Long lay the world in sin and error pining,
Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.
As the music swelled, sung by cheerful men and women slightly off-key and just behind tempo as the church organist struggled to keep pace, Genevieve’s throat closed.
She hadn’t realized she had been so afraid to step into the ordinary holiness.
For years, she had firmly believed the lie that she—that all vampires—were banned from all of this. She had carried bitterness in her heart because of it. How could a good God bar her from Himself, who had come to redeem all the hurts of the world? Was she trapped in an existence too far from what He’d intended with His creation? Did that make her hurts too deep, too blighted for His work? Was she and all those like her too far away for His grace to reach?
But no. That had been a lie, like so many others. Had Paul not said, “For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord”?
Even if she was undead?
Even if that creature was a vampire?
Nothing kept her from stepping forward now except her own bitterness.
And in the candlelight, assailed by the peace of the season, what place did that bitterness have now?
I have believed a lie, and I doubted what I knew of the Lord, she admitted.The flaw was in me, and not in Him.
Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.
Kendrick set one solid hand over hers, and she clung to it and closed her eyes as the second verse washed over her.
The King of kings lay thus in lowly manger,
In all our trials born to be our friend.
He knows our need, to our weakness no stranger.
Behold your King, before Him lowly bend!
Behold your King, your King, before Him lowly bend!
At the close of the song, the vicar stood and read the Annunciation from Luke, the same verses she had read for Hannah and Peter weeks before.“For with God, nothing shall be impossible.”
In the ruins of her shattered hopes and grieving heart, she hadn’t known what lay ahead. Genevieve hadn’t believed this kind of change had been possible for the Ossuary. She hadn’t even believed her heart could warm so quickly. But it had.
She straightened and turned to Kendrick. He met her eyes and raised an eyebrow in inquiry. She bit her lip and tightened her hand around his.
At the close of the service, Genevieve stepped out of the church in a daze. She felt curiously light. Around her, people exclaimed in delight.
“Look. It’s snowing,” Kendrick said, pointing with his free hand to the flakes softly falling, settling on the street and the houses all around, dusting everything in a coating of white.
“Snow on Christmas?” a woman exclaimed in surprise. “Unheard of!”
“Nothing is impossible, it seems,” Genevieve murmured.
“It’s snowing, mum!” Fletcher crowed as Kendrick and Genevieve returned, handing their snow-dusted capes and hats to Robbie, who was manning the door. “D’you think it will be there tomorrow?” he asked wistfully.
“If it falls steadily, it should be,” Kendrick said. “You will have to make snow angels and snowmen in the park, where we can see them at dusk.”
Fletcher bit his lip. “Wish you and missus could be there, guv.”
Kendrick reached out and ruffled his hair. “We’ll have a snowball fight at dusk. How about that?”
Fletcher brightened. “I think the nippers would like that. We can build fortifications, like against the Vikings!” He dashed off to the family parlor to impart the news.
