Carpathian 23 - Dark Storm

hadn’t considered that. Of course it was difficult for him, he’d spent centuries
     alone. Even before the volcano, he’d been a hunter of vampires, spending months, even
     years on his own with no one around. The world was a changed place for him. He had
     fought for hundreds of years for the protection of his people and then, while he was
     locked in a volcano, his species had nearly gone extinct.
    Jubal lifted his hand and walked away in the direction of the river, shepherding the
     others to follow Miguel. The professor was carried out, the remaining porters taking
     turns with the others as they made their way steadily into the rain forest. Within
     moments, the trees and foliage had swallowed them.
    Dax waited until they were gone before crouching down beside her. “Arabejila’s blood
     runs strong in you. Mitro believes she lives, which is to our advantage.”
    She nodded her head. “I understand that, but I didn’t realize it wasn’t only the earth
     telling me where Mitro has been. I can feel my blood reaching for him.” She took a
     deep breath, forcing herself to look him in the eye. “It’s disturbing. I want my blood
     to call to you, not him. It makes me feel dirty.”
    Dax gathered her into his arms. “Hän sívamak,” he whispered tenderly. “My beloved. My blood and your blood are forever connected.
     Our hearts, our minds and our souls are inseparable. As for Arabejila’s blood, as
     we traveled together, we often were forced to exchange blood. Her blood is why Mother
     Earth accepted me and granted favors to me. My connection to Mitro is not as strong,
     but it is there.”
    Riley slipped her arms around his neck. “You always know the right thing to say to
     me to make me feel better. Let’s go find him, Dax. The sooner we find him, the faster
     we can get on with our life together.”

15
    T he wind picked up, swirling through the canopy, blowing storm clouds into a churning,
     riotous mass of spinning dark threads. Lightning forked across the sky, a wicked fork
     of electricity, lighting the canopy for a brief moment. Thunder rolled, a great boom,
     shaking the ground. On the heels of the thunder the low moan of the wind rose to wail
     and then once again died down.
    Riley wiped sweat from her face. It was hard to breathe with the ash still clinging
     to the leaves and flowers. Her boots felt horribly heavy and she made a note to herself
     to purchase lighter ones next time. Her mind was a little hazy, the hike almost surreal.
    Fate had made a terrible mistake. For Riley, tramping through the rain forest at night
     was an exercise in courage. She tried not to connect with Dax, afraid he’d see how
     afraid she was of every shadow. Her heart beat so loud she feared Jubal and Gary would
     both hear it. She wasn’t certain how she got to be the lifemate of a Carpathian warrior,
     who seemed to have all the courage in the world, when she was afraid of the shadows.
    Riley cast a quick look around her at the others as they tramped through the dense
     vegetation. No one else seemed to be feeling as if at any moment they were going to
     be devoured by a pack of crazed jaguars leaping out of the shadows. It wasn’t as if
     she was completely crazy—the coughs and grunts coming from a short distance away told
     her at least one, mostly two jaguars paced along beside them.
    She tried to control her breathing as best she could, but with every step she took,
     apprehension grew stronger and her chest grew tighter. The jungle seemed much denser,
     Miguel and Alejandro struggling to hack a path and keep them all on the much-faded
     trail. The more miles they covered, the more the dread inside her grew and the harder
     it was to keep the pace the guide had set.
    Her night vision was amazing, her restless gaze following the thousands of insects
     forming a moving carpet under their feet. Everything seemed overly loud to her, especially
     the persistent drone of insects, and even the bugs took on a sinister quality to her
     overactive imagination.
    Birds screeched in warning to one another, a constant, alarmed communication, unusual
     for nighttime. Above their heads was continual motion, the flutter of wings, the swish
     of branches as monkeys leapt from branch to branch as if they, like the jaguars, were
     following the travelers.
    Tree trunks covered in black spikes seemed to leap out of the shadows at them. Oversize
     leaves, split into razor-sharp fronds, reached for them, driven by the