ALT My childe, You have found your place among our Kindred, as I always knew you would. You’re as safe and secure as any of us can be in these dire, difficult times. This means it’s time to turn your attention to the pursuits that make our existence worthwhile. They say vampires are immortal. That’s a lie. We can be burned the same as any mortal. But we don’t age. We have oceans of time, as the cliché goes. What to do with it all? My answer has always been love. I’ve heard many of our kind say that we don’t feel love, not after the Embrace took our humanity from us. That we just got through the motions, nostalgic for the emotions of our breathing days. Maybe it’s true. Who cares? What I’m saying is this: Romance is great fun. It fills the nights when everything has become stale and boring.

ALT Just when you thought you’d seen everything, some ardent little fledgling will kidnap you and try to force you to love them. You humor them for a week or two just because you want to see where they’re going with it. Of course, you end up killing them in the end. These fledglings tend to become boring once they’ve used up the one idea they had. Anyway. Romance! Such a lovely thing!