"It is finished for my children, " the leader whispered. "It is finished and done, for they know now they can disregard all of it. The things that bound us together, gave us the strength to endure as damned things! The mysteries that protected us here. " Again he looked at me.
"And you ask me for explanations as if it were inexplicable! " he said. "You, for whom the working of the Dark Trick is an act of shameless greed. You gave it to the very womb that bore you! Why not to this one, the devil's fiddler, whom you worship from afar every night? "
"Have I not told you? " sang the vampire queen. "Haven't we always known? There is nothing to fear in the sign of the Cross, nor the Holy Water, nor the Sacrament itself... " She repeated the words, varying the melody under her breath, adding as she went on. "And the old rites, the incense, the fire, the vows spoken, when we thought we saw the Evil One in the dark, whispering... "
"Silence! " said the leader, dropping his voice. His hands almost went to his ears in a strangely human gesture. Like a boy he looked, almost lost. God, that our immortal bodies could be such varied prisons for us, that our immortal faces should be such masks for our true souls. Again he fixed his eyes on me. I thought for a moment there would be another of those ghastly transformations or that some uncontrollable violence would come from him, and I hardened myself. But he was imploring me silently. Why did this come about! His voice almost dried in his throat as he repeated it aloud, as he tried to curb his rage. "You explain to me! Why you, you with the strength of ten vampires and the courage of a hell full of devils, crashing through the world in your brocade and your leather boots! Lelio, the actor from the House of Thesbians, making us into grand drama on the boulevard! Tell me! Tell me why! "
"It was Magnus's strength, Magnus's genius, " sang the woman vampire with the most wistful smile.
"No! " He shook his head. "I tell you, he is beyond all account. He knows no limit and so he has no limit. But why! " He moved just a little closer, not seeming to walk but to come more clearly into focus as an apparition might.
"Why you, " he demanded, "with the boldness to walk their streets, break their locks, call them by name. They dress your hair, they fit your clothes! You gamble at their tables! Deceiving them, embracing them, drinking their blood only steps from where other mortals laugh and dance. You who shun cemeteries and burst from crypts in churches. Why you! Thoughtless, arrogant, ignorant, and disdainful! You give me the explanation. Answer me! " My heart was racing. My face was warm and pulsing with blood. I was in no fear of him now, but I was angry beyond all mortal anger, and I didn't fully understand why. His mind-I had wanted to pierce his mind-and this is what I heard, this superstition, this absurdity. He was no sublime spirit who understood what his followers had not. He had not believed it. He had believed in it, a thousand times worse! And I realized quite clearly what he was not demon or angel at all, but a sensibility forged in a dark time when the small orbs of the sun traveled the dome of the heavens, and the stars were no more than tiny lanterns describing gods and goddesses upon a closed night. A time when man was the center of this great world in which we roam, a time when for every question there had been an answer. That was what he was, a child of olden days when witches had danced beneath the moon and knights had battled dragons. Ah, sad lost child, roaming the catacombs beneath a great city and an incomprehensible century. Maybe your mortal form is more fitting than I supposed. But there was no time to mourn for him, beautiful as he was. Those entombed in the walls suffered at his command. Those he had sent out of the chamber could be called back. I had to think of a reply to his question that he would be able to accept. The truth wasn't enough. It had to be arranged poetically the way that the older thinkers would have arranged it in the world before the age of reason had come to me.
"My answer? " I said softly. I was gathering my thoughts and I could almost feel Gabrielle's warning, Nicki's fear. "I'm no dealer in mysteries, " I said. "No lover of philosophy. But it's plain enough what has happened here. " He studied me with a strange earnestness.
"If you fear so much the power of God, " I said, "then the teachings of the Church aren't unknown to you. You must know that the forms of goodness change with the ages, that there are saints for all times under heaven. " Visibly he hearkened to this, warmed to the words I used.
"In ancient days, " I said, "there were martyrs who quenched the flames that sought to burn them, mystics who rose into the air as they heard the voice of God. But as the world changed, so changed the saints. What are they now but obedient nuns and priests? They build hospitals and orphanages, but they do not call down the angels to rout armies or tame the savage beast. " I could see no change in him but I pressed on.
"And so it is with evil, obviously. It changes its form. How many men in this age believe in the crosses that frighten your followers? Do you think mortals above are speaking to each other of heaven and hell? Philosophy is what they talk about, and science! What does it matter to them if white-faced haunts prowl a churchyard after dark? A few more murders in a wilderness of murders? How can this be of interest to God or the devil or to man? " I heard again the old queen vampire laughing. But Armand didn't speak or move.
"Even your playground is about to be taken from you, " I continued. "This cemetery in which you hide is about to be removed altogether from Paris. Even the bones of our ancestors are no longer sacred in this secular age. " His face softened suddenly. He couldn't conceal his shock.
"Les Innocents destroyed! " he whispered. "You're lying to me... "
"I never lie, " I said offhand. "At least not to those I don't love. The people of Paris don't want the stench of graveyards around them anymore. The emblems of the dead don't matter to them as they matter to you. Within a few years, markets, streets, and houses will cover this spot. Commerce. Practicality. That is the eighteenth- century world. "
"Stop! " he whispered. "Les Innocents has existed as long as I have existed! " His boyish face was strained. The old queen was undisturbed.
"Don't you see? " I said softly. "It is a new age. It requires a new evil. And I am that new evil. " I paused, watching him. "I am the vampire for these times. " He had not foreseen my point. And I saw in him for the first time a glimmer of terrible understanding, the first glimmer of real fear. I made a small accepting gesture.
"This incident in the village church tonight, " I said cautiously, "it was vulgar, I'm inclined to agree. My actions on the stage of theater, worse still. But these were blunders. And you know they aren't the source of your rancor. Forget them for the moment and try to envision my beauty and my power. Try to see the evil that I am. I stalk the world in mortal dressthe worst of fiends, the monster who looks exactly like everyone else. " The woman vampire made a low song of her laughter. I could feel only pain from him, and from her the warm emanation of her love.
"Think of it, Armand, " I pressed carefully. "Why should Death lurk in the shadows? Why should Death wait at the gate? There is no bedchamber, no ballroom that I cannot enter. Death in the glow of the hearth, Death on tiptoe in the corridor, that is what I am. Speak to me of the Dark Gifts-I use them. I'm Gentleman Death in silk and lace, come to put out the candles. The canker in the heart of the rose.
" There was a faint moan from Nicolas. I think I heard Armand sigh.