“Armand, take hold of yourself. You cannot surrender to this,” he said. His voice was sad. But Armand was lost. “Why?” Armand asked. He was just a child now on his knees. “Why?” This is how he must have looked centuries ago when Marius had come to free him from his Venetian captors, a boy kept for lust, a boy brought into the palace of the Undead. “Why can’t I believe it? Oh, my God, I do believe it. It is the face of Christ!”
