Dark Tarot (Dark Carpathians)

“You think I pretend to have power.” He pointed a long thin finger tipped with a sharp talon at her.

She felt the ground tremble. The air grew heated. Oppressive. She gathered her strength, determination coiling inside her, waiting to spring.

“You will join your lifemate in the Cave of Fire to feel the agony for eternity until the mistress allows you to serve her.” He spat the words at her and gestured toward the rocks. They widened, and a blast of heat belched forth.

He turned to wave her inside as if she were no more than a thin piece of paper. Adalasia could see the spinning web of fire that was the portal to the cave. That was all she needed. Using every ounce of skill she had learned throughout her years of training, she leapt at the demon, driving through his heart and straight up his body to his throat, splitting him open with the light pouring from the sword. In midair, she turned and dove into the fire, slamming the sword back into the scabbard while the flames poured over her and burned the flesh right from her bones.

She opened her mouth to scream and scream, but no sound emerged. Nothing had prepared her for the shock of pure agony washing through her. She looked down at her body, and to her horror, all she could see was ash clinging to her bones. Flames rolled over her continually. There was no way to breathe with the terrible heat. Her lungs refused to work. She was choking, strangling, breathing the flames into her body.

Time went by—she had no idea how long—while she fought the terrible pain, writhing and twisting in an effort to get away from it. There was nowhere to go. Not a moment, not a second of reprieve. She had been condemned to eternity in this agony.

You are Carpathian. The voice was calm. Detached. You are strong. Lower your body temperature as much as possible so you can breathe. Without breathing, you are in panic and cannot think. There is no aid without breath and rational thinking.

Adalasia didn’t recognize the voice, but she did see the wisdom. She fought her way past the pain enough to turn down her temperature as best she could. Once she found control, and the chaos in her brain stopped the terrible downward spiral, she felt the guardians pour into her, shouldering pain, aiding to bring down her temperature even more in the midst of the flames rolling over her bones.

Find him. You had a path to him. Find your lifemate now. Hurry. The voice was still calm, but there was an urgency to it.

She realized immediately she was not alone in the Cave of Fire. She wasn’t the only victim there, but she was being stalked by triumphant evil. Demons, she told the guardians. They are holding him. They know I’m here and are waiting for me.

You knew they would be there, Nicu’s voice whispered. Hurry, sisarke. We cannot be away this long and far from our physical bodies. You must get to him and follow the plan.

As his lifemate, Adalasia was forever connected to Sandu. She could find him anywhere. Unerringly, she moved through the terrible flames, doing her best to ignore the way the fire burned through her bones. She refused to look down at her body to see what was happening. That only made things worse.

Adalasia knew she was close to Sandu when a rush of sheer agony drove her to her knees. Malicious laughter echoed all around her as she struggled back up.

Adalasia. Sandu’s voice was barely there.

A whisper of unease traveled up her spine. He sounded so far from her even though she could see him now. He was ringed by the malicious, laughing demons, and he looked absolutely ravaged. Destroyed. At the same time, he faced them, standing as straight as possible even as some cracked whips of fire over his burning skin.

She refused to give in to the need to weep for him. She stood every bit as straight as she swept toward the circle of demons taunting and torturing her lifemate. Her eyes were on his.

“At last, Adalasia, you have joined us. Your sword of light will do little good to defeat all of us.” A man stepped forward, although he no longer resembled a man. His feet were hooves, and out of his head grew horns. His voice, however, was sweet, compelling, almost magical. A deceiver.

“I didn’t come to defeat you. I came to join my lifemate,” Adalasia replied, still walking straight toward the circle of demons as if they weren’t there. She sounded haughty, like a princess talking to a bothersome flea. Like Sandu, she paid no attention to the flames burning through her bones or the holes the unholy fire made in her insubstantial body.