Page 48 of Now Comes the Mist

Vlad regards me for a moment. “You are quite right. Allow me to rectify that.”

He gets up and moves to Mrs. Edgerton’s side. As gently as a lover, he moves her curtain of hair behind her, exposing her neck. And I realize that what I thought was a ribbon is actually a stream of dark liquid, trailing from a wound and soiling the pristine white lace of her nightgown. It glistens bright red as she continues playing her music in a joyous trance, unbothered.

My hands fly up to my own throat as a terrible shiver takes hold of me. I feel deathly cold as I take in the two gaping holes on Mrs. Edgerton’s slender neck. Blood weeps onto her gown and yet her face registers neither pain nor horror, only a chilling and perfect bliss so at odds with her condition. But there is something else beneath my fear—something I recognize, shocked, as envy. I amjealousof how happy and content she looks, such as I have never been in all my life.

Vlad is watching me with silent intensity.

“What is happening to her?” I croak.

“She is dying,” he says, kneeling behind her. He wraps his arms around her and rests his chin on her shoulder. She leans her head back adoringly on him with no interruption in the music, no pause of her fingers on the strings. “Have you ever seen the life leave a person, Lucy?”

“Yes,” I say, thinking of Papa and of my grandmother, motionless in her bed.

“But have you ever seen it leave like this?” He kisses Mrs. Edgerton’s naked shoulder, and I see that his eyes have changed. Instead of their usual deep blue-green, they have become entirely black with a ring of poisonous red encircling each pupil. He offers me a wide smile, and the candlelight glints on his perfect white teeth, two of which have elongated like daggers of bone. The space between them is exactly the same distance as that which separates the holes on the woman’s neck, and my breath snags in my chest as I realize … Irealize…

Vlad lowers his mouth in one smooth, merciless maneuver, puncturing her with his long, sharp teeth. I hear his lips moving like the softestof kisses, and she moans as her body seizes—with pain or pleasure? Her music never ceases as she thrashes in his embrace with unadulterated elation. I tremble at the sight, but this time the envy, thewant, is stronger than the horror. I have never seen such unbridled passion outside of my dreams. Vlad’s hand slides to Mrs. Edgerton’s breast as he deepens his kiss, adjusting the angle of his lips, and I let out a ragged breath.

After what seems like an eternity, her hands fall from the harp. The air hangs heavy with her unfinished music as she sinks against Vlad, bone white and drained of life. He detaches his mouth and faces me, teeth gleaming scarlet in the light. Slowly, deliberately, he licks them clean, then wipes his mouth with her nightdress and pushes her away as he stands, his eyes returning to their normal color. Mrs. Edgerton slumps to the floor at the base of her harp, head tilted back, her wounds no longer seeping. And I remember what Harriet had said about theDemeter’s luckless crew, of which only the captain and a single sailor had remained, dead and empty of blood: “Such a large vessel must have left port with a sizable crew,” she had told us. “What became of all the others, no one can guess.”

“It was you,” I breathe. “You came in on theDemeter, as you said you would. You sailed from Varna, and youdrankthe crew members. Did you … dispose of all the other men?” In my mind’s eye, I see pale drained bodies slipping into the sea one by one.

“Yes. Unfortunately there was no time to hide the two left on board. The storm pushed us into harbor too quickly and people were running to help, and I had to get myself away as soon as possible.”

For a moment, there is no sound but my labored breathing. “How did you disembark? People only saw a dog—”

“In town this morning,” he says calmly, straightening the collar of his shirt, “did you not notice how interested that tiny creature was in me? What was its name … Crumpet?”

“Biscuit,” I say faintly.

Vlad shrugs his powerful shoulders. “Animals always know. They have stronger senses than humans, and our friend Biscuit recognized me. He can see better, smell better, and move faster than you, and he might even outrun me … or at least try. But you, Lucy, would not be able to. You could not hide from me anywhere in the world if I wished to find you.”

It is clear from the curious and intent way in which he studies me that I am being tested. He is weighing my words and my reaction. He knows I am unlike others of my society; he knows that death attracts and compels me, but how will I respond when it stares me in the face withscarlet-stained teeth? I feel, then, the urge to show him that I am more equal to him than any other woman who blushed for him today.

“You say that Biscuit recognized what you … what you are today.” My eyes flicker to Diana Edgerton’s crumpled body. “And here I thought you were just good with dogs.”

Genuine surprise flickers across Vlad’s face. He laughs, the sound warm and inviting, and the candles seem to burn more brightly around us. He looks at me, his strong and handsome face alight, and I know that I have passed his test. “What a marvel you are, my little Lucy, my kindred soul,” he says affectionately. “Are you not afraid of me in the least?”

“Of course I am. I would be a fool otherwise.”

“Quite.”

I cannot stop looking at the corpse. “But I am as curious as I am afraid. I ought to be more disturbed by the manner in which you took her life. But it makes me want toknow,” I say, and with the admission comes the smallest bit of shame. Any other person would be running and screaming, disturbed by the scene, and here I am wishing to learn. It would be easier to shrug away my morbid desire in a dream … but now I know that this is reality.

Vlad seems to take it as a matter of course, however. He is as focused on me now as he was distant this morning. “Ask your questions, then,” he says indulgently, sitting back down on the sofa and gesturing for me to take Mrs. Edgerton’s abandoned stool. I obey, angling my feet to avoid the woman’s still-warm body. “I will answer whatever you want to know.”

“Who are you?” I ask at once. “What are you? And why do you drink blood?”

He laughs again. “I am who I say I am. The names and titles I gave you and Miss Murray this afternoon do belong to me, but onlyyouknow my private, given name. That is how special you are to me.” His eyes are soft on mine, and in that moment—try as I might to fight it—I feel myself forgive him. “I told you that in life, I was a scholar, a statesman, a philosopher, a warrior. Since then, I have inhabited many existences in many ages.”

“You are no longer alive?”

“Not in the way you are.” Vlad places a hand on his broad chest. “You see me before you, yet my heart does not beat. I breathe, yet my lungs do not need air. I am a being of fearsome physical and intellectual faculties … and I ought to be. I gave up my very soul for it long ago.”

I grip the edge of the stool. “Then death cannot touch you?”

“Not in the way that it does humans, but make no mistake, Icandie.” His smile is a thing of ferocious beauty. “I was born into a powerful family, but with power comes the fight to keep it. My father’s lands were torn between dueling empires and allegiances. Like you, I saw much loss in my youth. And when I in my turn became the lord of my people and inherited my father’s enemies, I heard the footsteps of death behind me wherever I went.” He pauses. “And that would simply not do.”

I feel as though I have forgotten how to breathe. “And so you cheated death?”

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