Martha's loss was hard on everyone.
Wayne missed the way she would help Wanda come up with creative ways to keep their children entertained.
Frank missed the way she would cook the best meals whenever he and Eunice visited, making you feel as though you were right at home.
Griffin missed the way her laugh would instantly brighten everyone's moods, no matter how sour one could be.
Murray missed her gentle attitude and kind nature.
But out of everyone, of course, the one who took it the hardest was Dracula himself.
Her husband, Dracula was unfairly left a widow. He had never quite been the same since that night the mob came and attacked their home - Castle Lubov - and staked her right in front of their daughter. Despite the successful relocation to his old castle in the heart of Transylvania, he hadn't recovered to a functional capacity just yet. It was almost like someone had taken a stake and struck him directly in his chest, leaving a scar that wouldn't ever heal, or killing a part of him entirely.
His friends tried their best to keep him company and offer any kind of comfort that could possibly cheer him up, but it was no use. It was clear the man wanted to be left alone with his thoughts, fathoming all the different ways he could have stopped it from happening so that he could still have a wife and mother to Mavis. If anything, the little baby was his sole comfort. Her wordless presence seemed to soothe Dracula more than anyone else. But it also brought a pang of guilt and sadness along with it. It was his fault she would have no mother, his fault that their security had been breached.
But Drac's friends knew this wasn't quite so. Humans were capable of being cruel, cruel creatures - more of monsters than actual monsters were at times. And it crushed the guys whenever Drac would pass up any of their consolement and instead sulk back up to his room, shut the door with a slight bang, and then promptly begin to sob in a heart-wrenching agony. It had to be torture for him. But the torture had to stop. And Murray claimed to have found a way, or in his words "the perfect solution."
***
The moonlight shone bright in the sky.
Determinedly, Dracula's four friends made their way through the dark forest and toward the Castle Lubov.
"I don't know, Murray," Frank said. "Didn't this not work the last time you did it? You know, when you tried it on your Egyptian princess?"
"Hey!" the mummy interjected, "There were a lot of factors at play before. For one, there won't be any humans interrupting - "
"How do you know?" Wayne cut in skeptically. "They're always ruining everything."
Griffin's glasses nodded up and down, and he addressed Murray. "Wayne does have a point," he said. "But on the other hand, the humans have been avoiding that place like the plague. I don't think they'd be very comfortable wanting to go anywhere near a place where vampires used to live."
Murray grimaced, but nodded in agreement. It was true. They were under the impression that vampires were horrifically dangerous, but he and his friends knew just how docile the creatures actually were. If only they could have seen the way that Dracula played with Mavis in her cradle, or how he and Martha had tucked their baby in and sang her little songs, some actual lullabies (albeit with a monster twist), and some just little made-up tunes. Murray shook the thoughts away, however, when the castle Lubov came into view.
It loomed ahead - or rather, what was left of it loomed ahead - its silhouette dark and foreboding against the night sky. The other friends silenced their small talk as they too caught sight of it. The group approached it, gazing upon the once mighty castle in awe. All that remained was crumbling walls, broken windows, and twisted wooden beams hanging from the ceiling, charred. The stone roof had caved in completely, and what remained of the structure was jutting out at an awkward angle from the ground. A few of the bricks still lay nearby, and Frank approached one, picking it up from the ground to inspect it. He shuddered.
"This is terrible," the Stein said, taking in all of the damage around him. "I can't even begin to imagine how Drac is taking it."
Wayne shook his head. "Try losing a Zing." The werewolf sighed heavily as he spotted a half-burned baby cradle tossed somewhere along the ground. Sometimes he wished he didn't have as many dirty diapers to clean up, but if something horrible were to happen to any of his children - or Wanda for that matter - he wouldn't be able to bear it.
Griffin didn't like the way things were, either. He had been to Castle Lubov before, of course, but it had been different. The atmosphere was warm and welcoming, making you feel like you wanted to visit the friendly vampire family that lay behind its great wooden doors. But now, it sat in an eerie silence that made one's spine tingle - and that was certainly saying a lot, considering how monsters don't usually have fear over such things.
Murray pushed down his own fears as he approached the center of the mess. He planted his feet on the ground, cold and hard underfoot, and then took a deep breath.
"Okay, guys," he said, loud enough so that it called attention to the others. "Are we ready?"
The monsters nodded. "Are you ready Murray?" Frank asked. "You're the one who's going to be performing this and reciting, after all."
The mummy nodded. "I got it all right here," he assured. He held up a worn piece of paper in between his bandaged fingers so that the other three could see it. They couldn't make out much of the body of the paragraph, most of it written in an ancient monster language, but the title was bold and clearly written at the top: Resurrection Spell.
He let out another breath to reassure himself, and then straightened up.
"Okay, guys, let's have a seat," Murray said, motioning towards the ground beneath them. "And let's make sure we're in a circle formation, too," he added.
The monsters did as ordered. They settled into their places, invisible, furry, stitched and wrapped legs crossing under them, and hands resting on knees. Griffin, Wayne, and Frank gazed at each other for a deadly silent moment, and then their eyes slowly turned to Murray. The mummy swallowed. "Ready?" he asked.
They nodded.
He cleared his throat.
"Right. Okay. Um. Here goes nothing..."
Murray lay the paper in front of him, skimmed over the words, and cracked his knuckles. He had memorized the spell before he came, but it was his first time encanting in over a hundred years. Two hundred, probably. Nevertheless, he opened his mouth and began to recite.
"YA-Hey Ti-SOO, Sish-poo enak TA-pak..."
The words rolled off his tongue smoothly, almost hypnotically, his fingers lightly twitching against his knees.
"Yin-Qoo enak, qes-a-WAK, sia-qoo, enak ey-oot-AK..."
He began swaying his hands in a practiced motion in the air, keeping rhythm with the words, and gradually increasing the tempo of his voice. A whispering wind began to pick up, swirling and whistling in the ears of the monsters.
"Wik-aoo, enak TA ya-RA, ya-wef-EK..."
The winds became increasingly stronger, and Murray's voice increasingly louder. Pebbles and dirt from the ground began to levitate all around them, rising several feet in the air as the mummy finished the last of the spell.
"...tanhad Marithan, tanhad Marithan... tanhad Marithan!"
The crumbling walls of the structure shook around them. The wind reached an impossible amount, whipping and howling against their faces, bricks and stones now starting to levitate around them as well. Murray had his eyes screwed shut in concentration, his arms wide and high in the air, his voice echoing ominously in the space. Thunder suddenly cracked in the air, followed by a brilliant flash of lightning in the sky.
And then, silence.
The wind died, and everything tumbled to the ground in a great heap. As Murray opened his eyes, he blinked at the sight of a dust cloud surrounding him. He coughed, his companions around him doing the same, and then keenly observed the center of the circle. But as the dust settled, his face fell. Nothing was waiting for them in the middle. The ground before them was just as plain and empty as it was when they were first seated. The mummy let out a defeated sigh.
But Frank was not so easy to give up. They had all come out here for a reason, and they were going to accomplish their goal before the night was through.
"Maybe.... we need to all say it together?" he suggested.
Murray shook his head in confusion. "But... It usually works if I say it alone..." he started to say, then reconsidered. "But then again, this is a rather unique situation..." He tapped his finger against his chin, assessed the monsters around him, and then made a decision. "All right! Let's do this then - Frank, Wayne, Griffin - get ready because we all gotta be in synch when we say it, got it?"
Frank saluted him like a soldier. "Sir, yes, sir!"
Griffin gave an invisible thumbs up, and Wayne simply nodded. Then Murray said, "Alright. Here goes nothing... again..."
Murray cleared his throat - the others copying his action - and then began, this time with the monsters echoing along behind him.
"YA-Hey Ti-SOO, Sish-poo enak TA-pak, yin-Qoo enak, qes-a-WAK, sia-qoo, enak ey-oot-AK..."
Like before, the winds picked up again, this time even more violent than before. The ground beneath them began to shake like an earthquake, the dust swirling all around them.
But Murray - nor Frank, nor Wayne, nor Griffin - did not relent. Instead, they pressed on, spooked and awed at the same time, eager to see if they would soon come to see the familiar face that they had once known, and that Dracula had once loved... and still loved. Emboldened, the team pushed ahead, chanting as one into the deafening wind the last part of the spell.
"..tanhad Marithan, tanhad Marithan... TANHAD MARITHAN!"
The thunder boomed overhead again, lightning flashing, and then something remarkable began to happen before their very eyes. The levitating sand and dirt that had been flying all around them started to coalesce and solidify, forming the recognizable shape of a slim, feminine figure. It rose above their heads, the figure's features starting to define itself more into more distinguishable details - the thick wavy hair, the slender fingers, the delicate nose and full lips, the long robe-like dress - all of which came to fruition into a stunning vision before them.
Murray gaped.
Wayne's eyes widened.
Frank's jaw went slack.
Griffin's glasses fell back on the ground.
"Martha..." the mummy whispered in disbelief.
As if in response to the name, the sand-figure before them opened its eyes. They glowed a brilliant gold, like Murray's own glowing green eyes, only these were far more powerful, burning with an intensity that sent shivers down his spine. They turned to look directly at him, and his breath caught in his throat. For a moment it looked at him, unmoving, expression unreadable and blank. Then, without warning, it screamed shrilly, almost in agony, the unexpected sound tearing at the eardrums and causing his hands and those of his friends to fly up and protect their ears. The soundwave blasted the monsters back and away on the stone ground as the figure collapsed in a heap, the sand that had formulated the body vanishing as quickly as it had appeared. After a few moments, the dust settled once again, revealing the once-more empty center among the monsters. There was no sign of the woman which whom they were hoping to take along with them back to Castle Dracula. Only some loose pebbles, and a small pile of dust where she had been. Murray sat up and slumped. He shook his head as he picked up the so-called 'Resurrection Spell' that he had and then crumpled it up in frustration. What good had it done? Nothing.
The mummy felt the weight of a hand sink onto his shoulder, and he looked over to find Frank looking sympathetically at him. "Come on, Murray. You did all you could do. It's time to go back."
Murray gazed at the Stein in shock. "Go back?"
Wayne shrugged. "It really was a good idea, Murray, but... it just didn't work out."
"Yeah. As awful as it is, it looks like she's just...gone," Griffin agreed sadly.
But Murray shook his head. "No, no, something went wrong. Maybe one of us was off key, or maybe I pronounced a word wrong, or - "
"Murray," Frank cut in sharply. Then he sighed. "It hurts me too to have to admit it. I mean, heck, Drac is my best friend! I hate to see him suffer through this... but maybe it's best now to just be there for him like we've been doing. And hopefully, in some time, he'll heal."
Wayne and Griffin nodded in agreement, and it was only then that Murray finally acquiesced. He nodded slowly.
"Okay."
***
Murray was feeling a little better about himself on the walk back to the castle. His mood was still dampered - as were the others - but knowing that they would still be supportive friends toward Drac made him feel some positivity.
Nobody, however, was expecting to see their vampire friend waiting right at the doorway when they got back, however.
They gasped, seeing him standing expectantly at the doorway, arms crossed and a sour expression on his face.
"Did someone tell him?" Wayne asked.
"Guys, we were supposed to keep this a surprise!" Murray whispered. "You know, in case it actually worked!"
"No, of course not!" Frank whispered back. "There's no way I would tell!"
"Ah, why should we believe you?" Griffin snapped. "Your head's never in the right place anyway!"
The sound of a throat clearing immediately brought them out of their discussion and snapped them back to the Count. One by one he scanned them, and one by one they lowered their heads, like schoolchildren being caught stealing from the cookie jar.
"Did you guys really think I'm that stupid?" he asked sternly. He pointed to his ear. "Super-bat hearing, remember? I could hear you guys making all your little plans, you know. Don't you know that spell doesn't work on vampires? Come ON!" He threw his hands up in the air in exasperation, voice booming, face contorting in a roar and red lighting taking over his features. His friends shrunk back in fear.
"B-But..." Murray began to ask in a meek, trembling voice. "If you knew, why didn't you bother stopping us?"
Dracula's mood suddenly shifted, his eyes taking on that familiar look of sadness that he'd seemed to permanently wear since the day the tragedy happened. He averted his gaze, feeling vulnerable.
"Because... I thought... I was hoping that maybe there was a chance..."
He trailed off with a sigh, struggling to say more but not needing to, as he heard his infant daughter begin to cry loudly somewhere upstairs.
"I have to go," he said quietly, his voice breaking slightly.
Frank tried to step toward him. "But, Drac - "
"Mavy needs me," he cut him off firmly, turning around and disappearing through the walls of the castle, shutting the door in the Stein's face with a BANG.
The friends remained silent for several moments, the weight of what just happened crashing down on them.
In a silent knowing, they dispersed, the early morning sun starting to rise and indicating that it was time for the monsters to head off and get sleep anyway. There would be more chances - there HAD to be more chances - to try and mend Drac's heart. Maybe not by bringing back his actual wife for him to have and hold and love, but still in other ways.
But for now, Murray, Frank, Wayne, and Griffin knew that it was best just to leave the Count be.