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"If she really thought it was Khayman, she'd do something," I said. "She'd destroy him if she felt she had to. No, it's Mekare."

"But how can she destroy Khayman? Khayman's as strong as she is," David said.

"Nonsense. She could get the jump on him," I said. "Any immortal can be decapitated. We saw that with Akasha. She was decapitated by a heavy jagged piece of glass."

"That's true," Jesse said. "Maharet herself told me this when she first brought me into the Blood. She said I'd grow so strong in the future that fire couldn't destroy me and the sun couldn't destroy me. But the sure way to murder any immortal was to separate the head from the heart and let the head and the body bleed out. She told me that even before Akasha came to the Sonoma compound with you. And then that's just what happened with Akasha, only Mekare took Akasha's brain and devo

ured it before the head or the heart bled out."

We all reflected for a long time in silence.

"Again, there's never been the slightest sign," said David gently, "that Mekare knows her own powers."

"Correct," said Jesse.

"But if she did this, she must know her own powers," David continued. "And Maharet is there to be a check upon her every waking moment."

"Perhaps."

"So where is all this going?" I asked. I tried not to sound exasperated. I loved Maharet.

"I don't think she will ever destroy herself and Mekare," said Jesse. "But I don't know. I do know she listens all the time to Benji's broadcasts out of New York. She listens to them on her computer. She sits back and listens for hours. She listens to all those young blood drinkers who call Benji. She listens to everything that they have to say. If she were going to bring the tribe to an end, I think she would warn me. I simply don't think she means to do it. But I think she agrees entirely with Benjamin. Things are in a very bad way. Things have changed. It wasn't only your music, Lestat, or Akasha rising. It's the age itself, it's the accelerated rate of technological advancement. She said once, as I believe I told you, that all institutions which depended upon secrecy are now threatened. She said that no system based on arcana or esoteric knowledge would survive this age. No new revealed religion could take hold in it. And no group that depended upon occult purpose could endure. She predicted that there would be changes in the Talamasca. 'Human beings won't fundamentally change,' she said. 'They'll adapt. And as they adapt they'll explore all mysteries relentlessly until they have found the fundamentals behind each and every one.' "

"My thoughts on the matter exactly," I offered.

"Well, she's right," said David. "There have been changes in the Talamasca, and that's what I wanted to tell you. That's why I sent out the call for you. I wouldn't have dared to disturb Maharet when she obviously did not want to be disturbed, but I have to confess I was hoping for news of her when you surfaced, and now I'm a bit stunned. What's been happening with the Talamasca of late doesn't mean so very much."

"Well, what has been happening?" I asked. I wondered if I was becoming a nuisance. But without my goading them, these two would have lapsed into long periods of silence and meaningful stares, and frankly, I wanted information.

Information age. I guess I'm part of it, even if I can't remember how to use my iPhone from week to week, and have to learn how to send e-mails all over again every couple of years, and can't retain any profound technological knowledge about the computers I sometimes use.

"Well, the answer to all that," Jesse said, responding to my thoughts, "is to use the technology regularly. Because we know now that our preternatural minds don't give us any superior gift for all knowledge, only the same kinds of knowledge we understood when we were human."

"Yes, right. That is certainly true," I confessed. "I'd thought it was different, because I'd learned Latin and Greek so easily in the Blood. But you're absolutely right. So on to the Talamasca. I assume they've digitized all their records by now?"

"Yes, they completed that process several years back," said David. "Everything's digitalized; and relics are in museum-quality environments under the Motherhouses in Amsterdam and in London. Every single relic has been photographed, recorded on video, described, studied, classified, etcetera. They had begun all that years ago when I was still Superior General."

"Are you talking to them directly?" asked Jesse. She herself had never wanted to do that. Since she came into the Blood, she'd never sought to contact her old friends there. I'd brought David over. She had not. For a while, I'd harassed the Talamasca, baited them, engaged now and then with their members, but that was now a long time ago.

"No," said David. "I don't disturb them. But I have occasionally visited those old friends of mine on their deathbeds. I have felt an obligation to do that. And it's simple enough for me to get into the Motherhouses and get into those sickrooms. I do that because I want to say goodbye to those old mortal friends, and also I know what they're experiencing. Dying without so many answers. Dying without ever having learned anything through the Talamasca that was transformative or transcendent. What I know now of the present state of the Talamasca I know from those encounters and from watching, simply watching and listening and prowling about, and picking at the thoughts of those who know someone is listening, but not who or what." He sighed. He looked weary suddenly. His dark eyes were puckered and there was a tremor in his lips.

I saw his soul so clearly now in the new youthful body that it was as if the old David and the new David had completely fused for me. And indeed his old persona did shape the expression of his youthful face. A multitude of facial expressions had reshaped the piercing black eyes of this face. Even his old voice sounded now through the newer vocal cords as if he had retuned them and refined them merely by using them for all those softly spoken, unfailingly polite words.

"What's happened," he said, "is that the mystery of the Elders and the origins of the Order have been buried in a new way."

"What do you mean?" asked Jesse.

David looked at me. "You're familiar with this. We never knew our origins really. You know that. We always knew the Order had been founded in the mid-eighth century, and we knew there was unaccountable wealth somewhere which financed our existence and our research. We knew the Elders governed the Order but we didn't know who they were or where they were. We had our hard-and-fast rules: observe but do not interfere, study but do not ever seek to use the power of a witch or a vampire for one's own gain, that sort of thing."

"And this is changing?" I asked.

"No," he replied. "The Order's as healthy and virtuous as ever. If anything they're thriving. There are more young scholars coming in today who know Latin and Greek than before, more young archaeologists--like Jesse--who are finding the Order attractive. The secrecy has been preserved, in spite of your charming books, Lestat, and all the publicity you so generously heaped on the Talamasca, and as far as I know there have been few scandals in recent years. In fact none whatsoever."

"So what's the big problem?"

"Well, I wouldn't call it a problem," said David. "I'd call it a deepening of the secrecy in a new and interesting way. Sometime in the last six months newly appointed Elders started introducing themselves to their colleagues and welcoming communication with them."

"You mean Elders actually chosen from the ranks," said Jesse with a bit of an ironic smile.