Christine Feehan 5 CARPATHIAN NOVELS

by Christine Feehan

  Manolito’s first thought was to kill in self-preservation. He was weak from hunger and already dripping precious blood. The wisest and safest course of action would be to end the battle quickly. Respect for the rain forest’s strongest predator made him hold back. He and his brothers had always lived in harmony with the creatures of the forest. He would not take this animal’s life if there was another choice.

  He growled a warning, clearly telling the male to back off. Testing the air, he could find no female leaving scent that might give the cat added incentive to fight.

  The jaguar circled Manolito’s powerful furred body, showing teeth and rumbling with challenge. Hoping to subdue the animal, Manolito leapt. The jaguar rushed to meet him, slashing with stiletto-like claws even as Manolito reached for the mind of the beast. The jungle erupted into an explosion of sound as the two cats came together.

  Birds screamed and took to the air, high in the canopy above. Monkeys shrieked warnings and threw twigs and leaves down on the two jaguars as they rolled in the vegetation. Boughs broke beneath the heavy bodies, scattering debris into a thick cloud around them. Manolito pushed past the red rage in the cat’s mind and tried to find the spirit of the animal as he kept its lethal fangs from sinking into him.

  Jaguars possessed extremely flexible spines that allowed them to turn and twist, move their legs in lateral sideswipes, even change direction in midair. And the ropes of muscles all over their bodies gave them tremendous strength. Manolito took another vicious rake on his side as he tried to focus on calming the cat.

  He pushed harder, breaking through the wall of rage and found—man. This was no jaguar. This was one of the rare and solitary jaguar-men who still made their homes in the rain forest. The Carpathians and the jaguar people had always lived in harmony, avoiding one another, yet this one had deliberately attacked.

  Manolito dissolved and took his human form, this time from the comparative safety of a distance away. Cats could cover amazing distances in a single leap, and the jaguar people had cunning and strength beyond normal. He stood, breathing hard, watching for any signs of aggression as the cat faced him, sides heaving, a snarl on its face.

  “I know you are a man. You will die here if you continue. You cannot use my respect for the jaguar to defeat me. Why have you broken our unspoken treaty?” He deliberately pitched his voice soft, calming, a mesmerizing tone of notes to aid in soothing the cat’s temper.

  The jaguar bared teeth, but held his ground, the eyes never leaving Manolito’s face, as if he was just waiting for one moment of weakness that would give him an advantage. And Manolito was weak. He held the pain of his wounds at bay and ignored the raging hunger nearly consuming him. The scent of blood was heavy in the air. Both jaguars had been torn, and droplets showered bright spots of crimson over the leaves. Deliberately the jaguar licked at the blood drops, to remind Manolito that he had scored.

  Manolito exploded into action, ice-cold fury washing over him at the insulting taunt. He leapt on the animal’s back, knees digging tightly into the banded muscle, legs nearly crushing the animal as he locked his ankles under the belly. One arm snaked around the thick neck in a half nelson to drag the head up. He sank his teeth deep into the jugular and drank. The animal tensed with resistance, but the man inside the cat form forced stillness, realizing Manolito could—and would—rip out his throat.

  The hot blood pumped into his starving body, soaking into tissue and cells, and rejuvenating muscles. For a moment he was flooded with euphoria, the adrenaline-laced blood too rich and addictive when he’d been so long without and so very closing to turning.

  So good. Do not stop. Feel the rush. Do not stop. There is nothing like it in the world. Join us, brother. Be with us. Take it all. Every drop.

  Manolito heard several voices whispering the temptation. The buzzing in his head grew louder until it was almost painful. It is forbidden to take a life.

  A cat only. Nothing to one such as you. He attacked you. Why should you give him his life when he would have killed you?

  The enticement was strong. Hot, rich blood. And he was starving. The cat had attacked him first. It would still kill him, given the chance, even now, when he had spared its life.

  Although he felt the difference in his body, he felt sick again, as if his stomach was cramping, which didn’t make sense. Insects buzzed in his ears, loud and obnoxious, but when he wished them away, the noise didn’t abate. Around him the ground rolled, as if an earthquake had taken place deep beneath the soil. His gut rolled with it.

  You need strength. The cat wounded you. You need blood to heal, and it is so good. Drink, brother. Drink it all. The persuasive whispers continued.

  Beneath him, the cat began to shake. The man prowling within the animal shouted something unintelligible, something human.

  Human. He could not kill while feeding.

  Not human. A cat. Tear its throat out. Rejoice in the power. Feel it, brother, feel the absolute power of a life ebbing away beneath your hands. Be what you were always meant to be—what you are.

  What was he? A killer? Yes. There was no doubt he had killed so many times he could no longer remember all the faces. Where was he? He looked around, and for a moment the rain forest was gone and he was surrounded by shadowy forms, the stretched and knotted fingers of the dead pointing accusingly. Branches clacked together like brittle white bones, sending a shiver down his spine.

  He killed—yes. But not like this. It was wrong. Self-defense was one thing. And there was justice and honor in dispatching a fallen brother when he had given his soul over to evil, but murder while feeding was against everything he believed. No. Whatever, whoever, was trying to get him to kill was no friend.

  It took discipline to take only what he needed to survive, only what he needed to push past the beast’s barriers and lay open the mind of the man hidden inside. He swept his tongue across the punctures to seal them and dissolved into vapor, only to reappear a distance away, taking a careful look into the shadows around him. Were those faces in the shadows, peering through the leaves and coming up out of the ground? Were vampires lurking? He shifted onto the balls of his feet, ready for anything. The jaguar roared, drawing his attention back to the danger closest to him.

  Manolito forced a careless smile. “You have the taste of my blood in your mouth. And I have the taste of yours. You have information I seek. You tried to kill me and I owe you no quarter.”

  The cat remained motionless, not a muscle moving, eyes focused intently on Manolito.

  The jaguar people were as elusive and secretive as the great cats, and like their animal part—or because of it—they preferred the dense rain forest near streams and riverbanks. They were rarely encountered and, most likely, were stealthy enough and too familiar with the rain forest to ever be seen unless they wished it. The men, like the animal, were heavily built and enormously strong. They had tremendous night vision and excellent hearing. They were good tree climbers and strong swimmers. Little was known of their society, although Manolito knew they had bad tempers when aroused.

  Before he probed deep into the brain of the jaguar, the hunter took another slow, careful look around him, scanning as he did so. The voices hadn’t completely abated, whispering in his ear, urging him to kill. The shadows his sight couldn’t quite penetrate seemed to hold a thousand secrets. Something slithered across the ground, just under the surface, displacing dirt as it moved. His mouth went dry.

  The jaguar shifted, crouching a little lower, muscles bunching, drawing Manolito’s instant attention. Centuries of hunting in dangerous situations kept his face expressionless, his eyes flat and cold and his mouth a little cruel. “Dare to attack, cat-man, and I will have no mercy for you.” And he wouldn’t. Not with the vampires closing in around him. He would have no time for mercy, not if he wanted to live.

  The blood Manolito had taken from the jaguar-man enabled him to follow the brain pattern, push past the last of the shields to extract information. Hatred, deep and violent, t
oward Carpathians. The need to find and destroy them. A sense of betrayal and righteous anger. Puzzled, Manolito probed deeper. The two species had never been great friends, but neither had they been enemies. They held different values, but had always managed to respect each other’s society.

  There was a touch there in the memories. A dark stain. Something off. He examined it carefully. The spot was very dark in the center, but rings formed around it, lighter in color, stretching out to encompass the entire brain of the jaguar-man. The closer Manolito got to the spreading discoloration, the more agitated and disturbed the jaguar became.

  The moment Manolito merged, as soft a touch as he used, he felt evil shift, become aware of him. Around him the shadows swelled and took form. Within the jaguar’s brain the blemish stirred as if disturbed. He backed off, not wanting to rouse the ire of the cat any further. The animal was shaking, fur wet and dark as its sides heaved. The man was beginning to lose the battle for control of the beast.

  “You have been touched by the vampire,” Manolito said, his voice low and carrying the ring of truth. “I can try to aid you to rid yourself of the poisonous influence, but it will fight to keep ahold of you.” And it would leave him vulnerable to attack, perhaps even from the jaguar. It was a risk, not even a good one, but Manolito felt compelled to help. The jaguar species, both man and beast, was losing the battle for existence just as the Carpathian species was. And Manolito very much feared that the De La Cruz brothers had unwittingly played a large part in the destruction of the jaguar people.

  The man stayed quiet within the jaguar. Tied to him by blood, Manolito could feel his alarm. He was no young man, cocky and full of bravado; he was old enough to know the danger of the vampire, and he had been questioning what was happening among his kind for some time. The cat crouched low and nodded the broad head, the gaze shifting from Manolito to their surroundings, as mindful of the danger as the Carpathian.

  In the canopy above them, the leaves rustled ominously. Clouds moved across the dark skies, bringing the promise of more rain. Already the air was heavy with moisture and the rivers and streams were swollen beyond the banks. Water poured over rocks and out of banks and made waterfalls where there had been none before. Most of the water was white and bubbling, but on the edges of the rocks, the water was stained with tannin and appeared a dull reddish brown.

  Manolito took a deep breath and pulled his gaze away from the blood-colored water, and let his air out, breathing away everything but the task at hand. He had to let go of his physical body, making himself incredibly vulnerable to a potential enemy already occupied by the vampire. It was much more difficult than he expected, now that he could feel emotion and it mattered that he stayed alive.

  The dark spot in the jaguar-man’s brain recoiled, minute wormlike creatures writhing as his spirit entered the other man, bathing the brain in white-hot energy. Manolito heard the jaguar roar and the man hiss out a warning. Manolito hesitated, afraid of injuring the warrior.

  Do it. I do not want that thing inside of me.

  Manolito attacked the stain, breaching the outer rings and burning them clean with healing light. The tiny parasites tried to dig deeper into the brain in an effort to escape. As they scattered, Manolito could see to the core of the jaguar-man. The parasites tried to keep the light out of the jaguar-man’s memories and hide what the vampire had done, but, unexpectedly, the jaguar-man joined his strength with Manolito’s, using his well-developed telepathic abilities and their newly established blood tie.

  He opened his memories to Manolito and flooded him with as much information as possible. His name was Luiz. For many years he’d worked to restore the dwindling strength of his species. Too many of their women had left, seeking companionship and love with human males rather than the careless abandonment of their own males. He’d influenced the others to follow the way of the Carpathians and mate for life, to provide a home and a family, a reason for women to stay with them. At first, many had gone along with his ideas and had begun to give up their solitary way of life, but recently, they had become divided in their thinking, as a slow, subtle change occurred.

  Packs of men had begun committing terrible crimes against women. A “new order” of jaguars had begun searching for women of their kind and raping them in an effort to have pureblood children. Luiz hadn’t known of the horrors, other than unconfirmed rumors, for the first few years, but now more and more men had joined the bands of marauding rebels. He feared not only for the women, but for their entire species. What woman would want to be with men who did such terrible things? He had heard that some of the women now were rescuing those in captivity. Their world had turned upside down, and Luiz had never once considered a vampire might be at work. Now it all made sense.

  Vampire. The vilest creature on the face of the earth. Since when had they tried to kill off an entire species? Manolito knew. He and his brothers had once known the Malinov brothers. Sadness crept in. The five Malinov brothers had been best friends with his family. Now it seemed as if they may have all turned vampire. The idea of losing all of them was distressing now that he was capable of emotion. With the Malinov brothers, they had spent many hours discussing how they could take over ruling the Carpathian people. The possibilities of destroying an entire species, allies of the prince, had been a hot topic of conversation. In the intellectual debate, they had devised many ways, and one had been to influence self-destructive behavior, to capitalize on a species’ weakness. Just as the jaguar society had done.

  When their prince had sent them out into the world, away from their native land to protect humans, the subject had once again come up. In the end, the De La Cruz brothers had sworn to serve their prince and people. Once their word was given, no De La Cruz would ever go back, given a choice. The Malinov brothers had done the same.

  Manolito was careful to keep that information to himself. Just the talk of betraying the prince had been bad enough and he was ashamed. He had never felt shame before and it was an uncomfortable emotion.

  You were right all those years ago. The voices whispered once again in his mind. You and your brothers should have followed your own path completely. You allowed a weaker man to reign, to lead our people down a path of destruction. Had Zacarias ruled, the Carpathian people would be thriving, not driven into the ground, hated and feared and hunted by the very people they protect.

  Manolito let out his breath in a long hiss of challenge. Show yourselves. Do not hide in the shadows. Come out where I can see you. He couldn’t maintain the energy to stay long within the jaguar-man’s body. He had to rid the man of the taint of the vampire and get back to his own unprotected body.

  There is no need to feel shame. It was a brilliant plan.

  Manolito took another breath and blocked everything out but the task at hand. The voices from the shadow world would have to wait. The jaguar-man was straining to hold the beast, keep it from leaping on Manolito and tearing apart his unprotected body.

  The hot white light, pure energy, spilled over the center of the dark stain with terrible purpose. Manolito focused his entire attention to the task, risking everything to do so, not only because it was the right thing to do, but because he wanted to make up, in some small way, for his part in the plot devised so many years earlier. What had only been an intellectual debate had at one time exploded into angry possibility, but Manolito thought they had discarded all notion of betrayal and sabotage. Obviously one or more of the Malinov brothers had decided at some point to implement the plan. Manolito had witnessed firsthand the attempts to assassinate the prince, and then to kill the women and children of the Carpathians. Now, it seemed, the enemy had also put into motion a plan to wipe out the jaguar people.

  Manolito utilized every bit of energy to fight the small threads of wriggling parasites, burning them out of their hiding places, following them as they raced through the jaguar-man’s brain in an attempt to evade the attack. It was exhausting and time-consuming work.

  When he was done and returned
to his own body, Manolito staggered and nearly went down. His earlier need for blood had barely been satisfied, and using such energy had drained him. Only iron discipline kept him on his feet.

  Beside him, the jaguar contorted. Fur rippled and muscles stretched and lengthened. The shifting of the jaguar people was different from that of the Carpathians. Skin and bands of muscle appeared; long, dark hair with streaks of gold running through it covered a noble head. A man crouched on the ground where the cat had been.

  Luiz straightened slowly until he was standing upright in front of Manolito. Like all jaguar-men, he was comfortable with his nudity, his body roped with muscles, his hair shaggy. “I apologize for attempting to take your life.” He spoke with great dignity, his eyes meeting Manolito’s without flinching, even as he gestured toward the blood dripping steadily down the hunter’s body.

  Manolito bowed slightly in acknowledgment, while keeping every sense alert for another attack. “No man is responsible for what he does under the influence of the vampire.”

  “I owe you a great debt for aiding me in getting rid of him.”

  Manolito knew better than to deny it. The jaguar-man was stiff with pride, the face edged with guilt and worry. “It must have been difficult living with such a thing when you have worked so hard to save your people from the very thing that infected you.”

  “I know the difference between right and wrong. Most of our remaining men do as well, but the vampire is like a disease. We can’t stop what we don’t see. If I go back and try to tell the others, I have no proof. I don’t have the ability, as you do, to find the taint of vampire and expel it.”

  “If you do not, there is no hope for your species,” Manolito pointed out. “Your women flee, as they should. The vampire is destroying you from the inside out.”