Mina Part 29

She willed her soul outside the box, and as she watched, fascinated even after centuries by her power, her body thinned to a mist that leaked from the lid of her marble coffin and swirled around her, slowly taking form.

"It is the soul that gives substance to the body," Illona had told her the first night of her second life. "To destroy us completely, someone must also destroy our soul."

"Can that be done?" Karina asked.

"With great difficulty. Perhaps someday you will learn how."

"I don't want to know," Karina said, for at the time even the strange half-life of her new existence seemed preferable to death.

"Time has a way of twisting perspective." Illona laughed, throwing back her head as she did. The sight of her teeth, so long and white, made Karina shake with the memory of her human fear.

Then time had done exactly what Illona had predicted. Karina, who had longed to be free of her estates and her duties, had been trapped in the castle for over a hundred years. Often, she willed herself to sleep through the nights as well as days until hunger made any rest impossible. But tonight she had risen eagerly, as she had last night. Someone was here, someone who gave more than blood and life.

A shard of hope.

So much that her human body had valued was lost to Karina now, yet surprisingly much still remained. Human comforts-the need for warmth and the pleasure of food and drink-meant nothing, but the trappings of human life took on a more profound meaning, as if by reclaiming them she could somehow reclaim a part of her lost humanity.

When had she last worn a new gown? Or listened to music? Or danced? Or laughed! Once the clothes had been possible. Now it had been months since the gypsies had camped near to the castle bringing with them bolts of cloth and beads and delicate lace.

And when they had, they'd danced and sang in their encampments, never coming within the castle walls unless Dracula himself summoned them. Now he was gone. They would never come again.

And so this Englishman's presence took on a deeper meaning for Karina.

Lord Gance could give her all she desired and more; he said as much. And he had known what she was and shown no fear when she kissed him. Strange, magnificently strange.

Though as cautious as all her kind, she went to him as soon as she woke, eager for his touch.

He slept. She moved through him, imagining herself mortal for a moment-warm, breathing softly. The heartbeat that was so imperceptible to the human senses seemed so clear to her in its soft and steady march towards death.

She pulled away and, hovering above him, drew her body over her soul like a cloak. Her fingers brushed Gance's lips; her hand moved under his loose s.h.i.+rt and up his bare chest. She called his name.He opened his eyes and looked up at her, smiling when he recognized her, lifting his head so their lips could touch. "Last night?"

he asked.

Breath was needed to speak. She paused, inhaled and said, "Last night was a test, a dream. Tonight will be real."

"Can I be certain?"

She smiled because she knew the sight of her teeth would please him, would convince him of her nature. "Certain? Is my power that great?"

"If you were the one who controlled last night's visions, it is."

Those had not been visions, and she hadn't been alone. She saw no reason to remind him of that. Instead she asked, "Will I be Lady Gance if I let you share my life?"

"Lady Gance should have a grander chamber for her wedding night," he replied.

"So should a lord. Come with me."

She took his hand, and he followed her on faith through the darkness of the outer hall and up a winding staircase in the tower. If he had not gripped her cold fingers so tightly, he would have believed himself alone, for only his footsteps sounded on the stairs, only his breathing hissed in the stillness of the dark.

He climbed past the pale shadows of open doors, past drafts from open windows. A bat skittered by his face, one leathery wing brus.h.i.+ng his cheek before it swept on, following the cold draft toward the night sky.

At the next turn, she led him into a room. As they entered, the fire flared, revealing a s.p.a.ce that still held all the beauty of its medieval past.

Candles were lit everywhere, illuminating the wealth contained here. Gold chains circled the velvet-draped bedposts. Ta.s.seled pillows covered the velvet-draped bed. Fur rugs lay scattered on the slate floor, and a s.h.i.+eld nearly the height of a man hung above the hearth. Beneath it, a thick sword that seemed even longer was mounted on pegs. Its polished bra.s.s hilt seemed to be waiting for someone to grasp it, though Gance wondered what man could wield so huge a weapon.

He heard her indrawn breath, listened as she said, "His sword. Even now, after so many centuries, I can smell the blood on it."

"Where is he?"

A pause, another indrawn breath. "Gone."

"Dead?"

Emotion flared, glowing red in the depths of her sapphire eyes, but he could not tell if it was anger or triumph. "Gone! Gone beyond the realm where he can touch any of us, but do not a.s.sume that a will such as his can be vanquished." She walked to the center of the room, threw up her hands and pirouetted to music vivid only in her memory.

And laughed, rippling waves of mirth that he could feel brus.h.i.+ng his body. "Shall I be your partner at our dances? Shall I sing for our guests?"

"Sing for me."

Eyes closed, head bowed, she let the music grow in the silence of her memories, then lifted her chin and began.

He had expected something childish. Instead she picked an old Hungarian folk tune about a couple who had just met, pledging their love for a lifetime and beyond. The irony of her choice did not escape him, and her singing voice was not as he expected. It had a deep, trained richness that her speech lacked.

When she'd finished, he pulled a green silk scarf from his pocket and handed it to her. She unfolded it carefully and saw a gold ring in the middle, with an emerald of deep clarity, the fire in its center visible even in the dim light. "It is yours, Karina, a sample of all the gifts I will give if you let me share your life."

She cupped it in her hand, watching the emerald flicker in the firelight. "No one has given me a gift for so many years."

"Share your life," he repeated. "And I will take you from this place."

"It isn't so simple, my lord. If only it were."

"You know the way." He held her in a manner that no mortal who knew her nature had ever held her before, his face close to hers, ready for her kiss.

"And if I could bring only death to you, would you rescue me anyway?""Death is coming soon enough," he responded. Hints of anguish in his tone convinced her that he spoke the truth.

"Poor mortal," she whispered, and stroked his cheek. The bed, as he had expected, was luxuriously soft. As they fell together onto it, she kissed him. He found himself astonished at the intensity of his response.

He had made love so many times before, but never to a woman as exotic as this. The countess Karina was soft, voluptuous in a youthful way he knew so well. Her scent was sweet-hyacinth and narcissus. Yet there was no heat to her body, no breath quickening at his touch. Her b.r.e.a.s.t.s were flawless, but if he rested his head on them, he would hear no heartbeat. She had died long ago, moving beyond any pleasure his touch could give. The thought would not leave him, and he fought down a sudden surge of revulsion, of fear.

"Do not tempt me," she whispered. "Fear brings death. Love me instead."

Her eyes were hungry for the life he offered her, as hungry he was for her eternal existence. "I will," he whispered and kissed her again.

She broke away, moved her lips to his neck. "So soon?" he asked.

"Your pa.s.sion is my pa.s.sion, my lord. I cannot respond, I can only echo."

Her teeth broke into his skin, sinking deeper. He felt the trickle of blood, the pressure of her lips as she drank. Her hands that had moved so languidly over his body became more insistent. Her legs brushed against the outside of his thighs, drawing him into her.

"Wait," he said. "Let me give you pleasure."

"Pleasure!" Her laughter rang clear and tremulous as crystal bells. "My lord, my only pleasure is that you love me." With a growl of frustration, he did as she asked and found that he was indeed ready. As his body moved above hers, her lips pressed against the wound. She drank, trembling as he trembled, her cry just after his own.

When he lay beside her with his eyes closed, trying to force his useless lung to breathe, trying to still the frantic racing of his heart, he felt her hand move down his body once more. "You drank from Lady Mina, did you not?" she asked, her voice light.

The act could hardly have been of any consequence. "I did. I was already wounded. I hoped to tap the strength of her blood."

"Of his, you mean." She sounded weary, terribly sad. The weight beside him vanished. When he opened his eyes, she was gone.

"Karina, will you share?" he whispered to the emptiness around him.

He thought he heard laughter, but he could be sure of nothing, not even that the laughter was hers.

But there was a presence lingering here; he sensed it hovering in the darkness, watching him as the women had watched him before they chose to appear. "Karina?" he called softly. "Joanna?"

The door to his room swung slowly inward. From higher up in the tower, he heard a woman chanting, her lone voice rising and falling, repeating a string of words that included his name and another that he had come to know well. "Dracula," she chanted.

Another test, he thought, this time one of courage.

With a candelabrum held high to light his way, he climbed the twisting stairs, listening to the chant grow louder. On the last turn, he saw light as well, and he continued more quickly to the open doors above him and into the room where torches shed a smoky light.

The narrow, vaulted room might have been a chapel once. The stone slab at the far end might have been its altar. But whatever function the room had once possessed had been twisted like the castle itself from one of succor and protection to one of terror and death.

Symbols had been painted on the walls around him-horned men, owls, snakes, bats and the dragon's tooth herald he had seen on the s.h.i.+eld in the room below. Interspersed with these were pictures of Mina's face drawn hastily in coal and lampblack. Many of these had been made on the stones themselves, others on sc.r.a.ps of paper and cloth. Discarded near the stone was a woman's cape, thick and fleece-trimmed. He could hardly know whose it was, yet he was somehow certain that it had belonged to Mina and that what was happening here was to blame for all her fears.

Illona sat on the stone, her back to him. Her hair fell in a dark cascade that covered her back and the stone itself. Her bare legs were crossed, her bare arms upraised. The chant did not waver, though Gance was certain that Illona had sensed his presence.

This was her sacred s.p.a.ce, her place of wors.h.i.+p to the dark G.o.d that Mina said had given her the secret of immortal life.

He halted just inside the door and listened, hoping to make sense of her words, hearing only the constant repet.i.tion of Dracula's name and his own.

He took another step into the room, and the door slammed shut behind him. The smoke from the torches seemed to increase, filling the s.p.a.ce until the pictures on the walls blurred and the walls themselves vanished. Only Illona was visible, in her place on the altar, her voice rising and falling, speaking his name.

Calling him.

The thickness of the air made him fight for breath. The candelabrum seemed suddenly so heavy. He set it down and walked toward her. As he did, she rose to her feet and turned to meet him with arms outstretched.

He saw that her body had been painted with bold strokes of red and black. The nipples of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s were circled with black, her pubic hair outlined in red. Red drops, undoubtedly meant to be blood, covered her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, red trickles marked her thighs. Her expression held a desire more intense than he had ever witnessed before. Her arms rose, and he saw that they were covered with the same symbols that adorned the walls. Multihued snakes circled her arms. Bats fluttered across the palms of her hands; owls sat solemnly on their backs, their brown feathers painted down the length of her tapering fingers.

Gance had always toyed with evil, but he had never seen real evil firsthand. He did now, and his first thought was to flee the room, the castle, the mountains, to put as much s.p.a.ce between himself and this creature as he could. He had begun to turn when her voice, tender and serene, called his name. "Winston."

Flee, he thought, yet he paused to look at her.

And saw the wound she had made on her chest, real blood flowing this time, the offering to him.

As he paused, uncertain, she smiled. Her fangs had been painted as well, so that they seemed to curve inward, mimicking the dragon's teeth of her husband's s.h.i.+eld.

"Did you think that she would be the one to turn you, Winston?" she asked. "She is a child, a charming child, so charming indeed that I have granted her wish. Come to me, Gance. Come. Drink."

"Drink?"

"My blood. Eternal blood. It flows in me through the power of the Lord of Darkness and Life. Come now. The invitation will not be given again."

Everything Gance wanted was waiting at that altar. All he needed to do was walk forward and take. He had come for this. He would not permit his courage to fail him now.

Yet as he moved toward her, his fear intensified and his heart began to pound. He felt faint, and the room seemed to grow suddenly smaller, with only swirling darkness for its walls. Her eyes glowed red, providing the only light he could focus on. He moved toward them, welcoming what she could give, fearing for the first time what he would become.

As he approached, she held out her hands. "Winston Gordon, Lord Gance, do you take freely the blood I offer you?" she chanted.

The instinct that had served him well through life was utterly overcome by the strongest fear of all-the fear of death. "I do," he responded. He took her hands and reverently pressed his lips to her chest, tasting her essence, her power.

Bittersweet. Cold. Lifeless.

Mina had told him that this was a pa.s.sionate moment, one of release. Gance did not feel the ecstasy. Instead it seemed that death moved through him, slowly numbing his throat, his trunk, spiraling outward in his limbs. His legs gave way, but Illona supported him, holding him as a mother holds a child.

Still he drank until he was incapable of swallowing any longer. She let his head drop across her arms, then lifted his body and laid him on the stone slab. Unable to speak or to move, he heard the chant begin once more.

"Dracula ... Gance ... Dracula."

There was a presence in the room, one he had sensed earlier in the hall of the castle. It was not Joanna, not Karina, but something far more powerful.

"My lord," Illona chanted. "Take this vessel. Make it your own and return to me."

"No!" Karina's voice screamed for him, petulant like a denied child's. "You promised him to me. You promised!" Gance wanted to say that it made no difference who turned him, so long as it happened. He wanted to tell her that he would indeed make a place for her in his world. But he could not speak. Could not even turn his head to look at her. Then she was gone, her shriek of anguish hanging in the dense air. The chant continued. The presence grew stronger.

"Gance . . . Dracula ... Gance . . ."

Something was moving in him, some ancient power filling him. His limbs grew heavy, the pressure in his chest increased. But as he looked up, past the whiteness of Illona's painted skin, and through the dark cloud of her hair, he saw Karina slowly taking form, and in her hand ...

The huge blade fell, severing Illona's head from her body. A gush of blood covered Gance's face, blinding him. He heard it drip from the slab onto the floor, heard a steady pounding of metal on wood.

"Cold," he mouthed, without breath.

Karina wiped the blood from his face, blew breath into his body, trying to force him to live. "You fool!" she said. "What use did she have for Gance the man? Though she was far more powerful than he, she existed only for her husband. She needed a creature who had shared his blood to bring him back. Mina would have served, but a man would be so much better. She would have made you his vessel, your memories and your fortune his to use, nothing more. His will is stronger than mine. It may already be too late to save you."

She lifted the huge blade from the floor and made a deep cut on her wrist. The blood flowed down his throat once more, but it did not have the numbing cold of the other. "Drink!" she ordered. "Live long enough for me to turn you."

He managed to do as she asked. As his strength grew and he sucked hungrily at her wound, she pressed her lips to his neck and began the slow drain of life from his body.

A sound he had never consciously heard save in illness ended when his heart stopped beating. Still not certain who would wake in his sh.e.l.l, he died.

TWENTY-EIGHT