Dark Peril (34 page)

Are you all right?
He kept the worry out of his voice. It would do neither of them any good. She could handle herself in a fight—even against vampires. This—
thing
—would not ruffle her.

She gave the mental equivalent of a shrug, reinforcing his belief in her.
What is it?

Something very dangerous.
Dominic emerged once again by her side.
Move away from me, but give yourself plenty of room if it attacks again.

You think it’s hunting me?
Again, her voice was very calm.

We will test that theory. I will give it a shot at me.

He heard her catch her breath, but she didn’t protest, trusting that he knew what he was doing. He moved to block the creature’s vision of the jaguar, filling the cave with his power and presence, growing in stature. Solange remained very small behind him, crouching close to the ground but, he noted, out away from the walls where she had room to maneuver.

Dominic concentrated on trying to reach the creature with his mind. There was nothing at all. Not blank, like the undead, an abomination of nature, might leave, but truly nothing, as if the creature wasn’t real. He considered that. A hallucination he shared with Solange? He knew that would be possible, though unlikely. He was an ancient and difficult to trick. And the blood staining the jaguar’s coat was very real.

The sound of dirt trickling down the cavern wall was his only warning. He turned his head and caught a glimpse of a shadow scurrying across the ceiling above his head, looking like a streak of black, lengthening with each bound.

Coming at you,
he warned as he leapt into the air to try to get his hands on the thing.

His palms met, going right through the shadow cat, but he felt hot breath, and just as the creature sprang past him, the brush of rough fur.

Solange met the cat in midair, this time driving with her broad muzzle and a mouthful of teeth deep into its chest wall. Again, she passed through the cat, but it whirled as she began to drop, gripping her back with his claws and sinking teeth into her neck, driving her down to the floor. She rolled, roaring, as the teeth drove deeper, finding her vein.

Dominic struck hard, tearing the cat from Solange’s back and dragging it away from her. He felt the fur, the heavy muscles and the spray of blood across his face, and then the creature was insubstantial again, sliding through his grip to once more become nothing but a shadow.

Solange! Talk to me.

Her breath hissed out in a quiet agony. She shifted, clamping a hand to her neck. Blood poured between her fingers. Dominic whirled around and pulled her to him, pressing his palm to the wound to cauterize and stop the flow of precious blood.

The creature sprang to the floor, once more emerging into substance, lapping ferociously at the blood on the ground.

Close your eyes.
As a precaution he shielded her eyes himself, clapping his hand over her face.

Flames leapt from the candle on the table, joining with one rising from the bottom of the basin. White-light radiated throughout the cave, a blinding beam of heat that struck the creature before it could slip away. It shrieked and burst into blue-purple flames, spreading across the room, growing into a giant shape with a huge gaping mouth filled with spiked teeth. The legs went stiff and the spine bent.

Dominic could see small tube-like appendages inside the mouth filled with blood—Solange’s blood—and his heart skipped a beat as realization dawned instantly. The shadow cat had been sent by someone to collect her blood. Someone else knew about her royal blood and wanted it for their own evil purposes.

The creature’s eyes turned on Dominic for the first time, seemingly just noticing him. The eyes whirled, black to red, vague and empty. Suddenly, for one heart-stopping moment, they went a glittering silver, cunning intelligence staring into the room, searching.

Before those eyes could focus on them, Dominic took Solange straight to the ground, covering her body with his, his hand still over her eyes as the mouth grotesquely opened wider and the silver eyes quartered the room.

Dominic flicked his hand at the fire, fanning the air into a turbulent whirlwind that sent the flames into a wild burning ball. The silver eyes turned back to the vacant blue-purple. The mouth yawned wider, emitting a harrowing scream of horror as the flames consumed the creature. In the midst of the flames Dominic could see a tiny black sliver of a shadow desperately trying to separate and slink toward the water. Dominic directed a fireball at it, watching with satisfaction as the last remnant turned to ash, completely incinerated. A foul stench permeated the air, and again he sent the wind crashing through the cavern to air it out.

Beneath him, Solange was utterly still. He lifted his hand away from her eyes and swept back her hair, his heart thundering hard.

“Talk to me,
minan
.”

She stirred, blinked up at him—and smiled. His heart stuttered. There was blood covering his hand, coating her neck and shoulder, there were deep furrows torn from her skin along her ribs and down her left hip, but she smiled at him. Her green eyes were totally clear. He could see pain reflected there, but she pushed herself into a sitting position, one hand coming up to touch his face.

“Don’t look at me like that. I’m fine. I’ve had worse. Thanks for stopping the bleeding. I might not have been able to do that myself.”

She shivered and he instantly wrapped a blanket around her, the comforter with all the healing symbols on it. Solange shook her head. “I don’t want to get blood on this. It’s so beautiful and I’d hate to ruin it.”

“Leave it,” he commanded, holding the blanket in place. “I can get blood out. Just sit there for a minute, Solange, while I clean you up. You are in shock.”

“No, just shocked that that thing was able to get past your safeguards and come in right under our noses. He should have killed me. He was sucking my blood out fast, rather than trying to finish me off. What was it?” Her voice was low and husky, as if her throat had been damaged in the attack. She cleared her throat several times and coughed, bringing her hand up to her mouth to cover it.

Dominic pulled her hand down. Her palm was smeared with blood. He lifted her and opened the earth, floating them down into the rich soil. He wrapped her in the comforter. “I’m going to heal you,
kessake
. Just rest. We will discuss this next rising. In the meantime, I will safeguard even our water and the very cracks in the rocks.”

She touched his face again. “I’m really okay, Dominic.” Her lashes fluttered and drifted down.

Dominic felt the soft whisper of fear creeping down his spine, a whisper that grew into fingers of terror when her breathing became labored.
Solange. Do not leave me!
The pain was sharp and terrible and so unexpected. She was wound tight in his heart. He gave her the command with every ounce of strength he had and set about working frantically on her. It took him three times going outside himself and into her before he spotted the tiny venom drops left behind by the murderous shadow cat.

14

My dream lover and lifemate,
You know every part of me.
We’re bound forever, soul to soul.
You hold the very heart of me.

SOLANGE TO DOMINIC

S
olange became aware slowly, inch by inch, rather than all at once as she normally did. She could hear her heart slamming hard in her chest and her pulse roaring in her ears. Her mind felt slow and hazy and her body sore. She was very disoriented and couldn’t quite get her eyes to open, which terrified her. She began to struggle, trying to fight her way out of sleep, knowing she was never safe and that waking was one of her most vulnerable moments.

“I am with you, Solange.”

Dominic’s voice penetrated the layers of fear she felt at not being able to function properly, and she subsided, aware she was in his arms. At once she felt safe and protected, a feeling she was entirely unfamiliar with. She could smell his masculine scent and she inhaled to draw him deeper into her lungs. The tension receded even more.

She moistened her dry lips and reached for her voice. “What happened?” Her throat was very sore and she was very thirsty.

“You were attacked by a shadow creature.” His hands swept back her hair. “Try to open your eyes for me,
hän sívamak
—beloved. You have given me a little bit of a scare and I have to tell you, that does not make me happy.”

She couldn’t help the smile at the edge to his voice. She had scared him, that was obvious, and he didn’t like it. Somehow that warmed her even more.

He leaned close, his lips against her ear. “Do not look pleased after I have been fighting for your life these two risings. I am not above punishing you for scaring me.”

Her lashes fluttered and she clamped down hard on the surge of laughter at the male irritation in his voice that was so unlike Dominic. She had apparently driven him to the edge of his patience and she hadn’t even been conscious. “If I get punished every time I scare you, I think we’re going to be in trouble.”

She found the energy to lift her lashes. His face came into focus. All those hard, tough edges. That gorgeous face. His eyes, midnight blue, dark with worry. She could see strain where there never had been. He actually looked exhausted. The hours of trying to save her had taken their toll, and it didn’t look as if the soil had rejuvenated him much.

“I’m sorry, Dominic.”

He kissed her, a long, slow, incredibly tender kiss. Tears welled up in her eyes and she blinked them away. She could feel his body trembling against hers.

“I really am sorry. The injury didn’t seem like a big deal,” she reiterated. “I knew you could stop the bleeding so I wasn’t worried.”

“The creature injected three drops of venom into your bloodstream. It took me several healing sessions to find them. I knew something was wrong, you were slipping further and further from me.”

“Poison?”

He shook his head. “I do not think the intent was to kill you. You had a reaction to the venom. If the intent had been to kill you, the shadow cat would have injected a lethal dose.”

She indicated she wanted to sit up. He moved, retaining his hold on her, allowing her to sit up very cautiously. She felt slightly nauseated, but after taking a few deep breaths, managed to maintain. “What was it?”

“If I had to guess, I’d say it was very much like the high mage’s familiars. Xavier has been destroyed, I know that to be true, but I studied him for years. He used creatures to do his spying. In all of my centuries, I have never encountered anything quite like it, but I have had time to consider it. The safeguards did not stop it because it came through the water as a shadow. They must have gotten a blood sample, some way to track you specifically.”

She inhaled sharply. “Brodrick. His jaguar bit and clawed me. My blood would have been all over him. I haven’t seen mages too often in this area, but once in a while, one shows up. He must have used one to track me.”

“The creature was taking more of your blood back to whoever sent it. I think the venom was to paralyze you so you would be unable to resist should they return to take you prisoner.”

Dominic’s voice was grim and she flicked him a quick, under-the-lashes glance. She rubbed her hand over his set jaw where a muscle ticked, giving away his underlying mood of suppressed fury.

“Dominic, no matter where we are, we are going to have enemies. Both of us. You must have made many in your centuries of existence, and I certainly have here. Whatever they intended to do with me isn’t going to happen. You prevented that.”

“They attacked you in our home, right under my nose.”

“
Our
noses,” she corrected gently. She locked gazes with him. “What is really upsetting you, Dominic?”

His breath hissed out between his teeth and his eyes spun into a glacier green. “I gave you my word that you would be safe with me when we were alone. Someone nearly killed you and not only did it scare the hell out of me—all those hours of desperately trying to find what was hiding from me while you slipped, inch by inch, away from me—but I had to face the fact that I failed you.”

A slow smile lit her eyes and she leaned into him to nuzzle his neck. “My God, Dominic, you’re not perfect. How very shocking is that?” She laughed softly. “You kept me safe. I’m not dead, am I? If the situation had been reversed, I doubt I could have saved you. I don’t have your ability to heal.”

He wrapped his arms around her, crushing her to him. For a moment she thought she was in danger of every rib cracking, but she melted against him, unresisting, recognizing he needed to hold her as close as possible. When his strength gentled and allowed an inch between them, she tilted her head to look up at his face.

The night had taken a toll on him. Her unflappable, calm-under-every-circumstance man had been extremely distraught over her. “Let’s track the thing back to the sender,” she suggested. “My jaguar won’t be too much help at first, not through the water. I’ll have to go around to the source, but you can follow through the cracks where the water came in.”

“How does one track a shadow?” he asked aloud.

“It’s a mage trick, right?” she asked. “So there’s a footprint. We just have to find it. You know that better than I do. You’re just a little shaken up right now. We were looking at smell and sight to go after it, but you can lock on to a mage illusion.” She poured her confidence in him into her voice and mind. “Can’t you?”

His smile was slow in coming. The green in his eyes blazed into turquoise. “I believe that would be possible. It looked at me, right before we destroyed it.”

She didn’t point out that she had had nothing to do with destroying the shadow cat, that it had all been him. She would have lost her life had it not been for him.

“The eyes were vacant, and then, just for a moment, they changed, grew intelligent, and the eyes were silver.”