A Jungle Nocturne
Chapter Four
The next night, David awoke, fit and well, with no lasting effects from his injuries.
"Lestat, look at this!" David said, lifting his shirt. "It is as if nothing ever happened!"
"But of course, David," Lestat smiled, kissing his fledgling. "You have MY blood. What did you expect?"
"I'm not certain. I knew of your ability to heal, of course, but it is just fantastic to experience it myself. I mean, when Louis was burned, he was in pain for several nights."
"Ah, yes, well, when I made Louis, I had only had one drink of . . ." Akasha's blood, He was thinking, but he couldn't bring himself to say her name. It was still difficult. It wasn't the same grief as he felt for Claudia. It was something different. Perhaps it was because he'd seen her die. Perhaps it was because his feeling had been deepened and sharpened with her ancient blood, so that when he saw her die, the grief was unlike anything he had ever before felt. Perhaps it was because they had been lovers.
"Lestat?" Louis had returned from hunting and entered the cave to see Lestat sitting across from David with the saddest expression on his face. "Lestat, what is the matter?"
Lestat looked up. "Oh, Louis, it's you. Nothing," he smiled, "nothing at all, mon ami. David and I were just discussing his miraculous recovery."
"I see. It can be disorienting." Louis said to David.
"Yes. I must thank you both for my life." David hugged Louis, "Louis , my rescuer." Then he hugged Lestat, "and Lestat, my healer."
"No thanks necessary David," Louis answered, returning the hug. "You know, really you only have us to thank for your comfort, it is very doubtful that you would have died."
"Surely if you hadn't located me and the sun rose, I should have died, don't you think?" David asked.
"I didn't," Lestat answered.
"Precisely," Louis continued, "and it seems that you have very near the strength of Lestat, you may have the same invulnerability."
"It isn't necessarily invulnerability," David said. "It is possible that, had he remained long enough, the sun would have destroyed him. We are simply uncertain how many days it might take."
"Well this is a morbid conversation!" Lestat announced.
Louis put his arm around Lestat. "Je désolé, mon couer."
"That's better." Lestat snuggled close to Louis, pulling David into his lap as he did so.
"I am anxious to explore the boundaries of my powers, though." David said, tilting his head back to see his maker.
"That can be a dangerous and painful pursuit, my darling one." Lestat said, noncommittally.
"Yes, David, the only way to find out how far one can go is to go one step too far. You don't want to risk your life so soon, do you?" Louis worried.
"It isn't that I want to risk my life, Louis, definitely not. But I do wish to use these new powers to their full extent." David explained. "What can I learn by being cautious?"
"Yes, Louis, what can one learn by being cautious, hmm?" Lestat reached back and tickled Louis's side.
"Quite a lot," Louis answered, capturing Lestat's hand. "I feel that I have learned very much by being cautious."
"That is a vague answer," Lestat reached up and ran his fingers through Louis's hair. "Tell us one thing, Louis, one specific thing that you have learned."
Louis was quiet for a moment. Finally very quietly he said, "I have learned that to be peaceful is to be underestimated and misunderstood, but to be passionate is to be in pain."
"Not true," Lestat said. "I am passionate, but not in pain."
"Aren't you?" Louis asked. "Then what drives you to do the things you do; lie in the sun, take a human body, take David?"
"Thirst for adventure," Lestat said with a laugh.
"Before Lestat did have his experience with Raglan James, he thought that what he wanted was to be human, in taking the chance offered to him, he found that he did not want to be human," David stated.
"He could have found out the same by taking the time to truly observe mortals, rather than romanticizing them," Louis said.
"Or by listening to someone who had, eh Louis?" David pointed to the manuscript of Lestat's latest book, THE TALE OF THE BODY THIEF, which both he and Louis had read.
"I will say that would have been a simpler, faster and less unpleasant way of learning that lesson, yes." Louis kissed the top of Lestat's golden head.
Lestat pouted. "David, I thought you were on my side."
"I didn't know we were taking sides, Lestat," David said. He turned in Lestat's lap and kissed his mouth. "We are having a discussion."
"Then let us discuss your behavior instead of mine." Lestat said.
"The Vampire Lestat wishes to discuss a subject other than himself, will wonders never cease?" Louis teased.
Lestat tugged Louis's hair. "Enough of that, you."
"So Louis, do think that one cannot be both peaceful and passionate?" David asked.
"I don't know. That is a question I am still pursuing. What do you think?"
"You are both, Beautiful One," Lestat said.
"Agreed," David added.
Louis blushed silently.
"Tomorrow night I am going back to Rio to hunt," Lestat said, changing the subject.
"Oh? I was thinking of finding Maharet and Mekare, to see the records of the Great Family." David stood up and stretched. Sitting back down in front of Lestat.
"How will you find them?" Louis asked. "Maharet has Mekare hidden somewhere, no one knows where they are."
"Well, I suppose I shall send out a call and see if I am answered," David said.
"And if you are not?" Louis lifted his eyebrows.
"Then I will go to Rangoon and see if I can find them or some clue to where they are."
"I think I shall go home," Louis said. "I want to be there when the book comes out, in case Anne needs anything. It is coming out soon, isn't it Lestat?"
"Yes, I sent in the manuscript as soon as I finished it. I imagine that Knopf and Anne have already hammered out the cover art and such by now. I don't know if they'll ask her to tour with this one or not."
"Hard to say, they sometimes make curious decisions about promotion. I should call Daniel and see if the financial end is working smoothly." Louis said, as much to himself as anyone.
"Well, chaps," David said, "it looks as if we are saying goodbye."
"It does, doesn't it." Louis said. He was surprised that he was even considering leaving Lestat, but then, he was needed in New Orleans, and going back to Rio wasn't particularly appealing.
"It is merely au revoir, David. We cannot live in each other's pockets forever." Lestat stated, his mind already on Rio.
"I suppose I thought it would end with more of a bang, than a whimper," David said.
"It isn't a whimper, David, " Louis smiled at his brother fondly. "We have come to an amicable separating point. Our interests are diverging. It is time to let go. It is best for now."
"We'll be together again." Lestat said, kissing Louis as the sleepy vampire looked toward his pallet.
David smiled back, "Yes. Yes, we will, all of us."
And they all settled in for their last day together.
The next night Lestat waited just long enough for Louis and David to wake before leaving.
They stood together in the jungle, giving final hugs and kisses.
"Bonsoir then, my luscious children!" Lestat gave them each a squeeze and then rose up and out of sight.
Louis and David looked after him a long time, staring into the stars, and wondering what sort of trouble he would get into next. Finally, they returned to the cave.
As they were gathering their belongings David turned to Louis. "How will you get back, dear boy?"
"I'll find a way, David. I have traveled before."
"Would you like me to give you a lift?"
"I would appreciate that, yes. Just to the airport, I can make my own way from there."
"Very well then." David began to pack up the Coleman stove and lanterns.
"Where are you taking those?" Louis asked.
David stopped what he was doing and looked at the bulky objects. "I suppose I thought to take them with us."
"Why?"
David thought about that a moment. "We don't need them, do we?"
"No, don't bother with them. It isn't as if they are evidence of the kills."
"Vampire refuse," David said with a little laugh.
"Yes, you want to leave something for your old order, don't you?" Louis laughed as well.
"So, just taking the journals?"
"Perhaps a few of the CDs . . . I should keep one of the cell phones." Louis went about the cave, picking up items and deciding, putting those he wanted to keep into his backpack.
David did the same and soon they were ready to leave.
A book fell out of Louis's backpack, opened to the page he'd last been reading.
Our voices took a weary tone,
An echo of the dungeon stone,
A grating sound - not full and free
As they of yore were wont to be:
It might be fancy, but to me
They never sounded like our own.
Louis looked at the book, deciding whether or not to take it. Finally he turned to the inside front cover, and under the words "The Prisoner of Chillon part III by George Gordon, Lord Byron" he wrote, Detritus of a Coven, and then tossed the book to the ground and left the cave to join David and begin his journey home.
Fin The End
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