The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume I: Volume I

by Irene Radford

  A hard spot in his heart dissolved. Her small hand sought his. With those few words the jealousy died and love reblossomed in his chest. He clung to her hand, the simple gesture binding them together.

  “What do we do about them?” She gestured to the horsemen who were pounding on the gates for entrance.

  “I know Darville’s banner gives this army authority. But I cannot find any reason our friend would betray our location to those three lords. He might tell Lord Andrall—his loyalty has never been questioned. But those three?” He shrugged in disbelief.

  “Could it have been a trick to disarm your suspicions. You would open the gate willingly for your king.”

  “Aye. But not to Jonnias and the two Marnaks.”

  The wind shifted slightly, carrying the babble of voices from the army. The aura of hatred intensified.

  “I believe we have been betrayed, Brevelan.” By whom? An agent of the fanatical Gnostic Utilitarian cult which decreed that all knowledge must come by hard work and experience, not magic? His best friend? Jaylor faced that painful possibility reluctantly. His spy should have told him about this army before it left the capital. Perhaps the Council had decided to secretly remove Glendon, the king’s bastard son, from Jaylor’s and Brevelan’s custody.

  Never! Jaylor resolved. “Show Master Fraandalor an image of Shayla’s old lair and have him begin transporting the library and the telescopes there. The time has come to find a new sanctuary for the Commune.” Regret hung heavily on his shoulders.

  The sanctity of this remote retreat for aging magicians, priests, and healers should not be violated by an army bent on destruction. Darville should not have succumbed to any of the forces that wanted an end to all magic in Coronnan.

  “Will we be able to protect everyone there?” Brevelan looked out over the undulating sea of soldiers that spread across the hills. The noise of their coming increased.

  “If Krej couldn’t find the path up the mountain without help, then this mundane army won’t be able to either. There is shelter, water, and privacy.” He snatched a quick kiss from her. “Go quickly. I’ll stall the lieutenants at the gates.” The ancient wooden barriers were beginning to buckle from the pounding of sword hilts on the planks.

  Brevelan’s departure emptied the stark room of warmth and sunshine. Jaylor emptied his mind and body of emotion, allowing keen thoughts to focus without distraction. Only by eliminating his beloved from his consciousness could he generate the spells necessary to save her. To save the Commune.

  “Why, Darville? Why are you with these men?” he asked the wind.

  Below him, in the courtyard, the gatekeepers peered out the viewing hole of the right-hand gate. Anxiety written in their posture and the wringing of their hands, they looked up to the tower window for guidance.

  Jaylor uncoiled a thread of magic, linking him to the gatekeepers. He fed them instructions to keep the gates barred, but not to retreat yet.

  The banner-toting envoys drew back a pace. “Yield this sacred stronghold of the Stargods to Darville III, by the grace of the dragons, King of Coronnan!” bellowed the man carrying the banner of Jonnias of Sauria.

  “This enclave belongs to the Stargods, not to any mundane king,” one of the two gatekeepers squeaked a reply. His frail old voice barely carried through the massive wooden barrier.

  The lieutenants growled and consulted among themselves for a stronger command.

  Jaylor directed the gatekeepers to withdraw to the safety of the library.

  “Yield or be taken by force!” the lieutenant of Jonnias cried once more.

  No one was left at the gate to reply.

  The lieutenants hoisted their banners high, Darville’s symbol highest of all, and returned to their comrades.

  The ranks of soldiers lunged forward, anxious to begin. A strange chant issued from a thousand throats. Waves of violent sound chilled Jaylor’s mind. “Kill magic. Kill all magicians.” The chant grew in volume and aggression, fed by a whiff of magic from some unknown source. Battle frenzy swelled, binding the men together for the coming fray.

  “Kill magic. Kill all magicians.”

  Weapons drumming on shields took on the rhythm of a thousand hearts beating in unison; a thousand minds with one goal. Battle. Blood. Heat. Lust.

  “Kill magic. Kill all magicians.”

  Determination rose and rose again as the chant became a shout and then a roar.

  Horror ran before the swelling noise, growing like a living thing. Fear filled the tower chamber and laid a heavy pall of doom on the once-quiet monastery.

  No spell could combat the power of unity and relentless drive generated by the chant. Anyone caught between the men and their objective would be torn limb from limb.

  Small points of deadly fire bloomed on the tips of arrows. Bright blossoms of green flame became a hailstorm of destruction.

  Chapter 10

  Yaakke sat beside the creekbed, replete and rested for the first time since he’d left Coronnan City. He folded his legs under him, palms resting on his knees, open and receptive. He stilled the twitching muscles of his back and thighs. His mind opened reluctantly.

  Three times he had dropped pebbles into the quiet pool at the edge of the creek. As the dropping rock created ripples in the surface of the water, raindrops had interfered with the pattern of ripples. He’d caught glimpses of scenes from his past. Yaakke and Baamin clearing debris from the cache of forbidden books in the tunnels. Yaakke in Brevelan’s clearing with Jaylor, teaching him the secret of transporting live humans without danger . . .

  But no glimpses of the future. The old Rover woman had sworn to Yaakke that the pebble always told what was to come within the next few hours.

  Maybe if Yaakke could properly center his magic, he’d work the Rover spell correctly.

  Fire. Smoke. His vision back at the dragon lair had been so real . . .

  Corby perched on a rock in front of him, head cocked curiously at his strange inactivity. Yaakke resisted the urge to shoo him away. He didn’t need an audience, but he had to remain still or lose his concentration.

  Stargods! He hated meditation. He couldn’t think of any other way to align himself to the Kardia. Knowledge of where he was and what direction he was headed in would follow. He hadn’t seen the sun rise or set beyond the ominous cloud cover for days. His youthful confidence melted with each new onslaught of rain, until he was totally lost and disoriented.

  Once he managed to center his magic, maybe he could sense Shayla’s power. Shayla needs me, he reminded himself.

  The urge to let his muscles move plagued his attempts at stillness. He resisted, forcing his mind to accept the wind and rain as an extension of himself. He heard only the creek rushing over stones. Then his heartbeat filled his ears just as loudly. He breathed deeply, listening.

  Slowly his pulse and the rhythm of his breathing tuned to the rhythm of the land around him. He heard birds on their perches fluffing their feathers against the cold. He felt the sap drift sluggishly within the tree that sheltered him. When his body cried out for him to move, he concentrated on the worms opening new paths through the soil, seeking tiny rootlets.

  Gradually a pull of energy tugged at his back. With eyes closed and a minimal shift of position, he turned to face the tug. This must be south, the nearest planetary pole. The world adjusted its orbit to include him. He merged with the four elements and the cardinal directions, one more piece of the whole.

  Behind his eyelids, his vision centered. Mountains to the south and west. Rolling plains to the north. The Great Bay to the east. The creek flowed north and east. Therefore he must be in the foothills of the south.

  A year ago, Jaylor had taken refuge in a monastery in this general vicinity, one day’s hard walk from Castle Krej. Yaakke had helped Jaylor hide there while they protected an injured Brevelan and Darville, who pranced at his heels, ensorcelled into the body of a golden wolf.

  This morning Yaakke had passed a boulder with a tall everblue growing out
of a crack that nearly split the rock in two. He’d marked it, deep inside his memory, as a pointer during that adventure last spring. Now, as his consciousness floated free of his body, he remembered the landmark. How far away was the monastery? The last time Yaakke had come this way, he’d been on steedback, compelling the animal to move faster than normal. Distances were badly distorted in his memory.

  Yaakke took a deep breath and roused himself from the silence. The rain had ceased and Corby was gone. His campfire smoldered within a ring of rocks three paces away. He fed it a few dry sticks. Flame glowed on the ends, then licked upward to consume the wood.

  He set his pan of water before the fire, allowing it to settle. Green-and-yellow flames reflected in the water. Their gentle movement enticed Yaakke to look deeper into them. He dropped a smooth white pebble into the water.

  Pictures appeared in the watery surface, more flames, bigger, hotter—destructive rather than friendly. Jaylor and Brevelan trapped by falling beams. Yaakke blinked and cleared his eyes of smoke.

  Anxiously Yaakke fixed an image of Jaylor in his mind and sent it through the water to the monastery. He had no shard of glass to direct a summons properly since he’d lost his pack in the void. The reflective surface of the water would have to do. The vision of flames grew higher, fiercer. The Senior Magician appeared in their midst. Frantically Jaylor lifted a fallen beam from a crumpled form. Flames licked at his hands. He ignored them. The muscles of his broad back and shoulders strained, and he grunted as he moved the beam aside with brute force. Why didn’t he use his magic?

  Yaakke watched in horror as his master gathered the unconscious form of Brevelan to his breast, and then they both disappeared as another flaming beam crashed down on top of them.

  Yaakke breathed deeply, sending his mind toward the void in preparation for transport.

  “Naw!” Corby warned him from the top of a tree. Yaakke couldn’t rescue Jaylor and Brevelan if he got lost in the void again. He cast around him for another solution. Smoke drifted on the wind from the west. He tried fixing his magic on Jaylor and Brevelan. He’d never transported two people at the same time before.

  His magic darted around and around the images in the flames. There was no one to latch onto and transport to safety.

  Yaakke took off at a run, over hummocks, around boulders and through a number of icy streams, taking the straightest route toward the smoke. Uphill he ran. Above him and to the left the land rose in a series of grassy plateaus. He crested the first ridge and pressed onward.

  Familiarity tugged at his memory as landmarks flashed past. On and on he ran, until his lungs burned and his legs begged for collapse. Still he ran, stumbling, panting, crying.

  Time and distance ceased to have meaning as he pressed his body to cover more and more ground. The only reality lay in the column of smoke that appeared beyond the next hilltop. He crested the steep rise. Terraced hills came into view half a league ahead.

  The refuge of the Commune should be on the third level, set back from the ridge about two hundred arm-lengths. The smoke thickened in that direction.

  If only he hadn’t taken so much time to center his magic—if only he hadn’t gotten lost in the void—

  The smell of smoke was stronger here, sour and vile. Halfway to the third ridge, Yaakke slowed his pelting progress. He couldn’t breathe. His legs and arms felt like jelled meat broth. His newly awakened contact with the wheel of sun, moon, and stars hummed a warning.

  A pile of boulders, a hundred arm-lengths beyond, offered shadows and a view of the next ridge. He stretched and pulled himself up the rocks, seeking hand- and footholds by instinct. He barked his knuckles and scraped his shins in his haste. At last he crawled on top of the tumbled boulders. Lying flat, barely breathing, he scanned the horizon.

  Ahead, above, and below him stretched an army of jubilant soldiers. Cadres of men capered and jeered as they tossed plunder back and forth in a vicious game of keep away with slighter, less aggressive men. Lean, battle-hardened men in well-used armor. Their evil grins gaped like bottomless pits in their smoke-blackened faces. One scarred sergeant made obscene gestures with a gnarled and twisted staff—the kind of tool favored by magicians.

  The plaited grain in the wood looked suspiciously like Jaylor’s staff—broken and mended by magic at three points. Yaakke sent out another mental probe addressed to his matter. His questions dissipated and died. No mind received or responded.

  On the next ridge, smoke rose in a dense black column. The monastery was gutted, the roof collapsed, and the walls breached in a dozen places.

  Incompetent fools! Couldn’t those bumbling generals tell that Jaylor had whisked his Commune to safety before they entered the buildings? Not a shred of paper left in their library. None of their fabled viewing equipment shattered from the heat of the flames. NOTHING!

  They used the transport spell. I will have that secret. As long as the Commune can jump from place to place without pursuit, none of the coven will be safe. We have to master that spell for our own escapes and secret raids.

  Jaylor’s escape is merely a setback, not a destruction of my goals. His suspicion of Darville’s involvement must remain. I have broken their friendship. I have had a minor success.

  I will not resort to the Tambootie to soothe my irritated nerves. That was the biggest mistake made by both Krej and his sister Janataea. Let us hope The Simeon doesn’t stoop to the drug as well. I need him in the coven and I need his base of temporal power as a sanctuary for Lord Krej.

  “Don’t give up, Hilza!” Katrina sat beside the little box bed in the kitchen holding her sister’s limp hand. Fever had dried the shrunken palm to parchment.

  At least the kitchen was warm now. Last moon, P’pa had overcome M’ma’s prideful objections and rented the upper levels of the narrow townhouse to street merchants, students, and artists. The money they paid Fraanken Kaantille bought firewood to heat the entire house and enough plain food to keep the family alive. But no amount of money could buy medicine to combat the lung rot that gripped half of Queen’s City.

  The rasping wheeze of Hilza’s lungs was the only reply to Katrina’s plea. Apprehension clawed at Katrina’s heart. Her little sister had slipped into unconsciousness last evening as her fever soared.

  Now, in the darkest hours before midwinter dawn, Hilza opened her eyes. Katrina bit her lip as she saw the hazy film covering her sister’s vision. Hilza’s breath grew shallower, more labored.

  Katrina rolled a blanket and stuffed it behind Hilza’s head, propping her as upright as possible. Her sister’s head lolled loosely on her weakened neck. Spasms racked her frail body as her lungs tried one more time to clear themselves of the accumulated fluid. Violent tremors passed through her limbs and bloody spittle trickled from her parched mouth.

  “P’pa, wake up. I need your help!” Katrina called.

  “I’m awake,” Fraanken answered as he rose stiffly from the straight-backed chair where he had dozed fitfully most of the night. Sadly he lifted his youngest daughter, supporting her head on his shoulder.

  Always, since the lung rot had grabbed hold of Hilza last autumn, P’pa’s cradling comfort had been able to overcome the worst of the cough. Not tonight. Hilza continued to choke and bleed with the disease that killed its victims, young and old, hale and weak.

  “Awaken your mother, Katey.” P’pa stroked Hilza’s back, trying desperately to soothe her.

  Katrina ran up the stairs to the guest parlor on the ground floor that was now her parents’ bedroom.

  A lamp on the dresser cast a dim glow on the room. Frightened at this sign of negligence and waste on the part of her mother, Katrina hastened to extinguish the tiny flame. Her eyes strayed to the wide bed where her mother should be asleep. The down quilts—remnants of better times—lay flat and empty, undisturbed by any sleeper.

  “M’ma?” Katrina searched the dim corners for some sign of her mother’s presence. No flicker of movement or shadow out of place. “M’ma!” she called l
ouder.

  A cold draft made the lamp flame flicker. Katrina raced to the entry seeking the source of the frigid air. The inner door stood wide open. Beyond it, the outer door was closed but not latched.

  “M’ma!” Katrina screamed in fear. She tugged on the outer door. Three filaments of white silk hung tangled in the lock. The finest yarn available that Tattia had woven into a lace shawl for Queen Miranda last autumn. A present the queen’s husband had rejected as unworthy of his wife because it had been made by a disgraced Kaantille. Queen Miranda hadn’t been allowed to view the gift and decide for herself to accept or reject it. Just yesterday, M’ma had tried again to see the queen and present her gift. She’d been evicted from the palace at the kitchen gate, before she reached Miranda.

  Katrina stared at the threads. Her chin quivered in uncertainty. She returned to the bedroom, seeking some sign of her mother. Tattia’s last woolen gown lay draped over the clothespress. Her cloak and shoes were in place. Nothing seemed missing except Tattia and the infamous lace shawl.

  Tattia had worn the shawl as a badge of honor ever since the rejection by King Simeon. A merchant, unknown to Katrina or her father, had offered to buy the shawl several times. Proud Tattia had refused to let it go. Now she had gone out in the predawn freeze wearing nothing but her nightrail and the silken lace.

  Katrina ran back to the kitchen. Her father gently laid Hilza’s slack body on the straw mattress. Tears streamed down his careworn cheeks.

  “P’pa?” Katrina choked on the fears that swamped her.

  “There is nothing more we can do, Katey. Our baby is gone. We must be grateful that she is no longer in pain, no longer struggling for every breath.” He stood over the body of his youngest daughter, shoulders slumped.

  “P’pa, I’m frightened. I think M’ma ran away. She didn’t wear her cloak or her shoes.”

  Fraanken looked up from his contemplation of death. His chin trembled with the effort to control himself. “Stay with your sister. One of us must watch over her until her spirit is prepared for passing.” There was no one else. He didn’t need to remind Katrina that Maaben no longer considered herself part of the family. “I will search for your mother. Perhaps she finally agreed to sell the shawl. She would have to go in secret because of King Simeon’s ban on her work.”