Chapter 14 [ You are not allowed to view attachments ]
Lately people in Willow Creek had been noticing a strange man showing up outside their doors at night. Dressed entirely in black, he had white hair and white skin -- not beige, which was usually referred to as white -- but white as in colorless.
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Brian Bibbler had actually talked to him and said that he had a foreign accent. "He might have been from Windenburg," he said.
"That sounds like Brother Vladislaus," the Wizard Rasmodius told his wife when she relayed the gossip. "I can't imagine what he's doing here, so far from Forgotten Hollow."
"Could it really be your brother?" said Tildy. "It's been over 100 years since you left, and you said he was an old man then."
"Well, he wasn't really my brother," said Rasmodius. "In fact, he was the one who turned me, back when I was a youth and in danger of dying. But it could easily be the Vladislaus I knew -- there's no telling how old the man was. He claimed to remember Philip of Macedon, Alexander the Great's father."
"Do you think he might be looking for you?" asked Tildy.
"I sincerely hope not," said Rasmodius. "I have no interest in seeing him again."
Several rooms away, Valerie was listening to the conversation. Usually she made an effort not to overhear her parents, but this subject was too fascinating. Having read all the books about vampires that she could find, she was now ready for training with a vampire. Sadly, she and her brother Octavius were the only vampires she knew of. If this vampire who was wandering around was the same one who had turned her father, then he was definitely more powerful than she was and capable of training her.
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Forgotten Hollow was on the other side of the ocean, but it took Valerie only a couple of days to get there. She transformed herself into a bat and stowed away in the baggage compartment. It was cold, but not dangerously so for one of the undead.
Although it was springtime too in Forgotten Hollow, the landscape seemed unchanged and unchanging, although Valerie guessed it might be snow-covered in winter. She located the house that seemed suitable for a master vampire and settled down in an upstairs bedroom to wait.
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"
Will this Vladislaus be the one?" she wrote in her journal. "
I cannot bear the thought of mating with a mere mortal, but what if he is too old to provide the heir that I'm supposed to have? But perhaps he can teach me how to turn mortals into vampires as he turned my father..."
A noise downstairs caught her attention, the unmistakeable wheeze of a pipe organ. Valerie plucked up her courage and followed the music down a long carpeted hallway through a hall filled with gargoyles to a staircase of crumbling stone.
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Vladislaus was playing the organ, but she soon persuaded him to stop and speak with her. "Rasmodius's daughter," he mused. "Yes, I remember the ingrate. Did he send you to me as a peace offering?"
"He doesn't know I'm here," said Valerie. "I'm a vampire, and I need training."
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"And what will you give me in return for this training?" asked Vladislaus. "Or did you think I would do it out of the goodness of my heart? I warn you, my lovely, I am evil through and through."
"I didn't bring anything with me, but if you come to Willow Creek, I can have a gift for you. Or I could give you a kiss."
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Count Vladislaus was most offended. "Do you think I'm some kind of frog to be transformed by a
kiss?" he demanded, as soon as he stopped writhing and hissing. "But I will give you a lesson, and you may give me this present, and if it's acceptable, I might provide another lesson or two."
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"Ush kinnara!" he exclaimed and rose into the air. Valerie could tell that her vampiric powers were improving, but all too soon he declared the lesson at an end. "I will come for my gift soon," said Vladislaus. "Until then, begone!"
And Valerie was back at home.
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If Count Vladislaus was going to come and teach her, they would need some privacy. She couldn't imagine him visiting her parents -- and they might not be safe with him, her father especially.
She would receive him in the Junimos' tower. They would have to leave of course. She knew they wouldn't be able to stand being in the vicinity of something evil, and besides, their cages were smelly.
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"What do you think you're doing?" her father demanded, just as she was releasing the last Junimo.
"I've decided to live here rather than in the house," said Valerie. "I'm a grown woman now, and I would like to have some privacy."
"A grown woman without a job," Rasmodius grumbled, but he did not argue with her.
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Vladislaus called the next day and said she should meet him at the Blue Velvet Nightclub. He was outside when she arrived and already suffering from the sun. He took her upstairs. "We can be private here," he said.
Valerie gave him her gift -- a single red rose from her mother's garden. Vladislaus was not impressed. "Is that all you have to offer?"
Valerie didn't want to suggest another kiss. "I could give you a whirl in my coffin," she said.
"Have you no modesty?" Vladislaus drew back, shocked, and then dissolved into a cloud of black smoke.
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Valerie was very upset and embarrassed and tried to calm herself down in the ladies' room. She didn't know what she was going to do. If she couldn't seduce Vladislaus, she would never be skilled enough to make anyone a vampire, and she couldn't, she just couldn't fall in love with and have children with someone who wasn't a vampire.
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Fortunately for Valerie's peace of mind, Count Vladislaus did call again. It was the night of the Romance Festival, and Valerie had an idea. "I've found a delicious tea that tastes remarkably like plasma fruit," she told him. "I would like to share it with you."
"That might be worth another lesson," Vladislaus said grudgingly.
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The Sakura tea worked its magic upon Vladislaus -- and upon Valerie, too. "Yes, Master," she agreed, "I will give you whatever you ask."
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The coffin whirled many times before ejecting them.
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Valerie was delighted to find out that she was pregnant.
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She made the journey to Forgotten Hollow to acquaint Count Vladislaus with the news.
"You would agree, would you not, that I have given you this child in your belly?"
"Yes," said Valerie.
"So it would not be excessive of me to ask for a child in return?"
"I would have to think about that," she said.
"No thinking is necessary," said Vladislaus. "You have already agreed to give me whatever I ask, do you not remember?"
Valerie's throat had gone dry. She couldn't speak but only nodded.
"You might find this hard to believe," said Vladislaus, "but our mating the other evening was my first experience with -- what do you call it, woohoo? I found that I quite enjoyed it. I should like someone to provide it on a regular basis -- in short, a wife.
"Oh, not you, my lovely. You have a temper, I've noticed, and besides, you are obligated to remain in your present charmingly minuscule abode. I have no wish to join you there, and you cannot move in with me here. No, you will have a daughter with some handsome mortal -- a mortal daughter, I think, so that I can decide whether to give her immortality. I should like her to be neat, a music lover like myself, and docile. And no red hair, please. You will send her to me when she is of marriageable age -- shall we say by Love Day in the Year of the Dog?"
"And if I don't do this?" asked Valerie.
"Oh, my lovely, I would seriously recommend compliance. Mortals have courts and lawsuits to deal with broken contracts, but among us vampires, it's much simpler -- you automatically cease to be a vampire and are bound over to me as my lawful prey. I might add that I have found the formula for that ambrosia which your father is seeking. It might almost be more satisfying -- but no, granddaughter or daughter in my power will be sufficient revenge."
Follow Valerie's adventures in
Chapter 24.
