Page 119

Lestat backed up the marble steps towards the portico, pausing with upraised hands, letting all those iPhones and cameras snap, even beaming at a mortal couple, young, curious, tourists in the big city, who passed wondering what manner of celebrity was this and then hurried on, slipping through the shifting blood drinkers as if they were mere Goth kids who would never harm anyone.

"Now you must let us do our work!" declared Lestat. "I ask you to listen to all that Benji has to say especially on this night of all nights, and be patient with us. I'll come back to you myself in person when I have something important, truly important, to tell you."

A young female dashed forward and kissed his hand; the males were giving off raucous cries of support. Indeed deep guttural sounds were breaking out in the crowd such as bloodthirsty mortal soldiers used to make but which were now the stuff of sports audiences in packed arenas. Woot, woot!

"Where shall we search for Viktor?" a male cried out from the middle of the empty street. "Benji's told us to search, but where do we begin?"

Gregory could see that this shocked Lestat. He hadn't been prepared for this. Apparently, he hadn't known that Benji had sent out the word as soon as Viktor was kidnapped. But Lestat rose to the moment.

"He that brings Viktor back safe to these front steps," he called out, "shall have his fill of my powerful blood in my grateful embrace, I swear to you."

Again the whole shifting and glittering assembly roared in unison.

"But be careful as you search, as you listen, as you use your gifts, to cast a net for his voice, for images of him and where he's held captive. For this thing that has Viktor is merciless, an outcast and a slayer of the greatest of his own kind, and therefore desperate. Come to us, here, or call Benji with any intelligence. Now be safe, and be wise, and be good! Be good!"

The crowd was screaming.

With a great wave of his right hand, Lestat backed through the open door and then he closed it.

He stood there as if catching his breath, his back to the dark-paneled wood, and then he looked up, his large blue-violet eyes flashing over the surrounding faces like lights.

"Where has Louis taken Rose?" he asked.

"Downstairs, the cellar," said Gregory. "We will see you in the attic."

The whole congregation moved upwards, to the giant ballroom where the meeting would take place.

By the time Gregory reached the top floor and walked into the vast dimly lighted space, a conference table had been arranged by bringing lots of smaller square tables, each covered in gold leaf, to form one great glittering rectangle with chairs up one side and down the other.

This was directly beneath the central chandelier and illuminated by the chandeliers before and after it.

All the residents and guests of the house were streaming into the room.

"Is there to be an order as to where we take our places," asked Arjun in a polite voice as he approached Gregory.

Gregory smiled. "I don't think it matters as long as there's a vacant chair at that far end, at the head of the table."

Suddenly he realized that Sevraine was standing beside him, his ancient and precious Blood Wife, Sevraine. But there was no time for taking her in his arms, for telling her what a joy it had been earlier to see her come through the back garden and into this house with all her company.

She couldn't possibly read his thoughts, but she knew what they were nevertheless.

"We have the future now," she whispered. "Does it matter that we've wasted so many opportunities to meet in the past?"

And he said with a soft sigh, "I honestly do believe that is true. We have the future." But he was reassuring himself now as well as he was reassuring her.

23

Lestat

In the Multitude of Counselors

THERE MUST HAVE BEEN forty or forty-five members of the Undead in the ballroom when I entered it with Louis. I was carrying Rose. We had had the briefest of reunions in the quiet of a cellar room, but I had been unable to quiet her fears, or my own for that matter as to leaving

her, and so I'd vowed not to let her out of my sight.

"Be still, my darling," I whispered to her. "You're with us now, and everything is made new."

She snuggled against me, helpless and trusting, her heart beating dangerously fast against my chest.