Again he smiled his awful smile. It was funny now, but it hadn’t been at all funny when the police came knocking at the door the day after George came back. He had very nearly made a serious mistake then, had gone too quickly on his guard, on the defensive. But of course they’d put his nervousness down to the recent loss of his ‘uncle’. If only they’d been able to know the truth, that in fact George Lake was right under their feet, whining and shivering in the cellars. And even so, what could they have done about it? It was hardly Yulian’s fault that George wouldn’t lie still, was it?
And that was another part of the legend which was a fact: that when a vampire killed a victim in a certain way, then that victim would return as one of the undead. Three nights George had lain there, and on the fourth he’d clawed his way out. A mere man buried alive could never have done it, but the vampire in him had given George all the strength he needed and more. The vampire which had been part of the Other, which had put one of its pseudohands into him and stopped George’s heart. The Other which had been part of Yulian, in fact Yulian’s tooth.
What a torn and bloodied state George had been in when Yulian opened the door to him that night. And how the house had rung to his demented sobbing and shrieking, until Yulian had grown angry with him, told him to be quiet and locked him in the cellar. And there he’d stayed.
Yulian watched the silver light of the moon creeping through a crack in his curtains, channelled his thoughts anew. What had he been recounting? Ah, yes, the police.
They had come to report a shocking crime, the illegal opening of George Lake’s grave by person or persons unknown, and the theft of his corpse. Was Mrs Lake still residing at Harkley House?
Why, yes she was, but she was still suffering from the shock of her husband’s death. If it wasn’t absolutely necessary that they see her, Yulian would prefer to break the news to her himself. But who could be responsible for so despicable a crime?
Well, sir, we do believe we’ve got one of them there cults at work in these here parts, despoiling graveyards and the like and holding, er, sabbats? Druids or some such. Devil worshippers, you know? But this time they’ve gone too far! Don’t you worry, sir, we’ll get ‘em in the end. But do break it easy to his missus, all right?
Of course, of course. And thank you for bringing us this news, terrible though it is. I certainly don’t envy you your job.
All in a day’s work, sir. Sorry we’ve nothing good to report, that’s all. Good night to you .
And that was that.
But again he had strayed, and once more he was obliged to focus his thoughts back on the ‘legend’ of the vampire. Mirrors: vampires hated mirrors because they had no reflections. False — and yet in a way true. Yulian did have a reflection; but sometimes, looking in a glass, especially at night, he saw far more than others could see. For he knew what he was looking at, that it was something alien to man. And he had wondered: if others saw him like that, reflected in a glass, would they too see the real thing, the monster behind the man?
And lastly there was the vampire’s lust, the way he sated himself on women. Now Yulian had tasted the blood — and more than the blood — of women, and had found it rich as deep red wine. It excited him as all blood did, but not so much that he’d glut himself on it. Georgina, Anne, Helen — he’d tried the blood of all three. And certainly, in good time, he would try the blood of many more.
But his attitude towards taking blood puzzled him. If he were a true vampire, surely blood would be the driving force of his life. And yet it wasn’t. Perhaps his metamorphosis wasn’t yet complete. Perhaps, as the change waxed in him, so the human part would wane, disappear altogether. And then he’d become a vampire full-blown. Or full-blooded?