The Dracula Chronicles: The Path To Decay Read online

  Litovoi looked around and saw one of them hunched down between two smouldering buildings. “Leave them be. Those poor wretches do what they do because of hunger, and the cold. They pose no further danger to the son of Dracul.”

  “Shall we return home then, my Lord?”

  “Yes, let us go home. We have no further need here.”

  The group that had accosted Vlad crept out from the shadows once the Vlach had left. Their leader walked out to the very same spot where he had stood earlier. He looked around at the bodies of his dead friends, a number that totalled nine in all.

  “How do we explain this to their wives and families?” another member of the gang asked him.

  The leader, a Bulgarian known to them as Divak, offered his cohort a cold, hard stare. “You all know the risks in what we do. On occasion, they shall fight back.”

  The gang member knew better than to antagonise Divak. He did not know his leader’s true name. Divak was a Bulgarian word that meant savage, and was an apt nickname for the man that had assumed leadership of the group. Still, he felt concern for the families of the dead men and pressed the issue. “And what of their children?”

  Divak’s face reddened with anger at the question. “They are not my concern, Georgi. I imagine they shall have to mature sooner than they had expected.”

  He waited for any further response. When it did not come, he walked over to the nearest of the dead men. He looked down at the body of a fellow Bulgarian. Dimitar had been a friend who had travelled with him from the old country. It enraged Divak to see him lying there with an arrow protruding from his throat.

  Divak knelt beside him and pulled out the arrow. With the blood that coated his fingers, he inscribed the sign of the Cross on his friend’s forehead. “Rest well, old friend,” he said, barely above a whisper.

  The other members of the gang moved closer and watched Divak’s short ritual. They then looked on, aghast, as Divak picked up Dimitar’s discarded sword and began to hack at the dead man’s right arm.

  “What are you doing?” Georgi shouted, forgetting for a moment his fear of his leader.

  Divak hacked at the limb three more times with the rusted blade before he pried it loose from the corpse. Only then did he look up. He looked Georgi straight in the eye and brandished the old sword in his direction. “Question me once more, and I shall cut your throat.”

  Georgi backed away, knowing Divak would make good on his threat. He had seen him kill before without compunction. The others stood frozen, their fear of Divak coming to the fore. They all knew Dimitar had been the closest of any of them to their leader, but it did not prevent the butchering of his body.

  Divak moved across the corpse and prepared to hack off the second arm. It was then he realised the members of his gang were all staring at him. He stopped and looked at them, resting the arm that held the blade, on his knee. For a moment, he considered them individually and thought of what he might say to placate them.

  He rubbed his nose while still holding the blade in hand. In truth, he cared little for what they thought of his actions. Even so, he did not want them to desert him or for the group to splinter or disband. Life was very hard in recent times, and it was good to have men on hand to serve him. Even though he ruled them with fear, he wanted to retain their loyalty.

  Keeping the tone of authority in his voice, he pointed the blade at Georgi’s brother, who stood a little further back than the others. “Pietru!” he said as loud as he could. “Remind me how many children it is you have.”

  The others took their eyes from Divak and turned their heads to look at Pietru.

  “I have four children,” came the reply.

  “Speak up man! I cannot hear you!”

  Pietru cleared his throat. “I have four children,” he repeated.

  Divak already knew how many children Pietru had. He knew everything there was to know of each of the men in his employ. “And when did they last eat?”

  Pietru opened his mouth to respond, but Divak cut him short.

  “Let me ask you, when did you last provide a meal for them?”

  “You know well we have not found food in the last five days.”

  “Yes, five days,” Divak reminded them all, running his gaze over each of the men in turn. “The pickings have not been so plentiful of late. So tell me, my good men. In light of this, which of you can refuse fresh meat when it is available to you? Who among you could refuse your children a free meal?”

  Pietru could not believe what he was hearing. “You want me to feed Dimitar to my children?”

  “Do you think Dimitar would take offence?”

  Georgi dropped to his hands and knees and began to dry retch. The others looked at Divak in utter astonishment. Hungry or not, they would never have considered eating human flesh, and certainly not that of their dead friends.

  “This is not the time to be noble,” Divak told them. “You can each do as you choose. On this night, my children shall not go hungry.”

  Divak turned his attention back to his dead friend. He looked down at Dimitar one last time and then raised the rusted sword over his head once again. Before he could bring it down on Dimitar’s remaining arm, it reached up and grabbed him by the throat.

  The strength of the grip on his throat instantly brought tears to Divak’s eyes. Despite his blurred vision, he looked down in horror at the offending arm, an arm that belonged to a dead man.

  Divak dropped the blade and clutched at Dimitar’s hand with both of his, but could not free himself from the hold on him. Despite his difficulty in breathing, he kept his calm and summoned all his strength. His eyes cleared just enough for him to see Dimitar open his.

  The dead man looked up into space, both his irises glazed over. He remained unmoved by Divak’s attempts to break free, and neither blinked nor turned his eyes to look at his old friend. When the others saw Dimitar open his eyes, they turned and fled in terror.

  Only Georgi remained there with Divak as he had been, on all fours, heaving up on a near-empty stomach. Some fluids hung down from his nose and mouth, and he wiped them away with a dirty sleeve.

  He looked up to see Divak struggling with the grip Dimitar had on his throat. It took him a few moments to grasp what he was actually seeing and when he did, fear paralysed the muscles in his lower back. But the sight of Divak’s mouth turning blue prompted him into action. As much as he feared his leader, the prospect of a future without Divak’s protection was not a good one. He weighed these factors over in his mind, and knew he had to try and help save Divak’s life.

  Georgi spied the arrow that Divak had pulled from Dimitar’s throat and discarded on the ground close to the dead man’s head. He reached over and picked it up in his right hand. Then, inching closer to Dimitar on both knees, Georgi clasped the arrow in both hands, and raised it above his head ready to deliver a crushing blow.

  Before he could do this, the severed arm rose up and struck him hard in the face. The blow stung Georgi and drew blood from his nose. He fell down onto his butt from the shock of the assault and dropped the arrow to the ground once again. When the hand began to claw against the hard surface of the piata and drag the rest of the severed arm with it, Georgi cried out and scrambled backwards on his hands and feet. Once he was clear of it, he managed to get to his feet and turn and flee into the heavy mist that had descended on the city. His action left Divak all alone to meet his fate.

  Divak saw the severed arm retrieve the arrow and watched as the hand held it and used a finger and thumb to inch its way back to its corpse, and to him. His fear intensified when Dimitar turned his head in a swift, sharp action to look at him. The stare from those inhuman eyes terrified him to his core. He knew if he did not act now then his life would surely end.

  With the last ounce of strength he possessed, Divak let go of Dimitar’s hand and reached for the rusted blade he had taken from the dead man. Dimitar saw this and gripped Divak’s throat harder. Despite this, Divak found the hilt of the blade and c
losed his fingers around it. When Dimitar opened his mouth to reveal a tongue as black as his teeth, Divak drove the blade into it.

  The blade smashed into the back of Dimitar’s throat and severed his cervical vertebrae. In an instant, he released his hold on Divak and his hand fell to his side.

  Divak gasped for air and fell back onto both hands. He glanced at Dimitar and at the blade which protruded from his mouth. As his breathing became more regular, he hoped that his friend was finally dead. Either way, he knew it best to get as far away from there as he could.

  He got to his feet and looked around. The mist had grown so thick that he could see no more than ten feet in any direction. There was no sign of the other gang members, and he realised they had deserted him. He curled his lower lip in anger, vowing to deal with them later.

  “Hello!” he called out, stepping away from Dimitar’s body.

  Divak cursed under his breath when he received no response. He took the knife he kept in a sheath on his waistband and held it out before him, sensing this episode was not yet over. His instincts proved to be correct when Dimitar suddenly sat upright and looked at him again. The blade still protruded from his friend’s mouth, but now the irises in his eyes had changed from their glazed appearance to a chilling black.

  It was as much as Divak could take, and he ran into the mist and away from his friend. He did not know if he had lost his mind, but the pain in his throat was very real. That, in itself, told him he had not imagined it. There was foul play afoot here, and whatever lay behind it seemed intent on killing him.

  Divak stumbled over the body of one of the other dead gang members. He cursed out loud as he fell to the ground, cutting his hand on the knife he held. When he got to his feet again, he saw the dead body he had tripped over now standing upright only a few feet away. The eyes showed the same black soulless depths as Dimitar’s had.

  He whimpered with fright, and felt his bowels loosen. The tough exterior he had always shown to the gang members was now all but gone. When he saw the others emerging from the mist, he dropped his knife and fled. In his haste, he ran straight into one of them. The impact sent a shock throughout his entire body and brought him crashing down again.

  For a moment, Divak felt as though he had run headlong into a brick wall. He rolled onto his back, sucking in a deep breath of air after the blow had left him winded. The imminent danger he was in brought him quickly back to his senses. He climbed to his feet again, aware for the first time that he had soiled himself.

  He had little time to dwell on it as the other eight dead men all stood in a circle around him. The one he had collided with remained on the ground. They stood firm, like statues, the gaze from their black eyes penetrating what was left of his resolve.

  Divak scanned them quickly, too afraid to move in case it should prompt one of them to attack him. He then looked down when he heard movement from the man on the ground. The man there appeared motionless also, but when he looked up again the others had drawn even closer than before.

  Without another thought, he turned to flee a second time. He was not able to get far however, and dropped to his left knee when something pulled hard on his right ankle. The jolt twisted the joint and he gasped in pain. When he turned his head around, he saw the man on the ground holding the ankle in a vice-like grip.

  Divak managed to turn his body around and supporting his weight on his hands, he lashed out with his left foot. The two blows that connected dislocated the nose of the dead man and dislodged several of his teeth. Yet they had no effect and, in response, the dead man dragged Divak with real force to him.

  The gang leader trembled with fear as he found himself beneath the dead man. Still, he managed to keep his wits about him. From the corner of his eye, he saw the others tighten the circle around him even though none of them moved their feet. He looked up into the eyes of the dead man, eyes that bore right through him. When the dead man opened his mouth, not only did he reveal a black tongue the same as Dimitar, he also showed two rows of black pointed teeth.

  Divak knew the moment was upon him. If he was to survive this ordeal, then he had to act now. He reached down to the dead man’s waistband and found the six-inch blade sheathed there. While trying to hold the dead man’s face away from his own with his left hand, he struggled with his right hand to extract the blade.

  He wasted no time once he had the blade in hand, and drove it deep into the dead man’s stomach. The dead flesh gave no resistance to the keen edge and Divak cut a deep wound upwards until the blade connected with the dead man’s ribcage. A foul stench filled the air as the flesh gave way and the still hot entrails fell down against Divak’s stomach.

  The shock of it gave Divak a surge of strength with which he was able to push the dead man away. He got to his feet at once with the blade in hand, ready to meet the next of the dead men to make a move against him. To his surprise, none of them did. He waited and watched, his senses on full alert. If he was to die this day, then he would not go down without a fight.

  “Vasil!” he heard a voice call from somewhere in the mist.

  It was the name his mother had given him at birth, and hearing it made the hairs stand up on the back of his neck. The only living person who knew his true name was his wife and, at his insistence, she had not used it in years.

  “Vasil!” the voice called again.

  He strained his ears, certain that it was his wife calling him. For her to have used his real name, he sensed she must be in some sort of danger. Divak might have been a murderer and a thief, but he was a man who cared deeply for his wife and children. Anyone or anything that threatened them, he would kill without mercy.

  The circle of dead men around him opened, and allowed him to walk through. He moved as quickly as he could toward the mist, affording himself just one glance back. The sight that met his eyes in that moment was the most horrifying of any he had seen that day. A monstrous python with a body as thick as a tree trunk, rose up behind Dimitar and swooped down on him. Its huge jaws opened and swallowed the entire top half of his body. He saw Dimitar’s legs rise up into the air before they, too, disappeared inside the mighty beast. Many other such creatures appeared to prey on the other dead men. The sickening crunching of bones was enough to prompt Divak to move on.

  Divak heard his wife, Mariya, call out to him once again. The sight he had just witnessed gave him a greater sense of urgency, and he disappeared into the mist in search of her. The thought that she might fall victim to one of those monsters filled him with dread. He had to find her and get her to safety.

  When he heard his name called a third time, it sent an icy chill through him. The voice calling his name was close now, but it was not that of his wife. He stopped and scrutinised the mist, unable to see anything at all in front of him. Then he caught a glimpse of her as she stepped toward him, a slight woman with long black hair that obscured much of her face.

  He hesitated, sensing something sinister about her. She did not look too threatening and yet his instincts were fully alert and warned him to keep his distance. When she motioned to him with a hand to follow her, he did not. A sound from behind caught his attention and he quickly turned his head. He saw two of the pythons emerge from the mist behind him. One of them reared its head and opened its jaws as he came within its sights. Knowing he was about to provide its next meal, he ran into the mist in the direction of the woman.

  Divak stumbled several times in his need to get away. Here the mist was even thicker and he was unable now to see where he was going. He knew, though, he had no choice but to run blind into the dense fog. It was that or be eaten alive by one of those hideous creatures. Such a fate would prove worse than any death he could imagine. He feared the woman he had glimpsed up ahead, but he feared the pythons more.

  For a minute or two he wandered around, not knowing where he was or where he was going. The fact he was lost served to intensify his fear, but made his senses even more alert. To his relief, the pythons had not appeared again. Still
, the thought stuck in his mind that they might spring from the mist and grab him at any moment. It was that, more than anything, which drove him on.

  Divak saw the woman once again. As he moved forward, the mist cleared around her. Her hair covered enough of her face to prevent him still from seeing her eyes. When she turned he decided to follow her, hopeful that she might lead him to safety and away from the snakes. He failed to recognise any of the narrow streets he walked along. None of the buildings he saw, where the mist lifted, looked familiar to him. Following the woman soon became his only option.

  She lingered up ahead long enough for him to see which direction she took next. He turned right into a street so narrow he was able to touch the houses to either side when he stretched out his arms. Rats scurried along to both his left and his right, where they had been hunting for morsels in the human waste that lay in putrid puddles on the ground. Here the stench was so bad he had to raise a hand to his nose and mouth to try and shield the foul air from his lungs.

  By the time Divak reached the end of the street, the mist had lifted. He stepped into a wider area and looked up at the black skies. The moon appeared through the heavy cloud cover and illuminated the area around him. A fountain lay just ahead in a small square that acted as a crossroads for four adjoining streets, including the one he had just walked along. He recognised it and, at once, had his bearings again. At least a half a dozen of his men lived along the streets that branched off in each direction.

  Divak began to feel his confidence return. His own home was still some distance away, but there were many places nearby where he could seek shelter. He turned his head to check behind. The pythons had not followed him that he could tell. He afforded himself a slight grin, until he faced front again and saw Lucy standing there.

  She stood straight with her arms at her sides. For the first time, Divak could see her eyes and it drained all his new-found confidence before he managed to draw another breath. He saw the same soulless black orbs he had seen on his dead friends, except this was much worse.