Raven actually had to shake off the compulsion to do as he wished. She glared at him. “Don’t even try that with me, Gregori.” She included Mikhail in her stare. “And you, you big lunk, you would have gone along with him like the tree-swinging macho man you are. Watch these guys, Shea, they’re impossible. They’ll do anything to get their way.”
Shea found herself smiling. “So I’ve noticed.” It was reassuring to see that Raven had learned to hold her own with the men. Shea was every bit as strong.
“I can’t leave Byron out there to suffer the same fate as Jacques,” Raven insisted stubbornly. She looked beyond Gregori to Shea for support. “We can’t.”
Shea had seen firsthand what the human butchers were capable of, and she could no more leave Byron to such a fate than she could walk away from Jacques. She nodded in agreement. “Once we have Byron’s location, you men can go after him. I’ll stay with Raven, and we’ll wait for you here. The vampire can’t come out with the sun up, and we have guns if the humans show up.”
“In any case, Mikhail, you know you could protect us from humans, even from a distance,” Raven reminded him.
“Shea is right, healer.” Jacques suddenly threw his support to the women. He owed Byron. He could not allow anyone to suffer as he had. He glanced at Gregori. “You knew Raven and Mikhail were in trouble when their minds were connected to Byron’s. What is it? How does the vampire trap us?”
“He ensnared Raven and me through Byron, a monumental feat,” Mikhail admitted. Then he rubbed his jaw ruefully. “Is it possible, little brother, you enjoyed hitting me just a bit too much?”
Jacques’ teeth gleamed white in the semblance of a smile. He could not help but admire Mikhail’s coolness in the midst of a threat as lethal as the healer’s and the vampire’s combined. To be able to joke, to put aside the ego of the Carpathian male, was nothing short of a miracle. Fragments of memory rushed over him, memories of greatness, of a powerful being dedicated to the preservation of their people. His arms crept around Shea, his anchor to reality, his bridge from his lost past to the present. Shea responded at once, so in tune with him she needed no second hint. She leaned into him immediately, flooding his mind with warmth and soothing comfort.
“There is a root,” Gregori explained. “One can grind it into a fine powder, mix it with two types of berries and sage. It is boiled until it becomes thick, all liquid evaporated, and the remaining gel is then mixed with the venom from a tree toad. I am positive the vampire is using it. The recipe is an ancient one and lost to all but those of us who studied alchemy and black magic. I know of only two others besides me who would have this knowledge.”
“Aidan,” Mikhail said softly. “Or Julian.”
“It cannot be,” Gregori denied. “I would feel their presence in our land. Even changed, I would know either of them.”
“What exactly does this drug do?” Shea asked. The identity of the vampire seemed secondary; she was far more intrigued with the results of such a mixture as Gregori described. She had studied plants and herbs extensively. Common ones like foxglove and rhododendrons could produce paralysis. She knew, too, that toad venom of itself could be lethal. Certain tribes in various parts of the world had discovered its properties and used it to tip their darts, spears, and arrows. Somehow the blend of root and berries and toxin must paralyze the nervous system, even affect the mind. “How is it administered?”
“It has to be in the bloodstream,” Gregori said.
“Who could get close enough to inject a Carpathian? Even a vampire cunning enough to disguise his true self would not have the strength to overcome someone of Jacques’ stature. It is inconceivable;’ Mikhail said. “Jacques was a hunter, a dispenser of justice. At the time the murders were decimating our people, he would have been doubly cautious.”
“The vampire tricked him. It is the usual weapon of a deceiver, is it not?” Gregori informed them calmly. “Dawn is here. We must hurry.”