Page 96 of Tiger's Voyage

She shushed me with a look and guided me to the wall. Lifting a delicate hand, she traced her finger across a carved thread. “I cannot speak of this anymore today. The sadness is too great. It is time for you to leave. Follow the silkworm, young one.”

She cupped her hand against the wall, and when she removed it, a white silkworm clung to the carved thread. As it began advancing along the line, I turned to say good-bye, but Lady Silkworm had disappeared. The worm made slow progress to a crack in the wall and then slipped inside. I tentatively touched the same crack. First my fingers and then my whole hand disappeared into the wall. Taking a deep breath, I stepped forward to find myself encompassed by blackness.

14

Of Dragons and Lost Continents

Iheld out my hand in front of me, groping blindly, and gasped when I felt warm fingers touch mine. I followed the gentle pull of the hand, letting it guide me forward until I hit a barrier. Tracing its surface, I searched for an opening. The hand holding mine tugged harder and pulled me from the blackness with a pop. I slammed against a very welldeveloped, masculine chest, as arms cradled me close. I’d returned to the slightly brighter main room of the Shore Temple.

I blinked and looked up into the face of my liberator. “Ren.”

“Are you alright?”

“Yes. Thank you.”

He let out a relieved sigh and briefly touched a strand of my hair.

I was about to ask him a question when I heard a voice shout out, “Kells? Mr. Kadam! I heard her!”

Mr. Kadam and Kishan approached quickly from another room.

Kishan pulled me from Ren’s embrace and wrapped me in his own. “Where were you?” He turned to Ren. “How did you find her?”

Ren replied. “I don’t know. A carving of a horse with a scarf wrapped around its neck appeared on this wall, and it hadn’t been there before. The horse transformed into a man who pointed to another carving that suddenly appeared. It was of Kelsey sitting in a chair by a window, sewing. When I touched it, my hand disappeared into the wall. Then the carving of Kelsey stood and moved toward me. I stretched out my hand, touched her fingers, and pulled her closer. The next thing I knew, she was standing in front of me.”

Kishan grunted. “Are you okay,bilauta? Are you hurt?”

“No, I’m fine. How long was I gone?”

Mr. Kadam stepped forward. “You’ve been missing for the last hour. Everyone was becoming …worried.”

I could see by his expression that it had been worse than that. I hugged Kishan and patted Ren’s arm briefly to comfort my tigers. “I was visiting with Lady Silkworm.” I looked down at the folded silk nestled in my arm. “Come on. Let’s get back to the ship. I have a lot to tell you.”

We quickly made our way out of the Shore Temple and back to the boat.

Kishan wrapped an arm around me. “I was worried, Kells.”

“It’s okay. Everything worked out, and we got what we came for.”

“I don’t like you disappearing like that. We couldn’t even track you on GPS. You just vanished. Your dot was gone.”

“I’m sorry.” I kissed his cheek and squeezed his arm. “Until the curse is broken, unexpected things are likely to happen to all of us. You know that.”

“I know.” He kissed my forehead. “I just wish I could always be there to protect you. It’s frustrating when there’s nothing I can do.”

I nodded and leaned my head on his shoulder. Ren was watching us. He looked at me thoughtfully for a brief moment and then turned to look out across the open sea. When we pulled up near the yacht, Ren leapt out first and quickly disappeared into the bowels of the ship. Kishan jumped up and helped Mr. Kadam and then held out his hand to me. We went to the lounge near our rooms while Mr. Kadam questioned Nilima about the staff.

We took our seats, Mr. Kadam in the chair and Kishan and I on the sofa. I asked, “Doesn’t Ren want to know what happened? I thought he would help us with this.”

Mr. Kadam replied, “I will tell him everything later. He … only wants to be present when we absolutely need him.”

“I see.” I held my tongue and sighed in resignation, before taking Kishan’s hand and then shared the story of Lady Silkworm, starting with the line of thread I’d followed on the wall and ending with emerging from it. Mr. Kadam and Kishan kept silent throughout the whole story. When I was finished, I held out the silky gift to Mr. Kadam. He carefully unfolded it.

It was a black silk kimono. The back featured five hand-embroidered dragons in exquisite detail. They looked more like Chinese serpents than dragons. Their long sinuous bodies curved and coiled. They were bearded, had long tongues, and four short limbs with taloned feet. On the top left of the robe’s front was a map with seven dots and symbols. Mr. Kadam studied the front carefully, while Kishan and I looked at the back.

“Red, white, gold, green, and blue. Yep, those are our dragons alright.” I traced a symbol. “Kishan … look at this.” I pointed to the red dragon. It looked as if it was walking in the stars. A different symbol surrounded each of the five dragons: stars, clouds, lightning, waves, and snowflakes. “I wonder what this means.”

Mr. Kadam set down the kimono and went to his writing desk to unlock a file drawer and gather some papers. “I believe what we’re looking at is a map with instructions. It’s telling us where to go and which dragon to seek first.”