Dark Wolf (23 page)

“If I can get her spirit and bring her close, you have to convert her, Josef. I cannot do both,” Dimitri instructed. His voice was raspy, hoarse, fear for Skyler choking him.

He shed his body fast, becoming pure spirit, a white light that entered her body and rushed down the tree of life after her fading spirit. He knew her so well. Every expression. The sound of her laughter. The way her eyes changed color and her hair banded with color, even when she dyed it. He knew her heart and soul. That steel spine that made her so formidable. Most of all he knew her love.

I cannot lose you. Your soul is tied to mine. We are one, csitri. Where you go, I will follow. Stay where you are, hold on and let me come get you.

There in the darkness he felt her. There was no light to guide him, but he would know the feel of her anywhere. That soft, gentle nature, the one that surrounded him and held him to her when all else was lost. She had come for him in his darkest hour. His lady. His Skyler.

His spirit moved downward along the trunk of the tree of life, passed the upper branches. Once below them, he couldn’t feel her anymore. For a moment panic nearly threw him back into his own body, but then he settled, calling on centuries of discipline. Hunting her in the cold and dark required calm, not panic, and he refused to lose her when he knew she was still there—somewhere.

Dimitri rose slowly, this time allowing the sense of the Guardian to emerge. The instant he did he became aware of everything there in the dark. Souls crying out. Those without souls crouched in the dark waiting for an unsuspecting traveler who knew them. The bitter cold coming from deep below, rising to infuse everything in its path with ice.

Yet above him and just to his left, there was a pocket of warmth between two branches, almost as if something had been caught there, or had clung there. He moved fast, surrounding that warmth with his light, holding it captive, recognizing the feel and strength of her unconditional love for him.

Päläfertiilam. Lifemate. Hän ku vigyáz sívamet és sielamet
—
keeper of my heart and soul. Give yourself into my keeping. Let me hold you close while Josef brings you fully into my world. To do this, you must have absolute trust in me. I will need to possess your body.

She was too far gone. She would never be able to take Josef’s blood even with his aid. He wasn’t even certain if the conversion could be done. Possession was forbidden, a tool of the mage world or the vampire, but he could see no other way.

Skyler could not respond. He couldn’t even see a faint flickering light, but her warmth increased to the point of true heat. He took that as a yes. He divided his spirit, a dangerous move when his own body was burning from the inside out. Nothing mattered to him but saving his lifemate.

He came back into his body disoriented and shaking. A part of him had remained in the nether world. “Paul, she is a daughter of the earth. We can’t heal these wounds in time, but Mother Earth may do so. Get the richest soil and press it into each of the bullet holes. Josef, take her blood, enough for an exchange.”

“But . . .” Josef and Paul exchanged a look of disbelief.

“Just do it. Then give her your blood.”

Dimitri didn’t wait for them to agree with his plan. He took possession of Skyler’s lifeless body. The fit was strange and wrong. Her eyes snapped open and she looked at Josef.

Josef fell back away from Skyler. He recognized those ice-cold blue eyes, and they weren’t Skyler’s. If he did as Dimitri asked, would she rise a puppet? The undead? He shook his head at the idea. There was no darkness in Skyler, not even with her powerful mage blood. He knew her.

He leaned down and sank his teeth into her neck, taking in the powerful combination of her lineage. He had taken her blood many times before when he was caught out away from others and needed to feed, but she was different now. More potent. There was even a different taste to her. He didn’t know if he was feeding from Skyler or Dimitri or a combination of both.

When he was certain he had taken enough for an exchange, he tore at his own wrist and pressed the laceration to Skyler’s mouth. Her movements were jerky, stiff even, as if she had little control over her own body. Her tongue tentatively swiped over the wound and then she began to drink, a small movement, barely there, increasing in strength.

Shocked, Josef gave her as much blood as he dared, not understanding what Dimitri was doing. He knew healers could retrieve spirits that hadn’t gone too far into the other world, but he’d never seen this done. Conversion was hard on a body. One species didn’t easily allow another to take over. But possession? Such an abomination was forbidden. One did not take over the body of another.

At this stage, Skyler was still human. Pressing dirt, no matter how rich, into her wounds couldn’t possibly heal her. Still, Paul did as Dimitri instructed and so did Josef. What else could they do?

Around them, the Lycans had gone wild, desperate to get through the transparent shield Skyler had erected. They tore at it with bare claws. They bit at it, fired bullets into it, and even hacked at it with swords. The shield held. Lycans climbed the trees surrounding the clearing and the strongest of them made large leaps in an effort to get over the shield. Most dropped to the ground, but two landed above their heads, slamming their bodies hard into the transparent ceiling. More dug at the ground in a feverish, frenzied effort to tunnel beneath the shield to gain entry.

Razvan sent Gabriel and Lucian one silent look, turned on his heel and abruptly left the doorway, striding away, the set of his shoulders the only thing that gave away his absolute rage. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that he intended to go find those who had murdered his daughter.

Ivory stepped inside the door and walked straight up to the Lycans, fearless. Her back was covered with tattoos of wolves. The wolves stared at the Lycans with lifelike eyes as she moved through their ranks. No one said a word. No one moved, not even when she emerged from the pack of Lycans to go up to Rolf and look him in the eye.

“He does not lie,” she announced. “It appears as if none of the members of the high council were aware of this betrayal, but I cannot tell if all of those who guard them were unaware of this treachery. There is the smell of conspiracy here. Which ones are guilty, I cannot say.”

Ivory stepped back from Rolf. “You do not know me, but I am wolf as well, not in the sense of blood, but I have had my own pack for centuries. I can tell you, someone wants a war between Carpathian and Lycan. I do not know who would benefit from such a war, but there are those of your kind working against you.”

Rolf frowned at her. “I hear the ring of truth in your voice, but there has been no hint of such a treachery. It would be difficult to hide from us.”

Ivory gestured around the room. “Whoever is behind this now has the perfect weapon available to them. These warriors will go to get their children. None will stand down. None will stop. They will hunt every Lycan who took part in the killing of their children. No one will be safe. No one. You and Mikhail must find a way to stop this.”

Abruptly she turned and walked out, following her lifemate.

“Rolf.” One of the guards, a man by the name of Lowell, pushed forward. “We should get all of you out of here, before this escalates.”

Another guard, Varg, nodded in agreement. “We have no confirmation that any of this is true. This could be
their
conspiracy to kill all of us and throw the Lycan world into chaos.”

Several guards pulled swords so that the light struck the silver, making it gleam as if in eagerness. More than one began to shift from their human form to Lycan, half wolf, half man.

Two of the elite hunters Mikhail recognized moved into position to defend Rolf. Daciana and Makoce, two of Zev’s elite pack, exchanged uneasy glances. They were aware, more than the others, of the danger all the Lycans were in. There would be a bloodbath here, if the tension continued to escalate between the two species.

The De La Cruz brothers spread out immediately, a clear sign of aggression. Jacques Dubrinsky, Mikhail’s brother, and several other Carpathian males moved into the spaces around Mikhail. The two species faced one another, moving warily to give themselves fighting room, yet careful not to trigger an attack.

Rolf did not take his eyes from Francesca’s grief-stricken face. “We did not know. When we heard that a
Sange rau
had been taken . . .”

“Dimitri is not
Sange rau
,” Mikhail reiterated, ignoring Gregori’s warning hand and emerging from the line of fierce protectors that had placed their bodies between his and danger. “He is
Hän ku pesäk kaikak
, Guardian of all. He saved the lives of your Lycans, and they repaid him with treachery. Would the
Sange rau
have risked his own life to save two of your people?”

Rolf shook his head. “Most of the others have never had to experience the complete destruction such a combination causes. We forbade contact with Carpathians in order to prevent such a mixed blood from rising.”

“If you know Dimitri couldn’t possibly be
Sange rau
, a rogue vampire/wolf mix, why would you hold him at all?” Mikhail asked.

In spite of the low, cool tones of both leaders, the tension in the room continued to escalate. Mikhail pinned Zacarias with piercing eyes. Zacarias was the leader among his brothers, a fierce, wild predator who remained untamed and uncivilized in spite of finding his lifemate. He was the most lethal man in the room, and the most unpredictable, a throwback to the old days when Carpathians hunted without fear of discovery.

He knew Zacarias was a law unto himself. He had been too long in the wilds, an ancient hunter on his own, far from home, with darkness always tearing at him, yet he had stayed an honorable man.

We will not be the ones to start the war, Zacarias. Keep your brothers, especially Rafael, under control while I sort this out.
Rafael was lifemate to Colby, Paul’s sister. He loved the boy and no doubt was furious that the Lycans had dared to attack him.

“We have not interviewed Dimitri as of yet,” Rolf said. “None of us have ever laid eyes on him. We sent word to treat him with respect and care as we were away. One phone call to Zev Hunter, and I will have a much clearer understanding of what is transpiring.”

“Zev is a good man,” Mikhail said. “One we have trusted. He was not a part of the taking of Dimitri and left soon after to track those who had taken him.”

Rolf shook his head. “Zev is the leader of the elite team. They would not have acted without Zev’s authority. It would be . . .” He frowned, looking from Daciana to Makoce, two of the four members of Zev’s elite hunter pack that were there to guard them. “Treachery.”

Daciana and Makoce both nodded their heads. “We were fighting the rogue pack with the Carpathians here,” Daciana explained. “Zev was with us. The
Sange rau
projected an image, an illusion of himself, and we all believed there was an imminent threat to the prince. While we fought here, two members of our team, Gunnolf and Convel, slipped away, and somehow this incident occurred with Dimitri.”

“How do we get from two of your elite hunters fighting with us, to betraying us, kidnapping the very man who saved their lives, torturing him and murdering our children?” Francesca demanded.

Rolf looked around the room at the posturing warriors and shook his head. “I do not have an answer for you. I can only reiterate we did not come here to start a war. We came in peace to build an alliance with you. An alliance between us would benefit not only your species, but ours and humans as well. Allow me to step outside and make a call to Zev. I’ll get to the bottom of this.”

“Why do you need permission for anything from those who harbor the
Sange rau
?” Lowell, the guard who had insisted there was no proof of the attack on the children, demanded. His raised his voice, a belligerent sneer adding fuel to the fire. “Look at them, living in the mountains, hiding from the world. They think they have the power to dictate to us, but they are nothing at all. We don’t need them. No Lycan would kill a child.” He looked around at his fellow guards. “They have contrived this story in order to have reason to kill us all.”

A murmur of agreement nearly ignited Rafael into action. He made a move, his hands coming up, but Zacarias glanced at him, his face set in stone and Rafael subsided.

“Lowell,” Rolf said, his voice firming. “You will remain silent.”

“It is my duty to keep you and all council members safe,” Lowell insisted. “I have a job to do, and while I respect your authority, in this instance, I believe that it is important to save you from yourself.”

The majority of the guards seemed to agree, nodding their heads, or simply drawing more weapons.

Mikhail, you must leave now,
Gregori insisted.
This is getting out of hand. Lowell is deliberately turning the other Lycans against us. He wants to start a fight. Your safety is too important to risk you.

Perhaps that is so,
Mikhail agreed,
but once I leave the room, a fight will start. I don’t want to give up yet. Rolf is an honorable man. Not only do I sense that, but Ivory confirmed my belief, and you know she is extraordinary.