Castle Volkihar (Dawnguard) is a brooding fortress on a lonely island in the Sea of Ghosts, tucked into the far northwestern corner of Skyrim near the sea border with High Rock. It is the home of the Volkihar Clan and its lord, Harkon. You first arrive by rowing out from Icewater Jetty, northwest of Northwatch Keep, but ferrymen can also take you, and a determined swimmer can just cross the channel. Join the vampires and the castle becomes your home – join the Dawnguard and it becomes your final dungeon.
What you’ll find
- Dining Hall: long tables piled with human flesh, blood-smeared silverware and vampire cattle being fed on, with Harkon’s throne at the far end.
- Feran’s Laboratory: an alchemy lab and ingredient display below, an arcane enchanter and soul gems on the balcony above.
- Bloodstone Chalice Room: where the chalice rests once recovered, granting Blood of the Ancients so Vampiric Drain also absorbs magicka and stamina.
- Sleeping Quarters: eight coffins that give the Vampiric Blood Rested bonus, plus vampire armor, boots and a bone hawk amulet.
- Smithy and training area: forge, tanning rack, grindstone and workbench (no smelter), run by the blacksmith Hestla.
- Harkon’s Room: thrones, a cattle cage, a torture table and a unique werewolf pelt on display.
- Serana’s Room: empty until The Bloodstone Chalice is done, then furnished with an enchanter and alchemy lab.
- A kitchen, a thrall dungeon, a ruined cathedral with a blood-soaked altar of Molag Bal, and the separate Volkihar dungeons out back.
- Outside: a gargoyle-lined bridge, a watchtower, docks patrolled by skeletons, and a balcony off Valerica’s Study where the Soul Cairn portal waits.
Quests
Bloodline brings you here to return Serana to her father. If you side with the vampires, The Bloodstone Chalice and other court jobs follow; if you side with the Dawnguard, you come back for Kindred Judgment and face Harkon in the cathedral. Serana’s mother Valerica is tied to the castle’s study and its portal.
Notable items
- Books: The Real Barenziah, Book I; The Great War; The Brothers of Darkness; The Arcturian Heresy.
- Bone hawk amulet, unique werewolf pelt,.
Tips
As a Volkihar member you get a full service base: Hestla sells arms, Ronthil sells general goods and trains Speech, and Fura Bloodmouth is a master Two-Handed trainer. Store gear in wardrobes and bookcases inside the keep – loose items in the open reset every 35 days or so. And keep your fangs: if you get cured, the residents give you the cold shoulder until you turn again.
Good to know
The castle is really two separate routes: the front door leads to the hall and cathedral, while the back entrance runs through the dungeons and courtyard up to Valerica’s Study. There is no indoor shortcut between them.
Nearby
Closest places covered on TamrielSaga: Icewater Jetty, Northwatch Keep, Rimerock Burrow, Steepfall Burrow, Pinefrost Tower.
Location data (hold, map position, editor ID) read from the Skyrim game files; details checked against community wiki articles and summarised in our own words.