Thorne approached the bars slowly, every step measured. Even before he saw the prisoner clearly, he felt it, a subtle resonance that hummed in the marrow of his bones, as if some part of him recognized the presence before his mind caught up.

He drew a slow breath as he stepped closer to the iron bars. Even at a distance, he could feel the collar's runes bleeding their power into the air, like a sickly heartbeat thrumming against his senses.

The figure inside didn't rise, only lifted his head in a slow, deliberate motion. Lantern light caught scales that gleamed like polished emeralds stretched over corded muscle. A ridge of faint spines ran along the curve of his skull down to the base of his neck, where they vanished beneath a ragged tunic darkened by old blood.

Long arms ended in hands that were almost claws. The fingers were tipped in black talons, tapping idly against the stone floor in a rhythm that reminded Thorne of a waiting predator. A tail, thick and sinuous, slid in a slow coil across the cell.

But it was the face that struck him most. Not because it was monstrous, but because it wasn't. The features were almost human beneath the scales: a strong jaw, sharp cheekbones, a mouth that curved into something disturbingly close to a smile.

And then the creature parted his lips, revealing rows of teeth so white and serrated they looked carved from bone.

"Well," the prisoner rasped. His voice was low and rough, like gravel shifting over old wounds. "I suppose it was only a matter of time before another little scribe came to prod me."

Thorne didn't answer. His heart was beating too fast. His mind, usually so precise, stumbled over the details.

It wasn't just the scales or the teeth. It was the way this being radiated an alien vitality, something so primal it made the air feel thinner. He looked… primitive. Animalistic. Nothing at all like himself or Marian or even the cold magnificence of Varo.

This is what we are, he thought. Not all of us look like the stories. Not all of us look like gods.

For a moment, something tight coiled in his chest. Relief. Horror. He didn't know.

He hadn't expected that. And for a heartbeat, shock flickered across his face.

He smoothed it away at once, using both his Acting and Mask of Deceit. A lazy smile touched his mouth, and his voice came out smooth, unbothered.

He swallowed it behind the same cool mask he'd worn for years. "I'm not here to take notes," he said evenly.

"Oh?" The slitted pupils contracted, bright yellow fixed on him with curiosity edged in menace. "Then what are you, little mage? Some pet of the Purifiers? Or one of their collectors?"

Thorne's voice didn't waver. "I came to ask questions."

The elderborn tilted his head. The tail flicked against the stones with a slow rasp. "That so? And you thought you'd just walk in here and have a chat?"

He laughed, a short, humorless sound. "That's rich. You have any idea what they paid to drag me in here?"

He gestured vaguely to the collar at his throat. "They even had this made special. Do you know how many wards it takes to choke an elderborn's core?"

Thorne said nothing. His gaze flicked briefly to the etched runes, layer after layer of spell-script braided together. It made his own amulet look like a toy.

"You came alone?" the prisoner pressed. "No guards? No scribes in their nice white robes?"

"I didn't need them."

The elderborn bared his teeth again. "Arrogant. Or stupid."

Thorne didn't bother arguing. He studied the walls, noting the empty cages, the scorched marks near the hinges where containment sigils had been burned out over the years. How many things had died down here?

"You haven't asked my name," the elderborn said, watching him.

"I doubt you'd give it."

A glint of amusement. "Perhaps not."

Thorne felt the pull in his chest again, that inexplicable certainty that this was why he'd come. That he was supposed to be standing here, across from this creature that looked nothing like him but felt… familiar. Like a brother...

The elderborn seemed to sense it, too. He shifted, leaning closer to the bars. "You have questions. I have answers. But nothing comes for free, mage."

"I'm not..."

"Save it." The creature lifted a clawed finger and tapped the collar. "You think you're the first to come down here promising kindness? You think you'll be the last?"

His tail lashed the floor. "Let me out, and I'll tell you everything you want to know. I'll give you names, places."

Thorne didn't break eye contact, watching cooly the creature. "I will not."

"Well, then..." the creature rasped, voice low and rasping, tinged with a faint amusement. "Did they finally send another butcher to carve me up?"

"Not exactly," he said. "Though I'm starting to think you'd deserve it."

The elderborn tilted his head, eyes narrowing. "Not one of theirs?" His slit pupils contracted. "Then you're here on your own." He bared his teeth again. "Clever little spy."

Thorne didn't move closer. "I came to talk."

The other gave a harsh laugh. "Talk. Always talk." His gaze flicked to the dagger in Thorne's grip, then back up. "Fine. But nothing is free, little mage. You open this door, and I'll tell you anything you wish to know."

Thorne let his gaze drop to the collar. "You'll forgive me if I don't take you at your word."

"Then we're at an impasse." The creature shifted forward, resting clawed hands on the runes of the bars. "But you'll come around. I know your kind. You can't help yourselves."

Thorne studied him, mind moving behind a placid mask. This was the first time he had ever stood face to face with another elderborn who wasn't centuries old and bound up in their own agendas. This was… one of them. And yet, he couldn't help the chill that crawled up his spine. He looked like a beast caged too long, waiting to bite the first hand extended.

Thorne only said, very softly, "How did they capture you?"

The creature paused. His tail stilled.

"Why does it matter?"

"It matters."

The yellow eyes narrowed. "You first. Who are you? Who sent you here? Which kingdom is bidding for my core?"

"Perhaps I'm no one."

"Don't lie to me." The scaled hand closed around one iron bar, claws scraping against the old runes. "You're not just a clerk. Even a Purifier wouldn't come alone."

Thorne felt the weight of his pendant against his chest. For the first time in hours, he thought about removing it. About showing this creature what he truly was.

But not yet.

Not until he had more.

"Tell me," he said again, voice low. "Or I leave you here."

The Elderborn's eyes glowed faintly in the dark. "You're bluffing."

"Try me."

For a long moment, neither moved.

The elderborn's tail gave a last restless flick, and then he crouched again, forearms resting on his scaled knees.

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"You want to know how they caught me." His voice was quieter now. "Fine. I'll give you that."

He lifted one hand, turning it palm-up as though studying the black runes branded into the scales. They glimmered dully, like coals long since gone cold.

"I was crossing the Orrel Mountains," he said, his slitted gaze fixed on the floor. "Winter was coming on. I thought I'd be clever, ambush a caravan, pick it clean before the roads closed. But the caravan wasn't a caravan. It was bait."

He glanced up, his yellow eyes sharp. "They've learned. The Purifiers. Learned how to smell our kind on the wind. Learned how to lay traps that even one such as me could not slip."

Thorne listened, silent and still.

"They had half a dozen warlocks hidden in the rocks. Woven circles, null wards… and something else. Something older. A net I didn't see until it fell on me." His lip curled, showing that jagged line of shark-like teeth. "They broke three of my limbs before they chained me."

"Why?" Thorne asked softly. "Why go to so much trouble?"

The creature gave a rough laugh. "Why do they always? They want to know what makes us different. They want to peel the secrets out of us one layer at a time." He gestured to the collar again. "And when they're done? They'll toss what's left into the river and call it mercy."

For a heartbeat, Thorne felt something cold and old move under his ribs, something he refused to name.

"You think that will be you?" he asked.

The elderborn tilted his head, scales catching the lamplight. "Unless you plan to change it."

He didn't answer.

Instead, he drew in a slow, steady breath and lifted his hand to the chain around his neck.

The creature's eyes flicked to the motion, curious. His tail gave another slow coil. "What's this?"

Thorne's fingers closed around the pendant. For an instant, he hesitated. Then he pulled it free.

The glamour collapsed like a dying breath.

His skin shifted, turned luminous and faintly iridescent, white as polished moonstone. His features sharpened into a face that belonged to nothing human. His hair spilled over his shoulders like silver threads. And his eyes, cold, depthless, burning, opened fully.

The elderborn's breath caught.

For the first time, he looked almost… reverent.

"You…" he whispered. The claws slackened around the iron bars. "I've never... What are you?"

Thorne let the pendant dangle from his fingertips, watching the creature with that inhuman gaze. He said nothing.

The elderborn rose to his feet in a slow, disbelieving motion. "You're not from any bloodline I've ever seen. Not the Wyrms, not the Drowned, not the Emberkin, nothing."

Still Thorne said nothing.

"Who sired you?" the prisoner demanded, voice rough. "What legacy did you crawl from?"

Silence.

Slowly, awe turned to something sharper, an edge of bitterness creeping into the scaled face.

"Of course," he spat. "You wear their trappings. You creep their halls. You hunt your own."

Thorne's head tilted a fraction. "Is that what you think?"

"Why else are you here?" the creature hissed. "Why else would you skulk in the dark like some tamed thing? Have they leashed you so well you'd rather be their hound than free?"

The words struck a nerve deeper than he cared to admit. But when he spoke, his voice was soft and cold.

"I have my reasons."

"Reasons," the elderborn echoed with a mocking laugh. "That's what all cowards say. Reasons. Justifications. You'll cling to them until the day they cut you open to see how many secrets spill out."

Thorne's expression didn't waver. "Perhaps."

A shudder passed through the prisoner's shoulders, the collar's runes flaring briefly as if in response to the surge of his anger. The yellow eyes met Thorne's, bright with contempt.

"You think you're different. That you're special." His voice was low and venomous. "But in the end, you'll die the same way as the rest of us. Alone. Forgotten."

Thorne slipped the pendant back over his head. In an instant, the glamour returned, smoothing him back into the pale, human mortal he'd been before. But something in the cell remained charged, vibrating with the afterimage of what he'd revealed.

He let the silence stretch. When he finally spoke, it was with that same even tone.

"You're very free with your insults, considering your position."

The elderborn's lips peeled back in a snarl. "What do you want from me?"

"Information."

"And then?"

"Then," Thorne said softly, "I'll decide if you're worth the risk."

For a moment, the scaled man seemed on the verge of another tirade. But then his shoulders sagged, and the edge in his voice dulled to something almost desperate.

"Wait." His hands curled around the bars. "Don't go. You can't, if you leave me here, they'll finish what they started. And you know what that means. You know."

Thorne watched him without expression.

"I can help you," the elderborn insisted, voice dropping to a rough whisper. "You think you're untouchable, but you're not. They'll catch your trail eventually. But I can make you invisible. I can teach you to slip through the cracks so deep no Seer could ever find you."

Thorne arched a brow. "You're bargaining again."

"I'm surviving," the creature snapped. "Isn't that what we do?"

There was a hollow ring to the question. One Thorne didn't bother answering.

The elderborn's tail lashed once, then stilled. He exhaled slowly.

"Ask your questions," he said at last, voice low. "But don't pretend you're better than me."

Thorne let his mask settle over him once more. Inside, the old, cold thing uncoiled a fraction, some mingling of kinship and revulsion he still couldn't name.

He took another step closer to the cage.

And began. "What is your name? Your true name?" He let the question hang in the air. A simple question, a question that would determine the rest of the conversation.

The elderborn leaned his scaled back against the bars, watching Thorne with slitted eyes that never quite blinked.

"You want names?" he rasped finally. "Fine. You can call me Zarash. Though I doubt it means much to you."

Thorne inclined his head just slightly. "Zarash."

He let the name sit between them like an unspoken bargain.

"The story I gave you," Zarash went on, voice low, "was only partly true. They did set a trap. But it wasn't just because they wanted another specimen to pry apart."

He shifted, his long tail scraping a lazy arc over the floor. "The caravan I hit, it was full of loot. Finer than anything I'd ever seen. Jewels. Woven relics. But there was one thing among it all that mattered."

Thorne's gaze didn't waver. "An artifact."

Zarash's jaw flexed. "You're clever. Yes. A ring." His teeth bared in a humorless grin. "Not unlike that little trinket you wear around your neck."

Thorne lifted a brow. "A ring of glamour."

"Exactly." Zarash's hand rose, touching the collar at his throat. "You think I walked through villages like this? You think I haven't learned how to hide?"

"Then how did you last so long without one?"

His slitted pupils thinned to golden knives. "It wasn't for me," he said quietly. "It was for my niece."

Thorne felt his heartbeat slow.

"She was coming of age," Zarash continued, voice rough. "Old enough to walk the world beyond our burrows. But without a charm to mask herself, she'd never leave. Never have even the illusion of freedom."

He laughed then, a low, brittle sound. "So I tried to steal her a chance. And they were waiting."

For a moment, silence stretched between them.

Zarash's eyes narrowed again, suspicion sharpening the lines of his face. "And you," he murmured. "Who are you, really? You don't smell like them, but you don't smell like us, either. Are you with another faction? Some little cabal planning to crown themselves kings over the ruins?"

Thorne tilted his head, voice perfectly flat. "What faction?"

Zarash's laugh had no mirth in it. "Don't play stupid. You think I don't know what's happening in the shadows?" His claws scraped the bars in slow arcs. "There are factions among us. Always have been. Some try to protect our kind. Some just want power. But all of them, all, would slit a thousand throats to keep their secrets."

He studied Thorne carefully. "Do you truly not know?"

Thorne let the mask of stillness settle over his face. Inside, his thoughts churned.

Factions? Organized? How many of us are left?

Outwardly, he didn't so much as twitch. The Mask of Deceit held him in a calm he didn't feel.

"Where?" he asked simply. "Where do they hide?"

Zarash's yellow eyes glittered. "Everywhere," he said softly. "In your cities. Your courts. Your caravans. You just have to know the right hands to shake."

Thorne regarded him in silence. "And you? Which of them do you serve?"

Zarash hesitated. A flicker of something, caution or shame, crossed his scaled features. But in the end, he nodded.

"I belong to the Sathal Enclave. Not that it matters now."

"The Sathal," Thorne repeated. He stored the name away, already thinking of Marian, she would know more.

His arms folded across his chest, expression cool. "Tell me. Is there an enclave hidden here in Aetherhold? Or Evermist?"

Zarash stared at him, then threw his head back and laughed, a rasping, hollow sound that echoed up the corridor.

"No one," he said when the laughter died, "is stupid enough to hide under the Purifiers' very noses."

Thorne inclined his head, just enough to suggest agreement. Though part of him still wondered.

"Is there anything else I should know?" he asked.

Zarash's pupils widened, flicking over his face. A strange hunger lit his gaze. "How strong are you?" he asked suddenly. "How far can you twist the aether? What level is your manipulation?"

Thorne lifted an eyebrow. "Why?"

"Because," Zarash said, his tail curling like a question mark behind him, "if you are what you claim, you could be… useful. There are those who would welcome your strength."

His mouth curved in a sly grin, serrated teeth gleaming. "They'd make you a prince of the old blood. If you have the spine."

Thorne felt cold amusement stir behind his mask. "We're finished here."

He turned, the hem of his coat whispering across the floor. Every step felt measured, final.

He didn't plan on leaving the creature alive. He couldn't. Not after showing his face. No matter what he was, no matter what he'd endured, Zarash had seen too much.

But he wanted to be sure the scaled bastard had nothing else to say.

He'd take the time to ask. And if there were no more secrets to be wrung from him…

The sound came as he took his second step.

A howl, raw and ragged, echoed behind him, laced with desperation.

"WAIT!" Zarash's claws rattled against the bars. "Don't go! I... I can give you something!"

Thorne paused, his back still to the cell.

Zarash's voice dropped to a hiss. "A gift. A power only my bloodline carries. An art no Seer can see until it's too late."

Slowly, Thorne turned back. His face was calm, cold.

"Keep talking," he said softly.

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