Tiger Prince

Dilam did not look at her as she turned and walked toward her horse. "I will go back to the crossing and fetch workers to clear the damage."

She was ignoring her words, Jane realized with frustration. The damn elephant could wreck her entire line and Dilam would do nothing to stop him.

"Jane," Ruel said.

She suddenly could take no more. Something inside her shattered, and despair turned to wild, reckless anger. "I suppose you're happy now. You've won."

"Aye, I've won."

The odd note in his voice made her whirl on him. His expression reflected no mockery, none of the gloating satisfaction she had thought would be there. She could not fathom what he was thinking. She didn't care what he was thinking. The rage exploding through her was a hot tide blurring everything in its wake. "But it's not enough for you, is it? You still want more. You want to see me on my knees. Isn't that what you said? You still want to punish me." Her eyes blazed at him. "Well, I'm going to give you your chance."

He stiffened. "Indeed?"

"It's never going to end." Her words came fast, feverish. "I can see that now. Not until you think you've hurt me enough. Well, I can take anything you want to deal out to me. Go back to your damn summerhouse and wait for me."

"What?"

"You heard me. I'll come to the summerhouse and let you do whatever you want to me. That's what you want, isn't it?" The words tumbled out fiercely, feverishly. "You want to punish me. That's what you've always wanted. That's why I'm here."

"I've never denied that."

"Oh no, you were always honest with me," she said bitterly. "Come to Ci

"I didn't say I'd give it to you. I said I'd give you the chance to win it."

"And I lost the first battle. Well, I'm not going to lose again. I'm going to finish the line on time."

"What's that got to do with you coming to the—"

"I don't want you here. You get in my way. I want you out of my life. I don't want to see or hear or think of you again. I want you to stay away from me until my work is done." Her voice was rising, but she made no attempt to control it. "And you won't do that until you've had your fill of revenge. Well, I'm giving you the opportunity to take it."

"I think you're too upset to know what you're saying," he said slowly.

"I know I'm sick to death of having you hover over me like a vulture. I know I want it over."

He stared at her flushed face and glittering eyes for a long time. "By God, so do I!" He turned his horse with a jerky motion. "Be at the summerhouse by sundown tomorrow night. Leave your horse at the palace stable and come on foot. I don't want anyone to know you're there." He kicked his horse into a trot, heading south.

"What are we going to do?"

She turned to see Li Sung limping toward her. She drew a deep breath, trying to hide her discomposure.

"Are we to let this elephant continue with his destruction?" he asked.

"You know we can't do that. We'll have to do something about him," she said curtly. "But first we have to repair this damage."

"Again."

"Yes, again," she said, exasperated. "What other choice do we have?"

"I could go after the elephant."

"No!" She tempered the sharpness of her tone. "I'll need you here to supervise the workers and send me word if there's any other problem with the elephant. Tomorrow morning I have to go to the palace to discuss the contract penalties with Ruel."

"Dilam can do that as well as I."

"I want you here. Dilam would probably stand by and let that elephant tear up every rail from here to the mountain."

"The elephant appears to have great determination." Li Sung's gaze wandered once again to the torn and broken trees that marked the elephant's passage back into the jungle. "He went west again. I wonder why."

At least she didn't have to worry about Li Sung's interference, she thought wearily as she watched him limp toward his horse. This strange obsession he had with the elephant was obscuring everything else in its wake.

She wished she could block out Ruel and what awaited her tomorrow night with a similar single-mind-edness. Her rage was begi

But she would block him out for now. There was work to do and time enough to face the ordeal when she must. She would not allow him to make her suffer more through anticipation.

She turned her horse and followed Li Sung back to Elephant Crossing.

"It's an elephant." Margaret gazed down at the exquisitely carved design on the small black stone on the worktable. The elephant, its trunk lifted in the act of trumpeting, was amazingly lifelike with every muscle skillfully delineated. The elaborate circle of leaves embossing the rim of the round stone was equally lovely.

"It relieves me to know you at least recognize the species in my humble effort," Kartauk said.

Margaret snorted. "Humble? You don't know the meaning of the word." She drew closer to the table. "But I admit this is very fine work. It wasn't here yesterday when I left. When did you do it?"

"Last night. I couldn't sleep, so I decided to make this seal for Ruel."

"Seal? No one uses seals anymore."

Kartauk gri

"With all this pampering he gets when he returns to the palace, he needs no more exaggeration of his consequence."

"Nevertheless, as a court artist I must please my patron."

"I think you did it more to please yourself," she said shrewdly. "Have you ever done a seal before?"

He threw back his head and laughed. "No, and I've always wanted to explore Cellini's methods in the art. I think you're begi

"Nothing pertaining to you is little." She looked quickly down at the stone again. "Why the elephant?"

"Since the second part of the elephant game won him the island from the maharajah, I thought it only appropriate." He delved into one of the small clay pots on the table beside him and drew out a generous scoop of slightly hardened black wax.

She watched in fascination as he fashioned a relief on the design on the stone. His big square hands were astonishingly deft and skillful, and she never tired of seeing him perform this magic of creating beauty from nothing but the materials provided by nature. There was something sensual, almost loving, about the way his hands moved on wax and stone.

"Besides, I like elephants," he said. "The maharajah permitted me to make dozens of statues of the beasts when I was at the palace."

"Did you not become bored?"

"After a while, but the end was worth the labor. I made sure there was an elephant in every room of the palace." He smiled slyly. "And Abdar hated every one. He detests the breed."

"Why?"

"His father told me he fell from the back of one when he was a child and the elephant stepped on his arm and broke it. Unfortunately, a servant snatched him from beneath the elephant's feet before he could finish the job." He took a fine paintbrush, dipped it into the olive oil, and moistened the wax relief. "I've had a fondness for the creatures ever since I heard the tale."