“I approached and stood before her. It was customary for peasants to bow to their lords upon approach but she did not. She stood defiantly and looked me in the eyes, something unheard of for a peasant woman to do to a noble male.
“What is your name, child?” I said.
“Elizabeth.”
“Do you always address your superiors with such defiance?”
“And who said you were my superior?”
I heard gasps behind me from my hunting party. One of the men began shouting at her and I held up my hand, indicating quiet. “Why are you so filled with fire?” I asked her. “I have done you no wrong.”
“No wrong?” she said. “Your tax collectors starve us so that you may have one more fine garment or one more servant. When my mother was sick … when she was sick we could not afford a doctor or medicine or enough food to bring her strength back. She died to pay your taxes.”
“They are not my taxes,” I said.
I felt embarrassed and a bit shocked. I had little to do with the administration of the province, and knew nothing about how revenue was raised or how the peasantry was treated. But the passion in her eyes told me that somehow, my family had caused the pain she now felt.
I said nothing more and turned and left. That night we were dining, for my mother insisted that our family should dine together frequently for supper, and my siblings spoke of the day’s hunts or female conquests, to which my father would laugh and slap their faces playfully. In between the laughter, I asked him about the taxes.
“That’s none of your concern,” he said. “Nobility does not have to consider such low things as money. I have special servants that take care of such matters.”
“But this girl said that they were starving because of our taxes.”
“The strong rule the weak, boy. It is the way of things. Do you feel that gold is infinite? There is only so much in the world and we must fight for it. For one family to grow rich, another must grow poor.”
At the time, what my father said made sense. I know now how foolish it was. Economics now teaches us that wealth can be created by exceptional men and women without the need to take from others. But six hundred years ago it was believed you could only prosper on the pain of others.
‘And which servant handles the taxes?’ I asked.
‘Grigore,’ he said.
I nodded to my father but said nothing else. After the meal I began exploring the castle’s interior near the servants’ quarters. An office there was reserved for the day-to-day operations of the castle. A castle, then, was much like a modern corporation. You had a finance department concerned with how to raise revenue for the noble family; you had an accounting department that handled the money; a PR department that handled keeping the peasants pacified so they would not take up arms in revolt; and a management department with a hierarchy in place to maintain order. Of course none of these positions were called such then. Everyone was simply a servant to the Lord of the Manor.
Grigore was, in modern terms, an executive of the castle. I found him in his little office going through ledgers by candlelight.”
“What is it?” he said, without looking up.
“Do we tax the peasants into starvation?” I said, coming in to his room and sitting on his bed.
He sighed and turned in his chair to look at me. “And who filled your head with such nonsense?”
“I’m just curious.”
“Hm. The peasants can live off of what we allow them to have. There is no need to starve if one is willing to work.”
“What if they can’t work?”
“Every one of them can work.”
“Really? Even the sick and lame? What if they are incapable of work?”
“Then they starve.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Why not?” he said. “Does a lion not starve if he cannot hunt? Why should we be so special as to carve out an exception for ourselves?”
“There’s a village not far from here to the south. It’s the first one near the little stream where I like to hunt. Do you know the one?”
“Yes.”
“I want you to lower their taxes. You don’t have to alert anyone and father shouldn’t know. They’re so small no one will notice anyhow. Lower them by half and send someone down tonight to inform them.”
He chuckled. “My you are an ambitious one, aren’t you little sparrow?” He turned back to his ledgers. “Now run along and let the adults handle the business.”
I stood up and forcibly turned him back around, holding his face in my hands. I was not aggressive by nature and the move surprised him.
“One day,” I said, “my father will pass and this kingdom and this castle will be mine. When that day comes, will I remember you fondly or with disdain?”
“Your brother is next in line.”
“Radu? Radu is a violent brute without enough brains to find his penis if you don’t tell him where it is. Do you really believe he will be the one to succeed my father?” I slapped him in a friendly manner and began walking out of the room. “You will lower their taxes.”
It was early the next morning that I feigned wanting to hunt and rode with a party down to the village. Because of bandits, I was not allowed to ride by myself but I attempted to minimize those that came with me. I had them wait by the stream and told them I was going into the village and that I would be right back. It was not unusual: my brother Radu would frequent villages such as this and have his way, whether forcibly or not, with several young girls before going back to the castle. Life for a peasant was a nasty affair and they were treated little better than slaves.
I found Elizabeth in the same field, wearing the same clothes, doing the same thing. I came up behind her and stood quietly. She eventually noticed me and at first it frightened her and a little gasp escaped her lips, but then the fury returned.
“Do you expect me to be thankful,” she said, “because you cut our taxes now? My mother is already dead.”
“I’m sorry for your mother. If I could, I would have cut taxes then.”
Her eyes seemed to soften a bit. A noble apologizing to someone in her status was unheard of. There is no equivalent to it today. So she glared at me with those deep, large brown eyes and said, “Thank you.”
“Does your father still live?”
“No. He died of the fever some time ago.”
“Whom do you live with?”
“I take care of myself and my sisters.”
I thought a moment and then looked down to my hand. A large gold ring adorned one of my fingers and I took it off and held it out to her.
“Take it.”
“I can’t.”
“Yes you can. It’s mine and I can give it to whomever I wish. Please, take it.”
She looked down to the ground. I could tell she desperately wanted to take it. Such a ring could feed her and her sisters for several years, but she felt too much shame. I took her hand and placed the ring inside it and closed her fingers around it. “It would bring me joy to know you have it.”
“Why are you kind to me?” She looked up for a moment and then down again. “Your brother comes through our village and rapes whatever woman he wishes. Why have you not raped me?”
“I would never harm you.” I got down on one knee, staring up into her eyes. “I am yours to command.”
I could see confusion and then sheer terror in her eyes. What I was doing was so against every cultural normalcy that she didn’t know what to do but run. She turned and went inside her small hut and glanced back at me once as she shut the door. I knew my father would be angry, I knew my mother would not approve. But I did not care. I wanted Elizabeth in a way I had never wanted anything in my life. And though I’d had sexual conquests with women before her, that wasn’t what I was after.
I went on a quick hunt and then back to the castle. There was always political intrigue and the day was buzzing with the latest news that one of my father’s political rivals was moving agai
nst him. I cared little for politics but my father, Vlad the Second, wished to groom Radu and myself for rule, so I sat by his side as his generals and ministers went over the threats that were posed. Apparently, another Romanian general, Abel, had begun marching through the province and it was undetermined what his destination would be. The two spies my father had sent had not returned.
“It’s a trap,” one of my father’s generals said. “They want us to react so that they then may say that we were the aggressors. If we do not act, they will not attack. They cannot risk the entire population seeing them as conquerors.”
“I disagree,” another general said. “Abel sees this land as his birthright. By putting us in this situation he knows you will be advised to inaction and he will use that opportunity attack.”
My father, a husky man with a great beard, walked away from the maps and diagrams and ran his hand through his beard. He looked to me and my brother. Though he had several other children, we were the only two legitimate heirs born in wedlock with his wife.
“What do you say?” he said.
Radu swallowed. “We should bargain with them. Why fight if we don’t have to?”
My father looked to me. “And you, Vlad?”
“Whenever an animal is unsure about what to do, it attacks.”
My father grinned but didn’t say anything. He continued to walk around the hall pulling at his beard. “I will think of this further and make my decision tomorrow morning. Things always look different in the morning.”
With that, the generals and ministers were excused and only my brother and I remained. My father came and sat before us.
“You’re good boys, both of you. I have not spoken of this with anyone else and I have no intention of doing so, but we are greatly outnumbered. They tell us that Abel has three soldiers for every one of ours. If a battle does begin, many of our men will defect as well, seeing him as the more certain wager for victory.” He sighed and looked towards the large archway-like windows encircling the room at the ink-black sky outside. “I am sending you both away.”
“Where?” Radu said, a hint of panic in his voice.
“With the Ottomans.”
“The Ottomans!”
My father slapped him across the mouth, causing him to nearly topple over. “Do you wish to announce it to the world boy!” He looked sternly at Radu and then softened and placed his hand affectionately on the back of his neck. “The Sultan and I have reached an agreement. We will feign a battle here with only a portion of my army and I will flee. When Abel believes his position to be secure, the Sultan will send his armies, and together with mine we will crush Abel and I will regain my throne. For now, however, it is too dangerous for you two to remain—”
The doors swung open and two guards came through. Between them they carried a young female. Her head was down and when she raised it to see who she was before, I saw my sweet Elizabeth’s face.
I leapt forward, my hand on the hilt of my sword. I withdrew it and held the tip at the guard’s throat.
“Sire,” the guard said confused, “we found this on the woman.” He held out my ring in his palm. “She would not tell us where she got it from.”
“Release her now or die. Both of you.”
My father stood and came over. “That’s your ring, Vlad. She must’ve stolen it.”
“No, I gave it to her.”
Radu came over and began inspecting the girl. He lifted her hair in his hand and let it run through his fingers. “May I have her, Father, before you impose any punishment?”
My sword, instinctively, left the guard’s throat and pointed at Radu. “You will not touch her.”
“Oh, ho ho, little brother has some courage. What will you do, little brother? Kill me too?”
“Stop it, both of you,” my father said. He turned to me. “Vlad, why did you give her your ring?”
“It is my ring to do with as I please, Father.”
He considered this and looked to the guards who released Elizabeth. I immediately fell to my knees and helped her up. I pushed my way past Radu as I walked her out, my arm around her delicate shoulders. My father did not say anything to me as we left.
“I’m sorry,” I said when we were outside.
“You have nothing to be sorry about. It was my fault for wearing the ring outside. I should have known it would draw unwanted attention.”
“Why did you wear it? Did you not try and sell it?”
She shook her head with a little grin.
The stars were bright outside as I walked her out of the castle and down the trail to the village. We spoke of mundane things: her mother, the work she performed to feed her sisters, what it was like raising three young girls on her own. I was enthralled by every word that came from her lips. I was like a man who was so drunk he could not stop drinking. To this day, in six hundred years, I have never heard a voice as sweet.
When we arrived at her hut, I planned to simply watch her go inside before leaving. Instead, she turned and kissed me. Her lips were as honey and the moment froze us both. I have not experienced such a kiss before or since. Time itself seemed to give way.
It was at that moment I knew I had found my wife.
Over the next days I would go every morning after training to Elizabeth and we would take walks to have picnics or I would take her younger sisters shopping at the bazaar for new clothes or toys. We couldn’t spend much time together at first because she had to work, and then I hit on the idea that I would have my servants work her small garden and her field. Every day, I would bring two or three servants and I take Elizabeth and her sisters away from the hut and expose them to things they would not otherwise have been able to experience.
One morning, as I was leaving, I saw Radu in the hallway. He was drunk, either from the morning’s drink or that he hadn’t yet recovered from the previous night.
“So little brother has a whore?” he said. “Well, I am the eldest. By right, your whores are my whores. I think tonight I would like to claim my prize.”
I leaned in close to him and said, “If you touch her, I will kill you.”
A slight change came over him when I said this. I think it was perhaps because I was so calm, and I was so serious. I had always excelled in hand-to-hand combat, and though he would no doubt cheat, he had to have understood that I would severely hurt him in the process and he wouldn’t want to risk such a battle.
He simply laughed, and stumbled away.
When I met Elizabeth that morning, my mind was distracted. We had received reports that Abel’s army was on the march. No one outside of my family and a few select generals knew what our plans were — that we would fake a battle and then flee. But for this ploy to work, the villagers mustn’t be made aware.
“What’s the matter?” Elizabeth asked as we lay on a wool blanket under the shade of some cypress trees.
“You must leave. You and your sisters. You must leave this village and not come back until I tell you to do so.”
“Why? What’s going on?”
“Do you trust me, Elizabeth?”
She kissed me, my face held in her small hands. “With my life.”
“Then you must trust that I know what I’m speaking of. You must take your sisters and leave today.”
“Where would we go? We have no money, no relations, we have nothing but the field and the garden left by my parents.”
“I will provide for you. Enough so that you do not have to worry about money for a long, long while. I have family in Brasov. You will go there and stay with them. I have made all the arrangements.”
Her face, normally sweet and innocent, for a moment lost that innocence. “War is coming, isn’t it?” I did not reply and she nodded. “I’ve already seen one war, when your father took the throne. I do not want to see another.”
“Then you will go?” She nodded and I kissed her. “Just knowing you are safe and away from all this will bring my heart joy.”
“Where will you go?”
“I must go to the Ottomans. My father has arranged a bargain with them, and until his terms are fulfilled I must stay with them.”
“They’re brutes. I cannot stand the thought of you in their clutches.”
“I won’t be harmed. To harm us is to break their word; no true Christian would ever trust them again.”
She leaned over me and placed her head on my chest. We lay there a long while. In the distance we heard the low thumping of drums.
Abel’s army was like a swarm of ants. I could see them from the castle’s ramparts. He had clearly received the aid of other provincial governors and self-proclaimed kings. I ran down to the village, a cart with two horses and several days supply of food and water with me. There was only one man I trusted for this task: Grigore. He was what’s now known as a homosexual, but at the time that was not what they were called. I knew Elizabeth and her sisters would be safe with him, for once the prospect of sex is no longer possible, most men are generally good and decent.
“Hurry, boy,” Grigore said. “I don’t plan on becoming fodder for Abel’s dogs.”
I ran into the hut and found Elizabeth and her sisters. The youngest, Sariah, ran to me as she always did and threw her arms around my legs. I bent down and kissed her and lifted her in my arms.
“We must go, right now.”
“Where are we going?” she asked in her sweet little voice.
“Somewhere safe and happy.”
Elizabeth came to me and I could see the concern written on her face though she refused to show it to her sisters. “When will you be able to come?”
Dracula (A Modern Telling) Page 10