“Perhaps they do,” said Seth. “Perhaps they don’t. Perhaps they are beyond caring what happens to us in this world.” His voice was not cold or hostile. He spoke evenly and politely. “Perhaps they have not come to us because they are indifferent to what we do here.”

“Whatever the case, you must keep the secret,” Fareed thought. “We will be moving soon from this building to a safer, more remote compound. It will be safer there for Viktor.”

“Has the boy no normal human life?” Gregory asked. “I don’t mean to challenge your judgment. I am only asking.”

“Actually much more than you might think. After all, by day he’s quite safe with the bodyguards we provide for him, is he not? And again, what would anyone gain from making him a hostage? Someone has to want something before he takes a hostage. What has Lestat to give but himself, and whatever that is, it cannot be extorted.” Gregory nodded, somewhat relieved when he considered it in that light. It would have been rude to push for more information. But of course there was a reason to take him hostage—to demand Lestat’s or Seth’s powerful Blood. Better not to point this out.

He had to leave this mystery in their hands.

But he secretly wondered if Lestat de Lioncourt wouldn’t be furious when he discovered the existence of Viktor. Lestat was known for having a temper almost as extreme as his sense of humor.

Before that night was finished, Fareed had made a few more statements about vampiric nature.

“Oh, if only I knew,” he said, “whether that thing is truly unconscious, or whether it retains an autonomous life and whether or not it wants something. All life wants something. All life moves towards something.…”

“And what are we then?” Gregory had asked.

“We are mutants,” Fareed answered. “We are a fusion of unrelated species, and the force in us which turns our human blood into vampire blood is making of us something perfect, but what that is, what that will be, what that must be, I do not know.”

“He wanted to be physical,” said Seth. “That was well known in olden times. Amel wanted to be flesh and blood. And he got what he wanted, and he lost himself in the process.”

“Perhaps,” said Fareed. “But does anyone really want to be mortal flesh and blood? What all beings want is to be immortal flesh and blood. And this monster has come closer to that perhaps than any spirit who temporarily possesses a child or a nun or a psychic.”

“Not if he’s lost himself in the process,” said Seth.

“You speak as if Akasha possessed him,” said Fareed. “But it was his goal to possess her, remember.”

This had frightened Gregory and it had taught him something.