Destiny's Lovers (23 page)

“Get the spare and double-check the reading,”
Tarik suggested.

They waited until Herne returned from the
shuttlecraft. Alla was in a state of uneasy excitement. Could it
possibly be Reid buried beneath the columns? Had he found his way
out of the forest and walked across the mountains to this place?
All her intelligence told her it was impossible, but her heart was
filled with hope.

Laying the second heat sensor down in the
shady spot where the first had been, Herne switched it on.
Immediately it began to emit a loud hum.

“Find the exact location,” Tarik instructed.
“We don’t want to move heavy stone unnecessarily.”

“I think we should call for another shuttle.
We need more help,” Herne said.

“There isn’t time!” Alla cried. “You said
that woman had been dead for four or five days. What if someone has
been trapped under those stones for all that time? Before the
others can get here, he could die.”

“He?” Herne frowned at her.

“She’s right.” Tarik was inspecting the
jumble of broken columns and other debris. “Let’s try to haul this
big stone out first. I think then we ought to be able to see if
anything really is inside this pile.”

It took all three of them, but they managed
to do it without disturbing the precariously balanced columns.

“Alla, you are the thinnest one here,” Tarik
said. “Can you squeeze into that space?”

“I think so.” She got down on her hands and
knees, and crawled beneath the columns until she was flat on her
belly with her left arm jammed down at her side and her right hand
at chin level. She did not care that it was dangerous. This might
be Reid. Or it might be someone who could tell her where he was. It
was worth the risk. Tarik slid his hand in to pass her a flexible
tubelight. When she switched it on, she drew in her breath in
amazement, forgetting to be disappointed because it was not
Reid.

She had never seen so perfect a male face. It
appeared to be chiseled out of the same smooth white stone as the
columns. She might have thought it was a statue except for the blue
dot and twin crescent tattoo on the forehead and the fact that the
man breathed in short, noisy gasps. Balancing the tubelight between
her left shoulder and her chin, she inched her right arm forward
until her fingers touched his cheek. Pale eyelids rose. Sea-blue
eyes stared at her, then closed again. Alla was stricken by the
pain and hopelessness in those eyes.

“We will help you,” she told the unknown man.
She was fully aware that the chances were good he could not
understand her, but still she wanted to reassure him and the sound
of her voice might do that. “We will get you out of here. I promise
it won’t take long. Just stay alive. Please, please, stay
alive.”

The ground shuddered a little. Small pieces
of shattered stone rained on Alla’s head. She felt the columns
above her shifting. Heavy white dust sifted downward, coating her
out-thrust right arm and hand, along with the still face before
her, making the man look even more like a statue.

“Alla?” That was Tarik, sounding urgent.
“Alla, are you all right?”

She began to back out of the cramped space.
It was hard to do. After a few moments of struggle, she was glad to
feel two pairs of hands on her lower legs, pulling her free of the
stones. Then she sat in shatteringly bright sunlight, breathing
deeply, but still refusing to admit to herself that she had been
afraid.

“There’s a man in there,” she finally was
able to say. “I think he has been badly hurt, but he is alive. I
told him we would get him out.”

“What?” Herne glared at her, looking angry,
while Tarik helped her to stand.

“It’s not Reid,” she said, nearly weeping
with disappointment. “Not Reid.”

While Tarik and Herne hurriedly discussed how
best to employ the equipment they had aboard the shuttlecraft to
free the injured man, Alla stood staring at the pile of broken
stone columns where he lay. She was fighting hard to control both
sorrow and elation. To be part of saving a life that surely would
have ended soon without help was cause for rejoicing. But where was
Reid? Was he here, buried under rubble like the man at her feet?
Was he somewhere else, and was he safe or hurt? Was he dead, as
Herne believed? She could not think so. She could not feel that
Reid was dead.

When Tarik ordered her to take one of the
heat sensors and use it to survey the entire walled area, she
examined every atom of the temple complex along with any likely
places within walking distance. There was no other sign of
life.

Extracting the man from the unstable rubble
surrounding him was a tedious job, made more dangerous for him and
difficult for his rescuers by the occasional earth tremors that
shook the area. They got him out toward evening, strapped him to a
stretcher, and laid him in the cargo hold of the shuttlecraft,
where Herne at once began using his diagnostic rods and various
treatment instruments.

Alla sat beside Tarik on the flight back to
headquarters.

“Perhaps, when he can talk again, he’ll be
able to tell us about Reid,” she said.

“Don’t expect too much,” Tarik cautioned her.
“According to Herne, he’s seriously dehydrated and badly enough
injured that he might not live. It will be a long time before he
can speak, if he ever does.”

“He will know something about Reid,” Alla
whispered, half to herself. “He will. I’m certain of it.”

* * * * *

Reid and Janina sailed due north on a sea as
deeply blue and calm as the sky above them. They stayed within
sight of land, riding the current that swept toward the polar
region. Once they left the low green area around the mouth of the
river where they had stopped for several days, the coastline
quickly became a dull, lifeless grey-brown.

The sky, however, more than made up for the
colorless land. Each evening, they were treated to a vibrantly
brilliant sunset as the volcanic ash still in the upper atmosphere
turned purple, green, and red in startlingly beautiful
combinations. Sunrises were almost as colorful, and Janina much
preferred them. Coward that she was, she feared the long nights,
during which sea monsters might creep up on them to devour them
before they even saw the terrible creatures. Sunrise, on the other
hand, meant that they had survived another night and had hours of
daylight ahead of them when they would be able to see any lurking
monsters and at least try to sail away from them. She did not tell
Reid of her fears, but she knew he was aware of them. She also knew
that he did not believe the sea monsters really existed.

On the sixth day after leaving the river,
they reached an area of dark red-and-gold striated rock cliffs,
which had been eroded by sea and wind into wildly improbable
shapes. The topmost layer of rock hung far out over the sea, like a
canopy. Well beyond the cliffs, individual rocks rose out of the
water in striped, treacherous beauty. Foam broke the surface of the
sea in many places where Janina could see no rocks, but she knew
they were there, hidden and dangerous.

“We are going to stop overnight,” Reid
decided. “I don’t want to navigate this part of the coast in the
dark if I don’t have to, and if I remember the computer model
correctly, there won’t be any other places to drop anchor so we can
rest until after we have rounded the cape.”

He then proceeded to maneuver the boat so
close to the overhanging rocks that Janina began to be afraid they
would be dashed onto them.

Before long, Reid found what he was searching
for, a sheltered inlet with a narrow opening to the sea. Inside it,
the water was quiet and crystal clear, allowing him to navigate
easily around the many rocks that jutted out of the little
harbor.

“Time for a bath,” Reid declared once they
were safely anchored. He flashed her a grin, reminding her of the
baths they had enjoyed together at their first anchorage. But this
was a very different place from that sunny cove.

“It’s too cold,” Janina protested, “and those
rocks look dangerous.”

But Reid was already pulling off his clothes.
He stood poised on the stern for a heartbeat of time, a tall,
strong, magnificently proportioned man. Then he was gone, cutting
into the water with hardly a splash.

Janina hung over the side, looking for him.
She wished she could be as brave and carefree as Reid was, instead
of constantly worrying about sea monsters. Reid surfaced farther
away from the boat than she would have believed possible. He waved
to her, beckoning her to join him.

Vowing not to show her fear of the water, not
to let him know what a quivering coward she was, she removed tunic
and trousers, then quickly went down the ladder. The water was
unbelievably cold. Left to herself, she would have dipped no more
than one foot in it, but Reid was calling her and she wanted him to
think she was as indifferent to danger as he was. She decided that
the best way to go in was all at once. It would be less painful
that way.

She released her grip on the ladder, letting
herself fall into the icy wetness. Just as she plunged beneath the
surface she remembered to hold her breath, but the cold made her
gasp, so she choked on the salty water. She thought she had fallen
to the center of the world before she began to rise again, too
slowly for her empty lungs. She bobbed to the top, gulping for air,
shivering violently from the cold. Then, recalling Reid’s lessons,
she lay on her back and began to float. She was certain she would
freeze to death within a moment or two.

“Swim,” Reid ordered from just beside her.
“Turn over and move your arms and legs. It will warm you.”

It did help a little. Still, she was glad to
climb out of the water onto a striped rock that angled upward at
one side of the inlet. Here, where they were sheltered from the
wind, a late-season sun had warmed the rock. Janina sat down on it,
pushing wet hair out of her face. She saw the boat riding at anchor
more than half the distance across the inlet.

“Did I swim that far?” she asked in
amazement.

“You are better at it than you think.” Reid
perched beside her, resting one hand on her thigh. “I regret there
is no soft beach we could use for a bed tonight. This rock is hard,
and the bunks are so narrow.”

She met his dark eyes and melted into them.
Then she felt the rough rock against her back as Reid’s weight bore
down on her, his mouth searching for hers. She cried out in pain.
He pulled away from her at once.

“This bed is too rough for you to lie on,” he
said. “Shall we swim back to the boat?”

“Can you wait?” she asked, surprised at his
suggestion.

“Not very happily,” he teased her, “but wait
I will. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I thought,” she blushed a little and her
tongue stumbled as she recalled their romantic interludes in the
cove. ”I thought when the man wanted, it had to be done at
once.”

“Sometimes it is sweeter for waiting,” he
answered, mischief lighting his face. “I’ll show you.”

He rose and went back into the water. It
looked to Janina as though he simply walked off the rock into the
sea, but when she tried it, she slipped on a wet spot and fell
hard, knocking the air out of her. She skidded across the wet edge
of the rock and fell into the water. Reid caught her hair and
pulled her to the surface, then towed her away from the rock.

“Can you swim or are you injured?” he asked,
his face filled with concern for her.

“I can swim,” she sputtered, unwilling to let
him know how the salt water stung the scrapes on her legs or the
scratches on her back. Knowing that he cared what happened to her
made her feel braver. Somehow she made it to the ladder at the
stern of the boat. There Reid stopped her.

“I want you,” he said, and kissed her
hard.

Janina responded eagerly. He was so warm, and
they had not made love since leaving the river. There had been no
time, for they had taken turns sleeping and sailing the boat. She
did not trust the unknown water of the inlet. It was deeper than
the river cove had been, and any kind of terrible sea creatures
might lurk there. But if this was where Reid wanted her, in the
same way in which she had once wantonly assaulted him, then she
would not resist. She could feel his hardness against her when he
held her. Her arms were around his neck. He caressed her body
quickly with eager, knowing hands, and suddenly the water did not
feel cold any more. But she thought it likely they would both drown
if he did not hold on to the ladder when he finally took her. Then
she heard his deep chuckle.

“Later,” he said, lifting her toward the
ladder. “We are going to wait, remember?”

She stood in the cockpit watching him climb
aboard. He wanted her. One glance at him told her that. She sighed
with a mixture of relief and anticipation. The bunks in the cabin
below were too narrow for two people, but at least they were not
the water.

Reid put out one hand to touch her face and
smooth back her dripping hair. Janina forgot that she was
half-frozen by the icy water, forgot her fear of the sea, forgot
everything but Reid.

Then he did an odd thing. He held her by the
shoulders, keeping her at a distance so their bodies could not
touch while he leaned forward to kiss her. His mouth was sure and
warm, his tongue a tormenting delight inside her. Janina put out
her arms to pull him closer, but Reid kept her away from him. She
ended the kiss with her hands clutching at his upper arms, her
nails digging into hard muscle. When he let her go, his fingertips
teased at her breasts before he moved away from her.

Janina drew in her breath with a quick,
hungry gasp. She half expected him to urge her down to the cabin so
he could make passionate love to her at once. With her blood
pounding in response to his touch, she would not have resisted him.
Instead of making for the cabin, he reached to the deck and pulled
on his recently discarded trousers.