Prince Lestat (The Vampire Chronicles 11)

Gregory did think back, yes. Back and back, he went through the memories to those long-ago human nights in ancient Kemet when he had danced, danced with other men, danced at the banquets of the court until he'd fallen down in bliss and exhaustion with the drums still pounding in his ears.

"Very well," he said to Davis. "You lead the way."

How marvelous it was to be drifting into the ancient patterns yet bound up in this new romantic music. How natural it suddenly seemed. And though his eyes were half closed and for a moment all his fear and apprehension was forgotten, he was conscious that other male immortals were dancing too, all around him, each in his own way. Flavius was dancing. Flavius of the miracle limb dancing with that limb. It seemed everyone was dancing; everyone was caught up in this raw and relentless music; everyone had yielded to it, and to this unprecedented and extraordinary moment that stretched on and on.

An hour had passed. Maybe more.

Gregory wandered the house. The music filled it, seemed to reverberate in the very beams.

In an open library, a pretty French library, he saw Pandora talking with Flavius by a gas fire. Flavius was weeping and Pandora was stroking his head, lovingly, tenderly.

"Oh, yes, but we have time now to talk about all of it," she said to him softly. "I have always loved you, loved you from the night I made you, and you have always been in my heart."

"There's so much I want to tell you. There's this longing for a continuity, for you to know."

"To be your witness, yes, I understand."

"Still, after all this time, this unimaginable time, I have these fears."

Fears.

Gregory passed on, silently, not wanting to intrude. Fears. What were his own fears? Was Gregory afraid that in this new coming together, they would lose their little family that had endured for so long?

Oh, yes. He knew that fear. He'd known it as soon as he'd brought his little company through the front door.

But something finer, something greater was possible here, and for that he was willing to take the risk. Even as it chilled him, even as he found himself wandering back towards the music, towards the inevitable spectacle of seeing his beloved Chrysanthe dazzled and entertained by new and magnetic immortals, he knew that he wanted this, this great gathering more than he had ever wanted anything with his entire soul. Were not all of these immortals here his kin? Could they not all become one united and enduring family?

18

Lestat

Sevraine and the Caves of Gold

MILLIONS OF YEARS AGO two great volcanoes poured lava and ash again and again over the land now called Cappadocia, creating a stark and breathtaking landscape of serpentine gorges and valleys and soaring cliffs and countless clustered knifelike towers of stone piercing the sky which have come to be known as fairy chimneys. For thousands of years, mortals have carved deep cave dwellings into the soft volcanic rock, eventually creating virtual cathedrals underground and monasteries and even whole cities remote from all natural light.

Was it any wonder that a great immortal had created a refuge in this strange land where tourists now come to see Byzantine paintings in cave churches, and hotels today offer luxurious accommodations in rock-cut rooms in cliff faces and mountain peaks?

How gorgeous it was under the light of the moon, this magical land in the middle of the Anatolian plain.

But nothing had prepared me for what I beheld as we entered Sevraine's underground domain.

It was just past midnight when we made our way through a narrow winding rocky valley far beyond any human habitation, and how Gabrielle found the entrance in what seemed an impenetrable cliff I wasn't certain.

But climbing the face of this cliff, clinging with preternatural skill to the outcroppings and broken roots that humans might never trust, we made our way into a dark slit of an opening that widened out into an actual low-roofed tunnel.

Even with my vampiric vision, it was difficult for me to make out the shape of Gabrielle moving in front of me, until suddenly after the fourth or fifth turn in the passage, her figure loomed small and dark against the glow of flickering flames.

Two vigorously burning torches marked the entrance into a passage of hammered gold where the air was suddenly cool with currents from the world beyond, and the shimmering metal all around us enclosed us in an eerie light.

On we walked until we reached the first of many broader gold-lined chambers where layer after layer of the precious metal had been hammered over crude stone, perhaps mixed with fresco plaster, I couldn't know, and suddenly the ceilings above us were ablaze with magnificent paintings in the old Byzantine style that had once filled the churches of Constantinople and still filled the churches of Ravenna and San Marco in Venice.

Rows and rows of dark-haired round-faced saints gazed down on us with dark brows and unwavering gravity, clothed in embroidered robes, as we moved deeper and de

eper into the underground realm.

At last we emerged on a gallery that wound around the upper part of a vast domed space with the feel of a great plaza. All around us passages opened from this great central place to other parts of the seeming city, while above the dome itself was decorated in brilliant sections of green and blue and gold mosaic swirling with vines and blossoms, bordered in red and gold at the top of the walls.

Grecian columns carved out of the soft rock appeared to hold a structure that was in fact part of the mountain. Everywhere the walls lived and breathed with color and ornament, but there were no Christian saints here. The figures that rose from the floor to gaze at us as we went down the rock-cut stairs were angelic and glorious but devoid of all faith iconography. They might have been celebrated members of our people for all I knew, with their shimmering and perfect faces, and grand robes of crimson or cobalt blue or twinkling silver.