XVI - A Fight to the Death

  Vlad stood his ground, unmoved by the vampyre’s threat. He met the creature’s wicked gaze with the dark eyes of his mask. “I have no doubt that you are a powerful foe,” he said, “however I am also certain that I have defeated strigoi much older and more fearsome than even you—one of which will someday be the one that I so desperately seek.”

  The Plague doctor drew his sword. It came free with an elegant hiss and shined with the light of the moon; had he looked down at the blade, he may have even been able to see his reflection in its beautiful, pristine silver surface. “And if I cannot even slay the likes of you, then I will never in my wildest machinations be able to defeat Three-Fang!”

  Vlad darted through the night, quickly closing the gap between him and his foe, his longsword held at a deadly angle. The vampyre Vivienne stood expectantly, grinning with its pair of white fangs, unmoving as its opponent drew closer. When he was within range, Vlad slashed; the strigoi effortlessly moved clear of the incoming blow so that his sword struck only the air.

  Vlad planted his feet and turned to face the vampyre once more. He brought up his sword to block as the creature’s razor-sharp claw of a hand sliced through the space between them and impacted off of his blade. He braced himself and did not stagger as the blow came in. Vivienne pressed its claw against his blade, attempting to shove him off-balance, but the Plague doctor managed to hold his ground.

  “I know not who this ‘Three-Fang’ is,” the strigoi said, “but I am afraid you will never have the opportunity to face them in battle—for I will have your drained, shriveled heart placed into one of my phials before the night is through, you wretched false doctor!”

  Vivienne continued to press against Vlad’s sword. Thin rivulets of smoke began to rise from the vampyre’s hand where its claws made contact with the silver of the blade, but the creature appeared largely unaffected by any pain that it might have felt; its ability to resist its weakness to the touch of silver truly demonstrated just how old and powerful it was. The Plague doctor knew that victory in this bout would not come easily— and yet still it must come.

  Vlad’s arms burned with the effort of his resistance. He felt himself beginning to shake, and was forced to take a small step backwards—an almost imperceptible adjustment, but proof of him losing the struggle all the same. Vivienne refusing to recoil from the touch of his silver blade was a rather large disadvantage that he would need to overcome. He could not recall the last time he had faced an opponent of this caliber. It had certainly been many years ago, when he was a much younger man.

  And a much more capable man, at that.

  Vlad shoved against the vampyre with all the force that he could muster and quickly twirled away from their embrace. Vivienne tried to slash at him as he went, but the creature’s claw missed its mark. Knowing he could not give his foe time to go back on the offensive, Vlad struck, lunging the sharp tip of his blade at the waiting strigoi. Vivienne deflected the blow, again demonstrating her resistance to the blade’s silver edge. He slashed at the monster once more, and was met with a similar parry. Vlad dug beneath his cloak with his free hand and pulled out his Star of the Mother, which he shoved toward the vampyre. Vivienne only smirked at the artifact as a deep chuckle rattled through the forest and shook the leaves on the trees.

  “You will be sorely disappointed if you believe me weak enough to cower at the sight of such blessed symbols,” the creature said. “I have long-since overcome such hindrances.”

  The strigoi darted at him, slashing with its outstretched claw. Vlad barely managed to avoid the blow, and retaliated by thrusting his Star toward the reaching arm.

  “You may have become so mighty that the mere presence of this Star no longer hinders you,” he said, pressing the relic against the vampyre’s limb, “but even the most ancient of nosferatu cannot overpower the Mother’s touch!”

  Vivienne’s flesh bubbled and burned where the Star touched it, tearing away at the clothing covering it as it reacted to the Mother’s influence. The strigoi hissed and staggered away as quickly as it could. For the first time since beginning their fight, Vlad finally felt as though he had managed to put his foe on the defensive; he used this building momentum to plunge his blade directly at the injured creature’s waiting heart. “Perish, cursed nosferatu!”

  But his blade did not puncture flesh. Instead, it passed through the translucent, crystalline body of Vivienne Frost, which suddenly dematerialized into a floating mist. Vlad took a surprised step back as the mist swirled overhead. He raised his sword defensively and watched the dancing cloud.

  “Hypnosis as well as the ability to transform,” he said. “I must say I am impressed. You have proven yourself to be an opponent not to be taken lightly, strigoi.”

  The mist reformed into the vague shape of Vivienne Frost before entirely rematerializing as the vampyre. It smirked at the Plague doctor. “My longevity is owed to my inability to be slain, it would seem.”

  “A pattern I intend to end tonight.”

  Vivienne laughed. “Your persistent confidence is admirable, Plague doctor, but it will not be enough to award you victory this night.”

  “I concede that your abilities are impressive,” Vlad said, “but they hardly make the result of this battle a foregone conclusion. I would have much preferred to face you in the light of day, when these tricks of yours would be suppressed, but there is little that can be done about that now.”

  “Have you not considered what slaying me would do to this caravan, Mr. Albescu?” Vivienne asked. “My existence is the only thing that prevents the Plague from completely eradicating these people. Only a small handful of Blight Bane phials remain in my carriage, and I alone know how to create more. No writing on how to produce it exists; its recipe lives solely within my mind. To destroy me now would mean that the remedy would never be produced again. And that is not to mention my future research at the University of Ardvent, where I can create the Bane at a much larger scale. Have you not thought once of all the good you will be eradicating from this world?”

  “If you had any concern for the preservation of Blight Bane,” Vlad said, “you would have long since passed on its knowledge. But you keep that knowledge hidden because you wish to hold it as insurance toward your further longevity. Blight Bane is just another means for you to exploit the living—nothing more.” He shook his head. “Well, nosferatu, I shall tell you what I told my apprentice when she posed this same question to me: These unfortunate people would be better off ravaged by the Plague than by the vampyre that ‘cures’ them of it. Your knowledge of Blight Bane will not protect you from the justice that you shall find at the far end of my blade.”

  “These people will never reach Ardvent without my aid,” the vampyre said. “The Plague will destroy them before they do. They know this. When the last of my elixir is depleted, they will realize their salvation is lost. They will turn on each other. They will kill each other far faster than the Plague ever could, and those that survive will slowly be ravaged by the disease. Mr. Osmond’s swift death shall look like a mercy compared to what will come without me. And you, Mr. Albescu, would condemn them to this fate?”

  Vlad nodded. “I would.”

  He again darted at his foe, his sword hefted in both hands, his Star of the Mother secured to his wrist. “As a matter of fact, I would condemn them to that very same fate a thousand times over before allowing you to prey upon them for a moment longer!”

  Vlad slashed, a blow that Vivienne once again effortlessly avoided. He slashed and chopped several more times, all of which the vampyre dodged. Finally he lunged at his foe, and before his blade could pierce Vivienne’s body, the creature again dematerialized into a cloud of mist. Vlad sliced at the mist to no avail; his silver blade passed harmlessly through its aqueous form. The cloud floated a few meters away before once again rematerializing as the vampyre Vivienne.

  “How will you condemn them to such a fate,” the monster said, “when you cannot even condemn me to hell with that sword of yours?”

  “You would have me believe you to be nigh invulnerable, Strigoi,” Vlad said, “but I can see beyond your vile charade. Transforming into that mist requires too much of your vigor for you to be able to shift between both states endlessly. Already I can see the toll that your technique is taking on you. Before long, you’ll be unable to avoid my blows—and when that time comes, I promise you that my blade shall discover your heart.”

  “It may be so that my ability to change has a threshold,” Vivienne admitted, “but fortunately you shall not live long enough to see me reach it.”

  “Do not be so certain,” Vlad said, closing the gap between them.

  The Plague doctor took his sword into his right hand and prepared to slash at his foe once again. Vivienne reached out a clawed hand to intercept the blade; Vlad saw the anticipation in the vampyre’s eyes, and he knew that the time had come. He began to move his blade as if to chop at his opponent, but instead reached for the chain whip at his belt with his off hand. He pulled the length of linked silver free and unfurled it with a swift crack, and with the same momentum swiped the whip at his unexpecting foe. The silver chain quickly coiled around Vivienne’s waiting forearm, its touch immediately eliciting a sound that was reminiscent of rolling thunder. The strigoi hissed as its skin bubbled and burned, thin tails of smoke rising from agonized flesh. Vivienne pulled against the coiled chain, teeth bared and angry snarls escaping from its mouth, but it was unable to escape from the firm grasp of its new bindings.

  “Release me, you cur of the Goddess! Unbind me from your wretched chains!”

  “A tolerance for sacred and silver you may have,” Vlad said, “but a tolerance is only that—you cannot fully shirk your nature, as much as you may desire to. No part of you shall be able to escape into mist so long as that chain burns your flesh and drains your power.” He approached Vivienne cautiously, sword raised and ready in his right hand, the left gripping the hilt of his whip, his Star still coiled around his wrist. “And thus, demon, I end this ordeal.”

  “Do not think it concluded so quickly.”

  Vlad partially turned in the direction of the sudden voice, cautious not to forget the vampyre that continued to squirm within the grasp of his whip, just barely out of attacking range. There, standing behind him in the gloom of the forest, was Felice. She stood below a gap in the canopy, and in the moonlight he could see that her crooked, bruised nose dripped with blood. More of note, though, was the musket that she gripped in her hands, and which she held trained directly at Vlad’s chest.

  “You have come to my aid, my apprentice,” Vivienne said through her gritted fangs. “And not a moment too soon.”

  “So you have evaded Night Owl,” Vlad said calmly, “for that is the only explanation for your being here. I cannot imagine a world where you bested her, even if you do possess power that is not your own.”

  Felice sneered at him, “You needn’t concern yourself with her when it is your own wellbeing that should worry you, vampyre hunter!”

  He glanced at the weapon in her hands. “And what of Mr. Brant? That is his firearm, is it not?”

  “He lives,” Felice said. She smirked beneath her bleeding nose. “Although the fool would do well not to leave his weapon loaded and resting while he sleeps so soundly. The poor man has been worked so ragged as of late that I likely could have fired this right beside him, and he would not have even stirred. I suppose that is largely our doing, though, and so by sparing his life, I make amends for the torment that we have brought upon him.” Her blood-smeared face grew serious. “Now, to the matter at hand, then. Release Master Vivienne and back away from her. Slowly.”

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  Vlad remained unphased. “I am afraid I cannot comply until the task at hand is complete.”

  “You will have a difficult go at completing it when you have a ball of lead lodged in your chest.”

  “If you meant to shoot me, you would have done so already,” Vlad said. “But I believe all present company understands the consequences of firing that weapon. You will bring the entire caravan down on top of you in a matter of moments, and you will have to explain to them all of the goings on here, including why you now have two fresh corpses at your feet, as well as a smoking musket.”

  “A preferable outcome to being slain,” Vivienne said. “Certainly the good people of our caravan will understand that Felice killed you after you so mercilessly cut down Mr. Osmond and threatened to do the same to me.”

  “It is possible that they may believe such a yarn,” Vlad said, “but by the same token, they also may not. I suppose you shall not know for certain until you put your theory to the test, no?”

  Vivienne looked at Felice. “Very well. If he will not release me, then kill him, my apprentice. Place a ball directly into his heart!”

  “Gladly, my master,” Felice said with a smirk, but Vlad could see the hesitation behind her eyes. Her smile vanished as she raised the musket. Her finger curled around the trigger, but it looked like it intended to go no further.

  “Make haste, my apprentice. Do away with this cursed sparrow of the Mother!”

  “You will do no such thing, Felice.”

  All three present turned to face the unexpected voice. A new figure stood in the darkness, and much like Felice before her, Sybil stepped out of the gloom and into the moonlight.

  And also like Felice, she was very much armed.

  She held her crossbow trained on the other girl, its sharp quarrel primed and ready to tear through clothing and skin and flesh alike. “For the moment you loose your weapon, I shall also loose mine.”

  Silence flooded the space between the trees. Each blade of grass seemed stiff enough to shatter into tiny pieces at the slightest movement. Even the wind thought better than to pass through that stretch of the forest, and instead seemingly circumvented the entire area in order to avoid the standoff that was currently underway therein.

  And then Felice began to laugh. Her voice echoed through the darkness-splashed trees, and for a few moments Vlad thought that she might even stir the caravan with her laughter, if not the sound of her firing the musket. When her fit was through, she looked at Sybil and smirked. “Oh poor, sweet Sybil. She wants to play the role of a valiant hero, but in truth, she is nothing more than a weak, frightened child. Look at the way she quivers and shakes from fear! It would be adorable were it not so pathetic!”

  Sybil scowled at her former friend. “Silence! Not another word from you!”

  “Or else what, girl?” Felice stifled another devilish giggle. “I have nothing to fear from you. If you could not shoot a mere fawn just a few short hours ago, how could you ever hope to loose your quarrel on me?”

  Felice’s laughter continued, and Sybil’s nerve clearly started to falter. She tried to maintain her angry scowl, but it began to drop into an anxious frown.

  “Do it, Sybil,” Vivienne said. “Put down my apprentice with that quarrel.”

  Felice’s laughter died in an instant. She looked at the vampyre in shock. “What are you saying, Master?”

  Vivienne smirked through the pain of its burning arm. “I see greatness in you, Sybil—your potential as my familiar far outclasses the wretch of an underling that I currently possess. All you must do is prove to me that you are superior. Prove to us all that you have the ability to shirk your weakness! Do that, and I will allow you to take Felice’s place at my side. I will teach you all that I know of old medicine, and together you and I can eradicate the Plague. We can save this world together, just as soon as we rid ourselves of our former burdens.” It glanced first at Felice, then at Vlad as it spoke this final sentence.

  “How could you, Master?” Felice said. Her face was still white with shock. “How could you?!”

  “All you must do is dispose of your predecessor,” Vivienne said, ignoring its apprentice’s wounded words. “Fire your crossbow, and join me in your new life!”

  “That’s enough!” Sybil yelled suddenly. “I shall not take orders from you, fiend.”

  The vampyre frowned, likely from equal parts pain and disappointment. “Do not answer so hastily. Will you not even consider my offer?”

  Sybil shook her head. “I will not.”

  A few moments of silence passed, during which the monster seemed to consider the rejection. After some time, it finally spoke.

  “Very well,” Vivienne said. The creature chuckled, almost sweetly. “If you will not join me…”

  The strigoi grabbed onto the silver whip wrapped around its forearm with its other hand. Smoke burst from its palm where the two made contact, but Vivienne fought through the searing pain and quickly ripped the chain away from its arm. Blood splashed from its limb where the cold metal of the whip tore at its flesh. “Then you shall share in your master’s fate!”

  Vlad, realizing what the creature had done, recoiled his whip and struck Vivienne again, quicker than the fiend had time to react. Vivienne hissed as the silver chain cracked against its chest, the blow causing it to stagger. With his foe momentarily stunned, Vlad quickly turned the whip on the still shaken Felice, striking her across the face and opening her flesh with a violent spray of blood. Felice fell away with a pained screech, the musket falling from her grip as she went. The whip wound up tangling about her arm as she fell; Vlad had no choice but to release his grip on the weapon and allow it to go with her into the darkness.

  The Plague doctor quickly turned back to face his foe and lunged at it with his sword. “You shall be the next to fall, cursed nosferatu!”

  Vivienne dematerialized, faster this time than ever before. The miasma of mist, instead of retreating, passed swiftly over Vlad, swallowing him in its frigid embrace as it went. It felt as if thousands of shards of ice suddenly dug into his body, penetrating even his chainmail armor. The sensation sent him to his knee with a distressed grunt. He swung at the cloud from his kneeling position, but his blow had no effect.

  The cloud passed over him quickly, and when he turned to follow it, he saw it heading directly for Sybil, who still stood with the crossbow trained in front of her. Her face was awash with fear as the mist drew closer to her before materializing back into Vivienne Frost mere inches from the frightened girl.

  “Get away, Night Owl!” Vlad cried, but his words would do her no good now.

  So very much happened as he staggered back to his feet and darted after his foe.

  Vivienne towered over Sybil, who could only cower beneath the vampyre’s mighty form. She held her crossbow at the ready, and could have pierced the creature’s chest with her quarrel if she had chosen to, but there was clearly no intent to kill anywhere within her. The vampyre stared down at Sybil with a sinister grin on its nightmarish face, its fangs exposed and hungry. “You are an even greater fool than my fool of an apprentice for spurning my offer, girl.”

  Vivienne swiped at Sybil with its claw. The girl, dropping her crossbow, barely managed to bring up her arms in self-defense. The strigoi’s sharp nails dug into both of Sybil’s forearms, tearing into her flesh and sending long streams of blood flowing toward the earth. The impact of the blow knocked Sybil off of her feet and sent her slamming into a nearby tree, where she slumped motionless as blood escaped from her wounds.

  “Night Owl!” Vlad scowled at his foe from beneath his mask. “Your battle is with me, strigoi! Not the girl!”

  Vivienne chuckled. “She is also a Plague doctor, is she not? Then she is liable to die like one as well.”

  Vlad reached the waiting vampyre, and slashed at it through his building rage. His anger made his strike clumsy, predictable, and the strigoi was not only able to effortlessly avoid the blow, but it also managed to grab his wrist as he followed through with the missed attack. “Worry not, false doctor. I have not yet forgotten about you.”

  With its other hand—the same one that had opened the wounds in Sybil’s arms—it lashed at Vlad’s face. A single claw sliced through his mask, digging into his face beneath it, creating a long line from the side of his right cheek all the way across to his forehead above his opposite eye. Burning blood obscured his vision as Vivienne released its grip on his wrist, allowing him to stagger away with the disorienting pain. Vlad dropped the sword in his right hand as his left instinctively rose to apply pressure against his damaged mask.

  Vivienne smirked at him, licking the mixed blood of Plague doctor and apprentice from its claw. “Your torment is only just beginning.”

  Vlad fought to gain control of the screaming pain that ran rampant along his face. He frantically wiped away the blood that pooled in his mask, desperate for any aperture through which he could see his foe. Soon the pain he felt in his face was joined by a sudden, frigid heat in his torso, and as his flailing body flew through the air and subsequently tumbled along the ground, he realized that he had been slammed in the chest by his foe. His Star of the Mother leaped from his wrist and fled from him into the darkness as he went.

  The first thing he noticed when the world stopped spinning was the sound of running water, and he realized he had been knocked next to the bank of the river. Doing his best to ignore his protesting body, which ached across every single inch, Vlad sat up onto his knees as quickly as he could and desperately threw a hand into the frigid water. He scooped some of the liquid onto his head, washing the blood away from his eyes and off of his Plague mask. His vision began to clear and he looked ahead of him, searching for his foe.

  His search would not last long.

  Through the gap in his Plague mask, he saw the vampyre. It approached him slowly, the smirk never leaving its face. Even now, so close to meeting his end at the hands of this horrific monster, Vlad could not help but acknowledge Vivienne Frost’s unrivalled beauty, which persisted despite the toll that their bout had taken on both of them.

  He realized that Vivienne’s prepossessing face might be the last thing he ever saw.

  “What was that you were saying before about defeating vampyres far more powerful than myself?” the strigoi said. “If that is true, and not the fabrications of a sad, aging fool, then I lament not getting to face the man that you used to be instead of the pitiful thing that you have become.”

  Vlad threw his hand behind his back and grabbed for his pistol. “You speak as if you have already defeated me, cur!” he said as he yanked the firearm free of its holster and pulled it out from behind his back. The Plague doctor moved to aim it forward, where he would fire it through his foe’s waiting heart. He would never receive such a chance.

  Vivienne closed the space between them in mere seconds, and in the same movement knocked the pistol out of Vlad’s grip with its clawed hand. The pistol, which was sliced in twain, flew through the air in two separate pieces, both of which landed in the rushing river and were quickly lost below the surface.

  Standing over him now, Vivienne looked down at him and widened its smirk. It licked its lips and fangs with its long, slender tongue. A terrible chuckle escaped from its vicious mouth. “Remember my instructions for when you arrive in hell, Mr. Albescu—for you shall be departing for your new home shortly.”

  Vlad, disregarding the sting of defeat that overwhelmed him, stared up at the monster defiantly, his exposed eye meeting its two icy balls of flame. He refused to blink, refused to allow his final sight to be of darkness, regardless of how much his pained eye begged him to close it. This strigoi would know that, even in his final moments, he was never once afraid of it. Even if it took his life, it would never break him. In this way, at least, he would still win.

  And then, suddenly, Vivienne Frost was shrieking with an agony that Vlad had not yet heard from it. It writhed violently and bent over backwards, revealing the bloody, panting form of Felice behind it. Felice’s face and bangs were stained crimson, and her temple was swollen and broken where Vlad had struck her with his whip, but she was still alive.

  And she was wielding Sybil’s silver dagger, which she had plunged into the base of the strigoi’s pale, bleeding neck.

  “You betrayed me, Master!” Felice croaked. “You told her to kill me!”

  Felice pulled the blade free and plunged it into Vivienne’s neck once again, this time even closer to the creature’s throat. Smoke danced from the vampyre’s body as it shrieked with the pain of silver against its immortal skin and bones. But somehow Felice’s own shrieks were even louder. “YOU BETRAYED ME!”

  Vivienne glared back at its once-apprentice, its frigid eyes brimmed with searing hatred. It whirled its torso around as Felice pulled the dagger free another time and slid its sharp claw along the girl’s body, creating a deep gash that ran from the bottom of Felice’s chest all the way up to her lower jaw.

  “You ungrateful, rotten wench!” Vivienne yelled.

  Felice’s eyes went wide. She dropped the dagger and fell away from the vampyre, her essence leaving her body in an instant.

  Vlad did not miss his opportunity.

  He drew his own silver dagger from his belt and lunged for the strigoi’s unguarded torso. The blade found Vivienne Frost’s chest before the creature could even turn back around to fully face him. Its eyes went wide, matching those of its apprentice, and for a long while it could only stare down at him as its clothes went dark with its own inhuman blood, either seeing everything there was to see, or no longer seeing anything at all.

  “Remind me, strigoi, which one of us departs for hell this night.”

  Vlad pulled his dagger free. A torrent of dark, spurting blood escaped from the vampyre’s fresh wound. He grabbed Vivienne by its bloodsoaked shirt and, with a forceful yank, tossed its body into the waiting river. Vivienne hit the water with a heavy splash and floated above the surface for only a moment before the current took it under, swallowing it up entirely. It was quickly lost to the churning abyss, which did not stop for even a moment to acknowledge the creature’s long overdue departure from the living world.

  The vampyre Vivienne Frost was gone.