Fire On The Wind – Olivia Drake

She couldn’t afford to wait with the other women. She had to find Damien and tell him of the peril they faced. Where in heaven was he? Where in hell was she? One hand shading his eyes, Damien scanned the crowded waterfront. A breeze whipped down from the forested foothills, wafting the aromas of cedar and incense along with the stink of rubbish. The ghats by the river buzzed with life.

His flute lilting, a man charmed a green snake from a brass spittoon. Astrologers beseeched business from shaven-headed pilgrims and yellow-robed sadhus reciting their private pujas. Beneath the spreading branches of a nearby shisham tree, a young penitent slept off the effects of the hookah cradled in the crook of his arm. A sacred cow lumbered past Damien and paused to excrete a pile of dung.

As the humpbacked animal ambled on, a sadhu bent and scooped the steaming heap into a clay jar, which he bore reverently away. Damien focused on the scores of women pilgrims. There were saris in reds and pinks and whites and blues. He spotted none in a distinctive olive- green hue trimmed with gold, encasing a body that unaccountably drove him mad. Damn you, Miss Sarah-Hardhead-Faulkner, he thought. Bloody double damn you.

He despised the fear that soured his stomach. The fear that he wouldn’t find her in this swarm of people. The fear that when he finally did track her down in some dark backstreet alley, she would be lying in a crumpled heap, her blue eyes wide and sightless, her slim throat ripped open in a bloodied gash. He banished the grisly image from his mind.

His imagination was running rampant not because he cared for her, but because he didn’t want the trouble of securing another nanny for his son. Where else would he find someone who could cope half as well as Sarah?

To my mother-in-law and father-in-law I am deeply indebted to Dr. Lawrence Ligon for answering my medical questions; to Shelby McDuff and Larry Wilhelm of Quest magazine, for sharing their library on India; and most of all, to the finest critique group in the world, Joyce Bell, Susan Wiggs, and Arnette Lamb. OceanofPDF.com Copyright This ebook is licensed to you for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be sold, shared, or given away. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the writer’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real.

Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Fire on the Wind Copyright 1992 © by Barbara Dawson Smith Ebook ISBN: ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this work may be used, reproduced, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without prior permission in writing from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

NYLA Publishing 121 W 27th St., Suite 1201, New York, NY 10001 http://www.nyliterary.com OceanofPDF.com T PROLOGUE London, December 24, 1836 onight his mother would finally love him. Damien Coleridge patted the gift in his pocket, the gift he’d spent hours perfecting. The rustle of the paper reassured him. Poking his small face between the scrolled posts of the balustrade, he peered down at the foyer. The chandelier threw diamonds of light over the white columns and checkerboard floor, over the green holly and red ribbons decorating the doorways.

The case clock ticked over the tinkling of the pianoforte from the music room. No one was in sight, not even a footman. Damien ran a finger under his starched lace collar with its fussy bow. He hoped he’d knotted it correctly. His knee breeches itched and his leather half-boots pinched. He hated wearing girlish velvet. Such fancy clothing better suited Christopher. But tonight Damien wanted to please Mother.

Squeezing his eyes shut against the sudden sting of tears, Damien saw an image of his elder brother, asleep on his cot in the nursery, his bony hands ghostly pale against the blue counterpane, his fair hair tousled on the pillow. Christopher had had another spell today. The doctor had shaken his head and murmured for a long time to Mother, then left a brown bottle of smelly tonic. The medicine calmed Christopher and made him sleep. Maybe it would cure him. If not, Damien would burn in hell.

Just as Mother said he would. The scents of greenery and candle wax suddenly made him ill.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

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• Title: –
• Author: Unknown
• Pages: 411
• Language: English (en)

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• Estimated Reading Time: 589.98 minutes
• Total Words: 117,995
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