Anno Dracula - Kim Newman [149]
A fastidiously dressed vampire youth, an explosion of lace escaping at his collar, mounted the dais.
‘These are the heroes of Whitechapel,’ he explained, a fluttering handkerchief before his mouth and nose. Beauregard recognised the Prime Minister.
‘To them we owe the ruination of the desperate murderers known as Jack the Ripper,’ Lord Ruthven continued. ‘Dr John Seward of infamous memory, and, ah, Arthur Holmwood, the terrible traitor...’ The Prince grinned ferociously, moustaches creaking like leather straps. Ruthven, Godalming’s father-in-darkness, was plainly put out at the reminder of the ghastly deeds in which his protégé was popularly believed to have collaborated.
‘You have served us well and faithfully, my subjects,’ Dracula said, his praise sounding like a threat...
... Ruthven stood by Prince Dracula’s side, completing the triptych of rulers, the elder vampires and the new-born Queen. There was no doubt that Vlad Tepes was the apex of this trinity of power.
Geneviève had met Ruthven nearly a century previously, while travelling in Greece. He struck her then as a dilettante, desperately amusing himself with romantic trifles but oppressed by the aridity of his long life. As Prime Minister, he had exchanged ennui for uncertainty, for he must know the higher he was raised the greater was the likelihood that he would eventually be dashed down to the depths. She wondered if any other could see the fear that nestled like a rat in the bosom of Lord Ruthven.
Dracula looked Charles up and down, almost benevolently. Geneviève sensed her lover’s blood boiling, and realised she had adopted an aggressive posture, teeth bared and fingers hooked into claws. She forced herself to stand demurely before the throne.
The Prince turned his attention to her and raised a thick eyebrow. His face was a mass of healed-over scars which swarmed about his smooth features.
‘Geneviève Dieudonné,’ he said, rolling her name around his tongue, trying to squeeze meaning from the syllables. ‘I have had word of you before, in earlier times.’
She held out her empty hands.
‘When I was new to this blessed state,’ he continued, gesturing expressively, ‘you were spoken of highly. It has been a wearisome task, keeping abreast of the peregrinations of our kind. The occasional report of you has come to me.’
As he spoke, the Prince seemed to swell. She suspected he chose to go naked not simply because he was able to, but because clothes could not contain his constant shifting of shape.
‘You counted a distant kinswoman of mine as a friend, I believe.’
‘Carmilla? That is so,’ said Geneviève.
‘A delicate flower, sadly missed.’
Geneviève nodded agreement. This monster’s solicitousness was sickly-sweet, hard to swallow without choking. As fondly and without thought as a master pets an old hunting dog, the Prince stretched out a hand and caressed the Queen’s tangled hair. Panic bloomed in Victoria’s eyes. At the base of the throne-dais clustered a knot of shrouded nosferatu women, the wives Dracula had set aside. Beauties all, they rent their garments immodestly, exposing limbs and breasts and loins. They hissed and lusted like cats. The Queen was plainly in terror of them. Dracula’s enormous fingers encircled Victoria’s fragile skull and squeezed slightly.
‘My lady,’ he continued, ‘why have you not come before to my court? We should have welcomed you to our sadly missed Castle Dracula in Transylvania or to our more modern estate here. All elders are welcome.’
Dracula’s smile was persuasive, but behind it were his teeth.
‘Do I so offend you, my lady? You wandered from one place to the next for hundreds of years, always in fear of the jealous warm. Like all un-dead, you were outcast on the face of the earth. Was this not injustice? Harried by inferiors, we were denied the succour of church and the protection of law. You and I, we have both lost girls that we have loved, to