The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume I: Volume I

grave. Merely ashes of the dead cast into the almost-frozen river by one of King Simeon’s officials. A duty the man had performed too often these last moons.
    The ground was frozen deep. No one could dig graves this winter. There was barely enough wood for a single funeral pyre. So, the numerous dead—from hunger and disease—were heaped together in a common bonfire, their remains mingled, and their funerals held at the same time. There was no way to separate the ashes for the grieving families. The poor and the homeless gathered around the pyres in a morbid search for warmth, cheering as each new body added fuel to the noisome black smoke.
    Katrina wouldn’t have an urn to set beside the hearth to cherish, for either Hilza or Tattia. Tattia’s body had not been found. All that remained of her was the lace scarf. P’pa had wanted to burn it along with Hilza’s body. Katrina had cleaned the precious reminder of her mother and hidden it where her father and the persistent merchant would never find it. Why was the stranger so eager to purchase the piece, tainted as it was by Tattia’s suicide?
    Ten other families joined Katrina in mourning the loss of a loved one on this cloudy day. Families huddled together for warmth, comfort, and shared memories. No one stood beside Katrina.
    Oncle Yon and Tante Syllia refused to be seen near the family of a suicide. Tattia’s ghost would haunt her kin for five generations.
    Lawsuits had been filed with Queen’s Court and Temple to sever all bonds of blood and law between Fraanken Kaantille and his brother Yon. Maaben’s name was included in the suits. Maaben would be kept safe and secure from this latest, and worst, scandal in the Kaantille family.
    The river marched toward the sea. A few traces of gray ash clung to the bobbing ice floes. Gradually they passed out of sight, under the bridges, on and on toward open water. Nothing remained of the dead but the grief within a few hearts.
    “Be warm, Hilza,” Katrina murmured. She could think of no other wish for her little sister. It was the same wish most citizens of Queen’s City prayed for.
    The stranger who was eager to buy Tattia’s shawl separated himself from the crowd of mourners. Katrina turned her steps away from him and the scene of the funeral. She ducked into a narrow alley wishing for the release of tears. Her eyes continued dry. Her grief built within her until she thought the pain would choke the breath from her.
    Aimlessly she wandered until the tears flowed freely, releasing the paralyzing grief in her throat. Only then did she seek her own kitchen door.
    “P’pa!” she called as the inner door banged behind her. “P’pa, I’m home.” Silence rang through the cold and empty kitchen.
    “Curse you, P’pa. The tenants will complain and refuse to pay their rent it you let the fire go out.” She gathered fresh kindling and a fire rock as she rushed to the stove that filled one whole corner of the room.
    Since Hilza’s death and M’ma’s suicide, P’pa rarely moved from his chair by the stove, where he sat in morose silence. The loss of his wife and child preyed more heavily on his mind and spirit than all of his financial woes combined. He started in fear at every moving shadow and sharp sound. He was the first person Tattia would haunt and plague until he, too, joined her in self-inflicted death.
    Only his fear for Katrina had prevented him from committing the ultimate sin.
    He was not in the kitchen today and had not attended Hilza’s funeral.
    The bell on the front stoop rang, loud and imperious.
    “P’pa!” she called again, as she fumbled with the kindling. The fire was more important than a visitor. Who would visit the disgraced Kaantilles?
    The bell rang again, impatient as a sick old granm’ma.
    Still no sounds from above or the front room. Where had P’pa gone? Katrina struck a spark and fed it enough fuel to keep it lit until she answered the bell.
    She flung open the inner door. Harsh pounding rattled the outer door. Her heart leaped into her throat.
    With shaking hands and trembling heart she opened the outer door. Three men-at-arms, in the gray uniform of the palace, stood on the front step. All the same height, all the same coloring and uniform. All with identical grim expressions.
    The center man stepped forward. Two bands of silver on each cuff marked his rank as above the other two. “Katrina Marie, daughter of Fraanken and Tattia Kaantille, you are summoned to the