Ten days later.
The storm hit without warning.
Limpick was in the great hall reciting scripture. Evening prayers had just ended and the faithful were still filing out. The brazier roared, throwing warm orange light across every face. Then the wind changed. It wasn't the usual damp sea breeze. This one was dry, cold, and coming from the east, carrying a smell he couldn't name—nothing like sulfur or seaweed. It smelled like the far edge of the world.
Melisandre stood at the altar, hands stretched toward the flames, finishing the final blessing. She stopped mid-chant, lifted her head, and narrowed her red eyes, staring hard into the heart of the fire. After a second she kept going, but her voice dropped and sped up, like she was trying to finish before something caught up to her. Limpick stood right behind her and caught the shift. He followed her gaze into the flames. They weren't dancing their usual steady rhythm. They jerked left, right, high, low, as if something invisible was shoving them around.
Outside, the wind rose from a moan to a shriek, like knives slicing the air. Shutters slammed against stone frames. Iron hinges screeched. A few worshippers glanced up, uneasy. An old woman muttered something; the person beside her patted her hand to quiet her.
The blessing ended. Melisandre lowered her hands and turned to the hall. Her face stayed calm, but her lips were pressed tighter than usual. "Service is over," she said. "Go home. Close your doors and windows. Do not go out tonight."
The faithful left. The lame blacksmith limped away on his crutch, paused beside Limpick as if he wanted to speak, then simply nodded and moved on. The boy with the birthmark was last. At the doorway he looked back, eyes lingering on Limpick for a beat, before he slipped into the darkness.
Now only Limpick and Melisandre remained. The brazier fire jumped wildly, throwing their shadows long and short across the wall like two ghosts dancing.
"The storm is coming," Melisandre said. "Not an ordinary one."
Limpick waited.
"I saw it in the flames," she went on, facing the brazier again. "The sea is rising—not waves, the whole surface lifting. Black clouds rolling in from the east, hanging low. There is light inside them—not lightning. Blue light. The same blue you saw during the ritual. But this blue isn't from the fire. It's coming from… somewhere farther away. I cannot explain it."
Limpick's heart gave one hard thump. Blue light. He had seen that same blue in the flames before—the deep passage inside the ritual fire, the glow at the root of the dragon-glass veins, the heart of the mountain itself. If Melisandre saw that blue riding the storm, then this wasn't natural weather. It was tied to the dragon glass, the volcano, the fire beneath their feet.
"I'm going down to the sea," Limpick said.
Melisandre looked at him. "I said do not go out tonight."
"I'll only look and come straight back."
She didn't stop him. She turned back to the altar, raised her hands to the flames again, and began a different chant—this one a prayer of protection for the island, the castle, the people. Her voice rose higher and faster, echoing through the empty hall and tangling with the wind outside.
Limpick pushed open the door and stepped into it.
The wind slammed him like a wall. He staggered, caught himself, and pushed forward, head down, shoulders hunched. His robe flapped and snapped against his body. Sand stung his face. He squinted, one hand shielding his eyes, and fought his way toward the cliffs. The sky was black—no moon, no stars. Low clouds pressed down like the night itself had been flipped over and clamped onto Dragonstone. Inside those clouds, blue light flickered, faint and pulsing, like a heartbeat.
He reached the cliff edge, gripped the rocks, and looked down.
The sea was wrong. The whole surface heaved and rolled, as if something enormous was turning over underneath. The water wasn't black anymore; it had turned a strange gray-white, like mud and foam from the bottom had been churned up into a glowing, porridge-like mess. Waves crashed against the cliffs with a boom, spraying water higher than his head and raining down like a storm. He wiped his face and kept watching. A huge dark shape rolled through the gray water—left to right, right to left—struggling, being dragged upward.
He knew that shape.
Yuan.
It should have been deep, guarding the clutch of eggs at the root of the dragon-glass vein. But something had forced it up. Its eight thick tentacles broke the surface, thrashing wildly, trying to grab hold of anything. They couldn't. The sea was spinning, the entire surface forming a massive whirlpool that sucked everything toward its center. Yuan's body rose higher, caught in the vortex, spinning faster and faster, closer to the eye.
Limpick stood up and started down the narrow path. He didn't know what he could do—he couldn't fight the sea—but his legs moved anyway.
A side gust hit him like a hammer. It knocked him flat on his face across the sharp rocks. His lip split open; blood tasted salty. He lifted his head just in time to see Yuan disappear into the whirlpool. The whole creature—body, tentacles, golden eyes—was dragged into the spinning center. At the very middle of the vortex, blue light flared, bright and blinding, like a sun lit underwater. The light flashed once and went dark.
The whirlpool collapsed. The sea flattened. The wind eased.
Yuan was gone.
Limpick lay on the ground, fingers digging into the rocks, knuckles white. He stared at the water, waiting for Yuan to surface again. Seconds passed. Minutes. Longer. Nothing. The gray-white sea turned deep blue once more. Waves rolled in normally, neither too high nor too fast, as if nothing had happened.
He pushed himself up, knelt by the rock, and reached into his robe for the dragon bone. It was jumping—not its usual steady pulse, but frantic, erratic, like a trapped bird slamming against a cage. He gripped it tight, closed his eyes, and tried to feel Yuan. Nothing. The heavy, warm presence that had always sat at the edge of his mind was simply gone, like a missing tooth his tongue kept probing but found only empty space.
He tucked the bone back inside his robe, stood up, and turned toward the castle. After a couple of steps he stopped.