J is for Jewel, Jaron, Joharadin

Wow! Lots of J words in The Magic Wakes! I guess it's one of my favorite letters? I'll try to keep the sections short since we're going to cover three topics today.

Jewel

Sketch by Chris Beaumont

This dragon sure has held onto her secrets! In fact, when I started writing TMW I thought she was a boy dragon! Several revisions went by before she let me in on that secret, and now she's clued me in on the big one. She'll be back and she has a major roll to play in Talia's life. But you'll have to wait for that.

Historically, Sendek had five dragon clans--green, gold, blue, red and silver. Jewel is a member of the green dragon clan. The same clan whose leader teamed up with Elvin Thule to create the Dragumon. She was too young to have a vote when it came time to decide if the Dragumon should be destroyed or exiled. Her magical powers were strong though and she had felt Shishali's evil and how skillfully she manipulated Kansisi and the other Dragumons. This along with some personal reasons is why she decided to remain on Sendek in hibernation waiting for their return. Every thousand years she would wake from her sleep and travel through portal to the home of the dragons and report the conditions on Sendek. But you'll learn more about that in a future book.

Jaron
*sigh* Jaron is perhaps the biggest surprise of TMW. So many people have told me he was their favorite character and they wanted more of his story. Alas, much of his appeal is his mystery, and why ruin a good thing? Truth is, he likes his privacy even more than Talia does. Perhaps one day I'll discover a short story or two about him, but most likely not.

I'm sort of in love with him too. He symbolizes all our internal struggles. And he chooses to live with them for so long because he knows it makes him strong enough to reach his goal. But when the goal is within reach he makes the decision to let go of all the hurt and evil he's held close. We have to make the same choices every day of our lives. Do we let our demons control us?

When I close my eyes and picture Jaron in his true form (not the Sendekian desguise), I see a blond Jude Law. The piercing blue eyes that are strong while conveying the depths of his pain and loss. Can't you just imagine him being tortured from the inside by a demon he summoned?

Joharadin
The city of Talia's nightmares. The place that she knows she will meet her death. The place she avoided all her life until she couldn't run from fate any longer.

I love the idea that by finally facing her greatest fear, and walking toward what she thought was sure death, she found what she needed most in her life. Love. Acceptance. Hope.

This city has several different layers in my head. I see it as Johar in it's ancient history. This is the place where the Royalist rose up. This is also where Elvin chose to present his Dragumon to the world of men and in the process he met his death. That ancient city looks just like the City of the Kings from LoTR. A great city built into the side of the mountain. Organic.

I started building a language system (which I quickly gave up when I realized it was A LOT of work) and the suffix -din meant child of. So, Joharadin is the child of Johar. Over the centuries it was ravaged and rebuilt as the kingdom of Algodova grew and struggled toward it's world domination. The final city, the one of Talia's day was much more like the cities from Star Wars--Coruscant or the natural melding of cities on Alderaan.

Today's question for you:
What kind of secrets do your characters keep from you? OR What kind of secrets do you keep?