"Yes." Slow, hushed, complicit. As if some part of him, gaze withered and dancing across each corner of the room, fears the walls listen. Given the number of inanimate spectators, who is to say?

But then, walking on, he starts to sink by the fireplace, searching in cold ashes with either singed or soot-darkened fingertips. Careful, as if fearing splinters of bone or marrow might sleep within the mounds.

"I am... uncertain whereabout." A moment's vulnerability. They have known each other long enough, and Wrathion is, if not enthusiastic, at least pleasantly pliant. "The grounds bleed." Red dirt, scant snow. "The castle bears curses. The forest grieves."

The... fire?