Chapter Eight
By morning, the Mangrove Lands were still again, cloaked in dew and the echoes of what had almost happened.
Zuberi slept restlessly beneath the roots of the elder mangrove, his breaths shallow, like a wind passing through hollow reeds. Asha sat beside him, her hand wrapped tightly around the coin that now bore three rings — the mark of three doors.
Three gates.
Three chosen.
But the third… still hidden.
The spirits weren't hunting blindly. They had a design, a sequence, a map drawn long ago by hands that no longer bled and voices no longer spoken aloud.
And Asha knew if they didn't find that third vessel before the tidebound did… the seal between worlds would shatter.
Forever.
She returned to Mama Tani by dusk.
The priestess was waiting, crouched beside a circle of bones and dyed cowrie shells that formed an ancient divination compass — one only used when ancestral names had been forgotten.
"You saw the spiral change?" Mama Tani asked, brushing chalk over the shell symbols.
"Yes. Three rings now."
"And the boy?"
"Zuberi remembered part of his past life. He opened the second gate before I could stop him."
Mama Tani did not look alarmed. Only tired.
"Then the third will awaken soon. The tidebound will feel it. They will hunt her."
"Her?" Asha asked sharply.
The priestess nodded slowly. "The third vessel is female. I don't know her name. But I know where the path begins."
She reached behind her and pulled out an old scroll tied in indigo thread. It was brittle and half-burned, edges crumbling like dried leaves.
"This is the Map of Forgotten Names," she said.
Asha carefully unfolded it.
It wasn't a map in the usual sense — no rivers or roads. Just symbols. Spirals, birds, eyes, and tide marks arranged in a shifting spiral across the page. And in the center, a name scratched out violently, overwritten with blood-ink.
"What is this?"
Mama Tani leaned in. "This is the record of the last breach — hundreds of years ago. Before the gates were sealed. Three children then. Two were taken. One survived."
Asha traced a trembling finger over the edge. "Where do we begin?"
The priestess pointed to a symbol shaped like an eye with wings.
"That is the village of Ukuta — near the border of the old salt plains. It is said the air there carries songs from beneath the ground."
Zuberi had joined them quietly. His skin still shimmered faintly with residue light.
"I've heard that song," he said. "In my sleep. It hums like bone on metal."
Asha turned to him. "Then we go together."
He hesitated. "Will I be able to hold the power again?"
"You will," Mama Tani said. "But every time you do, it will take more from you. The gate is a key, but also a burden."
"I'll carry it," Zuberi said, lifting his chin.
They left before the moon reached its highest point.
Through forests that whispered in languages older than wind. Across broken bridges lined with feathers and half-melted candles. Past villages where children were taught never to swim after sunset.
In each place, they found traces.
Scraps of songs sung in forgotten tongues.
Charcoal drawings of women with spirals carved into their skin.
Dreamcatchers woven from crow feathers and river bones — all pointing to one thing:
The third was awakening.
On the third day, they reached Ukuta — a village that looked empty at first glance, until they noticed the people standing still as statues, all facing the same direction.
South.
Toward the old salt plains.
Their eyes were open.
Their mouths silently moved.
Asha stepped forward. "Are they in trance?"
Zuberi touched one of the villagers' arms. It was cold — not lifeless, but paused.
"Not trance," he said. "Something is holding them."
Then, from within the well at the village center, came a voice.
"You are late… again."
The voice was not human.
It was hers.
The third gate.
A girl's voice, strong and sharp as broken coral.
"She's below," Asha whispered. "Calling us."
They stepped to the well and looked down.
There, at the bottom, glowing in soft violet light, stood a girl no older than them — barefoot, eyes shut, arms raised.
Above her head spun the spiral.
With four rings.
The gate is not waiting to be found.
She is already opening.
And with her, the final seal begins to tremble.
One door remains.
One breath away from the flood.