The House on Blackstone Moor (The Blackstone Vampires) (19 page)

She was Imogene, the nasty one from the club. She reached for me and bent over me. “I will show you pleasure, I will show you worlds you cannot imagine!”

“No! No!” I cried, somehow managing to break away from her. I ran again as fast as I could. She chased after me but suddenly stopped to sniff the air. She then fell upon the ground.

At first I didn’t realize what she was doing, I only understood when she looked up and smiled. “Virgin blood, sweet to the taste!”

I don’t remember screaming
. A
ll I know is I was soon surrounded by a sea of anxious faces.

“What is it, Rose?”

“What is it?!” I cried. “What is going on here? What depravity and monstrousness is about this place? You are demons!”

It seemed to me Dr. Bannion was making light of it all, inferring that I had imagined what I had seen. “I’m going to give you something now, Rose.”

Of course, first the reassuring words and then the sting of a needle and the medicine to calm me down and make me sleep.

Only this time I tried to fight it. But it didn’t work, I was soon asleep.

It was dark when I woke. I realized I must have slept for a long time.

A noise woke me, I didn’t know it was the preamble to my damnation--the opening shots as it were to my future, the one fate was giving me whether I liked it or not.

The ‘noise’ turned out to be the sound of voices, voices speaking from some other place it seemed.

It seemed like Louis and Mrs. Darton were speaking about me.

My hearing was still very acute; why that was I shall tell you but you will have to wait.

“You corruption! You summoned him!”

“I am sorry…”

“That is the end of it. You’re finished!”

“But Louis!”

It seemed to me Dr. Bannion tried to intercede but was shouted at and possibly threatened. “Well, I will go then.” I heard him say.

Suddenly, the door opened. “Rose?” It was Louis.

“What is out there? I have seen things…”

He looked as though he didn’t know what to say.

“Yes,” I said. “I imagine you cannot find any words. Don’t tell me you didn’t know!”

“Oh I did know. I knew and I didn’t care!”

I turned away because I felt sick. “You are disgusting. Leave me.”

But he didn’t leave. He stayed to tell me things, things I could barely understand. “I knew and I didn’t care because I had stopped caring. I am damned.”

I laughed at him. “Damned? Well, if you haven’t been you will be. How could you go along with that depravity?”

He shrugged. “It is my heritage. I have always been damned.”

I screamed for him to leave, and I kept on screaming.

He waited until I was exhausted whereupon he began his tale. “Please Rose I must now tell you things I want you to understand. You deserve to have the truth and you shall have it. You see Rose, there are many worlds within worlds and even magical species that dwell within those worlds. There are things beyond what you know…”

He paused then to gaze at me, as if willing me to understand. I shook my head. It sounded insane.

“It is a long story, but one you must hear, I’m afraid.” He moved closer to me. “Rose, I want to speak to you to show you things that will answer all your concerns.”

“All of my concerns?”

He nodded.

I bit my lip. If I had longed for all the truth, I also feared it. My world was turning in a different direction now and I felt the movement.

There were in these next moments an end and a beginning I would not understand the profound significance of for a while.

“The story I shall tell you is a story as old as time, my story. You will, I hope, understand all that I tell you. But first there are things you will see that will shock and horrify you. You see my dear, you are already becoming something different. It has been happening slowly and will continue to follow its slow but steady course until it is entirely accomplished. Even though the wine will be different—”

“The
wine
?”

“I think it best if we begin with
the with
Ada and Simon
,
and then you can open the door the rest of the way yourself for it is in so many ways like a door.

The children came then, holding the Lodge sisters’ hands. They were smiling happily but the sisters looked so serious, their gaunt faces more pale and their voices tremulous, “Are you certain, Louis, that this is the right thing now?”

Louis nodded sadly. “Yes, because she
knows…”

I was horrified. What did they get up to here? Where had I been sent? Before I could think any more of it, Ada and Simon rushed toward me. “Miss Baines! Oh, Miss Baines!”

Mr. Darton smiled sadly. “You may call her Rose now, children.”

“Rose! Oh, Rose!” They shouted as they began to glide toward me!

Simon giggled. “Don’t look so shocked, Rose. It is true, we can fly! You will too. It isn’t difficult. Come!” He held out his hand then as Ada did.

I was so shocked I let their hands clasp mine and I suddenly felt myself being lifted upward. I was actually floating out of the room into the hall. “I shall fall!”

“No!” They laughed. “We won’t let you. Come away! Come with us,
our
Rose.”

I felt I was in a dream. Yes, it was better to think of it that way, for how could I possibly consider it to be real?

“It is almost night now, Rose. Do you want to see the moors at night? The things we get up to?”

We were over the garden then, over the graveled walks and the flowers. Suddenly, I gasped for it seemed to me I had seen the stone cherub move slightly. I pointed and Ada giggled. “Yes Rose. Your eyes do not betray you!” with that she beckoned the statue forth and it flew toward us!

I watched incredulously as both the boy and the bird took to flight.

“No! It is frightening me,” I called out, but still it came closer.

It came so close that I could see its face change, from the smiling boy to a sad one.

“Oh!” Ada called out. “You have made him sad.”

When the bird flew toward me I screamed. “Get it away!” I cried, but it landed on my shoulder.

“Don’t frighten it,” Ada pleaded, “please don’t.”

At last the bird flew back to the boy and they both floated down to their places in the garden. I watched as they became statues again.

“It was only a bit of magic, Rose. We’re sorry. Come to the moors! We shall think of it no more!”

Before I could reply they guided me down toward the ground. They had spotted something.

Ada cried, “Look, a hare! We shall have a feast, won’t we, Simon?”

Simon laughed as he grabbed the animal with lightning speed, only to tear its neck asunder.

I watched in horror as both he and Ada began to drink the blood that spurted like a great, black fountain.

Now as I had seen once before, their faces changed just for an instant as something demonic revealed itself.

I screamed and turned to run but Louis was standing there. His voice was gentle. “With acceptance Rose will come understanding.”

I was surprised to see the others standing there too--Dora and Molly and Tom. “It’ll be alright, Rose You will see.”

“You’re all insane!” I cried as I fled toward the house. The back door was open and I hurried inside toward the kitchen. There was brandy there to steady my nerves. As I reached for the cabinet, I noticed the cellar door was open. That door was always locked with a padlock.

Something made me walk toward the open doorway. There I stood, gazing down at the dank, dark stairs. Then as if in a trance I picked up a lamp and lit it. Some force was urging me on.

Go Rose. Go and see!

I began to walk but recoiled for there was a stench of damp and rot but of something else too—the putrid odor of decaying meat. Yet still I went.

I didn’t see it right away. That is, I didn’t realize what I was looking at immediately. At first they looked like sacks of flour or potatoes.

It wasn’t until I got closer that I
really
I saw what they were. But then I stopped. I stopped because my brain was beginning to make sense of it all. At last I began to understand what I was looking at, for there before me were several corpses!

What I had discovered were several bodies that looked as though they had been drained of blood.

I turned to flee, but as I did, I realized I had come upon another gruesome discovery. For there, chained to a wall was Mrs. Sternwood.

She was in a weakened state and called to me. As I began to move toward her to see if I could help I heard someone shout, “Don’t go near her! She is not yet destroyed! If you step too close she will kill you, Rose. She has enough power to.”

Louis held out his hand to take mine, but I pulled away and began to run back toward the stairs, although without the lamp I kept stumbling and found I was sliding in some sticky substance which was all over the floor. It was, of course, blood.

Suddenly I tripped over something, something that moved.

“This is Imogene, the girl you saw on the moors, the one who lapped up the blood. We are making an example out of her…”

He said more, much more but I could make no sense of it for my brain had shut down. It was all too much.

The children had shocked me and then the horror of discovering the cellar had shocked me even more.

I remember trying to run from the horror I had seen, but I fell hard and cried in pain.

I looked up to see Louis above me, that anguished gaze of his pulling at my heartstrings. I crushed that feeling ruthlessly—that cursed feeling of love—because fool that I was I should have known that wanting this man for myself would have been my downfall.

I think at first I thought the entire thing was a dream
, the flying and the children—even the horror in the cellar—but as I began to get my wits about me, I remembered hearing Louis’ words…worlds within worlds and magical species…
That was not a dream surely, or was it?

Then I remembered the horrors I saw on the moors and realized it was all real. That image pushed a scream from my lips and Dr. Antor rushed in.

“That horror out there…I saw it was all real, wasn’t it?”

He looked so sad. Sad and judgmental as if he didn’t approve of such monstrous behavior. “Yes it was.”

“Why?”

“Rose!” Louis stood in the doorway. I turned away from him, for I could not bear to look upon his face. “Please, you must listen.”

Dr. Antor stepped back as Louis sat down. “Rose, the children, Mrs. Darton and the staff too, they are all the undead. They are vampires.”

I did look at him then and shook my head. “You’re trying to drive me insane. Is that what this is?”

“No, of course not! It is time for you to hear all of the truth. You have been tortured enough.”

“Yes! Yes!” I cried “I have been tortured!”

“Please.” He reached for my hand. I pulled it away but he kept reaching for it. At last I relented and he took it in his own. “I will explain, but you must listen. It is as I said. They are vampires.”

“Vampires?”
I had heard of the myth, some nonsense about immortal beings that made up folklore—but surely it was only myth. “I don’t believe it!”

“It is true, they were raised up.”

“How raised up? You mean from death?”

“Yes.”

“Who raised them up?”

“I did,” Louis replied. “I raised each of them up, Rose. I have done it countless times in my existence…”

This was all too much and I began to laugh but within moments that laughter turned to tears. I ordered both of them from my room for I needed to be alone.

They didn’t leave me for too long. They returned within minutes. “Rose, please you must hear this.”

I nodded and braced myself to hear what they had to tell me.

When it began, it began with Louis.

“I will tell you of myself first, Rose. I am the son of a fallen angel. Yes, there really was a war in heaven—my father supported Lucifer. He regretted it immediately but it was too late. He had become fallen…”

Needless to say, I did not just remain silent during this confession. I do recall saying, “This isn’t real! It isn’t happening. You are insane and so am I.”

But it was real, and it was happening. And I began to understand.

“You saw the children could fly, you flew too because you had changed enough to…”

It all began to make sense. What I had seen had been real—the headless bird, the hare and even, sadly, the flash of something monstrous that lay under the surface of their being.

“How were they raised up?”

“Each is raised the same way, Rose. They are pulled from the jaws of hell, but each returns to the world differently.
”