Page 58 of Now Comes the Mist

“He was here? You invited him in?” I try to sit up in my alarm, but it brings on a wave of dizziness so nauseating that I am forced to lie back down at once.

“No, he spoke to us at the party.” She smooths her cool hand over my brow. “Do you remember going out to the terrace with him? After some time, we went to look for you, but you were both gone. We were frantic until he returned and told us an animal attacked you.” She looks thoughtful. “I may have been wrong about him. There was always something in his eyes and manner of speaking that seemed mocking … but that night, he was so gentlemanly.”

I struggle to keep my face neutral. “Yes, I’m sure he was.”

“He made a lovely apology to Arthur for keeping you for two dances,” Mina says. “He said he was enjoying your conversation so much, and you only stayed with him to be polite, and it served him right that the second dance was interrupted when he saw a large dog outside.”

“A dog?”

Mina nods. “Do you recall that unfortunate ship? TheDemeter? People saw a black dog jump off, so the count assumed it was the same one and went out to investigate, as he has a way with animals. You bravely followed to see if you could help despite his protests. We were relieved to hear this, Arthur most of all. Forgive me, Lucy, but itdidrather look as though you and the count had had a lovers’ quarrel. However, I knew that could not be.”

I offer a weak smile at Vlad’s deft spinning of the truth. “What happened then?”

“On the terrace, the dog attacked you. It bit you just there.” Mina indicates the left side of my throat. “Your gown was so bloody that the countdid not want to call for help and terrify everyone, so he took you straight home in his carriage. He knocked and left at once, to protect you from gossip, and then came back to assure us that you were safe.”

“How noble of him.”

“Itwasnoble,” she says uncertainly, hearing my sarcasm. “He seemed very upset indeed that you had been hurt. I think you may have caught his fancy, darling, so I felt the need to remind him that you were engaged. He seemed amused, but grateful.”

Yes, I can believe that. How his eyes must have shone as my righteous friend protected my honor. The perfect woman of the age. My hunger fades into exhaustion as emotions overtake me. I have lied to my loved ones, begged Vlad to bite me, and lain so close to death that I can still feel the grip of its fingers. In my fervent hope to save my family pain, I only ended up inflicting it. “I am tired, Mina,” I whisper, closing my eyes. “I would like to sleep again.”

Later that night, I am roused from my troubled slumber by a noise. Harriet dozes in the chair nearby with her mending in her lap, but she is not snoring or making a sound. My room is dark and peaceful, and the door is securely locked, as I had requested. I close my eyes, ready to drift off again, when I hear a tapping at the window. I turn my head, feeling light and buoyant and dizzy, and see shadows moving against the night sky. Are they birds or branches shifting in the wind? Or are they the wings of a great black bat, cutting through the heavy mist?

My mind feels unmoored, unsteady. I am caught between waking and the land of dreams as the shadow lingers a moment, then flits away. I fall back into a sleep full of disturbing visions: of bleeding profusely on a dark terrace, of running through the mist, of searching for Vlad and feeling his presence like trailing notes of dark perfume. When I am awake, I may hate him and curse him and think of him chaining Jonathan up in a castle far away—but in my dreams, I long ceaselessly for him. I miss the kind and gentle Vlad who listened to my troubles, who held me and understood me and seemed to be the very last person on earth who would ever hurt me.

But hedidhurt me. And I told him I never wanted to see him again.

When I wake in the morning, dazed and delirious, I am sobbing as though my heart will break. Arthur hurries over and gathers me close as I babble over and over, “I am soiled. I am dirty. I do not deserve you.” I cling to him, shaking with sobs as he comforts me, his face almost grey with worry and distress. I feel Mina’s cool hand on my forehead and hearher say, “I don’t understand it. She was better yesterday,” before I sink back into oblivion.

On the fourth evening of my illness, I open my eyes to see a familiar man talking to Arthur as he slips out of a traveling coat. His smooth, unlined face crinkles in a smile when he sees that I am awake and there is something so like dear Papa in his handsome, olive-skinned countenance that I smile back and weakly reach my hand out to him.

He takes it and gives it a kind squeeze. “You remember me, then, Miss Westenra?”

“Dr. Van Helsing,” I whisper. “And it’s Lucy, please.”

“It has been some time since that dinner with our friend Jack Seward, hasn’t it? Where you and I spoke, most cheerfully, of death. But death is not welcome here,” he adds hastily, seeing Arthur’s alarm. “Not with me ready to fight it off with everything in my power. I came as soon as Jack told me of Mr. Holmwood’s telegram for help. He could not be spared from the asylum at present, so here I am.” His calm, fatherly manner puts me at ease, and even the pain in my throat subsides as he takes the chair beside my bed.

I hold on tight to his hand. “You traveled all the way from Amsterdam just for me?”

“Thank you, sir,” Arthur says fervently. “We know it was a long journey.”

“Pah! Thirteen hours on a train and a boat is nothing. I would have come a much greater distance, after the kindness Miss Lucy and her mamma showed me.” Dr. Van Helsing speaks in a light, comfortable tone, but I can see his physician’s sensibilities turning on. His keen eyes look between each of mine as his hands feel my forehead and jaw, pressing here and there. He leans in to examine the left side of my throat. “I hear you were attacked by a dog. Mr. Holmwood tells me it has been terrorizing people in town. It killed another dog this week, and also some cattle. Ripped them open from throat to belly, drained them of blood, and left them where they lay.”

“Truly? They were drained?” I ask, surprised by the revelation that Vlad is feeding on animals. Perhaps he only wishes to lie low and evade suspicion after my attack. I do not believe him to be penitent for what he has done to me … but I cannot be certain.

Arthur throws the doctor a disapproving glance. “Sir, she has been in and out of consciousness for days. Perhaps we ought not to upset her with these violent details.”

Dr. Van Helsing hums a noncommittal response. His fingers apply light, steady pressure around my wounds. “Does this hurt at all, Lucy? When I press … so?”

“A little,” I say, wincing.

“Two large, long, and very sharp fangs,” he says in a low voice, as though to himself. “The skin is warm around the injury and quite red. I see stark-white circles around these deep holes of red. I’m afraid you may have an infection, my poor young friend.”

I almost laugh at his use of the word. If only he knew. But I can only draw in a few shallow, ragged breaths, which attracts his attention at once.

“Do you have trouble breathing?”

“My lungs feel like …” Unable to find the words, I place a hand over my chest and press down to mimic a heavy weight. “I feel it most when I am awake.”

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