Now Comes the Mist

CHAPTER TWENTY

I gnoring the stares and whispers, I follow Vlad onto the terrace. When I shut the doors behind us, muting the voices and music from the ballroom, it is like being in one of my dreams with him again. But this time, he is not looking at me with amusement or affection. He is looking at me as though he would like to tear my head from my neck.

I hug myself, shivering in the chill of the ocean breeze and of his gaze. “Why are you so angry? I never thought to command you. It is a request.”

His sharp, gunshot laugh makes me flinch. “As if that is any better!”

“How can you be surprised? Every night we have been together, I have talked of how trapped and helpless I feel, and you have shown me a way out. Don’t you see? You showed your true self to me, and this could be my escape to my own true self.”

“You would so easily give up everything in your life? Your mother, your friends, Arthur?”

I shake my head in confusion. “Why would I give them up? They will have me as long as they live. They need never mourn me the way I do my father.” I go to him and clutch the lapels of his jacket. “I have never belonged to the living, neither do I truly wish to be locked away with the dead. You inhabit the world between, and I want to as well.”

Vlad plucks my hands off his jacket. He leans in, menacing and deadly, until our noses are almost touching. “What makes you think you have the right to ask this of me? A young woman like you should be modest and pure. Repulsed by the very idea of what I am, no matter how awed and curious you might have been at first. You should be running from me, not to me. Have you no dignity or virtue that you would dare choose this?” He turns his back on me and faces the sea, bracing his hands on the railing.

“ You chose. You chose to bargain away your soul for this existence.”

“It is not the same.”

“How is it different?” I demand. “I don’t understand. We both wish to evade death. You wanted more from life than forever grappling for power, and I want more from life than just becoming a vessel for children and old age. You said it yourself: I am your kindred soul.”

He whirls, looking at me with utter disdain. “I talk nonsense when I am infatuated with a woman. And it was an infatuation, Lucy. I hope you are not stupid enough to think that I could ever love you. You are but a plaything, a diversion in my long and often tedious life, enjoyed briefly and then forgotten. Did you imagine yourself as some sort of dark queen by my side?”

“Of course not, for I do not love you either,” I say as steadily as I can to hide my hurt. “It is not love I want from you, but something greater. Something no one has ever given me fully: sympathy and acceptance. You may be a master of deceit, but you cannot hide the truth.”

“Enlighten me. What is this truth?” he asks sarcastically.

I meet his eyes without flinching. “That I might be very near your equal in feeling and intellect, even without the advantage of a similar education. What you call an infatuation could become … if not love, then genuine regard and friendship, yet you will not give in to it.”

Vlad shakes his head and turns away, as though he cannot bear the sight of me.

“What disgusts you is that I am a woman,” I say, frustrated. “You and I are the same at our core, but because I am not a man, I ought to be virginal, helpless, and afraid instead of being courageous enough to make the same choice you did. You can’t stand that, despite all your years and intelligence, you were wrong about me.”

He is not looking at me, but I can feel in my very bones the violent animosity radiating from him. “It is not for a woman to want the unnatural,” he says. “This choice is not for her to pursue immodestly, only accept meekly if bestowed upon her.”

As afraid as I am, I am angrier. “How could you imagine sharing with me everything that you are and expecting me not to want it, too? You, with your talk of seeing the world, of centuries of learning, of castles and pleasures and delights. You, to whom nothing is limited. No prey can outrun you, no object of desire can deny you, and the few rules that bind you are nothing!”

“Nothing?” Vlad gives me a cruel smile. “I thought you were intelligent, Lucy. You think I gave up my soul for a kind of paradise? A blissful existence of immortality?”

“That was what you told me,” I cry. “You said you could not bear the sun or see yourself in a mirror or a painting. These, I can and will give up. You said you could subsist on animal blood, and I could, too, to avoid hurting anyone and—”

Vlad laughs mockingly. “You think not being able to preen in a mirror is the worst part of being a vampire? You simpleton. You utter child. You stand there and tell me to my face that you are my intellectual equal. You puff up with vanity over your romantic conquests and the suitors who would die for you, and yet you have no idea when a man is lying to you.”

“Lying? But you had no reflection in the mirror—”

“Lying by omission, my dear.” He faces me, and when he speaks again, it is with the pleasant, conversational tone he has always used with me. The ease with which he can switch between kindness and hatred is utterly chilling. “I told you that those who interest me most are in the greatest peril. I used that word, peril , and you did not question it. You did not ask why I equate vampirism with being in peril.” His gaze is piercing and direct. “There is a reason that it costs such a high price as one’s soul. Make no mistake: what I am is a curse.”

My temples are pounding with the pain of anger and confusion. “What do you mean? You told me of your limits, of mirrors and sunlight, of sleeping in boxes of earth and not entering homes without invitation, but you made them sound like nothing at all—”

“Haven’t you been listening?” Vlad taps my forehead with a cold, mocking finger and I jerk away from his touch. “I was infatuated with your innocence and beauty, and I wanted to awe and shock you. But there is much more to being a vampire than what I chose to tell you. Haven’t you wondered why I have so many different homes? Why I am forever moving from this land to that? Why I had to take the longest, loneliest route by sea to England? Because most humans fear me, despise me, and want me dead. I am always running away, Lucy, as powerful as I am, because wherever I go, I will be outnumbered.”

I look at him, shivering and silent.

“Most people do not like having a monster among them who might drain them of their blood,” he says sardonically. “I am forever in hiding and in disguise. Could you live like that?”

“I already do.” I close my eyes and turn away. “I thought you were a god, an immortal being who could hold the entire world in the palm of your hand. How disappointing to find that you are like any other man. You want me to be intelligent, but not more so than you. You want me to be beautiful and tempting, but unaware of it. You were happy to satisfy my curiosity, but now that you have whetted my appetite, you punish me for being hungry.” I hate myself for the tremor of tears in my voice, but perhaps this is what saves me, for his ire melts away at once.

“You were right before,” he says gently. “You are not my first choice. Mina is all that you ought to be: modest, innocent, and unstained by any thought of shadows or darkness. She is quick and curious like you, but her womanly qualities make her more ideal. The perfect woman of the age.” He moves behind me and strokes my hair, and only my rage and hurt keep me from leaning into his touch. “Women like Mina or Diana run from me because they cling to purity and goodness. I am the antithesis of everything they believe in, and to infect such a chaste and virtuous woman is profoundly satisfying. By transforming her, I would make her the opposite of herself, whereas if I do the same to you, I fear you might become more yourself than ever.”

I take in a deep, shaking, enraged breath.

“I am a predator, and I need prey. I need the thrill of the chase.” Vlad leans his head against the back of mine almost lovingly. “I should not have become angry with you. You are very young, Lucy, and I cannot expect you to understand any of this.”

I fly about in a rage. “Don’t speak to me like I am a little girl. I understand you perfectly. Why, if you find Mina so appealing, did you call to me ? I don’t believe a perfect woman is what you really want. What drew you to me as I was drawn to you?” I meet his hard gaze straight on, seeing his shock. No doubt he has never been spoken to like this in five hundred years, and certainly not by a lowly woman. “ I am what you want. Someone who is as hungry as you are. That is why we found each other, and yet you are afraid of me.”

“I? Afraid of you?”

“Yes,” I say, not taking my eyes from his. “You are a paradox, Vlad. You are so very lonely, but you are careful not to create other vampires, and if you do, you destroy them before they can grow too dear to you. You are outnumbered among humans because to be powerful, you must be without equal. But without someone to share your endless life, what is the point of existing? You will go on forever, yearning for companionship and then pushing it away when it is offered to you. For all your supposed intellect, you can’t even see this simple truth.”

More quickly than I can blink, his hand wraps around my neck. His thumb presses hard against my throat and I gasp for air. “You have insulted me quite enough, madam,” Vlad snarls. A glowing bloodred ring, burning with wrath, forms around each of the dark pupils of his eyes. When he bares his teeth, I see two long daggerlike fangs piercing through his pale gums, bringing drops of blood with them. “This is what you want, then? You want me to bite you as I bit that widow? Answer me, damn you!”

He thinks I am too afraid. He thinks his hand on my throat and the sight of his fangs will shock sense into me. Even in his violence, his expression holds mocking amusement at being able to manipulate me so easily. And so, coughing, I touch his face. He pauses, surprised by the tender gesture, and his hand on my throat loosens slightly. We gaze at each other, and a moment later, I feel the prickling pain beneath my scalp once more, prying at the edges of my mind. He is trying to read my thoughts, to unearth what I am feeling in this moment that I am not telling him.

No , I think fiercely. I picture, once more, a shield of pure silver protecting my mind from the onslaught. Silver like Mina’s bracelet, which she gave to me with love; silver like the ring belonging to Van, which she brought with her to a strange new land. I strain with the effort to protect myself, and I feel the prickling stop immediately.

“What is this?” Vlad spits. “How are you doing that?”

“You don’t need to invade my thoughts. I will tell you exactly what I am thinking.” I grit my teeth, staring into the unnatural red-ringed eyes. “I am thinking that I want you to bite me, if only to show that you do not fear me. You would have to bite several times to turn me into a vampire, so where is the harm, Vlad? What is holding you back if not cowardice?”

The impact of his fangs ripping into my skin comes with a burst of frenetic emotions. I can feel everything roiling inside of him: rage, astonishment, and overwhelming desire, all underlined by an unstoppable, insatiable hunger. He crushes me against him in an arctic embrace, his body as cold and brutal as winter. The only points of heat are where his fangs have embedded themselves into my throat. It is the most terrible, undeniable pain I have ever felt. My tender skin and the veins underneath bellow in agony at the invasion, and my lungs struggle to let out a sob, a shout, anything at all. But I only take in ragged gasps of air as my hands scrabble uselessly on his massive shoulders. In response, Vlad bites me even deeper and harder. Only when my feet kick desperately in the air do I realize he has fully lifted me off the ground.

I lose my vision. I can hear the sea and the wind and the awful gushing of my blood into his mouth, but I can see nothing except darkness. For the first time in my life, I genuinely wish to die. It is no longer a pleasant flirtation but a fervent need to no longer exist. I want to fade into oblivion so that this merciless pain that racks my body will disappear.

Someone is sobbing as though her heart will break.

A moment later, I realize that I am the one crying, lying crumpled on the ground. My vision returns in time for me to see a hot stream of blood pouring from my throat, splattering across my dress and the stones of the terrace. The world spins as I weep, tears scalding my face. The incredible pain is still there, but muted around the edges now that Vlad has stepped away to watch me sob, his bloodstained mouth set in a grim line. I curl up into a ball as a wall of heavy, freezing mist rolls in from the ocean. Vlad kneels beside me, and I press frantically against the railing, covering my wounded throat with my trembling hands.

“Please, Vlad,” I beg. “No more. It hurts so much. Please, please.”

But I am too weak to resist as he moves my hands away from my throat. When I look at him, however, his eyes have returned to their normal state and his face only holds a strange sort of weary pity. “I am only going to clean you,” he says quietly. “May I?” I do not have the strength to nod, but he sees the consent in my eyes and slowly lowers his mouth to my neck once more. I sob, expecting the excruciating impact of his fangs again, but I feel only his lips and his tongue, gently removing the blood from my shoulder and neck. When he has finished, he takes one of my hands and places it over the two raised wounds. When he holds my fingers before my eyes, I see that they are clean of any blood.

My body feels as limp as a rag wrung out too forcefully. The mist surrounds us, blocking the house from view, and I shiver in the unrelenting cold. I feel as though I may never get warm again. “Am I dying?” I whisper. “Was all of this for nothing?”

“You are not dying.”

A weak sob escapes me. “It hurt so much. I thought … I thought I would enjoy it as Mrs. Edgerton did. She looked happy. But I—” I break off as a wave of dizziness overtakes me. I feel as though I might float away with the mist if Vlad lets go of my hand. But he does not.

“I was rougher with you,” Vlad says, smoothing hair off my clammy forehead. “Much rougher. I had to teach you a lesson. I didn’t want to, but you forced my hand. You made me be the monster everyone expects me to be.” He presses his freezing fingers against my wounds, which feels so soothing that I lean against his hand, crying weakly. Gently, he pulls me into his arms and lifts me like a child, and as he stands up, the mist rises with him.

My head droops over his chest where his dead heart lies still. I am so cold and tired that I only vaguely register us moving through the thick fog. We are floating away from the bright windows of the Wilcox home, which slowly fades into the distance.

“I took more blood than I planned,” Vlad says ruefully. I feel no heartbeat in his chest, but I do hear the vibration of his voice. Alive, yet not alive. A man, yet not a man. “I’m afraid you will be very ill for some time. I wish you had listened to me and not forced me to bite you.”

I close my eyes against another wave of dizziness, and when I open them again, I see my family’s lodgings at the Crescent. Vlad carries me to the door and stops on the steps. “You brought me home?” I ask. “But Mamma and Mina and Arthur … the people at the ball—”

“I will take care of it.” He lowers me to the ground. My knees quiver as though I am walking on mist instead of solid ground. “I must leave you here. I cannot carry you inside.”

I press my hand against my neck, feeling the heat of the protruding wounds, and groan. “I am near death, and all you care about is my reputation and servants gossiping?”

“I cannot enter without invitation,” Vlad reminds me. “I told you, but you wouldn’t listen. What I am is a curse. And I am afraid,” he adds, a trifle smugly, “that now you have been infected with my venom, you will feel something of these limitations yourself.”

I blink at him, lightheaded and unsteady. “What do you mean? I cannot go into the sun?”

“Of course you can. You haven’t transformed. But you may find that it hurts your eyes or stings your skin. That is the price of what you brazenly demanded from me.” He strokes a long, icy finger down my tear-stained cheek, his face full of regret. “I think you will be extremely ill tomorrow, and the next day, and the next. You will need a doctor.”

“Oh, what do you care?” I ask tiredly, pushing his hand away and dropping onto the doorstep. “I am only a woman. A plaything and a diversion, as you said, and even after all I have shared with you, you still prefer someone else. Go and leave me here to die.”

“How dramatic you are,” Vlad says brightly. “Are you jealous?”

I lean my head against the door and close my eyes. “No, I am not jealous,” I say, exhausted. “I am only cold and tired and very, very sad. Please just go.”

But he does not leave. Instead, he sits down beside me, as though we are on the bench on the cliffs again, and he pulls my head to rest against his shoulder.

“Why are you still here?” I ask.

“Because what you said is true. I believe I do care more for you than even I know,” he says. “But what I told you before is also true: I do not love. It is simpler not to, and you must never hope for that from me, Lucy. No woman should … though many of them have.”

There are ghosts in his voice, past lovers who had fallen for him and fallen to their deaths. The perfect women of every age, succumbing before he took everything, emptied them like wine from a glass. I think of his admiration for Mina and go cold with fear at the idea that she could ever suffer what I just have. And then I remember what I should not have forgotten all along, had I been a better friend to her and not so absorbed in my own affairs: that Vlad seemed to have known of Mina before the cliffs, as indeed he had known of me.

I sense that this is my moment to ask him, that I will get more answers in his unusual state of gentleness, the closest I will ever get to an apology for what he has done. Mustering what strength I have left, I say thinly, “You told me you have seen Mina’s picture before. Tell me the truth, Vlad. Have you crossed paths with Jonathan Harker?”

“I have.”

I swallow, my throat dry and painful. “Then you are the client he was working for? The nobleman whose castle sits in the Mountains of Deep Winter?”

“I am.”

I am seized with an even more profound cold than what I already feel. Oh, Mina, my poor Mina. “But he left months ago,” I say, my voice trembling. “And you are here, and he is missing and has not written in a long time. Is he … is he dead?”

“No. Nor is he like me, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

With a monumental effort, I lift my head from his shoulder and look into his eyes. My voice is barely above a whisper. “But you did bite him as you bit me?”

His smile is a red slash in his face. Some of his teeth are still stained with my blood. “Several times, in fact, and quite enjoyed him.”

“Where is he?” I ask, my heart clenching for Mina.

“Still there,” Vlad says matter-of-factly. “He was extremely useful from the moment he set foot in my castle. He gave me such insight into his society and helped me with the language, in addition to assisting with the purchase of my home. I told him how his country fascinated me. Such a tiny land with such immense reach. Under the rule of a woman, no less! Power calls to power, and England called to me. I needed an agent who would introduce me to her ways.”

“And Jonathan served you well,” I say bitterly.

Vlad leans his shoulder against mine in a confiding way. “I told you Mina is the finest example of womanhood of your society, and she and Mr. Harker are well matched. He is a paragon among Englishmen, I think, and a beautiful young man.” He smiles, his eyes soft and faraway. “Such vivacity and intelligence, such boldness! I marvel at the strength in his character. No one can blame me for desiring him or being intrigued by his description of the perfect girl he was to marry. He showed me her photograph, kept in a pocket over his beating heart.”

My anger is rising again with every word, and I somehow find the fortitude to pull myself to a standing position. My head spins as the infernal mist swirls around me. “You are keeping Jonathan from Mina,” I say, my teeth clenched. “You are the reason her heart is breaking. She actually thought he had left her for another woman, but I will tell her the truth about you.”

Vlad looks up at me with raised eyebrows. “Mina Murray seems to me like a woman of logic and reason, and will therefore worry a great deal about your sanity.” He waves a dismissive hand. “Time will pass, and she will forget him. Humans are fickle creatures. Lovely as she is, she will marry another in no time. Mr. Harker is better off where he is.”

“You were right,” I say furiously, as my knees shake beneath me. “You know nothing of love if you think Mina could marry another. She only wants Jonathan, and to him alone will she give her whole heart. Your selfishness in keeping him like a disgusting pet will kill her.” I am forced to pause, leaning heavily against the door, as the blood rushes to my head in my anger. “Mina only dreams of a life with him, and I will not let you take that away from her.”

Vlad looks at me, so still that I wonder if I have enraged him again. I do not care.

“Bring him back,” I gasp, for my lungs feel full of cotton and not air. “Send a letter, send people … I do not care how it is done. But bring him back or I will somehow find a way to do it myself, even if I have to sail the wreck of the Demeter in this state.”

“You love Mina so much?” he asks quietly.

“More than I love myself. There is no one alive who is as kind and deserving as she is. I would do anything to bring … Jonathan … back for her …” I collapse, and Vlad is on his feet at once, holding me up as the earth spins wildly beneath me. I look up at him, dizzy and sick but still determined. “Please, Vlad, I am begging you. She loves him.”

“Then back to her he will go.”

“Do not toy with me,” I say feebly. “Not about this.”

“I am in earnest. I will release Jonathan. I have my ways.” He leans me against the wall and knocks sharply on the door. “And now I must leave you, Lucy, for I am afraid you really will die if you stay out here much longer. Have your servant carry you straight to bed.”

My body is heavy with the longing for sleep, but the rage shooting through me keeps me upright. “I thought you were my friend,” I say, my voice shaking, “but now I am not certain I want you to be anything to me anymore. Not after the cruel things you have said and done to me tonight, and not after you imprisoned Jonathan and kept him from Mina.”

He looks at me in silence as quick footsteps approach on the other side of the door.

“I don’t want to see you again,” I whisper. “In dreams or out of them.”

“You don’t mean that,” he says gently.

“Goodbye, Vlad.”

The door opens, and Harriet screams at the sight of me fainting and covered with blood. I fall into my maid’s arms as more servants come running, and I vaguely register that Vlad is gone. Only the mist remains as I am lifted over the threshold he cannot cross.

“Oh, Miss Lucy!” Harriet wails over and over as another servant locks the door.

“I’m all right,” I choke out, a dead weight in her arms. As they carry me upstairs, I turn to look out of the window beside the door one last time. Through the heavy mist, I see the glowing eyes of an enormous dog watching from the deserted street. “But I want you, please, to lock me in my bedroom tonight. And every night from here onward.”

And then I sink into nothingness.