Set On the Devil's Road
By Lillake, 1998


Disclaimer: This is a non profit piece of fan fiction.... I do not intend
to infringe upon the rights of Anne Rice and her characters.

Spoilers: None that I know of, but just to be sure, probably TVL.

The following is a narrative about the 'mad queen' from Armand's coven.
This is her past, or at least how she sees it. I discovered she was a
little over three hundred years old (from carefully re-reading the passage
she appears in about thirty times and then deducing the obvious), and she
was a friend of Magnus, and she started going mad a little over a hundred
years ago. Based on that information, I made up my own character for her.

******
To be Queen meant to be all powerful, nowadays it is a mere formality. In
*my* day a ruler was a supreme being; the judge and the executioner.
Throughout my mortal life I embraced both duties with open arms. I decided
who prospered and who failed, who worked and who begged, and ultimately,
who lived and who died. From my earliest years, I was required to make
choices, and even in death I chose to rise from the grave. The image of the
phoenix always comes to mind when I think of my death, it is really just a
fanciful image, of a bird rising, beautiful and whole from gray ashes, a
rather pretty notion if nothing more. And so I set foot on the Devil's
Road, to conquer or to fail, but it really is not as simple as that, it
never is.
But such a road; black as night, it catches the light and twists and bends
it like a crystal, flashing all the colors of the rainbow across eternal
night, but I jump ahead of myself. I always have, always looking to the
future, always warning those of what was to come. Perhaps that is why I
survived on this Road so long, or perhaps that is why I went so utterly and
completely mad. Not that it matters now.
I was around thirty five or thereabouts when I was given the Gift. It was
during the time of many wars between France and England, wonderful time
really, practically all the men gone, it left me with the power. I was
content; and no, I did not mourn my sons going off to fight battles,
screaming for glory at the top of their lungs. If you ask me, it was a damn
foolish thing.
And so I maintained the castle, my bards singing of heroic deeds, their
soft voices echoing in the dark halls. As I said, I was perfectly happy
with the situation, I cared not for my bloodthirsty husband, nor did I
share the passion of others to cast out the evil Englishmen. But of course
there was also a terrible downside to the time, the witch hunts were
becoming a popular cause. I lost a good many friends to the fire, they were
peasants mostly, harmless women that had a spark of wit about them. I
fought these hunts with every ounce of my being, and no, not for the glory
of revenge for my lost friends, they were dead and cold, but my heart still
beat, and I knew I was in danger. Quite a few Lords had their eyes on my
lands, and when they knew I would not step down, small whispers of certain
rumors escalated in my home. The most depressing bit about the whole
situation was, my son, one who had not gone off to fight, fed these rumors
until they grew tenfold. Well, he wanted the throne, I cannot truly blame
him, actually, I did blame him, and I denounced him in front of my court. A
mistake on my part.
They say poison is a woman's weapon, yet none of my three daughters tried
to poison me. My son, unfortunately did. And so I began to waste away, very
slowly might I add, the little bastard. My daughters tended me, but it was
my eldest, my Cassandre, ironically enough, that stayed with me day and
night, every vigilant at my bedside. She had my dark eyes, my dark hair, my
skin, and most importantly, my way of thinking. Mind you, since we were so
alike, we did not get along often, but we trusted one another, and sought
one another's company, though both of us would deny it. Cassandre was
loyal.
She tasted my food and drank my wine before my lips could touch them, to
ensure I would not be poisoned further. Poor girl, she was poisoned as
well, the few times my son was able to bribe a cook to slip in a certain
herb was enough to bring her to her deathbed, by my side.
It was a night I was very close to death that *he* came. The dark one. I
remember the night perfectly, not one star shone in the black sky, a storm
was brewing, flashes of silent brilliant white light illuminated the
hillsides, transforming everything into an eerie world, where the wind
screamed, and the heaven's weeped.
I sat upright when he walked with a cat's grace into my chamber. With all
the haughtiness I could gather, I looked down at him. He smiled and laughed
silently, his teeth flashing in the darkness.
"Beautiful Queen," he murmured, making a small bow, walking closer to the
bed. "I have been watching you."
I remained silent, pushing my hair over my shoulder and glancing carelessly
at the intruder, wondering if I could call my guards.
He pointedly ignored my glare and continued, walking silently through my
chamber, the shadows clinging to his form like soft cloth, then slowly
falling away. His voiced was gentle, soft. "I've watched you watch your son
kill you slowly; watched you watching the priests lurking silently in the
shadows, trying to find some way to declare you a witch..." He glanced at
me, expecting me to say something.
I noticed his eyes were a brilliant green, glowing slightly in the
darkness.
He reached forward and stroked my hair, his lips curving in a smile, "Your
eyes are so cold, distant... how you do look at me..."
"And what am I to think?" I snapped angrily. He nearly jumped, startled by
my sudden outburst. "Indeed.... what am I to think? A strange man comes
into my chamber at night... spouting poetry... how would you have me look
at you?"
He gave me an incredulous look, then threw his head back and laughed. I
covered my ears at the sound, his laughter rose in volume, his form
shaking, a tear falling from his eye.
Blood.
He stopped laughing under my stare, I let out a laugh of my own. "Does my
son send the very Lord of the Underworld, Satan himself, to dispose of me?
Ha! Does he trust no one else to do it?!"
"Christ cried tears of blood," the stranger reminded me gently. "Do not
damn me so quickly."
"Name,"I demanded, not wishing to go off on a theological discussion with a
man I thought my son had sent to kill me.
"Saverio," he supplied quickly.
"Saverio," I purred the name softly to myself. "Saverio," relishing in the
power of the name.
"Ahh, my beautiful Queen, my beautiful Marielle, I have... news for you,"
he sat on the edge of my bed and took my hand in his. His skin was cold,
but smooth, , I closed my eyes at the touch. There was such a settled air
about him, so calming, soothing. I fell back amidst my pillows, the fabric
sighing beneath my weary head.
I turned my eyes to his and smiled weakly. "Tell me they have found a cure
for the potion...."
He looked somberly down at me, running his fingers through my hair. "In a
way, yes," he whispered under his breath.
I stared at him, my face a mask, hiding my confusion. "Yes?"
"Tomorrow night, you will die."
I let out a harsh, short laugh. "Death is a cure indeed!"
He covered my lips with his fingertips and bade me be silent with his
sparkling eyes. "A man will come to you, under the guise of a doctor, he
will offer you drink, take it... it will kill you..."
"Is this what you were sent for? Has my son grown a soft heart from
watching his wretched poison slowly kill his mother? A swift release from
death he offers me now?"
"No," Saverio whispered, shaking his head, his long dark hair falling
across my arm in a silken whisper. "Trust me and drink it when it is
offered."
"Very well, there is nothing left to lose is there? I suppose it is merely
my own stubbornness that keeps me alive, if only to prevent that whining
child, who I hate to call my son, become a king."
"If that is the way you must see it...." he made a small bow and rose to
his feet. "Dear queen, take the drink... take it..."
"Very well, Saverio, I will take it gladly, death can be my release, no?" I
gave him a bitter smile.
"Release... only the lucky may have that," he mused.
I watched the lighting illuminate his frame in a vivid blue light, his eyes
captured the color and reflected it for a dazzling moment, his skin glowed
a strange white.
"You are not human," I said, smiling, always smiling, even then. A face as
a mask is hard to read, a smile is impossible.
He shook his head and held out his hands, palms up, in a helpless gesture.
"No, I thought not... so what are you? The Devil? A warlock? A demon? A
spirit?"
He gave me a sad smile. "Nothing that simple."
"Then what?"
"A vampire." He waited, watching for my reaction.
I nodded. "A vampire then, you drink the blood of the living, I have heard
of the legend, though I had expected such a creature to be... ill
mannered..."
"You believe me, then?" he breathed in a small gasp of astonishment, giving
me a dazzling smile.
"Saverio, a few moments I believed you to be Satan himself, why should I
not believe you to be a vampire?" I laughed quietly to myself.
His lips broadened in a feral grin. "Fare thee well, good queen... my
Marielle."
In the next flash of lightening and clap of thunder, he was gone.

I let out a hoarse laugh. The screeching winds drowned out my dry voice. I
listened to the rumbling of the sky, watched the white light, listened to
my daughter's forced breath. Ah yes, she had been sleeping in a bed by
mine, she had not wakened at Saverio's entrance, strange, she was such a
light sleeper. It did not matter, this time tomorrow night, I would be
dead... Saverio merely failed to mention that I would be able to roam the
earth long after my death.
Dawn crept softly into my chamber, pastel lights filling the room in a
delicate glow. Cassandre woke, eyes fluttering open. Her lips were tinged
with blue, a sign the poison was settling in her system. My own lips had
long since gone from blue to white, a sign that the poison was preparing to
take its victim.
"I had the strangest dream, Mother," Cassandre yawned, stretching across
her bed, trying to find a comfortable position for her aching limbs.
"And what did you dream, Cassandre?"
"That you were well and healed and walking again."
I shook my head, pushing back my hair, marveling at how quickly the poison
had changed my skin color from a soft white-gold to a sickly ivory. "Any
cure is beyond hope for me."
"We share the same fate then, Mother," Cassandre murmured quietly.
How old was she? Nineteen summers had passed, that was her life, she was
betrothed to marry a baron at the end of the next season. He would never
have her as a wife, she would be dead long before their wedding date.
"Bah," I hissed under my breath. I called for my most trusted guard. If I
had to die, and if Cassandre had to die, then by all that was holy I was
going to make certain my little cretin of a son died as well. It took but a
moment to arrange, I wanted him killed after my funeral, I wanted to make
certain he would have to suffer through the entire dull ceremony with
nothing but his quiet conscience to scold him. Perhaps the voices would
drive him mad. One could only hope.
The day passed at an astonishingly slow pace, doctors filed in and out.
Priests came and went, chanting invocations. The pungent smell of incense
filled the room, clouding the air, bringing tears to my eyes. The day
passed in a haze. Cassandre lost her temper and cast everyone out of my
room at midday.
"I am sorry, Mother, but they only make you waste away all the more quickly
with their stupid potions and ridiculous cures." She flicked back her hair
angrily with a thin, angry hand.
"A few more hours, what difference does it make?" I shrugged, ignoring the
burning cold that was spreading slowly across my limbs.
"Not much, I suppose," she collapsed at the foot of my bed, idly toying
with the fringe of the bed curtain.
The door creaked open. I gathered up every ounce of effort left in me and
rolled my eyes. "Let a dying woman go in peace!" I hissed rather loudly.
"Oh, Milady, stop your damn complaints," a familiar voice boomed through
the chamber. Maryvonne. A peasant wise woman, one of my last remaining
friends, but I was sure the fire would claim her next. She walked heavily
to my bedside, a large basket balanced on one his, full lips pursed,
beautiful blue eyes narrowed while she examined my prone form at a
distance. She was delightfully straightforward and well learned in herb
lore, and never once had she betrayed me.
"Well, Maryvonne?" Cassandre asked with a bitter smile, a fire dead in her
eyes.
"The Queen will not survive the night, Milady," she said slowly, with a
great deal of emphasis on 'survive'. She dropped the basket to the floor
and pressed her warm hand to my forehead. "Aye, you're getting cold
already, sure enough. And the pain?"
"Numbing away, slowly but surely."
She rummaged loudly through her basket, pulling out two small packages make
of coarse leather. "This one," she held up one pouch, "will dull the pain,
even the cold settling of death, until you pass on. And this one," she held
up the other, "will kill you painlessly and quickly." She held them both
out to me, in easy reaching distance.
Saverio's words suddenly flashed through my mind, at night he said the
doctor would come. I pointed to the packet that would dull the pain,
raising my eyes to Maryvonne's. "That one," I said carefully.
She nodded, features unreadable, and poured the fry contents into a cup of
wine by my side. "Drink it now," she ordered.
I lifted the drink to my lips in a silly salute to Maryvonne and let the
wine splash down my throat. "Ugh," I choked, "could you have made it any
more bitter?" I grimaced, swallowing that last few drops.
"No, I added herbs to make it even *more* bitter," she flashed me a wicked
grin.
"Thank you for your assistance," Cassandre murmured, watching the patterns
of light dance across the paneled walls of my room.
Maryvonne gave me an uncomfortable look.
I cleared my throat. "Cassandre, please leave for a moment, there is some
business I must finish with Maryvonne."
Cassandre nodded absently and left the room without a word.
I looked to Maryvonne. "Well?" I demanded roughly.
"She is going mad, she will have lost her reasoning by the next moon."
"How do you know?" I snapped, my fingers tightened around the fabric of the
coverlets. I desperately wished for strength so I could rip them to tiny
pieces.
"The dull look in her eyes, the way she stares, her silence, she is in more
pain than you were."
"I find that hard to believe."
"Quite frankly, I believe she is mourning her life, the end of it, that she
never truly lived."
I cast her a sly glance out of the corner of my eye. "Just a guess on your
part?"
"A guess, and the fact I read her memoirs every night, and yours too,
Milady," she bobbed a small curtsey.
"Ha! I knew it, spies, spies everywhere," I chanted in a sing song voice,
laughing idiotically, shaking my head. "So what you are telling me, is that
I have to have her killed."
Maryvonne shook her head. "No, I am telling you a fact, though in all
honesty, I had brought the second packet for her to use, should she choose
to do so. She must not only consider the madness she will suffer, but also
the pain."
"She will not choose. As level headed as she is, she is still young, she
will think she can fight it. So am I to die knowing she will go mad?
Screaming and acting like one possessed? That she might well be burned at
the stake, while her brother whispers rumors into the ears of the priests?"
She shrugged, neither acceptance nor denial, she tossed the packet onto my
bed.
"Ah Maryvonne," I said wearily.
"May God protect you," she whispered and slipped out of the room.
A strange thought crept into my mind, I thought she knew about Saverio, but
that was impossible, or at least I had thought it impossible. I shook the
idle thoughts from my head, that is all they were, idle thoughts, dangerous
thoughts for a dying woman, I had no future, I had to learn to accept that.
My hand reached out for the packet, it seemed to me that it was another's
hand. Death's hand, bony and frail, lacking all color. My fingers curved
around the goblet, I can still remember the exact texture. I poured the
contents into a second goblet. I silently watched the powder dissolve into
the deep, red wine. For a moment I considered taking it myself, but no...
this was her only release, and I would give it to her.
My voice failed me twice before I could manage to call her name.
She whisked back into the room, uncannily like a ghost. Her eyes darted
quickly over the room, they were dimly feral, like the eyes of the large
cat that had lived in the kitchen. One day it began attacking the servant,
hissing and clawing at everything, howling with an almost supernatural
power. My daughter was to suffer the same fate, I held death in my hand,
her only hope. I handed her the chalice, but this contained no life
everlasting, only the murky power of death.
She looked at me once, her eyes burn forever in my mind. Dark eyes, night,
slashed with gold, my eyes. I was killing myself. I passed the goblet to
her. She took it without a thought and drank.
She knew.
The effect was immediate, the metal cup slipped from her fingers, landing
softly on the carpeted floor. She soon followed, limbs closing in upon
themselves, like a dying flower. No life left in her tired body.
With a sudden pang I realized I was to follow, the cold settled, painlessly
as Maryvonne had assured me. I smiled, no pain, perhaps it would have been
better with the pain.

*He* walked into the room. In doctor's robes. I remember a sharp pain in my
neck, then oblivion, murmured words. A name, Jerome.
I can faintly recall funeral chants, but that was impossible. Strange
ceremonies danced around me, floated in and out of my thoughts. Fires,
wailing, laughing, glittering eyes, white skin, a burial vault, jumbled
memories, incense, candles, howling.
The dream was quickly lifted away, without mercy, and suddenly I awoke, in
a coffin. Shrieking, I clawed at the lid, that was when I noticed my hands.
They were white, smooth, healthy, nails the color of fine Venetian glass, I
screamed louder, the screaming climbed to a galloping laugh. I was alive,
alive! But dead! I cried tears of joy, fear, confusion. I pressed my
fingers to my face and brought them away. Blood. Blood tears. Saverio's
tears!
With strength I did not think I possessed I pushed open the coffin. I was
in a vault, my own vault. I ran to the door and leaned against it with all
my might. It creaked open slowly, stone grinding on stone. I bit back a
laugh as the pale moonlight spilt into the eternally dark chamber.
Saverio was waiting for me. He was gorgeous now, skin like my own, thoughts
flowed between us, images. I was a vampire, but I must not tell the others
about him.
What others?
Jerome made you, I picked the thought cleanly from his mind. You are part
of a coven.
And what are you a part of?
I wander the nights alone.
I understood. "You wander the Devil's Road!" I said aloud, my voice rang in
my ears, too loud.
He stepped closer to me, I reached out, letting a small giggle escape my
lips. My hands against his, my skin against his. His eyes, beautiful now,
green, the forest's color when the sun danced through them. Frail emerald
leaves, thin as gossamer, catching heavy golden light. I let out another
laugh.
The thirst, I thirsted, the need suddenly materialized, a driving force.
Saverio smiled at me, pushing back my hair, exposing his neck for me.
"Drink."
Without preamble I wrapped my arms around him and pressed my teeth to his
skin, my tiny incisors tore his flesh and then there was ecstasy. The pure
blood.
I drank, letting the night sky spin at a dizzying pace. Emotion flowed
through pictures, I saw his life, one thousand years he had lived. I saw
the times through his eyes, passing quickly, life, death, joy, despair...
these all flooded my thoughts, all under the blanket of night.
I was pushed away, gently but firmly. "Enough," he said. Already the skin
healed at his throat. I smiled, pressing my new grown fangs to my lips.
Blood. I licked my lips, relishing the taste. And I laughed.
"Now listen to me," he took my shoulders and shook me gently. "You have
risen far earlier than they would have expected. But listen, finish your
mortal business now. Quickly, before the rest of them arise."
"Yes," I breathed. "Yes." I turned quickly, glancing toward my castle. "Oh
yes."
"Good bye, my Queen," Saverio whispered, wrapping his arms around my waist,
pressing his lips to my neck in a chaste kiss.
He vanished. I never saw him again.
Nor did I notice his passing, my eyes were on the castle, looming in the
silent night like a giant leviathan among green waves.
I practically flew there, eyes never moving from my prey, to any passer by,
it would have seemed I was stalking the castle, but no, I wanted only one.
Through the rooms, like a ghost I searched, finally finding him. My son. My
betrayer.
I screeched out his name, sent the thought through his mind, searing his
thoughts, felt pain.
His eyes snapped open, he saw me. His blue eyes, wide in horror as I neared
the bed, silently, my face a white mask. I knew, I could see myself in his
eyes, smell his fear, hear his beating heart.
I grabbed him, unaccustomed to my new strength, his arm snapped loudly as
the bone splintered. Blood. But no, not from him, I would not award him the
ecstasy. I smiled.
"You killed me, my son," my words were soft, frighteningly serene.
"Dead," he gasped, half in pain, half in shock. "You are dead!"
The last words he every spoke.
No, I didn't kill him.
I left him mangled, broken, and bleeding in his room. He would never see
again, never speak his lies again, he would die in agony, slowly. Like I
died, like my Cassandre would have died.
I grabbed a torch, blood glistening on pale white skin. My feet never
touched the ground. I floated to the chamber where Maryvonne slept.
I opened the door and peered inside. No one. At least she would be safe, I
wanted her to live on. She who was my last friend. My other daughters, I
recalled. I easily pulled them out of their beds, placing them in the
stable, on beds of straw. I gave them my fortune, bags of gold and gems,
quickly writing curt notes, telling them to go to the castle that was my
home before I married, telling them where the rest of my fortune was
hidden. They would live as Queens as well.
Everyone I loved was cast out of the stone prison I had ruled. That left
one last piece of business to finish.
I ran the torch along the walls, flames licking at tapestries. Fire roared
all around me, I leapt out of a widow, falling softly to the ground.
The flames were higher now, screaming and shouting accented the sound of
falling lumber.
I felt a presence while transfixed upon the scene of destruction.
I turned and walked slowly back to my crypt and saw Maryvonne out of the
corner of my eye.
"Take care of my daughters," I whispered softly.
She nodded, drawing a hood over her pale face. "Fare thee well, Marielle,"
she answered gently, Maryvonne, a witch, she offered the thought as she
turned and left. My daughters would be safe.
Figures, walking shadows clothed in deeper shadows, tattered, ragged, were
clustered around my open crypt door. There was a soft whispering, like
rustling leaves, no, falling snow.
A dark robed figure stepped forward, beckoning me to come to him.
The coven, you are a part of our coven, his thoughts drifted into my mind.
I smiled, slowly, feeling the soft caresses of the night air as I have
never felt them before, silently laughing at the touch I had never known.
But the story of my life in the coven, that is a different tale.

The End