Dracula The Undead Part 21

'Jonathan will never take me back now. I will lose my son and be an outcast!'

'For what reason?'

'All I've done, and allowed - don't imagine that my husband does not know! He knows everything. Any Christian husband would shun his wife for what I have done.'

Dracula sneered. 'And you wish to return to these bourgeois rules of your so-compa.s.sionate society? I care nothing for their petty values! You think me a monster? Yet I am the one who will never condemn or desert you. I will welcome you always, though you go from me and suck the blood of all your beloved men, of thousands of men throughout the rest of time. You may be more easily rid of your husband, Mina, than you ever will of me. Don't mourn the loss of him. Jonathan will be yours in the end, as will Quincey.'

I closed my eyes. How could I answer?

'Have you made your decision? Do you wish to watch Quincey die, or to see him live for ever?'

'Just to see him again, alive - that is all I ask!'

1 December We have arrived at Hermannstadt.

The gypsies conveyed us along the broad valley of the Tirnave river in their creaking wagons. None spoke to me; they are the least courteous men I have ever met, and very intimidating with their swarthy looks and great black moustaches. I am more afraid of them than of the Count! I occupied myself by observing the scenery; the tiered fields and the leafless poplars, charming villages with low, red-roofed houses. Most have a fortified Saxon church at the centre. But all this medieval charm only reminded me how far I am from home and family.

I can and I will remain strong.

This room is a little larger, but even more eccentrically proportioned than the last. There is a lot of dark wood, and a good fire in the grate; I feel warm, for once. The door gives on to a vine-covered courtyard with stairs and galleries, but from the window I have a fine view of the town. Below me are narrow, cobbled streets with gabled houses, some with baroque fronts on their crooked medieval sh.e.l.ls. Raising my eyes I see the spires and domes of churches, and a long, tearing pang of guilt goes through me; but then, far beyond, there is the sudden blue wall of the mountains. That is where our destination lies. Dear Quincey; can he still be alive in that high, cold wilderness?

It seems strange that Dracula would let Elena reach the Scholomance; I thought he would have overtaken her by now! He has his reasons, I dare say. I must trust him. Ruthless as he is to those who cross him, he has a certain integrity . .. a n.o.bility.

Later Now I am destroyed. I must pray, if G.o.d has not entirely forsaken me. Oh G.o.d, dear Lord, let this all be lies!

Dracula came to me again. This time he did not seem tender but hard; like a man carved of marble yet animated by an inner fire that I have never seen matched in any mortal man. He held me tight and forced me down on to the bed, pinning my wrists so mat I could not struggle even if I had wanted to. Oh, the curse of his kind - that I did not want to resist him - was very strong upon me! I could only gasp, holding myself rigid, as his silken lips moved over my face and down the s.h.i.+vering skin of my throat. Then he bit down - and for a long time I came quite out of myself, and all was breath, and heartbeat, and delicious dizziness; all sensation, not thought. If he is as much beast as man, he is turning me into a beast also; a creature of flesh, not spirit. And for such l.u.s.ts, utterly d.a.m.ned.

When these fires ebbed away and I came back to myself, he still held me down, though more gently now. He had taken only a very, very little blood from me, I could tell, not even enough to make me faint.

'You remember,' he said, 'this - seven years ago.'

'That you violated me while my husband lay sleeping beside us?'

'If you would term it so. I would call it consummation. But you have seen, now, how delicate I can be ... as with you, so with a child. Your son, Mina . . .'

'Stop,' I said. Tears came painfully to my eyes. 'Don't talk to me of Quincey, I beg you. I cannot make such a decision.'

'You cannot decide, then, that he should not become immortal?'

'You are tormenting me. If you wish to prove that I can no longer renounce the Devil, have you not already done so? Quincey is also Jonathan's. He would never agree to such an abomination!'

Dracula smiled at me; a strange smile that was part tender, part malignant. 'Surely it is a decision only a mother could make. Yet you would consult his father?'

'I would not countenance even mentioning such an obscene notion.'

'But if his father was willing, more than willing, to let his son live for ever?'

'To exist for ever,' I said. 'No . . .' But still the idea of Quincey living for ever was so seductive, I could not let it go. And Dracula knew it.

'After that time I refreshed myself from your veins, while Jonathan lay asleep - how many months pa.s.sed before Quincey was born?'

I could not understand why he asked this. I paused to recall. 'Thirteen.'

'It is said that the Devil's get take thirteen months to come to term.'

He let me go, and stood beside the bed, looking down at me with a h.e.l.lish expression of- what? A sort of possessiveness, mixed with triumph. 'Ask yourself, then, who is truly the father of your son?'

His words struck such horror into my heart that I could not breathe. Even now I can barely write the words. I tremble and my tears fall on to the paper. How could he, even he, be so cruel as to suggest such horror, such blasphemy? Many thoughts ran through my head, like a rosary of torments, but I could only whisper at the last, 'Fiend, fiend...'

The Count laughed. His face, for all its harsh angles, became reflective, even tender. 'Such insults fall so easily from your lips.

Does it not strike you as ungracious, Mina, to speak so disparagingly of a man who may be your child's father? For Quincey's sake, at the least, you should accord me the respect and affection due to one who considers himself your devoted husband.'

I could not speak. I closed my eyes and lay motionless as he stroked my hair. 'Tomorrow we go into the mountains. You will need the warmest clothes, thick furs and food enough to last a few days. I will make all ready for you. You will soon be reunited with your son, my beloved, I promise.' Then he added with sudden pa.s.sion, 'What does G.o.d care for you, that he would take your son away? Come with me and he will never know death. Only the Undead can truly appreciate life in all its warmth and richness.

Only the Undead.'

When I looked up again he was gone, and there was only a thin mist swirling outside the window, and a sudden icy draught. I stoked the fire and am sitting over it even now, s.h.i.+vering and forcing myself to set down these words. I feel that I am going mad.

Dracula must be lying, tormenting me - but how can I ever be sure there is not some grain of truth in his hideous implication?

3 December?

I am unsure of the date; I am losing track of time. We left Hermannstadt yesterday, and the Szgany brought us towards the mountains until the way became impa.s.sable for the wagon. Since then we have made our way on foot.

Dracula led me through silent pinewoods and stretches of high pasture. It was growing intensely cold; frost glittered upon the branches and the forest floor crunched beneath our feet. As we emerged from the trees on to a broad saddle of gra.s.s, a bitter wind cut into us. I flinched; the Count only looked up at the sky. In the moonlight every gra.s.s blade was crusted and quivering in the wind, a field of fragile pennants.

As Dracula watched the horizon, clouds began to bank along the mountains and surge towards us. They came so fast, forming out of thin air as they came, that I knew this was unnatural. It was as if he summoned the clouds himself! Soon they clotted thick and low in the sky, obscuring the moon. Darkness folded in, yet I could still see my way, for the clouds and the landscape had a curious luminosity.

He took my arm. As we went on, light veils of snow began to dance across our path. We must have appeared a pair of spectres in the snowy wilderness.

The mountains rose steep and black before us. The sight of them filled me with dismay, for I was s.h.i.+vering and exhausted. At last I said, 'I need to rest. I cannot climb the mountains tonight!'

'Then I will find you somewhere to rest, and I will go on alone,' Dracula said simply.

Strange, how at some moments he can show such effortless courtesy. That both kindness and cruelty should come so instinctively to him, as to a child!Presently we came to a sloping spur of gra.s.s, with the forest running down steep on either side. Near the highest point of the spur was a low wooden building with a steep, overhanging roof. A cart track led us to it, and through a wattle gate in an arched gateway. It was a church. Not a fortified Saxon church but one of the picturesque Orthodox ones that are less common in this region. The spire rose like an arrow against the snow-laden sky; around us, gravestones, walnut trees and waist-high gra.s.s were quickly turning white. The reflective paleness of the snow made it increasingly easy to see, and as we came close to the church I saw that it had a galleried porch with great carved posts, long low walls of ma.s.sive planks which were curved at the apse like the stern of a s.h.i.+p. It made me think of the ark. A refuge to keep me safe from the storm?

Dracula stopped before he reached the porch but held out a hand, ushering me towards it. I saw, beneath the tiny windows, memorial crosses nailed, and pale outlines where older ones had fallen away. I wondered if he could enter a church, or only a chapel where his native earth lay?

I hesitated, with the flakes swirling into my face, the wind biting my cheeks. I did not want him to leave me. He leaned down and kissed me, full on the mouth; then he said, his -voice-stem as the snow, 'I know not how long I will be gone; in the Scholomance I can rest without my native earth, so I need not return to the Szgany. But I will come back to you as soon as I may - if not with Quincey, with news of him. By then you must have made your choice.'

With that, he stepped away from me, and almost immediately vanished into the swaying curtain of snow, which was growing heavier by the minute. Quickly I entered the church.

Near the altar I found matches and candles, and I lit three - no more, although it hardly seemed possible that anyone would pa.s.s the church and see the glow. With the benefit of light, I found there was a stove to the left of the nave, and a good supply of dry wood in a basket beside it. The lighting of this kept me occupied for some time. At last the fire took and I was able to warm myself.

I ate some bread, cheese and sausage, rationing myself, though I had a tremendous hunger from all the walking. Then I settled down in my furs - resting on the floor by the stove, with my back against a wall - and tried to forget my bodily discomforts in prayer.

But I could not pray. G.o.d has surely abandoned me, and will never take me back until I repent - but how can I, when Quincey's life is in the scales?

I must make my choice tonight. Oh, impossible, cruel choice!

Opening my eyes again, I noticed the paintings. Every wall was covered with frescoes! There were saints and martyrs looking down upon me, Moses with the stone tablets, Elijah in a chariot drawn by winged horses, Jacob's ladder, a beast with seven heads and the angel of the apocalypse with a face like the sun. They were peasant paintings, naive and with crooked perspectives, but their very awkwardness gave them an eerie power. They had been clouded by centuries of candlesmoke, and stared at me through the waxy layers as if through a dim veil of time. Tiers of icons glimmered on the decorated screen that separated the nave from the sanctuary. The mingling of candleglow with the snowlight that now filled the windows created the most unearthly effect. The saints watched me with pitying, terrible eyes. And there, arrayed above the screen - the iconostasis - was the Last Judgement; the sinners being cast down into the flames of h.e.l.l!

I covered my head, but I could not hide myself from their eyes.

If I am to be d.a.m.ned and suffer eternal torment, I tasted it that night, which seemed to last for ever. Despite the fire I ached to the bones with cold, but this was nothing to my spiritual anguish. I drifted in and out of sleep, but in both states my mind clamoured with terrible images. I heard the screams of the sinners as they fell, cast out for ever from grace. I fell with them, while the angels watched without pity- ___.

It should have been easy, should it not, to choose good above evil; to let my son die at the appointed time - and not try to cheat death or G.o.d's will for the sake of my own selfish longings! But still I could not decide.

If Quincey is Dracula's son, do I love him any the less? No, and a thousand times no. There exists no revelation under heaven that could make Quincey less sweet and dear to me.

I kept seeing the n.o.ble, harshly carved planes of Dracula's face, his proud eyes gleaming beneath the bushy profusion of his eyebrows; seeing the sadness in his eyes; feeling his lips upon mine; hearing his words, so grave and persuasive. 'What does G.o.d care for you, that he would take your son away? Come with me and he will never know death. Only the Undead can truly appreciate life, in all its warmth and richness. Only the Undead.'

___.

I woke before dawn, to that singular drear bleakness when one's spirits are at the lowest ebb and all breathes with desolation.

Embers in the stove glowed coldly red. My candles still burned, but I felt the church trembling from the force of the blizzard outside. The rising and falling moan of the wind sounded deathly. The snow was much worse; I could see it whirling across the windows, against the dim unnatural glow of snowfall. I was so cold now I could not move, could not even s.h.i.+ver.

Then the door of the church burst open. I sat up, very stiff and slow, my body not responding to the alarm of my mind. Snow whirled in on a blast of wind; and through the swirling flakes, as if carried in by them, came two human figures. I knew them - and this time was glad to see them! I called out, 'Dr Seward!' and the next I knew he was kneeling beside me. His face was blue with cold.

'Mina!' he cried, his lips stiff and frozen. 'Van Helsing, I have found her! Oh, thank G.o.d. We saw a light in the windows, and came to see what caused it, in the hope - oh, Mina, how are you? How long have you been here? Where 'He has gone after Elena to the Scholomance,' I said, and my lips, also, would barely work. Van Helsing came quickly to me and gave me a sip of plum brandy from his flask. He felt my pulse, looked into my eyes, carefully examined my neck. Meanwhile Dr Seward fed more wood into the stove.

'I am well,' I protested. 'Only chilled.'

'Then you will need all your strength, Madam Mina,' Van Helsing said gravely: The tip of his nose was bright red, like a cherry.

'We have a way to go before we find warmth . . . Why are you smiling?'

'Your nose, Professor!'

He laughed, but it was a grim sound. 'Then make mock of me all you will. Little girl, I would give much to see you smile again, for any reason!'

At that I turned my face away, and could not speak.

They asked if I had seen Elena; I answered that I had not. Van Helsing said, 'Wherever she has gone, I can only pray that she has taken Quincey somewhere safe and warm! Madam Mina, if you can walk, we should go. We must prevent Dracula reaching the Scholomance. Doubtless it is impossible now that we should overtake him, but we must try.'

I got up, summoning what energy I could - for that of a mother trying to rescue her child is never quite exhausted. But when we put our heads outside the door, the blizzard was wilder than ever. Snow filled the sky and lay thickly on the ground, m.u.f.fling every discernible feature. The world was a white nothingness.

'Dracula has conjured this weather to trap us,' I said. 'We can't follow him but neither can we escape the church!'

As I spoke, a third figure loomed grey through the clotted snow, frightening me so much dial I clung to Van Helsing's arm. It came closer, almost to the porch. Its face and hair were crusted with snow, as if it did not feel the cold; the face was white as ice, the lips red, and I knew that this was a vampire - the one I had seen at Carfax Abbey! And I recognized him, and almost cried out.

'Don't be afraid, Mrs Harker,' said this apparition. 'My only wish is to help you. For the esteem in which we held each other in life, I implore you to trust me. I would never harm you or my friends.'

Van Helsing patted my shoulder. 'Kovacs has come with us, to help us find the Scholomance. Without him, we have no chance.'

'No chance, I fear, in this blizzard!' I said.

'Mrs Harker is right,' Dr Seward added. 'Until this dies down, we would be foolish to wander out in it.'

But Kovacs raised a pale hand and beckoned to us. As he did so, I saw other shapes moving behind him which I could not discern through the swirling snow. They were not human.

He said, These powers are new to me. If only I had had time to grow adept before Beherit sent me to find Dracula! But come. I will guide you as best I can.'

Through the veils of whiteness I heard deep, animal growls. The moment was so eerie that I could not find my breath. I managed to say, 'Professor Kovacs, I fear there are bears outside.'

Kovacs inclined his head to me. 'Indeed, Mrs Harker. I called them. They will make a path for us.'

I understood, then, that he commanded these beasts as I had seen Dracula command wolves and rats. We made our way -1 leaning on Van Helsing's arm and Dr Seward bearing a lamp - down the treacherous drift that had covered the porch steps, and forged into the snowstorm.

The downfall of snow made the air less biting. Five great bears went ahead of us, moving ponderously, with snow crusting in thick ropes on their fur and the steam of their breath clouding from their muzzles. Around us stood great, sculpted drifts of snow, uncannily beautiful; but only the path the bears trod down made it possible for us to walk. Thus we progressed; the animals leading, Professor Kovacs following, with Van Helsing and I in the middle and Dr Seward bringing up the rear. Kovacs looked every inch the gentleman explorer he had been - and was still, I suppose, as Dracula, despite everything, is still the n.o.bleman.

How long the journey took, I cannot now recall. Two days, I believe, although the- sameness of it all makes the memory seem both interminable and condensed into a few hours. Van Helsing kept us alert by explaining Professor Kovacs's story as we went.

The story might have made me weep, had I had any energy to spare for tears; as it was, it only rilled me with deeper dread for Quincey's fate, and with horror of this creature called Beherit.

We took frequent but brief rests to sleep and eat, so that we did not become too cold. When I slept I would dream that I was still walking, but now seeing through Dracula's eyes the same intersecting slopes and lofty forests, the same pyramidal peaks linked by narrow ridges. But now the mountains enclosed me like extensions of my own self, as if this domain were completely mine to command. I was outside humanity but part of earth and nature. Wild animals howled at my pa.s.sing and answered my unspoken commands. Behind me, billows of snow clouded my footsteps and confounded my enemies; in front, the way was clear and glittering. Even the weather shaped itself to my will. Yet in the dream I - Dracula - had no sense of Elena's presence, no feeling that she was ahead of me, drawing me on. She was absent. It was something darker that drew me.

___We were all but dead on our feet when Kovacs at last led us over a ridge - an exhausting climb and descent - and into a small, deep valley. There were tall spruces, through which I glimpsed a snow-covered lake, and around us a circle of jagged, white peaks. I was immediately aware of an atmosphere; a brooding consciousness. An icy wind howled. We were not welcome, I was certain of that. Drifts of snow came whipping at us off the ridge, and we heard the rumbling of an avalanche beginning high above.

Dr Seward gave a warning shout. Van Helsing gripped my arm, just as I saw the bears running away and vanis.h.i.+ng between the trees. (I can only hope they escaped and were not buried.) Calling us to follow, Kovacs began to run. We ran after him, gaining the mouth of a cave just as a huge weight of snow broke and slithered down to block the entrance.

In the light of Dr Seward's lamp, we stood in astonished silence. All changed in a few seconds from wild wind and snow to enclosed darkness; and our panic, which at least contained the healthy will to survive, turned to a creeping horror, like that, I imagine, of being buried alive.

Van Helsing was almost purple with exertion, but gruffly dismissed my expressions of concern. The cave in which we stood was musty, and I sensed a soft rustling in the darkness above our heads. 'Now we are trapped,' I said, with a great effort to contain my dread. 'We shall have to dig our way out.'

'No,' said Kovacs. 'This is our destination; the way into the Scholomance.'

I did not want to go. I felt such foreboding I would rather have braved snow, bears, any danger of nature than this. But I swallowed my fear and made no protest.

We turned; we took a few steps deeper into the cave; then it seemed that my very dread surged into a blaze of light which was golden and yet soul-sickening, like the fires of h.e.l.l. Through it I glimpsed a figure, tall and bright-haired, almost beautiful except that this was a corrupt beauty, florid, red-dabbled and caked with blood. Grinning horribly, it reached for me. The light vanished, Dr Seward's lamp was extinguished. I heard Dr Van Helsing cry out. Then, in pitch blackness, I felt hands close on my shoulders, and I fell, and knew no more.

Chapter Seventeen.