Carpathian 23 - Dark Storm

water dragon hissed as it halted its forward progress abruptly and was jerked
     backward. The water churned, great turbulent bubbles, so agitated he could have been
     in the middle of a geyser. The tail whipped back and forth angrily and the water dragon
     spun around, and, moving like lightning, rushed the hunter.
    Dax watched the huge, wedge-shaped head lunge straight at him. Underwater, the eyes
     were open and fiercely malevolent. The horned snout opened to reveal a jaw filled
     with serrated teeth. Just as the dragon snapped at his head, Dax threw himself to
     the side, still retaining possession of the lashing tail. Beneath the water, he heard
     the steady drum of a heartbeat. The water amplified the sound. The rhythm of the heart
     of the water dragon sounded strange to him, the beat booming first loud and then softening
     only to swell in volume again.
    Dax was Carpathian, and he honed in on that sound unerringly. His blood sang in his
     veins. He reached out to the dragon, matching heartbeats, slowing the giant boom gradually,
     all the while dodging the lightning-fast strikes with those wicked teeth and the lashing
     head. He stayed just out of reach, staying in tune with the giant heart slowly taking
     control of that wild beat. It seemed to beat not where it should have been, but instead
     was lower and to the right, as if the heart had slipped and lodged in a different
     place than normal.
    The water dragon slowed his great body, shuddering. Still, the dragon was so enraged
     that something as insignificant as Dax would dare to enter his territory and stop
     him from gaining the meal promised him by his creator . . . Dax nearly dropped the
     tail. Mitro had created the dragon. He would know that if Dax faced the water dragon, he would go for the
     heart and he’d deliberately placed it in the wrong position.
    He is real yet not , the Old One confirmed.
    Dax struck hard at the weakened heart, driving through the thin mantle of scales to
     the soft underbelly. His diamond-hard nails bit through the belly to drive toward
     the now very sluggish heart. It was much larger than he expected, but he managed to
     grasp the organ in his fist. The dragon’s head whipped around and ripped at his shoulder.
    Dax hung on grimly to the tail with one hand while he curled his fingers around the
     object he sought. The moment he wrapped the heart in his hand, he knew he’d made a
     terrible mistake. Spines embedded themselves in his hands. Poison entered his system
     rapidly. He ripped the heart from the thrashing dragon before the creature could take
     his head off. It was close though; he felt the blasting breath of cold water pouring
     over him, the snap of those jaws as the teeth nearly managed to tear his face open.
    Dax put on a burst of speed, heading for the surface, feeling the poison taking hold,
     paralysis setting in. Below him, the gigantic tigerfish scented prey, shooting toward
     him in a pack hunting formation. His fist punched through the thin ground surface
     as his legs went numb. He stretched as far as he could, opening his hand, fingertips
     searching for something solid so he could pull himself out of the water. With the
     poison slowly spreading through his system, there was no way to shift.
    A hand smacked his wrist, caught hold and jerked on his arm. Jubal’s face swam into
     view. Gary, crouched beside him, reached down, caught him under the shoulder and heaved
     him up and out of the water. Under him, rising up out of the water, following the
     same path, a goliath tigerfish opened gaping jaws. The mouthful of thirty-two wicked
     teeth burst at him like a locomotive.
    The gunshot was loud, almost in his ear. Jubal and Gary dragged him up and away as
     Riley calmly emptied her Glock into the fish. It dropped back into the hole Dax had
     made, and the water instantly bubbled up red.
    We’ve got you. Riley’s voice poured into his mind.
    Give me a minute to drive the poison out of my system. I don’t want you near this.
     It’s slow-acting but paralyzing. It took longer than he anticipated to rid his body of the poisonous brew Mitro had
     prepared for him and to heal the wounds the dragon had inflicted.
    Miguel had continued with the others, racing out of the canyon. Dax waited until he
     had his strength back before destroying Mitro’s mutations. He didn’t want them to
     breed and grow in the river and eventually kill someone. By the time the four of them
     had caught up with the