The Wizard's Treasure (The Dragon Nimbus)

by Irene Radford

  The dragonet and Katrina cocked their heads in curiously similar gestures of acute listening. Jack’s heart swelled with possibilities and love for them both.

  He smiled fondly at them and the image they presented. Family. His family.

  “As a purple dragon, a very rare and special being, either you or Iianthe must give up your dragon form soon.”

  The dragon nodded sagely, suddenly more mature and experienced than any two-year-old had a right to be.

  “If you transform into a catlike creature, you can help me entice Rosie the cat out of Queen Mikka. Then you can stay with me forever as my familiar. As a dragon, you must make a lair of your own and live alone.”

  Perhaps, as a cat, Amaranth would lose a little of his awkwardness. Jack had never known a clumsy cat.

  “This is a really important task, Amaranth. I really need your help.”

  As long as Rosie remained joined to Rossemikka, the queen’s body would be unbalanced and she could not produce the heir that the country needed so badly for stability. The Gnuls preyed on that instability to spread their litany of fear.

  (An elegant solution to our problems, Jack,) Shayla said from a great distance.

  Jack sensed her presence, high above the city as she soared on a thermal. He knew she would not be too far away while one of her brood explored the world.

  “You agree with the plan?” he asked.

  Katrina struck an acute listening pose as well. Ever since she had bandaged Shayla’s wing with the unique lace shawl woven of Tambrin thread spun from the Tambootie trees, she had shared a rapport with the dragon.

  (How did you know that one of the two forms a redundant purple dragon may take is the flywacket?)

  “Flywacket? What’s a flywacket?”

  (A creature that has not been seen in this land in many generations of humans, but thanks to you, one will once again grace us with its wisdom and life force.)

  Somehow grace and wisdom did not fit Amaranth.

  “Flywacket, huh? If everyone agrees, we can try it tonight.”

  “So soon?” Katrina’s eyes grew wide with just a touch of panic.

  “Tonight! In the central grove on Sacred Isle. There should be enough space there for Shayla and Amaranth and everyone else.”

  He remembered with joy the day he had found his magician’s staff within one of the sacred oaks there. Performing the greatest spell of his life should take place in the same sacred grove. A few weeks ago he thought bringing the dragons home and defeating Rejiia should have been the magical achievement of a lifetime. What awaited him after this?

  “Why wait another day? Queen Mikka has been waiting three years to be rid of that cat. Tonight I perform the spell. Tomorrow we will marry. The day after we journey to SeLenicca.” He kissed Katrina soundly, wanting to linger. But the logistics of the magic pulled at his concentration. “I have to leave now, love. A spell of this magnitude requires a lot of preparation.”

  Amaranth squealed in delight. His dragon language rose shrill and piercing. Jack and Katrina both covered their ears rather than linger with another kiss.

  “Uh, Shayla, will you call your dragonet? He’s making a shambles of this wall and our eardrums.”

  A dragonlike chuckle sounded in the back of Jack’s head. A moment later Amaranth cocked his head and obediently, but clumsily, flapped his ungainly wings for a launch. The dragonet tilted dangerously forward, nearly brushing his nose against a prickly rosebush.

  Jack dashed forward to make sure the dragonet didn’t bump his muzzle and sensitive horn bud—again—when he crashed into the paving.

  At the last minute, Amaranth got enough air under his wings and cleared the courtyard by a talon length. Moments later he disappeared into the air, one more silvery distortion of light on this bright Spring day.

  “Tonight, my love. I’ll do the spell tonight. Trust me, everything will be all right. Then we’ll go home to SeLenicca.” Jack promised.

  “I trusted you with my life when all of SeLenicca conspired against me,” she replied, looking at her threads rather than him.

  “Tomorrow we will wed.” He kissed her again, cherishing the warmth of her body in his arms. “Trust me. We will be happy together. I’ll never hurt you. Ever.”

  CHAPTER 12

  Vareena opened the sagging gates of the monastery. She must remember to send Yeenos with a work party to repair the hinges.

  The villagers grumbled about the extra—and to them unnecessary—work of keeping the old site in good repair. Some, led by Yeenos himself, had refused outright when she’d requested repairs to the broken gutters last moon. She wondered how many more times she could command them.

  If the orders had come from Lord Laislac, they would obey without question. But since they came from her, a spinster no man wanted, they questioned their duty constantly.

  Did her mother and grandmother have the same trouble with recalcitrant villagers?

  What she really needed right now was a bolt of lightning, judiciously aimed at a few reluctant backsides.

  Instead, she had two new ghosts to cater to, just when she thought she’d get a rest from her duties and a chance to escape.

  The silver-and-amethyst amulet weighed heavily against her neck. It seemed to taunt her with broken promises of freedom; from her duties, from the scorn of the villagers, from her brothers.

  She kept the amulet hidden beneath her shift lest her family steal it from her.

  Early sunshine barely penetrated to the monastery courtyard through the ever-present haze. The mist seemed thicker today. “Good morning!” she called cheerfully. In all this haze she’d not see her ghosts easily. They’d have to come to her today. With direct light or within the building, she could see them quite easily as misty outlines with hints of color in their clothing. Hair and eye color tended to bleach out with only vague suggestions of fair or dark. Out here, with the light scattering in all directions and lingering nowhere, even those brief hints of their presence evaporated.

  If she couldn’t see them, could she pretend they did not exist and make her escape to the promised acres in Nunio?

  No. These two new ghosts had only recently passed into their amorphous existence. They needed her.

  She took a moment to stand beside the fresh grave among the foundation stones of the original temple in the southeast corner. When the magicians and priests abandoned this place, they had dismantled the house of worship to prevent desecration. “Stargods, watch over your servant Farrell as he passes to his next existence. Guide him with your wisdom. And grant his family peace in accepting his death though they have heard nothing from him in over two years.”

  Silence hung so heavy in this corner that she wondered if her prayer had escaped any better than any of her ghosts.

  Prayers complete, she searched for traces of Marcus’ magician-blue tunic, trews, and sash. She suspected the color matched his eyes exactly. Robb on the other hand, with dark, hooded eyes that brooded mysteriously, favored black for all but his identifying tunic and cloak.

  She worried about him. He hadn’t accepted his transition to ghosthood with Marcus’ good humor and optimism.

  “Over here, Vareena,” Marcus called to her.

  Without seeing him, she sensed the smile behind his voice. Her own lips curved upward in response. He told wonderfully funny accounts of their journeys. He made her laugh when her life seemed so hopeless. She searched the curtain wall on the other side of the gatehouse tower for signs of his vague outline.

  “No, I’m over here by the well,” Marcus called again.

  Vareena turned toward the stone circle that enclosed the pool of water. It had once provided for over one hundred men. Now it served only two. She trusted Marcus to direct her correctly. She’d never had a ghost trick her. Or lie to her—unlike the people of her village.

  “I brought you breakfast,” she said to the air, hoping she directed her words in the proper direction. She’d waited four days to come back. Ghosts never needed to eat
more than once or twice a week.

  “Thanks, I’m hungry.” The trencher of bread and cheese covered by a plain linen cloth floated from her hands. Ghosts could touch inanimate objects in this world, but not a living being. Life energies generated a barrier that repelled ghosts from humans and humans from ghosts.

  “Did anyone ever tell you how beautiful you are, Vareena?” Marcus asked. “I would compose poetry to you, but you defy the limitation of words.”

  She dismissed his admiration. Other ghosts had told her as much. They had no one else to speak to, share their thoughts with, or pass the idle hours. Of course they fell in love with her, or her mother before her, or her grandmother before that.

  If she were as beautiful as they claimed, then some normal man would have claimed her as his wife by now.

  Nothing could come of Marcus’ flirtations. These men were ghosts, after all. And she must cater to them until they died. Quite likely these two could last for the rest of her life rather than a bare two years.

  “Step into shadows, so I can see you, please.” She continued to search the area around the well for some trace of distorted light or a wisp of mist.

  There! The outline of Robb, the dark and brooding one, materialized on the far side of the well as he slumped to sit on the ground with his back against the stone circle.

  “Why bother eating,” Robb grumbled. “We’re trapped here until we die. Might as well hasten the process and get on into our next existence.”

  His dark eyes burned through the mist of the gloaming into her soul.

  “I wish I could help you,” she murmured. Her entire body ached for him, trapped here with no hope.

  And then she realized that she ached for herself as well.

  “Coronnan is doomed. We’ll never find the dragons and return magic to the Commune. Without dragon magic and controls, the lords will tear the country apart. Three hundred years of peace will evaporate like mist in sunshine. I wonder if this gloom ever evaporates. Everything is lost because we sought shelter here during a storm.” Robb buried his face in his hands.

  “Is he always so gloomy?” Vareena asked, wary of her own sensitivity to his emotions.

  “No. I can usually persuade him to look on the bright side.” Marcus moved around the well until he crouched beside Robb. “We’ll find a way out of this, friend. We always do. My luck will return. It always does.”

  “And if your good luck has deserted us permanently? As the dragons deserted Coronnan?” Robb thrust Marcus’ placating hand off his arm.

  “Then you will develop a plan, like you always do.”

  “I told you yesterday and the day before, and the day before that, your luck has run out and I never had any.”

  “There has to be a way out of here. I don’t know how or why yet, but there has to be,” Vareena said. Did she truly believe that? She must, or she would not have said so.

  Her mother had taught her that lies—even those said in comfort—served no purpose. Vareena had never knowingly lied before.

  Tentatively, she reached to touch Robb’s shoulder, offering what comfort she could—as she would to any living person in the village. Her hand tingled as she neared him. Resolutely she pushed herself closer, resisting the urge to jerk her hand back. The strange sensation in her hand and arm did not really hurt. Felt more like the pinpricks when she lay too long with her weight on a hand or foot.

  At last she made contact with him—almost. Her hand did not so much pass through him as curve around a soft mass, not quite liquid, not quite solid. Then the barrier of energy broke through her willpower and thrust her hand aside.

  Her hand and arm had not faded when she touched the ghost, however briefly.

  Robb looked at her. All of his hurt and despair poured from him into her. Her heart twisted and found a new rhythm.

  The world seemed to shift beneath her feet as she sought a new destiny. One that included this sorrowful man.

  “I brought a deck of cartes to help pass the time.” She proffered the painted sheets of pressed wood.

  Robb took them from her. He shuffled them idly. “Maybe I can finally win a game with Marcus now that his luck has deserted him. That’s about the only good that’s come out of this mess.”

  “I will help you find a way out of this,” Vareena vowed. Her heart ached for the sadness that made Robb’s shoulders slump and his mouth frown. “I promise on my sacred duty to serve the ghosts that haunt this place, that I will find a way to help you back into this existence. We will end the curse of this place so that no one becomes a ghost here again.” Perhaps then I will finally be able to claim my acres in Nunio and be free.

  Robb stood in the shadows of the north tower above the kitchen and refectory watching Marcus watch Vareena. After hours playing a complex three-handed game of cartes—which Marcus won quite handily—Vareena had left on errands (she said for the night but only a few hours had passed) and returned again while the sun still rode high in the sky.

  Part of his heart rejoiced every time Marcus sighed with longing directed at Vareena. If Marcus did truly love the woman—her maturity might give Marcus the steadying influence Robb thought he needed—then Marcus would forget his longtime passion for Margit. Margit would be hurt, of course. But when she healed, then perhaps, if he courted her very carefully, perhaps Robb could win her heart.

  Another part of him coiled in anger against his best friend. How could Marcus be so callous? How could he forget Margit so easily? How could he hurt her thus?

  He remembered the first time he’d seen Margit. She had met them in the market square near where her mother sold baked goods.

  “Tell Jaylor that the queen swears she will educate any daughters she bears in the ways of Rossemeyer. I presume that means she will bare her breasts and cover her hair. But the Gnuls in the city whisper that magic is not illegal in Rossemeyer and the queen wants her daughters to learn to throw magic.” Margit’s harsh whisper reached Robb’s ears before he realized that Jaylor’s spy in the palace had found him before he’d spotted her.

  He honed in on the direction of the whisper and spotted several of the queen’s maids examining the produce in the cart where Marcus and Robb lounged in seeming idleness. All of the maids were dressed alike in fine green brocade with low bodices and skirts that fell in wide folds to completely cover their shoes. All five of the women had veiled their hair as well. But one of them, the tallest among them, wore her finery awkwardly. She tripped upon the long skirts, had trouble keeping her blonde braids confined beneath the gauzy veil and slouched her shoulders in an attempt to hide the vast expanse of her upper breast exposed by the lack of gown.

  Robb nudged Marcus with his elbow. They both stared at the girl with open admiration until she eased away from her companions and sent them a withering glance in reprimand. Robb had lowered his eyes in apology. A brief nod of his head acknowledged her whisper as she reached across them to examine a ripe melon.

  Marcus continued to stare at her with mouth slightly open. “I think I’m love,” he said quietly when the women had moved on.

  “You are always in love,” Robb returned. A flare of jealousy burned through him. Marcus attracted any number of women and fell in love with most of them in turn. His rejects found solace in Robb’s arms.

  He’d never loved anyone. But Margit . . . this new apprentice of Jaylor’s intrigued him. Margit. He caressed the name in his mind. Margit.

  He could love this girl.

  But as their friendship developed, Margit clearly preferred Marcus. Robb’s best friend had remained faithful to Margit—as faithful as he was capable of being—for nearly three years, never declaring his love for another until now.

  Robb had kept his love for Margit a secret for all that time. He heaved a weary sigh, wondering if something good might come of this disastrous quest after all. If he could return to Margit with comfort and companionship while Marcus chased after Vareena . . .

  Vareena emptied her carry basket of firewood and kindling a
t Marcus’ feet. Her brother stood in disapproving silence at the gate. But his stern posture broke frequently as he cast weary glances about the courtyard, seeking what he did not have the talent to see.

  Robb allowed his eyes to cross slightly as he sought the aura of the man who escorted his sister so diligently. Spikes of orange fear shot through the multiple layers of fire green. A man of passion without a single hint of magical talent.

  Vareena, on the other hand, sparkled around the edges of her aura of bright pink and pale yellow. A minor talent that would go unnoticed anywhere but in this haunted monastery.

  Then Vareena lifted her eyes from the firewood to search the courtyard. Her gaze rested on Robb for a long moment. He looked away first. The longing that burned in her gaze embarrassed him. He had no interest in her as a woman, only as a helper in this dilemma. His heart truly belonged to Margit and Margit only.

  Reluctantly, Vareena turned to her brother and retreated back to her normal world in the village.

  Normal. What was normal anymore?

  For years he had trained to work only dragon magic and revile anyone who dared tap rogue powers. As magicians had believed for centuries, Robb had held to the tenet that any use of rogue, or solitary magic, had its roots in evil. That had been normal. Then the dragons had left Coronnan, taking their communal magic with them. Over the last three years Robb had come to accept solitary magic as normal. The wandering life he and Marcus led as journeymen carrying out Jaylor’s missions had become normal.

  How long would he and his best friend be stuck here before this half existence between reality and the void became normal?

  He couldn’t allow that to happen. Coronnan needed dragons so that honor and respect could be restored to magic and magicians. Only with dragons could magicians combine their powers, have them amplified by orders of magnitude to overcome any solitary magician. The Commune of Magicians was dedicated to enforcing law, ethics, honor, and justice among themselves and throughout Coronnan. He and Marcus were Jaylor’s last hope for bringing the female dragon Shayla and her mates home.