"For centuries the fire slept."
Cendre raised an eyebrow.
"The fire?"
"The fires of Uruko and Kao-Ah," she said. "Our gods of the deep earth. It is said that when their flames fade, the paths between our peoples open again."
Her tone suggested she believed the story completely.
"And truthfully," she continued, "we did not have access to those paths until the ice melted. Before that, the way south was sealed."
Cendre listened without interrupting.
"Many tried to leave," Tarja said. "Some attempted to climb the cliffs beyond the pass. Others tried to sail the northern waters."
She shook her head slowly.
"The sea devours ships."
"Storms?" he asked.
"Storms," she agreed. "And worse."
Her voice lowered slightly.
"The waters are home to leviathans. Creatures large enough to swallow a hull whole. Even when our ships escaped them, the eastern winds drove us into jagged rocks along the coast."
She sighed quietly.
"For more than four hundred years we tried to leave this place. Yet something always drove us back."
Her eyes drifted across the city as they rode deeper into its streets.
"It felt as though the world itself wished to keep us here."
Cendre considered her words.
To him, the explanation sounded like superstition wrapped around coincidence.
Yet he had learned long ago at St. Alfons that this world was rarely as simple as scholars preferred to believe. Mountains hid strange peoples. Oceans hid stranger things still.
Perhaps these people truly had been trapped here.
Or perhaps Tarja simply told the story well.
He could not yet decide which.
For now, he kept his doubts to himself.
The excitement in her voice when she spoke of meeting the people of Icy End sounded genuine. So did the frustration she showed when speaking of the battle.
If it was deception, it was convincing.
And if it was truth, then the deaths of the Duke and his son might not have been murder at all.
Only a terrible misunderstanding.
Still, he had to keep an open mind.
And at the moment, all thoughts of the Duke and the late heir drifted to the back of his mind, pushed aside by something far more immediate.
He found himself fascinated by the city.
The first section they passed through had already been large, crowded with stalls and people moving between them, but once they moved beyond a long stone tunnel that cut through the mountain's side, the city seemed to expand even further.
The view opened.
More houses appeared beyond the passage, spreading across a natural slope of dark rock. Some were built with flat roofs layered in thick stone, while others, particularly those higher along the incline, had sharply angled roofs meant to deflect the wind or pierce through the drifting snow.
It was not a crude settlement.
It was carefully planned.
The air smelled faintly of spring water.
Along the edges of the streets ran narrow canals carved into the stone. Clear water flowed through them in steady streams, guided by channels that carried it between clusters of homes. He spotted a small cart rolling along one of the paths, drawn by a sturdy horse. The cart carried packed snow stacked neatly in wooden bins.
"Our city," Tarja said as they rode, "houses thousands of kin."
Her tone carried a quiet pride.
"Just as many live on the surface as those who dwell within the biomes below. Beneath the stone we grow our food and raise animals."
"Fascinating," Cendre replied honestly.
He watched a group of children running along the edge of one canal, their boots splashing lightly in shallow water.
"Your streets are clean," he added. "And your people look well."
Tarja inclined her head slightly.
"Thank you. We strive to be so."
Then she continued, as though explaining something important rather than simply accepting praise.
"For cleanliness is not merely preference. It is a custom. If we abandon it, disease follows."
She gestured faintly toward the stone walls and carefully maintained streets.
"We have slain many beasties over the centuries. Husk-mouths that carried great clubs carved from trees. Four-legged creatures that stalked our herds."
Her expression darkened slightly.
"But it was disease that nearly ended us."
Cendre turned his head slightly toward her.
"It is our collective responsibility," she continued, "to ensure such tragedy never happens again."
She spoke the words with conviction.
Yet the more she explained, the more something about it caught his attention.
She was welcoming, yes.
But it felt… deliberate.
When a stranger enters a city, people usually do not begin reciting lessons about sanitation and responsibility. Hospitality often came with caution, not instruction.
It felt less like a casual explanation and more like a quiet warning.
"You are eager to tell me these things," he said after a moment. "Is this meant as a warning?"
Tarja glanced at him briefly.
"A reminder," she corrected calmly.
"It is better that you are informed rather than ignorant."
Her hands rested loosely on the reins as they rode.
"And it is my responsibility," she continued. "Few among my people speak the Commonal tongue well. Because of that, I must explain these matters to you."
Cendre nodded slightly.
"I am thankful," he said.
He allowed himself a faint smile.
"I must admit it is refreshing to be told these things rather than being forced to learn them the hard way."
Tarja's lips curved faintly in return.
"Is it not customary to inform a visitor of the rules of one's home?"
"Usually," Cendre replied, "they ask for coin first."
She let out a small breath that might have been a quiet laugh.
"I see," she said. "But you give us too much credit."
She gestured toward the streets around them.
"It is simply responsibility."
Then she added, almost as an afterthought, "And perhaps a small effort to make amends. It is rare for visitors to come."
They continued deeper into the city.
Eventually the streets widened until they reached a large open plaza carved directly into the stone. At its center stood a statue.
Cendre slowed his horse slightly as they approached it.
The statue depicted a tall figure carved from dark rock, its posture proud and steady. One hand rested on the pommel of a blade while the other pointed toward a massive stone formation behind the figure.
"Who is that?" he asked.
"Our founder," Tarja replied. "Guja of Hardsong."
Cendre studied the statue again.
"In front of him," she continued, "rests the heart of the fiery mountain."
He followed her gaze.
Behind the statue stood a circular pit surrounded by carved stone rings. Within it lay hardened black rock, cracked and uneven, as though something once burned there but had long since cooled.
"As you can see," Tarja said quietly, "the heat has faded. The flames do not appear anymore."
They rode past the statue.
The riders who had accompanied them earlier began speaking quietly to Tarja in their own language. After a brief exchange, they split off, guiding their horses down another street that curved away from the plaza.
Soon only Tarja and Cendre remained.
They continued upward along a long plateau that formed the upper section of the city.
This area felt different.
The streets were quieter, lined with larger residential buildings built closer together. Unlike the lower sections, where most structures remained bare stone, the walls here were painted.
Greens, yellows, and deep reds decorated the surfaces in layered patterns.
More surprising still was the presence of greenery.
Patches of grass and small shrubs grew along the edges of the paths, protected within shallow stone beds that trapped warmth rising from the ground below.
It felt almost unnatural compared to the frozen world beyond the walls.
Ahead of them stretched a large oval field.
Its surface had been carefully leveled and packed, the ground forming a smooth open space. At the far end of the oval stood a fortress built into the northern wall of the plateau.
"This," Tarja said, "is where our leaders and wise men reside."
She guided her horse toward a row of buildings near the edge of the field.
"You are welcome in my home, guest."
Cendre inclined his head slightly.
"Cendre Dalens," he said, almost apologetic. "That is my name by the way."
Tarja nodded once.
"I see. I have forgotten to ask out of excitement as well."
Then she added, "Ka-Cendre, now that we know are introduced, please follow me."
He glanced at her.
"Ka?"
"Ah," she said after a moment of realization. "It is how we refer to one another with respect."
"I see."
They continued a short distance before stopping in front of a modest two-story building.
From this higher vantage point, Cendre could see much of the settlement stretching below them. The entire place sat within what appeared to be the crater of a long-dead volcano, its stone walls forming a natural barrier around the city.
The fortress at the northern edge clung to the highest part of the crater rim like a watchful sentinel.
It was, he realized, a very defensible place.
He dismounted from the horse.
Tarja leaned slightly toward her own mount and whispered something softly near its ear.
The animal snorted once and turned away.
"It will return to its master," she explained.
Cendre nodded.
"I suspect you are weary from travel," Tarja said. "It would please me if you allowed yourself some rest inside my home. My elders will likely take time before they gather."
"I understand."
He stepped inside.
The interior was simple.
A central pit sat in the middle of the room, ringed by cushions placed around its edges. The walls were bare stone but warm to the touch. Light filtered through a narrow window above, casting a gentle glow across the room.
Cendre lowered himself onto one of the cushions near the pit.
For a moment he simply sat there.
It still baffled him that he had ridden across frozen wilderness, passed through a hidden pass, and now found himself seated inside the home of a stranger in a city that should not have existed.
Life truly was strange sometimes.