Prince Lestat and the Realms of Atlantis

by Anne Rice

  There was a phrase in these times on Earth for what had become of Amel. He had "gone native" on the planet. He had abandoned obedience to the Parents. He had used all of the fine knowledge they'd given him to gain power among the primitive primate mammals whom he discovered. He had adopted their ways.

  So the four born to punish Amel had not been made with the immense knowledge of Amel. They had been equipped only with the knowledge they needed to complete the mission that Amel had never completed. And Kapetria, the leader, would be their authority in all things that they did not understand.

  The vast spacious abode of the Parents had never been so vivid to him before in his memories, those many chambers lined with walls that lived and breathed with living visuals of Earth, and the great lofty enclosures in which the Parents would ascend to the topmost branches of the great trees. The chamber walls had been monitors with the resolution of today's motion-picture screens. Had they received images from everywhere on Earth or only the great wild lands around Atalantaya?

  "You are equipped," said the Parent of the luminous round eyes who spoke to them with such gentleness, "with all you need to know to fulfill this mission, and this gentle one, this sweet and gentle Derek, will alert you to danger, as he is the one most attuned to the emotions of the inhabitants, so mark when he is agitated; mark when he weeps; mark what arouses his fear. Observe what is happening around you. And do what you can to comfort him because he suffers as you do not."

  Oh, what a bitter thought--that they'd deliberately endowed him to suffer. And if so, why had they been so surprised when he wept at the idea that they would all die? He could not stop thinking of that moment. "But I don't want to die."

  Oh, but it was still fragmentary, this remembering. He couldn't put the pieces together. He could feel the gaps. He had a sense of great time spent with the Parents now lost. Welf and Kapetria had merely watched as Derek wept. It was Kapetria who had ventured the question: why had the Parents made them such complex and powerful units if their mission was to terminate in their own death?

  "It's simple for us," said the greatest of the Parents, "to make creatures such as you. And you will need the power and resilience with which you're gifted to survive in the savage lands, and to safely gain access to Atalantaya, without arousing the suspicions of Amel. We will be watching you always. Your bodies contain the means by which we can track you and see you and hear you. That is, until you enter Atalantaya, where the dome will make it impossible to monitor you or give you aid." There was so much more.

  Ah, would Kapetria be angry with him when she discovered that he had managed to birth a duplicate of himself through the severing of his arm? Kapetria lived, she lived and breathed, and he must stop thinking of her anger. When had Kapetria ever been anything but loving to him? And surely she would understand he didn't know what was happening, and he couldn't have prevented it. And then what if Kapetria did not know...?

  Slowly the pale milky daylight of the North Sea filled the dungeon. Derek pushed at the dying embers again, but it was no use. He thought of removing his shirt and burning it but that was not enough to reignite the log. Derek's teeth were chattering.

  A sound. He had heard a distinct sound. He rose to his feet, and moved away from the door. Someone was outside the door. Someone was lifting the simple bolt out of its slots. And now the door was opened outwards and Derek saw the marvelous figure of his son standing there.

  His son was dressed in heavy black jeans and a thick white sweater and he had on socks and shoes. His gold and black hair had been tamed and combed. He wore a handsome heavy tweed coat that hung to his knees.

  "Come, Father, hurry," said the boy. "I know where we are and how to get out of here. There are humans on this island, and I don't know how long we'll be alone."

  Derek rushed into the young one's arms.

  "Father, there's no time for tears now," said the boy. "We can weep and rejoice later. I've found bedrooms and wardrobes of garments, garments that fit me, and you. I've packed suitcases with clothes, money, lots of it, and passports and credit cards, every conceivable thing we'll need. Now you have to come and dress. You are shivering. And there's more work on the computer that I must do. These creatures will pay for having imprisoned you for so many years. They will pay with everything we can take from this place."

  The boy took Derek's hand and led him fast up a coiling flight of stone steps and into an upper hallway of stone as severe and barren as the dungeon chamber had been.

  But within minutes they had reached another floor, with doors open to many well-furnished bedchambers. Ah, the wealth of these demons, Derek thought. His hatred wasn't strong enough to overcome his fear.

  They entered a large oak-paneled room with an upholstered bed, thick blue carpets, and pale salmon-colored draperies over the high-arched windows. The weak northern sun was burning through a gray sky beyond. There were large modern paintings in heavy gilt frames on the walls, and velvet reclining chairs and a thin flat-screen television much larger than Derek had ever seen before.

  Desk, computers, chests of drawers, closets overflowing. And the computer on the desk was on with a screen filled with pictures of the sea. It had been years since Derek had seen a computer, and he had never seen one with such a large monitor.

  "I suspect the monster's acolyte, Benedict, was the owner of these closets," said the boy as he opened a pair of double doors. There were jackets and entire suits of clothing on hangers, shelves of folded shirts and sweaters, rows of shining boots and dress shoes.

  The floors were strewn with paper money, English, French, what appeared to be Russian, and euros, and American dollars, passports, and bundles of credit cards bound with rubber bands.

  "Father, come alive!" said the boy. He began to pull jackets and sweaters and pants from the hangers and the shelves, which smelled vaguely of cedar. "Here, Father, dress as quickly and as comfortably as you can. Choose what you like, but hurry. And the suitcases on the bed are packed."

  "I don't understand how you know all of these things," said Derek.

  "I know all that you know, Father," said the boy. "We can talk about that later. This blood drinker creature, Benedict, had a collection of watches. Here, put on this watch. It is brand-new. "

  Derek struggled to pull himself together.

  "Now I need to get back on the computer," said the boy. He seated himself at the desk and starting tapping the keyboard with two fingers just as Derek always did it. "We're north of the island of Saint Kilda. There are three boats in the harbor and I have to find more information on how to pilot the larger cabin cruiser. The speedboat is too complicated, and the smaller boat will not go fast enough."

  Derek struggled with the watch but managed to buckle the leather band. It was an old watch, but it was ticking. So this would now tell him the minutes and the hours of his new freedom. He felt suddenly hungry and exhausted and overwhelmed. He wanted to be excited, efficient, and helpful to the boy.

  He drew close to see the computer monitor over his son's shoulder.

  At once pictures of a giant yacht filled the screen, a Cheoy Lee 58 Sportfish. The boy was fast-forwarding through interiors of sumptuous cabins and what looked like a control room or cockpit of sorts. Derek knew nothing of modern boats.

  "Father, get dressed," said the boy. "Let me take care of this. Hurry."

  Derek found a pair of dark wool pants, put them on, and unwrapped a new white shirt from its plastic. As he balled up his old mutilated shirt, a surge of bitterness and anger moved through him.

  "For ten years, they kept me prisoner," he said under his breath. "Ten years, if you can imagine it, ten years, in a dreary locked room in a cellar in Budapest..." The words were bubbling up out of him uncontrollably.

  "I know," said his son. "There is time for vengeance. I can manage this boat easily. Everything I need to know is here. No problem. Channel sixteen is the universal Coast Guard channel. If the boat has full tanks..."

  Derek found a brush and comb. He ca
ught sight of himself in the long mirror on the open closet door. He hadn't seen his own reflection in so many years. It felt unbelievably good to rip the brush through his thick hair. But he knew his son had a confidence and demeanor he didn't possess. He looked like his son's younger brother.

  Suddenly the computer began to talk. But the talk was entirely mixed with the sound of a piano playing. Ah, it was Benji Mahmoud talking on the vampire radio station.

  "And all the Children of the Night throughout the world must be on the lookout for these three, Felix Welf, Dr. Karen Rhinehart who might also use the middle name Kapetria, and Garekyn on the West Coast of the United States, who has murdered another blood drinker."

  "Welf! Did you hear that?" Derek cried. "Welf is with Kapetria. We are all alive, all of us! That is all of us!"

  "Yes, I know," said the boy indifferently. He was tapping the buttons relentlessly as the voice continued. Suddenly Derek saw three faces on the screen: Garekyn unconscious lying on some sort of table; and official frontal portraits of Kapetria and Welf.

  Welf was smiling in his photograph, Welf the calm one, the one who had always smiled so easily, my big brother! His curly hair was massive and handsome, and his dark eyes brimmed with spirit.

  And we will be together once again! Derek was struggling to keep back tears. "We have to escape, we have to survive, we have to!" he said childishly. And then, "You will never in a million years know what all this means."

  He buttoned his new clean shirt and tucked it into his pants.

  The voice went on, words running steadily under the soft sweet current of the music, like a dark unfurling ribbon.

  "I do know what it means, Father," said his son, "because I know everything you know, I told you, but I don't have so much emotion attached to the information." The boy looked at him. "Now I want you to give me a name."

  The computer voice was saying something about murder, blood, decapitation. He was describing the trio of black-skinned black-haired non-humans as murderous, and a danger to the Undead. Worldwide alert. All blood drinkers were to hunt the trio.

  "Listen to him, he's lying!" said Derek. He was going through the socks and boots laid out on the bed. "Listen! This is all wrong. We are not the enemies of anything. What did you say about a name?"

  "I suggest my name be Derek Two pronounced as one word and spelt as such, Derektwo, and I'll take your modern last name, Alcazar, which you took after your rescuer."

  "No," said Derek, but he was focused on the radio voice. "You're not as clever as you think you are. Roland knows the name Alcazar. Roland went back to my apartment in Madrid after he'd taken me prisoner, and sacked it for information. Roland reported me dead."

  He sat down on a leather ottoman with the black socks and brown shoes he'd chosen from the bed.

  "Of course, you are right. All you know is inside me, but I'm not perfect at summoning the information. Give me a name."

  "Derektwo sounds absurd and will look absurd," said Derek.

  Black skin, said Benji Mahmoud, black curly hair, highly visible gold streaks in their hair. Strength of ten human beings. A desire for the vampiric blood, the vampiric brain.

  "That has to be a lie!" said Derek. "We have no craving for vampiric blood or brains. That is a filthy lie."

  "My name, Father. You are to give me my name."

  "What is this, a baptism?" demanded Derek. "Shorten your name to D-e-r-t-u," Derek said. "That's plenty good enough. And it sounds fairly normal. And if there is to be a Derek three and a Derek four, we'll figure some way to sound it out properly. Dertu will do. You don't need a last name now."

  "Very well," said the boy, "Dertu it is. I never thought of that. The last name can wait. We can't risk anything with new names from this computer, anyway. We'll worry about last names when we reach Scotland or Ireland."

  Derek pulled on the black socks, loving the silky feel of them. The brown shoes were fine, smooth, without buckles or zippers, but it was a chore to pull them on.

  "...extremely dangerous," said the low barely audible computer voice. "All elders are asked to come to Court. The Prince has asked this. All elders should come to Court if they possibly can, to confer on the matter of these menacing non-humans."

  "This is all wrong, what he's saying. They must have done something to Garekyn."

  Dertu knelt before him, helping him with the shoes.

  "Now put on a sweater, maybe two sweaters," said the boy. "The gloves and scarves are on the bed."

  Dertu turned up the volume on the computer.

  "Anyone sighting any of these strange non-humans must call us at this number," said Benji Mahmoud. "Remember, a machine will answer you and take the information night or day. To go directly on the air in my absence, press the numeral two on your keypad. Provide your information at the usual level. Be clear and succinct as to where you've seen the non-humans and at what time. It is very important that you include the time. When I come back on the air, I will return your call as soon as I can."

  Dertu at once picked up a ballpoint pen from the desk and wrote something on his wrist.

  "What are you writing?" asked Derek.

  "Never mind."

  Derek was in a daze. There was an abrupt crackling sound from the computer. A female voice was speaking: "This is Selena calling in from Hong Kong, Benji. We are all on the alert here but we cannot make it to the Court at this time. Benji, please update us as soon as you can."

  Dertu was offering Derek a good thick cashmere sweater. Red. Derek hated the color red, but there was no time. Derek pulled it over his head.

  "If you knew how hard it is to craft identities," muttered Derek. "And Roland went back and destroyed my identity. He used to say to me, No one will ever come looking for you. No one will ever seek to find out what happened to you."

  Dertu handed him a black coat, a coat as soft as the sweater. This was a man's formal overcoat, exquisitely lined, German made.

  "Well, maybe it's not so hard anymore," said the boy. "Maybe it just takes money, and we have plenty of money."

  "These things may be even more physically powerful than we realize," Benji Mahmoud was saying. "Garekyn Zweck Brovotkin may have left Los Angeles and we have no clues as of now to his destination."

  Dertu put a scarf around his father's neck.

  "Clean clothes," said Derek under his breath. He saw himself again in the mirror, restored. He couldn't move. "Clean clothes," he said. "Being warm."

  "And we know that the monsters are aware of this broadcast," said Benji Mahmoud through the computer, "and that they are listening to it. Only hours after we broadcast the alert on Garekyn Zweck Brovotkin, Dr. Karen Rhinehart and her companion Welf disappeared from their Geneva apartment. We suspect that Dr. Rhinehart and her companion had been spying on us for some time, and regularly listening to this program was undoubtedly part of it...."

  Dertu appeared transfixed staring at the computer.

  "...you must be circumspect when you go on the air with your reports. You want to alert your brothers and sisters. You do not want to aid these monsters in any way."

  "My God," said Derek. "They are our avowed enemies. They will seek to destroy us on sight! We have become fiends to them as they are to us."

  "No, not on sight," murmured Dertu. "They want us to come in."

  He put up his finger for quiet.

  "I don't believe that," said Derek. "I want to get as far away from them and their kind as I can."

  But someone had entered the great stone castle. Again Dertu motioned for quiet. They could hear a heavy uneven tread echoing as in a wooden stairwell, and a faint sound as if the person were singing.

  Dertu turned off the volume on the computer. He motioned for Derek to shut the closet door.

  "There's no time to do any more work here now," Dertu whispered. "Put on the coat, Father."

  Yes, a human male voice singing, singing some pleasant little ditty as the footsteps made their way closer. Dertu gathered up the two leather suitcases, han
ding one off to Derek.

  "Shall we meet the human being as two proper guests of the house?" he asked.

  They discovered the old gray-haired human caretaker in a large parlor where the man sang to himself as he dusted the furniture with a rag that reeked of pungent oil, completely oblivious to their presence until Dertu spoke to him.

  "Our host has suggested we take the smaller of the two big boats," said Dertu to the old man. "He said he thought it would be easier to manage. Did he remember to have the gas tank filled?"

  "Oh, the Benedicta," said the old man. "She's always fueled and ready to go." He was peering at Dertu and Derek through watery gray eyes. He smiled cordially. He looked utterly harmless in his sagging green cardigan with its brown patched elbows and old pants stained near the cuffs. "The master didn't tell me anyone was here. Why, I would have brought up your breakfast."

  "I am starving," whispered Derek. "I cannot remember not being hungry."

  "Well, you know our beloved host," said Dertu cheerfully to the old man. "Would he be insulted to be called an eccentric? Is there any food on the boat?"

  The old man laughed. He slipped a pair of glasses out of his shirt pocket and peered at Dertu through thick lenses. "I think the master loves to be called eccentric," he said. "And yes, the refrigerator on the Benedicta is always stocked with the basics. That's the boat my wife and I use. The master drives the new one. The keys are in the boathouse office. You can't miss the boathouse. But I'll go down with you if you like."

  "Not necessary," said Dertu. "How long will it take me to reach Oban?"

  "Oban? Good Lord, young man, it will take you three hours in that boat just to reach Harris. You'll be at sea all day. Listen, why don't you go down and make yourselves at home on the boat? It has a fireplace, you know. And I'll pack up lunch and dinner for you. And whatever else you might need. You really should take a flight from Harris if you're determined to reach Oban. Unless you're in love with the sea."

  "Thank you so much," said Dertu. "Now our gracious host said there was a laptop computer somewhere that I might take, and a cell phone."

  "Well, he must have meant those he stored after Mr. Benedict left. There were a couple unopened. Now you go down and become acquainted with the boat, and I'll see what I can rustle up. You'll find wine and cheese in the refrigerator. Fruit juice, vitamin water. The bread's in the freezer. You just toast it, you see. And the Brie defrosts perfectly as well."