Dark Tarot (Dark Carpathians)

Sivamet. There was sorrow in Sandu’s voice.

We are strong together. If the demons could overhear their intimate path, she still wanted him to know they weren’t alone if he wasn’t beyond the point of reasoning things out.

“Join him, then,” the man snarled, his teeth snapping together, his voice no longer sweet but grating and harsh. He flung his hands out toward Adalasia, lifting her as the demons parted to allow her into the circle.

Adalasia thrust Sandu’s soul into him, surrounding him with every bit of strength she had to protect him from any further harm. The guardians called to his spirit with her, pulling him through the ranks of demons, out from the circle. The Old One shielded their spirits from the intense heat as the demons screamed with rage and sent vicious fire bursting over and through them.

The head demon flung himself at Sandu, hooking his talons into him, jerking him back, fury in his red-rimmed eyes.

“You cannot have him,” Adalasia said calmly. “He has no body for you to hold.”

“We have him trapped. He’s too weak.”

The guardians and Adalasia kept Sandu surrounded, refusing to allow the demon a way in. It was Luiz’s power combining with the ancients that thrust Adalasia and Sandu out of the shadow realm and back into the cave where their bodies waited. Weak, desperate for blood, worn and weary from the long journey, they stayed bonded until they sealed off the portal and ensured Sandu was safe.

Sandu drifted in an agony of pain. He had often been wounded in battle. More than once in his conflicts with master vampires, he had been nearly eviscerated, had his throat torn, holes put in his chest and chunks of his flesh ripped out by poisonous teeth. Nothing in his long centuries of existence was like this kind of pain. He couldn’t distance himself from it. He could only endure.

He knew he was in rich soil, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t move. He felt the heartbeat of the earth reverberating through his own body. He could feel the minerals attempting to heal him. His need for blood was overwhelming, yet he didn’t have the necessary strength to attempt to draw any creatures to him. There was too much pain if he attempted movement, and the feeling of being trapped should have added to his discomfort, but he couldn’t summon the necessary emotions to care.

His heart stuttered when he felt the cool touch of a breeze on his face. He couldn’t open his eyes. Even that small movement was too painful. His lungs didn’t seem to work correctly. He thought perhaps someone was with him, forcing air in and out of his lungs like some great forge. He wasn’t breathing on his own. It was an impossible task.

Stay with me, Sandu. Don’t leave me alone.

Sandu heard her voice in his mind. Low. Sweet. Adalasia. He examined that tone from every possible perspective. No demon or vampire could replicate her exact pitch. It was too soft with love. Love. He hadn’t thought about such an emotion. In truth, he hadn’t known it to exist until the feeling began to creep up on him unawares. For her. His lifemate. Adalasia.

He struggled to answer her. To reassure her. He could hear tears in her voice. His mind and memories felt so fractured, he could barely hold on to what was real and what was illusion. He had been in the shadow realm, in the Cave of Fire, tortured for endless time.

First had come the temptations. He was weak, starved, his every cell crying out for blood. The temptations were horrendous, men and women offering him their adrenaline-laced blood if he would just come with them to the dark side. Women wound themselves around him, whispering lewd promises of giving him their bodies in return for their blood. They begged him to take their blood, to allow them to give him that service— for a price.

The whispers and temptations seemed to go on for months. Years. All the while the flames burned his skin and the demons tortured him, flaying the skin from his body with their fire whips. He was already sick and wounded from the fight with multiple vampires. The undead had set upon him the moment he was pulled into the shadow realm. There was no way to kill what was already dead. They tore his already weak body apart and dragged him gleefully to the Cave of Fire, where the demons waited for him.

He refused to betray his lifemate for any reason. They tortured him endlessly, relentlessly, promised him everything and anything if he would open the gate. Eventually, they wanted him to summon his lifemate, promising they both could leave the Cave of Fire if he would persuade her to open the gates.

Sandu knew he was becoming more and more confused, but his duty to Adalasia was never in question. That was the one thing he was resolute about. He would not yield. He would not betray her. She guarded the gate, reborn over and over, waiting for him, her lifemate, to arrive, and he would not jeopardize or cheapen what she had suffered over the centuries to hold back what was behind those gates. He had no idea how long he’d been there, but he feared she would come for him—and she had.