Page 72 of Tiger's Dream
“Ana,” I said again, shaking her shoulder. “I need to get you out of here.”
She licked her lips, which were cracked and bloodied, and jerked her head away from me. “No,” she said quietly. “No!” I covered her mouth so she wouldn’t wake the guard, but she thought I was one of her attackers. She sucked in a ragged breath and I could tell she was going to scream.
I shifted my hand to her jaw and spoke to her in my mind, shushing and soothing her. Even semiconscious, she immediately relaxed, sensing I meant her no harm. Taking the amulet from around my neck, I placed it over her head. I stroked her bruised cheek gently and leaned closer, whispering, “Go home, Ana. You have to go home.”
“Home,” she said, her voice raw.
Before I could lift my hand away, both of us were swept away in time and space, and when we landed, her upper body, no longer supported by a tree, fell with a thump onto the ground. I hissed and lifted her bruised body, cushioning her head on my knee. We’d left all our weapons behind. Anamika was unconscious. And in front of me was a sprawling estate that was unmistakably Indian.
A young boy burst from the trees, followed by a long-legged girl with green eyes.
“Ana,” I mumbled in shock.
We’d come to Ana’s past. The teenage boy was Sunil and the girl next to him, a young Anamika. Wide-eyed, the two of them approached. The teenage Anamika crouched down next to us. “Run and get Father, Sunil,” she said, her eyes full of compassion as she looked at us. “The woman is hurt.”
Sunil took off, and before I could stop her, the young beauty reached out to touch the hair of her older self. The injured woman at my side shimmered and then disappeared, turning into a shower of gold that rose in the air. The amulet she’d been wearing fell to the ground.
“Ana!” I screamed and glanced up. The golden light surrounded the young girl and lifted her into the air. Her eyes rolled back in her head as the light was sucked into her body. When the light was absorbed, she drifted close to me and lowered slowly into the same position Ana had been in before. She slumped in my arms just as her father and brother ran up to us.
The tall man, wearing a jeweled turban, turned a mottled shade of red.
“I’ll thank you to unhand my daughter!” the man demanded.
“Where did the woman go?” Sunil asked.
I said nothing, but rose and placed Anamika in the arms of her father.
Chapter 15
Truth Stone
As the man glanced down at his unconscious daughter, a heavy weight settled in my stomach. I bent over to pick up the fallen amulet and grasp Fanindra’s metal coils with the intention of following Sunil and his father back to the house, but the moment I stood, I knew something was wrong.
My foot wouldn’t move. I opened my mouth to call after them but no sound emerged. Even my attempt to change into a tiger produced no result. Sunil turned back to see if I was following and frowned, looking right and left as if he could no longer see me. He tugged on his father’s sleeve, and he, too, glanced behind and then shouted something, but I couldn’t hear what he said.
Space pressed around my frame. My ears popped and I smelled the electric energy that fills the air right before a powerful storm breaks. The pressure on my body was terrible and the farther away from me that Anamika’s father walked, the worse I felt. It was like she was being violently ripped away, and the tearing was worse than anything I’d ever experienced.
A resonant hum rose and the landscape faded like a washed-out painting left out in the sun. Then a violent thrust shifted my body through space and time. With no ground beneath my feet, my stomach plummeted and I drew in my arms and legs as I rolled head over heels in dizzying circles, my breaths sawing in mighty heaves.
For a time, I blacked out. When I came to myself, I was lying in the grass. I rolled over onto my knees and heaved, but there was nothing in my stomach. Groaning, my head pounding, I collapsed. With my back pressed to the grass, I stared up at the leafy canopy overhead, willing it to stop circling. I didn’t know what had happened to Ana but I knew I needed to fix it. I had to get back to her.
Lifting my head, I drew in a deep breath, and then took in another and another. The scents I normally caught were muted to the point of nonexistent, but regardless, I knew the forest was mine. The same one I spent most of my time in. I recognized the landmarks. Whatever had happened to Ana had thrust me back to my time.
At least I had the amulet.
Cupping it in my hands, I instructed the amulet to take me back to her. Nothing happened. I rubbed my thumb over it and stared at the inscription. The words around the outside jumped out at me.The amulet of Damon—The father of India—The son of Rajaram.
I hadn’t really given the inscription much thought since Ren and Kelsey left. In fact, I preferred not to think about it. Ana called me Damon when I was in my tiger form but I’d never really embraced the title. It didn’t belong to me. Yes, I was a son of Rajaram, but so was Ren. Yes, Damon was the tiger of Durga and it was the role I fulfilled, but still, I’d never really thought of the amulet as mine. Most of the time, it hung around Ana’s neck, and though I appreciated the power and used it when necessary, I would have preferred never to set eyes on the thing.
“Come on,” I said to the amulet. “We need to get her back.”
I closed my eyes and concentrated. Again, nothing happened. Growling, I flung the offending amulet into trees, but I didn’t hear the thump it should have made when it hit the ground. Worried, I got up and stumbled forward only to freeze when I heard the snap of brush.
A familiar baritone voice said, “I thought I taught you to respect your weapons, son.”
“Kadam,” I said as he emerged from the trees. He approached and handed back the amulet I’d thrown. As he leaned over, the broken portion of the amulet from the past that allowed him to travel in time swung from the chain around his neck.
“You did,” I said, fingering the whole amulet and wondering how it was the two objects could exist in the same space. Quickly, I shoved the thought from my mind. I didn’t like thinking about such things. “But this is a far cry from a knife or a sword.”
