"No."
  Yaksha sits up. "Did he say anything about me?"
  Shorter and shorter it burns.
  "No!"
  "Why won't you answer my question?"
  The truth bursts out of me. I have wanted to say it for so long. "Because I hate you!"
  "Why?"
  "Because you stole away my love, my Rama and Lalita. You steal my love away now, when I 
have finally found it again. I will hate you for eternity, and if that is not enough to 
stop you from being in his grace, then I will hate him as well." I point to Ray. "Let him 
go. Let him live."
  Yaksha is surprised. I have stunned the devil. "You love him. You love him more than 
your own life."
  There is only pain in my chest. The fourth center, the fourth note. It is as if it is 
off key. "Yes."
  Yaksha's tone softens. "Did he tell you something about love?"
  I nod, weeping, I feel so helpless. "Yes."
  "What did he tell you?"
  "He said, where there is love, there is my grace." The sound of his flute is too far 
away. There is no time to be grateful for what I have been given in my long life. I feel 
as if I will choke on my grief. I can only see Ray, my lover, my child, all the years he 
will be denied. He looks at me with such trusting eyes, as if somehow I will still manage 
to save him. "He told me to remember that."
  "He told me the same thing." Yaksha pauses to wonder. "It must be true." He adds 
casually, "You and your friend can go."
  I look up. "What?"
  "You broke your vow because you love this young man. It is the only reason you broke 
it. You must still have Krishna's grace. You only became a vampire to protect Rama and 
your child. You must have had his grace from the beginning. That is why he showed you 
such kindness. I did not see that till now.'I cannot harm you. He would not wish me to." 
Yaksha glances at the burning fuse. "You had better hurry."
  The sparks of the short fuse are like the final sands of an hourglass.
  I grab Ray's hand and leap up and pull him toward the front door. I do not open the 
door with my hand. I kick it open; the wrong way. The hinges rupture, the wood splinters. 
The night air is open before us. I shove Ray out ahead of me.
  "Run!" I shout.
  "But-"
  "Run!"
  He hears me, finally, and dashes for the trees. I turn, I don't know why. The chase is 
over and the race is won. There is no reason to tempt fate. What I do now, it is the most 
foolish act of my life. I stride back into the living room. Yaksha stares out at the dark 
sea. I stand behind him.
  "You have ten seconds," he says.
  "Hate and fear and love are all in the heart. I felt that when he played his flute." I 
touch his shoulder. "I don't just hate you. I didn't just fear you."
  He turns and looks at me. He smiles; he always had a devilish grin.
  "I know that, Sita," he says. "Goodbye."
  "Goodbye."
  I leap for the front door. I am outside, thirty feet off the front porch, when the 
bombs go off. The power of the shock wave is extraordinary even for me to absorb. It 
lifts me up, and for a few moments it is as if I can fly. But it does not set me down 
softly. At one point in my trajectory fate makes me a marksman's prized bird. An object 
hot and sharp pierces me from behind.
  It goes through my heart. A stake.
  I land in a ball of agony. The night burns behind me. My blood sears as it pours from 
the wound in my chest. Ray is beside me, asking me what he should do. I writhe in the 
dirt, my fingers clawing into the earth. But I do not want to go into the ground, no, not 
after walking on it for so long. I try to get the words out-it is not easy. I see I have 
been impaled by the splintered leg of my piano bench.
  "Pull it out," I gasp.
  "The stick?" It is the first stupid thing I have heard Ray say.
  I turn my front to him. "Yes."
  Ray grabs the end of the leg. The wood is literally flaming, although it has passed 
through my body. He yanks hard. The stick breaks; he has got half of it. The other half 
is still in my body. Too bad for me. I close my eyes for an instant and see a million red 
stars. I blink and they explode as if the universe has ended. There remains only red 
light everywhere. The color of sunset, the color of blood. I find myself settling onto my 
back. My head rolls to one side. Cool mud touches my cheek. It warms as my blood pours 
from my mouth and puddles around my head. A red stain, almost black in the fiery night, 
spreads down my beautiful blond hair. Ray weeps. I look at him with such love I honestly 
feel I see Krishna's face.
  It is not the worst way to die.
  "Love you," I whisper.
  He hugs me. "I love you, Sita."
  So much love, I think as I close my eyes and the pain recedes. There must be so much 
grace, so much protection for me if Krishna meant what he said. Of course I believe he 
meant it. I do believe in miracles.
  I wonder if I will die, after all...



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