My mind wouldn't settle.
As Kael Stark led me through the Stark district's crystalline corridors, I kept circling the same thought: What's happening here? The urgency in that boy's voice when he interrupted our duel hadn't been about politics or protocol. It was the sharp, clean fear of someone who'd just received news of a crack in the foundation of their world.
Was it another rift? Like the one I'd just sealed in the valley two days ago? The timing felt too close to be coincidence. Or was this something older, something buried beneath Iskandriel's glaciers that had nothing to do with the blue tears in reality I'd faced? I had no answers—only the cold certainty that whatever stirred in the Frostfang Peaks had Erion Stark's son running messages like a soldier in wartime.
