Celt stiffened, his head going up alertly. Dark clouds swarmed across the sky, shadowing even the rain so that it went from silver to black. Plumes of white water swirled madly, rising in several towers toward the veiled moon. A bird of prey with a hooked beak and razor-sharp curved talons flew overhead and circled the small group in the cove. The wind rose to a howl. Faintly, far off, the sound of animals answering could be heard.
The rain slashed at them, whipped into a frenzy by the sudden fury of the storm. The large owl landed on a tree above the path leading to the cove several yards from them. The heavens opened up and poured the rain down, a solid sheet, blocking sight of the bird. When it cleared, a man walked down the path toward them. He was enveloped in an old-fashioned, long, black cape. The folds swirled about his legs and body, and the hood hid his face. Rather than walk, he gave the impression of gliding, his feet not quite touching the ground. He halted a short distance from them, his outline vague and insubstantial in the silvery rain.
Byron struggled to a sitting position, holding out his hand toward the stranger in warning. He tugged at Antonietta’s wrist. “Go, now, take Paul and get him inside the tunnel. He is not safe out here. Do as I say quickly.” He issued the command, nothing less, burying a push in his tone to force compliance.
There was something so compelling in Byron’s voice that Antonietta took Paul’s arm without protest and hastened back into the Scarletti passageway. Celt stayed a moment longer to study the motionless figure in the distance, but he loped after Antonietta, disappearing into the dark caverns.
The two men stared at one another in silence. Byron pushed himself up with an unsteady hand. Blood ran into the sand and dirt beneath him, staining the ground a reddish pink. He managed to get his feet under him.
“Do not be foolish and waste your energy.” The voice rippled with power. It was quiet, almost soft, yet carried the force of nature.
Byron studied the man approaching him, gathering his strength as he did so. Lightning flashed across the sky, lit up the ground to reveal the small river of blood. “I do not recognize you. Have we met before?” Byron knew he had never before met the ageless stranger. The eyes were shimmering fire, the face etched with hardship.
“Your kin was not close enough to reach you in time.” The voice was very quiet, a pure, velvet tone. “I offer my blood freely that you may live.”
Byron knew even the most evil and cunning of vampires could appear noble and virtuous. They were master deceivers. Without taking his eyes from the stranger, Byron nodded slowly, even as he sought Jacques.
Do you know this one?
It had been years since he reached down that familiar path to his childhood friend. He felt awkward and stiff, but it was necessary. His enormous strength had run out onto the ground, leaving him swaying and weak. And there was Antonietta to protect. He would live to defeat any vampire to protect her.
He must be one of the ancients sent out by my father. I do not recognize him, nor has he yet sworn allegiance to our prince. It was discovered ancients were sent out across the seas to protect where they could. The call has gone out to bring them home.
Jacques was guarded in his reply.
Do not lose consciousness. Focus on him.
Byron burst out laughing. “Does one have control over losing consciousness? What do you think?”
The stranger was on him, a tall man with old eyes and a faint, humorless smile. “My guess would be that you should remain alert so your friend, watching me so closely, may continue to guard you properly. I am called Dominic.” He bowed low, an Old World, courtly gesture of respect. “I have been long from our homeland. You are one of the first of our kind I have seen in a long time.”
“I am Byron. I thank you for your assistance,” Byron returned formally. “I would greet you in the proper way of the warrior, but I am afraid I would fall down.” A faint smile took some of the pain from his face.
“It is not necessary. We are brethren. It is enough.” Very casually, Dominic tore at his wrist with his teeth, opening a gaping wound that he pressed to Byron’s mouth. “I am on my way to see our prince and to see for myself if it is true that his lifemate was human.”
The blood poured into Byron’s starving cells, ancient blood, pure and strong. Byron tried not to be greedy when his strength was all but gone and the sudden infusion of ancient blood hit with the force of a freight train. The rush was heady and overwhelming.
“The borzoi guards your lifemate well. He would have attacked me, had I made a wrong move, yet he recognized what manner of creature I am. I had forgotten their loyalty and heart. I thank you for providing the memory.”
Byron sank down onto the earth, felt the soil reaching for him. Comforting him. Very politely he closed the wound on Dominic’s wrist. “You have hunted long.”
“Too long. I have grown weary and wish to sleep, but I must bring news to our prince. There is something evil sweeping the land. It is subtle. So subtle I cannot find the source of it, and I have looked. But it threatens our prince and our people. It threatens our very existence and way of life. I must warn him and then continue in my hunt for my lost kin.”
Byron felt the blood moving through him. It had been so long since one of his own kind had shared blood with him that he had nearly forgotten the heady rush. “Lost kin? Is the prince aware one of our people is missing?”
Dominic leaned down, gathered Byron into his arms as if the full-grown man were no more than a child. “My sister was an apprentice to a great wizard. She had amazing skills, and under his tutelage she became adept at many things now lost to our kind.” Dominic shifted shape, still holding Byron securely, sweeping through the sky under cover of the storm.
The words triggered a distant memory, a fairy tale told of magicians and wizards among their kind teaching safeguards and spells to their people. Byron closed his eyes, allowing weariness to sweep through him. He reached to connect with his other half. His soul.
Antonietta? Are you well? Did they see to your wound? Byron? I left you alone. I can’t remember what happened. Why would I leave you alone? There were tears in Antonietta’s voice. She sounded forlorn, agitated. Not at all like his confident lifemate. How could I have done such a terrible thing? For my cousin? To save my cousin? I can’t think why I would have left you. Be calm,
cara mia
, I am fine. I asked you to leave me so my people would heal me in our way. It would have been too complicated to allow a doctor to see to my wounds. They would have insisted on calling the authorities. This is best. No! It isn’t best! I knew there was danger, I felt it all around us. It was storming and cold, and you lost so much blood. Tasha screamed when she saw me. I was covered in your blood. I should have stayed with you to protect you. To heal you. I have skills.
Byron smiled. Even a Scarletti with her unusual legacy did not have sufficient skills. He sent her waves of warmth, of love.
I shall be with you tomorrow night. Keep Celt close to you at all times. You will not be able to reach me until sunset tomorrow, so do not panic if you reach for me and I am not there. I need to touch you. To know you’re really alive.
Their connection was already fading. Antonietta tried desperately to hold on to the link between them. Byron drifted in and out of consciousness as Dominic took him to a series of caves deep beneath the earth.
“We will rest here this night.” Dominic opened the earth, cutting into a section of rich soil before lowering Byron into the cool, welcoming ground.
“Tell me of your kin. How is it she is lost to you?” Byron roused himself enough to seek the companionship of his kind.
“I am a hunter of the vampire. I was born a hunter.”
“Where I was not.”
Dominic shrugged his shoulders. “One who hunts when it is not their heritage is a warrior to respect. It is all I have known, even in my fledgling days. Those were dark times, long before the wars that destroyed most of our people. My sister learned much, and even Prince Vlad consulted
her. Some say she knew too much. Some say she turned on her people, wanting to rule, believing it was her right.”
“You are of the Dragonseeker blood.” Byron leaned his head against the soft soil and looked up at the man who had shared his lifeblood. “When I was a fledgling, I used to go to the house where you once must have dwelled. The carvings, the artwork was so beautiful. I wanted to be able to create such wonders. That was a long time ago.”
“The old house still stands? It would be a miracle to see it again.”
“Out of respect for your lineage,” Byron said. “Nothing has ever been touched, only to preserve it for you or any of your kin should they remain.”
“My sister was loyal to Prince Vlad and our people. No Dragonseeker has ever betrayed our people. Not one ever turned vampire. I cannot rest until I find who took my sister from us and clear our name.”
“I have never heard it whispered the Dragonseeker blood was tainted,” Byron objected. He watched as Dominic swept his hand around the cave so tiny pinpoints of light leapt to life. The stranger took powder from a small container and blew it across the cavern. The scent was aromatic and soothing.
“I am grateful that in my absence, such a thing was never suggested.” Dominic knelt beside Byron and began to gather handfulls of the earth. He mixed the soil with a second powder and his own saliva. “You will need more blood before you go to ground. The wound is quite extensive and did much damage to your internal organs. How is it you have hunted the undead, yet that human male was able to harm you?”
If there was a reprimand in Dominic’s voice, Byron couldn’t detect it, only mild interest in how a human managed to injure a Carpathian hunter. “Perhaps I am a better craftsmen than hunter.”
“I have noticed several of the people in this place have strange barriers. It is better to take your lifemate and leave this place. Take her to our homeland. She will eventually get used to it and get over being annoyed with you.” Dominic helped Byron to lean forward so he could pack the material tightly into the gaping back wound. “A craftsman who turned hunter to aid his people is always welcome at a warrior’s camp fire. Craftsmen are meticulous and methodical. It is an honor to meet one such as you.” Dominic’s hands were gentle as he helped Byron to lie back down.
“The prince found his lifemate some time ago,” Byron volunteered the news. “It seems that some human women possess psychic abilities, and those women can be successfully converted without fear of madness.”
“I have heard this rumor. How can this be?”
“I believe it is possible that the women we are finding with psychic powers are descendants of the Jaguar race.”
Dominic once again mixed the rich soil with his powder and saliva to pack into Byron’s chest. “I had not thought that any remained unless deep within the jungle.”
“Not true Jaguar, but of their blood. It would explain why the women are compatible with our race. The Jaguar are shape-shifters, and they had many gifts, as our people had.” Byron closed his eyes. “Do you leave tomorrow?”
“At sunset. I have not found the undead dwelling in this region,” Dominic answered. “I will continue my travel as soon as I rise. You will heal in the ground and be safe for several risings.”
“I must be able to wake tomorrow evening. Antonietta will grieve. I do not want her to suffer.”
“You will not be at full strength, but I will make certain you wake.”
Byron’s attention was caught and held by the piercing gaze. “You have green eyes.” Not just green but glittering, metallic green. Eerie. Eyes that saw through to the soul. “I should have remembered, it is the Dragonseeker’s legacy. Eyes of the seers.”
“I am weary now, Byron, I do not see what should be seen. Once I find the answers I seek, I will follow my kinsmen into the next life.”
“Or find your lifemate. I did not think it possible, yet there is no doubt that Antonietta is my other half.”
“My lineage is all but gone. Rhiannon and I were the last of our line. I doubt if either of us would have been so lucky.” Dominic stood, looming over the deep cut in the earth. “Sleep now, and wake fully healed. I will give your regards to our prince and give him the news that another woman will join our ranks soon. That alone is cause for celebration.”
“I thank you for your courtesy and for my life.”
Dominic bowed low in the way of the Carpathians. “You must sleep now and allow me to attempt to heal these massive wounds.”
Byron could hear the voices again, many of them, male and female, chanting the healing ritual in his head.
Sleep, old friend, we are with you, and we will watch over you while our brother heals your body.
That single voice of friendship took him back in time, when he ran free with the wolves, sat in the tallest trees, and was simply a boy playing with a friend. He allowed himself to drift off, the soothing voices distant. And one feminine voice whispering,
Come back.
Chapter 8
Antonietta sat at the piano, her hands curved over the keys. Music welled up inside of her. Poignant. Frightened. A clash of emotions. Her fingers brought beauty and poetry to the chaos, blending notes until the music swelled in volume, unable to be contained in the room with its perfect acoustics. She was blatantly calling to her lover to end her mourning. The music moaned and wept, pleaded and begged. Became soft and lilting as a siren. A melody of enticement.
The doors to her rooms were locked as they had been all day. She would see no one. Not even Don Giovanni could persuade her to open her doors. The seconds had ticked by, as loud as heartbeats. Long. Lasting minutes, hours, days. She couldn’t bear to go on without him. Byron. Her dark poet. She had lost him before she had a chance to know him, and the agony was beyond her comprehension.
Grief ravaged her. Ate at her. Blocked out her anger at her cousin. At her family. At Justine. She refused comfort from them all. Only Celt was allowed to remain with her as she wept and threw things in a way very unlike Antonietta. She cried a storm of tears, raged at the heavens that they would allow her cousin access to a gun. Through it all, the dog paced at her side, guided her around the missiles she had thrown, and thrust his head lovingly against her in consolation and camaraderie.
The music shifted into melancholy, the notes taking flight, spilling out into the great halls so the entire household was silent with grief. Even the children spoke in whispers, and Marita shushed them. A pall hung over the palazzo. Antonietta, their lifeblood, their mainstay, the one person constant in their lives, was devastated as she had never been before. Over a man. Worse, over a man they feared. The symphony played on endlessly, an outpouring of tears and anguish, until even the servants were weeping.
Outside, beyond the multitude of colors in the priceless stained glass windows, the storm had long since passed over, yet clouds rolled across the sky, darkening the moon and blotting the stars so that the gargoyles and winged creatures sitting atop the eaves and battlements were shadowed and dark.
Antonietta felt the music rising in her, the relentless, merciless emotions, a volcano erupting endlessly. She was driven to play, unable to stop. And then she felt the weight of his hands on her shoulders. The warmth of his breath on the nape of her neck. The touch of his lips in her hair. Her fingers stilled on the piano keys. There was abrupt silence after the intensity and power of the music. The palazzo hushed instantly, an eerie shock after the hours of passionate sound.
Antonietta sat on the gleaming piano bench without moving, without daring to believe he was there with her, that he had come to her after all the long hours of stark fear and grief. Her heart seemed to cease beating in her chest, her world narrowed to his hands. The heat of his skin. The warmth of his breath. The beating of his heart. Her heart stuttered, found the rhythm of his. Beat in perfect synchronization. She whirled around, her arms going around his neck, her cry muffled by his mouth melding with hers.
Byron tasted her tears, tasted love and acceptance. His lips traveled over her
face, her eyes, memorized her high cheekbones, the small dimple, returned to capture her mouth. There was heat and fire and need. The earth shifted out from under them. Her hands tugged at his shirt, desperate to inspect his body, to see with her fingertips. It was almost more than she could bear to wait. She nearly ripped the material covering his skin even as she kissed him back, ravaging his mouth, telling him without words what she needed.
Byron shrugged his shoulders, and the shirt fell away, exposing his chest to Antonietta’s inspection. She couldn’t stop kissing him. Over and over, frantic, long, drugging kisses. Her fingertips inspected every inch of his chest, every defined muscle, his rib cage, his narrow waist. She found the scar, still raw but nearly healed, and she gasped with alarm into the heat of his mouth.
He nearly killed you. I thought you were dead.
She couldn’t speak aloud, her mouth traveled over his jaw, down his throat to his chest.
I told you I would live. I am sorry you were so frightened.
He closed his eyes, threw his head back, his fists bunching in her hair as she tugged at his pants, desperate to take them off of him.
I need to touch you, every inch of you, and know you’re alive and here with me. I never want to feel like that again!
Her tongue tasted him. Textures and feel and taste were all important to her and in the aroused state she was in, a mixture of sexual hunger and intense emotion, Antonietta wanted to touch and explore and savor him.
Your shoulder?
His hands left her hair to push her robe from her arms. It floated to the floor, a soft pile of lace. The spaghetti straps of her gown were minute, yet he pushed them off her arms as well so that the gown slithered to the floor.
Antonietta barely noticed, as she dragged his clothes from his body. She rubbed her face over his chest, his abdomen. He tore the tie from her long hair so that it spilled, unbound, around them, silky and teasing his flesh.
“Antonietta.” He whispered her name in a husky blend of hunger and need as his own inspection began. The wound on her shoulder was nearly healed, although she was bruised, but the bullet had been spent from tearing through his body. It had lodged in the hollow of her shoulder, a shallow penetration, and Byron had removed it when he attempted to heal her. There was little damage to the muscle, but he leaned down to lap at the bruise.
Dark Symphony (Dark Series - book 10) Page 14