Page 125 of Tiger's Dream
After they were gone, I folded my arms and peered down into the water, disgust curving the edges of my mouth downward. “Nasty,” I said. “I’ve seen them in action too. Did you know they nearly killed Kelsey? If Fanindra hadn’t been there…”
Anamika pushed me hard on the back, and since I was already off-balance, I stumbled into the water, barely escaping before the things below caught me. I scrambled out as quickly and turned to her. It wasn’t that she’d pushed me; we’d tussled enough that I knew her full strength. What she’d done was not to hurt me but to send a message, and I had one of my own.
“What on earth is wrong with you?” I demanded, squeezing out my shirt. In my anger, I ripped it, and a second later, I yanked the sopping thing from my chest and threw it as hard as I could. It landed on the other side of the river. After tearing the scarf from her hands, I used it to dry my chest. Her eyes kept sliding down from my face to my chest. The reddish tinge to her cheeks told me she might now regret what she’d done, but I knew her. She’d never admit she’d gone too far.
While I used the scarf to create new clothes for myself, her eyes widened and she turned away, stomping to the river. Several demons lifted their heads from the water and blinked sideways with their inky black eyes. One with a pied coloration ran a tongue over his jagged teeth, eying me as if he was anticipating dinner.
With a flourish of her hand, Ana sent them away, and slowly, they once again sunk beneath the water. I picked up a rock and tossed it with a vengeance into the river. I’d aimed for the Kappa demons but ended up narrowly missing her. I regretted it when I saw her flinch and remembered the abuse she’d suffered as a young girl.
Letting out a long sigh, I said, “I’m sorry, Ana.” I headed over to where she stood and skipped another stone. As it sank, it transformed into a gemstone, and I stared at it, watching it fall to make sure it wasn’t just a trick of the light. Then I saw that all the rocks in the river had changed. The bed of the river was now lined with diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires, and other precious stones.
Why did the rocks change in the water?Did the Kappa demons cause it? I glanced over at Ana and saw her tossing an emerald up and down in her hand as she stared thoughtfully at the water. “You did this?” I asked, pointing at the water.
“I did,” she answered quietly.
The gemstones would tempt anyone. The idea that Ana would purposely draw Kelsey toward those evil creatures didn’t sit right with me. “Why?” I sputtered.
She whirled on me. “Why not,Kishan?” Ana spat my name with an air of disgust, as if the very mention of me tasted wrong on her tongue.
Trying to keep my temper under control, I worked my jaw back and forth, grinding my teeth until I could trust that I would speak civilly to her. Turned out, it didn’t matter.
“Ana,” I began, raising my hands and speaking calmly, trying to soothe the irascible woman, “don’t you understand how this could be a problem?”
“It’s not,” she said haughtily, folding her arms across her chest after tossing the emerald into the water.
I ran a hand through my hair, tugging in frustration. “But Kelsey and Ren will—”
She cut me off. “I don’t want to hear another word about Kelsey.”
A hiss distracted me from our argument, and I turned to the river to see several creatures paying very close attention to everything we said. I lowered my voice, remembering how the demons had almost killed Kells. “Why won’t you listen to me?”
“Why should I? You clearly don’t listen to me! If you’d bother to ask nicely instead of making assumptions, I’d tell you why I did it. Not that it should matter. I would think I’d earned your trust by now.”
My dumbfounded expression should have said it all, but just in case, I said, “Of course I trust you. I trust you with anything, everything.”
“Not…everything. Not when it comes to Kelsey.”
Silence fell between us. Her chest was heaving with emotion, and other than the slap of the water on the riverbank, our breaths were all I could hear. There was more between us though. Things that weren’t being said. The invisible, intangible weight of what we weren’t saying flowed between us like smoke. It filled my lungs and demanded I acknowledge it.
“I…” I began, not knowing what I was going to say but letting the words rise like bubbles from somewhere deep inside, “I know you would never do anything to hurt Kelsey.”
Her eyes bored into me, searching desperately for something, and I could see the moment when she gave up looking for it. “Never mind,” she said, her whole body slumping in disappointment. “We should just finish the task.”
I didn’t like the finality in her voice or the way she trudged ahead of me down the path. In that moment, she looked every inch the young girl, cowering from the villain. There was no trace of the goddess, and I hated that I was the one who’d made her feel that way. Quietly, I described the crumbled fortress, the mango tree, the fountain, and the monkeys.
As we channeled the power of earth, mighty stone blocks rose from the soil, stacking one atop the other, until there was an ancient Indian citadel. The trees shook behind us and I recognized the hoot of monkeys. They’d responded to her call and the trees allowed them to pass so they might serve their goddess. She tasked them with guarding the precious Golden Fruit of India, and after they agreed to bow before both the goddess and her weapons, they took their places atop the fortress, turning to stone much as Fanindra now did to metal.
When we got to the fountain, she took the golden mango from her bag and placed it in a large planter that rose in the center. With a few murmured words from Ana, it sank beneath the soil, and within a matter of a few moments, a seedling sprouted. It grew before our eyes until it reached full height. Flowers bloomed and fruit grew. At the top, one special flower, shining brighter than the sun, blossomed and turned into the Golden Fruit.
“But won’t we need it?” I asked.
She shook her head. “Not if we have the amulet. With this,” she said, lifting the medallion that hung around her neck, “we can draw upon the power of the Golden Fruit no matter where we are.”
“But how? It never worked that way before.”
“The fruit is a gift of Durga, is it not?”
“Yes, but—”
