The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume III: Volume III

slowly, easily.” Robb held his friend’s hand, infusing warmth and strength into the chill skin.
    Marcus slumped and sighed heavily. His eyelids fluttered. He looked up bleakly. “I couldn’t get through. I don’t think the spell climbed the walls any better than we did.”
    “My plan didn’t work.”

Chapter 13
     
    “D id you feel that?” Margit asked Ferrdie and Mikkail. She touched the little shard of glass in her scrip. A moment ago it felt as if it vibrated with a summons. Now it lay quiet again.
    For years, during her time as Queen Rossemikka’s maid and Jaylor’s spy in the capital, the summons spell was the only bit of magic she could work. She had mastered all nuances of that spell very well and should know that characteristic thrumming in her glass.
    But now the sensation had dissipated like mist in a fog. A summons did not work that way. The glass should continue to vibrate until the one summoned found a flame and a bit of privacy to answer.
    She’d known a spell to linger in her glass for the best part of a day.
    “Feel what?” Mikkail returned. He looked up from the text he studied at the long library table. Darkness had driven them inside, otherwise Margit would have insisted they continue their reading beneath a tree in the fresh air. She had chosen a table beneath a shuttered window, which she opened to the night air.
    Ferrdie looked around anxiously as if expecting to be beaten for doing his homework.
    Since she’d adopted masculine clothing and hairstyle, the boys in her class accepted her more readily, asked her to study and practice with them. WithyReed still did not call upon her in class, but the other masters took her more seriously. Almost as if a gown set up a barrier between them.
    Or a challenge. Dressed as a boy, she did not threaten their preconceived ideas about females and magic. She wondered briefly how Brevelan, the wife of the Senior Magician, coped with the archaic attitude.
    In asking the question, she knew the answer. Brevelan ignored the masters who treated her as subhuman. That irritated the masters immensely because their lofty opinions meant nothing to the wife of their Senior Magician.
    Briefly, Margit explained the strange half-sensation that her glass had interrupted a summons to someone else. Both boys touched their glasses within their scrips. Both shook their heads. Mikkail shrugged his shoulders and returned to the treatise written by the ancient magician named Scarface.
    “What’s this word, Margit?” He turned the scroll so she could see it.
    “Complementary,” she replied.
    “So the elements of Fire and Air are ‘com-ple-men-tar-y’.” He sounded each syllable carefully as Margit had taught him, so he’d remember the word next time he saw it.
    “And Kardia and Water are complementary. I wonder if one could negate a spell by invoking opposing elements?” she mused.
    “An interesting theory you may explore as part of your next advancement test, Margit,” Jaylor said from the doorway.
    All three apprentices jumped to their feet in respect for the Senior Magician.
    “Sit, sit, return to your studies.” He waved them back to their stools and their books. He carried his younger son under one arm and a cat on his other shoulder. Lately, he was rarely seen without at least one of his two sons and some of the overflow of animals attracted to the shelter of Brevelan’s Clearing. The first Senior Magician in many generations to have a family, he took his duties as a father very seriously—especially now that his wife Brevelan was heavily pregnant again. She needed a break from the excessive energy of her two sons and husband.
    “Have any of you seen Master Librarian Lyman?” Jaylor asked, looking about the jumbled shelves of the library. They’d lost a number of books in their years of running from refuge to refuge before building a new University in exile. But they’d retrieved many more books from unexpected sources as silent sympathizers found circuitous ways to send the treasures. Not everyone was willing to consign books to Gnul bonfires. Lyman, the ancient librarian, hadn’t managed to sort and shelve them all properly. Nor had he appointed an assistant to help him.
    Perhaps Ferrdie? Margit thought the job perfect for her meek friend.
    “Dozing in the corner,” Margit whispered to Jaylor.
    “I’ll not wake him then. He needs his rest.” Jaylor started to back out of the room.
    “Master Jaylor?” Margit stopped him. “Did