Dawnbreaker (36 page)

Down the line I heard a nightwalker scream seconds before his existence was snuffed out. From what I could tell, most of my kind were being tied down with the roots and then staked. A swell of panic filled my chest as I released my weapons. They were of no use since I couldn’t lift my arms. With my palms open, I conjured up a wave of fire that covered the length of my body, biting into the roots that held me. The earth clan naturi above me squealed in frustration and tried to crush me with the roots, but they were already beginning to weaken. With my binding crumbling, I sent a fireball screaming through the air. The air guardian turned and tried to escape, but the flames engulfed him and the earth naturi in an instant. His tough hide melted, his flesh sizzling and popping in the night sky before he finally lost the ability to fly and tumbled back to the earth.

Pulling against my bindings, the roots snapped and broke. On my feet again, I lifted my hands and torched two other air guardians I could see in the air above me. Cynnia rose as well and called up a storm, bringing up a swell of air that kept the air guardians fighting to stay close to where we were located on the side of the mountain.

“With these iron cuffs, I can do no more,” she confessed, holding her hands out to me.

“Betray me now and I’ll destroy you,” I snarled. With a grunt, I pulled apart the bindings of each iron cuff until they fell to the ground with a clatter. I prayed I wasn’t about to regret this, but I needed all the firepower I could get. She could have gone with her own kind but had stayed with me.

Beside me, Cynnia drew in a deep sigh as she raised her arms freely up into the air. Black clouds swirled around us like a thickening witch’s brew. I took a step backward and laid a hand on her shoulder, wary of what she was doing. In the flash of an eye two lightning bolts slammed to the earth, plunging through the two remaining air guardians before they had a chance to escape.

Along the path, the nightwalkers were breaking loose and getting back to their feet. Unfortunately, the humans had been quickly crushed and broken under the squeezing roots. I had also lost five nightwalkers. More than half of my army was gone now, and we had yet to reach the mountain ruins. I hoped Stefan was doing better.

Frowning, my narrowed eyes scanned the area laced with dancing shadows cast by the last of the burning roots. Danaus had disappeared from sight when the air guardians appeared. A chill ran up my spine. His name was on my lips when I finally spotted him sitting on the ground, his back pressed against the stone wall of the mountain. When I walked over, the harsh wheeze of his breathing could be heard over the crackling fires. Sheathing my weapons, I knelt beside the hunter. His throat was raw and bleeding. One of the roots had wrapped around his neck and crushed his windpipe.

“Is it healing?” I asked. He tried to say yes, but the word never made it up his throat. I held up my hand, stopping him from trying again. “Just nod or shake your head.” He nodded once, drawing in a sharp breath. I could feel the panic starting to swell in his chest. It wasn’t enough air, not by a long shot. His body was healing, but too slowly, and soon he would suffocate.

“Anything else hurt?” I demanded. Danaus shook his head. “We’ll wait,” I announced, kneeling on the ground in front of him.

“What? Let’s leave him!” snapped one of the other nightwalkers watching our conversation. He was young and had no concept of what he would face at the Machu Picchu ruins.

“He’s one of the few among us that can sense the naturi. I’m not going on without him,” I said calmly.

“He’s a hunter,” the nightwalker sneered. His jean-clad legs were braced wide apart, as if he was about to pounce on Danaus.

“And at the moment he holds more value to me than you and your petulant whining. If you’re anxious to move, take another and scout ahead.” The vampire glared at me a couple of seconds before he motioned for another to accompany him up the path.

Kneeling before the hunter, I found that he was blinking rapidly, desperately trying to stay conscious against the crowding darkness. He would pass out soon if I didn’t do something. I could now command the powers of both the earth and soul, but I lacked the ability to heal the human body. However, I did have a few other tricks up my sleeve. Not any that he would like, though.

I moved so I was directly in front of him with his knees on either side of my hips. He tried to shift and put some more distance between us, but I put a hand on his shoulder, holding him still.

“I can help you,” I murmured, trying to keep my voice soft and reassuring. “But you have to trust me.”

Danaus’s frown deepened and his eyes narrowed. I think he would have told me to go to hell if he could, but instead he drew another ragged and fractured breath. He was running out of time.

Placing my left hand against the side of his face, I pressed my thumb against his temple. I captured his left wrist with my free hand and placed it against my side so he was grasping my rib cage. I held his hand there because I knew he would try to pull away when he figured out what I planned to do.

Closing my eyes, I relaxed the tension from my shoulders and mentally reached out with my mind. I let my thoughts brush slightly against Danaus’s as a warning. He jerked away from me, digging his heels into the dirt as he tried to desperately push away, but I held tight to him.

“No,” he rasped.

Relax, Danaus.
I didn’t use my voice, but sent the words drifting through his mind. If he hadn’t been so weak already, I would never have been able to do this. When we had spoken telepathically in the past, it was sending a quick scattering of words across to each other. Our presence within each other’s minds was at an absolute minimum, in an effort to give the other person a little privacy. At the worst, we received a flash of emotion from one another, but little else. But now was different. I was there within in his mind.

Get out of my head!
He was livid, but over that was fear. His fear of me and what I was doing was so thick it felt like I was slogging through a Florida marsh. Neither one of us had dared venture so deep, to places where we could hear thoughts and walk through old memories and deeply hidden secrets.

You have to let me help you
.

Get out!
I could feel the walls being thrown up around me as he tried to erect defensive barriers. He was using all of his strength to fight me, and left nothing behind to continue the healing process. I was only making matters worse.

Biting back a curse, I forced myself deeper into his mind, tearing down his walls. Before he could scramble to fight me, I slowed his thoughts, sending a thick fog across his mind.

Calm. Be at peace. Think only of healing,
The words entered his brain as a whisper. He was trying to relax, but the burning in his lungs was growing.

Mira.
My name came softly, weak and so fragile. He was reaching out, fearful and in pain.
Can’t breathe.

You don’t need to. I’m breathing for you.
As I sent the thought through his mind, I drew in a long, deep breath. His hand gripped my side tighter for a moment and then he relaxed. It was all a lie, an illusion that I was weaving for his mind. I couldn’t breathe for him, but at the moment he believed I could and his panic waned, letting his body complete the healing process. The fear and panic subsided and all of his energy was redirected from trying to protect himself from me and the other nightwalkers toward healing the wound in his throat.

For a brief period of time I created an illusion of safety for him to mentally curl up in. At the same time, I opened the door to my own mind and powers, trying to push what energy I could into his body. I wasn’t sure the energy would flow this way, but I had to try. I was willing to give him every ounce of energy I could spare, so his body could heal before he finally suffocated.

We stayed like that for another ten seconds. I sent soft, calming thoughts rippling through his brain with each deep breath I drew. But his thoughts were growing dimmer as the lack of oxygen was steadily stealing his consciousness. When I knew I could wait no longer, I released my mental hold on him.

Breathe, Danaus.

His first harsh breath shattered the pristine silence of the night. With both of his hands grasping my sides, he pulled me forward so he could lean his forehead against my sternum. My body had become his anchor to reality, and he was clutching me tight enough to create bruises.

I stopped breathing and absently ran my right hand over his hair, smoothing it as his own breathing slowly evened out.

Bitch.

I stumbled over that last thought as I pulled free of his mind.

“It was good for me too,” I said in a husky voice before threading my fingers through his hair and pressing a kiss to the top of his head. I sat on my heels as his hands slid from my sides. He rested against the side of the mountain, tilting his head back so he could breathe more easily.

I could understand Danaus’s fears, but I’d never tried to force my way into his memories, his secrets, until now, when I had controlled him, forcing him to believe in an illusion that could have killed him. His anger began to ebb, but his fear was still a tangible thing between us. In his moment of weakness I was able to enter his mind, which I would not have been able to do under normal circumstances. What’s more, the direct path we had cut between our two minds was now stronger than ever. We could easily slip into each other’s thoughts now, something I knew that neither of us wanted.

But for a brief moment in time it didn’t matter. Tonight he would once again wield me like a sword in his hand. I might have briefly raped his mind, but I would repay that slight as his slave. We two were bound: vampire and hunter; monster and demon.

“We have to go,” Danaus whispered.

“Soon. Catch your breath. Jabari would be sorely disappointed if you didn’t make it to the ruins alive.” The hunter drew in a deep breath, filling his lungs. He winced against the pain, but he was breathing again.

“Where’s Stefan?” Danaus asked in a rough voice, pushing to his feet. I remained sitting another moment as I located the other pack of vampires. They were easy to spot, considering that they were currently fighting a group of naturi. The energy and violence in the air was building.

“They’ve just passed through the Main Gate. Let’s move. We’re almost to the top,” I said, springing to my feet.

Twenty-Seven

W
e continued up the mountain in silence. Tension coiled in my stomach as I waited for the next roadblock, the next horde of naturi waiting to take my head off. We needed to punch through and finally crest the hike into the clouds. We needed to finally end this game.

A halt was called when we came to a final turn in the road. The two nightwalkers I had sent ahead stood with their backs pressed to the mountainside. The whiner was nearly doubled over, his arms crossed tightly over this stomach.

“What happened?” I demanded. The Browning was in my left hand, while my right hand was wrapped around the hilt of the sword. My legs were spread as I scanned the area, waiting for the next attack.

The other nightwalker held up an arrow between two fingers. “As soon as we turned the corner, they filled the sky.”

“You’ll heal,” I muttered as I peered around the rock wall and up the hill. The firelight was brighter at the city entrance, but I still couldn’t see anyone. A narrow staircase ran along the main wall surrounding the city, leading up to the rise that held the guardhouse. Stefan was still above us, but close. We had to take care of the army of naturi at the entrance before he and his band stumbled on them. “How many?”

“Fifteen,” Danaus quickly answered.

“Know any good tricks?”

“No.”

“But I do,” Jabari said as he stepped out of empty air to stand beside me. Sadira stood in his arms, looking disoriented. Her skin was black and twisted, and her thick black hair was only now beginning to grow back. My maker and I had had a…disagreement while I was visiting Venice a couple months ago. The result had bathed her in flames, momentarily. In all honesty, it had been an accident, but I knew there wasn’t a nightwalker in existence that would believe me.

Sadira wore long, baggy clothes, hiding her hideous appearance. Other vampires cringed and grimaced at the sight of her. Understandably, she refused to look at me, remaining huddled against the Elder.

“They have us pinned down,” I said, looking back at Jabari. “Fifteen naturi with arrows. Earth clan naturi and air guardians are lurking around the mountain, giving us more than our share of problems.”

“I will stop the arrows. We just need bait.” Jabari smiled at me, his white teeth showing in the faint light. Any of the other nightwalkers would be fine for this task, but he wanted me.

I frowned and shook my head. “Yeah, I thought so.” I turned to Danaus and handed him my Glock and Browning. He was a better shot than me anyway. “Don’t miss. I’ll know you hit me on purpose.”

“I wouldn’t dare,” he replied, his rough voice dripping with sarcasm. I must have looked nervous because he rarely stooped to jokes.

“Wait. I’m sure they’d be happy to carve ‘Kick Me’ into your back as well,” I warned, forcing a smirk onto my lips.

“Mira?” Cynnia said, grabbing my arm as I prepared to step into the open. “I don’t feel good about this.”

“Do you know what they’re planning?” I asked, cocking my head to the side as I waited for her answer.

She shook her head and bit her lower lip. “I don’t know, but this just seems bad.”

“I know it’s bad, but I trust Jabari needs me alive for now,” I said with a sneer as I looked up at the Elder.

Drawing my sword, I stepped around the turn and into the middle of the road. I stood waiting, but nothing happened. Tightly gripping the hilt in my right hand, I slowly trudged up, my left hand bathed in dancing flames. It wasn’t possible to become a more visible target. I didn’t know what Jabari’s plan was, but I didn’t trust the Elder to keep me completely unharmed. He needed me alive, but that left a whole gray area of what kind of condition he could put me in. To sweeten the deal, I was relying on a vampire hunter to watch my back; one who wasn’t too happy with me at the moment. The only one that actually seemed concerned about my safety was the naturi. If I survived this, I was going to pay more attention to the type of company I kept.