Dark Legacy

by Christine Feehan

  17

  The sea rocked gently back and forth, a cradle holding vast amounts of salt water. Beneath the black, glassy surface, great long arms of kelp reached first one way as the water tugged them, and then the other. The arms reached up from the ocean floor so that only the top of the canopy showed, and then only briefly.

  As she swam, Emeline caught glimpses of hidden sea life when the kelp opened the lanes. Near the surface schools of fish moved in and out of the stalks, sometimes with a barracuda or yellowtail tuna pursuing them. It was the explosion of color that made the scene so beautiful, although oftentimes, over the years, she was never certain whether or not she was adding to the vivid colors.

  Curious sea lions rocketed through the long blades, and sometimes she stopped to watch them play. Most times she swam along the rocky reef below, where pastel sea fans swayed back and forth with the surge and so many sea creatures made appearances. There were lobsters moving in and out of cracks, and octopus and moray eels peeking out of crevices. Bat rays rested in the sand, although it was night, and feeding time, so most were beginning to stir.

  The kelp forests were generally between thirty and eighty feet deep, but these went down even farther, their air-filled bulbs planted in the uneven floor. She had been here countless times and knew the way as if it was her own home. She had been exploring the kelp forest from the time she was very young. She dove down into that wondrous world, glancing sideways to ensure Dragomir was with her. She wasn't afraid; this--dreaming--was her forte. She knew exactly what she was doing--and she knew what she had to show him.

  Other than his initial shock when she'd first taken him with her, sharing her dream, he had remained silent, content to allow her to lead the way. She stayed close to the ocean floor, moving in and out of the stalks straight to the large round pipes that stretched out for miles. The pipes were very large, tall enough that a man could easily stand in them. Wide enough to allow several men to walk side by side inside of them.

  Instead of following the pipes out to the sea, staying on the floor of the ocean, she headed back toward San Diego.

  Wait, I need to follow this out. Find out what is going on.

  She stopped, turned back to him and caught at his arm, shaking her head. She'd done that already so many times. Recalling a dream, she could change the details, and she had, night after night, ever since she was a child. She had explored all the way to the end of the pipes.

  It is like the catacombs ahead. People lying in wait to be taken by the vampires. There was horror in her voice--in her mind. She couldn't do anything to save them. Or rescue them. She knew, because she'd spent months, years, trying to discover a way. In the end she'd given up and continued her explorations, trying to determine what the vampires no one believed in were up to or even--when she was so young--if they were real.

  There is nothing to be done for them. But this is where I think is most important for you to see. I thought it wasn't real because I've dreamt it for so many years, but . . . Follow me. She attempted to pour demand into her voice. She didn't have the dominant trait that allowed him to speak so softly yet command everything and everyone around him. She had to be emphatic, insistent, to get her way. She should have known better. It took her pointing in the direction she wanted to go and a quick shake of her head. He was already swimming toward her, following her lead.

  God, she loved him for the way he trusted her. She loved that everything she said or did mattered to him. She wasn't positive she'd ever fully get used to it.

  She led him along the pipes through the vast kelp forest back toward the mouth of the river. Once she was there, they found the narrow opening that ran underground and connected to the river. She swam through it and then began to swim along the bottom of the river with Dragomir right behind her.

  She was aware of him in the way she always was aware of him. It didn't matter that this was a dream that she was sharing with him, her reactions to him were the same. Every single cell in her body alerted to him. She felt beautiful. She felt sexy. She felt safe. That was all new. In her previous dreams, she'd never felt any of those things--especially safe. She'd learned even dreams could be dangerous.

  She showed him the arteries that ran beneath the ground. Deep canals that led all over the city, that led to the lake where Tariq had built his fortress. Those deep canals led to the underground city where she had helped to rescue the children from Vadim.

  Show me the lake access.

  She hesitated and knew he was aware of her reluctance. He sets traps for me.

  She felt his shock. His fingers shackled her wrist, and he brought her up against him. One arm circled her waist and he tugged until her body was pressed tight to him. What do you mean, he sets traps for you? Vadim knows you dream of these waterways? This is his method of traveling beneath the city?

  She nodded. I was too young to recognize the importance of hiding from him when I first dreamt of these waters. I didn't know where they were or what the significance was. The map is in my head now, and I can draw it out. I've explored far more than he has. I've been to places all over, places that connect from one part of the ocean to vast amounts of land.

  Why didn't you tell me immediately? Why didn't you tell Tariq?

  She winced at his tone. It was a lash, and part of her felt she deserved it. Maybe she should have told Tariq, but then she wasn't certain. She hadn't made the connection between the pipeline and the lake. She had the underground city, but not the lake. She hadn't realized the extent of Vadim's empire beneath the ground.

  I was a child when I accidentally discovered the kelp forest. It was a wonderland to a child without a home. A place I could escape. I dreamt of it as often as possible. When I first discovered the pipeline, I ignored it. Then I followed it. I had uncovered the catacombs, the dead suspended beneath the sea, in long rows of clear chambers beneath the pipes. It was something out of a horror film. I was around ten or eleven. I wasn't certain it was real.

  Sivamet. Just that one word of endearment. All the anger was gone from his voice, leaving it a purring caress.

  She loved the sound of his voice and the way it brushed over her skin, on the inside of her mind, poured into her body.

  I don't know why I kept going back. I was drawn there. Every night I told myself I wouldn't go, but I couldn't stop myself. I would explore the ocean floor over and over, swim all along the pipeline, and then one day, when I was about fourteen, I saw him. He was in the chamber below the pipe. It was the first time I ever saw anyone alive. I was elated, thinking, at last someone that isn't lying there dead. I almost came out from behind the rocks where I was hiding. Honestly, Dragomir, I'd been dreaming it for so long, I didn't know if I made it up.

  Her voice shook. She couldn't help it. She would never forget those moments of her life. It was a dream, yet, for the first time she'd feared it was real. She'd known, as she'd walked the streets in San Diego, that just out from shore, where tourists dove and paid good money for locals to take them exploring along the kelp forests, a monster had begun to build a vast empire.

  No one would have believed her had she told them. She'd tried to tell Sean McGuire, Blaze's father, that there were vampires, and he'd told her she was having nightmares. That much was true, she couldn't deny it, but the fact that she'd dreamt it hadn't helped her cause.

  Keep going. I need to understand.

  I watched as he waved his hand and awakened a woman. I thought her dead, but she was sleeping. He smiled at her and held out his hand. Her fear was so strong it radiated all the way to me. I could feel her fear and his . . . delight. He needed her fear. He fed it. Amplified it and drank it in. I swear it was like an aphrodisiac to him. When he smiled again, I saw his teeth. He grabbed her and pulled her to him. She couldn't fight him physically, but I felt her struggle. He felt it, too, and that made him ecstatic.

  She shuddered and tasted fear in her mouth the way she always did when she thought of that night. She'd watched him sink his teeth into the woman's neck
and drain her blood. When he lifted his head, there was blood all over his lips and teeth. He left it there. He turned to go and then suddenly turned back and looked straight at me. I didn't move. He strode to the glass and continued to look out. When he waved his hand, the kelp parted away from the surge, not with it. We stared at each other.

  Dragomir stroked her hair, his hands as steady as his reassuring heartbeat. So he saw you. He knew what you looked like.

  He was like a bloodhound sniffing my scent through the glass. He tried to force me to go to him, I could feel the pull of his commands, but I resisted. That shocked him. More, it aroused his curiosity. I don't think many people had resisted his compulsions.

  You would be correct. The fact that you were only fourteen would have really caught his attention. And you were in a dream. Controlling the dream. I can see why he searched for you.

  She shivered again and pressed her face to his chest. To the steady rhythm of his heart. Her anchor. I backed up and got out of there. But I couldn't stop going back.

  He drew you back.

  She bit down on her lip. Perhaps. I considered it. Eventually I began to see that he had access to so many places. I set out to find them all. Several years went by before I figured that out.

  You mapped out the underground passageways, the arteries of his highway. You know where all his underground cities are. There's more than one, isn't there?

  She nodded. When I came back from France to help Blaze find Sean's killers, I considered going to the authorities, but of course, they would have thought me crazy, and Vadim has some sway with a few of them. He'd gotten in pretty deep with some of the crime families and was developing his own using male human psychics.

  Why didn't you tell Tariq?

  I was taken to his compound after Vadim had me. I was terrified he would find out that I was pregnant. Vadim kept whispering to me that Tariq and all the other Carpathians would reject me. I was terrified to leave the compound. I knew if I left, Vadim would get me. I barely knew Tariq or any of the others, only Blaze, and I hid from her as much as possible.

  Dragomir tipped her chin up. Why didn't you tell me?

  I was going to. I needed to figure out what it all meant. I can't get that piece as much as I try. Day after day I would go out and find every passageway I could to try to find just how large his holdings were. I tried to stop dreaming at night.

  He went very still. Tried? You still dreamt at night?

  Sometimes, I couldn't help it.

  Did you have other encounters with Vadim?

  I would see him in the dream, close it down and the next time avoid that area. So yes, there were a few encounters, but I always woke up immediately if I saw him.

  Did he know about Sean McGuire and Blaze?

  She didn't like where the conversation was going. I don't know what he knew about me, only that when we would meet in the dream there was always an exchange of something, I didn't even know what. I just knew I could feel him before he was there, stronger and stronger after each encounter. But he never got close to me. He certainly didn't take my blood.

  You were afraid of him. He sounded matter-of-fact.

  Of course she had been. Who wouldn't be? She wasn't embarrassed or ashamed of being afraid of a master vampire. She nodded, uncertain where he was going with his statement.

  Very much. Every time I saw him, I was terrified. I kept thinking he would find a way to trap me.

  But he didn't. He let you move through his waterways. His personal highway. Emeline, he didn't create the map, you did. He just watched you explore it all and followed you. You knew the ways to go before he did.

  She frowned, shaking her head. That's not true. I just followed where he'd already gone. The dream . . . She trailed off, suddenly filled with doubt. Her eyes widened and one hand flew defensively to her throat. Dragomir. Are you saying I helped him?

  No, of course you didn't help him, but he found a way inside your dreams.

  And I mapped out an entire city for him. More.

  He shook his head. Don't, Emeline. He was silent for a moment, and then she saw the dawning comprehension on his face. He doesn't know. He knows the passages are there, but he doesn't know how to access them. Only you do. He needs you. Vadim has no idea of those places he wishes to go. He knows how to get in and out of the underground city, and perhaps to the lake, although I doubt that, but he needs you for the rest. That's why he's sought you out from the very beginning. He didn't know who you were until you went in for psychic testing.

  My dreams? My ability to map out the ocean floor and connect it to the rivers and lakes? To all the cities? That's what he's after?

  It's more than that. You're unusual, even among psychics. You can resist his compulsions, you can command dreams, you are so strong that even his poisonous blood can't kill you. And you can map continents for him.

  It would have killed me.

  I don't think so, Emeline. I was inside you, in your bloodstream. He kept forcing the parasites to reproduce because you kept killing them off. Your blood. If he hadn't been able to get to the parasites, you would have managed to rid your body of them, not the Carpathian way, but by building antibodies that fought them off.

  She frowned at him. I don't understand what you're saying.

  I'm saying you're of tremendous value to both sides. You know the location of Vadim's stronghold, or at least you do within your dreams,. You can produce antibodies, which, because you've shared blood with me, means I can do the same, so at some point both of us will be immune to his parasites. That means every hunter, woman and child can be made immune. It isn't just that he thought you could produce the child he wanted, you are the ultimate prize for him.

  She shook her head. She'd created a map of the arteries and veins that made up the underground rivers. She had found all the passageways beneath the ground so that one could come in by sea and go just about anywhere they wanted. She knew them all like the back of her hand. Over the years she'd gone back nightly to try to find ways to stop the vampire. Find anything that might convince others of them. She'd never even told Blaze about her underwater dream, not after Sean dismissed it as a nightmare.

  She'd been looking for a place to sleep one night when she stumbled across two vampires feeding on homeless people in a back alley. Sean had sent her to Paris, and then he'd been murdered. She'd come home to help Blaze find his killers. She'd come home, already knowing Vadim would get his hands on her and she'd be pregnant with his child by the time the others found and rescued her.

  Take me to his underground city.

  Her heart jumped. She shook her head. They guard that place. If we go near it, the chances of running into some of them are fairly high. I've tried to slip past the guards. Sometimes I make it. Most times I nearly get caught and have to wake up fast.

  If we get into trouble, you can wake up.

  She didn't like it. She was uneasy. The passageway to Vadim's underground city was narrow, an easy place to set up an ambush. She knew Vadim was angry. The moment she'd entered the dream, she felt him in the water. His rage. His need to control her, to reacquire her. She didn't want to lead Dragomir into a trap. She'd wanted to show him the extent of Vadim's stronghold.

  She knew Tariq wouldn't abandon San Diego, but once he knew what he was really up against, with the information she could provide, maybe they could find Vadim and plan an attack. She wouldn't be able to fight with the hunters, but she would at least feel as if she'd contributed something. She'd brought Dragomir with her rather than tell him, so that there would be no question whether or not she was crazy and just having nightmares.

  She had taken Dragomir to the deep but thin ribbon of water beneath the ground that fed the lake Tariq's compound bordered. She turned to swim back toward the main artery underground. As she turned, Dragomir suddenly caught her by the arm and thrust her behind him. To her horror, a shark, mouth open wide, snapped at him, catching his upper arm, spinning around and streaking through the water with him. At once
blood turned the murky water red, so Emeline, rushing after them, swam through a red tunnel.

  She didn't dare end the dream with one of Vadim's creatures holding on to him. Dragomir's body was deep beneath the earth safe, but his spirit traveled with hers through the water in her dream. She should have been more vigilant. She knew Vadim had put traps throughout the waterways. This had never happened, but then she'd never taken Dragomir with her before. She wasn't going to get a "do over." She counted on having the dream night after night to correct any mistakes she made, such as triggering a trap.

  She put on a burst of speed. One thing dreaming of swimming every night allowed her to do was to become a very fast and strong swimmer. She might not put her foot in the water when she was awake, but in her dream, she was kick-ass all the way. She also had the advantage of knowing the canals, where they were deep or shallow, where they dropped deeper into the earth, turned abruptly or lazily made an S before straightening out. She knew a few little veins that were just a trickle, with barely enough water to get through. They were shortcuts connecting one waterway to the next.

  She hated losing sight of Dragomir. He was used to relying on his Carpathian powers, but in the dream, he didn't have them. She'd been a young child unknowing of Carpathian powers when she began dreaming about the kelp forests and what lay hidden in them. Cursing herself for ever bringing him into her dream, she took the shortcut, streaking toward the wider underground river that ran out to sea.

  She reached down to her leg where she'd strapped a knife. She'd started carrying one after she first saw Vadim when she was a teenager and knew she was hunted. She laid the blade along her wrist, her fist around the hilt. As she swam, the tops of her thighs skimmed the rocks on the floor, scraping skin, but she didn't slow down. She barely felt the burn as she rounded the corner and slashed at the eye of the beast holding Dragomir in its mouth.