Viaticum for the Marquise

In my dreams, I hold her still,
Angel, lover, Mother.
And in my dreams, I kiss her lips,
Mistress, Muse, Daughter.

She Gave me life
I gave her death
My beautiful Marquise.

And on the Devil's Road we walked
Two orphans then together.

And does she hear my hymns tonight
of Kings and Queens and Ancient truths?
Of broken vows and sorrow?

Or does she climb some distant path
where rhyme and song can't find her?

Come back to me, my Gabrielle
My Beautiful Marquise.
The castle's ruined on the hill
The village lost beneath the snow
But you are mine forever.

The Queen of the Damned ~ Anne Rice

Gabrielle ~ Dany & Dany ©2000

"I want you to go to Paris, Lestat," she said. "I want you to take this money, which is all I have left from my family. I want to know you're in Paris, Lestat, when my time comes. I want to die knowing you are in Paris."

~

"Do you want to come with me now?
DO YOU WANT TO COME WITH ME INTO THIS NOW?

I hide nothing from you, not my ignorance, not my fear, not the simple terror that if I try I might fail. I do not even know if it is mine to give more than once, or what is the price of giving it, but I will risk this for you, and we will discover it together, whatever the mystery and the terror, just as I've discovered alone all else."

The Vampire Lestat ~ Anne Rice

Lestat's mortal mother and first vampire companion. She is named for an archangel and a messenger of God, who announced the birth of Christ and will also announce the Day of Judgement.

Gabrielle is a marquise, the wife of a blind and indigent lord in the Auvergne. Originally from Naples, she has eight children, but only three - all sons - survive to adulthood. Blond, with cobalt blue eyes, she keeps mostly to herself, reading books. She does not like to be touched or to communicate with words. She never voices ordinary thoughts and, when she does talk, can be blunt to the point of cruelty. She hates to be called "Mother" and exhibits no sense of humour. Her dream is to detach herself from her family and take lovers of all kinds to her bed. She wants to be purely herself, belonging to no one.

There is a bond between Gabrielle and Lestat, her youngest son, because they are alike in their hatred of castle life and their family's attitudes. They are two parts of the same soul, and Gabrielle tells Lestat that he is the male part of her, the organ she does not possess. She intervenes for Lestat when she can and uses her own gold and jewels to obtain things for him, like a pair of mastiffs, a riding horse, and a trip to Paris.

Gabrielle has consumption, a fatal disease, and urges Lestat to leave for Paris before she dies. After he becomes a vampire, Gabrielle comes to Paris and Lestat visits her. Gabrielle realises that he is "not alive," and when he offers existence as a vampire to her, she takes it without hesitation. Their union as they engage in the transformation is highly erotic.

"She was the best person around for Lestat," says Rice. "It took a great act of maturity for him to realise that this was the person he wanted, even thought she was his mother. He treated her as an equal."

As a vampire, Gabrielle quickly discards her mortal ways and female garb; she wants to be free of all female entrapments. Instead, she dresses as a young man and chooses for herself the sarcophagus of a man, rather than one carved for a woman. She tries to cut her hair and when it grows back to its natural length, is greatly upset.

(Lestat & Gabrielle)
The Vampire Lestat
~ Innovation Books ©1990

Gabrielle claims that she would be happy if nature totally overran the world of men. In this desire, she prefigures Akasha. In fact, Gabrielle even predicts that some dark monarch may arise and attempt to sow chaos in the mortal world. She tries - and fails - to get Lestat to go with her to the jungles of Africa, to live in her world, with her vision. His continuing attachment to mortals irritates her, so she leaves him.

The character shows up again near the end of VL; she is the limousine driver who takes Lesat away from his chaotic rock concert to a retreat in Carmel Valley. Their reunion is happy but short-lived, for Akasha abducts him that same night. Gabrielle then joins with other vampires in planning a stand against the vampire queen that could be potentially fatal for them all.

Savage Garden

Another name for nature, it is what Lestat and Gabrielle call a world that would embrace exquisite monsters like vampires. For Lestat, nature itself is savage and ultimately its laws are based on asthetic principles. He sees that in modern times, ethical truth is embedded in the physical. No one is safe from nature's savagery, not even the innocent. Only beauty is consistent. Gabrielle envisions a time when the Savage Garden will overtake civilizations and destroy it.

When Akasha takes Lestat on her rampage, she reminds him of what he believes about the Savage Garden and aesthetics. Death, she says, is everywhere in nature, but her new Eden will be a paradise, better than nature because it will redeem amorality. The survival of the vampires is the beauty out of which all other beauties will be born.

Lestat thinks that the final triumph of the Savage Garden is found in the South American rain forests. These forests contain the endless struggle of animal survival - hunger and satiation are fulfilled only through violent death. However, David Talbot points out that the botanical gardens in Barbados are full of "mad, savage" flowers that are also soft, tame, and safe. His perception reveals his more peaceful nature.

Armand uses the concept of the Savage Garden to explain his attraction to Lestat: "You walk as if it is your garden to do with as you please. And in my wanderings, I always return to you."

Lestat tries to determine how God and Memnoch fit this concept of ruthlessness, beauty, and indifference to suffering. The garden in which he walks just outside of Heaven seems peaceful and perfect. Memnoch tells him, however, that his concept exactly describes God's plan for the world: "Your Savage Garden, Lestat, is His version of Perfection. It evolved from the same seed." As Memnoch explains the story of Creation, Lestat begins to understand how beauty and brutality coexist, although he does not want to accept this as originating with the God of light he has seen.

The Vampire Companion ~ Katherine Ramsland