Page 24 of Lucy Undying (Dracula #1)

24

Boston, September 25, 2024

Client Transcript

Sorry, did I stop talking? Sometimes I get lost in memories. That moment in China when I was so tired and lost and ready to be done with it all. It feels like I’m still there, or there again. Like I never escaped that feeling, I just managed to ignore it for a while.

But we’re about to meet the Queen!

In my mind, she’s the color red. Red silk, red lips. Red eyes that night she found me, flashing with violence and death. But also red for good luck, red for the truest blood from the heart, red as both warning and embrace.

She had me on the ground with her hands around my throat before I could move. Each of her fingers was capped in golden blades, razor claws both deadly and breathtaking.

“Breathtaking.” That’s a funny word for me to use, since I don’t need to breathe. It’s fascinating, how many figures of speech are intimately tied to the systems running through our bodies keeping us alive. Mortality is what binds us to one another, the most intimately, universally shared experience.

It’s a lonely thing to be cut off from mortality. Even the simplest phrases become complicated existential questions. If I don’t need to breathe, can my breath still be taken away?

If it can, the Queen would have done it. She leaned close to my face, her painted white beauty filling my entire vision. It was like being threatened by the moon itself.

“Tell me whose blood I smell on you and where the body is,” she said. Not a question—a demand. She never spoke in questions. The Queen ruled her land with absolute authority. “I will never allow one of Dracula’s vampires to claim unhallowed ground here.”

Her bladed fingers were placed precisely over my spine, ready to sever it. But though I had been ready for an ending, I was now desperately curious about the Queen. And perhaps I was a little in love already. I always responded well to demanding women; something in me was forever eager to please them.

“I killed Dracula’s familiar,” I answered, as calm as she was furious. I’d been taught the safest tactic was to only tell people what they expected and wanted to hear. But I felt truth was my best play. It was my only play, really. “After I cut off his head, I threw him into the harbor. There will never be grave dirt for anyone to rest in. I didn’t come here to serve Dracula; I came here to find him.”

She spat on the ground next to my face. What a show of power! Our fluids have to be consciously, actively replaced, so for her to waste saliva simply to show me her disdain? Not only was she in charge, she had a vast supply of blood, and she wanted me to know it.

I understood none of that nuance at the time. I was still impressed, though. I didn’t move, didn’t try to fight her or flee. I was ever an obedient victim.

The frenzy faded from her eyes, and she stood. “Because you found one of Dracula’s familiars who had managed to hide from me, I will not kill you.” I was able to take in her clothes for the first time. She was robed in richly embroidered layers of silk, everything elegant and formal and structured. But her sash had been pushed out of place while attacking me, and some of the jewels and chains in her hair were askew. She gestured toward them.

I stared stupidly up at her. She held out her hands, giving me a clear view of the deadly pieces on her fingers. Then she clicked the blades together impatiently. “Attend to me, little fool.”

She couldn’t get her own clothes and accessories back in order herself. She’d fused the gold to her bones, making her fingers into permanent weapons. A threat, yes, but also a demonstration of her status. She never needed to use her fingers for anything else. I learned later she never shifted from her human form, refusing to surrender her body for anything or anyone.

I stood, brushing my hands on my skirt to clean them. If I’d ruined something of the Queen’s, be it silk dress or leopard pet, she probably would have killed me without a thought. Then I carefully adjusted the pins and chains in her hair. I wasn’t certain how everything was supposed to settle with her elaborate clothing. Each fold and drape had a precise placement, but I did the best I could.

She flicked her eyes down and gave a curt nod. Then she looked at me properly for the first time. Her nose, broad and perfect, wrinkled ever so slightly in disgust.

It hurt far more than her attack had. I’d always prided myself on being not just beautiful, but lovely. To be judged for my appearance after such an arduous, exhausting journey? Shame burned inside my chest. Presenting a picture of ideal feminine grace was one of the few strengths I’d had in life. It helped control the way people saw me and gave me some small measure of power. I had neither control nor power now.

Maybe that was why she took pity on me. She gestured sharply, then began walking. I followed a few steps behind. She led me deeper into the rocky, scrubby hills, until we dipped into a hidden verdant valley. A natural spring burbled cheerily past, but I couldn’t look away from our destination.

I had never seen such an enchanting building. There were three levels of roof, all dark green, angling sharply down before swooping outward, much like the Queen’s voluminous sleeves. Bold red pillars supported the roofs. The walls of the house were the same red, with gold accents and white trim. The peaks and edges of the roof were spiked, fanged like their Queen. Light winked behind windows, where elaborately carved screens turned even privacy into something elegant and beautiful.

As we approached, towering bronze double doors opened. Two women—girls, really—bowed as we passed through into an inner courtyard. Though it was cultivated with geometric precision and filled with carefully tended greenery, something was strange.

“None of the plants smell strongly,” I pointed out. I had learned in my outings from the cemetery that gardens are overwhelming. What might register as vaguely pleasant to you attacks our senses. It makes it difficult to catch any other scents, which is a bit like walking around with an infant screaming in your ear, or flashing strobe lights aimed right at you.

I’ve never minded strong smells; it’s nice to have something tugging on my nose other than blood. But most vampires can’t abide them.

“This was once a summer palace for an emperor. Now it is my stronghold. Everything here exists for my pleasure, and to further my work,” she said by way of explanation. When she said it, one clawed hand gestured outward toward the edges of the courtyard, where a group of girls were sparring with wickedly sharp blades. They stopped and bowed when they saw her.

A dozen other girls and women came out to silently greet her. I thought they were servants, but a closer look revealed flashes of gold, jade, pearl, and expertly carved polished stones. Everyone was wearing silk and a museum display’s worth of wealth and treasure.

The Queen tapped two of her finger blades together. The women dispersed, disappearing through doors and behind screens, and the sparring group went right back to it. I could smell blood. They weren’t practicing with dull weapons.

I had so many questions. I’d been living in my mausoleum with Raven, scraping together an existence. I hadn’t been aware hidden palaces were an option.

The Queen continued, passing through a set of double doors ahead of us, smaller bronze siblings to the front gate. I followed her into a sitting room. The floor was sunken, strewn with pillows. Everything was green and blue, perfectly contrasting with the Queen in her resplendent red. Overlooking the sunken floor was a gilded throne, the back sculpted with a dragon holding the sun. When the Queen sat, she was haloed by the sun, wearing it as a crown.

She held out a hand. One of the girls appeared, rushing forward to place a jade goblet there. With her free hand, the Queen stroked the girl’s cheek, a caress light enough to avoid cutting her. The girl closed her eyes, in fear or ecstasy or both. She murmured gratitude, and then left us.

The goblet was filled with blood. Fresh blood, that much I could smell. But there was an oddness to it. It was a blend, a little taken from each of the girls and women who lived in the compound. The Queen never drank directly from any of them, and they all contributed daily to keep her fed. As a rule, the Queen never killed, which meant she never created a body that could be buried.

“I have never let him or any other vampire into China,” she said without preamble. “I guard every port. My girls are rescued from violence and predators, brought safely here. They’re given tools and training, then sent out as spies and assassins to destroy vampires and their servants. Every few years Dracula tries again to make a safe place for himself here so he can infect my land. He never will.”

“What about you?” I asked. “How did he attack you?”

“I was murdered and buried in Europe, far from my home.” Her eyes went soft and distant. “I can feel it out there, still. My grave. Unmarked. Anonymous. I defy it, as I defied him. He was too wedded to comfort and strength; he could never come to my land without a guarantee of both. I am the first and last defense, an immovable wall barring him from all of China. Blood alone gives me strength, and it is enough.” She tilted her chin up, and she was glorious. I admired her for her power and resolve.

I still do, despite everything.

Awed, I sat at her feet and gazed up at her in a stupor of exhaustion and adoration.

“Look what you made here,” I said. Or something equally inane. I was mixing Mandarin and English, my thoughts bubbling and flowing as quickly as the spring outside, impossible to grasp. All I could feel was how much I wanted what they had.

Not what she had. What the girls and women who lived there had. A safe home. Beautiful things. But also someone in charge. Someone to protect them, someone to tell them what to do, someone to make sense of the world for them. I missed Mina so much; it was the same as thirst, clawing agonizingly through my veins, itching in every part ofme.

“So you came here looking for Dracula, and now you are lost,” the Queen said.

“Do you know where to find him?” If her questions always sounded like commands, my questions sounded like pleas. I was ashamed of my weakness in front of her.

“Tell me why you wish to find him.”

It took me a long time to answer, to form into words what I hadn’t fully understood until then. I could have explained that I was worried about Mina. That I wanted to make sure Dracula was far away from her. That I needed proof that my sacrifice had been worth it.

But that wasn’t it. Not entirely. I tried to articulate what my questions were, for both our sakes. “Dracula took me with such focus and determination and care. So much struggle to make certain I’d become like him rather than simply dying. I want to know why. But he’s never appeared to me again. And I’m afraid for the safety of someone I love. I don’t know where he is, and I don’t know where she is, either.”

Because that was another upsetting truth: All those days and nights Raven spent watching for Dracula, I had kept watch, too. Mina never visited my resting place. Maybe she couldn’t. Maybe Dracula was stalking her, and she was in danger. Or maybe the men who hadn’t saved me had figured out the simplest thing to do was take Mina far away from Dracula’s thirst.

Either way, finding him would give me answers to more than just Mina’s fate.

The Queen gazed down at me. She was an altar I could have worshipped at. Her blades tapped against the arm of her chair. But there was a crack in the perfectly sculpted expanse of her face. A hint of the same pain I felt, the same loss. The same abandonment. “You will never have your answer. Dracula is dead.”

“What? When? How?” I couldn’t imagine anything killing Dracula. He seemed as inevitable as nightfall, as inescapable as winter.

“I have spies in Europe, too, watching his castle. They brought news a week ago. He was killed by men who chased him from London to Transylvania. He finally tried to take a woman whom men actually cared about.”

“Who?” I asked, my throat tight, my fingers clenched into clawed fists. But I already knew the answer. Why had Raven been distracting me? Why had she scared me away from trying to go home and find Mina? Why had she sent me here?

Because Raven was always a bride. She always served Dracula. And she was doing whatever she could to keep me from protecting his next chosen victim.

When I was still alive, I’d put myself between Dracula and Mina to protect her. And he’d still tried to take her. My sacrifice had been worth nothing.

But that wasn’t quite true. The men who failed to save me had managed to save her. Maybe because of what they’d learned from their failures. And if Dracula was dead, that meant Mina was safe, and I was…

What was I?

I should have been happy. Mina’s safety was what I had given myself up for. It was what I wanted.

Almost what I wanted. Because in that desperate, aching, eternal hunger that plagued me even before I awoke in my casket, I had always imagined my future with Mina. Now I couldn’t return home. Not ever. Because if I went back to Mina, I’d be the threat.

I didn’t know if I could resist drawing her to me, pressing my lips to her white neck, devouring her in death like I had never been able to in life.

The Queen had no idea what was happening inside my head. She sipped from her goblet, watching me. “I was going to kill you to send a message, but there is no one left worth sending a message to. Dracula is dead. His brides will wither and waste without him. And no one cares about you.”

The Queen was right about that. I would drift into the darkness, become one with it, cease being Lucy and exist as the night itself. Eternal and alone.

Or maybe…maybe I could stay here. Exchange a governess for a queen. Pour my desperate need to love and be loved into her. She seemed worthy of it.

The Queen tapped one metal-capped finger against her goblet as a summoning bell. “This land is mine. I am safe, and all the girls in my care are safe, too. No one can harm us. And now that you are here, no one will harm you, either.”

She smiled at last, and that was when I should have known I’d stepped into a trap.