[His chest clenches at that, and for a moment he leans into Louis' shoulder, fighting back the rising swell of memories. Lestat remembers that first night with Claudia, remembers saying the words 'Who was it that she takes after?'. He'd said them almost out of pique, after a long evening of fraught emotions, but time seemed to have borne them out as truth.
As for Louis finding that frustrating, well. That didn't surprise him, not really, not given how it had all come to be in the first place. Not when Louis still clung so tightly to humanity while Claudia embraced her new life with abandon, not when Claudia was brought to them in the afterglow of one of their worst arguments.
After a moment, Lestat murmurs:]
She inherited the pieces that best helped her survive, I'd like to think. She took to the gift and thrived. And she did what she needed to be strong through all of it.
[It had been for the best that she took from him the will to keep going, the ability to endure and overcome. Not his temper or vanities or wild swings of emotion, just the aspects that would help her in her afterlife. At least, he'd like to think those came from him.]
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As for Louis finding that frustrating, well. That didn't surprise him, not really, not given how it had all come to be in the first place. Not when Louis still clung so tightly to humanity while Claudia embraced her new life with abandon, not when Claudia was brought to them in the afterglow of one of their worst arguments.
After a moment, Lestat murmurs:]
She inherited the pieces that best helped her survive, I'd like to think. She took to the gift and thrived. And she did what she needed to be strong through all of it.
[It had been for the best that she took from him the will to keep going, the ability to endure and overcome. Not his temper or vanities or wild swings of emotion, just the aspects that would help her in her afterlife. At least, he'd like to think those came from him.]