Dark Demon (29 page)

Falcon lives close and Manolito has returned from South America. You are here as well. In any case, I am capable of protecting myself.

Vikirnoff was silent, mulling it over as he winged his way toward the old cave.
I think there is a well-orchestrated plot against you. How is it all of the hunters are gone
?

My brother and Gregori have been in the States. Byron is in Italy and I believe Tienn and Eric are traveling with their lifemates. Gregori and Jacques are on their way back, but they travel slowly as Shea is pregnant. Gabriel is not too far. Should there be need, they will come with all speed.

Vikirnoff didn't like it. There was need. Great need right now.
Forgive me, but perhaps you are being too complacent. I was in the States with Rafael and we encountered Maxim's brother. It took both of us to kill him and Rafael nearly died doing so. They have grown powerful, Mikhail, and they are developing strange weapons against us. The vampires are banding together and they mean to assassinate you. Maxim told me it was their goal. If they have sufficient ranks here, we may be in trouble. You said Falcon was wounded. You are wounded as am I. We do not know the full extent of the army they have in place against us. You are used to battling fledgling vampires and those of lesser skills. You have never faced an ancient of great power. With some of our most experienced hunters such as Traian or Falcon injured, perhaps we need to reassess what is going on
.

Vikirnoff was never much of a talker. He preferred action and it hadn't been his intention to get into a confrontation with his prince before actually meeting him, but twice now they had disagreed on a course of action. The prince was necessary to sustain their species. It was possible his daughter, Savannah, carried the necessary gene to ensure the survival of their entire species, but Vikirnoff wasn't willing to gamble with the prince's life to find out.

Heavy vines and a pile of rocks covered the entrance to the cave he sought. The area looked as if it hadn't been disturbed for several hundred years. The opening was very slender, hidden behind mere cracks in the boulder. Vikirnoff and his brother, Nicolae, had discovered the entrance as children. Magma, deep below the surface, heated the narrow tunnel and the caverns and springs. The double chambers were rich in minerals and the brothers had often carried the soil home to aid the healers.

Thank you for this information, Vikirnoff. I will take it under consideration. Do not worry about your lifemate. My friends will protect her.

Vikirnoff didn't snort his derision. It would have been rude when talking to royalty, but in truth, no one was going to protect his lifemate. If there was any protecting going on, Natalya would be the one doing it, he didn't care how distraught she might be over the separation. On that thought, came pride. Respect. Natalya might not be the woman he'd dreamt of, or fantasized about, but she was extraordinary and reliable. Utterly, absolutely reliable.

Deep within a chamber he opened the healing earth. His body was tired and he desperately needed to feed, but he had waited too long and the sun had climbed too high. Floating down into the warmth of the rich soil, he allowed the soothing properties to wash over him.
Are you all right
? He reached for her because he had to touch her. To know that she was alive and well.

Yes. What about you? You sound exhausted. Why haven't you gone to ground?

I was having a discussion with the prince.

There was a small silence.
You were ordering him around, weren't you
?

Why would you think that?

I just know you. Diplomacy and tact aren't exactly your strong suits.

The dirt began to fill in around and over him as he laughed softly, the sound echoing through her mind.

Chapter 11

"I love the way you laugh, Razvan, but it isn't going to get you the spell. You were supposed to study."

"I did study." Razvan grinned at her, his hair falling into his eyes the way it always did.

Natalya knew he believed all the girls thought he looked intriguing that way. She thought he looked like he needed a haircut, but she refrained from saying so.

"Just not spells. You know I think they're archaic. What's the point? No one believes in magick and I don't have the affinity for it that you do. Besides, you always tell me in the end, so stop stalling."

Natalya put her hands on her hips. Of course she was going to tell him. She always did, but she wasn't going to give it up that easy. "What do you have for me in return?"

"You're supposed to give it to me because you adore me," her twin pointed out.

"Adoration went out the window a long time ago when I realized I had to do all the studying. Safeguards are important, Razvan. What happens if I'm not around and you need to be safe?"

"I can always reach you, Natalya." He hugged her to him. "It's never made sense for both of us to study the same thing. We share information."

"But you aren't retaining the spells," Natalya argued, the smile fading from her face. "That worries me, Razvan. What happens if you need safeguards and you can't reach me? You protect me all the time, the only real thing I have to give you in return is knowledge and you don't take it seriously."

"
Believe me, Natalya, I take it very seriously
,"
Razvan corrected. He ruffled her hair affectionately. "You're so much smarter than I am, and maybe I take advantage of that by not studying as hard as I should, but never think I'm not aware of how much you help me. I'm proud of you
."

"Did he hurt you this time or did the safeguards hold against him?" Natalya, lowered her voice and looked around them. A shadow fell between them. Razvan's arm slipped from her shoulders and all at once he was a good distance away from her. He seemed to fade and Natalya reached out a hand to him, but she couldn't touch him and she dropped her arm.

"He was very angry. I think you're stronger than he is. If you keep working and learning things like you are, he can't touch us. Maybe his power is diminished, I don't know, but it worries me that you may be in danger. He doesn't like that he can't control you. If he can't hurt me, he can't get to you."

For a moment Natalya's hair and skin banded with stripes and her eyes glowed a stormy opaque. "He was able to get through the safeguards and he hurt you, didn't he? To punish me because I won't come to him when he insists."

"Show me the new one. Show me what you're using now."

Razvan was fading from her and Natalya couldn't stop him. Grief intruded. Not for her brother but for Vikirnoff. Her need to touch Vikirnoff's mind, just to know he was alive, was safe. She ached for him, her mind reaching… reaching… but he wasn't there—only a dark pitiless void she seemed to be tumbling into.

"Natalya! The safeguards." There was desperation in Razvan's voice.

"I told you to take them." She was so distracted. She needed Vikirnoff. Where was he? Why wasn't he answering her call? Could he be dead?

"No! I'm dead. The hunters killed me and you haven't made me safe. Why won't you make me safe, Natalya? I need the safeguard…"

Natalya woke with a start. Her head was pounding and she looked around trying to remember where she was and what she was doing. Past and present always seemed to come together with a vengeance in her dreams. It was disorienting. She sat in the middle of the floor, knees drawn up, rocking back and forth, with tears streaming down her face. The television was on, but she had no idea what she'd been watching. She didn't remember summoning a dream of her childhood, but she must have just before she'd succumbed to exhaustion. Swearing under her breath, annoyed by her lack of control, she forced herself to look around the room. She should have remained alert, not given in to sleep when enemies surrounded her.

Rubbing her ankle, Natalya looked at the heavy drapes drawn to block out the light. Her eyes and skin still burned, so she was certain the sun hadn't set yet. She tried to focus on the television, but she couldn't seem to think straight. She loved really old movies with bad special effects and she'd found a channel that played them, but she couldn't seem to keep her mind from straying to Vikirnoff. And that was just plain making her angry.

She gave it up with a little sigh, switching off the set and kicking at the rumpled bed. There had been no maid service in the room and it was still a mess from when Vikirnoff was there. The pillow held his scent and she buried her nose against its softness, inhaling deeply before hugging it to her. "Damn you, Vikirnoff Von Shrieder." She felt better condemning him out loud.

Usually dreams of her childhood with Razvan soothed her, but grief was inches from her, clawing at her, threatening to choke her. Not grief for her twin brother, long gone from her, but grief for a man she'd barely met. But she knew him. She'd been in his mind and she knew what kind of man he was. Her soul had touched his.
Where was he when she needed him so desperately
?

"I'll be damned if your stupid binding spell gets the better of me." He was alive. She knew he was alive. It didn't matter that she had reached out to touch his mind a hundred times over the last few hours and found a dark void, she would not give in to such fantasy. He was merely sleeping the rejuvenating sleep of his kind. She knew what it was, she'd actually studied the healing properties of the various soils in one of her many frenzied periods of gathering information to fill the long, empty hours of her life.

"Maybe I'll have to go to your cave and sit there waiting for you to wake up while I work on the spell to unbind us. Because I don't like this feeling." Emptiness was a hole eating her alive. "
Éntölam kuulua, avio päläfertiilam
. I can figure this out. It isn't that difficult." She pressed her hands into her churning stomach.

A soft rap on the door startled her. Natalya spun around, looking wildly for her weapons. They were always at her fingertips. Was she so far gone that she'd let her guard down? Vampires might not be able to attack during daylight hours, but they were masters of puppets, ghouls created to do their bidding. And there was always Brent Barstow skulking around. She wasn't in the least bit fooled by his casual attitude. The man was up to no good and that put him in league with the vampires as far as she was concerned.

"Who is it?" She stood to the right of the door, gun in hand, finger on the trigger, safety off. The safeguards should hold, but she believed in being prepared. The tigress rose close to the surface, allowing her to utilize the incredible gift of scent. A man and woman, no sweat to indicate fear or danger, but she didn't let down her guard.

"Jubal and Gabrielle Sanders, ma'am. Your lifemate sent us to watch over you."

Natalya let her breath out in a long, slow hiss of annoyance as she sagged against the wall.
You're an idiot, Vik, sending them here. You know damn well I'll be trying to take care of them instead of the other way around
. He couldn't hear her, but it gave her satisfaction to say it. "I told him I didn't need a baby-sitter, thank you very much. He's flattering himself to think I might miss him."

"Ma'am. We can't very well stand out here in the hall talking through the door." There was a small silence. "Well, okay, we could, but we're going to attract a bit of attention eventually."

"You could just go away," Natalya said hopefully.

"We have orders from the prince, ma'am. We can't leave."

"If you call me ma'am one more time, I may just shoot you right through the door," Natalya said. She sighed. "Just a minute." It took several minutes to remove the safeguards from the door. Staying to the side, gun rocksteady she took careful aim at the entrance. "Come on in."

The man entered first. He was tall and stocky with wide shoulders and dark wavy hair. He grinned at her and raised his hands into the air, stepping aside for the woman to enter. Natalya noted he stepped to place his body between the gun and his sister. "This is my sister, Gabrielle. I'm Jubal Sanders. Basically, we're human in-laws to Traian."

Gabrielle closed the door and slid the bolt into place. "Slavica, the innkeeper and her husband can vouch for us. Slavica and her daughter sometime help us watch Falcon and Sara's children. The children are human and can't go to ground so they need caretakers during the daylight hours."

"I don't need Slavica to vouch for you, I can read your mind." It was a lie. The brother and sister had very strong barriers, shields Natalya was certain the prince or Falcon had helped to construct.

Jubal's smile widened at her as if he knew she was lying. "Are you going to shoot us, because I'm beginning to feel like I'm in one of those gangster movies?"

"I'm still deciding," Natalya said. "I haven't killed anyone today and I don't want to make that a habit. I have to stay in practice."