The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume III: Volume III

his plan.
    “Do you have a death wish, boy?” Rollett raised his dark eyebrows.
    “He must. He asked me to kill him,” the consort said, only three paces away. “Give me your sword, Piedro. I shall execute this intruder myself.”
    “Aren’t you going to rip out my throat with your bare hands? That’s the way a dragon kills,” Powwell taunted. “And you are a dragon in spirit, Hanassa. The purple-tipped dragon instincts still drive you. You hunger for fresh meat, cooked by your own flames.”
    Hanassa licked her lips. A drop of drool trickled from the corner of her mouth. She swallowed heavily as if tasting sweet, fresh meat. Kalen’s features twisted into something alien and ugly. Any trace of the little girl had vanished beneath Hanassa’s lusts.
    “But you’ll never have your own dragon flames again,” Powwell continued. He and Rollett eased aside just a little, offering Hanassa a tantalizing glimpse of the scene beyond the dragongate. “The real dragon nimbus won’t let you have a dragon body again. They won’t let you fly out of this hellhole that is your prison. Your only escape is to steal a human body and walk out of here. But the humans won’t let you live among them as long as you drink their blood.”
    Hanassa edged closer. Her nose worked as if scenting freedom in the desert on the other side of the dragongate.
    The hot wind died. The gate began to close.
    “You’re more a prisoner here than we are, Hanassa,” Rollett added his taunts to Powwell’s. “We can step through the dragongate anytime we wish. Can you?”
    “It’s closing!” Hanassa wailed. She dashed toward them just as the red and black of the desert swirled into a myraid other colors.
    “Not again!” Kalen screamed as her body hurtled over the edge of the pit.
    A white mist enveloped her mundane body.
    “Now!” Powwell commanded as he wrapped a magic net around his sister. “Grab her.”
    He sensed Rollett’s diminished magic reaching to ensnare the young girl before she fell into the boiling lava a thousand feet below. Tendrils of power snaked and looped together, the dark red and deep sea-blue knots of Rollett’s magic cradled one side of Kalen. Powwell’s red and sparkling black held the other in a net of energy.
    Powwell had to open his mind further so that he and Rollett could work together. Every instinct inside him shouted to keep his secrets, keep this other man from learning how much he had enjoyed gathering blood magic.
    “Help me, Powwell!” Kalen, the true Kalen, screamed. “Don’t let me die in the pit again.”
    Powwell closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. He sought closer contact with Rollett’s mind. Their thoughts mingled, settled on a common need. Together they strained to haul Kalen back to the safety of the ledge.
    At last Powwell held Kalen in his arms and opened his eyes. His sister. The only family he had left. The child/ woman who completed his every thought and made sense of his ragged emotions.
    She turned to him, opening wide gray eyes to him in gratitude.
    Don’t let it get control of me, she pleaded. Her mental voice blended sweetly with his thoughts, filling a void that had existed since he’d been forced to leave her behind in this very tunnel over a year ago.
    “Thank you,” she said in Hanassa’s harsh voice several tones deeper than Kalen’s. The white mist separated from her body once more. The wraith sobbed her disappointment.
    Powwell’s heart nearly broke in grief.
    A self-satisfied smirk replaced the gratitude in Hanassa’s expression. “I read your mind, Powwell.” She caressed his face with long, talonlike nails that raked his skin but did not draw blood. “I knew what you planned the moment you shared your thoughts with Rollett. I let Kalen have her body for a few moments, so you would rescue her. Then I took it back. Now you are truly my prisoner, and I shall execute you properly.”

Chapter 33
     
    Afternoon, a stand of the Tambootie trees, south of First Bridge, on the mainland near Coronnan City
     
    K atie breathed deeply of the redolent smoke from the Tambootie wood fire. The queen, Nimbulan, and Myri stood in a circle around a small campfire deep in the woods south and west of the city. Their escort stood well back from this stand of Tambootie trees, backs turned to avoid breathing any of the smoke.
    Across the fire from her, Nimbulan swayed under the hallucinogens in the wood sap. Flame released those chemicals in uneven doses. They had no