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Once upon a time, there lived a boy named Arun. The boy had just one responsibility; to keep his masters happy.
The boy had always been a quick study. He was soon very good at his job.
There are two men in a room. One is responsible for the implosion of a relationship seven decades in the making. He, of course, blames the other man.
Daniel watches Armand from the room’s entrance. Armand is sitting with his back to the wall, face tucked into drawn-up knees, plaster in his hair. He hasn’t moved since Louis left; hasn’t moved in all the time it has taken Daniel to gather his things, prepare for a hasty exit, hesitate, and, against all reason, turn back. Now, he leans against the door frame, waiting for Armand to notice him.
Once the third minute has drifted into the fourth, what little curiosity he has retained finally dwindles into impatience. He clears his throat, and when that does not prove a fruitful tactic, says, with suitable contempt, “So you are still here. I was starting to think you’d slipped out, tail between your legs.”
When there’s no reply, Daniel shrugs. “Evidently I gave you too much credit,” he says. “Sneaking out runs the risk of bumping into someone, having to look them in the eye. Unless you were planning on waiting for Louis to come back?” He laughs, a short, humourless thing. “I think we both know that’s a spectacularly bad idea.”
Armand doesn’t react, and Daniel drops his grin abruptly and narrows his eyes. Armand looks exhaustingly pathetic, curled up like that. Like a figure made for mockery or pity, that upon receiving neither, fades to a nothingness of inconsequential existence.
Made to be forgotten. Made to spark a moment of gauche, perverted amusement, and then set aside until next called for. Made to be put away, like a child whose scientific curiosity has led to a brief interlude with experiments in the creation of slime before they move on to better, less clingy fun. Like the sticky residue that remains once said creation has been dumped into landfill, he lingers, tired and dull.
Still nothing. Daniel raises an eyebrow expectantly, and thinks, as loudly as he can, Did you hear that, Armand? Like slime residue. Not even the slime itself; just the gross, sticky part that’s left behind, the part not even the kids can bring themselves to play with. Sad and unsettling to look at. Like— He pauses, considering. Like… Hm. What’s something else that’s unpleasant, yet ultimately inconsequential?
“What is it you want,” Armand says dully. His voice is muffled, and Daniel has to strain to make it out, quiet as it is. It’s a far cry from the usual smug assuredness Daniel has grown used to. Daniel can almost hear it; A poet in the making, he would say. Please, do continue. Share with us the talent for words that has made you the washed-up has-been that you are.
Still, it’s a start. Daniel smirks, triumphant. “There he is.”
When no reply is forthcoming, he makes his way with gleeful casualness to Armand’s side, and leans heavily against the wall. He’s rewarded with a glance; just a small one, the briefest of glimpses of an eye peeking through dark curls before it vanishes once more into Armand’s knees.
“I take it your attempts to smooth things over didn’t go so well,” he remarks. He waits – one, two, three—
“Yes, you should be very proud. You’ve successfully ruined the only good thing I’ve ever had a hand in making. You have my sincerest congratulations.”
It speaks to the depths of Armand’s never-ending cynicism that his words are somehow so scathing despite sounding so very tired. Then again, from what Daniel’s heard, he has always been a creature of multitudes – terrified yet self-assured, manipulative yet lost, overbearing yet desperately lonely.
Vicious, yet boring.
“Exhaustingly pathetic yet willing to rip your throat out,” Armand says. Well, at least that proves he’s been listening. “Will you get your gloating over with and get out?”
Daniel considers. He holds a hand in front of him, makes a show of inspecting his nails and delights in the theatricality of it, even knowing it’s going unwitnessed. “Nah,” he says sweetly. “I’ve got questions, Armand. Comments. Things to think about. Here’s my favourite so far – you know what really gets me?” He pauses for a reply that does not arrive, and then continues, “You called it the only good thing you’ve had a hand in, completely unironically. I mean, that, that’s something, isn’t it?”
Again, an infuriating lack of reaction. Daniel sighs. “I don’t know what’s sadder, actually. The seven-decade lie you lived with a man who always found himself wishing you were someone else, or the fact that you really seem to have convinced yourself to believe it. The lies you told, I mean, they’re awful, they really are, but they have nothing on the ones you told yourself. Something good, Armand? Really? Good? Do you actually believe that?”
Nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing. If Armand hadn’t well and truly had it coming, Daniel might almost feel sorry for him, seeing him in this state. As it is, Louis could have done much worse – Daniel wonders why he spared him. Residual feelings, perhaps? Or was that too generous a take? Perhaps Louis’ lack of feeling for Armand was simply greater than even Louis himself had ever realised. Perhaps his love for Armand was simply so dulled, so off-handedly unremarkable, that Louis could not find it in him to care about the demolition of the relationship that has rendered Armand so lifeless amidst the ruins.
Perhaps, Daniel thinks, it was such a nothing of a relationship that Louis could not find it in himself to even be suitably angry. He would hardly be surprised. Their fondness for each other rung as forced from the moment Daniel laid eyes upon them.
The change in tactic works. There’s no way Armand doesn’t know what Daniel’s doing, but nevertheless, he raises his head – properly this time, not the half-hearted glances from before – to level a long, flat stare. His eyes are red, though his cheeks are dry. There’s plaster stuck to his face too.
Daniel thinks, Finally. “Did I strike a nerve?” he asks, and smirks. “Have you exhausted the depths of my mind only to stumble across a reflection of your sorry excuse of a relationship? Did you catch some unwanted glimpse of your true nature?”
Just a flicker of familiar acid rage flashes on Armand’s face before he turns sharply away again.
“Why won’t you answer me, Armand? What is it you’re afraid of? Me? No, I don’t buy that. You’re afraid of something though, that’s for sure. Afraid of feeling? Is that why you’re always so controlled, so impassive?”
One of Armand’s fingers twitches.
“What was it Louis called you, again? Half-blank, half-apocalyptic? Never able to feel anything in its entirety, is that it? Maybe I was wrong. Maybe it wasn’t just Louis who felt ambivalent about whatever toxic excuse of a love story you guys had going. Maybe he couldn’t love you because you could never love him; you could never love at all. Couldn’t feel a thing.”
Armand’s body is tense. Gone is the quiet thing that shivered inside its own arms – this is now something dangerous; a string taut and ready to snap.
Daniel doesn’t let himself lose the advantage. He steps closer, reaches out to cup Armand’s chin and draw his face back to him, clucking his tongue even as Armand refuses to meet his gaze.
“Look at you,” Daniel says. “Can’t even muster up a proper glare.” He waits, just a beat, for Armand to work his jaw and narrow his eyes, then says, “You really are boring, aren’t you, Arun?”
You don’t win two Pulitzer’s without knowing what you’re doing.
Armand moves faster than Daniel’s eyes can follow. One moment he’s curled up at Daniel’s feet, the next he’s got Daniel pressed against the wall by his neck, feet off the floor. His fingers tremble; with rage or fear or simple exertion, Daniel can’t be sure. His eyes are wide with something furious and violent and real, finally.
“I am going to kill you,” Armand snarls.
Daniel smiles.
The boy who was Arun called out to the darkness. He called out that he wished to die.
The darkness did not swallow his sorrows, as Arun expected; it heard him. It listened.
And the boy who was Arun became the boy who was Amadeo.
Armand doesn’t kill him, obviously. He holds Daniel there for a few seconds, pushes harder at his throat when the desired reaction is not produced, then abruptly lets go, leaving Daniel to scramble to get his feet under him. The fury on Armand’s face doesn’t quite abate, but it slips into something else – something quieter and more subdued. He turns his face away sharply when he catches Daniel watching him.
Daniel keeps his smile fixed, even as his heartrate struggles to resume a calm equilibrium. Armand won’t hurt him. He knows that, but his body doesn’t. Fighting down the wave of panic at an attack from an apex predator isn’t as easy as it sounds, but at least Armand is distracted.
Daniel really is getting too old for this kind of thing.
But Armand’s face is slipping quickly back into the quiet passivity that both does and doesn’t suit him at all, and he needs to press his advantage. So he takes just another second to catch his breath, and then he says, “Thoughts on whipping us up some martinis?”
Armand takes a long moment to respond. When he does, it’s with only a small amount of irritation, carefully disguised in a way that has him sounding more like himself than he has since – well. Since. “I’m sure Rashid is willing to attend to your needs.”
“Yeah…” Daniels says. “About that. Preeeeetty sure we’re the only living beings in this house right now. Well. By a… flexible definition of living, that is. Does that disclaimer ever get old, for you?”
Armand glances his way, jaw twitching, eyes still narrowed. With his head tilted downwards, it makes him look like a predator stalking his prey, creeping through the undergrowth. For some reason the thought almost makes him giggle, and he has to swallow it down.
“I don’t know if Louis sent them home or if they all just skedaddled,” Daniel adds courteously. “But either way, I’m parched. So…”
Armand’s glare doesn’t soften so much as fizzle out. He raises his fingers to his temples, massaging them, and it makes him look jarringly human. Daniel finds himself wondering if vampires can even get headaches, or if the movement is purely symbolic.
He’s about to prompt him again when Armand finally speaks. “Why are you here, Mr Molloy?” he says tiredly. “No games this time. Just tell me.”
Daniel opens mouth, closes it again, and swallows. His heart beats faster, and he tries not to dwell on it, because dwelling on it is a surefire way to get it noticed. “I’m a journalist,” he says slowly, and hesitates. “Last time I interviewed Louis, I nearly died, and I wasn’t really expecting this time to go much better but I got on that plane anyway, Armand, because I am a journalist. And I don’t let a good story go. Not without a fight. Not even when the subject could be dangerous.” He swallows again. “Maybe even especially then.”
Barely perceptible, Armand glances his way. Up, then down, then up again, taking Daniel in.
He doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t look away this time.
“I don’t understand you,” Daniel says. A pause, and then he admits it. “I want to.”
Something in Armand’s face changes. A momentary lapse in concentration – an infinitesimally small flicker of longing, desperate and fumbling and achingly lonely.
Then it’s gone, and the carefully blank, slightly bored gaze is back.
“You know my story already,” he says.
“Well, yeah. Told second-hand from Louis’ perspective, while his subconscious laughed at you.”
Another brief flicker of a look, caught only because Daniel was looking for it. Something pained, this time. Angry. Hurt.
“One’s true feelings toward another can hardly be attained from the behaviours of their hallucinations,” Armand says delicately. “One might as well submit themselves to the scientific rigour of astrology, or dream journalling.”
“Not a man with faith in the stars?” Daniel says, trying to hide his grin.
The look Armand sends him is both piercing and pinched. He doesn’t reply.
“Well, if you’ll humour me long enough to switch out pseudoscience for armchair psychology, I can’t help but notice that I didn’t say a thing about Louis’ true feelings.”
“You implied it.”
“I don’t think I did, buddy.”
Armand’s eyes flash. “I can read your mind, buddy, so don’t go playing these games with me.”
Daniel raises his arms in surrender. “Fine. Whatever. Point is, I don’t know your story. Not really.”
Armand crosses his arms sullenly, and it makes him look like a surly teenager. Daniel makes sure to bury that thought as soon as it emerges – provocation is no longer the right tool for the job, and now that a reaction has been found, he doesn’t want to play with fire any more than necessary.
“My story is boring,” Armand says dismissively.
“I really doubt that.”
Armand’s eyes narrow, and Daniel fights the urge to roll his eyes. Of course Armand would take that as a challenge.
Still, if it works, it works. And when Armand says, “Fine then. You want my story? Fine. Let’s do it—"
Well. He can’t quite help the squirm of satisfaction in his gut.
Amadeo loved. Amadeo loved, and he was loved in return. Of course he loved; of course he was loved. His master didn’t want just another slave; he wanted someone to love.
Amadeo was very good at his job.
When Rome’s coven showed up and burnt the place to the ground, however, Amadeo couldn’t – or didn’t – or wouldn’t – do shit about it.
And when they gave him the job as leader of the Parisian coven, where he would spend the next few centuries withering away until he could never be anything but Armand again, he wouldn’t do shit about that either.
Nor when a certain Frenchman came and revitalised their existence, nor when said Frenchman abandoned him again like he was nothing, nor when he had the chance to start again, to do something right for the first time in his life, to leave it all behind for love – he continued and continued to not do shit—
“—Because he was a sorrowful pit of pathetic nothingness and always would be, until the end of time, forever. The end.”
The following silence is heavy.
Then, “Wow,” Daniel says. “That sure was… something.”
Armand hasn’t taken his gaze off Daniel through his whole monologue, and he doesn’t take his gaze off now. If anything, he intensifies it. “Did my tale not satisfy?” he says. “I thought that was what you wanted.”
“What I wanted,” Daniel says, struggling to keep his tone even, “was to understand.”
Armand spreads his hands out in a well there you have it kind of gesture.
“Armand…” Daniel sighs, soft and long-suffering. “Is it so hard to believe that I actually wanted to take this seriously?”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Armand says pleasantly, eyes narrowed. “I have no idea how I could have misinterpreted your continued attempts at antagonisation. Every time you called me a pitiful waste of existence, it was truly so obvious that what you really, truly wanted was a genuine heart-to-heart.”
Daniel scowls. It felt necessary at the time – he truly believes Armand would have ignored him forever if Daniel hadn’t goaded him out of his moping – but he is perhaps starting to regret some of his choices, if only to avoid this current display of pettiness.
Do Armand’s antics border on juvenile only when Daniel is present, or did Louis just learn to tune them out?
Armand’s unaffected air drops immediately. He takes a step closer with deliberate slowness. “I suggest,” he says quietly, “that you abandon this avenue of thinking, before my respect for Louis’ request for your safe departure no longer outweighs my dislike for you.”
“Stay out of my head,” Daniel snaps back.
“Are we seriously going to pretend you aren’t doing this on purpose?”
“I’m not.”
Armand glares at him.
“I’m not anymore,” Daniel amends grudgingly. Armand’s glare progresses to a glower, and Daniel has to fight his own urge to rub at his temples. “I mean it, Armand. I’m not. I really do just want to figure you out.”
Armand scoffs, and Daniel’s eye twitches. “Armand—” he starts, irritably.
“You can’t tell me you weren’t planning from the start to conclude with my own pitiful inconsequence,” Armand interrupts. “I would have thought you thrilled to skip the middle steps – all that filler, getting in the way of the truth: that the vampire Armand was, is, and always will be nothing but a big coward.” He takes a second menacing step forward, and this time Daniel can’t help it – he takes a single, involuntary step back.
Armand’s goes still, and he stares at Daniel, eyes darting down to the increased gap between them. Slowly, he smiles. It’s a small thing, tight and fiercely, terrifyingly pleased, and when Armand takes another step forward Daniel can’t help but sharply inhale when he stumbles back, his shaky breath too sharp in his lungs. “Armand—” he tries again, going for pissed but instead landing on something a little choked.
“That,” Armand continues, eyes bright and smile biting, voice low and menacing, “he doesn’t know how to exist outside of the expectations of those around him. That any comfort or love or hope he will ever find in his never-ending existence will never be anything but a lie, because it’s all just a front, an attempt to be exactly what is desired from him. That he doesn’t even know how to be his own person anymore and how can that love ever be real when he himself is a lie?”
Armand keeps pushing forward, stalking more than he is walking, and Daniel tries to hold his ground, but his survival instincts are kicking in – he’s stepping away before he even knows it, subconsciously keeping the wall to his back, all focus on the predator in front of him. He tries again to say something. He can’t.
“That he knew,” Armand says, and his voice is raising, “knew that what he was doing was wrong, but was so twisted up in his selfish, aching fear of the unknown that he would rather give up his one chance at happiness than risk the security of a life he actively despised. Knew that what he was doing was wrong, but was so desperate to live this lie that he might ever be wanted, that his only way to maintain the façade was to poison his own lover’s mind – too pitiful and damaged to ever be able to fix what was so very broken, too afraid to ever try—"
Armand takes in a sudden, deep breath, and with wild eyes continues forward—
“—That he’s so exhaustingly pathetic,” – and his voice is almost a shout now – “that he’d rather spend seventy years as a rebound for a man who never stopped thinking of another just to escape the aching knowledge that he is nothing on his own, that he is nothing and always will be – and that – and that – that—”
Armand’s stops in his tracks with a jarring suddenness. He stares, wide-eyed and rigid, and he looks at Daniel, properly looks at him, suddenly seeming to realise that he’s been advancing this whole time, backing Daniel into the corner—
Daniel’s sure his face must be white. He feels faint, like his ears might never stop buzzing. His heart is pounding in his chest. The world doesn’t look quite right – is the lighting warmer than it was? Is the smell of blood in the air his own? There was newspaper covering up the windows, but there are no windows in here at all – just ceilings, up and up and up.
Armand abruptly takes a step back. He makes a sound, something frustrated and aborted midway, but he doesn’t turn away.
Daniel can’t breathe.
Armand continues staring, tense with some kind of emotion that Daniel can’t fully pin down. It’s not a glare, but it is angry. It’s not fear, but his eyes are so wide. His face does something complicated, then smooths out. He looks at the door, then back at Daniel.
Then he sighs. “Mr Molloy,” he says quietly, tiredly. “Mr Molloy. Daniel. The year is 2022. You are in Dubai.”
Daniel’s arms might be shaking. He’s not sure. He can’t look down; he’s frozen.
“Daniel,” Armand says again, slightly more insistent this time. “You are in Dubai. You have recently finished an interview with the vampire Louis de Pointe du Lac, and you finished it unharmed and unafraid. Louis has guaranteed I will not hurt you. You are safe and well. I promise. You are safe.”
The words are soothing. He feels at peace; he’s never felt more terrified in his life.
“Rest,” Daniel agrees.
Armand’s non-reaction is too perfect in execution to be anything but intentional. “No,” he says. “No, Daniel, the year is 2022. You are in Dubai. You took a plane here, do you remember? You took a plane, even though there’s a pandemic and you are ill. You took the plane because you are a journalist, and nothing will stop you getting a good story. You’ve won awards. You’ve had children, been married, been divorced. You’ve lived a long life. A good life, despite it all. Do you remember?”
Daniel blinks. Rest, he thinks again, and the word threatens to drown him in ways he cannot explain. But it won’t be rest, will it? There was no resting last time, and it follows there will be none this time either. Right?
Armand’s face is suddenly right in front of his. “You took a plane here, Daniel. You took a plane to Dubai. What was it like? Can you tell me what it was like? Was it cold? Empty? Was the flight long?”
“I… I don’t—”
“Yes, you do. Think, Daniel. You remember.”
He’s not very good at this, Daniel thinks hysterically. Much better at coaxing people into dissociation than out of it. This doesn’t feel nearly as good as last time.
Last time?
The thought has him shuddering. “It was…”
He swallows, and glances around. Then he tries again. “It was empty. Quiet. I’ve never seen an airport so quiet.”
Armand nods. “Good,” he says. “That’s good. What else? How was the taxi ride?”
“It…” Daniel blinks. He looks around, shivers again. “It was fine. Standard taxi ride. It was air-conditioned, which was nice.” He closes his eyes. He is in Dubai. The year is 2022. His name is Daniel Molloy, and he is a journalist, and he is safe and Armand has promised he is safe and he is fine and alive and he is safe. “I’m fine now. You can stop.”
Armand nods, not blinking. Armand doesn’t blink enough, Daniel notices. Louis’ was better at pulling off human – or perhaps he wasn’t. Rashid was good at it. Fake Rashid. Good god, but he pulls on faces like pulling on a pair of socks.
“I… apologise, for my outburst,” Armand says stiffly. He doesn’t wear awkwardness well. He must not have as much practice.
Daniel shifts uncomfortably. “It’s fine,” he says.
It’s not.
Again, it’s the perfected non-reaction that cues Daniel into its intentionality. Still, Armand has the grace not to comment on it, and for that Daniel is furiously, unjustifiably grateful.
They stand like that for a few seconds, just looking at each other. The stillness of the moment, born of the uncomfortable silence and oppressive emptiness of the room, weighs heavily around them, like it’s trying to choke them but can’t quite figure out how.
Then Armand sighs. “Alright then. Let’s get those martinis. A little inebriation will go a long way, if we are to do this.”
Daniel frowns. “What?”
Armand gives him a long-suffering look, but it’s tempered with amusement. “You wanted an interview, fine. Let’s have an interview.”
Daniel stares at him. Armand stares right back.
“Yeah?” Daniel finally manages.
Armand’s smile is forced and sardonic and just a little bit exasperated. He huffs, and it’s not quite a laugh and it’s not quite a sigh, but it’s certainly something both resigned and entertained – the kind of indulgent mockery one might share with a good friend.
“Yeah,” he echoes obediently.
“Right,” Daniel says, and what he means is, what the fuck? “Okay. Well. My laptop’s toast. I don’t suppose you have any tapes?”
Once upon a time, there was a boy named Arun. Arun became Amadeo. Amadeo became Armand. Armand became nothing, and everything, and anything, and he didn’t have a happy ending because he didn’t have an ending at all. Just more of the same, for all eternity, unless – until – one day, when the flames or the stakes would surely finally get him.
They don’t have any tapes. Instead, Daniel pulls out a notebook and a pen, getting ready to work the old-fashioned way, with shorthand and cramping fingers. He sits at the sofa in the living area, and Armand fusses around the martinis at his little stand to the side, just as he did as Rashid. He works slowly, and every now and then pauses to stare distantly at whatever he is holding in his hands.
“Won’t Louis be mad when he sees you’ve pulled all that out again?” Daniel asks.
“It doesn’t matter,” Armand says absently, not looking up.
Daniel quietly disagrees, but he doesn’t say anything. He looks to his notebook, tries to puzzle out how best to start.
Armand sighs. “He won’t be back for days,” he says. “He was heading for New Orleans. For…”
Ah. “For Lestat.”
Armand winces. “Yes,” he says quietly. “That.”
Daniel almost has to hold in his own grimace. All of these vampires really are so fucked up.
The briefest tug on the corner of Armand’s mouth is the only indication he was listening in on that particular thought. He comes over, drops off Daniel’s martini and sits down, eyes on his glass.
Daniel inspects his own in turn. Well, it’s as good a place to start as any. “How do you know how to make these?” he asks.
“I’m hundreds of years old, Daniel. You pick things up.”
“And you picked this up somewhere in your time between running Satanic cults and murdering your boyfriend’s kids, did you?”
“After,” Armand says shortly.
“After,” Daniel agrees slowly. “I would have thought you would have Rashid fix you up, after.”
“You know well we did not always enjoy the financial security that we… Hm. That Louis does today,” Armand says delicately. “The household staff are a relatively recent addition. Besides, Louis prefers when I make them, and I find the process satisfying. There is a certain… charm, to the work.”
Daniel raises an eyebrow, fighting the urge to smirk. “Would he dress you up as a little maid, too? Or did you source the outfit all by yourself?”
Armand scowls. “I can’t believe I agreed to this,” he mutters to his glass, and proceeds to drain half of it in one go.
Daniel grins widely and looks to his notes once more. “Alright, then. Let’s see… I’d like to hear a little more about Marius de Romanus.”
Armand’s grip on his glass tightens. A hesitation, then, with the most transparently forced casualness Daniel has seen for quite some time, he says, “There’s nothing left to tell.”
“You’ve got his painting hanging up on your wall.”
“Louis’ wall.”
“So it wasn’t you who put it there?”
Armand scowls. “It’s none of your business.”
Daniel doesn’t reply. He just waits.
As expected, Armand cracks first. “He was my master. He was an asshole. I’m glad he’s dead.”
“And yet you hung his painting on your wall.”
“I was in the studio when he painted it. I have just as much right to it than anyone else alive today. More.”
“Lot of memories attached though, I bet.”
Armand shrugs stiffly.
“You said you loved him.”
Armand drains the rest of his glass and stands up abruptly. He strides over to the martini station again, and starts making another.
Daniel watches silently.
It’s only after he’s slammed back the next martini that Armand speaks again. It’s with a slow and quiet almost-but-not-quite reverence. “He was… everything, to me. He used to… to hold me, bring me treats, tell me stories. Listen to my own in turn, at a time that very few would. He would talk to me like we were equals. I was safe, with him. I was loved.”
Slowly, his hands drift back to the bottles in front of him. He starts on his third martini.
Then Daniel barks out a harsh laugh. “Good lord,” he manages. “You and Louis both. I can’t believe it.”
Armand glances his way, quick and furtive. “I do not deny it was… complicated. As I said, his death was…” He trails off.
“Deserved?”
“Perhaps.”
“Perhaps?” Daniel echoes, decidedly unimpressed.
“It was complicated,” Armand repeats.
“You were his slave, Armand. He bought you.”
Armand puts his glass down with more force than strictly necessary, and straightens. “And now he’s dead. I no longer hold the opinions of my youth. I fail to see how this is relevant.”
“His painting is hanging on your wall, Armand.”
“So you’ve said.”
“Mm. It’s almost like I’m trying to figure out why.”
Amand glares. “You think I am hiding things from you.”
Daniel almost laughs. “I know you’re hiding things from me. This isn’t about that.”
“I am not Louis, desperate to dwell on the tragedies of the past. Marius de Romanus loved me, and he turned me, and then he died. There is nothing more to say.”
“Do you still love him?”
“I do not think of him.”
“If you did.”
Armand levels a flat stare. “But I don’t.”
Like pulling teeth. Daniel grits his own, then pushes himself off the sofa and stalks over. “Give me the next one,” he says, slamming his glass down in front of Armand. If Armand’s going to drain their drinks like shots, then fuck, Daniel will too. He’s got an unlimited supply to make up for very limited patience.
Armand’s shoulders are tense. He doesn’t reply, but he does offer a curt nod.
They do end up sipping at their next martinis slowly, both still standing, both glaring at their drinks. Or maybe it’s just Daniel – when he looks across, Armand is frowning at his, almost contemplative.
Armand sets his down before it’s even half-drunk. He sighs, and closes his eyes for a while.
When he opens them, it’s to look Daniel straight in the eye. “I haven’t been fair to you, have I, Mr Molloy?” he says quietly.
Daniel narrows his eyes. “No,” he says. “You really haven’t.”
Armand’s mouth twitches, but with something distinctly sad. “It was not your fault Louis liked you more than me. Nor was it Claudia’s, either.”
Daniel eyes him warily.
“It was not Marius’ fault he left me,” Armand continues. “But I hated him for it nonetheless.” He smiles again, just briefly, and it is, somehow, a lonely and self-deprecating thing. “I hate you, too, you know. You did this to me.”
“You did this to yourself, Armand.”
Armand hums. Daniel’s not sure he’s even heard him. “Marius, Lestat, Louis… Even the covens. Rome, Paris… Delhi. I was never enough for them.”
“Uh huh.”
“You took Louis from me.”
“I really didn’t, Armand. And I think you know that. What’s this about? What are you getting at?”
“I’m nothing without him,” Armand says. His gaze shifts resolutely to the floor. and huffs out a pained laugh. “I’m nothing.”
Personally, Daniel doesn’t think all the despicable things Armand did without even a hint of external prompting can be called being nothing. “Look,” he says. “Break ups are hard, sure, but they really aren’t the personality killers you seem to think they are, so…”
Armand doesn’t seem to have heard him. “I’m nothing,” he repeats faintly, and then his hand is on his mouth as if to hide his quickened breathing, his eyes wide and scared.
Daniel opens his mouth; closes it again. He glances around uncomfortably. This is usually the point in an interview that he has to connect with his subject or risk losing them, but Armand is not your standard interviewee, and Daniel’s not exactly itching to comfort him. He’d rather live through the night than risk the wrath that would result from what would be, admittedly, a very forced attempt at sympathy.
But Armand is still a person despite all the shit he’s done, and a person finally being hit with the reality of a very bad break-up at that. He’d really rather it be someone else’s problem, but Daniel is the only one here. “Look, Armand,” he tries, shifting uncomfortably. “If you need to step out…"
Armand blinks, then blinks again. He goes very still. “That’s right,” he says faintly, under his breath and so quietly that Daniel can barely hear it. “No, you’re right, you’re the only—"
Armand’s head snaps back to him with fierce suddenness; he grabs at Daniel’s wrist with horrible desperation. “I'm good at my job, Mr Molloy,” he says in a rush, with a kind of wild fervour that scares Daniel more than he would like to admit. “If there is something you want from me? I can do it. Be it. You miss your wife, don’t you? Your Alice? You can see her. I can do that, can make you see her. You wouldn’t know the difference. I can do it, I can. I am very good at my job, Mr Molloy. I promise. Whatever you want.”
Oh boy. Daniel winces and subtly tries to yank his wrist back. “Look, you’re… We’re both tired. Maybe we should… take a break. Get back to the interview later.”
Armand is already shaking his head feverishly. Oh boy, Daniel thinks again. Despite it all, one almost can’t help but feel sorry for him. Has he no dignity at all? All that strength, and he’s begging me to use him.
“Yes!” Armand says. “Yes. That’s exactly it. You wanted the truth about me, didn’t you, Mr Molloy? And I gave it to you. I gave it to you. Theres so much I can give you. Pathetic, yes, maybe, boring, sure, empty, cold, whatever, I'm still good at my job, Mr Molloy. They didn’t keep me around for nothing, you know. Whatever you want, I can be it. Just say yes. You just have to say yes.”
“No,” Daniel says, and then again, more forcefully, because Armand doesn’t look like he’s about to take that for an answer: “No.”
The look on Armand’s face is devastating.
God, but this is embarrassing. Daniel may have thought Armand was pitiful before, but he’s never worn pathetic so openly until this moment. Pitiful, Daniel can’t help but think again, and Armand laughs, wild and unhinged, and Daniel says, “I’d like you to stop reading my mind,” and Armand goes abruptly, starkly, terrifyingly silent.
Then he says, “I can do that for you too.”
Daniel’s mind goes blank with shock.
“No,” he says. “You don’t mean that.”
Armand doesn’t reply. He just stares at him.
“No,” Daniel says again. “No. Absolutely not. No.”
Armand’s whole body is rigid. His brow furrows; his fingers twitch. Daniel holds his breath. He can’t breathe. He stares back.
Then, just like that, the tension melts out of Armand’s body. He relaxes, shoulders settling back into place, and titles his head consideringly. When he smiles, it is soft and gentle and entirely too knowing. “Okay,” he says.
Daniel exhales shakily. Whatever just happened, whatever terrible thing just came over his vampiric companion, it seems to be over now. “Okay,” he echoes, almost steadily. “Good. Should we… We should take a break. Let’s take a break.”
Armand’s smile turns indulgent. “If you wish. But there is no need. I am more than happy to continue. You were asking about Marius, were you not?”
Were they? They were. Armand had been evasive, dancing around the topic, and it’s Daniel’s job to pin the truth down. He’s good at that – he should be good at that. Why does he feel like he’s underwater?
“Uh. Right. Yeah,” Daniel chokes out.
Armand taps his finger against his lap. “Mm. I don’t remember his rescuing me with much clarity. But the nights he spent, painting me in the studio – those early mornings, the few hours before the dawn, when he would put the palette down, beckon me to coffin… Ah, but I shan’t bore you with details. That was Amadeo, the boy. You are interested in the vampire, are you not? Hm. I can tell you of how he turned me?”
He glances at Daniel, almost coyly, and for a moment Daniel just stares right back. Then he jolts. “Right,” he says, and it takes a moment for him to remember what he’s agreeing to but it’s too late to take it back, really, and no reason to besides. “Yes. Sure. Yes.”
The briefest glimmer of… something, lights up Armand’s eyes, gone before Daniel can pin it down.
Armand starts speaking, once more, but try as he might Daniel can’t seem to concentrate. The story comes in snippets – a nobleman, a fight, poison? He swallows thickly, and takes notes that leave his head the second the pen leaves paper.
Armand’s watching him, he realises. His gaze is intense, and when Daniel looks resolutely away, Armand obligingly turns away also. And just like that, as if Armand’s observation were the only source of self-control, Daniel finds himself staring at him again.
“His blood should have been cold,” Armand is saying, almost dreamily, and Daniel shakes himself and forces himself to pay attention. “But it wasn’t. It was… How to describe it? I only need close my eyes to feel it, slipping down my throat, settling in my veins, flowing through my body. The world falls away, but what need have I of the world? Cold and foreign, it cannot fill my heart the way his very soul does. The sun itself beats within me, even as my humanity burns to ash.”
Armand closes his eyes, head tilted upwards as if to soak in a sunlight that would never be permitted to enter this room. He does not speak, lost in memory.
Daniel swallows, and whatever spell pulling Armand under is broken. He opens his eyes and smiles, almost bashfully. “Oh, but it was terrible,” he says with a laugh. “The worst pain of my life, back then at least. But exhilarating, too. Marius held me close, fed me more blood long after I had had my fill. I had been eyeing the… the others, a little too keenly, greedy with hunger for more of that light, and he kept me from pouncing on those I called my brothers—”
Armand keeps talking, but once again Daniel finds himself unable to focus. He watches Armand’s mouth, and the words being spoken don’t match the ones playing over and over in Daniel’s head. I can do that for you too, he hears. I can do that for you. I can do that for you.
Fuck. It’s not like Daniel asked. Armand… Armand offered. He offered.
“—it was only a few hours, of course, and yet it felt we were—” Armand is saying.
I can do that for you, Armand is saying.
There’s still so much he has to do, is the thing. Daniel’s not… he’s not afraid of death. Or, well, he is, but he’s made his peace with it. But this disease, stealing his own body from him, and that time limit, ticking away… He still has so much to do.
This is ridiculous. He knew as such when Louis offered, and there’s no reason for this to be different. He can’t—
“—not hear him, of course, but it was worth it, truly, for the way I could feel his heartbeat through mine when he pulled me close…"
He can’t.
“Armand,” Daniel finds himself saying.
Armand cuts himself off immediately, looking over curiously. But only for a moment; his expression soon shifts, and a smile gradually spreads its way across his face.
“Armand,” Daniel tries again. “What you said… I was wondering…”
I can do that for you, too.
Daniel takes a deep breath and tries again. “I—"
Armand watches him as Daniel struggles to get the words out. Don’t make me say it, he thinks, almost hysterically, and Armand’s gaze doesn’t waver one inch.
“Yes?” he says gently, and Daniel has to close his eyes, just for a moment. It doesn’t help.
“Would you… still..?”
Armand reaches out and takes Daniel’s wrist in his hand. Then he raises it slowly to his mouth – not quite touching it, but close, as if he were about to kiss it.
Daniel shivers, and Armand’s smile sharpens.
“Ask me, Daniel.”
And Daniel does.
Once upon a time there lived a boy named Arun, or Amadeo, or Armand, or something else entirely. His name was not important. What was important was this:
He was very good at his job.