The Wizard's Treasure (The Dragon Nimbus)

by Irene Radford

  Katrina gasped and tried to wrench her hand away.

  He held her tighter, seeing precisely how much pressure he exerted with his solid hand against her seemingly transparent flesh.

  A moment more and the last vessel closed. He encouraged the tendon tissue to knit and expel foreign matter so tiny only Jack’s magic could see it. Then he brought the muscle and skin together, binding them loosely with magic. Best if they finished healing on their own.

  At last he sat back on his heels and withdrew from the intimate contact. Sweat poured from his brow and his heart pounded erratically. Too tired to eat, he just wanted to curl up and sleep. He closed his eyes and still saw the pulses of energy and layers of color in the hand he kept within his own.

  “You did it, Jack,” Katrina said quietly. “I knew all along you had the healing touch. It only hurt a little.”

  Judging by the quieting layers of energy in her aura, that was a lie she almost believed.

  She brushed a stray lock of hair off his forehead. Her fingers lingered and traced his cheek. He turned his face just enough to kiss her palm.

  “It will be stiff for a few days, while it finishes healing. But you’ll be handling bobbins with ease after that,” he reassured her.

  “Time to get moving,” Margit said brusquely. She stood up and brushed her trews clean of the creekside debris. “Has your cat found the pack steed yet?”

  “He’s working on it.” Flashes of images began to penetrate Jack’s mind. Tall trees, rising terrain as they neared the mountain barrier between SeLenicca and Coronnan. A scatter of small buildings at the base of a hill. More trees and then—atop the hill a jumble of stones with many pack steeds and sledges milling among the stones. A great deal of black with purple-and-red trim adorned the saddles, packs and rounded huts atop the sledges. He knew who owned them.

  He sat up straighter, pushing Amaranth to focus more closely on the stones.

  Not jumbled haphazardly. Worked stone stacked carefully and mortared into thick walls. A steedshoeshaped building—squared off at the corners—with an exterior wall connecting the two outthrusting wings and forming a wide courtyard.

  And there, quietly nickering to one of the smaller beasts harnessed to a sledge, stood Margit’s white pack steed.

  “Found him!” Jack stood up, dragging Katrina with him. “Only a mile or two off, that way.” He pointed west and slightly south where they could see the beginning of the rising ground and the dense forest around the hill. The line of everblues blocked their view of the building.

  Margit threw dried meat and journey bread at Jack from her pack as she leaped astride her mount. “Eat as we ride. You need to replenish energies lost while working magic. We need that steed and its supplies. If we delay, it may wander farther.”

  More slowly, Katrina stuck her foot into a stirrup. Jack pushed her into the saddle. Then, closing his eyes and forcing Rosie to the back of his consciousness, he clambered up behind her.

  The cat within him roiled and wanted to spit. He fought it. His need to remain close to Katrina overcame the cat’s hissing fear. More like a need to have its own way than a real fear.

  Jack almost laughed out loud at this insight. “I’ll match you stubborn for stubborn, cat,” he said to himself.

  Katrina looked over her shoulder at him in question.

  “I think I found a solution to my problem,” he whispered into Katrina’s ear as he wound his arms around her waist. “Our steed found a bunch of Rover steeds. I believe they belong to my grandfather. The original spell that bound the queen to her cat was danced by Rovers. We’ll have my grandfather’s people reverse it for me and put the cat into Amaranth’s body where it belongs.”

  “Rovers.” Katrina gulped and stiffened in his arms. She did not urge her mount forward.

  Neeles Brunix, the man who had owned her for three years; used and abused her for his own gain, had flaunted his half-Rover connections, the same blood mix as Jack.

  CHAPTER 32

  “There’s a village,” Margit whooped. “We’ll purchase supplies and a new pack steed here. No sense going off on a wild lumbird chase after the other one.” She set her heels into the sides of her mount.

  Katrina did likewise.

  Jack bounced uncomfortably on the spine of the animal, clinging to Katrina for dear life. The cat spirit rose sharply to the front of his senses. His back arched, the hair on his nape and along his backbone stood up. A curious itch in his bottom felt as if a tail twitched in agitation. He swallowed the angry hiss that climbed from his gut to his throat like a too-long-suppressed cough. Rosie really did not like this steed.

  “I am stronger than you,” he hissed at the cat.

  “What?” Katrina spared him a look over her shoulder while she gripped the reins firmly with her right hand, fully in control of her mount. She rested her bandaged left hand in her lap.

  “Nothing, love. Take this path angling off to the south.” He relived the course Amaranth had flown in pursuit of the errant steed. Even now the flywacket perched atop a high stone tower, trying to make sense of the images that wandered in and out of his vision. Jack couldn’t make sense of them either. He hoped the confusion came from Amaranth’s youth and lack of experience and not what he feared.

  “But Margit . . .”

  “Margit will follow. Her mission is to take care of you. She won’t let us stray too far without her.”

  “Her true mission is to find Marcus. She can do that a lot easier without me. And now that you have come to see me safely into SeLenicca she will go off on her own, no matter what Jaylor orders.”

  “And leave you without a chaperone? Not likely. She knows her best chance of finding Marcus and Robb is to stick with me. Just guide this monstrous beast up that path to the top of the hill. I have a feeling we’ll all find answers up there.”

  He blinked rapidly trying to sort the curious double vision. Amaranth’s continuous feed of bizarre images, much clearer now that he perched atop a tower than when he flew, overlaid his own sensory view. He had to fight for balance the entire time. Then Rosie had to add her own confused perceptions, relying more on scent and sound than sight. Jack nearly lost his meager breakfast.

  Amaranth sensed Rosie’s need to understand through her other senses, and he began to relay scent impressions more than visual. Too many bodies confined together. Too many bewildered steeds. Strange cooking smells that relied heavily upon timboor, the fruit of the Tambootie tree, and something very old on the verge of decay.

  And then Amaranth focused sharply on a curious statue perched atop the largest and gaudiest of the Rover bardos. A tin weasel. At one time the statue had been dipped in gold and the outermost layer had begun to flake off. The flywacket knew the weasel form, but could not understand why the statue did not smell of weasel.

  Krej. Jack’s heart fell. Another problem for him to deal with before he could take Katrina to SeLenicca.

  (Gold!) the flywacket proclaimed.

  At one time the dragons had told Jack that they valued gold and jewels almost as much as humans. Gold represented the power of the Kardia, a symbol of the beauty of life.

  Rosie recognized the value humans placed upon gold and reared up, ready to make Jack pounce.

  Hold back, Amaranth. Do not announce your presence or betray your wings. I will be there, in a few moments. We can investigate together, he ordered his familiar.

  Ruthlessly, he forced Rosie away from the front of his consciousness. It fought him every finger-length of the way.

  Amaranth reluctantly folded his wings but continued to peer avariciously at the statue.

  Jack closed his eyes again, reducing the onslaught of sensations. His stomach slid back down from his throat to about the middle of his chest. Manageable.

  Silently he called Amaranth to him. Maybe if he could reduce the number of perspectives, he could conquer the queasiness.

  Amaranth remained stubbornly in place. (Must keep the gold from disappearing like funny men,) the flywack
et returned.

  “What funny men?” Jack muttered.

  Katrina pulled on the reins and looked back at him questioningly. He motioned her forward.

  Then another view of the monastery with a thick haze over all. The vague outlines, as if viewing them through a thick fog, of mingling steeds and Rover bardos superimposed onto his already distorted visions. This one came from high above them. Briefly he caught a glimpse of himself and Katrina atop the lumbering steed. He watched them climbing the long trail that circled the hill half a dozen times before ending abruptly at the tree line a few yards from the gatehouse tower.

  His stomach lurched again. “Don’t fly, Amaranth,” he pleaded with his familiar. Then he realized that the new view came from yet another source. A dragon flew above.

  “Shayla?” he asked the unseen observer.

  “Shayla?” Katrina looked up in delight.

  (Baamin,) the blue-tipped male dragon replied with a chuckle. (Shayla’s son fares better than you do, young Jack.) Another laugh rippled across Jack’s consciousness. (You can sever the link between your minds upon occasion.)

  “I don’t want him to feel lost. We need this time of constant contact to solidify our bond.” Jack looked up trying to catch a glimpse of the magician turned dragon who had been his mentor and father figure as well as father in another life. “You taught me that with Corby, my first familiar.”

  Katrina patted his hand. “How sweet, Jack. I hope you are as considerate of our children.” She must have heard the dragon. Unusual. Normally, only Shayla communicated with her.

  “I’m glad you are still thinking of our future.” Jack nuzzled her neck, drinking in her unique smell and the silkiness of her hair.

  (There will be many times when you do not wish a third participant in your life, Jack. Amaranth will wait for you.) Baamin broke off his verbal and visual contact. Abruptly, Amaranth’s contribution ceased as well.

  Jack sensed a tiny squeak of protest from his familiar just before his vision centered upon what his eyes could see alone.

  Relief came to his stomach with a sense of emptiness. The cat settled into a contented purr within him. The vibrations centered at the base of his spine. Since his attention was no longer divided between the cat and the flywacket, Rosie had nothing further to contribute.

  Jack almost panicked at the loss of Amaranth’s familiar presence in his mind. They’d been linked constantly since before the purple dragonet’s transformation. He took a deep breath and accepted the temporary separation. Temporary, he reminded himself and the cat.

  You know, if you had gone into Amaranth’s body as planned, you wouldn’t have anything to be jealous of, he reminded Rosie.

  The cat continued to purr without further comment, setting up an almost sexual satisfaction within Jack as the vibrations radiated out from his spine. His bottom stopped itching, as if his invisible tail curled around his hips in contentment.

  “What was that all about?” Katrina asked.

  “Did Baamin show you the view from above?”

  “I only caught bits and pieces through a thick fog. My contact with him is not as—as complete as it is with Shayla. But I sense his approval of me. He wants to deepen our contact. What is that strange building atop the hill that he seemed so concerned about?”

  “I’m guessing from the shape it’s an abandoned monastery from long ago. People who aren’t supposed to be there have recently taken up residence.”

  “What people?”

  “Rovers.” The bardos atop the sledges were distinctly Rover in construction and painted design. But why had the owners neglected the sledges and pack beasts? Rovers always attended to their animals very carefully before seeing to their own needs. Always. Steeds carried nearly as much value to them as the gold coins they wore on their sashes and caps. Only children represented more wealth than gold and steeds.

  The distinctive purple and red that dominated the colors of those bardos proclaimed them the possessions of Zolltarn, self-styled king of all Rovers, member of the Commune of Magicians, and Jack’s grandfather. That clan had an abundance of babies born in the last four years—to replace the men who had died quite suddenly the year before Zolltarn changed his loyalties from coven to Commune. The dragons had a hand in the loss of those men, and the Rovers had never quite trusted them as a source of magic or as a benign presence since.

  Zolltarn used dragon magic and his membership in the Commune to serve his own ends. Only he of all master magicians dared ignore a summons from Senior Magician Jaylor.

  “I might have known that Zolltarn would end up with the statue of Krej,” he muttered.

  “Amaranth. I need you to look again. Where are the children, where are the Rovers for that matter? They wouldn’t abandon their steeds and bardos.” He relinquished the moments of quiet single vision in favor of information.

  He saw again the bardos still harnessed to the steeds; the riding steeds wandering about the large courtyard, grazing on the overgrown herb garden; a woman he did not know sitting on the step beside the well, face buried in her hands, her shoulders heaving with sobs. Beside her stood a familiar and unwelcome figure. He sensed more than recognized the aura of his old enemy Lanciar from SeLenicca. What was he doing in Coronnan? And if Lanciar was about, Rejiia could not be far behind.

  Then the Rovers and several other figures emerged from inside the building. They looked nearly transparent, outlined in silver like a dragon. All of them had become ghosts!

  At that moment Katrina stopped their steed abruptly at the gate tower. Jack slid from its back, half planning to dismount, half falling from distorted balance and perception.

  “We’ve got some real problems here. Stay outside the walls, Katrina. Whatever happens, you and Margit stay outside the walls.” He walked quietly through the gate, keeping to the shadows.

  “Your problems are my problems, Jack.” Behind him, Katrina dismounted and followed closely on his heels.

  Vareena rose from her seat by the well and marched out into the courtyard. Steeds milled about, placing their burdensome sledges at odd angles. She stumbled over an abandoned pack, slipped in a fresh pile of dung and landed heavily against the sledge cabin. A tin weasel with flaking gilt paint grinned down at her as it teetered on its porch.

  “S’murghit!” she cursed in very unladylike tones. “I refuse to be responsible anymore. I’m leaving.” She righted herself and aimed for the gate.

  “Wait, you can’t abandon us. You’re the only one who knows what’s going on,” the blond man who remained human grabbed her sleeve and kept her from retreating out the gate.

  Another steed—taller and stockier than the beasts that had come with the Rovers—blocked the exit. Its sides heaved as if it had run a long distance. She’d not shove it aside without help, not for a while yet anyway.

  “You can leave this cursed place with me,” she said flatly, shoving her way through the crowded courtyard. Ghosts began appearing among the steeds. She bounced away from them into more animals, dogs and chickens as well as the pack beasts.

  “No, I can’t leave. They have my son. I can’t find him without your help, and I won’t leave him with these people.”

  “A child?” Vareena stopped short, heart aching for the lost souls condemned to this place. Why had this man been spared but not his son?

  “My son is still a baby, a tiny baby with black hair and brilliant blue eyes. Please help me find him. Please help me to hold him one more time before this terrible curse takes him from me forever.” The man who had appeared so confident when he walked through the gate looked helpless now. A great deal of pain and longing poured out of his eyes.

  “Vareena!” Marcus pelted out of the library into the courtyard. “Vareena, don’t leave me, please. I need you. I love you,” he panted as he skidded to a halt scant inches from her.

  “Marcus?” Vareena peered at his insubstantial form, not certain she had heard him correctly.

  “Yes, Vareena. I love you. I have from the mom
ent I first saw you. Please stay. I can find an answer to this problem. I know I can.” He rammed his right fist into the pocket of is trews while his left hand reached out tentatively as if to brush a stray lock of hair from her brow. A sharp tingle of energy repulsed him before he made contact with her.

  “No, Marcus, you do not love me. You can’t.” Not Marcus, her heart wailed. Why couldn’t it be Robb. ’Tis Robb I love. Will always love.

  Having acknowledged her attraction to the dark-haired magician, she knew she could not abandon Robb or his friend now. She needed to see this through to the end, even if she remained here the rest of her life, like her mother, and her mother’s mother before her.

  Once cursed by the monastery and the hoard of gold, the women of her family were cursed forever.

  Her last hope of freedom slid away.

  CHAPTER 33

  “Making your own luck doesn’t always work,” Marcus said as he trudged back to the library from Vareena’s side. She’d stay to help. Now he needed to stay by Robb until his friend also figured out the source of the curse.

  He watched the Rovers step through the constant veil of mist into his reality. His heart lodged in his throat. How could he push Robb to discover the secret with all of these Rovers complicating things?

  “This is bad luck for all of us,” Robb agreed.

  The hair on the back of Marcus’ neck stood on end. An unnatural chill climbed his spine. He whipped around to face the ghost of Ackerly. The misty form coalesced into a nearly solid being. His aura pulsed brighter as he sped across the massive library, sacrificial knife raised over his head.

  “He’s a Bloodmage,” Robb hissed. “He gains power from inflicting pain and drawing blood!”

  ‘Zolltarn, look out!” Marcus called. He dove for the Rover, knocking him to the ground. Ackerly’s knife sliced through the air where Zolltarn’s neck had been. In the same movement, Marcus drew Zolltarn’s long dagger and turned on the ghost.