Dark Storm (Dark #23)(101)
Author: Christine Feehan

Riley fought down panic, plunging her hands into the soil in order to communicate with the vines. She might not be a warrior, capable of helping Riordan with the rabid followers of a vile vampire, but she could at least enlist the plants to help where they could. The vines snaked out along the floor, reaching for the ankles and legs of those struggling to reach Riordan.

In the ensuing chaos, Mitro tried to shift, just as Dax had known he would. The sticky scale dust clung to his cells, refusing to allow him to change to another form. In a fit of rage, he kicked Pietra off the dais and then rocketed into the walls and hit the woven vines so thick they were impossible to penetrate.

He whirled around just as Dax dropped on him from above, his heavy body driving him to the ground. Mitro stabbed at the hunter’s eyes, even as he rolled, burrowing into the ground to get away. That escape was closed to him as well, the roots too thick to allow passage. Rolling over and over into the crowd, he slashed and tore at Dax, trying desperately to get through the scales to the flesh and blood.

He opened his mouth and expelled a noxious gas cloud along with death beetles, directly into Dax’s face. Dax countered with a blast of fire, incinerating the bugs and lighting the gas cloud. The explosion rocked the ground and building above. The walls expanded and contracted trying to contain the blast. Mitro shrieked in rage and pain as a wall of fire raced over him, blanketing both Dax and the vampire as well as the human puppets closest to them.

Pietra, her clothes on fire, scuttled across the floor like a crab, shrieking, raising a ceremonial knife high and stabbing down repeatedly at Dax’s exposed back as he straddled Mitro. Flames rose around all three. Pietra’s arm rose and fell one last time and then she crumpled to the floor, rolling, spreading the flames everywhere. The dark sliver of Mitro burst from her body, seeking another host. It shot across the distance back to Mitro, sealing itself to him, adding to his strength.

Dax shut out the sounds of Riordan’s battle, his fear for Riley and the smell of burning flesh. He barely felt the flames. He was a fire dragon. He barely felt Mitro tearing at him. He was a Carpathian hunter with one purpose. To destroy evil. He listened to the strange rhythm of the offbeat heart. Mitro had created the heart for the water dragon. The fire dragon’s remains had been smashed open.

Call to your heart. Dax was certain he was correct.

The Old One’s heart had been left behind in the volcano. Even as he instructed the dragon, he realized, he and the dragon had slowly merged. He used his own heart, just as with the water dragon, strengthening the beat, drawing the other to him.

Mitro shrieked his fury and clawed and spit acid, trying to stop Dax’s diamond-hard nails from slicing through his chest. This time, Dax followed the sound, low and to the left. Mitro grew frantic. He sliced at Dax’s throat, and tried gulping the ancient blood. Dax concentrated on burrowing deeper into the rotten carcass. Around him Riordan battled the undead’s army, keeping them off of the hunter. Around him the flames leapt higher, but Dax was of a single-minded purpose.

His fist closed around the hard gem. He dragged it from the body, opened his hand flat and thrust it into the flames to bathe it in fire. Mitro sprang toward the heart, his hand outstretched. Dax opened his own chest and thrust the brilliant gem inside. The moment his body swallowed the dragon’s heart, he closed the wound and watched Mitro.

The vampire’s mouth stretched wide in protest. No sound emerged. Insects poured out, maggots fell around him, the flames instantly incinerating them. Mitro shook his head, unable to believe he’d been defeated. He turned his head toward Riley, hatred in his eyes. He lifted his hand, bent on revenge. The fire engulfed him entirely. Without the fire dragon’s heart, with no heart of his own, his body rotted, going up in flames.

Dax stepped back away from the noxious-smelling remains. Riordan caught up Riley and they took to the air, rising toward the ceiling as the flames spread throughout the room. Riley coughed and choked, reaching for Dax. He was covered in blood, but she didn’t care, wrapping her arms around him, grateful he was alive. He looked tired, the lines in his face etched deep. Beneath them, Mitro’s worshippers had succumbed to smoke and flame without their master’s blood to sustain them.

Dax and Riordan exited through the ceiling, leaving nothing but ashes behind. "Mitro had been searching for centuries in volcanos," Dax told Riordan and Riley. "Somewhere he must have acquired the knowledge that when dragons die, their hearts remain behind and become petrified. They turn to gemstones. The heart kept him alive until I restored it to its rightful owner."

"I want to go home," Riley said. "Take me home, Dax."

Chapter 20

Dax set Riley down on the mountain that had been home to him for the last few centuries. The Old One had been born here, as had his children. They had all died here. Riley had been born here. Her mother had died here. The heat fed him, the earth called to him. This volcano was as close to home as he had to give her.

The ruins of the Cloud People stood valiantly, undeterred by the volcano or the passage of time, the stone guardians staring out over the edge of the cliffs, daring anyone to come close. He was surprised that he was the one tense, even trembling a little inside. Riley was as steady as a rock, absolutely resolute, while he was wavering, afraid if something went wrong, he would lose her.

He slipped his arm around her waist as they looked up into what remained of the cloudy forest. "It truly is beautiful here."

"Isn’t it?" Riley smiled up at him. "When I was a little girl and my mother would bring me here, I’d pretend I was climbing up a ladder of stars and when we reached the clouds, I would be in heaven."

Dax wrapped a length of her thick braid around his fist and brought her hair to his face. He would never tire of the feel of all that blue-black silk. "Nothing can happen to you."

She looked up at him from under her feathery lashes, her generous mouth curving into a smile of pure love. His heart actually hurt in his chest. Sometimes, like right at that moment, when she was so certain of her love for him, he couldn’t find words to express the way he felt about her. There were no words adequate enough for the truth.

He knew she had changed everything for him. She had something about her he couldn’t resist. She moved inside of him, wrapped herself deep, and there was no way he could get her out even if he wanted her gone. There was no hiding from her. No running from her. She turned him inside out with just one look from under those long, feminine lashes. She lit up his world with her smile, with her soft, contagious laughter. Her smile took away every bad moment in his life, replacing them with-her.