“Raphael asked for better security at the hotel on his second day of living there. He argued that a pack of mundane kids had been able to break in and kill one of our own. Camille laughed at him. Then we were attacked by a rogue band of werewolves, and Raphael’s security measures were put in place. Guards were posted, and Raphael always took his turn guarding the hotel, even once he was second in command and didn’t have to. He took the first watch, on the first day and night. I remember him showing me plans of the hotel, every weak point, the ways he’d figured out how to best defend ourselves. He had it all worked out, though he’d been with us less than a week. He left to take up his post, and as he went he said, ‘Sleep, Lily. I’ll watch the doors.’ I never slept peacefully before then. I didn’t know how to rest and trust I was safe. I slept that day as I’d never slept before.”

Lily stared at the vase of flowers, bright red as vampire blood. Alec didn’t think she was seeing them.

“Later it turned out that Raphael hired the werewolves to attack us so that we would implement the safety precautions he wanted,” Lily added in pragmatic tones. “He was extremely set on having his own way. Also, he was a total asshat.”

“That is clear to me,” said Alec.

Lily laughed again. She got up from the bed, gripping Alec’s shoulder for a moment as she passed, then she began to pace the little room as if it were a cage.

“Raphael was always there, from then on. Camille would demote him from being second in command now and then, to annoy him. It didn’t matter. He never wavered, no matter what anyone else did. I thought he’d be there forever. Then he was taken. I told myself I had to hold it together, form an alliance with the werewolves, hold the line against madness. Just until Raphael came back. Only Raphael never came back.”

Lily drew a hand over her eyes. She went to Rafael’s bedside, passing her tearstained hand lightly over his curly hair.

“Well,” she said. “I was happy for fifty-four years. That’s more than most people get. Now there’s the clan to look after, like Raphael would’ve wanted. The night we knew he was gone, and every night since, I watch my vampires in the home he guarded. I watch the mundanes in the streets he loved. Every one of them looks like a child I should help, a possibility for a future I wasn’t able to imagine. Every one of them seems precious, worth defending, worth the world. Every one of them is Raphael.”

The child stirred, as if he were being called. Lily pulled her hand away.

It was day, after a long night.