Dark Tarot (Dark Carpathians)

Abascus was a master vampire, and as such, he would not be easy to defeat. Sandu was close, and even as he nodded toward Ambrus, he stepped right into Abascus and drove his fist into the master vampire’s chest as the burn inside his veins turned into a fiery explosion. Black blood coated his fist and forearm. Acid burned skin away as his fingers stretched, reaching, his nails lengthening into sharp talons, digging for the wizened, blackened heart.

Abascus screamed and slammed his forehead hard against Sandu’s head—only at the last moment, Sandu changed the composition of his forehead so that when Abascus struck, he hit pure steel. Black blood erupted from Abascus’s head, pouring over his eyes, and with it, tiny white writhing parasites burst out of his skull.

That red fiery hell in Sandu demanded he keep smashing that steel block into Abascus’s forehead, obliterating all flesh until it was all white jagged bones and leeching brains, volumes of black acid and those tiny writhing parasites. All the while, Sandu continued digging deep until his nails found the heart and grasped it. He began to extract it from the body.

Abascus contorted, desperate to shift, but Sandu would not release the heart, not even when the vampire slammed his own fist into the hunter’s chest in order to try to get to his heart. Sandu was prepared for just such a move. He had fought master vampires for centuries. Once this close, there were only so many moves one could make. The fist came up against that same composition of steel, smashing all the bones in the hand.

With his free hand, Sandu’s nails lengthened, and he dug into Abascus’s neck and throat with razor-sharp talons, slicing through flesh to get at arteries. Acid poured from the master vampire along with the wiggling parasites. Sandu shoved his hand through the throat to the back of the neck, reaching for the spinal cord as he closed his other fist around that blackened, wizened heart.

In desperation, Abascus shifted his legs to that of a large cat, using long claws to rake at Sandu’s thighs and groin. Sandu continued to withdraw the heart, feeling the first rake down his left thigh but turning his body to keep the vampire from scoring his groin. In truth, he was caught up in the red haze of battle, beyond all feeling, by the need to rend and tear the despicable evil creature in front of him, intent on inflicting the most damage possible as he took the heart of the undead. The claws tore at his thighs in desperation, but Sandu changed the composition of his body to break the nails on the talons. He had been at this too many centuries not to know every trick the vampire knew. Now he had the heart out of the body.

Lightning cracked across the dark sky. Abascus took a step back on the boulder, his face contorting into a mask of fury and terror. Sandu brought one foot up and kicked him square in the chest, driving him backward over the falls. As he did, he tossed the blackened heart into the air and with one hand directed the lightning bolt straight at it. The white-hot spear hit the blackened organ, reducing it to ash instantly and then arcing down the rocks straight to the body of the master vampire, where he sat in a daze staring up at Sandu in confusion. The flash of light consumed him instantly, leaving nothing but ash behind. That slowly disappeared from the rocks, washed away by the water pounding down from above.

Still shaking with the adrenaline of battle, Sandu immediately bathed his arms in the light in order to rid his body of the acid before turning to aid his brethren. Flashes of lightning lit up the night sky. He could see his brethren didn’t need any help whatsoever. It didn’t surprise him. They had all been at this a very long time.

As he turned his attention to his wounds, he felt a small shadow in his mind retreat. His very disobedient lifemate. Adalasia.

Sandu had thought to heal his wounds and hunt for blood to replace what he’d lost, but he had to rethink this night. Assess Adalasia’s reaction. She was his lifemate, and as such, it would be difficult, if not impossible, for her not to need to heal him when she saw the extent of his wounds. She might be repelled by his actions in battle, but she wouldn’t be able to resist the necessity to care for him—even to give him blood. That would work in his favor.

Sandu looked into his mind as he approached the house, seeing that small, shivering woman in the tiny crevice of his mind. She had wanted to see how to kill a vampire in case she needed to aid him in battle. She had been trained to fight demons. He caught glimpses of her battle technique with various weapons. She was intrigued, wondering if any of the systems she’d been taught would aid her in destroying the undead.