The Wandering Dragon (Children of the Dragon Nimbus)

by Irene Radford

  Souska raced to light the candle as Linda leaned over the bowl and informed the caller of the situation, quietly, as if she didn’t want to disturb Maigret in the next room, all the while knowing she would. “Lily, how are you able to initiate a summons?” Linda asked. Puzzlement drew deep lines outward from her eyes and down her chin.

  Lily? Oh, yes, one of Lukan’s sisters. The one who’d gone wandering on her own after some dreadful accident. Lukan had only said that she needed to heal her mind and soul and could only do that by helping replant where the flood had wiped the land clean.

  “Because I have to,” came the weary reply.

  Souska turned her back on her fellow apprentice in politeness. But she still listened.

  “Linda, I need a sack of feverfew, another of willow bark, and . . . and . . . hellebore.” The last word came out on a whisper that sent heat and cold flashing up and down from Souska’s gut to her head.

  “No, no, no, NO!” Linda replied.

  Souska searched her memory for her gran’s words on the nature of the plant. “Delightful to look at, lovely when left, deadly if used wrong.”

  “What are you concocting, Lily? I thought you were nurturing and planting, curing the land, playing healer.”

  “Everywhere the Krakatrice eggs have hatched—even after the magicians and dragons killed the snakes—the land . . . There is a miasma that follows where their blood soaks into the dirt. Entire villages are dying. If I can break their fevers and steady their heartbeats, I think I can give them enough time to heal on their own. Until I find a cure. You have to wake Maigret and get her working on it. I don’t have the supplies, or the knowledge, or the skills that she does.” Lily sounded desperate. And frightened.

  “Where are you, Lily,” Linda demanded. Her voice sounded calm and controlled, but sweat beaded her brow and her hand shook as she waved to Souska to interrupt their mistress’ sleep.

  Since the joined summons spell, Souska really only needed a thought to penetrate Maigret’s mind with simple communications. You are needed. She couldn’t phrase her thoughts any more simply.

  “No, don’t come here. Don’t let anyone come. They’ll sicken too. Just send me what I ask for. Quickly.”

  A quick glance over Linda’s shoulder showed only a pale blob of a face surrounded by a red-gold mop of unruly curls that might have been as much aura as hair. The fuzziness of the image proved her lack of magical strength. Or was it physical weakness from illness and fatigue that kept her from appearing clearly in the glass?

  “And what’s to keep you from getting sick too?” Linda asked. The very question Souska needed to put forward.

  “I . . . I had a bit of it earlier. I can’t get it again.” A long pause. “I think Death awakened my magical talent. Not much. Just enough to call for help, and see . . . and see auras so I know which holes in the life spirit to fill.”

  “Just how sick are you?” Maigret asked, coming in from her private study attached to the workroom. She had a cot in there as well as her books and supplies. Her eyes looked strained and hollow with deep shadows marring their usual liveliness. “Sounds more like a fever dream than . . . a vision of Death. No one sees Death and lives.”

  Souska handed Maigret a cup of the hot tisane. She nodded her thanks and drank deeply. She sighed in relief, almost immediately.

  “My fever broke on its own,” Lily said. “My pulse is still rapid, but . . . I can control it with a tisane made from foxglove leaves.”

  Souska barely heard her admission. She turned her attention to finding the stores of the requested feverfew and willow bark. Common treatments for fever and body aches. Foxglove to steady the heartbeat . . . Why had she asked for hellebore if she used foxglove, a more proper name for fairy bells? Both were dangerous poisons unless used properly and judiciously. Maigret and Souska’s grandmother had told her never to use foxglove unless there was no other possibility of saving a life, and then only in tiny doses, building up bit by bit until she found the right one for that particular patient.

  Maigret never mentioned hellebore, pretended the plant did not exist. The difference between cure and death was tiny, barely a crumb of dried and ground leaves changed the dosage, and a big strong man could be more sensitive than a still-growing teenager. Or the opposite. A healer could never know the difference until too late.

  Lily had to have learned much from her mother, Brevelan, and from Maigret. But she was only a new journeyman. Did she know enough to save her patients and not kill them?

  “Tell me every nuance of every patient,” Maigret demanded. She pushed Linda aside and leaned over the bowl, cupping her hands around the rim, effectively shutting out her apprentices. “Foxglove is dangerous enough. But it is safer than hellebore.”

  “I’ve tried foxglove. It helps. But it is not enough. I need to slow the heart rate more and lower the pressure of the blood within the heart and veins. Hellebore is the only answer,” Lily insisted.

  Souska strained to hear. Linda joined her by the workbench, looking a little disgruntled. After all, she’d answered the summons for their mistress and for the past three days deflected other masters from bothering the woman while she ached and grieved.

  “What can we do?” Linda asked. A stray tendril of brown-gold hair escaped her blue scarf and slipped over her cheek. The former princess never allowed a hint of less than precise grooming to show.

  “My gran showed me how to use it, how to dilute it so that it worked without poisoning—if used cautiously,” Souska whispered. “A long, long time ago, her people suffered an unknown plague from far away. Along with a trace of hellebore they used a moss growing on leaf litter—not on a tree or rock—from the north bank of a creek soaked in algae, and . . . and a mushroom spiking above the moss, growing with it in sympathy and harmony. All must be dried on a rack over embers, then crumpled into the willow bark tea.”

  She hung her head as if ashamed. Old remedies like that were held in contempt by magician healers.

  “My mother says that sometimes deep magic isn’t the only way to do things,” Linda snorted. “Not everyone can look into an ailing body, find the alien disease and force it to leave. Why else would we study all the properties of plants and minerals and combinations and such?”

  “I know a place where the moss and mushrooms grow together,” Souska offered.

  “And I know of a still pool where algae grows around the edges, sliming rocks and embankments alike.”

  Souska looked into the other girl’s eyes and saw a twinkle of agreement and amusement there. “Where do we find the hellebore?” she whispered.

  “In the far corner of Maigret’s own herb garden. She keeps some on hand for emergencies.”

  “Fresh roots work better than dried.”

  “Dried is easier to control.”

  “Let’s do it!”

  Together, they crept toward the door. “Take clean linen to gather your remedy, and be careful not to touch those mushrooms with bare hands or you’ll leech the curative property from them,” Maigret called after them, showing that she was aware of their entire conversation. Her face looked more animated and less worried. She had a problem to solve, and solve it she would.

  “Souska, when next you summon Lukan, tonight if possible, ask him if he has heard anything about this illness on the Big Continent.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” A tiny glow warmed Souska’s heart. She had a reason to try out her new summoning skills. And she could use them to talk to her journeyman.

  “While you have his attention, ask him if he has located my husband in Amazonia yet.” Some of the worry crept back into her face and her voice. “I’ll find a dragon who can take you safely to Lily. Can’t risk having a master or journeyman transport you. Don’t want to risk you either, but I have to. We’ve had enough witch hunts in the last ten years to last three lifetimes or more. If Lily kills so much as one patient with her remedy, there will be no stopping the hysteria. Now, make certain you wear a mask and wash your hands any time y
ou touch anything. You must instruct her properly on how to use the hellebore. You can learn more that is suited to your talent from Lily than you can about big magic from her brother.”

  Stars shone brighter out at sea, Lukan thought as he lay back in his nest of folded canvas in the stern of the ship. He wasn’t sure why, but the tiny points of light in the deep black sky looked larger, scintillating with a kind of amusement at the antics of people on the planet below.

  He watched for a long time, not thinking, just breathing. He needed calm in mind as well as body after a hard day of work—no harder than throwing spells right, left, and sideways for his masters, but different. A part of him half-wished he could sleep in the crow’s nest, but his crewmates would wonder at that. The highest point on the ship was for watching, not sleeping. They didn’t know his affinity for “up.” They didn’t know his tricks for staying in place.

  The stars blurred as his eyes drifted closed. He wanted to keep their beauty in the front of his mind and vision a little longer.

  But what was that? He almost sat up with a jolt as his imagination drew silvery blue lines between the stars, connecting them in a giant web of energy. “Just like ley lines,” he breathed.

  Squinting, he forced his eyes to focus more closely on the lines, just as if he were looking at them beneath the Kardia. “I wonder . . .” Slowly, gently, he cleared his mind with deep breaths, finding the pole along his right side without the aid of the land. Fully centered, he reached up a hand and drew energy into him. A wee tingle against his fingertips, then a full vibration through his hand and arm. He pulled harder and felt his blood sing in renewal.

  “Lily? Val? Are you out there? Can you hear me?”

  A sleepy hum followed the lines of energy down through his senses. His vision shifted slightly to the left, from blue toward dark purple. “Go back to sleep, Val. You need your rest to grow strong.” He clenched his fist to close the communication.

  “Reaching for me, sailor boy?” an uneducated female voice rasped against his senses.

  His connection to the life energy of the stars shattered. “Who?” He had to fight to shift his focus from the thrall of the ley lines and the warmth of love for his sister to the stars.

  “Just me. Saw you giving me the eye earlier on deck.” The woman knelt down as if to crawl onto the folded sailcloth beside him.

  A flicker of light from the mast lamp showed only her silhouette. A few feminine curves. He only knew of two women on board. Rejiia and her servant.

  This wasn’t Rejiia. Nothing long and elegant about her. Short, stocky, and old. She must be older than Rejiia—late thirties, the sorceress’ real age, not the midtwenties she looked. Lukan remembered blotchy skin and a hooked nose, dull eyes, and lank, mouse-brown hair.

  Then he caught a whiff of enticing musk that reminded him of Rejiia. It overlay the scent of garlic and body sweat. That hint of Rejiia in the mix told him all he needed to know. The woman—was her name Bette?—borrowed some of her lady’s magic to seduce Lukan.

  He’d just filled himself with the ley lines’ magical energy. It bolstered his resolve and his ability to resist.

  His glass vibrated loudly inside his shirt beneath his heart. He pulled it out just enough to note the golden swirl inside the circle. “Excuse me, miss. I’m needed elsewhere. You can go back to your mistress. Either your imagination ran wild or someone lied to you.” He heaved himself up from his nest and headed for the stern.

  No candle or bowl of water. But he had the ocean and his finger to conjure a bit of flame for a moment. “Lukan here,” he said, leaning over the deck rail, with glass and hands positioned properly above the water.

  “Glenndon here,” his brother replied on a chuckle. “When did we start speaking like dragons?”

  “Too long ago to remember. What is so important you have to disrupt my sleep?” He wasn’t truly angry anymore, but the need to goad Glenndon remained deeply seeded.

  “I know you need your beauty sleep, little brother, but this is important.”

  “Important enough to break the rules by summoning a journeyman on journey?”

  “Yes. King Lokeen renewed his courtship of Lady Ariiell. He had a letter magically dispatched to King Darville. We think Robb threw the spell. Samlan is dead. All the other master magicians are accounted for.”

  Lukan loosed a long exhale. “I figured Robb was in Amazonia. I’m headed there now.”

  “Smart boy. Robb managed a very brief and aborted summons to Maigret begging for help.”

  “Master Marcus did manage to find him once, in a prison.”

  “Yes. We do not know what kind of coercion King Lokeen is using but it has to be strong, possibly torturous, if he’s forcing Robb to throw magic. Freeing him will not be easy. Master Marcus and I agree, you may call for help if you need it.”

  Lukan looked upward, wondering if his new friend Verdii followed the ship even at night.

  “Thanks, big brother. I’ll remember that.”

  “Lukan, this isn’t a competition. If you need help, summon me.”

  “If the situation becomes so dire that the dragons and I can’t handle it, I’ll call.”

  “Promise me you won’t try to bull your way through this on your own!”

  “I don’t . . .”

  “You do. Now promise me.”

  “I promise that if I can’t see another way out, I’ll summon you.”

  “All you need is a thought directed toward me. We are bound by blood and by love. And by memory. You are my brother.”

  Part of Lukan wanted to shout, “Half brother.” But another part of his heart swelled with . . . emotions he didn’t want to acknowledge. “Good night big brother. You need your beauty sleep. I need to think about some things.”

  Glenndon smiled. “When in doubt, trust the dragons.” He closed the communication.

  Lukan doused the flame on his fingertip. It was growing a little too hot to hold much longer. Then he pocketed his glass and looked around to make sure Bette didn’t linger to interfere again. The deck was open and empty except for the two crewmen on watch and a third in the crow’s nest.

  A jaunty tune came to his mind. He whistled the first notes of one of Skeller’s more ribald bar tunes.

  A blast of anger shot from the hatch leading belowdecks to the passenger cabins. He stepped neatly aside and continued on his way, still whistling into the wind.

  CHAPTER 14

  MARIA GINGERLY HELD between two fingers the thin parchment with the seal of Darville de Draconis, king by the grace of the dragons of Coronnan, as if it might burn her. The worn sheet spoke of the sender’s lack of respect for the recipient—for her, since the letter had landed at her feet. She hoped the foreign king meant unconcern for Lokeen, who must eventually receive this letter. The thinness also betrayed a second sealed sheet within the outer layer.

  She sat in the padded chair—the one her sister had had made especially to her measure—in her private sitting room adjacent to the kitchen stair, one leg tucked under her and sunshine from the broad window bathing her in gentle warmth.

  “You have to open it, my lady. It is addressed to you; dispatched to you by magic,” Frederico whispered from the stool at her feet. He had removed her boot and massaged her twisted foot with knowing fingers, easing the cramps out of her arch and toes. Now he hid his face and expression from her by bowing his head and letting his straight black hair fall forward over his swarthy skin.

  “But I did not dispatch the first letter that required this reply.”

  “King Darville wants to talk to you, not to Lokeen. Looks to me that the foreigner sees what too many people here refuse to: Lokeen is not our rightful king.”

  “Hush!” Maria looked anxiously around her room, fearful of eavesdroppers and spies.

  “Only stating the right of it.”

  “I know. But this seems so wrong. I am not queen. I have no right to be queen.”

  “More right than him what sits on the throne and wears your sis
ter’s crown,” Frederico mumbled under his breath.

  But Maria heard every word.

  “Need me to open that, break the seal?” he continued, letting his fingers go slack on her aching foot.

  “Not you. If I commit treason by doing this, then I must do it alone and not transfer any of the crime or guilt to you, my faithful friend.”

  “Then you’ll need a hot knife to slide under the wax without breaking the seal.” He released her and reached for a candle and a penknife from her worktable to his right. When he had lit the candle with flint and steel he passed the short-bladed knife through the flame several times.

  “It’s hot enough,” Maria said, anxious to get through this ordeal so she could make decisions on the outcome.

  “Not quite.” Frederico stalled her by holding up one finger. Three heartbeats later he nodded, as the blade began taking on a reddish tinge.

  Maria slid the blade beneath the blob of dark green wax, satisfied that the seal released from the parchment quite easily. She withdrew the blade and handed it back to her coconspirator. The letter unfolded almost of its own volition. Two pages. The one inside was addressed to Lokeen, no title or city, just his name. She read the first sentence of the outside page—the one addressed to the Queen of Amazonia—and gasped.

  Handfasting is a sacred and time-honored custom in Coronnan, beneficial to those who have no access to civil or religious marriage ceremonies. At this time we have no reason to dissolve the union between Ariiell and Mardoll. Neither party agrees to such an annulment. Lokeen, who styles himself as King of Amazonia, must seek a bride elsewhere.

  The daughter of the deposed lord Laislac has renounced her title, all connection to her father, and all rights as potential regent on behalf of her son. She has refused to testify on Laislac’s behalf at his trial for treason. Her written statement against him is enough evidence to convict him.

  “Styles himself as king? Them’s powerful words. Amazonia’s most powerful ally and trading partner doesn’t recognize Lokeen as rightful ruler.” Frederico sat back and whistled through his teeth.