They found the sealing site at 2,400 meters elevation, buried under six centuries of accumulated snowfall and geological drift.
The location matched the coordinates from the ancient Carver's records — a mountain valley in the northern range, sheltered from the worst of the arctic winds by a natural amphitheater of granite walls. The valley floor was flat. Covered in snow. Unremarkable.
Except to Thread Sight.
Voss activated the pushed frequency before they'd even landed. The aircraft touched down on a flat stretch of snowfield a kilometer from the coordinates. Squad 7 deployed in standard formation — Ryn on point, Dex and Kael flanking, Lena covering the rear. Ohn descended the cargo ramp in borrowed military cold-weather gear that was too large for her and boots she'd been forced to accept because the alternative was bare feet in snow.
The walk to the site took twenty minutes. Voss maintained Thread Sight the entire time, the standard frequency burning low, looking for anomalies in the dimensional background.
He found them almost immediately.
The thread density in this valley was wrong. In a normal environment — a city street, a forest floor, the interior of a building — Thread Sight perceived a constant background hum of thread-activity. Not visible as distinct threads, but present as a field. The substrate. The underlying fabric of dimensional matter that Ohn described as the Loom's output, flowing through all physical matter at all times.
Here, the hum was diminished. Not absent — Thread Sight still functioned, the background field was still present. But it was thinner. Weaker. Like a radio signal that had lost half its power. The difference was subtle enough that a standard Thread Sight user might not notice it. Voss's enhanced sensitivity — pushed by months of void-staring, amplified by the remnants of the dark armor's boost — caught it immediately.
"The substrate is degraded," he said. "I can feel it. The background thread density is approximately forty percent lower than baseline."
Ohn was already scribbling in her notebook. "Forty percent. After six hundred years of severance. That's — Director, that's catastrophic in dimensional physics terms. The substrate should be self-sustaining. A forty percent loss means the local fabric is failing."
"Failing how?"
"Look at the barriers."
Voss looked at the sky. The valley was remote — no city, no population, no reason for regular Rift monitoring. But even here, barrier domes were visible. Two of them. Small. Distant. Perched on the mountain ridges above the valley like soap bubbles balanced on a knife edge.
"Barriers form more easily in areas of degraded substrate," Ohn said. "The dimensional fabric is thinner here. The membrane between dimensions has less structural integrity. Rifts open with less provocation. Barrier frequency in this region should be lower than average — it's remote, low population, minimal mana activity. Instead, it's higher. I checked the records. This mountain range has the highest per-capita Rift frequency in the country."
"Because the Loom seal weakened the local fabric."
"Weakened it and kept it weak. For six hundred years."
Squad 7 reached the center of the valley. The coordinates from the ancient Carver's records placed the sealing site directly below them — underground, at a depth that the records didn't specify.
Voss pushed Living Thread Sight.
The world opened.
The degradation was visible. Not as an absence — as damage. The threads that composed the ground beneath his feet were frayed. Ragged. Individual strands that should have been smooth and continuous were splintered, their edges rough, their connections to neighboring threads weakened. Like a fabric that had been left in the sun for centuries — still holding together, but brittle. Close to failing.
And at the center of the degradation, deep underground — a knot. A dense mass of human-woven thread-architecture that Voss recognized because he'd seen something similar once before. In the Sealed Domain. The barrier that the ancient Carver had built to imprison the Sovereign.
This was the same technology. A barrier. Smaller. Specific. Woven into the dimensional fabric by Attuned hands six hundred years ago, designed to seal the tear that connected this location to the Loom.
The seal was still active. After six centuries, the human thread-work was still holding. But the surrounding substrate was dying around it. The seal was a plug in a wound — keeping the Loom's connection closed — but the wound had infected the tissue around it. The dimensional fabric for a hundred meters in every direction was compromised.
Seven seconds. Eight. Nine — a new record in living conditions, the cold and altitude and adrenaline pushing him past his normal threshold.
He dropped the Sight. The pain was immediate. He staggered. Ryn caught his arm.
"Report," she said. Battlefield voice. Even in the snow, even a thousand miles from the nearest combat, she defaulted to the tone that kept people alive.
"The seal is underground. Still active. The surrounding substrate is severely degraded. The dimensional fabric is failing in a radius of approximately one hundred meters. Ohn—"
"I heard. Forty percent degradation in a hundred-meter radius. If there were multiple sealing sites — and the records suggest there were at least six — the cumulative effect on the regional substrate would be—"
"Significant."
"More than significant. If each site shows similar degradation, the total substrate damage across the sealing network would be enough to increase Rift frequency by thirty to forty percent over a six-hundred-year period. Which aligns perfectly with the historical Rift frequency data that Ms. Dren provided."
Ohn was writing so fast her pen was tearing the paper. "This is it. This is the evidence. Measurable substrate degradation at the sealing site. Direct correlation between the Loom seal and increased Rift frequency. The ancient Carver was right."
Voss's communicator buzzed. Not a call — an alert. Corps priority channel.
He checked it. The message was from Holder Tam at the intelligence center.
*Director. Pillar Korvane has ordered the sealing of three Threadless Rifts in Districts 7, 12, and 19. Military barrier teams deployed at 0600 this morning. Sealing operations are underway.*
Voss read the message twice.
"He didn't wait," Ryn said. She'd read over his shoulder.
"He told us one week."
"He told you one week for your evidence. He didn't say he'd wait to start his own operations."
Voss called the intelligence center. Holder Tam answered on the second ring.
"Tam. Report. The Threadless Rift sealings — how far along?"
"District 7 is sealed. Completed twenty minutes ago. District 12 is in progress. District 19 is staged for this afternoon." Tam's voice was tense. The voice of someone who knew something was wrong but didn't have the authority to stop it. "Director, Carver Holder Fen was inside the District 12 barrier when the sealing team arrived. She was conducting a routine intelligence assessment. She reported the sealing operation beginning and — the comms went dead. The sealing team sealed the barrier with her inside."
The words hit Voss like a blade to the gut.
"She's inside a sealed barrier."
"She's inside a sealed barrier with three Threadless creatures. Her communicator went dead when the seal was applied. The barrier is now military-grade sealed — no entry, no exit, no communication."
"How long can she survive in there?"
"Without external mana support? The barrier's interior mana will deplete over approximately four hours. After that, the Threadless creatures will have no containment and she'll have no—"
"I know what happens after that."
Voss looked at Ryn. At the mountains. At the evidence beneath his feet that proved sealing was catastrophic and at the message on his communicator that proved Korvane hadn't waited.
"Tam. Get me Commander Yara. Now."
"Commander Yara is in a meeting with—"
"Interrupt her. Tell her Korvane sealed a barrier with a Carver inside. Tell her I'm requesting emergency authorization to break the seal."
"Director, breaking a military-grade seal requires Pillar authorization—"
"Then get a Pillar. Get Rehav. Get Lara Vex. Get anyone with the authority to open that barrier before my Carver dies."
He hung up. Looked at the team.
"Change of plans. We need to get back. Now."
Dex didn't ask questions. He was already moving toward the aircraft, his long stride eating the snow-covered ground. Kael matched pace. Lena fell in behind.
Ryn stayed beside Voss. "You have the evidence. The substrate data. It's on the scanner."
"I have the evidence. And Korvane sealed a barrier with Fen inside."
"You can't do both. You can't present the evidence to the Council and rescue Fen in the same window."
"Watch me."
They ran. The cold pressed against their faces. The mountains rose around them, ancient and indifferent, their peaks catching the light of a sun that didn't care about dimensional politics or sealed barriers or a Carver trapped inside a dome with three creatures that would convert her flesh to geometric cartilage if they touched her.
Voss ran and thought about Fen. Holder Fen. Twenty-three years old. Third-class graduate. Functional Thread Sight, moderate strength. She'd been assigned to District 12 for routine assessment because she was steady, reliable, and good at documenting Threadless behavior patterns.
She was inside a sealed barrier because Korvane had ordered the sealing without coordinating with the Carver Corps. Because the institutional instinct — seal, contain, wall off — had overridden the operational reality that people were inside the thing being sealed.
The same instinct that had sealed the Domain with two hundred soldiers inside. The same calculation. Acceptable losses for strategic security.
Holder Fen was not an acceptable loss.
The aircraft engines were already spinning when they reached the snowfield. Voss sprinted up the cargo ramp. The pilot, seeing the urgency, had the aircraft lifting before the ramp was fully closed.
"District 12," Voss told the pilot. "Maximum speed."
"Sir, that's a four-hour—"
"Maximum speed."
The aircraft banked south. The mountains fell away below them. The sky opened up — gray, cold, the color of a world that was six hundred years damaged and didn't know it.
Voss strapped in. Checked his communicator. No update from Tam. No word from Yara. No response from Rehav.
Ryn sat beside him. Her hand found his. Not romantic — tactical. The grip of a partner anchoring a partner who was close to the edge.
"We'll get her out," Ryn said.
"We'd better."
The aircraft flew south. Four hours at maximum speed. Fen had four hours of mana inside the sealed barrier. The math was a knife edge.
Voss held Ryn's hand and stared at the horizon and thought about seals and barriers and the specific institutional cruelty of a system that built walls faster than it built understanding.
The ancient Carver had warned about this. Six hundred years ago. In the margins of a journal that nobody read.
History was repeating.
Voss was going to break the pattern. Starting with the barrier that had his Carver inside it.
