The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume III: Volume III

sparkled around the edges of her aura of bright pink and pale yellow. A minor talent that would go unnoticed anywhere but in this haunted monastery.
    Then Vareena lifted her eyes from the firewood to search the courtyard. Her gaze rested on Robb for a long moment. He looked away first. The longing that burned in her gaze embarrassed him. He had no interest in her as a woman, only as a helper in this dilemma. His heart truly belonged to Margit and Margit only.
    Reluctantly, Vareena turned to her brother and retreated back to her normal world in the village.
    Normal. What was normal anymore?
    For years he had trained to work only dragon magic and revile anyone who dared tap rogue powers. As magicians had believed for centuries, Robb had held to the tenet that any use of rogue, or solitary magic, had its roots in evil. That had been normal. Then the dragons had left Coronnan, taking their communal magic with them. Over the last three years Robb had come to accept solitary magic as normal. The wandering life he and Marcus led as journeymen carrying out Jaylor’s missions had become normal.
    How long would he and his best friend be stuck here before this half existence between reality and the void became normal?
    He couldn’t allow that to happen. Coronnan needed dragons so that honor and respect could be restored to magic and magicians. Only with dragons could magicians combine their powers, have them amplified by orders of magnitude to overcome any solitary magician. The Commune of Magicians was dedicated to enforcing law, ethics, honor, and justice among themselves and throughout Coronnan. He and Marcus were Jaylor’s last hope for bringing the female dragon Shayla and her mates home.
    Yaakke had failed, having gone missing some three years ago.
    Now he and Marcus must remain missing in this hazy gloaming indefinitely.
    Didn’t that half-haze ever dissipate from the sky? He kicked the stone wall of the tower in his frustration. All he wanted right now was to see honest sunshine reflecting off Margit’s blond braids.
    In the center of the courtyard Marcus arranged the kindling and wood into an efficient campfire. He snapped his fingers and brought a flamelet of witchfire to his fingertip. It leaped from his hand into the kindling, chewing hungrily at the fuel.
    They were ready to try a summons spell again, in broad daylight, when they had a better chance of someone being awake at the University to respond. Possibly the containment spell around the monastery weakened the spell to the point a sleeping magician would not notice the faint hum in the recipient’s glass.
    Robb moved to Marcus’ side, staying slightly behind so he could feed the fire without distracting his friend from his spell.
    Marcus acknowledged him with a slight nod as he breathed deeply, in three counts, hold three, out three, hold three. His eyes glazed over, and he stared into the flames, seeing something far, far away. Slowly, deliberately, he brought his square of precious glass up to eye level and recited the ritual words that would summon Jaylor, Senior Magician of the Commune.
    Robb fought the urge to dive into his own trance and participate in the spell. If dragon magic were available, he could combine his own talent with Marcus’ and boost the power of the spell far beyond the sum of their two talents. Without dragons, he could only monitor his friend and keep the fire going for as long as the spell took to reach across Coronnan to the protected Clearing near the University.
    “Flame to flame, glass to glass, like seeking like,” Marcus chanted over and over again.
    Robb grew cramped sitting cross-legged on the hard-packed surface of the courtyard. He shifted uneasily and fed yet another log onto the fire. The sparks leaped high, greedy for more fuel.
    His back ached. He reached out with a tiny magical probe and checked Marcus’ pulse. He’d been in trance a long time. Surely Jaylor would answer the thrumming vibration of his glass no matter what time of the day or night. If he couldn’t, then an apprentice or another magician would intervene with his own glass and flame. He could not imagine a situation that would keep every magician in the Commune and University away from communication at the same time.
    The probe lost contact with Marcus’ pulse. Robb risked touching his friend. His skin was cool and had taken on the waxy pallor of exhaustion and hunger.
    “Wake up, Marcus. Return to your body and your thoughts. Come back