Julian nodded soberly. “There is no doubt, Darius. That is why those of us who can must try to have female children. It is the only way our race has a chance of surviving. Even so, we may be too late. Most Carpathian women give birth to males. If a female is born, she must struggle to survive that first difficult, dangerous year.”
Darius remembered just how hard it had been to keep the two fragile little girls who were Desari and Syndil alive so many centuries ago.
“It is necessary to try to provide lifemates for our kind, our brothers and friends,” Julian went on quietly, persuasively. “However, you must also consider that if you bind Tempest to you without converting her, like all lifemates, neither of you will be able to bear any physical or mental separation. You, a Carpathian, must sleep in deep ground. She will need air. When you sleep the true sleep of our people, she will be unable to reach you. No lifemate can take that for a prolonged length of time. It will not work.”
“Tempest is already bound to me, and I cannot bear any separation from her. This she does not understand, though. She thinks in human terms,” Darius admitted with a sigh.
“It cannot continue for long,” Julian said. “We are hunted. Through the centuries we have been hunted.
We are not invulnerable, despite our many gifts. She must be protected as one of ours.”
Darius shook his head. “I have asked much of her these last days. I would not ask this-conversion-of her also.”
“Before you close the door on the notion, Darius, give it thought. The other women I spoke of are happy in their lives. It took some adjustment, and I will not say they did not suffer, but in the end they accepted the inevitable.”
“Because they had no choice,” Darius pointed out softly. “The last thing I want is to cause Tempest any more suffering. She has had enough in her young life.”
* * *
Chapter Twelve
Tempest sighed and put down the wrench she had been using while double-checking her findings. She didn’t want to make any mistakes and miss buying a part she might need later on. It seemed unusually hot. She wiped the sweat from her face, and she thought about the night before. Syndil had been so sweet. While they talked, she had fixed a vegetable broth for Tempest. Tempest’s stomach seemed to rebel against the broth, but she didn’t want to hurt Syndil’s feelings, so she tried to eat it. Even so, without Darius’s aid she probably wouldn’t have kept it down.
Darius had been so quiet when he joined her. He watched her work on the truck, clearly unhappy when she made a list of things she would need that they didn’t already have. That meant she would have to make a trip to the nearest town during daylight hours. He hadn’t argued, but he told her he would sleep the sleep of humans, not Carpathians, so that he would be available should she need him.
Tempest cleaned up carefully as she contemplated what Darius might have meant. What was the difference? Would it somehow harm him? She knew none of his family members agreed with his decision, none of them liked it, yet no one argued with him or even went so far as to register a simple protest. Their uneasiness caught at her. She could tell none of them blamed her for Darius’s resolution, yet she knew they were concerned about Darius and what he was doing.
The money they had handed her so casually was quite substantial. She folded it, shoved it into her pocket, and resolutely climbed into the little sports car. She had a bad feeling about Darius coming to harm, so she wasn’t going to take any chances on getting lost. Twice last night she had driven the route to town with Darius beside her, just to reassure him she would be able to make her way there and back without a problem. Still, her sense of dread persisted. She just seemed to attract trouble everywhere she went.
Tempest enjoyed the solitude of the drive, the highway winding down a mountain, the tight turns, the speed and smoothness of the vehicle, but there was a heaviness in her heart, growing much more difficult to ignore. She found herself needing the touch of Darius’s mind. She actually felt grief seeping in, troubling thoughts. That something had happened to Darius. That he was lying hurt somewhere. That he was in danger. It was nonsense, her brain told her, but nevertheless she found herself wanting to weep uncontrollably.
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