Free The Silent Dragon: Children of The Dragon Nimbus #1 by Irene Radford

few months and they all looked, dressed, and talked alike, as if to vary one tiny morsel from court-dictated fashions might weaken the kingdom and leave it vulnerable to invasion. Except Lady Anya, Miri’s mother. She was always at M’ma’s side, a friend and confidante as well as assistant.
    Linda flashed her skirts at the ladies, showing a gossamer trim on her petticoat, purchased on a defiant whim after she’d abandoned Lucjemm. Beside her, Miri and Chastet practiced the same flick revealing similar, but not as grand lace on their petticoats. A game they’d cooked up together. Now that Linda had reached the mature age of fourteen and been assigned ladies of her own, she’d discovered the joy in setting her own fashion with colored ribbons and touches of lace from SeLennica.
    The ladies went into a huddle, discussing whether the princess should be allowed to dictate fashion to the rest of the court. From the way they plucked at the plain pleats on their bodices, Linda guessed they’d dash to the fabric stalls on Market Island the moment they finished their duties today.
    Lace had been out of fashion for a few years now—probably because it cost so much. And she thought there’d been a war with SeLennica. She hadn’t paid that much attention to her modern history lessons. Ancient legends and dragon lore were much more interesting. Now there was a treaty with SeLennica, but the lack of demand had dropped the prices of lace—a point of economics P’pa had taught her.
    “Princess Rosselinda.” M’ma dipped her head the precise depth dictated by formal protocol.
    Uh-oh. Formality before breakfast meant something awful. Had M’ma missed her pair of riding gloves that Linda had borrowed?
    M’ma didn’t ride anymore. And Linda didn’t want to see the fine leather go to waste . . .
    “Is P’pa all right?” she asked breathlessly. She advanced to kneel before her mother, crumpling her heavily brocaded skirts in both hands. Best way to deflect a reprimand was change the subject as fast as possible.
    “You father fares well, my dear,” M’ma chuckled. “He paces like an angry spotted saber cat, but he fares well.”
    “What angers him?” Linda asked warily. Had he found out that ’twas she who had stripped rosebuds from their stems after the men in the arena had so obviously let her win her bouts? Lucjemm was the only one honest enough to make her work for her victories. And yesterday he’d disappeared the moment she had arrived in the arena.
    On that thought her father appeared from the inner room. He prowled from window to chair to doorway, hands locked behind his back, head thrust forward, shoulders reaching for his ears. With his golden hair lightened with touches of gray, still tightly bound in a four-strand queue from its morning dressing, he resembled the predatory cat M’ma had likened him to.
    No, not precisely a spotted saber cat. More like a caged golden wolf.
    For some reason known only to her parents, she wasn’t allowed to mention that resemblance. Clear evidence to Linda that she had landed close to a truth. A dangerous truth.
    A truth told in cautionary legends of a prince enticed away from his duties by evil sorcerers and changed into a wolf so that he’d be killed on a random hunt. But he was saved by the dragons and a mysterious red-haired woman. The prince of legend was named Darville, and plainly resembled the current king; and like all tales, it supposedly took place long ago, before times anyone living had witnessed.
    Could the tale be true, a part of her father’s history, and could the mysterious red-haired woman be the mother of P’pa’s bastard son?
    A bell rang in the great hall directly below the queen’s quarters.
    Linda raised her eyebrows in question when her parents did not respond to the summons to break their fast.
    The ladies looked to Queen Rossemikka expectantly. Almost anxiously. Were they so eager to be first on Market Isle and conforming to the newest court