Dimitri looked at her. “I can’t believe you talked us into this, Simona.”
Simona snorted. “You can go back to camp right now, Dimitri. No one is holding a gun to your head.”
“A dare is a dare,” he countered.
“I don’t like this any more than you do.” Alba fingered the amulet Dimitri had given her that morning. “But I wasn’t about to let your friend call me a spooked cat behind my back.” She cast Simona a look that shot daggers.
“It’s not my intention to frighten you, little princess. By coming here, Dimitri and I are returning to our heritage. Our ancestors served Vlad Dracul by carrying his caskets on these very grounds. He wanted our loyalty forever, so he enchanted a stream beneath his castle. The Szgamys drank from it and that’s how they attained their magical powers.”
Alba dug her fingertips into Dimitri’s arm.
“Never mind the history lesson. Just tell us what we need to do to find a bloodsucker’s grave,” he ordered sharply.
Simona flung her waist-length black hair over her shoulder. “To find a true vampire we must look for finger-sized holes in the dirt. Because vampires can change into a mist, people say they can escape from their graves at night by way of these holes.”
“How are we going to spot the holes through this damned fog?” Dimitri asked.
“Well,” snapped Simona, “if we’d brought a black horse with us, the horse would circle the grave instead of walking across it. Since we don’t have a horse, do you have a better suggestion?”
Dimitri rolled his eyes.
“If we dig up a grave,” Simona hissed, “and if the corpse makes a groaning sound at being disturbed, then we’ve found our vampire. We’ll place these wild rosebud stems around its sleeping body to prevent the vampire from moving.” She handed Dimitri and Alba two stems each. “Finally, we must all touch the corpse with our bare hands. Agreed?”
They nodded.
Dimitri took Alba’s hand in his while Simona went in the other direction. They moved hesitantly about the graveyard, their necks craned downward in search of finger-sized holes. After a few minutes, Simona stopped before an unmarked grave and called her companions over. “I’ve found one!” she proclaimed proudly. “Start digging.”
With the shovels they’d brought with them, they began to catch the moist earth and fling it aside. It seemed forever before Dimitri’s shovel tip came into contact with something solid. “I think I hit the top of a casket!” he cried.
He lay facedown on the ground, his heart pounding. With the tip of the shovel, he pried open the four-hundred-year-old lid. Inside the casket sat a hideous corpse. The female figure, dressed in a royal gown, rested in eerie slumber while maggots bored holes in her cheekbones. Her slender hands lay folded across her chest and glowed an unearthly purple beneath the waning moonlight.
Simona wiped a layer of mud from the surface of the headstone and read the name on it. “Oh my God. We’ve found Petra Laskov!”
Dimitri’s face went pale. “I didn’t mean to . . .”
“Who is Petra Laskov?” Alba asked. “Was she a Szgamy Gypsy?”
“Yes,” answered Simona in a panicked voice. “She was also Dracul’s mistress. Dracul lured her away from her Gypsy camp and seduced her. When she grew tired of his advances, she tried to leave him. Legend has it that the prince turned her into a vampire himself, so that she would serve him for all eternity.”
The corpse emitted at low, guttural moan and the trio exchanged terrified glances. Before Simona could lower the wild rosebuds into the desecrated grave, Petra Laskov’s eyelids flashed open to reveal a pair of red pupils aflame with madness.
The vampire streamed out of the casket, baring its gleaming fangs. The friends scattered about the graveyard in two different directions, Simona toward the rear gate of the cemetery and Alba and Dimitri toward the tunnel they dug under the fence.
“How dare you disturb my slumber!” The vampire’s fangs caught the moonlight.
Dimitri drew back against the fence’s wrought-iron palings.
“I hereby damn all of you to the same fate I suffer: an eternity spent as the undead!” the vampire seethed.
Alba screamed.
“Quick,” Dimitri yelled. “Slide under the fence!”
She did as Dimitri urged. Before he could follow her, the vampire seized him in a choke hold and held him against the square palings. Dimitri clutched the shovel to his throat as protection against the creature’s razor-sharp fangs. The vampire raised him off the ground, then flung him like a rag doll onto the sharp points of a stone cross that topped a headstone in the distance.
“Dimitri!” Alba cried.
The outburst caused the vampire to turn in her direction. “You’re next!”
While the vampire moved toward Alba, Dimitri worked his shoulder free of the headstone’s sharp point. Grimacing, he dislodged the stone crucifix and raised it to eye level. “Go back to hell!” He stepped toward the creature.
The vampire cowered at the sight of the religious symbol.
Still holding the cross at arm’s length, Dimitri made his way to the fence. He managed to shimmy beneath it and join Alba on the other side. Assuming that Simona must have reached safety too, the frightened pair ran to a clearing. Dimitri stopped and pitched to his knees, his shoulder bleeding profusely.
Alba fought back tears as she tried to press her hand against the wound. But nothing would stop the gush of blood.
Dimitri looked up at her with sorrowful eyes. “You must get help.”
“I don’t want to leave you.”
“You must! I’ll bleed to death.”
Alba nodded. “I’ll fetch Dr. Rhessa. He’s the physician who tends to my stepmother’s hemophilic condition when we travel. He’ll know what to do.”
“Go. And hurry!”
Alba touched the amulet around her neck in a silent caress. Then with a tortured look, she disappeared into the forest.
Dimitri groaned. He tried to concentrate on the hope that Alba would return quickly. Was she running the entire two miles—through town and up the mountainside—until she reached Stelian Hall?
The rattle of a horse-drawn wagon seized his attention. Dimitri jerked his head to the right. A kindly-faced man with thick spectacles pulled his cart to a halt and jumped down to the ground.
He studied Dimitri’s bloody jacket. “What the devil happened to you, young man?”
“It’s my shoulder. If you don’t want to help me, you can take me to my camp.”
“I don’t care that you’re a Gypsy. I’m a doctor—and from what I can tell, you’ve lost too much blood to be moved at the moment.” He paused. “Let’s get you out of the road and into the wagon.”
“What is your name?” Dimitri asked as the tall physician helped him to his feet.
“Ionel Rhessa.”
“You’re the doctor Alba went to fetch at Stelian Hall. She cut through the woods, so she must not have seen you.”
“If that’s the case, you must be Dimitri. Alba speaks of you often.”
Dimitri groaned in pain. Perspiration soaked his dark hair and dripped in streams along his temples as the physician peeled off his ripped jacket.
The physician, a man approaching middle age, began to treat Dimitri’s jagged tear in the moonlight. An awkward silence hung in the back of the wagon.
Where is Alba?
Dr. Rhessa cleared his throat. “What were you doing when you got this nasty slice on your shoulder, young man?”
“Fighting a vampire,” Dimitri answered him without hesitation. Petra Laskov, of all creatures.
Dr. Rhessa simply nodded. “So you’re as brave as Alba claims.”
Dimitri grimaced as Rhessa stitched his skin with a sturdy needle and wire thread.
“Drink this, my boy. It will help.” The doctor, whose eyes seemed comically large behind his thick glasses, produced a flask of whiskey. “Mind you, I brought Alba into this world. Unfortunately, she will acquiesce to her pare
nts’ demands that she have nothing to do with you out of respect. But nothing will ever change what she feels inside unless she wills it so. She is that headstrong.” He paused. “As for you, my boy, it’s obvious that you will never be allowed anywhere near her again.”
“You think her parents will forbid me to see her?” The thought mortified Dimitri.
“Yes. Especially if Alba returns home tonight scared out of her mind, splattered with blood.” Rhessa clipped the wire off the needle. “The Zpdas are planning to return to Bucharest sooner than expected—all in an attempt to sever your relationship with Alba.”
“But I love her more than anything.” Tears stung Dimitri’s eyes. He took another swig of the fiery alcohol.
Rhessa applied a layer of soothing liniment, and bandaged the wound before he sighed at the dejection in Dimitri’s eyes. “I too know what it is like to love someone so deeply they become a consummation of your soul. My wife, she . . .”
“Yes?”
“My wife was a very beautiful woman,” Rhessa continued slowly. “But she left my son and me when Jochen was just a baby. It is something that still troubles him.”
“I’m sorry,” Dimitri said. “Where is your wife now?”
“I have no idea.”
Growing paler by the minute, Dimitri withdrew the promise ring from his pocket. “I made this so that I would never lose Alba. Silly, isn’t it?”
“Nothing that symbolizes love is ever silly.” The doctor set his instruments down and took the ring. He held it up in the moonlight and studied the phrase of love Dimitri had carved into its interior curve. “Impressive. It shows a very steady hand.”
“Thank you.”
He handed the ring back to Dimitri. “You’ve exhibited fortitude and courage this evening.”
Dimitri said nothing.
“Young man, have you ever considered becoming a surgeon? Fortitude, courage, and a steady hand are precisely what the profession requires.”
Dimitri laughed. “Me? A surgeon? I wasn’t able to join the village children in primary school because of my lack of education.”
The doctor stuffed his instruments into his bag. “No formal education, granted, but you’re obviously intelligent and determined. Do you happen to read and write?”
Dimitri wiped the perspiration from his brow with his shirtsleeve. “I taught myself with books I found here and there.”
“Excellent! Assuming you have no money saved, I can arrange for you to enter a secondary school in Bucharest where you will live in my apartment with my son, Jochen, and his governess. My son desperately needs companionship. He also needs someone he can learn a sense of character and discipline from. I have no doubt you will be a good influence.”
Dimitri took another swig of the liquor.
The doctor continued. “It is my hope that you will later gain access to my alma mater, the University of Bucharest, on scholarship.”
“Why are you being so nice to me?”
“You have impressed me, my boy. But please understand, you must have the proper grades to get in the university. Upon graduation, perhaps you will go on to attend my other alma mater, the Royal College of Physicians in Edinburgh, Scotland—also on scholarship. These are Jochen’s plans as well.” Rhessa paused.
“What is the catch?”
“No catch, young Dimitri. But there is one obstacle.”
“What is that?”
“You must learn to speak English,” Rhessa said.
“You would arrange for me to attend medical school—on scholarship?”
“Let me make this clear,” the doctor replied. “I can recommend you as a student, but you must have excellent grades, my boy, in order to qualify for the scholarship.”
“No one has ever been this kind to me,” Dimitri said excitedly. “Still, I don’t know—”
“For heaven’s sake, boy! Offers of help come few and far between. Besides, this may be the way to win over your princess. Transform yourself into a proper gentleman so that you may seek her out when you’re older.”
Dimitri hesitated. “I don’t want to leave Alba now.”
“I’ve told you, she will be leaving this countryside very soon. Besides, you won’t be alone,” Rhessa reminded him. “As I said, my son, Jochen, is planning to go the very same route. Although I’m not sure he has the discipline to become a surgeon, I must be supportive, eh?”
“I’ll show Alba that I can make something of myself.” Dimitri drew confidence into his voice. “And I’ll convince her parents that I’m not worthless at the same time.”
“That’s it!” Rhessa cried. “I’ll send correspondence to the secondary school in Bucharest immediately. If all goes well, you will start in a matter of weeks since the new school year is nearly upon us.”
“Thank you, Dr. Rhessa. I shall never forget your kindness. I hope to repay you for it someday.”
“Repay me by succeeding, Dimitri. My instincts tell me you have the makings of a fine surgeon. And God knows the world needs more of those.”
“I’ll do my best.” Dimitri paused. “Are you going back to Stelian Hall now?”
Looking embarrassed, the physician shook his head. “Ileana Zpda terminated my post. She claims I have not tended to her well enough.”
“I’m sorry,” Dimitri said. “But since you aren’t going back, could you to send a message to Alba—telling her what I plan to do?”
“I’d be happy to.”
Dimitri pulled in a breath. “Do you really think I could become a doctor?”
“In such things I am never wrong. Now let’s get you to my apartment in Bucharest so you can heal.”
Chapter Five
Shaking away the memory, Dimitri entered the bathroom and peeled his shirt off. Although he’d had all the mirrors removed from the house, he’d grown accustomed to shaving without one—and he certainly didn’t need to see his reflection to know what the scar on his shoulder looked like.
Scowling, he ran his fingertips over the puckered skin. He’d never forgotten the pain from that night—and he didn’t think he ever would.
He ran the sink water while the image of Alba’s long, white neck seared his mind like a mad temptation. If she knew I was a vampire, what would she think of me?
Since their time together in Romania, he’d gone from rough Gypsy boy to refined gentleman—yet Alba had no inkling of his worst identity. If Dimitri could continue to disguise the heinous monster he’d become, he might gain back her friendship and trust.
As he wiped the mysterious blood from his mouth, the wall sconce blew out. Alarmed, he whirled around and peered into the darkness.
A tiny blaze ignited in the center of the bathroom. His nerves jumped as the candle illuminated the face of a woman. She looked at him from beneath a riot of black wavy hair, her lips an otherworldly hue of purple.
“Simona?”
“Greetings, Dimitri.” She sauntered toward him, the nipples of her small breasts leading the way beneath a plunging gown.
Years ago, he’d turned to Simona in his anguish over losing Alba. She had followed him from Transylvania to Bucharest with the intention of lending him her support. But once Simona’s seductive wiles became too demanding, everything had changed between them. He’d chosen to leave Romania to attend the Royal College in Scotland. When he abandoned Simona, she became a woman scorned. Rail thin and deathly white, she lacked the vibrancy she’d emanated in her youth.
“You’re alive!” he cried.
The eerie figure tightened her fingers around the candle. Her lips changed from a frosted purple to a deep blood red. “You look as good as ever without a shirt, Dimitri.”
“What are you doing here? I thought you vanished off the face of the earth.”
She shook her head slowly.
“You look so . . . different,” Dimitri said.
She made no reply.
“Word reached me that you disappeared in Romania,” he went on. “Are you all right?”
“I a
m now,” she whispered.
His eyes narrowed. “What became of you after I left Bucharest?”
“The same thing that happened to you, Dimitri.”
He took a step back. “You became a vampire?” He remembered Simona as strong-willed. Demanding. Possessive. The kind of woman who would make a terrifying vampire.
“Yes. In fact, I’m the one who carried you over.”
“It was you. You were the bat that drained me of my blood in Wales. But why?”
She put a hand to his bare chest. Her icy breath gusted across his face. “It’s in our destiny to become vampires.”
His hands curled into fists and he shot her a glare. “Did you bite me again last night?”
“I did. You were so weak that you would have perished. I bit you to incapacitate you—while I pierced my wrist and allowed you to drink my blood. Now you feel good, extraordinarily potent, do you not?”
Fury flushed through him. “I would hardly have perished, Simona.”
She frowned. “It seems you underestimate your need to feed,” she said. “You must accept your fate as a vampire, Dimitri.”
“Stop saying that.” He fought the urge to strangle her. “If anything, I think our fates were sealed the moment you stole that amulet from Rosa Spera.”
“I beg to differ.”
“I’ll ask you again.” He grasped her fragile arm. “Why have you done this to me?”
“I brought you over because I knew you are still in love with Alba. It’s also why I urged you to pass the amulet on to her.”
“Giving the amulet to Alba was a mistake.”
“It was a brilliant idea, but I didn’t come up with it on my own,” Simona scoffed.
“What do you mean?”
“Alba’s stepmother persuaded me to steal the necklace from our camp.”
Alarm feathered up Dimitri’s spine. “Her stepmother?”
“Ileana Zpda is a witch. She dabbles in black magic. She knew about the Egyptian amulet and its curse. That’s why she came to me. She gave me money to take the stone and give it to you. To curse Alba.”
“And you agreed?”
“Yes,” she said flatly. “You loved Alba when you should have loved me. Now I’ve turned you into a vampire so that you and I may be together. The strength I’ve given you will lead to a clearer mind—with which to choose either me or Alba.”
Snow White and the Vampire (The Cursed Princes) Page 4
