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  On the other hand, Phil probably wouldn’t want to change.

  I’m planning to write a short story about Poppy and James and Phillip for my website. I’d like to show what happens to the three wanderers when they reach Poppy and Phillip’s father or show what happens to them when the apocalypse comes.

  Final thought: I now wonder, why in the world did I create all these sets of twins or siblings who have similar names? I can only guess that it’s because my sister and I grew up like twins, although our names (Judy and Lisa) don’t show it.

  Made Vampires

  Made vampires are different from lamia in that they don’t age and don’t eat, but again I purposely broke most of the vampire traditions. One thing that was important to me was that the two groups of vampires form a unified front … of evil. Another was that even though lamia today believe they are the best kind of vampires, made vampires got some respect. Made vampires have no obligations to the vampire or lamia who changed them. Hunter Redfern, a lamia and the most powerful of all the wicked Night People (except for his ancestress Maya), was quite content to have a made vampire, Quinn, as his heir. In fact, he was adamant about it. But, for the most part, Quinn went his own way, especially as centuries passed. When Quinn obeyed Hunter Redfern, it was because even in the 1600s Hunter was the leader of the Night World Council (Vampire Division), and Quinn didn’t care to be staked.

  Making the vampires patriarchal (run by men) and the witches matriarchal (run by women) was fun. Especially since Thierry, who was raised a witch but made a vampire, revived Circle Daybreak. Thierry retained all his witch values throughout the millennia and deemed that the Circle would be matriarchal.

  I got Thierry’s first name from an “I love Thierry” graffito written on a bathroom stall! And I gave him my favorite last name, Descouedres. According to a Frenchwoman I asked, his name is pronounced “TEE-ry Day-coo-DRAY.”

  Ghouls

  In order to write about ghouls, I had to read a book on death and the stages of decay of the body, and I will never forget it. It was incredibly morbid. It helped that I had already done some research on preserved mummies for my trilogy The Forbidden Game. Also, I was fascinated by a book about the Iceman, a remarkably well-preserved mummy found in a glacier in the Alps. Ötzi the Iceman died about 5,000 years ago and was encased in ice until a thaw revealed his head and neck and a hiking couple discovered him.

  I feel very sorry for ghouls. They have no mental activity except what Terry Pratchett and Resident Evil both call “the need to feed.” Their bodies keep decaying no matter what they eat. James Rasmussen’s childhood nanny in Secret Vampire (Miss Emma), and even the ghoul Jez Redfern fights in Huntress, were innocent humans once, who didn’t ask to become ghouls.

  The kindest thing you can do for ghouls is treat them to a stake dinner.

  Witches

  Just like Mary-Lynnette, who became fascinated by the matriarchal witches while learning about the kinship ceremony in Daughters of Darkness, I also fell in love with this clan. From the beginning, Circle Twilight was a lot like Circle Daybreak, except that Circle Twilight witches scorned humans. I didn’t write as much about Night World witches as I wanted because I had already done an entire trilogy about witches called The Secret Circle, in which I had used pretty much everything I could find or make up about Wicca.

  The idea of witchlight grew slowly, and the importance of Hellewise and Maya grew too. I made family trees about them, the twin daughters of Hecate Witch-Queen, and the other first witches to leave a historical record of them. I had a very hard time giving their descendents names that sounded both a little like cave people and a little romantic. I ended up with rather silly names like Conlan Spearthrower (Thierry’s brother, who mates with Hellewise.) Two I liked were Rushglow and Summer Ice.

  Here’s something that didn’t get into Spellbinder: Thea is only a Harman by adoption. Her father was actually the Harman, and since witch names pass through the female line, she was born Thea Avery. Unlike Sylvia Weald in Black Dawn, though, Thea was never bitter about being born to a “second-class” family.

  Shapeshifters

  Although I mention shapeshifters in Secret Vampire, for a long time I wrote only about werewolves, if I remember correctly. And then in Black Dawn I made up shapeshifters who were also evil—and rather stupid. But then I was just sort of tackled by a shapeshifter who was everything that the previous shape-changers weren’t. I’m talking about Keller.

  Raksha Keller is one of those characters who just came to me, jumped me, and went on running, leaving me sort of stunned, trying to trace her by her tracks. I’ve always loved her, but I never knew what she might do next. If you want to know more about Keller and her soulmate, there’s a story on my website called “Thicker than Water.” She’s also in Strange Fate. And between the two, there are some surprises, which, yes, I knew about from the beginning but couldn’t get into Witchlight because of space.

  The thing I like best about Keller is that she never pities herself— or at least she tries not to. And if she seems even more cold-blooded than Quinn, it’s because she’s a cat, basically, and anyone who loves cats knows how they value their independence. But Keller also has a completely pure and vulnerable heart, even if she herself doesn’t realize it. She’s like my cat Suzie, who was definitely not a lap cat and would jump into my lap and put her head under my arm, trying to hide there, when we went to the veterinarian.

  Werewolves

  I didn’t mean to make werewolves so evil. It was wrong, and I don’t know how it happened. I love wolves; I’ve read a lot about them. They are noble, playful, intelligent, and gentle creatures. But despite what I said about werewolves in Daughters of Darkness, that they were “wolves who sometimes looked like people,” they acted more like wolf-dog mixtures. Hybrids can be unstable and just outright mean. I think that must be what distinguishes werewolves from the other shapeshifters, even from the Draches, who are the lineal descendents of dragons. Werewolves must have some wolf blood in them as well as some dog blood. That’s what distinguishes them from noble wolves.

  Of course, Lupe and other werewolves who join Circle Daybreak are undoubtedly descended from pure wolves. And, incidentally, gray wolves are considered either threatened or endangered in the United States, except in Alaska.

  Maybe someday I’ll be able to write something about the noble werewolves.

  Dragons

  Since there’s a lot about dragons in Strange Fate, I’ll mention here that just about every ancient people have legends about dragons, from the Aztecs to the Chinese to the Romans to the Persians to the Irish. Once you begin to look into it, it’s almost scary. Really. The coincidences just keep piling up, and the more you research, the more you get a sort of strange sinking feeling. (Although, I’m a Virgo, so I’m very logical and don’t believe in astrology or any of that stuff about Atlantis or ancient astronauts.)

  Actually, the thing I find scariest about dragons is a dragon in human form. Just the thought of something that looks like a person but is actually a dragon, like the one Keller meets in Witchlight, with opaque black eyes and the soul of a monster—well, that gives me the shivers.

  Humans, Vermin, Outsiders

  The only thing I have to say about humans is that if you look around you, you’ll find that a lot of things are still like the evil vampire system: designed to keep women in their place. If you don’t believe me, try this: watch a commercial or movie or TV show and mentally change each character’s sex. Just try it. Now, does it sound ridiculous when a boy runs away shrieking from an enemy while his honey grits her teeth and faces it? Do guys look cute with multicolored junk smeared on their lips and cheeks and eyelashes? Are they funny in miniskirts and high heels? Do you notice that on the news, male politicians, anchors, and correspondents are always smiling, while female ones are allowed to look grave? And that someone has decided that women are still very attractive when their hair is gray and they have some wrinkles, while men must always be young or at leas
t have a face-lift every year? Isn’t it odd that even the bravest boy needs a girl for something in the end?

  I dare you to really try this a few times. Even on my own books, which were written to please editors. If you have a good imagination, you can do it easily. Don’t just sniff and list a few books or shows where you think a strong girl or woman appeared. Try it today on everything you see. And then … whoops! Yes, that’s the universe wobbling all around you.

  Scarier than the Night World, isn’t it?

  Old Souls

  I wanted to call Soulmate “Old Souls,” but my editor at the time thought it would sound too … old. That young people wouldn’t buy a book with “old” in the title. I also wanted the book to be much longer. Hannah (from Montana, and remember I wrote these books more than ten years ago) had so many lifetimes, and I wanted to show her in more of them. I wanted to show how Maya as a “friend” of her German teacher led young Viscountess Roshanna to a building that was bombed by the first Zeppelin raid in World War I. I wanted to show how, in ancient Persia, sixteen-year-old Anath was charmed by Maya into entering a cave full of serpents. And, of course, I wanted to show how Thierry tried, in each lifetime, to find and save his soulmate—but always failed. I researched those time periods and fell in love with them, learned all I could about each of them. I may still write the stories about them and post them on my website.

  Hannah Snow, Lady Hannah of Circle Daybreak, is still very dear to me. She isn’t just the heroine of the greatest Cinderella story in history (even I don’t know how rich and powerful Lord Thierry is, both in the Night World and the human world), she’s a worker who immediately began organizing things in Circle Daybreak. Old Souls don’t usually dillydally, even though they know they literally have all the time in the world.

  Of course Hannah has a large role in Strange Fate.

  The Soulmate Principle

  One of my favorite songs is from Aida. Not the old opera Aida by Giuseppe Verdi (although actually I love that, too), but the opening song of the rock musical by Sir Elton John and Sir Tim Rice. It’s my favorite song in the whole musical, and the first two minutes and twenty seconds are really a ballad, which I digitally cut off just before the loud, dissonant chord.

  It starts with the words “Every story, tale, or memoir …” and ends with “All are tales of love at heart.” It’s called “Every Story Is a Love Story.” Try to find it sung by Sherie Scott. I’m listening to her sing it on Windows Media Player right now. (I put it on my computer before all my CDs were stolen at the airport.) This song holds me mesmerized and makes me cry.

  Now that you’ve listened to it, you should understand the soulmate principle. It’s a very, very old idea, much older than the original Aida. It comes from Plato, in ancient Greece, who may not have been serious about it. In the Night World most people aren’t serious about it either—until it hits them.

  The Prophecies

  I wrote the “One from …” prophecy before I actually figured out how each line would be fulfilled. Of course, my editor at the time wanted to know how the four books I was proposing were going to work, so I had to figure out what each line meant. I wrote up four pages and completed the first three books easily. Little did I know that before I could properly start Strange Fate ( “One from the twilight to be one with the dark …”) my life was going to change so radically that I would be left for ten years without the ability to write, even in my head.

  There are actually three prophecies in Huntress. The other two are pretty self-explanatory. They were meant to be grim forebodings:

  In blue fire, the final darkness is banished;

  In blood, the final price is paid.

  Four to stand between the light and the shadow,

  Four of blue fire; power in their blood.

  Born in the year of the blind Maiden’s vision;

  Four less one and darkness triumphs.

  Circle Daybreak

  Circle Daybreak was a tale that grew in the telling. I first mentioned it casually in Spellbinder because I thought it would be a good idea to have three circles of witches. As I’ve mentioned before, three is a very magical number. To balance Circle Twilight and Circle Midnight, there needed to be a Circle Daybreak.

  I’d started the Night World series because I wanted to write stories of forbidden love. But after I’d gotten several illegal couples together, I realized that there ought to be some truly safe place to put them. And Circle Daybreak became the focus of all my hopes and ideals.

  Although I have a very logical, pragmatic side, I also have a side that is pure idealist. And Circle Daybreak was born out of the desperate hope and belief that somehow, someday, everybody on this planet will be able to tolerate one another. That there won’t be any more wars— between witches and vampires, or between countries, either.

  By the time I decided it was Thierry Descouedres who’d revived Circle Daybreak, I knew that it had just about infinite money and influence behind it, and that it must have secret towns just as the vampires did. These secret Daybreak towns showed the best side of people, where my soulmates could live in peace.

  Incidentally, Daybreakers still use their clan’s flower to identify themselves, but many have changed the color to black and white petals alternating; to twin flowers, one in each color; or even to pure white. That’s how the bad guys identify a Daybreaker.

  The Wild Powers

  Of the three Wild Powers who are already public, I like Jez Redfern best. Jez is another character who just sort of attacked me from behind, and her soulmate came right along with her, the way he does in Huntress. I’ve already written one long story about Jez and Morgead for my website, and I’ll probably write more. Jez has endless stories to tell, and Morgead lives in a real building I used to visit.

  Then there’s Iliana. To fulfill the prophecy, I needed Iliana to be a Harman, with the traditional Harman features—but not exactly like Thea; more like her distant cousin Gillian. Keller was so responsible that Iliana had to be a complete bubblehead. I also wanted a triangle where all three sides were equally loving. Galen and Iliana made that easy: love just flowed endlessly out of both of them. Enough, even, to break down the barricade around Keller’s heart.

  Third, there is Delos. Mostly what I think about Delos is that he’s used to being in charge, and that Jez is used to being in charge—and the time has come when they finally have to work together to hold off the apocalypse. Sparks are flying in Strange Fate, and it isn’t just the soulmate principle at work.

  And then there’s the last line of the prophecy: One from the twilight to be one with the dark….

  DON’T MISS THIS

  SPECIAL SNEAK PEEK AT THE

  DRAMATIC CONCLUSION TO

  L.J. SMITH’S

  BESTSELLING NIGHT WORLD SERIES:

  STRANGE FATE

  vampires, werewolves, witches, shapeshifters—they live among us without our knowledge. Night World is their secret society, a secret society with very strict rules. But the apocalypse is drawing near. And the Night World and the human world are about to collide in a cataclysmic way….

  CHAPTER 1

  Sarah

  Sarah wasn’t trying to hear the whispering that was going on in front of her. She couldn’t help it. Soft as it was, it seemed to override the teacher’s voice.

  “You’re really getting me worried about homecoming. Are you going or not?” Rachel Carr was saying softly to Pamela Adams.

  Sarah absentmindedly decorated math sums in her notebook with a design of flowers, which somehow seemed to make the voices even clearer.

  “It all depends,” Pamela answered, sighing. “The idea was to get Mal Harman to ask me, but so far …” She shrugged gracefully. “You know.”

  “Same with me,” Rachel whispered back heavily, without turning to look at Sarah.

  Sarah stopped drawing and stared at her notebook. Maybe they didn’t know she was there. Since her mother’s funeral a year ago, people often didn’t know she was around until she s
poke. And the two most popular girls at E. B. Turner High School didn’t usually sit near Sarah or pay her much attention.

  Rachel continued. “Don’t worry, I’m not competing with you. I mean, I have my eye on Kierlan Drache. But the question is, can either of them be pried apart from that mousy little Sarah, even for one dance?”

  The girls must not have noticed she was there. Pam and Rachel were always full of sweetness and light to Sarah in front of other people. But then, that was because Kierlan and Mal were usually the other people around Sarah. Sarah bit her lip. She would never last more than a few seconds in a debate with these girls, but …

  No. She bit her lip harder, holding back the words, imagining herself in a cool green forest instead of this slightly stuffy first-period math class. Her teacher’s droning voice became the creaking of the redwoods.

  It was October 12 and no one had really asked her to homecoming, and she certainly hadn’t asked anyone. But then, no one ever asked her to dances. What happened just happened by itself.

  “So have you spoken to Mal about it yet?” Rachel asked Pamela. Somehow, despite how Sarah tried, the whispering, although soft, would not become the sound of leaves rustling in the trees.

  “I’ll make my move when I’m ready,” Pamela said coolly, uncrossing and recrossing long, elegant legs in her very short white knit skirt.