Behind me, I heard Elisabeth’s voice, edged now with unmistakable excitement; and I knew then that I would be capable of doing what I wished in her presence without shame. “Do not be alarmed, sir,” she said. “It is simply our custom to let the women bathe after the men. It is considered quite proper.…”
But the Englishman hovered near the tub’s edge, knees and shins pressed against the hot iron, fingers gripping the rim. “Please, miss—a towel! I am rather uncomfortable, for in my country, the custom is decidedly different.”
I moved closer until our legs touched; he recoiled at once, splashing water everywhere in his desperation. I knew then that his decision to be faithful to his betrothed was unfortunately a sincere one and backed by great determination, so I reached out with a dripping hand and turned his stubbled chin towards me.
His will was strong, but not unduly so; the instant his gaze met mine, he fell under my glamour and sighed, content to be relieved of all troubling inhibitions.
“You are the most exquisitely beautiful creature I have ever seen,” he whispered, and reached for me.
We kissed, pressing our lips together feverishly—he with passion enough to meet mine, as though he, too, had been denied the experience of love for two decades. I thought I should go mad, so great was my yearning for his body and blood; my hungry kisses turned quickly to tiny, rapid nips upon his neck and shoulders. He rose, groaning, and lifted me with him so that his kisses might travel downward from my face to neck to breasts.
I moved backward then, to his dismay (for he reached after me in desperation), and leaned against the tub’s side, beckoning him to come to me. This he did and, even under trance, experienced a temporary confusion at what precisely should transpire next: my Englishman, it seemed, was a virgin. But when he pressed next to me, I hopped up to sit upon the tub’s rim, and wound my knees round his hips.
Intent on showing him how it was done, I had quite forgotten about Elisabeth’s presence until she appeared beside us—now incandescently naked, and more gloriously so than I. I found myself gazing deep into her electric-blue eyes, simply astonished by her beauty. As taken as I was with our houseguest, I was even more taken by her bare flesh, aglitter like fresh snow in the sunlight. And, I confess, by her breasts—large and full, yet firm as a young maiden’s, their milky whiteness crowned by nipples as delicately pink as cameo. I yearned to reach out and touch them, but was so startled to find myself lusting after a woman that I held back, and instead watched as she assisted the Englishman in his efforts to explore new territory.
As, her fingers tightly encircling him, she guided him towards me, I tilted my hips to permit him entry; at the instant it occurred, he gasped in astonished joy, the purely grateful sound of one who at last knows: Ah, so this is what I have so long been denied!
He began to thrust—wildly, urgently, filled with such unbearable desire that he could hold back not at all; I, too, could not restrain myself, but clung to him in desperation, crying out with each movement. In my delirium, I was but faintly aware of Elisabeth’s arm between us, her thumb and forefinger a tight ring grasping his member at its base, that its increased firmness might grant my lover and me more pleasure.
But too soon, too soon, he arched against me, crying out as I was flooded with internal warmth. At that instant, my urgent desire gave way to an even more urgent hunger: I bit savagely into the warm, wet skin at the juncture of his neck and shoulder and drank blood sweeter, more ambrosial, than any I have ever drunk, for the taste was enhanced by the Englishman’s intense virginal ecstasy and by my own hungry longing.
He moaned, arching now with a victim’s delight, for to receive the dark kiss is an infinitely sensual pleasure.
“Tear him!” Elisabeth cried beside me. “Tear him, make him bleed—Vlad will not know!”
I tore with teeth sunk tight into his flesh (taking care to stay clear of the neck, lest I inadvertently kill him), shaking my head as a dog does when it has caught a rat. My lover groaned again, for pain was joy to him now. Strong dark blood spattered upon my cheeks, my eyelids, my chest and hands; I drank. Drank until I was drunk, until I was blind, until I forgot myself and my surroundings utterly, deaf to all save the slow throb of the Englishman’s heart.
I would have continued mindlessly until its beating stopped—but strong arms pulled me away. I looked up, blinking like an owl in the lantern’s glare, and saw Elisabeth, catching the young man as he fell, lifting him from the water, laying him upon a linen towel spread on the floor.
Beautiful Elisabeth, her face spattered with English blood.
No angel, no goddess, could dare aspire to such loveliness. And then she put those strong hands round my shoulders, beneath my knees, and lifted me from the red-tinged water. I clasped her neck, Psyche rescued by Eros.
And when she had set me down beside my lover with infinite gentleness and proffered me a towel, she knelt between me and my fainted victim and with relish rubbed cheeks and tongue, breasts and belly, against his wound, covering herself in his blood. Then she dipped her fingers into his wounds and reached, dripping, to paint my smiling lips, my belly, my breasts. The latter she approached with great delicacy and a feathery touch, spiralling slowly inward from the outside of one breast until she reached its centre. There she lingered, tracing ever smaller and more inward circles until I could bear it no longer and shuddered in delicious anticipation, my legs writhing against the cold stone as if they yearned to escape.
But my heart would not let me.
It was already a contented captive, even before Elisabeth bent down to embrace me. I was sated with blood, dreamy and dazed by the thrill of feeding. But when she pressed her mouth against mine and I felt her tongue work hard against my lips, savouring the blood there, I realised that my hunger had been appeased—but not my physical desire.
Was it the forbiddenness of our love that filled me with a hotter fire than I have ever known? I reached up to press a palm against her back, another against the nape of her neck, and pulled her down upon me. It was then I experienced another revelation: that to-day, for the first time in my eighty years of existence, I had experienced love as it was meant—warm flesh against warm flesh.
She kissed my face, my breasts, my belly, using her tongue to clean each area with sensual, deliberate grace. Then she rose and reached for the Englishman’s wound again; once more, she dipped her fingers in his blood.
I cried out softly as she (my hands tremble so at the memory, I can scarce write) put those bloodied fingers betwixt my legs, and wiped the blood at the place where the Englishman had so recently been. Then with those fingers she entered me, and bent low again to lick away the blood.
I remember little else except for the instant I fell out of the world into that great and glorious abyss of pleasure, so distantly aware of my own screams it seemed as though someone else had made them.
Yet as I lay, eyes closed, undone by delight, I did hear the sensuous cries of another: Elisabeth, my darling Elisabeth, who lay beside me. I smoothed damp curls back from her forehead until she recovered and opened blue, blue eyes to smile at me.
I leaned down and kissed her tenderly. Then we two entwined our arms and held each other for a long silence.
At last, I have what Vlad long ago promised me but never gave: an eternal lover.
When finally we rose, I looked down at the sleeping Englishman, and saw that the wounds inflicted upon his shoulder had entirely healed.
Elisabeth took me out into the sitting-room, where a half-dozen large trunks sat beside another half-dozen suitcases, and opened one. For herself, she took out a stunning silk dressing-gown of pale yellow edged with broad eggshell lace; for me, a dressing-gown of electric-blue satin trimmed with black velvet. Together we returned to my chambers. At the open door, I stopped, and exclaimed in dismay:
“But Dunya! We have forgotten about poor Dunya!”
Elisabeth patted my shoulder reassuringly. “She will have many more chances; as long as I am here, she canno
t starve into oblivion, regardless of what Vlad might do. But for now, my darling, it is best that no one else know about our secret meetings.”
I sighed in reluctant acquiescence, though in fact I felt it utterly selfish to deny my trustworthy little servant a chance to feed.
At the unhappiness in my downcast eyes, Elisabeth put a finger beneath my chin and tenderly lifted it until our gazes met.
“Go and rest now,” she said soothingly, “and when night comes, you will rise again so that Vlad does not suspect. I doubt he will let us meet then, but I promise you that I shall do everything possible to convince him that you and Dunya must feed. And if he agrees, then you can give your supper entirely to her.” Pausing, she brushed my lips with the lightest of kisses.
“As for you, my darling … To-morrow, if it pleases you, we can watch the sun rise together.”
The thought so gladdened me that I cried out, “Oh, Elisabeth! I shall love you forever!”
And at that, she smiled.
9 MAY 1893. Once more, I woke to the sound of Elisabeth’s voice, and to the sight of her glorious face.
Last night I can scarcely remember, save that I was happy to see that, as Elisabeth had said, Dunya was still looking and feeling strong. This was a comfort to me, as I still felt guilt over not having invited her to yesterday’s feeding.
Ah, but yesterday noon I remembered then and remember now, and each time I do, I blush. Last night I did not see Elisabeth; I suspect Vlad felt obliged to keep her in his presence for lack of trust, and for my sake, she would not disobey his order to eschew my company.
It is just as well I did not see her then; for even in Vlad’s presence, I would not have been able to restrain my joy at the sight of her.
“My darling,” Elisabeth said softly, and reached down into my casket to smoothe a hand across my forehead and cheek, as tenderly as a mother would caress her child. “It pains me so to see you sleeping in this—this contraption. Vlad’s limitations are not yours, though he might wish you to believe so. Will you not stay in my bed?”
“I will do whatever pleases you.” I took her hand from my cheek and kissed it.
“It will please me to have you with me.”
Her statement pleased me, but in truth I listened to it with but half my attention—for I was gazing beyond her at the unfettered window, and seeing there the first rosy rays of dawn streaming through pearl-grey clouds.
Eager as a child, I turned to her. “Can we go outside? Now? I want to see it!”
“It’s drizzling, I fear, and at any moment will begin to rain harder.” She touched a hand to her carefully arranged golden curls as if the mere mention of the weather might ruin them.
“I don’t care! You can stay here—I just want to be out in it.”
At the first three words, she tossed back her head and laughed indulgently, and remained smiling as I finished. “I’ll go with you, my dear. I had no inkling you felt so strongly. But if you wish it, then it shall be done!”
And so I took her hand and climbed from my ghoulish resting-place, and together we walked the same path we had taken the day before. Her yellow silk dressing-gown and the dark blue satin dressing-gown she had given me rustled softly against the floor. As we walked, she turned to me, her expression one of unmistakable appreciation of my body, and said:
“That looks quite beautiful on you, darling. You may keep it, and I want you to pick out some of my dresses for you to wear; Dorka can do any needed alterations.”
“You are so kind, Elisabeth!” I felt literally aglow with love, as though my heart were a great furnace, kindled at last.
“And you are so beautiful, my Zsuzsanna.…”
At last we arrived at the great wood-and-iron door and pushed it open. I drew in a breath at once of the damp fresh air, and marvelled at the fine misting drizzle. Beyond lay a grey landscape, and a grey, clouded sky.
True, I was disappointed—how beautiful the drizzle would have looked, asparkle like diamonds in the sunshine. Even so, I was so glad just to be out-of-doors in the day that I stepped forward, wanting only to stand in it, to feel the cool water against my face, my skin.
But when I tried to run over the threshold and skip down the stairs, I cried out in even deeper disappointment; for, try as I might, I could not move farther than the doorway, held back by an invisible force.
I could not go outside. In bewildered desperation, I looked to Elisabeth for help.
What I saw quite surprised me.
She, too, stood in the doorway and, with a vehement Hungarian curse, stomped her small slippered foot. As I watched, the whites of her eyes reddened to scarlet, ruby against sapphire, the contrast eerily pronounced against the paleness of her skin. It was the only time I have seen her look unlovely, and it quite startled me.
Indignant, she wheeled to face me. “He fears us! And so he has taken to this pitiful magic.…” She waved in disgust at the doorway.
But I had utter faith in her abilities; had she commanded me to walk upon water, I should have. I waited for her to stride past me, to step boldly outside, then permit me to do the same.
She did not; she lingered beside me upon the threshold, her expression indignant. She could go outside no more than I. My disappointment was complete, for I had honestly believed her omnipotent.
Because of the doorway’s angle, I could not see the sun rising in the rosy clouds, nor the snow on the distant mountains; with these, I should have to content myself by gazing through the window. But I leaned forward as far as I could, extended my arm through the doorway, and turned my palm to the sky.
There I felt sweet, soft rain, cool and gentle upon my upturned palm; the drops splashed upon black velvet—upon which they beaded—and deep blue satin, which they darkened. There is something soothing about rain during the day, and something mournful about it in the dead of night.
At last, I slowly lowered my arm and turned sadly to Elisabeth. “We are trapped.”
Her expression was one of poorly repressed outrage, though the red in her eyes had faded somewhat. “Indeed not!”
“Then why can we not go outside?”
She frowned, as if my question had been highly impertinent, and with exasperation explained: “Because Vlad has pulled an unexpected trick. Don’t worry, Zsuzsanna. I shall soon set it right. But for now, come. Let us amuse ourselves in other ways.”
She led me back to the Englishman’s room, from whence, once again, the sound of snoring emerged. Elisabeth turned towards me, a cream goddess in sunny silk, and reached forward to lightly trace the outline of my collar with her fingertip. I shuddered slightly at her feathery touch against the skin of my collarbone, my breast, and was at once on fire.
“He is not so strong to-day,” she said, with a coquettish tilt to her head, and the shine of pure desire in her eyes. “But perhaps you could enjoy a small drink.…”
I wanted her more than him, and was about to say, No, let us go to your chambers, and spend the day in your bed. But she had already pushed open the door and entered.
I followed with only partial reluctance; the thought of dining again was not altogether disagreeable, as yesterday I had not been able to drink my fill. Even so, I was by no means overwhelmed by hunger. Thus I entered without haste, but with mild curiosity: who was this Englishman, and how had he come to be here? Obviously, on the nights Vlad went to hunt for us, he had gone instead to Bistritz to post letters to this man.…
Rather than go at once to the bed to claim my sleeping victim, I instead passed by the armoire, where a number of papers were neatly arranged in stacks. I glanced at the top letter, which was apparently a legal document of some type, prepared by a certain Peter Hawkins, Esquire—and signed by “Count” V. Dracula. “So!” I said, with a glance at the man snoring beneath the canopy—once again, with the bed curtains left open. I took no care to keep my voice low, for Elisabeth had shown me how to prevent others (including Vlad) from hearing me. “Our young Englishman is a solicitor employed by a man n
amed Hawkins. And he has been transacting legal business on behalf of a certain V. Dracula.”
Elisabeth’s eyes narrowed with intrigue; she at once moved away from the bed to stand beside me. Whilst I riffled through one stack of papers, she examined another, then picked up a small leather-bound diary and began to read.
“What language or code he writes in, I cannot say,” she said after a time. “But he has written his name here; Harker. Jonathan Harker, Esquire.”
I scarce heard her, for I had more carefully examined the legal document and scanned the stack of correspondence. I was stricken like Saul on the road to Damascus with a blinding revelation; and now, I felt my eyes blaze with the same red fury I had earlier seen in Elisabeth’s.
For I suddenly understood that this man was not here simply as a houseguest, to quench Vlad’s thirst. No, he was here for a far more sinister purpose: to assist Vlad in moving to England.
A half century ago, Vlad had sworn to me that he would take me from this dreary country to an exciting life in London. Only our difficulties with my brother, Arkady, and his son, the accursed Van Helsing, have prevented us from escape.
Now he was going at last—whilst I would remain behind to starve. Why else had he prevented me from leaving the castle?
I turned to her, waving a paper in my hand. “This!” I hissed. “This is a title deed—to property Vlad has purchased in secrecy!”
She stopped reading the paper in her hand, and faced me, one golden brow arched in an extreme inverted V as she peered at the document I clutched. “London, it seems,” she said, thoughtful, remaining calm despite my rage. “Purfleet is outside London.” And she held up to my gaze another signed paper, this a bill of sale for another estate. “Piccadilly. In London proper.”
Overwhelmed by rage, I sat abruptly in a faded brocade chair.