David Talbot is the former Superior General of the secret organization the Talamasca, which researches and investigates the supernatural, and was a telepath as a human. Introduced as an old British man, he is transformed into a vampire in the body of a younger Anglo-Indian man, where he was left after the events of The Tale of the Body Thief. As a vampire, David collects the stories of other vampires, and is the transcriber or collector of multiple books in The Vampire Chronicles. Mostly known as a wise and patient scholar, having lived a much longer human life than most of his vampire peers, this is in contrast to the the truth that, prior to becoming a vampire, David was already, in more than one sense, a predator.
Description[]
When David is first introduced in The Queen of the Damned, he is described as having a heavy frame, black eyes, and iron gray hair. He is energetic with a kind, lined face as an elderly man.
In The Tale of the Body Thief, David becomes a vampire in the body originally stolen by Raglan James. He has thick wavy dark brown hair, dark eyes, and dark golden skin. His face is that of a twenty-six year old, with a square jaw and large eyes, and noted as very attractive.
Personality[]
David is even tempered and level headed, having spent many years in the leadership of the Talamasca. He sought risky experiences as a younger man, first as a big game hunter and then with the supernatural, before dedicating his life to the Talamasca to sate his curiosity in a less dangerous way. Having lived to seventy four before becoming a vampire, he is an example of a vampire who has a more stable outlook on the world, having spent significantly more time as a human than most of his peers. Wise and patient, he serves as a mentor to Lestat, and manages to collect stories from Pandora and Armand.
Biography[]
Mortal Life[]
David Talbot was born to a wealthy British family, and spent his youth in India. As a young man he hunted for sport, killed a tiger at an early age in India, and also traveled to Africa on hunting expeditions. After World War Two, he arranged a hunting expedition to the Amazon in Brazil, and met and had a love affair with a boy named Carlos. When David brought Carlos with him on his expedition into the Jungle, Carlos's mother, a Candomble priestess, sent spirits to torment him. The spirits followed David back to England, and his mother called on the Talamasca, who helped him ward them off. Returning to Brazil, David begged Carlos's mother to teach him her power, and he learned from her for a year, honing his telepathic powers. After returning to England, David joined the Talamasca. At some point prior to being appointed Superior General, David had a brief sexual relationship with an eighteen year old member of the Talamasca named Joshua when he was significantly older. Joshua died in a mountain climbing accident, and David confessed the relationship to the Talamasca Elders. David was eventually named the Talamasca Superior General.
In the mid to late 1970's, David is summoned to the Talamasca Motherhouse in Louisiana by his colleague Aaron Lightner to meet a fourteen year old witch named Merrick Mayfair. When Merrick's grandmother dies, David and Aaron pose as her uncles, and take her to be raised by the Talamasca. David develops an attraction towards Merrick, but attempts to repress it as Merrick grows up, aware of the immorality of his own attraction to teenagers. Merrick grows up attending boarding school, traveling the world with David on school breaks, and attends Oxford, where she visits David on weekends. When David is seventy and Merrick is twenty-four, she asks him to come with her to attempt to rediscover a remote cave in the jungles in Guatemala she is haunted by memories of being taken to as a child. In a tent prior to visiting the cave, David and Merrick have sex. Finding the cave, he helps Merrick retrieve a Jade Mask, and becomes profoundly ill from his contact with the spirits who attempt to protect it.
David is first introduced to the reader in the 1980's in The Queen of the Damned, when he reveals to Jesse Reeves that the novel Interview with the Vampire is based on true events by showing her Talamasca held artifacts that prove the existence of Armand. He assigns her to investigate the events of the book in New Orleans. After the death of Akasha, Lestat de Lioncourt and Louis de Pointe du Lac visit David at the Motherhouse in England, where Lestat taunts David, offering to turn him into a vampire, which David soundly refuses.
By The Tale of the Body Thief, he and Lestat have become friends. After Lestat fails to end his immortal life by exposing himself to the sun in the Gobi Desert, he goes to David's home to recuperate. When Raglan James offers to switch bodies with Lestat, Lestat seeks advice from David on whether to accept the offer, though he ultimately ignores David's warning not to trust Raglan. The body switching, as warned, results in disaster for Lestat when Raglan does not return to switch back. David agrees to help Lestat regain his body when others such as Louis and Marius refuse, and Lestat repeatedly attempts to sleep with David, which David politely turns down. David goes with Lestat on the Queen Elizabeth 2 cruise ship to attempt to force Raglan out of Lestat's body, and coordinates with the Talamasca for the logistics and equipment required.
When Raglan is forced out of Lestat's body, he enters David's body, forcing David into the young Anglo-Indian body Raglan stole to switch with Lestat. Raglan, posing as David, tries to trick Lestat into making his elderly body into a vampire. As Lestat is about to give Raglan the Dark Gift, he discovers Raglan's deception and crushes his skull, killing Raglan's consciousness and David's body. Later, Lestat finds David in Barbados happily living in the young body Raglan stole, his faked death and the transfer of his own inheritance to his new body having been facilitated by the Talamasca. Lestat forcibly gives David the Dark Gift, making him a vampire against his will. Shortly after, David chooses to forgive Lestat, and travels with him and Louis to Rio.
Life as a Vampire[]
David Talbot as a vampire, from The Tale of the Body Thief, graphic novel published by Sicilian Dragon Publishing, art by Daerick Gross
In Memnoch the Devil, David is Lestat's confidant when he is given Memnoch's offer, and is left to watch Dora in New York with Armand while Lestat travels with Memnoch. When Lestat is catatonic after his return, David returns to New Orleans to keep watch over him. He meets Pandora in Paris and asks her to write an account of her life, which becomes the book Pandora. Some time later, after seeing Armand alive after his apparent death, he makes a similar request and records the story of his life in The Vampire Armand.
In Merrick, David reaches out to Merrick to ask her to to help Louis, who he has been living with at Rue Royale, to contact the ghost of Claudia. He reveals the history of their relationship to Louis, and is present when Claudia's ghost is summoned. At the end of the book, it is revealed that Merrick has been using magic to bring both David and Louis to her so she could attain eternal life. The plan works, and Louis gives her the blood and makes her immortal. After making Merrick his fledgling, Louis tries to commit suicide by placing his coffin in the open where he would be burned to death when the sun rose. He nearly succeeds, but his vampiric body is strong enough to survive, and David, Merrick, and Lestat find him and give him their blood to heal his burned form. Their combined blood makes Louis stronger than he was before. The four form a coven in New Orleans, but the Talamasca, enraged that three of their members had taken the blood, threaten the vampires and demand that Merrick and David be returned to them. Lestat wants to retaliate against the Talamasca, but David talks him out of doing anything rash, and the four leave their home in the Rue Royale.
David parts ways with Lestat at some point prior to Blackwood Farm. In the Prince Lestat trilogy of books, David is mostly seen in the company of Jesse Reeves, first working with her to investigate odd goings on in the Talamasca, and then traveling with her to recover the materials left at Maharet's compound.