Two faces on fire.
No traces,
something has swallowed the night.
You know that nothing can make it all right.
Like candy, emotion.
Too much and sugar can turn to sand.
You scream but nobody touches your hand.
Are we just shouting at the pain?
Or do we see just what we are?
We're naked in the rain!-
"Naked in the Rain"-Ronnie James Dio
Childhood
If I could describe my childhood growing up in Castle Dracula I would have to conclude that it was not great but it probably could have been much worse. By this time everyone in the village knew something about what my father had become, but due to the influence of my mother my father ceased to feed on the blood of humans. Because of this, the legend of Father being a vampire was put aside in the thoughts of people.
At night Father would roam the woods of the forest adjacent to the Castle and search for animals he could feed on. Typically after draining the blood of an animal, for example a rabbit, Father would carry its remains back to the Castle for Mother to cook the meat for herself and me.
Life in the Castle at this time was different when I was a boy then it was when I was a teenager. When I was a child there were no monsters roaming the floors the Castle, so every floor was perfectly safe. This was done because Father felt no need of urgency to protect himself and his family.
My mother was my closest companion. She was always there to play with me, and to tell me fairy tales from Germany. Although how she was able to hear of these tales herself is a mystery that I have never been able to solve. I saw very little of my father. He slept during the day, as would be his custom, but he did occasionally venture into the daylight.
When I was not spending time with my mother I spent it playing in the Castle courtyard. I enjoyed acting out the roles of some of the characters my mother would read to me about in fairy tales. I remember that when I was around five I used to pick up the remains of a tree branch that had fallen on the ground and pretended that it was a sword. I was acting out the role of the knight who's job it was to slay the dragon and rescue the princess. (Sometimes I wonder if such stories don't have some sort of a twist to the Christian saint, Saint George?) Regardless of where the story came from, in the Castle courtyard there were some images of our family's royal insignia, the Dragon. Well, the Dragon on the insignia was the Dragon that I was going to 'slay.' So I'd pick up my large 'broad sword' and would strike the Dragon with it hoping to 'slay' him and rescue the damsel in distress.
One afternoon I was busying attempting to 'slay' the dragon when my father happened to catch me striking the dragon with my 'sword.' Not only was I surprised to see my father during the daytime I was even more surprised when he started to scold me for striking the dragon. Apparently he viewed what I did to be disrespectful to our family's insignia, and told me never to do it again. Of course, since I was only five and did not know any better I would continue to play the 'knight' and 'slay' the dragon; and eventually I got caught. My father caught me again playing the role of the heroic 'knight' attempting to 'slay' the dragon, and when I noticed the glare in his cold dark eyes my small legs and tiny lips began to quiver. He ordered me to come to him, but unlike the 'heroic knight' I was supposed to be playing I acted like Lysander, Alcander, and every other small child when their parents are angry with them…I tried to run away. Note the word 'tried.' Lysander and Alcander may try to run away from me when I'm angry with them, but—as in the case of my father and me—I always catch them. My father swooped me under his arm, turned me over his knee, and swatted me a number of times. My father disciplined me, much the same as I discipline my own children, but he never went too far when it came to teaching me a lesson. Father was trying to teach me that I should respect our family's history, and when I went crying to my mother she backed my father's judgement over what he did since he was trying to teach me a lesson and I wasn't physically hurt in the process.
As I said before, it was a rare occurrence when I saw my father during the day. Typically I would embrace him whenever I saw before dark, since it was usually a special occasion; but one day I did not do this, and I listened in on a conversation he was having with my mother. The conversation consisted of Mother wanting to take me to visit her parents. Father was against the idea of Mother and I leaving the Castle, because he feared of what might happen to us. Some would probably assume that Father was afraid that if Mother and me left the Castle we would never return, but no, this was not the case.
Mother and I had left the Castle before. When I was around three my mother told my father that if I was ever to have some social abilities with others I was going to have to learn them by being around other children my own age. Father understood my mother's point, and so every other day Mother and I would go to the park in the village below the Castle so I could play with children from the village. However, Father was very cautious about what the villagers might do to us if they knew that we were his wife and son. Father knew that Mother could hide the truth about our relationship to him, but what about me? Anyone who has small children knows that they will blurt out embarrassing information about you and think nothing of it. My sons do it all the time. They do not understand how some things are best left unknown. Because of this, Mother thought of a plan to put my father at ease. If I were to ever accidentally mention that we live in a large Castle, or that our last name was Tepes, Mother would reply that she and I were the wife and son of Vlad Tepes but not the 'Impaler.' My father was not the only member of the Tepes family who held the name 'Vlad,' but the use of referring to him as the 'Impaler' distinguished him from another Vlad in the family. Obviously the idea worked, because otherwise I doubt I would be here to write this.
But in regards to the conversation that Father had with my mother centuries ago. I may have been only five, but I can still remember the essence of what was said. I remember that Father felt sympathy for Mother wanting to take me to visit her parents, but he also found the plan foolhardy. Apparently my mother had not visited her parents for over six years, and for her just to show up at their doorstep with a child would obviously result in a lot of questions. Father was afraid that even if Mother said that I was the son of Vlad 'not the Impaler' Tepes that it would only result in them wanting to visit us at the Castle, and how exactly was Mother going to do that?
I remember that Mother's answer to that question completely shocked my father. Mother told him that she was going to in fact be forthcoming and honest with her parents. In other words, she was going to tell them exactly who he was! Father thought that such an idea was suicide. He believed that to do so would result in the Orthodox Church forming a witch-hunt to kill all three of us. Mother, however, told him that, that would never happen. She said that her parents were not like that and that they could accept him for what he was. I can still remember Father not being completely sold on the entire idea, but he simply could not refuse my mother's enthusiasm so he reluctantly agreed.
The trip to my grandparents' residence took about two days. I remember that on the day I was to visit them my mother dressed me up in what was considered very formal for the time, but something that I would be against Maria dressing Lysander or Alcander in. I remember that my grandparents had a small farm, because my grandfather was attending to the cattle in the field when he noticed Mother and me approaching his residence. The exchange between my grandfather and my mother was similar to the story of the prodigal son from the New Testament with the only difference being that my mother was female. But the whole idea of 'my daughter who was once dead has come back alive' was very much the theme of my grandfather.
I can still remember that after my grandfather shouted for joy that his daughter had come home alive that he looked down at me for the first time. His gaze frightened me slightly, and I hid for protection behind my mother. "Who is that with you, Lisa?" he asked.
"This is my son, Adrian," she told him; and then she asked me to say hello to him. I did, but I was very shy about doing so; but then he smiled at me, and I started to trust him more.
Eventually all of us went inside. My grandmother acted the same as my grandfather, as would be expected, once she saw her daughter again; and she was similar in attitude towards me as well. We sat at the kitchen table, and my grandparents asked my mother to tell the story about what had happened to her over six years ago.
Mother told them about her run in with Vlad Tepes, and when she informed them that she was indeed speaking of the 'Impaler' Vlad Tepes both my grandparents made a gesture that I saw for the first time in my life. My grandparents took their hand and placed it on their forehead, their sternum, and finally across their chest—the sign of the cross. I did not understand the gesture, but I could tell that it had something to do with protection.
Mother continued, but when she spoke about my father she did not describe him as this evil monster that they had heard about—that is of course that he might be a vampire. Obviously by referring to him in the present tense my Mother let it be known to my parents of exactly what Father was, since everyone in the country knew that he was killed in a military battle some time before I was born.
Although I did not understand a lot of what was being said at the time I was starting to become very uncomfortable with my grandparents. The way that they looked at Mother and me after she told them about my father filled me with dread, but it was not until the moment that she told them that I was the son of a union between Vlad the Impaler and herself that the trouble started.
After that was declared my grandmother shouted, "What?! You've brought a demon into our house!"
I did not understand what she meant. A demon? How exactly was I a demon?
My mother did her best to try and explain the situation to her parents, but they would hear nothing of it. My grandfather at one point grabbed a cross and struck me over the head with it. I started screaming, and blood began to pour from my temple. The cross itself did not hurt me, but the force of my grandfather striking it against my young skull certainly did. It is probably a miracle that he did not kill me.
My mother screeched too, as she quickly lifted me up into her arms and charged out the front door. Through those cries I heard my grandfather exclaim that neither of us were ever wanted in his premises again, because "your mother and I want nothing to do with Satanists!" Well, I can tell you that my mother was never a Satanist, and I was too young to even have an understanding of what a Satanist was.
Mother and I were both lucky that her father decided not to run after us with a gun or anything like that, because both of us probably would have been killed. I suppose if my grandfather did anything right that day it was to allow his daughter to leave without sending a mob after her. My mother returned to the Castle in tears. My father did his best to comfort her, but at the same time he did warn her that this is exactly what would happen.