Burning Tigress (22 page)

So she gave up. She released her consciousness to the experience and allowed herself to fly.

Was she really flying? It was more like floating, but terribly fast. And she was warm—beautifully warm, as if she were swimming in the most perfect water in the most perfect place. But it wasn't water; it was air, because she could breathe. She saw lights as well: thousands of different balls of shimmering color dancing in the perfect dark air that felt sensuously like water.

There was sound too. She couldn't hear it, but she felt it. Music slid through the waterlike air right into her soul. She was floating in sound, immersed in beauty, and filled with such love that she began to giggle—which bizarrely made her soar even higher, right up to the colored lights.

So close! And so beautiful! If she reached out her hand she could touch...

William? One of the lights was her brother?

He was dressed all in white. No, he was the one who shone. And he was so bright that his raiment appeared white, but in truth, he was glowing with all colors. And he was smiling. He reached out a hand for her, and she grasped it without thought.

This was her brother! This was the man he would become: handsome, strong, with every piece of his attire in place—no stains, no rips, no untied laces. Better still, he looked at her with such intelligence. He understood her. More than that, he understood everything about everything.

"You're an angel!" She had meant that he
looked
like an angel, but as the words shimmered through the air between them, she realized it was the literal truth. Her brother was an angel.

But how was that possible? Even as she phrased the thought, she understood the answer. She was in Heaven, brought here to speak with her brother, the angel. She frowned, trying to sort through her thoughts. She was in Heaven with William. But if William was here in
Heaven,
if her brother was an
angel,
then...

"Oh God, you're dead!"

Panic formed, a dark cold knot in her chest. As it formed, it drew all the rest of her into it. Heart, lungs, ribs, skin—all of her chilled and tightened. Worst of all, the bits of her became heavy.
She
became heavy. She began to sink.

"William!" she cried, stretching out to him. He extended his hand as well. First one arm, then the other, he tried to hold her to him. She heard her name tremble in the air. William's mouth was open, as if he were trying to talk to her, but she couldn't hear. The icy hole in the center of her chest had expanded to include her ears. All she heard was a dull rumble.

But she still felt him. His left hand managed to connect with hers. He couldn't hold on, but she touched him nonetheless. Strength, gentleness, and a love that was all William passed into her from her brother's spirit—her dead brother's spirit. She knew he had something to say to her, something she needed desperately to hear, but there was no time. She was sinking like an iron weight.

She fought, stretching, she screamed and ran, but that only made things worse. She seemed to fall faster, grow colder, and all that she was became ugly and heavy. All that surrounded her became even worse.

She didn't want to be here. She wanted to be back with her brother. She had to know: Was he dead?

She landed. She hit bottom in the darkest place, the coldest location, in the most horrid of ways: sprawled on a floor, her flesh so heavy that she couldn't lift a finger.

She opened her eyes. Even before she pried her lids open, she knew where she was: in the gardener's shed with Ken Jin. She could feel the lumpy pillows and the hard floor beneath her. She smelled his strange incense and felt the scratch of a blanket over her body, a blanket that did nothing to alleviate the chill.

Swallowing, she tasted bitterness in her dry mouth. Across from her, Ken Jin was drawing on his trousers, a dark stain in front. His movements were jerky, as if he suppressed great anger, but she had no ability to understand his frustration.

So what if his pants were wet? Her brother was dead!

The thought spurred her to action. She sprang from the floor and ran out the door—or so she intended. Except, when next she focused her distraught mind on her surroundings, she realized she'd done no more than lift her head.

"Ken Jin..." she rasped.

His head snapped up. "You are awake."

She tried to speak. Her brother was dead. She'd seen him in Heaven as an angel, which meant he was dead here on Earth. She couldn't form the words. Instead, she felt tears slip from her eyes and trail into her hair. Her brother was dead.

"William," she finally managed. As she spoke, a great anger welled up inside her. Her brother was dead. She would not lie naked in the gardener's shed when she should be with her family. Her mother would need her. Her father would have to be found. And William... sweet William. Charlotte swallowed and grabbed hold of her fury. It warmed her and stiffened her spine. It gave her the power to roll onto her side and try to push herself upright.

"You should not move so soon after ascending," Ken Jin said, his voice tight.

"William's dead," she rasped. "I must go."

He put his hands on her shoulders. She tried to draw away from him; the last thing she needed was more weight, more resistance to plow through. But strangely, his hands did not hold her back. If anything, they seemed to ground her so that she could coordinate herself. She no longer moved a finger here, an elbow there, but her entire body with direction and purpose. She straightened her arms and lifted her head.

He meant to stop her. She could see it in his eyes, but he must have recognized her determination. He ended up helping her—to a point. He supported her until she sat upright on the floor, her legs spread and the blanket pooling at her waist. His grip had shifted to her upper arms as she moved, but now he released her and dropped back onto his heels. He crouched before her.

"Tell me what happened."

She had not stopped crying. Her face was wet, her eyes felt swollen, and her lips were thick and hot. She raised a hand to push the hair from her eyes, only to stare in stupefied shock at her arm. It was bare.

Well, of course it was bare! She was completely naked except for the blanket, and that could hardly be deemed clothing.

"I must get dressed," she managed. "Where are my clothes?" They were right beside her, easily within reach, but she could only glare at them while grief dragged at her thoughts.

"Charlotte..."

"Oh, sweet William," she whispered; and then fresh tears burned in her eyes. "I must go. Mother will need me."

"William is fine. He is sleeping."

She shook her head. It wobbled and felt five times too large.

"He is sleeping," Ken Jin repeated. Then he huffed with obvious frustration as he crawled to the loose board in the wall and dragged it to one side so she could see more clearly. "The house is dark. William sleeps."

"No," she whispered. "They don't know yet. He's d—" She couldn't say the word, but she would have to now. She would have to tell everyone. "He's dead."

"No, Miss Charlotte—"

"Damn it, Ken Jin, he's gone!" Then the reality of what she'd just bellowed hit her, and she all but collapsed into herself. Her hand flew to her mouth and she curled into her knees in an effort to stop the sobs. It didn't work, of course, and she ended up breathing wet wool as she gasped and strained for control.

She didn't know how long she stayed there, wrapped around her knees, but in time consciousness returned. It came in the form of a large hand that rested upon her back. Ken Jin, his hands gentle, quietly touched her. It was no attempt at a sexual caress, or even to gain her attention; he merely placed his hand upon her back and waited. In truth, it was very servantlike, a quiet presence available if needed, ignorable if unwanted.

Except Charlotte found she didn't want a servant just then. She wanted a person—a man, to be exact. She wanted Ken Jin. Without questioning the urge, she turned into his arms. He had no choice but to hold her. She knew that; and yet, this was her first real warmth since returning from... the other place. She relished it, especially as his hands found her back and she was enfolded in his arms.

"Tell me what you experienced," he said into her hair.

"William. Dead." She spoke into his shirt, only now noticing that the starch had long since wilted. What she felt was a fine, soft linen that was rapidly becoming sodden from her tears.

"You saw his body?"

"No." She felt renewed awe slip into her consciousness, but only barely. There was still too much grief to leave room for much else.

"Then what?" he pressed.

"An angel." She swallowed and forced herself to explain. "I saw William as an angel. I was in Heaven." She looked up, knowing how crazy she sounded, but she knew it was true. "I was in Heaven, and I spoke with my brother's spirit. I was brought there to speak to my brother one last time."

He did not answer, and she felt her grief overwhelm her once again. "Let us go see," he said.

She nodded. She would dress; then she would see to her family's needs.

Thankfully, Ken Jin helped her. She was still a little weak, and she wanted to appear excruciatingly correct. It wasn't guilt over what she'd been doing; this was out of respect for her brother. The least she could do when she found his body was to appear like a proper sister and not a tavern wench. Once she felt more composed, Ken Jin restored the room to order and together they walked silently through the back garden to the house, then up the servant staircase to the nursery. But then, she couldn't make herself step through the door.

"A Tigress only hides when stalking," Ken Jin murmured in her ear. "You are an Immor—" He swallowed, cutting himself off. "You have gone far, Miss Charlotte, further than anyone I know after a single night. Shall you abandon that? Shall you forsake the Tigress to once again become a rabbit?"

She turned to him, her heart beating painfully in her throat. "I've never understood half of what you say."

"And the other half?" he challenged. "What of the part you do comprehend?"

Charlotte sighed and put her hand against the nursery door. "That half is scary, Ken Jin." Then she pushed inside.

A maid sat dozing in a chair near a fire. The coals gave an infernal glow to the room, painting everything in tones of red and black. As Charlotte entered, the girl started, then rose quickly to her feet. Charlotte shook her head and gestured for her to remain seated. There would be plenty to do soon enough.

Her heart began to race as she walked to William's bedroom. Even through the doorway, she could see the dark lump of his body, still in death. Odd, how it took little effort for her to cross into his room, to kneel beside his bed, and to stroke his cooling brow. He was her brother, and she loved him. Indeed, she felt lost without him. What would she do with her days if not care for him? What would she do with her thoughts if not spend them in the endless search for ways to instruct him?

He stirred beneath her fingers. His eyes fluttered open to stare in bleary irritation. "Chary?" he asked.

She gasped, surprised enough to fall backward onto her bottom.

Her brother pushed up and rubbed his eyes. When he was finished with that, he scratched his groin and stared at her. She stared back, unable to reconcile her memory of William's angel with William alive in his bed. Had she been mistaken? But she had been so certain.

Huffing with the effort, her brother climbed out bed, dragging his blanket with him. He dropped down on his knees beside her and plopped his head in her lap, just as he'd done as a small boy. He snuggled close to her. He shifted and fidgeted until finally she did what he wanted; she wrapped her arms around him and dropped her chin on his forehead. The words came by rote, not because she willed them but because this was what she always said.

"Sweet dreams, sweet William. Sweet dreams, my sweet."

He smiled, though his eyes were closed. Moments later, his breathing had steadied and deepened. He was asleep. And he was alive.

She didn't understand. She'd seen his angel. She'd
touched
it. And yet... She looked up at Ken Jin. "He's alive."

"Yes."

"But I saw... I..." She straightened. "It wasn't a dream, Ken Jin. It was real. It felt so real..." Her voice trailed away as she looked down at her brother.

"I will go make some tea, Miss Charlotte," he said softly. "And when it is ready, I will return to help lift him back to bed. And then..." He paused until she looked up at him. His expression was firm as any tutor's to his student. "You will tell me everything that happened."

She nodded. What else could she do? Especially as William was so obviously warm and happy and very, very much alive in her lap.

* * *

Ken Jin despised English tea. It was a sterile brew with water strained through leaves and kept separate, as if knowing the source of one's food was terrible. In truth, it was very English in that every aspect was held apart from the others with no thought to the whole. Did they not realize that qi infused the leaves and therefore the water, but only when kept inside the teacup? Did they not know that a hint of flower or citrus, of ginger root or ginseng, brought body to the tea leaves and wholeness to the taste?