Remembering those days, pure hatred welled up. He would destroy Arabejila in his time, but first he would have to escape. She would not defeat him, a stupid cow of a woman who thought she was special because she could make flowers grow.
The mountain jolted hard, and he felt a subtle difference almost immediately. Arabejila had turned her full attention away from him and the weaves binding him. He fought down the urge to struggle, to panic when the explosion could happen at any moment. He narrowed his concentration to one strand of his bonds. One at a time. He would have to break through that chain in order to escape.
Mitro tried to recall every detail he could about his recent encounter with Arabejila. He'd been shocked. Horrified even. He was so certain she was dead. She had not responded or spoken to him and he hadn't searched her mind when he had the chance. He stayed very still, reaching out carefully. If he knew what words had bound him, he could undo the weaves quite easily. He just had to get inside her head. She was his lifemate. Her blood would answer his call, but his touch would have to be delicate.
He tamped down all anger, not an easy feat when Arabejila was to blame for everything that had gone wrong in his life and he was already plotting to kill her and everyone she might care about. His touch on the thick weaves was very careful, seeking a tie to her. His blood stirred, but remained cold. Silence. Emptiness. There was no contact at all. If he didn't know better, he would say she was dead.
Puzzled, he changed tactics. The sense of urgency grew as the mountain rumbled and the gases spewed high. Below him, the gathering fiery storm threatened to break free. Abruptly he felt a difference, as if the weaves had loosened just that little bit as if she hadn't quite set them before she turned her attention elsewhere. She'd been gripping him hard, and now, that death grip was gone.
Triumphant, he struck hard, slashing through the weaves. They held, stronger than he expected against his all-out assault. He exerted pressure on his bonds, fighting panic, afraid his struggles might attract the attention of the hunter. Danutdaxton had become something much more as well, there in the volcano, and eluding him was essential.
The bindings tightened once, but then unexpectedly dropped free. Exalted, Mitro rose quickly toward the barrier and the one spot he'd spent centuries thinning. It would take seconds to break through, and when the volcano erupted, he would go out the vent with the gases. Elation swept through him. Glee. Triumph. Nothing, no one, could stop him.
Dax streaked through the furious volcano, moving as only a dragon could through the lower chambers, upward, toward the barrier. He felt the subtle difference in the earth, a pouring of comfort, a soothing hand stroking the volcano, easing the rising catastrophic explosion that would have blown the top off the mountain and flattened everything for miles.
Arabejila? He sent his inquiry, but he was positive she had been long gone from the earth. He'd felt her passing. He'd felt the mourning of the mountain when she was gone. His blood should have called to hers had she been alive. Still, the feel of her, the welcoming, the power-it was all there. More so.
Silence greeted his call. Had Arabejila been close-and he knew someone was trying to soothe the volcano-their blood exchanges would have allowed him to reach out to her. They'd been friends long before Mitro's betrayal, but their centuries of traveling together had deepened that friendship even further. Being around Arabejila had allowed him some emotion. She had been unique that way, providing solace to the warriors of their people-and Dax had practically been born a warrior. He had a gift for ferreting out evil. He could smell it, see it inside, and from the moment he'd met Mitro he'd seen inside to his rotten core.
The volcano whispered to him as he moved through the scalding chambers, told him of a woman, powerful, healing, a true daughter of the earth. Dax knew the moment she plunged her hands into the soil-the volcano responded with a flutter of activity. He felt the instant reaction, not only of the volcano, the soil, the very heart of the earth, but in his own blood. Familiar, yet unfamiliar. Arabejila, yet now-more. This woman was a force to be reckoned with. Where Arabejila was soft through and through, this woman had a core of heat and fire.
He continued to streak through the labyrinth of lava-formed tubes and hollowed caves, moving up toward the barrier. No doubt Mitro thought he could escape with the explosion of the volcano, right through that small space the vampire had worked centuries to thin. Dax had never let on he was aware of Mitro's work.
He never caught the undead working to thin the barrier, and all traces were removed, but Mitro hadn't counted on one thing-the intense blood bond between lifemates. Mitro had deliberately filled the mountain with his evil, so it would be impossible for Dax to detect him, not with his scent permeating every razor-sharp rock and molten pool. He had done so too late for this one escape hatch. He hadn't considered that Arabejila and Dax had exchanged blood so often throughout their hunt for Mitro over the centuries, and when he'd first started the thinning process, Dax could use that blood bond to hunt him. Dax had marked the spot in his memory.
Arabejila's blood continually called to Mitro's, and as the earth claimed Dax more and more as her child, his blood had begun to do the same. He had only to listen. Now, with the soul of the dragon dwelling in him as well, he had an added advantage he hadn't before-his senses of sight and smell were far above what they had been. The heat of the volcano fed him rather than drained him. The Old One and Dax had become better at sharing the same body and all senses. Right now, he knew exactly where Mitro was. He could feel the vampire struggling against the bonds the woman placed on him.
Mitro had positioned himself right at that narrowed barrier, right where Dax was certain he would. Dax sent a small thanks to the woman and to Arabejila. At long last he would destroy the vampire and his duty to his people would be done. He would be free to go to the next life. He moved quickly, rising steadily, winding his way through the maze of miles of chambers. Magma pools bubbled ominously. Steam and heat swirled together to create a dense fog. He used the dragon's eyes to see his way through the storm, racing the volcano to reach Mitro while he was still trapped.
The volcano took a deep breath, the whirlwind stilling, a terrible calm heralding a violent storm. Dax felt the exact moment when the woman turned her attention from holding Mitro to suppressing the catastrophic explosion. He couldn't blame her, she had people to save-just as he did. He pushed his speed, rushing through the last two chambers leading to that point of weakness where he knew Mitro would be.
He heard Mitro's gleeful snicker as the bonds broke loose and he streaked for the thin spot in the barrier. Dax hit him from the side, slamming into the body of the undead, driving him down and away from his goal.
Mitro shrieked in frustration and anger, trying to twist away, to get distance between them. Dax was too strong, too fast and he stayed close, chest to chest, driving his fist deep, penetrating through muscle, bone and tissue to drive for the heart.
Dax stared into Mitro's all-black eyes, the eyes of insanity, a monster without a soul. He'd been born defective and he'd purposefully destroyed every good thing in his life. Dax felt the edge of that withered, blackened heart. Diamond-hard nails ripped deep, tearing through the vampire's chest in an effort to surround the one organ that would ensure Mitro's demise.
Mitro screamed and thrashed, his talons raking at Dax's face, gouging long furrows from eye to jaw. He slammed his own fist deep into Dax's chest, trying to reach the hunter's heart before the Carpathian could extract his.
Hot melting rock erupted through the chamber, rocketing high, smashing into the barrier erected by Arabejila. The heat was so intense the barrier clearly was melting and along with it, their skin. Mitro's face drooped as if it had grown too thin, sliding from his skull and bones. Dax knew his own skin, acclimatized to the volcano, could not long withstand the enormous heat from the very core of the earth. It didn't matter.
Nothing mattered but destroying Mitro. The vampire could tear out Dax's heart and throw it into the bubbling orange and red pool of hot rock steadily climbing toward them, and it would be well worth it as long as Mitro was gone from the world. Dax's fingers dug deeper, reaching for the vampire's heart, as Mitro tore a wider hole in Dax's chest. For a moment it felt as if the vampire was ripping through his body with a dull knife, but Dax cut off all pain and focused on the job at hand.
Dax closed his fingers around the blackened heart and began to extract it. The vampire shrieked, maddened, enraged, ripping at Dax's face and eyes with one hand while he continued to tunnel his hand into Dax's chest in an effort to kill him before it was too late.
Dax pulled the heart free of the body and, looking straight into Mitro's eyes, let the useless organ drop into the fiery pit below. He felt no animosity toward the vampire, he felt no triumph or sadness. The decayed organ incinerated the moment it hit the bubbling cauldron of melted rock.
But instead of collapsing, lifeless, in Dax's arms as the vampire should have once his heart was destroyed, Mitro's lips drew back in a parody of a smile, his blackened receding gums and jagged, stained teeth snapping together with an ominous clicking sound. Triumphant, vile, and still very much alive, the vampire abruptly leaned forward and sank his teeth into Dax's throat.
Chapter 7
Little by little the sky darkened, a great shadow drawn slowly overhead. A loud rumble heralded the continuous shaking of the earth. A dense ash cloud erupted, shooting straight into the sky like a voluminous black tower, expanding and churning as it rose. Within a matter of minutes the blackness was nearly impenetrable. Rain began to fall, a fast flurry of powdery drops.
Exhausted, mentally and physically, Riley could barely lift her head. Her body felt leaden, drained of all strength. She knelt in the dirt, trying to think what to do next, but her brain refused to work. She peered at the three men through the veil of darkness. They appeared misshapen from head to toe. All three crouched low on the ground trying to ride out the never-ending tremors. She realized the drops weren't water at all, but a heavy, powdery ash covering their bodies, blanketing the mountain, the trees, every bit of foliage surrounding them, and making it impossible to look up.
Lightning cracked across the sky. Thunder crashed. Electricity crackled around them all, sparks dancing around their bodies while halos surrounded their heads. The sound of cannonballs exploding hurt her ears and reverberated through her head. The smell of sulfur saturated the air.
Ben pushed himself to his feet, trying for balance when the ground rolled relentlessly. "We've got to make a run for it. We can't stay here. We're too close." He coughed, covering his mouth and nose. Anxiety edged his voice, but he clearly was trying to hold it together.