lifetime

“All you have to do is be a good listener. Nobody really wants to keep secrets, not even the dead”

“my love, with you my life has a beginning, a middle and an end… when your gone my life will be over”

“It was twilight when Matthew led us back through the gates. Sept-Tours was ablaze, every lamp illuminated in silent greeting. “Home,” I said, my heart lifting at the sight. Matthew looked at me, rather than the house, and smiled. “Home.””

“From birth I have searched for you. Since finding you I have been able to hold you in my arms, have heard your heart beat against mine. It would have been a terrible thing to die without knowing what it feels like to truly love.”

““Living in the past had always been my secret desire, but it was far more difficult than I’d ever imagined.””

“Turn to me with all your heart. Do not refuse me because I am dark and shadowed. The fire of the sun has altered me. The seas have encompassed me. The earth has been corrupted because of my work. Night fell over the earth when I sank into the miry deep, and my substance was hidden. From the depths of the water I cried out to you, and from the depths of the earth I will call to those who pass by me. Watch for me. See me. And if you find another who is like me, I will give him the morning star.”

“It begins with absence and desire. It begins with blood and fear. It begins with a discovery of witches.”

“You smell of willow sap. And chamomile that has been crushed underfoot. There’s honeysuckle and fallen oak leaves, too, along with witch hazel blooming and the first narcissus of spring. And ancient things - horehound, frankincense, lady’s mantle. Scents I thought I’d forgotten.”

“Somewhere in the center of my soul, a rusty chain began to unwind. It freed itself, link by link, from where it had rested, unobserved, waiting for him. My hands, which had been balled up and pressed against his chest, unfurled with it. The chain continued to drop, to an unfathomable depth where there was nothing but darkness and Matthew. At last it snapped to its full length, anchoring me to a vampire. Despite the manuscript, despite the fact that my hands contained enough voltage to run a microwave, and despite the photograph, as long as I was connected to him, I was safe.”

“There is no path forward that does not have him in it. Whichever way you go, you must choose him.””