The Vampire Lestat - By Anne Rice Page 0,211

stronger even with starvation, for when the starvation is ended, new strength is enjoyed. But the Father and the Mother do not care for their children. And now it seems they do not care for themselves. Maybe after four thousand nights, they merely wished to see the sun!

“ ‘Since the coming of the Greek into Egypt, since the perversion of the old art, they have not spoken to us. They have not let us see the blink of their eye. And what is Egypt now but the granary of Rome? When the Mother and the Father strike out to drive us away from the veins in their necks, they are as iron and can crush our bones. And if they do not care anymore, then why should I?’

“I studied him for a long moment.

“ ‘And you are saying,’ I asked, ‘that this is what caused the others to burn up? That the Father and Mother were left out in the sun?’

“He nodded.

“ ‘Our blood comes from them!’ he said. ‘It is their blood. The line is direct, and what befalls them befalls us. If they are burnt, we are burnt.’

“ ‘We are connected to them!’ I whispered in amazement.

“ ‘Exactly, my dear Marius,’ he said, watching me, seeming to enjoy my fear. ‘That is why they have been kept for a thousand years, the Mother and the Father, that is why victims are brought to them in sacrifice, that is why they are worshiped. What happens to them happens to us.’

“ ‘Who did it? Who put them in the sun?’ “He laughed without making a sound.

“ ‘The one who kept them,’ he said, ‘the one who couldn’t endure it any longer, the one who had had this solemn charge for too long, the one who could persuade no one else to accept the burden, and finally, weeping and shivering, took them out into the desert sands and left them like two statues there.’

“ ‘And my fate is linked to this,’ I murmured.

“ ‘Yes. But you see, I do not think he believed it any longer, the one who kept them. It was just an old tale. After all, they were worshiped as I told you, worshiped by us, as we are worshiped by mortals, and no one dared to harm them. No one held a torch to them to see if it made the rest of us feel pain. No. He did not believe it. He left them in the desert, and that night when he opened his eyes in his coffin and found himself a burnt and unrecognizable horror, he screamed and screamed.’

“ ‘You got them back underground.’

“ ‘Yes.’

“ ‘And they are blackened as you are . . . ’

“ ‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘Darkened to a golden bronze, like the meat turning on the spit. No more than that. And beautiful as before, as if beauty has become part of their heritage, beauty part and parcel of what they are destined to be. They stare forward as they always have, but they no longer incline their heads to each other, they no longer hum with the rhythm of their secret exchanges, they no longer let us drink their blood. And the victims brought to them, they will not take, save now and then, and only in solitude. No one knows when they will drink, when they will not.’

“I shook my head. I moved back and forth, my head bowed, the candle fluttering in my hand, not knowing what to say to all this, needing time to think it out.

“He gestured for me to take the chair on the other side of the writing table, and without thinking of it, I did.

“ ‘But wasn’t it meant to happen, Roman?’ he asked. ‘Weren’t they meant to meet their death in the sands, silent, unmoving, like statues cast there after a city is sacked by the conquering army, and were we not meant to die too? Look at Egypt. What is Egypt, I ask you again, but the granary of Rome? Were they not meant to burn there day after day while all of us burned like stars the world over?’

“ ‘Where are they?’ I asked.

“ ‘Why do you want to know?’ he sneered. ‘Why should I give you the secret? They cannot be hacked to pieces, they are too strong for that, a knife will barely pierce their skin. Yet cut them and you cut us. Burn them and you burn us. And whatever they make us feel, they