“I’m sorry, Belinda, it was an accident!” cried Susanna, with fear in her eyes. Belinda had taken a broom to her too many times in the past for her not to be frightened by the prospect.
“You pea-brained dunce!” Belinda shouted, as she grabbed Susanna by the hair. “You never learn, do you?”
Susanna was cowering again on the floor, her bare feet cut and bleeding from where she had stepped on some sherds from the broken crockery. She looked on with dread as Belinda came back not with the broom but with some reeds that Susanna had been saving in order to make a basket. Out of the frying pan and into the fire, it seemed.
“It seems I have to teach you a lesson… again!” She walked slowly, ominously, towards the focus of her wrath. Her eye began twitching as her anger increased.
“No, please, don’t!” Susanna pleaded, putting her hand up defensively. “Belinda, no, I can take no more of this!”
Belinda struck her ferociously and repeatedly with the smooth, hard reeds, which immediately left behind huge red lines upon Susanna’s flesh. The young woman shrieked loudly in pain, and Toby the dog yapped in alarm.
“Shut up, you stupid mongrel!” Belinda yelled as she smacked the dog with the reeds upon his bottom. Toby ran off with a yelp.
Susanna then took this chance and hobbled as fast as she could out of the open door.
Belinda turned around, her heart still beating wildly in her fury, and observed Susanna retreat into the forest. She certainly was not going to follow her thither.
“Good riddance!” she shouted, “I hope the beasts of the wood eat you alive, you worthless baggage!”
The sister-in-law shook her head and cast her eyes upon the shards of crockery, now scattered across the floor. She leaned over and found a triangular piece that displayed half of a rather cartoonish depiction of Charles II’s face. She picked the rest up, ruefully, and tossed them into the fire.
“That clumsy fool of a girl!” she muttered to herself. All of her own disillusions, all of her frustrations she had subconsciously pointed towards Susanna. Belinda, above all else, yearned to leave the stifling oppression of Coffin’s Bishop and be welcomed at the court of Charles II. But so hideous a creature as she would never be greeted with anything other than horror and derision from anyone beyond the village.
This plate, which her father had brought back from one of his rare trips to London, which he constantly referred to as ‘a den of vice and iniquity’, was the only physical object from that world of which she so longed to see. Though a small part of her loved Samuel, she cruelly resented the fact that he was incapacitated, and she, a mere farmer’s wife in a village that was not even on a map. She watched as the flames blackened the white plate; and as it turned to ash, so also did her dreams.
***
Although Henry only fed from those who were already dying, his nature still hungered to kill something fresh and healthy. This was a constant source of anxiety for him, this relentless conflict between his conscience and his vampire nature. His firm principles would never condone the murder of an innocent, healthy human, so he continued through the woods that surrounded his vast estate. Suddenly, he caught the scent of human blood. There was a dense fog throughout the forest, but this was no impediment for Henry. He flew quickly, the dark trees whizzing by him like shooting stars. Conscience or no, his hunger rose as the intoxicating aroma assailed his senses, and he shot through the woods towards his prey…
***
The fire crackled away before her inside the space between the stones. She looked at the palm of her hand. It had a nasty cut; and the blood was still seeping out. She had multiple cuts and bruises all over her body. She winced every time she moved, and her left eye was now swollen shut from Peter’s assault. Her fingers painfully reached into her pocket, from which she took out a little pot of ointment she had made. It was a standard concoction from a variety of medicinal herbs, to prevent an infection. She always carried it on her person, for incidents such as these were increasingly common for her, though she had never before retaliated against Peter. She winced again as she applied some of the soothing ointment to the cuts and grazes.
Susanna had never received such a sound beating, even with the horrible experience she had had two years before. She knew she had to leave, or they would ultimately kill her someday. But she was concerned, for she knew so little of the world; she did not know where she would go, or how she would make a living. She thought of London. London was a huge city, full of opportunities. If she did her best, she thought maybe she could even get a position as a scullery maid in one of the grand houses along the Mall, or perhaps selling oranges in the theatres. She even dreamed of being able to sing in the open, without fear or restraint. She sighed, and winced, as her left rib was now bruised where Peter had kicked her.
Alone in her own space, she began to cry — the only release she was able to indulge in — and her sobs and wails echoed around the cave. She sounded more like a ghost than a human.
***
Henry followed the heady, strong scent of fresh blood through the woods and he stopped near a rock formation. A warm glow from a fire emanated from within, and the delicious aroma of blood mingled with the wood smoke and made him growl with hunger. He snarled. Susanna heard this, and her one good eye opened wide in alarm. Was that a wolf? She cast her eye around the cave for something with which to defend herself, and she caught sight of her axe. The growling noise came closer, so she quickly fetched it, and held the axe high up, waiting to strike. Suddenly, a ferocious beast burst through the ferns and landed, snarling, by the fire. Her eyesight hindered by her injuries, she could not make it out completely, but it was hideous! Susanna let out a high-pitched scream as the monstrous creature lunged towards her.
***
She felt a throbbing pain from the back of her head as she slowly came to. She gingerly brought her hand up to the tender part of her scalp where she had hit the ground.
“Oww,” she groaned.
“You’ve hit your head rather hard, I fear,” said a man beside her.
Susanna gasped in shock and was utterly taken aback when she saw his face — so much like her own and not remotely resembling the swine faces she had seen all of her life in Coffin’s Bishop. In that same instant, though she did not realise it then, she was attracted to him.
“Who are you?” she managed to ask.
“Forgive me, lady, my name is Henry. Please do not be alarmed, I only wish to help you.”
“What are you doing here? Where is that monster?” she said, frantically, her good eye darting around her with fear.
“I, er, heard you screaming and I rushed over and found you in this cave. Yes, that was a terrible creature — a hellish beast, but I sent it packing.”
From the little she could see, she thought he looked sad. “It shall not come back anytime soon,” he continued. “It will not harm you. I’ll make sure of that.”
“Did it not attack you?” she wondered.
“No.”
“Are you certain? Please let me look at you, turn ‘round.” Samuel had once told her that some gravely injured people often did not know they were thus because they were in a state of shock. Henry felt strangely embarrassed but stood up and turned around slowly. He was completely unscathed. She, however, had as good a look at him as she could. He had leather boots on, brown breeches, with matching waistcoat, he wore a cravat around his throat, and his white shirtsleeves were tied with black ribbons at his wrists.
He gestured with his hands. “As you can see I am very well.”
Susanna nodded. “I’m glad of it. I wonder why it did not attack you? Or why it did not eat me?”
“Perhaps it would be best not to dwell upon the matter any longer. What is your name?” he asked.
“My name is Susanna Edmonds. I live at Edmonds Farm in Coffin’s Bishop.”
“Susanna,” he repeated in a whisper, letting the word roll about his tongue.
“I have never seen another as afflicted
with deformity as I,” she said, still unable to overlook his appearance.
Henry did not understand what she meant by this, and so proceeded to ask, “Shall I take you to your husband, Mistress Edmonds?”
She gave a sad little chuckle. “Oh! I am not married, Sir. I’m quite the village spinster!”
“Truly?” asked Henry, surprised at this. Although the young woman’s face had been damaged by her injuries and she was quite dirty, her red hair tangled and knotted, he could see she was no ugly creature.
“Aye, Sir. I am not well regarded there.” Susanna didn’t know what else to say.
His eyes narrowed into slits as he thought about the strange things she had said. Surely she must be a prostitute. “Are you a lady of the night?”
Her eye widened in offence. “By God, I am not! I may be friendless, Sir, but I still have my dignity.” She shrugged, and quietly added, “What’s left of it, anyway.”
“Please, I do beg your pardon. I was only endeavouring to understand why one such as yourself is in such a position. Please, sweet lady, I meant no offence.”
She looked at him as she judged whether or not he was being sincere. She sighed. “Of course, anyone would think that I was a lady of the night. Many do, but it is not the truth. It’s too ghastly to explain, so I shan’t, but I do wish that Coffin’s Bishop didn’t exist. Not the town, and particularly not people living in it.” Her expression darkened considerably as she remembered the horrors and humiliations she had endured at their hands. “They are an evil people.”
He gave her an odd look, for she did likely to harbour dislike for people on a whim; so only one conclusion could be drawn from this — she had been mistreated. This troublesome thought then made him think of her current wounds, and he was curious to know why she had received them.
“But your people reside at Edmonds Farm?”
“Aye, Sir, the farm is owned by my brother and his wife. I have no other family, for my mother and father died long ago. I tend to the animals and crops and the do the cooking and cleaning inside the cottage.”
“I took the liberty of applying some of these herbs that I found here beside you to your wounds. May I ask how you came to have these injuries?”
She bit her lip. “I have displeased my sister-in-law, Belinda. It was my own fault, I probably deserved it.” She shrugged her rounded shoulders and gave an involuntary sigh. He felt instantly uncomfortable, for the young woman was obviously being abused horribly. “But, no, I did not deserve it! Her brother is a foul man and in trying to flee from his grasp, I suddenly lashed out at him. I slashed him under his belly with my knife. And then in the struggle, we, I broke her favourite plate. She loves it so because it has an image of the King upon it.”
“That is all? Such things can be replaced. But this woman —“
“Belinda.”
“— Belinda does not deserve a replacement. This brother of hers sounds like a cad. An accident is, after all, an accident, and her subsequent behaviour renders her undeserving.”
“I suppose you must be right,” she replied, unused to such sensible thought. “I’m surprised that anyone else would be in these woods. You are not from the village, for you would be too afraid to venture hither if you were.”
With her good eye, she could see that he most certainly was not from Coffin’s Bishop, for he looked completely different from all the men she had ever seen, save her brother and father. Why, he looked nothing at all like the villagers! She assumed he was as misshapen as she, and yet, Henry was the first man to whom she had ever been attracted. Indeed, the attraction was immediate and potent. She took in his long, wavy black hair, the cleft in his chin, his full lips and his strong nose.
Henry smiled. “No, though I do live close by now. I am from London originally.”
“London!” she exclaimed, her face lighting up considerably. “Why, I have only just been thinking of how I would like to go to London, and get away from this horrible place. I wonder why you are here in this god-forsaken place.” She looked so vulnerable and sad that it would have broken his heart had it still been alive.
“I live nearby, on the other side of this wood.” He gestured towards the direction from which he had come.
“If you’re from London, does that mean you can read?” she asked, hopefully.
“I can read and write, though not everything in London can do so. It isn’t as though everything is perfect there.”
“Oh. It’s just, I so wish I could read. I have my father’s book here,” she said, reaching for the aged book, wrapped in rags to protect it. “Would you tell me what it is, please?”
He took it and pushed away the rags. “Why, this is a collection of the plays by William Shakespeare.”
“Who’s that?” asked Susanna, her good eye bright with excitement.
“Why, he was one of the greatest of all English dramatists,” Henry replied. “He died only at the beginning of this century. He is certainly one of my favourite playwrights.”
“Thank you. I have long wanted to know what kind of book it was.” She smiled. “To speak plainly, Sir, I have never met anyone from outside my village. I have never seen anything else. We’re quite a strange people here; we are not allowed to go to town fairs in Northampton. Why, the furthest I’ve gone is here. I’ve never seen the sea.” She shrugged. “George Winthrop, the magistrate, says that everything outside Coffin’s Bishop is damned, but I do not believe that. Is it really so awful out there?”
“There is both good and evil in the world,” he stated. Henry wondered what, if anything he should do. Should he employ her at his dilapidated castle? Griselda might be back at any time — what would she think about her? Should he even care what Griselda thought?
“There is another village nearby?” she asked, referring to his previous comment.
“No, there is nothing for hours in each direction. I live in Sanguinem Castle.”
“What? But that’s an accursed building!” she exclaimed, remembering the gory tales about the castle which had been whispered throughout the village.
He shook his head and laughed. “Nay, it is not. It was in bad repair when first I saw it, but for the past five years, I have made it better. It is rather comfortable now. Hardly any ghosts at all!”
She opened her good eye in amazement.
“I only jest. There are no ghosts there, at least none that I have come across. May I at least escort you back to your home?” he said, kindly. “Your feet are badly lacerated, you cannot walk on them. I wonder how you managed to get here at all.”
“Through sheer resolve, one can do anything, I suppose,” she replied, though she immediately thought of how she had doubted her ability to run away to London. Perhaps she would have made her way to the Capital had the beast not tried to attack her and this man come to her rescue…
This man.
She could feel his eyes upon her, and a brief shaft of rare felicity surged in her bosom. But then she thought of Belinda, and she was trembled at the thought of going back to the cottage. Would she strike at her again? She feared that she would soon die at her sister-in-law’s hands, and then it would all be over.
She shuddered.
“I am too frightened to go back. I think I should stay here for the night. She was so very angry.”
“I am very sorry to hear that. Does your brother not do anything to stop her from hurting you thus?”
Susanna shook her head. “No, Sir, for he cannot. Samuel has been bed-ridden for two years now. He had a fall from his horse and broke his back, you see, and we all thought he was going to die. He will never walk again.”
Henry’s memory instantly shot back to a time when he had been in the woods, hunting for someone upon which to feed. He smelled a healthy human and then flew through the wood. He hid behind the ferns as he readied to attack the lone male rider. The chestnut had sensed him and reared back violently throwing off the rider. He would have helped the man were it not for the two women who had come running. He
then realised this was the same young woman he had seen that evening.
She dared to look straight up into his eyes for the first time. Those haunting, mesmerising yellow-green eyes calmed her immediately. He took off his coat and gently placed it around Susanna’s shoulders. She shivered as she put her arm around his hard, cold neck. His skin seemed as hard as stone, but still smooth. Henry said nothing as he carried her in his arms through the thicket, with only the autumn moonlight above.
There was a very pleasant scent about him. She was not able to know, but his skin was perfumed by the expensive Castile soap, which he used to keep the odour of purification at bay. All she noticed was that his skin that had not the slightest trace of body odour, which she thought odd. Most people, including herself, reeked of perspiration as few people bathed regularly. Most washed their hands and swilled their face in the mornings, and some might go into the river, but it was usually far too cold to do so comfortably. No, no one ever smelled as good as he did and she felt herself finding pleasure as he carried her. She allowed her eyes to rest upon him as he took her back to Edmonds farm. The back of her head began to throb again. She must have hit her head very hard indeed, she thought, for again his eyes seemed to radiate green-yellow light like glow-worms in a midsummer’s night.
He walked quickly and did not grunt or complain under her weight, but continued on quietly. They spoke not a word to each other, for he still was hungry and had to make a concerted effort not to drink her dry. She, on the other hand, felt increasingly drawn to him. She bunched some of his silken hair in between her fingers, and this too brought her some delight. It was a soft as rabbit’s fur, but thick and lustrous as a horse’s mane. She could have happily continued on in his arms forever. Sooner than she wished, they had left the forest and the Edmonds Farm lay in view. Henry saw the large, dead tree and the cottage and barn. The cows, sensing his predatory presence, fidgeted and mooed with fear as he drew near.
The Stuart Vampire Page 13
