Free ClaimedbytheNative by Rea Thomas

Chapter One
     
    I wanted him.
    There was no preamble, no doubt, no inner quibbling. The
moment I glimpsed him, standing on the beach as dawn broke over the Arabian
Sea, I wanted him.
    Perhaps it was the ethereal light, casting his silhouette in
a golden halo, projecting him in almost godly radiance.
    I had come to India two months ago, roaming state to state
with a backpack and my old camera that still used film. I’d never had a love of
digital photography and felt it somehow lacked any spark. I had come to this
land of religion, culture, festivals, colors and musical movies expecting to
“find myself”. Although it was clichéd, I had boarded the plane in London,
hoping the diversity of India would evoke something deeply spiritual inside me.
That it might put my life into some kind of perspective. The kind of
perspective I knew had been desperately lacking recently.
    In some ways it had. India wasn’t quite as lost in the past
as I imagined it would be. The cities were modern, telecommunication as good as
the Western world. But still, there remained a part of the vast, diverse land
that was filled with history, myth, legend and ritual. I had seen perhaps one
hundred temples already and I still wasn’t bored. One would have thought
traveling alone was a solitary and lonely choice, but I had not felt any pangs
for company.
    Kerala, where I had arrived three days ago, was my favorite
place so far. They called it “God’s Own Country” and I could easily understand
why. The land was lush with vegetation. Coconut trees, mango trees, banana
trees and lime trees grew in haphazard abundance. Everywhere I looked there was
fruit readily available for picking—although I didn’t for fear of being branded
a thief. The air smelled heavily of this natural beauty too. Especially in the
morning, which was why I had left my hotel room for a wander along the beach.
    Where I saw him for the first time. Where I felt a sting of
loneliness for the first time in two months.
    I did not anticipate the wonderful racing of my pulse as I
rested my weight against a sloping coconut tree and watched him. It had been so
long since I had felt even the merest flicker of desire.
    He wore a cotton mundu —folded up to expose his thick,
dark legs—and nothing else. I couldn’t see his face, only the curls of his
black hair against the nape of his strong neck. He was performing some kind of
complex stretches, every muscle in his immaculately honed body tensing and
rippling beneath mocha-brown skin. His stance was almost warrior-like, his
limbs impossibly flexible as he rotated his body in a single, swift movement.
Long fingers brushed the sand, sending a spray of powdery grains into the air,
gold-dust as they caught the morning light.
    The sun had crested over the horizon, slanting beams across
the still-gray ocean. Gentle waves came and went against the shore,
occasionally advancing far enough to cover the tips of his toes. The merest
breeze teased his unruly hair and sent the cotton fabric fluttering. I was the
only other soul on the beach and in the fifteen minutes I had been watching, he
hadn’t given a single indication of being aware of me.
    He looked almost majestic, lifting his arms toward the
brightening sky, stretching as if in silent worship of this beautiful morning.
The thick tendons of his flesh were hard against his skin. He was magnificently
gorgeous. I felt as though I had stepped into another era, watching this mundu -clad
local man performing sacred martial arts, greeting the sunrise with reverence
and respect.
    As his routine drew to a close, the stranger lowered his
head and pressed his hands together. I watched him give silent prayer for
another few seconds, before he turned abruptly and leveled his eyes upon me at
once. I had no doubt then that he had been aware of me all along and the
impression he had not was simply a ruse.
    Eyes as black as onyx watched me, hard and appraising. From
the front, he was even more