Her gasp of pain was captured by his devouring lips. The embrace was searing, bruising, and all-consuming. Her hands flew to his lapels and clutched at them like a drowning man might a raft and held on for dear life as all that he was rolled over her like a storm.
An inhuman growl bore through him, low and deadly, resonating from him and into her. When he broke off the kiss, she was breathless and holding on to him to keep from collapsing to the floor. His hand in her hair did not relent. He craned his head farther to whisper into her ear, cold breath pooling against her skin.
“I have peeled the skin from a man and laughed as he wept for mercy. I have impaled a woman upon a pike and left her there for her family to find and smiled as I did. I relish the pain of others. I wallow in their misery and take joy in their agony. What you will see in my treatment of Van Helsing is nothing compared to that which I have wrought. It is all this I demand that you love—it is all this you should welcome into your heart with open arms, lest we both take the grave instead.”
And with that, the world folded away from them.
24
When they reappeared, he threw her away from him. She staggered and fell, hitting the ground hard on her hands. She winced at the pain but made no noise.
“Master and Mistress, hello!” A voice came from near her. Neither male nor female. She looked up, and her eyes went wide. Neither was it human or vampire.
The creature was something else entirely. A demon, perhaps? She had never seen one. It had rough greenish skin, a blunted but delicate-featured face, and a dozen long, thin, terrible horns that bent in graceful arcs away from its face. It blinked like a lizard, and its eyes were a bright and vicious yellow.
The creature was also fully naked, save for chains that draped along its inhuman form. Its legs were canted like those of a beast, and a long tail swished around behind them. It smiled down at her, toothy and dangerous. The glint in its features said that it would like to hurt her—very, very much.
“Forgive me for the state of my workbench. I did not know I would have company. Especially not her.” A taloned hand reached down to help her stand. She scrambled to her feet on her own. The creature shrugged, placed a hand in front of its waist, and bowed. “I am the Chainmaster. At your service, my Lady.”
“I am not your lady…”
“You are his toy, then? Even better.”
“Enough.” Dracula broke into the conversation. “I have been told you make progress with your newest project.”
“Yes, indeed! Come, come. Let me show you.” The creature walked away from them. It was only then that she could examine her surroundings—a chamber made entirely of roughly hewn stone, like a cavern that had been chipped away until it was mostly rectangular. Candles burned in sconces along nooks carved into the walls.
This was not the public library. Perhaps it was beneath the city—or perhaps it didn’t matter anymore. Dracula’s will was imposing itself upon the very fabric of the world around him. It was futile to try to make logical sense of where she was.
Vlad gestured for her to follow the creature. She wished she had not asked to come here, but it was too late. She needed to see what was happening to the ill-fated vampire hunter. She needed to witness the malice that her vampire enjoyed.
And so, she followed.
As they walked, she realized she was in…a prison. The walls were lined with doors with small barred windows. From inside them she heard the whimpering cries. But it was not the sound that made her pull up to a full stop.
It was what poured from their cages.
Fear. Pain. Agony. Death. Hands reaching up from a pit, begging for mercy. For clemency. For forgiveness. Please…please help me. Please free me. Save me. I never did anything to deserve this!
She put her head in her hands. Their emotions threatened to drown her. She couldn’t breathe.
Hands settled on her shoulders, and it was as though an ice-cold knife cut through the rest of the voices, silencing them and sending them scattering to the shadows from which they came.
She shuddered at the sudden silence but did not lower her hands from her face.
“Are you able to proceed?” His voice was as cold as a frozen winter. Unreadable and taciturn.
“I need a moment.” She lowered her hands and forced herself to pull in a long breath and let it out. “I was not expecting so many.” She could keep them at bay, but she had been caught off guard.
Draw a line in the sand. She shut her eyes and tried to visualize it. She was a rock in a river, and they were the water around her. She was not them. She was not their emotions. She was her own mind, her own self, her own soul. Slowly, the feeling of drowning abated. After a pause, she nodded, and he removed his hands from her shoulders.
She felt the press of the emotions around her once more, but she could now keep them under control. Her raft as no long sinking into the seas. Without glancing at him, she kept walking. The creature—the Chainmaster—had stopped at a room some fifty feet ahead of them.
When she approached, they took a step back and gestured for her to go in first. The door was open. From it came the smell of blood and rot. Once, during her time with the Roma, they had come across a horse lying nearly dead in the road that had been there for a day, perhaps more. She had not ever forgotten the smell.
That was what this was.
Something else brought back the memory with a fierce and unexpected slap. The horse had not been left to die in peace. Wild dogs had surrounded it, coyotes ripping at the flesh. Living meat fed the living hunters. The sound of the animals ripping at the whimpering, dying thing had lingered in her nightmares.
And from that room she could hear an animal eating. Like a dog chewing on a slab of tough steak. She knew it contained no such thing. With a wavering breath, she steeled herself. Whatever she was about to see would be a sight she knew she would replace that memory of the horse in her mind with something far more gruesome.
Swallowing down the bile that threatened to rise, she stepped into the room without a second look at either of the monsters beside her.
The room was as dimly lit as the hallway, but her vision had begun to adjust to the light. And she sincerely wished it hadn’t. There, lying in the middle of the floor, was a man she vaguely recognized as Alfonzo Van Helsing.
Or what was left of him.
He was unrestrained—and there was no need to shackle him down. For he was missing one of his legs. His left leg was a carefully stitched stump above the knee.
A ghoul was attempting to ensure that he lost the other.
A tight tourniquet was cinched at his thigh, preventing him from bleeding to death. She had heard of many men from the war who fainted at the sight of an amputation. They were grizzly things to behold. But she wondered if a single soldier would not have preferred that to what she now saw. The creature that was hunched over Alfonzo’s leg was tearing off strips of muscle and meat like a wolf from a lamb. Its jaw dripped and oozed bright, fresh blood.
“He has already begged me to let him die,” the Chainmaster boasted, leaning up against the wall. “He lasted longer than I thought he would. Hunters always make the best toys.”
Maxine wasn’t sure who they were addressing. She assumed Dracula, but it did not much matter.
“And has he accepted my offer yet?”
“No. But he will. It’s only a matter of time before he begs for that too.”
“What offer?” she asked, her voice sounding faraway and detached.
“I have offered to have him turned into a vampire to end his suffering. I want to see him plead through broken tears to become the very thing he sought to destroy. Only then, once he has debased himself and his holy mission, will I kill him. I place him upon a spike and let him greet the dawn.”
Maxine didn’t look at him when he spoke. She didn’t want to see the expression on his face. The iciness she could handle—but that was not what was in his voice. She did not wish to see his pleasure.
Steppin
g forward, she looked down at the ghoul tearing into the flesh of the vampire hunter. Alfonzo had never been terribly kind to her. That was not to say that he deserved anything remotely like what he now suffered. “Send the ghoul away until we are gone.”
“Does the sight bother you?” the Chainmaster purred. “I love the innocent ones…”
“I wish to try to speak with Alfonzo, and it will be hard to do so while he is being eaten.” She glared over at the Chainmaster and Vlad. She was not horrified—but angry. They would listen to her. She would make them. “Tell it to leave. Now.”
The Chainmaster grinned wide and swished their tail around behind itself. It looked up to Vlad. “Master?”
“Do as she says.”
“Mmm…innocent and assertive. I like her.” The Chainmaster clicked their tongue. The ghoul whined like a dog, but obeyed instantly, stopping in its grotesque work. It slunk out of the room liked a whipped animal.
“Thank you.”
“Innocent, assertive, and polite.” The monster cackled. “Can I play with her, Master?”
“No.”
It sighed. “Had to ask.”
Maxine shook her head and moved to kneel at Alfonzo’s side. She cared not that the blood and muck would stain the knees of her dress. She reached out and ran her gloved fingers along his cheek, stained as they were with tears, gore, and dirt. “Alfonzo?”
His eyes were open, but they were staring at the ceiling, not seeing the world around him. He was in shock. Or his mind was breaking down. Likely, the answer was both. She called his name quietly again, and he blinked. Slowly, painstakingly, he turned his head to her.
For a long time, he gazed at her without seeing. Without recognizing. Then, finally, his brow creased in confusion. “Maxine…?”
“Hello, Mr. Van Helsing,” she greeted the poor tortured man. She stroked his hair gently, trying to provide him any kind of comfort. “I am so very sorry.”
“I failed.” His voice cracked, and she saw tears start to form in his eyes. “Bella. She…she’s a demon, and I—I couldn’t—”
“I know.”
“I wasn’t strong enough…”
“It’s okay.” She tried to console him. She knew it was too little, too late.
“In my hubris, I…I doomed us all.” He reached up a hand to take hers, and she squeezed it tightly. “Forgive me.”
Maxine smiled faintly. “It is all right.”
“So many lives…Bella.”
“I know. I am sorry.”
“Hubris was not your only downfall, hunter. It was hatred. It was lust. A succubus cannot trigger desire that does not lie latent within their prey. They may only compel you to succumb to it. You wanted her. Your veritable daughter, and you wanted her. For shame.” Vlad’s voice filled the rancid air like a roll of thunder. At the sound of his voice, Alfonzo whimpered and tried to shrink away. But he could barely move. Maxine shushed him, but she knew it did no good to quell his terror. “You ignored the plights of the innocent souls you claim you were meant to protect. Nothing swayed you. And now, you pay your price.”
“He is not the only one guilty of hate.” She glared over at the vampire.
Vlad only smiled coldly in response.
Looking back down at Alfonzo, she kept stroking a hand over his hair. “I wish I could help you.”
“I know.” He coughed, and she saw flecks of blood on his lips. He had chewed through his lip, and by the sound of it, part of his tongue as well. “I will die soon.”
No. I don’t think you shall. And that is the problem.
“I…I’m afraid to die,” he whispered then chuckled. “After all this, I am afraid to die.”
“You needn’t be so. Death is a mercy. It will not hurt you, not like what you know now.” She tried to put on her best gentle smile. “It is a kindness to those in need. A freedom from the pain and the disease of this world. Men may fear its touch, but it is with loving arms that it comes. To be denied death is a terrible thing.” She resisted the urge to glare at Vlad again. “It breeds only madness.”
Alfonzo nodded weakly and shut his eyes. “Thank you, Maxine. I wish I had been better.”
She lifted his hand to her lips and kissed his knuckles. “You tried to do what was right. That is more than most can say. I have seen evil in this world, hunter. It is not the same as weakness.”
He smiled wistfully before his expression faded. He had fallen unconscious. It was probably for the best. She folded his hand across his chest and stood. She did not bother to inspect the stain on her dress. She walked from the room without a glance at either the Chainmaster or Dracula.
She spared a single look for the ghoul hovering in the shadows near the door, eager to get back to its meal. After pulling in a long breath, she held it and slowly released it. She forced all that she felt back behind a wall of simple rational thought, even though all she wished to do was scream.
This cannot continue.
Swallowing the rock in her throat, she turned from the door and walked back the direction from which they had come. She needed air. And while she did not know if that direction contained a way out, it was away from Alfonzo and the monsters that preyed on him.
Without warning, Vlad appeared in front of her. She walked into him with a grunt like he was a brick wall. He felt enough like one. She took a step back and rubbed her nose, glaring up at him. “That was unnecessary.”
“Where is it you think you are going?”
“Away. Out.”
“You have no indication of where you are.”
“I rather think that no longer matters. I need air.”
Crimson eyes narrowed at her. He took her by the upper arm, and the world folded away once more. When they reappeared, she felt fresh air on her face. She recognized where he had brought her—or what it had once been. It was the courtyard in the center of the public library. It had been a beautiful garden, once. Now it was a twisted and perverted version of its former self.
Statuary of weeping angels were surrounded by blood red roses. Vines threatened to overtake columns, as though they were a cancer infecting a body. Tangled and unruly, she wondered if the bushes around here had somehow become unfriendly creatures, as well. It was a safe assumption to make.
Tugging her arm out of his grasp, she walked away to sit on a bench several paces away. She was fairly certain—if only fairly—that the bench would not try to eat her. She shut her eyes and hung her head. “He is defeated. Let him die.”
“No. I will have him tortured until he begs to accept the blood of a vampire to heal him. I will starve him, beat him, feed him to my creatures until he shatters. Once he is of my kind, I will let him greet the sun he worships one last time. That is, if I am feeling merciful.”
“And if you do not?”
“I will shackle him into an iron coffin and drop him to the bottom of the ocean. There, his mind will molder and decay into madness for the rest of time.”
She put her head in her hands, rubbing her face, before running her fingers into her hair and fisting them. She rested her elbows on her knees and wished she could close out the world by shutting her eyes.
Hands grasped her wrists and pulled them away from her. She did not hear him approach, but suddenly he was on his knees before her. It was so startling to see him there that it broke through her instant desire to slap him.
He took her hands between his and placed them in her lap. Wordlessly, he bent his head and rested his cheek where he still held her hands in his grasp. He did not ask for forgiveness. He did not feel remorse over his actions. He would not release Van Helsing, nor would he give him a quick death. She knew better than to ask for any of those things. She would not pay either of them the indignity.
But the question remained what she would do in the wake of all these truths. Ones she had known, yes, but it was another matter entirely to see them firsthand. Could she love a creature capable of such things? Could she accept him, even with his barbarous ways?
Th
is morning, she had been leaning toward yes.
But now… “Who else dwells within your dungeon?”
“Countless souls. It runs deeper into the ground than you can imagine.”
She winced.
He turned his head and placed a kiss against her hands, followed by another, then another. Her heart began to beat a little faster, and she tried to push away the sensations he was dragging out in her. She had witnessed a man being eaten and tortured at the direction of the very same creature that was now working his way up to her wrist. It should not warm her cheeks the way it was. “Vlad, please…”
He growled, but he did not stop. When she tried to pull her hands out of his grasp, he allowed it, if only after a moment. He stood, and before she could say a word, he lay her down onto her back sideways on the bench with a press of his hand against her shoulder.
“Wait—”
He was over her then, caging her in, his hand pressing against the stone surface close to her head. He kissed her to silence her and left no room for argument. His tongue claimed her mouth as he turned his head to deepen the embrace.
“This is who I am, Maxine. This is who I will always be. Make your choice.” His words echoed in her mind.
His touch was warm. His heart was beating beneath her palm where she had unconsciously placed it against his neck. He moved to split her legs as he straddled the bench, placing her thighs on top of his as he gathered her stained skirt up to her waist.
The blood of a tortured man stains my clothes. She tried to push Vlad away. She succeeded in freeing her lips from his when she turned away from him. “This isn’t right.”
“I am the Vampire King. I am Vlad Tepes Dracula. I have destroyed cities. I have taken a continent’s worth of lives in my thousands of years. Stop fooling yourself, Maxine—none of this has never been, nor shall ever be, right.” He began to unlace her dress. “Do not speak to me of morals. Destroy me if you must. But if you cannot, then I will have you here and now.”
Curse of Dracula Page 24
