Brynja Stoneheart has spent seventy years perfecting the art of precision. As the High Scribe of Thorn-Hold, she has dedicated her life to the rigid laws of runic mathematics—the sacred geometry that keeps their mountain home stable and safe. But when the Council orders her to audit the revolutionary Magma-Forge designed by the infamous Gunnar Emberhold, she discovers that some problems cannot be solved with right angles alone.

Gunnar is everything Brynja has spent her life avoiding: chaotic, passionate, and utterly convinced that the old laws are strangling their clan. His curved runes defy centuries of tradition, and his theories about "teaching stone to sing" sound like heresy to her analytical mind.

But the mountain is dying. The deep-earth pressure is building toward a catastrophic blowout that could destroy everything Brynja has sworn to protect. To save her clan, she'll have to choose between the laws she's built her life around and the fire she never knew she needed.