“Well, well, well, Susanna Edmonds,” he had said, taking off his coat and threading it onto the iron bars of the cell. The old man knelt down and threw himself upon her. He tried, but his body would not do the wickedness he asked of it. He was humiliated, and he believed his inability had come from Susanna’s magic.
“Witch!” he spat, backhanding her violently. “You’ve done this! My manhood lies before me devoid of life. You have cursed me! You, just like that whore of a mother before you, can arouse a man’s lust but then you deny him! Well, deny me you may, but to-morrow, I shall deny you of life!” He slammed the rusty iron bars shut, locked it, and ran up the stairs.
The stench from his sweat was still upon her; the sounds of his futile grunting made her wretch with disgust as she heard them again and again in her mind. She whimpered, and curled up into a ball upon the filthy straw of her cell.
There was a torrential downpour that night. She wanted to pray to God, but why, why had he allowed this to befall her? Was it because Henry was truly evil? Was this punishment for loving him? Despite these thoughts, she knew this could not be, for Henry was the gentlest being she had ever known.
Where is Henry? She asked herself this question over and over again. He had great powers; he possessed extraordinary strength, could conjure up the elements with a mere flick of his hand, and had the ability to fly. Why then could he not save her from this? She knew he loved her, and so something must have been prevented him from rescuing her. Perhaps that blonde-haired woman, the one who had attacked her in the castle, was truly Griselda? Henry did say that she wanted him for her eternal mate. It could only be her, and she was thwarting Henry’s attempts to save her. He would have come immediately if he could. It was the only thing that made sense.
She spat out the blood in her mouth from where Winthrop had backhanded her, and she relished the thought of dying. It was a comforting thought. The black void called to her, and she was on the precipice of giving in. A moment or two after she had this thought, a heretofore-unknown rage began to seethe inside her. It was a strange feeling that she was unaccustomed to, for she had always been of a gentle, forgiving disposition.
But she could forgive them no longer. The memory of the humiliating taunts, the bullying, the sneers, and the spit that she had had to wipe off of her person after a visit into the village, added to the anger boiling to a fever pitch within her soul. In her agony and rage, a power, which had been dormant all of her life, suddenly began to surge forth from within her. Hatred grew strong and deep. This attracted yet another unwelcome visitor to her cell.
As Susanna continued with her angry thoughts, it seemed as though she was floating in the midst of red fog, and a pungent scent of sulphur assailed her bleeding nostrils. Susanna painfully turned her face towards the strange red light and gasped as she beheld him. With his coiled horns, scaly red skin, huge dragon’s wings, and large green-yellow eyes, she knew who he was at once: Lucifer, the fallen angel, and now King of the Underworld. She shrieked as she beheld his grotesque form.
“Susanna,” he purred, with his deep and strange voice. “Come with me, and be my eternal concubine. Join me and you can escape from here. Join me and you will seek your revenge and return to your mate.”
“You… you are the source of all our woes!” she exclaimed. “‘Twas you who created Griselda; ‘Twas you that gave her the power to make my Henry what he is.”
“But ‘twas I that made Winthrop impotent so that he could not ravish you,” he said, trying to find a way to get her to accept him. It was time to replace Griselda, and who better than one with so much pent-up rage as this quivering mess before him? The desire for vengeance had been seductive enough to countless others in the past.
But Susanna was stronger than he had anticipated. Her heart, despite the anger and grief, was still pure.
“Go, thou fiend!” she exclaimed. “You can offer me nothing that I would ever be tempted to accept. I would rather die than be your servant!”
Lucifer snarled and hissed in anger, for it was rare indeed for him to be denied.
“Then you shall have exactly what you wish, you fool of a girl!” And with a burst of foul-smelling smoke, he was gone.
When the grey and murky morning arrived, came the hour of Susanna’s execution, as commanded by Winthrop himself. As they had broken her legs, they dragged her from her cell by her arms, and she cried out again. As they opened the thick, creaking door of the gaol, she was blinded by the light of day. She was dragged through the muddy main street to the hanging tree where they meant to finish her. The rain continued to pelt down upon them all, and some of the blood and filth from the cell washed off of her.
“Hurry up! I want this done now and then we can all go into the dry.”
She looked up to see the rope already hanging from the tree, and it was gently swaying in the wind. Roger, tied the noose around her neck, and whispered coarsely into her ear, “’Tis a pity I didn’t have a go at ye myself.”
She spit at his face. She summoned all of the remaining strength within her and bellowed, “I will have vengeance for how you all have treated me. I will return! Mark you well my words, I will return! I will have my revenge! I will have my —”
And then Roger, who had been holding her up, kicked the stool out from under her and — unmercifully — her neck did not break. The pain was incredible, even in light of the tortures she had only recently suffered. She struggled, her body jerking violently, her feet waving rapidly in some vain attempt to save herself. Her vision blurred as the villagers danced in macabre glee around her. They cheered and hollered with terrible joy.
“The little witch is dead! The accursed Edmonds harlot is no longer! Praise God!” The villagers continued pointing and laughing, their ecstasy multiplying with each passing second. They, all of them, had smiles on their pig-like faces — and there hadn’t been so many smiling faces in Coffin’s Bishop since 1645 and the Witchfinder-General himself oversaw the hangings.
The rain worsened from drizzle to pouring and the villagers soon sought refuge, leaving Susanna’s corpse dangling from the tree.
Chapter 18:
Retribution
“Whatever dies, was not mix'd equally;
If our two loves be one, or thou and I
Love so alike that none can slacken, none can die.”
- John Donne, The Good-Morrow
Griselda suddenly began cackling wildly as soon as she sensed that Susanna had died. Her great rival was no more, and she would soon have Henry all to herself. He had no choice now. Henry looked at her with increasing dread, for he knew she had done something terrible. He caught her firmly by the shoulders.
“What has happened? What have you done to her?” he cried.
“Why don’t you see for yourself?” she replied, with a wave of her hand. With this, she lifted the spell over Sanguinem Castle, and as Henry was finally able to fly again, she said at the top of her voice, “Go, then! Go to the village square! Nothing can bring her back now!” Her maniacal cackling continued, reverberating off the castle walls and growing more hysterical than ever before.
The rain poured down hard upon him, and the lightning flashed in the pitch black of the night, illuminating the whole of the Sanguinem Valley. He flew over Sanguinem Wood and over the various shoddy buildings of Coffin’s Bishop as he made his way towards the square. There, swaying slightly in the wind like a poppet, was she, as lifeless as the dead tree above her. Seeing his beloved hanging there, her body bruised, broken; her head shaved, her hands bound before her, was too much for him. Henry felt as though he had been kicked in the gut. Her corpse hanged, her hands still bound tightly with rope, rocking slightly from side to side with the storm.
“No!” he sobbed, transforming into his human form. “Susanna!” he sobbed, his knees falling to the muddy ground with a splat. His face crumpled with emotion as the thunder crackled and the rain continued to batter down upon them. He slowly raised his head again to where she was, and the anger an
d pain boiled up inside him. He turned once more into the vampire form that he so abhorred and, with his talons, sliced through the rope. Down she fell, straight into his waiting arms, and he cut the rope that was savagely binding her once-warm hands. Henry enfolded her in his arms and stroked her bare skull tenderly with his elongated hands. He morphed into his human form, and only then could he press his lips against hers.
“God, hear me!” Henry exclaimed, looking up at the stormy skies above them. “I have never asked you for anything, and in my human life was ever at thy service. Now I beg of thee — help her! Help me! If thou canst not bring her back, then let me die. Let me finally have peace!”
Griselda had wanted and obtained Susanna’s suffering. He sobbed as he remembered how he had thought he had saved her from all the pain and sorrow she had known in Coffin’s Bishop. Since the moment she accepted what he was, he had thought there would be no true impediment to their happiness. Griselda, having been so long gone, seemed almost like a figment of his imagination. But Griselda had told him, those seven years before, that should he refuse her, she would seek vengeance. She knew that nothing would punish Henry more than having the woman he loved tortured and executed. The punishment she had meted out was unendurable.
Henry wept then, his bloody tears trickling onto Susanna’s pale face and washing away with the rain. She had been the great love of his life, she had been everything to him; and now she was gone. How could any kind and loving God make someone so innocent and good suffer such abominations? The anger and despair caused him to howl and roar over the sheer injustice of it all.
Henry bitterly remembered Griselda’s cruel last words echo in his head again, “Nothing can bring her back now!”
He sliced through the rope that was still around her neck, revealing the ugly line where it had strangled the life from his beloved. He threw his head back as he roared, and surged down and bit hard into her jugular vein. He sucked hard, for there was no movement of blood in her. He didn’t know why he did this, but he felt compelled to, and it felt as natural as sleep. Thus he continued, until he had drained her completely. It had only taken five minutes.
Then, he made an incision on the vulnerable spot upon his breast in the same manner that he had seen Griselda when she Begat him. His tainted dark crimson blood spewed in between Susanna’s cold, pale lips, past her teeth, and down her oesophagus.
“Let it work!” he cried, “Please God let this work!”
He picked her up in his arms and took her to the cemetery, where he found a stone sarcophagus large enough for both of them to lie together. He pushed aside the heavy lid and removed the old shrouded bones of its last occupant. Doing this, he placed Susanna gently within and clambered in beside her. His thoughts were desperate, and inside that macabre container of death, he continued to feed his blood into her lips.
After he had done that which had to be done, he leaned over her again, and whispered, “Susanna, I do not know if it worked, but if it did, you can hear me. I know the pain you are experiencing. I love thee, and I am here by your side. I shall not leave you. I should never have let you out of my sight. I should have known Griselda would come back and do something terrible to part us. Forgive me. Forgive me for having been unable to save you. I will never forgive myself.” He thought of all the religious study he had made in his youth and again and again did he remember the passage:
“And all were weeping and mourning for her, but he said, ‘Do not weep, for she is not dead but sleeping’”.
“Wake up!” his soul cried out, his tears of blood again falling upon her flesh. Soon, by his loss of blood, he fainted beside her. The two tragic lovers, vampire and human, their limbs entwined, their heads resting side by side, made a poignant image. Henry’s arm lay protectively across his wife’s chest. He neither saw nor thought of anything. The black void of nothingness consumed him.
But the pale blue angels had heard his cries, and had seen the pure love in his heart. Though he had the tainted blood of the Devil in his cold veins, the Other knew he was, and had always been, a good man. He had kept true to his humanity; to his compassion for others.
Susanna, like Eve before her, would be his mate for life, and through her just revenge, God’s wrath would fall upon the village of Coffin’s Bishop. They were a village of hypocrites, indulging in their many secret vices whilst condemning Susanna, a victim, for what befell her. Their envy, their lust, their cruelty had not gone unnoticed. They were to be punished, and from that punishment they would not survive. And Susanna would be the vessel from which that justice would be administered.
***
The Other breathed new life into Susanna, as Henry remained in a world of nothingness by her side. Instead of seeing the flames of hell and having to endure the howling shrieks of a million souls in torment, Susanna mind explored a sunny garden, vibrantly coloured with thousands of flowers and plants she had never seen before.
There was music, such sweet and sublime music that moved her soul to another plane. She felt a peace that she had not felt except in those few brief moments within Henry’s embrace. Beyond the fragrant garden lay a large mountain, purple and majestic, and topped with a gleaming golden castle surrounded by white clouds. She saw faces she recognised: her brother, Samuel, her father, looking healthy, and a woman with red hair. She was Susanna’s mother, Mary. It was almost as if Susanna was staring at her own face in a looking-glass.
“Mother?” she tentatively asked this strange but familiar woman.
“My Susanna. My poor Susanna,” Mary said, embracing her daughter for the first time.
Samuel could walk, and he looked just as he had before his riding accident.
“Samuel, Father, Mother… I am dead, aren’t I?” Susanna asked, the grim realisation coming upon her. “They have killed me, have they not?”
“Aye, my child,” replied her mother sorrowfully.
“Nay! My husband, I did not get to say goodbye to him!” she cried. “He will think it is his fault. Oh! I must go back to him!”
Her mother came closer. “Susanna,” she said, “They have asked us to tell you that you may return to your husband, if you so choose, but there is something you will have to do.”
She bent forward and whispered in her daughter’s ear…
***
Inside the sarcophagus, Susanna’s head, which had been so brutally shaved of its golden-red hair, now grew new hair. Thicker, stronger, her red mane curled and flowed down to her waist. Her broken legs healed and hardened like steel. The dozens of silvery and purple scars upon her skin were now erased, including the foul mark from the hangman’s noose around her neck. Her injuries vanished, and Henry’s blood had been allowed to transform her from mortal to immortal. Her muddy, bloodstained shift was now a dress of pale blue. Because she promised to serve the Other, her many wounds were instantly healed, and she became a vampire only within a matter of a few hours.
Henry came to, having also been changed by the Other, and was taken aback by Susanna’s new appearance. It had worked! His heart leapt with joy as he leaned over her. As he did this, she opened her eyes. Her once warm hazel eyes now glowed white-blue in the darkness of the sarcophagus — just as his eyes now did. The clarity with which she now saw startled her, as did her body — healed and stronger than ever before.
“Henry,” she murmured, smiling at once again being with him.
“I am here; right here, beside you.”
“Where are we?” she asked, registering the confined and dark space in which they lay.
“We are inside an ancient sarcophagus, my beloved. You are safe.”
She nodded. “They said you would be here when I awoke. I thought I would never see thee again, my husband. But, Henry, I’m so very hungry. There is this great gnawing pain inside me,” she said, her canine teeth sharpening into points. As a servant of the Other, only these two teeth would differentiate her from other human women. She would never take on the furrowed, devil’s head of Satan, or the two rows of
sharp teeth the Devil’s followers had.
“It’s at its worst in the beginning, but you should feed soon or else you may do what I did. I massacred a whole eating-house full of innocent people.”
“A massacre? Why, that is precisely what I intend to do, but those that I have in my sights are no innocents.”
Henry was taken aback by the forceful way in which she said this. It was not in her nature to be bloodthirsty or vengeful, but revenge in her heart had made her stronger than any other vampire Henry had ever encountered before. His love had been hurt terribly, and her hurt turned her into the most violent undead being. But more than this, she had right on her side, and her power was greater as a result.
***
It was the Sabbath, and all the villagers had congregated in the church and were awaiting the vicar. George Winthrop glanced over at his friends and gave them a self-satisfied nod. He had slept well since Susanna’s execution. In his bed he remembered her pain, her struggle; and with sadistic glee he had pleasured himself into a deep sleep. That her body was gone in the morning disturbed him, not because of any concern that she would return but because he had wanted to have his way with her corpse. His old flesh stirred at the thought of what he could have done to her, and he sighed, a debauched look smeared across his boar-like mouth.
Suddenly, Susanna and Henry burst through the window, glass flying on top of them all. They recognised her immediately and one woman shrieked, “The witch has returned!” Henry flew to the door, for no one would be allowed to leave. Susanna landed on the altar, and from here she spoke, her white-blue eyes upon George Winthrop’s ashen face.
The Stuart Vampire Page 21