Chapter 108: 108. Forbidden Knowledge

The message to Dominus took some time to reach Drak’thar and generate response.

Vorthraxx used that time to pace Celeste’s workshop like a caged predator.

Owen used it to investigate.

The cathedral held public records. Not everything—interrogation details remained sealed—but general case information was accessible to citizens requesting it. Owen presented himself as a concerned friend seeking information about Celeste’s legal standing.

The clerk provided forms reluctantly. Owen filled them out while watching guards patrol. Cathedral security had tripled. They expected something.

The records told him what Vale had left unsaid. Celestial binding marks appeared throughout church history. Always on humans. Always with catastrophic outcomes. Some marks designated martyrs—individuals whose deaths powered divine miracles. Others marked prophets forced to deliver messages they didn’t understand. A few became conduits for direct celestial intervention, their bodies temporarily hosting divine consciousness.

But… None survived.

The pattern was clear. Heaven marked humans as tools. Used them. Discarded them when their purpose was fulfilled.

Celeste was marked. Therefore she was a tool. Therefore she would be used.

The only variable was whether that use came through church control or celestial will. Either way, the outcome was the same.

Owen copied relevant passages, paid the records fee, and left before anyone asked why a hooded stranger wanted information about celestial bindings.

He returned to the workshop as the response from Dominus arrived. A messenger dragonkin in miniature form delivered a sealed letter to Vorthraxx’s hand.

Vorthraxx read it once. Twice. Then crumpled the paper and threw it across the room.

“Refused,” he said. “Diplomatic complications. Precedent concerns. Cannot intervene in internal human affairs without provocation that justifies military response.” He kicked a workbench. “Standard political cowardice.”

Owen picked up the crumpled letter and smoothed it out. The writing was precise, the arguments logical. Dominus laid out clear reasoning why dragon intervention would trigger broader conflict. Why one human life couldn’t justify risking thousands. Why Vorthraxx needed to trust the church’s judgment in celestial matters.

All perfectly reasonable.

All completely useless for saving Celeste.

“What now?” Owen asked.

Vorthraxx stared at the wall. At the tools Celeste had organized with such care. At the forge she’d built with her own hands. At the life she’d created through skill and determination.

“Now I break every law my father taught me to respect.”

He moved to Celeste’s personal quarters upstairs. Owen followed.

The room above the workshop was small but comfortable. Bed. Desk. Wardrobe. Shelves lined with books on metallurgy, theology, history. A window overlooking the street.

Vorthraxx went straight to the desk and began searching. Pulling out drawers. Checking for hidden compartments. Looking for something specific.

“What are you doing?”

“She kept research.” Papers scattered across the desk. “Notes about the sigil. Drawings. Theories about its origin. She showed me some of it but not everything.”

Owen helped search. They found notebooks filled with observations. Sketches of the sigil from different angles. Attempts to trace its geometric components to known mystical systems.

And wedged behind a loose board in the desk’s back panel, a second dragon language book.

Vorthraxx pulled it free. This one was smaller than the primer Vale had confiscated. Hand-bound. Personal rather than published.

“Her translation journal,” Vorthraxx said. “She was working on translating something. A text she found in cathedral archives.”

The pages contained side-by-side writing. Left column in dragon script. Right column in human common tongue. Celeste’s handwriting, careful and precise.

Owen read over Vorthraxx’s shoulder. The text was ancient. It discussed celestial entities in terms Owen hadn’t seen in the modern world.

“This talks about the Arbiter like it’s not singular,” Owen said. “Like there are multiple celestial authorities.”

“There are. Or were. The theology gets complicated.” Vorthraxx flipped pages. “The Radiant Arbiter is the only one that still actively influences the mortal realm. The others retreated after a war. Celestial casualties were… extensive back then.”

Vorthraxx stopped on a page marked with a ribbon. The translation broke off mid-sentence. Celeste had added a note in the margin: “Can’t find the rest of the source text. Cathedral removed it from archives.”

The partial translation discussed binding marks. Specifically how to identify their purpose by analyzing geometric patterns. Each celestial used unique mathematical principles in their mark construction. The Arbiter’s marks incorporated fractal recursion—patterns that repeated at different scales, each layer encoding additional instructions.

“She was trying to decode what the mark does,” Vorthraxx said. “Figure out what it’s designed to activate.”

“Did she succeed?”

“She didn’t mention any conclusions. But she was methodical. If she found something—” He flipped to the last pages.

The final entry was dated two days before the nether rift incident. Celeste’s handwriting, more hurried than earlier entries:

-“Pattern analysis suggests the mark is a beacon, not a binding. It doesn’t control me. It signals to something else. But signals require activation thresholds. What threshold? What triggers full manifestation?

Vorthraxx thinks I should stop researching. Says the knowledge is dangerous. But I can’t live with a mark I don’t understand. Can’t accept being someone else’s instrument without knowing what they intend.

If I’m meant to be a conduit, I want to know what I’m conducting. And whether I have any choice in the matter.

Tomorrow I’ll try to access the restricted archives. The texts they removed must contain answers. If I can find them—”

The entry ended there.

“She went to the cathedral,” Owen said. “Searched restricted archives. That’s probably what flagged church attention even before the rift incident.”

Vorthraxx closed the journal carefully. “She was trying to take control. Understand the mark so she could resist whatever it’s designed to do.”

“Can you even resist celestial programming?”

“I don’t know. Dragons have sovereignties—authority over reality itself. But celestial power operates on a different level. They don’t just command reality. They define it. Set the rules the lesser beings follow.”

Owen thought about his own sovereignties. Space-time manipulation. Destruction. They felt absolute when he used them. But they operated within reality’s framework. He bent rules. Celestials apparently wrote them.

“What does the Arbiter want?” Owen asked. “What purpose would Celeste serve?”

“Balance.” Vorthraxx set the journal down. “The Arbiter maintains cosmic equilibrium. When power concentrates too heavily in one faction, it intervenes to correct anything that might pull faith away from them. Dragons have grown strong. Our authority spreads wide through the world now more than ever. Our Magic exceeds human development. From the Arbiter’s perspective, we’re probably due for correction.”

“And Celeste is the correction mechanism.” Owen added.”Can we stop it?”

“Not through legal channels. The church will execute her once they confirm the mark’s purpose. They see themselves as preventing worse outcomes. Better one death now than thousands later.”

“Then we should break her out.”

Vorthraxx looked at him. “You’re suggesting prison break from a cathedral holding cell.”

“I’m suggesting we don’t let her die.”

“People will die.”

“I guess people will die either way.” Owen met his golden eyes. “The question is whether we choose who dies or let heaven choose for us.”

Vorthraxx was silent for a long moment. His tail moved in slow arcs, processing the implications.

“My father forbid intervention.”

“Your father isn’t here.”

“This will start a war.”

“The war is coming regardless.”

Vorthraxx’s tone suggested he was already committed. “When?”

“Tonight. Before they complete their research. Before they formally charge her.” Owen moved to the window and checked the street.

“I know the cathedral layout, I mapped it out last time we entered .” Vorthraxx joined him at the window. “East wing holding cells are on the third floor. Two guards per corridor. Four at the entrance. Ten-minute patrol intervals.”

“That’s for normal security. They’ll have increased protection now.”

“Then we go in hard and fast. Don’t give them time to organize response.”

Owen considered tactics. Direct assault meant casualties. Meant witnesses. Meant irrevocable proof of dragon aggression against human institutions.

But Celeste would be alive.

And sometimes survival mattered more than optics.

“We’ll need a distraction,” Owen said. “Something to draw guard attention away from the holding wing.”

“Fire in the archives. Guards will prioritize protecting sacred texts over one prisoner.”

“Won’t that destroy irreplaceable knowledge?”

“I don’t care.” Vorthraxx’s voice was flat. “They took her freedom. I’ll take their precious books. Fair trade.”

Owen thought about the records he’d reviewed. The historical accounts of celestial bindings. All that knowledge reduced to ash.

But Celeste alive seemed more valuable than historical documents.

“Alright. You handle extraction. I’ll create the distraction.”

“You sure? Dragon’s breath is more efficient for arson.”

“Your breath is too distinctive. Guards will know dragons were involved immediately. I can use normal fire. Make it look like accident. Candle knocked over. Human error.”

Vorthraxx nodded.

“Where do we go after we get her though?” Owen asked.

“Somewhere they can’t follow easily. The borderlands maybe. Or…” He paused. “Drak’thar.”

“But…Your father forbid intervention.”

“He forbid his intervention. Didn’t say anything about me providing sanctuary to a human friend.” Vorthraxx’s smile was sharp. “If she’s in dragon territory, human law doesn’t apply. The church can’t touch her.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Won’t risk war over one heretic when they can blame dragons for corruption and maintain moral authority.” He moved toward the door. “Either way, she’s safer there than anywhere in human lands.”

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