† The Brat Queen †

DISCLAIMER: The following stories are all non-profit, amateur efforts not intended to infringe on the rights of Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, David Geffen, Warner Brothers, Geffen Pictures, Knopf, Randomhouse, the city of New Orleans, the U.S. Constitution, any copyright holders that I might not have thought of or even a certain author who shall remain nameless but who has a set of initials which are, coincidentally enough, just one letter off from spelling "B.S."

All Hallow's Eve
by The Brat Queen
September, 2000

Winner - Best Minor Character and Best Romance! Second Place - Best Challenge! (2000)

Spoilers: TVL
Characters: Nicki, Lestat
Rated: R for language and sexual situations

Summary: Nicki and Lestat spend All Hallow's Eve together.

"Take me home!"

Nicolas perked up at the sound. He looked around. No one else was responding but he was certain he'd heard the speaker.

"Home. Now. Please." Nicolas looked around and saw who it was at last. Lestat. The Marquis' youngest son. He was clutching his nurse's hand and crying. His face was bright red and wet from tears.

"Hush, Lestat," his nurse said, attempting to cover his mouth to quiet him as the village priest continued speaking and telling them about the Witches Place.

"Take me home Now!" Lestat responded, breaking away. Nicolas winced at the shrillness of Lestat's voice. "This is evil! Take me home!"

"Monstrous brat," the nurse muttered, grabbing Lestat by the hand again and jerking him away. "Forgive us, Father," she said to the priest. "You know he never behaves."

Nicolas did not hear whatever the priest said in return. He didn't care. He found it far more interesting to watch Lestat.

"Evil," Lestat whispered one more time, shaking his head and pressing his free hand into his mouth. "Evil."

Nicolas then watched as the nurse grabbed Lestat roughly once more and pulled him away.

On Nicolas's face was a curious smile.

"You're snoring."

"I don't snore, Nic."

"Like Hell you don't. The noise from your lips could easily wake the dead, Lestat, and quite possibly has. I think I just saw my grandmother."

"Tell her I said hello."

"I'll do no such thing. She was a nasty old witch and I never liked her. If you wish to waste time speaking to her go right ahead. Ask her what eternal damnation is like."

"Something like listening to you prattle on, I'd imagine," Lestat replied. He stretched his long body out in the autumn sunlight. The outlines of his muscles pressed against his rough, homespun clothes.

"So the Marquis' son is to bring me the gift of his cleverness today, is that it?" Nicolas asked. He watched Lestat under half-lidded eyes. Through the veil of his dark brown lashes Lestat's hair blurred into a pool of gold.

"Nonsense," Lestat said. He reached out a lazy hand to pick up a wineglass and took a long sip. "I am never clever around you. You make me stupefied and tongue-tied."

"I can never tell when you are being sarcastic," Nicolas said, not sure what Lestat's response made him feel. He decided not to concern himself with it and returned to his book.

"What are you reading?"

"A book. It's a thing with words in it. You would understand that if you ever bothered to learn how to read something besides your own name."

"You're in a hideous mood, Nic," Lestat said. He pulled himself up to rest on his elbow. "Don't be."

Nicolas could not help a small, inner smile at Lestat's concept of a simple solution. He put the book aside and leaned over to pull a dead leaf from Lestat's hair. "So what is it to be, then? What shall we do on this evening that makes you happy?"

"I don't know," Lestat said. He sat up properly and took a loaf of bread out of the basket they had brought with them. He tore off a ragged piece and brought it to his lips, nibbling thoughtfully. "Something, perhaps. Something special. Magical."

Nicolas let himself watch Lestat's mouth for a moment before he responded. "Getting into the mood of things, are you?"

Lestat paused, mid-chew. "Mood?"

"Of the day," Nicolas said. He waved a languid hand in the direction of the village center. "We could always join in the festivities."

There was another pause as Lestat followed the direction of Nicki's hand. The grey eyes clouded, then cleared as realization dawned. "Oh yes. It is that time, isn't it?"

"You've had enough," Nicolas said, pulling Lestat's wine glass away from him and finishing off the rest of it himself. "And yes, Lestat, it is All Hallow's Eve. Everyone in the village is readying the annual bonfire and sacrificial lamb to ensure that the crops sleep well and our latest priest doesn't. I can't imagine why we shouldn't join them."

"You hate such things," Lestat said. He shivered, as though cold, and looked away. "I hate such things."

"Yes, I know. Death and destruction."

"Quiet." It was one of the few times when Lestat's voice was firm with him, and because of that Nicolas obeyed. He snuck another look into Lestat's eyes, though, and saw a flash of familiar darkness within. In a moment of uncharacteristic softness, he decided to stop the emotion before it started.

"Come," he said. He took Lestat's hand in his and drew him closer, threading his long fingers through Lestat's calloused ones. "Let us celebrate the night together then. What shall we do? Eat? Drink? Make merry? Scandalize the village elders?"

"Will you play for me later?" Lestat asked, surprising Nicolas not at all. "A beautiful song. One of your songs, in honor of the night."

"If the Marquis' son wishes it," Nicolas said. He kissed Lestat's inner wrist and secretly wished that such bouts of melancholia did not plague Lestat so. "But first we enjoy the night. Tell me, Lestat, how?"

"Have I ever enjoyed this night?" Lestat asked, leaning against Nicolas in a manner that let him know that his lover was well and truly on his way to being drunk. Nicolas finished off his own glass of wine in an effort to join him.

"I'm sure you have, Lestat. Your soul makes it impossible for you to be completely miserable about anything."

This earned him a bark of laughter, which was as close as Lestat ever came to cynicism. "Oh you're wrong, Nic. I can be completely miserable about anything. Everything. That's the horror of it all."

"No, the horror is that you're convinced that such things matter," Nicolas said, knowing that Lestat would dispute him. "When the truth of it all is that they do not. The world does not care what you think about happiness, or misery, or goodness, or evil, or anything. Only you do."

"But that's part of our very souls!" Lestat protested. The faintest of slurs to his voice told Nicolas that argument was useless. Much though watching Lestat's eyes catch fire with inebriated emotion was, in its own way, pleasing.

Nicolas sat up, pressing his lips to Lestat's to quiet all further debate. "Nonsense," he said. He put his arm around Lestat and held him closer. "Let's not talk of these things. They're foolish." Before Lestat could protest Nicolas kissed him again. And with a sigh Lestat quieted. Their lips met, parted, and moved easily, each one taking the taste of the other in. Nicolas could not help but feel enjoyment at it, remembering the first time he had kissed Lestat when the latter, in fact, had been attempting to quiet him. Nicolas had been surprised, halfway certain that Lestat hadn't had it in him to take a male lover before or, for that matter, ever.

The Marquis' son had proven him quite wrong on both counts.

A fit of drunken sentimentality struck Nicolas's own brain as he caressed Lestat's chest. "Always the fighter, Lestat. You can never sit still. Never accept. You wouldn't be happy if things were easy or plain."

"I could," Lestat said. His voice was soft, breathless. He had turned in Nicolas's embrace and was now pressing him towards the ground. "I desire such things."

"You would be miserable without a challenge," Nicki replied. Drunk as they both were, he felt his body respond, and the hardness of Lestat's reaction in turn. "Miserable and bored. Why else choose me then?"

Lestat laughed. If he closed his eyes, Nicolas felt he could almost see the sound. "You are not easy, Nicki, no." Ever direct, Lestat's hand found its way to the crotch of Nicki's grass-stained pants. "But there is goodness here, isn't there? Isn't this a form of pleasure? Of beauty?"

It was Nicolas's turn to laugh, then. Throwing his head back and laughing in a way that he knew Lestat would take no offense from. "No," Nicolas said. "No. I refuse. Not even you will bring Our Conversation into this, Lestat. I will not confuse the basic enjoyment of fucking - ah… - with your philosophy."

Lestat's eyes were glittering in the fading light. Nicolas moved beneath him, pressing against him in a manner that he knew would distract him. He was rewarded by the flicker of expressions on Lestat's face as lust won out over intelligence.

"But yes," Nicolas said as clothes were moved aside and their bodies came together, "this is a form of pleasure, Lestat. And - " he paused, drinking in the sight of Lestat's flushed and ready body, "of beauty."

"Perhaps that's all we need, then," Lestat whispered. His nails dug gouges into Nicki's arms as desire and instinct overcame him.

"Perhaps," Nicolas responded. He moved forward, took Lestat's mouth once more, and ended all further words with a long, shattering kiss.

"How shall we finish the night, then?"

Nicolas moved easily under the makeshift blanket they had created for themselves. Lestat's body was warm against his. Almost comfortable.

"However you wish."

"Will you play for me?"

Still feeling the aftereffects of their exertion and of their wine, Nicolas felt no irritation at Lestat's request. "Yes. If that is what you want."

"I do," Lestat said.

"When? Do you want me to play right now?"

"No," Lestat said. He was quiet for a time, then continued. "In a little while. I want to get up. I want to walk around. I want us to spend the rest of the night at the Witches Place."

Nicolas felt himself grow silent. A spark of memory flared inside of his mind. A protective urge filled him that he wished did not exist.

"Will you play for me there, Nicki?"

In the still-drunken state he was in, Nicolas thought he could almost see Lestat as he was. As the child he had been. But the question still sounded the same.

"Yes, Lestat," Nicolas replied. He let his hand stroke down Lestat's leg and kissed his hair in a manner to indicate that there was no doubt in all of this, no question about the wisdom of the plan, that it could be little else but a light amusement. "I will. I will play a song that even you shall enjoy and dare not weep to."

Lestat said nothing, choosing to respond instead with a kiss. Nicolas returned it, then poured them both another glass of wine.

He made a plan to get them more bottles before the evening continued.

-Fin-

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