Chapter 5

The event unfolded as a type of slow-motion torture. My longing and fear blended inside me. I had this craving for, and all the while, I dreaded what would come. Cristian jerked from view as he flew across the room, struck the wall next to the broken window. The young man slid down the wall, Cristian crumpled into a heap on the floor.

In a flash, he sprung to hands and knees. He looked like a wild animal ready to pounce for a kill, his eyes locked on her eyes. All the resolve inside him melted away at the sight of his Mistress. He cast his gaze down to his own hands. He rose to his feet in a slow, graceful, fluid movement, eyes still not looking at her; he uttered two words.

“Sorry, Mistress.”

The Countess stood next to me, her face hard, angry, cold as the ice of December. Her lips were bright red, a trickle of a thick, red fluid leaked from her mouth in a slow-moving ooze to her chin. Her tongue darted out, lapping the blood from her face. In her other hand, she held the wrist of a young woman. The girl gave the impression of enchantment. As if existence was this ecstatic stupor. Her eyes were dull and dilated as if a drug raced through her veins. Releasing the girl’s arm, the Countess’s appearance softened.

“She has been fun,” she said. “Life is in her veins. Sweet, tasty blood she longs to give you, and if you use her wisely, she may last many nights. Use her for pleasure and food. Take from her what she freely gives, her blood, strength, life, and every scrumptious drop, if you can. If you cannot find strength in you to do so, I will, or I will return her to her husband and her worthless life with him.”

“I can finish her, Mistress,” Alexandru said, moving toward her.

“No,” she said. “You will use her up, and nothing will remain for the lads. Go to the hall now, for I have other plans for you.”

Alexandru’s shoulders dropped, his head looked to the floor, he said, “Yes, Mistress.” He moved from my view.

The Countess bent to the woman, whispered in her ear. The young woman shed her clothing in a rapid, eager show for the brothers. The nameless wench swayed toward the first of them, her hips rolling, in a provocative manner, as she swept to his side. She kissed him, leaned back, and offered the open wounds on her neck to him.

Cristian lowered his head to her red, bleeding neck. With his tongue, he lapped up the blood, pressing his lips to the open wounds, sucked the blood from her. Boian moved behind her, bent his head to her, pushed his long incisors into her soft fleshy shoulder, biting deep into her willing body. The brothers stood on opposing sides of the young woman, feeding on her blood.

At this point, Countess Drago hoisted me into her arms, ambled away from the two remaining grooms, carrying me into the hall. Alexandru walked in front of us. I wanted so to speak, but could not, I could not move, not one finger, I hung in her arms in a languorous state, lacking either the will or strength to stir from this strange dream.

“Go to her room,” she told him. “We shall share her. But you can have only a mouth full. I do not want you to grow ill from the richness of her life nor the lavishness of her wholesome blood.” A clamor filled the air as someone pounded and screamed like some wild man at the door downstairs. “I must attend to this matter first. I’ll bring her to you when I have dealt with this.”

“Who is it?” he asked.

“The woman’s husband,” she answered. We wound our way down hallways, descended stairs, made our way back the way we had come, down other stairs, and finally to the corridor outside my room. Countess Valerie Drago moved past the door to my room. The Countess walked through the next hall. The halls and rooms merged, and as if by some magic, we were in the Great Entry room. Countess Drago carried me down the massive, curved staircase. My weight seemed to have no effect on her, as though I held no more mass than a feather to weigh down on her.

As we moved toward the doors, they swung open, revealing a man standing at the entryway. He held out his hands, bruised and bloodied, from his pounding his fist against the door, begging her. He fell to his face, prostrate on the wet stones.

“Please, Mistress Countess, return her to me,” I’m sure he spoke his native tongue, but oddly, I perceived him in English.

“No,” Countess Drago said, “she pleasures my children. They please her far more than you can. Soon, she’ll feed for nights to come.”

“No,” he cried out. “Take me instead. I’m full of blood for you.”

“You lack energy in your life. Your blood is far too pale to give nourishment. No, will keep her, too, late for her. You wouldn’t want her back now, for I have ... contaminated her.”

“She will be as you are?”

Her laughter rang into the still night’s air, echoing in the courtyard and off the sides of the mountains. The haunting chuckle reverberated and returned to her. That’s when I spotted the beasts behind the man. I was sure he didn’t realize they were so close, I supposed, in my hallucinating dream state, her laughter called them to her. A lynx moved to his right, while a giant bear stood not five feet behind him, and three enormous wolves stood in the archway entrance to the courtyard.

“Never shall she be like me, once she has satisfied my Undead children, she’ll feed these the other children of the night or rot in the tombs below my home, forage for my rats. I would never allow such common blood the gift of infinity.”

He turned his gaze to his left, his right, pivoted about, and stood face to face with the bear. Twisting back to the Countess, his eyes wild, he started to run toward her. Taking two steps, he froze when she whispered to him.

“Be still,” she said, “turn,” he moved around, faced the bear. “Walk to them, embrace them with open arms, give yourself to them, leave them something of your happiness, so they might remember you with fondness ... after you fill their bellies.”

The man tried to resist, but with his right foot pushed forward against his will, the other one followed. In a few short strides, he stood in front of the bear, the front paws of the beast rested on the shoulders of the peasant, the bear’s slavering mouth began to lower to the man’s face.

The Countess moved us inside, and the doors closed behind us. The weird, disgusting sounds of the beasts devouring the man filled my brain as she carried me to my bed. As though I was in a stupor, I didn’t move, offered no resistance to what happened to me.

The boy kissed me and hugged me. In the meantime, his powerful arms engulfed me. The Countess and I intertwined, Alexandru joined the orgy, as thoughts of Michael sprang into my intellect. In a flash, these sweet thoughts, driven from my mind by a yearning. A deep carnal, craving hunger consumed me, as the Countess and her young disciple did the same.

I wandered in and out of consciousness. Salacious corruptions happened in flashes. Through spurts of memory, I can only recall glimpses of our coupling. Weirdly, only the Countess and I were intimate. The hulking Alexandru, only joining in with sweet, longing kisses. He and she sucked on me in long, loving bites of the tender flesh, on my neck, shoulder, or breasts. Valarie kissed me, long, and we wound our bodies together again. Alexandru only watched as we pleasured one another.

My rapture held a price, for my breathing was not easy. In the excitement of our congress, my breathing turned ragged, and I took lengthy, rugged wheezing pants as I struggled to pull enough air into my lungs. But this only served to heighten my utopia.

As swiftly as all this began, it ended, and I lay alone in the dark, whereas my two hosts turned into two wispy pillars of smoke which rushed toward the door and vanished around the cracks of the doorway. The dream ended, and darkness covered me.

I lay alone in my bed. My energy sapped, my confused needs, which I had never admitted I possessed, satiated. I struggled to return to sleep, but the thoughts of the dream plagued me.

I mulled over the disturbing vision, eventually falling into a deep slumber. I dreamed of Michael. The dream took a turn, and I perceived as Valerie made love to him on my bed. The vision ended when her long incisors dug deep into the soft flesh of his shoulder — waking from my dream with a start. My heart raced, my chest heaved, I had anger in my heart for Michael. In a few moments, I calmed myself, realizing this was only a dream, a translucent vision made of storms and mist.

In the morning, I awoke in my bed. I remembered nothing of returning from the library. Odd dreams came to me, and I couldn’t help but wonder if they indeed happened if the Countess carried me. If the man, in reality, had been torn apart by those beasts. Every night brought a new revelation and new horrors. Coupled with unique visions of ecstasy. The shape of these things, I can’t quite make into some sensible idea. Nonetheless, they creep into my subconscious.

I did not know what treatment the boys received. They feared her, and they feared me, other than in my dreams. But again, are their mere dreams, or are the dark terrors I see not imagined but lived? If they are actual, I’m the one Doctor Drago treats? If all the goings-on were genuine, indeed, I was the lunatic.

Each day, I spent in the company of one or the other lads, or I spent my time alone. On odd occurrences, the Countess was my companion. We talked well past midnight every evening. I asked questions, and she avoided the answers. She asked questions, compelled me to answer by her sheer willpower. She learned where Michael has moved for his summer’s work and my small circle of friends, where they live, and what they do for livings.

I asked her this or that, she replied with long, rambling orations, which in the end, left me wondering what my questions were. After a while, she leaves me alone. In the dead of night, in this prison where I locked myself into my cell, only to return in my torrid, tortured, wanton dreams. All the while, I loathed her, yearned for her touch, her cold scorching flesh pressed to mine.

In all my life, I have never touched anyone with so little warmth. Nor one who inspired such sweltering covetousness for them inside me.

Alone in my room, I hungered to press my mouth to hers. I longed to feel the icy touch of her lips touching mine. The tension of fear, hatred, and lust built inside me every single moment we were together and a desire to flee, mixed with a necessity, to find her and be with her, each moment when we were apart.

And as always, the dreams followed her nightly departure. Wild, sexual fantasies of one of the boys. Still, Valerie Drago guided the boys, giving me, one of them, or both of us, instruction. Always, she and I make love until she sups from my neck or breasts.

In all the encounters with the boys, they only drank my blood or oral joinings. I wondered, was this to make me think they were dreams? These visions haunted my waking hours, and longing had overtaken logic. I tried and questioned her about treatments, but the words refused to issue from my mouth.

Let us consider the roses. The vase filled with twelve is lessened by one each day. The decaying petals cover the table, and new ones fall every morning. Those in the vessel are alive and vibrant. But where 12 began, 11, 10, and so on, until this morning, six remained. Were it not for the falling petals, I wouldn’t mark the day of the month. I feared those dying flowers were counting down to something. What I feared, for the thing might be the countdown to the death of me.

When I was not randy with lust, I trembled with fear. Strange occurrences shadowed my every move. One night, I witnessed the Countess turn to vapor, assuming this was another dream. The fog drifted out the window. I ran to the opening in terror, gazed outside while the mist wafted down the wall like sinister smoke drifting down into the trees. The fog evaporated into an immense wolf, which bounded away into the trees.

When I was awake, some nights, late in the evening, I heard men at the doors pounding. They screamed, shouted in angered voices to gain entry, and I remembered the dream from my second night.

I overheard the wild animals, and those poor wretches screamed louder as the beasts ripped the men to shreds, hideous, frightful noises. Once morning came, the dreadful sounds remained in my thoughts. I pondered if these awful events happened, or were these too, merely dreamt?

One day, whilst I was alone, I spied men loading coffins into carts from a room high above the courtyard. I counted 11 of the oblong boxes, being hauled away from the castle in oxen carts by rough-looking men, their heads wrapped with brightly colored bandanas, and the clothing was bright. They carried formidable daggers in their belts, and the workers gave every impression of being violent menfolk. For a brief moment, I thought they were Dacians, but the thought soon fled from my brain.

I remembered the word the coachwoman hurled at the coachman, Dacians trash. Which I thought, a specific insult. I learned from the Countess, those called Dacians were descendants of an ancient race. Once warriors believing, they turned themselves into wolves, but nowadays, mere peasants are afraid of their own shadows. A people who gave up their own religion and became Catholic Christian. Thus, the coachman’s propensity for crossing himself frequently. I realized these wild men were not Dacians but were, in fact, Gypsies.

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