Dark Slayer - Christine Feehan [62]
“Raja knows I respect you.” She pinned the pack alpha with a steely gaze. “I am certain he will accept you.” Because if the wolf didn’t, she might have a few private words with him.
Raja snorted and then gave her a wolfish grin, his tongue lolling out of his mouth as if he might be laughing. Razvan smiled. With a casual tear of his teeth, he sliced open his wrist and offered it to the big male wolf without hesitation.
Ivory tensed. Raja leaned his head toward the welling blood and sniffed before giving a tentative lick. His mouth clamped on the wrist unexpectedly, teeth sinking deep.
She murmured the binding words softly in the ancient language.
Nó me elidaban, nó me kalmaban—As we are in life we are in death.
Elid elided—Life to life.
Siel sieled—Soul to soul.
Me juttaak, me kureak—Life to life.
Me juttaak, me kureak—We are bound together as one.
Triumph swept through Razvan. He was part of something. He belonged. Ivory’s acceptance of him was far more reluctant than the alpha wolf’s. The wolf respected her mate. Had fought in battle with him, saw no hesitation and that he was quick to shield and protect Ivory. Ivory might accept Razvan as a warrior—at least one to train—but as her mate, that was something altogether different.
Razvan hid a smile as Ivory turned away from them, frowning a little as she fed the females. She kept her back to Razvan, shutting him out as she talked to the wolves, allowing him to reach for the mind of the wolves himself. He found Raja to be very intelligent, a strong strategist and capable leader. His second in command, Blaez, was a very serious wolf. He liked Blaez’s personality very much. And then there was Farkas, the male the vampire had attacked and injured so severely. Farkas’s body had been repaired in the healing soil, but craved rich Carpathian blood to complete the process.
Razvan staggered when Farkas finally licked across the wounds to seal them. He sank down beside the wolf. “You do this every night?”
She shook her head. “We are very careful not to rise every night. It is probably unnecessary after all these years, but without three consecutive nights in the soil, my body refused to function properly, so I still am cautious. In truth, I have not had problems in a long while, but I do not care to risk it.”
Razvan’s brows drew together. “What kinds of problems?”
Ivory sank to the floor beside him as the smallest female closed the laceration on her wrist. “Nothing big. Walking. Running. Coordination mainly. My muscles were cut into pieces and they need to be strengthened.”
“You should have told the healer.”
A faint, haughty look crept into her expression. “I have never needed the healer or anyone else to survive. If I have need of the soil, it is there for me.” She shrugged. “Besides, it is better for us not to be out much. The less we leave, the less chance of a vampire or hunter stumbling across the lair. I have much work to do here. We go out for a hunt and run, and then we stay in a few days. It has worked out well for us. I will need to go out to feed for both of us. It will take a few hours as I have to travel a distance from our lair.”
“Not without me.”
“There is no need for both to go. Xavier is actively hunting you, using every resource at his disposal. You cannot leave traces for him to find you.”
“Not without me,” he repeated, his tone mild.
She narrowed her eyes. “That is so silly.”
“So was refusing the healer’s help, but you had your reasons. I have mine.”
“You do not like anyone giving you blood,” she guessed, shrewdly. “You are Carpathian. You need blood to survive.”
“I am well aware of that.”
His tone never changed. Reasonable. Pleasant. Gentle even. She gritted her teeth. Nothing seemed to get to him, and she had deliberately needled him, wanting to shake him out of his stubbornness.
“It is just smarter for me to go alone.”
“Perhaps. But we go together.”
Her teeth snapped together at that mild tone.