knew he was resolute, and I also knew that he wouldn't force me. He'd let me start worrying about my mortal father, and he'd let me come to him and say I had to go. I had a few nights left.
"Yes," he answered softly. "And there are other things I can tell you."
I opened my eyes again. He was looking at me patiently, affectionately. I felt the ache of love as strongly as I'd ever felt it for Gabrielle. I felt the inevitable tears and did my best to suppress them.
"You've learned a great deal from Armand," he said, his voice steady as if to help me with this little silent struggle. "And you learned much more on your own. But there are still some things I might teach you."
"Yes, please," I said.
"Well, for one thing," he said, "your powers are extraordinary, but you can't expect those you make in the next fifty years to equal you or Gabrielle. Your second child didn't have half Gabrielle's strength and later children will have even less. The blood I gave you will make some difference. If you drink ... if you drink from Akasha and Enkil, which you may choose not to do ... that will make some difference too. But no matter, only so many children can be made by one in a century. And new offspring will be weak. However, this is not necessarily a bad thing. The rule of the old covens had wisdom in it that strength should come with time. And then again, there is the old truth: you might make titans or imbeciles, no one knows why or how.
"Whatever will happen will happen, but choose your companions with care. Choose them because you like to look at them and you like the sound of their voices, and they have profound secrets in them that you wish to know. In other words, choose them because you love them. Otherwise you will not be able to bear their company for very long."
"I understand," I said. "Make them in love."
"Exactly, make them in love. And make certain they have had some lifetime before you make them; and never never make one as young as Armand. That is the worst crime I have ever committed against my own kind, the taking of the young boy child Armand. "
"But you didn't know the Children of Darkness would come when they did, and separate him from you."
"No. But still, I should have waited. It was loneliness that drove me to it. And Armand's helplessness, that his mortal life was so completely in my hands. Remember, beware of that power, and the power you have over those who are dying. Loneliness in us, and that sense of power, can be as strong as the thirst for blood. If there were not an Enkil there might be no Akasha, and if there were not an Akasha, then there would be no Enkil."
"Yes. And from everything you said, it seems Enkil covets Akasha. That Akasha is the one who now and then..."
"Yes, that's true." His face became very somber suddenly, and his eyes had a confidential look in them as if we were whispering to each other and fearful another might hear. He waited for a moment as if thinking what to say. "Who knows what Akasha might do if there were no Enkil to hold her?" he whispered. "And why do I pretend that he can't hear this even when I think it? Why do I whisper? He can destroy me anytime that he likes. Maybe Akasha is the only thing keeping him from it. But then what would become of them if he did away with me?"
"Why did they let themselves be burnt by the sun?" I asked.
"How can we know? Perhaps they knew it wouldn't hurt them. It would only hurt and punish those who had done it to them. Perhaps in the state they live in they are slow to realize what is going on outside them. And they did not have time to gather their forces, to wake from their dreams and save themselves. Maybe their movements after it happened -- the movements of Akasha I witnessed -- were only possible because they had been awakened by the sun. And now they sleep again with their eyes open. And they dream again. And they do not even drink."
"What did you mean ... if I choose to drink their blood?" I asked. "How could I not choose?"
"That is something we have