No matter how hard it was, Miranda was right. Ending what Dracula did to her was the best way I could've shown my love.
I hear boots touch down. "Josh?"
It's the archangel. Michael. "Do you want to tell me what happened?" he asks, standing behind me.
"I don't want to talk about it. Besides, you already know." I shouldn't speak to him that way. Not Michael. Not that, at the moment, I care. I'm a failure. I failed Miranda. I failed the Big Boss. What more is there to say?
Then I turn, heartened, overjoyed to see the archangel cradling Miranda's sleeping soul. It's a transparent, sparkling blue echo of my girl.
"You did well," Michael announces. "You have fulfilled your mission."
Now I'm confused. "My mission?"
I think back to that conversation on the train. Josh said I was supposed to wipe out something of tremendous significance. Could he have meant Miranda? Was she the significant one?
Michael looks down at her spiritual form. "Yes, your mission. She has already given you your next one. Fulfill
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it, and you'll be welcomed back to heaven. Until then, earth is your home."
I struggle to unravel the grand scheme. My girl asked me to help save those vampires who could be redeemed. Michael just signed off on that. Since the beginning, such a thing would've been unthinkable. Angels had automatically written off the undead. But clearly, that's no longer the case. Miranda shifted the universe. She changed everything. And Michael's retrieving her soul means that she also saved herself.
Before I can thank him, they're gone.
My right hand falls to the hilt of a sword. My first thought is that I don't have a sword. Then I realize it's a gift from the archangel. I withdraw the weapon from its sheath and raise it, flaming, in the warm spring wind to the fading stars and rising sun.
I vow to honor my girl's wishes and take the challenge set before me. I vow to someday return upstairs to our community of heavenly beings and ascended souls.
I vow to be reunited with Miranda. No matter how long it takes, I can be patient.
After all, we have eternity.
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AUTHOR'S NOTE
Dracula, the quintessential literary vampire, was created by an Irishman, Abraham "Bram" Stoker, in an 1897 novel by the same name. Three more of his characters, Jonathan Harker (along with his knife), Renfield, and Dr. Van Helsing, are also referenced herein.
This novel also was influenced by another classic, Charles Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities (1859), which members of my ninth-grade English class took turns reading aloud over the course of a semester.
Both books feature a character with variations of the same name, Stoker's Lucy Westenra and Dickens's Lucie Manette. This inspired my naming of Miranda's best friend. Two more of Dickens's characters are mentioned in passing: Madame Defarge and Sydney Carton, whose surname is attributed to a family plot at the fictional Dallas cemetery.
It also merits noting that Miranda's high-school play is Romeo and Juliet, by William Shakespeare. It's generally believed to have been written in the late 1500s. The story pays tribute to an even older tradition of tales of star-crossed and (usually) tragic lovers. Though Miranda and Zachary may be fairly placed in this category, their ending is more hopeful that that of Shakespeare's heroes.
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Avid readers may also notice nods to the work of Howard Ashman, George Axelrod, "Blues Brother" Dan Aykroyd ("on a mission from God"), James Bridges, Frank Capra, Johnny Cash, Bob Clampett, Carlo Collodi, Walt Disney, John Fawcett, Neil Gaiman, William Goldman, Thomas Harris, Kimberly Willis Holt, James Howe, Bob Kane, John Landis, Aaron Latham, Arthur Laurents, Stan Lee, Alan Jay Lerner, C. S. Lewis, Frederick Loewe, George Lucas, Alan Menken, E. Nesbit, Sydney Newman, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Anne Rice, Gene Roddenberry, J. K. Rowling, Jerry Siegel, George Bernard Shaw, Mary Shelley, Takashi Shimizu, Joe Shuster, Stephen Sommers, Stephen Susco, J. R. R. Tolkien, Leonardo da Vinci, Karen Walton, and Joss Whedon. However, Wow the Crowd, Angels to Zombies: Apocalypse A to Z, and the various vampire media outlets are entirely fictional.
Furthermore, the novel augments its settings with the occasional street, alley, building, business, or other fictional locale, most notably the vampire-controlled Whitby Estates on Chicago's North Shore. Likewise, it offers a fictional spin on a handful of historical figures who are mentioned in passing.
Finally, this story takes place earlier in the same universe as my novel Tantalize. Members of both casts will cross over in a forthcoming book, Blessed.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Angels are everywhere!
I would like to thank: my agent, Ginger Knowlton; her assistant, Tracy Marchini; manuscript readers Greg Leitich Smith, Anne Bustard, Tim Crow, and Sean Petrie; and experts Brandee J. Hetle, Julie Lake, April Lurie, and Linda Mount.
I'd also like to thank the whole heavenly team at Candlewick Press for their faith, efforts, and professionalism, especially executive editor Deborah Wayshak, associate editor Jennifer Yoon, and intern Venus Musgrove.
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