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"Would you do that?" she asked. "In the church?"

"Of course I would. As you just said, the little beasts would never dare to enter! And the crypts under the altar will be as deep and dark as any grave. "

"But Lestat, to rest under the very altar!"

"Mother, you astonish me," I said. "I have taken victims under the very roof of Notre Dame. " But another little idea came to me. I went to Magnus's chest and started picking at the heap of treasure. I pulled out two rosaries, one of pearls, another of emeralds, both having the usual small crucifix.

She watched me, her face white, pinched.

"Here, you take this one," I said, giving her the emerald rosary. "Keep it on you. If and when we do meet with them, show them the crucifix. If I am right, they'll run from it. "

"But what happens if we don't find a safe place in the church?"

"How the hell should I know? We'll come back here!"

I could feel a fear collecting in her and radiating from her as she hesitated, looking through the windows at the fading stars. She had passed through the veil into the promise of eternity and now she was in danger again.

Quickly, I took the rosary from her and kissed her and slipped the rosary into the pocket of her frock coat.

"Emeralds mean eternal life, Mother," I said.

She appeared the boy standing there again, the last glow of the fire just tracing the line of her cheek and mouth.

"It's as I said before," she whispered. "You aren't afraid of anything, are you?"

"What does it matter if I am or not?" I shrugged. I took her arm and drew her to the passage. "We are the things that others fear," I said. "Remember that. "

When we reach the stable, I saw the boy had been hideously murdered. His broken body lay twisted on the hay strewn floor as if it had been flung there by a Titan. The back of his head was shattered. And to mock him, it seemed, or to mock me, they had dressed him in a gentleman's fancy velvet frock coat. Red velvet. Those were the words she'd murmured when they had done the crime. I'd seen only the death. I looked away now in disgust. All the horses were gone.

"They'll pay for that," I said.

I took her hand. But she stared at the miserable boy's body as if it drew her against her will. She glanced at me.

"I feel cold," she whispered. "I'm losing the strength in my limbs. I must, I must get to where it's dark. I can feel it. "

I led her fast over the rise of the nearby hill and towards the road.

There were no howling little monsters hidden in the village churchyard, of course. I didn't think there would be. The earth hadn't been turned up on the old graves in a long time.

Gabrielle was past conferring with me on this.

I half carried her to the side door of the church and quietly broke the latch.

"I'm cold all over. My eyes are burning," she said again under her breath. "Someplace dark. "

But as I started to take her in, she stopped.

"What if they're right," she said. "And we don't belong in the House of God. "

"Gibberish and nonsense. God isn't in the House of God. "

"Don't! . . . " She moaned.

I pulled her through the sacristy and out before the altar. She covered her face, and when she looked up it was at the crucifix over the tabernacle. She let out a long low gasp. But it was from the stained-glass windows that she shielded her eyes, turning her head towards me. The rising sun that I could not even feel yet was already burning her!

I picked her up as I had done last night. I had to find an old burial crypt, one that hadn't been used in years. I hurried towards the Blessed Virgin's altar, where the inscriptions were almost worn away. And kneeling, I hooked my fingernails around a slab and quickly lifted it to reveal a deep sepulcher with a single rotted coffin.

I pulled her down into the sepulcher with me and moved the slab back into place.