Dracul

by Finley Aaron

  He can’t be dead. There’s just no way. I mean, he took a stake to the ribs once and was fine. It missed his heart that time. Surely this stake missed his heart as well.

  Without the stupid weights holding me back, I can actually move freely. I swing my sword at Dracula’s neck.

  He ducks low, laughing, and then sends a volley of sword strikes my way that have me shuffling back in what probably looks like retreat, but it’s really an attempt to not get killed while I try to find the crossbow I dropped a minute ago.

  I glance behind me.

  There it is.

  I block a few of Dracula’s sword strokes and even take a few jabs toward his heart, but it’s all feinting because I’m going to shoot him with the last syringe. The crossbow is on the floor near my foot. I flick it into the air with my toes, catch it with my free hand, block Dracula’s strike, duck behind a big chunk of fallen fan, and attempt to load the syringe into the crossbow, only to discover the string has come loose.

  I don’t have time to restring the crossbow.

  There’s a stake five feet from me.

  Dracula is swinging his sword in a manner that suggests he doesn’t care if he takes me dead or alive, though I suppose if he really wanted me dead I’d be done by now. Still, as I lunge for the stake, blocking blows as I go, Dracula uses the tip of his sword to pull the hilt from my hand.

  He slices my hand with his blade, and my sword clatters to the floor.

  But at the same instant, my other hand closes around the stake, and I whip around, driving it furiously home through his heart.

  I don’t even wait for him to evaporate before I leap back toward Constantine.

  Constantine hasn’t evaporated. That’s a good sign, right? Because vampires evaporate when they die, so he can’t be dead, right?

  Except that he’s a dragon-turned-vampire, so who knows? Maybe that’s different.

  He’s not breathing.

  I pull the stake from his heart. I’m ready to try to stop the flow of blood with my purse or something, but no blood flows out.

  His heart is no longer beating.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  “Constantine?” My heart feels like it’s stopped, too. I can hardly make words come out.

  He can’t be dead. He can’t. I mean, he’s lived almost six hundred years, why die now?

  No, no, he’s cheated death before. He was buried alive and it didn’t kill him, not all the way. He can’t be dead.

  One of my tears splashes through the big slice in Constantine’s shirt, and runs like a tiny river to the hole in his heart.

  Then I remember.

  Tears!

  Dragon tears!

  My mom brought my dad back to life with them, once. Okay, so technically my dad wasn’t actually dead when that happened, but still. Dragon tears have amazing healing properties.

  I use my open palms to scoop all the running tears from my cheeks, and then I tip my fingers so the tears run in rivulets down into Constantine’s heart.

  This has to work.

  It has to.

  I’m sobbing and blubbering and probably making some pretty goofy-sounding promises about how if he comes back to life I’ll get him all the rotisserie chickens he wants, and play blackjack at every casino in the world and he doesn’t have to translate anything for me, ever, unless he likes translating in which case that’s cool, too.

  And I dump a bunch of tears into his heart, along with blood from the slice on my hand, but that’s just going to have to be okay because there’s nothing I can do about it now. Anyway I’m careful not to get any of his blood on me, because of the vampire thing and all.

  How long I’m like that, crying and making promises I’ll never get the chance to keep, I don’t know, but the whole time, Constantine lies completely still and doesn’t move and doesn’t breathe and his heart doesn’t beat.

  And then the fallen fan behind me makes some threatening sparks and part of it collapses with a bang, and I remember that I’m still inside the mountain and Lombard is down a hallway somewhere and might regain consciousness at any moment unless I actually killed him, and as far as that goes, I’m not even one hundred percent sure Dracula is dead, because after all he’s a demon, not a vampire, and I don’t know what the rules are with stakes through the heart for demons, but I don’t see him around anymore so he either turned to dust or crawled away to nurse his injuries and get his revenge another day, not that I really care either way because Constantine is dead.

  But I do need to get out of here.

  Constantine is dead, and I need to get out of here before I get captured or killed.

  I promised Felix I’d meet him at the castle.

  So I kiss Constantine one last time on the lips, and then I wait a few seconds longer in case maybe the kiss is the magical thing that will bring him back to life, but it doesn’t, which I knew it wouldn’t, but I still sort of hoped, you know?

  And then I fly away and sob the entire way to the castle in Romania.

  Felix is relieved to see me when I finally arrive. And though he’s sympathetic about Constantine’s death, he’s pragmatic about it, too.

  “He was a vampire. You’re a dragon. It’s better this way.”

  And even though I know he’s right, I’m still not happy about it.

  The only good news (and it’s bittersweet good news, because it seems so trivial now) is that I actually have the book The Life of Vlad Dracula, the Impaler, by Bogdan Dobrescu, translated into English by Melita Thorne.

  And Felix has The Book of the Wisdom of the Magi, which the original Vlad Dracula stole from the sultan, and which Felix took from Dracula’s son. It’s in all sorts of ancient Persian, Arabic, and Turkic dialects, which are completely indecipherable to me, and even with my brother’s love of foreign languages, will take him a long time to translate.

  Which is actually kind of reassuring to me, because I don’t really want him figuring out how to make gold on account of all that power could go to his head.

  I spend the next day recovering and eating whatever we can hunt, and then Felix flies home to tell our parents all about our adventures, and I fly back to Montana because Spring Break is almost over and I have a paper to write.

  And I write it.

  It’s a great paper. I don’t reveal anything too groundbreaking about Vlad Dracula, but my professor still asks to see Melita’s book, so I’m glad I have it. And I get an A on my paper, which is all I really wanted in the beginning.

  But even when I get my final grades as I’m cleaning out the house with my parents, who flew over to sign the papers to sell it (there were no more bats, so there was no infestation to ruin the sale price, so even with market fluctuations, we did okay on the sale), I can’t help breaking down in tears.

  “Those don’t look like happy tears,” my mom observes. She can see the grade report in my hands, so she knows I did a fabulous job academically, so she’s understandably a bit bewildered.

  “It wasn’t worth it,” I explain, choking back the sobs I really should have learned to contain by now. “Constantine died.”

  I’ve told them the whole story, so they know.

  “He was really old,” my dad tells me, using pretty much the exact same tone and words he used when my favorite dog died.

  “I know,” I admit, not because being old makes death okay, but because I know I won’t get anywhere trying to explain myself. “I just miss him. He’s been gone longer than I knew him, but I still miss him. I miss him so much.”

  My parents exchange glances, and my dad sighs.

  “We weren’t going to tell you this, but we’re planning to stop at the castle in Romania on the way home.”

  “I don’t think I want to go there again,” I confess.

  “You loved that place more than any of us did,” Mom insists. “And we want you to have happy memories, so we invited all your siblings to come for a graduation reception.”

  “What?”

  “It was going to b
e a surprise,” Dad admits. “But maybe you need to know, so you have something to look forward to.”

  “Yes.” I sniff back my tears and try to smile, because I know they’re trying to make me happy. “Thank you.” They wrap me in a big hug and I’m grateful.

  I’m grateful they’re here with me. I’m grateful they care.

  But my heart is still heavy as we fly toward home. In fact, I’m almost afraid to see the castle again, because that is where Constantine promised he’d meet me, and yes, I know Felix and I spent the day there when we recovered from our narrow escape from Lombard’s lair, but still.

  How can I be happy at Constantine’s castle when Constantine isn’t there?

  We land in the courtyard, and my siblings burst from various rooms and shout “Surprise!”

  And for a while there’s only laughter and hugging, and I can’t believe how much my niece and nephew have grown, or how much their bright faces cheer my heavy heart.

  It’s good to be here with my family.

  Felix is the last one to step forward for a hug, but it’s only a one-armed hug, because he’s still holding The Book of the Wisdom of the Magi.

  “Have you been holding that for the last two months?”

  “Just about.” There’s something guarded in his face, something uncertain.

  “What is it?”

  “I translated a passage,” he admits. “I want to read to you what I learned.”

  For reasons I don’t entirely understand, my heart starts thumping crazily. Maybe it’s the look on Felix’s face, or the way my entire family has gotten completely silent, like we’re at a funeral or something.

  “Okay. Read it to me.”

  “I’ve had this translation triple checked by ancient language experts,” Felix explains. “I wanted to be sure I didn’t misunderstand.”

  I nod, urging him to hurry up, but my heart is ramming so hard inside my throat, I don’t know if I can speak.

  “This comes shortly after the part about how a vampire’s blood can bring someone back from the brink of death, but only at the cost of turning them into a vampire.” Felix clears his throat and reads clearly. “It has been substantiated in three cases, three being the perfect number for certainty, without deviation, that when a dragon that has been changed to a vampire dies or is on the threshold of death, if that vampire, once a dragon, receives in his heart the fresh blood of a dragon, he shall be restored, not just to life, but to the full stature of a dragon. Witnesses have testified and our experiments have demonstrated without fail that such dragons no longer bear any traits of a vampire, but only those of a dragon, and their progeny are not those of a vampire, but those of a dragon.”

  I’m weeping by the end of it, and biting my hand to keep from screaming, and shaking my head. “If I had known that, I could have saved Constantine.”

  “But you did.”

  The voice comes from behind me.

  It’s Constantine’s voice.

  But it can’t be Constantine’s voice. For one thing, it’s daylight right now, and the courtyard is filled with sunshine.

  I spin around, and he’s standing there, his face flushed with more color than I’ve ever seen on him.

  “You’re not—” I stammer. “You were dead.”

  “I was.” He steps toward me.

  My family clears a path, and I approach Constantine cautiously. I have never seen him in sunlight because he was always a vampire before. I reach out a tentative hand and touch his cheek.

  It’s warm.

  There’s a scar on his forehead where Drake or Dracula’s blade cut him during that final fight.

  Just like Dracula’s blade cut my hand…and I bled, and it mixed with my tears and fell into his open wound, just the way The Book of the Wisdom of the Magi said it needed to in order to make him a dragon again.

  “You’re alive?”

  “Completely alive. No longer undead.” He pulls me into his arms.

  For a long time I hug him—just hug him. But then I pull back and ask, “Why didn’t anyone tell me sooner?”

  “It took me a week to get back here,” Constantine admits sheepishly. “I really was almost dead. And then I had to track down your brother, and we tried to sort out what happened.”

  Felix jumps in, “And even once we found the relevant passage and translated it, we had to make sure we didn’t misunderstand the passage. I mean, Vlad Dracula had this book all those years, and he married that Hungarian princess who was a dragon, so he had access to dragon blood. So why didn’t he just…fix his brother?”

  I look from Felix to Constantine.

  The answer is clear on Constantine’s face, but he still speaks the bitter words out loud. “He had the power to restore me, but he chose not to. In my dragon form, I would have been a threat to him—more powerful, and possibly, in the eyes of the people, a more competent leader.”

  Having watched Constantine show mercy to his brother’s descendants, Vlad’s betrayal stings all the more. I shake my head apologetically. “That’s so selfish.”

  Constantine nods. “I did not want to believe he would make that choice. Initially, I distrusted our translation, though its truth seemed evident in what had happened to me.”

  Felix adds, “That’s why we consulted so many linguistic experts, just to be sure. I couldn’t have you marrying him if he was still part vampire.”

  My dad adds, “Your mother and I knew of the preliminary translation, but we agreed not to tell you anything until they had it independently confirmed. This is the first we heard for sure and certain he’s a full-blooded dragon again.”

  I’m nodding dumbly through Dad’s explanation, but my mind is still stuck on one word Felix used.

  Marry.

  Constantine must be able to see it on my face, because he grins. “Will you marry me?”

  I’m feeling overwhelmed and somewhat emotionally conflicted—and maybe a little bit stunned speechless.

  “You still owe me three more weekends of gambling,” Constantine points out with a teasing grin. He’s way too cute when he smiles. “We could combine those with the honeymoon. It might be fun. What do you say?”

  “By rights I ought to slug you for letting me think you were dead.”

  “I was dead,” Constantine defends himself. “But you can slug me if it will make you feel better.”

  How can I hold a grudge against this guy? “I’d rather marry you,” I admit.

  My entire family starts cheering and Constantine kisses me, and then guess what?

  We get married.

  Not that very second, but about an hour later, after I’ve had time to take a bath (there’s still no running water at his castle, but Constantine figured I’d want to clean up, so he had water boiled and ready for the tub).

  And I wear my sparkly blue dress that matches my soul, because I left it at the castle after my last visit and Constantine had it washed and ready to go, although he didn’t mend the leg slit.

  First he says it’s because he can’t mend.

  Then he says it’s because he likes it that way.

  So I slug him.

  But not very hard. And then I kiss him.

  And my sisters do my hair and my mom does my makeup, and I might have kind of fallen asleep while my eyes were closed for the eyeshadow because did I mention I just flew across the Atlantic earlier?

  Well I did.

  Then we get married.

  And it turns out there’s a big feast ready in the dining room, with tons of food and plates and cups and everything (except silverware—I mean, it’s a celebration, why not act like it?). And then my sister-in-law Nia gets out a set of hand drums and starts playing and singing, and we all dance until my feet hurt.

  Constantine feels bad that my feet hurt, so he carries me up to his tower, the one place in the castle I’ve never seen before, and it’s really cool up there with exposed beams and stone walls and books and huge windows that look out over the mountains of Romania in every direction.


  And I love it.

  And he loves that I love it.

  He loves me.

  And I love him.

  THE END

  Dear Reader,

  I hope you enjoyed the fifth installment in the Dragon Eye series. There is one final book remaining, told from the point of view of the youngest of the Melikov siblings, Felix. Its title is Basilisk, and I have an exclusive sneak peak of the first two chapters here for you.

  There is also another related series I’m working on. It’s called The Lost Dragons, and the first book in that series is called Foundlings. You can find an excerpt of Foundlings at the end of the e-book edition of Vixen, the fourth book in the Dragon Eye series. The Lost Dragons series takes place in the same world as the Dragon Eye series, but it actually takes place in a slightly earlier time period. You could think of it as a sort of prequel to the Dragon Eye books.

  Thank you so much for joining me on this journey! As always, I’m delighted to hear from readers. You can sign up for my newsletter on my website, www.finleyaaron.com. I’m also hugely thrilled when readers take the time to leave reviews of my books. Thank you to all of you who’ve done so. Readers like you make this journey worth it.

  Tremendous thanks,

  Finley

  As promised, we’ll now join Felix for a peak of Basilisk:

  Chapter One

  Four years.

  It’s been four years since I recovered the Book of the Wisdom of the Magi from the Alpine cave of the evil mad scientist Jean Lombard, a.k.a. Hans Wexler. It’s been almost five years since my sister destroyed Wexler’s lab—the place where he used to make yagi.

  And yet, in those four years, I have yet to crack the code. I’ve translated the entire book, parts of it multiple times over in case I missed anything the first few times, but I still don’t know how to make gold. I have the secrets of the magi, but I don’t know the secrets of the magi.

  There is a difference.

  Depressing as all that is, it gets worse.

  You see, that lab my sister destroyed? Wexler used it to make yagi, which are creepy soulless dragon-tracking mutant crossbred creatures, half cockroach, half mercenary soldier. With the lab destroyed, we no longer have to fear yagi. For the first time in my life, I and my family members can travel freely without worrying about yagi coming upon us and killing us as they killed my grandmother and other innocent dragons.