Page 189 of Tiger's Voyage

Ren quickly explained, “She’s having nightmares. She sleeps better with a tiger around.”

I frowned. “Ren, you don’t have to arrange—”

“Just let me help with this, Kells.”

“Fine. Whatever. You two work out your plans.” I started up the stairs and heard Kishan and Ren whispering below. Rolling my eyes, I entered the wheelhouse and plopped into a comfortable chair. “So what’s going on?” I asked.

“We’re getting ready to enter the red dragon’s waters.”

“Okay.”

Half an hour later, the brothers and I watched as Mr. Kadam and Nilima deftly guided the ship in a circle around the waters of the red dragon. Nothing happened. We couldn’t see a passageway or a marker indicating what we were supposed to do. Lóngjn didn’t make an appearance either. By mid-afternoon, I was restless and thought I’d go crazy if I had to stare at the ocean any longer. My fingers brushed against something soft as I turned away from the window. It was Lady Silkworm’s kimono.

I traced the star on the front, which was now complete. Turning it over, I saw that all five dragons had indeed disappeared from the back, but that their elements were still there. I ran my hand over the clouds, traced the lightning bolts of the green dragon, and then flipped the kimono over again and drew a line to the Shore Temple with my finger. “Take us home,” I whispered.

I heard the slick pulling of silk threads and felt the ship lurch.

“What happened?” Mr. Kadam shouted.

“I touched the kimono and said, ‘Take us home.’”

Nilima and Mr. Kadam backed away from the controls that were now blinking wildly. The sextant and the sky disk shimmered and disappeared. Ren and Kishan abruptly changed into tigers and sat at my feet, one on each side. The movement of thread against my fingers caught my attention, and I showed Mr. Kadam a tiny stitched boat traveling along the new line of thread ending at the Shore Temple.

“It would appear as if we’re moving in normal time again. Though none of our instruments are working,” he said. “I believe Lady Silkworm is pulling us home.”

I sat abruptly and let out a breath. “Does that mean we have time before we get back?”

“I believe it does. It took us approximately twelve hours to travel between worlds before.”

“So we’ll arrive early tomorrow morning.”

“It would appear so.”

“Considering what’s waiting for us, that’s probably a good thing. Ren and Kishan need to be tigers for six hours.” I patted Ren on the head and scratched Kishan behind the ear, amending quickly, “Not that they aren’t equally as formidable in battle when in theirfelineforms.” I grinned and gently twisted Ren’s ear. Leaning over, I said, “Can’t punish me for teasing you now, can you, pretty kitty?”

Ren growled at me in a way that let me know he’d remember my jest and make me pay for it later. I giggled.

Mr. Kadam turned distractedly back to his maps while I smoothed the kimono on my lap. When I flipped it onto the other side, I saw the five dragons were back. The blue one snored softly, the white one nodded and smiled warmly, the red grinned, the green winked, and the gold panicked and ducked his head into a pile of gems.

“Nice to see you all too,” I laughed.

I shared dinner with my tigers and snickered when both of them preferred hand feeding. I’d missed this version of them and teased about their being giant spoiled kitty cats while they licked the juices between my fingers from the meaty chunks I was feeding them.

Later, I read to them fromGrimms’ Fairy Taleswhile reclining against Ren’s back. Kishan lay along my side with his head resting on my leg. It wasn’t too long before I shifted uncomfortably and asked him to move his head to the floor.

“Sorry, but my leg still hurts a little.”

Ren growled softly in response.

“You shush.” I slapped the white tiger playfully on the shoulder. “He didn’t know, and now he does.”

They both settled down, and I spent another hour reading out loud the stories ofThe Frog Prince,Tom Thumb, andThe Lady and the Lion, which was my favorite version of theBeauty and the Beasttale. After that, I stumbled my way sleepily to my room followed by both tigers.

Kishan jumped onto the bed, and Ren lay on the floor. I changed into my pajamas in the bathroom and slid between the sheets. Kishan was already asleep, but Ren lifted his white head off his paws so I could scratch his ears.

“Goodnight,” I whispered and fell into a dreamless, healing sleep.

Just after dawn, the ship lurched so suddenly and violently that I rolled off the bed and landed on top of Ren. He changed to a man and pulled me quickly out of the way as an entire shelf of books fell heavily onto the floor where we had just been a moment ago.