'Aren't you tired?'

Come, child. Lay your head down. Armand's body is ravaged further but he continues to cling, like smoke, like vines, like quicksand. A tar pit seeping its black ichor into Lestat's wounds and pores. It has already been long centuries, and he has spent so much of that time running away and crying and hiding beneath the earth or in the swamp and crying more. Always a production, with Lestat de Lioncourt. Isn't he tired? Wouldn't he like to rest?

The sun will be warm, and comforting. He can be a cat curled up in a slice of soothing yellow. It is so close, a cracked egg waiting to be pulled apart and show the golden interior.

Honey and softness and comfort. Armand blankets it onto him. The seams show through, his emptiness, bitterness, despair. But it's still like fly paper.

'Rest. I'll hold you.'

Rest. (Rest.) Rest.

Rest, every time he's told a mortal to stay in place indefinitely. Rest, every time he's had to shove a coven member into behaving. Rest, when he kept Daniel captive. Rest, when he rewired Louis' mind.