Silver in the Blood (16 page)

“I know who he is,” Lord Johnny said, his voice flat. “Listen carefully: you're being presented to the king and queen tomorrow. Prince Mihai will be there. I want you to watch him. Make sure he doesn't slip away alone. I am trying to arrange an invitation myself, but you'll be able to get closer to him. If he says anything to you, anything suspicious, I want you to try to remember it, so that you can tell me later.”

“You mean if he seems to be plotting treason?”

Lord Johnny's eyes widened. “He's already approached you about his family's plan?”

“
His
family's plan? Have you met my grandmother?” Dacia's voice cracked.

Lord Johnny's expression was grim. “Ah, yes. So you know of your family's involvement? We really must speak soon, when we have more time. And privacy. I also—”

“Miss Neulander! You are here! And where is she? Where is your fair cousin?”

A young man in a gray suit had leaped from the doorway into the middle of the terrace, startling Lou and Radu, and was turning in a rapid circle. Dacia and Lord Johnny stared out at him from their little hiding place.

“Will Carver? I don't believe it!” Dacia recovered herself and stepped out onto the terrace. “What are you doing here?”

Will stopped turning in circles and snatched at Dacia's hands, holding them to his heart.

“Miss Vreeholt! No, Dacia! My dear Dacia! You have to come with me right now,” he cried. “You're in very grave danger!”

“Mr. Carver—Will, I mean,” Dacia began, still a bit dazed by his sudden appearance. She noticed suddenly that he had a rather weak mouth and bulging eyes. Her time abroad in the company of Lord Johnny and Prince Mihai seemed to have raised her standard for male beauty. “Whatever do you mean? How did you find me?”

She freed one of her hands, and found herself automatically feeling at her hair to make sure it was in order. Then she realized that she didn't care if Will saw her with her hair mussed. Yes, her taste in men had changed a great deal in the past weeks.

“I called at your family home in Bucharest, and your uncle Horia Florescu was kind enough to tell me where to find you!” Will squeezed her other hand even tighter and she attempted to extract it without success. “There is a terrible evil stalking the streets of Bucharest! I've come to take you back to civilization
before it's too late,” he told her. “I only just put it all together, and I came as quickly as I could!”

“Put what all together?” Dacia managed to remove her hands from his grip. Lord Johnny was looking at Will Carver with a cynical expression, and she was still turning over what the young American was saying.

“I read a novel,” Will began. “A terrible, sickening work of trash! Nevertheless, it seems to have the ring of truth about it. It was set in Romania, and I thought nothing of that beyond hoping that you would never read it and see your mother's country defamed!

“But I began to be plagued by terrible nightmares and suspected that much of this novel was in actuality true. I got on the next train for Bucharest, thinking only to reassure myself that you were well, but as I journeyed my fears began to be realized! The terrible signs of evil from this very book were all around me: wolves running free in daylight, without a hint of fear. Swarms of bats that nearly blotted out the moon at night!”

Radu hissed and Dacia saw that his eyes were wide and he was clenching his fists.

“Oh, for heaven's sake, Radu,” she said in disgust, frowning repressively at her cousin. “Go on, Will, I'm afraid I still don't understand.”

“I'd like to know more myself,” Lord Johnny said. Dacia was about to chide him for mocking poor, silly Will, but a glance at the British lord showed that he was deadly serious.

Will hardly needed any encouragement. He seemed, rather, to relish the audience. Especially when Lou took Radu's arm,
as though looking for comfort. Dacia rather thought, though, that she was preventing Radu from punching Will, which seemed unnecessarily dramatic on his part.

“And then,” Will went on with great flair, “when I arrived in Bucharest I was horrified to find that it was too late: I saw your name in the paper, linked to the very family this novelist has seen fit to expose as the monsters that they are!”

“I'm sorry, is any of this supposed to make sense?” Lord Johnny raised an eyebrow. “I'd been hoping for something more concrete.”

“
My father
sent you here?” Radu looked astonished. “Who are you? Did you tell my father about the wolves and the bats?”

“He's Dacia's beau from New York,” Lou said in a low voice.

“Hmm,” Radu said. “Was he prone to hysterics in New York?”

“Hysterics?” Will was indignant. “Am I the only one here concerned for the safety of this delicate beauty?”

“Wait. Stop.” Dacia held up one hand. Will Carver had a very artistic temperament, and she was used to interpreting his sometimes complex sallies. “You read a novel, set in Romania, about a Romanian family who—”

“Are monsters.
Literal
monsters,” Will supplied eagerly as Dacia began to smile. “As well as having the power to summon beasts like wolves and bats. Their name is Dracula.”

Dacia froze.

Everyone on the terrace froze. Lou made a small noise, but otherwise didn't move.

“What do you know about the Draculas?” Radu spoke first, stepping forward. He had one arm around Lou now, and he put
the other around Dacia to move her away from Will. A good head taller than Will, Radu loomed over him, his expression menacing enough to make Will shrink back. Dacia wanted to prod him to make Radu stop, but she was suddenly afraid of her cousin. There was a look in his eyes that told her not to tease him, not now.

“They're, ah, vampires,” Will Carver said in a small voice, and his cheeks colored as though he was finally aware of how ridiculous it all was.

Dacia burst out laughing, a wave of relief rushing over her.

When she was in England she had found a copy of
Carmilla
, the scandalous novel about vampires set in the forests of southern Europe, and read it in her room at night. And as a child she'd heard the old folktales and legends of things that fed on human blood from her Romanian tutor. But Mihai a
vampire
?

She shook her head and laughed again, and for a brief, sweet moment she thought that everything would be all right, that Lady Ioana's treason was only talk, more nonsense taken too seriously. Soon she and Lou would go home without suffering anything more than the humiliation of having a grandmother with a nasty temper.

But Lord Johnny didn't laugh, nor did Radu. And Will looked desperate to prove that he wasn't a fool, so he began to speak again, babbling about dungeons and a Dracula who stole young ladies to feed his horrible appetite.

“He doesn't just
control
the vermin; he can turn himself into a wolf, or a bat, or even a mist,” Will added, as though this last impossibility was the most damning piece of evidence.

Dacia closed her eyes. In the golden afternoon sunlight, standing on the tiled terrace of the ancient castle, Will Carver truly did not seem as dashing and romantic as he had in the drawing rooms of New York. He was wispy, and apparently rather lacking in intelligence. Dacia opened her mouth to say that it was impossible for anyone to turn into a bat, but Lou spoke first.

“The Claw, the Wing, and the Smoke,” she said softly.

Dacia felt the whole world tilt.

Lou turned to Radu and said in a much louder voice, “You will find out what novel this was, and bring me a copy. I am going back to the estate.” And she marched away without looking to see if anyone was following her.

“Agreed,” Lord Johnny said in a strangled voice. “Carver, was it?” He put a comradely arm around Will. “You and I need to talk. Radu, you had better make sure that the young ladies get home safely. And if you can locate a copy of . . . ?”

“
Dracula
, by a Mr. Bram Stoker,” Will said, still sounding embarrassed but trying visibly to rally. “It was just published this year.”

“Yes,
Dracula
. I wouldn't mind having a look at it myself.” Lord Johnny nodded stiffly at Dacia. “I will do my best to see you tomorrow, Miss Vreeholt.”

Dacia could only nod stiffly herself by way of reply. She let Radu take her arm and lead her away. They passed through more whitewashed rooms with dark wood floors, but she didn't see them. Down in the courtyard, Lou was waiting by their carriage.

No one said a word all the way back to the Florescu estate.

 

THE DIARY OF MISS MARIA LOUISA NEULANDER

12 June 1897

I am the Wing.

The king and queen were out driving when Lou and her family arrived at Peles. The housekeeper was only too happy to take them on a tour of the palace, though, starting with the music room and ending with the guest bedrooms, which were rather plain and narrow and linked together in an odd way. Lou admired the glass ceiling of the foyer, and tried to look suitably impressed by the fact that it could be cranked open on sunny days. She peered at the grates that provided heat in the winter or cool air in the summertime, powered by an enormous boiler system down in the cellar, and saw one of the bathrooms with its modern fittings, making small noises of interest over these innovations even though she was feeling sick and anxious.

The royal couple returned, and the palace tour ended abruptly with the Florescus being herded into a room full of antique weapons and left there. Dacia and Radu immediately began exploring the spears and sabers nailed to the walls, but Lou's mother and Aunt Kate looked as though they were going to have fits.

“And they just leave us here, cooling our heels, for who knows how long?” Aunt Kate's face was pinched with displeasure.

“There's not even a chair to sit in,” Maria said by way of agreement.

“We have had this appointment for a week now,” Aunt Kate went on. “They should have at least had the courtesy to be at home when we came.”

“We arrived an hour and a half early,” Dacia pointed out in exasperation. “We wanted to tour the palace, and we did. I don't see how this is some kind of snub.”

Aunt Kate and Lou's mother gave her quelling looks.

Lou didn't even bother to try to soothe them. Just getting up that morning and getting dressed had taken all her energy. She spoke only when she absolutely had to, and couldn't bring herself to eat. Her mother tried to press her, but Aunt Kate had come to her aid and told Maria to leave her alone. Dacia, too, seemed to respect that Lou needed space, though she was normally one to try to jolly people back into good humor.

Of course, Lou reflected, Dacia was dealing with the same shocks that she herself had received, and probably felt much the same. Lou had felt too drained that morning to notice whether Dacia had eaten anything, either.

They had only been in the weapons room for a few minutes when the butler appeared. He led them to an elegant parlor, with a large harp standing before the windows and several brocade sofas. On one of them sat the queen, Elisabeth, a handsome woman wearing a plum-colored gown and a lace veil over her hair. King Carol the First stood near the windows in a green uniform, a book in one hand.

Even Lou, from the depths of her despair, could see that it was a prop. The king wanted to look like he was in the middle of reading a book, even though the book was closed and he was standing, stiff, several paces away from any chairs.

King Carol was afraid of them, Lou realized with a jolt. Did he know of her family's plan? She wondered why he had agreed to see them at all. Was he sizing them up?

“Your Majesties,” Aunt Kate said, curtsying. They all followed suit, except for Radu, who bowed. “Thank you for receiving us.”

“It is our pleasure,” the king said in a voice that was anything but pleased.

He was in his fifties, and had a beard shaped like a coal shovel. Lou found that she pitied him. He was the first king of Romania since the Ottoman Empire had finally been thrown off and the states of Wallachia and Moldova had been united. Many battles had been fought on Romanian soil, sitting as it did between Europe and the Near East, and many more would probably be fought in the future. But for a brief shining moment Romania had triumphed, and there was peace throughout the land. Then here came her family, plotting treason with the Draculas, trying to bring down this stately king and his kind-eyed wife.

And it seemed that the king knew of it.

Queen Elisabeth welcomed them graciously and held out a soft hand. They all lined up to kiss it while Aunt Kate murmured their names.

“My sister Mrs. Maria Louisa Florescu Neulander. Radu Florescu, the son of my brother Horia. My nieces, Maria Louisa Neulander and Dacia Vreeholt, both of New York.”

“Ah, yes, you were born in America,” said King Carol.