“Lestat de Lioncourt has arrived! There are now innumerable elders amongst us. But again, I caution you, Children of the Night, lay low where you are. Do not seek to come here. Let the elders meet. Give the elders a chance to stop the destruction. And search, search for this evil outlaw among us who has kidnapped one of our own from us. Search but take care. An ancient one can conceal his thoughts, but he cannot conceal the powerful beating of his heart, nor can he entirely conceal a low humming sound emanating from his very person.

“Call us with all reports. And please, I beg the rest of you, stay off the phone lines until the kidnap victim is found or until you have further reports from me.”

Benedict shut down the volume. He got up from the low-slung synthetic couch that smelled vaguely of petrol chemicals.

“But that’s just it,” said Benedict. “There are no young blood drinkers around here, none, they were all driven out of the New York hunting ground a long time ago. We’ve scanned this entire area. There’s nobody out here but us, and even if they do find us, what does it matter, as long as I’m standing right beside him when you make your case to Fareed?”

It struck Rhoshamandes again as it had in the jungles of the Amazon that Benedict had been displaying an amazing gift for battle and intrigue ever since this nasty business had started in earnest.

Who would have expected the mild-mannered and genuinely loving Benedict to drive his machete into Maharet’s skull at the moment when Rhosh was frozen with panic?

Who would have expected him to so handily carry the violent but helpless young Viktor to the bedroom upstairs and lock him securely in the large windowless bathroom, remarking so coolly, “Best place for a mortal, obviously, with all that plumbing.”

Who would have expected Benedict to have been so handy with hardware-store chains and padlocks to secure that bathroom prison with such simple and clever gestures, piling a store of wood and nails and a hammer nearby if further security measures were needed?

And who but Benedict would have outfitted the bathroom before-hand with every conceivable amenity—scented candles, toilet articles, even popular magazines, a “microwave oven” for the cooking of the stacks of canned foods he’d bought, and heaps of plastic forks and knives and spoons as well as paper bowls and dishes. He’d even included a little refrigerator in the bath full of carbonated sodas and a bottle of the finest Russian vodka, and had thrown in several soft new blankets for the boy and a pillow so he could sleep “comfortably” on the tiled floor when exhaustion eventually got the best of him.

“We don’t want him to panic,” Benedict had said. “We want him to remain calm and cooperative so this thing can be finished.”

By day the boards and nails would make his escape impossible, and for now, when he became panicky, he could press the intercom to speak to his captors.

That he had not done yet. Perhaps he was simply too angry to utter coherent words. That would not have been surprising.

One thing was certain. Someone very powerful had taught this human how to completely lock off his mind from all telepathic intrusion. He was as skilled at that as any scholarly member of the Talamasca. And as far as Rhosh knew, no mortal or immortal could open a telepathic line to others without opening himself to intrusion. So that meant the boy wasn’t frantically attempting to send messages to others. And maybe he didn’t know how. The vampires who brought him up might have taught him many things, but not how to be a human psychic.

Rhoshamandes didn’t much believe in human telepathy anyway. But he had to stop thinking about this! He had to stop thinking about all the different ways this spectacular gambit might fail, and it strongly occurred to him that he ought to call Trinity Gate now and return the boy and throw himself on the mercy of the gathering blood drinkers!

“Are you insane,” said the Voice to him. “Are you simply out of your mind? You do that and they’ll destroy you. What in the world would prompt them to have the slightest mercy? Since when do blood drinkers have honor?”

“Well, they had better have some or this plan simply isn’t going to work,” said Rhosh.

Benedict knew Rhosh was talking aloud to the Voice. But he remained attentive, desperate to know what was happening.

“I’ll tell you this much on my honor,” said Rhosh aloud for the benefit of Benedict as well as the Voice. “The very first thing I will do when I have the power is destroy that little Bedouin! I’m going to take that noisy, impudent little monster in my hands and squeeze the life and the blood and brains out of him. I’m going to drain him dry, and tear his remains into shreds. And I’ll do that in the presence of his blessed Sybelle and his blessed Armand and his blessed maker, Marius.”

“And just how,” asked Benedict gently, “are you going to seize and maintain power?”

“It’s pointless bothering with that question,” said the Voice. “I’ve explained myself to your starry-eyed acolyte over and over. When you have me inside you, no one can harm you! You will be as untouchable as Mekare is now.”

Mekare.

Without Benedict, would Rhosh have ever dared to attempt moving her? Again Benedict had taken the lead.

The night after the killing of Maharet, as Rhosh called his mortal agents to arrange for a domicile in North America, Benedict had gone off into the jungle to find Mekare a tender young female victim from one of the naked tribes. Benedict had put this frightened and utterly malleable woman into Mekare’s arms, the whole while whispering softly to Mekare that she should drink, that she needed the strength, that they had a journey to take, and he’d sat there patiently waiting till the silent monster had slowly wakened to the smell of the blood, slowly lifted her left hand as though it were an unbearable weight and laid it on the breast of the prone victim.

With lightning speed, she’d closed her teeth on the sweet little girl’s neck, drinking slowly until the heart was stopped, and could pump no more blood into her. Even after that she drank, her powerful heart drawing the blood until the victim was pale and shriveling. Then she’d sat back, eyes empty as always, her pink tongue licking her pretty lips slowly and efficiently. There wasn’t the tiniest spark of reason in her.

And it was Benedict who suggested that they wrap her, that they find the finest coverings or garments that they could and that they wrap her as if she were a mummy in those garments and then they might carry her north safely to accomplish their purpose. “Remember, Marius wrapped the King and Queen,” he’d said, “before he moved them from Egypt.” Yes, well, if Marius had been telling the truth in that old story.