Chapter 6
The following evening, Louis woke with Lestat's words still echoing in his mind: "You're free." He lay motionless in his coffin for several moments, contemplating the strange mix of liberation and loss those words had stirred within him. Freedom had been what he thought he wanted for so long—freedom from Lestat's influence, from the complicated web of emotions that bound them together. Now that it had been offered, he found himself uncertain what to do with such a gift.
As he dressed, Louis heard movement from Claudia's adjoining chamber. He hesitated, then knocked softly on the connecting door.
"Enter," came her clear voice.
He found her seated at her dressing table, Madeline carefully arranging her golden curls. The scene was so reminiscent of their evenings in New Orleans and later Paris that Louis felt a pang of nostalgia—for simpler times that perhaps had never been as simple as memory painted them.
"Good evening, Louis," Claudia greeted him, her eyes meeting his in the mirror. "You look troubled."
Louis nodded to Madeline, who discreetly excused herself, understanding that the two older vampires needed privacy. When the door closed behind her, Louis seated himself on the edge of Claudia's bed.
"I spoke with Lestat last night," he began, "after you and Madeline left for your hunt."
Claudia turned from the mirror to face him directly. "About his absence, I presume? Did he provide a more satisfactory explanation than the one he offered us?"
"Yes." Louis hesitated, unsure how much to share. Despite everything, he felt an instinctive protectiveness toward Lestat, a reluctance to reveal his maker's vulnerabilities even to Claudia. "The Théâtre sent another hunting party after us—a larger one this time, led by Armand himself."
Claudia's eyes widened slightly, the only indication of her surprise. "And Lestat confronted them?"
"More than confronted," Louis said quietly. "He destroyed them, Claudia. All of them. With help from older vampires he knows in Europe, he eliminated the entire coven."
Claudia was silent for a moment, absorbing this information. "Including Armand?" she asked finally.
Louis nodded. "According to Lestat, yes."
A small, satisfied smile curved Claudia's lips. "Good," she said simply. Then, noting Louis's expression: "Don't look so shocked, Louis. They would have destroyed us without hesitation. Lestat merely ensured they couldn't try again."
"It's not just that," Louis admitted. "Lestat was... different. More open about certain aspects of himself, his past. He spoke of connections I never knew he had, powers and influence he's kept hidden from us all these years."
"And this surprises you?" Claudia asked, her tone gently mocking. "Lestat has always played his cards close to his chest, revealing only what serves his immediate purpose."
"Yes, but—" Louis paused, searching for words. "It made me realize how little I truly know him, even after all these decades. And it made me question... everything between us."
Claudia studied him carefully. "What else did you discuss, Louis? Something more personal, I think."
Louis looked away, unable to meet her perceptive gaze. "He told me I was free," he said quietly. "Free to stay or go, free from... from whatever has bound us together all these years."
"And this troubles you," Claudia observed. "Why? Isn't freedom what you've always claimed to want?"
"I thought it was," Louis admitted. "Now I'm not so certain."
Claudia rose from her dressing table and moved to sit beside him on the bed, her child's body creating an incongruous picture beside his adult form. "Do you want to leave, Louis?" she asked directly. "Now that Lestat has granted his permission, do you wish to go elsewhere, start anew?"
Louis shook his head slowly. "No," he said, the realization solidifying as he spoke. "No, I don't think I do."
"Nor do I," Claudia confessed, surprising him. "Despite everything, despite what he did to us—what we tried to do to him—I find I have no desire to leave." She laughed softly, the sound containing little humor. "Perhaps there's a certain comfort in familiar torments."
Louis turned to look at her, struck by the unusual vulnerability in her tone. "You want to stay? Even after everything that happened in New Orleans, in Paris?"
Claudia was silent for a long moment, her gaze distant as if looking back through the decades. "Do you remember how it was in the beginning, Louis?" she asked finally. "Before the bitterness set in, before I began to understand what I truly was?"
"Yes," Louis said softly. "You were happy then, I think. As happy as any of us could be."
"I was," Claudia agreed. "We all were, in our way. A strange little family of monsters, playing at humanity in our fine house on the rue Royale." Her voice took on a wistful quality Louis rarely heard from her. "I've been thinking about those early years since our conversation at the piano. About what was real and what was merely a child's perception."
She rose and moved to the window, looking out at the snow-covered Russian landscape, so different from the humid New Orleans nights of their beginning. "I blamed Lestat for so long," she continued. "For making me what I am, for trapping me in this unchanging body. I made him the villain of my existence because it was easier than accepting the randomness of fate—that I was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time when he was hungry and grieving."
Louis joined her at the window, listening intently. It was rare for Claudia to speak so openly about her feelings toward Lestat.
"You were right, you know," she said, glancing up at him. "When you warned me about how monstrous our kind could be. The Théâtre was a revelation, Louis—not because they were cruel, but because they showed me that Lestat, for all his faults, was not the worst of our kind. Not by far."
"No," Louis agreed softly. "He never was."
"Maybe what I want," Claudia said, her voice barely above a whisper, "is for us to find our way back. Not to recreate exactly what we had before—that's impossible. But to build something new that honors what was good about our strange little family." She looked up at Louis, her ancient eyes in her child's face filled with an emotion he couldn't quite name. "Maybe I want us all to be happy again, as we were before things got bad."
Louis felt a tightness in his throat at her words. Despite her immortal mind and the decades of experience trapped in her child's form, there were moments when Claudia still expressed the simple, direct desires of the child she had been—connection, security, belonging. Things they had all lost long before becoming vampires.
"Is that possible, do you think?" he asked quietly.
Claudia considered the question seriously. "I don't know," she admitted. "There's been so much damage done, so many wounds inflicted. But..." She paused, then continued with unusual hesitation, "I think I would like to try. If he would. If you would."
Louis placed a gentle hand on her shoulder, touched by her rare display of vulnerability. "I would like that too," he said.
They stood together at the window for some time, watching the moon rise over the snow-covered estate, each lost in their own thoughts of past and future.
"He cares for you still, Louis," Claudia said finally, breaking the companionable silence. "Whatever else has passed between you, that much is clear. I think—" She paused, choosing her words carefully. "I think if reconciliation is what you want, you will need to be the one to reach for it."
Louis nodded, understanding the truth in her assessment. Lestat, for all his boldness in other matters, had always been guarded in expressing genuine emotion. His offer of freedom the night before had been both generous and self-protective—giving Louis choice while simultaneously creating distance between them.
"Thank you, Claudia," he said softly, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. "For your wisdom, and your honesty."
She smiled up at him, her porcelain-perfect features briefly reflecting the child she had been rather than the immortal she had become. "We're a family, Louis," she said simply. "Damaged and strange as we are, we're still a family. Perhaps it's time we remembered that."
---
Dawn was approaching when Louis finally found the courage to act on his decision. The house had grown quiet; Madeline had retired early, and Claudia, after their conversation, had gone to the library to lose herself in a volume of Russian poetry Lestat had recommended. Lestat himself had spent the evening in the music room, playing melancholy pieces on the pianoforte that echoed through the manor before eventually retiring to his chambers.
Louis stood outside Lestat's door, hand raised to knock, hesitating as doubts assailed him. What if he had misinterpreted Lestat's words? What if the distance Lestat had established between them was what he truly wanted? What if reconciliation was impossible after all they had done to each other?
Before these thoughts could overwhelm him, he knocked firmly on the heavy oak door.
There was a moment of silence, then Lestat's voice: "Enter."
Louis pushed open the door to find Lestat seated by the fire, a book open in his lap though his gaze was fixed on the flames. He looked up as Louis entered, surprise briefly crossing his features before his expression settled into its usual mask of casual indifference.
"Louis," he acknowledged. "I didn't expect you tonight."
Louis closed the door behind him and moved further into the room. "I've been thinking about what you said last night," he began, his voice steadier than he felt. "About freedom, and choice."
Lestat set aside his book and gestured to a chair opposite his own. "And have you come to any conclusions?" he asked, his tone carefully neutral.
Louis remained standing. "Yes," he said simply. "I choose to stay. Not because I have nowhere else to go, not because I'm your creation seeking approval, but because this is where I wish to be."
Lestat studied him silently, his expression revealing nothing of his thoughts. "With Claudia and Madeline," he said finally. "A reasonable choice. The manor is comfortable, secure—"
"With you, Lestat," Louis interrupted, taking a step closer. "I choose to stay with you."
Now Lestat did show surprise, a flicker of it passing across his features before he controlled it. "After everything I said last night about the nature of our relationship?" he asked skeptically. "About the toxicity of our attachment?"
"Because of what you said," Louis corrected him. "Because you were honest with me, perhaps for the first time. Because you offered me freedom instead of trying to possess me." He moved closer still, until he stood directly before Lestat's chair. "And because I realized something important when you did."
"And what was that?" Lestat asked, his voice low.
"That I don't want freedom from you, Lestat," Louis said simply. "I want freedom with you. There's a difference."
Lestat's eyes, that unnatural, beautiful blue-gray that had captivated Louis from their first meeting, searched his face as if looking for deception or confusion. "You don't know what you're saying, Louis," he said finally. "You're responding to old patterns, old desires—"
"No," Louis insisted, kneeling before him so they were at eye level. "I'm responding to you—the real you, the one you finally allowed me to see last night. Not the theatrical villain or the careless predator, but the complex being beneath those masks."
He reached out slowly, giving Lestat time to withdraw, and took his hand. "You asked for honesty between us. I'm offering it now. I love you, Lestat. Not the idea of you, not what you represent, but you as you are."
Lestat's fingers tightened involuntarily around Louis's. "You can't possibly know who I am," he objected, though with less conviction than before. "After all these years of deception—"
"Then show me," Louis challenged him softly. "Show me who you truly are, day by day, night by night. Let me learn you as you are, not as I imagined you to be."
Lestat was still for a long moment, his expression unreadable as he studied Louis's face. Then, with a movement so swift Louis barely had time to register it, he pulled Louis toward him, one hand tangling in his dark hair as their lips met.
The kiss was unlike any they had shared before—neither the cautious exploration of their earliest encounters nor the passionate but often angry clashes of their years in New Orleans. This was something new, something that contained both tenderness and hunger, both past and possibility.
When they finally parted, Lestat kept his hand at the nape of Louis's neck, holding him close. "Are you certain this is what you want?" he asked, his voice rough with emotion. "Not just tonight, but the path forward? It won't be easy, Louis. We have too much history, too many wounds."
"I'm certain," Louis affirmed. "Not that it will be easy, but that it's worth trying. That we're worth trying."
Lestat searched his eyes a moment longer, then nodded once, decision made. He rose from his chair, drawing Louis up with him, and led him toward the large four-poster bed that dominated one wall of the chamber.
"There are things you should know about me," Lestat said as they stood beside the bed. "Things I've never told you or Claudia, about who I was before I made you, about why I've done the things I've done."
"Tell me," Louis encouraged him. "Whatever you're ready to share."
Lestat shook his head slightly. "Not tonight," he decided. "Tonight is for beginning again, for leaving the past where it belongs, at least for a few hours." His hand came up to cup Louis's face gently. "Tonight is for this—just this."
Their second kiss was deeper, more urgent, hands beginning to explore bodies both familiar and somehow new in this context of honesty and chosen connection. Layers of clothing were discarded, revealing pale immortal flesh that gleamed like marble in the firelight.
Lestat guided Louis onto the bed, moving over him with a grace that had always been part of his allure. "Let me," he murmured against Louis's throat, his lips tracing the veins that had once pulsed with mortal blood. "Let me show you what we can be to each other now."
Louis surrendered himself to Lestat's touch, to the exquisite pleasure of immortal bodies freed from the constraints of both humanity and their own bitter history. There was a reverence in Lestat's caresses that Louis had never felt before, as if he were being not just desired but treasured.
When Lestat finally claimed him fully, Louis arched beneath him, their bodies joining with an intensity that transcended mere physical pleasure. There was communion in their union, a sharing and merging that went beyond flesh to touch whatever remained of their immortal souls.
"I promise you this," Lestat whispered against Louis's ear as they moved together, his voice strained with emotion and desire. "No more lies between us. No more masks, no more deception."
"And I promise you," Louis replied, his hands tangling in Lestat's golden hair, "no more blame, no more making you the villain of my existence."
Their shared release when it came was like nothing Louis had experienced in his long existence—a moment of perfect unity that felt like both an ending and a beginning, a death and a rebirth. They clung to each other as the sensations washed through them, neither willing to surrender the connection even as their bodies stilled.
Afterward, they lay tangled together in the large bed, Louis's head resting on Lestat's chest where no heartbeat sounded. The silence between them was comfortable now, free of the tension that had defined their relationship for so long.
"Claudia and I talked earlier," Louis said finally, his fingers tracing patterns on Lestat's pale skin. "She wishes to stay as well. She spoke of wanting to try to recapture something of what we had in the beginning, before everything went wrong."
Lestat's arm tightened around him. "Is that possible, do you think?"
"Not exactly as it was," Louis admitted. "Too much has happened. But something new that honors what was good about that time? Yes, I think that's possible."
Lestat was quiet for a moment, considering. "A family," he said finally, testing the word as if it were unfamiliar. "Strange as we are, monstrous as we are, that's what we were trying to be, wasn't it?"
"Yes," Louis agreed softly. "And perhaps what we can be again, in our own way."
Lestat lifted Louis's hand to his lips, pressing a kiss to the palm in a gesture of surprising tenderness. "I would like that," he said simply.
They lay together as the night deepened toward dawn, speaking quietly of practical matters—how long they would stay in Russia, where they might go next, how they would navigate the complexities of their unusual family dynamic. There was comfort in this mundane planning, this shared vision of a future together.
As the first faint lightening of the eastern sky warned of approaching day, Lestat turned to Louis with sudden seriousness.
"There's something I need to tell you," he said, his expression grave. "Something I should have told you long ago, about my maker, about why I was as I was when we met."
Louis placed a finger against Lestat's lips, stopping his words. "Tomorrow night," he said gently. "We have time now, Lestat. All the time in the world to learn each other truly."
Lestat nodded, understanding in his eyes. Wordlessly, they rose and prepared for the death-sleep that would claim them with the rising sun. Unlike previous nights, they did not separate to their individual coffins but instead lay back down together on Lestat's bed.
"Sleep well, mon cher," Lestat murmured as the familiar lethargy began to overtake them.
Louis's last thought before the death-sleep claimed him was that for the first time in decades, perhaps for the first time since his dark rebirth, he felt something like peace. Not happiness exactly—that might come with time—but a quieting of the inner turmoil that had been his constant companion for so long.
Whatever the future held for their strange immortal family—whatever joys or sorrows, whatever challenges or triumphs—they would face it together, bound not by blood or obligation but by choice. And in that choice lay a freedom more profound than Louis had ever imagined possible.
THE END