"Wait, the armor is down here too?" Henry blurted out, his mind racing.

"Of course it is," the Wand sneered. "That silly dwarf didn’t want you to find it and become unstoppable—the crafty, respawning guy."

Henry barely had time to process the words when a sharp jolt shot through his arm. "What the—" he yelped as the Wand yanked him forward with surprising force. It pulled him down the dim hallway, his boots scraping against the uneven stone floor. The air grew colder with each step, the faint tang of metal and decay lingering in his nostrils.

Henry dug his heels into the stone floor, trying to resist the Wand’s pull, but the damn thing was relentless. His boots scraped uselessly against the slick rock as he stumbled forward.

"Slow down!" he barked, throwing his weight backward in a desperate attempt to stop.

"Oh, don’t be such a baby," the Wand sneered. "I’m just helping you move with purpose."

"Helping? Helping would be guiding me like a normal—gah!" His shoulder slammed into the wall as the Wand yanked him sideways, his balance thrown off by the uneven ground. A shiver crawled up his spine as something wet dripped onto his arm from the cavern ceiling. The air smelled metallic, damp, like an open wound.

Elara hovered beside him, giggling. "Just go with it, Henry! You can’t fight fate!"

"I can fight you both, though," Henry growled under his breath.

Elara zipped after them, her wild grin nearly splitting her face. "Ooooh, this is exciting! We’re off to find legendary armor! Maybe it’s cursed! Maybe it’s haunted! Maybe it’s—"

"Shut. Up." Henry groaned, barely catching his balance as the Wand jerked him forward again.

It took around an hour before they found it—the exposed and beating core nestled deep within the cavern.

The heart pulsed, slow and rhythmic, and Henry swore he could feel it in his own chest—like his body was trying to sync with its unnatural beat. A deep, wet sound echoed through the cavern with every contraction, a sound too organic for something that should not be alive.

He took a shaky step forward, swallowing back the bile rising in his throat. "It’s… it’s actually alive?"

"Of course," the Wand said, almost bored. "What, did you think I was exaggerating?"

"I was hoping you were exaggerating!" Henry snapped, his voice cracking. He forced himself to stare at it, to process what he was seeing. The surface was thick, veined with lines of molten gold, each beat sending a ripple of energy through the cavern floor. The mist that surrounded it wasn’t just drifting—it was feeding.

"That’s new," the Wand muttered, sounding almost concerned. “Never seen it feeding before”

"Feeding?" Henry’s voice came out strained, his pulse hammering.

The mist coiled tighter around the heart, thickening as it pulsed, the golden veins in its surface glowing brighter with each beat. The sight made Henry’s stomach twist.

"Feeding on what, exactly?" He took a cautious step back.

Stolen story; please report.

"That’s the part I don’t like," the Wand admitted. "I never designed it to do this. It was just supposed to sit there, tethered to my existence, quietly keeping me alive. But this… this is something else."

The Wand’s glow flickered, its voice uncharacteristically uncertain.

Elara, for once, wasn’t grinning. She tilted her head, her glow dimming slightly. "Oooooooh, you don’t think it’s—"

"I don’t know," the Wand cut in sharply. "And I don’t like not knowing."

Elara who had been meandering behind, flowing around in circles, gasped, her glow flickering wildly as she zipped in frantic circles around the pulsating mass. "OHHHHHH, this is the heart heart. The heart. The HEART! Expose it, crack it open, peel it apart like a ripe fruit, and—oh, oh, oh! The gumdrop center! That’s where Mother gave birth!"

Henry froze, his stomach knotting. "What?"

The Wand let out a low, guttural sigh, its glow pulsing faintly. "Oh, for the love of—Elara, stop making it weird."

Elara twirled midair, utterly unbothered, her expression caught between manic glee and something eerily wistful. "But it is weird, Mother! Look at it! So exposed, so raw, so thump-thump." She mimicked a heartbeat with her tiny hands. "This is my heart, my very own, my precious, my—"

"Enough." The Wand’s rasping voice cut through her rambling, its glow flaring with irritation. "You act like I wanted to leave a chunk of my essence rotting in a cave. Do you know how annoying it is to exist without your core? Like trying to scream with no mouth. Like thinking without thinking. Like being stuck in a room with you and no way to leave."

"Awww, you missed me!" Elara clasped her hands over her chest, beaming.

"I did not."

Henry pinched the bridge of his nose, exhaling slowly. "Okay. Let me get this straight. That thing—" he pointed at the grotesque, undulating heart "—is literally part of you, Mother Wand?"

"Ugh. When you say it like that, it sounds revolting." The Wand’s glow flickered. "But yes. That thing is what’s left of me before I was… reduced to this."

"Reduced? You mean upgraded!" Elara interjected, gesturing dramatically toward the Wand. "You’re so much more compact now! Portable! Easy to store! Like a convenient little jar of misery!"

"I despise you."

"Love you too, Mother!"

Henry took another slow step back, glancing between the two lunatics he was now stuck with. His gaze lingered on the pulsing heart. "So, uh… what happens if it stops beating?"

For the first time, the Wand hesitated. Its glow dimmed slightly.

Elara spun lazily through the air, her grin stretching wide. "Then she dies, silly."

Henry frowned, glancing at the Wand in his grip. "But she’s still… here."

"For now," the Wand murmured, its voice uncharacteristically quiet. "But if that heart withers, so do I. Permanently."

"Okay… that doesn’t sound so bad—"

"And so does everything tied to it," the Wand cut in. "You think this place exists by accident? No, no, no, boy. It exists because I exist. My heart is the keystone, the anchor. If it stops, the magic unraveling won’t just kill me—it’ll collapse this entire cavern, and anything inside it."

Henry felt the blood drain from his face. "Which is us."

"Very good," the Wand purred. "See? You can keep up."

Henry studied the pulsing mass again, a new weight settling in his chest. "So… do we leave it alone?"

Elara giggled. "Oh, no, no, no, no, no. We need to fix it." She clasped her hands together and twirled midair. "And you, dear Henry, are going to help!"

Henry closed his eyes for a long moment. "Of course I am."

The Wand let out a raspy chuckle, its usual smugness creeping back into its voice. "Cheer up, boy. At least now you finally have a reason to care if I live or die. Once we fix this, you get to go back home."

Henry let out a sharp breath, nodding to himself. Home. The thought steadied him, gave him something solid to hold onto.

But then another image flashed in his mind—Sarah, pale and feverish, her small hands clutching at him in the darkness. The way she had looked at him back in the hospital, trusting him to fix everything. The way she had whispered his name when the mist took her away.

His grip on the Wand tightened.

"Alright, I’ll help you both." His voice was firm now, resolute. "But we save my sister first."