Taltos (Lives of the Mayfair Witches #3)(47)
Author: Anne Rice

“Let’s go down, Stuart,” said Marklin. “Let’s have our supper now. We’re cold, we’re hungry.”

“If we had it to do over again,” said Tommy, “we’d do it better. We didn’t have to take those lives. It might have been more of a challenge, you know, to accomplish our purpose without really hurting anyone.”

Stuart seemed lost in thought, only glancing at Tommy absently. The wind rose again, cuttingly, and Marklin shivered. If he was this cold, what must Stuart be feeling? They must go down to the hotel. They must break bread together.

“We are not ourselves, you know, Stuart,” Marklin said. He was looking down at the town, and conscious that both of the others were staring at him. “When gathered together, we make a person whom none of us knows well enough, perhaps, a fourth entity which we should give a name, because he is more than our collective selves. Perhaps we must better learn to control him. But destroy him now? No, that we cannot do, Stuart. If we do, we all betray each other. It’s a hard truth to face, but the death of Aaron means nothing.”

He had played his final card. He had said the finest and the worst things that he’d had to say, here in the chill wind, and without real forethought, with only his instinct to guide him. Finally he looked at his teacher and at his friend, and saw that both had been impressed by these words, perhaps even more than he could have hoped.

“Yes, it was this fourth entity, as you call him, who killed my friend,” said Stuart quietly. “You are right about that. And we know that the power, the future of this fourth entity, is unimaginable.”

“Yes, exactly,” said Tommy in a flat murmur.

“But the death of Aaron is a terrible, terrible thing! You will never, either of you, ever speak to me of it again, and never, never will you speak of it lightly to anyone.”

“Agreed,” said Tommy.

“My innocent friend,” said Stuart, “who sought only to help the Mayfair family.”

“No one in the Talamasca is really innocent,” Tommy said.

Stuart appeared startled, at first enraged and then caught by this simple statement.

“What do you mean by this?”

“I mean that one cannot expect to possess knowledge which does not change one. Once one knows, then one is acting upon that knowledge, whether it is to withhold the knowledge from those who would also be changed, or to give it to them. Aaron knew this. The Talamasca is evil by nature; that’s the price it pays for its libraries and inventories and computer records. Rather like God, wouldn’t you say, who knows that some of his creatures will suffer and some will triumph, but does not tell his creatures what he knows? The Talamasca is more evil even than the Supreme Being, but the Talamasca creates nothing.”

So very right, thought Marklin, though he could not have said such a thing aloud to Stuart, for fear of what Stuart would say in return.

“Perhaps you’re right,” said Stuart under his breath. He sounded defeated, or desperate for some tolerable point of view.

“It’s a sterile priesthood,” said Tommy, the voice once again devoid of all feeling. He gave his heavy glasses a shove with one finger. “The altars are barren; the statues are stored away. The scholars study for study’s sake.”

“Don’t say any more.”

“Let me talk of us, then,” said Tommy, “that we are not sterile, and we will see the sacred union come about, and we will hear the voices of memory.”

“Yes,” said Marklin, unable to assume such a cold voice. “Yes, we are the real priests now! True mediators between the earth and the forces of the unknown. We possess the words and the power.”

Another silence had fallen.

Could Marklin ever get them off this hill? He had won. They were together again, and he longed for the warmth of the George and Pilgrims. He longed for the taste of hot soup and ale, and the light of the fire. He longed to celebrate. He was wildly excited again.

“And Tessa?” asked Tommy. “How is it with Tessa?”

“The same,” said Stuart.

“Does she know that the male Taltos is dead?”

“She never knew he was alive,” said Stuart.

“Ah.”

“Come on, teacher,” said Marklin. “Let’s go down now, to the hotel. Let’s dine together.”

“Yes,” said Tommy, “we’re all too cold now to speak anymore.”

They began the descent, both Tommy and Marklin steadying Stuart in the slippery mud. When they had reached Stuart’s car, they opted for the drive rather than the long walk.

“This is all very good,” said Stuart, giving over the car keys to Marklin. “But I will visit Chalice Well as always before we go.”

“What for?” asked Marklin, making his words quiet, and respectful, and seemingly expressive of the love he felt for Stuart. “Will you wash your hands in Chalice Well to cleanse the blood off them? The water is already bloody itself, teacher.”

Stuart gave a little bitter laugh.

“Ah, but that is the blood of Christ, isn’t it?” Stuart said.

“It’s the blood of conviction,” said Marklin. “We’ll go to the well after dinner, and just before dark. I promise you that.”

They drove down the hill together.

Eight

MICHAEL TOLD CLEM he wanted to leave by the front gate. He’d bring the suitcases out. There were only two of them—Rowan’s and his. This was no vacation that required trunks and garment bags.

He looked at his diary before he closed it. There was a long statement there of his philosophy, written on Mardi Gras night, before he had ever dreamed that he would be awakened later by a plaintive gramophone song or by the vision of Mona dancing like a nymph in her white nightgown. Bow in hair, fresh and fragrant as warm bread, fresh milk, strawberries.

No, can’t think any more about Mona just now. Wait for the phone call in London.

Besides, it was the passage he wanted to read:

And I suppose I do believe, in the final analysis, that a peace of mind can be obtained in the face of the worst horrors and the worst losses. It can be obtained by faith in change and in will and in accident; and by faith in ourselves, that we will do the right thing, more often than not, in the face of adversity.

Six weeks had passed since that night, when, in illness and in grief, he’d written those sentiments. He’d been a prisoner of this house then, and up until this very moment.

He closed the diary. He slipped it into his leather bag, tucked the bag under his arm, and picked up the suitcases. He went down the stairs, a bit nervous since neither hand was free to reach for the rail, reminding himself that he would suffer no dizzy spell now, or any other form of weakness.