Dark Peril
Authors: Christine Feehan
Tags: #Romance, #Romantic suspense fiction, #Occult fiction, #Horror, #Occult & Supernatural, #South America, #Vampires, #Fiction, #Shapeshifting, #Paranormal, #Fantasy, #General
Table of Contents
“YOU ARE THE VERY HEART OF ME”
APPENDIX 1 - Carpathian Healing Chants
APPENDIX 2 - The Carpathian Language
Titles by Christine Feehan
STREET GAME
MURDER GAME
PREDATORY GAME
DEADLY GAME
CONSPIRACY GAME
NIGHT GAME
MIND GAME
SHADOW GAME
HIDDEN CURRENTS
TURBULENT SEA
SAFE HARBOR
DANGEROUS TIDES
OCEANS OF FIRE
WILD FIRE
BURNING WILD
WILD RAIN
WATER BOUND
DARK PERIL
DARK SLAYER
DARK CURSE
DARK HUNGER
DARK POSSESSION
DARK CELEBRATION
DARK DEMON
DARK SECRET
DARK DESTINY
DARK MELODY
DARK SYMPHONY
DARK GUARDIAN
DARK LEGEND
DARK FIRE
DARK CHALLENGE
DARK MAGIC
DARK GOLD
DARK DESIRE
DARK PRINCE
Anthologies
HOT BLOODED
(with Maggie Shayne, Emma Holly, and Angela Knight)
LOVER BEWARE
(with Fiona Brand, Katherine Sutcliffe, and Eileen Wilks)
FANTASY
(with Emma Holly, Sabrina Jeffries, and Elda Minger)
FEVER
(includes
THE AWAKENING
and
WILD RAIN
)
THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP
Published by the Penguin Group
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Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
This book is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
Copyright © 2010 by Christine Feehan.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in vio lation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.
BERKLEY
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Feehan, Christine.
eISBN : 978-1-101-44250-0
1. Vampires—Fiction. 2. Shapeshifting—Fiction. 3. South America—Fiction. I. Title. PS3606.E36D3856 2010
813’.6—dc22
2010017424
For Alexa Bridges,
with much love
FOR MY READERS
Be sure to go to
http://www.christinefeehan.com/members/
to sign up for my PRIVATE book announcement list and download the FREE e-book of
Dark Desserts
. Join my community and get first-hand news, enter the book discussions, ask your questions and chat with me. Please feel free to email me at [email protected]. I would love to hear from you.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I could never have written this book without the help of two wonderful men. Dr. Christopher Tong is always amazing with his continual support. His song is beautiful and perfect for Dominic and Solange. As always, thank you for your help with the language; thank heavens you always find a way to get things done.
Brian Feehan really came through in my hour of need, as he always does, working late with me to map out our destruction of the vampire stronghold.
Thanks to both Cheryl Wilson and Kathie Firzlaff, who gave me invaluable feedback at literally the eleventh hour and without whom I wouldn’t have been able to finish the book.
And Domini, what can I say. You work long hours and far into the weekends to make the book the best that it can be. I appreciate you so much!
1
I was half-alive for a thousand years.
I’d given up hope that we’d meet in this time.
Too many the centuries. All disappears
as time and the darkness steal color and rhyme.
DOMINIC TO SOLANGE
C
arpathian males without a lifemate didn’t dream. They didn’t see in color and they certainly didn’t feel emotion. Pain, yes, but not emotion. So why had he been reaching for a dream for the past few years? He was an ancient, an experienced warrior. He had no time for fantasy, or for imagination. His world was stark and barren, a necessity for battling an enemy who, inevitably, had been a friend or family member.
Over the first hundred or so years after losing his emotions, he had held out hope. As centuries passed, the hope of finding his lifemate had faded. He had accepted he would find her in the next life and he was carrying out his resolve to do his last duty to his people. Yet here he was, an ancient of great experience, Dominic of the Dragonseeker line, a lineage as old as time itself, a man of wisdom, a warrior renowned and feared—lying awake beneath the rich soil, dreaming.
Dreams should have felt insubstantial—and at first his had been. A woman. Just a vague idea of her appearance. So young in comparison to him, but a warrior in her own right. She hadn’t been his concept of the woman who would partner him, yet as she grew in substance over the years, he realized how perfect she was for him. He had fought far too long to ever lay down his sword. He knew no other way of life. Duty and sacrifice were bred into his very bones and he needed a woman who could understand him.
Perhaps that was what dreams were. He’d never dreamt until a few years ago. Never. Dreams were emotions, and he’d long ago lost those. Dreams were color, although not his. But they felt like color as the years shaped the woman. She was a mystery, sheer confidence when she fought. She often had fresh bruises and wounds that left scars on her soft skin. He’d taken to examining her carefully each time they met—healing her had become a traditional greeting. He found himself smiling inside, thinking how she was entirely the opposite of confident when it came to viewing herself as a woman.
For a few moments he contemplated why he should be smiling inside. Smiling was equated with happiness, and he had no emotions to feel such things, but his memories of emotions were sharpening as he moved toward the end of his life, instead of dimming as he had expected. Because when he summoned the dream, he felt a sense of comfort, of well-being and happiness.
Over the years she had become clearer to him. A jaguar-woman. A fierce warrior with exactly the same values he held on loyalty and family and duty. He would never forget the night, only a week ago, when he saw her eyes in color. For a moment he couldn’t breathe, looking at her in wonder, shocked that he could remember colors so vividly that he could attribute an actual color to her cat’s eyes.
Her eyes were beautiful, glowing green with faint hints of gold and amber that darkened when he managed to elicit a laugh from her. She didn’t laugh often or easily, and when she did, he felt it was more of a victory than any of the battles he’d won.