“Here...and here,” Lestat said.
Louis looked up from the divan to see his maker’s finger move across the long sheet of paper. He watched as Chérie’s red marker followed, noting each correction as Lestat pointed.
“Très bon, mon père,” she said, nodding.
Louis smiled as he watched her warm brown hair bob playfully. She wore her ponytail looped halfway again through the colorful rayon and elastic tie, creating an unending circle. Her neck lay exposed seductively and his dark green eyes lovingly traced its alabaster contours. He ignored the urge to rise and taste that flesh with his lips, to loose that hair and feel its silkiness between his long, hard fingers. Lestat would be none too pleased at yet another interruption.
Since Daniel’s contract had been signed a month earlier, Chérie and Lestat had labored over the new edition of his book. Daniel would not begin his rewrites until Louis approved the changes and additions they had been diligently cataloging.
They had fallen into the pattern of Lestat dictating and Chérie typing, though their maker had been loathe to admit she was the better typist. Louis’s eyes danced, recalling the night Lestat had insisted they test this ability, maker and fledgling. Chérie trounced him every time, her vampiric abilities enhancing her natural dexterity.
She was so beautiful. And so very enticing to him. A modern vampire, made only last summer, the most recent and perhaps the last of Lestat’s coven. Chérie was unlike any other vampire. Not solely for her dress, which was strange enough, preferring as she did the lightest weight fabrics, rayon and silk, next to her preternatural flesh. She conceded to sweaters, long trowsers, and boots only when the foulest weather demanded them. Footwear, it seemed, she shunned most of all.
Louis marked his place in the novel he had been reading and set the book on the endtable. Lestat hovered over her now, one hand on the desk and one on her shoulder, reading the words as they appeared on the computer’s monitor. Chérie wore a long rayon shirt matching her hair tie, deep blue and covered in a print of tropical flowers, the material draping sensually beneath her maker’s hand. She sat with one leg tucked under her, slender fingers poised over the keyboard as Lestat described a location to her.
What separated Chérie from other vampires was how she had come to be Born to Darkness. Not in the way she had been made, for Louis had played a similar part in Claudia’s making as well, draining her before Lestat had allowed her to feed. She was unique in why she had sought the Dark Gift. Chérie had been conceived in love and she loved her maker without reservation. She found nothing but delight in Lestat and he seemed truly happy to heap his affections upon her.
Not since those early days with Claudia had Louis seen his maker so at ease with simple love. Making Chérie had seemed to lift the gloom that had trailed Lestat since his affair with Memnoch. It freed him to love Louis again, as he had never done, even going so far as to forgive Louis what Lestat had called his worst sin, withholding the immortal blood during the fiasco with the body thief.
But it was the demon Memnoch who had given understanding to Lestat of Louis’s anguish over killing mortals. There was no denying their vampire nature and the need to kill, though, as both he and Lestat had attempted. This had been excruciating for Chérie as well. He knew she had fed her second night, taking her instruction from Lestat on choosing to hunt where evildoers were prevalent. Their maker had been uncharacteristically patient with her, Louis later learned, once he had again fed from his maker and gained the ability to hear his Chérie’s thoughts.
For she had been made for him. She had accepted the Dark Gift because of her love for Louis. Chérie was not running from pain or guilt or fear. She chose being Born to Darkness so she might live with him forever.
A tear gathered in Louis’s eye. She loved him. Loved him more than she despised the killing. It had been by far the most difficult thing he’d done when, a week after her birthing, she had again needed to feed. He still hunted nightly then, though she did not, made as she was with Lestat’s powerful blood. Chérie had accompanied him, watching him take the first mortal to cross his path. They sat and talked a long time after that. He described his complete surrender to his vampire nature, how he fed swiftly and ruthlessly. His human nature manifested itself only in that he did not give his victims the chance to feel fear or pain. She asked about what their maker called the little drink and he had reminded her what it had done to Daniel and to Nicki, as they had read in Lestat’s books. Chérie had agreed it seemed cruel, only creating more victims while delaying the kill that must eventually come. He tried to explain Armand’s way of calling out Those Who Would Die, how the auburn-haired vampire would put up visions to entice his victims to come to him.
Late that night, after she had fed, Louis held her as she cried. Chérie had tried calling out a victim but she had visions when she fed, as her maker did, and it was too painful, the anguish her victim had felt, the loneliness, and the fear of living.
They had hunted once more together, a month after Louis had fed again from Lestat, finally accepting his maker’s appeal to embrace his vampiric gifts and grow stronger. That night, Chérie held Louis as he wept. He had seen the visions for the first time, experiencing completely the life he was taking. The loves and joys of his victim, the rapture the mortal had felt as the life drained from him. Sweet, too deliciously sweet.
She too was Merciful Death that night and when they returned to her little house, they lay together on her big bed and cried. She opened her mind to him, and he to her, telling silently of their victims. Holding each other, stroking hair, kissing away the blood tears. Finally they locked, fangs to neck, joined in love, bound in blood. The ecstasy he felt as the gush of her blood filled his mouth, sliding through his being, was unlike any he’d known. His flesh, warm from the kill, pressed hard against her scorching flesh. She had seemed frantic to pull him closer as their thoughts flooded together, image upon image rushing with the blood. So like mortal coupling but infinitely more.
“Louis!”
He sat up abruptly on the divan at the sharpness in her voice. Lestat was as he was before but watching him and looking somewhat annoyed. Chérie had turned to face him, her cheeks slightly flushed.
“Louis,” she scolded gently. “We shall never get any work done with you thinking that way. My God! Who could concentrate!”
Louis looked contrite and smiled. “I’m sorry, my love.”
Lestat burst into laughter, the back of his hand delicately covering his lips. “What ever were you thinking, Louis?”
“You’ll never know,” Louis said, affecting a cruelty he did not possess.
His maker matched his stare, the effect genuine. “You think not? I alone cannot read your thoughts, mon petit.” He turned back to the galleys, explaining no further.
There was no need. Louis had been careless to let his mind roam freely for other vampires to read as they pleased. He closed his mind now, putting up what he thought of as a wall of static, one corner of his preternatural mind churning out ambiguous images as fast as they could be conjured. And then he ignored that corner, something he was quite good at doing, actually.
But those vampiric minds, and those of innumerable mortals, were open to Lestat if he chose and they were unguarded, all but the four belonging to his living fledglings. He and Chérie. David. And Gabrielle. Louis smiled.
“Gabrielle sends her love,” he said. He saw Chérie’s smile before she turned. Lestat threw up his hands.
“Mon Dieu! Are we to get no work done tonight?” He stomped across the room and threw himself into the chair opposite Louis. “So. You’ve been in contact with Gabrielle.”
Louis nodded slowly. “She’s somewhere in South America, I think. It felt vaguely familiar.” He searched his maker’s blue-gray eyes. They were almost violet tonight, picking up the color from the brilliant purple satin shirt he wore, a perfect contrast to his lustrous yellow locks.
“Focus please, Louis,” Lestat said wearily.
Chérie giggled as she saved the documents they had been working on.
Don’t laugh, Louis glared at her silently. You do it, too.
She clamped a hand over her mouth.
He returned his attention to their maker. Lestat’s eyes shimmered with amusement, his gaze low, his lips pressed together, silken and seductive. Lestat was playing with him, he knew. Louis intertwined his fingers and stared at them lest he get distracted again.
“I have been trying to contact her for several weeks,” he continued. “With no success. I wanted to learn if I could do this and she seemed the best choice.”
Lestat nodded. “Difficult. Yes, a good choice. If you could contact her, any of the others would be easy by comparison.”
“Exactly.”
“How is she?” Lestat asked quietly as he inspected the white plaster walls. “You know, this room screams for wallpaper.”
Louis glanced at Chérie. Lestat had already rearranged the furniture several times, his latest victim being the coffeetable, which now stood forlornly up-ended, exiled in the garage. Louis was at a loss in advising Chérie for it seemed he had always been routed in these bizarre little battles with his maker. And it had astounded him when she explained her belief that this was just another way Lestat expressed his love, that in lavishing his attention on their things he was in truth caring for them. It seemed far too simple, compared to Lestat’s usual machinations. Yet, she had worked hard for her home and was not about to relinquish her mastery over it.
Chérie clicked off the monitor and crossed to sit beside Louis.
“Oh, no you don’t!” she said. “Don’t you start redecorating my house now. I don’t have near enough budget for your tastes.”
Their maker waved it away as if it was no reason at all.
“Consider it a wedding gift then.”
“Wedding gift,” she repeated flatly, sitting back and hooking a leg over Louis’s.
Lestat leered at her momentarily then turned back to Louis. “So how is Mother?”
“She seemed fine,” Louis continued quickly, slipping his arm around Chérie. From the tension in her shoulders, he knew she would not let Lestat’s remark rest for long. What could Lestat be thinking? “Gabrielle is worried about you, though. I tried to let her know you were well, back to your old surly self, but I don’t think she’ll believe it until she sees you with her own eyes.”
His maker shifted, propping one elbow on the arm of the chair and leaning his head on his hand. “Well, it’s not exactly true, is it? I don’t know if I’ll ever be the same.” With his free hand he made a gesture that encompassed Louis and Chérie. “You two have been an interesting diversion, but really, how much longer can that last?”
Louis smiled. “A century, at least. We’ve done it before, under far worse circumstances.”
Lestat’s eyebrows raised thoughtfully as he absently nodded, stroking his chin with one finger.
“Claudia?” Chérie asked, uttering the name with some reverence.
Her maker’s finger halted and he looked at her.
“Do the similarities disturb you?” he asked.
“Some.”
“Don’t let them. They’re really only superficial, coincidence even. Like Louis’s feeding from Claudia and my feeding from you. It was simply time for the denial to end. Creating Claudia was folly. You were not.”
Chérie nodded. “But didn’t she bind you together?”
Louis pulled her onto his lap, loosing her hair and combing it with his fingers as she lay her head against his shoulder.
“For a time. It was an excuse because I loved Lestat from the moment I saw him. Through you I saw I no longer needed an excuse, that I could accept his love.” Louis looked up to see Lestat’s intense gaze upon him and he held those eyes a long time. He would never turn away from that love again. He smiled. “And you, my love, were the first of his fledglings he did not defeat into taking the Dark Gift.”
Lestat laughed. “No, Louis. You were the first.” He seemed amused by Louis’s confusion as he addressed himself to Chérie. “I never gave the others a choice. Only to Louis did I give understanding of what this life meant before working the Dark Trick. Horrified though he was, he saw the beauty beyond the death and loved me anyway. As you love him, Chérie.”
“David knew,” Louis said.
“Yes, but I hardly gave him a choice, now did I?” He stood hastily and knelt before them, crooking a finger under Chérie’s chin and stroking her cheek with his other hand. “I am a liar. Never forget that, Chérie. I will say anything to get what I want.”
Her eyes twinkled. “Really? And are you lying now?”
“No,” he said, but his grin left much room for doubt.
She searched her maker’s eyes that were so like her own blue-gray eyes. Her delicate fingers caressed his face, cradling his beauty between her hands. She pulled him close, raking her fingers back through his hair, causing his chin to tilt upward, until her hands held the back of his neck and their parted lips almost touched.
“Don’t ever lie to me, Lestat,” she whispered, his name coming out as a seduction. She let their lips touch for an instant. “You have only to tell me what you desire and I will give it to you, if it is in my power, up to betraying Louis.”
Lestat seemed entranced, bewitched. But he was not spellbound.
“And what if what I desire is Louis?”
“He is already yours. I would not want to change that even if it was in my power.” She slid from Louis’s lap and knelt beside their maker, their bodies close but not touching.
Lestat drew his finger along her nose and then gathered her into his arms. Gently drawing her hair away from his face, he fixed his eyes on Louis.
“And what if what I desire is you, Chérie?”
Louis saw her back rise and fall with her sigh.
“I am already yours,” she whispered. “Louis knows of my love for you.”
“Does he?” Lestat’s eyes were still on Louis, but his gaze faltered.
“Yes, from the very first night,” Louis said. He needs to hear the words, my love, he said silently.
She pulled back from Lestat, smoothing his hair as she demanded his gaze. She searched his face a long time before she spoke.
“I love you, Lestat.”
Louis saw her grimace slightly as she pierced her own tongue and drew their maker into her embrace. He watched, fascinated, as the surprise drained from Lestat’s face and he surrendered to the kiss. He heard his maker pierce his own tongue and saw their embrace deepen, Lestat lifting her from the carpet until he held her entire form in his arms.
Quietly, their lips parted, changing to smaller and smaller kisses. Chérie gazed up into Lestat’s eyes and smiled.
“Now tell me what you meant by wedding gift.”
Louis smiled.
Lestat laughed and would have spoken, but just then the front door burst open and Daniel stumbled into the room.
Chérie was instantly beside him, concern filling her face.
“What’s wrong?” she demanded as she pried Daniel’s portable computer from his fingers, quickly setting it upon a table.
The young vampire fought to regain his breath. “Turn on the television!”
“What?” Louis asked, but he reached for the remote and clicked on the set. The mammoth screen blazed to life, it’s amplified sound seemingly alien.
Chérie put Daniel in Lestat’s chair and then perched on its arm, her hand on his shoulder.
“News!” Daniel said. “Find the news.”
Louis flipped to the cable news channel. The tape they were airing was shaky, a hand-held camera jostling to get the picture.
“...hoax. The witness believed dead has allegedly just completed a sworn affidavit before Dade County officials.”
“Dade County,” Chérie whispered. “That’s Florida.”
Louis nodded, searching the crowds still shown on screen. A bright light fell upon the object of the camera’s search, a young man with long dark curls, a thin hand shielding his face as he kept his back to the light. Louis gasped as the auburn of the hair became evident.
“Armand!”
“Armand? But I thought...” Chérie began, but Lestat held up his hand for silence.
“...held earlier at a local radio station,” the reporter droned on. “But reports indicate officials from the Justice Department, in full cooperation with the district attorney’s office, did indeed take a statement from the unidentified man, who was allegedly the first witness to the veracity of the Veil of Veronica. Statements taken at the time all reported the man had spontaneously combusted, bursting into flames and dying instantly. It now seems these reports were greatly exaggerated....”
The picture switched to the station’s studio and a man in a tailored suit. Louis clicked off the set and, dropping the remote, buried his face in his hands.
No one spoke.
Alive. Armand was alive. Louis felt his tears gathering, tears he had not wept for Armand’s passing flowed now. He dug a handkerchief out of his pocket. He had never forgiven Armand for his part in Claudia’s death and he had been so cruel to the auburn-haired vampire. For decades, he let Armand hope for more than Louis had ever had any intention of giving. Suddenly there was hope. He looked up at Daniel’s moan.
“He’s alive,” the young vampire muttered. “The son of a bitch is alive!” He was trembling uncontrollably, his eyes wide. His hands dug frantically in his pockets for the cigarettes he had not carried in more than a decade.
Louis quickly knelt before him.
“You’re all right, Daniel,” he soothed. “You’re safe with us and you’re stronger than you were then.”
“I know, Louis,” Daniel said. “But why? Why did he do it?”
Louis slowly shook his head. He had no answer for his adopted fledgling.
“He can’t harm you,” Chérie assured him.
“Of course he can,” Daniel whispered. “He already has. He lied to me. He let me think he was dead.”
Lestat had risen, staring at the blank screen as if images still flickered there.
“He had no choice, Daniel. Did you see his skin? His hand had been burned. To them,” he waved his hand at the screen but abruptly halted as he inspected his own lightly browned flesh, flexing his fingers and turning them before his eyes. “To mortals it is no more than a Miami tan. But he was burnt.”
“Do you think he’s been underground?” Louis asked.
Lestat slowly nodded. “Probably. The pain is terrible and other than taking old blood, healing blood from the ancient ones, going underground is the safest way to heal.” He turned and strode to where his leather jacket lay.
“You’re going to him?” Chérie asked as he pulled on the jacket and tied back his hair.
“Yes.”
Louis frowned. “The sun has already risen there, Lestat.”
“I know. I’ll go the long way and be there when he awakens.”
“What will you do to him?” Daniel asked hesitantly.
Lestat smiled warmly. “Nothing. Don’t worry, Daniel. I only need to speak with him.”
“Then take me with you!”
“No, Daniel,” Lestat said firmly. “You wouldn’t survive the route I’m taking. When you rise, Louis and Chérie can bring you east, safely.”
“You think he’s back on the Night Island?” Chérie asked.
“That seems pretty clear. Or he would have staged his resurrection elsewhere.” He opened the door and breathed in the cool air.
Louis laid a hand gently on his maker’s shoulder and Lestat turned to embrace him.
“And how are you, Lestat? Does this change everything?”
“I don’t know, Louis.” Lestat closed his eyes. “Perhaps it’s simply Memnoch’s final trick. I don’t know.”
“Remember that we love you,” Louis whispered, kissing his maker on both cheeks.
Lestat smiled and pulled away. “I will.”
They walked him onto the porch.
“We’ll be there as soon as we rise,” Louis said.
Lestat nodded and disappeared into the night, rising faster than even preternatural eyes could follow.
Louis stared into the night sky, as if his eyes still beheld his maker against the stars. They never spoke of it, but he knew Lestat’s love for the auburn-haired vampire. He recalled a note his maker had once left for him in their townhouse in New Orleans. The fine parchment had appeared to be abandoned mistakenly, but he knew Lestat, well enough to know he had placed it with care where Louis was sure to find it. His maker’s flowing hand had filled the sheet.
“‘How strong could love grow if you had eternity to nourish it,’” he said, repeating the words Lestat had written, and later embellished for one of his books. He did not believe they were written with Armand in mind, but they seemed to fit nonetheless.
Chérie nodded and wandered back into the house, Louis about to follow.
“I don’t know what I’ll say to him,” Daniel said, sitting on the porch step.
“Neither do I,” Louis admitted. He let the screen close and descended the two steps, tipping his head back to gaze at the stars over the roof. A light breeze lifted the hair off his neck momentarily. Cool but with the promise of another warm day, and Chérie sleeping in a lightweight tee-shirt again. Not an unpleasant prospect. The neighboring houses were all dark and the night was still but for the rustling leaves in the twisted walnut tree. A luxuriant California night. The young vampire glanced up at him.
“What can I say to him?” Daniel raked his fingers through his ashen hair. “I’ve hated him for dying, for leaving me.”
“Tell him what you want to tell him, Daniel,” Louis said. “But be truthful with yourself and tell him everything. You are his firstborn, his only child, and if what Lestat says is true, he will have gone through a terrible ordeal.”
Daniel closed his eyes as a gust swirled about them. “Until tonight,” he said quietly, “I could not picture his face, no matter how hard I tried. Now it’s all I can see and I can’t imagine it otherwise.”
Louis nodded, pushing his black hair away from his face. “For me, as well. I knew a lifetime with Armand but could not be the thing he wanted. I was incapable of feeling for his passing. Yet all I want is to see him again. Alive. Beautiful and alive.”
Daniel’s violet eyes misted and his lips moved as if to speak but in the end, he simply pressed them together, finding no words.
Louis watched him, hearing the turmoil in his thoughts. So much pain, and guilt. Daniel had regressed terribly after Armand’s death, falling back onto old habits, traveling aimlessly, spending most of his waking hours haunting taverns in the most dismal corners of the world’s great cities. He had spent exorbitant amounts rashly, almost contemptuously. He bought jets and then abandoned them, impatient to be wherever he was not. Securing leases in whatever building was within sight when he wanted to rest, staying only until sunset and never returning. The fortune Armand had amassed would not endure. Daniel had not created the wealth, only moved it between brokers and bankers, and he made no attempt to use his gifts as Armand had. The small fees he had been paid when he roused himself long enough to write up one of his interviews and the royalties on Louis’s book were Daniel’s only sources of income. And his feeding had become careless, his kills often flagrantly brutal and grisly, drawing mortal attention, so much so that even Lestat had commented.
Late last summer, Louis had begun searching out the ashen-haired vampire, once the mortal boy he had fed upon, forever altering the young man’s life. Responsibility, yes, he could not deny he felt that for Daniel, but there was more. And Chérie had encouraged him for she too felt an affection for Daniel, though they had never met, for his part in bringing them together. By early autumn, Louis had arranged a meeting with the young vampire. And Daniel had come to live with them in Chérie’s little house.
It had been difficult at first, Daniel’s lethargy unshakable, and at times he simply circled the backyard for hours. Incoherent mumbling. Bitter cackling. Silent torment.
Then Chérie had discovered his venerate fear of Louis and Lestat, the impossible images he had of them, mired in his memory. They worked constantly to dispel these myths, opening a door Daniel could finally step through.
He slowly came back to life, remembering those things Armand had taught him, concealing his kills, hearing what they had to tell him. They took great care, only augmenting his maker’s lessons. Then Daniel had taken up the pen once more. At first, he simply transcribed the bags of cassette tapes he had accumulated, his agent negotiating the publication of an anthology of his interviews. But now he was immersed in something larger as he waited to begin work on Louis’s book, his little portable computer a constant companion. Daniel’s laughter was coming easily again, the cynicism fading.
And now this.
Louis sat beside Daniel. “You must tell Armand what is most important to you. He will want to know your pain. Hearing it will be as vital to him as the telling will be to you.”
“I just want to hear his voice again,” Daniel suddenly choked out, gulping back the sobs that threatened to consume him. He wasn’t ready for it, not yet. He opened his eyes wide so the early morning air could dry his tears before they spilled. “I want to hear his voice. He told me once that what scared him most was dying. It has been an endless nightmare, thinking of him trapped with the one thing that terrified him.”
Louis wrapped an arm around Daniel’s shoulders and squeezed him gently.
“Oh God,” Daniel moaned, swiping at his eyes with both hands. “I’m such a mess.”
Louis smiled and slowly shook his head. “No. Just in love.”
Daniel laughed wistfully. “Yeah.”
Chérie popped her head out the door. “Good time for a break?”
“Please!” Daniel pleaded half-jokingly.
Louis rose and she instantly stole his seat, smiling up at him innocently. She so enchanted him, more beautiful than Armand had ever been because she was real. Armand had been almost a fantasy to him, abstract. There was a purity in how Chérie loved him, a celebration of life. Eve in the Garden, before there was guilt. Lestat’s Dark Blood had only magnified the joy she bestowed, allowing her to love what he loved, what Lestat loved, what Daniel loved. And their ecstasy seemed to feed her, creating an ever-increasing spring from which they happily drank.
Love begets love.
Louis smiled. Perhaps Lestat did indeed drink of Christ’s blood. It had been difficult to completely believe until there was Chérie, his only fledgling created of that blood.
Chérie pulled a thin, white cylinder from her shirt pocket and pressed it between her lips.
“You still smoke?” Daniel asked, surprised.
“Once or twice,” she admitted, giving her shoulders a little shrug. “I keep a pack in the back of the freezer. Would you like one?”
“God, yes!” He grinned as she pulled a second cigarette from her pocket.
“I thought you might,” she teased. “It’s really awful so don’t take a big hit. But then, we never smoked for the taste, did we?” She laughed.
He shook his head as his fingers caressed the thin white paper. “How did you know we could still smoke?”
“We breathe it every day,” she said, making an expansive gesture and then nudging his shoulder playfully. “You probably more so, with as much time as you spend in bars.” She carefully lit the cigarettes with a small butane lighter, Daniel drawing the smoke cautiously into his lungs and still choking somewhat.
“God! That’s terrible!”
“Hey, I warned you.”
Louis bent to kiss her cheek and went into the house, leaving them to their mortal pleasures. Chérie had become surrogate mother to Daniel, but they were contemporaries as well, Daniel being only four years her senior. He had already been a vampire a decade, however, when she was Born to Darkness, and his help had been invaluable to her as she became accustomed to her new life. They often chatted for hours, their language at times incomprehensible. He and Lestat would tease them by weaving the modern words into their speech, the effect perfectly ghastly, or by slipping into the archaic French patois of the plantation.
He smiled as he sat on the divan, shucking his boots and socks. He was glad they’d found friendship. So difficult to be alone with your age. Perhaps that is what had disturbed him most about Armand. The auburn-haired vampire had no one of his age he could relax with, he had been in perpetual need of translation.
Is in need. Armand. Alive.
Louis picked up the remote and with his thumb circled its buttons thoughtfully before he clicked on the set. As commercial gave way to sportscaster, he carried his boots to their bedroom. Dawn approached and he had already begun longing to stretch out in the coffin. Not yet.
The carpet felt good beneath his naked feet. Though walking around partially undressed still seemed improper to him, he was adjusting to the custom. Chérie did it, as did Daniel. And Lestat did as he pleased, as he had always done.
Another advertisement screamed from the set as he regained his place on the divan. It mercifully faded and the picture returned to what the announcer labeled “the top story of the day.”
Louis felt Daniel tense as Armand was described as the “alleged witness.” He called to him silently. Come inside. See with your own eyes.
Chérie held the door for the young vampire, before lounging in the big chair. Daniel sat next to Louis on the divan, close to the television.
“Is it really him?” Chérie asked.
The footage showed the front of an office building, the witness pushing through the doors and being mobbed by reporters. He wore a linen suit in taupe, a loose-woven sweater in the same beige under the lightweight coat. Whenever a light flared, he brought his hand up to block its brilliance. Between the flashes, though, his face was clear, his soft brown eyes meeting each questioner, his lips moving in response.
“Yes, that is Armand,” Louis answered.
Armand neared the camera and a foam-covered microphone was thrust into view.
“Why are you coming forward now?” the reporter asked.
Daniel became like stone, holding his breath.
The auburn-haired vampire continued walking as he stared into the lens that kept pace with him. It seemed almost as if he was watching them watching him.
“People are being hurt,” Armand said, his voice unstrained by the press of mortal bodies. “Good people, people I love, and innocent strangers. This cannot go on.”
He was lost to the camera as he was jostled forward.
“Is the Veil of Veronica genuine?” the reporter yelled.
“I don’t know,” he said as the camera found him again, half-turned. The rest of his answer was lost as the crowd closed behind him. The picture continued as they had seen earlier.
“He is alive,” Daniel whispered. “It was his voice.” He laughed quietly. “What he calls his mortal voice, but it was his. I didn’t see the whole thing before. I was over at Mike’s,” he said, naming the nearby tavern and all-night coffee shop he frequented. “As soon as I realized what was going on, I ran home.” He sat back and smiled, his entire face alight. “Incredible!”
Louis returned his smile.
“Even in the lights, he passed for mortal,” Chérie observed.
“Yes, my love,” Louis said. “And his flesh. Lestat was correct, he was burned.”
“What it took to stand waiting for the sun.” She shook her head. “I can’t imagine it. And was it all an act? Could he fool Lestat so completely?”
Daniel laughed and slowly nodded his head. “Oh yeah. Armand can make you believe anything he wants you to believe.”
“And it didn’t hurt that Lestat was beside himself,” Louis added. To Chérie, he explained. “Armand is a spellbinder. We all have this ability, but none so much as he. Armand can immobilize you with a thought, make you see, hear, even feel things that aren’t there. I myself have felt this, though it was long ago.”
Chérie’s eyes grew wide, though not at anything Louis had said. She raised a pale, delicate hand toward the television, where a shrouded gurney was shown being loaded into an ambulance. The newscaster’s voice droned.
“...and televangelist, Theodora Flynn, who had made public the alleged Veil of Veronica, is dead, reportedly at her own hands. Neighbors claim she became distraught over the allegations of fraud that were raised....”
Louis clicked off the set. “Dora. My God!”
“The woman who gave Lestat the orphanage?” Daniel asked.
Louis nodded, holding a hand to his mouth, a thumb pressed to his lips. How would this affect Lestat? His maker had obsessed over the mortal and had then fallen to pieces, haunting the orphanage, lost among the nameless little spirits. Could this push him back into despair?
Chérie rose slowly from her chair. “There’s nothing we can do until sunset and I’m feeling positively leaden. Louis?” She held out her hand.
He took it and rose. “You’re right, my love. It’s time to rest.”
She leaned to kiss Daniel on the cheek and then disappeared down the hall.
Louis turned to the young vampire. “Are you coming?”
Daniel shook his head. “In a minute. Tell me something, Louis. Tell me the truth. Will you fight Armand for me?”
Louis was surprised by the question. “If something is terribly wrong and you need me to, yes.” He smiled warmly as he suddenly realized Daniel’s concern. “But I suspect you will stay with Armand. He loves you as no other can. You know me well enough to know I only want you to be happy. But understand this, Daniel. You will always have a home with me. No strings attached.”
“Thank you, Louis.” Daniel rose and embraced him.
Louis squeezed his adopted fledgling quickly before following Chérie to their bedroom.
Daniel sat back on the divan and clicked on the television. The news channel was repeating their top story. The young vampire listened as the reporter asked his question and he again heard that most wonderful sound. His maker’s voice.
“Armand,” he whispered as the blood tears tumbled down his cheeks.
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