Blood Canticle - Anne Rice [11]
It had been will and witchcraft—the high persuasion of witches—that had helped her get the flowers and to force so much assistance when she arrived.
But now that Quinn had come, now that Quinn was there with her, and the one bold idea of her dying hours was consummate, the pain in her internal organs and her joints was defeating her. There was also a terrible pain in the entire surface of her skin. Merely sitting amid all the precious flowers hurt her.
As for my brave Quinn renouncing every execration he had laid on his fate and offering her the Dark Blood, no big surprise, I had to admit, but I wished to Hell he hadn’t.
It’s hard to watch anyone die when you know you possess this evil paradoxical power. And he was still in love with her, naturally and unnaturally, and couldn’t abide her suffering. Who could?
However, as I have already explained, Quinn had received a theophany only last night, seeing Merrick and his doppelganger spirit both passing into the Light.
So why in the name of God had he not consented to merely holding Mona’s hand and seeing her through it? She certainly wasn’t going to live until midnight.
Fact of the matter, he didn’t have the strength to let her go. Of course Quinn never would have gone to her, I should add, he’d protected her from his secret valiantly, as noted, but she’d come here to Quinn, to his very room, begging to die in his bed. And he was a male vampire, and this was his territory, his lair, so to speak, and some male juices were flowing here, vampire or no, and now she was in his arms, and a monstrous possessiveness and high imaginative perception of saving her had taken hold of him.
And as surely as I knew all that, I knew he couldn’t work the Dark Trick on her. He’d never done it before, and she was too frail. He’d kill her. And that was no way to go. Shoot, the child, having opted for the Dark Blood, could go to Hell! I had to get up there. Vampire Lestat to the rescue!
I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, “Lestat, is this a comedy? We don’t want a comedy.” No, it’s not!
It’s just that all the debasing subterfuge is falling away from me, don’t you see? Not the glamour you understand, keep your mind on the image, baby! We’re only losing those elements which tended to cheapen my discourse, and throw up a barrier of—artificial quaintness, more or less.
Okay. Onward. I went the human route, through the front door, clickity click, startling Clem, throwing him an ingratiating smile, “Quinn’s friend, Lestat, yeah, gotcha, hey, and Clem, have that car ready, we’re going into New Orleans afterwards, okay, dude?” and headed up the circular stairs, beaming down at little Jerome as I passed him, and giving Jasmine a quick hug as she stood stranded in the hallway, then telepathically turned the lock on Quinn’s bedroom door and entered.
Entered? Why not went in? That’s the artificial quaintness that has to go. You see my point? Matter of fact, I barreled into the room, if you must know.
Now, I’ll let you in on a little secret. Nothing seen telepathically is ever one tenth as vivid as what a vampire sees with his own eyes. Telepathy is cool, no doubt about it, but our vision is almost intolerably vivid. That’s why telepathy doesn’t play much of a role in this book. I’m a sensualist anyway.
And the sight of Mona sitting on the foot of the big glowering four-poster was heartbreaking. The girl was in more pain than Quinn could conceivably realize. Even his arm around her was hurting her. I calculated without wanting to do it that she should have died about two hours ago. Her kidneys had shut down, her heart was sputtering and she couldn’t fill her lungs with enough air to take deep breaths.
But her flawless green eyes were wide as she looked at me, and her fierce intellect