BVC Announces The Loneliest Magician by Irene Radford

The Loneliest Magician
The Dragon Nimbus Book #3
by Irene Radford

He chose a grand name of a legendary warrior from ancient times. Now he has to live up to it.

The dragons have left Coronnan and taken their magic with them. Magicians who can gather dragon magic can combine their talents to increase their power exponentially to impose ethics and honor upon any solitary practitioner.

King Darville is tied to the dragons. He endures a painful wound to his dominant left arm that will not heal. He and his senior magician fear that he shares the festering burn because Shayla, the last breeding female dragon suffers an identical wound.

The task to return the dragons to Coronnan falls to the apprentice magician who was previously thought too stupid to have a name. So, when he exhibits a strong magical talent using nearly forgotten solitary techniques, he is brought into the Commune and given the right to choose his own name.
He chooses a grand name of a legendary warrior from ancient times: Yaake.

Now he has to live up to it.

His convoluted path to find the dragons leads him to isolated kingdom of Se Lennica, ruled by a man known as The Simeon, Coronnan’s greatest enemy.

The Simeon has stripped the land of its resources and now faces floods, landslides, and relentless climate change.
He has usurped power from his young and naïve wife, the true queen of the land who controls the lacemaking industry, Se Lennica’s only export.

Shayla, cannot fly to freedom until Yaake can find a cure for her wound. He has to do it before his king dies and before catches up to him and the young woman whom Yaake loves but has been designated a sacrifice in the Simeon’s last, desperate attempt to magically restore the land.

Can Yaake and his new allies find a way out without magic? More importantly, can he aid his friends and the love of his life before they fall victim to The Simeon’s cruel magic that draws power from blood and pain?

The Dragon Nimbus Book #3
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Irene Radford is a founding member of Book View Café. You can find many of her books, both reprints and original titles, at the café, including her earliest books being released throughout 2023. She has been writing stories ever since she figured out what a pencil was for. Editing, as Phyllis Irene Radford, grew out of her love of the craft of writing. History has been a part of her life from earliest childhood and led to her BA from Lewis and Clark College.

Mostly she writes fantasy and historical fantasy including the best-selling Dragon Nimbus Series and the masterwork Merlin’s Descendants series. Look for her writing new historical fantasy tales as Rachel Atwood, a different take on the Robin Hood mythology in Walk the Wild with Me, from DAW Books and the sequel Outcasts of the Wildwood. In other lifetimes she writes urban fantasy as P.R. Frost or Phyllis Ames, and space opera as C.F. Bentley. Lately she ventured into Steampunk as Julia Verne St. John.

If you wish information on the latest releases from Ms Radford, under any of her pen names, you can subscribe to her newsletter: www.ireneradford.net. Or you can follow her on Facebook as Phyllis Irene Radford.

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Prologue

Lord Krej and his sister Janataea are lost to the coven. Zolltarn, king of the Rovers, betrayed them both and deserted our ranks. No other has enough power to become the focus of our magic rituals. Our numbers are depleted; a miserable six when we need nine, and I am but half-trained. The Council of Provinces and their puppet king have triumphed.

But only for the moment. I am making plans for when we are a full nine once more. Then the Twelve will die for what they have done to us.

I have not the power or knowledge to break the reflected magic that transformed Krej into a tin weasel with flaking gilt paint. No honor for him, tricked by Darville and caught in the spell’s backlash. If only our Lady Janessa could be revived. She would know how to release her son. But she died and was honored by being transformed into an idol at the moment of death. I sense that Lord Krej still lives within his statue prison. His life-spirit fades little by little.

I will have revenge. Before Darville is crowned, when all eyes are on the gaudy display of the coronation festival, my agents will kill the self-righteous king and his trollop of a queen.

The great winged god Simurgh will demand blood for the power needed to carry through with the plan. A mere slave will do for the initial spells. When all is done, I will need a triple sacrifice for the return of Krej. Yes! I sense the balances moving into place as I plan.

Jaylor is boon companion to Darville. His wife, Brevelan, is bastard daughter of Krej. And their babe is an innocent. They should die together.

Buy The Loneliest Magician in the BVC bookstore