"And hungry," she murmured. "Tell me about them. Everything you can think of."
Gary looked up quickly. Fear and panic raced over his face as he fought to find words. Before Riley could look up he spoke.
"I will. Later. Right now, we need to move." His voice somehow seemed calm compared to how she felt when she saw giant red dragon wings outstretched, speeding toward the opposite side of the mountain.
They ran. They raced through trees and brush, leaping over fallen trees and debris, unmindful of the many small cuts and bruises they earned as fronds and branches whipped at their skin. The first time they heard the powerful roar that ripped through the air above them, the sound nearly froze them in their tracks. Then survival instincts kicked in, and a jolt of adrenaline sent them racing even faster.
Adrenaline and lack of breath dueled with one another as they attempted to race over a small rise. A crash came from their left, its strength so great it dropped them to their knees. They couldn't tear their eyes away as trees, dirt and ash were tossed into the air. For a split second Riley thought she made out the shape and color of a red wing, but then it was buried in chaos.
The madness came to an end, but what rose over the treetops below was a sight to dazzle the mind, dust and ash still in the air; the red dragon rose from the rubble, his head and back and folded wings coming fully clear of the smaller trees. Jaw, lined with wicked teeth, opened wide, eyes almost alight with fire, in their depths a crimson red.
A second, much smaller dragon, a gleaming black, burst from the ashes, wings out from its torn, bloody body, the wedge-shaped head reaching with snapping teeth toward the red dragon.
"Holy shit," Ben whispered.
Under the circumstances, Riley found the profanity utterly appropriate. The two enraged dragons turned their heads in tandem and pinned their focus on Riley and her companions.
Fear had been her constant companion this entire trip, but now, as the gazes of the giant red and the smaller black dragon rested on them, fear turned to terror. A rotting, twisted evil shredded her insides, and heat so hot it felt like she was trying to hold the sun in her chest burst through her body.
Riley fell to her knees. Sickness washed through her, seeming to spread from the ground up as if living mold and fungus raced over her skin. A terrible, poisonous voice began clawing at her mind, speaking the same language the porters had used.
Then it was over. The terrible voice fell silent as the black dragon let out a furious roar. The red dragon answered, his shout like a force of nature, the shock waves of the sound strong enough to flatten trees.
Riley's hands came up, covering over her ears. She felt a pressure in her chest as she saw the black dragon turn and climb up the mountain. The red dragon followed close behind.
A hand grabbed her arm and yanked her to her feet. Jubal. The man always seemed to hold on to his nerves no matter what happened.
"We need to get away from here now."
The ground began to rumble and quake. On the volcano less than a mile above them, new vents split open, releasing geysers of steam and hot gas.
"Holy shit." The whispered words sounded crystal clear to Dax's dragon-enhanced senses.
Four humans were huddled together on the ash-covered mountainside. Dax caught a glimpse of shocked faces. Three men huddled protectively around the smaller, curvier frame of a woman. Inside the red dragon, Dax felt a strange awareness-like a crystalline note singing through the dragon's veins. Rich, vibrant, alive. All at once Dax smelt the rich, fertile aroma of the forest, of earth. Through the dragon's eyes, he could see it, a verdant glow of green that seemed to radiate from the spot where the woman's feet touched the ground. Dax couldn't see her face, but Dax knew instantly who she was. The power of the earth was so strong with her, she could only be the latest descendent of Arabejila.
Protect them! he cried into the Old One's mind.
The red dragon snarled and snapped at the air in a clear warning, and the four humans took off running down the mountainside. The black dragon hissed and charged toward them, but the Old One leapt into his path. The two beasts began a bizarre dance between predators as Mitro looked for a way around the giant red dragon, stepping to the side, bobbing his head, only to be matched step for step, move for move.
With no choice but to trust the Old One to keep Mitro from the humans, Dax directed his full attention to healing the dragon's wounds from the inside out, while simultaneously trying to find a way to separate himself from the bombardment of visceral emotion and bring the red dragon under his control. The Old One was a ferocious fighter, but he had no sense of self-preservation and no intention of letting any other being dominate his actions, even for his own good.
Their shared body was badly injured, dangerous amounts of blood gushing from deep wounds, internal organs damaged almost beyond repair, but his spirit fought Dax's attempt to divert him from his prey. The Old One was completely consumed by the need to rend and kill his enemy, regardless of the cost to himself. Within the dragon's body, aware of how close they were to death and even more aware of the vulnerable humans who had resumed their frantic run down the mountain, Dax was equally determined to stop the Old One long enough to heal. He could not afford for them to die before Mitro was defeated-especially not with the woman so close. Yet each time he attempted to exert control, his efforts seemed only to feed the Old One's rage.
Suddenly, the black dragon turned and extended his wings. Long, curving hooks sprouted from the apex of each wing. He used the hooks as a third pair of claws, scrabbling up the volcano in leaps and bounds. With a final, ferocious roar, the red dragon set off after his adversary once again.
The hot rush of emotion rolled over Dax like an ocean of fire, burning him with its wild need. But this time, instead of fighting that fury, he relaxed into it, let it wash over and through him. He didn't try to stand fast. Instead, he tried to make himself as insubstantial as mist.
The Old One's anger and destruction surrounded him. The dragon's innate determination to dominate any threat plowed into him, and this time, Dax let that fury pass through him without resistance. Lightly, with serene patience and endless calm, his senses branched out through the dragon's body. He was not an interloper in the dragon's body. He was the dragon. Not a separate consciousness, not a separate will, but one and the same. He did not want to imprison or control the dragon, but rather merge their consciousnesses, let their thoughts and actions become one. The dragon offered raw power, primal and indefatigable. Dax offered calm, judicial restraint, the ability to plan, think and act without passion, without rage, without emotion. If he could successfully join the dragon's might with his own legendary control, together they would be unstoppable. Together they could-and would-end the threat Mitro posed to the world.
But they would only succeed if they could act as one, rather than fighting each other for control.
Above them, higher up the volcano's slope, Mitro had turned his attention to the bubbling fury of the earth's hot core. The ground began to tremble as Mitro directed the volcano's heated gases and acids to the surface. Steam began to rise from the cracks and fissures in the rocks. The main blast of the volcano had exploded on the other side of the mountain, but now Mitro was opening another vent on this side ... one that would mean certain death for the four humans racing down the mountainside.
Mitro knew Dax too well. Knew how to distract him. Mitro called it weakness-to care for those helpless before a hunter's great power-but that need to serve, to protect, was the only thing that had ever stood between Dax and the same darkness to which Mitro and so many other Carpathian hunters had succumbed. The innocent must be protected at all cost. It was the reason Dax had been born. The reason he lived still.
The dragon's bloodlust was in full force as the Old One fought to pursue Mitro and end him. Fire spewed from his throat, roaring up the mountain, licking at the black dragon's tail.
Mitro leapt into the sky just as the volcano split open. The side of the mountain burst open, throwing boulders and trees through the air like a child's toys. Burning clouds of ash and superheated gas roared down the mountainside at phenomenal speed.