Tiger's Dream (Tiger's Curse Book 5)

by Colleen Houck

  ***

  I was soundly asleep when the door abruptly swung open and smacked my tiger head. At my soft, grumbling growl, Anamika pushed her way through and then glared at me, putting her hands on her hips. Transformed from the vulnerable little girl to a powerful goddess once again, she announced that it was time for us move forward with the next item on Kadam’s list, and if I didn’t like it, then too bad.

  I didn’t like this turn of events. Not one bit. The implications of Anamika’s failure to save her past self from a lecherous man meant that the plans I had made for myself were full of impending roadblocks, and the last thing I wanted to do was to add more logs to the dam preventing me from fixing the past to get what I wanted.

  She produced the list and the next item was making sure Ren was captured. After mulling it over for a moment, I decided this one was okay. If I was ever going to meet Kelsey in the future, er…past, then Ren had to be at the circus.

  I briefly entertained the notion that I could get myself captured instead, but a black tiger was so rare it was likely I’d be kept in Asia forever and would never end up at the little circus in Oregon. Also there was the little problem of my never aging. It would be too tough to pull off, so putting Ren in a cage was necessary.

  When we were both ready, Anamika stood next to me, and when I offered my hand, she took it. Together we disappeared from our mountain home and rematerialized in my old stomping grounds. Catching my own tiger scent, I immediately crouched down and tugged her down with me, pressing my finger to my lips to indicate she should be quiet.

  A soft growl rumbled through the trees, and just as my old form poked his head through the brush to investigate, Anamika wrapped her hand around my bicep and we went invisible, phasing our bodies half in and half out of a time stream, which also masked our scents. The black tiger approached us and spent a long time sniffing the air, then, to my surprise, he walked right through our crouched forms. With the flick of a black tail, he was gone.

  “That was close,” Anamika said quietly after we rematerialized a few moments later. “Do you remember that?”

  “No. I remember very little from my days in the jungle.”

  “Good. Shall we find the hunters then?”

  Turning my nose into the wind, I began walking east, stopping often to scent the area and moving as quietly as possible through the forest. To her credit, Anamika was a silent companion behind me. When I turned to glance at her, she remained alert, golden bow at the ready and nocked with an arrow. Once again she was wearing her green dress and thigh-high boots, and she made not a whisper of sound though the brown leaves on the path crackled with even my own carefully placed steps.

  I considered her idea of what she wanted from a man. Anamika claimed she didn’t need one, and in all my research about the goddess Durga, there was never any indication that she took a mate. Her only companion was her tiger, Damon. It would be easy to be the kind of man she wanted, the kind she needed. With my chakram hanging from my belt and my ability to wield tooth and claw, I could be just what she needed—a companion who watched her back. The problem was…I wanted more.

  I dreamt of a home with a woman who loved me, one who drove me crazy with both passionate arguments and passionate embraces—the kind of relationship my parents had. Also, I wanted children. A son I could teach to hunt and spar with, a daughter beautiful and sweet with the same fire as her mother. When suitors came around, they’d think twice about how they treated her with a father who could rip them in two.

  It saddened me to think of all the things that Anamika was willing to give up. She’d resigned herself to a future without love and tenderness. The loss of her brother must have been hard indeed.

  Clouds crawled across the bright blue sky, but the jungle was sweltering despite the shade of the trees. In the midday sun, sweat trickled down the back of my neck and dampened my shirt. Anamika swiped at her forehead. Her skin glistened in the heat but she didn’t complain, and I found myself admiring not only her stamina but the way her hair curled in the humidity.

  I couldn’t help but compare her with Kelsey. My former fiancée would have grumbled about the heat at least once per hour as she stomped noisily beside me. I didn’t mind it. Not really. But it did make sneaking up on prey rather difficult. As I had recently seen Kelsey trudging through the underbrush, chattering to Ren like a happy bird, she was a startling contrast to the young woman striding along next to me.

  Where Kelsey kept me entertained with her lively babble and stories, Ana was pensive and quiet. Her eyes were trained on the jungle and her senses were alert to her surroundings. When I raised a hand, silently indicating we should head west, Anamika nodded and moved forward comfortably, finding paths as easily as I could.

  Kelsey, on the other hand, would often get lost, wander into impenetrable brush, or need a nudge to keep her on the right track. She’d spread her things around camp. Her clothes, journal, and supplies were tossed about randomly like she was planting a garden of arbitrary things, and she’d end up leaving her scent everywhere. Any idiot who knew anything about tracking could follow her trail as easily as a herd of buffalo.

  Ana, though, barely left a trace of herself. She was like a ghost in the woods, a phantom. Sometimes, as we walked, she’d disappear altogether. I’d stop and turn, straining my ears for a hint of her whereabouts, and then she’d emerge suddenly from the brush with a handful of berries or a cutting of a plant she wanted to add to her garden at home. I’d frown at her, but she’d just raise an eyebrow, taunting me to go ahead and say something. It was easier to keep the peace.

  We soon came upon a group of hunters. The scent of death and fear clung to them like a disease. Jungle creatures fled at the stench, putting as great a distance as they could manage between themselves and the humans. Anamika wrinkled her nose as if she, too, could smell them. Rippling heat hung over the group languishing in the trees. The knowledge of what they were, of what they did, brought the taste of bile to my mouth.

  Even from a distance where we hid in the trees, I could make out dozens of caged birds and animals, pelts of all kinds, and the unmistakable shine of ivory peeking out of large bags. One man teased a creature in a cage by offering meat and then pulling it away. His laugh cut through me. If I wasn’t angry already, I would have been after seeing him taunt the poor creature. A solid band of anger twisted in my gut at the thought of leaving Ren in the hands of these men. Suddenly, consigning Ren to a cage such as that didn’t sit so well with me. It was Ana who caught my attention and distracted me from the scene.

  She drew me around a copse of trees and pointed. From that angle we could make out a few of the men climbing out of a pit. The leader grunted his instructions, and the men took one of the smaller animals from a cage, killed it, and hoisted its bleeding carcass over the hole they’d made. Quickly, they covered it with long crisscrossing sticks and then wove leaves through the branches until the pit was concealed. When they were satisfied, they picked up their bags and cages and moved off deeper into the jungle.

  Deeming it safe a half hour after their departure, we stepped out of the trees, and I rubbed a hand across my jaw, inspecting the trap. “He’s not going to fall for this one. He’s far too intelligent. Even so,” I mumbled, bending down to peek through the leaves covering the pit, “there are sharpened pikes in there. He could heal from being impaled, but he’d have a hard time freeing himself.”

  “Then we’ll fashion a second trap and make certain he doesn’t see that one,” she said.

  “Are you sure that’s a smart idea? Even if he falls in, how can you be sure the hunters would find it?”

  “We will place the second near the first.”

  “Won’t the hunters realize it isn’t their trap?”

  “These aren’t the type of men to honor any type of hunting code. If they see him, they will take him. We’ll just have to make sure they see him.”

  Using the power of the Damon Amulet, Ana moved dirt quickly, fashioning another pit right n
ext to the first one. When it was prepared, she erased our scents and we climbed high into a tree to wait for Ren. At first, I was worried that we’d be waiting for quite a long time, but I took us to the approximate date of the morning Ren went missing, so we’d only been sitting in the tree for a short time when I heard him.

  There was a snap in the bushes, and with the wave of her hand, Anamika made us invisible. Ren poked his tiger head out of the bush and lifted his nose in the air. He took his time, listening, and then he emerged from the bush, stretched lazily, and lifted his head to peer up at the raw meat. Carefully, he circled the pit, purposely nudging the leaves covering the hole until it was exposed. He wrinkled his nose in a tiger grimace when he saw the sharpened sticks jutting up out of the hole.

  Glancing up at the meat again, he licked his whiskers. It was an easy meal and he was likely hungry. Ren didn’t like hunting as much as I did. I often brought my kills home to share with him. He had the same instincts I did but he hated giving in to his tiger half. When he was close to the second pit, Anamika shot a series of arrows down on him from our perch in the tree. She missed him each time, purposely, but when he started to move in the wrong direction, she allowed an arrow to graze him so he’d head back the other way.

  He leapt to the side after an arrow pierced his flank and fell into the hole she’d made. The one without the deadly pikes. Quietly, she dropped from the tree, phasing her body in time so Ren couldn’t detect her. She gathered her arrows and gazed down upon his pacing tiger form. I joined her, and together we moved off through the trees, staying close enough to watch over him but far enough away that there was no danger he’d hear us. When we were satisfied with our position, Anamika sped up time.

  After two days for Ren and a few minutes for us, she took hold of the amulet, and time slowed down to normal. Ren had already been hungry when he’d fallen in the pit. I could see his ribs jutting out even through the foliage. He was likely ravenous now, so Anamika used the amulet to rain over his pit so he had water, and she chased a few small animals into it so he could eat something. Then she returned to my side and the clock sped ahead again.

  As we watched and waited, I wondered if Ren would have died if I hadn’t been there at that exact time to make sure he was fed. Then I remembered how difficult it was to destroy us. Ren had his heart literally ripped from his chest and he survived that. Surely going without food and water wasn’t going to do him in.

  Still, it was sobering to think that my presence had made his past self comfortable. My thoughts turned from my desire to be with Kelsey to the capture of my brother. I didn’t envy the years of captivity and suffering he’d have to endure. Three hundred years of it. I’m not sure I would have done as well had I been in his place.

  We were about to give him water and food again on day four when we noticed the return of the hunters. Anamika slowed time so we could listen in as they discovered their catch. When they did, they marveled at their prize and argued for a time about whether they should skin Ren right there or take him alive.

  Ren snarled at them from the pit and swiped at them with his claws every chance he got. He roared loudly and I recognized his cry. It was to get my attention. He must have sensed my nearness. I winced. The old me was wandering far off in the jungle, sulking about Yesubai and my fate. I never heard his roar for help. I’m here, I thought. I’ve got you, brother.

  My brother would never know that, of course. His past self didn’t get to see the man I’d become since then. This Ren only knew a brother who had betrayed him, stolen his fiancée, and sulked in the jungle. I was ashamed of the man I’d been. If I had paid attention, I’d have noticed he was missing. Nearly four days he’d been in the pit. If I had checked in with my family more often, I could have found him easily. The fact was, his capture had been the final tragedy that brought my parents down to their death beds.

  I could stop it.

  Change his past. Change our past.

  Kadam insisted that Ren needed to be taken by the hunters. But was that really true? If Ren had never been in the circus, he never would have met Kelsey. The idea brought a swell of sadness to my heart. But maybe, maybe, my parents would have lived longer. Maybe Kadam wouldn’t have left. Maybe Kelsey would have been better off never knowing us. I pressed my palms over my temples and squeezed. The circular logic was crushing me.

  I felt a hand on my arm. Anamkia’s warmth radiated through me. Her look was one of understanding. One of sympathy. Leaning over, she pressed her lips against my ear and whispered, “All will be well. Trust in our teacher.”

  With a reassuring squeeze, she turned her attention back to the men. Ana trusted her teacher, Phet, no, Kadam completely. Could I trust him as much as she did? I had in the past. I knew he had secrets. That there was more going on than he shared with us. Snickering softly, I marveled that he’d been able to keep all this from us for so long. He was a wily one. I did trust him though. Always had. No one loved my parents, loved me and Ren more than he did.

  The hoots of the men by the pit caught my attention. When the leader advocated for killing Ren, I sprang into action, disguising myself as one of the hunters who had gone off into the trees to relieve himself. I said I knew a very wealthy man who would pay dearly to have a living white tiger to add to his menagerie. Of course I actually knew no such thing, but figured I needed to say something to prevent them from removing Ren’s fur from his body.

  The leader seemed shocked that one of his minions would have any connection to a man of means and demanded that I tell him who. I said the first name that came to mind, Anik Kadam, and told him the name of the nearest town. It was agreed then that they’d take the living tiger to this Kadam and negotiate payment.

  If I was wrong, I’d be soundly beaten. I agreed and slipped out between the trees just as the man I’d impersonated returned. He was intelligent enough to fake knowing what was going on, but I could see the alarm on his face when he turned away from the group.

  With some hassle, they managed to get Ren into a hastily constructed cage. It took a half dozen men to carry him. Since I wasn’t certain that they wouldn’t kill Ren after all, we decided to split up. Anamika would follow the procession through the jungle while I would return to the future to find Kadam. His instructions had left too much to the imagination, and I wasn’t willing to risk Ren’s life on an oversight on my part.

  I took Ana’s hand before we departed and asked her again if she’d rather return to the future instead of me, but she shook her head, reminding me that I was more familiar with Kadam’s paths than she was. It was an uncomfortable feeling leaving her alone with all those men despite the fact that she obviously knew the jungle better than any of them. I knew Anamika distrusted men in general and being around them made her feel nervous despite the power she had at her disposal.

  Reassuring her that I’d hurry, I took her hand, and when she gripped it tightly, I wrapped an arm around her shoulders. I was surprised when she stepped into the embrace. It was over before I could react to it. Moving back, I gave her a stiff nod and disappeared, darkness swirling around me as I sought out Kadam.

  Chapter 7

  A Tiger’s Tale

  Moving through time and space, I decided the safest way to track down Kadam was to find Phet. I knew the date that Ren and Kelsey entered my forest, seeking me out to help them break the first part of the curse, so I headed to Phet’s…er…Kadam’s hut, hid in the trees, and let time flow backwards until I saw Kelsey and Ren. Power rushed over me in a whoosh as I stopped time and let it progress normally again.

  Kelsey and Ren, in his tiger form, exited the hut and headed off through the jungle as Phet waved good-bye and encouraged them on their journey in his singsong voice. Smoke drifted lazily from the small chimney in the roof as he stared after them. When they were gone, the strange half smile melted off his face and he straightened his back until he looked more like Kadam wearing Phet’s face.

  Even though he was still donning the disguise of the little sh
aman, I recognized the tired expression. It was how he’d looked the last few weeks before he died. I swallowed a lump in my throat as I remembered the final days of my mentor. How alone he must have felt as he carried on with his work without having anyone to confide in. He headed back inside, and I moved from my hiding spot, careful to be quiet lest Ren hear me and turn back.

  Phet reappeared at the door with a cage and opened it, encouraging the little bird inside to fly back into the trees, but the bird wouldn’t budge. He hadn’t noticed me.

  “Looks like he prefers to be caged,” I said quietly from the side of the hut.

  Phet, no…Kadam turned wide eyes in my direction. “What are you doing here, son?”

  “Looking for you. I need your help.”

  He glanced at the trees where Ren and Kelsey had just left. “Come inside then,” he said. “Quickly. I don’t want them to overhear.”

  I ducked, following him into the hut, and sat in a familiar chair. “So,” I said, not really knowing how to begin. “Was this building always here or did you create it?”

  After setting down the cage with the bird and leaving the door open so it could move about freely, he closed the flimsy curtains and lit a second candle. It wasn’t long before I heard the whisper of fabric. When he sat down, the monk had disappeared, and in his place was the man with more secrets than anyone should have to bear.

  “A man did live here at one time. The frame was intact,” he said. “I just added enough so it would appear lived in.” He reached behind him for a kettle and poured me a mug of fragrant tea, then set a plate of rustic cookies between us, crumbling the end of one and sprinkling it on the table. The bird hopped down and pecked at the food. “How can I help?” he asked.

  Kadam looked like he needed more help than I did. “You’re tired,” I said, perhaps too bluntly.

  “There is much to do before my bones can rest.”