Free Prince Lestat by Anne Rice Page B

provide her with eyes from a blood drinker that would last her for eternity. He said hecould implant these new eyes for her with surgical delicacy so that they would endure forever. He explained that he knew how to override the Blood in us and stop its relentless war on change long enough to make the alterations in tissue required for a true wedding of nerves and biological threads.” Jesse sighed. “I didn’t understand most of it. I don’t think Maharet did either. But he was brilliant, undeniably brilliant. He explained he was a true physician for our kind. He said he’d recently attached a full-functioning vampiric leg to an ancient vampire named Flavius who had lost the limb before he was ever brought into the Blood.”
    “Of course, Flavius,” said David. “Pandora’s Flavius, her Athenian slave. But this is marvelous.”
    I knew that story as well. I smiled. Of course, Fareed could do such a thing. But what else might he do?
    Jesse continued.
    “Well, Maharet took him up on the offer. She did not like the idea that a young fledgling would be blinded for these purposes. But he soon got around this ethically, telling her to choose a victim for herself, one upon whom she thought it entirely proper and just to feed. He would take that victim, render him or her unconscious, and then infuse the body with the vampiric blood. When he’d removed the eyes, he would do away with the victim. She might be present at all stages if she wished. And once again, he emphasized that the placement of the eyes would involve his skills as a surgeon with more infusions of vampiric blood to perfect the result. Her eyes would be her eyes forever. She had only to pick the victim, as he said, from all those within her hearing, all those with the proper-color eyes.”
    That sent a chill through me: “the proper-color eyes.” Brought back flashes of something horrible, but I didn’t want to see exactly what it was. I shook myself all over and fastened my attention on Jesse.
    “She took him up on it,” said Jesse. “But she took him up on more than that. He wanted to welcome her and Mekare both to his laboratory in America. He had a huge place, apparently a mad scientist’s dream. I believe it was in New York at that time. They’d tried a number of locations. But Maharet wouldn’t risk trying to take Mekare to this place. Instead she spent a king’s ransom bringing all Fareed’s staff and equipment to us. She had everything flown into Jakarta, and brought out by truck to the compound. Electricians were brought in, new generators purchased and installed. When it was finished Fareedhad what he needed to do every kind of test known to modern science on Mekare.”
    Again, she broke off.
    “You’re talking about magnetic imaging,” I said, “CAT scans, all of it.”
    “Yes, exactly,” said Jesse.
    “I should have known. And all these years, I’ve been afraid for Fareed, afraid that she’d done away with him, blasted him and his staff off the planet.”
    “And how could she have done that with Seth protecting Fareed?” asked David. “When you met Fareed, surely you met Seth.”
    “She might have made a considerable dent in operations,” I said. “She could have burned them both out. But you’re saying”—I looked at Jesse—“you’re saying, they’re all friends.”
    “Allies,” said Jesse.
    “Did Mekare submit to the tests?”
    “Completely,” said Jesse. “Meekly. Mekare has never balked at anything that I was ever aware of. Nothing. And so they did the tests. There were these physician fledglings with them, and Seth was always working with Fareed. It was frightening to me to meet Seth. It was frightening to Khayman to meet him. Khayman had known Seth when Seth had been a human child. When Seth had been the Crown Prince of Kemet. Sometime after the Blood came into Akasha, she’d sent Seth away. Khayman had never had any knowledge of Seth being made into a blood drinker. He feared him, feared some old