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“I know, but I also can’t have a half-mad female running through Stonefire.” Kai moved to the door and stopped to hold up his mobile phone. “Keep me in the loop.”
With that, the dragonman left, keeping the door open.
After sitting, Bronx quickly tucked the sedative between his leg and the side of the chair and stared at the still female form on the bed.
Her chest moved up and down, but nothing else. Her face was partially turned toward him. She had brown hair and extremely pale skin, as if she’d never been outside, and he could make out the edges of a red birthmark on her neck, one that brushed the edges of her jaw.
He had no idea how old she was, but she was young. Too fucking young to have suffered all she probably had.
Just the thought of his only daughter, Violet, being held prisoner, raped, or tortured made his stomach turn. His daughter was only fifteen, and the female on the bed couldn’t be more than ten years older than her.
His dragon said softly,Violet is safe. But we can try to help this female as much as we can. She deserves a better life than what she’s had to date.
For a second, his confidence faltered. Dr. Serafina Rossi would’ve been a better choice—a female talking to a female survivor—but he was all they had. No one else even remotely possessed the training he had.
And for most dragon-shifters, their first instinct was to push, and demand, and be a bit bossy. That would probably be counterproductive with someone like Percy.
Maybe once they’d figured out if she was friend or foe, he could bring in Nikki or another clan member to help her feel safe. Because being constantly surrounded by males probably wouldn’t do it.
He was lost in thought, thinking of who might be able to help, when Dr. Sid strode into the room. Her mousy brown hair was in its usual ponytail, but she didn’t have a white lab coat on like she usually wore at the surgery. Instead, she had on dark jeans and a short-sleeved blue top.
At his raised brow, Dr. Sid shrugged. “They said she’d been surrounded by so-called doctors in white coats. And given the state of the others and what little I’ve already learned, the white coat signaled hell and misery to them.”
Bronx tucked away that bit of information, along with a note to find out what he could from anyone who’d been on the rescue mission. The more intel he had, the more easily he could form a plan for Percy. He nodded. “I’ll need statements or reports about their experiences.” Dr. Sid frowned, but he added quickly, “Just generalizations. It’ll help me figure out who this female is a lot quicker.”
Once Kai had sent a message that Percy had been imprisoned the longest, Bram, Stonefire’s clan leader, had made the decision to assign Percy to Bronx. The others would go to those with lesser training.
That meant Percy was probably the most traumatized. Any of the inmates would’ve suffered, but this one had been clever enough to survive. Not only that, but she had been smart enough to come up with a plan once Ava and Joey were handed into her care.
To keep that kind of intelligence and calm intact, she’d probably had some sort of coping mechanism in place. If it failed her, it wouldn’t be good.
And if they wanted to learn as much as possible from Percy, they needed to keep her from falling apart.
As Dr. Sid checked her over, Bronx stood and turned away, to give them privacy. It was hard to remain calm and still, since he wanted to get to work right away. However, he couldn’t do anything that might set her off. She probably had triggers he needed to learn. Plus, if she’d been imprisoned a long time, she’d probably never had choices before.
He wanted to give them to her.
His dragon spoke up.We will. And Kai and the others will make the bastards responsible for hurting her pay.
Dr. Sid said, “You can turn around.”
He did and saw Percy now was on her back, the covers tucked up to her neck.
“Kai found a dart near her body, and it was some kind of sedative. She’ll be out for a while yet.” She motioned toward the door. “We need to chat.”
He glanced one last time at Percy and followed the dragon doctor down the hall and into the kitchen. She turned and didn’t beat around the bush. “I still need to run tests on her blood, but if she’s like the others, she’s been given the sleeping dragon drug for years. I don’t know if, or when, her dragon might return. The safest thing would be to keep her restrained, and yet I’m hesitant to do that.” She lowered her voice. “Some of the others mentioned being used for fertility experiments and pain threshold tests and all other kinds of bloody barbaric practices. If that’s true for Percy too, which I suspect it is, her dragon could wake up rogue and out of control. Especially if it’s true she spent seven years in that hellhole, she would’ve been a child when she first set foot inside. She probably didn’t even have proper training on how to control her dragon.”
The thought of a girl younger than his own daughter being imprisoned, her dragon drugged silent, and who the bloody hell knew what kind of pain she’d endured, made both man and beast growl.
Dr. Sid nodded. “I feel the same way. I’ll consult some of my fellow doctors to see if there’s ever been a case like hers, or at least one that’s been recorded. Until then, we might have to keep her dragon silent, administering it secretly via a food source instead of a syringe. But at the same time, I don’t want to lose any possibility of trust. What do you suggest, Bronx?”
He tapped his fingers against his thigh. “I need to talk to her, but with other females present. Until I learn more about what she’s gone through, what she suffered, or even how hostile or guarded she is, I can’t form a plan. There are certain things that might trigger memories or bring back suppressed memories, so we need to be careful.”
Dr. Sid nodded. “We’ll have to discuss it with Dr. Rossi on the video conference Bram scheduled for later. Also, Dr. Layla McFarland is coming down from Lochguard to help for a few days. But for now, I have eight new patients to attend to. I wish Bram would allow them inside Stonefire and inside my surgery, although I understand why he’s being cautious.”
All of the rescued prisoners, apart from Ava and Joey, were in the various cabins located on the edge of the clan’s land. It was stretching the Protectors and the medical staff thin.
Bronx nodded. “I’ll work with Zain later. Maybe we can put some questions together to help figure out their loyalties. Although I’ll be realistic with you—this kind of stuff could take a lifetime to fully move past, if she can at all.”
