Veils of Silk

  Perhaps the old rascal had come to keep him company. Or perhaps what he felt was that deity whom Pyotr had believed in. Whatever—or Whoever—might be here, Ian no longer felt alone.

  The faces of his family passed in front of his mind's eye, beginning and ending with Laura. She was so vivid that it seemed as if he could reach out and touch her. Larissa Alexandrovna, his fierce, loyal, loving Tartar. Be happy, Larishka, and sometimes remember me.

  Then he lay back and let the current take him into the abyss.

  * * *

  The next chamber was the most beautiful of all, but to Laura's bitter disappointment, it was also the end of the cave. Half the floor of the chamber was taken up by a deep pool with a waterfall plunging into it.

  She prowled around the perimeter, the stub of her candle so low that it almost singed her fingers, but could find no way out except the one by which they had entered. She felt as if she were trapped inside a Russian cathedral of spires and glittering surfaces.

  David was also investigating, scrambling over the uneven floor, but finally the two of them met by the pool. "We'll have to turn back, Laura," he said. "This is the end. Maybe Zafir and Kuram have had better luck. Even if they have, we'd better rest outside before trying another tunnel. We're exhausted, and even willpower has its limits."

  She sighed. "I suppose so, though I hate to admit it. I keep feeling that Ian must be here somewhere, if only I knew where to look. If only I tried a little harder.''

  "No one could try harder than you, Laura. You're the most indomitable female I've ever met." David touched her shoulder. "But now it's time to go back."

  She nodded, but when he walked away, she paused for one last look at the waterfall that poured noisily from the wall. No way forward there, for it filled the shaft from which it emerged. She was beginning to turn when she saw an object sweeping down through the veil of water. Something large, a chunk of wood or a drowned animal. It hit with a splash.

  Laura stared, sure that she must be hallucinating, seeing Ian in the roiled water because she so much wanted to. Then she began to shout.

  * * *

  Compared to the rest of Ian's subterranean journey, passage through the underground river was almost easy. The water did all the work, sucking him down the stony pipe, the chill numbing his bruises and abraded hands. If only there were air....

  His lungs began to ache, then burn. He exhaled slowly, using the slight relief to hold back the moment when suffocation would become agony.

  Suddenly he slammed into a protruding rock and stuck, trapped by the beating current. Violently he shoved at the stone until he was enough to one side that the water grabbed him again.

  The river spread out, expanding into a waterfall. His desperate lungs drew in a mixture of air and water that choked more than relieved.

  Then he plunged into a deep pool. After the waterfall, it was still and calm. And shockingly, he saw a glimmer of light above.

  His first thought, even before the hope that escape was at hand, was that thank God, he wasn't blind. Weakly he struck out toward the light, kicking upward and wondering if he would last long enough to reach it before he drowned.

  When he broke through the surface, the roar of the falls and of blood pounding in his ears eliminated other sounds. It wasn't until a strong arm grabbed him and dragged him through the water that he realized he wasn't alone.

  He was bumped over the edge of the pool, then landed on a rough stone floor in a chamber feebly illuminated by candlelight. Reality tilted crazily, for above him he saw Laura's face, which had to be impossible.

  Nonetheless, he reached up to touch her cheek. The smooth skin was warm beneath his chilled fingers.

  She leaned forward and kissed him and his confusion cleared instantly. "Bloody hell," he croaked. "I'm alive?"

  "You are indeed."

  It was David's voice. Ian shifted his gaze and saw his brother kneeling beside him. After coughing again, he said, "What the devil are you doing here?"

  "Trying to find out if I'd inherited Falkirk. I thought for sure I had it this time." David gave a lopsided smile. "You've got more lives than a cat, Ian, but you've really got to stop getting yourself killed. It's too exhausting."

  "I couldn't agree more." Shaking his head to clear the water from his ears, Ian pushed himself up.

  David helped him get to his feet, then enfolded him in a fierce bear hug. Laura was there, too, all three of them wrapped around each other like the aerial roots of a banyan tree.

  The combination of physical and emotional warmth restored Ian more than he would have believed possible. It began to sink in that he really was alive, and likely to stay so. With life came curiosity. "Is there a war going on outside?"

  "No, you kept the Afghans from getting through. The pass was destroyed when the cliff collapsed," Laura replied. "There's still trouble in Afghanistan, but that's where it will stay."

  "So we did it," he said softly. "We put out the fire before it could spread across India."

  "Not 'we,' love. You," she said. "You're the one who deduced what the plan was, you're the one who held off an army. Pyotr must be very happy up in that onion-domed heaven of his."

  "I'm glad, too." With great reluctance, Ian disentangled himself from his wife and brother. "It's been a hell of a day, and I'm really not in the mood for a war."

  While Laura dug into her pack for food and brandy, David wrapped a coarse woolen blanket around Ian's shoulders. "Better use this to keep yourself warm. We still have a fairly lengthy trek out of here."

  "The sooner we get out, the better." Ian swallowed a mouthful of brandy, welcoming the burn. As he accepted a rolled chapati from Laura, he added, "If either of you ever hears me express a desire to go into another cave, please hit me on the head with a rock until I change my mind."

  With laughter ringing in his ears and Laura's arm around his waist, Ian set off for the land of the living.

  * * *

  When Ian awoke, he ached all over. Nonetheless, he felt wonderful, which undoubtedly had much to do with the fact that a soft, familiar female form was wrapped around him. Opening his eye, he found that they were on a charpoy in a darkened room, with a low-burning oil lamp on a table by the bed.

  It was the guest room of a Pathan compound, much like the one at Habibur's. This time they were with the Afridis who had taken in Laura and Gulzar Khan several days before. Dimly Ian remembered the lengthy, exhausting trip out of the cave. He doubted that he could have made it that far alone.

  They had emerged at dawn. Zafir and a helpful Afridi, Kuram, had been outside. They had also reached a point in the cavern where they could go no further.

  Ian wondered if the waterfall was the only link between the upper and lower caves. He'd been lucky, damned lucky. Or perhaps it wasn't luck. Perhaps there was such a thing as iqbal.

  Kuram had insisted they come here, to the home of Gulzar Khan's cousin. Ian gathered that he and Laura were entitled to lifetime hospitality because they had helped the havildar through the pass. The fact that Gulzar Khan had tried to kill him was tactfully unmentioned. These little misunderstandings happened.

  Once they reached the compound, David had said goodbye, for he must lead his troops to Jallalabad. Zafir, who was still officially on leave, decided to stay with Ian and Laura to escort them back to India. Or at least as far as Habibur's, where Zafir intended to marry Meera as soon as possible.

  Ian thought that was a sound plan. He looked down at the bronze hair tumbling over his arm and the curve of Laura's cheek and thought what an excellent idea marriage was. At least, with a wife like this one. He stroked her hair, scarcely able to believe that they were really together and safe.

  Light though his touch was, it woke Laura. Her long lashes fluttered up, showing the amber depths of her amazing eyes. "How are you feeling, doushenka?"

  "Rather as if I lost a fight with a bull elephant. Apart from that, I feel wonderful. In fact, better than wonderful."

  Laura inhaled, her eyes
widening. "It's gone! That darkness inside you is gone. What happened to heal it?"

  "I should have guessed you knew it was there." Ian was unsurprised that his wife understood what was going on inside his head better than he did. For she was right. The vein of sorrow and shame that had run through the depths of his soul was gone.

  Experimentally he probed around inside his mind. Though he found much that he regretted, there was nothing that he couldn't live with.

  "The darkness was fear," he answered, brows knit as he tried to define the mysterious shift that had taken place during his passage through the underworld. "In Bokhara, I was buried alive and died. This time, though I came within a hairsbreadth of destroying myself, I managed to survive all of the things I feared the most, including fear itself. For the first time since I was taken captive in Bokhara, I feel as if I am truly free."

  "Even though you're married?"

  He laughed. "That's the greatest freedom of all, Larishka, because you've seen me at my worst and are still here."

  He paused to give her a deep, leisurely kiss. "The pieces I thought were broken beyond repair seem to have cobbled themselves together again. Almost as good as new, if you don't mind a plate with lots of seams and scars."

  "That just means you're stronger in the mended places." She inhaled with pleasure as he found a particularly tender spot beneath her ear.

  "I must be, because before I wasn't strong enough to say how much I love you." He opened the front of her gown, exposing her breasts, and kissed one sensitive tip. "And I do love you, Larissa Alexandrovna, my fierce, bewitching, tenacious Russian lady. I can't believe the good luck that brought us together in the face of so many unlikely circumstances."

  She caught her breath as joy spiraled through her. "I love you, too, doushenka, my heart and my soul. But I don't think luck had much to do with bringing us together. Kamala's astrologer said there were no accidents. Everything that happened was meant to be."

  "You may be right. The last few months have been too improbable to be the result of blind chance." He tugged off his robe and tossed it on the floor. "Now that you and I have peeled away all the layers of each other's secrets and fears so that we are finally down to our bare selves, the only thing left is to be happy. And speaking of bare selves..."

  As Laura laughed, he deftly pulled her nightgown over her head so that they were flesh to flesh. Voice husky, he whispered, "To everything there is a season..."

  As he eased into her body, his lips touched hers, warm and infinitely sweet. "And now is the season for love."

  Epilogue

  Scotland August 1842

  Still in her nightgown, Laura gazed absently out the window of her bedroom and mentally tallied everything that must be done before her visitors arrived in mid-afternoon. Realistically, she knew that she had done as much as humanly possible to make the old castle comfortable.

  She was enjoying the task, and selling one of Pyotr's gems had provided the funds to do the job right. But she'd only been here three months, and much remained to be done.

  She hoped that her first house party would go well. Not only would she be meeting Ian's formidable sister for the first time, but another couple was coming. The wife, Lady Sara Connery, was the daughter of a duke, and her husband Mikahl was some sort of Himalayan prince.

  Laura reflected that she would have been wiser to enter the waters of social life at a less exalted level.

  Suddenly her stomach turned disastrously. She barely had time to reach the washbasin before losing the tea, buns, and marmalade which had been served when they were still in bed.

  Ian chose this inauspicious moment to return from his dressing room. "What's wrong, Laura?" he said with quick concern.

  "I was thinking about our guests," she said feebly.

  Ian poured a glass of water and brought it to her, wrapping an arm around her while she drank. "I know you're nervous, but these are all very nice people. There's no need to tie yourself in knots." He kissed her forehead. "And if any of them have any complaints about your housekeeping, they can damned well leave. Not that they will. You've done wonders."

  Laura smiled, feeling much better, as much because of Ian's embrace as because of his words. "Thank you for the loyal support. You really are a most agreeable spouse."

  She tilted her head back so she could see his face. "However, while my hostess nerves arc genuine, that isn't the reason I felt ill. You can stop worrying about whether you suffered any permanent damage when you were beaten in Bokhara."

  When Ian stared at her, brows drawn, she elaborated, "I am just about certain, Lord Falkirk, that you have done your duty to carry on the family name."

  With a whoop, he swept her off her feet. Almost immediately he stopped and set her on the ground. "Good Lord, you give me wonderful news and I promptly try to make you sick again! How are you feeling?"

  "Don't worry, I made a very fast recovery." She grinned. "And what I feel is vastly pleased with myself."

  "You should be." He touched her hair as gently as if she were fine porcelain. "How did you know that I thought perhaps I'd lost the ability to father a child?"

  "I am Russki and I know everything worth knowing." She put on her best mysterious Oriental expression. "The priest who did our horoscopes in Manpur promised us a son. He didn't say anything about daughters, but Hindus consider them not worth mentioning, so we might have one or two of them as well."

  "I'm willing. I hope at least one of them looks exactly like you." He kissed her again. "If this is a son, shall we call him Kenneth Peter, after your stepfather and uncle?"

  "What a wonderful idea." Laura set down her glass of water, slid her arms around her husband, and wiggled her hips against him provocatively.

  He grinned and lifted her in his arms. "Just how much better are you feeling?"

  "Much, much better," she said demurely as he carried her to their massive four-poster bed. "But I thought you had to go see the bailiff this morning. And you're already dressed."

  "The bailiff can wait, and being dressed can be remedied," he said as he laid her on the mattress. Within a minute, it was.

  Laura never ceased to be fascinated by the subtle nuances of lovemaking. This morning, as they celebrated the new life they had made, the theme was tenderness.

  After fulfillment, they lay quietly in each other's arms for a time, stealing the minutes from what would be a full day. It was a kind of theft Laura enjoyed, for she never ceased to be enchanted by the man she had married.

  Since the darkness within Ian had healed, his naturally buoyant nature had proved to be a perfect complement to her Russian intensity. She loved his exuberance. Yet because he'd looked into the abyss, he had remarkable depth and sensitivity.

  If the Hindus were right about reincarnation, she must have done something very, very good in her last life to deserve him.

  She chuckled, drawing a questioning look from her husband. According to Ian, she was still very, very good.

  * * *

  Laura dreamily inserted a carnation into her flower arrangement, thinking that there was nothing like the successful pursuit of kama to dispel a case of nerves. The pursuit had put her behind in her schedule. Once she finished arranging flowers, she would have barely enough time to bathe, change, and turn herself into a model hostess.

  She was in a small workroom full of brilliant blooms that the gardener had cut for her. Clipping the stem of a rose, she added it to the vase. She was never able to look at roses without thinking of Kamala and Dharjistan and flurries of petals.

  At first she had worried that Ian's actions in preventing a rebellion had ended her friendship with the maharani, but the week before, a letter had arrived from Dharjistan. Kamala had borne a son. Reading between the lines, Laura guessed that finally having an heir had alleviated much of Rajiv Singh's resentment of the Sirkar, for the royal throne of Dharjistan was secure for another generation. She was glad for both of them.

  In fact, babies seemed to be the order of the day. A
month earlier, a letter from Meera had informed her that Zafir's confidence in his virility had not been misplaced. A little Pathan was expected in the autumn, and Meera had sounded just as pleased as Laura felt.

  She was finishing her fourth arrangement when an unexpected occupant of the workroom subverted her efforts. A huge, staggeringly ugly ginger cat leaped on the table and proceeded to knock over all of the vases.

  "You miserable beast!" she shrieked, her serenity vanishing. "We Russians have ways of dealing with insolent peasants like you."

  Unmoved by the threat, the one-eyed tomcat settled in the middle of the table and began washing his face. "You're taking advantage of the fact that I have a weakness for you because of your resemblance to Ian," Laura grumbled as she got down on her knees and began retrieving fallen flowers. "But Ian is much better looking!"

  She was crawling under the table to collect the last elusive bloom when the workroom door swung open. Expecting a servant, she looked up, right into the eyes of a very tall, very confident, very red-haired woman.

  Hastily repressed mirth in her gray eyes, the new arrival said, "You must be Laura."

  As their gazes met, Laura cringed. "And you're Juliet."

  So much for her intentions of impressing her new relatives with her poise and elegance. Instead she was wearing her oldest gown and crawling around on the floor after having lost a battle with the castle mouser. She gave serious consideration to going back under the table and staying there for the next fortnight.

  Her sister-in-law smiled. "Right the first time, though I look so much like Ian that you don't get much credit for guessing."

  With a graceful flutter of skirts, she knelt so that they were eye to eye. "I'm so glad that you aren't the stuffy sort who is always perfect," she said warmly. "When I last saw Ian, he was going to marry a female named Georgina who sounded like the most appalling pattern card of propriety. I knew she would despise me."