The stone hallways breathed around him, a living thing with too many throats and not enough eyes. Sterling slipped through them like a ghost who hadn't realized he'd died , soundless boots, shoulders brushing the old walls that still smelled of moss and cold smoke. His shadow followed him faithfully, stretching and curling as torchlight flickered in the draft.
Magnolia knew he was out there. She could feel him in her bones the way old wounds sometimes ache before the rain. She sat at the council table long after Beckett stormed off to fortify the east wing, her fingers drumming against the scarred wood. In front of her, the old map lay unrolled, its edges frayed, stained with the ghosts of battles that never quite ended.
She traced a line down the ridge where Camille might be , if Sterling spoke the truth. The thought turned her stomach. A truth from Sterling now was as likely as milk from a snake.
Footsteps. Slow. Deliberate. A hunter's tread.
