20

WE WERE BACK at the flat. Rear parlor. My darlings on the couch. The drugs in their blood had played out on the walk back. Me at the desk but facing them.

I told her to change clothes. That short sequined dress was just too damned distracting. And we had some heavy matters to address immediately.

"Are you serious!" she demanded. "You're not honestly telling me what I can and cannot wear, you don't for one minute think I'm going to listen to this, this is not the eighteenth century, baby. I don't know what castle you grew up in, but I assure you I don't change my mode of dress for feudal lords, no matter-."

"Beloved Boss, could you not simply ask Mona to change her dress instead of telling her!" said Quinn with restrained exasperation.

"Yeah, what about that!" she said, leaning forward, accentuating her cleavage swelling under the sequined band across her breasts.

"Mona, my darling," I said with perfect candor, "ma ch¨¦rie, my beauty, please change into something less fetching. I find it hard to think, for you are so lovely in that dress. Forgive me. I lay my shameful omnisensual impulses at your feet. A tribute. I, having spent two centuries in the Blood, should possess a wisdom and restraint that makes such a request unnecessary, but alas, within my heart I feed a human flame that it may never completely go out, and it is the heat of this flame which distracts me now and renders me so powerless in your presence."

She narrowed her eyes and puckered her brows. Exploring me as best she could for mockery. Finding none. Then her lower lip began to tremble.

"Can you really help me find Morrigan?" she asked.

"I don't talk till you change the dress," I replied.

"You're a bully and a tyrant!" she said. "You treat me like a child or a slut. I won't change it. Will you help me find Morrigan or not? Now make up your mind."

"You're the one who has to make up her mind. You act like a child and a slut. You have no dignity, no gravitas! No mercy! We have things to discuss before we get to the finding of Morrigan. You didn't behave very well last night. Now change your clothes, before I change them for you."

"You dare touch me!" she said. "You liked it well enough when every human being at that party turned to look at me. What don't you like about this dress now?"

"Take it off!" I said. "It's needlessly distracting."

"And if you think you're going to preach to me about the way I behaved with my family. . . ."

"That's just it, they're not simply your family now. There's infinitely more to it, and you know it. You're forfeiting your intelligence for cheap emotional outbursts. You abused your powers last night, your singular advantages. Now change that dress."

"And what are you going to do if I don't change it!"

Her eyes were blazing.

I was flabbergasted.

"Have you forgotten that this is my flat?" I said. "That I am the one who has made you welcome here! That you exist because of me!"

"Go on, throw me out!" she declared. Her whole face went red. She shot to her feet and leaned over me, her eyes on fire.

"You know what I did last night after you left us and went away just because you were oh, so in love with Rowan! Oh, so very in love with La Doctor Dolorosa. Well, guess what! I read your books, your maudlin mawkish melancholy Vampire Chronicles, and I can see why your fledglings despise you! You treated Claudia like a doll just 'cause she had the body of a child! And what was that all about, making a child a vampire in the first place?-"

"Stop it, how dare you!"

"And your own mother, you give her the Dark Gift, and then you try to stop her from cutting her long hair or wearing men's clothes, and this in the eighteenth century, when women have to go around looking like wedding cakes, you're an autocratic monster!"

"You insult me, you abuse me! If you don't stop-."

"And I know why you're so fired up over Rowan, she's the first adult female other than your own mother who's ever caught your attention for more than five minutes, and Hello! Lestat Discovers The Opposite Sex! Yeah, females do come in grown-up sizes! And I happen to be one of them, and this is not the Garden of Eden, and I am not taking off this dress!"

Quinn got to his feet. "Lestat, wait, please!"

"Get out!" I roared. I stood up. My heart was cut so deep I could hardly talk. I felt that stinging hurt again all over my skin, the hurt I'd felt when Rowan had been railing at me at the Retreat House, an enervating, crippling pain.

"Out of my house, you wretched little ingrate," I shouted, "get out now before I throw you down the steps! You're a Power Slut, that's what you are, using every edge your sex or youth can give you, a moral lilliputian in grown-up shoes, a career adolescent, a professional child! You don't know the meaning of philosophical insight, or spiritual engagement, or true growth-. Out, out of here now, Heiress to the Mayfair Legacy, what a fiasco that must have been, go beat up on your mortal family at First Street, rave at them until you drive them out of their minds and they crack you over the head with their shovel and bury you alive in the backyard!"

"Lestat, I beg you-." Quinn put his hands out.

I was too angry. "Take her to Blackwood Farm!"

"Nobody's taking me anywhere!" she cried. She ran out the door, hair whirling, sequins sparkling, slamming the door shut. Clatter down the iron steps.

Quinn shook his head. He was in silent tears. "This just shouldn't have happened," he whispered. "It was entirely avoidable. You don't understand, she's not even accustomed to being out of a sickbed, to putting one foot in front of the other, to putting one word after another-."

"It was inevitable," I said. I was shaking. "It's why I gave her the Dark Gift instead of you, so the anger would come at me, don't you see? But how could she attack so violently the things that have happened to me! She has no moral modulation, no moral rhythm, no moral patience, no moral kindness. She's a pitiless little hellion! I don't know what I'm saying. Go after her. She's so blatantly and arrogantly careless! Just go."

"Please, please," he said, "don't let this be a split between us."

"Not between you and me," I said, "no, never. Just go."

I could hear her sobs from the courtyard.

I stormed out onto the balcony. "You get off my property!" I shouted down to her. She was glowing in the dark. "Don't you dare stand there weeping in my courtyard. I won't have it! Get out!" I came down the steps.

She fled from me down the carriageway. "Quinn!" she wailed. "Quinn!" as if I was murdering her. "Quinn, Quinn," she squealed.

He brushed against me as he passed me.

I turned around and went up the steps. I clung to the balcony railing for a long moment, forcing some calm upon myself, my hands trembling, but it did little good.

As soon as I'd closed the door I saw Julien out of the corner of my eye. I tried again to quell my pounding heart. I refused to tremble. I collected myself, eyes roving the ceiling, ready for the next cheap diatribe to be flung in my face.

"Eh bien," he said, going on in French, his arms folded, his dinner jacket very black against the damask striped wallpaper. "You've done a fine job, Monsieur, haven't you? You've fallen deep in love with a mortal who'll never yield to you, only succeeding in driving a true rivet into her heart which her innocent husband won't fail to detect sooner or later. And now my innocent niece, whom you've so cleverly brought over into your world, is running rampant through the streets with a boy lover who hasn't a clue as to how to comfort her or contain her mounting madness. You are a fine example of the Ancien R¨¦gime, Monsieur, oh, but I should be calling you Chevalier, should I not? Or, what precisely was your title, anyway? Was there something lower?"

I sighed, and then slowly I smiled. I wasn't shaking too badly.

"Les bourgeois have always disappointed me," I said gently. "My father's title means nothing to me. That it means so much to you is tiresome. Why don't we let the matter drop?"

I took my chair at the desk, caught the heel of my shoe on the rung and just looked at the ghost admiringly. Flawless white shirt. Patent leather shoes. Now, he knows how to dress, doesn't he? In my exhaustion and my grief for what had just taken place with Mona, I looked into his eyes and I prayed silently to Saint Juan Diego. What is there that can come of this that might be good?

"Oh?" he asked. "You've come to be fond of me?"

"Where's Stella?" I asked. "I want to see Stella."

"You do?" he asked, arching his eyebrows and tipping his forehead slightly.

"I don't like to be alone," I said, "as much as I give out. And I don't want to be alone at this moment."

He lost his look of resolute superiority. Grim gaze. He'd been a handsome man in his time, trim white curls, clever black eyes.

"Sorry to disappoint you," I said. "But since you do go and come as you will, it seems I must get used to you."

"You think I like what I do?" he asked with sudden bitterness.

"I don't think you know much about what you do," I replied. "Maybe we have that in common. I've been hearing about you. Rather ominous things, it seems."

Blank expression, then a slow yield to appraisal.

I heard a skipping step in the hall, definitely a child skipping. And there she came into the room, in a snow white dress, with her white sox and her black Mary Janes, a darling girl.

"Hello, Ducky, you have the most amazing digs," she said. "I simply love your paintings. This is the first time I've had a chance to look at them. I love the soft colors. I love the sailboats and all the agreeable people, people in lovely long dresses. There's a sweetness to these paintings. If I weren't a little girl, I'd suspect that they soothe people's nerves."

"I can't claim to have chosen them myself," I replied, "someone else did. But now and then I add one or more to the collection. I like the brighter, stronger colors. I like the greater, more savage force."

"What do you intend to do about all this?" asked Julien, plainly irritated by this exchange.

My heart had begun to assume its normal rhythm.

"About all what?" I asked. "And let me assure you that your mixing in it isn't a good omen, from what I've learnt. Seems some of your mortal descendants believe you're doomed to failure in all your Earthly visitations, did you know that? It's a special curse visited upon you, apparently, or so I'm told."

Stella had plopped into a Louis XV chair, her white dress going poof all around her. She looked up at Julien with alarm.

"You do me a bitter injustice," he said coldly. "You can't know my accomplishments. And only very few of my descendants know them either. Now let's get back to your present obligation. Certainly you don't intend to let my niece run rampant with the powers you've given her."

I laughed. "I told you before," I said, "that if you want her, you will have to tell her. Why are you so afraid of her? Or is it that she won't acknowledge you? That she's completely unreceptive? That she's off on a supernatural tear and you're small potatoes to her now, hmmm?"

His face became hard.

"You're not fooling me, not for a moment," he said. "You're cut to the quick by Mona's words, you're cut to the quick by Rowan, that you can't have her, no matter how much harm you try to do to her. You're paying for your sins. You're paying now as we speak. You're terrified you'll never see either of them again. And maybe you won't. And maybe if you do, they'll show you a defiance that will demoralize you even more truly than you're demoralized now. Come, Stella. Let's leave this mountebank to his nightmares. I tire of his company."

"Oncle Julien, I don't want to leave!" she said. "These are new shoes and I love them. Besides, I find Lestat charming. Ducky, you must forgive Oncle Julien. Death has had the most oppressive effect upon him. When he was alive, he would never have said such things!"

She bounced to the floor, ran to me and threw her soft little arms around me and kissed my cheek.

"Bye, Lestat," she said.

"Au revoir, Stella."

And then the room was empty.

Perfectly empty.

I turned, disconsolate and shuddering, and put my head down on my arm, as if I could go to sleep on my desk.

"Ah, Maharet," I said, naming again our great ancestor, our mother, one who was for all I knew on the opposite side of the globe. "Ah, Maharet, what have I done and what can I do? Help me! Let my voice reach you over the miles." I closed my eyes. Once again, I used the very strongest of my telepathic power. I have such need of you. I come to you ashamed of my failures. I come to you as the Brat Prince of the Blood Drinkers. I don't claim to be anything better or worse. Listen to me. Help me. Help me for the sake of others. I beg you. Hear my prayer.

I was in this dark frame of mind, alone with this message, which engaged my soul completely, when I heard a step on the iron stairs outside.

Knock at the door.

My guard from the gate: "It's Clem from Blackwood Farm out front."

"How in the world did he find this address?" I asked.

"Well, he's looking for Quinn, says they need Quinn back there right away. Seems he's been up to the Mayfair house looking for Quinn and they sent him over here."

I might as well hang out a tasteful neon sign.

Now I had an immediate and mundane use for my telepathy: scan the blocks around for the Dazzling Duo and relay this message to Quinn.

Zap: nothing to it.

Quinn and Mona were in a small caf¨¦ on Jackson Square, Mona sobbing into an immense heap of paper napkins, Quinn enfolding her and hiding her from the world.

Gotcha. Tell Clem to meet me at Chartres and St. Ann. And please, Lestat, I beg you, come with me.

Meet you at Blackwood Farm, sweet boy.

Eh bien, so after the proper messages were conveyed to Clem, who was presiding over the choking, wheezing, seething limousine outside in the Rue Royale, at least I had a moment of stillness in which to think, and then a destination.

And I was NOT riding over the lake in the car with that unforgivable Valkyrie in her sequined chemise! I

would take to the clouds, thank you.

I went outside.

That twinge of autumn again in my beloved heat. I didn't so much like it. I fretted the winter coming on. But what was all this to me with my broken heart, and illegitimate soul, and what had I done to Rowan with my furtive, disgraceful whispers? And Michael, that powerful and soft-spoken Michael, who had trusted me with his wife's heart, what had I done to him?

And how could Mona say such hurtful things, how could she? And how could I have behaved so childishly in response?

I closed my eyes.

I cleared my mind of all distractions and random images.

Again I spoke only to Maharet. Wherever you are, I need you.

And now came some artifice-to describe once more my needs without casting to the winds unnecessary details for every other immortal who might pick up my message and ponder the precise nature of what I sought. To find a tribe of tall beings, tender of bone, ancient, simple, tangled with my fledgling, unknown to the world of records, history and location essential to the sanity of those I love. Guidance. Mistakes I've made with my fledgling, spiraling out of control. Give to me your wisdom, your keen hearing, your vision. Where are the tall creatures? I am your loyal subject. More or less. I send my love.

Would she answer? I didn't know. In all honesty (yeah, like all the rest of this is a pack of lies?), I had only once, years ago, called out to her for help, and she had not answered me. However, I'd been guilty of the most ridiculous blunder at the time. I'd switched bodies with a mortal, and been abandoned by him. Idiocy. I had to go after my own supernatural body and recover it. And on my own-well, almost on my own-I'd found a solution to my problem. And so it had ended well.

But I had seen her since, this mysterious ancestor, when she did come to my aid of her own volition, and she had taken great pains with me. She'd forgiven my ranting and raving and my temper. I'd described her in my writings, and she had borne it. From me, she'd borne many things.

Perhaps she had heard me last night. Perhaps she would hear me now.

If nothing came of the call, I would try again. And again. And if her silence continued, I would call to others. I would enlist Marius, my sometime mentor, and wise Child of the Millennia. And if that failed, I would scan the Earth on my own for the Taltos, be they one or many.

I knew I had to make good on my promise to find the Taltos-for Michael and for Rowan, my precious

Rowan, even if Mona utterly deserted me, which was most likely the case.

Yes, I felt my heart shrinking. I had already somehow lost Mona. And soon Quinn would follow. And precisely how I'd done it, I really didn't grasp.

Somewhere in the back of my conscious was taking shape the horrid realization that a modern-minded fledgling was as complex as a nuclear reactor, a communications satellite, a Pentium 4 computer, a microwave oven, a cell phone and all the other intricate overarching newfangled creations I couldn't understand. Of course, it was all a matter of exploding sophistication.

Or mystification.

Vixen. I hated her. That's why I was crying my own blood tears, wasn't it? Well, there was nobody to see it.

Eh bien,it was on to Blackwood Farm, and as I ascended I prayed to Maharet. Maharet was my prayer of the winds all the way there.

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