They didn't stop once. Bianca's borrowed horse was shaking, foam streaking its sides, by the time Sterling's gates finally appeared in the cold, gray dawn.
Rhys met them in the courtyard before they'd fully dismounted, his expression already grim with news of his own. "The search party found the trail," he said, without preamble. "It leads exactly where you're about to tell me it does."
"The ancestral seat," Bianca confirmed, breathless, shoving the journal into his hands. "Ambrose Draveth. He's planning to force the ritual using the children as an unwilling catalyst, since Serrin's own attempts keep failing." She met his eyes, dread coiling tight in her chest. "And he knows we're onto him. He's moving up the timeline."
Rhys scanned the journal's marked page in seconds, his jaw tighteni
