Authors: Iris Johansen
The Tiger Prince (2 page)
“And how will you do that?”
“I’ll just keep at him and never give up.” She set her jaw. “If you want something bad enough, you can make it happen. You just keep on going until everybody else gets tired of fighting.”
“Let us hope he grows weary before we reach this Omaha.” Li Sung limped down the aisle toward the far end of the car.
Her father had finished his discussion with the conductor and was striding down the platform, his expression distinctly displeased.
Father. She must remember not to call him that, she thought wistfully. He would not acknowledge her as kin, and it would only anger him. Perhaps, if she worked very hard, if she made herself useful enough, someday he would let her use the word.
The piercing blast of the whistle made her jump and then grab hold of the wooden seat as the train lurched forward.
She heard Patrick’s obscene exclamation as he loped the last few yards, jumped for the steps, and pulled himself on the train.
Steam frosted the cold air outside the window as the black dragon began to glide slowly away from the hastily erected shacks and weather-stained tents that was Promontory Point.
Fear caught and held Jane as she saw the scenes flying
by and realized everything she had ever known was vanishing before her eyes.
“Want to go back?”
She looked up to see her fath—Patrick standing beside her, his expression hopeful. “I can send you home once we reach the next stop.”
“No.”
“Last chance.”
Promontory Point vanished from view as if it had never been, and suddenly her fear also vanished. “No.” She did not really know much about homes, but she was sure Frenchie’s had never been one. Her father was a railroad man who moved from place to place, so perhaps this puffing, roaring dragon they were riding would be her home from then on. If so, she must learn everything about it and make it her own. Yes, that was what she must do; her father loved the railroad and it must become as much a part of her as it was of him.
She settled gingerly back on the hard seat and deliberately tried to relax her tense muscles. “I’m not goin’ back. I was just a little scared for a minute, but I’m all right now.”
He muttered something beneath his breath and dropped onto the seat next to her.
She closed her eyes and listened to the rumble of the wheels on the iron track. Slowly, gradually, she became aware of a rhythm in the metal clatter like the beat of a giant heart, a cadence in the hissing of the steam that was vaguely soothing. Perhaps the dragon wasn’t so fierce after all. Perhaps, in time, he would let her befriend him and learn all his secrets….
Krugerville, Africa
April 3, 1876
uel reminded Ian of a beautiful tiger set to pounce.
Ruel’s right hand gripped a bone-handled knife with deadly competence, and an eager smile curved his lips. Stripped to the waist, his muscles gleaming gold-bronze in the lantern light, blue eyes blazing with fierce joy, he circled the huge mulatto holding the machete.
Shock jolted through Ian MacClaren as he peered through the smoke layering the air of the bar at the two men squaring off across the room. Somehow he had not expected Ruel to look so lethal. Yet the reports
he had received over the years should have given him some warning, and even as a boy Ruel had never been tame. Certainly no trace of tameness lingered in his brother now.
Tiger pad softly, tiger burn bright …
The scrap of an old verse popped into Ian’s mind, underscoring the impression that had leapt into being the instant he had caught sight of Ruel. The boy had always burned with a restless, volatile energy, but now he cast out an almost incandescent vitality. Time had honed and hardened the faultless symmetry of the face-Margaret had once described as having the beauty of a fallen angel, but it still held the riveting magnetism it had always possessed. Strands of tawny white-gold laced the dark brown hair he wore tied back in a queue, adding to the tigerish quality of his appearance.
The mulatto suddenly sliced out with the machete.
Ruel easily avoided the parry and gave a low, pleased laugh. “At last. You were beginning to bore me, Barak.”
“Don’t just stand there.” The woman, Mila, grabbed Ian’s arm. “You said if I brought you to him, you would help. Barak will kill him.”
“He certainly appears to be trying,” Ian murmured. He had been told when he had arrived in town a few hours earlier that she was only one of the gold camp’s whores, but she was clearly emotionally involved with Ruel. The circumstance did not astonish him. Drawn by those wicked good looks and careless, joyous paganism, women had gravitated to Ruel’s bed before he had reached puberty. However, Ian was surprised he felt no fear the woman’s prophecy would prove true. This Barak towered almost seven feet and his bull-like musculature made Ruel’s five-foot-eleven physique appear childlike in comparison. Yet Ian felt Ruel would have no more trouble defeating him than he had the bullies who had taunted his brother as a child. “I believe we’ll wait and watch awhile. Ruel never liked me to interfere in these matters.”
The giant mulatto made another lunge, and Ruel’s
torso arched catlike as the blade just missed digging into his belly.
“Better,” Ruel laughed. “But not good enough. God, you’re clumsy.”
Barak roared with anger and lunged again.
But Ruel was no longer there.
He had danced with lightning swiftness to the left, and a red slash suddenly appeared on Barak’s side. “As clumsy with the machete as you are at dealing from the bottom of the deck. I could teach you a bit about both.” He circled the huge man with the quickness of a mongoose with a cobra. “But I don’t really think it would be worthwhile. I hate to waste my time, when you’ll be dead soon anyway.”
Ian stiffened, jarred back to the realization that this was no childhood fight that would end only with black eyes and scraped knuckles. He turned to the woman. “I think we’d better go get the local magistrate to stop this.”
She gazed at him in bewilderment. “Magistrate?”
“The law,” he said impatiently.
“There’s no law here,” she said.
“You
must stop it. Barak wants Ruel’s claim. He cheated only to make Ruel angry enough to fight so he could kill him.”
Ian muttered a curse as he looked around the crowded bar. God knows he was no more equipped to step into this battle than he had been for Ruel’s boyhood frays at Glenclaren, but he could see no help would be forthcoming from any of the roughly dressed men sitting at the tables in this disreputable hovel; the miners were staring at the two combatants with only amusement and a curiously hungry look distinctly more sinister in nature.
Yet it was becoming evident Ian must do something. He could not permit Ruel to commit murder even in self-defense.
Barak lunged again and Ruel whirled away. A long, bloody cut suddenly appeared on Barak’s upper arm.
“You’re beginning to bore me, you son of a bitch,” Ruel said.
Ian recognized the signs; Ruel was toying with Barak, but he was beginning to get impatient and would soon go on the offensive. He would have to do something—
Barak had drawn blood.
Ruel had been a tenth of a second too slow, and Barak’s machete had grazed his rib cage.
“Excellent.” Incredibly, Ruel nodded with approval. “You should always take advantage of an opponent’s overconfidence. Perhaps your wits aren’t as thick as I thought.”
“You lied to me. You do
nothing.
” The woman beside Ian released her death grip on his arm. “Don’t you understand? He
helped
me. He made them—and you will let him die while you stand there and watch Barak—” She darted across the room toward the two men circling each other.
“No!” Ian moved forward, grabbing a whiskey bottle from the table beside him. He heard a shout of protest from one of the miners at the table and murmured, “I do beg your pardon, but I may need this.”
Ruel was laughing again, but Ian could detect the slightest hardening in his expression. He was not foolish enough to ignore the warning of Barak’s pinprick and would move to finish it now.
“Barak!” Mila jumped on the giant’s back, her wiry arms encircling his thick neck.
Ruel stopped, disconcerted, and then started laughing again. “Get off him, Mila. He’s having enough problems.”
Barak shook himself like a sodden bear and broke Mila’s hold. She fell to her knees on the floor.
Barak whirled toward her, the machete raised.
“No!” The laughter vanished from Ruel’s expression. “Me. Not her, you bastard. You want
me.”
He lunged forward and the tip of his dagger drew a thin red line on the back of Barak’s neck. “Do I have your attention, you stupid ox?”
Barak cursed, whirled back to face Ruel, and took a step forward.
Ruel balanced on the balls of his feet, his blue eyes
glittering wildly, his nostrils flaring.
“Now
, you thieving son of—”
Ian stepped forward and said quietly, “No, Ruel.”
Ruel froze. “Ian?” His gaze flew from Barak to Ian, his eyes widened in shock. “What the hell are—”
Barak sprang forward, and the machete sliced into Ruel’s shoulder. The blade had been aimed at his heart. If Ruel hadn’t spun away at the last moment, it would have cleaved his chest as it had his shoulder.
Ian heard the scream of the woman kneeling on the floor, saw Ruel’s face contort with pain, and acted without thinking.
He took a step forward, lifted the whiskey bottle, and brought it down with all his strength on Barak’s head.
Glass shattered; liquor sprayed.
The giant grunted, tottered, and fell to the floor.
Ruel swayed, his knees began to buckle.
Ian stepped forward and caught him before he could follow Barak to the floor.
“Why—” Ruel stopped, flinching as pain washed over him. “Dammit, Ian, why the hell are—”
“Hush.” Ian shifted his hold and picked Ruel up in his arms as easily as if he weighed no more than a child. “I’ve come to take you home, lad.”
As soon as Ruel opened his eyes he realized he was back in his own shack. He had lain looking at the stars through those cracks in the ceiling too many nights not to recognize his surroundings even through this haze of feverish pain.
“Awake?”
Ruel’s gaze shifted from the cracks to the man sitting by his cot.
A long, aquiline nose, wide mouth, bright hazel eyes set deep in a face saved from homeliness only by humor and intelligence. Ian’s face.
“You’re going to be fine. You’ve had the fever, but you’re mending nicely.”
Ian’s brogue fell pleasantly on Ruel’s ears, and for an
instant he felt a sharp pang. He rejected the thought that it might be homesickness. Christ, it must be the fever. He had gotten over any maudlin yearnings for Glen-claren the first six weeks after he had left. He whispered, “What are you doing here?”
“I told you.” Ian dipped a cloth in a bowl of water by the bed. “I’ve come to take you home.”
“You almost took me home in a coffin. I’ve always told you to stay out of my way in a fight.”
“Sorry. I thought it time I took a hand. You were in a temper, but you didn’t really want to kill that lummox.”
“Didn’t I?”
Ian wrung out the cloth and laid it on Ruel’s forehead. “Killing is a mortal sin. Life is much easier when you’re not forced to carry around those kinds of burdens. Do you wish a drink of water?”
Ruel nodded, then studied Ian as he reached down and filled the iron dipper from the bucket beside his stool. Ian was in his middle thirties now, but Ruel could see little change brought by the years. The big, loose-limbed strength that had enabled Ian to lift Ruel as if he weighed no more than a feather was clearly still there, as was the neatly barbered black hair, the slow, deliberate way he moved and spoke.
Ian brought the dipper to Ruel’s lips, holding it steady while he drank thirstily. “There’s stew in the pot on the stove over there. Mila made it only a half hour ago, and it should still be warm.”
Ruel shook his head.
“Later, then.” Ian returned the dipper to the bucket and gently wiped Ruel’s forehead. “This Mila appears to be very loyal to you.”