The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume II

and deny himself access to this new magic. True magicians rarely sired children, and females with magic never carried a child to term. That was a fact of life he’d tried to compensate for with his numerous apprentices over the years, seeking a son or daughter in each one who came to him for training.
    He’d lost them all to disease, accident, betrayal. Keegan’s death had been the worst loss of all. The emptiness in him yearned to be filled. Televarn offered him the chance. . . .
    “Our children are often born sickly. We mate too closely within the clan. Soon we must invoke the ancient laws against incest and banish all the young men to other clans as soon as they mature.”
    Nimbulan winced at the sense of loss each parent must feel if the boys were sent elsewhere, never to return.
    “Your child will be healthy and wouldn’t have to be banished,” Televarn whispered.
    “I would like a child of my own.”
    “As would I, but all the women of my family are too close to me. Many of the clans who might offer me a bride are also too close, or feuding with us. I must seek a mate elsewhere.” A wistful look came over Televarn’s face as he looked into the distance.
    Nimbulan sensed his mind floating to a different time and place. A woman who eluded him? “How does this magic work?”
    Televarn shook himself lightly, as if to banish his far away thoughts. “We have rituals that must be performed precisely. Any variation breaks our contact with the Kardia, and we must begin again. Interrupting a ritual, once we have begun, is death. A horrible death as the forces of sun, moon, and Kardia align and crush the one who interferes with the harmony. Are you willing to risk joining us tonight, as the full moon reaches its highest arc? We must begin soon for the ritual to climax at the proper moment. Timing is as essential as form.”
    “If the ritual is so dangerous, why do you risk it?” Once he learned it, would he dare teach it to apprentices?
    “For the reward of unity. Will you join us tonight, Lan?”
    Across the fire, Maia stood up. As she bent to place her flute on the floor beside her stool, her bodice gaped open to reveal the full globes of her breasts. She lifted her head and smiled invitingly to Nimbulan.
    “You will join with her afterward, and her thoughts will be yours. You will feel what she feels, know what she knows, and never lose the awareness of her presence again,” Televarn whispered.
    “What must I do?” Nimbulan swallowed deeply, trying to restrain his desire for the woman and his need to belong to someone. This ritual might prove the beginning of a whole new system of magic that would allow magicians to join their powers. Then, and only then, could they impose ethics and honor on all magicians. He could remove magic from the wars and politics allowing a natural balance of power to bring peace to Coronnan at last.
    But once he learned this magic, he’d have to leave the clan and Maia.
     
    “Forget the cold, soon the magic will take you,” Maia breathed in Nimbulan’s ear. She squeezed his hand and let it drop. Her scent lingered in the frosty air as she moved into her place in the ring of people outside the lodge.
    Every adult in the clan gathered in a circle around their winter home. They alternated male and female in even numbers. Televarn was the only unmatched person. He walked around the outside perimeter of people, lost in his own thoughts, mumbling to himself and breathing deeply.
    Nimbulan recognized his exercises as the beginning of a trance. The form of magic might be different, but a trance was a universal ingredient, essential for the magic to work with a body.
    He, too, inhaled on a ritual three counts, held it another three counts, and exhaled on the same rhythm. The women on either side of him did the same. Visibly their muscles relaxed and so did his. The chill winter night, the hand’s span of packed snow, the glittering stars in the clear sky, all receded from his consciousness.
    A second deep breath in three counts, hold three, release three, gave him access to the void. The blackness beckoned, urging him to take that third deep breath and release his body.
    “Not yet, Lan. Wait for the rest of us,” a voice reminded him.
    Televarn? Possible. He didn’t care. Only the trance and the void tugging at him in opposite directions mattered. He felt stretched almost to the point of dissipating into mist.
    The circle of people began moving to his right, widdershins,