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Then he took him to the prison alcove.

He asked him about her childhood, her real one, and about what he’s learned being Strolguil’s captive for years. Rurik had come to learn more of the villainous Witch’s misdeeds.

At every coven and turn, he’d advocated for dark and blood magic use. He would teach every Witch he came into contact with what they could do to increase their power. He would also force white wielders to turn, would go out of his way to corrupt them.

Her mother’s pregnancy had been difficult, and they knew when Amalia was to be born that her mother would most likely not survive. Strolguil had been the one to teach her father how to save her and showed him the spells and ingredients he would need when the time came.

It was what turned her father. His love for his wife, and his desperation to save her is what led to his corruption.

Once Rurik was done with him and closed him inside of his prison alcove, warding it as well, he’d turned to his trophy room.

If he waited much longer, his stomach would begin to digest Strolguil’s head. When they changed size or form, their food would change as well since their stomach had magical properties inside of it.

Unless it was expelled, of course.

He’d shifted so that he could bring his head up, as well as the other two coven Witches he’d killed. Preparing them for later, he placed Strolguil’s head on the stone work bench he had inside this room and removed his blazing red hair.

He was planning to attach it to his skull once he removed his skin and muscles. Rurik wanted to make it obvious that it was Strolguil’s since he didn’t want anyone to mistake his skull for the others he’d collected.

After he did this, he changed back into a human, knowing it would be easier to face Amalia if he wasn’t a towering, scaly beast. He knew she would be afraid and would have to approach her slowly.

What he hadn’t expected was, in the time he’d spoken to her father, removed the Witches from his stomach, and found pants because he knew it would make her more at ease, that she would rise and be gone.

Rurik nearly had a damn heart attack when he’d walked into the cooking alcove to find she was no longer resting against the table.

She had fled, and after shouting her name, he’d bolted to the entrance of his lair thinking she had run away outside. He hadn’t replaced the ward yet and thought she was truly gone.

When he couldn’t find a trace of her scent outside, a deep frown had marred his features as he’d walked back inside to check each alcove for her. Her scent had filled the cooking alcove, softer than usual, but still noticeable to him even in his human form.

The moment it took him to the stream, and he looked around for her, he knew where she was. He was aware of the shallow hole behind his waterfall. He knew the ins and outs of his own lair as much as he knew every scale on his body.

Her fear of him had twisted his insides worse than any sword that had ever been sunk into his side. But he’d found her, he’d comforted her, and then he brought her here to rest. She was very pale, and weakness was easy to see in her trembling legs and hands.

She has lost a lot of blood.It may have been one of the reasons why he found it so hard to bring her back. Last time she was strangled to death.

Amalia hadn’t been toeing the afterlife so hard.

She also did not want to return.

Now that he’d been told her side of the events that played out, he knew she had been brave. She convinced them that she was a willing party in their plans to the point they gave her fleeting moments of alone time.

She could have tried to escape on her own, but she did not want to leave me behind.

Rurik felt warmth and pride spread through him.

As much as he wanted to stay with her, there were things he needed to do before she woke again. Now that she understood she was safe, he doubted she would wake for quite some time.

He went to the entrance of his lair and reapplied the ward that would prevent Witches and pixies from entering, no longer seeing the need to ward it further.

Then he made his way back to his trophy room to finish what he had started. He didn’t burn the Witches to remove their flesh like he normally would. Instead, he skinned them and cleaned their skulls by his own hands, not wanting to add the smell of burning flesh into his home with Amalia inside of it in a fragile state.

Once he mounted their heads on the wall, he turned to Strolguil’s skull and did the same. He’d once wanted to mount his entire skeleton in his main room, but when he had needed to search for Amalia, he hadn’t cared at the time to also retrieve his body.

He still mounted what he’d taken in the main room of his lair, though, and it sat right above the tapestry of the tale of him killing his own father.

Rurik stared up at it for a long while and the hair he had attached to it. His kind would never forget him, the Dragon who had slain the Vast.

If I am not to hunt him any longer, who else must I search for?He had reached his peak of pride, nothing he did after this would matter as much.