Author's note: Sorry it's been so long! I went back and added page-divider lines to all the chapters, so now this story is actually readable, lol. There are some direct quotes from Bram Stoker's Dracula in this chapter, made obvious by the use of italics, so please don't sue me…
Chapter 22: Memory
Romania, 1946
At last, the wild Carpathian Mountains were visible out the window of the train. D watched solemnly as the rugged mountains approached, his shoulder pressed to the glass as the train clattered and rattled over the tracks, mile after mile clicking by-- bringing him closer and closer to the place he came from, the place he never thought he would see again. He was close enough now to feel that he was approaching his homeland. The land itself called out to him, to his blood, to all his senses.
"It's nothing but a hideous, godforsaken wilderness out there," Hesselius remarked from the seat across from D. "By God, I miss civilization."
"You didn't have to come along," D reminded him quietly.
"Yes I did," the man insisted. "You've been paying me to help you prepare for this for over a year. If I backed out now, word would get around and soon I'd be out of a job. Unfortunately, I'm not old enough to retire yet, so I'm going to see this business through to the bloody end. We're going to kill that damned father of yours until he's dead and gone for sure and for ever. Now… let's review." He pulled a tattered black book from the pocket of his coat and flipped it open on his lap.
"We've been through that a hundred times," D muttered emotionlessly, not taking his gaze away from the jagged terrain out the window.
"And yet I'm still not completely certain as to the color of old Lucy's hair," Hess replied cheerfully, finding his place on the page. "I guess we'll just have to ask your dad when we see him, eh?" he didn't wait for a reply, but leaned forward eagerly. "Ah, here it is. They're talking about the very place to which we are currently traveling. Listen to this: 'Do you know what the place is? Have you seen that awful den of hellish infamy, with the very moonlight alive with grisly shapes, and ever speck of dust that whirls in the wind a devouring monster in embryo? Have you felt the Vampire's lips upon your throat?'"
Hesselius looked up at D with his blond-white eyebrows raised, as if expecting a reply from the somber dhampir.
D sighed faintly. "Yes," he answered softly.
"Well?" Hess asked, his voice slightly strained. "What is this bit about the specks of dust being 'monsters' in embryo? Is that something we need to take into consideration?"
"I've already told you," D said quietly. "The castle… you can't trust it. It's been enchanted… cursed… haunted… and it's been that way ever since it was first built, over seven hundred years ago."
"That worthless Van Helsing and that infernal gang of idiots," Hesselius grumbled, ignoring D and flipping ahead a few more pages in the book. "This is my favorite part right here, where they are actually stupid enough to think they've exterminated the King of the Vampires. Listen:"
"Hesselius. I know the story," D said, but the man would not be dissuaded.
"Just listen: 'I saw the Count lying within the box upon the earth, some of which the rude falling from the cart had scattered over him. He was deathly pale, just like a waxen image, and the red eyes glared with the horrible vindictive look which I knew so well. As I looked, the eyes saw the sinking sun, and the look of hate in them turned to triumph. But, on the instant, came the sweep and flash of Jonathan's great knife. I shrieked as I saw it shear through the throat. Whilst at the same moment Mr. Morris's bowie knife plunged into the heart. It was like a miracle, but before our very eyes, and almost in the drawing of a breath, the whole body crumbled into dust and passed from our sight.' Those fools! It says right here that the body had dirt scattered over it—what they saw was not the vampire's body crumbling into dust, but all that scattered dirt falling down when the vampire chose to vanish. Any vampire hunter worth half a piss would realize that!" Hesselius snapped the book shut. "Did those worthless idiots accomplish anything useful at all in their whole ridiculous escapade?"
D didn't answer. He had never given much thought to any of the 'damned Van Helsing people' that Hesselius loved to complain about, but he was glad that they had survived their 'ridiculous escapade', even if they hadn't actually managed to kill any vampires. As far as D knew, however, the events recorded in that 'fictional' book documented the closest that anyone had ever come to killing his father… and the only reason they came as close as they did was because the Vampire King had been practically insane at the time.
D's father had driven himself nearly senile by keeping a promise to a dead woman for so many years—a promise to exist without nourishment, without appeasement... At last the old vampire decided to break that promise, and very nearly lost his mind in the process. D had stayed well out of his father's way during those turbulent few months, not understanding the significance of what was going on around him. Back then, D's primary concern in life had been finding time to sneak off into the woods to visit Tasia Belus-- he hadn't thought much about his father's return to his old evil habits. He knew his father was a vampire, he knew what vampires did to people, and he wanted nothing to do with it… he wanted only to sit by the hearth in that warm little cottage with its wood-and-plaster walls, with Tasia, his one and only friend, beside him. Those had been happy times, the only ones he had known since his mother had died, so many sad years before.
D closed his eyes, intending to allow the noise of the train to lull him to sleep for a while. And as he drifted into fragmented dreams, he wondered if his father knew that he was coming home…
It was a warm spring day in 1820. The Vampire King got down on his knees and gripped his son by the shoulders. The boy blinked solemn blue eyes at him, the frown on his pale, round face looking far too pensive for someone as small as he.
"I cannot prolong her life, D. Do you understand what that means?"
"No," the child replied innocently.
The vampire searched the boy's face. "It means," he said slowly, his rich, rolling voice nearly a whisper-- "she'll die very soon."
"Mother will?" the boy asked.
The vampire nodded. "Yes," he managed to say. The child's expression didn't change, and this upset the ancient creature. "Come," he said, standing again and steering the child down the hall. Sunlight shone through the crack at the bottom of a large wooden door at the end of the corridor.
"Are we going in Mother's room?" the boy asked plaintively, looking up at his father.
"Yes."
"I don't want to. The sun's in there."
"We won't be there long. Hush now."
"I don't like it!" D protested.
"I told you to hush," his father said warningly, wrapping his white hand around the handle to the door. Wincing and squinting against the light that flooded the corridor as the door swung open, father and son slipped into the sunlit room.
As his eyes adjusted to the brightness of midmorning, the boy looked around at the familiar surroundings of the room: the clean, warm boards of the floor, covered in places with sheepskin rugs, the large bed with its clean white sheets and light blue quilts, and his mother in the bed- an old, frail woman in a white nightgown with white hair and wrinkled, translucent skin.
"Are you awake, darling?" his father whispered.
"Why… you shouldn't be in here," a weak voice replied from the bed. "The light…"
"Don't worry about me," the vampire said, sitting on the edge of the bed and lifting the boy up beside him. "How are you feeling?"
"Tired," the voice replied honestly. The old woman blinked, and smiled, her eyes still as clear and blue as the summer sky. She gazed fondly at her two visitors, and reached out with her crooked fingers to hold the hand of her child.
"Mother, will you take me to the town again?" D asked hopefully. The old woman looked up at the vampire, confused.
"The town?" she asked tremulously, struggling to remember.
"Ten years ago," the vampire explained quickly, quietly. "The trip you took ten years ago. To him it seems like yesterday."
"Of course," the old woman said, and smiled again at the little boy. "I remember now. I'm sorry, D. I can't take you to the town today."
"How about tomorrow?" the boy asked innocently.
"We'll see," his mother replied kindly. She looked at the boy's small hand, and suddenly her eyes filled with tears. "Sometimes…" she said hesitantly. "Sometimes… I wish you would grow up. I want to see my dear boy tall and strong… before I… die."
"You mustn't leave him with me," the boy's father said, his voice breaking. "Please. I don't know what I'll do with him."
The old woman gazed fondly, wisely, at her husband. "Why, you'll watch him grow up, that's what you'll do," she said softly. "You'll care for him… you'll teach him. You'll love him."
"But without you…" the vampire whispered, searching those sky-blue eyes.
The old woman placed her hand on her son's head, and brushed the soft brown locks away from the child's white face. "That first year, you were just a normal baby," she said to the boy. "For one year, you grew so fast. And then… time began to slow for you. And one day… it will stop altogether. You'll never grow old." She looked up at her husband, knowing that he knew that she was on the threshold now. "But he will grow up, won't he?" she asked softly. "He'll grow up strong and brave and good…"
"Yes," the vampire said distractedly, nodding. "Yes, he'll grow up eventually."
The old woman smiled. Her hand suddenly went numb, and she let it fall. She blinked a few times, struggling to focus on her son's face. Those solemn dark blue eyes and thin mouth… ah, D had an angel's smile, though he hardly ever showed it. He was such a serious, thoughtful little boy. The old woman's thoughts flew ahead to the endless open brightness of her son's future, and she found that her hopes for him far outweighed her fears. "Mm," she said, and her face relaxed as her eyes fluttered closed. "I wish I could be there…"
Not understanding anything, little D laid down beside his mother, while her breathing grew fainter. The vampire looked down at his little family, his scarlet eyes quivering with pain. He always knew this day would come, he'd known it from the beginning. But it seemed too soon, much too soon. The boy was still so small.
The Vampire King was certainly no stranger to Death. Indeed, since ancient times he had played with death, used it, caused it and invited it whenever he wished. But now, the only time it mattered, he was powerless against it. This was the one death that he had no control over- he was utterly helpless, and could do nothing but watch as it claimed the one he loved. Silently he turned and lowered himself onto the bed beside his wife and child, reaching one arm over his son so that he could hold the wrinkled hand which was still much warmer than his own.
And the three of them stayed there together for the last few minutes, until the inevitable happened, and the old woman accomplished the last and ultimate task of her mortality-- and quietly, peacefully, and irrevocably went onwards, leaving behind two beings who would never be able to follow her.
Red eyes opened slowly, and a white hand gracefully lifted the lid of the coffin. It was still daylight, about an hour before sunset. The vampire rose slowly to his feet and went to the balcony. Why had he dreamed of that memory? Every detail had been perfect. It was as if he had gone back in time and re-experienced the day of her death.
"Why?" he whispered, stepping outside and staring up at the sky, which would never be as beautifully blue and clear as her eyes had been. Quickly he lowered his gaze and scanned the familiar outlines of the forest that surrounded the castle. His eyes found the dusty tan streak of the one road that led to his gate, and he followed it outward to the furthest point he could see, where the road crested a rocky, treeless ledge before disappearing down the other side of the mountain. That point in the road was probably twelve or fifteen miles away from the castle, but the vampire merely squinted at it, and brought it into such perfect focus that he would have been able to see the expression on the face of anyone who might have been standing there.
The road at the mountain pass was empty, but instinct or intuition kept the vampire's attention riveted to that place. He knew something was coming. He had been through enough wars and invasions to sense the threat of battle in the air. He curved his hands over the railing of the balcony, waiting and watching, and soon he smiled.
The Vampire King realized who was coming for him, and a wave of pride and delight swelled in his heart. Yes, it was unmistakable.
A moment later a rider appeared on the road at the mountain pass. It was exactly who Dracula expected-- astride a dark bay horse, a sword slung across his back, a broad-brimmed hat on his head to keep the harsh sun from his chalk-white face…
D reined-in the horse, which shook its head as it stopped, the gusty wind flagging its mane to one side. As soon as he rode onto the rocky ledge, D knew who was staring at him from such an incredible distance, and raised his eyes to the castle. Immediately he knew where to focus, and saw the figure standing on the balcony, dressed in dark, elegant clothing reminiscent of a forgotten era of regality, complete with a black cape… and D looked into the face that matched his own, saw the white gleam of his father's unabashed smile, and the garnet flash of his eyes.
Welcome back, whispered an all-too-familiar voice in D's head. D narrowed his eyes, surprised. It was still daytime- he hadn't thought his father was able to project his thoughts like that during the day. The old vampire nodded to him. Expressionlessly, D tipped his head forward just half an inch to return the nod- and in so doing he obscured his view of the distant castle with the brim of his hat. A second later when he looked back, his father was gone. D quickly scanned the stone walls of the castle, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary—yet. Blinking, he let the castle fall out of focus.
D looked behind himself at Hesselius, who was busy cursing quite explicitly as he urged his reluctant horse up the steep road.
"What are you stopping for?" Hesselius called out, noticing D's grim expression. "God above, please don't tell we're lost! I can't take much more of these miserable mountain trails."
"He knows we're here," D said softly.
"Wonderful!" Hess exclaimed, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a pistol. "I suppose we can expect an ambush at any second now? Well, I say, let's get on with it!" the man grinned, and with a frustrated huff his horse broke into a trot.
D nodded and then tapped his heels against his horse's sides, spurring the animal down the road towards the castle…
They would arrive at sunset.
A/N: I had to throw in the flashback to explain how/when D's mom died because I think it's an important thing to consider. Argh! It drives me crazy not knowing the real story, you know? Who was D's mom? Was she happy, or sad? Did she die naturally, or by suicide, or did D's father end up killing her, or did he turn her into a vampire and then D had to kill her? Man, I hope not… I hope she died of natural causes, which is sad enough…
Anyway, some of you are probably wondering why that obnoxious Hesselius character is still hanging around- sure, he was the plot device I used to get D back to Samantha, but he's got one more purpose to serve in this story before I get him out of the way…