|
Vampires always order hot drinks. They aren't going to drinkthem; but they can feel the warmth and smell them if they're hot, andthat is so good.
David looked at me again. Or rather this familiar body with Davidinside looked at me. Because for me, David would always be the elderlyhuman I'd known and treasured, as well as this magnificentburnished shell of stolen flesh that was slowly being shaped by hisexpressions and manner and mood.
Dear Reader, he switched human bodies before I made him avampire, worry no more. It has nothing to do with this story.
'Something's following you again?" he asked. "This is what Ar mand told me.
So did Jesse.""Where did you see them?""Armand?" he asked. "A complete accident. In Paris. He was justwalking on the street. He was the first one I saw.""He didn't make any move to hurt you?""Why would he? Why were you calling to me? Who's stalkingyou? What is all this?""And you've been with Maharet."He sat back. He shook his head. "Lestat, I have pored overmanuscripts such as no living human has seen in centuries; I have laid myhands on clay tablets that...""David, the scholar," I said. "Educated by the Talamasca to bethe perfect vampire, though they never had an inkling that that iswhat you'd become.""Oh, but you must understand. Maharet took me to these placeswhere she keeps her treasures. You have to know what it means tohold in your hands a tablet covered in symbols that predate cuneiform. And Maharet herself, I might have lived how many centurieswithout ever glimpsing her."Maharet was really the only one he had ever had to fear. I supposewe both knew it. My memories of Maharet held no menace, only themystery of a survivor of Millennia, a living being so ancient that eachgesture seemed marble made liquid, and her soft voice had becomethe distillation of all human eloquence.
"If she gave you her blessing, nothing else much matters," I saidwith a little sigh. I wondered if I myself would ever lay eyes upon heragain. I had not hoped for it nor wanted it.
"I've also seen my beloved Jesse," said David.
"Ah, I should have thought of that, of course.""I went searching for my beloved Jesse. I went crying out fromplace to place, just the way you sent out the wordless cry for me."Jesse. Pale, bird-boned, red-haired. Twentieth-century born.
Highly educated and psychic as a human. Jesse he had known as ahuman; Jesse he knew now as an immortal. Jesse had been his humanpupil in the order called the Talamasca. Now he was the equal ofJesse in beauty and vampiric power, or very near to it. I really did notknow.
Jesse had been brought over by Maharet of the First Brood, bornas a human before humans had begun to write their history at all orbarely knew that they had one. The Elder now, if there was one, theQueen of the Damned was Maharet and her mute sister, Mekare, ofwhom no one spoke anymore much at all.
I had never seen a fledgling brought over by one as old as Maharet.
Jesse had seemed a transparent vessel of immense strength whenlast I saw her. Jesse must have had her own tales to tell now, her ownchronicles and adventures.
I had passed onto David my own vintage blood mixed with a straineven older than Maharet's. Yes, blood from Akasha, and blood fromthe ancient Marius, and of course my own strength was in my blood,and my own strength, as we all knew, was quite beyond measure.
So he and Jesse must have been grand companions, and what hadit meant to her to see her aged mentor clothed in the fleshly raimentof a young human male?
I was immediately envious and suddenly full of despair. I'd drawnDavid away from those willowy white creatures who had drawn himinto their sanctuary somewhere far across the sea, deep in a landwhere their treasures might be hidden from crisis and war forgenerations. Exotic names came to mind, but I could not for the momentthink where they had gone, the two red-haired ones, the one ancient,the one young. And to their hearth, they had admitted David.
A little sound startled me and I looked over my shoulder. I settledback, embarrassed to have appeared so anxious, and I focused silentlyfor a moment on my victim.
My Victim was still in the restaurant very near us in this hotel,sitting with his beautiful daughter. I wouldn't lose him tonight. I wassure enough of that.
I sighed. Enough of him. I'd been following him for months. Hewas interesting, but he had nothing to do with all this. Or did he? Imight kill him tonight, but I doubted it. Having spied the daughter,and knowing full well how much the Victim loved her, I had decidedto wait until she returned home. I mean, why be so mean to a younggirl like that? And how he loved her. Right now, he was pleading withher to accept a gift, something newly discovered by him and verysplendid in his eyes. However, I couldn't quite see the image of thegift in her mind or his.
3/163 首页 上一页 1 2 3 4 5 6 下一页 尾页
|
