Vlad, chapter IV: Preparations.

Morning's light filtered through the woodland canopy, warming the forest floor while night creatures sought their lairs. A cloud of gnats tortured Lamia's eye, drowning in conjunctive goo and floating to the edges as she studied Dracula's fortress from her concealment. 

She would not war in open fields for hatred of man's treachery. An army with overwhelming numbers had once driven her into a canyon with deadfalls and spear pits. They'd sent their dog packs and archers, whose murmuration of arrows blotted out the sun while she scaled a sheer wall to freedom. No, thought Lamia, wait, my attack will be by ambush.

Of the seven Gorgon sisters, Lamia was the most revolting. Towering over men and equal in weight to their oxen, Lamia wielded a decapitator, keen as obsidian, on the end of a slashing tail. A cluster of glands below her eye shot ruinous venom, her serpent's tongue combing the air for infants, whose flesh she gobbled in bolts. Her teeth were sabers, but the seat of her strength lay with her arms and piercing talons. An unspeakable odor heralded her approach. Perhaps most frightening of all was the wonton savagery of her heart.

In three hundred years, she had not drawn so close to Desponia as today. The Stygian witches lay slaughtered at the underworld's entrance. The eye was hers. Zeus would seek revenge for the witches. 

My days are numbered, but my revenge is at hand.

***

"Clear this food away," Desponia said, watching from a window as yard workers led the woman away.

 

Luminita touched her arm. 

 

"Something troubles you, my lady?"

 

"All the world is full of woe."

"Are we still to ride this afternoon?"

 

Desponia glanced distantly at her gypsy.

 

"As you wish, child." 

 

They walked to the stables an hour later and found Ehrlich mucking a stall. 

 

He set his shovel aside and bowed.

 

"Straighten your back, man; you've nothing to fear. There was a ranting woman earlier in the day."

 

Ehrlich frowned.

 

"The blacksmith's wife from Medias. I know nothing more than the lady was grievous and perhaps mad."

 

"Meet my eyes, Ehrlich. Why would you call her mad?"

 

"She claimed a monster devoured her infant, a thing that walked on two legs, a horrible odor, and a malignant eye."

 

"Oh, how silly," taunted Luminita, "why worry over monsters? We came to ride."

 

She stepped forward and tossed her hair. 

 

"Bring us mounts!"

 

Desponia said, "Hold your tongue. I am distracted by this woman's plight."

 

She turned to Ehrlich, "See to it that the guard doubles. Keep the bridge raised and pick a patrol to walk the castle's perimeter at the top of each hour."

 

"Are we not to ride?" Luminita asked with a pout.

 

****

 

Later, the goddess and her gypsy reclined in the great hall.

 

“Do you find Ehrlich repugnant?” Desponia asked.

 

Luminita pushed up the tip of her nose.

 

"He's a kind of farm animal, a pig."

 

"Even a pig has its uses,"

 

"He makes me sick."

 

"I've heard it said Ehrlich cannot be charmed."

 

"Men are charmed with what they most want to believe about themselves. I would charm him easily."

 

"You might ply him with mutton."

 

"As if I would deign to serve him mutton?"

 

"You are cleverer than he, Luminita. Let us try this idea of yours."

 

"But..."

 

Desponia called for the cook to bring a leg of mutton. "Let us see your charms in action, Luminita."

 

They found Ehrlich pushing a wheelbarrow of potatoes across the yard.

 

"Here is your chance."

 

Desponia pressed the small of Luminita's back. 

 

The gypsy stumbled forward, holding the mutton.

 

"Take it," she said.

 

"For the discourtesy," added Desponia.

 

Ehrlich hesitated a moment, took the mutton, then tossed 

it on the wheelbarrow before pushing on.

 

"What is discourtesy?" Luminita asked.

 

"It is a way of saying you are a great seductress."

 

Luminita smiled broadly.

 

****

 

The dying sun cast shadows.

 

Ehrlich stood in the courtyard, ringing a bell to close the workday. 

 

The workers gathered in the yard, forming a line that Ehrlich walked while taking a headcount. 

 

He motioned for the accountant, who sat at a table with a poke of coins. 

 

Ehrlich called the worker’s names. Each stepped forward, made his mark, and received a coin. They joined at the drawbridge. When the last had gathered, Ehrlich signaled the bridge down, and the workers crossed, entering the tree line to the sound of a minstrel's flute. 

 

Desponia climbed the battlements and looked over the walls, eyes scanning the trees. She cursed. 

Where are you hiding, gorgon?

 

Ehrlich ordered the bridge up, and the flute's music disappeared in the roll of the windlass's chains.

 

**** 

 

As evening fell, Desponia brought the gypsy once again to Maria's shop.

 

"I've not worked the night before," Maria said. She went nervously about her business. "Are you sure his lordship won't have me boiled?"

 

"Nonsense," Desponia said, "you're here because we need your services. Continue with the fitting."

 

"But none of us have stayed after sunset." She wrung her hands. "Oh, dear, my girls are quite nervous."

 

"Do not wander the castle. Stay in your chambers. Complete Luminita's wardrobe. You will have a safe passage in the morning. You're well paid."

 

"Yes, my lady."

 

"You're well paid!" Luminita stamped her right foot.

 

****

 

With the day done, Dracula stirred in his coffin. With each waking moment, the power of his immortality returned. He pushed the coffin's lid, sprang to the floor, and went to an adjoining chamber. 

 

Six-foot-four inches in height, he was a youthful man with forgotten centuries in his eyes. With speed and flexibility, a gentleman and a storm of destruction, he could leap upwards of two stories. At close quarters, his actions were undetectable; he covered shorter distances in subdivisions of a second. A single feeding would sustain him for a week. Without blood, he would not suffer the incapacity of an average person for six months.

 

****

 

Desponia and the gypsy waited in the great hall for Dracula's arrival. The goddess sat atop the table with her knees pulled to her chest. Her transparent garment fell along the curves of her shoulder. A servant girl stroked Luminita's hair with a brush of boar bristle. 

 

"How much longer would we wait?" complained Luminita. 

 

As she spoke, the goddess detected a rumble. 

 

"It is our lord," Desponia said. 

 

The servant girl dropped the brush, scanning the room with widened eyes. In the next moment, she began to tremble.

 

"What is wrong with you?" Luminita demanded.

 

"She is frightened by the approach of our Lord, as are many," Desponia said.

 

"Why?"

 

But then she caught Dracula's eyes, and she trembled.

 

Desponia dismissed the servant.

 

Vlad stood at his full height. The weave of his clothing was unknown; the cut of his trousers and jacket collaborated with the finest Italian tailors. 

 

Desponia had acquired the material from the stockrooms of Olympus itself.

 

His figure was equal to an Olympian god in stature and breadth. He held a cane by its golden handle and leaned forward as he scanned the room.

"Greet your master, Luminita." But the gypsy's eyes remained frozen to the floor.

 

"I am afraid." She began to weep.

 

Luminita lifted her head and gazed into Vlad's face, knowing he'd changed her existence.

 

"Well, I was sure I saw you speak last night, Luminita. Has so much changed in a day?" he asked.

 

"Answer, then," urged Desponia.

 

"Perhaps you would play a board game?"

 

"No, my Lord."

 

"Well, then," said Dracula, taking Luminita's arm, "We shall walk corridors until you've grown accustomed to my presence."

 

With that, he led her to the closest hall, tugging lightly and disappearing into the castle's recesses.

 

Moments later, Desponia heard her gypsy's laughter echoing through the castle. They returned to the hall.

 

"It seems your gypsy is near exhaustion," Dracula said. 

 

"We have yet to finish her wardrobe, Vlad; I will see it directly. Come Luminita, it is time we retired to our chamber. The seamstresses will be along shortly."

 

Dracula departed in search of Ehrlich. The night was moonless, as Dracula much preferred. He found his man overseeing the arrival of heavy wagons, each holding steam trunks and crates suitable for coffins.

 

Ehrlich sensed his master's approach but stayed his course, waiting dutifully for the great thump on the back he'd grown used to receiving.

 

If Dracula overlooked the ritual, he considered his workday incomplete. 

 

Ehrlich's wife knew of the thump and was reluctant to predict her husband's mood when he had not received it. 

 

The caretaker was a powerful man, so much so that once, he'd single-handedly wrestled a horse to the ground. He expected a thump from Dracula that would send a lesser man flying into a curtain wall.

 

"How goes the evening, Ehrlich?" Dracula asked. 

 

Silence.

 

Tension hung in the air as his underlings looked nervously about the courtyard. Then came the resounding thump. 

 

"All goes well," said Ehrlich with alacrity.

 

Nods of approval went round the courtyard, and the night crew happily returned to their chores.