Dracula The Undead Part 22

MINA HARKER'S JOURNAL (Continued)

When I came back to consciousness, I found myself lying on a couch in a dimly lit room. My head ached; my first thought was of Quincey. I tried to sit up, and then I saw two shadowy figures looking down at me, and my heart throbbed painfully in fear.

The room was plain and sparely furnished, with mosaic walls that put me in mind of a Roman villa. I had a profound sense of being underground, buried. The window had no gla.s.s but a sort of honeycomb grille, through which a bluish glow silhouetted the two tall figures who gazed down upon me.

One was Professor Kovacs. He looked white and grizzled with ice, like the corpse of a man who had expired in the snowstorm yet still walked. A smell of damp rose from his clothes, and from my own, for the air here was warm.

The other man, the stranger: it was he who struck the deepest dread into my soul. He might have stepped from a portrait of an Elizabethan alchemist, dressed in a long blood-red robe that hung heavy with embroidery and dull jewels. His hair was golden, his face pure and luminous - reminding me, painfully, of Quincey - yet no one could have perceived him as angelic! His beauty contained all the corruption, laughing cruelty and foul appet.i.tes of the d.a.m.ned. I felt coldness, the certainty of death, the unbearable knowledge that I might die without ever knowing what became of Quincey! My soul failed, and I cursed the folly that had led me to discard all holy defences against his kind. His kind? Or mine, also?

I rose to a sitting position, much as it pained me, and he spoke, bowing with apparent courtesy. 'Madam Mina, I bid you welcome to the Scholomance. Do not be afraid; you are safe. I am Beherit. Your journey has been long and arduous, and you deserve all the hospitality I may provide. You will wish to rest and eat ..."

Now I stood, despite my dizziness. 'Where are my companions?'

'Safe, as are you, Madam Mina. You may see them, in time.'

He seemed to know everything. The next question I could hardly bear to ask, but I must. 'Is my son here? A fair boy with a dark-haired Hungarian woman?'

Beherit paused, a smile playing on his red lips. 'He may be here. You may be allowed to see him, if your conduct pleases me.'

At this I almost fainted. Kovacs caught me, helped me to sit down and held a gla.s.s of water to my lips. So I am to be this demon's puppet, as I was the Count's!

'And Dracula?' I asked, my voice trembling.

'Ah, yes, Dracula is here.' As Beherit spoke, Kovacs moved back to his side and both watched me with the same luminous, unearthly stare. 'Andre has served me well.'

Now I was confused, and angry despite my fear. 'But I understood Professor Kovacs was meant to warn Dracula against coming here! He has failed you, surely.'

Beherit answered, 'But what surer way to draw Dracula here than to whet his curiosity, to rouse his war-like and defiant spirit by forbidding him to come? So far from failing me, my dear friend Andre has fulfilled my plan beautifully!'Beherit's next action I could hardly believe. He bent to Kovacs and kissed him full on the lips, just as a man would kiss a woman - and Kovacs allowed the kiss, nay, returned it! Now I know for certain that I am in the Devil's realm, where all of nature is turned upside down!

'Will you wish also to see Dracula?' Beherit asked, still caressing Kovacs.

I was unsure how the question might be meant to trap me. 'I -1 don't know.'

'Well, all shall be known in time,' he said enigmatically. With that, he and Kovacs bowed to me and left. I ran to the door after them, but found it locked; worse, there was no visible handle or keyhole. My head throbbed and spun from the exertion. Through the window I could see a courtyard, deserted and ghostly; no sign of my companions. When I called, there was no answer. Above the buildings, there was an indistinct darkness; no snow, but an echoey vault like the inside of a great cave. A hollow mountain. The Scholomance.

There is an inner door - an archway concealed by a screen - 1-which leads only to a little room, all marble, with a bath and privy. I say 'only' but this is remarkable; running water, hot and cold! Is such sophistication, such extraordinary architecture, achieved by necromancy? My practical mind will not accept it. I would rather recall the Roman influence upon this land. Yet the mosaic frieze along the white walls -showing, as far as I can tell, scholarly scenes of teachers and students - seems a parody of Roman art; the colours are so darkly succulent as to be repulsive and even the figures seem full of malign insinuation.

Understanding that I am a prisoner, I refreshed myself, then mastered my situation as I always do; by bringing my journal up to date.

Later Kovacs has paid me a visit, alone.

I slept for a while and was woken, again, by a presence in the room. I heard a voice say, 'Madam Marker, do not be startled. I have brought you some food.'

For a moment I thought it was Van Helsing! But with a weary mixture of dread and disappointment, I recognized Kovacs, who was setting a tray down on a small marble table. I asked, 'Professor, is Quincey here? Have you seen him? For the sake of our friends.h.i.+p in life, please help me!'

'I cannot help you.'

'Where is Count Dracula? Why doesn't he come to me?'

'Please, Madam Harker. I don't know.' Kovacs came and sat beside me on the couch. He looked at me and then I saw all the horror of his fate in his eyes, in his hangdog white face. Such despair! He said, 'I came back to Beherit in terror, _,. believing I had failed him, but where I expected punishment I found joyful grat.i.tude. Now I have all I desire. Beherit and the library. Yet how hollow it seems to go on without human love from now until Judgement Day!'

His voice was cracked and dry, as if it issued from a corpse! I wanted to show him compa.s.sion but I recoiled, unable to help myself. Then his hands shot out and seized my shoulders, like winter twigs, and I felt his breath fall cold upon my neck, and I heard the churning of his tongue over his great sharp teeth.

'In G.o.d's name!' I whispered. 'Don't!'

He flung himself away from me with a groan. I fell back on to my elbows, panting for breath. I saw Kovacs by the door, his gnarled hands dangling by his sides and his countenance suffused with shame. 'I should be destroyed. But the library ... for that I will survive. Nothing matters but the library!'

'Not even my son?' I cried, but the door opened and shut quickly, and I was alone. I dried my tears as swiftly as I might, for my becoming prostrate with grief will aid no one.

Then I ate the meal, which consisted of paprika chicken, potatoes and hot spiced wine. How this was produced I don't know, unless the Szgany serve Beherit as they serve Dracula. I was too hungry to decline the meal, and I tried not to think of the consequences, in fairy tales, of eating 'goblin food'.

Now I feel restored in body, but in mind -! These monsters are all around me. How, after seeing the evil in Beherit's eyes, the despair in Kovacs's, can I even contemplate Quincey becoming one of them?

Or myself. When it so nearly happened to me the first time, Jonathan said he would rather come with me into that unknown country than let me go into it alone - and no more could I let Quincey enter Undeath without me! I have such fond thoughts of Jonathan now. He seems as wholesome and good as milk against these b.l.o.o.d.y, brimstone spirits that have stained me!

Yet Jonathan would disown me now, and quite within his rights. My son is not his son. But if he could forgive me, and I him, and if we could accept each other, our faults and sins and all...

Later - 5 December?

Now all is dark, and the end surely not far off. I have time, I hope, to finish this account, if any ever discover it. I have only a few sheets of paper left and I am almost too exhausted to write, but let me record what has happened in order. The lamp will last a little while yet, I pray.As I was writing my last entry, Beherit came to my room and to my astonishment held open the door, beckoning me to go outside with him. 'Come,' he said, with a pa.s.sable show of friendliness. 'Walk with me. I would talk to you.'

I did not trust him, but what was the use of refusing? So I went, tucking the sheaf of paper that contains my journal inside my dress but leaving my heavy furs behind. Outside - strangely I remember little of our surroundings, Beherit's voice had such a lulling effect upon me. I recall a dull white courtyard, tumbling ferns, and then dark caverns with an underwater glow glimmering on the walls, s.h.i.+ning now and then on a startling mosaic of dragon or serpent. 'You must not fear me,' Beherit said. 'My quarrel is not with you, and my need to restrict your movements only for your own safety. The Scholomance is greater in size than a castle, with many dangers.'

'Then I am free to go?'

'Yes, but how could you go, sans friends and child, into that blizzard?'

'Of course, I can go nowhere! But I must know where my companions are.' He ignored my question. I grew outraged. 'Are you a courteous man, Beherit?'

'Naturally.'

'Then do me the courtesy of telling me the truth! I have no power over you, I cannot use this knowledge to harm you. If you ever had one ounce of compa.s.sion within you, you would understand my natural feelings as a mother and friend.'

'But try to understand me,' Beherit said. Here I recall we were walking upwards through a sinuous tunnel whose walls were decorated with fantastic and obscene images; even their visceral hues were shocking. The air became steamy and oddly lukewarm.

"Someone cheated me. Someone failed to pay the Devil his due, for which omission I have been held hostage for four hundred years and more, and may be held for ever if the debt is not paid. Dracula must be made to "* pay.'

I understood, yet in another way felt I did not understand. 'You mean he must give himself to the Devil, then you will be free to roam the world?'

'Yes, my dear Madam Harker, as in the Bible; a tooth for a tooth and so on.'

And I could feel the Devil's presence very close; a dragging down of the spirit, a heartlessness, a hollow glee without joy, which sickened me to the very stomach. To think of Beherit at liberty in the world! 'But you insist the Count is here!' I said. 'Isn't that enough to buy your liberty?'

'Not enough,' Beherit said quietly. 'What is he to you?'

I gasped at the impudence of the question. 'That is none of your concern. Sir, you are most impolite.'

'And you are easily offended, madam, for a woman who demands frankness. Yet you didn't answer as I expected, "He is a monster, I wish him dead." You love him, then.'

'That is an extraordinary a.s.sumption,' I said. I felt blood rus.h.i.+ng to my cheeks. 'There is no love here, nothing but greed for knowledge and power. Dracula was unfortunate to fall among such as you.'

'Unfortunate? I beg you, don't make him a victim of this. Don't you know how powerful, how ruthless he is?'

'But I have seen a n.o.bler side to his nature, of which you cannot conceive. There is no such side to you!' I don't know how I dared speak so provokingly to a vampire who had corrupted Professor Kovacs and murdered his friend Miklos. I forgot myself.

Beherit said, 'But I had brothers to surpa.s.s, a father to prove wrong...', and I caught just a glimpse of the human he had once been. All humanity worn away by a surfeit of arcane knowledge and centuries of bitter imprisonment. 'You feel some tenderness, at least, for Dracula.'

'Very well, yes, I do. Christian pity.'

At this he gave a smile of such sneering contempt that I blushed. 'The object of your pity arrived less than a day before your party, Madam Mina. I regret to say that we fought and that Dracula fled and locked himself in a section of the library, denying me access. Unless I can persuade him to come out. . .'

His tone was quite soft, not dangerous, or so I thought. But suddenly Beherit stopped and pulled me to face him. Then I saw the fierce rage swimming in his eyes, almost a madness, and I was terrified - not entirely for myself. I saw his sharp ivory wolf-teeth.

'Please, unhand me! There is nothing I can do!'

'You can persuade him to come out.'

'So that you can destroy him?'

Beherit released me. 'I cannot and will not destroy him,' he sighed. 'Believe me. I cannot physically harm him. He is as strong as me, if not stronger. I wish only to talk to him.'

Oh, I so wanted to see Dracula, but I was sure I was being tricked! We walked in silence, and the eerie corridors began to oppress me unbearably. I was aware that if he abandoned me I would be utterly lost! I saw an even stranger glow ahead, a reddish light that cast an unutterable spell of dread over me, and I felt an inrush of foul air; not icy, but unpleasantly warm and sulphur- scented.

The pa.s.sage gave into a series of antechambers all surfaced in mosaics as richly red as poppies, and then into a great chamber worked with such an obscenity of colour and design that I could not endure it. The b.e.s.t.i.a.l scenes, the intensity of the oily purples and dripping, subterranean greens revolted me, and yet I felt that if I looked on them too long I would be quite mesmerized - corrupted! Kovacs described this place. I can add nothing, for I have seen images no Christian woman should see.Beherit took me towards the grotesque, obsidian dragon statue, and between its great claws to the door Kovacs so dreaded. I felt no great fear, only mixed fascination and anxiety. The door was translucent white with darkness behind it. Beherit opened it and led me through.

We came out upon a long ledge of rock that ran high above a gloomy chasm. Disorientated, I clung to his arm in shock. Beyond the ledge on which we stood soared a cavern so vast I could see neither the far side nor the roof. The air was damp, and somewhat rank; draughts moved sluggishly through the darkness. By instinct I wanted to cling back against the wall, but Beherit drew me forwards to the very edge.

I gasped. The slippery ledge on which we stood was the lip of a cliff that fell a hundred feet sheer towards an underground lake!

One thing gave me the courage to remain there; that there was a great protective gate or fence running along the lip, like the black, s.p.a.ced railings of a graveyard. To left and right it ran, and upwards, vanis.h.i.+ng into darkness. Resting a hand on one of these railings, I looked into the void.

I saw the same faint light that s.h.i.+nes everywhere reflected off the lake far below, and a different light coming from beneath the lake, as if from an underwater fissure that looked fathomless. Deep in the abyss there was a globe of dull bronze light, like ... oh, dear G.o.d, like a great baleful eye under the water!

'What is it?' I said.

As my words died, I saw a roiling under the surface, as if the glowing sphere were rippling and rising. A great bubble surged upwards. I watched in alarm, as if some h.e.l.lish monster were about to unleash itself upon the world. The bubble breached the surface in a plume of steam and spray; nothing more, but the stench of brimstone that drifted up made me cough. Little flames danced on the water for a moment, then all turned to coldest, darkest blue. But the eye was still there in the fissure. All of this filled me, not with clear terror, but with darkest unease.

'The Cauldron of the Dragon,' Beherit said with a soft laugh in his voice. 'The lake in the valley pa.s.ses under the roots of the mountain and surfaces again here; a dual lake, of darkness and light. The Cauldron in which all things are made and destroyed. We name it also the Gate. And then again, Yadu Drakuluj.'

'Why did you wish me to see it?'

'I am showing you my domain, like a good host. But we were speaking of Dracula..." I said nothing. Beherit took my hand and kissed it, an intimacy I did not want or invite; looking into my eyes he said, in a soft malicious tone like the very Devil, 'Your child, Madam Mina. If you wish to see him again you will answer me. Does Dracula love you?'

'I won't answer!' I cried, pulling free. 'Your question is obscene. You are a liar. This is a place of lies, and a cap over the very mouth of h.e.l.l! Sir, if my Quincey is here, I must insist that you take me to him at once!'

I cursed my outburst, for I hated to show my weakness to this creature. I felt suddenly desperate to flee from him, from this madness; I took a few steps away, but Beherit did not move or speak. I stopped where I was, leaning on a railing. I had an overwhelming sense that I stood on the threshold of a vast graveyard, where ghosts and vampires moaned, and the black-clad figure of the Grim Reaper walked slowly towards me ...

There came voices, at first afar, then close at hand; a lamp shone in my eyes so brightly that for a moment I could not see. Then Van Helsing's face appeared through the glare! 'Madam Mina! Kovacs brought us to you - thank G.o.d!'

I saw Dr Seward just behind him. Both men were panting for breath, as if their search for me had been long and arduous.

Seward was brandis.h.i.+ng a cross at Beherit, who withdrew slowly and with an expression of contempt, until I could not see him in the shadows. I saw Kovacs in the temple doorway, more than ever as pale as a walking corpse.

They clutched my hands, Seward and Van Helsing, but I could not respond to their expressions of concern. 'I am well,' I said.

'No, I have not seen Quincey or Elena - or Dracula.'

'Nor have we,' said Seward.

We talked rapidly, I relating my experience, then Seward giving his own account: 'We blundered about in the dark for a long time - I could not relight my lamp - until we found ourselves in the ten-sided chamber of which Kovacs wrote. It was only then that I got the lamp lit, by which time you and Kovacs had long vanished. We were trapped there for many hours. The experience came close to unmanning me, I must confess. The body of poor Miklos was still there. The severed head .. . I'm a doctor, I have cut up my fair share of cadavers - but still this made me almost sick to see and smell it! Van Helsing saved us; after much exertion he found a secret mechanism that caused a door, a quite invisible door, to open. As we explored, Kovacs found us, and we made him bring us to you. Kovacs has betrayed us; he was only ever acting for Beherit! I don't know what loyalty we expected of a vampire.'

I hardly knew what to say to them. These men who are so dear to me seemed to be strangers! 'You must be exhausted,' I said.

'I have at least had rest and food.'

Van Helsing waved his hand impatiently, as if bodily needs could not matter less. His face was wrought with strain, yet his eyes still gleamed with the look of wonder I knew so well. 'But what a place is this! The Devil's or not - a structure of the most extraordinary engineering. Weighted doors, magnets, subtle mechanisms; heat from some underground fire, technology the Romans possessed but which we have lost; science in advance of our own! What tragedy that we come here in such circ.u.mstances and not as discoverers!'Beherit said contemptuously from the shadows, 'To seek knowledge of the Devil, whom you profess to despise?'

Kovacs added, 'You accuse me of betrayal, yet it is in my nature to betray the living. But look at the library, my friends, before you condemn me. Millions of books believed lost, burned, destroyed. A complete perfect copy of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Treasures you can't guess at.' I saw a glint of temptation in Van Helsing's eye. 'Why is your scholars.h.i.+p G.o.dly and ours evil?'

'I am tempted to ask the same question,' said Beherit, 'but I will not.' He came into the lamplight; Seward lifted the cross again.

Revulsion flickered on Benefit's face but he said, 'Please, put down your holy weapon. I am not your enemy. We all wish Dracula destroyed, do we not? Therefore let us call a truce and help each other."

I saw my two companions exchanging cautious looks. But I was horrified. I said, 'No! Professor, don't listen to him! You cannot take his side against Dracula. Can't you see dial Beherit is even worse?'

'But Madam Mina, our priority, our only hope of saving Quincey, is to destroy the Count, that monster!'

Van Helsing looked keenly at me; I could see he was already lost! Corrupted, like Kovacs! Some strand within me, stretched beyond tolerance, now broke, and I turned away and went running along the rock, holding up my skirts around my ankles, the cliff edge and the tall railings to my right, the cave wall on my left.

This wall curved in front of me, but there was a fissure within it, a short tunnel into which I ran, thinking to hide but finding only a dead end. I know not what I meant to achieve with this flight. I acted in desperation, that is all I know.

I heard the others coming after me. Then a light flooded from the blank end of the tunnel and a voice said, 'Mina!'

A hand seized mine, pulling me through a doorway into a small well-lit room. A door slid shut behind me; glancing around, I saw there was only a bookshelf where I had entered. And before me stood Dracula!

His hair had gone almost white again, but with stark black streaks; the effect against his austere black clothes was startling and handsome. His face, ageless, with its bushy brows and strong nose and the deep-coloured lips lifting over the great white teeth ...

he looked serious, tender, yet monstrous, like some infinitely wise yet utterly depraved necromancer ... and yet I forgave him this.

He held my hands; he embraced me. I think I wept.

'Can Beherit come in here?' I asked.