Deliver Me from Darkness: A Novel of the Paladin Warriors (32 page)

Too dark. There was a portable spotlight set up in the corner bathing light on what appeared to be a hollowed out cavern, but not a drop spilled upon the creature hovering over her. All she got was a sense of vast size that was only defined by the blackness of the creature’s edges. Human in body shape, but with a presence of evil about it that sucked the hope right out of her. And it had touched her.

She’d woken on a scream. A bone-deep knowledge that having brushed against such evil she might never be at home in the light again. That she was somehow tainted and if it continued to touch her it would be at the cost of her soul.

Evil. Her mind had recoiled from its purity. All thought had focused on an escape which she knew was unachievable. The evil held her, cutting her off from all sense of reality.

Evil. She was going to shatter under its pressure. When Roland eventually found her, and she knew he would, it would be to find a broken body, alive but devoid of any sense of mind or soul.

Evil. It wrapped her up, spiraling her down into darkness until there was nothing else. This was her existence. This was her life. This was—and then…then it was gone.

***

Karissa tore back into the real world on a gasp, her eyes blinking against the blinding light around her. She tried to lift her hand to wipe her eyes but couldn’t lift her arms past the burning cut of rope bindings.

Where was she? What happened? The last thing she remembered was stepping outside the cabin to…

Oh crap. The girl. Bait for the trap. How stupid, stupid, stupid could she be?

“She’s awake.”

Karissa sucked in a breath, sweat beading and instantly chilling on her skin. She shivered. She knew that voice. It was the last thing she’d heard after the pleased laughter, before her world had gone dark. She twisted her head. Still in the cave. The monster was gone but now there were two men, neither of whom looked like a white knight.

“What shall we do with her?” the first man, the scary, handsome one said.

The second man absently waved his hand. “Do as you wish. We have the blood we need.”

“For ten chosen.” His lips curled back, revealing long pointed fangs. “Do you wonder why only ten? Do you wonder why the ten should be mine alone?”

Eyes narrowed. “It is your children who cannot breach the light.”

The vampire nodded. “Conceived by the light and born in darkness, the child’s blood shall give the dark lord’s children the ability to breach the two worlds.” He smiled. “Worlds. Not day and night. Why just mine? Do you think he’s afraid? Or do you think, perhaps, that he likes me better?”

“Just do as you’ve been told.” The other man spun around, grabbing up a handful of vials and stiffly marching out of the room.

The vampire laughed, leaning down over Karissa. “Guess it’s just you and me, pet.”

“What,” Karissa croaked, wet her cracked lips, and tried again, “What do you want?”

“Want? Why, for you to scream.” He lifted a wicked looking instrument in front of her. Scalpel. Oh crap. “Scream, darling. Call your mate’s name.”

He lowered the blade and pierced her skin. Karissa screamed.

Roland jerked up so fast he rapped his head on the lid of the trunk. “Crap.” He grabbed the top of his head, even as he tried to hone in on the frantic thought that had him jumping out of his pants.

“What? What’s wrong?” Logan asked.

“She’s awake. Goddamn bastards. They’re hurting her.” He closed his eyes, following the residual stain of fear and pain that had jarred him from the silent tension in the car.
Where
are
you, baby? Tell me where you are.

Roland?

Her essence clung to him, like nails digging into his insides. He could feel her panic and the throbbing agony that was her body.

Karissa, God. I’m coming for you, honey. I’m coming.

No…don’t.
The nails slipped free, her mental presence trying to push away.

Karissa!
he screamed, grasping onto her with all his might.
Don’t you dare leave me!

Can’t come here…Trap. He wants you.

Who, baby? Who wants me?

The second he asked, her mind provided the answer: a blurred image of a man with high cheekbones and a chiseled face. Christos. Placing the knowledge aside, he forced himself to look past the object of his eternal hatred and onto the room beyond. Not a room, but some sort of unnatural cavern. Whatever the light source was it bounced off the reflective stone in the background creating an eye-blinking mix of light and shadow.

Christos leaned in closer, clucking his tongue over something. Searing pain tore over their link, obliterating the image.

Karissa!
Roland rode out Karissa’s pain, trying to take it in but knowing he couldn’t. All he could do was share it. He felt her slipping, her mind shutting down as the torture, heaped upon whatever else she’d already been put through, became too much. Good. If she was unconscious they’d leave her alone.
Please, Father, make them leave her alone.

Hold
on,
mon chaton
.
With all that he was, he reached out to her, soothing her into her slumber.
I’m coming.

And when he got there, Christos was going to die.

It was Logan’s question, a solid minute of silence later, that broke him from the haze of residual pain and anger. “Where is she?”

He looked up, meeting his friend’s questioning gaze in the mirror. He cleared his throat, swallowing blood. Damn, he’d bitten himself again. “It looks like some sort of mining operation. The cavern she’s in has been dug out somewhat, but the entrance has railroad ties that suggest it leads back into a man-made tunnel.”

“Coal mines,” Valin said from the passenger seat.

“What?”

“We’re well into Pennsylvania. There are a bunch of abandoned coal mines in the western part of the state. It’s the perfect place for an army of vampires and demons to hide out.” Valin shook his head. “Fuck. Of all the luck.”

“What?”

“Have you ever driven through the back roads of western Pennsylvania?”

“No.”

“They suck. And they don’t go in a straight line. The closest mine I know of is probably going to take us another two or three hours to drive to.”

Roland’s blood chilled to ice. “She doesn’t have two or three hours.”

Silence sucked up the tension in the car. Roland worked on taking deep breaths, working through his fear. Valin was right. The road they were on now was running northwest along a ridge of mountains on their left, but that was after having gone north for a while after having originally been going southwest. It was more than infuriating. Every single time they switched directions it seemed like the distance between them and Karissa was increasing, not decreasing. Overall that wasn’t true, but as the crow flew, he knew they could have been there by now. If it hadn’t been daylight outside, even if he could have been blessed with some frigging rain, he could have used his vamp tricks to be across the many mountain ridges that were forcing them off their path.

His hands fisted, cutting and digging, cutting and digging until the scent of his own blood permeated the air around him. The pain, barely a shadow of what he’d felt coming from Karissa over their link, eased his churning guts and allowed him to think more clearly. He couldn’t go out. Logan couldn’t magically transport their car over the massive ridge on their left, but there was someone…“Go, Valin. You’re the only one who can get to her in time.”

“And if she’s not at the first mine? Or the second? There are dozens of these mines in the general direction you’re suggesting.”

“Damn you. Does the fact she’s a Paladin mean nothing to you? Do you hate me so much you’d let her die because of our bond? Please. You have to try.”

Valin tapped the dashboard, his mouth twisted as he contemplated. Roland was about ready to beg again, or, perhaps more likely, reach through the seats, grab him, then pummel him until he agreed when the bastard finally spoke.

“Pull over, Logan.”

Logan looked sharply at Valin but pulled off onto the shoulder.

Valin threw open his door, marching out of sight around the car. A second later there was a pop and the trunk lifted, sunlight bathing the previously dark haven. Roland hissed, pulling his blanket over as much of himself as possible. From the front Logan swore as he bolted out of the car. Valin started to reach inside the trunk.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Logan demanded, slapping Valin’s hand away and lunging for the tailgate.

Valin raised an arm, preventing Logan from closing the trunk again, and stood with his other arm outstretched toward Roland. “Come on, vamp. I’ll cloak you.”

“What?”

“Do you want to save your woman?”

“Fuck you. You know I do.” Even with Logan and Valin’s body shadowing him, his skin was burning. A slow tingle and sizzle that meant he was already lobster quality wherever his skin was still exposed.

“Then get out. I’ll cloak you.”

***

Valin fell out of the Shade, forming with a cloud of particles into his human form beside Roland. He reached up, swiping the sheet of instantaneous wet locks out of his face and tossed them over his shoulder.

“Rain. I hate rain.”

“I love it,” Roland said from where he crouched down beside the Paladin. Not only did the rain make it possible for him to be out in the open while it was still day, but it did wonders to cool the heated skin on his face and hands. Even with Valin cloaking him, he was able to feel the sizzle of the sun on his face. Of course, in order to see where he needed to “leap” to next, Valin had to thin the veil of darkness he created for Roland to see through.

“Yeah, but rain is harder to sift through. Makes traveling in the Shade difficult.”

“Kind of sucks.”

“Not to mention this is a cold rain. I think my balls are trying to hide somewhere in the vicinity of my small intestine.”

Without a word, Roland pulled Valin’s T-shirt and jeans from his rolled up blanket and passed them to Valin, then donned the blanket again as an added precaution. Knowing his luck, the rain would break and the clouds would miraculously part in a beam of heavenly light. Bad for the two vamps standing a few meters back in the mine shaft, but worse for Roland crouching out here.

Valin yanked on a pant leg, then the other, as he nodded at the vamps. “Think anyone will notice if they go missing?”

“They’re Christos’s, so yeah.”

Valin sighed, planting his hands on his hips despite the fact he’d yet to zip up. “That sucks.”

“Finish getting dressed so we can go kick some ass, would you?”

“Why?” Valin started pulling the pants off again. “I’m just going to have to take them off again.”

Roland twisted around to look at him head-on. Valin winked. “How would you like to be invisible?”

Of course. When Valin was in his particle form, he was all but impossible to see, unless he let you see him. It was probably safe to assume the same went for anything within Valin’s circumference of influence—like the vampire he’d encircled. “Invisibility is handy. But not if it means slicking up with you again.”

“Ah, poor Roland, your masculinity being threatened by hanging with me?”

“Shit no.”

Valin’s lips curled up saying, “Suck it up, vamp,” just before he twisted into darkness.

***

Gabriella screamed a soundless scream, straining against the thick leather and metal manacles that kept her anchored to the granite wall. She was fully healed. Had all her strength back, and yet, for the life of her, she couldn’t break through a couple measly bindings. What the hell?

Most of the van ride was a blur. The agony the sun wrought on her was enough to blur the edges of her memory. She remembered Christos sliding the bloody finger in her mouth. And though she’d instinctively swallowed, she remembered that she’d somehow managed to resist leaping onto the curly-haired woman and sucking her dry. She also remembered how a little while later, as they’d driven out of the fog, how the van had pulled over, the back doors cracking open, and Christos ordering she be tossed outside into the full effects of the burning sun.

She’d screamed, clawing at the doorframe, then crawled on hands and knees across the ground as she searched for a bush or something. Her already taxed body hadn’t been able to take the stress and she’d passed out—and woken here. Perfectly healed, perfectly healthy. Someone must have picked her up off the ground before she could burn to a crisp and fed her the blood she needed to heal. Who that was, why, or whose blood she’d been given, she didn’t know. Didn’t care. Only thing that mattered was getting free, finding Roland’s woman, and getting them both out of this mess. Problem was, the only thing she knew how to do was the second. Whether she’d had a mere drop or a full IV bag of Curls’s blood, Gabriella now had the ability to track the woman down. Blood called to blood. Gabriella, Roland, and Curls were now as tight as family.