Page 35 of Dark Shaman: The Lost Treasure (The Children Of The Gods #98)

TAMIRA

T he dining room was half full when Tamira arrived, and several of her usual companions were already gathered. Tony sat with Tula, the two of them engaged in an intense discussion about the genetics of offspring and the Russian roulette of what traits children inherited from their parents.

Tony had integrated well over the months, providing a fresh perspective and a glimpse into modern science.

Still, Tamira thought that he was a little too full of himself, in a typical male fashion, and assumed that the six of them only appeared smart because they had thousands of years to accumulate information.

But Tula liked him, or at least tolerated him, probably wanting some semblance of normalcy in a place that was anything but.

"Good morning, sunshine," Liliat called out. "Although I use the term loosely since none of us has been outside for the past four days. The rains are brutal, and even when it's not raining, it's too hot and humid out there. I don't know how Elias gets out there each day and works in his garden."

"I saw sunshine less than an hour ago." Tamira took her usual seat. "It was radiating from my bed."

Raviki laughed. "My, we're poetic this morning. Your shaman must have hidden talents."

"Oh, his talents aren't hidden," Tamira said, accepting coffee from the serving girl with a nod of thanks. "He displays them quite openly and repeatedly."

"Scandalous," Sarah said with mock severity, though her eyes danced behind her unnecessary glasses. "What would Lord Navuh say?"

"Probably 'Good, maybe she'll finally conceive,'" Beulah said dryly. "Isn't that the point of allowing Elias up here? Fresh breeding stock that happens to be intelligent?"

The reminder sobered Tamira's mood.

Navuh had permitted the exception to his usual rules not out of kindness, concern for their happiness, or even to appease Lady Areana, but because he wanted more sons, and he wanted them to be smart, and none of his so-called concubines had conceived in many years.

"Well, if that's his goal, he chose well," Rolenna said. "I've never seen you so glowing, Tamira."

"I caught her humming in the library yesterday," Liliat said conspiratorially. "Humming! Our Ice Queen of Profound Melancholy, reduced to humming like a lovestruck girl."

"I am not an ice queen," Tamira protested. "Nor am I melancholy. And I'm certainly not a lovestruck girl."

She wasn't sure about the last part of her statement. It was hard not to fall for Elias. He was perfect except for lacking immortality, fangs, and venom.

"We all have our ways of coping with this existence," Sarah said sagely. "Yours was to build walls of elegant distance. It's been remarkable watching them crumble over the past week."

Sipping her coffee, Tamira considered Sarah's claim, which seemed to reinforce what Liliat had said before.

Had she really been so cold?

Looking back over recent centuries, she could see their point.

She'd retreated into books, maintaining cordial but distant relationships even with her sisters in captivity.

It was inevitable that it would happen, especially to a realist who had at some point realized that she would welcome death over this endless, purposeless existence.

If the mythology books she'd read were a true report of the gods' shenanigans, she could understand why they had acted the way they had.

They'd been bored, just like she was, and they would have done anything and everything to alleviate that boredom, even if it meant playing with the lives of mortals and making them miserable.

Not that understanding meant she would have done the same. She would never stoop as low as harming others just to entertain herself.

"Elias makes me feel alive. For far too long, I've merely existed."

"That's beautiful," Sarah said. "And terrifying."

"Why terrifying?" Tony asked.

The women exchanged glances. How to explain the mathematics of immortal relationships with mortals without making the only mortal at the table acutely aware of his mortality?

"Because he's human," Tula said quietly. "In fifty years, seventy if he's exceptionally lucky, he'll be gone. Tamira will remain, carrying the memory of these moments of happiness and the pain of their loss."

They'd had this discussion before and would likely have it again. The cruel mathematics of immortality made every human connection an exercise in anticipated grief.

Tamira had sworn off such entanglements, determined to avoid the pain. But then Elias had walked into her life, bringing his careful smiles and hidden depths, and all her resolutions had crumbled like sand.

"Speaking of your shaman," Sarah said, "I've been doing research."

Tamira's attention sharpened. "Oh?"

"I was curious about shamanic practices." Sarah adjusted her glasses in the way she did when preparing to share scholarly insights. "Where did he say he was from?"

"He said he was Armenian," Tamira said.

"Yes, that's what I thought. The Armenian highland has ancient shamanic traditions dating back thousands of years. They still have them to this day, so his calling himself a shaman is not as unusual as I thought."

Tamira thought of her conversations with Elias over the past week while picking at her breakfast. The way he'd discussed historical events with the immediacy of personal experience, then caught himself and added qualifiers like "I've read that" or "historians say.

" His knowledge of trade routes that hadn't been used in generations, describing them with the detail of someone who'd walked them.

"You're very quiet," Beulah said with her kind voice. "Is something troubling you?"

"No," Tamira said quickly. "I was just thinking about what Sarah said. Maybe I should read up on shamanism. Get some insight."

After breakfast, Tamira made her way to the library.

It had become her refuge over the centuries.

It was extensive and relatively current if one knew how to navigate the restrictions.

Was Navuh even aware of the multitudes of books being delivered regularly to the harem?

He must be. Nothing on this island happened without his approval, including the kinds of books that found their way to the library.

There was nothing about politics or current events, and she and the others pieced together information from recent fiction books that mentioned what was going on in the world and reflected how different societies functioned these days. It was fascinating and frustrating at the same time.

She could use her imagination to picture herself living in New York, working in a fashion house or a modeling agency.

She was too short to model clothing, but she could be a world-famous actress or a cosmetics model.

The obvious problem was that no one knew about immortals in the human world, so if there were any immortals living among the masses, they were hiding their identities and were not allowing themselves to become famous.

Tamira found her usual corner, where her Sanskrit texts waited. But today she bypassed them, moving instead to the section on mythology and folklore. If Elias wouldn't tell her his secrets, perhaps she could puzzle them out herself.

She pulled down volumes on ancient civilizations, hoping to find something about shamanism within them.

"Anything interesting?” Elias said from behind her.

Startled, Tamira nearly dropped the book. "Research," she said, closing the volume perhaps too quickly. "For my translations."

His eyes flicked to the spine, reading the title in Russian without hesitation. "Traditions of the Caucasus helps you with Sanskrit translation?"

Heat rose in her cheeks. "I was taking a break. Comparative mythology interests me."

"I see." He moved around her chair, settling into the one beside it. "And what have you learned?"

There was something in his tone—not quite warning, but close.

She met his gaze steadily. "That mythologies and traditions are far more complex than most people realize, and that there is very little mention of shamanism.

The only thing I found was a comment about the depth of knowledge and the many years of training required to master it. "

"It's a calling, not a skill one learns."

She let it drop, though questions burned on her tongue. "How was your day?"

"One of the servants is pregnant and having difficulties. I prepared some remedies to ease her discomfort."

Always so helpful, always needed. It was part of what drew her to him—that instinct to heal, to ease suffering wherever he found it.

"Are you going to join me for lunch?" she asked. "Or will the pregnant servant require more of your attention?"

He took her hand, threading their fingers together, and for a moment, they sat in silence, surrounded by the ever-present unspoken truths.

"What are we doing, Elias?" she asked softly.

"I don't know," he admitted. "I didn't plan for this to go where it did."

"But here we are."

"Here we are." He brought her hand to his lips, kissing each knuckle with reverence. "I can't seem to stay away from you, no matter how much wisdom might dictate otherwise. I still have so much work today, but I had to take a break and come see you like an addict needing his fix."

"Then sit with me a little bit. Tell me about your travels. Not the big things, not the secrets you guard so carefully. Just the small moments. What was your favorite market? Where did you see the most beautiful sunset? What food made you understand why people call taste a gateway to memory?"

He relaxed in his chair. "There was a market in Samarkand.

Not the grand bazaar the tourists visit, but a smaller one in the old quarter.

A woman there made these dumplings—manti, she called them.

Lamb and onions and spices that I couldn't identify, steamed in a metal contraption that looked like it had been serving the same purpose for centuries. "

"When was this?" she asked casually.

His eyes became shuttered like they usually did when he lied to her or told her half-truths. "Years ago. But I'm sure the market is still there. Places like that endure."

Another deflection, but she let it pass, content to listen as he painted pictures with words.

A sunrise over Mount Ararat, the sound of evening prayers echoing across Constantinople—he caught himself and said Istanbul.

The taste of tea so perfect that it had made him understand why ceremonies had been built around the simple act of steeping leaves in water.

With each story, she felt she understood him better and less.

The depth of his experience, the poetry in his observations, the gravity of memory he carried—it all spoke of a life lived fully but alone.

Whatever he was, wherever he'd come from, he'd been searching for something.

She wondered if he'd found it here, in this underground prison that was her world.

"I love listening to you," she said when he paused. "You make me feel like I've traveled alongside you."

"Maybe someday—" He cut himself off, shaking his head.

"What?" she pressed. "Maybe someday what?"

"Nothing. Foolish thoughts."

"Tell me your foolish thoughts. I'll share mine in return."

He looked at her for a long moment, and she saw the war in his eyes—the desire to trust battling against habits of secrecy that seemed carved into his bones.

"I can imagine showing you the world," he said.

"All the places I've been to, seen through your eyes.

The way the light would catch in your hair at sunset over the Bosphorus.

How you'd laugh at the chaos of a bazaar.

The expression on your face while tasting your first real kebab from a street vendor who's been perfecting his recipe for forty years. "

Tears pricked her eyes. "That's a beautiful but foolish thought."

"What's yours?"

"Sometimes I imagine waking up beside you somewhere else. A house with a window, the real kind that shows the sky. No guards, no schedules, no one to answer to but us, living an ordinary life."

"Tamira..." His voice sounded rough with emotion.

"I know," she said. "Impossible dreams. But isn't that what makes them precious?"

He stood, and for a moment she thought he would leave. Instead, he pulled her to her feet and into his arms, kissing her with a desperation that made her heart race. She could taste longing on his lips, could feel the barely leashed control in the way his hands gripped her waist.

When they broke apart, he rested his forehead against hers. "You're going to destroy me," he whispered.

"You'll destroy me first," she whispered back.

When he left, she returned to her book, but the words blurred before her eyes.

In just seven days, he'd cracked open the shell she'd built around herself. She felt exposed, vulnerable in a way she hadn't allowed herself to be in centuries. The smart thing would be to rebuild her walls, to treat this as a pleasant interlude and nothing more.

But it seemed like she hadn't been smart after all, and she had been negligent in protecting her heart. It would cost her, she knew that, but it was too late to do anything about it.