“Of course,” I murmured, marveling at the fact that she and I hid Hendrik’s letters in the same space. I cleared my throat. “Many happinesses to you both, my sister,” I croaked, using the honored language all village brides were accustomed to hearing upon the revelation of such happy news. “I hope that your union brings you much joy.”
“Thank you, big brother,” she said. She could not hear the pain tripping off every blessing I uttered on her, nor could she read the rage in my heart or my hands. “I know it is silly of me to cry like this at such happy news,” she added, “but I suddenly realized that I could not remember the color of Hendrik’s eyes. And then I had a difficult time remembering the exact shape of his nose. Is his face round, or oval?” She was smiling brightly now, now that she was over her childish fears of marrying a man she did not know. “Silly, isn’t it? He was here for many weeks. But I simply cannot remember what he looks like. Not well, anyway.” With an impish sigh she wrapped her arms around my neck and firmly squeezed. I held her as tightly as she held me. Now that my face was clear from her gaze, my tears could flow freely, and they did, down my cheeks and dripping onto the sleeve of my shirt. She moved to break our embrace but I refused to let her go, wiping my eyes in desperation so that she could not see the anguish in there. Laughing, she tapped the side of my head with her open palm, thinking my grip was nothing more than a silly extension of one of our childish games. Finally, when my face was clear, when it was safe, I let her go.
“Thank you, Ferenc,” she said as she leapt off her bed and began to fold her quilt neatly. “Truly, I do not know what came over me.” She stopped, looking at me as if suddenly realizing I was in the room. “Why is it you came home from the mine so early?” she asked me. “Is there something you need?”
I shook my head, still choking back one last sob, and stood to go. “Green,” I said as I turned to leave her small, cramped room.
“What was that?” she asked. “What did you say, big brother?”
I turned to look at her. “Green,” I repeated. “Hendrik’s eyes are green.”
THAT night, I poured all my feelings into a letter to Hendrik, pages and pages of hurt and betrayal and rage. And my love, yes, always my undying love. I did not need wait for his reply to know what he would say. Dearest, he would write, I ache to learn I have caused you such pain. But we both knew of this inevitability. This day was coming. It will come for you too, sooner than you imagine. It is safer this way. Two men, alone, might arouse suspicion. And besides, the empire is gripped with the fervor of war. You and I would be swept up, separated, and perhaps killed. I could not bear to imagine you in harm’s way. This way is safer. Please, my dear beautiful boy, it must be this way with men like us. I knew what he would write because he wrote variations on these same words with every letter he sent.
Still, I spilled my heart into what I wrote. I spoke of us, our glorious past, our unbearable present, and what, perhaps, could still be between us. When I was done, I read my letter over carefully, poring over every single word. It spoke achingly of our love, of a way for he and I to be together. My Hendrik, my sweet Hendrik, I wrote, I would give up everything for you. My life, my honor… I could live in a small cottage at the edge of a great wood, and cut clear timber every day, and eat the meager scraps of whatever food we could find, if only it meant I did not have to share you with a world that will never love you as I. I meant every word of what I wrote; never, in fact, had I been more sincere. When I finished the letter, I addressed it, sealed it, and, saying a silent prayer of hope, held it to my heart.
And then, rising, I threw it in the fire.
I DID not sleep that night. At first light I stole out of the house. I would not go to the mine today. Instead, I made my way up the mountain.
Never had Hendrik felt so distant, so remote from me! Never had I felt him slipping from my grasp more than now, at this moment. I needed to commune with him, to feel his arms around me, and if I could not have him here with me bodily, I could at least go to where his spirit most resided in these ancient hills.
The day was crisp and cold, but not uncomfortable. The night before had been silent and calm, and only a dusting of snow embraced the ground as I made my way up the steep mountain path. Still, even the slightest hint of snow made the path treacherous, and only because I had traversed it every night in my heart did I make my way safely up the rise. As I mounted, the snow grew deeper, and the going slower. Nonetheless, I was determined.
I was almost to the ruins when I first heard the howling. Wolves? But there was only the one sound, a singular howl, and it did not sound like a wolf. A wolf bayed, a call that started low and peaked before ending low again. This sound was sudden, violent, a screech that rent the air in twain, like a great unseen knife. To hear it cooled my ardor, halting me in my tracks. I had heard this sound before, on nights when Grandmamma had kept me up with tales of the bogeymen and demons that lived up in these hills. I shook my head. That was childish nonsense. This was not the snagov vrolok. The noise was likely some large bird or other such creature. The raven’s harsh caw was a sound disturbing to those who had never heard it, but the animal who made it was small and harmless. This was likely the same. And I needed to get inside the monastery. I needed to be with Hendrik—as with him as I could.
I pressed on.
The sounds grew louder as I made my way toward the monastery. Whatever creature it was would surely be found inside or at least nearby. I was frightened now, truly, but I had come this far, and the need for Hendrik was so great. I began to run toward the ruins as fast as I could through the ever-increasing depths of snow. The sounds felt closer, as if upon me. There was another sound as well, a great movement amongst the trees. Something was in them, something large, high above me. These were no playful mountain squirrels. I searched the tree limbs frantically, but saw nothing, no disturbance, just the blowing of branches in a sudden wind. Snow dropped from the branch heights in a drifting, dazzling display, almost blinding me. But I saw nothing. I heard more sounds, a great rushing of air, the crashing of branches, and yes, that unearthly howl, that ghastly screeching that threatened to tear the very fiber of my sanity from me. I ran, ran forward not back, thinking of nothing now, thinking only of Hendrik, only his face, as I hurriedly passed through the great stone arch that marked the entrance of the monastery ruins.
Nothing.
Silence.
I stood there, bent over at the waist, panting desperately into the snow. There were no sounds, not even the gentle whistle of the wind. The day was still and calm, as still a day as I had ever known. It had all been in my mind, in my imagination. I chided myself for such foolishness. Still, I was uneasy here. I made my way quickly into the courtyard.
The courtyard. Our courtyard. For that is how I thought of it, as if it belonged to me and to him. I stood there surrounded by silence and immediately felt a sense of calm, of ease, wash over me. The familiar ache, the pain that had encircled my heart since the day he left, lifted. Despite the cold, despite the white that covered every familiar surface in the place, I felt warmth and peace and love. Our love. I was home. That was how I felt here now and for the first time. There was no apprehension now, no fear, no sense of foreboding. There was only Hendrik, Hendrik so far and yet so near, and my memories of him.
I walked over to the small mound, to the place where we first made love. Using a gloved hand, I cleared away the snow from a small patch of land, exposing the still-green grass underneath. I sat in the cold and closed my eyes. Instantly I was transported back to him in my mind, to the moment we first kissed, to our eyes first seeing each other as we truly wished to be seen. I felt the cool silk of Hendrik’s skin against mine, felt the sharpness of Hendrik’s bones, felt the familiar, comforting pressure of my prick pushing into him. I started to harden, a warm feeling spreading from my groin to the rest of my body, a flushed sense I allowed to wash over me. I reached my hand down, into my breeches, wrapped my cold skin around the heat of my ardor.
/> “Hendrik,” I whispered, my eyes still welded shut, my fist a blur, my mind reeling with him, my sense drunk with the memories and emotions of the time we spent together here. I could feel his fingers on mine, his mouth on my neck; “Hendrik,” I whispered again as my passions stirred ever higher, “Hendrik, Hendrik, Hendrik….”
“Ferenc….”
It was a whisper, nothing more, but the sound instantly caused me to open my eyes, to fumble my aching prick into my pants as best I could. For a moment I believed my father or someone else had found me, but my eyes, still adjusting to the light, saw no one. Nothing at all. Just the snow, starting to fall now, lazy flakes of fluffy white snow raining down upon me. Just the snow and nothing more. But the voice—or was it a voice? Had it been just my imagination, my intense longing for Hendrik playing tricks with my senses? Or rather—there—near the entrance to the courtyard—was someone there? I narrowed my eyes and thought, perhaps, I could make out a dim, dark figure, just the hazy shape and form of a man, nothing more. Was he truly there? I called to the man, waved, and for one imperceptible moment I thought I saw the form pause and turn as if to stare at me. It turned its face to me, only it had no face, no flesh, no eyes, just bone, a glimmering, gleaming white skull set against the white of the snow, a grinning, leering skull that now bounded toward me, leaving the darkness behind and merging with the white, the white of the snow, the white of the bone, the white-hot sound of my own voice rending the air. I screamed. I closed my eyes and screamed, waiting awfully, expectantly for that thing—for something—to grab me.
But nothing did.
I opened my eyes, rubbed them, and looked again. I saw nothing, nothing but the snow. I breathed deep—inhale, exhale. My mind again. Tricks of the mind. This place—this place, so amazing and so terrible to me all at the same time. I focused on Hendrik, determined to see only what he would see now, to look at this place through his eyes. And through his eyes, even when this world was covered with inches of white, bright snow, I could see wispy grass peeping up through the baked brown dirt of the courtyard floor. I could see the stray white wildflowers that grew in the corner of the yard. I could see us, him and me, naked, limbs entwined, in the first throes of happiness, ecstasy, and love. I could see us holding hands. I could see our vows. I could see everything there before me, the courtyard, the grass, the flowers, the memories, the wolf.
A wolf.
There, by the entrance of the courtyard, stood one lone wolf. It was emaciated with hunger and eyeing me ravenously. Its ears were back against its skull, a threatening posture, but it made no sound. Nor did it advance but stood there, silent and menacing, blocking the only exit from this place. My hands shook; I felt fear. It must have been a wolf I heard all along. But there are no wolves left in the pass. Not this time of year. Are there? There is no game for them here, except…. I looked around frantically. Wolves hunt in packs, but if this creature came with companions, I did not see or hear them. Sometimes wolves became loners, thrust from their pack through violence or circumstance. When that happened, they lost all fear, all sense of reason, and were truly dangerous. I looked around for a weapon, for a stout stick to cudgel the beast with, or a rock, but the courtyard was empty, empty of anything save for me and the wolf and the dizzying white of the snow. The creature had yellow eyes, and its muzzle was stained with red, as if had just been feasting. Well, soon it would have meat aplenty.
I backed myself against the cold stone wall of the courtyard and crouched in order to best defend myself. The wolf began to advance. Its muzzle juddered, but still I could not hear it, could hear nothing at all except the heavy silence that hung in the air and the desperate panting of my own ragged breaths. The wolf grew closer. Closer. I lowered my head and raised my arms. My only hope was to grab it when it came close enough, and to hope I did not lose too much blood before I could find its throat. I waited to feel the heat of its breath, smell the stench emanating from its mullet, but I could feel or smell nothing. Cautiously, I opened one eye. There was no wolf. There was nothing there. Slowly, I moved back to a standing position. Hesitantly I made my way toward the entrance of the courtyard. I looked at the ground. I saw no tracks save my own, nothing to suggest any disturbance in the snow whatsoever, save for a small circular depression some ten feet from where I had been crouched. I rubbed my eyes. Was the snow playing tricks on me again? Or was this some other form of bedevilment? I made my way out of the courtyard and back through the stone entrance arch. It was then—and only then—that I heard noise, the small blowing of the gentle mountain wind and a yelp, the sound of an animal being hurt, but muffled, as if far away. Was it the wolf? Had he caught some other prey? Deciding discretion was indeed the better part of valor, I hastily made my way down the mountain, determined that the wolf—if, indeed, he had been there at all—should find me long gone if he came to look for me again.
BY THE time I reached home, I had decided that I must have imagined the wolf. There were no wolves in the pass, especially this time of year. They needed deer or other large game to sustain them, and the deer always moved down the mountain in winter. What I had seen was caused by my anger, hurt, and imagination, and nothing more.
There was a letter awaiting my return, another missive from Hendrik, and all my irrational fears were forgotten as I raced upstairs to open his note in privacy. My dear Ferenc, his note began, I am, as always, enclosing all my love to you in these pages, and hope that this little note finds you as happy and as well as the day I left you. I must tell you that I am quite in earnest on that last desire, perhaps more so today than before, because of the very strange dream I had two nights ago. I dreamt of you—then again, I always dream of you, dear Ferenc—but this dream was different. In my dream you were there, in our special place, but it wasn’t the grass-strewn courtyard of my waking dreams. No, this was different. It was cold, and snow covered the ruins, a great blanket of white that made austere what our love had once painted so beautiful to me. I was nervous for you in my dream, though I did not know why initially. It seemed that as you entered the courtyard you were not alone. But it was not I who was with you, but rather someone else, or perhaps something else, something I could not see, located just beyond the tree line.
I was afraid for you, and I tried to reach you as desperately as I could, but I was rooted to the spot, and could make no forward progression. Instead I could only watch as I saw a lone, ravaging wolf skulk into the courtyard behind you. “Ferenc!” I tried to shout, but my voice caught fast in my throat, and I could utter no sound above a whisper. I feared for you gravely, as I could hear the wolf howl with a savagery that chilled me to my soul. Then, suddenly, I heard a terrible noise, a cry of absolute pain and fear—and then nothing. I swear in my dream I was weeping for you, Ferenc, and calling out your name, but no one could hear me. Then, quite happily, you emerged, unscathed and alive, and made your way hastily back down the mountain.
When I awoke I was in quite the cold sweat! How I wished you had a telephone somewhere in your tiny village so I could hear your voice and know you are well! But I soon realized that it was only a dream, just a silly dream, perhaps brought on by thoughts of how much I missed you. Still, it lingered with me for much of the day, so please, dear Ferenc, do write to me as quickly as possible and let me know you are quite well, and that you still love me and only me, so that my timid heart will only swell once more with happy thoughts of you and our time on the mountain.
There was more to Hendrik’s letter, but I could not finish it, not now, at least, not after what I had read. Hendrik’s dream sounded exactly like what had happened to me on the mountain. But that was not possible! And the letter—I checked the date on it. It had been written well over a week ago! How could that be? I felt the familiar misapprehension begin to course through me, feeling anxious and scared, feeling, for the life of me, that I was back there, alone on the mountain, with the wolf before me. For a moment I sat on the edge of my bed and trembled, nervous and unsure of what to do. But then I took
a deep breath and did my best to shake the feeling off me. There was a reasonable explanation. It made sense that both Hendrik and I would dream of this place, this place that meant so much to both of us. The wolf could simply have been a symbol of our longing, of our intense desire to be together. It was merely a coincidence—an amazing coincidence to be sure, but nothing more than that. What more could it possibly be?
My thoughts were interrupted by Poppa coming home from the mine and loudly calling out my name. Poppa was furious I had spent much of the day away from the village and away from the mine. His fury came with a stern lecture about responsibility and a smart cuff on my cheek. But he was right—about being responsible, about striking me, about all of it. And, I supposed, Hendrik must be right as well, about the position men such as we face and the way of the world. My own ideas of our possible life together, my own silly dreams of he and I were just that… dreams. How I had longed for Hendrik to be wrong, but as my father shook his fist and raged at me about “finally growing up,” I realized, indeed, and with a breaking heart, that he and Hendrik were right.
The Snow Vampire Page 6