Dragonlands(233)

Elinor pulled back. Her arms stiff at her sides and her hands in fists, she looked up at Bastian. "I didn't just give you my moon, Bastian. I gave you my ultimate sacrifice."

"I'm not familiar with healers, Elinor. I don't know what that means." He didn't like where the conversation was heading.

"When a healer makes the ultimate sacrifice, she not only gives her moon, she gives all of her healing. Forever." Elinor choked in a breath.

"I still don't understand," Bastian said. "Speak plainly." He gazed at the woman he desired. The one who brought him more happiness than any other woman he'd known. What had she done?

"You cannot die easily, Bastian. I gave you my healing. As long as your heart beats, your body will heal itself." Tears spilled from her cheeks. "I did it not because I loved you, but because I wanted to relieve myself of the power to give my moon. I did not want to become what my father had dreamed for me.” Elinor took a deep breath. “There is more. You saw how my wound healed so quickly on the Isle of Repose?"

Bastian nodded, mute.

“As long as your heart beats, mine does too. We are connected. Forever.”

“But when your father tortured you, I took you to a healer…” Bastian remembered the moment so clearly. He thought she’d betrayed them, then found Elinor beaten, bloody, and tied up. She needed a healer, and an old man helped her.

Elinor shook her head, tears bubbling at the corners of her eyes. “I did not want you to know then. I thought you would be angry with me for what I’d done. I let myself be healed, even though I didn’t need it. At the time I thought it would be better if you never knew. Had I known I would love you, had I known you would love me back...I never would have cursed us.”

She turned and ran from the throne room. Bastian stood still, his mouth agape.





Chapter Twenty-Seven


Tressa flew into the battle, power coursing through her veins. Dragons darted in every direction. Smoke billowed around Tressa, blinding her. The fray was too chaotic, too packed, and she feared getting caught in a blast of dragonfire. Claws slashed. Swords clanged and whips cracked, wielded by a few Red riders standing on the backs of their dragons. Screams ripped through the sky as both humans and dragons fell to their death.

Tressa let herself fall, feigning an injury. Her chest heaved as she drifted to the ground, exhausted. She gazed into the sky. The Black dragons fought ferociously, felling Red after Red after Red. The field around her blossomed with bodies. Blood hung in the air, heavier than rain on a stormy day.

"Tressa..." The voice whispered to her on the wind.

Jarrett’s pleas didn’t abate, muffling even the screams of the battle. Tressa felt her resistance weakening. Yes, he had tried to kill her, but she knew it was only because something grave was wrong with him. Otherwise he never would have hurt her. Jarrett hadn’t abandoned her when her change began. She’d be damned if she left him when he needed her most.

She looked at the battle again. Granna rode Mestifito, striking down enemies in their path. Her new friends wouldn’t miss her if she left. All that mattered was Jarrett.

Tressa rose into the air, fighting against the strong wind, heading west and north, toward the island where she'd found Jarrett.

Something tickled at her mind, an insistent voice, but she shoved it away. Whoever it was didn't need her. Jarrett needed her. Only Jarrett. Jarrett.

Her mind rang with only one thought. One desire. One compulsion.

She flew away from the people who'd taken her in toward the one who loved her most. Nothing mattered but Jarrett.

Tressa thought to look back once more but her neck wouldn't move. Instead, her snout pointed directly toward the Isle of Repose. Toward Jarrett. Toward the only thing she cared about.

She flew and flew, her wings tiring. But still she kept on, not letting anything stand in the way of reaching Jarrett. She struggled to stay aloft against the pull of the earth. Somehow she won. Somehow she kept on until the island came into sight again.

He stood on the beach still, looking for her. Waiting. Unflinching.

Her body couldn't sustain one more moment of being a dragon. Tressa landed next to him and she changed back into a human.

"Jarrett." She reached out a hand, her vision swimming.

He came closer, and she saw a strange, felt hat pulled over his ears. She recognized it, remembered playfully tugging at it—but that was all. Clouded memories swirled around her head. Tressa couldn’t make sense of any of them.

His strong arms lifted her. Tressa's head slumped against his shoulder.

"I'll take care of you," he whispered in her ear. "I promise. You can trust me."

Tressa wanted to agree, but she couldn't even nod her head. She felt like something was pulling her down, just like when she'd almost drowned. She could feel the water swimming around her, muffling every thought. Jarrett whispered words she couldn't understand. Like a lullaby, it calmed her. She gave up fighting Jarrett just as she had given up fighting with the Black in battle. None of it mattered. Just Jarrett's arms around her.