The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume III: Volume III

to trust either man. But both had sworn oaths of loyalty to the Commune.
    The Rover at the doorway drifted closer. His hands reached behind him. Margit couldn’t tell more because of the blasted haze that made the man nearly invisible. But she knew that no lock could resist a Rover for long.
    She placed two fingers against her teeth and blew. A sharp whistle reverberated through the courtyard. Several shadowy outlines lifted their heads to look in her direction. Jack and Katrina among them.
    At least Margit could see those two along with Miranda, her Rover lover, and Lanciar, the soldier from SeLenicca. None of them had passed into the gloaming.
    With her magical senses extended, Jack and Katrina’s auras became fully visible to her. They complemented each other in shades of purple, silver, and white. Except . . .
    Jack’s aura had a strange double layer; a reversed reflection of the purple and silver that could also be bronze and black depending upon how the light hit him. Queen Rossemikka’s aura also had a bizarre reflection that doubled the layers of energy about her. Jack did indeed have a problem.
    He only took about three heartbeats to assess the position of the Rover. He turned his head toward the Rover guard. One of the indistinct outlines raised a hand and pointed at the figure outside Rejiia’s prison door.
    Instantly the guard jerked as if coming awake from a doze.
    Rejiia’s magic recoiled, too, as if she’d been stung by a bee.
    That strange mind-to-mind link all Rovers seemed to share at work again. So why wasn’t Miranda’s lover a ghost, too?
    And then Margit felt the faintest brush of tingling air against her arm. Instinctively, she swatted at the butterfly-light touch. Her hand encountered a barrier of energy extremely close. One of the ghosts stood next to her. She peered closer, letting her eyes cross, looking for distortions of light, a remnant of an aura, anything that might tell her who stood so close, so quiet she couldn’t even hear him/ her breathe.
    Jack and the ghost who was probably Zolltarn approached the guard. They stood for several moments talking to him in heated whispers in a language Margit did not understand. The ghost who stood next to her must be someone different. An unwanted eavesdropper.
    One of the nobles or their servants? Jack and Lanciar had made certain they had all passed into the gloaming to keep them here until the situation was resolved.
    “Why didn’t Rejiia try this earlier, while we slept?” Jack’s words came to Margit quite clearly.
    “Time is distorted here,” Zolltarn said. His worried voice sounded as if it traversed a great distance, but was more distinct than his body. “If I have lost my planetary orientation, then so must Rejiia. She might not know what time it is. She might not have been able to control her temper until now.”
    “I know what it’s like when the loss of one’s sense of where and when goes askew.” Jack shuddered visibly. “But Rejiia has always been able channel her temper into ruthless cunning. Why not now?”
    “Because Ackerly has invaded all of our dreams and made us react without thinking,” Zolltarn replied.
    “Who needs to think?” the invisible one next to Margit said on a breath. “Don’t think. Just turn your backs for one long moment.”
    Margit almost didn’t hear her, but as soon as the words penetrated her consciousness she recognized the petulant tones of Ariiell, the pregnant one who thought the world owed her adulation.
    Ariiell almost floated between the Rover guard and the door. She must have cloaked herself in some kind of invisibility spell for Jack and Zolltarn not to notice her. But the spell probably kept her from noticing anyone not in the gloaming.
    Ariiell hunched over the lock and proceeded to fiddle with it.
    “Oh, no, you don’t, you conniving bitch.” Margit launched herself at Ariiell in a full body tackle. She bounced against the barrier to the gloaming. Her entire front burned. But Ariiell stumbled away from the lock. A tiny bit of the mist that surrounded her faded along with her invisibility spell.
    “Get away from me, you filthy peasant!” Ariiell screeched. She arched her fingers as if to claw at anyone who stood in her way.
    “You won’t get that door open, Lady.” Zolltarn hauled her to her feet without regard to her delicate condition or sensibilities.
    “Do not touch me, Rover.” Ariiell spat at Zolltarn’s feet. “And I am more than a lady. I carry the