The pain faded slowly, like the echo of thunder in a distant canyon.
Vezdaryon rested atop a ledge carved into a jagged cliff, his body stretched out against the scorched rock. Blood no longer flowed freely from his wounds, though scabs and raw pink tissue marked the places where claws and teeth had pierced his hide. His wing still ached, and there was a stiffness to his shoulder every time he moved, but healing had begun.
It had taken days. Perhaps longer. Time moved differently in Valyria the skies never truly cleared, and the sun often burned behind curtains of smoke. But Vezdaryon knew he was mending. Every beat of his massive heart carried fire through his veins. Every breath filled his lungs with the warm, sulfur-rich air of his domain.
And in the stillness of his recovery, something unexpected had stirred inside him.
He felt… alive.
Not merely existing, as he had for years. Not simply gliding through the air or basking in the warmth of forgotten ruins. But awakened, sharpened by fire and fang. The battle with the wyvern had done more than scar him it had awakened something buried deep in his soul.
A thrill.
Not joy. Not bloodlust. But something fierce, something proud. The struggle, the fury, the dance of strength and instinct it had tested him in ways nothing else had. And he had endured.
He was no longer the hatchling who once wandered the rocky cliffs of Dragonstone.
He was Vezdaryon now. Named in fire. Forged in the crucible of this cursed land.
And Valyria had not broken him.
When he rose at last wings stretching with new strength, muscles healed, fire pulsing again in his chest the land welcomed him in silence. Ash drifted in the air like falling feathers. Lava glowed below in endless streams. The earth rumbled softly beneath his claws.
It was time to fly again.
He leapt from the ledge, wings catching the thick, heated air. With each beat, he soared higher into the sky, scanning the lands ahead. Valyria was vast and twisted the ruin of a once-great civilization, now reclaimed by chaos and time. Yet in its brokenness, it held wonders that could not be found anywhere else in the world.
Beneath him, a range of mountains curled like the spine of a sleeping beast, peaks jagged and red-hot at their summits. Smoke poured from their vents in lazy plumes. Vezdaryon turned east, letting the wind carry him across a series of gorges. Below, glowing rivers of lava split the valleys, illuminating twisted stone trees petrified in place remnants of forests long ago turned to fireglass.
Then he saw it something new.
Ahead, nestled between two colossal peaks, opened the yawning mouth of a cavern. It was immense, the arch wide enough for even a dragon twice his size to pass through. Black rock framed its entrance like the open jaws of some ancient titan.
Vezdaryon slowed, wings gliding, and descended toward it.
The air grew warmer as he approached, tinged with a deep hum that thrummed in his bones. He hovered at the threshold, peering inside. The darkness seemed endless. But further in, the shadows glowed faintly reds, oranges, and golds flickering off the walls like reflected flame.
He entered.
The cavern swallowed him whole. Light disappeared for a moment, and only the sound of dripping stone and slow wind accompanied his flight. But then, suddenly, the walls opened wide into a vast chamber the size of a castle, perhaps more. Firelight danced across veins of glowing minerals embedded in the rock. The ceiling arched impossibly high, jagged and shining, like the inside of a geode.
Here, waterfalls of molten rock poured from cracks in the cliff face, slow and steady, glowing like sunlight made liquid. They flowed into pools that steamed and bubbled, casting shifting reflections onto the ceiling above.
Vezdaryon landed near the edge of one, the heat licking at his scales like an old friend. He took it in this forgotten place beneath the world. Untouched. Unclaimed.
How long had it been since any creature walked these caverns? A hundred years? A thousand?
He dipped his snout toward the glowing lava pool, not to drink he knew better but to feel its warmth. It welcomed him.
For a while, he lay still in the glow of the firefalls, wings relaxed at his sides, tail curled around him. No movement stirred the air save the slow roll of heat. Here, he felt ancient like part of the land itself. A creature born not of flesh and blood, but of fire and stone.
The wyvern's ambush still echoed in his thoughts. The fury in its eyes. The reckless desperation. The way it fought without fear, even knowing it could not win.
Vezdaryon did not feel guilt for the kill. The beast had chosen its end. But he understood it now.
Valyria was not a land of mercy. It was a crucible a forge for monsters and kings alike. And only the strongest could survive it.
And survive, he had.
Yet, more than survival… he had grown.
Not just in size. But in self. He no longer wandered as a ghost of his old human memories. Those were fading now, slipping like sand through claws. The name "Jake" barely whispered in the back of his mind. His thoughts were sharper, simpler. And when he dreamed now, he dreamed in color and flame, not words.
But the heart the part of him that remembered what it meant to feel it still beat within.
It had mourned his first kill.
And now, it burned with wonder.
He would fly again. Explore again. Discover every mystery buried beneath this shattered land. Because now he understood.
This wasn't just exile.
It was purpose.
With a final glance at the firefalls, Vezdaryon rose once more, wings unfurling wide. The cavern air swirled as he leapt back into flight. He soared out of the chamber and into the twilight sky above Valyria, a streak of red-black against the ash-choked clouds.
Behind him, the cave glowed like the forge of the gods. Before him, the world waited vast, wild, and ancient and Vezdaryon would not stop until he had seen all of it.
——
Enjoy the chapter