Princess of Apocalypse Read online

  “And thanks for the dress”, I added quickly.

  “It doesn’t make us sisters”, she snapped. “C’mon. Dinner is ready.”

  “I know we’re a bit late.”

  “Doesn’t matter, a lady has the obligation to be late.”

  What was that?

  “So can I take it this way, you don’t wanna kill me anymore?” I asked at her back, while she promenaded downstairs with a grace I wasn’t able to master in my best dreams.

  “If I had it my way, you would be history by now”, she chatted over her shoulder casually as if telling me about her latest shopping trip. “Nothing personal.”

  “How can shorten my lifespan considered not personal?” I called after her, trying to swing some note of how deeply insulted I felt into the question. Well, it didn’t work or she was indifferent to my pity.

  Then it struck me. Well, they struck me. At the bottom of the stairs waited Count Dracula and Dimitri, both dressed in black tie and white gloves. Alright, he looked cute, I gave him that, but Jake would have looked cute too in this attire. Nevertheless, when I encountered him staring at me as if I was one of the seven world wonders, it took all my willpower to succumb flushing deeply red. Dimitri’s face showed still some bruises above his right eye and right cheekbone, his lips showed a red scab. Nevertheless, I couldn’t lower my focus on him while I descended the steps, imagining me whirling around in his arms.

  Signs of the hero that hurried to my rescue, I commented in thoughts to his injuries. Which girl wouldn’t swoon away? Right now he could have demanded everything from me, if it wouldn’t be for Jake, think of Jake.

  After all, he saved your life, a voice in my head threw in, but I silenced it sternly.

  Then, the romance was gone. Dimitri reached out his hand… for Tatiana to take it. She slipped her arm through his and they walked away as if I didn’t exist, leaving me alone with Count Dracula.

  “Miss Elisabeth, I’m most delighted finding you up well”, he took my hand and kissed the back of it. I hope you had a reviving sleep.”

  “Y…Yes”, I stumbled over my own tongue, partly related to the unexpected hand kiss, partly because of my own imagination playing up with me and giving me the illusion that Dimitri had been staring at me, while in fact he had only eyes for his sweetheart. “Actually, I’m sorry, I’m late.”

  “It was worth the wait.” He sent me this smile, which crossed from one ear to the other.

  “Certainly, you must be starving.”

  In answer my stomach grumbled impolitely. “You’ve no idea.”

  “Well, we can do something about that.” He offered me his arm and I accepted instantly.

  In the next moment, I found myself standing in a dining room, seated opposite Dimitri and Tatiana and on the head of the table Count Dracula. Alright, I reminded myself, I should stop calling him this way, but it simply always popped in my mind whenever I looked at his very pale face and the slight red under his eyes.

  “Dinner is served!” The voice belonged to an elderly man with a half circle of white hair around his shining bald head, standing at the entrance to the dining room, his nose up as if he’d smelled something awful.

  “May I introduce, this is Alfred, the butler of Deerpark Manor”, Dracula, sorry Victor, answered my unspoken question. “Alfred, this is Miss Elisabeth Parker from Beacon Hills, California, USA.”

  “I’m delighted making your acquaintance, Miss Parker.” The accent was unmistakably British and so the way he twisted his nose when his master had mentioned the country of my origin. “I hope your Ladyship enjoys her time abroad the colonies.”

  Alfred attended at once to a side table and started with pouring in some red wine from a carafe.

  “Alfred”, Tatiana burred out in laughter. “I’m afraid breaching it to you, but the colonies are lost. They’re a republic now.”

  “An unfortunate tragedy, Lady Tatiana.” And the way he said it, I knew he meant it.

  “Most tragically”, Dimitri said in affirmation.

  “I couldn’t agree more, Master Dimitri.”

  “Right”, I was sick of this charade. “I better address the elephant in the room straight away? After all, answers were promised to me.”

  “I didn’t promise a thing, except your demise”, Tatiana muttered and took a nip from her wine.

  “My friends are in grave danger, I’ve almost been killed, several times that is, she”, I pointed deliberately at Tatiana, “still contemplates my murder, I’m not allowed calling my parents who right now probably are crying their eyes out, because they think I might be dead, and forgive me for not sharing this calmness here, I can’t pretend a cheerful aristocratic dinner in this beautiful palace wherever that is, while all the people I care…”, I couldn’t finish this sentence out of obvious reasons of grief. “I demand answers.”

  “A thanks would have been welcome”, Dimitri said cold.

  “Slovakia.” Tatiana shrugged her shoulders. “Well, Barbie wanted to know, where we are”, she added in response to Dimitri’s questioning glance.

  “Really?” I snapped at both of them. “Could we just stop the charade where you pretend I’m a stupid plastic doll and just answer my questions. I’m well aware that Slovakia is located in Europe and me being in Europe is just impossible.”

  Tatiana wanted to answer, but Victor raised his hand in a warning, holding her back.

  “Miss Elisabeth”, Victor started and I found his reassuring hand on the back of my palm. “Be assured, no one will contemplate your murder under my roof. Also, please answer me the question, if the situation of you starving to death is benefitting the situation of your friends?”

  “You can’t tell me you’re having this black tie event every night”, I shot back.

  “Actually, we do”, Dimitri said in a matter of fact tone. “Black tie in general, only on weekends and public holidays it’s white tie.”

  I glanced confused at him. “Really? This is not simply to impress me or—”

  “No, that’s because we’re hungry and if you’ve been on time, I would have been just half as hungry by now.”

  “Miss Elisabeth”, Victor said, “I promised you to answer all your questions to the best of my knowledge. And I tend to keep my promises. Nevertheless, I can’t promise you to have all the answers to your questions, however, a formal dinner resembles the perfect environment to elaborate on the concerns at hand. So, whenever you’re ready, shoot away. Ask whatever you like.”

  “I don’t know even where to begin with. Who are you guys? And demons? They should not even exist and what do they want with my friends?”

  “We’re the ones that saved your life”, Tatiana blurted out. “Not that I had a particular say in it.”

  “So you’re telling me, you’re the good ones?”

  “Unfortunately, it’s not that easy, Miss Elisabeth.” Victor shifted in his seat. “The world can’t be simply divided into good and bad, black and white. You commoners—”

  “Are you royalty?”

  “Partly, but we prefer to refer to your kind as commoners. People, who do not possess the knowledge of the supernatural.”

  “Supernatural? As in Harry Potter?”

  Tatiana rolled her eyes upon my last comment. “Tata, surprise, surprise, I’m a witch.”

  “I know what they say about you at school — the witch from Transylvania — be assured I’d nothing to do with it.”

  “My dear, I thought you mentioned this horrible attire of yours were the perfect disguise”, Victor asked with a raised eyebrow at his niece.

  “They were wrong about the Transylvania part, if that helps”, she answered meekly. “Doesn’t matter this waste of time finally found an end. I wouldn’t have endured another week of this charade.” She shook in disgust her shoulders and head at the same time.

  “On the positive, this stupid history homework is gone”, Dimitri threw in.

  “So”, I started, collecting the right words. “She’s a witch.”
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  “Proudly, witchcraft is in our family for twenty-one generations”, she answered.

  “Twenty”, Victor corrected.

  “Twenty-one if you consider Maribella.”

  “Her cooking skills can be hardly classified witchcraft, my dear.”

  “And”, I pointed to Dimitri, “that makes you a warlock?”

  He immediately raised his hands in defence. “Satan forbid, no, I’m not.”

  “We’re not really cousins”, Tatiana helped explaining and somehow my heart took a deep dive. Not cousins. He’s making out with a hot witch. Think of Jake, Jake, Jake, Jake…

  “So, what are you?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “Actually, it isn’t”, Tatiana helped out and widely articulated between her left and right side. “He’s part witch, part demon.”

  “Demon?”

  Dimitri lowered his glance. Obviously, this wasn’t his favourite topic.

  “Well, the truth had to come out one way or the other and I can still kill her, if the truth becomes an inconvenience.”

  “Tatiana, no one is getting killed here”, Victor announced, annoyance waved into his voice.

  “What a pity”, Tatiana puffed out and leaned back in her seat.

  Alfred avoided worse by intervening and serving the entry, a delicious looking salad dressed with fried chicken and bacon on top, I couldn’t hold myself back any longer and started immediately.

  “Anyway”, Victor continued. “There are supernaturals among human kind. You know them as witches, warlocks, werewolves—“

  “Wait”, I devoured a chicken piece hastily. “Werewolves do exist?”

  “Not many anymore, but yes.”

  “How about vampires?”

  “Vampires, Magicians, Druids, Valkyries, Elves, Fairies—”

  “Tinker Bell is real. No kidding?”

  “Tinker who?” Victor gazed at his niece.

  “Some commoner folklore I guess”, she rolled again with her eyes. “A tiny fly thingy, who busses around a guy in green tights twenty times her size.”

  “I’m impressed”, Dimitri smirked. “American education taught you one thing after all.”

  “Danny called me the dark version of Tinker Bell once. I looked it up. I wasn’t amused.”

  “He liked you”, I muttered. The memory almost conjured up another tear.

  “Yeah, if he would have liked me a bit more and would be less interested following his stupid fellow gang members to the lake for some stupid bullying contest, he probably would be still alive.”

  “Tatiana!” This was Victor and this time his voice sounded not grandfatherly calm.

  “What? Just stating the obvious.”

  “She’s right”, I admitted, my glance wandered to Dimitri. “I’m sorry. What happened at the lake, shouldn’t have happened. They behaved like jerks and—“

  “It wasn’t your fault, Elisabeth”, Dimitri snapped back, uncomfortably shifting in his seat.

  “Your foolish friends brought themselves in great danger”, Tatiana said and touched Dimitri’s right arm. The intimacy between them was breathtaking and made me horrendously jealous. It shouldn’t, but maybe there is a screwed up version of the nurse falling for her patient, just in my case it’s the helpless girl and her hero.

  “Really”, I fired back. “I saw Dimitri in the crouch position most of the time.”

  “Luckily for your boyfriend, I did a good job keeping his demon side under control. You’ve seen what the Berserkers did to your friends. Imagine him unleashed!”

  “Could you please show a little compassion with her, Tat”, Dimitri sighed. “She just lost friends.”

  “I just highlight the facts. Isn’t that the full purpose of this gathering?”

  “So, demons.” I changed the topic on purpose.

  “Yes, nasty creatures from hell”, Tatiana answered my unformulated question. “Summoned to earth to fulfil their master’s bidding.”

  “And what kind of bidding could that be?”

  Victor stiffened in his seat. “The capture of the Prince of Death.”

  “Who the hell is this Prince of Death?”

  Dimitri took a deep breath. “We thought it’s either your boyfriend or his twin brother.”

  “Jake, a prince?” I burst out in played laughter. “This must be a mix up.”

  “The Council and the Accords think differently,” Tatiana said slightly insulted. It was impossible to miss the seriousness in her voice.

  “Council?”

  “The Council is the supernatural version of a government or more like a supervisory board”, Victor said, finishing his salad and taking a long sip from his wine glass. “Their main task is the prevention of the supernatural world being discovered by commoners.”

  “Why? I’m sure some people wouldn’t mind.”

  “Some never mind, but the majority are afraid. Over the centuries, commoners have brought our kind to near extinction. We’ve become a myth, which protects us from further extinction.”

  “Inquisition killed thousands of my kind”, Tatiana added and spiked her fork furiously into the main course. “Including my mother.”

  “It’s imperative that we keep our world secret”, Victor continued quickly. “The Council employs tracker teams like Dimitri and Tatiana. They’re something like the executive arm of the Council. They find other supernaturals, mostly young children, who just discovered their supernatural talents. The magic gene survives among commoners for generations and if the right match is found, suddenly becomes dominant again. Imagine a kid lifts up his parents at a birthday party and makes them fly to the ceiling. Trackers find those kids and take them away.”

  My finger shot at Dimitri and Tatiana. “You abduct children from their parents.”

  Tatiana didn’t look the slightest bit insulted. “Among other tasks. The borders between good and evil are overlapping sometimes. What sounds horrible to your motherly instincts, if the kids grow up among commoners, they quickly get the attention of your governments, which would use them for far worse causes. If a third world war could be prevented by stealing one child, would you do it?”

  “It’s rare that those skills reappear among commoners, but it happens”, Dimitri made clear. “Magicians are called in to change the memory of the parents, making them overcome the loss.”

  “That doesn’t make it sound any better”, I commented with a nasty grimace in his direction.

  “It shouldn’t, just presenting you all the aspects.”

  “Trackers are also needed to prevent a misuse of our skills”, Victor said after having a piece from his main meal. “Some of us use their skills to gather wealth or power. Imagine their doings and skills are made public.”

  “What are the trackers doing to those who do?”

  “Finding them and asking them politely to stop”, Tatiana said.

  “And that works?” I inquired, putting my forehead into wrinkles.

  “Not always, but there is always the option of killing.”

  “Why does it always have to be killing when it comes to you?”

  “I’m good at it.”

  “No doubt.”

  “Ladies, please”, Victor pleaded and took a deep breath. “Most importantly, the tracker’s job is to kill demons.”

  “It’s hard to believe the governments of this world are oblivious to the demon threat. Such an attack as we saw on the lakeside can’t get unnoticed.”

  “You would be amazed.” Tatiana grinned, but she couldn’t escape my questioning glance, which asked for more details. “Of course, it’s all over the news. Every channel is broadcasting a special. Four teenagers killed in California, six others missing. So far, no confirmation about a kidnapping. Now, after day two, the authorities admit, they’re clueless. No one even mentioned the demons. In their defence, demons do not leave any traces behind.”

  “Commoners look for reasonable explanations, not always the most logical”, Victor explained.

 
“Do you want to tell me those attacks happen every day?”

  “Not at all, Miss Elisabeth. It’s important to understand that demons can’t enter our world indefinitely and on their own. They require a ceremony. Sometimes, if a warlock had turned evil and summoned some demons for his personal use, trackers are called in to kill the demons and get rid of the warlock.”

  “Summoning a demon is a crime”, Dimitri interrupted. “The Council proclaims the death penalty for those who do.”

  “Executed on the spot”, Tatiana poked into her meal with delight.

  “What are you three saying?” I asked “That someone summoned those demons on purpose?”

  “Miss Elisabeth, there were more than a dozen Berserker demons involved. This can be considered a small army.”

  “Who would do this?”

  “The Guild”, Dimitri said coldly.

  “The Guild?”

  Victor placed his fork and knife back on the table and started scratching his chin. “The Guild is a secret order of supernaturals, which were famous for killing the Children of Apocalypse.”

  “Children of Apocalypse?” Are they still speaking English? My head started aching again.