The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume II

had to find the right dosage and combinations to duplicate the meshing of thoughts he’d attained with the Timboor.
    One taste of the brew had set Nimbulan’s craving for Tambootie afire. Ackerly had better return soon.
    “It’s the damp that makes you feel colder.” Rollett, the eldest of all nine apprentices and nearly ready for promotion to journeyman, stirred the fire in the small baking hearth with an iron poker. The big roasting hearth had been blocked to prevent further heat loss.
    “My da was born not too far from here. He used to say that the river mists chilled his bones so deep it took an entire summer to get warm.” An old sadness clouded his eyes. “Da always said the damp would kill him. He was wrong. The wars killed him.”
    Nimbulan remembered Rollett’s father, stoop-shouldered with the joint disease while still fairly young. He had reluctantly handed his youngest son to a magician for training seven years ago. Nimbulan had taken the boy with marginal talent more to give the impoverished farmer one less mouth to feed than because he needed another apprentice. But Rollett had proved his worth time and time again. Eager to please and more eager to learn, he’d mastered all his lessons and improved his talent tenfold. The young man had begun tapping ley lines only a few weeks before the guardian spirit sealed the well.
    Nimbulan had expected him to become no more adept than Ackerly, who could hold a spell together and feed Nimbulan strength, but couldn’t levitate anything heavier than a small parchment, nor conjure more than a whisper of flame.
    Last spring, Rollett had taken a brief respite from his studies to return home for a much anticipated reunion. He’d hoped to help with some of the heavy plowing and planting, maybe use some of his magic to repair the family hut. He could lift a new roof tree by himself with magic, something ten men would have found onerous.
    But foraging scouts for one army or another had stripped the farm, burned the buildings, and left the family’s bodies to rot in the rain.
    Nimbulan grieved with Rollett, then and now. In this case he had truly replaced the boy’s birth father. In the moons since that terrible time, Nimbulan had spent many evenings comforting Rollett, sharing memories of his father. Reliving the events of Rollett’s loss was the first time Nimbulan had allowed the endless wars to touch him personally. His long road to a quest for peace had really begun there. Keegan’s death had been the final catalyst that had brought him to Lord Quinnault de Tanos and this ancient building with Ackerly, Lyman, a few tired Battlemages, and eight apprentices.
    “Someone comes.” Zane lifted his head, sniffing the air for changes.
    “A man. Walking with heavy steps, as if very weary,” Powwell added, cocking his ear toward the door. “Two men, one younger and stronger than the other.”
    “Ackerly.” Haakkon closed his eyes and furrowed his brow in concentration. “He’s thinking of food and ale and gold. The boatman walks behind with heavy luggage.”
    He’d expected Ackerly two days ago, before this latest winter storm had made the river a churning cauldron of eddies and wicked currents.
    “Together, you three would make one powerful magician,” Nimbulan acknowledged the young apprentices’ various talents. “Now which of you will be able to open the door for Ackerly at the moment he reaches for the latch?”
    The three youngsters looked to each other as if consulting. A grin of mischief crossed Zane’s face as he shook free of his blanket and walked to the kitchen door.
    “I meant, open it with magic!”
    “But you told us just yesterday not to waste our energy with frivolous uses of magic,” Haakkon reminded his master.
    “Since none of you has mastered levitation with any precision, this is a test and not a waste. Back to your chair, Zane. And no help from you other apprentices.” Nimbulan glared at the five older boys who looked as if they wanted to open the door with an easy magical gesture.
    Lyman wandered into the kitchen from the interior of the building without a word and moved to warm his hands over the fire, watching the boys with curiosity and amusement.
    Zane settled into his blankets once more. The three new boys stared at the door with intense concentration. A blue aura burst forth from each apprentice. The wavering sapphire glows hovered separately. Haakkon’s aura took on a hint of red and purple, the colors that would