The Dragons Revenge (Tales from the New Earth #2) by J.J. Thompson Page B

convalescence
starts now.”

Chapter
7

    Simon's recovery took
almost three weeks. Once he had admitted to himself that he really
had pushed his mind and body too far too soon, the wizard was able to
take a step back and relax, albeit with poor grace.
    He went to bed early and
slept until noon most days. He sat by the fire drinking cup after cup
of chamomile tea and reading old beloved books that he hadn't picked
up in years. He ate when he was hungry, baking bread and cakes using
his precious supply of flour and actually enjoying the mundane tasks.
    In short, Simon O'Toole
took a holiday from magic. The elementals allowed him to light
candles with his power, but that was the extent of it. And to his
surprise, the wizard began to feel better.
    He put on some weight,
although with his lanky frame, Simon would never be a heavyweight.
His tremors disappeared and he became a little less susceptible to
chills. Although he would never like the cold of winter, he did
become better at coping with it.
    And the black smears of
exhaustion faded from under his eyes. Even his dark hair, with its
streaks of white caused by casting master-class spells in his fight
with the black dragon, became fuller and shinier again. It hung down
below his shoulders now, but Simon had no urge to cut it. Long hair
on a wizard, at least in his mind, seemed to be appropriate.
    Aeris traveled to
Nottinghill once during Simon's convalescence, to see if Clara and
the villagers were doing all right. When he returned, he assured the
wizard that he hadn't told the cleric about Simon's condition. In
fact, he said that he had reassured her that all was well and that
when the weather became more tolerable, they would all travel to the
village for a visit.
    “ Thanks, Aeris,”
Simon said with relief after the air elemental's report. “Clara
has enough on her plate taking care of her own people without
worrying about me.”
    “ You're welcome,”
Aeris replied with a tight smile. “And you're right. Winter is
hard on them and the cleric helps to keep them organized and focused.
I hope when the weather breaks that we do head down there to see
them.”
    “ Oh, we will, we
will. But I'd rather wait until the spring, or close to it. This is
pretty much the worst winter that I can remember, and that includes
the winters I lived through back in my old life.”
    Aeris floated above the
desk in the study. Simon had been idly going through his spell-book,
but under the watchful eye of the elemental, he hadn't attempted to
cast even the simplest of spells.
    He suddenly made a
notation on one of the spells, looked at it intently and nodded.
Aeris watched this curiously.
    “ What was that for?”
he asked Simon, indicating the spell-book.
    “ Hmm? Well, I know
it sounds weird, but in the past few days when I've checked my
spells, I've found some, I don't know, mistakes in the incantations.
So I've been correcting as I read through them.”
    “ How do you know
they're mistakes? They worked before, didn't they?”
    Simon read the spell under
his breath, careful not to concentrate and actually memorize it.
    “ Yeah, they did.”
He shrugged. “I've just had a, you know, feeling. That's all.”
    The air elemental seemed
to be pondering that answer and then his expression brightened.
    “ I wonder if this is
the gods of Justice finding a surreptitious of helping you again?
They were thwarted by their enemies when you were stripped of your
magic and your knowledge, so perhaps they are fine-tuning your
spells, making them more efficient.”
    The wizard sat back and
thought about Aeris' notion. It wasn't a crazy idea. Simon had picked
up spells through dreams in the past, dreams that he'd learned
originated from the gods. So maybe they were helping again, this time in a more subtle, less obvious way.
    “ That's
a possibility, Aeris. Good thinking. The gods may actually be taking
advantage of my down-time to slip these alterations into my dreams.”
    He
smiled a bit