In canon, Louis did explain to Claudia that sex was, for him, the “pale shadow of killing,” and some other negative things about the experience, but it was probably meant more to try to make her feel better about missing out on it. She would never be able to experience it herself :-
In movie!IWTV, Louis seems to spend his mortal nights getting drunk and hiring cheap prostitutes like have you seen the higher quality ones Lestat hires?! so I would say he’s probably sexing them, I wouldn’t think he’s hiring them for their conversational skills…
I can’t find the same info in book!IWTV, about the prostitutes, but he was getting drunk and passing out in cabarets.
Thanks, dearie! What do you love about it specifically, hmmm? Simply my awesomeness in the VC fandom? You don’t need to answer that, my awesome is unquestionable hehehe…
Armand/Louis: To ship or not to ship?
[by garama bc apparently I’m having a GARAMA APPRECIATION DAY]
I have alot of Armand/Louis feels. The way they view each other seems built on their first impressions of eachother:
Louis saw Armand as the teacher/mentor (and lover??) Lestat could not have been. Armand definitely used some mental persuasion to draw Louis closer, but it seems the attraction was mutual, mostly natural chemistry.
Armand saw Louis as someone who could help him see the world anew, through younger eyes, and someone who was very much in tune with their emotions. Armand had closed off alot of those feelings, and was not very connected to any of the vampires in the Theatre des Vampires. Also he wanted Louis as a lover, but don’t we all? Also, Armand had advised Lestat in TVL that your fledglings will never make perfect companions, what you need is someone else’s fledgling. AND, it’s possible that Armand was even more attracted to Louis after reading his mind and knowing he was Lestat’s, whom Armand had a major unrequited crush on.
So they both sort of filled a void for the other, but couldn’t be together initially, as Louis was devoted to Claudia. Armand’s responsibility for her removal is subject to interpretation, whether it was his order or not, and other things that happened to her, but it seems to me that Armand had intended for Claudia to leave with Madeleine. He admitted to forcing Louis to make Madeleine for this purpose.
Your math sounds about right, but a relationship’s quality is not based on the amount of time it lasts. Louis was probably much happier when he was with Lestat and Claudia for some 65 years. Of the 100 yrs he spent with Armand, much of it seems like Louis was going through the motions, letting Armand have him as a companion in various ways, but not really engaged fully in the relationship.
Lestat does often have to go off on his own adventures and leave Louis alone. There’s a kind of mutual respect between Lestat, Armand, and Louis now, it seems all of their past transgressions to each other are mostly water under the bridge.
TL;DR: Louis does still gravitate to Armand, maybe not as the mentor/teacher he saw him as before, but more as an ex-boyfriend that he is on good terms with, someone he cares about, and who cares about him. Extended family.
That’s my job, yes, I am the Great and Awesome Dealer of the VC fandom ❤ All of my addicts are wonderful customers hehehe 😉
Of course you may! Go right ahead and add translations. It seems like you were doing so already, if this is your page:
Anne Rice Vampire Chronicles México.I knew that people would download and repost things from my blog. That’s why I started adding my url name on some of them, so that people would know the source.
I don’t add my url on things that I worry are too offensive, or on things that I didn’t really add anything to, or make too much of an effort on, like screencaps and production stills 😉
A question only I can answer?! Pffffft, that would be true only if I was Anne Rice herself. Although really she ought to deputize me as one of her fandom spokespeople, my VC obsession has made me such a great resource for the fandom!
1. Does Louis just not care that she put a “fix” on him or does he still not believe her?
In his letter, Louis says that she admitted to bewitching him:
“No talk from Merrick of her potent spells can excuse my actions, though in fact, she does indeed claim to have brought me to her with magic I cannot understand. What I understand is that I love her…” – Louis de Pointe du Lac, Merrick
I think that as he writes this, he feels love for her, but he knows it can’t be real love. He must feel tricked at some level, why else commit suicide right after making a loved one into a vampire? If he really loved her, he would want to stay alive and be with her. I think he’s chosen death because he knows what he did was wrong and rather than just adding another vampire to the world, he’s taking himself out, so there’s no change in the number of vampires ;A;
2. Is that spell still there?
I think Louis is still bewitched as he writes his letter, but it’s probably worn off to some extent in the process of his resuscitation. It has definitely worn off by the time he is himself again, but I think at that point he has to consider Merrick with some natural love, because she is his fledgling and there will always be a bond there. The Dark Gift is probably the most intimate experience a vampire can give/receive.
3. And why does Lestat react so nonchalantly to it, as if it was funny rather than a bad thing? Shouldn’t he be a bit more…I dunno, jealous and pissed?
Lestat has just woken up again, cut him some slack! He’s disoriented! “With an awkward step, as though his body, so long unused, revolted against him, he made his way closer to Merrick,”
Lestat also often goes into a kind of emotional and physical paralysis when such devastating things happen. It happened when he was mortal, too. The humor that follows is also a defense mechanism against feeling the pain of the situation.
He knows that there will be an opportunity much later to get jealous and pissed, but in the immediate aftermath his thoughts are narrowed to the emergency and how to save Louis ;A;
I’m not sure why he insists on sharing his blood with Merrick, though. That seemed to condone her trickery too far for my tastes, but I suppose he did it because he saw that Louis still loved her. Making Merrick more of an equal was a gift to Louis.
Or, perhaps he wanted to drink from her to experience her side of the story, without any of her witchery, and sharing blood with her was an excuse to do that.
garama‘s fanart is a great illustration for this answer bc when you compare these two relationships, there are similarities, but you can see very clearly that there are almost 4 characters here: mortal!Nicki, mortal!Lestat, vampire!Louis, and vampire!Lestat. The 2 pairings physically resemble eachother, but there’s alot of deeper stuff going on that’s described by those poses.
“…but if I did have to choose, the companion would be Louis. My longest most enduring friendship and love affair in this world was with Louis. And though his limitations can be maddening, they can also be as inspiring to me as his virtues… the best choices we make are not always the wise choices. Sometimes they are intensely emotional choices. And I’ve always had a deep Romantic respect for emotion. My love for Louis transcends wisdom. And I may need the pain as much as the consolation that an eternal relationship with Louis would involve.“
I’m inclined to agree with Lestat on that. Lestat would choose Louis over everyone. They have an inexplicable chemistry that binds them hopelessly together.
Do you really want my full opinion? Hit the jump.
Nicolas was Lestat’s first real long-term relationship at a time when Lestat desperately needed love and nurturing and wanted to give it back, too. Nicolas is the first person who really listened to him and they both helped each other immensely.
Lestat was a different person when he was with Nicolas; quite literally! They were mortal lovers, and they were in their early 20s, they went through alot together in escaping from their homeland to Paris, and thrived there. Their relationship was horribly shattered when Lestat was kidnapped from their apartment, and things were never the same between them after that happened. Even aside from that, Nicolas revealed that he had a different mission in life than Lestat did:
“And when we decided to go to Paris, I thought we would starve in Paris, that we would go down and down and down. It was what I wanted, rather than what they wanted, that I, the favored son, should rise for them. I thought we would go down! We were supposed to go down.” – Nicolas de Lenfent, TVL
So even in your Alternate Universe suggestion that Lestat could be with Nicki again, I don’t think that relationship could ever really work, because deep down Nicolas and Lestat always wanted different things out of life.
Lestat was about 31 mortal yrs old when he met Louis, and he had grown and experienced a lot. He was more mature, more in control of his emotions. He saw vampiring as being a great adventure and he saw the potential in Louis to be the companion he always wanted. He was right. Louis has been one of the strongest vampires in the coven, without needing to display it in physical feats of strength, but in emotional ones, and in the choices he’s made.
I-want-my-IWTV 