Part 3 (1/2)
Beneath him, quietly working in the black shadows, stood his tormentor, only recently of our employ -Vanya, a redheaded ogre with a hunched back and twisted legs, a creature who bore the same afflictions I had in my pathetic mortal life. But I had no sympathy for Vanya, with his ruddy skin that stank perpetually of drink, for a fevered excitement blazed in his bloodshot eyes as he smeared oil upon the blunted tip of a long, pointed stake.
I knew what this portended and, panicked, turned back swiftly to Vlad. Jean Belmonde surely adored me solely for my appearance and my wealth and would have proven an unfaithful mate. And though I bore no real love for him, I could not bear the thought of his suffering.
Vlad's lips thinned in a faint amused smile, but there was a hardness in his eyes that commanded me to steel myself, to be strong.
”Not yet,” I said softly-too softly for my unfortunate Jean's ears. I tried to hide my revulsion as I reached forth to stroke Vlad's arm coquettishly. ”Let me have him first.
Uncle, please . . .”
Yes, I am dead, and consider myself beyond the reproach of the living; already d.a.m.ned, and beyond the judgement of any G.o.d. But d.a.m.ned or not, I am still capable of compa.s.sion for my own victims. If I must kill, then let them die sweetly in my arms; and if I must sin, let it bring pleasure, not pain.
The blood, at least, tastes sweeter.
”Perhaps,” he said, smiling. ”But you have, it seems, already had your fill of him. First I must know. What of Arkady? Did it all go as arranged? You found him? Went to him?”
”I did.”
He moved eagerly to the edge of the throne, lowering his voice. ”And you contacted the human agent there as I directed-”
”Yes,” I answered shortly. I had thought myself incapable of shame, but a pang of it a.s.sailed me at the memory. I had in fact seduced the man Vlad directed me to, and drunk from him, and left him for dead.
Vlad's smile widened to reveal deadly teeth. ”Good. Good. . . . Now-tell me-” Here he reached forth to catch my wrist with painfully intense strength and pulled me towards him to the throne. ”Tell me you saw Arkady destroyed. Properly.”
I lowered my gaze, unable to meet the scrutiny of those merciless green orbs. I might have lied then to spare myself, but I knew the penalty would be far, far worse to dissemble now and be later discovered. And so I said, ”I have no doubt he was. I instructed the man carefully myself and paid him well. But I drank too much of drunken blood and had to leave to sleep before the day broke-”
He jerked to his feet, hurling me down the steps with a single imperious sweep of an arm.
”Liar!” he shrieked, his eyes glowing inhuman red with rage, as though the green forest therein had been abruptly consumed by flame. ”You swore to me that you would see it done! You have failed in the one most important thing! Are you too much a fool to realise that we have little time, that we can afford to miss no more opportunities? By sparing your brother, you condemn us! How can you claim to love me?”
I am no longer human; the blow caused me no harm. I landed lightly on my feet beside cringing Dunya and pulled myself to my full height, my most dazzling beauty. ”I am no liar!”
I shouted, provoked to anger myself. I could not be frightened; perhaps Vlad could have me destroyed if he wished, as he sometimes threatens, but I suspected he was unsure as I of the consequence of harming me. ”But he is still my brother, and my blood does not yet flow as cold as yours. How can you ask me to witness such a gruesome fate for one I love?”
His face hardened, as though it had been hewn from white marble, and his eyes narrowed even as they pierced me. I knew he was considering the a.s.sumption I wanted him to make: that I could not report on Arkady's demise merely because I had left early out of a faint heart.
For a moment, we glared at each other in furious silence, and then he said slowly, ”How am I to trust anything you tell me, then? How am I to know you tell the truth?”
He cannot, of course; when he broke the covenant to make me as he is, he surrendered his ability to know my thoughts, and my brother's.
So it was his gaze fell on Dunya.
She moaned in despair as he lifted a single finger to beckon her; for an instant, she clutched my skirts like a frightened child before yielding reluctantly to the magnetic pull of those evergreen eyes. Overwhelmed with pity, I patted her hand before she turned to him, and saw the tears in her eyes.
She ascended the platform with slow, reluctant grace and, with the deliberate, exaggerated movements of a sleepwalker, lifted the dark coil of hair from her neck and offered it to him as he sat. She was not at quite the proper angle for him, and so he put a single finger beneath her chin and, tilting it upwards, moved her head to one side and pulled her back until she leaned heavily against him.
He leaned his head low, his iron-grey hair spilling down over her shoulder, and drank. The girl gave a slight shuddering cry as his teeth pierced her skin again (as they have so many times before). And as he supped, her eyes went dull, then fluttered until at last they closed in that sweet, dreamy languour brought by his kiss.
”Not long,” I warned him, for Dunya's sake. ”She is tired, and I often made use of her on my way to Vienna.”
He obeyed, drinking of her blood and thoughts only a short time, then raising his face, teeth, and lips painted red. Poor Jean no doubt saw in this a preview of his own fate, for behind me came an astonished gasp.
Dunya's ignorance was my salvation. I could read acceptance in Vlad's expression.
”So,” he said. ”It is true, at least, that you visited him and mesmerised him quite thoroughly. But what is this incorrigible harlotry, my dear, that you pressed yourself and your maid upon your own brother? Most interesting. For if either of you were to bear him a male heir-”
He did not complete the thought, but I finished it for him in my own mind: Then perhaps there would be no need to find Arkady or his son.
”Take my child,” I replied swiftly, ”and Dunya's, into your service. One for Arkady's generation, the other for his son's.”
He tilted his head, thoughtful, alabaster lids lowering briefly over emerald eyes. And then his gaze became direct, pointed. ”I doubt such subst.i.tutions possible. But even if they were .
. . you are naive, Zsuzsanna, to think these two acts might immediately produce children.
The chances are that neither of you will conceive. And if you do not?”
For this I had no answer.
”I see. So you thought to find a way to save both your brother and me.” He paused, and I saw a brilliant flare of anger in his eyes. As strong as I am, as immortal, the sight still filled me with fear. For though he would raise no hand against me, I knew that my poor Monsieur Belmonde would be spared no pain, no indignity.
With a softness more terrifying than the most earth-rattling thunder, he said, ”Do you relish your life now, Zsuzsanna?”
”Yes,” I whispered.
”Yet you love your brother.” Yes. . . .
”Decide, my dear. For the one precludes the other. A mortal's lifetime, Zsuzsanna. A single lifetime-that is all we have left, before the covenant lapses and we two are destroyed. If Arkady's son dies unbound to us, uncorrupted-so will we die. And if we fail to destroy Arkady during that lifetime, we will also die. You have just cost me an opportunity! How many more will come to us in the next fifty, sixty years? It is not so long a time-a mere nod of the head, the wink of an eye, to us! I fear you still think like a mortal.” ”Answer me: Do you wish to die in this castle a hag? Shrivelled, starved, ugly beyond any man's desire, a more pitiful creature than you were as a mortal?”
”No,” I whispered. ”No.”
”That is what you condemn yourself to, Zsuzsanna, with your weakness. With your foolish love.”
He fingered the chalice that rested near his hand- the chalice stained with Kasha's blood, and our father's, and our father's father's, and his before him-then lifted it and swore: ”With your help or without, I will see Arkady destroyed. And I will drink of his son's blood, and he of mine; a new generation will be bound to my service!”
On the surface, his tone sounded utterly confident -but my perceptions are keen now; I could hear the fear beneath it, the terror, the rage.
To know him fearful frightened me more deeply than I had ever thought possible. I would have felt safer in the presence of a wounded raging lion.
He looked beyond the raised chalice, narrowing his eyes at me. ”Your brother is a fool to think himself a match for me! And you, my darling Zsuzsa . . . know that I love you. But my love can turn rapidly to hatred should I be deceived. Justus etpius.”
He lowered the chalice then and turned to Vanya. ”It is time.”
With a grunt, Vanya hoisted the man-long stake in both freckled sinewy arms and, scrabbling sidewise like a strong little crab, dragged it to the end of the rack, where a special groove had been carved for it into the wood.
It was an unwieldy task for one man, much less one bent and crippled, but Vanya managed with much grunting and determination-born, no doubt, of the same desire that brought the bright unholy gleam to his eyes. With a loud thump, the stake fell into the groove, which extended the length of Jean's leg down the center of the rack, and ended, most ominously, just above his lower spine.
The unfortunate man began to scream.