The climbing raised stone road of dark star-iron rose in a spiraling arc toward the central sanctum platform, suspended two hundred and forty meters above the calm expanse of the azure lake.
Arthur walked with deliberate, measured strides, his heavy combat boots clicking rhythmically against the metal flat stone slabs. Beside him, Grimm kept pace, the hound’s black glass fur rippling with faint static discharges as they drew closer to the suspended dais. Every muscle in Grimm’s frame was taut as a high-tension cable. His head was held level with his spine, his amber eyes fixed upon the titanic dark shape resting upon the central dais.
The fossil of the World-Eater First-born lay in a stance of ancient, dignified repose.
Spanning more than seventy-one meters from the tip of its elongated premaxilla to the end-post tail-end spine bones, the ancient sovereign occupied the entire central dais. Its ribs rose thirty-five meters into the warm air. He formed a vaulted archway of black iron-hard metal bone that looked more like the load-bearing hull of an ancient dreadnought than a living skeleton.
Arthur stopped at the base of the left hip bones. There, the old family thigh bone rested against a raised stone stand of crystal-clear quartzite.
