So he had meant it, what he'd said in New Orleans. Lestat, intending to tour. To put himself on a stage, take music to crowds of people. Louis spares a moment to wonder what it will sound like now. It has been so many years since the days when they would sit together in the parlor, Lestat at his piano and Louis with a book. (And Claudia, sometimes playing a duet, sometimes painting, sometimes writing—) What has Lestat's music become, in all the passing decades?

A hum of acknowledgement, some passing understanding of the limitations of capital where the arts are concerned. Louis, who has amassed a disgusting fortune in the buying and selling of artwork, is more than aware of how useless all that money is when it comes to the production of it. All the money in the world has not made Louis into an artist.

"Will you begin as we travel?" Louis asks. "Or will you take the time after?"

A tricky question. How careful they have all been, when it comes to discussing the future. The past is a wound, to be handled delicately. But the future, the future is a void. Only the immediate present is easily dealt with, and even then, there are pitfalls. The acquisition of blood. The book, hanging overhead.

But those things are less painful to touch than what came before and what may yet come.