Son of the Dragon

by Victor T Foia

  COPYRIGHT NOTICE

  Dracula Chronicles

  Book One: Son of the Dragon

  By: Victor T. Foia

  Second Kindle Edition

  Published by: Dracula Press, LLC

  www.draculachronicles.com info@draculachronicles.com

  Cover artwork by Justin T. Foia

  Editors: Arlene W. Robinson and Terry Lee Robinson

  The image of the dragon on the cover property of Bayerisches Nationalmuseum

  Reproduced with permission based on a slightly modified image of Inv. No T 3792,

  “Badge of the Order of the Dragon”

  Copyright © 2012 and 2014 by Victor T. Foia

  All rights reserved

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication

  may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted,

  in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or

  otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the

  above publisher of this book.

  ISBN-13 (paperback edition only): 978-1475192339

  ISBN-10 (paperback edition only): 1475192339

  Library of Congress Control Number (paperback edition only): 2012922681

  QED stands for Quality, Excellence and Design. The QED seal of approval shown here verifies that this eBook has passed a rigorous quality assurance process and will render well in most eBook reading platforms.

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  For Diane

  Whose love, trust, and support made this book possible

  Son of the Dragon

  Book One of The Dracula Chronicles

  by

  Victor T. Foia

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  MAPS OF THE DRACULA CHRONICLES

  CHAPTER 1: God’s Messenger

  CHAPTER 2: A Long Awaited Day

  CHAPTER 3: Satan’s Wrath

  CHAPTER 4: An Unwanted Trophy

  CHAPTER 5: A Surprising Discovery

  CHAPTER 6: Call of the Prophecy

  CHAPTER 7: Butterfly in the Snow

  CHAPTER 8: A Whimsical Gatekeeper

  CHAPTER 9: You will not Fear the Terror of the Night

  CHAPTER 10: Come for the Feast, Stay for the Fight

  CHAPTER 11: Threats and Promises

  CHAPTER 12: Many Called, Few Chosen

  CHAPTER 13: A Parade of Winners and Losers

  CHAPTER 14: Death in Eisenmarkt

  CHAPTER 15: Dar al-Harb, The House of War

  CHAPTER 16: The Power of Greed

  CHAPTER 17: Evil in the Forest

  CHAPTER 18: The Ransom Note

  CHAPTER 19: Dangerous Fortunetellers

  CHAPTER 20: The Small Royal Council

  CHAPTER 21: The Faces of Lust

  CHAPTER 22: On the Trail of the Raiders

  CHAPTER 23: The End of the Raid

  CHAPTER 24: Sweet Basil and Honey

  CHAPTER 25: The Noose Tightens

  CHAPTER 26: The Justice of the Sword

  CHAPTER 27: Buried in a Foreign Land

  CHAPTER 28: The Loss of a Friend

  CHAPTER 29: Do no Good Deed to an Evil Man

  CHAPTER 30: Friends and Enemies

  CHAPTER 31: The King’s Deception

  CHAPTER 32: Dar al Islam

  THE JOURNEY CONTINUES

  GLOSSARY

  WHO IS WHO AND WHAT IS WHAT

  THE STORY WORLD OF THE DRACULA CHRONICLES

  HOUSES OF THE DRACULA CHRONICLES

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Maps of The Dracula Chronicles

  Southeast Europe & Asia Minor in the time of Dracula

  Balkan Space in the time of Dracula

  Wallachia in the time of Dracula

  Transylvania in the time of Dracula

  Constantinople in the time of Dracula

  CHAPTER 1: God’s Messenger

  March 1353

  Theodore knew King Alexander’s men would come for him as soon as the worst of Wallachia’s winter was over. In March, even though the ground was still frozen, the angel told him to be ready. He recognized the moment had arrived the morning he saw the sun break through the clouds for the first time in weeks. He began immediately to rummage the family’s wooden coffer for some footwear. His parents, though accustomed by now to Theodore’s quirky behavior, watched silent and troubled while he took out a pair of new bark opinch. Father had made them for Theodore’s upcoming twelfth name day.

  “The time hasn’t yet come to wear them, Theodore,” his father said, gruff. He was an old man with few teeth, and a beard not trimmed since the onset of winter. “Great Lent is still a ways off.”

  “I mustn’t go poorly shod in front of the king,” Theodore said. He held the opinch up to the opening that served as the cottage’s window. In the pale light diffused through the stretched pig’s bladder covering the hole, the birch-tree bark that made the opinch’s soles and uppers shone creamy white.

  “I won’t let them take you away, Theo,” his mother said, voice aquiver. “Not in this cold.” Yet she proceeded to help Theodore get ready for the king. Taking a pair of foot wrappers from the coffer, she kneeled in front of him and tugged at his shirt to make him sit on a stool.

  “The angel told me I won’t be back for Lent,” he said. His mother began to weep. “But don’t worry about me, Mother. He also said everything that will happen is the will of God.”

  “Nothing would be happening if your mother didn’t blabber around the village about you and your stupid visions,” his father said, giving his mother a venomous look. “And anyway, why couldn’t God choose another messenger? Why not one of the miller’s boys? He’s got five of them, when I’ve got only one.”

  “Don’t say such things, Husband.” Theo’s mother crossed herself. “You know it’s a sin to question God’s plans.”

  “Mother’s right, Father.” Theodore leaned over and kissed her on top of her head. She was only twelve years older than Theodore, and he felt as protective of her as if she were his sister.

  “Maybe the king’s men won’t come.” His father spit onto the dirt floor. “Better yet, maybe the wolves will kill them on the way here.”

  “The angel said to be ready today, Father. No wolves can go against the will of God.”

  “For not having any schooling, Son, you sound more like a priest than Father Ignatius in his sober days. Why, before you know it, you’ll be reading and writing like a—”

  “Leave the boy alone, Husband,” his mother said. “He’s been chosen by God because he’s a good boy, and—”

  The back of the old man’s bony hand landed with a whack on her nape. She tumbled to the floor and whimpered.

  “I need the boy here for spring weeding,” his father shouted, and then he kicked her. “I don’t need him loafing about the king’s court like the son of some rich man with gold to waste.”

  Terrified, Theodore waited for him to calm down before he helped his mother rise. She gave Theodore a grateful look, and then swathed his feet and calves with the foot wrappers. Next she laced the opinch, winding the leather thongs around his legs up to his knees.

  “There,” she said, with a sigh that clawed at Theodore’s heart. “If you don’t get them wet, you’ll be fine until you come home—”

  “The angel said I’ll never again work in the field with you, Father.”

  “What nonsense is that?” His father stood, fists clenched. “You think the king’s going to keep you as his pet, seeing as you’re on speaking terms with the Almighty?”

  “You blaspheme again, Husband.” As she said this, Theodore’
s mother cowered and raised her hand in defense. But the blow she anticipated didn’t come. As the old man lifted his hand at her, the tip of a lance tore through the pig’s bladder in the window with the crack of a bullwhip, and a shaft of bright sunlight shot through the hut. The sounds came next, of horses as they snorted and pranced about in front of the hut, breaking dry twigs under the snow with loud pops.

  “Is the child Theodore in there?” a deep voice growled from outside.

  “Here Theodore,” his mother whispered, frantic, “wrap yourself in this sheepskin, and don’t lose it, or your father—”

  “What do you want with my son?” his father shouted through the window in a bellicose tone. “And who’s going to pay for a new pig’s bladder?”

  “Come out here, vermin, and I’ll pay you on the spot,” the same voice said. Other riders laughed.

  “I’m whom you seek,” Theodore said, stepping out into the yard. He squinted in the harsh light at the four riders, whose mounts blew clouds of steam through distended nostrils. “You must leave my father alone, or the king will punish you when I tell him of your behavior.”

  The man who seemed to be the leader said, with a chortle, “Listen to the seer, boys. The little shit’s on good terms with both God and the king. Get hold of him, Ilie, and don’t lose him in the snow, or we’ll have to replace him with a bear turd just as big.”

  As Theodore was carried away, he threw a glance back over his shoulder. The angel had said he wouldn’t see his home or parents again. The image of his mother, standing in the doorway, fists pressed to her lips, imprinted itself forever in his mind. But not that of his father. The old man had withdrawn into the darkness of the hut.

  “When was the first time you heard voices, Theodore?” the fat priest asked. He leaned over the table to glare at Theodore, and his tall hat appeared ready to topple. Theodore stopped chewing the piece of bread he’d just stuffed into his mouth. He glanced around the room the men called the Council Chamber, and saw servants with mocking faces lined along the walls. He noted none of them wore the opinch of the simple folk, but had winter felt boots. Overcome by shyness, he glanced at the blond-haired man whose servant had brought him the food, and who seemed friendlier than the priest.

  “Let the poor child eat, Father,” the friendly man said, patting Theodore on the head. “I’m Ghenadios Alba, His Majesty’s Lord Treasurer. You’ll be in my care, child, and you’ll tell me everything when you’re good and ready. Won’t you?”

  Theodore resumed chewing; he had never tasted anything this good. The porridge his mother made from the mill-house floor sweepings was sour tasting. This bread was like what the angel must be eating.

  “You know the king has no patience left, Ghenadios,” Father Macarios said, straightening up. “The countryside’s been abuzz for months with rumors about the voices this child’s heard, and His Grace feels he’s the last to know what’s going on. Why, the boy’s predicting the king will have a second grandson and—”

  “All in good time, Father,” Alba said, and pushed a mug of milk in front of Theodore. “I don’t see the arrival of a grandson being of such importance the king should work himself into a lather over it.”

  “True enough, Ghenadios. But as you’re the guardian of the only grandson the king has at the present, it’s you who should perhaps be worrying. This boy’s been heard to say the second grandson will be king one day! And that one of his descendants will accomplish great things in the name of the Lord.”

  “I don’t see why that should concern me,” Alba said, indifferent. But Theodore noticed the treasurer clench and unclench his fists.

  The priest’s eyes narrowed. “The new child will get his own guardian, and that leaves you and your ward on the outside, doesn’t it?”

  Alba turned to Theodore, and the boy saw the kindness had left the treasurer’s face. But the impression was fleeting. “Eat, drink,” he said, and smiled, encouraging.

  “I was nine years old when I heard the voice for the first time,” Theodore said against his will, and knew it was the angel who bade him speak. “That was three years ago.” Hearing his own voice intimidated him. He wished he were home in his hut.

  Father Macarios pulled a chair and sat across the table from him, with an expectant air. Alba rested his hands on the table and leaned forward, he too gripped by curiosity. “If you tell us everything you heard, you’ll have all the bread you want.” Alba motioned to a servant who approached with mincing steps. “Bring the boy another piece of bread and some cheese.”

  “Where were you when you heard the angel’s voice, child?” Macarios asked.

  “Who cares where he was, Father?” Alba turned to Theodore. “Did you see something, or only heard voices—?”

  “I want to know everything,” Macarios said with an impatient glance at Alba. “When, what, how... everything. The king’s charged me with determining if this child is lying, or if there is something to his claim. I want all he says written down, so we can tell if he changes his story from day to day.”

  “I’ll put my secretary at your disposal, Father,” Alba said, and beckoned to someone standing behind Theodore. “Get me Philip, and tell him to bring his desk and writing materials.”

  Theodore heard quick steps departing. Soon there was a commotion behind him and the sound of furniture being dragged across the floor. When quiet resumed, he reached for the bread. Then he saw the priest’s eyes fastened on him, and he tucked his hands under the table.

  “So, you saw a light?” Macarios said, pursing his lips. Theodore heard the scratching of quill on parchment behind him. “What color was it? How bright?”

  The answers came to Theodore with no effort. He remembered everything from his encounters with the angel, as if they happened a moment ago: the smell of the flowers, the song of the birds, the sky above him that opened up like willow branches parting in the wind.

  “Who was there with you? Did the angel speak in Romanian? What clothes did he wear? Were you scared?”

  The fat priest appeared taken by frenzy as question after question shot from his mouth. Scared? Quite the opposite. But how could Theodore explain the feeling you have when the light from above washes over you?

  When Macarios tired of questioning, he ordered Theodore locked in a cell with a straw mat for bedding and a bucket for his needs.

  Next day the priest and the treasurer were joined by other people in the Council Chamber, men equally well dressed, equally curious. The questions were the same, but they came at Theodore in a different order. He had the feeling the men were trying to trick him into changing his answers, but that was impossible. The answers were on his tongue before the questions left the men’s mouths, and they were always the same. He couldn’t have changed them if he wanted to. A force he didn’t understand moved his lips, while his mind wandered off to the pastures and the glades where the angel spoke to him.

  Three more days passed in the same manner. The men showed an obsession with the description of Theodore’s encounters with the angel. At first they seemed to have no interest in what the angel told him. “Did he have wings?” they wanted to know. “Eyes? Nose? Mouth?” Theodore heard them say to each other things about the angel he hadn’t told them, and wondered why they were inventing them. The men argued among themselves for hours about what angels should look like; they quoted descriptions other seers had given over the centuries. At length, they concluded Theodore must have seen a higher celestial being than an ordinary angel, perhaps a cherubim or an archangel; his description didn’t match any on record.

  Then the men turned to the message.

  “Child, can you repeat word for word what the angel said?” Father Macarios said. “Do not change an iota, or the king will be very angry with you—”

  “Skip the small talk and tell us the part about the lion and the dragon.” This came from a man the others called Chancellor Novak. “That’s what everyone in the country’s been talking about for months,” he added, and looked around him f
or approval. The others murmured their assent.

  “My lords,” Alba said, raising a hand to silence them. “Don’t you think it’d be best to let my secretary write down the ramblings of this child, while we go about our business? Once a record is made, we can reconvene and try to make sense of it for our king.”

  Theodore didn’t know what “small talk” meant. He repeated to the scribe every word the angel said over the three years he visited him. The only thing Theodore didn’t relate was the part that concerned him alone. “Men will make you suffer for the things you tell them,” the angel had said. “If you take my words to the king and his men, you’ll never see your parents again. You’ll never again graze sheep, work in the fields, or chase rabbits and squirrels. You’ll be without friends in the world for the rest of your life. Do you still want to do it?”

  The warning didn’t frighten Theodore. “But you’ll come back to me, won’t you?” he’d asked. Though he spoke without opening his mouth, Theodore’s voice rang clear through the air.

  “I’ll never abandon you, Theodore,” the angel promised. “You might not always know it, but I’ll be with you every moment you have left on this earth.”

  The happiness pouring down on the boy that moment was overwhelming. If it felt this way being close to a mere angel, how much greater happiness could there be in the presence of God?

  Next day the men returned to the Council Chamber to find a stack of parchments filled with script. Father Macarios leafed through the sheets, discarding them one after another with an impatient frown.

  “Who’d have thought the angel would be talking about crops, weather, and... Macarios glanced at the scribe, reproachful, as if he were guilty of the superfluous details. “Aha, here we go,” he exclaimed a moment later, holding up a sheet. “This is what the king will be interested in.” He turned the parchment to the candelabrum on the table and read in a tone that started casual but soon became aggravated.