The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume I: Volume I

priest. Old temples sometimes had runes decorating tombs and icons.
    Jack fell into step behind the man, thanking the Stargods as he kept a discreet distance.
    A temple constructed of huge stone blocks, each as tall as a man, loomed before Jack. Bigger than the Palace Reveta Tristille, he’d never seen anything like it before. In Coronnan, the temples were small, little larger than a house, and scattered throughout the city for the convenience of each neighborhood, mostly taken for granted because they were an everyday part of life. This place of worship demanded attention by its imposing height and impossibly huge building stones. Men could not have built this place. It seemed designed for the entire population of the city to gather at once. The priest strode up the two dozen steps with the ease of long familiarity.
    Jack followed him, stretching his legs to mount each broad stair. A long line of people dressed in sober colors filed into and out of the sanctuary. Jack joined them.
    Inside the impressive structure, darkness ruled. No windows allowed daylight to penetrate beyond the porch. Hundreds of lighted candles lined the walls in banks of nine rows and nine tiers. The building was so massive in size, the candles lit only small areas around icons dedicated to one of the three red-haired Stargod brothers, or the painted canvases of the queen before her ailment. Nine tall candles in each of nine candelabras drew Jack’s eyes to the altar.
    One solid piece of lace spilled over the focal point of worship. Soft light reflected from the shimmering threads of the design. From the distance of one hundred arm-lengths, Jack knew the lace was made from Tambrin. The magic inherent in the Tambootie tree vibrated inside his body like a finely tuned instrument ready to sound the most beautiful note ever heard.
    But it was a power he dared not draw into his body. Dragons were the only beings who could safely digest any part of the Tambootie. Madness trod the path of the Tambootie. Simeon’s obsessive search for Tattia’s lace shawl exhibited some of the signs of that insanity.
    The line of worshipers in front of Jack moved forward. To his right, a series of tiny chapels bulged outward from the main sanctuary. Some were no wider than a single person. Others could accommodate three or four kneeling side by side before altars dedicated to images Jack couldn’t identify. Incense hung heavily in the air.
    A sneeze tickled in the back of Jack’s throat. He held his breath. The sneeze subsided along with the thick perfume of burning herbs. Priests used incense in their rituals in Coronnan. Jack had never heard of them saturating the air with it, nor of using such heavy and exotic scents. Like so many things in this decaying city, the incense sought to hide unpleasantness rather than cleanse it.
    He looked up, way up, to see how high the cloud of incense hovered. Four or five stories above the center of the sanctuary, the bowl of a huge dome separated the worshipers from the weather. Painted night skies with stylized stars decorated the interior of the dome. Most of the constellation groupings were inaccurate, broken by seams. Ah, the priests did do something traditional in SeLenicca. The panels in the dome opened, by a series of just barely visible pulleys and ropes, for observation of the night skies.
    The architecture seemed to be centered on that dome. Did the entire temple date from the time of the Stargods or was the open dome added later to accommodate stargazing?
    He sidled out of line to examine the side aisles and their stone tombs. Jack guessed the stonework was much older than the religion of the Stargods and the efficient alphabet introduced by the three divine brothers. The ancient runes should still adorn places considered sacred through all the changes of dynasties and worship. Somewhere in this vast building there must be some runes and he intended to find them.
    Then he’d worry about a translation.
     
    Katrina paced the circumference of Brunix’s sitting room. Two burly warehousemen carried her trunk of personal possessions between them into the bedroom beyond. A third employee hauled her extra pillow up the stairs.
    “Where you want it?” he asked, not daring to lift his eyes to meet hers.
    “By the window.” She pointed to a cleared space beside the pillow where she worked the new shawl. Since the factory owner’s uncharacteristic violence this morning, she hadn’t been able to work, to concentrate,