“I suppose for that I am grateful. You do not wish to kill me, and you do not wish to turn me. What do you wish for, then?”
“You know. You heard my thoughts. You stole them in our private moment last night.”
“I was a bit distracted.” She glared at him.
He smiled. “Then I am glad you did not retain them. I will keep my secrets a little longer. Tell me something, Miss Parker. How many souls have you destroyed with your touch?”
She hesitated.
“Please, Miss Parker.”
With a sigh, she shook her head. There was no point in hiding. His body count was far higher. “Eleven.”
He let out a low hum. “And how many deserved it?”
“None. No one deserves the fate I bring them.”
“How many of them were murderers? How many of them had done terrible deeds worthy of destruction? You saw their souls laid bare. How many would you personally deem unworthy of life?”
“None. It is not my place to say that someone is irredeemable.”
“Not even murderers?”
“Murder is an unnatural act for anyone. It is not in the self-interest of the species to commit such blatant acts of violence. While it is in human nature to do so, it is never without great cause. Mental illness, emotional duress, depravity brought on by extenuating circumstances, or when required by society such as in war. Look deeper past the degenerate nature that inspires such an act, and you will find someone worthy of pity.”
“And what of me?”
She was still shuffling the cards and looked up at him for a brief moment. “You are not human.”
“I was, once.”
“Were you?”
“I was not born a vampire.”
“Do you remember what made you this way?”
He let out a long breath. “No.”
“What do you remember?”
“The same as you’ve seen. Sand, the burning sun. Blood. Monuments to ancient gods…and wrath. I believe I destroyed a city the day they made me.” He sneered. “It was my first, but not my last.”
She did remember those visions quite well. Grief and agony. Someone being taken away. She saw a bowl of blood, thick and poisoned. Being forced to drink it. A card slipped from her hands and fell face up on the table.
The Tower. Tragedy and disaster. She cringed and picked up the card and put it back into the deck. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For what you’ve suffered.”
“There is not enough sympathy in the world, I’m afraid.” He let out a long, low growl, then schooled his features back into a softer expression as he looked to her. “I appreciate the sentiment. It is rare that I receive such kindness.” He watched her for a long moment. “Read my cards, Miss Parker.”
“Why will you not tell me what you wish me to be to you?”
“Perhaps the cards will tell you all you need to know.”
She narrowed her eyes at him accusatorially. “You’re toying with me again.”
“Indeed I am. Amuse me.”
“I am not the ballerina in my music box. I do not dance for your amusement.”
A thin twist to his lips and that devious, hungry look in his crimson eyes returned. “Do tell.”
She sighed in frustration and placed the cards down on the table in front of her. “No, Vlad. I will not read for you. I will not be ordered around by you.”
“You belong to me. Now and forever. From the moment you touched my brooch, until the moment you are dust.”
She cringed.
“Never forget who and what I am, Maxine. Never.”
“Why would you not wish me to forget?”
Crimson eyes slipped shut. “Everyone else does.”
Something about his words sliced her deep. They were unexpected. They were honest. She could feel his emotions rolling off him in waves. Grief, anger, loneliness. But resilience. A certain kind of bullheaded stubborn pride. He was not ashamed of those deaths. But there was a bitterness about them that confused her. “What do you mean?”
“I have nothing more to say on the matter at the moment.”
He was a difficult man. She pinched the bridge of her nose and tried to resist the urge to throw a lamp at his head. He would disappear before it struck him. Perhaps he was right. Perhaps her cards would show her something. She looked down at the deck of cards on the table and picked them up. She shuffled it one more time and placed it in front of him. “Are you right-handed or left?”
“Left.”
Of course. She let herself smile. “Cut the deck in half with your right hand, wherever you like, and place the bottom on the top.”
“Why?”
“You asked me to read your cards, didn’t you?”
With a low hum, he did as she asked. She took the deck again and fanned it out into the arc in front of her. Shutting her eyes, she hovered her hand over the card and began to sweep along the path, searching for the ones that called to her in turn.
“Tell me something, Vlad. Is there anything I could do that would convince you to spare this city?”
“No.”
“Is there anything I could do that would convince you to spare the lives of the hunters?”
“No.”
“Then why is it they are not dead, and this city is not already in ruins?” She paused in her progress and looked up to him.
He was watching her, curious and amused. “I am distracted.”
“I can stall for time, then. Good.”
“Is that the only reason you so peaceably agree to see me? Are you a treacherous little succubus after all, luring me into your dreams with the promise of your sweet embrace, only to trick me?”
Her face bloomed in warmth. She glared at him viciously. It did nothing but make him laugh. “Do not mock me.”
“I am not. I think it is quite charming how you try to hold up the bastion flag and convince me the only reason you dreamed of yourself in my bed is because you seek to ‘stall for time.’”
“This is wrong. All of this is wrong. On many levels.”
“Oh, do tell.”
“Even if I were to accept that I desire you—”
“You do.”
She shot him another vicious glare and earned a cruel chuckle in return. “How many women do you keep in your ‘employ,’ Vlad?”
“You say that as if I am going to pay you.” He raised his hand when she went to shout at him, cutting off her tirade before it began. “None. Have I kept companions in my years? Yes, of course.”
She paused for a second as she thought over her words. “Do you remember all the people you have killed?”
“No.” He raised an eyebrow at her, as if wondering where the conversation was headed. “Do you remember all the meals you have ever eaten?”
“Are we only that, then? Meals?”
“Yes.”
She winced. There was a cynical air to him again as he watched her. This was the cruel King of the Vampires that most of the world saw. A deeply haughty, aristocratic, tyrannical thing. Not what she had known to date. What she had seen was a passionate and surprisingly approachable thing. She found she disliked this version of the man.
Seeing her reaction, he softened. The coldness faded. “Forgive me. It is easy to be that which others expect me to be.”
“What do you mean?”
“I am only ever what others wish me to be. The villain, the tyrant, the demon, the monster.”
“What of those who serve you?”
“Even to them, they only see a piece of me. To them, I play the father, the lord, the friend, or mentor. Your kind are not always merely livestock to me. Sometimes, you become more than that. Sometimes you become family.”
“Like Walter and Zadok.”
“Indeed. I care for them deeply. Even the Frenchman, as hard as that may be to believe.”
“But you say they do not know the whole of you?”
“No one ever has. I am as old as the human race
itself. I have been many things in all those years. I have played my part for them all. It is exhausting.”
“And what of the companions you said you’ve had?”
“To them, I have been a lover, a betrayer, a saint, and much more. I have been the gentle husband or the cruel prince. Whatever they have wished me to be. Each saw a facet of me in turn, and only that, like all the rest.”
She went silent. She could press him for more, but she didn’t. She was beginning to suspect he was giving her the answer to the question she had been pondering. Why me? And for what ends?
Suddenly, she was not certain she wanted to know the answer. But it was too late now. “I do not wish for you to pretend to be any facet of yourself, vampire. I do not want to know only a part of you. Only the whole, as much as I am capable of it.”
“For that, I am immensely grateful. More than you may know.” He gestured to the cards. “Please, continue.”
She went silent and finished pulling the cards. Stacking the remainders, she began to turn them out into the layout she preferred. An adapted Celtic Cross she had changed for her needs.
The Ace of Cups. Death. The Emperor. The Hanged Man. Three of Wands. Seven of Swords. Five of Wands. The Devil—she tried not to laugh—followed by the Hermit. Lastly came the Ten of Swords.
She looked down at the cards and felt something was missing. There was more to be told. She picked up the deck again and, rifling her finger down the side of the stack, pulled out another card and placed it next to the last one, the foreboding Ten of Swords.
The Lovers.
She sighed.
16
She stared down at the cards and felt nothing but dread. She heard the chair across from her click, as if it rocked briefly on its legs. She looked up and found it empty. Once more, he had disappeared from it without moving.
The mystery of where he had gone again did not last. His hand touched her cheek, cradling her face, as he tilted her head to look up at him. “I am no Roma spellcaster. But I know what that card means.”
“I—it doesn’t—”
“Yes, it does.” He hummed and stepped closer to her. The scent of roses washed over her. “Shall we speak of our shared dream, Maxine?”
She pulled away from him, desperate to keep the feeling of him from overtaking her. Once it did, she was hopeless. She would be unable to deny him anything he asked. “I haven’t yet finished your reading.”
He grinned, seeing her very transparent attempt at a dodge for what it was. He motioned a hand toward the table. “Well, then…after you.” He vanished into nothing more than a shadow, and she watched in fascination as he reformed in his chair. “Or would you rather save it for later? I know of something else we could pass the time with instead.”
Her face was warm, and she knew she was blushing. She studied the cards in front of her. Anything to keep from looking at the dark and smirking vampire across from her.
She tapped the two cards in the center of the cross. The first two she had drawn. The Ace of Cups who sat crossed by Death. She decided there was no dancing about the subject. “What I am going to tell you may be unkind.”
“I would want for nothing else.”
He wasn’t listening to her. She tried again. “Stop me if I go too far, if what I say becomes too personal.”
“Nothing you could possibly do could ever be too intimate for me.” His purr was seductive, filled with insinuation and entendre.
She glared at him and tapped the two cards crossed in the center again. Very well—if he wouldn’t heed her warning, she’d teach him to be more mindful. “You fear loss. It keeps you from feeling anything at all. That is what consumes you. For someone who can never die, death is all that surrounds you. You have lost everything you have ever come to care about in your thousands of years, and it leaves you crippled. Afraid and unwilling to ever let yourself feel anything legitimate again.”
The playfulness left his expression, but he said nothing. He leaned back in his chair and watched her. For all the world, he might have been a statue.
“This position is your consciousness.” She tapped the card over the two crossed in the center. “All that weighs on your mind that you are aware of. Here we have the Emperor, and never have I seen a card so fitting for a man. You think yourself Master of all that you see. All that you touch is yours to own. A tyrant.”
“In the upright state, it is meant to symbolize structure. Rightful authority, does it not?” His eyes narrowed with his words.
“You know the tarot?”
“I know a great deal of things about a great many subjects.” He watched her, his expression once more unfathomable. “I am very old.”
She nodded once. Of course. She was foolish to think he didn’t understand the cards himself. “I choose not to read cards reversed or upright.” She shook her head. “I believe every blade is double-edged. Every card has two meanings.”
“Then how do you know if your Emperor is benign or malign?”
“It is determined by its context—the cards around it. Like all the rest of life, nothing can be viewed alone in a void.”
“And what do you see?”
“I see as I told you.” She placed her hand flat on the card in question. “A man who thinks he owns the world around him. You conduct yourself accordingly.”
“But you do not believe in my power. Why is that?”
“Because neither do you.”
“Bold accusations.”
“Is it? This card.” She tapped the Hanged Man, who sat beneath the crossed cards. “That which lies within your subconscious. That which influences you without your recognition.” She looked down at the figure who was hanged by a tree from his ankle, his hands unbound but crossed behind his back regardless. “A man who chooses to trap himself within his pain. A martyr of his own making. A man who suffers because he cannot see that he has the power to free himself. You are not a god—you are not an emperor—you are powerless in your own fate. Or so you see yourself.”
Vlad was silent, watching her. Waiting. Giving up nothing. He is a man who takes an inch and never relinquishes it, she reminded herself. As such, he believes the same of all those around him.
She tapped the position to the right of the crossed cards. “The Three of Swords. The influences that are leaving your life. Looking ahead. Travel. Trying to see the future. You wanted to leave all you were behind you.”
“I left London. It did not suit me.”
“Not across the ocean, but away—away from all the pain you’ve known.” She tapped the position to the left of the cross. “To this. You have not come in good faith. The Seven of Swords. Deception, trickery, and tactics. You are trying to scheme your way through your future. You tried to leave your past, only to repeat it.”
“Ah, now you make the soothsayer’s mistake. You assume your way through the gaps.”
“I am no soothsayer.”
“And it shows. I agree I have left the past and looked ahead. I agree that I have come here with deception in mind. But you connect the two in ways you should not.” He picked up the Seven of Swords, plucking it from underneath her fingers. He turned the card about, pondering it. “Deception. Have I deceived you, Miss Parker? Have I not shown you all that I am from the very beginning?”
“You danced with me as a mortal man.”
“A blink of an eye. A single evening’s diversion. A game.”
“Do you play games often?”
“At every opportunity.”
Reaching for her card, he handed it to her, and she replaced it where it had been. “And now we reach this.” She moved her hand to the first card in the righthand upright path. Four cards in a row. Four cards that people delighted over but were far less weighty than the six she had already read. “The future is like a lighthouse. The farther away the object from the lamp, the harder it is to read. The less certain its location. Do you understand?”
“The future is still mine to change.”
“The futu
re is still changeable,” she corrected. His egotism was unflinching, but it was consistent. “But yes.” She shook her head and resisted the urge to slap him. Barely. “The Five of Wands. Conflict and rivalry. Strife awaits you.”
“With whom? You?”
She picked up the deck of cards, rifled her finger down the side of it, and pulled out a card where she felt the urge to stop. The Page of Wands. “No. Someone else.” That card was not her. One of the hunters, perhaps. But she was not certain which one.
“Then I do not care.”
She sighed. Of course, he ignored her warning. She moved on. She tapped the next card. “This card represents how people view you. How you are seen by the world around you.” She touched the Devil. “Do I need to elaborate?”
He laughed. “No.”
She moved on to the next. “Your hopes and fears.”
“In one card?”
“That which we hope can also be that which we fear, in its absence. And now you see why I do not read cards inverted.” She looked down at the card in question. “The Hermit. You hope to find guidance, you hope to find your inner truth, but you think you may be lost. You worry that you are without redemption. You fear that in the end, all that you are is meaningless.”
Vlad was silent.
So, she moved on. “The future is twofold.” She tapped the two cards that sat beside each other. The Ten of Swords and the Lovers. “Defeat—utter surrender. Surrounded on all sides, beaten and broken. Or…love. The choice is yours what road you will take.”
She moved to swipe the cards away, but his hands stopped hers. Pressed her hands down against them and refused to let her clean the table.
“Love with whom? Who awaits me at the end of that path?”
She sat back and watched him warily. “I don’t know.”
“Ask the cards, if you do not know.” He motioned to the stack of cards. She hesitated. He urged again. “Ask.”
She picked up the deck, rifled her thumb down the side, and placed a card in the center of the table. The Moon.
“Who does that represent?” He pressed her. She suspected he knew the answer.
Her face grew warm, flushing. She shut her eyes. “I don’t know.”
“You lie. Say it, Maxine. Tell me who waits for me at the end of that road, should I take it. Who waits to welcome me from the jaws of defeat?”
Heart of Dracula Page 18