"You're kidding," hissed Denise. Quickly, almost surreptitiously, she glanced at Drugeth. The way he was just standing there, not moving at all while he studied whatever the hell he found so fascinating in a campfire, matched Keenan's depiction perfectly. The expressionless, handsome, brooding face, half in shadows, the easy stance—everything. She could picture him just like that, standing in a castle in Transylvania. Which was part of Hungary, now that she thought about it. Well, parts of it were, anyway.
"Oh, wow." She took her eyes away from Janos, lest she draw his attention somehow. She didn't really believe in supernatural powers, but you could never be sure.
"Yup," said Keenan. "That's the whole story. I got it from Gardiner and Gage just an hour ago, while we were out foraging for wood. Janos Drugeth is a vampire."
Noelle sniffed. "Keenan, I am quite certain that neither Gage nor Gardiner said any such thing."
"Well, sure. Not in so many words. But what else could we be talking about? I mean, I've even heard of his grandma. The Blood Countess. She's almost as famous as Dracula himself. The one who sucked all those virgins dry of their blood so her complexion wouldn't get bad. Dozens of virgins."
Noelle sniffed again. "There are so many errors in what you just said that I don't know where to begin. For starters, she didn't 'suck the blood' out of anybody. She—uh . . ."
Denise had heard the story, too. "That's quibbling, Noelle. So she drained them dry with a knife and bathed in the blood. Big fucking difference. And it's a fact—well, that's what I heard, anyway—that when they caught her they didn't try to execute her 'cause they couldn't. So they walled her up in a room until she died of old age."
"Why didn't they drive a wooden stake through her heart?" Lannie asked plaintively. "That's supposed to work."
"There are no such things as vampires!" Noelle hissed. But Denise figured the reason she hissed it instead of shouting it was because Noelle was just as concerned as anyone else not to draw Drugeth's attention.
Denise glanced quickly at Janos again. He was still in that brown study he seemed to fall into about twenty times a day. Not surprising, really. Denise figured if she were a vampire she'd probably spend a lot of time contemplating the whichness of what herself.
How fucking exciting could it get? A vampire.
Well. Close enough, anyway.
Eventually, Noelle gave up. Even Eddie seemed dubious of her arguments.
Superstitious dolts!
She avoided looking at Drugeth for the rest of the evening, she was so exasperated.
But she found that she couldn't stop thinking about him, even after she rolled into her blankets, and that was even more exasperating.
The problem, she finally admitted to herself, was that while she absolutely did not—Did. Not.—believe in vampires, she also had to admit something else.
She doted on vampire stories. She owned every one of Anne Rice's books that had come out before the Ring of Fire, and had read none of them less than twice. Her copy of Bram Stoker's original novel was dog-eared.
She'd even once, in college, gotten into a ferocious all-night-long argument with three other female students over the subject of which actor's Dracula had been the best. Stupid mindless twits had been all ga-ga and gushing over effete fops like Bela Lugosi and Christopher Lee.
Even at that age, Noelle knew the truth. A real vampire—which didn't exist, of course—would be like the Dracula portrayed by Jack Palance. Medieval rulers, commanders of armies, swordsmen, guys with muscles as well as fangs. Not layabouts loafing in a castle somewhere.
Interesting guys. Exciting guys.
And just how deep, anyway, was she going to wallow in this idiotic fantasy?
She was a sane, sensible, rational modern woman. An official of the SoTF government. And he was an enemy soldier.
Period.
"Boy, do you look bedraggled," was Denise's greeting the next morning.
"I didn't sleep well," Noelle said grumpily.
Denise grinned at her. "You gotta admit, the guy's fascinating as all hell. If he weren't too old for me, I'd be checking him out myself."
That evening they reached a village in one of the many little valleys in the Fichtelgebirge. It was a Catholic village, with a small church.
The village was too small for a tavern, so they camped just outside it. After the camp was made, Janos went to the church.
Noelle followed him, after waiting a few minutes. Not because she was following him, but simply because she felt the need herself.
When she entered, he was in one of the pews, praying. She was quite certain he was praying for the souls of the two men he'd slain, a few days earlier. For his own, too, of course. But mostly theirs. There was still much about Janos Drugeth that was a mystery to her, but not everything. One of the prayers she'd be making here, as she had so many times since it happened, would be a prayer for the soul of the torturer she'd killed in Franconia last year. And for her own, for having done it.