AN: Here we are, another part to this one.

I hope you enjoy! Please don't forget to let me know what you think!

111

Daryl was quiet after returning to their camp. Some nights he was very quiet. Carol always disliked those nights the most because Daryl's quiet felt heavy and thick. It didn't feel heavy and thick in the same way that Ed's had felt—suffocating and like the way the air felt when a bad storm was coming—and it didn't frighten Carol, but it unsettled something in her belly. When Daryl got quiet and the air around him got heavy, Carol wanted very little besides to figure out how she might do her job as a mate—though it was a job that Daryl had never identified for her as being an absolutely necessary part of being his mate—and lift whatever burden he was carrying so that he'd look light and happy again.

Carol didn't know how to lift the burden, though, and she feared that pressing too much might turn the heavy brooding into something else entirely. Daryl had never shown her anything else, really, and she had no actual reason to believe that she might press him too much, but Ed had taught her a great many lessons that she kept close at heart, and one of those was that pressing anyone could eventually get you a mouthful of blood for your efforts.

Instead of pressing, Carol treated Daryl soft-like. He liked that. He liked her treating him soft-like because that was what a mate was supposed to do. That much he'd told her about his expectations, and she'd agreed that such a way of interacting seemed the most mate-like to her. He was clumsy when he tried to be soft, and a bit clumsy, honestly, when he tried to be anything else, so Carol showed him a great deal about what she imagined being soft was like, and he copied her.

So, when Daryl returned to camp several days in a row with the heavy silence that worried Carol, she treated him soft-like to make him feel better. She brought him his meal without him asking her for such care, hot from the fire, and she served him hot coffee. She warmed his water and, despite his protests, she washed her mate clean with the warm water, usually enticing him to mate with her once he was stripped down and clean.

It was only after those several days that Carol wondered if she might be able to press real soft so that it didn't make him angry in any way. She brought him his meal and his coffee. She let him eat it in the silence that he'd wrapped around him, and she brought him the bathwater she warmed for him when their plates were cleaned for the morning meal to come. She helped him shrug off his clothes and she washed him, gently, placing kisses along clean paths of his body as she went. She felt the tightness of his body easing away and running off with the bathwater.

"You have anything on your mind you'd feel like telling me?" Carol dared, finally, her own voice coming out nearly hoarse from not using it much in the past few days. "As your mate and all, you can tell me anything. That's how mating works, you know—now there's nothing that you can't tell me, if you've got a mind to talk about it."

Carol moved her body around Daryl's to face him. She caught his eyes and held them. Her stomach tightened. She felt like there was some kind of pain coming right out of him and into her, and she wanted it to stop—for him, just as much as for her. She gave him a soft smile of encouragement, sensing he needed it, and nodded her head.

"It's true, you know," she said. "In fact—as my mate—it's part of the…of the whole mating thing for you to tell me if there's anything troubling you. Makes us stronger mated."

"How you know that?" Daryl asked.

Carol bit back the smile that automatically tugged at her features. It was the first thing she really felt like she'd heard him say in days beyond a nearly grunted "thanks" for any kindness she did for him.

"'Cause I know some things about mating, Daryl," Carol said. "Important things. So—you better just go on and tell me what you got on your mind, because I don't want to take the risk of us not being as strong-mated as we can be. Do you?"

Daryl stared at her. She held his eyes. She didn't dare to drop her hold on them. She could see some kind of storm brewing behind them, and his brow was furrowed, but nothing in her belly told her that she ought to be afraid. The storm was there, and she might end up seeing it roll through, but it wasn't coming for her. She could weather a storm with Daryl, if that's what he needed.

"I notice you—ain't brought home near as many pelts as you usually do," Carol offered, trying to work out the storm for herself or, at the very least, to help him say what it was that he had all bound up inside of him. "Not nearly as many. But I notice you—you been coming home with your hands pretty well in need of my tending to 'em from scratches and sores, and you been bringing bags of yellow and pretty rocks."

The furrow between Daryl's brow deepened.

"I ain't brought you enough to eat?" He asked. "I let you get hungry?"

Carol smiled softly at him and combed his hair back with her fingertips after she dipped them in the water that was going cold. It didn't matter. She'd almost finished his bath, as he sat before her naked as the day he was born, and she'd be happy to warm him more water if he wanted her to go on bathing him when the storm that was brewing had passed.

"No," she said, keeping her voice soft and low. He responded to it just like she hoped—with that sleepy, heavy-lidded look he got when she spoke to him soft and he was relaxing into feeling his own softness toward her. When he looked at her like that, she didn't fear any storm at all. She couldn't fear Daryl when he looked at her like that. All she felt was a warmth in her chest that made her want to invite him under the blanket with her to hold her close to him. "No—I'm not hungry. You didn't let me get hungry at all. You never let me get hungry or…or cold…or wet, even, that I don't wanna be that way. But—you have been making me feel hurt right here."

She took his hand and put it against her chest. She pressed it to her body with her own hands, hugging it there. For a moment, she closed her eyes. She could feel the strength in his fingertips even as he gently flexed them against her chest.

"How did I hurt you?" He asked.

"Because you've been seeming like you were hurting," Carol said, "but—you didn't want to share it with me, and that's one of the most important parts of mating, I think, so I was just thinking that—maybe you didn't want to be mated to me no more. Maybe you were even thinking of—taking me to town and leaving me there."

Daryl frowned at her.

"I don't wanna do that," he said. "I don't want nothin' like that. I don't want you never leavin' me, and I don't wanna hurt you none. Not even in here." He patted her chest. She smiled at him.

"Then, you better tell me what's got you worryin' like you are," she said. "You've been looking like you could worry the teats off a cow lately."

Daryl seemed to think about it long and hard. She gave him time, but she didn't back away or give him any more space. She stayed close to him—close enough that he could feel her warmth in one way or another, even after he'd dropped his hand away from her chest. The sigh he gave, finally, was a heavy sigh—almost as heavy as the air around him had been lately. He scrambled away from her, not leaving the blanket entirely, and moved for his tobacco. She gave him the freedom of movement, but she was happy when he returned to smoke next to her. She cuddled against him, offering him any warmth he may need, though he seemed entirely unaware of and uncaring about his nudity in her presence.

"I been figurin' that—it ain't right," Daryl finally admitted.

"What ain't right?" Carol pressed, nuzzling her cheek against the upper part of his arm before she made eye contact with him again.

"This," Daryl said, gesturing somewhat vaguely.

"You think we ain't right?" Carol asked. "Our being mated? Because—I already told you we done it right, Daryl. I promise we did. And all the other ways are right, too, but if you just wanna do it the one way because you think it's righter, then we can do that, too. I don't mind doing it whatever way is righter to you."

"No—ain't that," Daryl said. "I mean—I still don't know if them other ways is righter and all, but as long as we mated, then I guess we'll stay mated, no matter how we're doin' it, even though…"

"Even though?" Carol pressed.

"It might be good to do it the right way from time to time so it don't come undone," Daryl offered.

Carol nodded.

"Yeah," she said. "Yeah—OK. I think…you might be right. We might ought to do it the righter way from time to time, just so it don't come undone. Is that what you've been heavy over? Because—we can do it that way right now, Daryl, if that's what's been weighing on you."

"No," Daryl said. "I mean—I been studyin' on that, but it ain't what I really been figurin' on." Carol simply raised her eyebrows at him, this time, to make it clear that she wanted to know what he'd been thinking about. He nodded his head and focused on his tobacco for a moment. "I been knowin' trappers an' just about every other kinda man a body could know for my whole life. Some you see, and you know, for a season or so, and you don't see 'em no more. Some come back across your path. You don't never know. I been listenin' to what they got to say for my whole life, too. And the one thing I know is that when they take mates, things change."

"What kinds of things?" Carol asked.

"Everything, really," Daryl said. "At least—if they matin' for life and not for just the matin' proper."

"And we're mating for life," Carol offered softly, making sure that he heard her, but not wanting to be too forceful. He hummed at her and nodded.

"That's the thing," Daryl said. "Them that mates for life—they take a whole different kinda life. And you might see 'em, but you don't see 'em the same as you did before."

"What do you mean?" Carol asked.

"Some—they might leave their wife for a season and all, especially if she's got people. I knowed a couple took mates from tribes we come across and all. Some of 'em move a lot. Got to. Man'd take him a mate an' leave her for a season here or there with her people—go wanderin' back where the tribe was."

"I don't have people," Carol said. "And I don't have a tribe, neither. There's nobody for you to leave me with."

Daryl caught her eyes. He held them. He shook his head gently at her.

"I weren't thinkin' about leavin' you, no way," he said. "I was just sayin' that—there was them that I knowed that did leave their mates sometimes. They'd come on up to some of the places I went back a few times with Jim, and they'd talk about takin' them a squaw and all. But there was others that—you seen 'em sometimes, but they'd changed their lives all the way."

"Changed?" Carol asked.

Daryl shrugged his shoulders.

"Didn't live like this no more," Daryl said. "Didn't winter hard and move without a care. They settled somewhere. Found 'em a good spot. Put down roots, as Jim called 'em. Made a nest for their mate."

"You wantin' a nest?" Carol asked.

Daryl shrugged his shoulders.

"I never had one," he said. "At least—never since I could remember real good, and half of what I do remember is dark around the outside like maybe it didn't never happen like I thought it did."

"You want a nest?" Carol asked again, softly.

"I don't know nothin' about makin' no nest," Daryl said. "Don't know nothin' about…well…the only thing I do know is that you gotta have a place to build it. And—you gotta have plenty to trade on for good things for buildin' a proper structure. I got all that yellow—and I can get more, it ain't no hardship for me—so I could buy all the things I need for a proper structure. I could build it—the best structure. And they said in town that there's plenty of good space just there for the claiming. I could claim some space. Some good space, just for you—for us—for the nestin'. I could build somethin' that would mean that there weren't no more winterin' hard. I want that. I wanna give you somethin' so you don't gotta winter hard."

"I'd winter hard with you," Carol said. "If that's what you want. If that's what'd make you happy."

"I want you to have somethin' proper," Daryl said.

"Then—claim what you want," Carol said. "Build what you want. Whatever you build—I'll want it, too."

Daryl frowned at her. Carol mirrored the expression. She crawled up onto her knees to press closer to him.

"Is that what's troubling you?"

"I know how to make somethin', Carol," Daryl said. "I know how to make a structure that don't let it in the wind or the rain. I know how to make somethin' that'll keep out the bears."

"What else do we need?" Carol asked.

"I just don't know—how to make a nest," Daryl said, shrugging his shoulders and looking heavy about it all, again. "I don't know how to make a structure into…a proper nest. I don't know nothin' about makin' it more'n a structure for keepin' out the wind, and the rain, and the bears."

Carol smiled at him. She touched his face. She nuzzled her cheek against his, and then she kissed him.

"Don't you worry no more about it," she offered. "That part's my job, Daryl, and I know just what I gotta do—so you don't worry about it not even a minute more."