I returned home as quickly as possible from the task, as Gerda had begun to worsen terribly over the past two days. Early this morning I went to see her, as is my custom before retiring. Usually I make a vain attempt to hypnotise her, to see what news I can learn of Zsuzsanna and thus Vlad. But this morning when I went in, she was not staring at the ceiling as she always does. No, her eyes were closed, and her breathing laboured. I sat with her a long time, checking her breath and pulse and aura and trying to ascertain the cause of her decline.

There is no physical reason for it, other than her psychic connexion with Zsuzsanna. Of that I am certain. If she was weakening and near death, it meant Zsuzsanna was the same.

The day I had so diligently been working towards for a quarter-century was now here. As Arminius had said so long ago, the covenant works both ways: by destroying Vlad's evil children, I weaken him-and strengthen myself. And at last the moment had come when I was the stronger, and could deliver Vlad his long-overdue fate.So after I left her I did not go to bed; instead, I began to pack my trunk and checked the timetables to see which trains were headed east, and when. My hope was that, if I could arrive in Transylvania and dispatch both Vlad and Zsuzsanna in time, Gerda might be spared both death and a dark resurrection.

But I also knew that if I failed, it would not be safe for her to remain in this house with Mama and Katya, nor for the mortician who kept her body for burial. She could not stay here without the keen scrutiny of one who can perceive the symptoms of encroaching vampirism, and knows how to keep the undead at bay. As I packed, I puzzled upon this for some time, since there is no one in Amsterdam I can trust with such a task.

But there is such an one in London: my friend John, with his lunatic asylum. He does not know, about the details of my wife's illness, but he is much interested in occultism and possesses an open mind. If I instruct him as to Gerda's confinement and care, he will follow my orders to the letter.

I was composing a telegram to him in my own mind when the bell rang. I answered it to find a stout German lady somewhat past middle age, with iron-streaked brown hair, broad jaw, and a ruddy complexion laced with spidery broken veins. (And, I admit, a vast, intimidating bosom; when she leaned from the waist to bow, I quite expected her to topple forward.) "Herr Van Helsing?" She smiled most pleasantly, and I knew at once that she would make a suitable day nurse for Mama, for she projected both dependability and kindness. I had no need for psychic protection around her-she even wore a crucifix, hidden beneath her black widow's weeds-and so I relaxed and smiled as I motioned her inside.

"And you must be Frau Koehler," I answered in German, and at the sound of her native tongue, she positively beamed.

As I led her upstairs to Mama's room, we made pleasant small talk about the ease with which she had located my house, and about how I had been referred to her by a colleague.

Once we'd entered Mama's bedroom, she fell silent and gazed with reverence upon her prospective patient, then crossed herself at the sight of the crucifix hanging over the bed.

"Ah," she said with forthright sympathy. "She is dying, yes?"

"Yes."

"How sad for you!" Her tone was that of one who had been through the same terrible experience closehand. "And are you alone? I see no wife, no children..."

I sensed a glimmer of marital hope in the widow Koehler's eyes and aspect. "I have a wife,"

I said at once, suddenly overwhelmed by bitterness at the recollection of how she had been taken from me in spirit; and by the recollection of my little Jan, taken in body by the vampires -by Zsuzsanna, the vile demoness for whom I can find no forgiveness in my heart. "But Gerda, too, is ill-"

"How doubly sad! G.o.d has given you a heavy burden." She tilted her wide, strong-jawed face towards me and studied me with at least as much pity as she had directed towards Mama. "Then there shall be two patients?"

"No. I am taking my wife with me to London, to consult a specialist. My mother has an excellent nurse who relieves me during the night; but now that I must be gone, I need someone to care for her by day."

"Ah. And what is your wife's difficulty?" "Shock," said I. At the horror of being bitten, and finding that the attacker had stolen her firstborn son.

"And our patient?" she asked gently, turning her kind gaze once again upon Mama.

"Tumours of the breast and now, I think, the brain and elsewhere. She is not altogether lucid; usually she sleeps because of the morphia. There is pain."

She clicked her tongue softly. "And what is her name, sir, if I might ask?"

Van Helsing, the same as mine, I almost replied. But her demeanour was so much that of a trusted family friend that I answered, "Mary."

"Mary." She savoured the word with loving approval. "The Mother of G.o.d. Such a good name..." And she went over to sit in the rocking-chair beside the bed. "And I am Helga," she said, lifting Mama's hand from beneath the sheets and pressing it gently between her own, as if she were introducing herself and exchanging information. I doubt the woman was aware of what she was doing, but it was clear to me that she was a natural psychic.

After a time, she confirmed this by looking over her shoulder at me and saying: "You are a good man, sir, and very brave. I also know in my heart that your mother is a good woman. I shall be happy to give her excellent care.

And if G.o.d wills that she should die while you are gone, do not think that she died alone or with a stranger, for I shall care and pray for her as if she were my own sister."

I turned away, clumsily pretending to gaze out the window at that moment, for her compa.s.sion quite touched me. And when I am moved, suppressed grief wells within me and shatters my defenses like floodwaters breaking a dam; I could not prevent tears from spilling, but I moved quickly to wipe them away and recover myself.

"Weep, sir," she said behind me, and I heard the soft sound of her patting Mama's hand-as if Mama were fully conscious and aware of my tears, and Frau Koehler wished to comfort her. "You have a right to."

I feigned a cough so that I could withdraw my kerchief and wipe nose and eyes, then turned apologetically towards the two women and nodded at Mama, whose eyelids had begun to flicker. "Not so much right as she. She is the one who is suffering, not I."

"Untrue, sir. Because you love her, all her suffering has become yours. And because you are more able to keenly observe it, you are even more aware of its extent than she. Is it not more painful to see someone you love suffer than to endure that suffering yourself?"

I wanted to protest, for a part of me was incensed to think that I suffered more than Mama.

Yet I could not deny that because I was conscious, lucid, and still graced with adequate eyesight, I could look upon my mother's face and see the wasting there, see the lines traced by years of grief, see the sunken cheeks and slightly jaundiced skin. See, also, the raw bleeding bedsores devour her flesh while she screamed in anguish in a futile effort to void.

Her whole life has been pain: the loss of two husbands, a son, a grandson, terror of a fate truly worse than death. All this she has borne cheerfully, courageously-and for what purpose? To die in agony after an unhappy existence? To lose all her dignity and beauty- I must not continue, or I shall break down weeping again. Enough, enough!

It took me some time to compose myself sufficiently to answer Frau Koehler: "It is difficult, indeed. But I am some judge of character myself, and I perceive that you will give my mother such wonderful and compa.s.sionate care that I need have no worry." And I shook off all grief and tried to change my tone to that of the brisk businessman. "Is it true that you can start this morning? For my trip cannot wait; the sooner I and my wife leave, the better.

I should like to have you stay now, if you can, while I pack and make arrangements."

"I would be pleased to stay," she said, rising, and gently replacing Mama's hand upon the covers.

"Excellent!"

I showed her where all the medical necessities were kept in the bedroom: the syringe, the morphia, the bedpan and paregoric, the salve and bandages for the bedsores. She was well trained and quite intelligent, and we soon swiftly dispensed with the details of the patient's care. The time then came to escort her down to my office so that I might pay her an advance portion of her salary.

But as I led her back towards the staircase, a sudden cry-muted, so that I could not judge whether it was joyous or agonised-p.r.i.c.ked the small hairs at the nape of my neck. For an instant, I feared it was Mama, calling out in pain; but then realisation dawned, so forcefully, so fearfully, that the gooseflesh on my neck branched downward to my spine and arms.

Twenty-two years had pa.s.sed since I had last heard my wife's voice; thus I had not recognised it at once.

With neither explanation nor apology to Frau Koehler, I turned and ran at once down the hallway and into Gerda's room.

And there she sat in the bed-eyes open, shining, all signs of weakness vanished. My heart felt as though it had flipped over in my chest, and for a fleeting instant I dared hope that she was returned to me, that Zsuzsanna and Vlad had both been destroyed and that my darling was now freed.

Alas! Her eyes, though open, remained fixed upon a distant and invisible vision. But she was strong, radiant, her skin no longer pale but slightly flushed, as though she had recently taken sun, and her hair-her hair! Still dishevelled above the long, neat braid Katya faithfully tended each night... but every streak of silver had departed from her sable- brown locks.

I peered again at her face, unable to believe what my own eyes perceived, but there it was: she had grown younger since the early morning. Every grey hair, every wrinkle and fold of sagging flesh, had disappeared.

"Gerda!" I breathed, then louder: "Gerda, my darling, can you hear me?"

She gave no sign of either hearing or seeing me, but something she regarded in the invisible distance made her face brighten with pure joy. "She has come!" she said, and laughed aloud.

"She has come..."

"Who?" I urged, as Frau Koehler came and stood in the doorway, watching in silent amazement. "Who has come, darling?"

She replied not a word, but began gradually to calm as I watched her in silence. After a time, her lips curved upward in a brilliant smile, revealing slightly elongated eyeteeth.

"Amazing," the nurse whispered behind me. "What shall I do, sir? Do you still intend to take your wife to London?"

"I-I do not know." I stared at Gerda, stricken. Her joyous cry had made me dare hope, but now I saw that all was lost. For Gerda's moods and health had, for the last twenty-two years, been tied to those of Zsuzsanna. If Gerda was now young and strong and healthy, it meant that Zsuzsanna was too-and Vlad.

And Gerda was beginning to Change.

What had the vampire done to strengthen himself and his consort?

I promised the good Frau Koehler that I should be in touch with her directly once a decision had been made, and quickly dismissed her so that I could return to Gerda's bedside.

Efforts to rouse my wife from trance failed, as did all attempts at hypnosis (which I knew would probably be futile, given the time of day). Yet I was determined to sit with her and learn what I could; so I locked the windows and rose, thinking to lock the door behind me- from the outside, so that Gerda could not escape. There was little chance she would, since I had fastened crucifixes and the Host over the lintel of door and window, but. the extra safeguard rea.s.sured me.

Yet before I had pa.s.sed over the threshold, she whispered a single phrase: "The Dark Lord..."

It seemed at once a question and an admission of fear, voiced in an apprehensive yet curious tremolo.

I froze in the doorway, overtaken by terror at the abrupt mental image of the dark, devouring creature in my dream.

Who is this creature, and why are even the undead afraid of his name?

Arminius! Arminius, my rescuer of times past, do not remain silent any longer. Help me!

Chapter 3.

Zsuzsanna Dracul's Diary 3 May 1893.

She has come!

I was lying in my casket, having awakened hours before but too overwhelmed with exhaustion to rouse myself; there seemed no purpose in doing so, at any rate. I felt like a dying woman who, at G.o.d's insistence, was forced to live beyond my time. I desired nothing more than to be released from my suffering.

And as I lay, I detected voices within the castle. At first they were only barely audible murmurs, and in my self-pitying weakness, I paid no heed. (Once I would have heard them distinctly, but my ability had faded to the degree that I could distinguish only the voice and the cadence, but not the words.) They continued for some time, and then they neared, so that I could recognise one of them: Vlad spoke with the tone of a cordial host, which thus far I have only heard him use to welcome victims.

And then I heard another voice-one that, for a moment, I mistook for a man's, for it was deep and throaty and so utterly, confidently sensual that I thought, I am in love... Thus I naturally a.s.sumed that the visitor he had been expecting had arrived, but the thought evoked only pale joy. I knew that Vlad would tend first to his own hunger, leaving only the dregs for me and Dunya. If, in hopes of getting more, I dared interrupt him as he fed, his rage might very well prompt him to deny me so much as a single drop.Then came silence; or so I think, for I drowsed a time.

But I came to myself at once when suddenly this other laughed, an utterly joyous sound which for an instant rose so high that I realised I was hearing instead the voice of a woman.

Elisabeth...

Why did the knowledge of her arrival fill me with excitement? I cannot say, for certainly I found in her far, far more than I could have antic.i.p.ated; and I am d.a.m.ned, therefore I dare not trust in the kindly interventions of G.o.d or fate. I only know that I rose from my resting place at once and hurried down the corridor and up the stairs to Vlad's private chambers, from whence the laughter had originated.

And when I arrived, I flung open the door without so much as a knock.

There before a burning fireplace stood Vlad, still ancient and white-haired, but clearly more vigorous than he had been of late. His lips had taken on a rosy hue, his shoulders were no longer stooped but straight and square, and for the first time in years, he was in an excellent humour. But his smile faded instantly at the sight of me, and his eyes flared red. I knew at once that I would bear the brunt of his wrath again for my interruption.

But I cared not, for my gaze had fallen upon Elisabeth.

To say that she was comely is to slight her. I am lovely beyond any mortal-this I know from looking at Dunya, and from the portrait that hangs upon my wall (though Dunya says oils cannot do justice to the shimmering phosph.o.r.escence of my skin, or the molten golden gleam in my eyes).

But Elisabeth! She was beyond beauty: regal as a queen in a modern plumed cap and fitted satin gown of pewter-blue, with sapphire eyes to match, and skin as fine and white as an infant child's, save where the tenderest pink bloomed upon her cheeks and lips. Her hair was tied at the nape of her neck-a delicate porcelain swan's neck, with the most bewitching hollow at the collarbone-and the curls brought forward onto one shoulder, where in the fire's glow they shone pale golden as the sun.

She was as fair as I am dark, and at that instant, had she been a man, I would have fallen utterly in love. Even so, I believe I cried out weakly in awe; and when she turned her brilliant, omniscient gaze on me, I feared I would faint.

"Vlad, Vlad," said she, in a voice deep as Lake Hermannstadt and soft as smoke. "Will you not grant me the pleasure of introducing me to this lovely lady?"

The question brought tears to my eyes, for I knew that I looked a walking corpse and far from lovely. Her kindness touched me, and I managed a wavering smile as Vlad -without protest, to my surprise-at once bowed and said: "Countess Elisabeth Bathory of Csejthe. May I have the honour of presenting to you my niece, Zsuzsanna Dracul."

Elisabeth held out a hand, gloved in powder-blue and marvellously perfumed-and, to my utter astonishment, warm. I took it and made with difficulty a small courtesy as she said to Vlad, "And not Tsepesh? Have you discarded the name entirely, then?"

He gave a solemn nod. His anger seemed to have entirely evaporated, as if he was actually hesitant to berate me in front of this woman, seeing as my presence pleased her. "While living, I was famed as the Impaler, the tsepesh. But now that I am immortal, I have other interests, and am more pleased to be known as Dracula-the son of the Devil." "So the Dragon is indeed a Devil?" she asked c.o.c.kily, then laughed-a sound as sweet as her perfume. But she fell silent and turned her attention to me the instant I murmured: "Your hand. It is warm-are you vampire or living? But you are far too beautiful to be mortal..."

At that, her pink lips curved slyly, and she peered sidewise at Vlad from beneath a fringe of golden lashes, with an expression that said, Shall I tell her? But he lowered his gaze with a grave expression-and I felt she withheld something from me as she laughed ruefully and replied, "I am neither young nor mortal, my dear, but I suppose that, compared to Vlad, I am still a girl; I died a mere two hundred and eighty years ago."

As she spoke, the sensation of swooning overtook me again, and I would have fallen backward had she not caught my arms.

"Why, my dear Zsuzsanna, you are so weak! And how thoughtless we are to insist you remain on your feet." And she favoured Vlad with another enigmatic glance, saying, "I should like to be alone with her for a time."

Reluctance flitted over his features, but it was soon replaced by a look of maliciously smug understanding, as if some wicked revelation had just come to him. "Ah. Of course... She can lead you to her chambers. There is another one there too-the serving-girl..."

"Even better," answered she, and coiled a satiny arm round my waist. "Lead on, Zsuzsanna." Her aspect was one of helpfulness, as I was still unsteady on my feet; and so I permitted myself to lean my cheek against her shoulder that I might study that magnificent porcelain neck and breathe in her perfume. It had been so long since I'd laid eyes upon immortal beauty that her striking appearance quite overwhelmed me.

We made our way down the winding stairs while I listened to the music of Elisabeth's cello voice. She chattered on about her home in Vienna, of how wonderful that city was, and I whispered in reply that I had travelled to that city once and fallen in love with it.

"Well, then! You will come to my house there, and enjoy all that I have at your leisure. You are exhausted now for lack of power, but I can see beneath this premature aging. You are far too beautiful a creature to languish here in this desolate ruin of a castle." She glanced over her shoulder as if in recognition of Vlad's keener hearing-but I said: "Do not worry. He can no longer hear so well as-"

"I know precisely how well he can hear, and he cannot detect us at this distance. Perhaps you were too weak to notice, but I did restore a modic.u.m of his former strength to him tonight." She paused and turned her delicate features towards me, the long gold-gleaming curls falling forward from her shoulder onto an ample mother-of-pearl bosom. "We can speak in confidence now. My dear-did you know that he directed me not to restore your power to you?"

My lips drew back in an angry grimace; I managed to press them together, but still they quivered with rage. "He has been so cruel and heartless-you cannot imagine! I have only been good to him, and obedient-"

"Obedient." She spat it out like the most onerous curse.

"-but he has tricked me, starved me until I was too weak even to hunt. For half a century I have trusted him, thinking that he had honest concern, even love, for me. He is my own uncle, whom I adored without reserve during my life, and he has preyed upon my affection in order to deceive me."

As I spoke, she came to a stop and listened intently to my words, her full lips compressing gradually into a thin line. I told her of his "generous" offer to hunt for us all, and of his cruelty to me and to poor Dunya. And when I had ended, she said slowly, "It is as I thought.

The stupid mediaeval b.a.s.t.a.r.d!" And she took off again at full speed, dragging me along.

I broke into explosive laughter despite my weakness, and though I gasped, I could not catch my breath-or stop my giggles-to reply. I had never heard anyone refer to him without awe or fear, and to hear him so bluntly described startled and pleased me without end.

"Ah, the term amuses you," she said, her perfect forehead marred by the crease of a frown.

"But think: Is my term for him so inaccurate? The year is 1893, but Vlad thinks it is still 1476. He treats women like chattel; I would not be surprised to hear that he has kept his serfs."

Still grinning, I confided, "No, they fled fifty years ago, out of fear when he broke the covenant..."

She drew her head sharply up and back, her gaze keen and searching. "The covenant? His agreement with the Dark Lord? Is this why I was called?"

"This has nothing to do with the Devil," I said, and paused to gesture at my chamber door, for we had arrived at our destination. "He had broken his vow not to share immortality with one of his family, and the villagers all feared that he might begin to feed on them. Why do you laugh?"

For she had pressed a hand to her white bosom, spreading the blue-gloved fingers there, and begun to laugh without reserve. Indeed, she flung back her head, causing the cascade of golden curls to fall behind her shoulder and spill down her back. I drew my face close to hers and peered, mildly insulted that she should find mirth in such a serious thing.