The Tiger and the Tomb (Khamsin Warriors of the Wind Book 2) by Vanak Bonnie

Author:Vanak, Bonnie [Vanak, Bonnie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-12-31T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWELVE

He believed her. God help him, but he did. Truth shone in the emerald depths of her large eyes. He had learned to read emotions there. Crackling with spitting anger. Wide emerald orbs signaling surprise. Tiny lines crinkling the corners as she laughed.

But never the sheen of tears as he glimpsed now. Her lips might hide the truth, but oh those beautiful jewel eyes could not lie. They blurted out secrets her veiled lips concealed.

Kalila had no desire to steal the gold that had lain here for thousands of years. Something else held her here. Something evil and foul as greedy men's thoughts. He wished he could lift the spell weaving her into this sticky web of deceit.

With the veil curtaining her face, soft silk trousers of indigo and matching shirt, Kalila looked as exotic as a princess from ancient times. Thick ebony curls as lustrous as heavy satin spilled down to her slender waist. Her diminutive figure bragged of curves and her melodious voice whispered to him like sand singing in the dunes.

He could not have her. Ramses wrapped his fingers around his hidden tattoo. It burned through his binish as if heated from within, reminding him of his oath of fidelity.

Questioning her might yield some answers. Better to converse and keep his shattering nerves from further unraveling. When the door had sealed the tomb shut, he'd forced a scream down his throat. Only years of self-discipline and control allowed calm to shoulder aside pure panic.

"If the gold means nothing to you, why did you steal the map?"

She sank to the ground, sitting with her head buried into trembling palms. "I had no choice," came the muffled reply.

He lifted her chin with a finger. "We always have choices," Ramses said softly.

"Not always. Sometimes we have to do things against our will, even though we know they are wrong, for a greater purpose."

Her words made no sense. "Evil deeds only bring a greater purpose of evil. The Old Ones always stressed this. Indeed, they lived in fear of failing at the judging in the afterlife."

"The afterlife isn't what I fear," she murmured, staring at her hands.

He grasped one, pulled her up as he stood and went over to the coffin. "My ancestors did. Look."

The sarcophagus was inlaid with the eye of Horus and other markings of his tattoo. Kalila bent over it, long ebony curls hiding her face as she examined the markings.

"Why is it so important?" She pointed to the eye.

The eye of Horus? She did not know? Every Egyptian knew the eye's protective powers. The pieces of mystery surrounding Kalila began forming a mosaic that distressed him. She knew of totems from her shaman, yet remained ignorant of the Udjat's protective powers. Myrrh scented her hair, yet she untangled it with a brush stamped with a foreign crest. Ramses did not want her to be foreign. He wanted Kalila as comfortable and familiar as his own heritage, as Egyptian as the tomb imprisoning them. Dismissing the nagging instinct as quickly as it surfaced, he rationalized there must be another reason for her ignorance.

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