by Ana Calin
“He’s over six centuries old, and he was married three times, all of those marriages in the first fifty years of his life. All who came after that weren’t official, but there have been women.”
Jealousy bites sharply into my heart.
“He’s opposed to marriage unless it’s something dead serious,” Irina continues, thinking she’s doing me good. I swallow hard, not sure I want to keep hearing this. Vlad has made it clear he’d never make us official.
“If it is any consolation, I have been a vampire for two hundred years, and no matter how hard women tried to seduce Dracula—because many did, I have to say—they all failed.”
I look down, clasping my hands together so hard my fingernails pierce my skin.
“Irina, against your warning, I just spoke to Gruia. He said I shouldn’t trust Dracula because, against all appearances, he’s my worst enemy. I would normally dismiss it as a simple attempt to cause discord between us, but he’s not the first person to warn me.”
“Who else did?”
I look up at her with narrowed eyes, the blackness spreading into the whites again as I remember Sedan’s warning. Irina leans away.
“Don’t do that, you’re starting to scare me.”
“I’d never hurt you. I just want to know the truth.” I take a deep breath, steeling myself. “Did Dracula ever intend to kill me? Don’t lie, I’ll know.”
She looks worried into my eyes, pursing her lips. “Don’t force it out of me Rux, he’d have my head,” she whispers.
My heart jumps, causing sweat of anxiety to cover my body—the man I fell in love with truly had terrible intentions with me!
The sound of a chair being knocked back draws both our attention to the long table and the gathering of vampires. The highest in rank sit at that table, while a hundred others have crowded by the opposite wall. Only Irina and I are sitting by the wall with the windows.
It’s Gruia who stood up, apparently no longer able to contain his animosity.
“The darkness has risen ever since you took that girl to the Northern Monastery.” He points at me. “The demon has infiltrated the village, his power growing. The others are just too scared to speak up, too scared that they’ll end up hanging from the stalactites in your cave, but they’re thinking the same. You shouldn’t have given that woman your blood, you only made the darkness stronger through her.”
A ripple of consent goes over the table, spreading to the crowd around the entrance as well. Heartened by the support, Gruia squares his shoulders, pushes out his chin and continues.
“And there’s more. Ruxandra Len not only channels the demon’s energy, she has power over silver. She is a lethal weapon against vampires.”
“Lady Ruxandra has absolutely no intention of hurting any of you,” Vlad says evenly, threat lurking behind his words.
“You can’t guarantee that, Lord Dracula. The demon has power over her, you never know when he could possess her. He’s probably just waiting for the right time, having infiltrated her to spy on us first, discover our soft spots. She could be a Trojan Horse.”
The murmur of consent increases, vampires talking louder, some pointing fingers at me, glaring and hissing. Now I know what women must have felt centuries ago at witch trials. Most of the vampires here may have lived in those times, too, since they’re very old, so burning me alive might be the finest kind of entertainment to them.
I shake my head, because I can already feel the darkness rising inside of me. It’s this kind of vile thinking in people that triggered the demon in Adara’s veins in the first place, back at the Nazi orphanage.
“You should have done what you planned to initially,” another vampire dares from the crowd.
“It’s not too late to do it.”
“You can’t keep her anymore, the woman’s a time bomb."
Irina jumps to her feet, hurrying forward into the hall, holding her hands up.
“Gruia is making things seem worse than they are,” she says loudly. “He’s purposely sowing unrest. Ruxandra Len isn’t a danger to anyone.”
“Initially.... He planned to kill me,” I whisper to myself, rage pooling inside my chest. The blackness spreads to the whites of my eyes again, I can feel it.
A sound begins to trickle up from the talisman that I’ve hidden under my gown between my thighs, like the murmur of ghosts. It’s talking to me in some way, but I can’t understand what it’s saying. I place my elbows on my knees and bring my chest as close as I can to my thighs, hoping I’ll get a hint of the words. I think I can make out a ghostly ‘Get out of here.’
It’s hard to put up with the hatred and the glares anyway. The willingness of the vampires to kill me, their desire to spill my blood in this very hall, makes evil rise in me to dangerous levels. I can already imagine the ceiling cracking, the wooden beams and iron from inside the stone snapping, falling and piercing them. My inner senses have already started feeling around for silver, but there’s very little of it in this castle. Or at least in the east wing.
I slip out of the hall to the study next door, and from there into the so-called ‘secret passageway’. I should probably be looking for a safer place, but all the vampires are still in the hall, the castle has been cleared of tourists, allegedly for repairs, and I don’t have one drop of patience left. This should be private and safe enough.
I force myself to unclasp my hand from around the golden talisman, crouching down in the narrow corridor, my forehead touching the other side of the rocky wall under the mysterious orange light.
The ghostly sounds keep rising up from the talisman like steam, surrounding my head but making little sense.
“I don’t understand you,” I whisper.
More ghostly murmurs come out, one word clearer than all others. “Open.”
The talisman looks like a nicely carved golden globe, one embossed line circling it. It must be an opening system. I clamp my fingers on it and fiddle with it until the talisman opens, white smoke rising from it. I come to my feet as the smoke rises, taking a familiar shape—the half-dark half-white haired Victoria, her face haggard and witch-like, the irises of her eyes small as black beans in the center of her eyeballs.
For moments we just stand in the narrow passageway, staring at each other, so close that we almost touch. She simmers in front of me like a hologram. Now that I have her before my eyes I understand how she lives in multiple dimensions at the same time, in layered versions of reality, and in different periods of time.
“He was planning to kill you,” she hisses in the same ghost-like murmur that surrounded me while she was still inside the talisman.
“Was.” I whisper.
She shakes her head like I’m a stupid child. I can’t look away from the tip of her nose that hangs over her thin lips. She has a witch’s face, a face meant for the covers of Grimm fairy tales.
“Look, I’ll give it to you straight,” she says. “You know by now that you’re Dracula’s Grail—your blood can heal him of his—”
“Sensitivity to silver and sunlight, I know,” I interrupt.
“Yes, and he’s planning to kill you while drinking your blood—yes, he is still planning on doing it. If he doesn’t drink you dry, your blood can only heal him of his weakness temporarily. He has to drink all of it in order to become completely invincible. Which has to do with the energy of the sacrifice—he consumes your life, taking it for himself along with your blood.”
I stare into her eyes, absorbing her image along with her words. I’m not shocked, I’m not even surprised. Deep down, I always knew. I felt it the first time Dracula and I met on the first festival night, when he turned and revealed his face to me in front of his portrait. I felt he was dangerous to me.
“Okay.”
Victoria stares at me puzzled.
“Is that all you have to say?”
I shrug. “I’m here, at his castle, and he hasn’t killed me yet.”
She grins like she finally understands something. “And you thi
nk he won’t do it at all? He will do it, Ruxandra, probably while he fucks you. Try to wrap your mind around that. He’ll sink his teeth into your jugular and suck you dry as if you’re nothing more than a piece of meat, a steak on his plate—I’m sorry to be so blunt with that comparison.”
Flashes of Vlad’s huge, muscular body moving on mine rush into my head, his rock-like pectorals pressing against my breasts, his teeth piercing my throat. Victoria’s grin widens, revealing long, sharp teeth. It would scare the crap out of anyone else, but this is me, the fucking demon-girl.
“The only reason he spared you in the first place,” she says, “was because the Old Priest convinced him this was his chance to get rid of your demon once and for all. You see, your demon is one of the two enemies that Vlad Dracula ever took seriously. The first one is the shifter who whipped him to the bone, king of the serpents.”
A shudder goes through me at the mere mention. I feel the energy of something slithery, cold and too versatile.
“The demon,” she continues, clearly unsettled by the fact that she can’t scare me, “like any demon, can only be defeated if you know his name. Or, at the very least, if you understand what he is, what power he represents. That’s why Dracula went with you to the monastery, in order to use you and discover the demon’s name, so that he could control him, and banish him.”
I still look at her without blinking, my shoulders square, my face expressionless, but inside I’m dying. Dracula used me.
“He could care less if you draw another breath, Ruxandra, he will only keep you alive until you’ve served your purpose,” Victoria turns the knife in my wound. “But I can help you.”
I snort, and then I burst into laughter. Victoria looks around, worried.
“Hush, they might hear us.”
“Yes, they might, so what?” I scan her up and down, conveying my contempt. “How stupid do you think I am to trust you? You might be telling the truth about Vlad’s initial plan for me, but that’s just a strategy—using half-truths to raise trust, then lie.”
“Oh, you’re mistaken, child. I have no problem giving you the entire truth. I want to bring down Vlad Dracula because he confined me to this—” she motions to the talisman now lying at our feet between us, the golden chain coiling around it like a snake. “Piece of junk. And I do hope to use you to win my freedom, but it’s in your best interest, too. So listen.”
If she could come closer she would, but there’s no space, so all she does is bring her ghostly face nearer, the rest of her body rippling around like folds of smoke. She does remind me of a genie coming out of a bottle.
“I know that Lord Dracula has been sleeping with you all this time, seeping into your chamber in the form of mist.”
The blood freezes in my veins—how the hell does she know that?
“He’s kept it a secret from all vampires, and has persuaded you to play along. He thinks you a stupid little girl, and took advantage, Ruxandra.”
She surrounds me all over now in coils of smoke, only her face still floating in front of mine.
“He used other women before just like he’s using you now. I’ll be blunt with you—he would have fucked you and sucked you dry, wiping his mouth and washing his cock, and then never thinking about you again, hadn’t it been for the demon.”
Pain surges from my chest to my throat, bringing me close to choking. I’m trying to keep steady, keep on my feet, but my trembling chin betrays me.
“But, like I said, I can help you,” Victoria looks down at herself. “I am something similar to your father Radek. I can travel through dimensions. One of the most important dimensions of this world is the so-called mirror dimension, the upside down, the flipside version of this reality. Of this very castle and this village. That’s where your demon is waiting for you. He is your true ancestor and your power. He is the only one you’ll be safe with, and he can help you punish Dracula for what he intends to do to you.”
I crave one reason, at least one, for which I can dismiss her as a filthy liar, and find a way to kill her with my dark powers. But deep inside I know she might be right.
I think of the vampires urging Dracula to do what the ‘planned initially’ because they grew too afraid of me. He would probably do it already if the demon were defeated.
“What’s in it for you?” I ask Victoria, raising an eyebrow. At least I feel I’m finally facing a spirit as doomed as mine. The black has filled my eyeballs, and the blood has left my face, leaving me as white as paper. People would scream in terror just from looking at me right now, but Victoria can take it on the same level.
“From a scary freak to another,” she says with a grin. “Here’s the naked truth. I hope the demon will finish Dracula, because otherwise the vampire prince will confine me back to this fucking talisman. Your demonic powers freed me, but only until he gets me and imprisons me again. Still, my freedom means that I will go after your mother and father.”
“I’ll never let you.”
“I don’t expect you to. You and I will face and fight each other when the time comes but, right now, let us fight our common enemy—Lord Vlad Dracula, who wants you dead and me forever imprisoned, under his control.”
I hear muffled steps through the buzzing in my ears.
“He’s coming,” Victoria panics, her eyes shooting wide, the black beans in the center shrinking even more. “Quickly, hide the talisman. I’ll find you later, and take you to the mirror dimension, help you find the demon. Believe it or not, he is your salvation.”
She disappears through the wall, and I kick the now empty talisman behind me, into a crack.
The door to the secret passageway opens, and Dracula enters, his huge shadow filling the corridor. His eyes sparkle when he spots me, as if he’s come alive.
He walks over, his shoulders so broad that he fills the tunnel, his eyes almost black with hunger. I push myself against the wall, knowing what’s going to happen.
CHAPTER X
Rux
VLAD STOPS IN FRONT of me, looking deeply into my eyes. He’s too big to fit in the narrow secret passageway without touching me, so my breasts brush against his chest that I know is as hard as a metal breastplate under the leather tunic.
My body is clay in his huge mailed hands as he clasps my shoulders, bringing me up to the tips of my toes while he lowers his head. He presses his lips on mine so hard that I’m sure I’ll bruise. He opens my mouth with his, pushing his tongue inside, possessing me with the hunger of a mad man.
“Oh, good God, how I want you,” he whispers, his breath hot against my mouth, eyes closed as if he just had his fill of water after a drought. His hands knead my shoulders possessively, and he pushes his crotch into me.
“I want you, right now,” he whispers against my lips, pulling my gown up my thighs, then grabbing my leg and positioning himself eagerly as if to take me.
“Wait,” I manage, looking down to avoid him reading the expression in my face.
He stops.
“What is it?”
I can’t make the words come out. When I think that he’s capable of using my body again, probably right after he promised the vampires once again that he would end me when this is over, I want to cry. It hurts so bad.
“Rux,” he nudges, his mailed finger under my chin to make me look up.
“What did you tell them? How did you manage to calm them down?”
“I’m Vlad Dracula, they just do what I tell them.”
“Well, that’s not good enough for me anymore, Vlad.” I jerk my head away from his hand, and look him in the face. He sees my tears and his lips part in surprise.
“For the love of God,” he says, his voice warm and deep. He takes the mail glove off, drops it on the floor where it makes a clinking sound, and wipes the tears from under my eyes. His finger is rough but warm and loving on my skin. I want to cry harder, realizing just how much I hang on his little gestures of affection. He’s the first and only man who made me feel like he was in love with me.
“You can’t keep ruling the vampires with fear,” I say among tears, unable to stem the flow. “Maybe you could do it for centuries, but now, because of the demon, they are rising against you. They will—”
“They cannot bring me down, Rux, if this is what you fear. Their flesh is bound to me, I’m the king of vampires, the Prince of Blood. I can kill them, but they cannot kill me without dying themselves. No vampire that I ever made, or that has been made by a vampire that I, let’s say, fathered with my venom can exist without me existing. ”
I can’t say another word, even though my mind keeps working. I understand why Gruia hates Dracula without actually ever trying to assassinate him or something like that. Victoria doesn’t care if she loses Gruia when the demon kills him, she can get another cock when she’s free but, judging by Gruia’s behavior at the gathering, Victoria must have promised to disconnect him from Dracula, and help him take over the vampires. All my senses tell me that is the truth.
Vlad smiles, his eyes moving over my face full of desire, and it makes me want to cry out in pain. This is all fake, this is him acting, pretending. Sure, he’s over six hundred years old, he can trick just about anyone. How could I ever believe, even for one second, that of all the women he’s met and had, he would stop at me? He bends down to kiss me, but I lean my head back against the rocky wall.
“How did you calm them? What did you promise?”
“I repeat, I don’t have to promise them anything. I told them that we’d deal with the demon first, and then we’d see.”
“Even with the demon gone, I might still retain power over silver. This could—”
“Rux,” he whispers in a deep, rich voice, his eyes dark with desire. “I’ve been away from you for hours, acting cold when all I wanted was to kiss you in front of them all. I’m starving for you, let us talk about all this later.”
I stare up at him.
“Then why don’t we make it official, Vlad?” I stop him again when he bends down to kiss me. “Why don’t you put their minds at ease? Tell them I would never hurt them because I’m their king’s, I don’t know, concubine or whatever. Something official.”
