Ana wrapped her arms around my waist and the mountain disappeared. This was followed by vertigo and a severe popping in my ears. Ana and I both bent over after the transition, clutching our heads, but soon, the sensation dissipated. “We’re deep beneath the ocean,” I explained. “I think that’s why it hurts, but it seems the amulet is protecting us from the pressure.”
Her eyes grew wide. “Truly? We are under the sea?”
“Yes. This cavern is part of an ice tunnel the white dragon uses to move beneath the water without getting wet.”
“And what of this Ocean of Milk I am to create?”
I described the fountain, the mermaid, the key, and the fact that I was the one who’d had to swim for it. Ana created the fountain easily enough and used the water piece of the amulet to fashion a vast lake in the cavern, but as far as I could tell, the water wasn’t unique in any way.
“It should be white. The water, I mean,” I said.
“Then I will summon the guardian. Perhaps she will know.”
Ana called to the trident, dipped its spikes in the water, and stirred. Closing her eyes, she whispered, summoning a wanderer willing to serve. Her eyes flew open suddenly. “She is coming,” Ana said. With a flourish of her hand, the trident vanished.
A moment later, the water rippled and a blonde-haired mermaid peeked out. “Hello there.” she said. “Did someone call for a siren?”
“A siren?” I said quietly to Ana. “Does that mean she’s like those who live in the great tree of Shangri-La?”
“In a way.”
I heard a giggle and the mermaid turned to fog. Her ghostly form moved through the passageway toward the fountain. We followed. When we arrived, she was already lounging in the pool. “How lovely!” she said. “Though I wouldn’t mind if you turned up the heat.”
Ana obliged and steam filled the air around her. The mermaid sighed contentedly and relaxed back in the water. “Will you serve for a time?” she asked the mermaid. “Travelers are coming soon and they will need a key.” Ana produced a key in her palm. When I asked her how she knew it would open the temple, she said the temple hadn’t been built yet but that we were going to do that next.
The mermaid leaned over the lip of the fountain, deliberately arching her body to show it off. “I suppose I can do that. With the right incentive,” she said, winking at me. “Hi. My name’s Kaeliora.”
Frowning, Ana asked, “What boon would you like for helping?”
Kaeliora pretended to think about it. “I’ve been lonely for so very long,” she said, lifting her long tail out of the water and trailing her hands provocatively down her scales. “I think a kiss would be enough to motivate me.”
“You wish for me to kiss you?” Ana asked with a grimace.
The mermaid rolled her eyes. “Not you. Him.” The way she said him, by making the little mmmm sound at the end, made me shift uncomfortably.
“Look,” I said, “I don’t think that’s—”
Ana cut me off. “Is this your only demand?” she asked stiffly.
“Oh, I think that should be enough. As long as he puts his back into it, so to speak.”
I said, “No,” at the same time Ana said, “Very well.”
The mermaid clapped her hands giddily. “Yay!” She slid her lithe body up to the bench at the edge of the fountain and held out her dripping arms. “Come here, gorgeous,” she beckoned, laughing huskily.
Turning to Ana, I hissed, “Can’t we offer her something else?”
“This is her demand,” Ana said. “You know this closeness to another being is what provides them sustenance. In essence she is asking for food. How can we think to deprive her of something so basic?”
“Yeah, I know but…”
“Just do it and be done with it,” Ana commanded irritably.
“This feels like a test,” I said. “Is this a test?”
“I do not know what you are referring to.”
“A relationship test. They’re common in Kelsey’s time. Women give men little tests regarding their integrity and commitment.”
“The only assessments I employ regarding men is in their ability to protect my back during battle. If they fail in that respect, they are assigned to other duties or dismissed. You have long since proved your valor in this occupation. As this is a part of our work, it therefore does not apply to our…relationship. Rest assured, I am not testing you in any way.”
Logically, I understood what she was saying, but my instincts still told me something was off. “Are you sure you want me to do this?”
“I am certain.”
“Okay,” I said, trudging toward the fountain as slowly and nervously as a man heading to the hangman’s noose. I kept glancing over my shoulder at Ana. At first, she waved me on and then, when I got close, she turned her head away. I didn’t know if that was a good sign or a bad one.
“Now, you’d better make it count,” Kaeliora warned. “Otherwise, it’s no deal.”
It’s just sustenance, I thought. Grimly, I sat down next to her and took her voluptuous form in my arms. She wriggled, jostling closer until her scaled curves were pressed so tightly against me I was surprised she could breathe. She licked her lips, slowly, hungrily, and I lowered my mouth to hers. In the matter of a few seconds, I forgot where I was, who I was. All that mattered was her luscious kiss.
The taste of her and the scent of her were driving me mad. I needed more. Taking hold of her slippery body, I pulled her halfway out of the fountain and onto my lap, uncaring that I became soaked in the process. The water was hot, but not as hot as the woman in my arms. The bare skin I touched scorched my hands.
My hands roamed her back, slid into the soggy mass of her flaxen hair. Her sigh against my mouth was mellifluous and tasted like the salt of the ocean. I dug my fingers into her scales and she gasped a little moan of pleasure. Colors and images flashed in my mind—azure scales, orange coral, lake blue, and shark gray. They pulsed and spun faster and faster, beating a wild tune, and my body surged, dancing to the sound, drowning slowly. Together, the two of us raced to the escalating denouement.
I wasn’t aware of the cold until Kaeliora shivered against me.
She wrenched her lips from mine. “Stop,” she mumbled. “Stop!” she cried. Her lips had turned glacial blue and her skin as white as porcelain. Puffs of air bloomed from her mouth, clouding the space between us. Still under her thrall, I pulled her close again, my mind misty with desire. With a violent shove, she pushed me away, and I tumbled from the fountain, dazed, my fingers clenching with the need to take her in my arms again.
“No!” the mermaid shouted. “Stay back.”
Confused, I turned my head to see what the mermaid was staring at and saw a woman, full of fury and power. Her midnight hair stood out, floating around her and framing her face. Silver balls of light crackled in her palms. She stared down at me with a raw loathing, and as I watched, enthralled, her eyes turned from a dark olive to emerald to chrome.
The woman’s golden skin brightened, becoming luminescent. As she lifted her hands up, her body rose in the air. I was transfixed by her beauty, that is, until she threw her power straight at my head. That was the last thing I remembered before the world around me went white.
Chapter 35
A Dream Forgotten
Slowly, the white light faded. I groaned as shapes finally began to take form around me. Before my vision returned, I realized I was freezing. My body shook with violent tremors, and instinctively, I called upon the tiger, transforming to protect my human frame. Immediately, my body temperature rose. Rolling to my feet, I shook my whole body, my fur standing on end, and then opened my eyes, trying to figure out what had happened.
All at once, I knew. Ana had done this. She…she was mad about something. The last thing I remembered was the mermaid asking for a kiss. I sat beside her and…and…for the life of me, I couldn’t remember. Pacing up to the fountain, I saw the mermaid lounging in her pool of water. She was frozen solid, just l
ike I remembered she’d been when I first saw her with Kelsey so long ago. But where was Ana?
Lowering my nose to the ground, I caught her scent. She’d gone back to the underwater lake. I rolled my shoulders as I walked. My muscles were as sore and as tired as if I’d just run halfway across India. I found Ana standing in the middle of the lake. She was soaked from head to toe and was currently submerged to just above her waist. It nearly blinded me to look at her, even in tiger form.
Waves of energy coursed off her body and steam rose from the bubbling water. The surface crackled with electricity. I knew the water was deep, so she was either standing on a platform or using her power to float there. Shifting to a man, I cupped my hands and shouted to her but she didn’t turn to look at me. Calling to her mind didn’t work either. All I got from her was a sort of dark static.
The water had changed too. It wasn’t plain seawater any longer, nor was it the color of milk like I remembered. Instead it was a vivid, boiling green. The smell was noxious. Toxic. In fact, it smelled awfully close to the juice from a poisonous plant we dipped arrows in when I was a soldier. I touched my toe to it and the water jolted me so my hair stood on end, but it wasn’t too hot to tolerate nor did it sting my skin.
Saving Ana from it became my sole motivation. Something terrible had happened to her and my first course of action was to get her out of danger. Despite the unknown risks, I dove in, and the pulses of energy nearly fried my brain. I was stunned to the point where I stopped breathing for a moment, but my inner power revived me enough so I could catch my breath, and I began swimming. Careful not to imbibe any of the water, I quickly made my way to her side. My energy drained from me faster than it could refill and I was exhausted by the time I got to her.
When I neared Ana, my hand brushed a rocky outcropping and I climbed up onto it, limbs shaking. The water parted around my torso as I made my way over to her. “Ana?” I took hold of her arm and shook her, but she continued to stare straight ahead, her eyes fixed on nothing as slow, steady tears dripped from her cheeks and plopped into the lake. Each tear fizzed like acid when it hit the surface of the water.
I inhaled sharply, remembering the Kappa demons who had been created from her tears. “Ana, love. Tell me what’s wrong,” I pleaded as I wiped the tears away from her cheeks.
“I…I threw the key into the lake,” she said quietly. “It sank to the bottom.”
“Okay. That’s not a problem. When I came here before with Kelsey, I had to dive for it anyway.” The water susurrated around my waist as it leeched power from my body. I imagined it was doing the same thing to her.
Despite the warmth of the water, she trembled. I ran my hands up and down her arms, trying to warm her. “Tell me what happened,” I said. “I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s wrong.”
“That is the heart of my problem,” she said. “I do not know why I was angry before and I do not know why I am sad now. All I do know is that I wanted to destroy something, everything, and now that feeling is gone. In its wake, there is a terrible misery in my heart.”
“Okay. Then, if you can’t tell me what happened, show me.”
Ana blinked. “Show you?” she asked with a small frown.
“Yes. In my mind. Open your thoughts to me.”
She shook her head. “I cannot.”
“You can.” I touched my finger to her chin and nudged her face up so she’d look at me. “You don’t have to show me everything, just what happened with the mermaid. I’m just asking you to try.”
After searching my eyes, she slowly nodded and touched her hands to my cheeks. She still kept most of her mind blocked but let me see her recent memories. In her mind’s eye, I saw me walking toward the mermaid, my steps hesitant, and then I kissed her.
I was shocked at how ardent the embrace became, especially since I had no memory of it. Through Ana’s vision I saw how Kaeliora pulled me closer and winked saucily at Ana even as she siphoned enough energy from me to fuel a small city. It quickly became clear that I’d lost my mind to the mermaid. My hands roved her form and I was blind to everything but her.
Softly, Ana said, “No more. That is enough.”
The mermaid ignored her.
“Sohan,” Ana called, “Come back to me.”
Still, the kiss continued. “Sohan?”
I heard a voice echo in Ana’s mind and recognized the siren. “He’s mine now. He’ll never come back to you once he’s tasted my lips,” she promised.
“No,” Ana said. Her breathing quickened. “No!” she shouted. “You will not take him!” Then she lifted her hands and rained down punishment on the deceitful siren.
I fell to the ground, drained and unconscious, while Kaeliora pleaded for mercy. The vengeful goddess paused a moment when the desperate mermaid warned that if she was harmed it would destroy me as well. She told Ana that I was tied to her now and that I would seek her out for the rest of my days.
Ana’s response was to freeze the siren instead of killing her, though, at the time, she’d desperately wanted the girl dead. After that, Ana numbly walked to the lake, hoping the freezing water would temper the fire burning in her blood. Instead, her pain seeped out, slowly polluting the water.
“She lied,” I said, stroking the wet tangles of her hair. “I feel no pull for the mermaid. She holds no sway over me.”
“But you did want her. I saw it on your face. In the way you held her.”
“It was a trick. A mere spell to take what she wanted from me. I was a mindless bee seduced by the honey of her lips, but I have a queen back home. She is the one I serve.” When she remained mute, I added, “Ana. You must believe me. I would not dally with you in such a way. What happened was not deliberate on my part nor was it a sign of affection.”
I wrapped my arms around her waist, drawing her into me so tightly our hearts beat against one another. “As for your emotional state, you were angry because you thought I betrayed you. The tears came after because you believed that I was lost to you. Is this not so, my lady fair?”
Ana slid her hands up, locking them around my neck, and nodded. “Hers is a seductive beauty,” she said forlornly. “I do not blame you for wanting her.”
I held her, rocking her body against me. “But I didn’t want her. Not even a little. Besides, I would have broken free of her magic quickly enough. Did you know I was once trapped by the sirens in the great tree of Shangri-La?”
When she shook her head, I explained. “It took me a long time to escape. More than it did for Kells. The moment she thought of Ren, she broke free. In my case, I relished losing myself in the spell of the sirens. It’s an intoxicating charm they use and the only way to diffuse it is to think of the one you love. The strange thing is, Kells was not the girl I thought of when I got away, though I believed it was her at the time.”
“Then how did you manage to flee their embrace?” Ana asked.
“I heard the whisper of a goddess.” Ana pulled back and I smiled, cupping her cheek. “At the time, I thought the goddess Durga was taking pity on me, but now I know differently.”
She swallowed, her eyes bright. “It was me?”
“I realize now, it’s always been you. You’ve walked with me all my life, Ana. How could I be enchanted by the kiss of a mere mermaid when I’ve been embraced by a goddess?”
“So, it is a goddess who haunts your dreams then?” she asked softly.
“The goddess is a part of you, Ana, and I won’t deny I find her breathtaking, but I don’t dream of the eight-armed goddess Durga. My dreams are filled with a dark-haired girl who hunts the forest alongside me. One who challenges me at every turn. The grove showed me this girl twice and neither time was she a goddess. She’s the one I can’t seem to stop thinking about.”
Trailing my thumbs over her still-wet cheeks, I kissed her. I’d intended to keep it sweet and brief but Ana wouldn’t let me go. Her mouth molded softly to mine and I could taste the salt of her tears. It was real and heady and utterly unlike the for
gettable kiss of the mermaid. A spell of a different kind wove around us. The water rippled around our bodies in our private lagoon with a sumptuous pull and push that was not unlike the give-and-take of our kiss.
Drawing away, though it was one of the last things I wanted to do, I asked, “Can you forgive me, Ana?”
She blinked languidly. It was a stroke to my ego to note she’d been just as affected by our kiss as I had been. Tilting her head, she kissed my cheek softly. “Does that gesture mean forgiveness as well as missing someone?” she asked.
“It can be,” I said, and took her hand, touching my lips to her fingers. I glanced down at the lake. It now shimmered with light. Every trace of the green toxicity was gone, and it had transformed into the Ocean of Milk that I knew. “Well, that’s interesting,” I said.
Ana looked around. “It hums with power. Healing power,” she added.
“It does.” I rubbed my jaw and gave her a look.
“Why do you glance at me in that way?” Ana asked.
“I’m just wondering what would happen if I did more than kiss you. Would it set off a volcano? Move the moon out of its orbit?”
Ana furrowed her brow, taking my comment seriously. “Hmm, yes. At some point, I would like to practice kissing you for much longer than two minutes. We had better counsel with Kadam.”
“What? No!”
“Does the idea of our bodily contact embarrass you?”
“No, it doesn’t embarrass—”
“Yes, it does.”
“Stop reading my mind.”
“Your thoughts are painfully clear, even if our minds are still closed to one another. There is much you would like to do with me that you haven’t yet done. And as for me—”
“Okay, let’s just stop right there. Can we make a note to revisit this conversation later?”
She sighed. “Very well.”
Now then,” I said, desperate to change the subject, “what are we going to do about our mermaid?”
Tiger's Dream (Tiger's Curse Book 5) Page 57