He hadn't considered what rebirth meant. What the pouring of wealth into his mind from all the ancients in the Daratrazanoff lineage would actually mean. He received all the power. All the skills and knowledge acquired in centuries of battles, of living, were in his head. All of it. But with that came the darkness. Overwhelming. Terrible. Descending on him as if he'd lived those centuries, but again, overnight. Robbing him of his humanity. Taking this woman from him. His one love.
His hand tightened convulsively around Gabrielle. He stepped closer, needing to feel her body against his. Needing to hold her. He put his arms around her and held her tight. One hand cupped the back of her head, pressing her face against him. He ignored the rising hum of the bracelet.
"Honey, you are just as Carpathian as I am." The words, as true as they were, tasted bitter in his mouth. It was too late for them. She didn't understand what was happening to him. He was hurting her. He knew he was and that just added to the sorrow in him. She had chosen to live because she thought they would be together. Now she had to feel as if he was deserting her.
"Don't, Gary. Please. Please, don't let them take you away from me." Gabrielle wept uncontrollably, her arms around him. Clinging. Pressing herself even closer.
If there was a hell, this was it. Gary dropped his head down to rub his face in her soft hair. Breathing her in. Breathing in her sweetness. Trying to make a memory that couldn't be ripped from him in just a few moments.
"I can make you happy," she whispered softly. "I can, Gary. I know it. We can leave here, go far away and marry. Have a family. We can live a human lifetime together. After that, after we're supposed to be dead and gone, maybe then we'll have had enough of each other, but I can't imagine my life without you. I can't."
"I know, Gabrielle. I feel the same." He heard the regret in his voice. She heard it, too, because she stiffened.
Gabrielle pulled back, putting space between them, her hands curling into two tight fists. Her face tipped up toward his and he could see the anger and hurt there. He could feel it vibrating in the air between them.
"You're refusing me. Rejecting me. On. My. Wedding. Night."
"It's a matter of honor, honey. You know it's the right thing to do."
"For them. It's always about them. I can't believe you're willing to sacrifice us. Sacrifice me. For them."
Tears ran down her face unchecked, breaking his heart further. More color bled away. Gary reached for her. She stepped back, shaking her head.
"I have to tell you what's happening, Gabrielle, so that you'll understand." If his ability to see in color was fading so fast, it stood to reason he would lose his emotions just as abruptly. He couldn't risk her.
"I know what's happening, Gary. This is our wedding night. You made promises to me, and now you're walking away. Rejecting me. Jilting me."
She sounded close to hysterical and she jammed a fist in her mouth, stepping back even farther from him. His gut tied into hard, bitter knots. Gary murmured her name and stepped toward her. Gabrielle threw her hand between them, palm out.
"Don't. Not unless you're going to leave with me. Go away from here and live out our lifetime as humans while we can. We can have that. At least that, Gary."
He wanted to give that to her. He wanted to give that to himself. She was right there, standing in front of him, everything he'd ever dreamed about. He loved her with every beat of his heart. Every breath he took.
"Honey, just for a moment, listen to me. I'm already losing my ability to see in color. It's happening fast. Everything's fading to gray. When the ancients in the Daratrazanoff lineage accepted me as theirs, they poured their knowledge into me. They gave me tremendous gifts, their power, their skills, even their abilities to fight vampires. All of it, just as if I was born with those abilities and power."
She bit her lip, her gray eyes swimming with tears. He could see the teardrops sparkling on the ends of absurdly long lashes. At that moment, with the flowers surrounding her and the night sky above her, she was more beautiful than ever. "How can that be?" she whispered.
His heart turned over at the concern in her voice. "I don't know how it's done exactly, I only know they have a collective conscious. Mikhail has access to them there in the cave of warriors. When they come together like they do, all the warriors, past and present, they are very powerful. That power runs through Mikhail. I felt it. He's some sort of conductor, or rather, a receptacle for that combined power."
Gabrielle stepped into him again, her arms circling his waist, her head on his chest. "What have they done to you?"
"I love you, Gabrielle," he admitted. The words felt wrenched from him, leaving him naked and exposed. He couldn't have her. He would have to allow another man to have her, and that would kill him. The warrior in him protested.
"I know you do," she whispered. "I love you, too. There has to be a way. If you feel love for me, you can still feel emotion, even if you're losing your ability to see in color. We could still go away and live together. Have that life. Most humans get forty, fifty years together. We can take that time for ourselves, couldn't we? What would be so wrong about that?"
He held her close, feeling his body heat surrounding her. Inhaling her scent. The temptation of keeping her--having her for himself--was alarming in its strength.
"We can't make a decision like that without really thinking it through, Gabrielle. We would have to leave. Live far from here, far from other Carpathians. If your lifemate came along, or mine . . ."
"I once asked Mikhail what would happen if a Carpathian male found his lifemate and she was human, married with a family and happy. He said a man of honor would either meet the dawn or wait it out, hoping her spouse died before she did. He would never come between them. A lifemate makes his other half happy."
"Exactly, Gabrielle. You're not thinking how you would feel. If your lifemate happened to find you, you would be compelled to make him happy." He kept his voice gentle as he explained a reality he was certain she hadn't considered.
"I wouldn't know because I'd be happy with you and he wouldn't reveal himself," she pointed out.
He'd always known she had a stubborn streak. That was part of what made her so good in a laboratory. She fought so fiercely for them. She would make a fantastic mother, one who would fight for her children with a ferocity that he would admire always. She took care of those she loved.
"No, he wouldn't, Gabrielle, but he would suffer. He might even take his own life because we were giving ourselves a few years together selfishly."
She lifted her head and stared into his eyes. "You're a genius, Gary. What are the odds of both of us finding our lifemates?"
He knew so many of the ancients were still out there, looking, hoping. Hanging on by a thread. She had been in the Carpathian Mountains and met many of them. None had claimed her. The odds were far less for him. She saw the answer in his eyes.
"Exactly," she said. "Gary, we have a right to be happy. Both of us. We've helped the Carpathians. You know we have. This is our time."
His hands came up to frame her face. "And if I lose my emotions? My ability to feel love for you, what then, Gabrielle? What happens to you? To our children?"
"I don't know. No future is ever certain, Gary."
He took a breath and then he kissed her. Hard. Hot. Hungry. She tasted incredible. She kissed him back, opening her mouth to his, taking him just as hungrily, just as in need. Just as filled with despair. They clung to each other in silence until he lifted his head.
"Gary, I honestly don't know if I can make it without you," she whispered against his throat. "I don't know how to live without you in my life."
He understood because he felt the same way. He tightened his arms around her, pressing her body tightly to his. Even though he feared he might be in danger of crushing her, she didn't protest. She held him just as tightly.
"Please come away with me," she whispered. "I'm afraid without you. You steady me. You make me feel as if I have an anchor in a world I don't und
erstand. If you leave me alone, I'll just dry up and blow away."
He closed his eyes, his heart weeping. "Give me time to figure out whether we'll have the time to raise a family and be together before I lose my ability to feel. I won't put you through that, Gabrielle. I need to talk to Mikhail and Gregori . . ."
"No," she said sharply, her hands going to the lapels of his jacket. "You know they'll tell you to let me go. You know they will. This is between the two of us. Our decision, not theirs."
"Honey, you persist in thinking they're the enemy."
"In a way, they are, Gary. They're my enemy. They've taken you from me. You were always mine, the only person I've ever really had."
"Gabrielle." He caught her chin and tilted her face up toward his, compelling her to look into his eyes. "You come from a loving family. You adore your sister and brother. You love your parents."
"Very much," she admitted. "But I don't fit anywhere. Not with them. They don't know me. They don't understand me. They never have, as much as they'd like to. These people"--she swept her hand around the field to indicate the Carpathians--"they don't even try to get to know me. I do research and I keep to myself. I don't mean anything at all to them. But you . . . you see me. I matter. I exist." She shook her head, tears swimming in her eyes again. "You can't take that away from me, Gary. What will I have left?"
He took a breath. "All right, honey. I want you to take some time and think about this realistically. If in a week you still feel like we can make a go of it, we'll revisit the issue, but you need to really think about what could happen if I lose my emotions so abruptly and have all the past history of hundreds of years of loneliness poured into me all at once. That could be dangerous to us."
"You're a man of honor, Gary. You would tell me what was happening and we'd face it together. You know that's what you'd do." She was absolutely certain.
He crushed her to him again, knowing he would have to give her up, that she wasn't his. She believed that much in him. He was the one who didn't have a family anymore. He'd given up being in the human world in order to try to help Gregori. He admired him. At first he'd been intrigued by the Carpathians, but then it became a compulsion, a need to aid them. The species was in danger of extinction in spite of their longevity. With no women and their inability to conceive or carry children, something had to be done, and Gary had been determined to do it. He'd led the research projects, with Gabrielle and Shea, a doctor, to aid him. In a short time, they'd come a long way.
He was in the middle of working on how to permanently remove all the mage-mutated microbes spreading throughout the soil. Xavier, a mage the Carpathian people had believed was their friend, had plotted to bring the entire species down and had nearly done so.
Carpathians were diligent about cleaning the soil where they slept, and about removing any of the microbes they found in their bodies that would kill the unborn children or the babies in their first year. Gary was certain, if Xavier could mutate the microbes to do his bidding, they could reverse the process. He was close, too. He felt it. He always felt something before a major breakthrough.
Gary had never once regretted his decision to help the Carpathian people. Never. He was fully committed to them. Until now. This moment. Giving up Gabrielle was nearly impossible. He took a deep breath and brushed his mouth over the top of her head, savoring the feeling of her in his arms. He wanted to commit this moment to memory. The scent of the flowers. The night sky. The way she looked in her gown. Her hair done so intricately, flowers woven through the silken strands. Even the bracelet, burning red-gold flames captured in the links, circling her delicate wrist.
"I know what you're doing," Gabrielle whispered. "I'm doing the same thing. I won't change my mind, Gary. I choose you. Every time, I choose you. It will always be you."
He didn't answer. He was a Daratrazanoff and he felt the heavy responsibility of his bloodline. He had a duty to the prince, to his people. He was a shield now. A protector of his people. He had all the power and skills, but he also had the brain he'd been born with. He knew he was a huge resource to the Carpathians, and Mikhail and Gregori recognized him as such.
Gabrielle was correct when she said the prince and Gregori would discourage any romance between them. Still, he also knew, when he dropped from vivid, real emotion to absolute nothing at all, they would try to cushion that fall. It would be brutal. He was intelligent enough to know why the Carpathians' emotions faded over time and why, when they were restored and their lifemate was taken from them, that abrupt nothingness sent them into a dangerous killing frenzy known as the thrall.
He wouldn't endanger Gabrielle. He had to find out when it would happen. How much time he had. If he had fifty years, he would take those years and give them to her. If he didn't have at least that many, he would have to give her up. She wouldn't forgive him. That would be the price he would have to pay to keep her safe. She would always feel as if he abandoned her. Rejected her.
"Think about it, Gabrielle. I'll do some research and see what we're looking at. We'll talk in a few days."
She shook her head, clinging to him. "If I let you go now, I'll lose you. Make love to me. Give me that."
Sheer torture. He felt as if his heart was being ripped out of his body. "Honey, if I touch you, I will never have the strength to walk away. I think you know that. We have to know what we're getting into before we make a decision."
She tore herself out of his arms. "You've already made up your mind. God. I hate them. I hate what I am. I hate that I have to live my life according to their rules. That some man I don't know or love can dictate to me what I can or can't have. I don't know if he even exists and he's ruling my life."
She turned and ran away from him, charging through the field of Night Star flowers. The stalks bent toward her, as if bowing as she passed, and then sprang back up. Gary watched her flee, hearing her weep as she raced down the mountain, her gown flowing behind her. He wept with her, his tears bloodred, dropping on the petals of the flowers surrounding him. Even as he looked at the droplets, the red faded to a dull gray.
Gary blinked rapidly to clear his vision. With Gabrielle's departure, all color was gone from his life. She'd taken it with her. He stood there a long time. Minutes. Hours. He didn't know. Staying still. Knowing if he moved, he might shatter. She took her bright light and left him in darkness.
"Gary."
He closed his eyes. The voice held too much compassion. Mikhail Dubrinsky, prince of the Carpathian people, stood to one side of him. Gregori was on the other. Guarding. Watching over him. To protect the others, or defend him? He didn't know, but Gabrielle must have returned while he stood alone and they had come to him.
"You knew." It was an accusation.
"I suspected," Mikhail corrected. "I hoped, for your sake. I feel the love you have for her. It is very strong. I wanted it to work out, but the chances were . . ."
"Zero," Gary said, tasting bitterness. "She couldn't have held the other half of my soul, nor could I hold hers. I had hoped she wasn't another man's lifemate. That she was psychic, but that she wasn't a lifemate. Not all psychic women are. When she was converted, I held on to that. I didn't make a move, waiting for another to claim her. They didn't. She was mine. She belonged to me."
"Gary," Gregori said, his voice gentle. "I'm sorry."
"I gutted her. She's so hurt."
"She'll come to terms with it," Mikhail said.
For the first time Gary looked at the prince, met his eyes. He knew there was fury in his gaze, but Mikhail didn't flinch. "She was gutted. I did that to her. You both knew I would lose my ability to see in color immediately. You should have warned me."
He was looking directly at Mikhail so he saw the shock on the prince's face. Mikhail looked to Gregori. Gary followed his gaze. Gregori looked just as shocked.
"You've lost color?" Gregori asked.
Gary nodded. The sense of betrayal faded with the shock on their faces. "Yes. Tonight. Nearly all at once. When she left, s
he took the last of the color with her."
"That isn't good," Gregori said. "If it happened to you, it will happen to the others as well. Not Zev. He has his lifemate. But Luiz. And he's a De La Cruz. That's going to be brutal."
"How long before I lose my emotions?" Gary asked.
Gregori's gaze sharpened. "Do not even think about living with Gabrielle, Gary. Do you have any idea how dangerous that would be?"
"That's for us to decide. I want to know how long I've got."
"Gary," Mikhail said, turning Gary's attention back to him. "We had no idea you would lose your ability to see in color, at least not for a couple of hundred years. We should have known better. You have the blood, the memories and experience of the ancients. Of course you would also have the loss of emotion and color as so many of them had no lifemate and neither do you."
Gregori swore in the ancient language. "Gary. When you lose emotion too fast, it is dangerous. Horrendous. You cannot be with Gabrielle when that happens. You will need help through those first dark months."
Gary cursed his own intellect. He had known. He didn't want to know, but he had. He had lost Gabrielle. "I can't face her. If I see her cry one more time, or if she pleads with me, I won't be able to resist the love I have for her."
Mikhail let out his breath slowly. "Andre has found his lifemate. She believes she has the ability to extend the ancients' time before they become so dangerous they cannot hunt the undead or feed from innocents. Gregori was going to go to the monastery up in the mountains to talk to Fane, who seems to run the place. We were hoping that if Andre's lifemate could really do such a thing, the other healers could be taught as well. Perhaps you should go in Gregori's place."
Gregori stirred as if to protest, but Mikhail's gaze lifted to his just once and Gregori subsided.