The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume I: Volume I

know I’d live.” Reluctantly, Jaylor handed his treasure to the man who had been his archenemy.
    “I’ll need some Tambootie.”
    “Why?”
    “To counteract the witchbane Darville douses me with on a weekly basis.”
    “Here, sir.” Yaakke produced two fat leaves of the tree of magic out of thin air.
    “Have you taught the boy how to transport people? We would pay much to learn that spell.”
    “My name is Yaakke,” he asserted.
    “Yaakke? Son of Yaacob, the usurper. A bit audacious, Boy. ” Krej sniffed and turned his back on Yaakke. “Brevelan, give me your hand.”
    “No!” Jaylor shouldered his way between his wife and her father. “I cannot allow you to touch her.”
    “You ask my help, then dictate the terms of the spell?”
    “I protect my wife from a man who has tried to kill her more than once.”
    “Then how do you propose I save her life? If I can’t touch her, my magic can’t reach her.”
    “I will be your staff. Focus your magic through me.”
    “Magic warps and reshapes wood. Look at your own staff to see how much. You risk your life to save the chit. Is she worth it?”
    “Yes!”

Chapter 9
     
    W here was Janataea? Uncle Rumbelly was going to be very angry when he heard how Rosie had disgraced herself with the prince.
    Rosie hugged the shadows in one of the corners of her spacious apartment. The little space between the big bed and the wardrobe looked snug enough to hide her from whoever the Lord Regent of Rossemeyer sent to punish her. She slid to a sitting position, her back to the wall.
    Rosie didn’t like the smell of the room she had been given. It was too clean, the hangings and furniture smelled of soap. There was no dust to collect the scent of those who passed through the room. How could she hide in a room that wouldn’t mask her scent?
    And she was alone. Utterly alone. Janataea was the only one she knew in this long, long wing isolated from the rest of the huge palace. Kevin-Rosse was quartered across the city, on an entirely different island, in the embassy.
    That was another thing she didn’t like, the islands. Hundreds of them connected by slender, untrustworthy bridges. The city was nothing but islands surrounded by water. Deep water. Shallow water. Muddy water. Clean water. All of it moving very rapidly toward the Great Bay.
    Rosie shuddered and ducked her head against her knees.
    Janataea had promised to be back in a matter of an hour, long before Rosie finished her interview with Prince Darville. But her time with the prince had been cut short.
    “H-hsss-ch,” she hissed to herself. “I mistrust him. Him and his witchcat.”
    What was she to do? Janataea would tell her.
    But Janataea was gone on an errand. Gone for hours now. Janataea had broken a promise.
    “I can’t trust anyone but myself!” she wailed. “And sometimes I can’t trust myself. Why did I say those ill-timed words to the prince when we hadn’t even been introduced?”
    A light knock on the door sent Rosie scuttling deeper into the shadows. She crouched, ready to launch herself into either flight or an attack.
    The knock came again. Louder, longer. “Your Highness?” a strange male voice asked. A gentle voice. Reassuring, trustworthy. “Are you there, Princess Rossemikka?”
    “Who . . . who is it?” she stammered from her hiding place.
    “Senior Magician Baamin, Your Highness. I have a message from Prince Darville. May I come in?”
    Baamin, the magician from the University whom she was supposed to seek out and poison. Kevin-Rosse promised dire punishment if she did not.
    The magician sounded so meek and gentle he could not be a threat to Rossemeyer. She didn’t dare trust him. He was a magician and therefore incapable of telling the truth.
    In Rossemeyer, magicians were solitary scholars who sought the mysteries of the universe. They were known to lie, cheat, steal, and even kidnap and murder to serve their quest. But this was Coronnan, where the magicians were trained in a university, posted to the lords as advisers. Coronnan’s magicians were supposed to be trusted.
    “I do not wish to speak of the prince.” She found herself standing. Her muscles relaxed from their panic. She didn’t know why.
    “Then we won’t speak of him.” A pause while Rosie searched the room again for some sign of Janataea’s hovering presence. “This door is thick. Talking through it strains an old man’s voice. May I come in?”
    “Do you need permission to enter any room?” She