by Rice, Anne
“You think a spirit doesn’t know the tricks of a witch, Merrick,” said Goblin in his low flat voice, which carried over the noise of the fire—a voice I hadn’t heard in over four years. “You think I don’t know you want to kill me, Merrick? You hate me, Merrick.”
At once the figure began to thin out and grow immense and come down with full force upon Merrick, but she cried out:
“Burn now, burn!”
And we all cut loose with our force against him, crying out the single word, “burn,” as we sent the power, and as he rose over the flames we saw him, a thing of myriad tiny flames, paralyzed above the fire and retracting and howling in a soundless and ghastly confusion, and then turning in on himself and coiling so that he became a formed wind assaulting the altar, and then a funnel as he bore down on Merrick once again.
The noise was intolerable. The leaves were a hurricane upon us and the blaze flared. Merrick staggered backwards, but we kept up the force, crying out:
“Burn, Garwain, burn!”
“Burn till all of you is pure ghost as it should be!” cried Merrick, “and you can pass into the Light as God wills, Garwain!”
And then she turned and from the large black bag she snatched a small bundle, and, peeling back the white blankets that covered it, she revealed the small shriveled corpse of a child!
“This is you, Garwain!” she cried out. “This is you, brought from your grave, the body from which you departed, wandering astray, confounded and confused! This is your mortal body, your infant self, and from this self you have roamed lost and feeding upon Quinn! See this tiny form, this is your form, Goblin!”
“Liar!” came his voice, and he rose up on this side of the altar, right before us, my doppelgänger down to the buttons, raging at her and trying to snatch the tiny black shriveled infant out of her arms, but she wouldn’t let it go and she roared at him:
“You are smoke and mirrors, you are air and will and theft and terror. Go where God will send you! Lord, I beg you, take this servant, take him as you will!”
His image wavered. He was trying to fuse with her. She was resisting him with all her power. I could see him faltering and fading. He grew pale and large and billowing in the firelight. What did the fire feel like to him?
Once again, he rose high above us, spread out above us like a canopy.
I raised my voice: “Dear God, who made Julien, Gravier, Patsy, take him, take this orphan! Grace, Alice, Rose, come for this doomed wanderer. Add your prayers to ours.”
“Yes,” cried Merrick, clutching the infant corpse tight to her breast, “Julien, Gravier, Thomas—I beg you, come from your eternal rest and take this child into the Light, take him!”
“I repudiate you, Goblin, now and forever!” I called out. “I do so before God! Before Pops, before all my ancestors, before the angels and the saints! O Lord hear my prayer!”
“O Lord, hear our cry!” pleaded Merrick.
She lifted the baby up, and I saw with my own eyes a living child! I saw its limbs move, I heard its mewling! I heard its crying!
“Yes, Goblin!” she cried out. “Your infant self, yes! Come into this form. Come into your rightful flesh! I adjure you, come as I command you.”
High above the fire the giant image of Goblin shivered, horrific and weak and confused, and then plunged, plunged into the crying infant. I saw it. I felt it. I said in my heart: Amen, brother, amen.
There came a terrible wailing and once again the branches of the oak trees thrashed in the wind.
And then there was utter stillness except for the fire. There was a stillness so total that it seemed the Earth had stopped turning.
Only the fire roared.
I realized I was on the ground. An invisible force had knocked me down.
I was seeing a brilliant light but it wasn’t hurting my eyes. It was nothing short of magnificent and it was falling down on the fire, and yet something terrible was happening in the fire.
Merrick had gone into the fire. Merrick had climbed up on the altar and had gone into the fire with the baby and they were both burning. They were burning—unspeakable, irrevocable—but in the pure celestial Light I saw figures moving, thin figures—the gaunt unmistakable figure of Pops in the Light, and with him an infant, a tiny infant toddling along, and there also was Merrick, Merrick and a small old woman, and I saw Merrick turn and raise her hand as if to say farewell.
I lay transfixed by the Light, by its immensity and the undeniable sense of love that seemed part of its nature.
I think that I cried.
Then slowly the great wealth of blessed Light faded. Its warmth and its glory went away. The heat of the night closed around me. The Earth was the lonely Earth again.
Rediscovering my limbs and how to use them I rose to my feet and realized Lestat had pulled Merrick’s body from the fire and was sobbing and trying to put out the flames that were consuming her, beating at her burning figure with his coat.
“She’s gone, I saw her go,” I said.
But he was frantic. He wouldn’t listen to me. The flames were finally smothered, but half her face was burnt away and most of her torso and her right arm. It was a dreadful sight. He slit his wrist, he let the thick, viscid blood pour down on her body, but nothing happened. I knew what he wanted to happen. I knew the lore.
“She’s gone,” I said again. “I saw her go. I saw her in the Light. She waved farewell.”
Lestat stood up. He wiped at his blood tears and at the soot on his face. He couldn’t stop crying. I loved him.
We lifted her remains and put them on the altar together. We built up the fire and it wasn’t long before the body was ashes, and we scattered them. And the fire and Merrick’s body were no more.
The humid night was quiet and calm and the cemetery lay in darkness.
Lestat cried.
“She was so young among us,” he said. “It’s always the young ones who end it. The ones for whom mortality holds magic. As we grow older it’s eternity that is our boon.”
51
Lestat was still covered in soot. He didn’t much care about it. We rang the front doorbell of Oak Haven, and it was Stirling himself who answered, in his heavy quilted robe, and perfectly astonished to see the pair of us right there at the Retreat House of the Talamasca—two wanderers in the night.
Of course he invited us into the library and we accepted the invitation, and we settled into the big leather wing chairs that were so comfortably arranged everywhere, and Stirling told the agreeable little housekeeper that we didn’t require anything, and then we were alone.
Slowly, in a broken voice, Lestat told Stirling what had happened to Merrick. He described the ceremony and how Merrick had climbed onto the altar, and what he had seen—the baby come alive, and Goblin descending into it.
And then I told Stirling what I had seen—the Light and the figures moving in the Light. Lestat had not seen this Light but he never doubted me.
“May I put this into our records?” Stirling asked. He took out his handkerchief and wiped at his nose. He was crying inside for Merrick. And then the tears came and he let them flow for a moment and then he wiped them away.
“That’s why I’m telling you,” said Lestat. “So you can close your file on Merrick Mayfair, and know what became of her. So it doesn’t end in silence and confusion, so you don’t mourn for her forever without ever knowing where she wandered or what she became. She was a gentle soul. She preyed upon the Evil Doer only. No innocent blood ever stained her hands. And it was very deliberate what she did. And why she chose this moment I don’t really know.”
“I think I know,” I said. “But I don’t want to be presumptuous. She chose this moment because she wasn’t alone. She had Garwain.”
“And how do you feel now that he’s gone?” asked Stirling.
“Free of him,” I responded, “and rather shocked by all that’s happened. Shocked that Garwain killed Aunt Queen. You knew he did that, didn’t you? He frightened her and made her fall.
Everyone knew it.”
“Yes,” Stirling said, “there was much talk about it at the wake. What will you do now?”
“I’m shocked that Merrick died,” I said. “Merrick freed me of Garwain. Lestat loved Merrick. I loved Merrick. I don’t know what I will do or where I will go. There are people who need me. There have always been people who need me, people who matter to me. I’m enmeshed in human life.”
I thought in silence of the murder of Patsy. I wanted desperately to confess it, but I loathed myself so much for it that I didn’t speak of it at all.
“That’s a good way to put it,” Lestat said bitterly, “ ‘enmeshed in human life.’ ”
Stirling nodded to this.
“Why don’t you ask me what I’ll do?” asked Lestat archly, with a raised eyebrow and a wink.
“Would you tell me?” asked Stirling with a little laugh.
“Of course not,” said Lestat. “But I’m in love with Tarquin, you can put that in your file, if you like. That doesn’t mean you can entrap me at Blackwood Manor, and you do remember your promise to me to leave Tarquin alone, don’t you?”
“Absolutely,” said Stirling. “I’m a man who keeps his promises.”
“I have a question for you,” I said shyly. “I’ve talked to Michael Curry and Rowan Mayfair several times in the last few months, but they only put me off with vague answers. They won’t really tell me much about Mona except that she can’t see me, that she’s undergoing a special therapy, that she’s in intensive care. They say she can die from any kind of infection. I can’t even talk to her on the phone—.”
“She’s dying,” Stirling said. He sat staring at me.
Silence.
Then Lestat spoke:
“Why are you telling him this?”
Stirling was still looking at me.
“Because he wants to know,” Stirling responded.
“Very well,” said Lestat. “Come on, Little Brother, let’s hunt. I know of two Evil Doers in Boca Raton who are alone in a magnificent waterfront mansion. It will be such fun, you wouldn’t believe. Good night, Stirling. Good night to the Talamasca. Let’s go.”
52
The sky was still a deep lavender when I walked into the house the following night. Lestat was lingering in the cemetery saying some last prayer for Merrick, or to Merrick, I wasn’t sure which.
Our hunting last night in Boca Raton had been marvelous and he had once again given me the gift of his all-powerful blood and I was exhilarated and confused and praying in my own way for some sign of what to do about Mona, wondering if I could just see her and talk to her; if I went to Mayfair Medical and insisted, could I perhaps use some spellbinding power to get to where she was? One last glimpse … one last talk.
But suddenly Jasmine and Clem both came rushing up to me at the foot of the stairs.
“There’s a crazy woman in your bedroom,” said Jasmine. “There was nothing we could do to stop her, Quinn. It’s Mona Mayfair, you remember her? She’s up there, Quinn. She drove here in a limousine full of flowers, Quinn, and she’s a living skeleton, you’re gonna die when you see her. Quinn, wait, we couldn’t stop her. Only reason we helped her with all those flowers is she was so weak.”
“Jasmine, lemme go!” I shouted. “I love her, don’t you understand?”
“Quinn, she’s got something wrong with her! Be careful!”
I ran up the stairs as fast as any mortal man dared and rushed into my bedroom and slammed the door shut and locked it.
She rose up to greet me. A living skeleton! Oh yes! And the bed was covered with her flowers. I stood there shocked to the core of my being, shocked and so glad to see her, so glad to rush to her and take her fragile form in my arms! My Mona, my frail and withering Mona, my pale and magnificent Mona, oh, my God, don’t let me hurt you.
“I love you, my beloved Ophelia,” I said, “my Ophelia Immortal, and mine always …”
Oh, look at the roses, the marguerites, the zinnias, the lilies.
“Noble Abelard,” she whispered. “I’ve come to ask the ultimate sacrifice; I’ve come to ask, let me die here, let me die with you here, let me die here instead of there with their needles and their tubes, let me die in your bed.”
I drew back. I could see the entire outline of her skull beneath her skin, and the bones of her shoulders underneath the spotted hospital gown that she wore. Only her full red hair had been spared. Her arms were like sticks, and her hands were the same. It was ghastly, the sight. She suffered with every breath.
“Oh, my darling, my sweetheart, thank God you came to me,” I told her, “but can’t you see what’s happened to me? Can’t your witch’s eyes see? I’m not human anymore. I’m not your Noble Abelard. I don’t sleep where the rays of the sun can reach me. Look at me, Mona, look at me. Do you want to be what I am?” What was I saying? I was mad. I couldn’t stop myself. “Do you want to be what I am?” I asked again. “Because you won’t die if you want to be what I am! If you’ll live off the blood of others forever. You’ll be immortal with me.”
I heard the lock of my door turn. I was outraged, then silenced. It was Lestat who entered.
Mona stared in astonishment. He had removed his sunglasses, and he stood under the gasolier as if he was bathing in its light.
“Let me work the Dark Trick, Quinn,” he said. “That way, you’ll be much closer to your princess. Let me take her for you with my strong blood, and that way your minds won’t be closed to each other. I’m a past master at such Dark Tricks, Quinn. Mona, would you know our secrets?” He came to her. “Make your choice, pretty girl. You can always choose the Light some other night, cherie. Ask Quinn if you doubt it. He’s seen it. He’s seen the Light of Heaven with his own eyes.”
She clung to me while he talked to her, pacing the floor, back and forth, telling her so many things—how it was with us, the rules, the limitations, the way he violated the rules and the limitations, the way the strong and the old survived, the way the new ones went into the flames. On and on he talked, and she clung to me, my Ophelia in her nest of flowers, with her legs so fragile and her whole little body trembling, oh, sweet Ophelia Immortal.
“Yes. I want it,” she said.
Dedicated
to
my son,
Christopher Rice
A Ballantine Book
Published by the Random House Publishing Group
Copyright © 2003 by Anne O’Brien Rice
All Rights Reserved.
Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
Ballantine and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
eISBN: 978-1-400-04194-7
This edition published by arrangement with Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
www.ballantinebooks.com
v3.1
Contents
Master Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Epigraph
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Dedication
Other Books by This Author
Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth; and let thy heart cheer
thee
in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart,
and in the sight of thine eyes; but know thou, that for
all these things God will bring thee to judgment.
ECCLESIASTES 11:9. King James Version
1
I want to be a saint. I want to save souls by the millions. I want to do good far and wide. I want to fight evil! I want my life-sized statue in every church. I’m talking six feet tall, blond hair, blue eyes—.
Wait a second.
Do you know who I am?
I’m thinking maybe you’re a new reader and you’ve never heard of me.
Well, if that’s the case, allow me to introduce myself, which I absolutely crave doing at the beginning of every one of my books.
I’m the Vampire Lestat, the most potent and lovable vampire ever created, a supernatural knockout, two hundred years old but fixed forever in the form of a twenty-year-old male with features and figure you’d die for—and just might. I’m endlessly resourceful, and undeniably charming. Death, disease, time, gravity, they mean nothing to me.
Only two things are my enemy: daylight, because it renders me completely lifeless and vulnerable to the burning rays of the sun, and conscience. In other words, I’m a condemned inhabitant of eternal night and an eternally tormented blood seeker.
Doesn’t that make me sound irresistible?
And before I continue with my fantasy let me assure you:
I know damned well how to be a full-fledged, post-Renaissance, post–nineteenth century, post-modern, post-popular writer. I don’t deconstruct nothin’. That is, you’re going to get a full-dress story here—with a beginning, middle and end. I’m talking plot, characters, suspense, the works.
I’m going to take care of you. So rest easy and read on. You won’t be sorry. You think I don’t want new readers? My name is thirst, baby. I must have you!
However, since we are taking this little break from my preoccupation with being a saint, let me say a few words to my dedicated following. You new guys follow along. It certainly won’t be difficult. Why would I do something that you find difficult? That would be self-defeating, right?
