The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume I: Volume I

certain Tattia Kaantille could work the design, let alone her half-trained daughter.”
    Katrina gasped at his audacity. By invoking her mother’s name, he reminded them all of the taint of suicide that clung to Katrina. Tattia’s ghost was said to haunt the workroom at night. Superstition claimed that Katrina, too, would become a ghost upon her death because of her mother’s sin.
    “We seem to be at an impasse,” Brunix sneered at Katrina. “I will examine the design. If it is worthy, I will consider adding it to my stock.”
    “No.” Katrina grabbed the pattern from him and walked over to the edge of the walkway. There she held the strip of leather over the rushing river. “I have many more ideas for new patterns—exporters always need new designs. All of my ideas are exclusively yours in exchange for my freedom. End my slavery, or I destroy it.”
    “That pattern is mine! And so are you.” Brunix lunged to grab it away from Katrina. As his hands curled around her arm, she opened her fingers. A puff of wind caught the contested prize, swirled it, and then dropped it at Brunix’s feet. He retrieved the strip of stained leather before the next breeze drowned it in the river.
    “Stupid bitch. You’ll pay for your insolence!” Brunix screamed. “I’ll make a fortune from this design and the others. You owe me your life and I intend to keep you my slave for a very, very long time.”
    “I hope the cost of a license for Tambrin to work the design properly will beggar you.” Katrina stalked back to the workroom alone.
     
    Jaylor raised his head and listened to the clearing. “Someone comes,” he announced to Brevelan across the open space where she hung the laundry.
    “Another victim?” She cocked her head as if listening. “Build up the fire and start some water boiling. Fetch some bandages, too. I sense pain. Serious pain.” She hurried toward the west path.
    Glendon ran ahead of his father into the hut. Two-year-old Lukan planted a reluctant lop-eared rabbit onto his hip and toddled in her wake.
    Light shimmered in a sense-lurching flash of colored arcs as the forest shifted and the entrance to this hidden clearing opened.
    A nondescript young man dressed in common trews and homespun shirt used his sturdy staff for balance as he dragged a smaller body up the hill.
    “Another victim,” Jaylor acknowledged, knowing his wife had been correct in her assessment of the newcomers. He hastened to set a cauldron of water to boil for whatever healing herbs and poultices she might need. Bandages. The stock was low. This was the third refugee in the past moon. He sent Glendon to tear strips from the store of linen in the loft.
    The young man he recognized as Journeyman Marcus. One of the few boys of talent who had remained with the Commune since Baamin’s death and the disbanding of the University. Journeyman quests now revolved around rescuing the victims of the Gnostic Utilitarians. In the last year the cult’s hatred had gained momentum. Why?
    Whether the child with Marcus had true magical abilities or was hounded away from his home because of unfounded accusations of witchcraft remained to be seen.
    More than two dozen refugees had found shelter in the southern mountains with the remnants of the Commune. Most of them had some talent; one or two had the potential to become true magicians and join the continual fight for the survival of the Commune.
    Unfortunately, most of the girls who found their way to the clearing were so traumatized by the rape gangs that wandered villages in search of “potential” witches, they’d never be brave enough to try magic. The mistaken belief that only virgins could throw magic was just an excuse for bullies to run wilder than magicians were reputed to.
    “Good thing we started a new cabin to house apprentices,” Jaylor remarked to the greenbird perched above the doorway of his own newly expanded home. The cluster of wooden buildings at the base of a cliff an hour’s walk from the clearing had grown from a single library to include Masters’ quarters and now apprentice dormitories. The two journeymen, Marcus and Robb, parked their weary bodies where they could when they were about. Mostly they wandered Coronnan, supplying Jaylor with information and new apprentices.
    Jaylor’s biggest worry lately was to find ways to feed them all without arousing the suspicion of the countryside.
    “News from the capital, Master.” Marcus eased his companion onto a cot