sometimes use.
“Well, the answer to all that,” Jesse said, responding to my thoughts, “is to use the technology regularly. Because we know now that our preternatural minds don’t give us any superior gift for all knowledge, only the same kinds of knowledge we understood when we were human.”
“Yes, right. That is certainly true,” I confessed. “I’d thought it was different, because I’d learned Latin and Greek so easily in the Blood. But you’re absolutely right. So on to the Talamasca. I assume they’ve digitized all their records by now?”
“Yes, they completed that process several years back,” said David. “Everything’s digitalized; and relics are in museum-quality environments under the Motherhouses in Amsterdam and in London. Every single relic has been photographed, recorded on video, described, studied, classified, etcetera. They had begun all that years ago when I was still Superior General.”
“Are you talking to them directly?” asked Jesse. She herself had never wanted to do that. Since she came into the Blood, she’d never sought to contact her old friends there. I’d brought David over. She had not. For a while, I’d harassed the Talamasca, baited them, engaged now and then with their members, but that was now a long time ago.
“No,” said David. “I don’t disturb them. But I have occasionally visited those old friends of mine on their deathbeds. I have felt an obligation to do that. And it’s simple enough for me to get into the Motherhouses and get into those sickrooms. I do that because I want to say goodbye to those old mortal friends, and also I know what they’re experiencing. Dying without so many answers. Dying withoutever having learned anything through the Talamasca that was transformative or transcendent. What I know now of the present state of the Talamasca I know from those encounters and from watching, simply watching and listening and prowling about, and picking at the thoughts of those who know someone is listening, but not who or what.” He sighed. He looked weary suddenly. His dark eyes were puckered and there was a tremor in his lips.
I saw his soul so clearly now in the new youthful body that it was as if the old David and the new David had completely fused for me. And indeed his old persona did shape the expression of his youthful face. A multitude of facial expressions had reshaped the piercing black eyes of this face. Even his old voice sounded now through the newer vocal cords as if he had retuned them and refined them merely by using them for all those softly spoken, unfailingly polite words.
“What’s happened,” he said, “is that the mystery of the Elders and the origins of the Order have been buried in a new way.”
“What do you mean?” asked Jesse.
David looked at me. “You’re familiar with this. We never knew our origins really. You know that. We always knew the Order had been founded in the mid–eighth century, and we knew there was unaccountable wealth somewhere which financed our existence and our research. We knew the Elders governed the Order but we didn’t know who they were or where they were. We had our hard-and-fast rules: observe but do not interfere, study but do not ever seek to use the power of a witch or a vampire for one’s own gain, that sort of thing.”
“And this is changing?” I asked.
“No,” he replied. “The Order’s as healthy and virtuous as ever. If anything they’re thriving. There are more young scholars coming in today who know Latin and Greek than before, more young archaeologists—like Jesse—who are finding the Order attractive. The secrecy has been preserved, in spite of your charming books, Lestat, and all the publicity you so generously heaped on the Talamasca, and as far as I know there have been few scandals in recent years. In fact none whatsoever.”
“So what’s the big problem?”
“Well, I wouldn’t call it a problem,” said David. “I’d call it a deepening of
“Well, the answer to all that,” Jesse said, responding to my thoughts, “is to use the technology regularly. Because we know now that our preternatural minds don’t give us any superior gift for all knowledge, only the same kinds of knowledge we understood when we were human.”
“Yes, right. That is certainly true,” I confessed. “I’d thought it was different, because I’d learned Latin and Greek so easily in the Blood. But you’re absolutely right. So on to the Talamasca. I assume they’ve digitized all their records by now?”
“Yes, they completed that process several years back,” said David. “Everything’s digitalized; and relics are in museum-quality environments under the Motherhouses in Amsterdam and in London. Every single relic has been photographed, recorded on video, described, studied, classified, etcetera. They had begun all that years ago when I was still Superior General.”
“Are you talking to them directly?” asked Jesse. She herself had never wanted to do that. Since she came into the Blood, she’d never sought to contact her old friends there. I’d brought David over. She had not. For a while, I’d harassed the Talamasca, baited them, engaged now and then with their members, but that was now a long time ago.
“No,” said David. “I don’t disturb them. But I have occasionally visited those old friends of mine on their deathbeds. I have felt an obligation to do that. And it’s simple enough for me to get into the Motherhouses and get into those sickrooms. I do that because I want to say goodbye to those old mortal friends, and also I know what they’re experiencing. Dying without so many answers. Dying withoutever having learned anything through the Talamasca that was transformative or transcendent. What I know now of the present state of the Talamasca I know from those encounters and from watching, simply watching and listening and prowling about, and picking at the thoughts of those who know someone is listening, but not who or what.” He sighed. He looked weary suddenly. His dark eyes were puckered and there was a tremor in his lips.
I saw his soul so clearly now in the new youthful body that it was as if the old David and the new David had completely fused for me. And indeed his old persona did shape the expression of his youthful face. A multitude of facial expressions had reshaped the piercing black eyes of this face. Even his old voice sounded now through the newer vocal cords as if he had retuned them and refined them merely by using them for all those softly spoken, unfailingly polite words.
“What’s happened,” he said, “is that the mystery of the Elders and the origins of the Order have been buried in a new way.”
“What do you mean?” asked Jesse.
David looked at me. “You’re familiar with this. We never knew our origins really. You know that. We always knew the Order had been founded in the mid–eighth century, and we knew there was unaccountable wealth somewhere which financed our existence and our research. We knew the Elders governed the Order but we didn’t know who they were or where they were. We had our hard-and-fast rules: observe but do not interfere, study but do not ever seek to use the power of a witch or a vampire for one’s own gain, that sort of thing.”
“And this is changing?” I asked.
“No,” he replied. “The Order’s as healthy and virtuous as ever. If anything they’re thriving. There are more young scholars coming in today who know Latin and Greek than before, more young archaeologists—like Jesse—who are finding the Order attractive. The secrecy has been preserved, in spite of your charming books, Lestat, and all the publicity you so generously heaped on the Talamasca, and as far as I know there have been few scandals in recent years. In fact none whatsoever.”
“So what’s the big problem?”
“Well, I wouldn’t call it a problem,” said David. “I’d call it a deepening of
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