The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume I: Volume I

eye. The whorls of spinning color didn’t seem to mock him. Did dragons have a sense of humor? He clamped down on that question before Shayla could answer him.
    She cocked her steedlike muzzle to one side as if puzzled by the closure of his thoughts.
    (Don’t you trust me to be honest with you?)
    “Of course I trust you, Shayla. I’m just not used to having my thoughts read and my questions answered before I’ve thought them through.” He looked away from the compelling jewel eyes.
    The dragon loomed so high above him that the only place he could look without overbalancing was along her side to the folded wings. The transparent membranes fluttered slightly for balance as Shayla emerged from the pool.
    A twisting black burn, as long as Jack’s body and as wide as his two thighs pressed together, marred the beauty of the left wing. Charred by magic that snaked along veins and bones, the wing hung lower, heavier and more painful than its undamaged mate. Unable to heal herself and unable to fly to a healer, Shayla was trapped in the beautiful prison of this valley with the rainbow waterfall.
     
    Jaylor studied the misty colors of the clearing’s barrier with his magic-heightened senses. A tiny crack in the armor glared back at him. A crack that might admit an enemy. Since Brevelan refused to move her family or the Commune, Jaylor had to make sure the protections of the clearing were intact, impregnable.
    “How are we going to explain this to your mother, Glendon?” he asked his son.
    Sorry. The boy hung his head and stared at his feet. No words escaped him now. No words had ever come out of his mouth. What need had he of words when his mind relayed all the information he needed to impart?
    “What were you and Lukan doing?” Jaylor shook his head in dismay. Brevelan was the chosen guardian of the clearing and the dragons. She had been the only person capable of opening and closing the barrier until Jaylor’s spirit journey with the dragons. As Brevelan’s husband, the dragons had granted him the privilege of sharing the guardianship. As far as he knew, the boys were not included in the privilege of opening and closing the clearing.
    Stargods help them all if Glendon got loose to wreak his personal havoc and tricks on the world at large!
    Wrestling, Glendon replied.
    “Wrestling with what?” The image the boy relayed to his father didn’t mesh with Jaylor’s idea of normal little boy activity.
    Dead silence surrounded Glendon. Nothing escaped his mind.
    “Have you two been experimenting with magic again?” Jaylor tried to keep the panic out of his voice. He had gained early admission to the Old University at age ten because of his precocious talent. His sons were only three and two and they’d managed to crack armor that even their grandfather, Lord Krej, had been unable to weaken.
    Krej had managed to come through the barrier by shape-changing himself and his followers into small animals, then transforming them back into normal form once they were through. Glendon and Lukan hadn’t figured out how to shape-change, yet. Or had they?
    “If you don’t tell me, Glendon, your mother will extract the information from you. Do you want her mucking about with your feelings?”
    Glendon had the grace to blush. Somehow he turned the expression into a scowl at the same time. Brevelan had a unique way of making the boys feel guilty and regretful for their infractions of rules. Her empathy projected her own hurt and disappointment into her children.
    “Well, son, what were you wrestling with?”
    Witchballs.
    An image of giant globes, almost as large as Glendon, formed of moss and dirt and leaves, held together by a magic glue, formed in Jaylor’s mind. He’d made witchballs for the boys—small ones—among their earliest toys. The balls had the advantage of being as light or heavy as a child could handle, easily replaced, never lost, and could be broken down with a thought before they crashed into some fragile object.
    Who would have thought the clearing barrier was vulnerable to a witchball?
    “How many rocks did you put into the center of the balls?” Jaylor had a brief nightmare of the boys forming their latest toy around a boulder and rolling it into the walls of the house.
    No rocks, Glendon replied.
    “Then what did you put into them?” Jaylor tried not to shout. Sometimes the boy’s cryptic remarks made him wonder if Glendon might have been fathered by Old Baamin or maybe by a dragon.
    Armor