Before they could enter a figure rushed out to stop them. The girl was slight in build and her long golden hair was tied back demurely from her face. Her dress was old fashioned and its pale yellow skirts swept the floor before her. Her outstretched hands were clad in white leather gloves which reached up to her elbows. Her pretty face was stricken with terror and her blue eyes were wide with panic. She held out her hands before her as though to stop their progress.
Harry watched in amazement as Carmilla, with a gasp of recognition, pushed passed him and rushed towards the young girl. The girl too recognised Carmilla, gasping out her name with a pretty English accent as she wrung her hands before her.
'Laura!' Carmilla's voice was breathy and desperate, she held out her hands and the young girl clasped them passionately to her chest, holding them tightly as though she were afraid that Carmilla was a vision who might vanish when she touched her. As Carmilla drew nearer, her hands being pulled by the girl's own embrace, the air around the couple shimmered subtly. Harry felt sure that only he had noticed the flash of scintillation in the air, like a bubble which captured Carmilla and the girl in its circle.
Carmilla was holding the girl's face between her long, white fingers now, stroking back the golden hair. Her demeanour which had been so stately and elegant seemed almost human in its desperation now. Feverishly she kissed the girl deeply, holding her head back and bending the poor creature back so she could taste her mouth with those full red lips. Her other hand stroked the soft white skin of the girl's breast which was framed by the ivory lace of her dress. The girl was holding Carmilla's face with one hand, the fingers stroking the alabaster cheek as she hungrily returned the kisses which Carmilla rained down up her, moving from her mouth to her cheeks, her eyelids. The girl's other hand dangled at her side, hidden in the folds of her dress.
It was this hand which now moved. Carmilla, whispering and murmuring of how she feared she had lost her love, her Laura, didn't see the hand creeping from behind the pale silk. The rest of the group stared in horror as the slim white hand emerged from the hanging folds of the dress. In it was a sharp pointed, wooden stake.
In the sudden flurry of movement Sir Francis was the first to leap at the girl, his arm outstretched to bat away the weapon she clutched in her hand. The air around the two women seemed to shimmer and time seemed to slow down. Harry saw in horror Sir Francis slowly starting to dissolve as his momentum brought him into contact with the glittering air. His hands, his arms, simply melted away. There was no residue, no dust to show for his passing just a silent erasing of his form as he came into contact with the sparkle of, what Harry now realised, must be magic. The whole event must have taken only a few moments, none of the other vampires had time to strike before he was gone. It was though he had never existed.
Before anyone had chance to register what had happened, before Harry had time to process what he had just seen, the Viking guard sprung towards Carmilla. This time the scene flashed before Harry's eyes so fast he barely registered it. The guards were simply gone. Torchlight flickered in the wake of air made by their leaping and then settled again.
Why wasn't anyone moving? Speaking? Screaming? Harry thought in horror, as his mind whirled at the scene before him. Now the girl had the stake poised at Carmilla's back, directly behind her heart. The vampire, oblivious to her impending fate, still showering kisses on the pretty face. Harry tried to look at Edward, at Spike, but he couldn't move his head. He swivelled his eyes frantically trying to see the reaction of his friends. They too seemed mesmerised, held in whatever spell had captured him in its embrace.
In a long torturous moment the girl brought the stake down. Harry could see its sharp point pierce first the dress and then the flesh of Carmilla's back. He saw the blood well up from the wound and the look of betrayal and anguish on Carmilla's ethereal face as she felt the penetration of the stake. Slowly the blood pooled around the wound, pouring out over the girl's lily white hand and dripping heavily down her arm, smearing her lemon yellow dress with thick, dark blood. Carmilla fell forward, the girl stepping smartly out from beneath her victim and rolling her onto her back on the floor. Carmilla's long body writhed in pain, her eyes wide in terror and her mouth forming a rigid 'O' as the blood began to flow from her mouth, trailing down her face and clogging in her long flaxen hair. The girl stood back, her eyes ablaze with cruelty as she looked down at her victim. Carmilla's skin was withering, shrinking and sagging. Her bones cracked and she screamed a long painful scream as her body began to collapse on itself as though it had been filled out with the blood that now gushed from her open mouth and from the wound in her back. She pulled herself onto her hands and Harry choked back his horror as she retched and heaved the black blood from her mouth. She fell forward, her pale skin contrasted starkly with the gore which lapped at her body, never leaving the scintillating circle of magic around the two women. Carmilla lay completely still and, even though he was used to vampire stillness, Harry could see that Carmilla was dead.
Suddenly Harry felt he could move. The vampires must have felt the release of the magic too because Spike was rushing forward. He was grabbed by Mitchell who hauled him bodily back from the circle which still shimmered around the women.
'Spike, no!' He shouted at the blonde vampire who was fighting to be set free. 'You saw what happened to Francis!' Mitchell's nostrils were flared and Harry noticed that all the vampires seemed to be reacting to the smell of the blood pooling around the fallen body of Carmilla. Instead of the attraction he had assumed they would have, all of them seemed to be utterly repelled by the smell tanging the air with iron so potent that even Harry could smell it. Edward had covered his mouth and nose, although the eyes above his hand still held a trace of amusement. Lady Elizabeth had slunk back behind the others; she was crouched down ready to attack. Harker was covering his eyes and Harry though he was weeping. Laughing Bear was standing perfectly still; his face was a mask of disgust.
Carmilla's murderer stepped back from the corpse of her victim. Her pretty pastel dress smeared with blood where Carmilla had tried in vain to defend herself. The sweet, heart shaped face held a look of evil and cruelty so fierce that Harry could hardly bring himself to look at her. Her mouth opened wide and the pearly white teeth glinted dangerously in the torchlight. She began to laugh; the laugh was tinkling and innocent, it delighted the ear, it was rippled music in the cavern. The shimmering of the air began to increase; now everyone could see the glittering magic. It danced before the girl like heat haze, distorting and shifting her form. Her laugh swirled and echoed in Harry's head. The girl's body was changing, he could see through her, as though she was a ghost. Behind the image of the pretty little girl began to form another body, its laugh just as sweet and young. The shimmering reached a crescendo and then died down. Where the girl had stood was a young, beautiful boy. His hair was raven black and falling to his bare shoulders, his lean pale body was clad only in a pair of exquisitely fitted leather trousers. His sapphire blue eyes danced with amusement behind the sweeping dark lashes.
'What fun!' His voice was husky and seemed older than the voluptuous mouth which framed the words. Harry felt a shiver of recognition through his body, this was Dracula.
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