Diaries of the Family Dracul - The Covenant with the Vampire Part 17

His voice was musical, soothing, pleasing to the ear, and soon I calmed. Despite his urging, I fell after several moments into a sound slumber. How long I slept I do not know; but I was awakened some time later when the corridor lit up with the distant, yellow glow of a lantern, and footsteps echoed in the tomb's entrance-followed by a lupine snarl, and a man's horrified screams.

I clambered groggily to my feet, and groped in the shadows for the revolver, found it on the cold floor, then ran towards the commotion.

Just inside the open entrance to the antechamber, the lantern lay on its side, and the oil had spilled out in a puddle on the marble and ignited. I watched by the light of that small blaze as a large grey wolf pushed its muzzle past flailing arms, sank its teeth into the throat of a man, and shook him as a terrier might a rat.

I raised the gun, ready to fire-but the rapid movement, combined with my exhaustion and the laudanum's effects, blurred the distinction between victim and attacker. I cried out in frustration, unable to aim, afraid to fire, lest I instead kill the human.

The victim let go a gurgling, gagging cough; his arms fell back limp against the marble as the wolf bent lower, sinking its teeth more deeply into flesh and muscle and bone before giving another, more thorough shake, then lifting its prey more than a foot off the ground.The wolf let go, satisfied its job was done, and observed its handiwork. The man fell back, his skull striking the marble with an ugly crack, the impact spattering fat drops of blood on the white walls and floor.

I gasped as I recognised the old gardener, Ion. His white moustache was soaked with blood, his dark eyes wide with terror, his mouth slack and bubbling with the same crimson foam that welled up from his exposed windpipe.

With bright, deadly golden eyes, the animal looked up at me and emitted a low growl.

I raised the revolver to shoot. To my surprise, the animal turned, and, rather than attack, bounded out of the tomb and into the night. I did not pursue, but instead knelt beside poor Ion, who was already dead. Only then did I notice on the floor beside him a cloth bag, stained with blood.

I opened it, and found within the mallet, the saw, the stake, the garlic. The sight filled me with wild, mindless hatred; I could not forgive Ion for the act. Driven by overwhelming compulsion, I took the bag and its contents over to the place on the floor where the oil had spilled, and fed it to the flames, slowly, coaxing them to consume as much as possible. The metal saw remained intact, and the mallet's handle was only slightly blackened, but the garlic ascended to heaven like the most pungent incense, with copious, eye-stinging smoke.

I took pleasure in seeing the stake charred and broken into small pieces.

By then all the oil was consumed and the fire went out, leaving me in hazy darkness. I slipped the revolver into my waistband and rose, dizzied by smoke and opium, and stumbled back towards the inner chamber.

As I entered the narrow corridor, I spied at its other end a fleeting flash of white, and hesitated, at first fearful; but the flash had been gently radiant, like feeble candleglow, before disappearing. This was no wolf, but a person carrying a failing lamp-Mary, I decided, who had returned and somehow slipped into the inner chamber without my notice.

I called her name.

And heard, echoing within the second chamber, a soft sigh, almost a groan, a sound that was at once human, feminine, yet strangely feral. And with that sound -I do not understand how or why, but with that sound...

All confusion, all doubt fell away. There was still fear, yes, deeper and greater than ever before, and grief. I an only compare my mental experience to that of a man who, ignorant of the fact he has been blind for decades, suddenly regains his sight. The shackles of control fell away, the invisible claws that clutched my skull withdrew. For the first time since childhood, my mind was truly my own.

The light grew as Zsuzsa stepped into the outer chamber.

G.o.ds! she was lovely, as radiant as an angel. It was her pale, s.h.i.+ning skin that had glimmered in the corridor, and I saw it in the darkness as clearly as if she had been surrounded by a thousand burning candles-nay, that seemed to blaze bright within her!

Impossible for any man not to be drawn like a moth to that inner flame, to those full, red satin lips, to those gleaming teeth. To those eyes, whose gentle dark brown colour had not changed, but which now seemed burnished with gold; blank, wild eyes which looked upon me and did not know me. Her hair had become l.u.s.trous and black, asparkle with glints of electric blue. That hair fell unfettered and soft to her waist, over a body whose shape showed clearly beneath the diaphanous grave cerements: a body newly perfect and full and womanly.

All this I perceived in the s.p.a.ce of a second, no more. For that brief time, I felt an urge to step forward, to embrace her, to kiss those crimson lips, to weep with joy at her resurrection; but my mind was free, and my thoughts clear. My elation turned quickly to horror as I understood with blinding conviction the truth about V., about my poor dead sister.

Dear G.o.d, I only thought I knew fear. But what I have experienced of it in my past is like a tiny crystalline pond compared to the storm-dark, turbulent ocean that surrounds me now.

I turned and ran; ran as though the Devil Himself pursued, across the uneven slope towards the manor, my mind swirling with revelations: That my uncle was indeed the strigoi of legend. That I had been controlled, led step by step by V., masquerading as my brother's ghost; that he had controlled the behaviour of the wolves, who were meant to kill other prying souls who went into forbidden areas of the forest -but not to harm me. That he had stopped the wolves in time... in order to lead me to the conclusion of my own madness.

He toys with you... It is all a game.

All a s.a.d.i.s.tic game to lead me to the forest, then to Bistritz, then to the verge of insanity...

but for what purpose? For this one night, when I was but a p.a.w.n to protect Zsuzsa? To break my will, that I might cooperate in murder? In the procurement of victims?

But V. needs no one's help; could it be that he torments me for the sheer simple pleasure of it? No. It must be something more; he is too shrewd, too calculating. But if'so-why now has control of my own mind, my thoughts and emotion and volition, been returned to me?

I ran straight to the stables and there harnessed the horses to the caleche, intending to fetch Mary immediately and flee with her into the night. Yet before I could climb into the carriage and drive it round to the front of the manor, I heard a sudden shriek: "Domnule! Domnule!"

The little chambermaid, Dunya, dashed towards me out of the darkness, gesticulating wildly; her scarf had come loose and slipped down upon her hair, and her face was red and s.h.i.+ning with tears. "Domnule, hurry!" she cried, sobbing and gasping for breath such that she could scarcely get the words out. "The child is about to be born, and he has taken her!

He has taken her!"

My heart froze; I knew at once of whom she spoke, yet I grabbed her shoulders and shook them. "Who? Mary? Has someone taken Mary?"

"Vlad!" she replied.

"Where?"

"The castle..."

I swung up into the caleche and took the reins; beside me, Dunya wrung her hands, crying out pitifully, "Do not leave me! Please, let me come!"

"It is safer for you here," I said, and urged the horses on; but she managed to catch hold of the moving carriage and climbed up, saying, with a determination that touched me: "She is my mistress; I cannot desert her! The baby is coming and she will need me."

So I headed for the castle equipped with nothing more than a lantern, Father's revolver, and the chambermaid.As we drew near to those grey stone walls, they appeared especially forbidding and forlorn; at first I a.s.sumed it was my state of mind that made them so. Then I realised, as I stared at the great ancient battlements rising dark against the darker sky, that not a single window shone with light.

I pulled the caleche into the courtyard and handed the reins to Dunya. "Remain here. If I do not return with Mary within a quarter-hour, take yourself to safety."

Fright had made her eyes great as saucers, yet she replied stoutly: "I will stay here until you return with the doamna. "I tried to leave the lantern with her as well, but she insisted I carry it; and so, with lamp in hand, I tried to push open the great front door, which had been bolted shut. I therefore went round to the small entrance on the castle's eastern side, which I knew of only because I had seen the servants make use of it. With my free hand I drew the revolver, and made my way through the narrow corridors and up the winding front staircase toward the guest wing.

I strained to hear the sounds of a woman groaning in childbirth but the castle was bereft of light or sound as a tomb, save for the wavering yellow glow cast by the lamp and the ring of my hurried footsteps. Yet I could not shake the notion that in the shadows lurked an evil, watchful intelligence, cognizant of my every move. I dashed from room to room, floor to floor, faster, faster, calling out softly at first and then, in desperation, shouting Mary's name.

Silence; only silence, and gloomy bedchambers centuries unused and veiled in dust.

My pace and agitation increased until at last only two rooms remained unsearched: the guest quarters, and V."s private chambers. The direction of my search caused me to arrive at the guest quarters, my best hope, first. The door where earlier a tousled, damp Herr Mueller and I had spoken stood wide open, and the rooms beyond were as dark as the rest of the building.

My sister's death and my terror for Mary's sake had caused me to totally forget the poor visitors for three days; I remembered them now with a thrill of dread. Raising the lantern, I moved through the outer salon into the bedroom, this time calling both Mary's name and the Muellers".

To my bitter disappointment, this chamber also was deserted, though the signs of the most recent inhabitants were all too evident: a woman's fine white lace-and-silk nightgown, of the elaborate sort worn by brides on their wedding night, dangled from the edge of a nearby chair, where it had been tossed with joyful abandon; and upon the great canopied bed, in the centre of which I spied a tiny flower of dried blood, sheets and pillows and coverlet had been flung back and twisted into careless, rumpled piles.

Only one of the half-dozen pillows remained in its place, at the far left corner against the headboard. Propped against the solitary pillow, as though she had been placed there with utmost care to watch the proceedings, sat a child's doll in a lace christening gown, with hands and face of china and a body of rag. She had slumped forward from the waist, her face pressed against the sheets, her limp, lace-ruffled arms flung forward so that her intricately posed little hands rested beside lacquered brunette curls.

In the far corner of the room was a bath-tub filled with grey water. Near the bed a trunk sat opened and riffled through, as though the owners had retrieved items of clothing; but there were so many belongings scattered around the room that they more than accounted for the entire volume of luggage which might have been crammed into the trunk. It seemed that for once, at least, the servants had not made off with whatever booty was to be had.

The lamp revealed no clues as to what had become of the young couple, and so I left the guest quarters with a sense of foreboding and fatalism. I could think only of V."s secret chambers; I knew the answer to my wife's fate, and that of the travelers', waited there.

I made my way through night-shrouded corridors to Uncle's rooms, and the nearer I drew, the more my dread increased.

I arrived to discover the door to V."s sitting-room open and the hearth and tapers unlit. I stepped inside and faced away from the fireplace and saw, gilding the slightly ajar door that led to Uncle's private chambers, a ribbon of light.

That strip of light pulled like a magnet. I set the lamp upon the end-table, and crossed the sitting-room to stand before that door.

Reality faltered. I knew that I, an adult, married and soon to be a father, put my hand forth and grasped the doork.n.o.b. At the same time I was Arkady the child of twenty years before, who clung fearfully to his father as Petru reached for the door.

The adult Arkady's hand turned the k.n.o.b and pushed; my father's ghostly hand did the same.

And at the sound of the hinge creaking, the door to memory opened to allow me my past.

The grown Arkady vanished, leaving only my child-self and my father in the long-repressed reality of twenty years ago, in the grim days after Stefan's death.

In the second it took for the door to swing inward, groaning, I remembered: Crossing the threshold with my father, his hand tight upon mine, his voice soft and soothing as he said, No harm will come to you, Kasha. Only trust me, and trust Uncle...

The light of a hundred candles glittered in his tear-filled eyes.

We walked through the narrow entryway, then emerged into a grand hall. The side on which I stood, the left, was hidden from view by a ceiling-to-floor black velvet curtain, large enough to conceal a small stage.

In front of us, on the back wall, was yet another closed door leading to yet another secret chamber.

To our right, across from that mysterious theatre, sat a platform of dark, polished wood, with three steps leading up to a throne. The platform's base was inlaid with gold, which spelled out the phrase JUSTUS ET PIUS.

Just and faithful.

On either side of the throne were tall candelabra, laden with blazing tapers, and upon it was seated Uncle, who gripped the armrests in his customary regal posture.

He emanated such confident power, such virile strength that I looked on him with the same fear and admiration I would have a beautiful lion: terrified of his wrath, breathless at his magnificence. His robes were scarlet, and atop his head rested an ancient gold diadem studded with rubies. Behind him, hung upon the wall was a crumbling warrior's s.h.i.+eld of incalculable age; I could just make out the fading winged dragon thereon, and realised that this was the s.h.i.+eld represented in the portrait of the Impaler.

At V."s right hand was a golden goblet, set with a large single ruby, and resting in a special hollow carved into the throne's arm so the contents should not spill. But the jewels that outshone all others were his eyes, which, standing out against the white of his skin and the silver of the hair that flowed onto his shoulders, pierced me with their pitiless emerald brilliance, their frightening intelligence. His beauty was as Zsuzsanna's had been when she had risen from the tomb: like the sun, too radiant to bear.

Stunned into reverent silence, we approached the prince upon the throne. At last my father genuflected, then crouched down to put his arms around me and say, in a tone of unutterably sorrowful resignation: "Here is the boy."

"You are sad, Petru," the prince said thoughtfully, in a deep, handsome voice; I emitted a gasp of surprise, for he had seemed too unreal, too lovely, too much a work of art to speak. "But there is no cause. I love the boy, and will treat him well."

"As you have treated me?"

A rebuke; but the prince remained distant, unmoved. "No harm need come to his loved ones unless he betrays me. He would have been spared this; his brother Stefan would have served as eldest, and Arkady would have lived a life free from this charge, but your actions have brought him here. You alone are responsible for the grief that has visited your family, Petru. I am harsh, but just. Remain faithful to me, and I shall remain faithful to you. It is all I ask."

He lifted an object; silver flashed as he drew the knife across his own wrist, and held it over the golden chalice over the arm of the throne. He bled little, but a few drops which came only when encouraged; and then he held the dagger towards my father. "It is time.

My father hesitated, then stepped up to the throne and reluctantly took the knife from the prince. He held it aloft for a moment, and I saw again the glint of candlelight on sharpened metal. "I can"t," my father cried, anguished; his voice shook.

"You must," the prince replied, in a voice stern and unyielding, but I heard the odd undercurrent of tenderness there. "You must. I dare not trust myself. He is your son; you will be gentle."

My father"s fingers tightened on the dagger. He lowered it slowly, then with his other hand took the chalice proffered by the prince.

I watched him return to my side, feeling nothing but a child's curiosity. I trusted my father, even when he lifted the chalice to my lips and forced me to take a tiny sip.

Gagging, I tasted salt and metal and decay; but the effect of that small taste of blood was overwhelmingly intoxicating. I grew unsteady on my feet, for the effect was warming as wine and altogether pleasurable. I felt a sudden wild, inexplicable burst of love and grat.i.tude toward Uncle as I sank down to a sitting position; my father knelt beside me.

When he set down the chalice to take hold of my arm and turn the inside toward him as he raised the dagger, I felt no alarm, only mild apprehension as to whether the cut might briefly hurt.

Certainly I felt no fear for my life as he brought the keen edge of the daggers blade down against the tender inside of my wrist, and nicked a vein there, whispering: "I'm sorry.

Someday you will understand... it is all for everyone"s good... For the good of the family, the village, the country ..."

The pain drew me from my cosy stupor. I cried out in indignance, and continued to do so as he held my small but copiously bleeding wound over the chalice and milked it.

I struggled feebly, but Father held my arm steady until the bottom of the golden cup was covered with my young, dark blood. And then he produced from his pocket a clean handkerchief and secured it firmly about the cut, holding it a time to stanch the flow.

Finally, he rose, and gave the cup to Uncle, and returned to me. I lay, faintly dizzy, with my head in his lap as he stroked my hair, making soft sounds of apology and comfort while Uncle cradled the chalice in cupped hands and lowered his face to it, eyes closed in pure bliss, breathing in its scent like a connoisseur inhaling the fragrance of the finest century-old cognac.

Then he opened his eyes, bright with antic.i.p.ation, and said: "Arkady. Thus I tie you to me. Leave home you may- for a while, but this shall ensure your return to me, at the proper time; and, at the proper time, your will shall be returned to you, and all be made known. This I swear: you and yours I shall never harm, and shall generously support, so long as you support and obey me. Your blood for mine. These are the terms of the covenant. "

Smitten with love, I watched from Fathers lap the flash of candlelight upon gold as V.

upended the goblet and drank.

I cried out and clutched my head as iron claws sank deep into my brain.

Of a sudden, I came to myself, to the adult Arkady of the present. The entire memory had returned, fullblown and complete, in the split second it had taken to unlock the door and push it open.

Now I crossed that threshold alone.

I pa.s.sed through the small entryway into the great room. There, to the right, sat the prince's throne- empty now, though one of the flanking candelabra, tall as I, had been lit.

There, too, was the aged s.h.i.+eld, though missing was the chalice which once held my blood.

In the centre of the far wall stood the door which lead to even deeper mysteries, and to the left...

To the left, the black velvet veil had been pulled aside to reveal what had once been hidden: Bolted to the wall, a set of black iron manacles; propped nearby, four oiled, glistening wooden stakes, twice a man's height and worn at one end to blunt points; a rack; and, dangling from the ceiling, the thick metal chains of a strappado, used to hoist victims by their arms into the air. Beneath manacles and strappado were strategically placed wooden tubs, the interiors clean but stained by countless years of use a permanent reddish-brown.

To one side of this chamber of horrors stood a carving-block which contained an a.s.sortment of cleavers and knives, and beside it a st.u.r.dy waist-high table, the length and shape of a coffin.

Upon this table Herr Mueller lay naked and p.r.o.ne, the bare flesh of his back the shocking white of an alabaster statue. Only his upper body rested upon the table; his legs dangled to the floor, bent slightly at the knees because of their length, so that his body formed an equal-armed if not altogether straight "L." Above his tangled mane of curling, sand- coloured hair, his arms were extended like a diver's, and at first, I thought he gripped the table's edge- But no, his hands were utterly relaxed. I thought immediately of the little cloth and porcelain doll, slumped forward upon his wedding bed.

He was as limp and lifeless as she; dead. Quite dead.

And moving.Moving, dead torso jiggling back-and-forth, stray golden-brown curls bouncing, head lolling ever so slightly, dead arms sliding up-and-down against the table, unfeeling fingers polis.h.i.+ng the dull-gleaming wood limply, horribly, to the rhythmic slap of another's flesh against his.

I lifted my gaze and saw Laszlo, eyes closed, lips parted in dreamlike ecstasy, gripping the corpse at its hipbones as he stood directly behind it at the table's edge. His trousers were unfastened, pulled down to his thighs, and the hem of his long peasant's s.h.i.+rt swept over the small of the dead man's back as he thrusted.

I looked again at the body, and knew that the face hidden from me was frozen in the same rictus of horrified anguish Jeffries had worn.

I did not think, reflect, recoil. I raised my father's gun, aimed point-blank at the centre of the living man's skull, and opened my mouth to shout: Stop! In the name of G.o.d, stop, or I will fire!

Quickly, so quickly that I had no time to utter the words, Laszlo disengaged himself from the corpse, pulled a cleaver from the block, and hurled it at me.

The handle of the cleaver knocked the revolver from my hand; it went skittering into the shadows as Laszlo propelled himself over the table.

Even by wavering candlelight, I could see his face was transformed. No longer was he the dull, gloating coachman, but a wild-eyed fury. He lunged like the wolf who had attacked in the forest the day I had discovered the hidden graves. I threw up my arms in defense, half believing that he would not harm me-that, like the wolf, he was simply there to threaten, to discourage, to test.

We staggered backward like h.e.l.l-bound dancers, his right hand clutching my left wrist, my left hand clutching the wrist of the hand which reached for my throat. We stood as close as lovers, so that I could smell his scent: sour sweat, mixed with the faint odor of faeces and decay.

So we proceeded, our arms trembling mightily in deadlock, his madman's strength forcing me back, away from the grisly site where Mueller and Jeffries had met their deaths-until the mortared stones beneath my feet grew uneven, and I lost my balance and fell.