Stars: 4

Author: Christine Feehan

Title: Dark Challenge

Publisher: Love Spell

Year: 2000

ISBN: 0-505-52409-0

Distribution: MMPB

Pages: 390

Christine Feehan's fifth book in her saga of the Carpathians brings a twist to their magical, sexist world. Heretofore Feehan's dominating male Carpathians have found their soulmates in younger, usually human women -- strong-willed, but without the knowledge and abilities that each one's other half had gained through the centuries. However, when Julian Savage sets out to perform one last good deed before surrendering himself to the dawn, he discovers a phenomenon virtually forgotten among his kind: a female Carpathian whose age and powers rival his own.

Not that Desari fully appreciates what she is. She and her "family" are well acquainted with their superhuman powers: telepathy and shapeshifting; control of the elements, the earth, and human minds. However, having been separated from their kind since childhood, they remain unaware of the full range of needs and vulnerabilities peculiar to their species. In acting like a typical Carpathian, Julian initially seems more a threat than anything else, particularly when Desari, his unwilling and unwitting lifemate and soulmate, finds herself literally inseparable from both him and the handful of Carpathians she has traveled with for centuries.

Led by Darius since they lost their families in childhood, the little band has had to find its way in a world that forces them to hide their true nature. They tour in the guise of a musical group with Desari's singing as its focus, but they suffer the risks that endanger all Carpathians. Formerly a sextet, the group now numbers five after one of the males "went vampire"; now Darius, Barack, and Dayan are more protective than ever of Desari and the other female, delicate Syndil, who was the chief victim of Savon's change. Darius himself is feeling the effects of age: his longstanding emotionlessness and increasing sun-sensitivity point to the growing likelihood that he, too, will turn vampire. Wherever the group tours, vampires are growing fiercer and more cunning in their attempts to capture the dwindling numbers of female Carpathians, and organized human vampire hunters also have put the strange troupe in their crosshairs.

In the midst of these complexities Julian appears. Blood-bonding with Desari after a would-be fatal attack by vampire hunters saves her life but throws her into internal turmoil. The lifemate concept is alien to the little group, and the protective males are not readily convinced that cocksure Julian could have any positive effect on one of their treasured women. Desari herself, like Feehan's other female lifemates, chafes at the control Julian is determined to exercise over her; unlike the others, she is several centuries old and prepared to demonstrate repeatedly that she can, and will, take care of herself whether Julian approves or not.

On top of the difficulties Julian and Desari face in learning to live with each other and with Desari's family, Julian contends with double-pronged vampire difficulties. Even as he continues to hunt vampires -- ancient beings with poisonous blood and powers of the mind developed over centuries -- a dark vampire taint in his own past may make him a threat to the group that is now his adoptive family, including the lifemate that he cannot live without.

The major characters -- Julian, Desari, and Darius, and to a lesser extent Barack -- are portrayed in some depth, with glimpses at their reflections and self-doubts. When Julian is not demonstrating his superiority, he can be both perceptive and sympathetic. Darius's responsibilities and powers strike resonant chords within him -- he is, after all, also a male Carpathian -- and he at times has a better grasp of Syndil's needs than do her self-appointed guardians, even Desari.

In addition to the standard generous dollops of hot sex and male arrogance, Dark Challenge introduces new elements in the Carpathians' universe: not only the now-found "lost" Carpathians, but the two famed hunters Lucian and Gabriel, twin brothers whose fate remains unknown. But even more refreshing is the long-awaited heroine who is strong not merely in her resolve but in her ability to deal with the protective, proud, and predatory males of the species. That a Carpathian male can do nothing but make his lifemate happy is a much-repeated dictum of this universe. Desari is enough of a woman -- a Carpathian woman -- to hold Julian to that: in her living arrangements and in her choice of career, as well as in bed.

Reviewed by Catherine B. Krusberg