Dark Curse (47 page)

Several other galleries opened, but other than glancing inside, the four continued upward. They'd been inside Xavier's lair for sometime: They needed to find Tatijana and Branislava and get out. The shower of ice was constant, small pieces breaking off and raining down on them, so it was necessary to keep a shield above them. As the floor sloped up, icicles began to vibrate. Water dripped faster. One wall began to web into tiny cracks. Water trickled out.

"I detest this place," Vikirnoff said. "We should just get out of here."

Natalya scowled at him. "I'm not going to leave without finding my aunts' bodies. You saw the blood. What if they're still alive?"

Nicolas muttered something foul under his breath. "They are not alive. After all this time, it would be impossible. This is a fool's errand and you are going to get us killed."

Vikirnoff whirled around, baring his teeth. "This was not Natalya's idea.
Your
lifemate dragged us here."

Nicolas responded with aggression, his black eyes smoldering with red flames, with the need for action. "Do not use that tone when speaking of my lifemate."

Lara frowned as she stepped between the two men. With the ice spiders weaving luminescent threads to light the way, the silky strings cast shadows not only along the blue and white ice, but over both men's faces, and they seemed dark and sinister in the shimmering glow. Along the wall, the shadows seemed to move of their own accord, growing and extending, reshaping with each movement within the tunnel.

Lara lifted her hands palm out and sang to her spiders.
Tiny spiders of crystalline ice, spinning threads to make us light, throw and cast your finespun threads, digging deeper into what we dread. Enter the ice, search it well, reveal to me what's hidden by spell
.

Dark streaks appeared along the ice wall and crisscrossed the tunnel itself. She drew in her breath. "He's controlling emotions. It's Xavier. Don't speak. Don't think. Keep your mind blank while I find a way to counter this."

Again she lifted her hands and wove a counterspell.
That which has been cast to control and be hidden, can be undone by the song of a maiden
.

Within the icy walls, a face and form of a young girl began to take shape, and then a perfectly formed ice sculpture of a young girl emerged. She appeared to be reaching down into the ice. As she bent over, she began to sing and the notes appeared like a cold wind, blowing across the walls and up across the tube itself, coating the dark streaks with ropes of ice so that each streak froze solid. Her notes pitched higher and higher until the frequency shattered the ice ropes and they fell, harmless to the floor. The maiden climbed back into the ice and disappeared.

Nicolas grinned at Vikirnoff. "That's my woman."

Natalya smiled at her, pride on her face. "You really know your stuff."

"The aunts taught me everything. It's all them." Technically, they were her great-aunts and Natalya's aunts, but Lara would never think of them any other way. "I have to find them."

"We will,
sívamet
, we all want to find them and bring them home," Nicolas assured.

Still the shadows on the walls continued to grow and lengthen. The male Carpathians put the women between them, deadly snarls on their faces. The danger in the tunnel was palpable. The shadows swirled on the blue-white walls, pushing through the layers of ice so that smoke drifted out.

Natalya gasped. She gripped Lara's wrist. "I know what this is."

Both looked at one another, horror on their faces. "Shadow warriors," they whispered together.

Nicolas drew in his breath and looked up and down the long tunnel. They were in the middle of the tube and all along the walls, in front and behind them, smoke began to push through the cracks in the ice. "Not even the most seasoned hunter can hope to escape the shadow guardians," he said. "We have to get to the next chamber before they emerge from the wall. If we are caught in between them, we die here."

"Movement attracts them," Natalya pointed out.

"I would have to say they already know we are here," Nicolas replied.

"If we can get to a safer place and give Natalya some time," Vikirnoff said, "then she can perhaps deal with them, but it takes time."

"I could because I had mage blood running in me, I think," Natalya said. "I'm not as certain I could control them now."

"I have mage blood," Lara said.

"Talk later! Run now!" Nicolas caught Lara's wrist and, without waiting for an argument, put on a burst of preternatural speed.

Vikirnoff and Natalya stayed right on their heels, all four blurred they moved so fast, but the action caused a reaction from the whirling shadows. The dark smoke poured even faster from the ice wall and began to form into life-sized apparitions of swirling smoke, shadow and substance.

They barely made it to the entrance to the next chamber before the shadow warriors were after them, gliding silently through the twisting ice tube, swords raised high. The smoke swirled and shifted, often revealing an armor-clad warrior, face obscured completely, but sword gleaming and polished.

Nicolas kept moving to the opposite side of the chamber, heading for the left entrance, but several warriors spread out quickly through the room, cutting off that escape route. The only choice they had was a narrow right passage, still leading up, but away from the direction they wanted to go.

Shadow warriors were made of whatever elements were available, molecules and water. Once the most skilled and honored fighters of their time, their spirits were ripped from them and forced into service by the dark mage. They were already dead, insubstantial and nearly impossible to defeat in battle.

The warriors fanned out and the Carpathians retreated farther into the narrow corridor of ice. The men kept the women firmly behind them, walking backward, facing the enemy.

"They'll have to face us one at a time," Nicolas said with some satisfaction.

Natalya tried to stem the flow of shadows into the room. She halted and raised her arms.

Hear me now, dark ones, torn from your resting place. I call on earth, wind, fire, water and spirit.

The warriors should have put down their swords and waited for commands, but instead, they rushed toward the two women, the smoke going from gray to black.

"That's not working so well without the mage blood," Natalya said. "Run!"

The Carpathians whirled and ran again, using their blurring speed. Lara had a difficult time keeping up, although Nicolas was pulling her along and her feet didn't really touch the ground. She kept forgetting to regulate her body temperature and it was so cold, she ached and shivered continually. Her legs and arms felt stiff and her chest hurt from the cold. As they continued up the narrow corridor, the air changed, warming a bit, which gave her some relief, but she worried with the temperature a few degrees warmer, the ice might melt.

Lara glanced over her shoulder and saw that the warriors had finally come to a halt. Perhaps the holding spell Natalya had cast had finally taken, or they were guardians of a specific area and could not go any farther.

"They aren't following us," she announced.

The others stopped to look back. The warriors had halted at the entrance to the tube and stood, smoke whirling around them, swords raised.

"Keep moving," Nicolas said, his hand on the small of Lara's back. "Who is to say they will not attack again? Let's keep going, but look for a corridor leading to our left and we can take that and get back on track to find your aunts."

Lara checked the ice surrounding them. Even a few degrees difference in temperature could trigger large chunks of ice to come flying out of or off of the wall. This tube was narrower than most and lined heavily with rows of dagger-sharp icicles. On either side of them, above and below, were two solid rows of icy stilettos in strange colors of faded brown, very unusual for an ice cave. The floor was covered in round ice pods, also very unusual. The slightly raised bumps were everywhere, as if some strange form of bacteria grew along the floor of the tunnel.

As they continued, it grew darker and she realized the ice spiders were not emerging from the walls to light the way with their luminescent silk. The floor curved upward and with each step there were more of the pods and the temperature increased.

"Stop." Lara took a careful look around.

She had good night vision, but the Carpathians could see in the dark without any light and it looked as if a few more steps would take them over the slight rise and into pitch blackness. Before she went blind and had to rely on the others, she wanted to check out the stability of the ice. She noted two particularly sharpened, curved icicles—one on either side of them near the opening—were dripping. Each drop was yellowish in color and formed a small pool before running along the base of the icicles on the floor. The liquid fed the small ice pods, slowly staining them a pale amber. As the pods went amber, she detected movement, tiny microbes wriggling inside the pods.

She swore under her breath. "This isn't good."

Nicolas had continued forward a few steps in order to put the light far enough behind him for his night vision to kick in. At the top of the slope he peered down into the darkened tunnel.

"The sounds are different," Natalya said. "I don't like this."

Vikirnoff moved up beside Nicolas, surveying the only way open to them. "What do you think?" Both scanned all around them continuously.

"Something is down there waiting for us," Nicolas said. "It is unfamiliar to me, but I feel movement. I think the shadow warriors herded us into this tube for a reason and the reason is crouched in the dark, ready to attack."

Vikirnoff glanced over his shoulder. The shadow warriors had not melted away. They were holding their position and waiting for something.

Lara crouched down beside the pods, studying them carefully and then, careful not to step on them, examined the double rows of brownish icicles. She passed her palm over the formations without touching them. "These icicles are swarming with bacteria, but that's not why they're such an odd color." She leaned closer and sniffed delicately. "This is diluted blood. At least I think it is."

"Whatever is moving down there is coming this way," Nicolas warned.

For the first time since entering the cave, he felt truly trapped. Whatever was creeping toward them out of the dark, sounded, to his ears, as if it was not alone. His vision cleared as the thing got closer and at first he thought it was several large snakes, thick like anacondas. The heads were large and each opened its mouth wide, forked tongue testing the air, sniffing for prey. The snake heads looked suspiciously like the ones taken from Terry's leg.

"How many?" Vikirnoff asked. "I'm counting six visually, but hearing more behind them."

"It's only one," Nicolas corrected. "One with tentacles. I think it's planning on dragging us into its mouth."

"We are already in its mouth," Lara said.

There was a small silence while they all looked around the tube. The double rows of bloodstained icicles were teeth. The two curved teeth held venom. The mouth was a breeding ground for bacteria, all kinds of strains, many fatal. The bumps along the tongue were the nesting pods. And the tentacles reaching for them would pull them back where they could be digested.

"Vikirnoff and I will hold the tentacles back, but we have to get out of here. Find a way through the shadow warriors, Lara. You're mage."

She rolled her eyes. "Whatever happened to your women-not-fighting campaign?"

"No, we just have to fight a legion of shadow warriors," Natalya said sarcastically. "No biggie."

"You've done it before," Vikirnoff pointed out. "I think you can handle it."

"Are you certain you don't want to impregnate me and send me home while you play Superman? Because I'm all for it," Natalya said.

"The snake heads have stopped sniffing and they're coming for us," Nicolas said. "You might want to get on those shadow warriors right now."

"As my absolute hero in
The Abyss
would say, 'Keep your pantyhose on.' " Natalya sniffed indignantly. "Come on, Lara, let's show them how to fight a shadow warrior."

Lara reluctantly followed her aunt back toward the double rows of teeth. "Be careful, don't step on the pods. I think this is parasite breeding ground, not the microbes. I'm fairly certain that laboratory was for the extremophiles. He collects them from the ice and tests them in the first few pools, mutates them and sends them into the blood and amniotic fluids so they learn to survive in those conditions. And then he lets the glacier take them down to the soil where the Carpathians rest. This thing, whatever it is, breeds his parasites. Look at them wiggling inside the pods." She was very suspicious that the yellow-colored venom feeding the pods was the same liquid injected into Razvan.

"Oh dear," Natalya quipped. "I do believe we re inside mommy dearest."

The tiny maggots became excited, even agitated when they stepped close to the pods.

Behind them, the first attack came. Nicolas and Vikirnoff fashioned swords of ice, spreading out to give themselves room to maneuver, hovering inches from the floor in order to keep from stepping on the pods littered all over what had to be the creatures tongue. The huge heads bobbed and ducked, slashing from side to side. The attack was well-coordinated, the heads moving in a mesmerizing pattern, like a cobra hypnotizing its prey.