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Marius paused

He looked away from me for the first time and towards the sky beyond the s, as if he were listening to island voices I couldn’t hear

"I have a few s which are is" But he was distracted "And there are promises," he said, finally, "which I must exact "

And he slipped into quiet, listening, his face too much like that of Akasha and Enkil

There were a thousand questions I wanted to ask But nificant perhaps there were a thousand statements of his I wanted to reiterate, as if I had to say theood sense

I sat back against the cool brocade of the winged chair with ether in the form of a steeple, and I just looked ahead of me, as if his tale were spread out there for ht of the truth of his stateht have horrified htness of the philosophy of the terrible gods of the East, that we could solory in e did

I too was a child of the West, and all led with the Western inability to accept evil or death

But underneath all these considerations lay the appalling fact that Marius could annihilate all of us by destroying Akasha and Enkil Marius could kill every single one of us in existence if he were to burn Akasha and Enkil and thereby get rid of an old and decrepit and useless form of evil in the world Or so it seemed

And the horror of Akasha and Enkil themselvesWhat could I say to this, except that I too had felt the first glimmer of what he once felt, that I could rouse theain, I could make them move Or more truly, I had felt when I saw them that someone should and could do it Someone could end their open-eyed sleep

And ould they be if they ever walked and talked again? Ancient Egyptian monsters What would they do?

I saw the two possibilities as seductive suddenly -- rousing the them Both tempted the mind I wanted to pierce them and commune with the to destroy theht with them that would take all our doomed species with it

Both attitudes had to do with power And soe of time

"Aren’t you ever tempted to do it?" I asked, and my voice had pain in it I wondered if down in their chapel they heard

He awakened fro and turned to h you know better than anyone that we have no place?"

Again he shook his head No

"I am immortal," he said, "truly immortal To be perfectly honest, I do not knohat can kill o on I do not even think of it I aed for years and years ago when I was alive, and I’ress of mankind I want to see ill happen now that the world has coods Why, I couldn’t be persuaded now to close my eyes for any reason"

I nodded in understanding

"But I don’t suffer what you suffer," he said "Even in the grove in northern France, when I wasI have been lonely since, I have known near uish, but I was never i I have done over and over what you have yet to do the thing that must take you away from me very very soon"

"Take o, Lestat," he said "And very soon, as I said You’re not ready to res I have left to tell you and you must listen with the same attention hich you listened to the rest"

"Marius, I can’t ier suddenly Why had he brought me here to cast me out? And I remembered all Armand’s admonitions to me It is only with the old ones that we find communion, not with those we create And I had found Marius But these were mere words They didn’t touch the core of what I felt, the sudden misery and fear of separation

"Listen to ently "Before I was taken by the Gauls, I had lived a good lifeti as many a man in those days And after I took Those Who Must Be Kept out of Egypt, I lived again for years in Antioch as a rich Roht live I had a house, slaves, and the love of Pandora We had life in Antioch, atchers of all that passed And having had that lifetith to becoth to rule on this island as I do You, like o early into the fire or the sun, have had no real life at all

"As a young man, you tasted real life for no more than six months in Paris As a va houses and other lives as you drifted from place to place

"If you mean to survive, you must live out one complete lifetime as soon as you can To forestall it o into the earth again, never to rise Or worse"

"I want it I understand," I said "And yet when they offered it to me in Paris, to remain with the Theater, I couldn’t do it"

"That was not the right place for you Besides, the Theater of the Vampires is a coven It isn’t the world any e of mine is the world And too many horrors happened to you there

"But in this New World wilderness to which you’re headed, this barbaric little city called New Orleans, you may enter into the world as never before You may take up residence there as a mortal, just as you tried to do so s with Gabrielle There will be no old covens to bother you, no rogues to try to strike you down out of fear And when you make others -- and you will, out of loneliness, make others -- make and keep them as human as you can Keep them close to you as members of a fae you live in, the decades you pass through Understand the style of gars in which you spend your leisure hours, the place in which you hunt Understand what it e of tis die" All the things Arainst

"Of course You are made to triumph over time, not to run from it And you will suffer that you harbor the secret of your monstrosity and that you must kill And e your conscience, and you may succeed, or you may fail But you can come very close to life, if you will only lock the secret within you You are fashioned to be close to it, as you yourself once told the members of the old Paris coven You are the imitation of a man"

"I want it, I do want it -- "

"Then do as I advise And understand this also In a real way, eternity isof one hu periods of retreat; tiain we plunge into the streas us down as they will do ain? Leave this retreat and plunge into the streaht ain that I can’t resist it Then I’ll walk city streets I’ll take a nas"

"Then come noith me!" Ah, painful echo of Armand And of the vain plea from Gabrielle ten years after

"It’s ainvitation than you know," he answered, "but I’d do you a great disservice if I came with you I’d stand between you and the world I couldn’t help it"

I shook my head and looked away, full of bitterness

"Do you want to continue?" he asked "Or do you want Gabrielle’s predictions to come true?"

"I want to continue," I said

"Then you o," he said "A century froain I won’t be on this island I will have taken Those Who Must Be Kept to another place But wherever I am and wherever you are, I’ll find you And then I’ll be the one ill not want you to leave s you remain I’ll fall in love with your coht of you, your stamina and your recklessness, and your lack of belief in anything -- all the things about you I already love rather too strongly"

I could scarcely listen to this without breaking down I wanted to beg him to let me remain

"Is it absolutely impossible now?" I asked "Marius, can’t you spare me this lifetime?"

"Quite impossible," he said "I can tell you stories forever, but they are no substitute for life Believe me, I’ve tried to spare others: I’ve never succeeded I can’t teach what one lifetime can teach I never should have taken Ar are a penance tohim into the Paris of this century, but I fear for him it is too late Believe me, Lestat, when I say this has to happen You must have that lifetime, for those who are robbed of it spin in dissatisfaction until they finally live it somewhere or they are destroyed"

"And what about Gabrielle?"

"Gabrielle had her life; she had her death alth to reenter the world when she chooses, or to live on its fringes indefinitely"

"And do you think she will ever reenter?"

"I don’t know," he said "Gabrielle defiesNot my experience -- she’s too like Pandora But I never understood Pandora The truth is most women are weak, be they , they are absolutely unpredictable"

I shook my head I closed my eyes for a moone, no matter e said here

And I still could not accept that I had to go this seeue anymore I kneas resolute, and I also knew that he wouldn’t forceabout my mortal father, and he’d let hts left

"Yes," he answered softly "And there are other things I can tell you"

I openedat me patiently, affectionately I felt the ache of love as strongly as I’d ever felt it for Gabrielle I felt the inevitable tears and did reat deal from Armand," he said, his voice steady as if to help le "And you learned ht teach you"

"Yes, please," I said

"Well, for one thing," he said, "your powers are extraordinary, but you can’t expect those you make in the next fifty years to equal you or Gabrielle Your second child didn’t have half Gabrielle’s strength and later children will have even less The blood I gave you will make some difference If you drinkif you drink from Akasha and Enkil, which you may choose not to dothat will make some difference too But no matter, only so many children can bewill be weak However, this is not necessarily a bad thing The rule of the old covens had wisdoain, there is the old truth: you ht make titans or imbeciles, no one knohy or how

"Whatever will happen will happen, but choose your companions with care Choose them because you like to look at them and you like the sound of their voices, and they have profound secrets in them that you wish to know In other words, choose them because you love them Otherwise you will not be able to bear their co"

"I understand," I said "Make them in love"

"Exactly, make them in love And make certain they have had some lifeti as Arainstboy child Armand "

"But you didn’t know the Children of Darkness would come when they did, and separate him from you"

"No But still, I should have waited It was loneliness that drove me to it And Armand’s helplessness, that his mortal life was so completely in my hands Remember, beware of that power, and the power you have over those who are dying Loneliness in us, and that sense of power, can be as strong as the thirst for blood If there were not an Enkil there ht be no Akasha, and if there were not an Akasha, then there would be no Enkil"

"Yes And fro you said, it seems Enkil covets Akasha That Akasha is the one who now and then"

"Yes, that’s true" His face became very somber suddenly, and his eyes had a confidential look in the to each other and fearful anotherwhat to say "Who knohat Akasha ht do if there were no Enkil to hold her?" he whispered "And why do I pretend that he can’t hear this even when I think it? Why do I whisper? He can destroykeeping him from it But then ould become of them if he did aith me?"

"Why did they let themselves be burnt by the sun?" I asked

"How can we know? Perhaps they kneouldn’t hurt them It would only hurt and punish those who had done it to them Perhaps in the state they live in they are slow to realize what is going on outside theather their forces, to wake from their dreams and save themselves Maybe their movements after it happened -- the movements of Akasha I witnessed -- were only possible because they had been awakened by the sun And now they sleep again with their eyes open And they dreaain And they do not even drink"

"What did you meanif I choose to drink their blood?" I asked "How could I not choose?"

"That is so we have to think on, both of us," he said "And there is always the possibility that they won’t allow you to drink"

I shuddered thinking of one of those ar h the stone floor itself

"She told you her name, Lestat," he said "I think she will let you drink But if you take her blood, then you will be even then you, but if she gives you more than that, a full measure, hardly any force on earth can destroy you after that You have to be certain you want it"

"Why wouldn’t I want it?" I said

"Do you want to be burnt to a cinder and live on in agony? Do you want to be slashed with knives a thousand tiuns, and yet live on, a shredded husk that cannot fend for itself? BelieveYou could suffer the sun even, and live through it, burnt beyond recognition, wishing as the old gods did in Egypt that they had died"

"But won’t I heal faster?"

"Not necessarily Not without another infusion of her blood in the wounded state Time with its constant measure of human victims or the blood of old ones -- these are the restoratives But you may wish you had died Think on this Take your time"

"What would you do if you were I?"

"I would drink from Those Who Must Be Kept, of course I would drink to be stronger, more nearly immortal I would beseech Akasha on o into her ars She has never struck out at me She has never forbidden me, and I know that I want to live forever I would endure the fire again I would endure the sun And all o on You may not be so sure that eternity is what you want"

"I want it," I said "I could pretend to think about it, pretend to be clever and wise as I weigh it But what the hell? I wouldn’t fool you, would I? You knehat I would say"