Love. It's so close to hate, it's almost indistinguishable. But this is how it was for the two of them. Love and hate. Life and death. Joy and anguish.

I have never given this ring, my soul, to anyone. Azrael has never had any part of this. This is the only part of myself that is truly mine, and now it is yours.” —Jack Force

I don't need anything to get high. I'm high on life.

Maybe she'd been drinking too much of the super-sweet Mexican Coca-Cola they had down here. Or maybe she was just tired, alone, and far from home. Because somewhere in the brittle, concrete center of Azrael's dark heart, something was melting.

Memories were moving pictures in which meaning was constantly in flux. They were stories people told themselves.

The Code of the Vampires decreed that anyone who violated the Sacred Law was condemned to death, the blood burning. Charles had refused to subject Allegra to the sentence. But Mimi was a different matter. Mimi walked out of the church, knowing that if she ever saw Jack again, she would have to kill him.

Remember all fairy tales end at some point.