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"Tell the Court you want to come in," he said. "I'll go with you. They won't dare to harm you at a time like this. They'll need you, want your cooperation and assistance."

For a brief second, only a second, it seemed possible--a future in which Rhosh would be welcomed, in which Benedict would be there, pleading perhaps for his acceptance, and then he would confer with the Prince, and he would see Sevraine again, Sevraine who had refused to receive him in her own compound, and he would be with Gregory, Gregory who'd been brought into this realm of darkness six thousand years ago. But it vanished, this brief flash of possibility, as if it were the flare from the guttering of a dying candle.

Before he'd even decided, the heat had gone out of him, blasting the heavy draperies that flanked the windows of this room, causing them to explode in flame.

Roland was startled, Roland who would do well to stop talking altogether, Roland turning around and around as all the draperies of this great room went up in flames, as the dark oak paneling began to blister and smoke.

Oh, it was a most convenient power, and in some ways the most delicious of powers, though in truth, Rhosh had discovered it only very late in his long journey through time, and seldom if ever used it as he was using it now, reserving it for the most mundane things--the lighting of fires on hearths, the lighting of tapers in chandeliers. But it felt wondrous all right, the invisible muscle tightening and releasing behind his forehead and the sudden spectacle of smoke roaring towards the ceiling from the synthetic fabrics all round him.

With an intake of breath, he blew out the double doors, and walked over the broken glass into the stillness of the night, ignoring the electronic wail of a fire alarm. Roland was right beside him like a faithful dog, and how he detested him suddenly. But remember, this is your only ally in all the world! All the world! Allesandra has deserted you. And Arion, that duplicitous and worthless soul, had gone with her as well, straight to the Prince.

The telepathic voices of the vampiric world were laughing at him, laughing at Rhoshamandes as his fledglings deserted him. Only Roland remained, Roland who had welcomed Rhosh into the house, Roland who had given him the gift of Derek, the non-human with the thick, delicious blood.

Rhosh turned and sent the fire blast against the upstairs windows, one after another from left to right, blowing the shattered glass in all directions, incinerating the rooms that lay within. And now the air was filled with the sound of sirens. The lowering clouds were the color of blood.

Oh, if only Rhosh had known of this power centuries ago. He would have destroyed that Satanic coven under Les Innocents, destroyed Armand, and taken back the fledglings the Children of Satan had stolen from him. But he hadn't known. No, it was the great Lestat in his books who had become the first real schoolteacher of the Undead, and Marius their professor. How he loathed them all.

He turned his back on the house, seeing his own long shadow thrown out across the wet grass in front of him, and the shadow of Roland like a hovering angel beside him.

"Let's go back to Northern Ireland," said Roland. "Let's keep searching, searching minds until someone throws up the image of the pair of them."

"They're gone from there by now," Rhoshamandes said. "It's been too long since that sniveling little boy-thing called the radio station and told them where he was."

"But they have no identification, and they can't travel in this world without it."

Oh, ye of little faith and little knowledge!

They moved fast through the dark and with all the speed at their command until they found a quiet street far away from the inferno of Garekyn's house, and the fire engines gathering around it.

Roland was talking again. Roland almost never stopped talking. Roland was saying something about the broadcast, and Rhosh was thinking how good it had felt to burn that house, how good it had felt to melt to cinders anything that belonged to the comrade of that despicable weak little Derek, who had so reminded him of Benedict at times, an eternal boy, an immortal boy, a miserable combination of a man's rage and a child's helplessness.

Yes, put that little earbud in your ear and listen to the program. What do I care about the program? What do I care about anything?

It seemed a great void had opened beneath him the night Benedict had left; it seemed he had seen to the depths of that void, and he'd confronted the most awful truth of his existence, that without Benedict, nothing really meant anything to him, that it had been Benedict, poor sweet Benedict, who kept him alive, not human blood and the power of Amel forever changing his cells from human to immortal--just Benedict, Benedict's need and Benedict's love, and all the other passions of Rhoshamandes had gone up in flames, just as surely as if Benedict had used the Fire Gift as he left Rhoshamandes's life forever.

He thought of the Prince. He saw his smiling face; he saw his brilliant, flashing eyes; he heard the timbre of his voice. Had Rhoshamandes ever had such passion for living as the Prince had, the Prince who had already died and risen again in his short pampered vampiric life, the Prince who fed off the love around him as surely as he fed off blood, the Prince who declared love for that demon thing Amel that had brought Rhoshamandes to this ruin!--the Prince who was untouchable as long as Amel remained inside of him.

He could have turned the Fire Gift on the whole world! He could have burned these houses all around him, these trees. He could have blasted the very clouds above and brought down a storm of rain on fires that nothing could quench. He could have burned the city of London! The growing sense of his power vaguely thrilled him, warming his hard cold heart as if it might truly feel again.

Roland came striding towards him.

"The Prince is broadcasting now," said Roland. "The Prince is inviting them to call in. The Prince says he will invite them all to come to the Chateau. The Prince will arrange everything."

Roland held out the little cell phone for him to listen. How Rhosh was tempted to grind the little phone into sand, sand twinkling with tiny particles of glass. Or to turn the Fire Gift, so new, so deliciously powerful, on this one, Roland, to see just how long it took for one so old and so powerful to burn.

Something in Roland changed. His eyes fixed on those of Rhosh as if Rhosh's thoughts had leapt out of his mind and pinched at Roland's heart though Rhosh had never inten

ded such a thing.

Rhosh smiled. He reached out and laid his hand on Roland's shoulder.

" 'Get thee behind me, Satan,' " said Rhosh. "Follow or go away." And turning, Rhosh went up fast towards the broken clouds and the faint stars above them.

15

Lestat

THE LITTLE CHURCH was dark and empty. Only ten years ago, my beloved architect had rebuilt it from the ground up, according to what historical records he could find, and my own remembrances. And it looked very like the old church of my times, when it had seemed vast to me as a child, and the Masses said on the distant altar had held the only connection with the Divine ever offered me.