Now Comes the Night Read Free Page A

their mother and me… Can you think of a better way of describing my relationship with them?”
    “And what do you intend for them to call me?”
    Damian’s eyes twinkled suddenly and Conrad could have sworn he was holding back a laugh as he answered, “Grandfather, obviously. I would have thought that went without saying.”
    “ Grand father?” Conrad stared at him. “How is that obvious? Do I look so old now?”
    Damian smiled. “Not at all. You’re still as youthful looking as the day I met you. It’s simply that, again, as you are their mother’s sire, I judged it the simplest approach. But perhaps you had something else in mind? Was there some other way in which you planned to describe to them your relationship with their mother?”
     
    Conrad scrubbed his hand across his face. His relationship with their mother. Yes, that was definitely not a subject he wished to discuss in any great detail with her children. Assuming they lived long enough to ask about her. “I hadn’t actually given the matter much thought.” It was all still such a long shot. “But, since you clearly have, so be it. Grandfather I shall be, should the need arise. Now, where’s the blood?” he asked, choosing to change the subject rather than continue. “I’m assuming you did eventually manage to bring some home with you?”
    “Yes, of course,” Damian replied, in between murmured endearments addressed to the babes in his arms. “You didn’t really think I’d forget, did you? I got as much as I could, several bottles, the freshest they had. Hopefully it’ll be enough to tide us over for a while, but if they’re going to continue to eat at this rate, we’re going to have to reconsider our plans, not to mention seek out some new resources—and soon. I left the bag on the dining room table, if you’d be so good as to get it.”
    Conrad blinked in surprise. “You expect me to get it?” There had been a time, and not that long ago, when people had waited on him, not the other way around.
    Damian glanced pointedly at the infants in his arms. “Well, I do have my hands full at the moment. Unless you’d like to trade places? I don’t imagine you thought to change their diapers while I was gone, did you?”
    Conrad opened his mouth and then closed it again when he could think of nothing to say. Turning, he left the room without saying another word.
    It was too much. Nothing in his past had prepared him for this. How was he expected to deal with it all? Deadly threats against the twins, their imminent starvation, the possible annihilation of his entire race and his own forced absence from his nest—for who knew how long, decades at least. Now diapers too? Why, in his day, children didn’t even wear diapers. Come to think of it, they hadn’t in Damian’s day either. At least…he didn’t think they did. So how was it he could remember to think of all these details?
     
    By the time Conrad returned to the living room Damian was ensconced in one of the armchairs with the twins, freshly changed, reclining peacefully in his arms. He tried not to smirk when he realized Conrad had taken the time to carefully warm the blood and transfer it into two of the baby bottles they’d purchased when they’d first moved here, several weeks earlier. From the way Conrad had first reacted to the suggestion that he retrieve the blood from the dining room, Damian hadn’t been sure what to expect. But, as always, his old friend was full of surprises.
    “Here, take this.” Conrad held out one of the bottles to him. “And give me one of them.”
    Damian passed him one of the babies without comment, wondering if Conrad would ask which of them he’d been given. It was the boy, but would Conrad know that? Could he tell them apart yet? Did he even care?
    Conrad scrutinized the infant’s face for a moment but said nothing, merely took his seat in the empty armchair and settled the child in his arm.
    Though the babies were not identical they bore