Immortality

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Twenty-Four

The numbness that he felt on waking should have meant something was wrong, but instead a strange contentment filled him. He felt happy as he’d ever been, though that happiness was edged in ice, and had chilled him to that numbness. He shivered in his lover’s arms, and woke him.

Dracula’s eyes were dark and immediately alert as though he had been merely feigning sleep. Gabriel saw the torchlight in them dancing, but that was all he saw; he wanted to say he saw right down to his soul, that he read his past and his every emotion in those eyes, but he saw nothing of the sort. They were dead. It made him wonder if the man in his arms was even capable of feeling, but something told him that was just a triviality. What mattered was what he felt himself, and surely that was real enough. He was still Gabriel Van Helsing, mind control or not, and he was sure of what he felt. He had to trust in something.

Then Dracula shifted in his arms and the movement, the dance of the fire in his eyes, was like a fragment of forgotten memory. He had forgotten something. He frowned and wondered what it was, why he was thinking of silver shining in his eyes. Inside he was conflicted; he felt he should forget, but a shapeless memory brushed by and set him on edge. His happiness was tainted. He wondered if he’d ever know what it was that he’d forgotten.

“Good morning, Gabriel,” murmured his lover, his breath cold against Gabriel’s throat. “I trust that you slept well?”

In point of fact he’d slept very well, better than he could remember having ever slept. But he was robbed of the chance to respond by a loud knocking on the door. Dracula’s eyes narrowed and he quickly twisted from Gabriel’s embrace; he left the bed. He was naked as he took his first few steps but as Gabriel watched, as he stepped toward the door, his discarded clothes seemed to move like a whirlwind about him. By the time he reached the door he was fully clothed, not a hair out of place. It should probably have been astonishing or disconcerting, but Gabriel just watched mutely.

The door opened. He couldn’t hear the words but he did hear the tone with which the count spoke and he did not see at all amused at having been disturbed. He gestured to whoever was beyond the door and Gabriel just lay in bed and watched, warming now, wondering absently where Dorian was since he’d become so strangely accustomed to waking in his presence. But then Dracula turned and swept back to the bed in almost impossibly long strides and seated himself on his side of it, crossing his legs at the knee.

“I am afraid that I have been called away,” he said, glancing back at Gabriel over his shoulder with those empty and yet strangely captivating eyes. Gabriel frowned; he’d noticed that the door was open still, had tested his limbs and found himself to be perfectly capable of moving under his own power, but still the fact that Dracula was leaving him meant more than this most apparent chance for escape. His eyes strayed from the door and thoughts of what might lie beyond, and returned to Dracula, to the clip that held his hair. It was silver, like his memories.

“I shall not be gone from you for long, I hope,” said Dracula, who then stood and turned and let his eyes linger on Gabriel’s face for longer than was strictly necessary to convey the sentiment. “I will return soon.” And then he swept quickly from the room, the door closing behind him. With only the smallest sliver of his consciousness Gabriel heard a key turn in the lock and the bar lowered back into place. His best chance for escape had passed, but still he dwelled on the empty space in the bed beside him. He wished he could think of something else.

The room was so empty then. He glanced around it, over the furniture and the glass of wine that he’d left half empty on the table, over the space on the bed to the drapes pulled across the window. It had to be morning but he was still lying there in the dim light cast from the dying torches. So he threw back the sheets and slipped from the bed, walked barefootr thr the cold stone floor and let the morning’s flat grey light in through the high window. He had never seen out from it and found that he didn’t care to. He glanced at the food on the table and found he had no appetite. He didn’t even feel the cold until he saw his trousers lying by the bed and realised that he was still naked. He felt lost. He was not himself.

He dressed – if pulling on a pair of trousers and a belt could be considered dressing, combed the tangles from hai hair with his fingers and then sat down cross-legged on the bed with a blanket around his shoulders. It felt colder there now that the flat daylight spilled into the room, spreading across the floor like icy water, and he felt ill at ease. He moved, drumming his fingers against his calves at first, then stretching, until finally he left the bed and paced to and fro across the room despite the cold stones beneath his feet. He could barely remember the last time he’d felt so restless. He was irritated by the fact that he couldn’t remember how long he’d been there and dashed his unfinished glass of wine against a wall before he could help himself. Then he sighed and sank back down on the bed, dropping his head into his hands. This was ridiculous. If he didn’t want to leave then how couldbe sbe so restless staying?

He knew why, though, even if it was not exactly something that he wanted to admit. The tenseness he felt, clawing at his shoulders, the restless feeling that fluttered like moths in his stomach, was because Dracula had left the room. He felt he should be with him and would probably feel just this way unte ree returned. He hated that, or should have, his happiness being so dependant on another, and on Dracula in particular whom he knew was his enemy, who he’d returned there to kill. But all he could think about was the moment when he’d return, about him stepping through the door. He could see him so clearly in his mind, and exactly what he’d do… Dracula was not the only one who could move swiftly and before the count knew it he’d be up against the wall, hands pinned above his head, Gabriel’s teeth at his throat. They’d kiss ‘til he felt light-headed, Gabriel’s hands tracing the muscles that lay beneath that stark black jacket until they could stand it no longer and simply had to…

The Door opened, quickly, and brought him back to himself. He glared, narrowing his eyes, cursing under his breath as Dorian stepped into the room.

“You just ruined a perfectly good fantasy,” he said, and Dorian frowned, looking at him rather strangely.

“Well, I’m sorry Gabriel, but it *is* rather important,” he told him, leaving the door open behind him and walking quickly across the room. He looked so graceful doing it but Gabriel couldn’t help but note that Dracula was more graceful still. Considering that they both seemed to have made pacts with the devil, Gabriel found that rather odd.

“Why are you here, Dorian?” he asked, as Dorian dumped whatever it was that he’d been carrying down onto the bed. He looked down at it and realised it was his clothes, the rest of them: sitting there at the foot of the bed were his shirt and jumper, socks, boots, coat… even his scarf had apparently survived. He plucked at the sleeve of his battered leather coat and wondered if Dorian had kept them for him all along. Not that that mattered, of course.

“Well, I thought you might like to escape,” Dorian said. That was certainly unexpected. “Your ber aer and your friar friend are downstairs with fifty or so rather raggedy villagers and though it does seem that their attempts to end Dracula’s unlife may prove to be rather abortive… let’s just say that this could well be you last best chance of leaving here. Alive, that is.”

Gabriel stopped glaring, stopped frowning and just stared at Dorian. It was then that it hit him. He didn’t think that he’d be leaving there alive.

“Oh,” Dorian said, and took a step back. He must have seen it written there on his face or in his eyes because it was patently obvious that Dorian understood completely. “Oh, I see.”

Gabriel said absolutely nothing, but perhaps his expression changed. He wanted to believe that it did, because even though he knew he didn’t care about leaving, Dorian had tried to do something for him. If Dracula found out then he’d probably burn Dorian’s picture because of it, and that would most likely be the end of Dorian Gray. He wanted to think that his look was grateful but determined. It was probably closer to mocking. Maybe he ought to tell Dracula what Dorian had suggested, once he came back.

“So he finally broke you,” Dorian said disdainfully. It was an odd tone and an odd look for him, he whose natural expression was that of innocence and wonder at torldorld, but he did it so *well*. Of course, Dorian was far from being innocent, he knew; he was at best a liar, with every other human sin beneath. But even his disdain was beautiful.

“He didn’t break me,” Gabriel replied. “He opened my eyes.” But his conviction was seriously lacking. It was so strange. “I think that you should leave.”

Dorian nodded slowly, still giving him that look. “Yes,” he said. “I think I should. I’m quite sure that I’m not needed here. Please don’t expect that I will linger here waiting for you to realise your mistake, Gabriel; you did always know that I have a greater interest in self-preservation than in playing the hero, even where you’re concerned.”

Gabriel had simply no idea what he was supposed to say to that, so he remained silent. All he could do was to hold onto his coat and watch mutely was Dorian adjusted his collar, gave him one last wry smile and then swept from the room.

The whole experience, he found as he sat there running his fingertips over the seams of his coat, had left him with no particular lasting impression. He knew that he should have felt *something*, just as he knew he should have accepted Dorian’s offer and bolted through that still open doorway, but he was oddly detached. He couldn’t even muster up a feeling when he thought of Carl and Abraham and wondered if they were still living. That couldn’t be right, surely; his old friend and a man who claimed to be his brother had quite foolishly stormed the castle and he found that he quite simply could not have cared less. But he didn’t have time to dwell on that thought, or didn’t feel that he wanted to give time to it. He had vastly more important things on his mind.

How long would it take for Dracula and the Dwergi to despatch their would-be killers? Not so very long, he thou con considering the state of the villagers, and Carl – though not exactly short on the inventive side of things – was still no field man. The only unknown, he thought, was Abraham; he knew so very little about the man, but had a rather odd feeling that he could cause Dracula some trouble if he put his mind to it. He tried to reason with himself that Abraham was just one man, but that was where his logic failed him as he knew that not so long ago he himself had been considered just one man. Abraham Van Helsing was the unknown of the equation, and he found that unsettling. He needed to know that Dracula would be returning.

He let go of the sleeve of his coat and pulled a sock from the pile of clothing. Two or three of the torches had died out and he was feeling colder, so he started to dress; it was as he lifted his hair free of the neck of his jumper that he looked up at the door, really *looked* at it and recognised that Dorian had left it open. No one had closed it and locked it behind them. The bar was out of place. All he had to do was cross the room and pass through it, and he’d slip away in the confusion. But he couldn’t leaObviObviously he couldn’t leave because without the gateway being open or the ability to sprout wings, escape was actually impossible, but also because he had to wait there. He had a plan that involved the far wall, teeth, and rather more nakedness that was generally deemed acceptable in polite society.

He could hear something, he thought, that echoed down the corridors and in the halls. He knew it must be the villagers, Carl and Abraham somewhere amongst them, and the thought of the battle raging so close to him while he sat there immobile was really rather disconcerting. He shouldn’t go but he knew he should be there. He could almost feel the crossbow in his hands. For that matter he could almost feel the wolf in his veins, an echo of what had gone before, and when he closed his eyes he could still see Anna. She was dead and gone and that was still on him, and knowing that distracted him for a moment. But only for a moment, and then he realised that there was somewhere that he had to be.

He left the bed and pulled on his coat. Yes, there was somewhere that he had to be.

***