The Vorbing (3 page)

“It appears you share the same destiny as your father.”

“I don’t want to end up like him.”

“Aren’t you proud of him?”

“Of course, I just don’t want to die like he did…alone, in agony, and before his time.”

Hana patted Vlad’s hand affectionately.

“You’re becoming a man, like your father,” Hana said sadly. “How your father would have wished to see how strong you have become.”

“I must put fresh garlic on father’s grave. I don’t want it to get desecrated by the vampires the way it was the first time, remember?”

Hana shivered.

“Oh, don’t mention that, please,” Hana said.

Vinegar Tom, Vlad’s ginger cat, entered their dwelling with something in his mouth.

“Oh look,” Vlad said. “Vinegar Tom’s caught a mouse.”

Vinegar Tom dropped the mouse. The tired, injured rodent sat on the floor, staring at the cat in terror, acutely aware of its own impending doom.

“They’re doing the dance of death,” Vlad said, as he watched with fascination. “How can such a tiny creature fight a huge beast like our cat and live?”

“With help,” Hana said, as she picked up Vinegar Tom and the mouse scurried down through a hole in the floorboards and escaped.

“Why did you deny our cat his prize?” Vlad asked, outraged.

“There’s too much bloodshed around here already, Vlad,” Hana said. “He may only be a mouse, but he has a life and a family, too.”

Vlad finished his meal in silence; made the sign of the cross and left the kitchen area.

Chapter Three

Vlad walked across the golden field, twirling a stick he had found like a sword. Thick, black clouds blanketed the sky, but the sun still shone underneath them. The sunlight refracted through the falling autumn leaves from the swaying oak trees on the hill. The gentle rustling sounds of the leaves blowing in the warm wind calmed Vlad. He loved nature and felt most comfortable being outdoors. A gagging cloud of thick smoke interrupted Vlad’s relaxation, and he looked around for the source of it.

Human and animal victims of the vampires from the night before were being burned up on funeral pyres in the distance. Charred embers of flesh blew everywhere in the swirling breeze. Beside it, a religious procession was taking place. No service was possible in Nocturne’s church due to the extensive damage from the vampire attack of the previous evening. At the head of it walked the stern town elder Vrillium Gladwish, holding a makeshift crucifix aloft.

“Another procession,” Vlad said to himself. “Why are they wasting their time?”

“Don’t you believe in God?” a voice asked.

Vlad turned around quickly and saw his paramour, Ula, standing there.

“Yes, I do, Ula, but you can’t beat the vampires that way.”

“God protects us from them.”

“Yes, but can he destroy them? He can’t, can he? It is up to us to decide our destiny, not God.”

“Vlad, don’t speak such blasphemy,” Ula said as she hugged him.

They watched the procession pass. Vrillium Gladwish solemnly scattered holy water on the ground as he went. Children followed in his wake, scattering incense from a canister and rose petals to mask the smell of dead bodies and singed flesh. The rest of the crowd carried portraits of the saints and chanted prayers. Vrillium gave Vlad and Ula the evil eye as the procession moved out of sight. Their absence was noted. When the noise receded, they continued where they had left off earlier.

Whenever Vlad thought of Ula, he saw her smiling face instantly; her long, golden hair, light green eyes and the ridge of freckles across her turned-up nose. Ula was seventeen and in the full bloom of youth. She had such a vibrant personality. She always made Vlad laugh. He hated being apart from her. The villagers had noticed how Vlad and Ula had been spending so much time together and talk of marriage crossed everyone’s lips. Vlad feared marriage. Living in a land of vampires, it was good not to become attached to anything. No one knew where they would strike next. Survival in Nocturne was sheer luck. As certain as death itself, the vampires would hold the life of all Nocturnians and their loved ones in their gnarled claws eventually.

However, there was another reason why Vlad did not want to become too intimate. If he was going to avenge his father (something he planned to do), it was best not to present the vampires with an Achilles heel to exploit. The vampires would find whatever someone loved and use it against them. If they were unable to blackmail someone through loved ones, the vampires would kill them. An isolated individual was fair game for the vampires. They were using divide and conquer tactics.

Deadulus had a mate, Votona, but she was a mere physical convenience. She was infertile and never would give Deadulus progeny. Votona needed Deadulus for power and protection within the group. Vlad assumed he could kill her and Deadulus would find another willing female with ease, but he knew little about vampire mating patterns. He had to be careful, though. Anyone associated with him would be a target for vampires, and Vlad loved Ula too much to put her through that.

Vlad wondered why he should allow the vampires to control his life.
To Hell with those evil beasts,
Vlad decided. They already had caused him enough pain. Besides, Vlad found Ula irresistibly attractive. No matter what his mind told him, one look at her, and separation was out of the question. However, if he committed himself to Ula and something happened to her, he would find it unbearable. Vlad loved his father, and he had lost him forever. The road stretched out before Vlad Ingisbohr. It simultaneously enthralled and terrified him. Whatever he decided, marriage was a long way in the future. Until then, he and Ula enjoyed each other's company, free of pressure.

Vlad and Ula went to their favourite meeting place, beneath a tree beside the river. The tree was in full blossom, and in the sunlight, with Ula beside him, it felt like Heaven itself. Vlad’s eyes scanned her voluptuous form as she finished tossing stones into the water. He quietly watched the teasing rhythm of her unhindered breasts and the graceful movements of her long limbs as she got nearer to him. Vlad had not seen her for a while. Ula and her family had suffered a hideous run of illness. Ula and her younger sister were the ones chiefly affected mostly by diseases of the respiratory tract. Vlad asked many detailed questions regarding her illness. Surprisingly, Ula did not take offence and reassured Vlad as best she could.

Ula sat down beside Vlad and went to stroke his hair. He flinched and got to his feet.

“H-How are you feeling, Ula?” he stammered, smoothing his hair back, “better, I hope.”

“I have fully recovered, Vlad,” she said with a beaming smile, “my sister is also better.”

“The illness is gone?” Vlad asked enthusiastically.

Ula grinned and nodded. Vlad smiled and eased himself down beside her. He wanted to believe her and took her at her word, pressing Ula against him in a passionate embrace.

“You are a strange man, Vlad Ingisbohr,” Ula said passionately, reciprocating Vlad’s desire.

Vlad liked that the apparently demure female form bubbled underneath with feral passion, and with the merest kiss or caress he could unleash it. Ula had once been in love with a cruel man, a man Vlad had heard was rotting in a dungeon somewhere. Ula would never go into detail about that person. She would not even reveal his first name. Vlad had taken the hint and did not pursue the issue any further. Vlad stopped kissing Ula, and she opened her eyes with a start.

“Why are you stopping?” Ula asked.

“Haven’t you heard that a woman’s chastity is a sty in the eye of the Devil?”

“No.”

“Well, perhaps it’s a sty in the eye of that farmer over there!”

Ula looked up and saw nothing.

“What farmer, Vlad?” Ula asked. “There’s no one there; everyone is at the procession.”

“There was an old man leaning on his cudgel, watching us in the next field!’ Vlad insisted.

There was rustling in the bushes, and something shot up Vampire

Mountain with incredible speed.

“Did you see that?” Vlad asked.

“I saw it,” Ula said, stunned. “What was it?”

“The vampires were watching us,” Vlad said, fear in his voice.

“Why?” Ula asked.

“They’re probably wondering why we’re not at the village procession against them,” Vlad said.

“I’m scared, Vlad,” Ula said.

Vlad put his arm around her to calm her. “Was there any damage to your farm last night?” enquired Vlad.

“Yes,” Ula replied, “they killed one of our pigs.”

“Which one?” he asked.

“The small one with the black spot,” Ula said. “It must have escaped through that gap in the floor again. I told my father to patch it up, but it’s too late now.”

There was a long silence before Ula produced a basket. “I brought you some apples,” she said. She took one out and handed it to him. He munched on it hungrily and devoured it in three bites. Vlad tossed the apple core in the river. When he looked up at Ula, she was in a fit of giggles.

“Why are you laughing at me?” Vlad asked.

“You eat apples like my horse!” she giggled.

Vlad sulked, obviously hurt by the derisive giggles of a girl.

“Don’t              be like that, Vlad,” Ula said as she moved closer to him. She just had placed her lips on his cheek when they heard chanting coming from the road.

After Vlad had kissed Ula goodbye, he looked up at Vampire Mountain as he walked and shivered. In winter, the biting northerly and easterly winds swept down from Vampire Mountain onto Nocturne and went right through the draughty dwellings and into the bones of the residents. It was an oppressive time, and the loss of life was greatest then, as sickness was rife and many just lost the will to live. Christmas was the darkest time of the year, when the vampires had roughly seventeen hours of darkness with which to lay siege to Nocturne and the surrounding area. On cloudy days, Deadulus was able to venture forth alone and cause more mayhem for brief periods. Those were the worst days, when the suffocating darkness was all around and nothing seemed possible. A crippling malaise joined with fear and paranoia and made life almost unbearable.

Although Christmas was a welcome relief, there was one other thing that the people had to keep them going: the prophecy. In Nocturne town square, there was a large obelisk. It had tableaux chiselled into it depicting an elderly blind man with a beard leading smiling children to a happier place in the sun. This blind man would deliver them all from evil by defeating the vampires. The prophecy had been passed down by word of mouth around the hearth in every home for generations. Nobody knew when or where the prophecy began, they were only aware it existed and they believed in it wholeheartedly. There was no evidence that there was even a grain of truth in it, but they had complete blind faith in their blind man - the blind leading the blind. Without their prophecy, many more Nocturnians would have lost the will to live.

As Vlad crossed Nocturne Village Square, he looked to the left as he always did to the timid hillock where his grandparents were buried. The burial ground was a jagged arrangement of wooden crosses that had been buffeted by the elements. Even the dead had no respite from the weather. It was ringed by a long wall of trees. If the village of Nocturne had been built on the far side of those trees, they would have served as a natural buffer against the driving wind coming down from Vampire Mountain. Beside the cemetery was Lake Veronus that edged onto the Ingisbohr farm. Beside the lake were the fields where Vlad loved to play as a boy. There were no other children of Vlad’s age around then, so he had imagined them. The villagers thought he was a strange, lonely boy, playing by himself all the time, but Vlad was lost in his own world and he loved every minute of it. He was the ruler of the world he had created. Whatever Vlad wanted, he thought up. He never had to ask permission from anyone to do anything. He just did it.

Vlad always picked flowers for his mother Hana in the fields as a child, and they brought a smile to her face, even when he brought back colourful weeds. He also made her food when she was sick, and she always ate it or pretended to even if it looked or smelled disgusting. Vlad’s father Adam had been a tough man, and he thought it was a weakness that Vlad was so close to his mother, but Vlad never saw it that way. Vlad thought his father had felt the diseased crow of jealousy pecking at his heart over the relationship he and his mother enjoyed. Some people had terrible relationships with their mothers, or no relationship at all. Vlad never got what the problem was, but it was a constant source of strife between Vlad and his father. If Adam started picking on his son, Vlad would retreat to the fields again to escape, no matter what the weather. He once got very sick by staying too long in the icy fields due to his reluctance to go home and face more endless criticism. Vlad loved his father and he did miss him, but he was happy that it was his mother who was still alive. Had his mother died first, life would have been unimaginably cold and difficult living alone with his father. Vlad shuddered to even think about it.

Vlad left his village of Nocturne. He enjoyed leaving Nocturne behind and going for an adventure occasionally. If he stayed too long there, he felt the oppressive atmosphere start coiling itself around his throat. He needed to get away from time to time. Slowly, all signs of humanity melted away and rugged, windswept, harmonious nature surrounded him, and he felt at peace. Even the air began to freshen as funeral pyres and the stench of death receded into the distance behind him as he walked.

              A huge storm had ripped through the area ten years before, and the scattered detritus left in its wake still was visible even though it had become overgrown with flora, green shoots from desolation’s grave. Vlad paused to look at it and remind himself of the remarkable power of nature. He was only a young boy on the terrifying night the storm had struck, but he had vivid memories of it. Recalling it still gave him a shiver of excitement and anticipation. He loved storms and how they had the power to change everything around him in a short space of time. Even if the result was ugly and chaotic, Vlad still liked the shift in perspective and welcomed it. There was a longing for anarchy and confrontation within him. It made the return to serenity feel even better. Forces of nature brought change to those who avoided it, and so did the vampires. Although their power and destruction was frightening and devastating, Vlad still wanted to experience their elemental fury. By surviving, he could learn and transcend anything. It made him feel stronger and in control of his destiny. In that way, freak events were a welcome catalyst. They challenged even the greatest plans and made their creators think differently and adapt and overcome.

Some in his village thought the ferocity of that storm was the end of the world, but Vlad laughed at that. He revelled in the potential for danger and rebirth the storm brought. It was another reason why Vlad was thought to be odd in his village, but he did not care. Vlad gleefully went for a walk on the morning after the storm to survey all the damage. Fallen trees and branches were particular favourites of his. Dirty looks from fellow Nocturnians did not dampen his enthusiasm for wreckage. Vlad laughed to himself. Some sustained injuries or lost loved ones during the storm, and Vlad had shown them great consideration. He hand-delivered food made by his mother to afflicted families and joined his father and other Nocturnian men in rebuilding properties damaged by the tempest. It was the first time Vlad had felt like a man instead of a boy, and he learned many valuable things, skills he was able to utilise long after his father was gone. Songs and jokes from the men as they worked remained with him, even the ones his father tried to stop him hearing by blocking Vlad’s ears. He especially liked those. Vlad loved the unity shown by the people of Nocturne then. It was an idyllic time before the vampires came. When Deadulus and his kind did arrive, there was one final massive show of unity at McLintock’s Spit, and then nothing. An every-man-for-himself mentality descended after that. Vrillium Gladwish was the ice forming in the rock slowly cracking the structure apart from within. Vlad came back to grim reality with a frown. There he drew a veil across his memories and proceeded onward.