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Authors: Irene Radford

The Wizard's Treasure (The Dragon Nimbus) (11 page)

BOOK: The Wizard's Treasure (The Dragon Nimbus)
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But he wouldn’t have awakened from a dragon-dream.
Still shivering with memories of arrows and boiling oil, he called a ball a witchlight to hand and stumbled to the latrine. Best way to banish a nightmare.
Three spiders as large as the largest gold coin crunched under his boots between his cell and the corner latrine. He relished the squishy sound of their deaths. This, he could control.
But when he climbed beneath the blankets again, the dream returned. He forced himself awake and counted the stones in each wall, the floor, and ceiling for the rest of the night.
 
“I don’t love you anymore, Margit,” Marcus stated boldly.
The tall blonde stood before him, hands on hips, feet spread, mouth agape. The setting sun backlit her flowing tresses into a wild halo of indignation. And then she started throwing spells, fire, water, wind, dirt clods.
Marcus ducked, holding up his arms to shield his face. He tried to erect a barrier between himself and Margit’s fury. Magic dribbled from his fingers like the last dregs of old ale from the bottom of the barrel.
“Let me explain, Margit.” When magic deserted him, he always had words. He could charm the surliest of beldames into giving him a night’s shelter, a meal, or a tumble in the hay. “We’ve had some good times together. We’ve shared the secrets of magicians spying upon politicos and fanatic Gnuls. I was the liaison between you and Jaylor at the Commune of Magicians. But that wasn’t true love. You don’t truly love me any more than I love you.”
“Explain!” Margit hurled rocks with fists and magic. Only one landed at his feet. The others found her targets, his shoulders, his gut, his head. She’d had a lot of practice warding off ravens and jackdaws from her mother’s bakery cart in the market square. “Explain! You call that an explanation? What have you found this time? A more beautiful woman, a wealthier woman, a willing woman on the long, lonely nights in the middle of nowhere? I’ve heard all of your excuses before, Marcus. But this is the last one. I’ll kill you before I let another woman have you.”
From empty air she conjured metal throwing stars. She aimed their sharp points at his eyes.
His luck had definitely run out. No more could he count on Margit’s love and loyalty waiting for him in the capital when he returned.
Fierce, hot pain in his eyes and head jolted Marcus awake. Darkness surrounded him. Had Margit’s aim been true and blinded him? Sweat poured down his face and back. He rubbed at the biting pain in his temple and eye. Insect bites.
Gradually, the faint starlight filtered through the high window of his monastery cell. As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he remembered where he was. He sighed heavily and brought a ball of cold witchlight to his hand.
“Just a nightmare. I still have my magic and my luck.” He rolled over and curled into his bedroll, seeking to warm the chill of sweat drying on his skin.
Images of Margit’s fury superimposed themselves on his mind every time he closed his eyes.
“I don’t love Margit. ’Tis Vareena who has captured my heart.” He tried to conjure her image before him, starting with her cloud of fair curls surrounding delicate features, frail frame, and serene demeanor.
Margit’s laugh and well-muscled strength kept trying to mask the pictures he held in his mind’s eye.
“I love Vareena. Tomorrow I’ll find a way out of here so that we can be together. Forever,” he repeated over and over again, until exhausted sleep finally claimed him.
CHAPTER 9
 
 
 
 
“
M
arcus, we’ve tried this before.” Robb sighed heavily.
“But we haven’t tried it this way,” Marcus replied. Eagerly he placed his right foot into a crevice in the outer wall. Then he reached for the first secure handhold with a show of confidence he didn’t really feel. They’d been trying to escape the old monastery all morning with no luck.
No luck. The words rang ominously around his head. He gritted his teeth and hauled himself up to find the next toehold. The chipped crevice he sought eluded him. As his balance teetered and his arms threatened to give way from the strain of holding his weight so precariously, he pressed his back against the gatehouse tower and wedged his body in the tight corner between it and the main curtain wall.
This would be easier if he’d slept better last night. Even after he’d banished the nightmare of Margit trying to kill him, he had not slept. Every time he’d turned over on the stone bench of a bed, the bed itself had seemed to roll and reshape itself to be more uncomfortable. Good fortune would never return until he escaped this cursed monastery.
From the looks of the deep shadows beneath Robb’s eyes, he hadn’t slept any better.
They had to get out of here. Today. Now.
“Your theory is flawed, Marcus. Whatever magical barrier holds us here is most thorough. Even the scattered ley lines within the courtyard do not reach the wall. They end abruptly and never do they cross. Our summons spell to Jaylor last night did not leave this complex. I think the thick cloud cover kept it within the walls. The confinement spell must have been constructed to surround the entire wall, not just the obvious exits and easily climbed points. Actually from the way you are bracing yourself there, I believe this to be the most obvious place for a climber to escape.” Robb droned on with his logical assessment of their predicament. He held his grounded staff so that the top made little circles at the end of each sentence.
“But Vareena comes and goes with her brother. Why them and not us?” Marcus returned. “She brought us food and blankets this morning. She talks to us. She sees us. But her brother doesn’t. Not once could I make eye contact with him while we dug Farrell’s grave. Why can Vareena and her brother leave and we can’t?” He didn’t add that he wanted to follow the lovely blonde. He’d follow her to the ends of the Kardia if he had to, giving up his dreams of a snug cottage and never wandering more than a few leagues from there ever again.
Margit’s image reared up before him. She’d never forgive him for deserting her. She’d hunt him down and kill him . . . No that was the nightmare. Margit might make life miserable for him, but she’d never . . . or would she?
He had a nagging feeling that his infamous good luck wouldn’t solve this problem for him.
But he had to have Vareena—He caressed the name in his mind as he climbed. Vareena needed his protection. She stood barely as tall as his shoulder. Her willowy figure looked too fragile to withstand a light breeze, let alone stand up to her strapping brother. And yet, from their conversations, Marcus gathered that the entire family of strong brothers and an implacable father listened and obeyed her. She’d remained a spinster to care for them.
“Perhaps Vareena and her brother have the freedom to leave because they are mundane,” Robb mused. He stroked his dark beard, eyes crossing in thought. In another time and place, Marcus might expect a spell to bounce from the end of his staff. But those ley lines curved and twisted away from each other as if repelled. Neither he nor Robb had been able to tap into their energy for more than the most rudimentary spells.
The summons spell had not exited the walls.
“What does talent or lack of it have to do with escape?” Marcus wormed his way up the wall a little higher. His right foot slipped just as he shifted his balance to move his other foot. Rough stone rasped his palms and cheek while he scrabbled for a better position. “
S’murghit!
That stings.” His breath whistled through his clenched teeth.
Time was, he could set his mind to any task, and luck would carry him through to the end. He always found a way to come through unscathed no matter how difficult or dangerous the chore.
Robb bore a number of scars from their adventures. They enhanced his rugged appeal. Marcus had no scars to blemish his fair skin and lithe body—yet.
Doggedly he climbed higher, doing his best to ignore the painful scrapes that made him want to curl his fingers tightly over the wounds.
“This would be a lot easier if the builders had put in a parapet and walkway for guards or lookouts. This exterior wall must have been added for protection after the main building was constructed,” Marcus mused rather than think about his luck and his magic draining away.
“We must consider the possibility that this monastery was converted to a prison for rogue magicians at the end of the Great Wars of Disruption.” Robb continued his lecture. “If such were the case, then the Commune would need a powerful spell to keep the criminals in. Something in the nature of the magical border around Coronnan. Until recently it prevented enemies and undesirables from entering the country.”
“Flawed logic, Robb. The border broke down when the number of dragons that supplied our magic decreased. When Shayla flew away and took her mates with her, the border dissolved completely. Why didn’t this spell?” He didn’t want to think what kind of sorcery kept the dragons in SeLenicca. Who could be stronger than a dragon?
Robb made no reply. A quick glance over his shoulder told Marcus that his friend’s eyes crossed almost to opposite sockets as he stroked his beard.
“Another puzzle that I must think on,” Robb replied after several moments.
“If you don’t let your eyes straighten out, Robb, they will remain crossed forever,” he chided his friend.
Robb apparently didn’t hear him, but remained deep in contemplation.
Marcus reached higher. His shoulders and back ached and his face burned from the previous scrape. If he didn’t have an audience, he just might give up and go find a dark corner where he could vent his frustration by stomping a few of the monstrous spiders that thrived in this place. Then he’d nurse his hurts in private.
He edged closer to the top of the wall where it joined the taller gatehouse tower.
At last his left hand clutched the rounded top. Then he pushed high enough to fling his right arm over the top stone and brace his weight. A shout of triumph burst out of his laboring lungs.
It died before it passed his lips. Magical power jolted up his arm to his neck and head. His ears rang and a numbness grew in his head. The blankness spread and he lost his grip. He couldn’t find the other wall with his back. His feet went slack.
He knew he fell, but he couldn’t feel a thing.
He
did
hear Robb droning on about
his
theory of how one would create such an enduring protective spell that would not disintegrate with the loss of the dragons.
“That
s’murghin’
containment spell is killing my luck,” Marcus cursed.
 
These men who seek to steal my power are either too stubborn for their own health or too stupid to survive. They have not responded to the dreams of portent I sent them, nor to the subtle persuasion of a kardiaquake. I must think anew. I have time. I am not going anywhere.
BOOK: The Wizard's Treasure (The Dragon Nimbus)
8.39Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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