Queen of the Damned
And out of the great bank of memories that Marius carried forever with him, there came a long neglected moment, startling in its purity--Mael coming to the palazzo in Venice in the contented years of the fifteenth century, when Marius and Armand had known such happiness, and Mael seeing the mortal boy at work with the other apprentices on a mural which Marius had only lately left to their less competent hands. Strange how vivid, the smell of the egg tempera, the smell of the candles, and that familiar smell--not unpleasant now in remembering--which permeated all Venice, the smell of the rottenness of things, of the dark and putrid waters of the canals.
"And so you would make that one?" Mael had asked with simple directness.
"When it's time," Marius had said dismissively, "when it's time."
Less than a year later, he had made his little blunder. "Come into my arms, young one, I can live without you no more."
Marius stared at the distant house. *My world trembles and I think of him, my Amadeo, my Armand.*
Centuries ago in a palazzo in Venice, he had tried to capture in imperishable pigment the quality of this love. What had been its lesson? That in all the world no two souls contain the same secret, the same gift of devotion or abandon; that in a common child, a wounded child, he had found a blending of sadness and simple grace that would forever break his heart? This one had understood him! This one had loved him as no other ever had.
He tightened his arms around Armand. He kissed Armand's lips, and his long loose vagabond hair. He ran his hand covetously over Armand's shoulders. He looked at the slim white hand he held in his own. Every detail he had sought to preserve forever on canvas; every detail he had certainly preserved in death.
"I love you," Marius whispered suddenly, passionately as a mortal man might. "I have always loved you. I wish I could believe in anything other than love at this moment; but I can't."
-Queen of the Damned
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