by Helen Allan
“Not exactly,” he frowns. “She drains a small amount of blood every day and distributes that to her court. Those who are closest to her benefit the most. In this way she retains their loyalty and love because the blood is so rare, one might go many, many centuries before finding some outside of the court.”
“Huh,” I sip my wine and keep my eyes on him. “where do I come into the scheme of things?”
He leans forward, his excitement evident in the gleam in his eyes.
“I want to give you to her. To place you in her dungeon. I will tell her that you are the bait to attract your prince, update her about your illicit liaison, embellish the truth a little.”
“Hang on,” I hold up my hand, “I’m no mastermind, but this isn’t sounding like a great plan. Why would I agree to this?”
“Because if you follow my strategy to the letter. If you do as I ask, the queen will die. I will claim responsibility and ascend the throne. And when I am king, I will grant protection, worldwide protection, to your prince. No vampire will dare to harm him. He can live his life in peace, and you will be free to live yours.”
I gasp.
“But how will me being imprisoned help you to kill the queen?”
“Well, this is the beauty of my plan, little French gypsy. Your blood is poisonous to our kind.”
“Say what?”
“Oh yes,” he smirks, “you gypsies think we just don’t like the taste of you. But in fact, if we sip you, we die. Strange magic.”
“How come we don’t know this?” I throw up my hands in despair. How come the enemy knows more about us than we do? It is like the game is rigged.
He shrugs, “much has been lost over the centuries. But for those of us who live long enough, all truths remain.”
“Hang on,” I hold my hand up, my mind still reeling from this latest bombshell. “my best friend is a vampire,” I see his eyebrows shoot up at this, “and she always said I smelled like Draino, and that was why she and her friends didn’t bite me.”
“You smell divine,” Henri says in a sexy voice, “but one bite and it’s curtains for us.”
“But if you can’t smell something bad about me,” I pause, “how do vampires know gypsies from everyday humans. How do you know not to bite us?
“It is a sixth sense,” he says, clapping his hands for the servants to clear the table, “we sense danger when we are around you, like when you feel eyes on you and turn to find someone watching you, a similar feeling, the hairs on the back of our neck rise.”
“Huh,” I smile as a bowl of ice cream is bought out, it’s cherry chip, my favourite. I can’t help wondering how he knows this, or if it was a lucky guess. Or maybe it’s just because it is pink, with little flecks of red in it, just another blood reference. I shrug and tuck in, regardless.
“So how do you propose I get my blood into the queen if she won’t drink from me?”
“Ah,” he rubs his hands together like a happy little boy, “this is the beauty. I have contacts in the court. I was the queen’s lover for nearly two centuries, I know most of the servants, human and vampire alike, by name. I will ensure they let you out of your dungeon long enough to slip some of your blood into the prince’s blood collection container. When the queen takes a sip – Viola! – she is dead.”
“Ding dong the witch is dead,” I muse. “And me?” I ask, scooping out the last of the ice cream and frowning that it had gone so soon.
“When I am crowned, I set you free, and you and your little Danish prince can live happily ever after.”
I try to look nonchalant. I don’t bother telling him I’d like to drown my Danish prince, better to let him think we are all happy families and I no longer care for Zan.
“Henri you do know this is starting to sound like one of those trust things. You know, where I fall back and you are supposed to catch me, but you drop me onto the ground.”
“Trust is involved, yes,” he says, his eyes dark, “but I will not drop you Freely.”
“I’ve listened to what you’ve said,” I say, leaning back and patting my stomach, boy was I full, “but I don’t want to do it.”
He carefully places his wine glass back on the table and gives me a disappointed look.
“Freely, I have been patient with you, but you don’t seem to appreciate the danger I pose, should you, how shall I say, deny me.”
I grit my teeth and consider him through narrowed eyes; I have a feeling I could take him; he seems a bit soft to me.
“You would not win Ma Cherie,” he says softly, as if reading my thoughts.
Without hesitation, I throw my steak knife at his heart. But he is quick, fucking quick, and he is by my side with his hand on my throat before I can blink. The knife is embedded in his chair, level with where his chest would have been. I gasp and, for the first time, feel a tingle of fear run up my spine. He could snap my neck like a twig. Instead, he chuckles, gives me a peck on the cheek, and lets me go, flitting back to his chair faster than my eye can follow.
“Right,” I breathe, “I guess we have a deal, on one condition.”
“And that is?” he asks quietly, his voice deadly.
“I want more ice cream.”
Chapter 10
I wonder if Henri was a fashion designer in a past life.
Looking in the mirror at the latest ensemble he has me in I have to admit, he knows his frocks. It is another floor-length gown, heavily lined cream wool with little blue velvet flowers, blue velvet buttons run from the high neck, all the way to the hem. It has tight, long arms, and comes in flatteringly at the breast and waist. I sigh as I stand for his inspection.
It’s my last day at the chateau, I’ve been here three days ‘fattening up’ as Henri calls it. He wanted to feed me and have me at my peak before he confines me to the Queen’s dungeons. If I’m totally honest, I’ve had fun living with him; his library is to die for. Literally, I could happily live here my whole life as a vampire if I got that library as part of the deal. Wall-to-wall books in a towering room, many accessible only via tall ladders leaning against the shelves. I could spend ten years there and not even read a thousandth of what he has collected over the years. Every waking moment, when I wasn’t being stuffed to overflowing with delicious treats and fine wine, I was in his library.
“Is this really an appropriate gown for a dungeon?” I ask, as he stands and admires me.
“You never know how long you might be there darling,” he croons as I stare at him, still not sure if I should complete this ridiculously dangerous assignment. “And this fabric is layered and warm. It will insulate you against the cold, damp rock.”
“What the fuck Henri?” I throw my hands into the air. “You told me no more than two days. You said you would get your little lackey to let me out Day One to give blood, and Day Two I would be free. Are you second-guessing yourself?”
“No, Mon Dieu, not at all,” he sighs, coming forward to face me. I want to take a step back, but I don’t want to show him fear. I like his sense of humour, true, and he is a handsome and sophisticated man, true, maybe even a bit sexy, but he is also incredibly old and incredibly strong.
He leans in and carefully, gently, does up a velvet button I have missed, just below my bust line. His fingers linger a little longer than necessary, and I blush as my nipples respond. It is a good thing I will be leaving this place soon, Henri is starting to grow on me, like a fungus I remind myself.
He smiles gently and sighs. I know my reaction is not lost on him.
“So beautiful. I will not let anything happen to you, Ma Cherie.”
I hold my bottom lip between my teeth and narrow my eyes at him. What choice do I have really?
As we stand there, I hear the chopper landing on the roof landing pad.
“Are you sure you don’t want anything to eat before we go?” I ask him one last time. Since I have been at the chateau I haven’t seen him drink anyone, and the glass he sips at the dining table is only wine, I checked.
“Definitely I would like to eat,” he winks at me and casts a meaningful glance at my crotch.
“Don’t be rude Henri,” I laugh, “you are a very sick old man.” As I say this, I wonder at what age he stopped - ageing that is - he looks to be about 29-30 to me.
“Old, yes, sick, ahhh, if only you knew the things I would like to do to your body.”
I sneer, “um, telling a chick how you’d like to kill her? No wonder you are still single.”
“Kill? Kill with pleasure perhaps,” he drawls, “your blood prince was a madman casting you aside, but a stronger man than I would have been, had I been in his shoes. I shall take great pleasure in draining him for hurting you in such a way.”
I hold my breath. Henri has told me before he plans to wipe out Zan’s family. It would be a big coup for a new king to take out the ruling class of vampire hunters. He has also, in a sly way, tried to draw me out, to find out what I really think about the Karishnokovs. He told me that to cast aside a gypsy was virtually unheard of, ‘the most shameful thing that could be done to one of your kind.’ I didn’t show my shock or hurt at the time, but smiled and told him I was happy in Denmark, all things considered. But I sense he doesn’t believe me.
I laugh now, at his reference to killing Zan. ‘Not going to happen.’
“Well, let us get this little queen killing episode over first before you start wholesale slaughtering the populace.”
“Indeed,” he sighs, turning from me to lead the way up to the helicopter, “and you know,” he adds as an afterthought, “when I am king, you will need to refer to me as ‘my liege’ and bow to me.
“Yeah?” I laugh, “you’ve got two chances of that happening, zero and Buckley’s.”
“Buckley’s?”
“Never mind.” I’m still laughing when I get in the helicopter.
The dungeon is cold, fucking cold, and three days in I’m beginning to seriously doubt my intelligence.
Has Henri tricked me? Is this all a ploy to draw in a prince who will never actually come for me? I mean, my God, I haven’t seen Zan in months and months. Haven’t heard from him, not a phone call, not a text, not a quick ‘are you ok?’ – nothing. So the likelihood of him actually doing anything when he is told of my capture – zilch.
But Henri knows this, so I have to trust that his plan will work, that something has just gone slightly awry. I don’t know why, but I trust that little French bastard, although a small, persistent voice keeps telling me that perhaps that will be my undoing.
I rattle my chains and try to rearrange my skirts beneath me, so I don’t get haemorrhoids from constantly sitting on cold concrete, Dad used to always warn me about that – then again, he used to warn me constantly about tinea too – it’s a wonder I didn’t turn out to be a hypochondriac, although I have just worried in the space of five minutes about catching a cold, getting piles, being eaten by rats and catching the plague…
This gets me to thinking about my parents, and I wonder if I will ever see them again. I push this thought away; I can’t visit them even when, if, I do get free. I can’t abandon my shitty little prince or lead vamps to my mother and father.
I hear the prisoner next door cough, and my thoughts swing back to my current incarceration. Henri was at least right about the dress choice. I hope to hell I’m not in here another night. It’s cold, I’m hungry, I feel a chill coming on, and I’m scared. On more than one occasion vampires have come to the door to stare through the bars at me. None looked very pleasant, I have to say, and the screams from other cells kind of indicate they aren’t your average, modern vampire.
My only companion, apart from the rats, is the unfortunate blood prince next door, who can barely speak he is so weak and sick. I don’t know what his name is, but I have been telling him hopeful things, sharing news of the outside world. Hell, if this keeps up I would have told him my whole life story by tomorrow. It beats listening to my brain telling me I’m a fuckwit on death row.
Hearing him cough again, I call out and ask how he is this morning.
“I’m dying,” he says, quietly and matter-of-factly. “I have not seen the sunlight for, I lost count at 18 months, I’ve stopped eating, they have to force me. Every day they take so much blood, I lose consciousness. One more day, maybe two, the end.”
This is the most I have heard him say, and I try not to cry. He sounds so resigned, so sure, and if I’m honest, I selfishly don’t want to be left alone down here. I don’t want his story to end here either. From the little I have heard him say in the past few days I like him, I like his turn of phrase; he seems, somehow familiar, but I know I can’t save him, it is not part of the deal.
“Well, since you are determined to cark it and leave me here ‘alone and palely loitering,’ why don’t you use that last bit of strength to tell me about yourself.”
He chuckles, “La Belle Dame sans Merci, Keats, how fitting.” He coughs, and the key turns in my door.
I tense, thinking this might be the day the servant comes to set me free, but no. A tall, dark-haired, dark-eyed vampire enters the room and firmly shuts the door behind him.
“Take your clothes off,” he says in a sinister voice, pulling a small knife from his pocket and advancing towards me.
I snigger and hold my chains up to him, I couldn’t undress if I wanted to, and I sure as hell don’t want to. I back off when he begins to advance.
“Fuck off!” I spit, backing into the corner of the room. I’ve seen this guy, he comes lurking to stare in my door, and I hear his taunts to the prince in the cell next door. He is the queen’s lover, and he wants to drain the prince. But he can’t without severely pissing her off. I also know, from the dark chuckles and the high and never-ending women’s screams that go on and on and then cut off suddenly in other cells, that he is one sick fuck.
“Oh I do love it when they fight me,” he drawls, advancing.
I can’t do much, to be honest, I don’t have the strength after three days in here, and I don’t have my gypsy strength or speed, I lost that when Zan left me. All I really have is my wits, and, let’s face it, I think I’m funnier than I am.
“Listen Sauron,” I start, smirking despite myself, “the whole ‘dark lord’ look is lost on me. And if you kill me, word is bound to leak out, and my prince won’t come for me. Which might, you know, scuttle your immortality plans a tad.”
He smiles and grabs a handful of my hair from the back of my head, pulling my face to his. I hate my hair being pulled. I mean, like most pale-skinned and red to auburn hair types, we have sensitive skin, and hair pulling is something that we just don’t cope well with. As a child, pulling my hair would result in you being beaten to a pulp, no one, and I mean no one, pulled my hair. I’m hating him now with a vengeance, and gasping, as with his other hand he cuts the buttons off my gown, one by one from the neck down. With each ‘snick’ of a button, a tiny nick is cut into my skin, and I can feel rivulets of blood running down my cleavage. I’d like to say I can stoically keep my mouth shut during torture, but I can’t, and I scream my box off.
He laughs and pulls my gown off my shoulders, revealing the corset I have underneath. I know, right, a corset, but like I said, Henri.
“You know,” I mutter, staring into his eyes as he pushes the knife to my throat and shoves his hand up my skirts. “I’m starting to feel like one of those ravished damsels in distress in an 18th century romance novel. How do you feel? Pirate? Villain? Rogue? Mad, psychotic duke?”
He turns his head and studies me like I’m a bug.
“Days and days,” he croons, as his fingers slip inside my knickers and he pinches me cruelly. “It can take days and days for me to skin a woman, days and days for her to beg me to let her die, and yet, with you, I think longer, there are so many things I can take from you, before your skin.” As if to make the point he rams two fingers into my vagina, and I scream again.
“I will carve my initials into every part of your body,” he sneers, squeezing me hard from the
inside.
“Yeah?” I mutter, I can see his handkerchief peeking out the top of his coat pocket, it has a big V monogrammed on it, nothing more. “You might want to come up with something a little more original. I mean, ripping off a television show? A bit sad don’t you think?”
He smirks and rams his fingers harder into me, and I scream again.
He turns his head to the side and grins as I look him in the eyes and, while I know people spit at baddies in the movies, I don’t do that, it’s just plain gross, and I’m really not the spitting type. Instead, I grin back. And I don’t really know why. Sometimes I do it when I’m nervous. Sometimes if I’m really scared. I think this grin falls into the latter category this time because, by fuck, I don’t want to be skinned. I’m thinking of some way I can hurt him, any possible way I can fight back, and coming up blank when he is called from the doorway.
“Vahid.”
He turns and snarls at the intruder, but his snarl quickly turns to a look of amused nonchalance.
“My queen?” he says, casually pulling his hand out from under my skirts and wiping it on my cheek.
I try to pull away, but he still has the knife to my throat and, frankly, I’m terrified.
“Here you are. I’ve been looking all over,” she says, “Leave my little toys alone, please, you have plenty of others to indulge your artistic desires with.”
“But I want this one,” he says motioning to me with his head, “she has annoyed me.”
The woman is silhouetted in the doorway wearing a tight black thigh-length skirt and high, high heels. I notice she has one of those supermodel figures, the kind where you see a big gap between their long, long legs. I’ve never had that. I also notice her change her stance slightly, she seems kind of pissed off to me, but keeping it in check.
“Soon, soon my darling one,” she sighs, “When her prince comes for her, as Henri has promised he will, you can have her. Keep her as a pet if you like.”
