The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume III: Volume III Read Online Free PDF Page B

not one of them. Back home he would be the first to wade into a brawl, fists and feet flying, loving the game of breaking heads to break up the fight. Liam Francis had vanished again. No sign of Sean Michael or Jamie Patrick either.
    One of the disputants, clothed in a gaudy orange shirt with purple piping, threw an overripe pear at his neighbor. The fruit splattered the more sober unbleached linen shirt of a dark-haired man who stood a little taller than most of the crowd. He responded by throwing the remains of his ale into Orange-shirt’s face.
    Both followed through with fists. Their neighbors joined the spreading brawl.
    “Guards, go and break this up. Disperse the people before this spreads even further,” Quinnault ordered.
    Half of the armed escort dispersed through the crowd.
    Katie clutched her husband’s arm, frightened, as the anger spread and engulfed the people standing closest to the bridge. Angry thoughts blasted through her mental armor. The emotions behind the fight made her toes curl and brought lumbird bumps to her spine.
    She’d experienced this sensation only once before, when an assassin had crept into her room the night before her wedding. He’d used magic to instill fear in her, a terror so great she lay immobile, defenseless against his attack.
    “Come, Your Grace,” the sergeant-at-arms suggested. “I’ll escort you to the royal stables. You’ll be safe there.”
    “Take Her Grace back to the palace by whatever back routes you can find,” Quinnault replied. He patted Katie’s hand. “I’ll follow by a different route with the others. We’ll be safer attracting less attention with smaller parties.”
    “No, Quinnault,” Katie said quietly but with determination. “We both need to stay. Someone is amplifying the crowd’s emotions with magic to further their own political agenda. Listen to the argument. Listen hard. We need to stop this here and now!”
    “Filthy foreigner!” Orange-shirt yelled. “How dare you think of marrying off your daughter to my son. I’ll not taint our bloodline with Rovers.”
    Strange, Orange-shirt dressed more like a Rover than the man he accused.
    “Rovers steal our children as well as our hard-earned dragini.” That voice came from a different quarter altogether. The angry emotions swelled, as if being manipulated by a master hand.
    The assassin who had used her own emotions against Katie had been a Rover.
    Confusion muddled her thoughts. Who was behind this?
    “Rovers will rape and control your mind with their magic worse than any Commune Magician.” That voice came from an ordinary woman with muddy blond hair, no Rover coloring in her face or clothing.
    “Bad enough we have to put up with a foreign queen and her prancing lumbird father. We don’t need Rovers and them desert mercenaries freeloading off our bounty. We don’t need a foreign queen controlling our king,” Orange-shirt called to the crowd in general.
    Katie bristled. Beside her, Quinnault clenched his jaw. A muscle jumped in his cheek, and the pulse in his neck beat too rapidly.
    The few remaining courtiers in their party gasped at the audacity of the crowd voicing these sentiments in front of the royal couple. Most of the dignitaries had dispersed at the first sign of trouble.
    “We need a new king,” Orange-shirt yelled above the noise of the crowd. “We need a king who doesn’t bow to foreign interests.”
    “Kill all foreigners!”

Chapter 3
     
    Late afternoon, Saawheen, on the Long Bridge to the mainland, Coronnan City
     
    ‘ S peak to them, Quinnault. End this before the violence spreads!’ Katie tugged at her husband’s arm. The moisture on her brow and back turned icy with fear.
    The guards surrounded them, swords drawn. Tension made their arms twitch.
    If any one of them drew so much as a drop of blood, all hope of exerting calm would disappear.
    Quinnault stared at her, gathering his thoughts. Then he nodded his head and took a deep breath.
    “My people.”