Blood, Milk & Chocolate - Part 1 (The Grimm Diaries Book 3) (9 page)

18

The Dream
Temple took little time to prepare. Loki had explained how it worked when they
were in the Schloss.
Every little detail, from how to draw
the Dream Temple to how to use the mirrors.
It occurred to Fable that
maybe Loki had sensed this would happen to him. Maybe he had intentionally
prepared her without telling her, the same way Charmwill had mentored him.
Feeling so connected to Loki made Fable feel better. She'd really liked him
since the first day they met.

Right now,
Fable and Shew lay next to each other in the Dream Temple's circle in the
cellar. Two mirrors were placed opposite each other, and the rest of the ritual
had been prepared. Babushka brought two Obol coins and placed them on the girls'
eyes as part of the ritual. Then she poured what was left of the baby tears in
Shew's eyes.

Shew
looked drowsy as Fable whispered the Incubator in Shew's ears, the last thing
before she entered the Dreamworld.

"Wilhelm
Carl Grimm," Fable said.

As she
waited to enter the Dreamworld, Fable turned her head toward Babushka and said,
"Can you please put some breadcrumbs in my grip?"

"You
know no items ever pass through to the Dreamworld," Babushka said.

"Still,
it wouldn't hurt to try," Fable said, weakened by her addiction to the
breadcrumbs. "Please?"

Babushka
brought her a handful of breadcrumbs and poured them in Fable's palm, closed
her hands, and patted them.

"Thank
you," Fable said. "I feel safer now."

Babushka
waited until Fable had phased out and said, "Thank you, Fable, for
agreeing to go through hell to save my son."

Part 2

Lost Souls & Magic

19

The
Schloss

"Why
did you stop reading?" Axel asked Lucy.

"Because
I don't like this diary," she said, resting the book on her lap.

"What's
not to like?" Axel said. "It's the best diary I've ever read.
Carmilla's conflict with the mirror touched something in me."

"What
are you talking about, Axel?" Lucy puffed. "This isn't the Queen of
Sorrow I was expecting to read about. She is all too giddy and fragile. What is
this?"

"I
thought you sympathized with her."

"I
did, and still do, but I want her to be stronger than a mere teenager who
whines about wanting to see her real looks," Lucy said. "I really
don't like this."

"I'm
sure the path she is about to take will turn her into the vicious Queen of
Sorrow you like," Axel said. "How do you think she transformed to who
she is now?"

"What
do you think she saw when she looked in the water?" Lucy's eyes glittered
suddenly. "Do you think she discovered she was no beauty, but a
beast?"

"Only
one way to find out." Axel raised an eyebrow and pointed at the diary
while munching on Sticky Sweet Bones.

"You're
right," Lucy said. "Let's read on."

20

The
Queen's Diary

When I
opened my eyes, I was surprised I had no time to see my reflection in the
water.

Before I
fully looked at the rippling waves of the pond, someone's arms pulled me from
behind and dragged me. I first guessed it to be my father; he'd caught me
before I succumbed to my selfishness and sent my family and land to hell.

But the
hands were too aggressive to be my father's. They
weren't
loving
hands. They meant me harm. They were the hands of an enemy.

I couldn't
see my captors, whoever they were. They began choking me. In all my years in
the castle I had been trained to ride horses and even use a sword, but none of
this was good enough to handle my kidnapper. All kinds of sinister scenarios
flashed before my eyes.

What will
happen to me?

It didn't
take long before I began fainting. As my eyelids draped my vision into
darkness, I heard someone utter the name I feared the most—at least, I
was taught to fear it. A name I had only heard on the tongue of my father.
Someone was praising
their
king: Night Von Sorrow.

***

When I
woke up, I was tied up in chains in some underground dungeon. Realizing I was
in some dungeon was the easy part. It was dark and filthy, not like anything I
had ever seen. Grey walls and vaults with a small barred window, too high for a
normal human being to reach. I was surprised I didn't panic yet.

What I saw
later made me panic.

Desperate,
I tried to free myself from the chains, kicking, swearing, and foolishly
threatening my enemies that my father was going to hunt them one by one. It was
all in vain. All I got back were some hissing laughs, reeking of blood and
mockery.

Then I
realized that the chains were bolted to four sides of the walls, keeping me
afloat in the air, not knowing what was underneath me.

How was
that possible?

As I
kicked and screamed, a strange smell soaked my soul. It was a collection and
mixture of odors and scents I had never experienced before—at least not
together.

What was
this? I needed to focus, rather than trying to separate each smell on my own.

The first
smell was unmistakable, and actually easy to identify. It was blood. A lot of
it, fuming
like
a spreading disease up my nostrils. It
was coming from right underneath me, but I couldn't twist my head enough to
peek down there.

What could
hold such amounts of blood? A pool?

The notion
made me nauseated, but it also made me realize I was wet. Turning my head, I
saw blood trickling down my arms and legs tied to my sides. Had I been soaked
in that pool and brought up again? Why?

I followed
the trickling blood and pressured my body to a brief twist, which hurt my limbs
and made me scream in agony. Finally, I could barely glimpse a surface
underneath me. This time I could see what it was.

I was
floating above a bathtub.
A bloodbath of sorts.

The
bathtub was filled with blood. But not only blood.

There were
other liquids I couldn't recognize immediately—because seriously, it
didn't make any sense to mix them together.

What kind
of mixture was that, and why?

The blood
was mixed with something white, which spread like swirling tree branches
through it.

What was
that? Milk?

Then there
was something else I hadn't enough time to see with my eyes. My limbs ached and
begged me to turn back to a normal position.

But I
could smell it.

It was
something rare and preciously desired by kings and queens at that time.
A treat for the elite only.
Chocolate. Dark chocolate.

I knew it
because, similar to the Vampire Craze, there had been a Chocolate Craze in my
time. In Styria, chocolate had been prohibited, and the poor couldn't afford it
anyway. Only the likes of my mother had a few precious amounts she offered for
the elite kings and queens who visited us. The reasoning behind the prohibition
had been announced after renowned physicians from London and France claimed
chocolate caused madness. And madness had always been linked to diseases, which
recently had been linked to being a vampire.

But there
was no more time for me to analyze why I had been dipped into that mix while my
body was hung in the air. I decided I would annoy my captors with the only
weapon I had.

My scream!

I screamed
and screeched and squealed from the top of my lungs, wishing for a response or
clarification why I was here—and where
was
here?

All the
shouting I did could not free me. The dungeon smelled of all things evil. It
was as if the walls were smeared with rotten apples. I could tell there were
tens of cloaked men and women standing silently in the shadows, not uttering a
word. But I didn't understand why they didn't talk. Was this some kind of a
ritual? Where they waiting for someone?

A few
moments later, I could see a raven and dove fluttering beyond the barred
windows near the ceiling. That was when my torturers slowly emerged from the
darkness, pulling their black cloaks back and staring at me. Men and women with
pointed teeth. Pale but beautiful faces, even with their unusual golden eyes.
Those were definitely the Sorrows, my family's greatest enemy since the days
when my ancestor escaped Transylvania.

One man
came a step closer to me. Everyone was sure to grant him enough space and
slightly bow at his proximity. He seemed
uglier
than
the rest. His eyes were red, not gold. He had long silver hair and a bushy
beard, and edgy features—a bit too edgy, his cheekbones too sharp. He had
a scar running sideways on his left cheek.

The man
rested both his hands on a cane. I could see his long white fingernails shining
in the dimly lit room. They were old hands, though. I had no doubt it was Night
Von Sorrow, because I hadn't seen anything scarier than him in my life. I
hadn't seen anything more cold-blooded. The slight parting of his mouth,
showing his fangs, confirmed my fears. He smelled of blood, milk, and
chocolate.

"Is
she the one?" Night asked in a raspy voice that sent shivers to my soul.

"Carmilla
Karnstein in the flesh," someone answered him.

"Weak
is the flesh," Night said, taking a step forward and bending over. He held
me by the jaw and parted his lips slowly, showing his sharp fangs again.
"Strong is the soul that lives forever," he added, almost admiring me—or
whatever his eyes were scanning my body for. "I can smell her soul
already," he mumbled with envy and hatred, probably because he had no soul
himself.

"I
know who you are!" I spat on him, wondering from where I got my
feistiness. After the incident with my mother, this was the second time I'd
realized how much anger I had inside.

"Then
you're not as afraid as you should be," Night said. "Although I
despise all Karnsteins, I have always admired their foolish bravery." His
eyes met mine. They were piercing, as if looking for something beyond me.
"You're such a beauty, Carmilla, just like the ripe Blood Apples the
Karnsteins produce." He laughed in a low drone as his long fingernails
almost scraped my cheeks. "We have been waiting so long for you."

"Let
go of me!" I wriggled in my chains, not having a clue what he meant.
"What is this bathtub? What do you want from me?"

"It's
a tub of blood, milk, and dark chocolate." He dipped his long forefinger
in it, pulled it up, and licked it with closed eyes. "And not any blood,
or any milk, or any chocolate." It looked genuinely delicious to him.
"I will let go of you." He signaled for the other men, who came and
unchained me. They were too tall and strong, so I decided against kicking
against them or trying to escape. Not yet. I didn't know where I was.

Night Von
Sorrow turned back to the cloaked men. "Send him in," he ordered.
"I want him to have her. Now!" he screamed, clenching his fists, red
veins sticking out his strong neck. When he did, the liquid in the bathtub
rippled, blood, milk, and chocolate weaving into each other's curvy threads.
"Let's see if she is the one we're looking for."

A few
cloaked men pulled open an iron door and dragged a man in a red cloak inside.
A tall man with broad shoulders.
His hands were tied, and
two giant henchmen barely held him. He seemed strong, only overruled by their
numbers. Another hostage, I thought, as he tried to set himself free.

"I
believe you have met my son, Angel Von Sorrow," Night said proudly,
removing Angel's cloak.

"The
apple trader?" My heart tore into pieces.
Too many
surprises.
It was the first time I'd realized that Angel had betrayed my
father and our land. He was not an apple trader, but a disguised member of the
Sorrow's family. Didn't he say his name was Angel Hassenpflug?

And he was
a vampire who was supposed to kill me?

I didn't
really care if I died that day. How could Angel betray me? It was one of the
first moments I realized the world wasn't as friendly as I had thought. I had
been confined behind walls of conformity, not really knowing anything about the
real world outside. Betrayal seemed the world's most common trait.

"It
was a nice little trick to fool you and sneak into your castle and learn about
you." Night smirked at me. "You see
,
my dear
son has not been fully turned into a vampire yet. We postponed the ritual of
his full transformation so I could send him to Germany and then to Austria
disguised as a human being. Being a half-vampire made him undetectable by your
father. Karnsteins haven't developed the talent for sniffing half-vampires yet.
For years, my son has been very useful to us, learning how humans thought and
behaved so we can rule the world soon enough."

"Why
would you do that?" If I was going to get killed, I needed to know.

"Because
humans have been haunting and killing us for years, thinking we're just like
rats, infecting the world with a disease." Night Von Sorrow sounded hurt
for a slice of a moment. Soon he raised his raspy voice again, as if he were an
actor in the Shakespearean theatre. "You have been wrongfully burning
everyone who was different from you; the women whom you called witches, for
instance. Humans have been exterminating everything that's new to them because
they just couldn't understand it. They couldn't look at the beauty behind the
fangs and the blood. You treat us like a walking plague, thinking you are the
greatest species on earth. We, vampires,
are
the greatest species. Not
you.
We
are
an evolved human being
with much more powers than any of you. We're something new and beautiful. I
know it looks like we are the evil creatures, but it's the other way around.
Vampires are just different from people, with their own lifestyle. Humans
should have made a space for us so we could all live together."

"What
kind of crazy ideas are you speaking of?" I snapped. "You kill
people. You suck their blood."

"Humans
suck other humans' blood every day," Night said. "Just look at the
wars and poverty all around you. But you are a Karnstein. You wouldn't
understand." He turned around and pulled his son by his hair. It was a
violent move. Angel's eyes went red as he tried to avoid looking at me. I
didn't know if it was fear or shame that paralyzed him. He had looked like a
ferocious, strong man back in Styria. What had happened to him? "Take her,
my son," Night demanded. "She looks sweet. She'll be your first, so
you can turn into a full vampire. And maybe she is the one we're looking
for."

This was
the second time he'd declared that. I wondered who he thought I really was.

"I
don't want to!" Angel moaned, resisting his father's pull. "I don't
want to become a vampire. I don't want to be like you!"

Night
slapped his son on the face. It was more than a slap. He'd granted him a scar
across the cheek, one very similar to his own. Unlike Night Von Sorrow, Angel's
scar healed instantly. I was confused. "You're a vampire like me."
Night held his son's strong skull between his long-fingered hands, forehead to
forehead, as if pleading. "You are a Sorrow. You don't have much of a choice.
The time you spent with humans has softened your heart. You were supposed to
taste her blood while you were in their castle. I brought her here for you, so
you have no more excuses."

"I
can't," Angel pleaded. He somehow still loved his father, although it was
a weakened kind of love. "I just can't. Torture me all you want. I'm not
like you. If there was ever a way I could turn human, I would have sold my soul
for it."

Night Von
Sorrow slashed his long fingernails at his son's face again, cutting him in
sharp lines. "That's the problem with half-vampires. They still have what
they think is a soul. You still think you're not like me? You think if you were
human you'd heal, just like that?"