My brother the vampire, whose kiss was a slow death sentence, had a stable and loving relationship with a girl who was crazy about him. By contrast, I could barely talk to a woman, at least about anything pertaining to a relationship. Given that my only long-term girlfriends had faked their own death, died, and broken free of enslaving enchantments to end the relationship, the empirical evidence seemed to indicate that he knew something I didn't. Keep your life tonight, Harry. Complicate it tomorrow.

We all must die. There is no better way to do so than in the pursuit of something you love.

Sometimes I think that's where most of us are. Fighting off the crazy as best we can. Trying to become something better than we were. It's that second bit that's important.

but all the things Science had promised us hadn't come to pass. Disease was still a problem. Starvation was still a problem. Violence and crime and war were still problems. In spite of the advance of technology, things just hadn't changed the way everyone had hoped and thought they would.

I checked the icebox. The faeries usually brought some sort of food to stock the icebox and the pantry when they cleaned, but they could have mighty odd ideas about what constituted a healthy diet. One time I'd opened the pantry and found nothing but boxes and boxes and boxes of Fruit Loops. I had a near-miss with diabetes, and Thomas, who was never quite sure where the food had come from, declared that I had clearly been driven Fruit Loopy.

Black Court vampires. I just shortened it some." Ebenezar tsked. "Blampires. That's the problem with you young people. Shortening all the words.

I believe that there's a cloud for every silver lining,' I said.