Disclaimer: Van Helsing and Co. are property of Steven Sommers. Although I am plotting to abduct the big, black, beautiful werewolf…hehe…
Thanks for reviewing, guys!
Oh, if anybody knows where I can find a screen cap of the big black werewolf from the end, please let me know! I've spent hours searching the net, but I can't find one anywhere! Please?
Chapter 3
When the building first came into sight Carl tried to turn right back around. Only Van Helsing's firm grip on both horse's reins kept their pace steady. Despite the fact that there really wasn't much left of the ruins, it still managed to inspire a sense of unease that set them both on edge and kept the birds silent. It was mostly just a few piles of old stones held upright by scant bits of remaining mortar. There looked to be the bottom of a winding staircase, but most of the rest had been so worn by time that it bore not even a passing resemblance to the daunting mansion it once was. The horses pawed at the ground nervously when they tied them to a young oak, but otherwise gave no argument.
"Van Helsing…I know I don't have the most experience in these things…but something doesn't feel right about this place," Carl muttered, his eyes twitching left and right. Van Helsing cast his a sidelong smirk and proceeded toward the ruins, weapons still carefully sheathed.
"You're right, Carl. There was something here, but it's here no longer." Van Helsing paused, nostrils flaring briefly. "And apparently it hasn't been here in while."
"Oh. Well, that's all right then I suppose," Carl muttered, but hurried to keep up with the taller man.
The ground was broadly covered with broken bits of stone, some larger slabs betraying where the ancient foundation once lay. Weeds and large shrubs grew in the soil too shallow for the larger trees, though they were brown and sickly looking. Van Helsing suddenly stopped, hands purposefully brushing the tall grass as he knelt toward the ground. "Carl, take a look at this."
Carl shuffled over quickly, keeping his eye on a shadow in the far line of trees that he was positive was something nasty. "What..? Oh dear…I haven't seen one of these in a while!" Carl muttered, and all sense of fear was immediately overridden by curiosity. Laid out on the ground before Van Helsing's feet was a large chalk circle. A dark stain seemed to run around the perimeter as well, with large, thick drops speckled all around the edges. A small lock of brown hair lay in the center, accompanied by the burnt remains of some sort of plant.
"It looks like we have our answer," Van Helsing muttered, and plucked the lock of hair from the ground and lifted it to his nose.
"What is it?" Carl asked. He'd bent his face close to the ground, and was poking at the burnt plants as if to try and determine what they were. Van Helsing's eyes narrowed, and he bent closer to the ground. He opened his mouth briefly, and then closed it again, as if unsure if he should share his findings.
"The blood here, and the hair are from the same person. A young woman. It seems to have been here for at most a few weeks," he said, and pointed a finger toward the darker stain surrounding the chalk circle. Carl eyed him oddly for a moment, but the greater curiosity was apparently their discovery for the moment.
"Well, that seems to fit with the requirements for a Summoning Circle. I'd bet my books that this is where the Gargoyle was brought forth. For a Gargoyle the summoner must use their own blood and a piece of themselves, in this case the hair, to bind the creature to their command. I bet the plants were brought from the place the beast was bound to. Normally these spells are cast at the place of binding, but in theory it's possible to do it elsewhere…"
"Carl," Van Helsing interrupted.
"Yes?"
"Aside from the lesson in Dark Magick, just give me the facts, please."
"Er…right. The young woman you ..ah…detected summoned the Gargoyle here, bound it to herself, and to an unknown location. She'll only return here if she decides to break the binding, which isn't likely. Because she's bound the creature someplace besides here, the magick will require that a piece of this place, probably a stone or something, be taken to the place of the actual binding."
"Right. And this helps us how?"
"I suppose if we find her rock and give it the old one-two, the creature will be forced to return here nightly. Or, it could just make it very very angry." Carl was tucking the burnt plants into a pocket while he spoke.
"So, aside from knowing a young woman is our target, this doesn't help us at all." Van Helsing was already headed back toward the horses, dusting his fingers off on his coat.
"Well…not really, no. But if I can figure out what these plants are, there's a slight possibility that I can figure out where she's bound the creature." Carl hurriedly mounted his horse seconds after Van Helsing, nearly sending himself over the side and face-first into the ground.
"How slight?" Van Helsing asked, but sounded more bored than interested.
"Er…miniscule. If these plants are scarce, I can find out where they grow from the locals. Otherwise they're probably common for at least a fifty mile radius, which doesn't help at all."
Van Helsing growled briefly, eyes narrowed with frustration. He hated fumbling around with riddles and clues. He preferred to simply run down his prey quickly and efficiently, without all the detective work.
"Van Helsing, did you just growl at me?" Carl asked suddenly, and Van Helsing whirled.
"What?"
"I asked, did you just growl at me?" Carl asked again, and his expression was somewhere between impatience and amusement.
"Er…why would I do that?" Van Helsing replied lamely, though his cheeks were tinged with embarrassment.
"Honestly, Van Helsing! I knew that cure of Dracula's left you with a few side-effects, but growling?" Carl rolled his eyes and looked mock offended, then turned and eyed him warily. "You're not going to start howling, are you? Because I'm not above gagging you in your sleep if you do."
On the one hand, Van Helsing was vastly grateful that Carl seemed to have blamed his odd behavior on 'side effects' of Dracula's serum. But on the other hand, he couldn't honestly give an answer to Carl's question, so he did the only thing he could think of to get out of it.
He growled.
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From deep in the trees, a figure watched silently. He made no sound, and drew no breath, and was scarcely more than a shadow himself. For the first time in several hundred years, he gazed into the daylight without fear. The two figures he watched slowly mounted their horses, disappearing back down the trail on which they had come. The figure smiled to himself, and willed the formlessness of his body to follow, keeping deep to the shadows that hid him almost completely.
When at first awareness had returned to him, he had been unsure what to do. He had no purpose, no companions, not even a body to speak of. He had no needs, and the only desire was one for an end to the loneliness. Daylight, something he hadn't seen without pain in too many years to remember, had been his first indulgence. To exist someplace besides the darkness had been…wondrous; a rebirth in its own right. And now he took every opportunity to surround himself by it. Watching people at the market, following merchants down dusty roads, even watching birds twirling in a sky absent of stars and moonlight had been his hobby for weeks. But it grew dull quickly, despite the odd…pleasure it gave him. Then he had seen those he recognized…Van Helsing, and the annoying friar. They had quickly become his new hobby, and he'd followed them all the way from Valerious Mansion. Carl he had come to appreciate on some level. The man was no common friar, and he admitted to himself that he had dismissed him far too quickly. Van Helsing had truly sparked his curiosity, especially over the past few days. Something was going on with the Hunter, and he was determined to figure it out, though he certainly had his suspicions. So far he had only been following the pair at a distance, but perhaps it was time to get a bit closer.
Smiling formlessly, he drifted off through the trees, bleeding from shadow to shadow like fresh spilled ink. It was time to arrange a reunion.
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"Still alive, then?" The Inkeeper asked as they stepped through the door. He was busy polishing the front desk, which, despite the picture, remained the only clean thing in the establishment.
"And planning to stay that way, thank you," Carl said, chin thrust stubbornly upward.
"I wish you luck then." The Innkeeper turned away, obviously dismissing their presence. They had spent the remainder of the day scouting the area for footprints or any sign of where the young lady behind the Gargoyle had gone. Carl thought that Van Helsing was trying to sniff her out, literally, but the Hunter had obviously wanted to hide the fact so Carl had said nothing. Apparently he hadn't found anything, for they'd been forced to return none the wiser.
They were almost to the hallway when another voice stopped them. It was light and musical, with just a hint of an Italian accent, and Carl could have sworn it was familiar, but the face that greeted them wasn't. Sitting in a corner, a large journal opened in his lap, was a man who couldn't have been older than eighteen. He had shaggy blond hair and hazel eyes, and a smile that seemed to only pull up half of his mouth.
"The Great Van Helsing and Carl the Friar, I presume?" the boy asked, not bothering to rise. His tone was almost playful, and not the least bit malicious, so Van Helsing turned and nodded.
"We are. And who are you?" he asked, and the boy's smile widened.
"I'm Ricardo. I was hoping I could speak to the two of you," he said, and Van Helsing narrowed his eyes.
"About?" he asked impatiently.
"The Gargoyle, of course. What else could there be to talk about in a town this small? I'm a bit of scholar, and I was just passing through when I heard that you were here hunting a Gargoyle. I found I couldn't pass up the opportunity," he said, motioning to a large satchel lying bonelessly at his side, the top sprouting rolls of parchment and books he hadn't quite managed to squeeze all the way inside.
"Perhaps another time," Van Helsing said, and grabbed the hood of Carl's robes and began dragging him toward the hallway before he could protest.
Once they were safely locked inside their room, Carl sat back on his cot with a huff. "What did you do that for? I think it would be highly educational to speak to a fellow scholar…" Carl muttered, crossing his arms bitterly.
"He was lying about something," Van Helsing said, digging through one of the large, brown bags that held their weapons. After a moment, he pulled a hand back with a yelp and stuck the edge of one finger in his mouth briefly before sticking the other hand in the bag.
"About what?" Carl asked, "And what are you looking for?"
"I don't know about what. Something. And I'm looking for that large bronze cross. We need to mount it in the window in case the Gargoyle decides to stop by."
"You lost that one in Amsterdam three months ago," Carl said, and pulled a large silver and gold cross out of the second bag by the bed. Polishing it briefly with one sleeve, he lodged it between the bedframe and the windowsill. "There. I always liked the silver one better anyway," he said, and looked up to see Van Helsing staring at it pensively. Carl sighed and crossed his arms, shaking his head as if he were dealing with a petulant child.
"If you want to go after it that badly, what are you standing around here for? I've got to find out what these plants are, and I'll not have you pacing about." Carl promptly turned his back and began rummaging through the bags, tossing a few books out on the floor behind him with less respect than Van Helsing would have expected.
"Very well, if you insist," Van Helsing said, and paused only long enough to snatch the crossbow from the floor before heading toward the exit.
Ricardo the Scholar was gone when he left the Inn, but Van Helsing assumed he had retired to his own room with the setting of the sun. After all, The Innkeeper couldn't be bothered to keep any candles burning anywhere he didn't have to. Outside, the sky above the trees had turned the odd purple color that made the sky seem like something unnatural. A few stars were blinking into existence, and the dim yellow light of distant lanterns set in windows could be seen through the black expanse of trees. Van Helsing set off in a different direction than he had the previous night, ears straining for any sound out of the ordinary.
He was disappointed that he heard nothing, and could not keep his mind from drifting no matter how hard he tried to stay focused. Scents and sounds seemed suddenly stronger, flooding in so intensely for a moment that he stumbled and clutched his head, waiting for them to die down again.
"Is something wrong, Gabriel?"
Van Helsing spun around so quickly that it took his senses a moment to catch up. Even when they had, he could only stare. He blinked, struggling to clear his eyes of the vision that was surely a figment of his imagination. Maybe all that had been happening were just side-effects, and this was just another one….
The figure before him was standing calmly, dressed all in black from head to toe. The clothing was slightly old fashioned, but still unerringly elegant. The knee-high, polished leather boots shone immaculately, and Van Helsing found his eyes seeking out every last detail as if to assure himself that he wasn't going insane after all. Two tiny, gold loop earrings pierced his ears, matched by the gold thread that edged his jacket. And the smirk…barely there, but plainly visible in the creases of his dark eyes and curve of his mouth.
"Dracula…" Gabriel said, and drew in a slow breath as he quickly began to throw off the shock. The man in question didn't so much as twitch, but stood there patiently. It was then that Van Helsing noticed something different about the vampire. His skin, while it had always been pale, was now just barely translucent. It wasn't noticeable at first, but Van Helsing's sharp eyes could detect the faint glow of a distant lantern through the black of his clothing, and just see the dark shadow of a tree through the planes of his face.
Count Vladislaus Dracula was a ghost.
"Surprise, surprise," Dracula said, and the smirk widened just a bit. "Seems we both have our secrets, don't we Gabriel." Dracula shifted his gaze, and Van Helsing turned his head just enough to catch sight of the moon rising over the distant horizon. Tomorrow night it would be full.
"I'm sure I don't know what you mean," Gabriel said through clenched teeth, and narrowed his eyes at the ghost. "I thought you had returned to Hell."
"To be honest, I thought that was my fate as well. Apparently I neglected to realize that by signing a contract to ensure my immortality, I also denied myself entrance to the afterworld." Dracula sighed and absently tucked a strand of hair behind his ear. Van Helsing narrowed his eyes, and crossed his arms. The familiarity in Dracula's speech was disturbing, but it was also stirring up memories that sat just beyond Van Helsing's grasp.
"And why are you here?" Van Helsing asked, and surprised himself with the low, rumbling growl that rode under his words.
"I was bored, and even you must admit that life is always interesting around you, Gabriel." Dracula smiled, sharp teeth shining white in the growing moonlight. Then the smile faded slightly, and his expression turned serious. "I did not lie to you before, Gabriel. We were friends once, brothers in arms. We fought many battles beneath my father's banner."
"I think death has addled your head, Dracula."
"Perhaps. I find my perspectives shifting, now that my only purpose has been reduced to merely existing." Dracula's eyes suddenly narrowed, and he lowered his head slightly so that his eyes fell into shadow. "Don't think that you'll be able to be rid of me so easily this time, Gabriel."
"Oh, don't worry. My mission was to kill you, and you are dead. Excorcising ghosts is not in my job description. Now, if you don't mind, I have a Gargoyle to kill." Dracula frowned as Gabriel began to turn away, and stepped quickly back into his line of sight.
"I can see you don't believe me. I expected that. Allow me to give you a warning as a sign of good faith," he began. "It was after the twelfth stroke of midnight, Gabriel." Dracula reached out one hand, and Van Helsing suddenly felt a chill on his skin where Velkan had bitten him. And then, Dracula was gone.
Van Helsing whirled quickly, but the vampire had disappeared entirely from sight, and even he couldn't sense a ghost. "Damnit," he muttered, and pressed one hand to the lingering cold on his shoulder. Then he sucked in a quick breath, eyes flying wide. Dracula had exactly quoted himself in the strange dream he had the night before. Anger suddenly flared brightly in his chest, and with eyes burning, he whirled and smashed a fist into a tree with a throaty roar. The tree was splintered nearly all the way through, and leaning dangerously backward. Van Helsing dropped shakily to the ground, panting past the pain curling dangerously through his chest, shifting things just beneath the surface. "No," he hissed passed clenched teeth, but he couldn't deny it any longer. He could feel the wolf surging just beneath his skin, like something monsterish preparing to claw its way out of its mother's womb. Despite the short reprieve he'd been granted, he was still a werewolf. And tomorrow night, there would be no Anna or mysterious 'cure' to save him.