Unwilling to let his prey escape, the Old One put on a burst of speed, latched on to the black dragon’s rear leg and threw him into a stand of nearby trees.
Riley blinked rapidly as the cave around them disintegrated. Ash continued to fall, soft drifting petals that choked the air and covered the trees and foliage like down. The forest around them was intact—the blast hadn’t flattened the trees on their side of the mountain—but a few scattered fires and mud had done major damage. Several hundred feet up, she could see the devastation of the ruins of the Cloud People’s village. Fires glowed all up and down the mountain, orange and red valiantly struggling through the darkened ash swirling in the air.
“We can’t stay up here,” Jubal said, covering his mouth and nose. “The wind is shifting our way and there’s every possibility of a gas cloud coming at us from the other side.”
“I can’t see a trail,” Ben said. “How are we going to find our way back without Miguel?”
“We’ve got GPS,” Gary said. “And once the ash settles enough, we’ve got friends we can call in to pull us out with a helicopter, but we should try to find Miguel and the others just in case.”
Riley’s head jerked up. There was that ominous note in his voice—in the way he worded it. She let her breath out, coughed and covered her mouth. “I think I can track them,” she admitted with a small glance at Ben.
“Of course you can,” Ben said. “You can build caves and stop volcanos. I’m just looking for the thigh-high boots and cape.” He flashed her a little grin and wiggled his eyebrows.
In spite of the circumstances she laughed. “I wish I had my cape. I’d fly us out of here.”
Gary took the lead. Riley and Ben fell into step behind him. Jubal brought up the rear as they began to make their way down the mountain. Ash was thick powder on the ground, in the foliage, falling from the trees above them until they were nearly drowning in it. They wrapped shirts around their mouths and noses and continued doggedly on.
It was impossible to tell how close to dawn it was with the ash so dense in the sky, obscuring any evidence of light, but her watch told her they had a few more hours before the sun began to climb. It shouldn’t have mattered, but if there was an honest-to-God vampire roaming around, then she wanted the sun to come up fast.
She cleared her throat. “Gary, if this ash hangs over the rain forest and keeps it dark, will the . . . a . . .” Saying the word vampire out loud just sounded ludicrous. She definitely could understand Ben’s disbelief even in the face of evidence that some form of evil haunted their journey and pushed the porter to murder her mother.
Gary glanced over his shoulder, his expression sober. “I know it’s difficult to believe that such things exist. But it’s out there and it’s a killing machine. It cannot come out in the sun, that much is true about them. They go to ground and place safeguards around their resting places. If this one was locked in a volcano for hundreds of years without blood to sustain it, it has to be one powerful creature.”
“And hungry,” she murmured. “Tell me about them. Everything you can think of.”
Gary looked up quickly. Fear and panic raced over his face as he fought to find words. Before Riley could look up he spoke.
“I will. Later. Right now, we need to move.” His voice somehow seemed calm compared to how she felt when she saw giant red dragon wings outstretched, speeding toward the opposite side of the mountain.
They ran. They raced through trees and brush, leaping over fallen trees and debris, unmindful of the many small cuts and bruises they earned as fronds and branches whipped at their skin. The first time they heard the powerful roar that ripped through the air above them, the sound nearly froze them in their tracks. Then survival instincts kicked in, and a jolt of adrenaline sent them racing even faster.
Adrenaline and lack of breath dueled with one another as they attempted to race over a small rise. A crash came from their left, its strength so great it dropped them to their knees. They couldn’t tear their eyes away as trees, dirt and ash were tossed into the air. For a split second Riley thought she made out the shape and color of a red wing, but then it was buried in chaos.
The madness came to an end, but what rose over the treetops below was a sight to dazzle the mind, dust and ash still in the air; the red dragon rose from the rubble, his head and back and folded wings coming fully clear of the smaller trees. Jaw, lined with wicked teeth, opened wide, eyes almost alight with fire, in their depths a crimson red.
A second, much smaller dragon, a gleaming black, burst from the ashes, wings out from its torn, bloody body, the wedge-shaped head reaching with snapping teeth toward the red dragon.
“Holy shit,” Ben whispered.
Under the circumstances, Riley found the profanity utterly appropriate. The two enraged dragons turned their heads in tandem and pinned their focus on Riley and her companions.
Fear had been her constant companion this entire trip, but now, as the gazes of the giant red and the smaller black dragon rested on them, fear turned to terror. A rotting, twisted evil shredded her insides, and heat so hot it felt like she was trying to hold the sun in her chest burst through her body.
Riley fell to her knees. Sickness washed through her, seeming to spread from the ground up as if living mold and fungus raced over her skin. A terrible, poisonous voice began clawing at her mind, speaking the same language the porters had used.
Then it was over. The terrible voice fell silent as the black dragon let out a furious roar. The red dragon answered, his shout like a force of nature, the shock waves of the sound strong enough to flatten trees.
Riley’s hands came up, covering over her ears. She felt a pressure in her chest as she saw the black dragon turn and climb up the mountain. The red dragon followed close behind.
A hand grabbed her arm and yanked her to her feet. Jubal. The man always seemed to hold on to his nerves no matter what happened.
“We need to get away from here now.”
The ground began to rumble and quake. On the volcano less than a mile above them, new vents split open, releasing geysers of steam and hot gas.
“Holy shit.” The whispered words sounded crystal clear to Dax’s dragon-enhanced senses.
Four humans were huddled together on the ash-covered mountainside. Dax caught a glimpse of shocked faces. Three men huddled protectively around the smaller, curvier frame of a woman. Inside the red dragon, Dax felt a strange awareness—like a crystalline note singing through the dragon’s veins. Rich, vibrant, alive. All at once Dax smelt the rich, fertile aroma of the forest, of earth. Through the dragon’s eyes, he could see it, a verdant glow of green that seemed to radiate from the spot where the woman’s feet touched the ground. Dax couldn’t see her face, but Dax knew instantly who she was. The power of the earth was so strong with her, she could only be the latest descendent of Arabejila.
Protect them! he cried into the Old One’s mind.
The red dragon snarled and snapped at the air in a clear warning, and the four humans took off running down the mountainside. The black dragon hissed and charged toward them, but the Old One leapt into his path. The two beasts began a bizarre dance between predators as Mitro looked for a way around the giant red dragon, stepping to the side, bobbing his head, only to be matched step for step, move for move.
With no choice but to trust the Old One to keep Mitro from the humans, Dax directed his full attention to healing the dragon’s wounds from the inside out, while simultaneously trying to find a way to separate himself from the bombardment of visceral emotion and bring the red dragon under his control. The Old One was a ferocious fighter, but he had no sense of self-preservation and no intention of letting any other being dominate his actions, even for his own good.
Their shared body was badly injured, dangerous amounts of blood gushing from deep wounds, interna
l organs damaged almost beyond repair, but his spirit fought Dax’s attempt to divert him from his prey. The Old One was completely consumed by the need to rend and kill his enemy, regardless of the cost to himself. Within the dragon’s body, aware of how close they were to death and even more aware of the vulnerable humans who had resumed their frantic run down the mountain, Dax was equally determined to stop the Old One long enough to heal. He could not afford for them to die before Mitro was defeated—especially not with the woman so close. Yet each time he attempted to exert control, his efforts seemed only to feed the Old One’s rage.
Suddenly, the black dragon turned and extended his wings. Long, curving hooks sprouted from the apex of each wing. He used the hooks as a third pair of claws, scrabbling up the volcano in leaps and bounds. With a final, ferocious roar, the red dragon set off after his adversary once again.
The hot rush of emotion rolled over Dax like an ocean of fire, burning him with its wild need. But this time, instead of fighting that fury, he relaxed into it, let it wash over and through him. He didn’t try to stand fast. Instead, he tried to make himself as insubstantial as mist.
The Old One’s anger and destruction surrounded him. The dragon’s innate determination to dominate any threat plowed into him, and this time, Dax let that fury pass through him without resistance. Lightly, with serene patience and endless calm, his senses branched out through the dragon’s body. He was not an interloper in the dragon’s body. He was the dragon. Not a separate consciousness, not a separate will, but one and the same. He did not want to imprison or control the dragon, but rather merge their consciousnesses, let their thoughts and actions become one. The dragon offered raw power, primal and indefatigable. Dax offered calm, judicial restraint, the ability to plan, think and act without passion, without rage, without emotion. If he could successfully join the dragon’s might with his own legendary control, together they would be unstoppable. Together they could—and would—end the threat Mitro posed to the world.
But they would only succeed if they could act as one, rather than fighting each other for control.
Above them, higher up the volcano’s slope, Mitro had turned his attention to the bubbling fury of the earth’s hot core. The ground began to tremble as Mitro directed the volcano’s heated gases and acids to the surface. Steam began to rise from the cracks and fissures in the rocks. The main blast of the volcano had exploded on the other side of the mountain, but now Mitro was opening another vent on this side . . . one that would mean certain death for the four humans racing down the mountainside.
Mitro knew Dax too well. Knew how to distract him. Mitro called it weakness—to care for those helpless before a hunter’s great power—but that need to serve, to protect, was the only thing that had ever stood between Dax and the same darkness to which Mitro and so many other Carpathian hunters had succumbed. The innocent must be protected at all cost. It was the reason Dax had been born. The reason he lived still.
The dragon’s bloodlust was in full force as the Old One fought to pursue Mitro and end him. Fire spewed from his throat, roaring up the mountain, licking at the black dragon’s tail.
Mitro leapt into the sky just as the volcano split open. The side of the mountain burst open, throwing boulders and trees through the air like a child’s toys. Burning clouds of ash and superheated gas roared down the mountainside at phenomenal speed.
As diversions went, it was a superb one. To go after Mitro now would mean certain death for the humans. With only a split second to decide, Dax made his choice.
We must save them, Old One. The woman, especially.
He didn’t try to force the dragon to his will, instead he merged his will with the dragon’s, weaving their most instinctive drives together. With a scream, the Old One wheeled around and launched into the air, diving at a steep incline toward the fleeing humans below. As they neared the small group, dragon’s wings spread wide, forming a protective shield over their bodies. Ash and burning rock pelted the dragon’s hide. He locked his claws deep in the earth and swept his wings tight around the small party, ignoring their shouts of fear and surprise as he caged the humans in a protective dome formed by his curled body and overlapping wings. The dragon tucked his head beneath his wings as the pyroclastic cloud slammed into him.
His good eye was pressed against his tail. His left eye was temporarily blinded by the wound Mitro had dealt him, so he couldn’t make out the faces of the people trapped beneath his wings. There was so much dust and ash from his landing that he doubted any of the people could see anything. They’d probably have a hard time breathing soon, too. But they would survive, and that was the important thing.
Dax tried to calm the Old One, to silence the instinctive growls rumbling in the dragon’s chest. He didn’t want to frighten the humans more.
Then, to his utter shock, a hand slipped out and touched the wound next to his eye. The touch was such a small, tiny thing, but so unexpected—so fearless and unafraid—that both Dax and the dragon froze in stunned paralysis.
Long, long ago, before even Dax had been born, the world told tales of dragons and maidens. Some said, a maiden’s call was impossible for a dragon to resist. But now, as the woman laid that small, soft, gentle hand upon him, Dax knew it wasn’t her call—it was her touch. A caress that gentled the savage heart of the beast. It was such a paradox—frailty that conquered strength.
Finally, the volcanic blast subsided, and for another, long moment, no one moved. Dax wasn’t sure what to do. Everything in him—every thought, every one of his senses, every nerve in the dragon’s body—was focused on that small, slender hand laid alongside the dragon’s wounded eye.
Abruptly, foul, crowing laughter rang out in his mind, snapping him out of his strange daze.
Once again you have failed, Danutdaxton. Just as you will always fail. Mitro’s sneering voice choked Dax’s enhanced senses with rotting filth. Because I am the superior being, and you will always be weak!
The Old One unfurled his wings and flung himself back on his haunches. Despite his wounds, the dragon roared a defiant challenge with enough force to be heard for miles, then spouted a jet of intense flame high into the sky, a beacon in the dark of night. It cut through the ash and clouds, lighting the area in a fiery glow. But Mitro was already gone.
Sapped of strength, the Old One turned slowly back to the humans, who had covered their ears against his shattering roar and curled up in tight balls to protect themselves from the intense heat of his flame. They were huddled in the only small spot of greenery left on this part of the mountain. As the echoes of his scream died away, they lifted their heads and slowly got to their feet.
Dax’s heart skipped a beat as he caught his first good look at the woman—at the extraordinarily beautiful face that was as familiar to him as his own. The lush, womanly curves, the soft, fathomless dark eyes, the long, iridescent black hair and skin as pale as milk beneath the layer of volcanic ash that covered her from head to toe.
Arabejila? Hiszak hän olen te? He whispered the question in astonishment on the private path they had forged between themselves centuries ago. Was it truly her? She had been an ally in his pursuit to bring Mitro to justice, but he’d felt her die centuries ago. Hadn’t he? It seemed impossible that she could have survived all these years . . . and yet, there she stood.
She turned as if she might be seeking the protection of the three men with her, but the Old One surprised him by curling his tail more tightly, trapping her and forcing her a step closer. Her scent dizzied him as they breathed her in.
Her heart thundered in his ears. Clearly, the red dragon frightened her. Perhaps she could sense, as Mitro had not, that the Old One was a true dragon, not simply a shape assumed by the Carpathian hunter she had once known.
Dax radiated his will through every cell of the dragon’s body and their mutual, merged consciousness. The Old One was too
weary from battle to fight for control, and the great, fiery red scales and immense mass of the dragon folded in upon itself. Shrinking down and metamorphosing back into the tall, muscled density of Dax’s natural form.
“Arabejila. Hiszakund olenaszund elävänej.” He truly had thought she was dead.
She stumbled back, raising her hands as if to ward him off, clearly shocked that the massive bulk of the dragon would disappear to leave a human form standing before her. Two of the men in her company sprang into action, pulling weapons of some kind and rushing toward him, lethal intent plain in the cold glitter of their eyes.
Had he misread the situation? Were these men holding her prisoner?
Dax reacted instinctively, moving with preternatural speed. “Arabejila, run!” he shouted in Carpathian. “Run, my sister! If they are Mitro’s slaves, he will soon return.”
He disarmed Jubal, breaking his arm with a clear, audible snap. The man fell to his knees, clutching his arm to his chest.
“Sisar?” the man repeated in Carpathian almost under his breath. Then in an odd dialect Dax was unfamiliar with, “Gary, wait, he thinks she’s his sister. He’s trying to protect her.”
Dax caught Jubal by the strange clothing covering his chest. The hunter pulled his hand back, fingers curved into diamond-tipped claws, ready to rip out the human’s throat, when Arabejila cried out in the same, odd dialect as the first man.
“No! Stop! Don’t hurt him! Please!”
Dax froze. Not because he understood her command—though the plea in her voice was unmistakable—but because at the first sound of her voice, an enormous wave of emotion crashed over him. Not the fiery, rage-fueled emotion of the dragon, but something deeper, fuller, more visceral. It shook him to his core. And the black-and-white world of his Carpathian vision deepened as well, becoming richer, more varied.
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