Princess Before Dawn

by E. D. Baker

  CHAPTER 11

  Annie thought the garden might be the prettiest one she had ever seen, or it would have been if the buds had been open. “I love the fountain and the arbors hiding those lovely benches, but none of the flowers are actually blooming,” Annie said after they’d explored every inch of it. “Don’t you think it’s strange that not a single blossom is open?”

  “During one of my visits here with my parents, the gardener told me that he’d planted only night-blooming flowers in this garden,” Zoë told her. “The vampires who live at Heartsblood want to be able to see them.”

  “If the gardener is a vampire, he must work at night,” said Annie. “Doesn’t that make it harder for him?”

  Zoë shrugged. “Vampires can see perfectly well in the dark.”

  “That’s why they can sneak up on you so easily,” Francis told her. “Zoë likes to jump out and startle me at night sometimes.”

  “I can’t help it,” Zoë said, laughing. “The expression on your face is always priceless!”

  Audun raised his head to look at them. He had stayed a dragon, and had been napping in the sun for the last few hours. “If you don’t mind, I might do a little hunting before nightfall. If I catch something now, it would give me time to digest before we leave.”

  “You can hunt, just not in this valley,” said Zoë. “If the vampires were going to farms outside the valley to feed, the count must reserve all the animals in the valley for himself. He’d be angry if he learned that some were missing.”

  “Then I might be gone a little longer,” said Audun. “I don’t want to eat any of the farmer’s livestock, either, so I’ll have to look farther afield.”

  “Please don’t be gone too long,” Annie said. “After all the things I’ve heard, I don’t want to stay here any longer than is absolutely necessary.”

  With Audun gone and Zoë having a private conversation with Francis, Annie found a deep-seated garden bench in the shade and curled up on it for a nap. It was dusk when she woke and went looking for her friends. Seeing Audun land at the other end of the garden, she hurried down the path to join him. Zoë and Francis were already there.

  “We can head to the house now,” Zoë said when she saw Annie. “Everyone should be up and about by the time we knock on the door.”

  Zoë led the way with her hand on her husband’s arm. Annie was happy to take Audun’s arm when he offered it to her; having a dragon so close made her feel safer and gave her the confidence to follow Zoë up the steps to the wide front door.

  Francis knocked on the door. Seconds later, a vampire servant in fine livery opened it. “We have come to see Count Bracken,” Zoë announced.

  The vampire recognized her right away. His eyes grew wide and he gestured to something behind him. Although it was dark inside, some places looked even darker than others. There was a whisper of sound and the darkness behind him shifted. Annie had a feeling that something was watching them. The servant glanced back and gestured again. Black on black roiled, and the unseen presence was gone.

  “It’s awfully dark in there,” Annie said to her friends.

  The servant bowed and opened the door wider. “You grace us with your visit, Your Highness,” he said. “Please enter.”

  Annie panicked at the thought of stepping into the darkened room, where the very air looked threatening. She glanced at Audun, who patted her hand and smiled reassuringly.

  Zoë stepped inside and looked around. “Lights would be nice,” she said.

  The servant gestured again and candles flared in a chandelier above them, in wall sconces around the room, and on every table in the hall. Suddenly the space was bright and far more welcoming. Annie appreciated Zoë’s thoughtfulness, knowing that the vampire girl didn’t need the light herself.

  Audun pressed Annie’s arm against his side as they stepped across the threshold. The room was beautiful, with a high ceiling and a patterned stone floor. Tables bearing candles and bouquets of flowers stood against the walls, which were decorated with shields both modern and very, very old. Regardless, Annie couldn’t help being repulsed by the odor of mustiness and freshly turned soil that permeated the room. It reminded her too much of the smell they’d encountered in the house in Tottington. She glanced up at the ceiling, half expecting to see bats hanging upside down above them.

  “Please, follow me,” said the servant, and led the way to a room down a short corridor.

  Candles flared and the logs in a large fireplace lit themselves as Annie and her friends filed in. The room was elegant, with tapestries on the walls and fresh flowers on the tables, but Annie still felt uneasy. After they’d seated themselves on the cushioned benches and comfortable-looking chairs, the servant turned to Zoë, saying, “Grunwald will be with you shortly.” He left, closing the door behind him, but even then Annie felt as if someone or something was in the room with her and her friends.

  “Do you feel it?” she asked Audun, who was seated beside her. “There’s something else in the room besides us.”

  Audun looked around. He shook his head, saying, “I don’t see anything. But don’t worry; nothing will hurt you with me here.”

  The door opened and a man walked in. Tall and thin with a hawk-like nose, he didn’t seem to see anyone but Zoë. He looked so aristocratic that Annie was sure he had to be the count.

  “Your Highness,” he said, bowing low. “How wonderful to see you again. I understand you’ve come to call upon Count Bracken. I’m afraid you’ve missed him by a few days. He left shortly after your father’s visit and has yet to return. He’ll be very sorry that he didn’t get to see you.”

  “Then perhaps you might be able to tell me if my father mentioned where he and my mother were going next.”

  “I believe he said that they were on their way to Highcliff Castle,” said the man. “May I be so presumptuous as to invite you to stay for dinner with the family? As you may recall, Count Bracken’s mother, aunt, and brothers reside here. I am sure they would be delighted to have you dine with them.”

  “It would give me great pleasure to see them again,” Zoë replied. “There will be four of us joining them.” She looked pointedly at each of her friends, then pretended not to see the look of dismay on the man’s face.

  “Very good,” the man said, his words sounding forced. “Dinner will be served shortly.”

  As soon as the door shut behind him, Zoë turned to her friends and said, “I’m sorry. I hadn’t intended to stay, but there was no polite way to get out of it.”

  “Why did you have to tell him how many of us there would be?” asked Annie. “Couldn’t he see that for himself?”

  “If it had been up to him, I would have been the only one to be seated with the count’s family. Most vampires don’t regard non-vampires as people and capable of conversation.”

  “They think of us the way some people think of dogs. Useful at times, but not worthy of eating at the table with them,” said Francis. “The only humans they like are the ones they’ve turned, although even turned humans aren’t considered to be on the same level as vampires born to vampires.”

  Something shifted in the back of the room and Annie heard the faintest of sounds, but when she looked, there was nothing there. Whatever it was, she couldn’t wait to leave this place.

  A servant girl came to the door a short time later, offering Zoë a chance to “refresh herself and change her clothes.” The vampire princess declined the offer.

  When the girl was gone, Zoë told Annie, “I want to be able to leave right after we eat and I have no desire to travel dressed in the overdone clothes they wear to dinner here. You’ll see what I mean.”

  They all stood when another servant came to announce that dinner was about to be served. When Annie entered the dining room with her friends, she felt decidedly underdressed. Her plain traveling clothes looked shabby beside the elegant gowns the two vampire women wore. One was dressed all in silver with beading and bows everywhere. The other’s gown was a deep, da
rk red, the color of old blood. Annie thought that the black-and-gray embroidery made it look like rotting meat. She could understand why Zoë wouldn’t want to dress like them.

  Zoë, however, managed to make the women look overdressed when she held her head high and acted as if she were in charge. Taking a cue from her friend, Annie ignored the women’s disdainful looks when their gaze passed over her.

  The four vampires in the room all appeared to be in their twenties, but Annie remembered the steward saying that one of the women was the count’s aunt and the other was his mother. Apparently, vampires didn’t age the same way as humans. While the servant led Zoë to the head of the table, her husband and friends were left to find their own seats. Annie ended up sitting between Audun and one of the count’s brothers. Francis was at the end next to the other brother, who looked surly and not at all happy to be there.

  The two vampire women spoke only to Zoë, telling her how lovely she looked and how well her father had seemed when he stopped by. Although Zoë kept up a lively conversation with them, Annie didn’t hear much of it because the vampire man beside her never stopped talking.

  “You and that one,” he said, pointing at Francis, “are the first humans we’ve ever had here who came voluntarily. I wonder why our princess is traveling with your kind. There must be something special about you. I wonder what it is.”

  He took a sip of something in his chalice that left a thick, red droplet on the corner of his lips. Annie looked away.

  “Bracken isn’t here right now. He went to visit a friend and has yet to return,” said the vampire. “He does that quite often, actually. There’s no saying when he’ll be back. Mother doesn’t like it when he’s gone so long, but she doesn’t tell him that.”

  Annie wondered if the count was one of the vampires still at her parents’ castle.

  A servant offered her a platter of meat. Annie shuddered when she saw that it was raw and still bleeding. “No, thank you,” she said, shaking her head.

  The man next to her took a large portion. “I’m Rance and my brother is Spenser. I don’t mind humans, but Spenser hates them, especially now. His best friend flew off the other night to feed and never came back. Spenser is convinced that a human killed him, but he doesn’t know where or how. I almost feel sorry for whoever did it if my brother ever finds him.”

  Annie was grateful that another servant brought a platter of vegetables just then so she had a reason to turn away. A picture of the farmer’s nets had popped into her head and she was afraid that the vampire could see from her expression that she knew something about missing vampires. After helping herself to squash and carrots, she ate a few bites. She noticed that Rance waved the platter away without taking any.

  “See how my mother is fawning over the princess?” said the vampire. “She hopes that Zoë will fall for Bracken and want to marry him someday. She’s been dreaming about the match for years.”

  “But Zoë is already married to Francis,” Annie protested.

  “That human?” said Rance, glancing down the table at Francis. “He doesn’t count. Humans don’t live long enough to matter. Give the princess enough decades and she’ll be ready for Bracken. I wouldn’t mind having royalty in the family. It certainly would make Mother happy.”

  Annie glanced at the two women talking to Zoë. Something moved behind them, but when she looked directly at the spot, there was nothing there.

  “Tell me, Your Highness,” one of the vampire woman trilled. “What of your companions? I know that human male is your husband, but tell me about the girl. Is she your blood donor?”

  Annie paled when she realized that the woman was talking about her. The vampires all turned to look her way and she almost dropped the knife she was using to cut up her carrots.

  “No, she is not,” Zoë said, sounding angry. “She is my friend and a princess in her own kingdom.”

  “You have human friends?” said the other woman. “Well, of course you do. After all, you are married to one!”

  “And what about that lovely young man with all that gorgeous white hair?” the first woman said, looking at Audun. “Is he your blood donor or another friend?”

  “What is he exactly? He smells delicious,” Rance said, leaning past Annie to sniff the air. “Hot and spicy. I wonder what his blood tastes like.”

  “He’s my friend,” said Zoë. “And I wouldn’t try to find out what he tastes like if I were you. He bites. Dragons do, you know.”

  Rance drew back, dismay plain on his face. His brother stared at Audun as if he couldn’t quite believe what he’d heard.

  Annie stopped pretending to be interested in the food in front of her. Setting her knife on her trencher, she sat farther back in her chair and glanced at Audun. The dragon-turned-man seemed as calm as ever, but Annie saw the tightness around his mouth and that his eyes didn’t look fully human anymore.

  Zoë must have noticed it as well, because she got to her feet, saying, “I believe it’s time for us to go. Annie, Audun, please wait for me in the corridor. I’d like to say a few words to our hosts.”

  Audun stood quickly and pulled Annie’s chair back for her. The vampires were all watching Zoë as she took a long, slow sip from a chalice while Francis hurried to stand by her chair. Annie walked from the room with her back straight and her head held high. She doubted that any of the vampires even noticed that she had gone, but it rankled that they thought of humans as no more than dogs. They obviously didn’t even consider them worthy of common courtesy. Imagine—talking about her as if she were there so someone could drink her blood! She was glad they were afraid of Audun.

  Annie was halfway down the corridor when she turned to say something to her dragon friend. She’d thought he had followed her out the door, but instead she could see him in the doorway, waiting for Francis and Zoë. She was about to start back when she felt something cold on her cheek. Spinning on her heel, she turned to look around, but no one was there. When something whispered and moved beside her, she turned again and felt a clammy touch on her wrist.

  “Now cut that out!” she exclaimed. “I know you’re there, whatever you are!”

  Suddenly Annie felt as if she were surrounded. The air seemed to seethe around her, and she heard a murmuring that almost sounded like words. She swatted her hand as if at an insect, but all she felt was emptiness.

  Then Zoë, Francis, and Audun were beside her. “Is something wrong?” asked Zoë.

  “I don’t know what it is, but I keep seeing something, although I don’t really see it, if you know what I mean,” Annie said.

  “I see it now, too,” Audun told her. His eyes were fully dragon, and he was staring intently at a spot just past Annie’s shoulder.

  As Annie watched, the invisible nothings started to become slightly more discernable, taking on vaguely human forms. “Are they vampires?” Annie asked Zoë. “Were they using their magic to stay invisible?”

  Zoë shook her head. “No, these are wraiths. I’ve heard about them, but I’ve never encountered any before. They seem to want something of you, Annie.”

  The wraiths were clustered around Annie, watching her with mournful-looking eyes. Aside from the impression of a head and face, they seemed to be nothing more than barely visible tattered rags that fluttered around an unseen body. The closest wraiths reached out to Annie, touching her with almost imperceptible hands. When one touched her arm, Annie could swear she heard it say, “Help us!”

  “I think I know what they want,” Zoë said. “We have to go right now.”

  “What do they want?” Annie asked her. “Is there something I can do to help them?”

  Grabbing Annie by the hand, Zoë told her, “You can run!”

  The wraiths were pressing closer to Annie when she started running. Fearing that they might want something dreadful from her, Annie ran as fast as she could. As she approached the door, she felt pinpricks of cold as they collided with her from behind. And then Annie and her friends were outside and the wraiths we
re, too, dozens of them bursting out of the manor with such force that she could feel them bumping into her and almost knocking her off her feet. Francis, Zoë, and Audun watched with Annie as the wraiths swirled around them, then disappeared into the night sky.

  “What just happened?” asked Francis.

  “I’m not exactly certain,” said Zoë, “but I think Annie just released some creatures who had been kept here against their will for a very long time. Remember how I told you that my father pays beasts to guard his castle? I’ve heard that vampires used wraiths as unpaid guards long ago, but I didn’t know that anyone still did. If I’m right, the wraiths were brought here to guard the manor house and were never allowed to leave. Vampire magic couldn’t keep them here, so someone must have used some very old magic to imprison them. Annie’s presence must have weakened the magic enough for the wraiths to escape.”

  “I think you’re right,” Annie told her. “Just before they flew off, I was sure I heard someone say, ‘Thank you!’ ”

  “We need to go,” Audun said as he stepped away from the house. A moment later he was a dragon, gleaming white in the light still pouring through the door of the manor house. “After what you said inside, and after Annie released their guards, those vampires are not going to be very happy with us. I, for one, don’t want to stick around to see what they do.”

  “What did you say to them, Zoë?” Annie asked as she climbed onto Audun’s back.

  “Just that I thought they had been rude to my friends and they had no right to treat you that way,” replied Zoë. “I told them that they needed some lessons in civility and that it would be a very long time before I visited there again, if ever.”

  Francis was settling down behind Annie when he laughed and said, “In other words, she gave them a good scolding.” He opened his pocket and Zoë the bat slipped inside.

  “They must be terribly disappointed,” Annie said as Audun took off. “Rance told me that his family hoped Zoë would marry the count someday. Apparently, humans aren’t good enough for vampires.”