Page 47 of Dark Shaman: The Lost Treasure (The Children Of The Gods #98)

TAMIRA

T he dress that had been delivered to Tamira's room felt wrong against her skin. It was also too short, too structured, nothing like the flowing silks she was accustomed to. She tugged at the neckline as she descended the stairs, the stiff fabric a reminder that everything had changed overnight.

She'd expected the dining room to look like the ones she'd seen in movies about rich people living in a metropolis, but she'd been too modest in her expectations.

The room reminded her of a picture she'd seen of an exhibit in a modern art museum.

Glass, chrome, and strange sharp angles everywhere.

The artwork on the wall was very colorful but it depicted nothing.

It was like the artist had thrown buckets of paint onto the huge canvas, but she had to admit that the combinations of vivid colors were pleasing to the eye.

The other ladies were already seated, looking equally uncomfortable in their new clothing. Liliat kept touching her hair, still damp from the shower. Raviki fidgeted with the buttons on her blouse, and even Sarah seemed overwhelmed by their unusual surroundings.

Elias sat at the far end of the table, wearing a simple white shirt and dark pants that must have come from the store that served this part of the island, the one that the ladies' outfits had come from as well.

The clothes fit him surprisingly well, and Tamira had to force herself not to stare at the way the fabric stretched across his shoulders.

Tony sat beside him, drumming his fingers on the glass table in a nervous rhythm.

"Good morning," Areana said as Tamira took her seat. "I trust everyone is refreshed?"

"Thank you for the clothes," Beulah said. "And the hot shower was lovely."

Navuh entered, and the atmosphere shifted, becoming colder and stiffer.

His household staff watched everything with poorly concealed curiosity. These people didn't know that Navuh never touched his concubines, that Elias was far more than an advisor, and that Tony belonged to Tula.

"Ladies," Navuh said, taking his seat at the head of the table. "Elias. Tony."

"Thank you for hosting us for breakfast, my lord," Elias said with a proper dip of his head.

Tony repeated his thanks, and the staff began serving the morning meal, an elaborate spread that seemed excessive, bordering on ostentatious. Fresh fruit, pastries, eggs prepared three different ways, four different sorts of bread, cheeses and cold cuts of all kinds.

Tamira picked at a piece of melon, her appetite nonexistent. Every bite felt like sawdust when all she wanted to do was reach across the table and take Elias's hand and kiss him until neither of them could breathe.

Instead, she buttered a roll that she had no intention of eating.

"More water pumps were delivered to the site," Navuh announced, spreading honey on his toast with precise, elegant movements. "The engineers need the water cleared out before they can assess the damage."

"How long will it take?" Areana asked, and Tamira caught the edge in her voice. Their lady was anxious, and that was unusual for her.

Areana was their rock—always composed, always ready to help with a kind word. To see her so discombobulated was concerning.

Was it the shock of displacement?

They all knew their roles in the harem, the rhythm of their days. Here, everything was uncertain.

Or perhaps something else was troubling her?

As Areana's fingers tightened on her teacup, Tamira suddenly understood.

In the harem, everyone knew that Navuh was devoted solely to his first lady, his wife, and that the concubines were there to produce sons he could claim as his own.

But here, with his regular household staff and guards watching, Areana's role in Navuh's life was diminished.

She was still the first lady of the harem, but she was supposed to share him with six others.

She was forced to pretend that her mate was spreading his affections among seven women.

It was humiliating.

How far was the pretense going to go? Would Navuh be spending some of his nights with his concubines now?

Tamira shuddered at the thought. It would be torture to spend a night with him even if she slept on the couch and he slept in the bed. Just having him in the same room with her meant that she wouldn't be able to have a minute of shuteye.

Hey, she could spend the next day sleeping, providing material for the household staff to gossip about. They would be convinced that their lord had tired out his concubine.

Navuh must have sensed his mate's distress because he reached for her hand. "The water needs to recede before they can access the lower levels. But I assure you, my dear, that the restoration will begin as quickly as possible."

"Of course," Areana murmured.

An uncomfortable silence fell that someone needed to fill, to maintain the pretense of normalcy, but Tamira couldn't think of a single thing to say.

Tony, bless him, seemed to understand. "The implications of prolonged water exposure on structural materials are quite fascinating." He launched into what promised to be a lengthy lecture. "You see, when concrete is subjected to hydrostatic pressure..."

Tamira tuned him out, grateful for the distraction he provided but having no patience for his scientific explanations.

Not when Elias sat mere feet away, close enough that she could smell the soap he'd used, see the way his hair curled slightly when damp, but too far for her to reach and run her fingers through those curls or press her face against his neck and breathe him in.

Instead, she focused on spreading jam on her unwanted roll.

"The porosity of volcanic rock creates unique challenges," Tony continued, warming to his subject. "Water can penetrate microscopic channels, creating weakness in otherwise solid stone..."

Tamira suspected that Tony sometimes made up his assertions. He couldn't be knowledgeable on so many subjects, and by now he knew what each of them was interested in and what he could get away with.

Once he was finally done, Areana turned to Elias. "This experience has been quite traumatic for all of us. Do you have any advice on how to process such an event? Some spiritual guidance?"

Elias set down his coffee cup. "In times of crisis, we often focus on what was lost," he said, his voice taking on the particular cadence that meant he was choosing each word carefully. "Meditating on gratitude for what was preserved is the best antidote. Every life saved was a victory over chaos."

"Beautiful words," Liliat said, and for once, she didn't sound flippant.

"The Sufis speak of finding the gift within the trial," Elias continued. "Perhaps this displacement, difficult as it is, offers opportunities for reflection and growth."

Tamira almost laughed. Growth? The only thing growing was her desperate need to be alone with him, to drop this suffocating pretense and have her way with him. But she couldn't laugh, couldn't react at all beyond polite interest.

The damn servants were watching.

"Speaking of growth," she said instead, proud of how steady her voice remained, "I've been having difficulty sleeping. Do you have any herbal recommendations? Perhaps a calming tea?"

It was such a transparent excuse to speak to him that she nearly cringed.

"Passionflower and chamomile." Elias played along seamlessly. "With a touch of lavender for scent. I could prepare something for you if Lord Navuh permits."

"That would be helpful," she managed, when what she really wanted to say was that she needed him, that last night or rather this morning, she'd thought she'd lost him to the flood, and now she was losing him to these stupid rules and watching eyes and?—

"The hotel should have these things," Navuh said, effectively ending that line of conversation. "You can prepare the remedies there."

The meaning was clear. Elias would be at the hotel, not here. Not with her.

After a few more minutes of mind-numbingly stilted conversation, Navuh pushed back from the table. "I have business to attend to. Elias, Tony—the guards will escort you to the hotel."

He kissed Areana's cheek with a formal flourish and then swept from the room, leaving them to navigate the goodbyes without his oppressive presence, not out of the goodness of his heart, but because he had things to do.

The household staff remained, though, watchful and judgmental.

Areana rose from her chair gracefully. "Gentlemen, thank you for your assistance during this difficult time. I'll speak with Lord Navuh about arranging regular visits. The ladies and I benefit greatly from your company."

"You're most kind, my lady," Tony said with a bow that looked theatrical rather than genuine.

Elias stood and Tamira forced herself to remain seated. Every instinct screamed at her to go to him, to throw her arms around him and refuse to let go. Instead, she folded her napkin next to her plate.

"Thank you for the tea recommendation," she said, the words ashes in her mouth. "I look forward to trying it."

"I hope it brings you relief," he said, and she heard everything he couldn't say in those simple words.

The guards entered the room, two immortal warriors who would take the men to the hotel.

Tula finally looked up, her eyes finding Tony's. "Safe travels," she said in a formal tone, but Tamira heard the undertones of anger and frustration.

"Thank you, my lady." Tony inclined his head. The pain in his eyes was obvious to anyone who knew him.

He loved Tula, that was obvious, but Tamira wasn't sure that Tula loved him back. Like many others before him, Tony was a temporary amusement.

No doubt Tula was smarter than Tamira in that regard. Getting attached to a human was stupid. A mistake a long-lived immortal like her should have never allowed.

As the men headed out, Elias paused in the doorway for a moment, and as his eyes found Tamira's, she saw her own anguish reflected in that brief connection.

Then he was gone, and the temperature in the dining room plunged several degrees lower even though no one touched the air-conditioning controls.

"Well," Sarah said after a long moment, "that was properly excruciating."

"Sarah," Areana admonished, glancing at the servants.

"Apologies, my lady. I meant only that we don't like parting from our instructors. Their guidance is highly appreciated."

Nice save, but the damage was done. The servants had heard the bitterness, filed it away with whatever other gossip they'd collected. By evening, the entire household would be speculating about the real relationships hidden beneath the formal facades.

"Perhaps we should adjourn to the sitting room," Areana suggested. "I believe I've noticed a bookshelf. Perhaps we can find something interesting to read."

They rose and headed out of the dining room, a flock of exotic birds transplanted to the wrong habitat.

In the sitting room, Tamira picked up a book without looking at the title and claimed a chair by the window. The words blurred on the page as her mind replayed every moment of breakfast, every carefully chosen word, every glance she'd had to cut short.

Elias was probably at the hotel now, surrounded by displaced harem staff. She was here, in this new, cold prison, where she had nothing but the memory of his eyes in that doorway and the taste of words she'd never gotten to say to him.

It was almost funny how the harem felt like a sanctuary to her now. At least there, she'd had her beautiful, warm room, her books, her routines, her nights with Elias.