Jarrett hesitated. He wanted to ask Connor about his temper, whether he was able to control it. But Jarrett wasn't sure he knew the man well enough to ask such a personal question.
"I cannot turn like you," Jarrett said, "but I have spent many years around dragons. If you have any questions, I might be able to answer them for you."
"I do have one." Connor took a deep breath. "Will I ever remember my past?"
Jarrett's shoulders fell. He looked at Connor's curious eyes, wanting so badly to give him good news. "You may not. Sometimes the transformation is too traumatic. If it's done properly and with care, the mind does not suffer. But when someone is brought to the dragon through torture, the mind may choose to block the memories." He shuffled his feet. "Tressa told me what happened to you. How Stacia flayed your skin to pieces with her braid studded with metal. Tressa swore you had died, or she and Bastian never would have left you. It would be very difficult for you to remember your past after an experience like that. That likely was Stacia's intent."
Connor's eyes clouded over. "I'm sure it was. I was not the only man she kept chained in the dungeon under the castle at Ashoom."
"If you couldn't remember your ties to the past, then you'd be less likely to fight for freedom," Jarrett said. He shook his head. He'd heard stories about Stacia's cruelty, even seen some of it up close, but hearing from a man who who’d experienced it firsthand made it all the more real. "The other men, what happened to them?"
"Dead. All of them." Connor leaned on the rail. "They were all dead before I turned into a dragon. Each dead man's body wrapped around an egg. Stacia's offspring with them. I can only assume she was breeding her own army. I'm glad I could help Tressa kill Stacia. I'm just sorry your friend Henry lost his life too."
"Henry was no friend of mine," Jarrett said. He recalled the arrogant boy who'd walked into his own death. "I was there to help him if he attempted to wrest the Blue throne from Stacia. The one person I couldn't protect him against was himself."
Silence fell over them as the waves lapped against the wooden side. Salty sprays danced in the air. Jarrett looked back at Bastian and Elinor. She sat on a bench with Bastian's head in her lap. The redhead looked unwell. Perhaps her herbs hadn't helped him as much as they'd hoped.
"I still don't remember my wife,” Connor said. “Even seeing my boys back at the Blue castle didn't jog my memory. It doesn't mean I don't care for them, though. Deep down, I think part of me remembers."
"That's good," Jarrett said. He wasn't sure if it meant Connor's memories were still intact or if he was simply a man with a big heart. Regardless, hope often brought about miracles. Jarrett prayed Connor would experience such a miracle.
"How much farther is it?" Connor asked. He rested a hand above his brow and squinted toward the north. "I don't see land yet."
Jarrett pointed to a gull circling above the sails. “Those birds don’t fly far from land. I wager we'll be seeing land very, very soon. And then begins the challenge of surviving whatever traps the Keepers have laid."
"And finding my eggs. Only one is mine, but I am responsible for the other ten too. They have no one but me to care for them."
"They are lucky dragons," Jarrett said with a smile.
He glanced into the sky again. A dark cloud drifted above the island. Clouds always moved from the west to the east, but this stationary cloud hung over the top of a mountain as it was anchored there by some evil force. Jarrett took a deep breath, hoping the stories of the Keepers were nothing more than legend.
Chapter Ten
Tressa woke from a long sleep. She blinked a few times, wondering why there was no sunlight. Then she remembered where she was, deep under the Charred Barrens, in a place daylight could not touch.
"You're awake. How do you feel?" Fi's soft voice echoed in the dark room. Tressa couldn't see her, except for her glowing blue eyes.
Tressa stretched her arms above her head, letting her legs splay out to the side, every muscle in her body awakening. "Surprisingly good. Better than good." She sat up and swung her legs over the side of the bed.
Her head didn't swim. The world didn't spin. Everything remained still, as it should.
"Is there a light in here?" Tressa asked.
Fi snapped and a brazier burst to life. "I'm glad you finally drank the blood. If we would have known the situation was so dire when we first went to rescue you in Malum, I would have brought some with me. Sophia is a true seer, but she does not see all."
"I don't want to talk about her," Tressa said.
Fi sat on the bed next to her. "We have to. There's so much you don't understand. Once you are told why she made certain choices, you will see why she had to do it."