They hadn't run into much since the lab just the occasional twisted creature, malformed by time and magic. A two-headed rat the size of a dog. A blind serpent that hissed at its own shadow. Nothing they couldn't handle. Nothing like what Vaelros feared.
They drank sparingly from their own water, never trusting the stagnant pools that dotted the ruins. The air was growing heavier, hotter. The deeper they went, the more the castle seemed to press in around them, like a tomb that had never quite finished closing.
The corridor narrowed, then opened into a wide antechamber. The walls were scorched black, the ceiling collapsed in places. And there, half-buried in rubble, lay a skeleton.
It was massive long, low, and unmistakably reptilian. The skull was broad and flat, the jaws lined with jagged teeth. Its limbs were thick, claws curled inward, ribs splayed like broken fingers.
"Gods," Calen whispered. "Is that...?"
Vaelros stepped closer, crouching beside the bones. "It's the Komodo dragon. Or what's left of it."
Tharn whistled. "Big as a direwolf."
"Bigger," Vaelros said. "It must've hatched. Grew. But there was no food. No way out. It starved."
He looked down at the eggs in his satchel, now sealed in a reinforced container. "I'm keeping them. Whatever this mage did... it worked. But I'll do better."
Calen raised an eyebrow. "You planning to raise one?"
"Maybe," Vaelros said. "But not here. Not now."
They pressed on.
The path to the dragon pit was buried beneath layers of stone and spellwork. It took hours climbing, crawling, navigating collapsed stairwells and half-melted halls. The deeper they went, the more the air changed. It wasn't just hot it was charged, like the inside of a forge that had never cooled.
Finally, they found it.
A massive circular chamber, sealed by a door of black stone etched with runes that shimmered faintly in the dark. The locking mechanism was not mechanical. It was magical. And it was alive.
Vaelros stepped forward, swaying slightly. His hands trembled as he reached into his satchel and pulled out the last of his redleaf only half a pouch remained. He took a deep breath, shoved a handful into his mouth, and began to chew.
The bitterness hit him like a slap. His stomach turned. He spat the pulp to the floor, eyes watering, and dropped to one knee.
"Stay back," he said, voice hoarse. "This is going to hurt."
He reached into himself deeper than he had in years and found the thread. The old thread. The one that didn't belong to this world.
He began to speak.
The words weren't Valyrian. They weren't any language spoken in Essos or Westeros. They were older. Words of power, drawn from a life he barely remembered, from a world of sanctums and sorcerers and shattered stars.
The runes on the door flared red.
He kept going.
The magic here was blood-bound. He could feel it woven from pain, from sacrifice. The notes had hinted at it, but now he knew: the spell that sealed this place had been powered by a village's worth of lives. Their souls were the mortar. Their screams, the key.
He reached deeper, calling on a name he hadn't dared speak in years.
Cyttorak.
The bands of power snapped taut around him, pressing against his ribs, his skull, his teeth. His vision blurred. Blood ran from his nose, his ears. His knees hit the stone.
But the door began to open.
Stone ground against stone, the runes flaring brighter, then fading to black. The air that spilled out was hot, dry, and wrong—like breathing in the last gasp of a dying god.
Vaelros collapsed, gasping.
Tharn caught him before he hit the floor. "You alright?"
"I will be," he rasped. "Just... give me a moment."
Calen stepped to the threshold, peering into the dark beyond. "So this is it?"
Vaelros nodded weakly. "The dragon pit. Or what's left of it."
They stepped inside.
And the forge of House Vharax welcomed them home.