Mrs. Dracula: Vampire Anthology

by Logan Keys

  This country will be different, though.

  I will be different.

  I will be the girl I once was, before I became a woman, before I was sold like chattel for land rights.

  When I was in Russia, I found ways to keep apprised of the world; it helped that I had powerful connections, that I surrounded myself with those of influence. It saddens me that I have just arrived in Uganda, formally Buganda because the British decided the ‘b’ wasn’t necessary, after the blood-wars between the religious sects. Protestants. Catholics. Muslims. They all had to be right, had to have their version of religion dominate and deemed the only truth. Being what I am, I do not usually spend time musing about a higher ordinance. Oft times when I do so, I am left knowing I will not be welcomed within any afterlife that is good and kind. Still, though, I feel I should have abandoned Russia earlier, for these fairer pastures and, then, I would not have missed the mouth-watering bloodshed between the faithfuls.

  Again, I find that my mouth is watering, this time threatening to spill from between my lips despite how tightly I seal them.

  The village is over the next ridge. I can feel the vibrations of sound and life and the sharp cacophony of a group of drums that has begun to beat, beat, beat, like the pulse of this place is its own person, its own body. The tone of the voices, as I come closer to the village, is cheerful. I do not think I will find the evil here that I crave. But I am so hungry; it makes it hard to remember my new pact to walk a different path.

  So very hungry.

  I can feel my skin beginning to dry, though I cannot see it yet, not beyond the dryness I have affected to fit my story. It is there, though, like an unseen tightening, a pulling of flesh and bone. It reminds me of a specialty treatment in Russia for the face that employed clay and oils. It was the fashion, a gift from Alexander to keep his ‘mistress looking lovely’. I can remember how it sounds in Russia, what Alexander had said in regards to the gift. His lovely mistress. It had not been a beautiful noise. I’ve never found the Russian language lovely though.

  I am not noticed at first; the village is teeming with activity. I am but a face in the crowd.

  There is a moment where I feel something familiar. I cannot place it and the sensation is gone so very quickly that I am sure it has been a figment of my mind. I try to focus on it, try to find it again, but am interrupted. I have been seen.

  A little girl is pointing at me. She is clinging to her mother’s breast, her face half hidden in the wild wonderfulness of her own hair. “Mama,” she says quietly. And the mother turns, her mouth opening at the sight of me. “Bitalo! Bitalo!” The woman turns from me, looking for someone. A man comes forward quickly, wearing robes so bright and white that he is the sun floated down to Earth, decided to stay a while. His head is unadorned, his chest weighted down with a necklace of golden plates, and he carries a large, roughhewn staff that looks to be made of ivory.

  “Help her,” he speaks in a deep, rich voice full of yesteryear. Like the small child, he points, instead directing his finger towards a structure with walls that looks made of dried mud and a roof that is crafted from straw-like material. It reminds me of thatched roofs in the Russian countryside. But those have walls of timber.

  In moments, I am lifted from the ground by a strong-looking youth whose hair is cut so short that his head is a deep, ebony mirror. I expect him to look at me the way other men have, but he does not. His mouth is a hard, unexpressive line. His eyes flash to my face only once, and those carry concern versus lust. It is hard to react to this, as I have long been accustomed to attracting a certain sort of attention.

  But I am not that woman here, I remind myself. Here, I am a starved girl, a victim of the remnants of war. I flutter my hands above my stomach, above my nakedness. I am keenly aware of my body at this moment, as he cradles me against his athletic form.

  Soon, we are passing into the thatched-roof building and he is setting me down upon a mattress of more thatched, dried grass with a covering made of animal skin. That covering is soft against my dry skin that has quickly tendered in the heat and sun. Without being asked to, the youth retrieves a second covering and places it across my body. I whisper ‘thank you’ and he nods, only now allowing a modicum of distress to pass like a ghost across his face before he spirits himself out of the edifice.

  The one called Bitalo comes in next. He brings the sunny outdoors inside with him, his robe glowing for a while before calming down in the dimness of the interior setting. “You have been through much, it appears.” He moves to me slowly, a bowl in his hand. When he is kneeling beside me, he tilts the bowl to dribble water into my mouth. I try not to spit it up. There are few things now that taste vile to me, but water is one of them. My body still needs it, still craves it, but it will only accept this nourishment through the vessel of blood. I force myself to accept the offering, force my face to not contort in disgust. I manage, somewhat, and hope he takes my reaction for exhaustion and painful thirst.

  “There, slowly.” Bitalo turns and hands the bowl to a woman behind him. She is tall and lithe with uncovered breasts and a belly that speaks of late pregnancy. “This is my wife, Dembe. She is a healer.”

  Vlad once told me that there is nothing so rich as that of a pregnant woman’s blood; that the presence of the baby creates a world of new tastes. “It is as if the blood has never actually been alive before, but now it is, swarming within the mother’s veins to help her child grow and develop. You must try it, my goddess.” I can see him, standing over the woman he’d just fed on, crimson wetness soaking the beautiful silk of his dressing robe. I can see his hand curling elegantly to beckon me forward. I’d refused a taste— a modicum of my humanity momentarily resurfacing.

  Seeing Dembe though, standing there with a small, reassuring smile on her face, all I can think of is how badly I want to sink my teeth into her lovely, chocolate-hued neck.

  “Thank you,” I say for a second time, my voice a tad stronger, and I feel my mouth finally water past the point of containment.

  “You have not eaten or satisfied your thirst in a long time, have you?” Dembe takes her husband’s place and gently wipes at my mouth with a maroon-dyed cloth. “You must take it slow or your body will reject.” A new person has arrived and I realize it is the young woman who’d been arguing with her mother on the path earlier. She is carrying a small bucket and another cloth. “We will bathe you,” Dembe says, “and, then, when you have rested, we will feed your belly.”

  I reach out, without thinking, and rest my withered hand on her stomach. “Life is beautiful,” I breathe out, my voice almost catching in my throat. “Beautiful and must always be fed.”

  Dembe says nothing for a moment and I remove my hand from her swollen stomach, feeling the sort of shyness more suited to my younger, human years. Perhaps seeing the introversion in my face, Dembe reaches for the hand I’ve removed and she wraps her much larger fingers around mine. “Life is everywhere, even hidden in the darkest places. And, yes, it must always be fed. Often in unpleasant ways.” That last sentence… it as if she is seeing into my core, to the very parts of me I have so recently decided to abandon.

  I wonder if she thinks I have been musing about my false past, talking about life and feeding. I wonder if she thinks my mind rests along the path of my perceived abuses and the starvation that my body speaks of. She would not speak so kindly to me if she knew what actually drove my words— a hunger that will not be satisfied by the sort of food she means me to eat, a hunger that has me eyeing her belly with absolute and voracious longing. It is a hunger that urges me to realize that I cannot be different than what I am; I cannot find a sense of righteous justice in this blood lust that is carved into every corner of me. I am what Vlad made me. No, I am what I wanted him to make me.

  When I drift into sleep, I dream for the first time in as long as I can remember. I dream of Vlad, of him who brought me into this life.

  I was married again. This time, the service had been in a church with wit
nesses. Everything proper and according to the traditions of the era and predominant faith. Then, I had not realized that all involved had been forced into participation through Vlad’s gift of compulsion. I don’t think it would have mattered to me though, had I realized. I knew what he was. I’d embraced it fully. He’d shown me more compassion, respect, and joy in a few months than I’d known my entire life.

  He’d been married before, of course he had. In all of his many, many decades of living, he’d not been alone perpetually. But I was the first he’d chosen to change. I was the first who became as he was. It was a privilege. It was as if Vlad was saying that I was not human property for him to hold within his never-aging, eternal grasp. I was not just a toy for him to bat around across the hardwoods like a cat with a mouse.

  I’d ingested his blood before the wedding. Vlad had assured me it wouldn’t hurt; it would be like falling asleep, he’d said.

  And it was. He’d kissed me lightly on the forehead and laid my body down against the coolest, silkiest sheets I’d ever felt. I’d been so weak since he’d brought me back from the church, in a horse-drawn covered carriage no less with red rose petals strewn about the royal blue interior carpeting. A transport fit for a queen. A goddess.

  The last thing I remembered seeing were his storm-grey eyes, the way they’d almost flashed white in the candle light. And his hair that was even paler, like a dove’s feathers. He was stunning.

  And he’d chosen me.

  When I’d woken from that long, changeling sleep, he’d had a bounty awaiting me. Gorgeous women dressed in the finest gowns, expertly tailored to trim their waists and plump their breasts like perfectly-ripened fruit. And there were handsome men in high-necked frilly shirts, already unbuttoned to reveal sculpted chests. They’d all stood, ready and waiting, transfixed. Their attentions were for solely me; as if I were the most intoxicating creature any of them had ever seen. Vlad said that I was; he’d shown me the changes in the mirror. That was the moment he’d coined me ‘his goddess’. Lengths of silver-white hair trailed down my back. Grey eyes with golden flecks shone like polished stones. Skin the color of fresh-fallen snow seemed to glow despite the low lighting.

  Angelic.

  Yet, so the opposite. So dangerous.

  The rapture of killing those first men and women was unlike anything ever known to me before. Vlad had held me tightly against him, the blood coursing like a waterfall between our two forms. We’d become slick with it, navigating one another’s bodies like a great and vast sea, with no horizon and no limitations. He’d kissed me so deeply that I thought I might combust with the pressure of it all. In that moment, forever was the most wondrous notion.

  Forever.

  Forever ended too fast for my liking. Vlad had promised it wasn’t the end though. He’d promised to find me again one day. Now, I’m not so sure I want that.

  “Why does she look like that?” A child’s voice floats to me, carried across time into my dream.

  “That is what happens to the body without food and water, Mwana.” A gentle hand strokes my forehead, rubbing something cool and pungent across my skin. “She will be a new person once she is strong again.”

  “How can she be a new person? We are what we are? That is what Bitalo says.”

  “We can all be new, whenever we choose, Mwana. Perhaps not in body, but in spirit.”

  I shift, so that they know I am waking up. I’m not sure why I do so, why I so long to have them stop talking about becoming new, but I do.

  “She’s waking, Kato. Go get Dembe.”

  “Yes, mama.”

  Opening my eyes just a slit, I see a figure, no taller than that of an average seven year old, scurrying out of the building. The open doorway reveals that it is night time. The air here is clear and even from my position lying down, I can see the stars twinkling like fresh promises against the black blanket of evening sky. Inside, the space is slightly smoky from the small fire burning in the center of the room. I find that the sight of it causes perspiration to dew across my forehead.

  Moments later, a cool damp cloth is swiping away the sweat and the pungent scent is borne anew.

  “It is warm tonight. The sun clings to the earth. I even hear the animals asking the night to cool.” It’s Dembe’s voice. The other woman is gone. Did I fall asleep again? Why should a goddess need sleep? It is because I have been too long outside Vlad’s influence. I never needed sleep whilst with him. A demoness… no, a goddess… should not need sleep. I am hot, boiling it feels like.

  “I’m so hot,” I whisper out, lifting my right hand to fan warm air across my face.

  “Yes, it is.” Dembe smiles softly. With one hand, she continues to move water across my body, with the other, she rubs her hand in circular motion across her stomach. “I’m ready to have this baby,” she hums, looking down. “It is too warm to be so heavy.”

  “You’re so fortunate.” Again, I’ve spoken and I do not know why I’ve said what I have said. I only know that it needs saying. Why is she lucky? Because… “I will never know what it is like to carry a child. To be a mother.”

  Her hand stops moving the damp cloth across my skin. “You are still so young. You will have your chance. Do not despair when there is no cause.”

  I look away from her because I can feel dampness building in my eyes. The tears will not be human tears, not clear wet things running tracks down my cheeks. No, they will be lines of blood, proof of what I am. Looking at the wall of the building, I control myself. I think of anything that will defeat the emotions. It only takes a few moments, precious seconds delving into those worst, hidden-away memories from my former life, to become calm once more.

  Silence wraps around us, as if the smoke from the fire is reaching out with purposeful fingers to stifle sound.

  I fall asleep again and, this time, I do not wake until it is bright and shining morning.

  Today is a new day.

  A new country.

  New life.

  The first thing I set eyes on when I am awake is Dembe and the growing child within her stomach. And I realize that I cannot stay here with these people, that there is nothing for me here if I truly wish to walk a different path through eternity. There is no one here that deserves the pain I will bring, with my presence, with my purpose. I will leave only terror in my wake, despite my keen desire to be peaceable.

  “Here, eat.” Dembe is next to me again, kneeling on the floor, offering me a bowl of a substance that looks like a paste of crushed herbs, grains, and greens. She curls two of her fingers and scoops up a small portion, gesturing her hand towards my mouth. When she thinks I am confused, she pushes the food into her mouth. “See, eat.”

  I take the bowl from her, push my fingers into the muddy texture, and sniff at it before taking a tentative lick. It isn’t bad; there is even something appealing about it. “What is it?” I ask, before taking a full bite.

  “Ugali. A type of porridge. There’s medicine though, things you need.”

  “Medicine?”

  “Herbs mostly. Plant oils. Things to make your body, your insides, strong again.” She makes a motion with her hands as if to say ‘keep eating’. And I do.

  I eat the rest of the food, curious why this dish, unlike any other dish since my changing, seems to actually be providing a sense of nourishment. Without willing my body to change, I can feel the effects of the feeding, like the ugali is plumping up my skin in the most unexpected, life-affirming way. Like I am not what I am, but human, tethered to a mortal thread and living under the reality that someday my cord will be snipped with golden shears.

  When the bowl is empty, Dembe hands me another bowl filled with water. I drink it slowly, waiting for the taste to make me gag, but it only tastes mildly unpleasant.

  “Here, I’ve brought you some clothing.” She sets folded lengths of burnt orange cloth onto the floor mattress.

  Looking at the intricate way her skirts are weaved, the way they are wrapped up around her breasts and braided ba
ck down in a waterfall of effortless-looking folds, I realize I have no idea how to dress myself. This is a language of cotton and dye, not words.

  “Can you help me, please?” I’m a bit embarrassed having to ask.

  “Of course.” Dembe takes me by the arms and helps me into a standing position. I realize then that I should probably ask to use the restroom soon, as a person would do. I stand as still as I can, whilst also feigning dizziness. She moves the length of soft, dyed material around my body until it is a perfect frame for my dark skin. It hides my withered curves quite effectively. “There, you are a vision.”

  I wish for a mirror, the full length ones so common in well-dressed Russian homes, to see if I am truly what she says. A vision. It’s silly, unnecessary. I know what I look like. I can close my eyes and see my appearance in vivid, unavoidable color. I have enough vanity left in me, however, to want to see my body the way that Dembe does.

  “Are you strong enough to walk? Fresh air would do you good.” Not waiting for my response, Dembe begins to move me forward, towards the light and noise of activity outside. When we exit, several young girls approach us. They are holding chains made of large yellow beads and single stem flowers with bright orange-red petals. The necklaces are over my head and resting against my chest in flashes of fast, joyous color. The orange flowers are tucked into my hair until I wear a floral crown. They welcome me like a visiting noble, versus a lost and starved girl.

  I can stay here.

  I can live here.

  Make a home. A real place where I belong.

  I twirl, laughing along with the children. It makes me actually dizzy, no feigning necessary.

  “Careful.” Dembe’s voice is full of joy. “You’ll fall.”

  “What is your name?” A small boy asks, tugging at the folds of my new skirt.