themselves. To offer our moon when someone of value is dying. To make the ultimate sacrifice for one who must survive, despite all costs." With the last sentence she looked at the floor.
"What is this ultimate sacrifice?" Bastian asked, taking Elinor's hand in his.
She sniffled, refusing to look at him. Bastian rested a finger under her chin, but she wouldn't let him raise it.
"Elinor? What is it?"
"Do you remember before we left for Malum? How I told you there was something in my childhood?" Her eyes remained trained on the floor.
"Yes," Bastian said. "I didn't want to pry if you weren't ready to talk about it."
"My father." She took in a ragged breath. "He told me that when I grew up, I would be the most famous of all healers. That I would work with him to bring the world to a greater destiny. He saw things, Bastian. Horrible things. He would wake from nightmares screaming about dragons and how he would rule them all."
Bastian kept silent. He knew Malachi had stolen the baby dragons for some reason. But to claim it was destiny? Look where destiny had gotten him. Dismembered on the Isle of Repose. He'd also gotten all but two of the baby dragons killed.
"He told me that one day I would use my moon to save the Red Queen. That she would reward us handsomely. That we would be the most powerful of all healers."
"You wouldn't do that." Bastian pulled Elinor in for a hug, her chest and shoulders heaving with every wet breath.
"I can't do that," Elinor said. "It's impossible."
"No, you have your moon back. You used it to heal me, but more than a moon has passed. You can heal again if you choose to. But I know you would never choose to heal the enemy and join her."
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