Pleasure of a Dark Prince (38 page)

“So El Dorado is no’ a man.”

In a soft tone, Lucia said, “She’s La Dorada, the Gilded
Woman
. History had it wrong. Really wrong.”

“Makes sense.”

“What do you mean?”

“Say you were a conquistador, hunting for the Gilded One’s gold, yet the native was clever enough to keep a tomb full of it hidden. A native—a
woman
native— somehow outwits you?” He shook his head. “Back in the day, I met a few gold-hungry conquistadors, and let’s put it this way—the fragility of conquistador ego canna be overstated.”

“She was smart and kept her gold.” Lucia gazed down almost
fondly
. “How evil could she be?”

“Does no’ matter. Let’s get what we came for.”

With that, they began scouring every inch of the chamber, passing by more riches than he could ever have imagined. But they found no weapons.

Finally, in a shadowy corner, he spied an archery quiver, coated with dust. Inside was a single arrow. Not gold. Not beautiful. But something about it drew him. He sensed…
power
. “Come, Lousha. I think I’ve found your dieumort.” He collected the battered quiver, brushing away the accumulated layers of dust.

With a look of breathless excitement, she hurried to his side. Then her face fell. “No, this can’t be right.
Wood?
No way!”

“Maybe you’re to fight an old evil with an old arrow?”

When he drew it out, she said, “MacRieve, the arrowhead is
bone
! Look at those old-fashioned flights—were those feathers plucked from a dodo bird?”

“Come, then, hold it.”

She reluctantly accepted it from him. And her dark eyes widened.

“You feel something with it, no? Some power?”

“I do,” she admitted. “But wood and bone?”

“Trusted stand-bys for euphemisms
and
arrows.”

“MacRieve! It’d be like Serena Williams going to Wimbledon with a flyswatter.”

“Aye, but if she were as good as you are at shooting, she’d still win.”

At that, Lucia gave him a coaxed smile. “You’re right, werewolf. Schwag-looking arrow or not, I’ll take it.” She slipped it into her thigh quiver.

In a solemn tone, he said, “You chose wisely.” Then he added, “I’m relieved it is no’ gold. I dinna want to alarm you, but my Instinct was screaming warnings about this. Now, we can take it without waking an ancient evil. So, as far as afternoons-after go, this is looking up.”

She chuckled, leaping into his arms, kissing him soundly on the lips. “We did it!”

He grunted. “Easy, lass, go easy on the ribs.”

“Oh, sorry!”

She slid down, and just that was enough to make even his battered body stir. With a steadying breath, he set her away. “Let’s get you out of here.” On their way to the entrance, he thought he heard something and turned back to the sarcophagus. “Did you hear that?”

But she was already jogging ahead, chattering happily.

“Wait, Lousha!” He would’ve been right behind her… but he could have sworn he’d heard something
moving
.

FORTY-THREE

Lucia couldn’t stop a grin as she exited the tomb. The arrow might be unremarkable
looking
—hardly the golden one of her dreams—but she’d sensed its latent power.

In fact, Lucia had never felt the like.

Last night in the skiff, she’d thought she was finished. This morning she’d lost all hope; now she was back in the game and in a better position than she’d ever been.
I’m going to destroy my nightmare.
How many beings had that opportunity? To rid herself—and the world— of an abomination.

At the thought, her aggression, her darkness, surfaced, filling Lucia with the need for raw violence. She
wanted
to kill Cruach, to hurt him.

Her path was clear: journey to the Northlands where Cruach’s lair was located, meet up with Regin, then execute a god. All she had to do was lose MacRieve in Iquitos—

A vampire appeared out of thin air, not twenty feet from her.

Lothaire.
Just there, standing in the canopy’s shade. She’d been right—he
had
been aboard the
Barão
. Though his face was expressionless, she sensed his menace. She had her bow up and her arrow shot so fast it was a blur, but he traced out of the way with incredible speed.

The arrow whizzed off into the distance.

I… missed.
Preparing for the crippling pain, she shut her eyes and awaited it….
Still waiting.
She cracked open her eyes. Nothing.

Because Skathi has no hold on me—

Suddenly, Lothaire did. He’d traced behind her, grabbing her around the neck in a tight choke hold.

Getting sick of males grabbing my neck!

In his thick Russian accent, he commanded, “Drop the bow, Valkyrie. Or I’ll trace you from this place.”

In the blink of an eye, he could teleport her to the Horde dungeons. She unwillingly tossed her bow beside her pack. “I knew it was you aboard the
Barão
.”

MacRieve exited the tomb just then.
“Let her go.”
His beast flickered, his fangs lengthening. Pale blue eyes evaluated, spying for any weakness in Lothaire.

“Come closer, and I’ll punish her,” the vampire said, so coolly. To Lucia, he asked, “You’re hunting for a dieumort?”

“Aye, take it,” MacRieve bit out. “Just doona hurt her.”

“I’m not here for that, but for something much more interesting. Back inside, Archer.”

She resisted. “Lothaire, we’re here to stop an apocalypse, a real end-of-the-world scenario.”

As if she hadn’t spoken, he said, “Take me to the Gilded One.
Now.
”

She hesitated until MacRieve gave her a quick nod. “Do it.”

Lucia saw no choice but to comply. With the vampire’s arm a constant pressure around her neck, she headed back inside to the chamber.

MacRieve followed, a continual low growl in his throat.

“Don’t you care that we’re averting an apocalypse?” she asked Lothaire. “Don’t you have anyone on this earth you’d prefer, oh, I don’t know,
not
to die?”

The pressure on her neck increased. At her ear, the vampire grated, “You don’t know me, Valkyrie.” His voice was low, ominous. “You don’t know what I care about.”
So chilling.

“We’re not supposed to take any treasure or disturb the Gilded One,” she heedlessly continued. “Or else we’ll wake an ancient evil.” As soon as she spoke the words, she cringed. Like he would care—he
was
an ancient evil. He’d probably think,
The more the merrier.

When they returned to the chamber, of all the treasures inside, Lothaire’s attention grew riveted to a plain golden ring—on La Dorada’s thumb. The one
on her person
.

“You can’t take that, vampire!” Lucia said. “If you remove anything from her body, we’ll all be doomed.”

“Will
we
?” Amusement. Never relinquishing his hold on Lucia, he reached down, snapping La Dorada’s thumb clean from her body.

Lucia gasped.

“Why
that
ring, Lothaire?” MacRieve demanded. “Of all these riches?”

“There’s no accounting for taste.” He shoved the finger and gold band into his pants pocket.

“Bastard! You can’t take that from here,” Lucia cried, still in his grip. “You don’t understand—it will set off traps. We’ll
all
be killed.”

She felt Lothaire shrug behind her. “Then it’s fortunate that I can trace.”

“Not if I can help it.” She grabbed his arms, sinking her claws into them. “You’re not taking that ring, vampire!”

“Lousha,
no
! Doona fight him!” As MacRieve charged for them, Lothaire’s hands flew up. Lucia felt pressure, then heard an uncanny crack.

Then came darkness.

As Garreth ran for her, he saw it all as if in slow motion.

With no hint of expression, the vampire calmly gripped her chin and the back of her head and snapped her neck. The pop of bone was deafening.

Lucia’s limp body dropped. With a roar, MacRieve tackled thin air; Lothaire had traced twenty feet down the corridor.

“I told you not to come closer,” the vampire said. “She’s been punished.”

Garreth bellowed in fury, but the vampire was already gone. At once, he heard whirring gears.
The traps…

“Lousha, wake up, baby.” She couldn’t be killed like this. She couldn’t—but who knew in the Lore? He’d also never thought his cousin would marry a witch or that the Lykae queen would be a vampire!

From outside came the deep crackling sound of rocks breaking. The tomb began shaking, gold tiles raining from the ceiling. Garreth clutched Lucia’s limp body, cupping her lolling head, and tore down the corridor.

Once he reached the tomb entrance, he could barely see—stone dust filled the air. The levees were self-destructing! Walls were collapsing, water shooting through. With no mortar, they’d crumble like a sand castle.

The city was about to be wiped out. About to be bombarded with water, boulders, and four-ton anacondas.

Which left him with two choices: hole up in one of the temples, trying to shelter her body from the impact, or run for it with her, leaving her completely unprotected….

FORTY-FOUR

Howler monkeys screeching. Boulders knocking together. The very ground quaking.

In and out of consciousness, Lucia dimly perceived that MacRieve had her in a fireman’s hold, spread over his shoulder, hanging upside down. He’d yelled, “Oh, fook this!” snatched up her gear, and then he’d taken off running.

With his every step, pain spiked through one spot in her neck. The rest of her body was numb.

As he sprinted down the cobbled path, the totems flanking it began to topple, giant dominoes collapsing. MacRieve ducked and sidestepped while they crashed all around them.

Then came a minefield of those huge ceiba trees exploding up from the rupturing ground, their roots shooting out like grasping arms.

Lucia could do nothing to help him.

When MacRieve leapt once, then directly again, she gaped down. Beneath them, crevasses in the earth fissured, opening and closing like gills….

At last, against all odds, MacRieve made it to the levees. He scrabbled up, scaling the rock wall even as it crumbled. Vines snapped, whipping as though alive. Every time she thought he’d gotten his footing, stones would disappear, plummeting below. On each side of them, unimaginable water pressure shot rocks like they were cannonballs. Directly above them, water jetted with a bullet’s velocity.

“Just hold on, lass,” he told her. “I’ll get us out of this.” He added in a mutter,
“Somehow.”

With that, she blacked out once more.

The next time she woke, he was laying her flat in the bottom of the skiff. Then she dimly heard him trying to start the engine, again and again. “Come on, fire, you little bugger!”

It roared to life—they’d be saved!

“Can you hear me, Lousha?” he asked as he got them under way.

She blinked open her eyes, squinting against the afternoon sun streaming in through branches. With a frown, she lifted her head—

Pain radiated through her neck, then down her back. “Ow!”

“Damn it, stay put!”

She couldn’t move her head without pain, could only look straight up. Probing her neck, she cried, “That hurts!”

“Then stop
doing
it. Just lie still for a bit.”

“Are we safe yet?”

“Uh, no, no’ as such.”

She could hear the propeller churning, could smell the engine smoking, and yet the branches overhead weren’t moving. The boat was staying in place? Ah, gods, the river was equalizing, and they were caught in the current. “We’re about to be sucked back into the necropolis, aren’t we?”

“Oh, aye.”

Come on, come on!
Garreth inwardly commanded. But how much more could this engine take?

She’d been quiet for long moments. “
Now
are we safe?”

Just as he’d muttered, “No’ yet,” the current released them at last. The boat shot forward, freed. He briefly closed his eyes in relief.