"A matter of speech," she said, but her gaze was focussed straight ahead, on her destination, rather than on me; I could not help feeling that she wished desperately to avoid the subject altogether, as if it were too unpleasant even to contemplate. "You would be absorbed.

Annihilated. Devoured."

Is this what Vlad has done to Dunya? Has her soul been eaten by the Dark One with the loving eyes?

Yet if that is what I felt in His presence-that ecstatic sense of No Thing and All Things- then I cannot, as Elisabeth does, fear Him. If that is where Dunya is, then I shall dry my still-streaming tears... And yearn to join her.

Elisabeth will not teach me any of the needed knowledge to contact Him directly-to seek revenge on Vlad, and safe pa.s.sage for us both from this castle. But I will find Him.

I will find Him...

29 JUNE.

No entry in all this time; grief has caused my strength and inclination to wane. I think often of the dead: my good mother and father, my brothers Arkady and little Stefan, and dear Dunya. Sometimes I even think of all the poor souls whose bodies and bones lie corrupting in this castle and the vast encircling forest. So much death and suffering everywhere I turn!

The magnitude of it overwhelms, permeates, my mind and heart... _ But so many things have happened that I must record them before the details fade from memory. Tonight, for the first time in months, my mind is directed towards something other than mortality-towards a distant land I have always yearned to see, but came to think I never would.

A month or so ago, tsigani men drove their wagons into the castle courtyard and camped there. It was a warm day, and hotter still for the gypsies, as they had decided to cook their noonday meal-a kid-and so built a large fire and spit and sat round it half-naked, their bare chests and backs exposed and glistening with sweat.

Their presence was resounding evidence (although I had never doubted) that Vlad did indeed mean to desert me here, for when Elisabeth and I tried to signal the group's apparent leader from the windows, the men laughed derisively and ignored us-just as they ignored Mr. Harker, who also cried out from his window. (Obviously, he is just as much a prisoner as we; though certainly ignorant of dealing with gypsies. The fool threw them money-which of course they pocketed before turning away.) "Shut him up!" Elisabeth ordered, her eyes narrowed in frustration at the smirking ruffians beneath us; like an obedient slave, I hurried at once up to Harker's chambers and entranced him. When I returned, I found Elisabeth a feminine parody of the men; leaning seductively out the unfettered window, her gown and camisole both unfastened and pulled down to the waist, baring her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, she sang a patently bawdy song in Romany to the captivated onlookers below. My first reaction was to be slightly jealous at her brazen display in front of those vile, untrustworthy creatures; but the jealousy was swiftly replaced by humour at Elisabeth's audacity, and the comically smitten expressions on the gypsy men's faces. This was the first time since Dunya's death that I had been graced by laughter, and that made it all the more powerful: I shut my mouth and bit my tongue in an effort to quell the chuckling that bubbled up within me, but all for naught. The laughter came regardless; thus I stood somewhat back from the window so that I could not be seen, but I could see both Elisabeth and her adoring audience.

Her little performance achieved her intent; the tsigani chief immediately ran from his place in front of the campfire-shouting an order to the other men to remain-and arrived at the castle entrance. This was apparently bolted from the outside, for as we rushed to welcome him in, I heard the sc.r.a.pe of wood against metal, then the hollow clank of a wooden bolt striking stone.

Although we were forced to remain inside, he had no difficulty crossing that threshold; like a lovestruck bull, he flung aside the heavy door and rushed straight for Elisabeth and her bared bosom. He grasped her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, one with each hand, and, with alarming disregard for civility, pushed her backward to the cold floor.

To my astonishment, she did not resist (though she could easily have held her ground, causing him to fall back as though he had collided with a mountain). No, she fell back, laughing, and when he threw back her skirts and petticoats, she laughed harder still, as if it were all the most amusing sport, and let her bare legs sprawl wide.

He was not an unhandsome man-in fact, his shining coal-coloured hair and strong beak of a nose reminded me somewhat of my brother-but there was a crudeness to his broad face and plump, barrel-chested body, and to his oily olive skin and ridiculously long waxed mustache that I found supremely distasteful.

And when he quickly unfastened his trousers and fell atop her, piercing her, bellowing, still clutching her soft b.r.e.a.s.t.s with his thick, inelegant fingers, the whole scene struck me as nauseous, and I turned away, thinking to leave before I was called upon next.

But at that moment, Elisabeth framed the tsigani'% face with her hands (so white and delicate in contrast to his sun-darkened cheeks) and mightily pulled him down into a kiss.

At first he resisted-such silly feminine desires were clearly not to be indulged, not by a wh.o.r.e who had so blatantly lured him here for one thing, and one thing alone! But I saw, in profile, Elisabeth open her eyes as she pressed her lips pa.s.sionately to his, and I saw his flutter open in surprise, then slowly grow dull and dreamy as all his volition fled.

Throughout, his desperate thrusting never ceased, for this transpired in the s.p.a.ce of a few seconds.

"Zsuzsanna!" Elisabeth gasped, in the clear unyielding tone that signalled she would accept no refusal.

I stepped back towards her and looked down: her glorious hair had been swept up so that it spilled above her onto the stone, encircling her head like a halo-or the pale golden crescent of the half moon. The big tsigani still flailed wildly, his face now pressed into the sweetly scented pillow of hair half an arm's length above the top of her skull. All the while, she pressed her palms into his chest, easily holding him up. He would have crushed and suffocated a mortal woman.

"I can't, Elisabeth. I-I have no heart for this."

"I don't care if you f.u.c.k him or not, dearest. But bite him! For me, please!"

"I have no appet.i.te..."

"You needn't drink! Just bite him-don't kill him- and let the blood run down upon my face..."

With a sigh I obeyed, moving behind her impaler's sweat-streaming back and bending down to strike the front of his shoulder. At this, he stiffened and emitted a strangled cry of terror and ecstatic release.

Sweet blood, but I was too grief-stricken, too troubled, too bored with life in this castle, to savour it. I withdrew, unhappily pleased to deny myself, unhappily pleased to suffer at the hands of hunger; and I sat back on my haunches and watched as Elisabeth licked the gypsy's small, streaming wound and rubbed her cheeks against it as a cat rubs its face against its mistress' legs.

"You are mine," Elisabeth whispered into his ear. "You shall obey Vlad's orders so long as they do not harm us, but you are mine. And so, after you have taken the prince from this castle, you shall return for us-and you will secretly tell your closest friend, and make him swear that if you should mysteriously die, he must come and rescue us poor, helpless women. All within a day..."

Within a day. And now that the time is almost here, I think, Will they really come?

But there were further signs to convince me that Vlad would indeed be soon gone. For within a matter of days, he had stolen all of Harker's papers and clothes-this we learned when we paid our customary morning visit to the guest chambers. These forays have become most enlightening now that Harker carefully transcribes the bizarre scribblings of his diary into English on separate parchment. He has written the entire journal out for us, and I know it will serve us well in England, for it is laden with the consummate details befitting a lawyer's diary.

"He shall be our spy in London," Elisabeth told me that day, "and before Vlad rises, I shall do a private ritual to ensure that Mr. Harker survives long enough to be of service to us.

But first, a more pragmatic bit of protection..."

As she spoke, she moved to the night-stand and picked . up a crucifix lying there, or rather the gold chain attached to it, and let it dangle in front of her face.

I confessed I gasped aloud, for I had been quite aware of its presence all along, and rendered ill-at-ease. She saw my discomfort (or rather, frankly, terror)-and laughed, tilting her face skyward whilst bringing the tiny impaled.

Christ overhead until it rested just above her unmarred, porcelain features.

"Do not be cruel," I begged her in a trembling voice, for I was at once on the precipice of weeping. "Do not toy with me so, for I cannot bear it... You will scar your precious skin!"

Still she ignored me, laughing, as though holding a red-hot poker above such a perfect and beautiful countenance was delightful sport. I surrendered to tears and covered my eyes.

And when I looked again, she had pressed the golden cross to her lips and kissed it.

I screamed, and began to faint; at once, she rushed over and caught me in her arms, saying: "My dear, my dear, I did not mean to alarm you so! I merely meant to prove a point.

Here..." She immediately carried me to the sofa and sat beside me, gently patting my cheeks until I at last dared open my eyes.

She held a closed fist up to my face, then slowly opened it to reveal the crucifix upon her white palm. Again I recoiled and began to cover my face, but she commanded urgently: "Look at me, Zsuzsanna. Look..."

I looked. And saw that the flesh beneath the shining golden object was perfect, untouched.

Awed, I raised trembling fingers to her ruby mouth and found it entirely unblemished and beautiful.

But when she clasped my wrist and turned my hand palm-upward, intent on handing me the cross, I cried out again. "I can't! It will burn me... I know, because it has happened."

"Zsuzsanna." Her tone grew stern. "It's like the sunlight. It can only hurt you if you are afraid of it. These are Vlad's fears, not your own; why have you carried them so long?" And, too swiftly for me to resist, she pushed the object into my outstretched palm and curled my ringers tight about it.

I was too startled to scream, to react-to do anything, really, except gape at the gleaming image in my hand. And a few seconds after, the revelation came: The cross was cold and sharp in my palm, but it did not burn my skin, nor did its presence evoke the expected agony.

"You see?" Elisabeth said, smiling again. "It is a bit of metal, nothing more. But Vlad does not believe that; and so, let us employ his superst.i.tions against him. Go on, Zsuzsanna... put it round Mr. Harker's sleepy little head."

I did so, marvelling at my own imperviousness, my own power.

"And now, dear Jonathan," Elisabeth intoned softly at the snoring solicitor, "you are to wear this necklace wherever you go, and if the chain should break, you must always carry the cross upon your person. If Vlad-the count"-and here she glanced at me, grinning at her intentional repet.i.tion of Harker's misinformation-"should threaten, shove this pendant in his face."

Thus did Mr. Harker become our agent.

A fortnight later, the tsigani contingent returned with great wagons, and the pattern of Vlad's scheme more clearly emerged. There can be no question: He is indeed abandoning this place, if not forever, then for a very long time. At that time, Elisabeth's gypsy lover returned-but their second meeting was limited to travel arrangements, both ours and Vlad's. He is taking the safest way for him -boat-but we are not so constrained, and will be waiting for him when he finally arrives.

When I saw the big uncovered wagons, each large enough to hold several caskets of earth (another of Vlad's ridiculous superst.i.tions, to believe that he cannot leave Transylvania without taking a bit of it with him), my anger at being abandoned again flared, and I begged Elisabeth to do everything in her power to destroy him now. She insisted that such an effort would most likely fail at this time (what is she not telling me now in order to spare me worry?); nevertheless she would try, by recruiting our Englishman to attempt the deed.

And this she did, sending Mr. Harker on a diurnal mission to kill Vlad (which he very nearly did)-but the fool quailed.

And so I sit, equally overcome by excitement and fear. Tonight, Vlad finally came to me-I have not seen him for almost a month, but was not surprised to find him further rejuvenated, with hair no longer white but pewter, and complexion faintly rosy. His expression was one of exultation mixed with condescending generosity.

"Tomorrow night," said he, smiling. "He is yours tomorrow."

I feigned an expression of hopelessness and said sullenly, "You are abandoning me here to starve. Do not tiunk 't do not Vnovj."

His brows arched in mock innocence; he placed a spread palm upon his lifeless heart. "Me?

Zsuzsanna, have you in your crush for Elisabeth come to realise that /, not she, have been your benefactor all these years? No, my dear, I must go and see to the details of some very special property... in England. At long last, I have found a way to free us both. And I do not do so without first thinking of you: I shall leave you the English guest for your very own!

When all is ready, long before you are hungry again, I shall return for you."

I would not meet his gaze, but kept my own fixed upon the window... and the freedom beyond. In a low, hostile voice, I slowly proclaimed: "Arkady is gone."

So consummate was his deceit that his expression of abject surprise, limned with fear, was quite convincing; but I was not fooled. "What?" "It is true."

Too terribly true. Knowing that the time would soon arrive when I would leave this castle for good-either through the vehicle of death, or the carriage that would bear me across the continent-I had gone down this morning to the subterranean vault, to bid my dear brother's body farewell.

Gone; vanished. (I am too heartsick even to weep about it now.) No trace of the corpse, though the bloodless stake lay atop the bare earthen catafalque where he had lain. At the discovery, I had fallen upon the damp mouldering ground and sobbed to think of my sweet Kasha's remains defiled in some evil attempt at magic by that monster. And like the Marys at the unsealed tomb, I demanded of Vlad now: "Where have you taken him?"

His grey brows knit together like rushing thunderclouds, and his colour grew livid as he shouted: "This is some new treachery, is it not? Some new plot for misguided revenge! You have been listening to Elisabeth's lies -and I will give you no further warnings, since you have not believed the first. My only satisfaction comes from the knowledge that soon you will see your own stupidity in having trusted her and abandoned me... And then all your pleas for help will be too late!"

He turned on his heel and stormed away, slamming the door behind him with such force that, with the ear-stunning sound of a pistol shot, the wood cracked in a lightning-bolt diagonal.

Through it all, I kept my silence. My revenge shall consist not of words or arguments, but of deeds which shall see him hurled down to h.e.l.l in agony.

So at last, we have parted-forever. I feel no sadness, no melancholy grat.i.tude to him who gave me the immortal kiss. He has taken from me my mother, my father, my brother, my friend, my dignity; he has turned all my love to vengeful wrath.

b.a.s.t.a.r.d! We shall meet again in England-England! It seems an unattainable dream, a mirage which beckons in the distance; and I worry that when I at last draw near, it will waver and dissolve into dust.

No. No fear, no doubt. I will find you in London. And there 1 will strike you down...

Chapter 7.

Telegram, Abraham Van Helsing, M.D., D.Ph., D. Lit., Etc., Etc., Amsterdam, to John Seward, M.D., Purfleet, England 28 June Dear and trusted friend, Apologies in advance for the imposition: Need your help and discretion, and unpardonably soon. Am bringing psychiatric patient to Purfleet afternoon of 1 July and require lodging for us both-but need for secrecy paramount. No one else must know we are in the city.

My companion requires a barred and padlocked cell; I request same for myself Destroy this doc.u.ment at once.

Dr. Seward's Diary 1 JULY. The professor has come.

He arrived as expected in the afternoon, dressed in black with a broad-brimmed straw hat and looking for all the world like a village priest. I stood in the entryway and watched him step from the cab, then turn and reach out as the driver handed down a small, frail woman.

She, too, wore all black, including a veil which obscured her features.

He carried her easily in his arms down the flower-lined path, as if he were long accustomed to doing so. When he spotted me on the porch, he grinned broadly, his blue eyes brightening at once. I strode forward and clapped his shoulder; the impulse to shake hands occurred to us both, but was rendered impossible because of the mysterious patient in his arms.

"Professor Van Helsing!" I called heartily, while behind him, the driver set two large suitcases upon the ground. I hurried over and took care of the tip at once; my mentor is not very well off financially, from what I can gather. I believe he routinely undercharges his patients or charges them not at all, and I would be a gentleman of leisure now were it not for my "hobby," the asylum.

At my greeting, the professor's grin faded and some of the light left his eyes. He pursed his lips as if to hush me into silence; had he not borne such a burden, he would have also raised a finger to them. I heeded the warning and immediately lowered my voice to a whisper.

"It is good to see you again."

The smile and brightness returned immediately. "And you, friend John. Though you are looking rather pale and underfed. We shall have to find a young lady to fatten you up and lure you out for walks in the sunshine!"

I averted my gaze briefly down at the riot of yellow and crimson zinnias edging our path, but maintained a pleasant expression. Anything that evoked thoughts of Lucy was still painful, so I did not reply.

At once his tone softened with compa.s.sion. "Ah...

I see I have blundered directly onto the problem's source. Forgive me, my friend; I am a blind and foolish old man."

I believe I blushed, which only increased my discomfort, as it is for me an uncommon reaction. Then I glanced shyly at the silent patient, wondering hew lucid she might be, and whether she had registered the exchange. How could I manage a dignified introduction now?

Once again, Van Helsing seemed to have read my thoughts. "Have no worry, John. She suffers from catatonia; her mind is far from us. Even if it were not, she would be unable to divulge your troubles, for she does not speak."

"You are far from old, and most certainly not blind," I told him. "Frankly, you are the most perceptive person I know." Indeed, he has been this way since I first met him. Sometimes, his ability to guess what I-or another person -am thinking is astounding. It is not simply that he knows me well; I have seen him do the same with strangers. Over time, I have developed two theories: one, that he has honed his observation skills to preternatural perfection; or two, that he is psychic.

The latter is difficult to prove, though of late I have become keenly interested in occult phenomena and the teachings of a local organisation known as the Golden Dawn. (My readings have led me to conclude that the professor is privy to much, or all, of their knowledge. This is based on countless comments he has made during our close eight-year friendship. Esoteric phrases such as As above, so below-a quote from our mutual acquaintance Hermes Trismegistus. And dozens more such opaque-at the time, anyway- remarks.) More than that, the professor radiates an aura of power-not so much the physical sort as the mental. Like me, he was a wunderkind, but I do not speak of intelligence here, which he has in abundance; I speak of the metaphysical. In public-except when he lectures-he takes on the persona of the good-natured b.u.mbler, the clown. I have even heard him affect the most outrageously comical foreign accent, even though his English is quite excellent. It is as if he wants to prevent the world from seeing the true man: the scholar, the genius, the philosopher.

Yet when alone in my presence, he sometimes permits me glimpses of an immensely brilliant and knowledgeable occultist beneath the fool's mask. He has never labelled it as occultism, of course; this is what I have gleaned. But now I remember a long-ago holiday in Amsterdam, when I inadvertently wandered into his private library and discovered inside a closed cabinet a treasure-trove of treatises on magic-The Greater Key of Solomon, The Goetia, the Sepher Yetzirah, and A True and Faithful Relation of What Pa.s.sed for Many Years Between Doctor Dee and Some Spirits.

This is the man I met again today, though he had successfully adopted the guise of a not-so- educated country priest. But I saw beneath the simple guilelessness that veiled the wide blue eyes, beneath the cheerful expression. He looks older than when I last saw him; more of the red-gold hairs have faded to white, and he, like me, has lost weight and looks drawn about the cheeks and jaw. Despite it all, he radiates even more of that impressive internal strength, that deep sense of wisdom and calm even the fiercest tempest cannot shake- paradoxically making him -the real, interior man beneath the costume of flesh- seem far younger than when we last met.

"But here," I continued, gesturing towards the entry. We both headed for the open door, I reaching as if to take the motionless woman in his arms. As expected, he refused any aid.

"Let's go inside at once and relieve you of your burden. I will call the attendant to carry her-"

"No!" The sharpness of his reply made me jerk my head to stare at him at once. More mildly, he added, "No attendants yet. The time may come when she requires one, but today, let us maintain as much privacy as we can."

I agreed, and told him I would wait to ring Thomas to fetch the bags until both he and his patient were settled into their rooms, then have the bags left outside the cell doors to guarantee their anonymity. Once we had stepped over the threshold, I convinced him to let go of his jealously guarded prize and deposit her in a high-backed wheelchair. It is the newest model, specially equipped with restraints for the more violent patients. As he tucked her with tender solicitousness into the chair and paused to regard the straps, I commented softly, "I doubt she will need those."

"Not at the moment." The jovial mask slipped again for an instant, no more. This time I saw a darkly troubled man, one who bore the weight of all the world upon his soul. "But the time may come soon. We must remain alert."

He insisted upon pushing the chair himself. I led him directly to the lift (a necessity here; dragging a violent patient upstairs or down is dangerous work). In the absolute privacy of the lift, I awaited an explanation of his "secret mission," but none came. So I made small talk and inquired after his mother, a true English gentlewoman whom I have met and come to fondly admire.