(A/N: Here is chapter three hope you like it! A friend told me to update so I did! Enjoy!)
CHAPTER THREE
Bethany and Mori entered the manor side by side, soaking wet. Beth took her hat off and shook out her hair, splattering Mori with water in the process.
"Hey!"
"Sorry." Beth said and placed her hat on her head again.
"Well, I don't see how I can get much wetter anyway." Mori said.
"I could lock you outside for another twenty minuets and see what that does." Beth said playfully.
"I'd kill you when I got back in." Mori said glaring at her.
"Is killing your solution to everything?" Beth asked being sarcastic.
"Yes." Mori said smirking.
Beth gave a small laugh and then sighed, still smiling.
"Good to have you back Mori."
"Good to be back, my dear Bethany."
"I don't know about you, but after that I need a steaming, hot bath. A long one at that."
"I'm going to dry off and change." Mori said.
"Oh, and shout at Van Helsing for me if you see him before I do." Beth said.
"Okay, but first I want to scare Carl." Mori said as Beth turned down the hall to her room.
Beth smiled as she sighed and shook her head. This was so like her.
"Good night, Mori."
"Good evening, Beth."
Beth took a boiling hot bath. It felt so good to feel warm after those hours of being rained on. If she had stayed out there much longer, her bones would've been frozen solid. After her bath, Beth cleaned and bandaged the cut on her thigh. The girl put on a new pair of black pants and a black shirt with long bell-shaped sleeves. She put on her boots and strapped on her sword. She didn't put on her hat or her coat so they could dry. Both were still dripping water. The girl quickly brushed her hair and headed off to the tower library.
Beth opened the door to the library and heard Van Helsing shouting.
"She still shouldn't have gone out here!"
"She did it to save me!" Mori shouted back.
"She could have gotten killed!" Van Helsing retorted.
"But I didn't." Beth said calmly. Jen, Mori, Van Helsing and Carl turned to the girl. "And neither did Jen. Now please relax."
Beth then glanced over at Mori. She had her hair in a French braid and had on black pants, a black long-sleeved shirt, black boots and a long black cloak. Her black leather gloves were on her hands, as usual.
"Van Helsing, she's right. It's all in the past." Carl said. He nervously glanced over at Mori. Beth knew she would scare him in the hall way. By the way the friar was acting, Mori did just that.
"Alright, but don't do it again." Van Helsing said.
"You hear that Mori? Don't fall over a cliff ever again. Got it?" Beth said.
"I got it." Mori said glaring at Van Helsing.
"So what are we looking for?" Jen asked.
"Clues on how to kill Dracula…again. Only now we have to make it so the Devil can't bring him back." Carl said.
"Great." Beth mumbled.
"Let's get started." Van Helsing said.
Each person pulled out a book and began to read. Beth didn't find anything at all. The night slowly slipped away to give way to a cloudy dawn outside the windows of the mansion. No one noticed, except for the fact that they didn't have to relight most of the candles anymore.
Beth yawned and stretched after looking up from her books. Jen had fallen asleep with her head on a desk. Van Helsing was asleep in a chair, his hat lowered over his eyes. Carl was asleep on the couch. The book he had been reading fell on his face after he drifted off and it really was rather funny. Beth watched as Mori got up from one of the chairs and placed a book on the shelf. She got another one and came back. She sat down and propped her feet up on the coffee table right before she began to read the book.
"What number is that?" Beth asked.
"Seven. You?"
"Six. Are you nocturnal or something?" Beth asked her, eyelids half open.
"Something like that." Mori replied.
"I'm going to go to bed before I fall over from exhaustion." Beth said standing up and stretching.
"Night Mori." Beth told her as she made her way through the door way.
"Or rather, good morning." Beth heard Mori mumbled before she walked out the door.
Beth went to her room and flopped down on the bed. She immediately fell asleep. Her dreams were full of nightmares, as they usually were. When a person was in the monster hunting business, there are some images that you never want to see again, but end up doing so in your nightmares.
Beth woke up at sundown. She sat up and looked out the window. The sun was only halfway set. No monsters…yet. The girl brushed her hair and put on her coat, which was now dry after hanging up the entire day. Beth made sure her weapons were in her coat. Both her pistols, her revolver, her grappling gun and her tojo blades were in there along with wooden and silver stakes. Beth put her switch blade knife in her boot and walked out of the room.
Mori was dozing off in the library when she heard Beth walk in. She looked up to see the girl smile at her.
"Morning sunshine, or should I say 'evening'?" Beth said.
"Evening Beth." Mori said noticing that Beth had two cups in her hands.
"Have you been up all day?" Beth asked. Mori just nodded.
"Drink this. It will make you feel better." Beth said handing her a cup.
Mori looked at Beth as the girl took a long drink from her cup.
"What is it?" Mori asked looking suspiciously at the brown liquid in the cup.
"Poison." Beth said, sarcasm dripping in her voice.
Mori shrugged and drank the liquid. She noticed the drink was hot as it slid down her throat. It immediately warmed her body and perked her up even thought it had a bitter taste to it.
"Wow, what is that?"
"It's coffee, black with no sugar or cream." Beth told her as she took another drink from her own glass.
"Since when do you drink this?" Mori asked her, cocking an eyebrow.
"Since I joined the Order. You need it with monks blowing stuff up all night to keep you awake. Explosions are not easy to sleep through." Beth said.
"You mean Carl's experiments?"
"Yes, Carl." Beth laughing slightly. "He's the one who usually caused it."
"Who caused what?"
The two turned to see that Jen was slowly waking up.
"Evening. Coffee?" Beth offered. "There is some more in the kitchen if you want it."
"What?" Jen asked.
"She's a sharp one when she wakes up, isn't she?" Mori asked flatly.
"No, no." a voice softly muttered to the side of them.
The girls all silenced to listen to Carl talking in his sleep.
"I don't want to go to Transylvania. There are bats that will make me dance. I don't want to dance mommy. They'll put me in the too-too."
Mori cocked an eyebrow as all three girls looked at each other. Beth was trying not to smile, and failing horribly. They all burst out laughing at the same time, making Carl and Van Helsing jump awake.
"What? What is so funny?" Carl asked.
"You, you silly little friar." Mori said.
"Do you not want to dance Carl?" Beth asked before she started laughing again. Beth sat down in a chair by the fire place, still laughing. The second she leaned back on the chair, it collapsed. Beth's hand flew up and grabbed onto the fire place. Her pointer finger hit the center of a swirl carving on the mantel. The spot sank in and the back wall of the hearth flew up.
"Whoa." Beth said from the floor.
"Who wants to go down the dark, creepy tunnel first?" Carl asked looking at the dark void before him.
Van Helsing grabbed a torch as Mori helped Beth up. Jen came over and looked at the tunnel.
"It looks like it goes a long way." Jen said.
"Only one way to find out." Van Helsing said and entered the tunnel. Beth and Mori were right behind him. Jen followed the two girls, dragging Carl behind her by his robes.
"How long do you think it's been since anyone has been down here?" Jen asked.
"Maybe about…" Beth started and then began inspecting the degree of dust, cobwebs and spider webs. "Four hundred and fifty years."
At that mention, Van Helsing shuddered. On his first trip here, he discovered he killed Dracula four hundred and fifty years ago. Now, it was four hundred and fifty-five, and that was only the first time.
Beth stepped down and the edge of the stair chipped of. She began to fall, but Van Helsing grabbed her arm before she hit the ground.
"Be careful." he told her as the girl got her feet back under her.
"Thanks." Beth told him.
The stairs came to a heavy iron door. Van Helsing tried the handle, but had no such luck. He tried to shove it open, but only succeeded in injuring his shoulder.
"Any one have any idea how to get this open?" Jen asked.
"Yeah Carl, any idea?" Beth asked turning to him.
"You trust him to figure it out?" Mori asked.
"Mori!" Beth said.
"Sorry."
"You're forgiven." Jen said.
"Well genius, any ideas?" Mori asked him.
"No, none at all." Carl replied.
Van Helsing held the torch up to examine the door. He saw nothing. It was just an ordinary iron door. Beth thought she saw something on the wall to the left of the door. Beth touched the wall and felt something. It was a crevice. She put her ear to the wall.
"What are heck are you doing?" Jen asked her.
Beth knocked on the wall. It was hallow. Beth stepped back and kicked it as hard as she could. A group of stones flew inward to show a library beyond.
"I found the door." Beth said.
Van Helsing entered the library and lit the first torch. He then continued around the room till all the torches were lit. The library was as old as the pathway down and was covered with dust, cobwebs and spiders webs. There were books lining all the walls with two extra book cases standing freely near the sides of the rom. In the center of the room was a desk, two sofas and three leather chairs.
Beth glanced over at Carl. He looked thrilled at seeing all the books. The look on his face was similar to a child's on Christmas morning.
"Well, let's get started." Jen said.
"Yes, princess." Beth said using her nickname for her.
"Hunter." Jen mumbled.
Mori rolled her eyes at the two and sighed. "Children."
"Judged by the company you keep." Beth reminded Mori.
Mori opened her mouth to reply, but found she had nothing to say. She shut her mouth and Beth smirked slightly.
"Clever, very clever indeed." Mori told her.
"Thank you."
"Will you two just get something to read already?" Jen told them.
"Yes princess." Beth said and picked up a book. She sat at the desk and rested her feet on the desk top.
"As you wish, princess." Mori said bowing.
"Oh, stop it." Jen told her.
"Mori, will you quit torturing the poor thing?" Beth said smiling slightly and shaking her head. Beth then plunged her nose into a book.
From then on, the hours slipped by silently with everyone reading. Beth hadn't found anything yet. With a sigh, she got up to put the fourth book she had read that night on the shelf. Beth then started wandering around for something else to read. The tittles were all pretty much the same. They were things like 'Man to Beast', 'Anatomy of a Vampire', 'Origins of Vampires', and 'Vampires and Werewolves: Which is worse?'.
Beth looked at the chapter titles in all of those books and found they were on things she already knew. They were things about crosses, silver, reflections and sunlight. Beth sat back down at the desk and rested her elbows on the top as she massaged her temples. She was beginning to get a headache. The girl opened one of the drawers of the desk hoping to find a note or something from the previous owner like Anna, Velkan or Boris Valerious.
In the top drawer was a small, black leather bound book. Beth gently took it out and opened it, careful not to harm the old yellow pages. It was a journal. It was dated 1457. Beth scanned down the written page to see who's it was. When she saw the name, she immediately dropped the book on the desk and stood up before she backed away.
"Beth, what is it?" Van Helsing asked.
"It's his journal, before he was murdered." Beth said, pure shock in her voice and on her face.
"Who's?" Jen asked as Mori got up and looked at the book. She opened it and then looked at Van Helsing.
"Dracula's." the girl said.
Van Helsing quickly looked at the signature at the bottom of the first entry. Sure enough it was Dracula's. Van Helsing flipped to the last entry. It was dated 1462.
"What does it say?" Carl asked.
"It says he got a message. It said One is fine, and two is sad, three however is very bad, past chance three, it will be the end of thee." Mori said as Beth's shock wore off and she came to look at the journal.
"Then is says Half and half is a strange thing, but two of them shall clip your wing, a Valerious shall do you in, that means there are three then." Van Helsing read.
"Then some rivals from the past, will finally bury you at last. No tooth of wolf or shining sun, (unless they die first) they will succeed and the war is done." Beth finished.
"Carl, any idea what it means?" Jen asked him.
"Well, the Valerious could be you. It means he won't die from a werewolf or daylight. That's what the 'tooth of wolf' part meant. It also means that we will have a part in it, especially Van Helsing."
"That's what the 'rivals from the past' meant. You killed him already once." Beth said.
"Twice." mumbled Van Helsing barely loud enough for himself to hear.
"What do you mean twice?" Mori asked.
Van Helsing looked at her. How did she hear that? He really didn't want to explain to these children that he was the left hand of God. Might as well deny it.
"I didn't say anything."
"Oh, sorry." Mori said.
"Are you hearing voices in your head again?" Jen asked sarcastically.
"Shut up princess. I'm in no mood for it right now." Mori snapped at her.
"Sorry, I was only kidding Mori. I didn't mean it." Jen apologized.
Mori closed her eyes and sighed. "I know you didn't. I'm just a little tired. I didn't mean to snap."
"Mori, you go get some sleep. We'll stay here for the rest of the night." Beth said.
"Alright. Good night every one." Mori said and then left.
The rest of the night crept by slowly with everyone reading anything and everything to try and solve the riddle. Part of it was clear, but the other part wasn't. Jen eventually went to her room to sleep and so did Carl, leaving Van Helsing and Beth alone.
"Will you be sleeping any time soon?" Van Helsing asked Beth. "You know it's almost sunrise."
"Probably." Beth replied. "If you don't mind me asking…"
Van Helsing looked at Beth, who was now lying on the couch.
"How did you stop Dracula the first time?" Beth asked.
"It's a long story, you sure you want to hear it?" Van Helsing asked. Beth nodded.
"Well, it all started after I got back from an assignment. The Cardinal said I had to go to Transylvania to protect the last Valerious and help them kill Dracula so their family wouldn't slip in to purgatory. The last known Valerious at that time was…" Van Helsing stopped as memories of Anna flooded into his mind.
"Anna?" Beth asked.
"Yes…Anna. Well, I came to Transylvania and we met. We found out her brother Velkan had been turned into a werewolf and so I had to hunt him. Anna stopped me from shooting him and we followed him to Frankenstein's castle. There we learned Dracula was trying to bring his children to life. After we escaped the castle, we found the Frankenstein monster, but he preferred to be called Frankenstein. Frankenstein was the key to life and the werewolf saw us. We decided to take him to Rome to hide him. On that trip, Anna was captured and I killed Velkan, but while he was still a wolf he bit me."
"Carl and I hid Frankenstein and went to a masked ball to save Anna. I saved her but Frankenstein was captured. When Anna, Carl and I got back here, we found Dracula's castle. We figured out the only thing that could kill him was a werewolf and when I transformed at midnight, I killed him. Dracula had a cure for the werewolf and Anna got it in me right before I…" Van Helsing couldn't bring himself to say it.
"I'm sorry." Beth said. "I know what it feels like to lose someone you love."
Van Helsing looked at the girl across from him, who was now sitting up. There was a genuine sadness in her eyes.
"My mom died in child birth and my dad vanished when I was only four. After that I stayed with my mom's parents till I went to the Order when I was eight." Beth said, her eyes glazed over as memories swept over her mind.
"I'm sorry." was all Van Helsing could say.
The monster hunter sighed and then rose to his feet.
"We better get some sleep." he said.
Beth smiled softly and stood. She and Van Helsing walked side by side out of the room, up the stairs, out of the library and down the hall. When Beth got in her room, she flopped down on the bed and fell asleep. Her sleep was dreamless, causing her painful memories to be forgotten. It was a blessing, even though it wouldn't last forever.
( A/N: What do you think? No flames please. This is one of my longest chapters at 12 pages. The next one won't be this long. Until then…bye!)