Chapter 52

Veya awakens shackled in the underground lair of Arkyn, the disfigured Scavenger King who rules the fighting pits beneath the mountains. Arkyn reveals himself as Ostern Vaegor's illegitimate son—Veya's half-brother—and shares his brutal history of abuse and abandonment, contrasting it with Kaan's favored treatment. The revelation culminates in Arkyn's declaration of intent to seize the bronze throne and his demand that Veya's mind be read by someone named Guíll.

Veya regains consciousness in a vast cavern filled with scavenged treasures and guarded by two bronze-masked figures. She is dragged before a lofty throne constructed from moonshards, including fragments from the silver Moonplume Slátra. A hooded figure emerges—Arkyn, revealed through his skeletal fingers and blazing eyes—who knows her name and her connection to Bulder. Veya is shackled and questioning, attempting to maintain her composure despite her wound and weakness.

Arkyn begins interrogating Veya about her father, Ostern Vaegor, gauging her character. When Veya defends Kaan as the rightful killer of their father, Arkyn whistles, summoning an Elding Bird—a legendary creature thought extinct—which emerges from the cavern shadows to nuzzle him with evident devotion. Arkyn then recounts a devastating personal story: he is Ostern's bastard son, born to a servant woman, while Kaan was the legitimate heir to Kovina, Ostern's beautiful northern wife. Ostern brutalized Arkyn's mother while protecting Kovina, and when Arkyn presented Ostern with a golden Elding Bird egg as a gift, their father crushed it beneath his boot and cast him out. Arkyn's face was burned—scarred and melted—apparently by his own fire-wielding as a result of that trauma, though the Elding Bird, Cliár, saved his life.

Arkyn reveals his true motive: he seeks to claim the bronze throne that Kaan now occupies, viewing it as his rightful inheritance stolen by a favored brother. When Veya insists Kaan is nothing like Ostern and defends him passionately, Arkyn presses her about whom Kaan loves. Veya's slip—mentioning love—betrays crucial information. Arkyn orders his subordinate Worin to bring Guíll, a mind-reader, to extract Veya's thoughts and secrets.