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leg where the worst of the lacerations seemed to be. Her head was down, but she looked lethal, a flow of spots sliding in and out of the foliage so stealthily that at times, even with the eagle's extraordinary eyesight, it was difficult to spot her against the vegetation of the forest floor.

She moved in complete silence, ignoring the monkeys and birds, padding along at a steady pace, her muscles flowing beneath the thick fur. So intrigued was Dominic by her dogged persistence in traveling in spite of her severe injuries, it took several minutes before he realized the hideous whispers in his mind had eased significantly. All the times he had drained off the parasites to give himself some relief, he had never had them cease their continual assault on his brain; yet now, they were nearly silent.

Curious, he took to the skies, circling overhead, staying within the canopy to keep out the last rays of the sun. He noted that the farther he was from the jaguar, the louder the whispers became. The parasites ceased activity the closer he got to her, so that the stabbing shards of glass cutting his insides remained still, and for a short time he had a respite from the brutal pain.

The jaguar continued to move steadily into deeper forest, away from the river and into the interior. Night fell and still she traveled. He found that he couldn't leave her, that he had no wish to leave her. He began to equate the strange calming of the parasites with her, as well as the even stranger emotions. The rage had subsided into an unrelenting sorrow and anguish. His heart was so heavy of a burden he could barely function as he moved overhead.

Below, large limestone blocks appeared, half buried in the soil. The remnants of a great Mayan temple lay cracked and broken, trees and vines nearly obliterating what was left of the once-impressive structure. Scattered over the next few miles were the remains of an ancient civilization. The Mayans had been farmers, growing their golden corn in the middle of the rain forest, whispering with reverence of the jaguar and building temples to bring sky, earth and the underworld together.

He spotted the sinkhole, and beneath it the cool waters of the underground river he'd noted earlier in the evening. The jaguar continued without pause until she came to another Mayan site, although this one had been used more recently. The thick growth of tangled vines and trees put the date nearly twenty years earlier, but clearly there had been more modern houses here. A generator, long since rusted and wrapped with thick lianas and shoots of green, lay on its side. The ground wept with the memories of battle and the slaughters that had taken place here. The sorrow was so heavy now, Dominic needed to ease the burden. The harpy eagle flew through the canopy a distance away from the jaguar and remained motionless, just watching, as the jaguar made her way through the long-ago battlefield, as if she were connected to the dead who wailed there.

Chapter One

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

Carpathian 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