The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume I: Volume I

member . . .” Andrall looked directly into Jaylor’s eyes in accusation. “And the test must be to the Council’s satisfaction, not the Commune’s . . . until that time, we forbid the presence of any magician in Council. We also terminate all advisory positions to the members of the Council.”

Chapter 30
     
    “T his thread goes here. Over and under. And take this one around and take two threads through,” Rosie chanted the litany of her game.
    Mikka allowed the cat within her to be occupied with the tangle of her threads. While their fingers passed through the intricate pattern again and again, her eyes peered into every crevice of the stone walls.
    A careless servant had left Rosie’s hairbrush and comb within the chamber. Janataea must still believe that Rosie could be lulled into docility by having her hair brushed. Mikka had bent and twisted the tail of the comb into a lock pick. Mikka couldn’t fault the shuffling old woman for leaving behind the means of her escape. Where could a prisoner run to? Castle Krej was sealed shut in anticipation of a siege.
    “I may not run, but I can hide until it’s too late for Krej to rape me,” she muttered to herself.
    Narrow, dark corridors wound around and around the formidable fortress. The cat within her wanted to explore all of them—the deeper and darker, the better. Mikka suppressed the urge. This castle might have tunnels, but certainly they were not a likely means of escape. The defenses were designed around an impregnable position, carved out of a sheer cliff face, not an escape route that could be betrayed or discovered.
    She found servant’s clothing in a storeroom, stout trews and warm tunic, long woolen stockings, and indoor slippers to protect her feet. Warm and comfortable at last, she glided through the passages, as silent as a ghost.
    All corridors in the building eventually led to the Great Hall. This huge room was unlike any Mikka had run across in other castles. The dais, where the family and honored guests dined or held court, was missing. No armor, or sleeping pallets for men-at-arms lined the walls. The room was much less functional than a standard Great Hall, much more beautiful and very, very frightening.
    A Tambootie wood fire glowed in a central hearth. Around that circle of stones, perched on appropriate pedestals, was Krej’s renowned sculpture collection. In the moons since Shayla had torn a hole in the outer wall and freed the reanimated creatures, Krej had replaced most of his sculptures. Where Shayla had left the wall gaping to the elements now stood new stonework and a huge window to light his collection.
    Mikka gasped at the cost of all that glass. No one had a right to own that much. Colored and clear pieces had been fashioned or cut to make a picture. Huge wings and enormous claws gave the impression of a dragon. Appropriate, since a dragon had created the space the window filled.
    Then Mikka moved closer, staring in wonder at the morning sun streaming through the rare window. No dragon this. She was staring at an icon of Simurgh.
    Quickly, she turned away from the blasphemous picture only to be greeted by the animals in the sculpture collection.
    A great gray bear in pewter. A wild tusker in ebony wood. The spotted saber cat in bronze. And several other creatures Mikka could not identify. There was a winged raptor, similar to the kahmsin eagle beloved in Rossemeyer, similar, but larger and more fierce. A pouched rodent, too preposterous to be real, raised up on oversized hind legs and thick tail. Its shortened forepaws seemed poised, as if prepared to engage its enemies in fisticuffs.
    And yet . . . and yet the life of each creature glimmered beneath the surface of the sculpture. Resentment, anger, confusion, bewilderment assaulted Mikka. Was she doomed to the same fate? Once she had served Krej’s and Janataea’s purpose and borne the child they needed for their dynastic plans, would she be shape-changed into a cat, and then frozen in time in a prison of iridescent shale, the color of Rosse’s fur?
    Too frightened to think, she buried her consciousness deep inside herself.
    Rosie tangled her thread into a hopeless knot. In frustration she ended the game and stretched the string into a long straight piece, with a huge Rover’s knot just to the left of middle.
    If only life were untangled so simply, a slightly recovered Mikka mused.
    Then she saw it. In the wide place that had once contained a life-sized sculpture of