Anno Dracula (Anno Dracula #1)

Anno Dracula (Anno Dracula #1) Page 57

THE HOME LIFE OF OUR OWN DEAR QUEEN

Netley applied the whip to the team. The imposing carriage had prowled through Whitechapel's cramped streets as irritably as a panther in Hampton Court Maze, unable to move with its accustomed elegance and speed. In the wider thoroughfares of the city, it rolled at a rapid pace. The suspension was perfect, lulling her along without even the creak of wood and iron. Hostile eyes were drawn to the gilt coat of arms that stood out like a red-and-gold scar on the polished black door. Despite the luxurious interior, Genevieve found comfort impossible. With black leather upholstery and discreet brass lamps, the Royal Coach was too much like a hearse.

They proceeded down Fleet Street, past the boarded-up and burned-out offices of the nation's great periodicals. There was no fog tonight, just a razored wind. There were still newspapers, but Ruthven had installed tame vampire editors. Even fervent loyalists were bored by bland endorsements of the latest laws or endless encomia to the Royal Family. Very rarely an item would be printed which, combined with certain private knowledge, might actually qualify as a piece of news, such as the recent note in The Times of the expulsion from the Bagatelle Club of Colonel Sebastian Moran, his hitherto uncanny abilities at the whist table, which extended to somewhat unorthodox manipulations of the cards, now being severely impaired by his unexplained loss of both little fingers.

As they passed the law courts, a scatter of broad-sheets blew across the dark pavements of the Strand. Passersby, even those marked by their dress as of the upper orders, hastily picked up these papers and stuffed them into their coats. A constable did his best to collect as many as possible, but they rained down from some garret heaven like autumn leaves. Hand-printed in basements, these were impossible to stamp out: no matter how many premises were raided, how many scribblers arrested, the hydra-headed spirit of dissent persisted. Kate Reed, Charles's admirer, had become a leading luminary of the underground press. In hiding, she had won a reputation as an Angel of the Insurrection.

In Pall Mall, Netley, whom Genevieve judged a fidgety sort, stopped at the Diogenes Club. After a moment, the door was held open and Charles joined her in the coach. After kissing her, lips cold on her cheek, he sat opposite, discouraging further intimacy. He wore immaculate evening dress, the scarlet lining of his cloak like spilled blood on his seat, a perfect white rose in his lapel. She glanced at the door as it was shut and saw the closed face of the moustached vampire from Miller's Court.

'Good night, Dravot,' Charles said to the servant of the Diogenes Club.

'Good night, sir.'

Dravot stood at the kerb, at attention but suppressing a salute. The coach had to take a circuitous route to the Palace. The Mall had been blocked by Crusaders for most of last week; the remains of barricades still stood, and great stretches of St James Street had been torn up, cobbles converted to missiles.

Charles was subdued. She had seen him several times since the night of the 9th of November, and even been admitted into the hallowed Star Chamber of the Diogenes Club to give evidence at a private hearing of the ruling cabal. Charles had been called upon to account for the deaths of Dr Seward, Lord Godalming and, incidentally, Mary Jane Kelly. The tribunal had as much to do with deciding which truths should be concealed as which should be presented to the public at large. The Chairman, a warm diplomat who had weathered the changes, took in everything, but gave no verdict, each grain of information shaping the policies of a club that was often more than a club. Genevieve supposed it a hiding place for pillars of the ancien regime, if not a nest of insurrectionists. Aside from Dravot, there were few vampires in the Diogenes Club. Her discretion, she knew, had been vouched for by Charles. Otherwise she assumed the Sergeant would call upon her with a garotte of silver wire.

As soon as they were underway, Charles leaned forwards and took her hands. He fixed her with his eyes, intently serious. They had been together two nights ago, in private. His collar hid the marks.

'Gene, I implore you,' he said, 'let me stop the coach outside the Palace and turn you loose.' His fingers pressed her palms.

'Darling, don't be absurd. I'm not afraid of Vlad Tepes.'

He let her go and sat back, obviously distressed. Eventually, he would confide in her. She had learned that, in many things, Charles's desires conflicted with his duty. Just now, she was Charles's desire. His duties lay in directions she could not immediately discern.

'It's not that. It's...'

... the disarray in which Beauregard found Mycroft had an air of the Final Act. At this meeting, he alone was the cabal.

The Chairman toyed with the scalpel. 'The famous Silver Knife,' he mused, testing the blade with his thumb. 'So keen.'

He laid down the instrument and let loose a sigh that set his cheeks wobbling. He had lost some of his prodigious weight and his skin was slackening, but his eyes were still sharp.

'You're to be invited to the Palace. Pay your regards to our friend in the Queen's service. You must not be startled by him. He is the gentlest of fellows. A touch too gentle, if truth be told.'

'I have heard him spoken of highly.'

'He was a great favourite of the late Princess Alexandra. Poor Alex.' Mycroft steepled his fat fingers and rested his chins on them. 'We demand much of our people. There's precious little public glory in this bloody business, but it must be done.'

Beauregard looked at the shining knife.

'Sacrifices must be made.'

Beauregard remembered Mary Jane Kelly. And others, some only names in newspapers, some frozen faces: Seward, Jago, Godalming, Kostaki, Mackenzie, von Klatka.

'We would all do what we ask of you,' Mycroft insisted.

He knew that was true.

'Not that many of us remain.'

Sir Mandeville Messervy awaited execution on a charge of high treason, along with other worthies; the dramatist Gilbert, the financial colossus Wilcox, the arch-reformatrice Beatrice Potter, the radical editor Henry Labouchere.

'Chairman, one thing perplexes me still. Why me? What did I do Dravot could not have? You let me run through the maze but he was there always. He could have accomplished this all on his own account.'

Mycroft shook his head. 'Dravot is a good man, Beauregard. We did not choose to burden you with knowledge of his part in our larger plans, lest it interfere...'

Beauregard swallowed the pill without choking.

'But Dravot is not you. He is not a gentleman. No matter what he did, he would never, never, be invited into the Royal Presences.'

At last, Beauregard understood...

... an engraved invitation had been delivered into her hand by a pair of fully-uniformed Carpathian Guardsmen; Martin Cuda, who pretended not to remember her and kept his head down, and Rupert of Hentzau, a Ruritanian blood whose studied sardonic smile constantly threatened to become a cruel laugh. As the more-or-less permanent Acting Director of Toynbee Hall, she was busier than ever but a summons from the Queen was not to be ignored. Presumably, she was to be commended for her part in ending the career of Jack the Ripper. A private honour, perhaps, but an honour nevertheless.

Their names had been kept out of it. Charles insisted public credit be taken by the police. It was generally believed that Constable Collins had come upon Godalming and Seward as they left the room where they had together mutilated Mary Jane Kelly. Hastily-summoned reinforcements trapped them in Miller's Court and both were killed in the confusion. Either the murderers did for each other to escape the stake, or the police, enraged and appalled, destroyed them on the spot. Influenced by the recent habits of justice in London, most favoured the latter explanation, although Tussaud's Chamber of Horrors offered a vivid recreation, complete with actual clothes, of the two Rippers gutting each other.

At Scotland Yard, Sir Charles Warren had resigned in exchange for an overseas posting, and Caleb Croft, an elder with a reputation as a hatchet man, was his replacement. Lestrade and Abberline were on fresh cases. The city hunted a new maniac, a warm murderer of brutish disposition and appearance named Edward Hyde. He had trampled a small child, then raised his ambitions by shoving a broken walking-stick through the heart of a new-born Member of Parliament, Sir Danvers Carew. Once Hyde was apprehended, another murderer would come along, and another, and another...

Red light rippled in the carriage as they passed Trafalgar Square. Although the police kept dousing the bonfires, insurrectionists always rekindled them. Scraps of wood were smuggled in, and even items of clothing used for fuel. New-borns, superstitiously afraid of fire, didn't care to get too near. Crowds scuffled with policemen by the fires, while an engine crew, perhaps half-heartedly, tried to train hoses. Captain Eyre Massey Shaw, the popular superintendant of the London Fire Brigade, had recently been removed from office, allegedly because of a refusal to deal with the Trafalgar Square conflagration; Dr Callistratus, a sullen Transylvanian with no appreciable experience of or interest in fire-fighting, was installed in Shaw's stead and was reportedly unable to occupy his office due to the pile of resignations heaped against the door. Genevieve looked out at the blazes heaped around the stone lions, flames leaping up a third of the height of Nelson's Column. Originally a memorial to the victims of Bloody Sunday, the fires now had fresh meaning. Word of a new mutiny had come from India. Sir Francis Varney had been dragged by sepoys from the Red Fort in Delhi and bound over the muzzle of one of his own guns to be blown away. A jumble of old scrap-iron and silver salts shot through his chest, Varney was cast into a fire and burned down to ash and bones. Many warm British troops and officials had thrown in with the native rebels. According to the broad-sheets, who plainly had highly-positioned sources, India was in open revolt, and there were further stirrings in Africa and points east.

Placards were waved and slogans shouted. JACK STILL RIPS, a graffito read. The letters still came, red-inked scrawls signed 'Jack the Ripper'. They had been received by the press, by the police, by prominent individuals. Now they called for the warm to rally against their vampire masters or for British new-borns to resist foreign elders. Whenever a vampire was killed, 'Jack the Ripper' took credit. Charles said nothing, but Genevieve suspected many of the letters were issued from the Diogenes Club. A dangerous game was played out in the halls of secret government. Even if a madman became a hero, a purpose was served. To those for whom Jack the Ripper was a martyr, there was Jack Seward taking his silver knife to the vampire oppressors. To those for whom Jack the Ripper was a monster, there was Lord Godalming, the arrogant un-dead disposing of common women he regarded as trash. The story had a different meaning for each retelling, the Ripper a different face. For Genevieve, that face would always be Danny Dravot, fingers bloody with ink, standing by while Mary Jane Kelly was ripped apart.

Public order in the city was at the point of breaking down. Not just in Whitechapel and Limehouse, but in Whitehall and Mayfair. The heavier the hand of the authorities became, the more people resisted. The latest fashion was for warm Londoners of all classes to black their faces like minstrels and call themselves 'natives'. Five army officers awaited court martial and summary impalement for refusing to order their men to fire upon a peaceful demonstration of mock blackamoors.

After some negotiations, and not a little shouted abuse from a black-faced matron, Netley was allowed to take the carriage through Admiralty Arch. The coachman must wish he was able to paint out the crest on his conveyance.

A vampire but not of the bloodline of Vlad Tepes, Genevieve was left, as ever, on the side-lines. It had been refreshing at first, after centuries of dissembling, not to have to pretend to be warm; but eventually the Prince Consort had made things as uncomfortable for most of the un-dead as for the living he called cattle. For every noble murgatroyd in his town house with his harem of willing blood-slaves, there were twenty of Mary Jane Kelly, Lily Mylett, or Cathy Eddowes, as miserable as they had ever been, vampire attributes, addictions and handicaps rather than powers and potentials...

... with Genevieve, he called upon the Churchwards. Penelope was out of bed now. They found her in a Bath chair in the heavily-curtained parlour, a tartan rug over her legs. A new-purchased coffin, lined in a white satin, stood on trestles in place of the occasional table.

Penelope was getting stronger. Her eyes were clear. She had little to say.

On the mantel, Beauregard noticed a photograph of Godalming, posed stiffly by a potted plant with a studio background, ringed with black crepe.

'He was, in a manner of speaking, my father,' Penelope explained.

Genevieve understood in a way Beauregard could never hope to.

'Was he really such a monster?' Penelope asked.

Beauregard told the truth. 'Yes, I'm afraid he was.'

Penelope almost smiled. 'Good. I'm glad. I shall be a monster too.'

They sat together, untouched cups on the low table, darkness gathering...

... the carriage sped smoothly down Bird Cage Walk towards Buckingham Palace. Insurrectionists hung in chains from cruciform cages lining the road, some still alive. Within the last three nights, open battle had raged between the warm and the un-dead in St James's Park.

'Look,' Charles said, sadly, 'there's Van Helsing's head.'

Genevieve craned and saw the pathetic lump on the end of its pike. Some said Abraham Van Helsing was still alive, in the Prince Consort's thrall, raised high so that his eyes might see the reign of Dracula over London. That was a lie; what was left was a fly-blown skull.

The main gates loomed before them, new-fangled barbed wire wrapped around the upright bars. Carpathians, midnight black uniforms slashed with crimson, hauled the huge ironwork frames aside as if they were silk curtains, and the coach slid through. Genevieve imagined Netley sweating like a frightened pig at an Indian Officers' Ball. The Palace, illuminated by watch-fires and incandescent lamps, poured black smoke into the sky, its face an image of Moloch the Devourer.

Charles's face was a blank, but he was focused in his mind. 'You can stay in the carriage,' he said, urgent, persuasive. 'Safe. I shall be all right. This will not take long.'

Genevieve shook her head. She supposed she had been avoiding Vlad Tepes for centuries, but she would face whatever was inside the Palace.

'Gene, I beg you,' his voice almost broke.

Two nights ago, she had been with Charles, delicately lapping blood from cuts on his chest. She knew and understood his body now. Together, they made love. She knew and understood him.

'Charles, why are you so worried? We're heroes, we have nothing to fear from the Prince. I am his elder.'

The carriage halted by the maw-like porch, and a periwigged footman opened the door. Genevieve stepped down first, relishing the soft crunch of the clean gravel under her shoes. Charles followed, taut as a drawn bowstring, gathering his cloak about him. She took his arm and nuzzled against him, but he would not be comforted. He eagerly anticipated what he would find inside the Palace, but his anticipation was blackened by dread.

Beyond the Palace fences stood crowds, as usual. Sullen sightseers peered through the bars, awaiting the Changing of the Guard. Near the gates, Genevieve saw a familiar face, the Chinese girl from the Old Jago. She stood with a tall, old oriental man whose aspect was somehow sinister. Behind them, in shadow, was a taller, older oriental form, and she had a flash of a past terror, returning. Looking again, the Chinese party was gone, but her heart still beat too fast. Charles had still not told her the full story behind his bargain with the elder assassin.

The footman, a vampire youth with a gold-painted face, led them up the broad stairs, and struck the doors with his tall stick. They opened as if by some unheard mechanism, disclosing the marbled length of a vaulted reception hall.

With her single decent dress ruined, she had been forced to commission a replacement. Now she wore it for the first time, a simple ball-gown free of bustles, frills and flounces. She doubted Vlad Tepes thought much of formality but supposed she should make an effort for the Queen. She could remember the family as electors of Hanover. Her only unusual ornament was a small gold crucifix on the latest of innumerable replacement chains. It was all she had from her warm life. Her real father had given it to her, claiming it blessed by Jeanne d'Arc. She doubted that but somehow had contrived to keep it through the ages. Many times, she had walked away from entire lives  -  houses, possessions, wardrobes, estates, fortunes  -  keeping only the cross the Maid of Orleans had probably never touched.

Thirty-foot diaphanous silk curtains parted in the draught, and they passed through. The effect was of a giant cobweb, billowing open to entice the unwary fly. Servants appeared, under the direction of a vampire lady-in-waiting, and Charles and Genevieve were relieved of their cloaks. A Carpathian, his face a mask of stiff hair, stood by to watch Charles hand over his cane. Silver was frowned on at the Court. She had no weapons to yield...

... he had tried everything to dissuade her from accompanying him, short of disclosing to her the duty he must perform. Beauregard knew he would die. His death would have purpose, and he was prepared for it. But his heart sickened at what might become of Genevieve. This was not her crusade. If it were possible, he would help her escape even at the cost of his own life. But his duty was more important than either of them.

When they were together, warmed by their communion, he told her what he had told no other woman since Pamela.

'Gene, I love you.'

'And I you, Charles. I you.'

'I you what?'

'Love, Charles. I love you.'

Her mouth was on him again and they rolled together, getting comfortable...

... an armadillo wriggled by her feet, its rear-parts clogged with its own dirt. Vlad Tepes had raided Regent's Park Zoo and had exotic species roaming loose in the Palace. This poor edentate was merely one of his more harmless pets.

The lady-in-waiting who guided them through the cathedral-like space of the reception hall wore black velvet livery, the Royal Crest upon her bosom. With tight trews and gold-buckled knee-boots, she looked like the principal boy. Although handsome, her face had lost any feminine softness it might have possessed when its wearer was warm.

'Mr Beauregard, you have forgotten me,' she said.

Charles, involved in his own thoughts, was almost shocked. He looked closely at the lady-in-waiting.

'We met at the Stokers',' she explained. 'Some years ago. Before the changes.'

'Miss Murray?'

'The widow Harker now. Wilhelmina. Mina.'

Genevieve knew who the woman was: one of Vlad Tepes's get. After Jack Seward's Lucy, the first of the Prince Consort's conquests in Britain. Like Jack and Godalming, she had been in with Van Helsing's group.

'So that fearful murderer was Dr Seward,' Mina Harker mused. 'He was spared only to suffer, and to make others suffer. And Lord Godalming too. How Lucy would have been disappointed in her suitors.'

Genevieve saw into Mina Harker, and realised the woman was condemned  -  had condemned herself  -  to exist with the consequences of failure. Her failure to resist Vlad Tepes, her circle's failure to trap and destroy the invader.

'I had not expected to find you here,' Charles blurted.

'Serving in Hell?'

They were at the end of the hall. More doors loomed above them. Mina Harker, eyes like burning ice, looked at them both as she struck a panel, the rapping of her knuckles as loud in the echoing space as shots from a revolver...

... Beauregard remembered the warm Mina Harker, unfussy and direct when set beside Florence, Penelope or Lucy, siding with Kate Reed in the belief that a woman should earn a living, should be more than a decoration. That woman was dead and this white-faced court servant was her pale ghost. Seward had been a ghost too, and Godalming. Between them, the Prince Consort and the skull on the pike had to account for a great deal of human wreckage.

The inner doors opened in noisy lurches and a startling servant admitted them to a well-lit antechamber. The extensive and grotesque malformations of his body were emphasised by a tailored particoloured suit. He was not the new-born victim of catastrophically failed shape-shifting, but a warm man suffering from enormous defects of birth. His spine was drastically kinked, loaf-shaped excrescences sprouting from his back; his limbs, with the exception of the left arm, were bloated and twisted. His head was swollen by bulbs of bone, from which sprouted wisps of hair, and his features were almost completely obscured by warty growths. Mycroft had prepared Beauregard for this, but he still felt a heart-stab of pity.

'Good evening,' he said. 'Merrick, is it not?'

A smile formed somewhere in the doughy recesses of Merrick's face. He returned the greeting, voice slurred by excess slews of flesh around his mouth.

'How is Her Majesty this evening?'

Merrick did not reply, but Beauregard imagined expression in the unreadable expanse of his features. There was a sadness in his single exposed eye and a grim set to his growth-twisted lips.

He gave Merrick a card and said 'Compliments of the Diogenes Club.' The man understood and his huge head bobbed. He was another servant of the ruling cabal.

Merrick led them down the hallway, hunched over like a gorilla, a long club-handed arm propelling his body. It apparently amused the Prince Consort to keep this poor creature on hand. Beauregard could not help but feel an additional disgust for the vampire. Merrick knocked on doors three times his height...

... she realised, ridiculously late, that Charles was not afraid of whatever he would face in the Palace. He was afraid for her, afraid of the consequences of something soon to happen. He took her hand and held it tight.

'Gene,' Charles said, voice just above a whisper, 'if what I do brings harm to you, I am sincerely sorry.'

She did not understand him. As her mind raced to catch up with him, he leaned over and kissed her, on the mouth, the warm way. She tasted him, and was reminded of everything...

... her voice was cool in the dark.

'This can be for ever, Charles. Truly for ever.'

He remembered his meeting with Mycroft.

'Nothing is for ever, my darling...'

... the kiss broke, and he stood back, leaving her baffled. Then the doors were opened and they were admitted into the Royal Presences.

Ill lit by broken chandeliers, the throne-room was an infernal sty of people and animals, its once-fine walls torn and stained. Dirtied and abused paintings hung at strange angles or were piled loose behind furniture. Laughing, whimpering, grunting, whining, screaming creatures congregated on divans and carpets. An almost naked Carpathian wrestled a giant ape, their feet scrabbling and slipping on a marble floor thick with discharges. The stench of dried blood and ordure was as strong as it had been in Number 13 Miller's Court.

Merrick announced them to the company, palate suffering as he got out their names. Someone made a crude remark in German. Gales of cruel laughter cut through the din, then were cut off by a wave of a ham-sized hand. The gesture gave the congregation pause; the Carpathian jammed the ape's face against the floor and snapped the animal's spine, prematurely ending the contest of strength.

Upon the raised hand, an enormous gemstone ring held the burning reflections of seven fires. She recognised the Koh-i-Noor, or Lake of Light, the largest diamond in the world, and the centrepiece of the collection known as the Crown Jewels. Her eyes were drawn to the shining light, and to the vampire who wielded it. Prince Dracula sat upon his throne, massive as a commemorative statue, his enormously bloated face a rich red under withered grey. Moustaches stiff with recent blood hung to his chest, his thick hair was loose about his shoulders, and his black-stubbled chin was dotted with the gravy of his last feeding. His left hand loosely held the orb of office, which seemed in his grip the size of a tennis ball.

Charles shook in the presence of the enemy, the smell smiting him like blows. Genevieve held him up and looked around.

'I never dreamed...' he muttered, 'never...'

An ermine-collared black velvet cloak, ragged at the edges, clung to Dracula's shoulders like the wings of a giant bat. Otherwise he was naked, his body thickly coated with matted hair, blood clotting on his chest and limbs. His white manhood coiled in his lap, tipped scarlet as an adder's tongue. His body was swollen with blood, rope-thick veins visibly pulsing in his neck and arms. In life, Vlad Tepes had been a man of less than medium height; now he was a giant.

A warm girl ran across the room, pursued by one of the Carpathians. It was Rupert of Hentzau, his uniform in tatters, a ruddy flush on his face. The plates of his skull dislocated as he shambled, distorting and reassembling his face. He brought the girl down with a swipe of a paw, scraping silk and skin from her back. Then he began to tear at her back and sides with triple-jointed jaws, taking meat as well as drink. As Hentzau fed he became wolfish, wriggling out of his boots and britches, his laugh turning to a howl. The girl was instantly dead.

Dracula smiled, yellow teeth the size and shape of pointed thumbs. Genevieve looked into the broad face of the King of Vampires.

The Queen knelt by the throne, a spiked collar around her neck, a massive chain leading from it to a loose bracelet upon Dracula's wrist. She was in her shift and stockings, brown hair loose, blood on her face. It was impossible to see the round old woman she had been in this abused creature. Genevieve hoped her mad, but feared her well aware of what was happening about her. Victoria turned away, not looking at the Carpathian's meal.

'Majesties,' Charles said, bowing his head.

An enormous fart of laughter exploded from Dracula's jaggedly fanged maw. The stench of his breath filled the room. It was everything dead and rotten.

'I am Dracula,' he said, in surprisingly unaccented and mild English. 'And who might these welcome guests be?'

... his head was in the eye of a nightmare maelstrom. In his heart was steel resolve. All he saw made him justum et tenacem propositi virum, a man upright and tenacious of purpose. Later, if he still lived, he might succumb to nausea. Now, in this vital moment, he must have complete control of himself.

Never entirely a soldier, Beauregard had learned strategy at school and in the field. He knew, without seeming to notice, the relative positions of all in the throne-room. Few of them mattered, but he was especially aware of Genevieve, Merrick and, without quite knowing why, Mina Harker. All, as it happened, were behind him.

The man and the woman on the dais were the focus of his attention; the Queen, whose visible distress gripped his heart, and the Prince, who sat at his ease on the throne, embodying the chaos about him. Dracula's face seemed painted on water; sometimes frozen into hard-planed ice, but for the most part in motion. Beauregard discerned other faces beneath. The red eyes and wolf teeth were fixed, but around them, under the rough cheeks, was a constantly shifting shape; sometimes a hairy, wet snout, sometimes a thin, polished skull.

A fastidiously dressed vampire youth, an explosion of lace escaping at his collar, mounted the dais.

'These are the heroes of Whitechapel,' he explained, a fluttering handkerchief before his mouth and nose. Beauregard recognised the Prime Minister.

'To them we owe the ruination of the desperate murderers known as Jack the Ripper,' Lord Ruthven continued. 'Dr John Seward of infamous memory, and, ah, Arthur Holmwood, the terrible traitor...' The Prince grinned ferociously, moustaches creaking like leather straps. Ruthven, Godalming's father-in-darkness, was plainly put out at the reminder of the ghastly deeds in which his protege was popularly believed to have collaborated.

'You have served us well and faithfully, my subjects,' Dracula said, his praise sounding like a threat...

... Ruthven stood by Prince Dracula's side, completing the triptych of rulers, the elder vampires and the new-born Queen. There was no doubt that Vlad Tepes was the apex of this trinity of power.

Genevieve had met Ruthven nearly a century previously, while travelling in Greece. He struck her then as a dilettante, desperately amusing himself with romantic trifles but oppressed by the aridity of his long life. As Prime Minister, he had exchanged ennui for uncertainty, for he must know the higher he was raised the greater was the likelihood that he would eventually be dashed down to the depths. She wondered if any other could see the fear that nestled like a rat in the bosom of Lord Ruthven.

Dracula looked Charles up and down, almost benevolently. Genevieve sensed her lover's blood boiling, and realised she had adopted an aggressive posture, teeth bared and fingers hooked into claws. She forced herself to stand demurely before the throne.

The Prince turned his attention to her and raised a thick eyebrow. His face was a mass of healed-over scars which swarmed about his smooth features.

'Genevieve Dieudonne,' he said, rolling her name around his tongue, trying to squeeze meaning from the syllables. 'I have had word of you before, in earlier times.'

She held out her empty hands.

'When I was new to this blessed state,' he continued, gesturing expressively, 'you were spoken of highly. It has been a wearisome task, keeping abreast of the peregrinations of our kind. The occasional report of you has come to me.'

As he spoke, the Prince seemed to swell. She suspected he chose to go naked not simply because he was able to, but because clothes could not contain his constant shifting of shape.

'You counted a distant kinswoman of mine as a friend, I believe.'

'Carmilla? That is so,' said Genevieve.

'A delicate flower, sadly missed.'

Genevieve nodded agreement. This monster's solicitousness was sickly-sweet, hard to swallow without choking. As fondly and without thought as a master pets an old hunting dog, the Prince stretched out a hand and caressed the Queen's tangled hair. Panic bloomed in Victoria's eyes. At the base of the throne-dais clustered a knot of shrouded nosferatu women, the wives Dracula had set aside. Beauties all, they rent their garments immodestly, exposing limbs and breasts and loins. They hissed and lusted like cats. The Queen was plainly in terror of them. Dracula's enormous fingers encircled Victoria's fragile skull and squeezed slightly.

'My lady,' he continued, 'why have you not come before to my court? We should have welcomed you to our sadly missed Castle Dracula in Transylvania or to our more modern estate here. All elders are welcome.'

Dracula's smile was persuasive, but behind it were his teeth.

'Do I so offend you, my lady? You wandered from one place to the next for hundreds of years, always in fear of the jealous warm. Like all un-dead, you were outcast on the face of the earth. Was this not injustice? Harried by inferiors, we were denied the succour of church and the protection of law. You and I, we have both lost girls that we have loved, to peasants with sharpened spikes and silver sickles. I am named Tepes, and yet it was not Dracula who pierced the heart of Carmilla Karnstein, nor that of Lucy Westenra. My dark kiss brings life, eternal and sweet; it is the silver knives that bring cold death, empty and endless. The dark nights are ended and we are raised to our rightful estate. This have I done for the good of all who are nosferatu. None need hide his nature among the warm, none need suffer the brain fever of the red thirst. Daughter-in-darkness of Chandagnac, you share in this; and yet you have no love for Dracula. Is this not sad? Is this not the attitude of a shallow and ungrateful woman?'

Dracula's hand was about Victoria's neck, thumb stroking her throat. The Queen's eyes were downcast.

'Were you not alone, Genevieve Dieudonne? And are you not among friends now? Among equals?'

She had been un-dead a half-century longer than Vlad Tepes. When she turned, this prince was a babe in arms, shortly to be delivered into a life in captivity.

'Impaler,' she declared, 'I have no equal.'

... as the Prince glowered at Genevieve, Beauregard stepped forward.

'I have a gift,' he said, his hand inside the breast of his tailcoat, 'a souvenir of our exploit in the East End.'

Dracula's eyes showed the philistine avarice of a true barbarian. Despite lofty titles, he was barely a generation away from his mountain bully-boy ancestors. This prince liked nothing more than pretty things. Bright, shining toys. Beauregard took a cloth bundle from his inside pocket, and unwrapped it.

Silver light exploded.

Vampires had been feeding in the shadows, noisily suckling the flesh of youths and girls. Now everyone was quiet. It must be an illusion, but the tiny blade gleamed, a miniature excalibur illuminating the whole room. Fury twisted Dracula's brow, then contempt and mirth turned his face into a wide-mouthed mask. Beauregard held up Jack Seward's silver scalpel.

'You think to defy me with this little needle, Englishman?'

'It is a gift,' he replied. 'But not for you.'

Genevieve edged away, uncertain. Merrick and Mina Harker were too far off to affect this action. Carpathians detached themselves from their amusements and formed a half-circle to one side. Several of the harem stood, red mouths wet and eager. No one was between Beauregard and the dais, but if he made a move towards Dracula, a wall of solid bone and vampire-flesh would form.

'For my Queen,' Charles said, tossing the knife.

Tumbling silver reflected in Dracula's eyes, as anger exploded dark in the pupils. Victoria snatched the scalpel from the air...

... it had all been for this moment, to get Charles into the Royal Presence, to serve this one duty. Genevieve, the taste of him in her mouth, understood...

... the Queen slipped the blade under her breast, stapling her shift to her ribs, puncturing her heart. For her, it was over swiftly. With a moan of joy, she fell from the dais, blood gouting from her fatal wound, and rolled down the steps, chain rattling with her as it unravelled. Sic transit Victoria Regina.

The Prime Minister beat his way through the harem, pushing the harpies aside, and clutched the Queen's body. Her head flopped as he extracted the scalpel with a single pull. Ruthven pressed his hand over her wound as if willing her back to life. It was no use. He stood, still gripping the silver knife. His fingers began to smoke and he threw away the scalpel, admitting with a yelp to his own pain. Surrounded by Dracula's wives, their faces transforming with hunger and rage, the Prime Minister shook inside his murgatroyd's finery.

Beauregard waited for the deluge.

The Prince  -  Consort no more  -  was on his feet, cloak rippling around him like a thundercloud. Tusks exploded from his mouth, his hands became spear-tipped clusters. His power was dealt a blow from which it could never recover. Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, was King now; and the stepfather who had dispatched him to pleasurable but purposeless exile in Paris was scarcely likely to exert any great influence over him. The Empire Dracula had usurped would rise against him.

If Beauregard died now, he would have done enough.

Dracula raised a hand, the useless chain dangling from his wrist, and pointed at Beauregard. Beyond speech, he spat out rage and hate.

The late Queen had been the Grandmother of Europe. Seven of her children still lived, four of them warm. By marriage and accession they linked the remaining Royal houses of Europe. Even if Bertie were set aside, there were sufficient claimants to contest the throne. By a nice irony, the King Vampire could be brought low by a gaggle of crowned haemophiliacs.

Beauregard walked backwards. The vampires, suddenly sober, gathered. The women of the harem and the officers of the guard. The women pounced first and bore him on to the floor, ripping...

... Charles had tried to save her from harm by keeping her out of the designs of the Diogenes Club, but she'd stubbornly insisted on seeing Dracula in his lair. Now they would probably both die.

She was thrust aside by Dracula's women. They were on Charles, claws and mouths red. She felt the razor-kiss of their nails on his face and hands. She pulled one hell-cat  -  that Styrian bitch Countess Barbara de Cilly, unless Genevieve was mistaken  -  from the fray and pitched her screeching across the room. Genevieve bared her teeth and hissed at the fallen woman.

Anger gave her strength.

She strode to the huddle that had formed over Charles and hauled him free, thumping and stabbing with her hands. In their lair, the courtiers were soft, replete. It was comparatively easy to cast aside Dracula's women. Genevieve found herself spitting and shrieking with the other she-creatures, pulling handfuls of hair and scratching at red eyes. Charles was bloodied, but still living. She fought for him as a mother wolf fights for her cubs.

The hell-cats scrabbled backwards, away from Genevieve, giving her room. Charles stood by her, still in a daze. Hentzau stood before them, Dracula's champion. His lower body was human, but he had an animal's teeth and claws. He made a fist and a point of bone slid from his knuckles. It grew long and straight and sharp.

She stepped back, out of range of the bone-rapier. The courtiers retreated, forming a circle like a prize-fight crowd. Still shackled to his dead Queen, Dracula watched. Hentzau whirled about, his sword moving faster than she could see. She heard the whisper of the blade and, moments later, realised her shoulder was opened, a red line trickling on her dress. She snatched up a footstool and raised it as a shield, parrying the next slice. Hentzau cut through cover and cushion, fixing his blade-edge in wood. As he pulled free, horsehair bled from the gash.

'Fighting with the furniture, eh?' Hentzau sneered.

Hentzau made passes near her face and locks of her hair floated free. From somewhere by the doors came a shout, and something was thrown to the floor before Charles...... the strangled voice was John Merrick's. At his feet was his sword-cane. The poor creature had wrested it from the custody of a footman. Beauregard had not expected to survive his Queen. For him, these seconds were an afterlife.

The Guardsman who had extruded a sword from his skeleton closed on Genevieve. Hentzau did not reckon a warm man worth the worry. He was light on his feet, a fencer's muscles moving in his knees, his sword-arm keen enough to fetch off a head.

Beauregard picked up his cane and drew the silver-edged sword. He understood how the Ruritanian must feel, with a weapon as an extension of his arm.

With a tap, Hentzau whisked Genevieve's stool from her hands. He grinned and drew back for a thrust at her heart. Beauregard sliced down, knocking Hentzau's point out of true, and slashed back, the edge of his blade slipping under the Guardsman's jaw, sliding through coarse fur, opening skin and scraping bone.

The Ruritanian howled in silver pain and turned on Beauregard. He launched an assault, sword-point darting like a dragonfly. Even in agony, he was fast and accurate. Beauregard parried a rapid compass of attacks. Suddenly, a thrust came. He felt a fish-hook sting just under his ribs. Throwing himself backwards, half-seconds ahead of the piercing blade, his heels skidded on the marble. He fell badly, knowing Hentzau would close on him and puncture his arteries. The women of the harem would drink from his fountaining wounds.

Hentzau raised his sword-arm like a scythe; the blade began a swishing descent. Beauregard knew the arc would terminate in his neck. He thought of Genevieve. And Pamela. With a convulsion, he brought up his own arm to ward off the blow. The handle of his sword slipped slightly in his sweat-slick fist and he gripped it hard.

A shock of impact ran through his whole body. Hentzau's arm sliced against Beauregard's silver. The Guardsman staggered back. His sword-arm fell in a dead lump, cut clean through at the elbow. As blood geysered, Beauregard rolled out of the way.

He regained his footing. The Guardsman gripped his stump and stumbled. His face turned human, moulting hair. After Hentzau's howl had subsided to a succession of choking sobs, there came an exaggerated clanking sound. Beauregard and Genevieve turned to its source.

Prince Dracula stood on the dais. He had detached the Queen's chain from his arm, and dropped it...... he came down from his throne, steam pouring from his nostrils. For centuries he had thought himself a higher being, apart from humanity; less blinded by selfish fantasies, she knew she was just a tick in the hide of the warm. In his bloated state, the Prince was almost lethargic.

Genevieve held Charles to her and turned to the doors. Before them stood the Prime Minister. He was civilised, almost effete, in this company.

'Aside, Ruthven,' she hissed.

Ruthven was uncertain. With the Queen truly dead, things would change. Willing to try anything, Genevieve held out her crucifix. Ruthven, surprised, almost laughed. He could have barred their path, but he hesitated  -  ever the politician  -  then stepped out of the way.

'Very clever, my lord,' she told him, quietly.

Ruthven shrugged. He knew an empire had foundered. She guessed he would immediately concentrate on his own survival. Elders were skilled in survival.

Merrick held the doors open. In the antechamber, a startled Mina Harker stood, unsure in her shock. Everyone was reeling, trying to keep up with the rapid changes. Some of the courtiers had given up and returned to their pleasures.

Dracula's shadow grew, his wrath reaching out like a fog.

Genevieve helped Charles out of the throne-room. She licked blood from his face, and felt the strength of his heart. Together, they would ride this whirlwind.

'I couldn't tell you,' he tried to explain.

She shushed him.

Merrick shut the doors and put his enormous back to them. He made a long howl that might have meant 'go!' Something smashed against the other side of the doors and a clawed hand punched through above Merrick's head, a dozen feet from floor-level, tearing at the wood. The hand made a fist, and enlarged its hole. The doors shook as if a rhinoceros were slamming against them. An upper hinge flew apart.

She saluted Merrick and limped away, Charles by her side...

... he told himself not to look back.

As they ran, Beauregard heard the doors behind them bursting outwards, and Merrick being crushed under falling wood and stamping feet. Another ill-used hero, lost too swiftly to be mourned.

Sweeping past Mina Harker, they emerged from the antechamber into the reception hall, which was full of vampires in livery. A dozen different rumours animated them.

Genevieve pulled him onwards.

He heard the thunder of pursuit. Among the clatter of boots, there was a single flap. He felt the draught of giant wings.

Bewildered guards let them through the Palace doors...

... her blood raced. There was no carriage, of course. They would have to make their way on foot and disappear in the crowds. In the most populated city in the world, it should be easy to hide.

As they stumbled down the wide steps, a cadre of Carpathians quick-marched up, swords rattling in their scabbards. At their head was the General everyone made fun of behind his back, Iorga.

'Quick,' she shouted, 'the Prince Consort, the Queen! All will be lost!'

Iorga tried to look resolute, not delighted at the prospect of some unknown harm to his commander-in-chief. The cadre redoubled their speed and jammed into the great doorway just as Dracula's retinue tried to come through. They should be through the main gates by the time the Carpathians had disentangled themselves.

Charles, the exhilaration of his duel fading, wiped his face with his sleeve. She took his arm and they strolled lopsidedly away from the clamour.

'Gene, Gene, Gene,' he murmured through blood.

'Shush,' she said, guiding him onwards. 'We must hurry.'

... people, warm and un-dead, streamed around from all sides. The Palace was being attacked and reinforced at once. In the park, a choir of demonstrators sang hymns, blocking the path of a fire engine. In the grounds, loose horses ran, kicking up scuds of gravel.

He needed to draw breath. Genevieve, her grip on his arm fierce, let him pause. The instant he stopped running, he was aware of the mauling he had sustained. He supported himself with his naked sword and gulped cold air into his lungs. His mind and body shook. It was as if he had died back in the throne-room and was now an ectoplasmic form liberated from earthly flesh.

Ahead, people swarmed over the Palace gates. The weight of numbers made them swing inwards, knocking over a couple of Guardsmen. This riot came at a most convenient time. The Diogenes Club took care of its own. Or his other friends, the Limehouse Ring, were intervening on his behalf. Or he was lost in the tides of history, and this was simply a fortunate occurrence.

Holding aloft torches and wooden crucifixes, a crowd of roughs, faces streaked with burnt cork, shoved into the courtyard. Their leader was a nun, her wimple disclosing a Chinese cameo of a face. Tiny and lithe, she summoned her followers, and pointed up at the skies.

A deeper darkness than night fell. A great shadow was all around, thrown over the crowds. Twin red moons looked down. Slow-flapping winds knocked people off their feet. The bat-shape filled the sky over the Palace.

For a moment, the crowds fell silent. Then a voice was raised against the shape. More voices joined. Torches were tossed into the air, but fell short. Stones pulled from the drive were hurled. Shots were fired. The huge shadow soared higher.

Iorga's men, regathered after their undignified tumble, charged the crowds, laying about themselves with sabres. The mob was easily beaten back through the main gates. Beauregard and Genevieve were sucked out of the courtyard with the retreat. A lot of noise had been made, but little damage was done. The Chinese nun was the first to disappear into the night, her followers scattering after her.

Well away from the gates, he allowed himself to look back. The shadow had alighted on the roof of Buckingham Palace. A gargoyle-shape looked down, wings settling like a cloak. Beauregard wondered how long the Prince could cling to his perch.

In the night, fires burned high. The news would soon spread, a match touched to the powder-keg. In Chelsea and Whitechapel and Kingstead; in Exeter and Purfleet and Whitby; in Paris and Moscow and New York: there would be repercussions, rippling out to change the world. The park was full of shouting. Dark figures danced and fought...

... she felt a twinge of regret for her lost position. She would not return to Toynbee Hall and her work would pass to others. With or without Charles, in this country or abroad, in the open or in hiding, she would start anew, building another life. All she took with her was her father's crucifix. And a good dress, somewhat spotted.

She was sure the creature on the roof of the Palace, even with his night-eyes and lofty vantage point, could not see them. The further away they walked, the smaller he became. After they were past the piked skull of Abraham Van Helsing, Genevieve looked back and saw only darkness.