by Chanel Smith
Vera screamed. Veronica bit down hard, rending open a big wound in the woman's neck. She let go and turned away. She went backward, keeping her katana leveled at the woman again.
Blood spurted from the arterial wound and Vera clasped her hand to her neck. She was losing blood faster than she could heal; the feeding in the tiny village over the last few days must not have been very good. All color drained from her skin and she looked old all of a sudden. She stumbled, her hand suddenly weak. But she still tried to fight, bringing the knife up and lunging once again. She was not fast enough. This time Veronica's cut was accurate and fast. The shining tip of ten thousand times folded steel was a blur until it cut down at the unwounded side of Vera's neck. It sliced through her throat and cut through her spinal cord. The head fell sideways and the body collapsed.
Veronica swung the blade at the altar and cut a large splinter off. She picked it up and in one move thrust the spruce into the vampire’s chest. It was over.
Veronica picked up the knife and went to Alexei to cut his bonds. Silently, she gave the boy the knife and together they left the church, joining the fray.
***
There had been over a hundred of Yakov Sverdlov's followers in the village, and all of them rushed out to meet the onslaught of the weres. They were werewolves, werebears and vampires, witches and humans. And they were met with fangs, teeth and claws. They were led by an unchanged Kullervo who was singing as he slaughtered. Veronica thought he had gone mad, but then she remembered he had spoken of the magical sword of Ukko. She realized he was not singing, he was commanding the enchanted blade to slaughter. He commanded it who to slaughter, to kill the creatures that could not normally be killed.
But it was not the sight of Kullervo that astounded Veronica. What held her attention and caused her to gasp was Anastasia fighting Yakov Sverdlov. Alexei turned to look and had to put a hand before his mouth so that he would not cry out in dismay.
There was no subtlety in that fight. No skills, just sheer hatred; Sverdlov's anger versus Anastasia's hate of the killer of her family. She had charged her bayonet and used the rifle and bayonet as a spear, lunging quickly at the witch, who kept throwing flames and curses at her. He had picked up an axe and swung it at Anastasia whenever she came too close.
And Veronica saw all of it happening. She rushed forwards when Anastasia lunged at Sverdlov and did not recover fast enough. She was not a trained fighter, not like Veronica was. She did not have the years of careful training and honing of skills. Sverdlov stepped back and Anastasia was off balance. The long-handled axe came down and was destined to slam into her spine. Alexei screamed at the thought of seeing his sister get killed before his eyes. Veronica swore and rushed on. She did not have to.
In desperation, Anastasia pulled the trigger of her rifle. She did not know whether it was still loaded, but it was. The rifle went off and the powder in the cartridge ignited. The silver bullet spewed out of the old barrel and spun the short distance to Sverdlov's body. At that distance, it could not miss. The silver penetrated Sverdlov's chest and threw him back. He was depleted of life before he hit the muddy ground.
***
Alexei had tears in his eyes when he walked up to the yellow facade of the Alexander Palace, holding his sister's hand. The moment they had gotten to Pushkin, they had gone straight to the Tsarskoye Selo, the Imperial Village. Veronica was instantly impressed by the huge Catherine Palace, but Alexei and Anastasia had rushed past, barely interested in it.
The tears of joy came to Alexei when he saw the Alexander Palace. That was the place they had spent their youth. Catherine Palace was the large palace that had served as a formal residence since the days of Catherine the Great, together with the Kremlin Palace in Moscow and the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg. But their father had always opted to reside in the smaller Alexander Palace.
Veronica left the two alone to wander in the gardens around the Alexander Palace, the Catherine Park and the rooms of their childhood home. She found a quiet spot in the corner of the cafeteria that had been set up in the grounds for the sake of the thousands of tourists that passed through the grounds each year. Kullervo sat down opposite her.
“So what now for you?” Veronica asked him. She watched as he poured sugar into his coffee and stirred.
Kullervo shrugged.
“Back to the forest, where I belong. Hiisi Pohjoisessa can be resettled now; I'll probably help with that and then go back to make my own lair.”
“Don't people need you?”
“Of all of them, Ida Averbach is the only one left. She disappeared before I could get to her. When the weres of the north need me, they'll know where to find me.” He nodded to her. “And you?”
“I promised to bring those two to Csejte Castle, God knows where that is, and then I will be going home to California. Back to the warmth.”
Kullervo nodded.
“You'll find Transylvania a lot warmer. The southern Carpathians are more moderately climated. Higher up it can be a bit like here, but in a month’s time, the lower reaches will be above freezing again during the day.”
“Well, we'll still have to find this damned castle. Apparently it was moved from Slovakia lock, stock and barrel and hidden. No idea how to find it.”
Kullervo thought for a moment, pensively sipping his coffee. Then he pulled out a pen and took a napkin from a holder. He wrote down something.
“Make your way to Bistritz. There is an English historian there who might be able to help.” He pushed the note over to Veronica, who folded it and put it in her coat's inner pocket.
“What's his name?”
“Johnny Harker.”
Part Two:
THE DEATH OF KULLERVO
Kullervo, son of Kalervo,
Leaves his home immediately,
Stopping only to inquire:
"Goodbye now, my good father!
Will you mourn for me, my father,
When you hear that I am dead
And have vanished from the nation,
Have departed from the clan?"
And to that his father answered:
"No, I will not mourn for you
If I hear that you are dead.
Another boy will be begotten,
Far better and more talented."
And to that his son replied:
"Neither will I mourn for you
If I hear that you are dead.
I can make me such a father:
Mouth of mud and head of rock,
Eyes of cranberries from the bog,
Beard of winter-withered grasses;
Legs from the fork of water-willow
And the flesh from rotten punkwood."
Thereupon he asked his mother:
"My dear mother, little mother,
Gentle carrier, golden bearer,
Will you mourn for me, my mother
When you hear that I am dead
And have vanished from the nation,
Have departed from the clan?"
And to that his mother answered:
"You don't know a mother's mind,
Understand a mother's heart.
Yes, of course I'll mourn for you
When I hear that you are dead,
Taken from the nation's number
And departed from the clan.
I will flood the house with weeping,
Making waves upon the floorboards;
I will weep there all bent over
In the lanes and in the cowbarn.
I will weep the snow to glare ice
And the glare ice into thaw,
All the thawed ground into greening
And the greening into stubble.
"What I cannot bear to weep,
Cannot bear to weep in public,
I will sob out in the sauna,
Weep in secret in the sauna,
Overflowing bench and platform."
Kalevala, Rune 36
Chapter Five
The three flew to Timisoara t
he next day. It took a little persuasion from Veronica to allow their firearms to be checked in, but once the Russian desk employee was persuaded, everything else came easily.
In the morning, they had said goodbye to Kullervo in the center of St. Petersburg. They watched him board the train to Murmansk. He would leave the train somewhere north of Petroskoi and travel further on foot into his forests.
The city of Timisoara, in the northwest of Romania only had a small airport, though it was the second largest in all of Romania, but it was the closest one to where they had to be. The airport was actually a passenger terminal at the air force base.
The flight had taken them over the Carpathians, and Veronica was struck by the enormity of the mountain chain. Alexei explained to her some of the history lessons he had learned some hundred years before.
“The Dacians and Thracians who lived in these mountains held the Romans at bay for decades. And they kept fighting them of course. The Romans could never conquer this area completely. There are too many places to hide and too many places you can fortify and build a strong position on. Our Viking ancestors never came here either. The Saxons did, but that was during the Great Migration, when all the peoples of the continent moved to take advantage of the fall of the Western Empire.”
Veronica looked puzzled at the boy next to her.
“Your Viking ancestors?”
Alexei nodded.
“The name Rus actually means Viking or Norse. The first dukes and emperors of Russia were the Norse kings of Kiev. That's where we come from. But later in the line, we come from Vikings too. From Denmark and Sweden, to be precise.”
“And Germany, don't forget Germany,” Anastasia chimed in, looking up from her magazine.
“Yes, Germany too.” Alexei nodded.
Veronica rolled her eyes.
“Of course the most famous part of the Carpathians, and of the Dacian lands, is the principality of Transylvania, and its most famous prince was Vlad Dracul, the Impaler.”
That name rang a bell with Veronica.
“You mean Dracula?” Alexei nodded.
“I thought he was a count.”
Alexei grinned. “Tricky that. They were part Saxon here then and because of the influence of the Austrians, the elite often spoke German. He was called a fürst, a lord. In German that means a prince, but it can also mean a grand duke or an earl in other places.”
Veronica blinked and shook her head. Alexei's grandstanding was doing a number on her brain. But the boy had decided to keep going.
They spent the night in the city of Timisoara. It was a far more pleasant place to be as a vampire than the cold north. They found an inn to eat at, and to Veronica's surprise, the inn keeper looked at them strangely when they placed their orders. He winked at them and asked something in a language she did not understand. Anastasia frowned at the man and said something in yet another language. The man repeated his question more slowly and clearly and suddenly, Anastasia smiled brightly, giving the man a flash of sharp fang. She nodded to him and he disappeared.
When he came back with some rare steaks, he brought along some glasses of warm, thick blood too. He said something more to Anastasia and then retreated.
“What was that?” Veronica asked her suspiciously. “And how come you speak their language?”
Anastasia put the glass to her lips and sipped.
“I don't speak their language, but I do speak Italian and Latin.”
Veronica blinked, taking up her own glass too.
“Romanian is a Romance language. Its origin is Latin and it's very close to Italian. Got a large Slavic substrate though.”
Veronica blinked again, then rolled her eyes dramatically. “Whatever.” She sipped her glass and looked around the inn.
I hope Ana is not going to start the damned grandstanding as well.
“How come he knew?”
“I reckon we're not the only ones here, or even the only ones in the area.”
Veronica nodded.
Later that evening, in their room at the tavern, Anastasia came up to Veronica.
“You need some time alone.”
Veronica frowned at her, but did not answer. Anastasia was right, of course.
“You need some time without me and Alexei cramping your style.”
“What I'd like is not as relevant as the fact that I am supposed to be guarding the two of you.”
Anastasia cleared her throat and half drew the bayonet that she carried at the back of her hip again. She checked the edge with her thumb and slid it back.
She is right. She’s more than proven that she can take care of herself, and she even fatally shot the biggest threat to their safety that ever lived. Veronica nodded.
“Gives you time to plan for tomorrow as well.”
So she left Alexei with Anastasia and her rifle at the inn and went into the city. She wandered around the streets in the dark night and soon came to the conclusion that there was indeed a massive supernatural underground scene in the city. The backstreets of the city were a hive of activity in the night.
Veronica eventually found a gothic discotheque. She paid the doorman some lei and went in. For some reason, the place felt much the same as those places that subscribed to the same kind of gothic subculture that was so prominent in Southern California. Inside the dark room, with dull red lighting everywhere, she went to the bar. She ordered a drink, speaking English. The bartender seemed to speak English as well. Good English too.
“What do you want exactly?” he shouted over the music.
“What do you have? Can't read Romanian!” she answered.
“I'll give you the local specialty, then.” He pulled a bottle from the shelf and poured a glass. “First drink on the house.”
Veronica sipped it. It was a clear liquor with a uniquely metallic taste. She looked at it and tasted again. The drink was tangy and irony, but miraculously it had no color. It had a slightly bloody quality to it. “This is the local stuff?”
The bartender nodded. “Made from the grain grown on the Blood Hills.”
“Blood Hills?”
The bartender waved his hand to indicate where they were. “Vlad Tepes impaled a group of Turkish delegates there. And after that, they were used as an execution site.”
Veronica nodded and began walking around the club. She looked at the faces. There were a few obvious fangs out there. A few very pale faces too, usually belonging to people with small puncture wounds on their necks or wrists.
A woman caught her eye. She was a dark beauty, dressed in mock gypsy clothing. And she noticed Veronica too.
“Hello!” She spoke with an obvious New York accent. She was very chirpy.
Veronica gave her a kind nod, wondering what this woman was up to.
“You don't look like a local either! Here looking for real vampires too?”
Veronica blinked. “Um, yeah. Sure.”
“I've been looking for a real vampire for a long time. There're all these fakes in New York.”
Her comment made Veronica stifle a laugh. “Are you sure you've been looking properly; perhaps in the right places?”
The woman nodded. “I've been looking for fifteen years. Finally, I've come here to find them. This area is where they are supposed to come from, you know?”
“Really? Ya don’t say!”
Veronica was tempted to roll her eyes, but something struck her about the woman. What struck her most was that she was American. “Are you here on your own?”
The woman shook her head. “No, no, we're here with a group. Tomorrow night we are going to Bistritz with the whole group. From there, we're going to continue on to where Dracula had his castle!”
She's nuts. Just nuts. But most of the wannabe vampires are nuts. Useful nutjobs though.
“How many of you are there?” Veronica asked.
“Another twenty.”
“All from New York?”
“Yeah, we all expressed interest in finding the true vampires, and we wer
e invited to come and find them by some historians in New York.”
Veronica frowned. That’s a bit unusual.
“Are you interested in vampires as well?”
Veronica nodded vigorously with mock enthusiasm.
“Yeah, big time. Me and my Russian friends are here for a hunting trip. But maybe we can tag along with you?”
The woman was jumping up and down with excitement. “Of course! We could use some people who know their way around weapons too. There're bears and wolves here, and I've heard there's still bandits out here.”
“Bandits?”
“Yeah! There's rumors of a gang up there. And there're people here who claim that some tourists who have gone into the mountains don't always come back.”
“Really?”
“But there have always been rumors like that! It has not been different since Roman times, hasn't it?”
“No. No, I've heard about that, yeah.”
The woman looked Veronica over. “What's your name?”
“Veronica. Veronica Melbourne.”
The woman offered her hand. “I’m Gilda O'Brien.”
Veronica shook her hand. Gilda frowned. “It's not warm in here, is it?”
Veronica cursed herself and produced a shiver. “No, quite chilly. Listen, what time are you leaving tomorrow?”
“We've got a coach booked and we're leaving for Bistritz at seven tomorrow night. Leaving from the town hall.”
“You're sure it's cool if I and my friends come along?”
The woman nodded. “Positive. Especially if you want to continue on with us into the mountains for a bit.”
Veronica nodded to her. “Will I see you there then?”
“Of course!”
Veronica moved on. She went back to the bar and looked around. Gilda O'Brien walked up to a cluster of men and women, chatting with them. She pointed at Veronica and Veronica raised her glass to them.
An hour later she went back out into the nighttime streets. There was not a lot of light. The streets of Timisoara were dank and neglected. The smell of industry was everywhere, but there was a feel to the town of opportunity. A feel of being able to do what you wanted to. She liked it.