Look at him, piccola. Do not be afraid. I am close. 1 will see what you see. Keep your mind open. As always, Aidan sounded calm and in control.

The stranger's beguiling mouth curved, but there was no warmth in the slashing silver of his eyes.

"You speak to him. Good. I am certain he can see me now. But he is a fool to allow his feelings for you to blind him to his duties."

Her chin lifted. "Who are you?" she repeated.

"I am Gregori. The dark one. Perhaps he has told you of me."

He is the most knowledgeable, the most powerful of all our kind, Aidan confirmed. He was very near. He is the greatest healer our kind has ever known and my teacher. He is also a master of destruction and bodyguard to our Prince.

He terrifies me.

He terrifies everyone. Only Mikhail, the Prince of our people, knows him well.

"I trust Aidan has good things to say about me." He was facing her, those brilliant eyes seeing right into her soul, but Alexandria had the feeling his attention was elsewhere. His voice was so pure, so perfect, she wanted him to go on speaking.

A rush of wind stirred up a whirling eddy of sand that spun and swirled until it enveloped Alexandria, driving her backward. When she finally regained her balance and uncovered her eyes, Aidan was directly in front of her.

"Very impressive, Aidan," the stranger said with a trace of satisfaction.

"I have not seen one of my own people for many years," Aidan said softly. "I am pleased it is you, Gregori."

"Do you now use your woman as bait?" The tone was mild, but the reprimand was clear.

Alexandria stirred, furious that this man would try to make Aidan feel guilty about her independence. Aidan's fingers unerringly found her wrist behind him, closing around it like a vise.

Do not, he warned. She subsided immediately, sensing danger thick in the air.

"This one, this betrayer to our people." Gregori nodded toward the man lying so still on the rocks where he had fallen. "He sought to take her from you."

"He could not have done so," Aidan said softly.

Gregori nodded. "I believe that to be true. Still, she takes a risk that should not be permitted." A network of iridescent white veins lit up the sky, sharp, brilliant, a powerful display. The arcing lightning cast a peculiar shadow across the dark, handsome face and flashing silver eyes, making Gregori look both cruel and hungry.

The fingers around Alexandria's wrist tightened even more. Do not move, do not speak, no matter what, Aidan cautioned softly in her mind. "Thank you for your a.s.sistance, Gregori," he said aloud, his voice gentle and true. "This is my lifemate, Alexandria. She is new to our people and knows nothing of our ways. We would both consider it a great honor if you would accompany us back to our house and tell us the news of our homeland."

Are you out of your mind? Alexandria protested silently, horrified. It would be like bringing home a wild jungle cat. A tiger. Something very lethal.

Gregori inclined his head at the introduction, but the refusal to join them was clear in his silver eyes. "It would be unwise of me to join you indoors. I would be a caged tiger, untrustworthy, unpredictable." His pale eyes flickered over Alexandria, and she had the distinct impression he was laughing at her. Then he turned his attention once more to Aidan. "I need to ask of you a favor."

Aidan knew of what Gregori would speak, and he shook his head. "Do not, Gregori. You are my friend. Do not ask of me what I cannot do." Alexandria felt Aidan's sorrow, his distress. His mind was a turmoil of emotions, fear among them.

The silver eyes flashed and burned. "You will do what you must, Aidan, just as I have done for over a thousand years. I have come here to wait for my lifemate. She will arrive in a few months to do a show, magic show. San Francisco is on her schedule. I intend to establish a house high in the mountains, far from your place. I need the wild, the heights, and I must be alone. I am close to the end, Aidan. The hunt, the kill, is all I have left."

He waved a hand, and the ocean waves leapt in response. "I am not certain if I can wait until she comes. I am too close. The demon has nearly consumed me." There was no change in the sweet purity of his voice.

"Go to her. Send for her. Call her to you." Aidan rubbed his forehead in agitation, and his obvious upset alarmed Alexandria more than anything else. Nothing ever seemed to get to Aidan. "Where is she? Who is she?"

"She is Mikhail and Raven's daughter. But Raven did not prepare her for what was to come on the day of the claiming. She was but eighteen years. When I went to her, she was so filled with fear, I found I could not be the monster I needed to be to claim her against her will. I did not press her. I vowed to myself to allow her five years of freedom. After all, joining with me will be rather like joining with a tiger. Not the most comfortable of destinies."

"You can no longer wait." Alexandria had never heard Aidan so agitated. She stroked her thumb in a small caress across his wrist to remind him he would not have to face the future alone.

"I made a vow, and I will keep it. Once she is joined to me for all eternity, her life will not be an easy one, so she runs from it, and from me." Gregori's voice was so beautiful, so clear. There was no trace of bitterness, no regret.

"Does she know what you suffer for her?"

The silver eyes flashed at the implication of his lifemate's selfishness. "She knows nothing. This was my decision, my gift to her. The favor I ask is that you do not hunt me alone, if such becomes necessary. You will need Julian. He is of the darkness."

"Julian is like me," Aidan instantly protested.

"No, Aidan," Gregori corrected in his mesmerizing voice. "Julian is like me. That is why he seeks out the high reaches, why he is always alone. He is like me. He will help you defeat me should there be need.""Go to her, Gregori," Aidan pleaded.

Gregori shook his head. "I cannot. Promise me you will do as I have requested. You will not attempt to hunt me without Julian."

"I would never be so foolish as to hunt the most wily wolf without the aid of another. Stay strong, Gregori." There was real sorrow in Aidan's voice.

"I will hold out as long as I am able," Gregori replied, "but in the waiting, there is much danger. I will be unable to destroy myself should it become too late. I will be too far gone. You understand, Aidan. The burden of this decision could fall on your shoulders, and for that, I ask your forgiveness. I always thought it would be Mikhail, but she is here, in the United States. And she will be here, in San Francisco, when my vow has been honored."

Aidan nodded, but Alexandria could feel the tears burning in his mind, in his heart. She made an effort to comfort him, to send him warmth, but she remained as still as he had asked her, not completely understanding what Gregori was saying but knowing it was grave.

"I will attend to this one, destroy all evidence of his existence." Gregori gestured toward the body at the bottom of the cliff. "But, Aidan, he was not alone. There was another. I thought it best to stay and protect your lifemate rather than hunt him down. So close to turning myself, I did not want to chance two kills in one evening." The soft, musical voice could have been discussing the weather.

"Gregori, I thank you for the warning and the help. You need not worry over the betrayer. That is my job, though I admit I have been attending to other things than hunting recently."

"As you should have," Gregori acknowledged with a gentle smile. "A lifemate comes first in all things."

"Why is it you fear yours will not have an easy life?" Aidan asked.

"I have hunted too long to ever stop. I am used to my own way in all things. I have waited too long, fought too hard, and suffered too much to allow her the freedom she will desire. Her life will never be her own, only what I make of it."

Aidan smiled then, and Alexandria could feel him relaxing. "If you do as you believe, put her before your own comfort, you will have no choice but to allow her freedom."

"I am not like Mikhail or Jacques or, it seems, you. I intend that her protection come above all else." Gregori's voice held an edge.

Aidan grinned at him, laughter spilling from his golden eyes. "I can only hope I have the chance to see you, Gregori, under the spell of your woman. You must promise that you will bring her to meet us one day."

"Not if I end up like you or Mikhail. I will not have my dangerous reputation destroyed in such a way." A hint of humor seemed to creep in and then was quickly gone, as if the wind had carried it away.

"I will see to the vampire," Aidan said. "You should avoid confronting death."

"I killed him from a distance. You will find it... unsettling," Gregori warned.

"You are even more powerful than I remember."

"I have acquired much knowledge over the years," Gregori conceded. His pale eyes rested thoughtfully on Aidan's face. "You will find your brother much changed, also. He is a fast learner, that one, and unafraid of reaching too far into the shadows. I tried to tell him the cost, but he would not listen."Aidan shook his head. "Julian always said rules were made to be broken. He has always gone his own way. But he did respect you. You were the only real influence in his life, maybe the only one he ever listened to."

Gregori shook his head. "He could not listen any longer. The wind called, the mountains, the far-off places. I could not hope to stop him. He was dark inside, and nothing would ever satisfy him."

"You call it darkness. But it was that quality in you that made you open the world for us. It made you seek out the healing techniques that you have pa.s.sed on to me, to others. It allowed you to perform the miracles that you have performed for our people. It has done the same for Julian,"

Aidan replied softly.

The silver eyes paled to steel. Cold. Bleak. Empty. "It led both of us to things that should never have been learned. In the acquisition of knowledge comes power, Aidan. But without rules, without emotions, without a concept of right or wrong, it is far too easy to abuse that power."

"All Carpathians are aware of that, Gregori," Aidan argued. "You, more than most, know the concept of right and wrong. And so does Julian. Why have you endured, resisted wrong, when others turned? You fought for justice, for our people. You had a code, and you have always lived up to it, as you are doing now. You say you have no feeling, but what of the compa.s.sion you felt for your lifemate when she was so frightened? You cannot turn. Every moment is an eternity for you, I know, but you have an end in sight."

Gregori's cold eyes seemed to impale Aidan, but the younger Carpathian did not flinch. He held Gregori's gaze until Alexandria could have sworn she saw a flicker of fire, a flame, springing from one to the other. Gregori's hard mouth softened slightly. "You have learned well, Aidan. You are a healer of both body and mind."

Aidan inclined his head in acknowledgment of the compliment. The wind howled, the waves crashed, and Gregori launched himself into the dark, roiling clouds. A black shape spread across the sky, an ominous shadow staining the heavens, and then it moved north and faded away as if it had never been, taking the storm with it.

Aidan sank into the sand, his head bowed, his shoulders shaking, as if he was trying to control some great emotion that had overcome him. Alexandria circled his head with her arms. She could feel sobs tearing at his throat and chest, yet he made no sound. Only a single, blood-red tear marked his great sorrow.

"I am sorry, cara, but he is a great man, one our people cannot afford to lose. I could feel his bleakness, the inner demon waiting to devour him. To have to honor my promise to him, to have to hunt him..." He shook his head. "It is such a disservice to one who has dedicated his life to our people, to our Prince."

Alexandria's breath caught in her throat. She had thought Aidan invincible. Capable, even, of hunting vampires and triumphing over their evil power. But Gregori was a different proposition.

Even with two hunters such as Aidan, it didn't seem possible that he could be defeated. "Can't you contact this woman, the one who could save him?"

Aidan shook his head regretfully. "He would continue to honor his vow, and her presence would only make things worse."

She touched his hair with gentle, loving fingers. "As I made it worse for you." She rubbed her chin thoughtfully against his hair. "I can understand that girl's being afraid. You scared me. You still do.

But Gregori, he's terrifying. I would never want to be tied to such a being. And she's only a child."

"Why would you still be afraid of me?" Aidan lifted his head and touched her face reverently with his fingertips, with a tenderness that turned her heart over.

"Your power. Your intensity. Maybe when you teach me a few things, I won't be so nervous of it, but now it seems you have too much power for any one person to wield."

"Your mind holds the same powers as mine. You simply have to think of what you want, Alexandria. If you wish flight, you simply hold the picture in your mind, and your body is light, and you float."

His arm circled her waist, and they rose slowly into the air. "Merge with me. See it for yourself.

There is no need to ever fear me." He set them gently back to earth.

"Tell me about the 'claiming' he was talking about. What did he mean? And who is Mikhail?"

"Mikhail is the oldest of our people, our Prince. He has led us for centuries. Gregori is only a quarter of a century younger, so in our terms, they are nearly the same age. Our people have been persecuted over the years, driven into hiding, and many were ma.s.sacred. Our women have become so few, the men cannot find lifemates to bring light to their darkness, and more and more turn vampire. Though no one has yet discovered why, the few children born to us are male, and most do not survive the first year of life. Those women who give birth and lose the child grow despondent and refuse to try after a time. So the men without lifemates are lost, without hope. They either greet the dawn and perish or succ.u.mb to the demon within. Become vampire, true predators."

"How terrible." She meant it, sorrow filling her mind and heart.

"Mikhail and Gregori have been trying to find a way to avoid the inevitable, the extinction of our race. They discovered that a small group of human women possessing psychic abilities were capable of bonding chemically with our males."

"Like me."

He nodded. "You did not find human men physically attractive. For some unknown reason, you were not born into our race but were made for me specifically. Your body and mine have a need to be one. Your heart and soul are the other half of mine. Mikhail and Gregori believe that those psychic women of human descent are capable of producing female children, and that those children will also be capable, or at least more likely to produce female children. So you see why you are so treasured."

"What is the claiming?"

Aidan let his breath out slowly. "Alexandria..." There was hesitation in his voice.

She stepped away from him, her chin rising. "I guess there's a lot you haven't told me. Am I expected to have a child? A girl? What are the odds that my child will live?"

He reached out, framing her face in his large hands. "I do not want you for a breeder for my race, piccola. I want you for myself. I do not know the odds that our child will survive. Like you, I can only pray. We will have to cross that bridge when we come to it."

"So we have a girl, she survives her first year and grows up. What happens then?" Her sapphire eyes were steady on his golden ones.

"All female children are claimed on their eighteenth birthdays. The males come from all over to meet the girl. If the chemistry is right, she is claimed by the male."

"That is barbaric. Like a meat market. She has no chance at living any kind of life for herself."

Alexandria was shocked.

"Carpathian women are raised to know they hold the fate of their lifemate in their hands. It is their birthright, as is bearing the children."

"No wonder the poor girl ran away. Can you imagine facing a life with that man at such an early age? How old is he? To her he must seem ancient. He's a man, for heaven's sake, not a boy. He's tough and probably cruel, and evidently he knows more about every subject under the sun than anyone alive."

"How old do you think I am, Alexandria?" Aidan asked softly. "I have lived over eight hundred years now. You are irrevocably bound to me. Is it such a terrible fate?"

For a moment there was silence. Then she was smiling at him. "Ask me again in a hundred years.

I'll tell you then."

His eyes burned a liquid gold, molten, s.e.xy. "Go home, cara mia. I will finish my work here and join you."

"I brought the car," she said. "When my Volkswagen wouldn't start, I took the little sporty-looking thing that no one ever uses. Stefan said it would be all right."

"I knew, and you did not hear a complaint. There is nowhere you go and nothing you do that is not known to me. We are one, piccola." He ruffled her hair as if she was a child because his body was starting to make demands, and a vampire's remains were but a few yards away. "Drive home, and I will meet you there."

As he walked her to the car, she fit beneath his shoulder, so that his body was sheltering her.

Alexandria was ashamed of herself for liking the feeling it gave her. She was determined to hold on to her independence with both hands, especially in light of what he had told her might be the fate of her daughter. She had to be strong enough to stand up to Aidan, if she wanted a daughter who was able to choose her own way. She had the feeling Carpathian males had never caught on to the twentieth-century women's liberation movement.

Aidan watched the taillights of the little car disappear around the curve leading up to the main road. He shoved a hand through his thick mane of hair and turned to face the mess on the rocks.

Several weeks earlier, five vampires had arrived in the area. They had moved across the United States on a killing spree, believing no hunters would follow them so far from their homeland. Still, it was known among their people that Aidan Savage resided in San Francisco. Why had they chosen to come here, to take such a risk? Was it because Gregori's woman was coming? But that was months away. What then? What had drawn the vampires to one of the few places in the United States where a true hunter resided?

He walked across the sand, his strides long and fast. Had they sensed Alexandria's presence when he had not? Was something else drawing them to San Francisco? He knew several renegades had chosen to go to New Orleans because the city had such a reputation for debauchery, for being the murder capital of the United States. Los Angeles, too, drew them because its frequent violence would hide their handiwork. He hunted there, though, when he recognized their doings.

When he reached the vampire's body he found it blackened and singed, the hair smoldering. It gave off the unmistakable stench of evil. If this one had stalked Alexandria, no doubt their home was being watched. He looked up at the night sky and sent his challenge. Clouds raced forward, dark and ominous, heralding retribution. Come for me. You sought out my city, my home, my family. I am waiting for you. The wind carried his words over the city, and somewhere, far off, like a distant clap of thunder, a bellow of anger answered him, the frenzied barking of dogs adding to the din.

His white teeth gleamed like a predator's as Aidan sent his silent laughter winging its way to his adversary. The challenge made, he bent over what remained of this vampire. Though he had spent much time with Gregori, he had never seen anything like this before. The vampire's chest was blown away, but his tainted blood had not seeped out because the wound was cauterized by the blast. The heart had turned to black, useless ashes. He shook his head. Gregori was nature at its most lethal.

Aidan stepped back from the abomination with a sense of sadness and inevitability. He had known this fallen creature, had grown up with him. This man was nearly two hundred years younger than he, yet he had turned. Why? Why did some of them hold out and some give in so quickly? Was it strength of character in those who endured? A loss of belief in any future for those who turned?

Mikhail and Gregori struggled endlessly to bring their race hope, yet this man was proof they weren't succeeding. Too many of them were turning. The numbers increased with every pa.s.sing century. It was no wonder Gregori was tired of hunting, of fighting the demon that was always within him. How did one hunt former friends, century after century, without becoming as hopeless as those he pursued?

Aidan had to go home. He needed Alexandria's arms around him. He needed her warmth and compa.s.sion. He needed her body burning around his, telling him he was alive and had not become death. But he had become death to many of his kind, those who had turned, those he had hunted, and he knew it.