Dracula and His Brides Page 17

  While my brides brought the grandfather to Devil's Precipice, I ventured to the town and made a point of locating Viorica for the sole purpose of telling her that I would be heading to the precipice and I had heard that Van Helsing was there. She, of course, corrected me, saying that he was still undergoing treatment, but I mentioned Van Helsing's hair was the same color as mine.

  “Oh, you mean his grandfather! I didn’t realize he was still going out on adventures. I don’t know if you heard about that place. It’s rumored to be cursed.”

  “I’ve heard the rumors,” I said, “but my wife and I need to get away for a little bit. Those grisly murders… I know Van Helsing wasn’t responsible, but that means there’s another killer in Transylvania, and honestly, Devil’s Precipice feels safer.”

  “I can hardly believe anyone could utter such a sentence and mean it,” she murmured, “but I understand. My husband and the other police agents are doing their best.”

  “I’m sure they are. Perhaps the murderer will be behind bars by the time we return.”

  “I very much hope so.”

  “As do I.”

  I dipped my head to her and grinned as I wandered off. No doubt Van Helsing would know about his grandfather within the hour.

  Actually, Van Helsing showed up within the hour. His face was flushed with anger as he stood at the top of the precipice, glowering down at us. My brides and I stood in a circle around the tree the grandfather was tethered to. We had not harmed his grandfather at all. In fact, we kept him well fed. Whenever he wasn’t eating or drinking water, we kept his gagged but only because he would not shut up about how his grandson would kill us all, that we would rue taking him, that he could kill us himself despite him being in his seventies and his muscles turning to fat. Well, he didn’t talk about his fat. That spoke for itself.

  “My grandfather is innocent,” Van Helsing shouted. “You never should have brought him here.”

  “No?” In a flash, I freed the grandfather.

  Immediately, as planned, Catina forced the elderly man to dig. Would this enact the curse? We couldn’t be certain, but the man had served his purpose. Van Helsing was here. We would kill the elder once the younger was dead, and the Van Helsings would be dead forever more, no longer a plight to vampires and monsters alike.

  With an inhuman scream, Van Helsing leapt down. No human could survive that jump, yet he did.

  I rushed him, but Van Helsing only held out his hand, touching my chest, yet enough force reverberated throughout my body that I was flung backward as if he had dealt me a massive blow. In fact, from my ragged breathing and the fierce pain burning through me, I could only suppose that he had somehow cracked some of my ribs.

  I gaped at him as my ribs healed. Now that he stood before me, I realized just how much his body had changed. He had muscles on his muscles, having nearly doubled in mass, all of it muscle without an ounce of fat.

  He rushed me, running as swiftly as a vampire.

  What the hell had the mad scientist done? Turn Van Helsing into a superhero?

  As we had discussed, Catina the panther kept the grandfather under control. Andreea the werewolf, Stela the fiery bird, and I would handle Van Helsing.

  The superhero vampire hunter went to punch me, but I turned into my fog, obscuring his vision. He whirled around, but a werewolf bite to his Achilles should’ve had him tumbling to the ground.

  Instead, he merely kicked Andreea away from him, unfazed by the massively bleeding wound. Whimpering, Andreea smacked into a tree. She stood immediately, shaking her head, and bounded back toward us.

  Stela dug her claws deep into Van Helsing’s shoulders and lifted him high up into the air, going higher and higher. She flew so swiftly I worried her fire would extinguish, but that wasn’t the case.

  That was good, however her fire did not set Van Helsing ablaze. Was he impervious to fire? How could that be?

  Swiftly, I altered to my bats, flying up to join them, biting and tearing into Van Helsing’s body. I was careful not to drink his blood any, for fear it was poisoned, but bleeding out should kill him just as well as any other way.

  Only his bite wounds were closing seconds after I tore into his skin. He was healing as swiftly as a vampire.

  Van Helsing slashed at Stela. I couldn’t see the weapon, only the flash of silver.

  Stela dropped him. Thankfully, it seemed she hadn’t been cut at all, and Van Helsing plummeted.

  That didn’t stop him from attacking, though. He whipped out an arbalest, the massive steel bow lined up with Stela. He fired the shot and then aimed at Andreea, firing a second one.

  Andreea jumped out of the way, leaping far higher than I would have thought possible even for a werewolf.

  My bats tore after him, but Van Helsing landed on his feet. I had to get to my stash of potions. Any one of them could end this battle, but I couldn’t as fog hold them.

  Catina the panther bounded over. She was licking her lips, blood staining her mouth area. She nodded. At least the grandfather was no longer a threat.

  Van Helsing must have realized this because he attacked as if possessed. He broke Andreea’s neck, threw Stela down and stomped on her wing, and then kicked Catina in the ribs. My two conscious brides both howled in pain, but they descended on the vampire in a clash of claws, fire, and teeth.

  I just secured one of the potions, the one that would vaporize him, when Catina whimpered. She had never made such a sound before. She was bleeding but remained on her feet.

  By now, Andreea had recovered from her broken neck. Her and Stela fought Van Helsing. I flashed into my bats and then back to my vampire, the signal that I was to vaporize the vampire hunter.

  Immediately, Andreea and Stela backed off, but Van Helsing was no fool. Without hesitating, he gripped Stela by the throat. Despite being a giant bird, her throat was rather small, and he squeezed hard.

  “Throw that potion into the tree,” Van Helsing demanded, “or else I’ll break her neck.”

  “You leave her be,” I said with a snarl.

  “You killed my grandfather and my fiancée. There’s no one else you can take away from me. I don’t care about my own life, and you know it. I’ll kill her, Dracula. You know I will.”

  Stela tried to reach him with her fiery wings, but her movements slowed. I could see it in her eyes and feel it in my heart. She was dying. Her breathing was slowing, and soon, she would be no more.

  I gritted my teeth. Van Helsing wasn't just a vampire hunter anymore. Now, he truly was a superhero. We hadn't underestimated him this time. We had underestimated the mad scientist and what his enhancements could accomplish.

  We needed to leave and regroup, as much as it pained me. Yes, Stela would be able to survive a broken neck, but it would only be a matter of time before he truly killed one of us for the final time if we grew careless.

  Swiftly, I threw the potion to the tree. It vaporized, turning to ashes that then disappeared themselves. My fog returned, and I swiftly banished away my brides. I brought them all the way back to the castle in the mountains.

  As much as I tried to tell myself this hadn’t been a colossal failure, I couldn’t help feeling that we had lost all the same.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Stela turned back into her vampire form the moment I released her. She slapped me hard. “Why did you leave?” she demanded. “I would have been fine!”

  “I know, but Van Helsing—"

  “Is still alive!” she shouted.

  “Can you honestly tell me you felt good about that battle?” I demanded.

  “We had it well in hand,” she said stubbornly.

  “He was healing. I couldn’t get him to bleed out.”

  “You could have used more of your potions,” she said. “Andreea could have for that matter. Her werewolf was more than capable of holding them.”

  “True enough,” Catina said. Her chin remained bloodstained. “You left them behind, didn’t you?”

  “No.” I l
ifted the large bundle. They hadn’t realized it, but as soon as I brought them all here, I dashed back and returned.

  “So smug.” Stela rolled her eyes.

  “Are any of you worried?” Catina asked.

  “He was so superior to his normal self,” Andreea murmured. She rubbed the back of her neck. “I have no notion as to what the scientist could have done to him.”

  “The effects have turned him into a superhero,” I declared, “but he’s not invincible. He’s not infallible.”

  “Now, he’ll run back to the scientist and have even more enhancements done and be even harder to kill!” Stela shouted. “Leaving was the wrong choice.”

  “It was the only choice,” Catina said softly.

  “I would have been fine,” Stela protested.

  “I’m hoping Van Helsing won’t be, but… Right before Dracula spirited us away, I saw them.”

  “Them?” Stela repeated, lifting her eyebrows.

  “The minotaurs,” Andreea breathed. “But we didn’t dig anything.”

  “And it was after I killed granddaddy Van Helsing,” Catina said, “but they were definitely heading our way. I don’t know if they don’t appreciate vampires, or if they wanted to see why we were fighting, or if they wanted to join the battle… It wouldn’t have been worth it to stick around and find out.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Andreea murmured.

  I cleared my throat. “As much as I would love for the minotaurs to have ripped Van Helsing limb from limb, we can’t assume that’s the case.”

  “Of course not,” Stela said. She narrowed her eyes. “You didn’t see them, did you?”

  “No,” I admitted. “I was too preoccupied by you.”

  She scowled and glanced away. “If you can’t trust us to handle ourselves—” she started.

  “Is it so terrible that I don’t want you to die?”

  “Trust,” she exploded. “That’s what’s important!”

  “Your life is,” I said quietly.

  “And how long are we going to live for? We have huge targets on our backs, and we just made them even wider by killing his last living relative.”

  “We need to find a way to even the odds,” I said.

  “We do,” Stela said coolly.

  Andreea rubbed her chin. “We’re strongest at night, but he knows this. He’ll avoid us then. We’re also at our strongest after a heavy feeding.” She glanced at me for confirmation.

  I nodded. “True.”

  “We drank before the battle,” Stela protested.

  “We did, but I, for one, wasn’t gorged on blood. Were you?”

  “Not exactly,” Andreea cut in, “but how can we stay gorged on blood? As we battle him, we’ll deplete our supply. He hadn’t shown any signs of slowing down at all during the fight. We might have an advantage at first, but it won’t last.”

  I began to pace. Sometimes, I thought better when I was moving.

  We were vampires, so we possessed superhuman strength, but that wasn’t enough. We needed to be stronger, faster. We needed to best Van Helsing in every way. He wasn’t a typical man or even a typical vampire hunter. He truly was a superhero, which made him that much more dangerous.

  Suddenly, I halted my pacing and burst out laughing.

  “What’s so funny?” Catina asked.

  “Can’t you tell?” Stela smirked. “He’s lost it.”

  “Can you ever be nice?” Andreea asked her.

  “We carefully planned our attack. Things were going well—”

  “My neck was snapped. Yours nearly as too,” Andreea pointed out.

  “Minor details,” Stela said with a wave of her hand.

  “And the minotaurs?” Catina added.

  “Whose side are you on?” Stela snapped.

  “We’re all on the same side.” I wiped at my eye. If I were still human, I might have just laughed until I’d cried.

  “Are you going to tell us the joke now?” Catina asked.

  “Me. I’m the joke.” I shook my head, disgusted and annoyed with myself. “I spent so much time trying to use my magic to attack him when I could have been doing what the mad scientist was.”

  “You think you can enhance us?” Andreea asked skeptically. “Change what exactly about us?”

  “Some of the potions I brought here help to increase vigor, strength, and endurance. I tried one of each earlier, and not one of them enhanced my already superior attributes. That said, I think I know a way to alter them so that they can help us.”

  Stela tilted her head to the side. “Please tell me you mean to do more than just add human blood to them.”

  I grinned. “Human blood will be an additional ingredient, yes, but it will require a lot more than just their lifeforce.”

  “Are you certain this will work?” Catina asked.

  “I doubt it will kill us.”

  “Oh, how reassuring,” Stela muttered.

  “It will work,” I said. “I’ll drink it first.”

  “Vigor, strength, and endurance,” Andreea repeated.

  “Can you think of anything else we might need?” I inquired.

  “More speed.”

  I nodded. “We might have a few of those. All right. You all feast on the humans we have here, but, Andreea, can you send eight of them to the tallest tower?”

  “Eight? That many?”

  “Yes.”

  Wisely, she said nothing else, and the other two brides followed her out. By the time the eight humans trooped their way up to the tower, I was already there and waiting for them, the sixteen potions—four of each kind—lined up in the middle of the room, squarely where the moonlight shone from the windows.

  I drained the first six humans of their blood, mixing the delicious lifeforce into each of the potions. From each human, I ripped out their hearts and then tore them into two before adding half a heart to each potion. The last two humans I ripped apart and used their bones to mix the potions.

  My work completed but untested, I found my brides with the rest of the humans, drinking to their heart’s content. I joined them, and several minutes passed before one of them realized I was there.

  “You finished already?” Catina asked.

  “For now. The potions should sit under the moonlight for a few hours.”

  “Then you’ll test one?” Stela asked.

  I shook my head. “As soon as the moon rises, I’ll try one.”

  “So you’ll already be at your strongest without the potion’s influence,” Andreea said, nodding. “Smart.”

  “Before you applaud yourself too much,” Stela interjected, “we need to figure out where and when and how we’re going to draw Van Helsing out.”

  “Leave that to me,” Andreea said. “I can get him to meet me.”

  “Where?” I demanded, trying not to sound overbearing. I hated that she had been with that man at one point.

  Van Helsing never deserved someone with as much vision, grace, beauty, brains, and kindness as Andreea.

  “The marshes on the northern edge of the Danube Delta,” she answered.

  “Why there?” Catina asked.

  “Are there monsters there?” Stela asked.

  “Not anymore,” Andreea said. “A hydra used to live there. I was studying it, trying to learn its weaknesses. I don’t typically want to kill monsters, but the hydra, well, it killed so many and showed no signs of remorse. In fact, the more times each head was cut off and regrown, the angrier and more ruthless the creature became.”

  “Let me guess. Van Helsing swooped in and killed the hydra?” I asked sarcastically.

  "Actually, he and I both slew the hydra," she corrected.

  “And that was how you two met.”

  “Yes,” she said shortly.

  “Why would he want to see you there?” Catina asked.

  “We didn’t burn the hydra. We buried it. The hydra’s blood is toxic. I think I might be able to convince him of a few things. One, I want a cure. Two, if one can’t be had,
I want to die. Drinking hydra blood should do it.”

  “And he could just slice off your head!” I said anxiously.

  “He won’t. Trust me. I know he’s hurting and in pain, but the Van Helsing I know won’t turn his back on me. Not if I can convince him that a trace of the me he knew has survived the transition.”

  “That’s a big if,” Stela said.

  “I’ll be fine.” Andreea smiled and bit her lower lip. “I appreciate your concern.”

  “I don’t like this either,” I said, shaking my head.

  “You just make sure that the potions will turn us into super-vampires,” Andreea said. “Come tomorrow night, we end this.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Tomorrow finally did come, and just before swallowing down the enhanced strength potion, I added some bone dust. The concoction tasted both sweet and sour, bitter and sugary.

  Immediately, raw strength flooded through my body. I didn’t need to test the effects, but I still did. I raced out of the castle, yanked a tree out of the ground, and slammed it against the side of the mountain.

  A crack formed, and I nearly started a rockslide.

  My brides met me outside.

  “What was that?” Stela demanded.

  “The strength potion works.”

  Andreea grinned. “Let’s drink them all. Then we all know what to do.”

  We downed each of our potions—strength, endurance, vigor, and speed—and then, Andreea took off first. So much of this plan rested on her, and I could not help being worried over her safety. Yes, she was strong and capable, but I would be devastated if anything should happen to her.

  Relax. Everything will be fine. Before the sun rises, Van Helsing will be dead. Then, you can decide if you want to stay here in Transylvania or if you want to move elsewhere.

  Oh, and I couldn’t forget about the mad scientist too. It would hardly do for us to rid the world of the monster Van Helsing had turned into for Doctor Frankenstein to create another one.

  Impatient as ever, Stela took off next. Suppressing a groan, I nodded to Catina, and we raced after her. Danube Delta was a mixture of marshes and sandbanks, and it was easy enough to find trees and underbrush to hide behind.