To be a vampire you must choose life – your life, not someone else’s – over and over again, day after day,” Ysabeau said. “You must choose it over sleep, over peace, over grief, over death. In the end, it is our relentless drive to live that defines us. Without that, we are nothing but a nightmare or a ghost: a shadow of the humans we once were.
Men don’t have it. Our resolve is born out of fear. It’s merely bravado.
So that’s it?” I asked when I could manage it. “We’re going to abide by an ancient, narrow-minded agreement made almost a thousand years ago. Case closed.
Adrenaline poisoning,’ one of my doctors had called these surges of anxiety that had troubled me since childhood. The doctors explained that, for reasons they could not understand, my body seemed to think it was in a constant state of danger. One of the specialists my aunt consulted explained earnestly that it was a biochemical leftover from hunter-gatherer days. I’d be all right so long as I rid my bloodstream of the adrenaline load.
He took my chin in his fingers. “You’re impossible. Stop worrying about what other women do. Be your own extraordinary self.” When I nodded, he kissed me before returning to his table.
Los secretos, como los muertos, no siempre permanecen enterrados.
When the door swung open, Marcus’s blue eyes met mine with a twinkle. ‘Hi, Mom, we’re home!
Here’s your pen,” Marcus said politely, “and your form. See?” He leaned closer. “I did exactly what you asked me to. I’m really very well behaved. My father made sure of it.
The house was winning, thanks to its chief weapon: Fleetwood Mac.
You should be a diplomat, Ysabeau. You’re very good with a quick non-answer.
They’ll figure it out if we’re not careful. Humans like power – secrets, too.
One year ago you walked into the Bodleian Library and straight into my heart. As soon as that wicked mouth of yours smiled, the moment your eyes lightened with recognition even though we’d never met before, I knew that my life would never be the same.
Thomas Paine had come to believe that religion was the worst form of tyranny because it pursued you through death and into eternity – something no king or despot had yet managed to do. At last, Marcus settled on repeating something Thomas himself had written. “ ‘My country is the world, and my religion is to do good.
It pained Emily to her librarian’s soul to see books mistreated like this.
You travel safely too, Auntie Diana. And bring that uncle of mine with you,” Gallowglass said to the sea and the sky before he climbed back onto his bike and headed into a future he could no longer imagine nor postpone.
Matthew,’ I breathed, ‘I don’t think that’s bundling.
We’re witches – of course the house is haunted.
In the world’s apparent chaos, there is still evidence of God’s plan.
Now most in the room accept we’re more similar than different and treat one another with courtesy.
They fear us because we are different. Fear breeds contempt, then hate. It is a familiar story.