The Tiger's Lady (49 page)

An angry protest rushed to Barrett’s lips, but she knew that Nihal spoke the truth. How like Pagan to give such a high-handed but selfless order. Infuriating, impossible, wonderful man!

So instead of protesting she turned her thoughts to the man tossing on the cot, refusing to consider that she would not succeed.

But as the minutes ticked by and Pagan continued to toss and struggle, flushed with fever, gaunt and motionless, she began to grow very afraid. His image blurred before her, tears squeezing from her eyes.

“Get well, damn you! Do you hear me, Deveril Pagan?”

But there was no answer, no sign of a response of any sort.

Grimly Barrett wrenched to her feet, unable to bear looking at his motionless features any longer. Rubbing her neck, which was tight with pain from her long vigil in the chair by his cot, she walked blindly to the tent flap.

Outside a group of bearers was busy loading the last cases on two large and very intimidating elephants. Barrett watched a thin
mahout
coax one of the great beasts backward, then guide his trunk down to lift a huge, chair-like structure of wooden planks up onto his back. It was a seat of some sort, she realized, complete with a tattered canvas awning to block the sun.

It was a noisy scene, bright and full of energy and life. But Barrett saw none of it, for a gaunt, lined face with a pair of jagged scars cut off every other thought.

It was a face that she would have given anything to see awake and angry and ripping up at her right now.

Miles away, beneath a spreading
sal
tree in the shimmering heat of mid-afternoon, a gaunt old man sank to his heels and studied the distant horizon. His face impassive, he observed the clouds skimming overhead and listened carefully to the wind.

What he heard and saw pleased him, for his lips curved slightly.

Yes, all was as the shaman had foreseen.

Without warning a shadow loomed low and swept over the ground, then soared with a whoosh to a neighboring tree. Bright-eyed, a shahin falcon pranced on a twisted branch, then settled its wings carefully.

Glittering gold eyes met startled brown.

What omen was this? the old man wondered. Was it just possible that he had made an error after all?

Frowning he looked down at the arrangement of polished stones he had cast before him on the ground. Sunlight burst off their gleaming faces in sparks of blood red, green, and sapphire. Yes, all was just as he had foretold in the ritual flames. And yet…

A spark leaped.

The old man’s brow furled.

But this was a new and entirely unexpected element, he saw. A thing dark and twisted, ineffably evil.

His breath slid slowly from his throat. Yes, this new element would bear close consideration.

Eyes half closed, the old man breathed deeply, in a soothing rhythm, his gaze fixed inward.

When the falcon shrieked once and exploded off its perch into the shimmering sky, the old man was far, far away, exploring a place where past, present, and future twisted together like the gnarled roots of the great banyan and then became one.

It was time.

She knew it by the sudden tension in the bearers’ faces, by the strain in Nihal’s mahogany features. Silently he caught Barrett’s eye and shook his head sadly.

Her two hours had come and gone.

Disappointment welled through her as she watched Nihal turn and start back to issue the command to depart. Barrett’s first instinct was to run and block his way, trying to protect Pagan from what she knew must happen next. But almost immediately she quelled the urge, realizing it would be useless.

Nihal was right in insisting they leave, of course.

If they stayed here they would certainly all die, for it would be only a matter of hours before their enemy returned.

Regret burned through her like acid and she scrubbed away a hot sheen of tears. If only…

From behind her came a faint creaking.

“Hush, Magic,” she said bleakly, not bothering to turn. “We—we must go very soon, I fear. Let him rest while he can.”

“But what if this
he
you speak of doesn’t—
want
to rest?”

At the sound of that low, gravelly voice, Barrett’s heart flipped over. “P-Pagan!” Whirling about, she saw her patient fighting to sit up on the cot.

“Damn it, Pagan, stay still, can’t you? Sweet Lord, you must have lost gallons of blood. You—you nearly died!” she added accusingly.

“Can that possibly be sympathy I hear?”

“Humph! Your ears must be sorely affected, too, I fear.” With a furtive swipe at her eyes, Barrett stalked to the cot and stood glaring down at Pagan, hands on her hips. “Lie back down!”

“Is that a proposition,
Angrezi?”

“No, it’s a
promise,
lackwit. I promise I’ll hold you down and tie you there if you don’t obey me!”

Pale still, Pagan somehow managed a lopsided smile.

“Grown weary of your tasks already, have you?” He made a clucking sound. “Give the wench a few minutes of sickbed duty and she turns into a sergeant-major parading the regiment.”

“A few minutes?
You’ve been here all of the night and most of the day.”

Pagan’s smiled faded. Slowly he ran a wobbly hand across his sweat-slick brow. “So long as that?” Abruptly his face hardened. “We must be on our way. We cannot stay here in the open another night.” He called hoarsely for Nihal, then swayed, gritting his teeth in a fight to stay upright.

“Damn it, Pagan, you’re as weak as blancmange! You just can’t stand up and swagger about giving orders when—”

He simply ignored her, while white lines of strain built around his lips. “We’ll—we’ll need elephants. Two—yes, two at the very least. That will be the safest way to cover the uphill terrain. Tell Nihal to—”

“I’ll tell Nihal nothing!” Barrett interrupted furiously. Grimly she bent down and tried to force Pagan back onto the cot. But even half delirious as he was, it was still like trying to shove down a brick wall. “Good sweet Lord, when are you going to be quiet and listen to me?”

At that moment Pagan’s headman poked his head through the flap, taking in the scene inside instantly. His face broke into a brilliant smile. “You are awake! Thanks be to all the gods! I am securing the two elephants now, lord. One is waiting for you and the
memsab.
But it is very much better if we are away now, while we still have several hours of daylight left to travel in.”

Slowly Pagan released a sigh. His eyes met Barrett’s and one black brow crooked. He gave her a faint smile. “Damned good man, Nihal. Remind me to give him a raise. Now where was I? Oh, yes … two elephants…” His eyes grew dim. “With them we should … should … reach Windhaven by…”

He never finished. Eyes closed, he simply toppled backward, unconscious before his back even met the straining canvas.

“Horrid, impossible man,” Barrett muttered beneath her breath.

But even as she said the words, a tiny smile began to play around her lips. And her eyes, when she brushed back an errant strand from Pagan’s forehead, were positively shot through with happiness.

He woke to incandescent heat, to raging thirst and savage pain at his back and shoulder.

He was rocking and swaying, a soft female body wedged against his thigh. With a faint sigh Pagan relaxed and sank back.

He recognized that odd, slow gait. They were on elephant back.

And
she
was beside him, the woman in his dreams. The woman whom he had kissed beneath a globe of London gaslight and never forgotten.

“Meri jaan.
Soul of my soul.”

He felt her shift, her breast nudging his arm. Instantly Pagan winced as a fire that had nothing to do with his wound leaped through him.

She was asleep, he realized, her head curled atop one arm, her hair spilling over both of them.

Pagan’s lips twisted in a crooked, bittersweet smile.

So fate had saved him from his enemy, ordaining he should live to fight another day. And love another night, he added.

Perhaps, Pagan decided, he would have to do
both,
when the woman was such a one as his Barrett.

His lips curved slightly, and he sank back down into dreams, dreams rich and bright and blatantly erotic.

And
she
was in every one.

She rocked along in the shade of a pitching awning, anchored atop four tons of gray, shifting muscle.

This could almost become pleasant, after one grew used to the odd rocking, Barrett decided.

Looking down, she saw that Pagan’s face was in the sun and moved the canvas until he was covered. At her movement, he shifted, his arm sweeping across her waist while his head settled into the curve of her knee.

Barrett’s breath wedged in her throat. She tried to ease away, but the swaying compartment was barely large enough to hold them both. As it was, Pagan lay slanted crosswise and she had to tuck her legs to fit in the remaining space.

She gritted her teeth, trying to ignore the weight of his hand at her rib. When the elephant lurched to avoid a boulder, their bodies were crushed even closer.

“Ummmm.” The fingers slid lazily from side to side over her ribs. “Magic?”

Barrett scowled. So he thought she was a monkey, did he? Muttering beneath her breath, she shoved his hands away.

A few seconds later he sighed and his hand swung even higher.

This time when his long fingers splayed open, they captured the lush swell of her breast. “Mmmmmm.” He thumbed the hardened nub and mumbled something in Hindi. His nail stroked idly, sending heat crashing to the pit of Barrett’s stomach—and lower. Dear Lord, how did the man do such things to her?

“Ahhhhh. Perfect, by all the gods. Mita?”

This was absolutely the outside of enough! Teal eyes flashing, Barrett jerked away and forced Pagan’s hand firmly down beneath his thigh.

A second later she found her hand caught to his thigh, and inching steadily toward the rapidly expanding bulge at his chocolate-colored riding breeches.

Her breath caught in fury. Even in his dreams the man plotted his deviltry! Scowling, she tried to jerk free, but his fingers were like steel bands. And then she was cupping the hot heart of him, where desire throbbed in molten, pulsing waves.