Yes, she had
loved him, admired him, shared his cause as a true wife must. She even damned
herself for him.
As their enemies grew, she made a
pact with the Lord of Darkness. I saw her standing alone in one of the castle
rooms, her body bathed by firelight and incense. The room was cold, so cold
that in spite of the blue woolen cloak she had tightly wrapped around her, she
kept close to the fire. I shared her resolve, her incredible courage as she
watched the grotesque form of the master she had chosen lumbering from the
shadows of the room toward the place where she stood so still, as if death had
already claimed her. "I believe," she whispered and knelt to kiss
the ruby ring on his finger, to grasp his dark and taloned hand.
She had hoped to drink from him-only
to drink--but he wanted more. With growing horror, she watched his yellow
reptilian eyes study her lithe body, watched his hands move toward her cloak
and pull it from her. "My slave," he said, his voice soft and sweet,
so at odds with his ugliness. I thought of Eve in the garden. The snake would
have spoken in a voice such as this.
Then he
kissed her, sinking his long fangs into his own lips as he did so. She shuddered
as she kissed him, but with the first taste
of his blood, her loathing
turned swiftly to desire.
I understood too well the horror she felt, for I had glimpsed some
measure of her passion when I drank from Dracula. But he had once been a man,
still had the semblance of a man. This creature had never been human, had never
known love or tenderness, only the dark beauty of suffering, the fulfillment
of pain.
As his blood
moved swiftly through her, turning her instantly into the creature she had longed
to become, his savagery increased.
He could do as he wished to
her for she could no longer die.
When he was sated, when her body lay
ripped and bleeding on the cold stone floor of the room, when her tortured,
hysterical sobs no longer amused him, he left her to pull the tattered
remnants of her soul back together and live forever in eternal life-in-death.
He gave her
his dark gift. When the change was complete, she could not die and those who
tasted her blood would share her
immortality.
How she begged her husband to accept
her gift! How she swore that nothing within her had changed, that they could
love one another forever. Her lips were warm as they kissed him, her touch
more wanton than ever before. In the end, out of love and need to protect his
people lie weakened and took the blood she offered then left to command what
could well be his legions' final battle.
The Turks were breaking through
Dracula's last defenses, when Illona threw herself from the castle walls in
full view of them. I sensed her terror as she fell, then nothing until the
night she wandered the carnage of Dracula's final battlefield, searching for
his body among the rotting piles of the dead. There were so many that had
fallen on both sides, yet only one was truly of her blood. As she pulled the
reeking corpses from the mound where Dracula lay dressed in the coat of a
common soldier, she saw that his wounds had already begun to heal. In the
bowels of the castle, she laid him in the tomb she had prepared for him. She
nursed him with her own blood. That and his native soil slowly restored him.
It took months for the wounds to heal completely. When they did, he rose into
her life.
I saw his
face when he first woke. How radiant it had seemed, how filled with wonder. How
quickly that wonder died.
The pair had done this for the sake
of their people, but after the change, the needs of mortals meant nothing to
them. They lost all concern about the people inhabiting their lands. Blood,
after all, is the same. They were mad for a while, reveling in the carnage their
powers allowed them.
The memories
took hours to sort and place in order, the words themselves so many minutes to
write, yet all this was thrust into
my mind in only a moment. In
the next, Van Helsing, armed with the crumbling host, moved between me and the
woman.
She
retreated. Van Helsing pursued her until she joined her pale sisters, then he
ran to the protection of his sacred circle. As for
me, I lay facedown in the snow. What happened between them seemed
unimportant to me in the face of one terrible final revelation.
The bargain
the woman had struck could have been made by others. There could be dozens of
these creatures scattered
throughout the world.
"Come
to us," the three called to me, holding out their delicate hands. "Be
with us, a sister forever."
I didn't
move. Instead I knelt in the center of the circle, horrified most by the
temptation their offer held for me. Seductive.
Powerful. Eternal. So beyond the judgment of God Himself. What of
my love for Jonathan, my responsibilities to the family I had left in England,
the life I had led?
"Sisters,"
I whispered, I begged. "Sisters, please give me time. Leave us in
peace."
The fools
turned their attention to Van Helsing instead. I saw them bare their bodies
before him, showing him the perfection of
life-in-death.
They kissed one another, touched one another, their hands moving seductively,
their lips parted with a passion I often felt deep inside but never dared
express. They had one another, used one another in an incest perfected through
the centuries. Their laughter grew husky, sensual, inviting as they moved to
the edge of Van Helsing's circle and stretched out their bare arms to him.
In spite of his age and his intellect
and his determination, Van Helsing was affected by their passion. His mouth
hung slack, his hands rose, seemingly of their own accord, to reach toward
them, then, fists clenched, Van Helsing the hunter, the slayer, the righteous
one began to force them back to his side. As he did, they grabbed his arm,
pulling it out of the circle. With their eyes turned seductively toward his,
they held his hand against their breasts, they brushed their tapered fingers
over his lips. The boldest of them licked Van Helsing's wrist and bit deep.
For an instant he was helpless, frozen by the touch of her lips and the
enthralling passion that touch gave. I sensed his anger at his own weakness,
his abhorrence of their seduction. They did not understand the righteousness
of the man they faced, or they would not have tempted him so.
"Go!"
I cried to them again. "Leave us now!"
The fear in my voice made them pause
and look at me. Understanding that I spoke a warning, they smiled and drifted
away from us. Some time later, the horses that had been whinnying in fear
ceased their sounds. The women reappeared momentarily, their faces flushed
with the blood they had consumed. The fair one blew me a kiss, her smile young
and filled with delight as they faded into a mist that dissolved at the touch
of the pale dawn light.
November 6
. I recalled nothing more
until I woke to find the sun had risen. The day is dark. There are wolf prints
in the new fallen snow around the campsite, yet Van Helsing is gone. Only one
thing would make him leave me unarmed and at the mercy of the unseen pack-he
has gone to destroy the women. I expect that soon I will know the outcome of
his quest, one way or the other. The women were fools to try to tempt him.
Their terrible beauty may have aroused him, but it only makes his path more
clear. As to the women's power, it is daylight-his time, not theirs.
I found it easy to leave my holy
circle, but there was nowhere to go. I have built up the tire as best I can.
Now I sit beside it, watching the gray shapes of wolves moving in the shadows
of the trees. I am so tired, yet sleep could well be fatal. So I wait, hoping
that should the wolves decide to attack me, they will kill me quickly and
finally. The pack has grown in size ... I must pause in my writing and watch
them ... Van Helsing, where have you gone?
An hour or
more passed while the wolves grew bolder, circling closer to me. Often I had to
pull a flaming branch out of the tire
and stab at them to scare
them off.
Finally, they tired of the sport and
found an easier meal in our dead horses. As I watched the pack at their feast,
once more the blood lust was upon me. I waited until the pack had eaten their
till then lifted a flaming branch and walked toward them. My display of
courage confused them, and they retreated, allowing me to kneel beside the warm
carcass, to press my fingers against the bloody meat then lick them clean.
The scent.
The taste. Finer than the richest wine, the most exquisite meal. I yielded to
my hunger, dipping my hands into the
mangled
carcass, feasting as I had not done in days on Van Helsing's charred meat. It
had been so long since I had felt so satisfied. When I was done, I looked down
at my bloody hands, the bits of flesh sticking to the fur of my wrap. I had
become an animal. No, worse!
Van Helsing
must never know what I had done! I ran to the fire, melted some snow and washed
all traces of the meal from my
face, clothes and hands then
took out this journal and wrote these words.
Though it can hardly be past noon, the sky has darkened and a
heavy wet snow falls once more. I am sitting in the covered back of the wagon
writing this account. An exhilaration has taken hold of me. Whatever the
outcome, soon everything will be over. My entire future depends on the next
few hours, yet all I feel is curiosity, as if I have already died and am about
to view the manner of my ending.
The snow
falls harder, dancing in the wind. Whorls of it move closer to the carriage. I
see the faces of my sisters in it. I am alone.
No one can stop me now as I
go out to dance with them ...
The women
were only there in spirit. Even when their garments moved in the wind, brushing
against my outstretched hands, I
could not feel them touching
me. Spectral hands reached for mine, spectral arms circled me. "Van
Helsing has gone to destroy you.
You must not stay with me," I cautioned them, feeling no
remorse for my warning. "If you are able, go back to your bodies, leave your
sleeping room and hide."
The fair one
smiled with lips together to hide the strangeness of her teeth. "What can
he do? He will never find us," she said,
laughter rippling through her
voice.
"Jonathan
Harker is my husband. He found your resting place. He told Van Helsing where to
look."
The dark-haired one who was Dracula’s wife grew even whiter, if
that were possible. She opened her mouth, as if to agree with my warning, but
no sound came from her. Instead, I saw the vision begin to fade. As it did, a
sudden gush of blood burst through the white skin of her chest, staining her diaphanous
gown. Her terrible shriek of agony vanished in the winter wind.
Her blood
was my blood, her pain my pain. I doubled over, clutching my chest as if to
shield them all from Van Helsing's stakes.
The screams
continued, borne on the wind as the three vanished from my sight, one bloody
apparition after another, the fair-haired one the last to go. Though I saw her
wince, saw the blood spread across her chest, she remained silent. As she
vanished, I saw an expression on her face that seemed inexplicably one of
triumph, as if what had happened were meant to happen.
It seemed
that I was to be killed as well. A great weight pressed against my chest. I
tried to take a breath and found it impossible.
My heart pounded, and I
folded slowly to my knees as darkness closed in around me.
Sisters, I
thought. Sisters, may your souls wait for me.
When I
regained consciousness, snow was falling heavily though the sky seemed lighter,
giving some promise that the storm
would soon end. Van Helsing had returned and stood near the fire
putting on a clean coat. A second, bloody one lay on the ground beside him. I
looked at him, horrified by the knowledge of what he had done.
"It is
all right. I am not hurt," he said, then went back to his washing, hoping
perhaps that I would return to sleep. I stood and
walked to the fire.
"When the sky clears, it will be colder. The castle could
give us shelter," I suggested. "The men are sure to come
there." He shook his head. "You especially must not rest within the
walls," he said.
"Because
of the bodies?" I asked him, the sharpness of my voice betraying my anger.
He looked at
me curiously, paused for emphasis, then said, "The women are dust, Madame
Mina. Their souls are at peace. No,
you must not go because it is
his lair. The very walls will call to you. No ... you must not."
I didn't have the strength to argue. Instead, I helped him collect
our bundles. Then, burdened by the weight of our baggage and the exhaustion
the day always gives me, slipping often on the snow-covered rocks, I followed
Van Helsing down the path to the distant road.
We had
traveled less than a quarter mile when we saw fresh wolf prints in the snow. A
bit later, I saw a pair of the beasts on the
path below us.
"Professor," I whispered and pointed.
Two more appeared, the pack blocking
our descent. Van Helsing scanned the rocky ground around us and motioned me
into a little hollow. There, an overhang made it impossible for the wolves to
attack from above, and the narrow entrance assured that they would have to
pass into the space single file. "We shoot them if they come," he
said, lifting a revolver. I pulled Quincey's pistol from my pack and crouched
beside him.
The wolves
seemed content to stop our journey. Hours passed and they did not attack.
Though the snow continued, occasional
clear patches of sky to the
west showed the height of the sun. We waited anxiously as the afternoon
stretched on forever.
"Is the
vampire close, Madame Mina?" Van Helsing asked.
I nodded and pushed myself to my
feet. As I did, I noticed that the valley below us was visible from the stand
of rocks. On the road that wound through it, I could make out a number of
riders and a can of some sort heading toward us. Even more distant were two
riders-no doubt some of our party in pursuit. "They're coming," I
called to Van Helsing.
Van Helsing
looked from the road to the setting sun, measuring the time the men had before
Dracula woke. I did not need to
look. Dracula was already
awake in his box, waiting for the moment when he could rise in his own
land-powerful, ready for the kill.
I felt
Dracula's rage rise in me as well, and fought it down with horror. Whatever I
had become, I was still Mina, wife to
Jonathan. I recalled how much
I loved my husband. The thought was all that sustained me as I helped Van
Helsing collect our furs.
"We go
down to them," he told me, "There is a path ... see it?"