Jacques reached for the organ, tore it free, and flung it far from the vampire. “You are dead, vampire, and you go, I hope, to some semblance of peace. The crimes you have committed against me and my family are avenged. You go to meet your God and his mercy. I feel none toward you. You would have taken her with you had you been able to do so. Carpathian justice has been dispensed.”
Rand staggered forward, his gray face slack, tainted blood flowing freely. His mouth working convulsively, he fell to his knees. Jacques leapt back from the thrashing body, careful that the grasping claws did not touch him, that not one speck of the dark blood splattered on him. His hand was burning as he wiped it clean in the shriveling grass.
The air around them stilled, the wind completely silent. The earth seemed to groan. An eerie steam rose from the wriggling body, mixed with a noxious odor. Jacques instinctively moved farther away from the spectacle. Vampires died hard; all fought to overcome death with every trick they had. The tainted blood trickled across the ground toward Jacques’ boots, guided by the dying vampire’s last evil thoughts. Jacques watched without emotion as the vampire crawled toward him, inched his way closer and closer, his face twisted with depravity, with hatred.
Jacques shook his head. “You hated yourself, Rand. You hated yourself all these years. All of you had to do was find the courage to follow her. Maggie would have saved your soul.”
Low, pitiful growls escaped from the hideous mouth, blood spewed forth, and Rand collapsed in front of Jacques, still reaching for him, still determined in his last moment to kill.
Jacques inhaled sharply, caught his first whiff of fresh, clean air, and knew the vampire had fully expired. With a little sigh he carried the bodies of the hunters to an open area and carefully collected what dry branches he could find. There could be no evidence left of this night. The vampire, too, had to be completely consumed by the fire so that there was no chance the tainted blood could find a way to revive him. The power of the vampire’s blood was incredible.
Weakness was becoming an increasing concern for Jacques. The fight had used up his last energies, and he still had to create and maintain a huge conflagration in the midst of a rain-soaked forest.
The wolf howled again, this time much closer, obviously loping toward the scene of death and destruction, perhaps drawn by the smell of blood. Jacques scored the earth with a lightning bolt, directing it along the river of blood. No creature needed the madness of that fluid in its belly.
An unusually large, rare, golden wolf trotted out of the timberline, circled the area warily, and sat down on its haunches only feet from Jacques. It watched him steadily with its strange golden eyes, completely unafraid. It seemed not to be affected by the fire, the lightning, or the Carpathian male. Jacques watched the animal equally intently, certain he was facing more than a wolf. The creature did not make an attempt to use the common mental path to communicate. It simply watched him, taking in the bizarre scene, the golden eyes never wavering.
A humorless smile curved Jacques’ hard mouth. “If you are looking for action tonight, I am too tired to oblige you, and far too hungry.”
The wolf’s shape contorted, stretched, shimmered in the smoke of the fire, and soon a large, heavily muscled man was facing Jacques. His long, shaggy mane of hair was blond, his eyes golden, his body perfectly balanced. “You are Jacques, brother to Mikhail. I heard you were dead.”
“That is the story going around,” Jacques assented warily.
“You have no memory of me? I am Julian, brother to Aidan. I have been away these last long years. The far-off mountains, the places without people, are my home.”
“The last I heard, you were fighting wars in distant lands.”
“When the mood is upon me, I fight where it is needed,” Julian agreed. “I see you do also. The vampire lies dead, and you are pale beyond imagination.”