The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume I: Volume I

Damp salt air from the Great Bay was hard on thatch. This nearly forgotten hostel beside the river didn’t look prosperous enough to reroof with slate, or even wood.
    Brevelan and Yaakke had both turned up their noses when Jaylor chose to lodge his family here. The Senior Magician had insisted it would be easy to guard Brevelan and baby Glendon against theft and physical attack at the Bay Hag. Protecting them from suspicious neighbors who might report the presence of magicians to the Council might prove impossible.
    Yaakke extended his senses into the wooden planks and beyond. The loft where he’d hidden his staff and pack was empty of people. Maybe he should just transport them to his hand. He could grab them and leave right now. No, Jaylor and Brevelan were constantly reminding him that magic was for need, not convenience, and he’d wasted too many spells on inconsequential things today. Witch-sniffers might be on his tail already.
    “If he needs healing, I must go to him. I can’t return to the clearing yet.” Brevelan’s urgent whispers to her husband penetrated Yaakke’s thoughts through the closed door at the top of the landing.
    Why hadn’t they answered his telepathic call?
    “We don’t dare stay in the capital any longer,” Jaylor returned. “The witchbane is still in me. I can’t whisk us out of here at the first sign of trouble. We have to leave on foot with the rest of the crowds before someone recognizes us.”
    Witchbane? That explained Jaylor’s silence. Yaakke sent a tendril of self-healing through his body, searching for something wrong. Nothing. Wherever Jaylor had encountered the dreaded drug, Yaakke had escaped an accidental dosage that would temporarily rob him of his magic. He shuddered. Without magic he was just another nameless kitchen drudge.
    “I’m not leaving until I see Darville and I know that he is well,” Brevelan announced.
    Yaakke knew from experience that Jaylor might as well give up his arguments when Brevelan used that tone of voice.
    “NO!” Jaylor’s denial echoed across the landing.
    Baby Glendon set up a howl of protest at the angry words circling around the room.
    The king must be very ill indeed if he needed Brevelan’s special brand of empathic healing. He’d looked a little pale at the coronation, wincing when he jarred his injured arm. Not many people in the Grand Court looked beyond the joy of the coronation to see the deep creases in the king’s forehead that suggested the pain was never very far away—a legacy of his last battle with the witch Janataea.
    Yaakke was glad he wasn’t an empath like Brevelan. The churning discomfort he felt in his gut from just listening to this fight was bad enough. To actually experience other people’s anger and grief, their pain and illness, as Brevelan did, was more than his body and mind could handle.
    Did he dare linger long enough to deliver his message about the smuggler, or should he wait until he was out of town and Jaylor free of the witchbane?
    Yaakke stretched his ears a little closer to the closed door.
    “Conventional healers can’t help Darville. He needs me!” Brevelan said.
    Yaakke bit his lip. He had never heard these two fight before. He knew nothing of how a marriage worked, even less of women and their moods. Could a loving bond recover from angry words? Stargods , he needed to be away from this argument.
    “And just how do you intend to get close enough to the king to heal him? When do you propose to do this—before or after the witchbane wears off? You got a pretty good dose of that purple smoke, too. Don’t deny it.” Jaylor’s voice started to rise. Then he dropped it to a hissing whisper.
    Yaakke’s toes began to tingle with the urge to depart. He didn’t want to stay here at the inn and listen to his only two friends argue and hurt each other. He didn’t want to watch their bruised feelings dissolve their love.
    He turned to make his way back down to the kitchen level. He’d have to risk retrieving his few possessions later by magical transport.
    Jaylor threw open the door of his private chamber and grabbed his apprentice’s collar. “Not so fast, Yaakke. Where have you been? You should have been back hours ago.”
    “How’d you know it was me?” Yaakke squeaked. He cleared his throat, almost glad rather than embarrassed by his lack of control over his voice. Maybe, just maybe, he was finally growing into manhood. Fifteen was kind of late for the change.
    By tradition