Total pages in book: 153
Estimated words: 141492 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 707(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 472(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 141492 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 707(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 472(@300wpm)
The memory seeped out from under that partially open door in his mind and crept beneath that twisted gray veil before he could shut it down. There was a reason he hadn’t remembered his past—a reason it had been locked away. A reason those scars on his body hadn’t meant anything to him.
Betrayal. He whispered the truth to Benedek. How can there be forgiveness?
Benedek was again silent, but Petru had his complete attention. Petru didn’t continue, didn’t look further into those memories. The sun would sink soon, and they would be streaking toward Dellys and his lifemate. If he was going to get to her in time to save her life, he would have to use every means possible to get around the vampires seeking to delay him.
Petru? What is wrong? I have been scanning around us, and I do not feel danger near.
That was Nicu Dalca, another constant companion now, grim-faced, gray-eyed, with long black hair tied back in leather cords. He had a scar that ran from his left temple to his eye. His muscles were sleek and powerful. Lightning-fast in a fight, he had an affinity with animals. He would spend long periods of time off in the wilds with them. They would spy for him and always guarded him if he was close.
Petru? Benedek prompted.
What was the use of holding back? His traveling companions were risking their lives to help him. They deserved to know everything. He had a code of honor. He held himself and those around him to a high standard. He refused to shrink from telling them the truth of what he found disturbing in the memories returning to him.
As you are aware, Vasilisa read the tarot cards for me before we set out on this journey. She said the scars on my chest were a map to my lifemate. Once she said that to me, each time I passed my palm over the scars, I began to have disturbing memories. Bits and pieces of past battles. Far in the past. Creatures such as those we fought with Adalasia and Vasilisa, only far more aggressive. Humans fought valiantly, but those creatures tore through them.
Benedek broke into the explanation. Perhaps it would be wise to include the triplets in the conversation if you believe this will change our course of action.
I believe someone knows my lifemate exists in Dellys and wants to destroy her before I can get to her. I have been remembering a terrible battle that changed the course of my life. Someone else survived that battle and is rising once again. They are aware of my return and seek to prevent me from interfering with their plans.
Nicu stirred in their minds. I am catching glimpses of this dark battle in your mind, Petru. I agree that you should share the information with Mataias, Tomas and Lojos. You are the best of us at outthinking any enemy. If you talk out the details of what we will face and what you expect now, before you claim your lifemate and emotions interfere, we will have a solid plan to defeat him.
There was wisdom in Nicu’s advice. Nicu was a man who spent a great deal of time alone, away even from the other ancients he traveled with, and he rarely spoke, but when he did, Petru always found he made sense. He put out the call to wake the triplets. They were never far from one another. They had not spent time in the monastery with him, but he knew them.
They were scary predators, disappearing into the mist, not as molecules but as fully formed Carpathians. The three of them moved in complete synchronization, as if they were one person, in utter silence, cunningly intelligent and eerily frightening in their abilities to fight the undead.
They shared the same body type: tall, with broad shoulders, long chestnut-colored hair at odds with their brilliant aquamarine-colored eyes. Each had their own scarring from the battles they’d fought over the centuries. Tomas had strange tear-shaped scarring on the right side of his face from his hairline to his jaw. Lojos had a web of scarring running from his left shoulder, down his arm, all the way to his hand. Mataias had no visible scars on his face or arms, but Petru had seen his back and chest where vampires had done their best to carve through his chest to extract his heart. It said quite a lot about him that he had survived.
Petru shared with the three the concerns he’d conveyed to Nicu and Benedek. The more I am able to trace the scars on my chest, the more the door in my mind opens and allows me to remember more details of the battle in the past. I was in Dellys centuries ago. I was not alone. My family was with me. My father and mother. Two brothers. There were three other families with us.