Blood and Gold - Anne Rice [172]
“Tell me the names under which they traveled,” I said. “There must have been names, names they used as mortals, for how else could they have lived as rich mortals? Give me the names.”
“I don’t know them,” he said. He gathered all his reserve now. “Give me time and perhaps I can obtain them. But I do not in truth think the Order will give me such information to give to you.”
Again I turned away from him. I put my right hand up to shield my eyes. What gestures does a mortal man make at such a moment? I made of my right hand a fist, and held my right arm firmly with my left hand.
She lived. Was I not content with that? She lived! The centuries had not destroyed her. Was that not enough?
I turned around. I saw him standing there, so very bravely, though his hands trembled at his sides.
“Why are you not terrified of me?” I whispered, “terrified that I may come to your Motherhouse and find this information for myself?”
“Perhaps no such action is necessary,” he responded quickly. “Perhaps I can obtain it for you, if you must have it, for it breaks no vows we’ve taken. It was not Pandora herself who sought shelter with us.”
“Ah, yes, you make a lawyer’s point on this score,” I answered. “What more can you tell me? What more did Pandora tell this young one of me?”
“No more,” he answered.
“Of Marius, this young one spoke, having heard the name from Pandora—.” I repeated.
“Yes, and then here we discovered you in Venice. I have told you all!”
I drew back once more. He was exhausted with me and so frightened of me that his mentality was almost to the point where it might break.
“I have told you all,” he said again gravely.
“I know you have,” I said. “I see that you are capable of secrecy but quite incapable of a lie.”
He said nothing.
I took the gold coin from my pocket, the one which he had given me. I read the word:
Talamasca
I turned it over.
There imprinted on it was the picture of a high and well-fortified castle, and beneath it the name: Lorwich, East Anglia.
I looked up.
“Raymond Gallant,” I said. “I thank you.”
He nodded.
“Marius,” he said suddenly, as though screwing up his courage, “can you not send out some message to her over the miles?”
I shook my head.
“I made her a blood drinker, and her mind has been closed to me from the beginning. So it is with the beautiful child you saw dancing this very night. Maker and offspring cannot read each other’s thoughts.”
He mulled this over as though we were speaking of human things, just that calmly, and then he said:
“But surely you can send the message with your powerful mind to others who may see her and tell her that you search for her, and where you are.”
A strange moment passed between us.
How could I confess to him that I could not beg her to come to me? How could I confess to myself that I had to come upon her and take her in my arms and force her to look at me, that some old anger separated me from her? I could not confess these things to myself.
I looked at him. He stood watching me, growing ever more calm, but certainly enrapt.
“Leave Venice, please,” I said, “as I have asked you to do.” I untied my purse and I put a good many gold florins on his desk, just as I had done twice with Botticelli. “Take this from me,” I said, “for all your trouble. Leave here, and write to me when you can.”
Again he nodded, his pale eyes very clear and determined, his young face rather willfully calm.
“It will be an ordinary letter,” I said, “come to Venice by ordinary means, but it will contain the most marvelous information, for I may find in it intelligence of a creature whom I have not embraced in over a thousand years.”
This shocked him, though why I did not understand. Surely he knew the age of the stones in Antioch. But I saw the shock penetrate him and course through his limbs.
“What have I done?” I said aloud, though I wasn’t speaking to him. “I shall leave Venice soon, on account of you