God was not happy with her choice.

Amanda Malreaux could not afford to think that way.

Lying in the filthy alley, she felt the coming darkness as the vampires savored her blood, felt the confusion, fog and terror that others had described. The pain of the gunshot eased as she slowly died.

But her faith would be strong enough to keep her in the light now. It must be.

She had never been a font of biblical wisdom. To sustain herself now, she called not on the Bible but on the words of great writers.

She spun dizzy and lost through icy fog but she heard Whittier: The steps of faith fall on the seeming void but find the rock beneath.

With great effort, she stood on that rock, abandoned and eternally outside. But Nathaniel Hawthorne had written: Christian faith is a grand cathedral, with divinely pictured windows. Standing without you can see no glory, nor can imagine any, but standing within every ray of light reveals a harmony of unspeakable splendors.

It seemed she stood within that blazing harmony now, but she ravened like a murdering animal with the power that coursed through her. Ah, but Shakespeare had said: Oh, it is excellent to have a giant’s strength; but it is tyrannous to use it like a giant.

And so, with exhausting misery, she held her power in check. How she suffered with the thirst! But she thought of Achebe, the writer so beloved by her Nigerian mother: When suffering knocks at your door and you say there is no seat for him, he tells you not to worry because he has brought his own stool.

How could she not laugh?

And so, step by painful step, Amanda Malreaux did what nobody in five years had done.

With no beloved standing by to remind her of who she was (except the Beloved she believed in with all her dear heart), she became a vampire and stayed herself.

When her eyes fluttered open at last, she was hungry and cold on her back in a dirty alley. At first she thought she was alone but she saw the three who had made her a vampire sitting nearby. None of them looked at her but they hadn't wandered away.

She sat slowly, feeling as though her body was made of glacial ice that flows under enormous pressure. She fought off the impulse to search for the man who had shot her and claw him to quivering shreds. She fought off the urge to go back to the convent, get Sister Francine to let her in and then to drink and drink and drink.

There was only one acceptable option. She must wait for dawn and walk into the sunlight. (And if the City was covered in fog, she must wait longer.) And she must abandon modesty and remove her clothing when she did.

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Her younger days had included three relationships, all of them passionate (but with all necessary precautions). And of course there had been Kendal, the sweet scholar she had been so sure was her soul mate. She had conceived with him just before he drifted away and she had never told him she carried his child. While fully supporting the right of women to choose, she had faced the deepest struggle of her life before making her own decision about abortion ten years ago. Shortly after that, she had begun the pathway toward joining the Community of Saint Francis. She had not had a sexual experience since, though she accepted the erotic dreams that made her blush as a natural consequence of the life she had chosen.

So she was not shocked at the thought of undulating in ecstasy; she actually looked forward to experiencing it again. And if others saw her, that was a cross she must bear. She even thought with a wry smile that she would be emulating Saint Francis when he threw off his clothes and declared he would henceforth have nothing.

No, it was the thought of sitting for hours in this smelly alley that drove her mad.

“Hello,” she said softly to the three vampires who had saved her. They moved when she spoke, but kept looking toward the alley’s mouth. The night was dark and endless; she spoke more for need of company than anything else.

“Will you look at me, dear ones? Will you hear me again, even though I'm now one of you?” The woman with the eyepatch glanced at her neutrally.

“When I was human,” she began, and stopped, choked with a flood of feelings which those words brought. She reached instinctually for the gold cross around her neck. As her hand touched it, she felt rather than saw it flash, gleaming as though the gold was kissed by sunlight.

It never occurred to her that she might no longer be able to touch it, that it might burn her. She pressed it to her heart and felt it sustain her.

“When I was human,” she said with renewed confidence, “I declared that wherever I stood I was at Home with my Beloved. I believe that more firmly than ever now.”

All three turned to face her. “Dear ones, we are still sharing that Home. Brothers? Sister? Will you take my hands? Will you stand with me and wait the long hours until morning?” Their eyes were more human. When dawn came she would ask them to stand with her in sunlight, but not yet.

She glided to her feet, fought off a clutch of hollowness that nearly doubled her over, and said, “Take my hands. Please?” Her shoulder felt calm. She flexed it: the bullet grated but the only pain felt was the hunger.

They believed in her, she could see it. She knew she should tell them, “Believe not in me but in God,” but she hadn't the strength. She needed their faith in her. The tall woman put a cold hand in hers, the man in the red scarf took her other hand and the long-haired white man actually gave her a hug.

They said nothing but looked at her and, just as though she hadn't become a vampire, she spoke to them as she had that evening. When the dawn came, would they stand with her?

Would she be drawn into explicit acts of passion with them?

Oh dear Lord!

A nun, having a foursome with another woman and two men. How the pornographers of the world would love that! But she must have faith.

Once Brandon or Kevian had handed her his phone, saying “Hey, Sister, this looks important!” and she’d found herself watching nun porn. Handing the phone back with a wry grin, she’d only said, “Dressing like a penguin does not make you a nun.”

The young man had tried to look worldly but his respect for her had clearly ticked up a notch.

Everything would be alright.