Rice’s 36th book comes out on Nov. 29.
But in advance of its release, were thrilled to offer this exclusive sneak peek inside.
I heard the cries of thousands.
Anne Rice.Credit:Beck Starr/WireImage
It was a chorus as mighty as the wind and the waves, all those voices of the dying.
I saw flames that outshone the lamps of heaven.
And all the world was shaken.
I held the root now of the great vampire vine on which I was once only another exotic blossom.
Would the root itself suffer?
The root thinks and feels and speaks when he wants to speak.
And the root has always suffered.
Only gradually had I come to realize it how profound was the suffering of the root.
Without moving my lips, I asked him: Amel, what was that city?
Where did the dream come from?
He gave me no answer.
But I knew he was there.
I could feel the warm pressure on the back of my neck that always meant he was there.
He had not gone off along the many branches of the great vine to dream with another.
I saw the dying city again.
I could have sworn I heard his voice crying out as the city was broken open.
Amel, what does this mean?
What is this city?
We would lie together in the dark for an hour like this.
We are the vampires of the world, and Ive called us many such names.
Amel, answer me.
Scent of satin, old wood.
I like seasoned and venerable things, coffins padded for the sleep of the dead.
And the close warm air around me.
Why shouldnt a vampire love such things?
This is my marble vault, my place, my candles.
This is the crypt beneath my castle, my home.
I thought I heard him sigh.
Then you did see it, you did dream it too.
I dont dream when you do!
I am not confined here while you sleep.
I go where I want to go.
Suddenly it was more terrible than I could bear.
He was seeing it.
I knew he was.
And he had seen it when I dreamed of it.
After a while, he gave me the truth.
Id come to know the tone of his secret voice when he admitted the truth.
I dont know what it is, he said.
I dont know what it means.
I dont want to see it.
The next night and the night after he was to say the same thing.
Would we have been better off if we had never discovered the meaning of what we saw?
Would it have mattered?
But then the stars never do, do they?
But the stars never say a word.
He was telling the truth when he said he didnt know.
But the dream had struck a chord of fear in his heart.
In dreams and waking hours he and I were bound as no two others.
I loved him and he loved me.
And the greatest of these is love….
