The structural storm proved worse than Thalia's first reading had suggested.
Within hours of entering the outer bands the alliance fleet lost all forward progress. Currents that should have been readable turned violent and contradictory. Living ships flexed and groaned. Bone-and-glass hulls took impact damage from waves that moved against every visible wind. Grey Ashen Court vessels fared little better. Isolde ordered the fleet to seek the calmer systems Thalia could still detect deeper inside the storm's mass.
We found them by midday: a chain of floating stone platforms drifting in a rough circle inside what passed for the storm's eye. The platforms were large enough to anchor the stronger ships and high enough to keep the decks clear of the worst water. The storm walls rose on every side in dark, slow-moving curtains that never fully closed, leaving a bruised circle of open sky above the centre.
