Dark Curse (20 page)

He felt each individual tooth, felt skin rip, tissue and muscle, felt the puncture into his vein and the flow of his life force from his body. His spirit shrank until he felt small and vulnerable beyond even his scope of imagination. At the worst moment in his life, he had never felt this helpless. The lips sucking blood from his body felt greedy and ravenous. His body became leaden, his heart struggling to find a beat while his lungs labored for air.

"Stop! Stop, Razvan," Shauna cried and pushed at the mouth clamped around the little wrist. "You're going to kill the baby."

Razvan jerked back. Tears spilled down his face. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Lara. Shauna, this isn't safe. I can't stop myself anymore. I'm becoming like him."

"No you're not," Shauna said fiercely. "You're not like him. You'll never be like him." She rocked the baby back and forth trying to sooth her.

Razvan leaned over and closed the wound with a swipe of his tongue. Nicolas knew the healing saliva wasn't quite right, wasn't quite able to numb the flesh or heal properly, which was why the little wrist had scar tissue everywhere and why Lara felt the pain of each bite as if knives were ripping at her.

"Hurry now. She must go. He'll be coming any moment."

Razvan inched his body aside to reveal a hole in the ice. Where the ice had been white or bluish in color, it was now red with pink edges. He had tunneled into the wall of ice using his own warm blood to carve a tiny passageway.

Shauna hugged the child to her, squeezing tight, sobbing quietly as she did so. Abruptly she thrust the girl into the tight channel and shoved her. "Go. Hurry. Follow the water out."

The ice pressed down on the little body, scraping at skin. He felt the lacerations and tears as he scooted forward. There was no turning around. When he tried to scoot back rather than go into that smaller, darkened warren with the scent of blood heavy in his nostrils, his body simply wedged in tighter. Panic began to take hold. Nicolas fought to shift, to become smaller, anything to get out of the tunnel. The heavy ice weighed down on him. Above and all around him, the ice creaked ominously as the heavy pressure constantly shifted the walls.

Nicolas couldn't draw air into his lungs, his head was buzzing from lack of oxygen. He felt as if he was suffocating. He knew Lara was experiencing the same reaction and he was totally helpless to come to her aid. He felt overwhelming tenderness for Lara the adult who had suffered as a child, and rage and aggression, at his own impotence in protecting her from reliving it. He tried to pound at the ice, using sheer will to break her free, but there was no escaping the tight space. He only bloodied his fists.

For the first time in his life he experienced claustrophobia. He felt trapped with no way out. His enormous strength didn't work. No magic spell saved him. He couldn't weave energy and use it. No matter how hard he tried to use sheer force to crack the ice and break out, he was in a three-year-old female body that didn't have his powers. It was impossible.

Lara's spirit stirred. Merged so deeply together, it was nearly impossible to tell where one started and the other left off. Their souls were bound together.
Go
. Her whisper was weak.
There is no need for you to live this with me. I survived it before, I will again
.

He wasn't certain that was true. She barely was alive, and in any case, there was no way he would abandon his lifemate to relive whatever experiences she must in order to come back to him. He had thrown her into the past and he would shield her with everything he had in him in order to protect her from the worst of her memories. No matter what it took, he would stand in front of her.
Rest, o jelä sielamak. Light of my soul, I will not abandon you here
. The tenderness in his voice surprised him, as did the ache in his heart.

Something sharp pierced his ankle, stabbed deep, all the way to the bone. His body suddenly jerked backward. Ice tore the skin from his shoulders and hips, from his arms. He tried to kick back to remove whatever had penetrated his ankle, but all that did was cause excruciating pain. His body was ripped backward through the tunnel fast, peeling the skin from his body as he was pulled back through to the ice chamber.

He fell onto the chamber's hard floor, horror filling him as he saw the most monstrous of creatures—Xavier. Shauna lay on the floor, blood seeping from her mouth and nose. Already dark bruises stood out on her skin. She reached for the little girl, but Xavier kicked the woman away and yanked Lara/Nicolas up by the coppery curls. He carelessly tossed the child against the cavern wall, smashing her small body without thought.

Xavier was a mass of decomposing flesh, serrated blackened teeth and pitiless silver eyes. Nicolas watched with horror as the monstrous demon stomped the woman repeatedly, her ribs, crushing them, her face, breaking bones, her legs, pulverizing them.

Razvan struggled against the chains, so that they cut into his body and blood ran in rivers to drip onto the ice. He screamed, a hoarse, hopeless yell, bloodred tears streaking his face. "It was me. Don't touch her. I'll do anything. Please. Please." He fell back weeping, his fists pounding into the ice until they, too, were bloody.

Xavier ignored him, continuing to kick and stomp Shauna's body. "Look at what you've made me do," he yelled to Lara. "Look at her. Your mother, taking your punishment. You deserve this treatment. You did this. You've made her suffer." He reached down and yanked the child by her hair, dragging her across the floor to fling her facedown beside her mother. "Steal her last breath, you ungrateful brat. What are you good for except for food? You've killed your own mother."

He spat on the body and reached into the pocket of his long tunic, pulling out ajar of wiggling white parasites. "My friends will gladly clean up
your
mess, although it will take a few days. Feast," he said and threw the parasites onto Shauna's limp body. The grotesque bugs immediately swarmed over her mother.

Xavier reached down and caught up Lara, his silver eyes glittering with maniacal glee. Laughing, he snapped a chain around her waist, locking it to her father's chain before he hobbled away. She had little room and was forced to sit beside her mother's body while her father rocked and moaned as they watched the parasites slowly consume her.

It could have been hours, or days that Nicolas sat, traumatized by the brutality of the Carpathian's worst enemy. He had thought he knew evil intimately in the centuries of hunting of the vampire, but this was far, far worse. Xavier had murdered his grandson's wife in front of the man and their child. Even more, he forced them to watch the slow consumption of her body by the ravenous parasites. It was no wonder that Lara had flashbacks when she saw them combined with Gregori's unusual eye color. And it was no wonder that her aunts and father had buried her memories deep.

We are with you, Lara
, a voice whispered softly.
Do not fear, we are near. Do not look at the body on the floor. That is no longer your mother. She has gone to a safe place where the monster cannot reach her
.

Nicolas concentrated on the voices as they whispered encouragement, told stories and tried to aid a young child in dealing with the incomprehensible. Without her great-aunts, Lara would have either given up or gone insane. He found himself holding on to their voices, letting the soothing compulsion wash over him as the next vignette of Lara's childhood began.

The fear cycle was always first, he realized. Her spirit traveled up the path of her childhood, inching her way from her past toward the surface—and him. She managed to advance a couple of years before the web of horror entangled her again, effectively holding her prisoner in her memories.

At six she was thin and small, barely fed and alone constantly. She had a tiny cubicle, slept on the ice floor with only a thin blanket and her growing ability to regulate her body temperature. It was difficult for her to sustain heat, and the constant shivering prevented her from gaining much weight. The aunts were the one stabilizing influence, talking to her day and night, whispering of far-off places, teaching her as much as a child could comprehend and implanting lessons and truths for times when she was older and could possibly grasp the knowledge and wield more power.

He learned they were kept drained of blood as Razvan was, often frozen, encased in ice, that they suffered horribly when thawed and that Lara felt every moment of their agony along with her tortured father's. It was only their voices that kept her sane.

He moved toward the surface with her, cradling her spirit, breathing warmth into her mind in an effort to reconnect with her. He needed her trust and he'd blown it in the worst possible way. He understood that now, understood what it was like to feel small and helpless—and without hope. He understood fully why she had chosen the only way out to her and that he was responsible for driving her to feel helpless all over again.

The moment fear swamped her, coming at her like a tidal wave, he knew she was trapped again in a significant moment of her life. She was aware the moment he stepped in front of her spirit again, surrounding her with his protection, allowing the waves of terror to engulf him.

Don't. Just go, get out while you can. We may never be able to leave this place.

I will not leave without you, Lara. It is my sin, my failing that sent you back here. I will not leave you here. If we stay, we stay together.

And he meant it. He embraced that child's body as she sat crosslegged on the floor, drawing a picture of a dragon on the ice wall. There was amazing detail for a child. Her little fingers grasped the small tine of a fork and carved scales with painstaking care over the dragon's body and long tail. She took her time, humming to herself, lost in her art.

A small whisper of sound alerted her. Lara tensed and slowly lowered her hand from the drawing, looking over her shoulder. Razvan's broad shoulders filled the doorway. His eyes were dark with sorrow, his face ravaged. One moment he looked a handsome man who had seen too much pain, the next his body hunched as if under a terrible burden. His face contorted and his eyes rolled back in his head as he fought some unseen foe.

"Lara, get out. Run, baby. Get out. He's in me, he's taken over my body and I can't throw him out. Go."

Even as he warned her, his voice changed back and forth, going from concern to cackling. Although it appeared to be Razvan standing in the doorway, Lara smelled Xavier, the rotting corpse of a man who refused to die. Nicolas felt her stillness, the instant pounding of her heart, the terror seizing her mind. She stumbled back on all fours to crouch against the wall.

"What is this?" Xavier/Razvan asked, standing in front of her drawing.

Lara/Nicholas stayed silent, keeping her hands behind her back, fear stamped on her face. Nicolas pushed her behind him as Xavier whirled around and struck him, knocking him off his feet, sending him flying.

"Answer me." Xavier/Razvan hissed with displeasure.

Lara/Nicolas picked himself up. "My best friend."

Razvan's face contorted as though he was fighting again. His body shook and a bloodred tear trickled down his face. For a moment he held out his hand, but abruptly, the fingers curled into two tight fists and he sneered. "Friend? You think those dragons are your friends? Why would such a powerful creature ever befriend the likes of you? You're worthless, totally worthless."

He cackled, the wicked sound sending chills down Nicolas's spine, and the voice was all Xavier now in Razvan's body. Once again, Nicolas felt that hopeless vulnerability, knowing he couldn't stop this man. He was a six-year-old child, anemic, fragile, alone, with no hope of escaping. As he watched, the dragon on the wall began to pop out, first one clawed foot, stretching and reaching, the talons curling sharply. The head emerged, the eyes blinking for a moment before glowing red. The tail slashed and the dragon broke free, landing on the floor a few feet from Lara.

Nicolas pushed her farther behind him, corralling her spirit and shielding her as he felt her cringe in anticipation. This was going to be bad. He knew it wasn't just physical warfare, this was psychological, a deliberate attempt to defeat all hope, using a childhood make-believe friend that took the form of her comforting aunts against her. Possessing her father's body so that he did the ultimate damage to her, betraying all trust, ensuring she had nothing at all to hold on to. And he couldn't imagine what Razvan suffered, obviously some part of his mind aware of how his body was being used to torment his child.

The dragon swung its head back and forth, eyes spinning and then focusing on the child. It leapt on Lara/Nicholas, hissing and spitting. At the last moment Lara/Nicolas spun around and the claws ripped at his back, tearing deep gouges. He went to the floor, curling up in the fetal position as the dragon bit at his legs and slashed at him with its spiked tail.

Possessed as he was by Xavier, her father laughed and kicked at him, encouraging the dragon to spout flames until she screamed and Nicolas screamed with her.

Do not resist. Let him take what he wants from you
. The feminine voices were in unison and Nicolas was instantly aware of Lara trying to kick out with her feet, not toward the dragon, but toward her father.

The dragon renewed its assault in a maddened frenzy of teeth and talons. Nicolas felt every shred in his skin, felt the rakes on his back as muscle tore beneath those sharp claws. The bites were painful, but shallow. The worst was the fire, spraying over his head, frying his sensitive skin, raising blisters instantly.