“You know what’s happened,” I said. He was staring at me intently, staring, and perhaps staring through me, and through my eyes at Amel. I couldn’t know. But Amel was quiet. Amel was there as he always would be, but not a sound came from him.

And not a sound came from Gremt either. That this being was in fact a spirit and not some species of biological immortal was almost impossible to grasp as I looked at him. He appeared so very vital, and so complex and obviously filled with feeling. He was not at ease.

“Soon,” I said, “I want to talk to you, to sit down with you, if you will, and talk—with you and Magnus here and all of your little company. I’m going home as soon as I can to my father’s house in France, in the country where I was born. Will you come to us there?”

Again, no response and then Gremt seemed to pull himself up, to force himself to be alert, and he gave a little shiver, and then spoke.

“Yes,” said Gremt. “Yes, thank you, most definitely. We want very much to do that. Forgive us for interrupting you without warning. I realize that you’re expected elsewhere. It’s only that we could not stay away.”

The blood drinker, Teskhamen, a spare white-haired being of considerable elegance, stepped forward. He introduced himself again with a soft agreeable voice. “Yes, you will forgive us, I hope, for coming to you so unexpectedly. But you see we are so eager for a meeting, and simply could not, after what has happened, remain away.”

What did they know of what had happened? But then of course they knew. How could they not? Ghosts, spirits, what limits were there to what they could know? For all I knew they’d been in the house, present invisibly when I had taken Amel into me.

But it did seem this Teskhamen wanted to put me at ease.

“Lestat,” he said warmly. “We are the ancient Elders of the Talamasca. You’ve been told this. We are the founders of the Order. In a sense, we are the real Talamasca and the enduring Talamasca—no longer in need of the mortal Order that survives—and we want to talk with you very much.”

Armand standing silently against the wall said and did nothing.

“Well, I couldn’t be more eager to talk to you myself,” I said. “And I understand why you came. And I suspect I understand why you’ve cut loose your mortal scholars. I think I do, at any rate. But I need time to prepare my home in France, before I see you. And I ask that you come to me there, and soon.”