Dark Carousel (Dark 26)

Tariq wrapped his arm around her to steady her. She pressed closer to him, grateful for the support. She felt each of those women's emotions. The terror. The horror. The need to fight back. Submission. Despair. And then pain. So much pain.

The babies. She whispered it in her mind. Sharing that with all of them. The screams of the unborn as they twisted in the womb, on fire, burning, the acid eating them from the inside out, in the same way it ate away at the mothers.

Enough, Tariq ordered. Let go.

She shook her head. We need to know what they did to that man. What they wanted from him. The head guy . . . vampire . . . whatever . . . likes to talk. He talked to the women constantly, taunting them, making them aware they were nothing in his eyes, only vessels to carry something he wanted. He talked when he hurt them. He talked when he raped them. He would have talked when he tortured the Carpathian.

Tariq brushed his hand down the length of her hair. The Carpathian tortured is Val Zhestokly. He was in bad shape when Blaze found him. She set him free and Emeline gave him blood. In return, he hunted with us to get her back from Vadim. He is healing at the moment.

Charlotte shuddered at the thought of what Vadim wanted to do to Emeline. Even to be close to the vampire would be horrible, let alone to have him touch you, or sink his teeth into you. She needed to visit Emeline immediately and offer friendship if nothing else. Emeline needed to know she had friends, people she could talk with.

She pressed her hand into the table, right over the large spot of dried blood. She knew it was Val's. The man had endured far worse torture than the women. It was as though Vadim and his friends were trying to find out just how much the hunter could endure before he died. Or cried out. He never made a sound. Not one single sound. The vampires systematically cut him almost into pieces. They tore his flesh open, and he didn't respond. Who could do that?

The torture went on for more than a year--she couldn't tell how long, but it was a very long time. Vadim or other vampires held him in their prison, keeping him so low on blood that his body nearly succumbed from that alone, but they knew how to keep him alive. They used every torture device known, modern and ancient, to break him. He seemed unbreakable.

Charlotte sifted through the history as fast as possible, gaining an entirely new admiration and awe for the Carpathian hunters. She felt a kinship with Val now that she'd shared his suffering. She didn't know him. She'd never even seen him, not alive and well, just this pale, worn image of him with the lines drawn heavily in his handsome face. His body was covered in scars, old and new. He had the same drifting tattoo she'd caught sight of on Dragomir. She knew she could find the origin of that if she went back far enough, but she had to come forward. She had to find out what Vadim's sudden surge of elation was as she neared the last few weeks.

You are not safe. Run. Run now before you die in there.

His voice, that terrible sweet sound, she recognized. Whispering to her. Commanding her. She knew he'd taken aim and thrust the compulsion at her because her head nearly exploded with pain and at the same time, her body spun around of its own accord prepared to flee. Tariq's arm was a band around her rib cage, holding her to him, his breath warm in her ear.

That is Vadim. Be careful when you answer me--stay on our path. It is different--a subtle difference only, so you must be careful. You are certain you have never been close to him?

She shook her head, keeping her eyes closed tight, afraid to look around her, afraid that Tariq might suddenly let her go and she'd be facing the threat alone. Vadim Malinov was a far worse threat than Fridrick. She'd sensed Fridrick in the background. He'd taken Carpathian blood a few times and done his share of torturing, but no one was as evil as Vadim, not even his brother, Sergey.

He has never touched me. Look into my memories. Into my mind. He's not there. I didn't know he existed until I met you. I don't know how he's doing this.

Kod alte han. Tariq snarled the words, his voice a soft growl that sent a shiver through her.

What does that mean? She tipped her head up to look at him, hands still on the table, connecting both of them to Val Zhestokly and the Carpathian's suffering.

Tariq's eyes had gone to pure blue flames. "It means 'darkness curse it.' Swearing in Carpathian doesn't sound as bad as swearing in today's modern language, but believe me, Charlotte, it is."

She did believe him, mostly because of the way he said it, the tone he'd used. He didn't like that Vadim was in her head and he couldn't figure out how the vampire had gotten there. Keep holding me while I find out exactly what Vadim wanted from Val.

She didn't wait for Tariq to agree. She moved forward from the past to just a few weeks earlier. She had to reach for the right time she needed, and when she did, she took a deep breath and allowed the walls of the tunnel to grow around her, sealing her in with the memories solidified right there in the blood and wood.

Vadim approached Val, who was chained in a small, uncomfortable cage like an animal. Clearly the vampire was filled with mocking glee. I have found the right one. The others will die soon. They are too weak and cannot possibly carry my child, the one to destroy Mikhail and his entire lineage. But this one, she has tested very high, and she will soon be here in the States. I've set things in motion already, and I have discovered just how important you are to this project. Do you know what that means, Val? Do you have any idea?

Vadim waited but Val didn't deign to look at him let alone answer him. Vadim waved his hand to unlock the cage. He reached in with deliberate slowness, wanting his victim to see what was coming.

The vampire struck hard and cruelly, tearing into Val's throat, his teeth sharp and huge. Chained and weak from lack of blood, from all the torture of whips and chains and knives, Val couldn't do anything to protect himself. He continued to be silent, stoic, completely ignoring the cruelty of Vadim's assault.

Vadim drank his fill and then shoved the Carpathian away from him, smearing the blood on his lips with the back of his hand. Val made no attempt to sit up straight, remaining slumped against the bars of his cage. Vadim watched him. It burns, doesn't it? The hunger. It eats away at you until you can't think of anything else. That need. Every waking moment it is there with you. You had your chance to join us, but you were too stupid to see the reality of what the Dubrinsky line was doing--becoming weaker and weaker. Draven should have shown you that.

Val made no acknowledgment of Vadim's declaration. The Carpathian merely looked at his tormentor with no expression whatsoever. Charlotte had never seen a man so ravaged and torn, so tortured, and yet he was stoic. She knew he felt pain because she felt it through her connection to him.

The more she touched each vignette from the past, the more she understood the players--and Tariq's world. It was violent and dangerous, just as he was. There was also something incredibly beautiful and heroic about the way the Carpathian endured his imprisonment and torture. She couldn't help but admire and respect the man. She knew he was very similar in personality to Tariq. She'd been in Tariq's mind, and now she was sharing both Val's and Vadim's minds.

Vadim. He was the most narcissistic person she'd ever met in her life. He was a megalomaniac, without a single doubt believing he was smarter than anyone else. He wanted power and believed he deserved having it. No one was greater than him.

You will always know it was you, Zhestokly, that aided me in bringing down the prince and his lineage. You and your blood. You will live a long time knowing that again and again I will use your blood to kill my enemies and raise my army. The vampire spat at Val, the spittle hitting him full in the face, but the Carpathian made no sound, no movement. He sat stoically in the cage, folded up, unable to move, his heart weak, barely able to pump. She wanted to touch him. To reassure him that he would escape. That the others had in fact come for him.

Come back to me, Charlotte, Tariq whispered softly in her mind. Again there were the small caressing strokes she was fast becoming familiar with.

Charlotte shook her head. She wa

s so close to figuring out Vadim. They would need to know every detail in order to defeat him--because someone had to stop him. Someone had to stand up to the mastermind monster and his army of vile followers.

You've been gone too long. Come back to me.

There was a hint of steel in the voice, and her first impulse was to go back to him. This place and time were very dangerous to linger in. Tariq had noticed her presence when he was carving his carousel horse. Vadim's attention was entirely focused on Val, but at any moment he could have sensed her presence.

One more time. I haven't gotten everything yet.

She didn't wait for Tariq to answer because she knew he would demand she return. She moved to the next vignette, closer to the present timeline. She chose the day they had rescued Emeline in the hopes that it would reveal where Vadim had gone and what he was up to next.

The terrified screams of a child pierced the air. Evil laughter, a sound that rivaled nails on a chalkboard. She heard the low murmur of the Carpathian's voice for the first time, soothing the child. Talking quietly just beneath the shrieking voices of the vampires surrounding him. To Charlotte's horror, they were bleeding him dry. She recognized Fridrick and Vadim, but there were two others holding cups to the numerous wounds pouring blood from their victim.

The child--the one she recognized as Liv--sat almost on the Carpathian's lap; he had one strong arm curled around her, his hand over her eyes. His head was bent low to her ear as he whispered to her. Her screams stopped abruptly and she nodded over and over, sinking into him for protection. Charlotte knew there would be none--not for the child and certainly not for the hunter.