"I've never seen your world so I can't get quite that exact. I suppose if you know a lot of other mortals I could try to put it right up against the base of one of those ashmounts you mentioned, maybe as specifically as 'on the north face'? And then you could just have people try to walk up the mountain and eventually one would go through the Steppes instead, presuming that I'd had a chance to make the gate in the intervening time."