The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume II

and flee the old monastery. He hadn’t dared pilfer his private quarters for his staff and glass. Perhaps he should transport them here. No. Someone might witness the disappearance and trace the transport.
    He would cut a new staff for his new life and career. What about the glass, expensive and difficult to replace? So many spells depended upon the qualities of perfectly clear glass to work. He’d just have to improvise with a clear pool of water.
    He spared a moment to regret leaving his boys. But he had confidence in them. He’d trained them well, taught them honor and respect. He could imagine Rollett gathering all of the apprentices in the dormitory late at night, telling them stories and passing on the message of peace through community. Nimbulan’s dream would live a little longer. At least until he came back with Rover secrets and new spells to implement the dream.
    Which direction?
    (East,) the frigid south wind seemed to sigh.
    Rovers lived in the south more often than not. A Rover spell might give him the clue to combining magic. Because of the curve of the Great Bay, east was the fastest way to the lands south of Coronnan. Once he had information about how Rovers worked their magic together, he’d return to the school and his work to remove magic from battles and politics. And find the man who had tried to murder him.
    (East.) As good a direction as any. He centered his magic, concentrating on south, the closest magnetic pole. With his left hand up, palm outward and fingers slightly curved, he turned in a slow circle. A slight stab of awareness pierced his palm. South lay up that dune and to the right about twenty degrees. He must have drifted into the great curve of the Bay. If he kept a true course, halfway between east and south, he’d run into the trade road within a mile or two. Rovers traveled the highway.
    The well-trod road wandered from village to village offering Rovers many opportunities to sell their distinctive metalwork and earn coins by entertaining the locals with music and dance. Eventually the road crossed the Southern Mountains at a point almost due east from Quinnault de Tanos’ islands, and then into Rossemeyer. He had no desire to explore the high desert plateau of that impoverished kingdom. The road went many places before it reached the mountain pass.
    Many places. Many choices. The sudden freedom of his situation swamped his senses. His friends and students and patrons thought him dead. He had no obligations. No responsibilities. No expectations.
    For the first time in his forty-nine years he could go anywhere, do anything, and not keep a schedule. Giddy laughter sent him to his knees.
    “I am free!” he yelled into the wind. Was that a laugh he heard in reply?
    Nimbulan stared at the tree on the bluff above the beach. Just an ordinary tree. He tried remembering the last time he stared at a tree for no reason other than to stare at a tree, and failed. For the past thirty years, at least, he’d had to weigh the location of the tree, its height, how much wood it could provide campfires, would it become a rallying point to turn the tide of battle, how many men could hide in it for ambush . . . ?
    “You are the most beautiful tree I have ever seen!” he yelled as loudly as he could, throwing out his arms as if to embrace the world. “You are beautiful because you are just a tree.”
    He drank in the tranquillity of the moment until the winter air reminded him to move on.
    A pang of guilt almost sent him back toward the islands. He’d set up the School for Magicians in an attempt to force peace on the lords of Coronnan. The lords didn’t want peace. He’d tried. What more could they ask of him?
    (Success.)
    His only clue to success lay with the Rovers, along the trade road that wound its way east. He set his steps toward his journey. He’d find answers in the east. Maybe he’d find his life there, too.
     
    “Have you hospitality for a lost traveler?” Myri asked the stout woman who hovered in the mouth of an old sea cave. The ocean had changed levels many generations before and left the cave on a plateau a hundred feet or more above the beach. A village had grown up around the mouth of the cave. A fishing village judging by the nets strung out to dry and the boats hauled up for winter repairs.
    “A mite young to be out on your own, girl. Where you hail from?” The woman placed her beefy hands on her hips. Her girth and the double doors framed and hung in the