The Unholy Night

Chapter IX

"I can make nothing of it," Seward said, sounding very confused.

"I must go back to Amsterdam tonight," Van Helsing said. I was struck with a bit of realization as I realized where his accent was from. It wasn't obvious, but it was there. "There are books and things there that I need. You must remain here, and you must not take your eyes off her."

"Shall I have a nurse?" 

"No. You keep watch all night. See that she is well-fed and that nothing disturbs her. You must not sleep at all. You may sleep later. I shall be back as soon as possible. Remember, she is your charge. If you leave her, and harm befalls her, you shall not sleep easy afterward." 

Van Helsing left, and Bess and I went to go find Addy. 

She was livid when we found her. She was sitting on her bed in our room, her arms and legs crossed, and her eyes full of rage. 

"Why wouldn't you help me?" she hissed. 

"We didn't know why you were attacking," Bess replied simply, taking a seat on the end of her bed. 

"And we still don't," I added. A blood transfusion did seem useless in her condition, but it wasn't like it could harm her. Not in any ways I knew of, at least. 

"The survival rate for becoming a vampire is high. Less so if you account for the fact that Dracula is trying to make her waste away, and a blood transfusion is just going to tie her to life longer. It puts her at more of a risk of her body just getting too tired and giving out."

The next day, we spoke to Lucy about it. She'd had a better night than usual, and was quite cheerful.

"Well, that's simple, though," she told us. 

"How so?"

"You keep the doctors away from me, and Seward will keep the vampires. And if you're too good at your job, you people don't need sleep, do you?"

"We do not."

"And there we have it. A plan."

Addy ran a hand through her hair. "That logic... actually makes sense."

By the next day, we were at the point in time that we were doing the opposite of the plan. Drugging doctors and sneaking vampires into Lucy's room. 

Lucy had gotten very sick of Seward very quickly, so she stole some of his opiate, insisted he sleep on the couch in the next room, and slipped it to him. 

After that, it was fairly easy to get me inside. We wrongly suspected one of us would be enough to protect Lucy. 

It was around midnight when the floor creaked and Dracula entered. Someone had left the window open.

I sat up groggily, completely forgetting where I was. While I was trying to remember, Dracula spotted me, although I don't think he recognized me. 

As soon as I remembered, it was already too late. His hand was clasped tight around my throat, crushing my windpipe so I couldn't scream, and I knew fighting him was not going to be much of an option. 

He threw me across the room, and I crumpled against the wall. The last thing I saw before I blacked out was Dracula advancing towards Lucy's sleeping figure. 

I wasn't up early in the morning. In fact, I was woken up by the footsteps of the doctors, followed by Addy shouting obscenities, and then Bess shaking me awake, calling my name. 

"Mary! Mary!"

"What's happening?" I said, sitting straight up, and immediately feeling quite dizzy. My whole body was sore, and I suspected bruised as well. 

"Something horrible happened to Lucy," Addy said, pulling me to my feet, glaring at me in a way that made it very clear that she was blaming me for whatever was going on. 

I looked towards the bed, and had to hold in a shriek. Lucy looked like a corpse. Her skin was the color of snow, and even her lips had gone pale. Her gums looked like they'd shrunken back from her teeth. 

Another transfusion was performed, this time using Seward as the one who donated the blood. Addy didn't protest. I think she knew that this time, it was a matter of life or death. A body with no blood was just a corpse, whether they contained a vampire infection or not. Dead as a door nail. 

Lucy slept for much longer, and when she woke up, she scowled at me, but in a joking way. "Fat load of good having you around did, now Seward will be in my room every night!"

"He just saved your life with a blood transfusion," Bess informed her. 

She didn't even take a moment to process this. "I. Don't. Care."

"He wants to talk to you, by the way," I added, which probably only served to make things worse. 

She glared at me with the most intense of furies. 

The next day, Lucy woke up feeling much better, still pissed at me, but less so. 

The situation became worse when Seward arrived (for Van Helsing stayed the night, and you'll have to forgive me for not attempting to recall nights like that), and soon after, a large parcel arrived. 

It was an enormous package of white flowers. 

"These are for you, Miss Lucy," Van Helsing said, in the tone any ordinary person would use on the tiniest of babies. 

"For me? Oh, Dr. Van Helsing!" Lucy chirped in reply, like the good little girl she was. Or was pretending to be, at least. 

Van Helsing scowled. "These are medicines, my dear, not playthings, but I might bring you something of the sort next time I come."

I had begun a mental list of things I hated about Van Helsing by this point, and a few choice words had just been added to it. 

"These are like the lotus flowers, and they smell of the river Lethe!" he continued. "They shall make all your troubles forgotten!"

Addy raised an eyebrow. "These are garlic."

Now Lucy looked annoyed. "Are you putting a joke on me?"

"Never! I don't jest. There is purpose in all I do, and I warn you not to thwart me. Take care for the sake of others if not for your own."

Lucy looked confused, but Van Helsing seemed to take this as fear, so he immediately softened his voice back to something more condescending. "Oh, little miss, don't fear me. I do everything for your good, but these common flowers can do you much good. I will place them in your room. I will make you a wreath to wear."

Lucy opened her mouth to ask a question, but Van Helsing immediately held up a hand. "Hush! You mustn't ask any inquisitive questions. You must obey, and silence is a part of obedience, and obedience brings you, strong and well, into the arms of those that love you."

Lucy's performance slipped for a second, revealing rage underneath. 

God, I still want to punch him in the face! He must be dead for over a century now, but I'll dig whatever's left of him out of the ground and set him on fire if I get the chance. 

He told Lucy to sit still while he and Seward ran off to decorate her room with garlic.

"I know his game," Addy said, sounding irritated. "It's not going to work."

"Does garlic not work on vampires?" Lucy asked. 

"It doesn't," Bess said. "Although Addy vomited one time after she ate a whole clove." 

"In which case, I think this would be an excellent opportunity to mess with Van Helsing," Lucy suggested, looking a little murderous. "Although I can't do it."

"What do you suggest?" Addy asked. 

And the plan, in our defense, seemed like a pretty harmless idea at the time. A way to momentarily scare the doctors. 

Not in a way that would have any real effect, of course. 

But when do these things ever go well.