So when the monsters burst into her bedroom that cold December night, with her Christmas dress hanging bright and crisp on the closet door and her stepfather bending over her, Brigid should have been horrified. She should have cried out when the dark-haired monster scooped her up in one blurring motion. She should have looked away when the red-haired demon with the burning blue eyes grabbed Richard Kelly by the throat and twisted his neck until she heard the quick pop and he crumbled lifeless to the floor.

But Brigid did none of those things. Because she knew on that cold winter night, as the frost crunched beneath the monsters’ shoes and they bundled her into the waiting car, that appearances could be very deceiving.

Her great-aunt’s waiting arms were soft and warm, and she was enveloped immediately in their embrace.

“We didn’t know, child,” the old woman whispered. “As soon as your mum… we didn’t know. Why didn’t you tell me, Brigid? Don’t worry, darling, we’re away from here now. You’re coming with me and the doctor will take care of everything. Don’t worry—”

“I have my Christmas program tomorrow at school.”

Brigid remembered a sudden silence and a shifting sound outside the car. Suddenly, a pair of blue eyes met hers over her Aunt Sinead’s shoulder. It was the monster who had snapped her stepfather’s neck. He stared at her for a moment; then in an inhuman blur, he was gone. Seconds later, she heard the car door open, and her aunt reached out. Sinead spread her Christmas dress next to her on the seat, and Brigid looked back over her shoulder.

The red-haired monster stood in the frigid night air, but no steaming breath puffed from his mouth. He looked at her with solemn eyes. Suddenly, a smile turned up the corner of his mouth. “It’s a lovely dress,” he said. “You’ll look grand in it.”

Brigid could only whisper. “Thank you.”

The car doors closed. The dark-haired monster with the kind smile slipped into the front seat, and they sped away from the tidy neighborhood in the suburbs of Dublin.

But the red-haired monster stood in front of the house that had been her prison, alone in the freezing night.

Gwynedd, Wales

December 995 AD

“Please.” He grasped her cold hand. “Don’t.”

She only squeezed his fingers and turned back to the fire.

“It is a sin,” Carwyn said quietly. “A grave one. To give in to despair—”

“You are my son,” Maelona said with a soft smile, “not my priest.”

“Mother.” Carwyn, son of Bryn, knelt before her, the wind whipping outside the door of the old cottage that fronted the cozy home. Maelona had dug her shelter into the mountain centuries before, forming and twisting the earth to her will as all of her immortal kind did. The elemental energy had sustained her life and protected her for over three hundred years. And the same mountain had sheltered her only child when he had woken twenty-seven years before, transformed by Maelona’s immortal blood as the young priest lay on the edge of death.

She had saved him. Loved him as a son. Trained him as a vampire to survive in the harsh world he had entered. Now, the powerful immortal whose energy commanded the very earth beneath him sat hunched in front of the fire, pleading with his sire to live.

“Please, I beg you, do not leave me. Your sister’s loss—”

“You know nothing of my loss.” Her voice was sharp, but softened when he raised his red-rimmed eyes to meet her gaze. “You are so young. You know only the faint mortal echo of it. Perhaps, one day, you will understand. For three hundred years she was my companion. The only immortal who knew me from my human life. The only one who understood. I told her not to leave. For her to go to the island and be killed by those Northern heathens…” Maelona’s eyes tightened in grief. “She was surrounded by water when she died, Carwyn. Her ashes drift alone in the ocean.”

Carwyn rose from his knees and sat next to her in front of the crackling fire. “Your sister’s death does not have to mean your own.”

She closed her eyes and gave him a soft smile. “I am tired of this life. You never abandoned your faith, Carwyn. Do you not believe that my soul will fly to meet hers? Don’t you tell me that God does not abandon those touched by our peculiar curse?”

“To willingly meet the day is not a natural death.”

She squeezed his hand. “There is nothing natural about this life.”

“Perhaps not. But there is much to look forward to.” His voice faltered, betraying his own fear. “Many reasons to hope.”

“There are for you.” She smiled and he remembered her joy from his early years with her. “Do not make my mistake, Carwyn. Do not fear the attachments of family and kin.” She reached up and touched his face. “Making you my son has been my greatest joy. I should have had many more children to share my life. Do not make my mistake.”

“Mother—”

“You have more love to give than any vampire I have ever known. You should surround yourself with family,” she said softly. “You had a wife once. Children. Find a new family in this life as you did in your human one.”

He frowned and looked away. “My wife is dead. My children are grown. I am only a faint memory to them. I want no other family.”

“No.” Maelona grasped his hands in her own. She was slender but tall. Unusually so for a woman of her age, and Carwyn had often wondered whether the Northern blood of the raiders who had killed her sister had not touched her own family as well. His sire was a strong woman but had been melancholy for too long. “Do not abandon love. Love is the foundation of strength. What we build on and hold to. Find a new family to share your love. Find them from those who need healing. The weak who need help. Find a mate and surround yourself with joy. This life is too lonely to travel alone.”