Dark Prince (37 page)

Raven was thankful that she could defy him. She couldn't sleep, didn't dare until she knew Jacques was safe. Mikhail and Gregori were racing the sun, powerful wings beating strongly as they flew toward the old cabin. They would burrow deep into the soil the moment they were able, taking Jacques with them.

Raven
. The call was closer, filling her mind with love.
You are so weak
.

Save Jacques. Come to me tonight, Mikhail. The vampire knows my thoughts. He thinks he is safe, that I can be used to trap you. Don't let him be right.
She tried desperately to send the words clearly to him, but her brain was sluggish.

"Raven?" Edgar Hummer touched her forehead, finding her ice cold. Her skin was so pale, she seemed nearly translucent, her blue eyes sunken, like two bruised flowers pressed into her face. "Can you talk? Is Mikhail alive?"

She nodded, surveying his swollen face with dismay. "What have they done to you? Why would they beat you this way?"

"They say they're certain I know where Mikhail keeps all of his spare coffins. According to Andre…"

"Who is Andre?"

"The treacherous vampire in league with these killers. He is a true undead, feeding on children, destroying all that is holy. His soul is lost for all eternity. As far as I can tell, Andre appears to be deliberately perpetuating the vampire myths. He claims that Mikhail is the head vampire and if they succeed in killing him, those under his influence will be returned to mortal existence. He must have established a blood bond without their knowledge and he uses it to give them orders."

Raven closed her eyes weakly. Her heart was struggling to pump without necessary blood; her lungs cried out for oxygen. "How many of them are there?"

"Three that I've seen. This one is James Slovensky. His brother Eugene is their supposed leader, and their muscle man is Anton Fabrezo."

"Two of them stayed at the inn with the American couple. We thought they had left the country. This Andre must be a lot more powerful than anyone suspects."

Her voice was fading, her speech slurring. Father Hummer watched as she tried to lift her arm to push her hair away from her face. Her arm seemed too heavy; her face seemed too great a distance away. He did it for her with gentle fingers.

Raven
! There was anguish in Mikhail's voice.

It was too difficult to answer him; it required far too much strength. The priest shifted so that her head could fall against his arm. Raven was shivering with cold. "I need a blanket back here for her."

"Shut up, old man," Slovensky snapped. His eyes continually searched the sky through his windshield. The sun was up, but heavy clouds dimmed the sky, hiding the light.

"If she dies, Andre will make you wish you had died too," Edgar Hummer persisted.

"I need sleep," Raven said softly without opening her eyes. She didn't even wince when Slovensky's jacket landed on her unprotected face.

Mikhail had to get out of the sun. Without dark glasses or any substantial protection from the rays, his skin and eyes were burning. He landed on the low branch of a tree and changed to human form as he jumped the remaining seven feet to earth. Jacques's body lay in the sun, a cardigan covering his neck and face. Without looking to see the extent of his brother's injuries, Mikhail lifted him and glided above ground toward the network of caves a mile away.

A huge black wolf burst from the clearing to join him, loping easily beside him, pale silver eyes gleaming with menace. Together they raced through the narrow passages until they found a large, steaming chamber. The black wolf contorted, fur rippling along muscular arms as Gregori shape-shifted to his true form.

Mikhail laid Jacques's body gently on the rich soil and lifted away the covering. He swore softly, unshed tears burning in his throat and eyes. "Can you save him?"

Gregori's hands moved over the body, the vicious wounds. "He stopped his heart and lungs so that he could conserve his blood. Raven is weak because she fed him. She mixed her saliva and the soil and packed it in tight. It is already beginning to heal the wounds. I will need your herbs, Mikhail."

"Save him, Gregori." Mikhail's body rippled with thick, glossy fur, bent, stretched, took shape as he ran along the maze of passages upward out of the bowels of the earth. He dared not think of Raven and how weak she was. The heaviness was invading his body already, demanding he go to ground, that he sleep.

Summoning his immense strength and a will honed to iron over hundreds of years, Mikhail burst into the open at a flat run. The wolf's body was built for speed and he used it, running flat out, eyes narrowed to tiny slits. Paws hit the ground; back feet dug into soil to leap rotting logs. He never slowed, racing through ravines and over rocks.

The overcast sky helped to ease the effects of the sun, but his eyes were streaming as he approached the cabin. The wind shifted, bringing the foul stench of sweat and fear.
Man.
The beast snarled silently, all the pent-up rage in him exploding into white-hot fury. The wolf skidded to a halt, body low to the ground, once more the predator.

The wolf kept downwind, gliding through thick brush to creep up on the two men waiting in ambush. A trap for him. Of course the betrayer would know Mikhail would rush to aid his brother. The vampire was cunning and willing to take chances. The betrayer had lain in wait, feeding Hans Romanov's fanaticism. It was probably the undead who had commanded Hans to murder his wife. The wolf slunk low on its belly, crawled forward until it was within feet of the larger of the two men.

"We're too late," Anton Fabrezo whispered, half rising to stare down the trail in front of the cabin. "Something sure happened here."

"Damn truck, it would have to overheat," Dieter Hodkins complained. "There's blood everywhere and smashed branches. There was a fight, all right."

"Do you think Andre killed Dubrinsky?" Anton asked.

"That's our job. But the sun's up. If Dubrinsky's alive, he's somewhere sleeping in his coffin. We can check the cabin, but I don't think we're going to find anything," Dieter said with irritation.

"Andre isn't going to be happy with us," Anton worried aloud. "He wants Dubrinsky dead in a big way."

"Well, he should have provided us with a decent truck. I told him mine was breaking down," Dieter snapped impatiently. He believed in vampires, and that it was his holy duty to exterminate them.

Dieter stood up cautiously, surveying the landscape carefully. "Come on, Fabrezo. Maybe we'll get lucky and Dubrinsky will be in the cabin already laid out in his coffin."

Anton laughed nervously. "I'll drive in the stake; you cut off the head. This vampire-killing stuff is messy."

"Cover me while I scout it out," Dieter ordered. He took a step through the thick foliage, his rifle cradled in his arms. The bushes directly in front of him parted and he was face to face with a huge, heavily muscled wolf. His heart nearly stopped, and he froze, unable for a moment to move.

Black eyes glittered malevolently, streaming and red-rimmed. Sharp white fangs glinted, glistened with saliva. The wolf held him with those black eyes for a full thirty seconds, striking terror in Dieter's heart. Without warning it lunged, jaws wide, head low, caught one booted ankle and crushed down with incredible power, breaking through leather and bones with a loud, sickening snap. Dieter screamed and fell. The wolf instantly released him and sprang back, regarding him with impersonal eyes.

From his position in the bushes, Fabrezo had seen Dieter Hodkins go down screaming, but he couldn't see why. The terror in Hodkin's tone sent fear spiraling through him. It took a minute for Anton to find his voice. "What is it? I can't see." He didn't try to see either, sliding further down in the bushes, holding his gun up and ready, finger on the trigger ready to spray anything that moved. He wanted to yell at Dieter to shut up, but he remained quiet, his heart pounding in alarm.

Dieter tried to bring his rifle into firing position. Between the pain and the terror those black, venomous eyes were inducing, he couldn't quite get the barrel around fast enough. Those eyes were far too intelligent, held rage and fury. That death stare was very personal. And it was the eyes of death that mesmerized him. He couldn't look away, not even when the wolf lunged for his exposed throat. At the last he didn't feel a thing, suddenly welcoming the end. The deadly eyes staring into his changed at the last moment, suddenly saddened as the wolf made the kill.

The wolf shook its shaggy head and eased into the bushes behind Anton Fabrezo. He could hear the heart thudding with terror, bursting with life. He could hear the blood rushing hotly through the body, smelled fear and sweat. Joy washed over the wolf, the need for blood, for the kill. Mikhail pushed it down, thought of Raven, her compassion and courage and the need to kill vanished. The sun broke through a small hole in the heavy cloud cover and a thousand needles pierced his eyes.

I need those herbs, Mikhail. The sun is climbing and time is running out for Jacques. Finish it now.

The wolf waited for the clouds to move back in place and then it walked boldly into the open, deliberately keeping his back to Fabrezo. Anton's eyes narrowed, and an evil smile twisted his mouth. His hand raised the gun, his finger finding the trigger. Before he could pull the trigger the wolf whirled in midair and smashed into Anton's chest, driving through bone, ripping straight for the heart.

The wolf leaped over the body, his manner contemptuous as he loped to the cabin. His eyes were tearing continually, streaming water no matter how narrow the slits. The heaviness spreading through his body was far more difficult to ignore. Aware of time passing, the wolf sprinted up the stairs to the door. One claw contorted, lengthened to fingers so that he was able to grasp the doorknob and push the heavy door open. The need for sleep was almost overpowering and Jacques was waiting for the herbs.

Distorted, clawed hands hung the bag of precious herbs around the thick, muscular neck, and then the wolf was in a dead run, racing the climbing sun as it burned away the thick cloud covering.

Thunder cracked unexpectedly. Thick black clouds, heavy with rain, blew across the sky, providing Mikhail with dense cover from the sun. The storm rolled in over the forest fast, with wild winds kicking up leaves and swaying branches. A bolt of lightning sizzled across the sky in a fiery whip of dancing light. The sky darkened to an ominous cauldron of boiling clouds. Mikhail bounded into the caves and raced along the narrow maze of passages toward the main chamber, shape-shifting as he ran.

Gregori's cool silver gaze slid over him as Mikhail relinquished the herbs. "It is a wonder you have been able to tie your shoes without me all of these centuries."

Mikhail sank down beside his brother, one hand over his burning eyes. "It is more of a wonder you have stayed alive with your ostentatious displays."

Ancient language, as old as time, flooded the chamber. Gregori's voice was beautiful yet commanding. No one had a voice like Gregori's. Beautiful, hypnotic, mesmerizing. The ritual chant provided an anchor in the uncertain sea in which Jacques was floating. Rich soil mixed with Gregori's saliva was a collar around the wounded Carpathian's neck. Gregori's blood, old and powerful beyond measure, flowed in Jacques's starved veins. Gregori crushed and mixed herbs, adding them to the mixture around Jacques's neck.

"I repaired the damage from the inside out. He is weak, Mikhail, but his will is strong. If we put him deep within the earth and give him time, he will heal." Gregori pushed a poultice into Mikhail's hand. "Put that on your eyes. It will help until we get you in the ground."

Gregori was right. The poultice was soothing, a cool ice melting the fire. But somewhere deep inside another nightmare was starting. A yawning, black, empty hole that began to stretch, to crawl through him, whispering dark, insane thoughts. No matter how many times his mind reached for Raven's, he found emptiness. Intellect told him she was in a deep sleep, but his Carpathian blood cried out for her touch.

"You need to go to ground now," Gregori pointed out. "I will fix the safeguards and ensure we are not disturbed."

"With a big sign saying 'Gregori lies here, do not disturb'?" Mikhail asked softly, his voice a low warning.

Gregori lowered Jacques's body deep within the healing earth, in no way disturbed by Mikhail's sarcasm.

"You may as well have written your name in the sky with that display, Gregori."

"I want the vampire to be very clear about who I am, whom he has chosen for his enemy." Gregori's shoulders shrugged in a lazy ripple of power.

Need crawled along Mikhail's skin like a thousand biting ants, stinging his organs and gnawing at his sinews. He raised red, swollen eyes to Gregori's harsh, yet curiously sensual features. There was such power in Gregori; it blazed in the silver of his eyes. "You think with Raven that I am complete and no longer have need of you. You deliberately draw the danger to yourself, away from me and mine, because in your heart you believe you can no longer hold out. You welcome the danger of the hunt; you are seeking a way to end this life. Now, more than ever, our people need you, Gregori. We have hope. There is a future for us if we can survive the coming years."

Gregori sighed heavily, looked away from the steel in Mikhail's eyes, the censure blazing there. "There is purpose in saving your life, but for me, not much else."

Mikhail pushed a hand through his thick mane of hair. "Our people cannot do without you, Gregori, and quite simply, neither can I."

"You are so certain that I will not turn?" Gregori's smile was humorless, self-mocking. "Your faith in me exceeds my own. This vampire is ruthless, drunk on his own power. He craves the killing, the destruction. I walk the line of that madness every day. His power is nothing, a feather in the wind compared to mine. I have no heart and my soul is dark. I do not want to wait until I cannot make my own choice. The one thing I do not want is to force you to seek me out to destroy me. My life has been my belief in you, in protecting you. I will not wait until I must be hunted."