The days on the road east passed with a rhythm that felt different from the tension that had carried them west toward Ashwood Pass.
Robert spent much of it in quiet thought, turning the investigation over from every angle he could manage without exhausting the same conclusions again and again. He did not need to repeat what they already knew. What really matters now was how the future would unfold, but no matter how he tried to approach it, he kept hitting the same wall from every angle.
He still lacked strength. Not enough for the formation door, not for the trial platform that awaited him in the eastern hall, and certainly not for whatever civilization had managed to create a seal that could last three thousand years without breaking down.
Every thread of the mystery eventually returned to the same requirement. Strength first. Understanding would follow, but strength was the door that had to open before any of the rest of it mattered.
