" 'Only the mortal part of you will die,' said the one who had spoken to me all along.

'Bad luck' I said. 'Since that's about all there is to me.'

'No, he said. 'Your form will remain and it will become glorified. You will see. Don't fear. And besides, there is nothing you can do to change these things. Until the feast of Samhain, you will let your hair grow long, and you will learn our tongue, and our hymns and our laws. We will care for you. My name is Mael, and I myself will teach you.' "

~

"I could tell you how Mael, my poor Druid priest, finally drank from a wounded god himself and in one instant lost all his belief in the old religion, going on to become as enduring and dangerous a rogue immortal as any of us"

The Vampire Lestat ~ Anne Rice

A tall, blond blue-eyed Druid priest with a hawk nose who teaches Marius the customs, laws, and poetry of the Druids so that he can become an appropriate god for them. Mael also explains to Marius what will happen to him when he is transformed into a vampire. After Marius flees the Druids, Mael drinks from a vampire himself and goes through the transformation. He soon loses his belief in his Druidic religion and becomes one of the wandering rogue vampires.

Later he visits Marius in Venice and sees Armand, the mortal boy who Marius intends to turn into a vampire.

Mael shows up more prominently in QD, in the company of Maharet. He is protective of Jesse, who he knows to be descended from Maharet: he fears the fragility of her mortality and believes she should be made a vampire. One night he even attempts to bite Jesse, but Maharet intervenes and sends Jesse away. Mael appears to Jesse once in London, as if he is looking after her from afar, but avoids her when she approaches him. He goes to Lestat's rock concert to watch over her and there encounters Khayman, who frightens him. Khayman advises him to cloak his thoughts of Maharet and Jesse or he will expose their presence to Akasha. Mael's love for Jesse weakens him because it distracts him from protecting himself from Akasha's vengeance.

Of Mael, Khayman decides that he is a quarrelsome, angry vampire whose mind does not make sophisticated distinctions, and that he both fears and loves Maharet.

When Jesse's neck is broken at the concert, Mael goes to the hospital and gives her his healing blood. He wants to make her a vampire himself, but Maharet arrives to initiate and perform the transformation.

Mael is also one of the vampires who survives Akasha's attack and joins with Maharet to stand against her.

When Dora displays Veronica's veil as evidence of God's miraculous manifestation as Christ, Mael arrives in Manhattan to see it for himself. To affirm this miracle, Armand had already destroyed himself in the sun on the first day it was displayed. Mael does likewise. On the steps of St Patrick's Cathedral, in front of the media, he lets the sun take him. Lestat dismisses this as the act of a priest who cannot let go of his need for such beliefs.

The Vampire Companion ~ Katherine Ramsland