The Mark of Cain (28 page)

Some had fallen farther than the others and had no
clothes at all, the cloth long ago having come apart and disintegrating to show
their flesh, which in turn was ragged and blistered and covered in filth. Those
few only had their own goose bumps and shivers to protect them from this
relentless rain.

Again, Cain laughed, the husky foreman beside him
flinching with every trill. But Cain couldn’t help it. God had so obviously
forsaken this sorry lot. And, if
He
had done so, then Cain really
wouldn’t
be held accountable for the atrocities he committed against them.

Wanting to test his hypothesis, he said to the
foreman, a lurid grin on his face, “Gather the slaves together. I have a gift
for them.”

When they were gathered together before him—their
chins which had begun defiant now drawn to their chests, their eyes that had
once held anger now muted and lifeless—he announced, “It has come to my
attention that the reason you are not making ample progress on my castle is
because you are too weak to work as hard as I need you to. That is why I have
prepared for you a nice meal full of meat and wine, as well as the Lord’s
communion.”

Numerous pairs of eyes glanced up at him, hope in
their eyes that spoke of the thoughts going through their heads that things
were going to get better; that his torture of them was over. Even more eyes
looked up when he clapped, telling Seneslav to bring forth the banquet he’d had
prepared for them while the foreman had rounded them up from the vast acres
they were working on.

Oversized platters made of expensive silver were
brought out, large chunks of meat resting on them in thick juices. Each slave’s
eyes opened wide, their mouths watering akin to the sky as they licked their
starved lips.

“Come. Eat,” he commanded with a friendly smile. He
then sat at a table, an open tent set up above to keep the rain off his own
thick stew and heavy bread.

The moment his men set the platters on the thick
wild grass, dark green from the torrential rain, the slaves ran forward. They
didn’t even seem to notice that the platters had been theirs, looted to add to
his treasury when the worthless beasts had become his property.

With a cruel leer, he dipped his bread in his wine
and set it into his mouth. They weren’t even tasting the meat as they
practically inhaled it. Such a shame. Many cultures would give
anything
to eat of the meat he had prepared for them. Many men would consider it an
honor
;
a way to hone another man’s life force. But these filthy mongrels weren’t being
respectful of the customs, instead snarling at each other like common dogs
protecting their food.

It was when they had calmed down, their stomachs
full, that he stood before them.

“Thank you for ridding myself of your husbands and
wives, your daughters and sons, your mothers and fathers,” he said as he looked
around the group, his smile widening with each person who seemed to understand
what he was actually saying. One woman retched, spilling what could be her
husband’s remains all over the ground.

“Now that’s just disrespectful. Here I give you a
marvelous feast and you disrespect me by throwing it in my face,” he said, his
grin one that would frighten even Satan it was so full of nefarious glee. “I
only gave you the freshest of your relatives. I didn’t want to make you
ill
.
For ill slaves cannot work, now can they?”

As his soldiers brought out golden chalices full of
blood the color of the rubies emblazoned upon them, he added, “Perhaps you just
need something to wash it down with. Or, should I say, wash
them
down
with.”

As the soldiers forced the liquid down the slaves’
throats, he stood and said the sacramental prayer in perfect Latin, blessing
the food and drink as though they were Christ Himself. It was difficult to get
out because every few words were punctuated by crazed laughter.

Once done with that, he had the soldiers cut off the
remaining rags until the people were all nude, announcing, “Peasants smell
better than you lot. Your appearance is a personal offense. I will not have you
clothed in such filth. You will learn what it means to be selfish. To sell
yourselves as common harlots to the Turkish sultan. It is you and your
struggles for power, along with thieves and robbers, who have caused Wallachia
to become weak.”

In an attempt to strengthen Wallachia, the following
months were full of bloodshed. He began by ordering almost all trade between
Wallachia and other countries to cease. The only items he allowed to be traded
from outside of their country were the few that they couldn’t get from
Wallachia itself. As he’d intended, this boosted the economy until it was
actually stable.

As he worked on the economy, he also worked on his
forces, which had grown quite large, due mostly to the fact that he allowed
peasants to be promoted by their hard work. It stood against everything he
believed in since he despised the lower classes, but it was what was best for
Wallachia. And what was best for Wallachia was best for him. He was willing to
temporarily do something he didn’t agree with if it would give him more power
in the end. Besides, they’d be useful to him in the now. There was no altruism
in it.

When his forces were no longer
completely
useless, he used them to make raids into other areas around Wallachia, mainly
Transylvania, which was linked to the boyars. Also, during this time, he made
plenty of examples out of anyone who committed any crime—even petty thieves and
women performing sex outside of wedlock were punished with impalement. There
was no trial for the accused. Instead, Cain would immediately put them to
death.

When the castle was finally finished, he took a
wife: Nadia. She was beautiful. Dark. Mysterious and strong. The perfect wife
for the man that he was. For the man who was the subject of so many rumors;
some true, some outright lies. Though the rumors made him look worse than he
was, he allowed them to circulate for, whether true or false, one thing they
all had in common was that they sowed fear into the hearts of his enemies. And
that was exactly what he had set out to do; to put the fear of him into all
humans, as well as into God Himself.

Usually, when presented with a situation, Cain would
think about what would be the most condemnable and truly malicious response.
What would prove to God that he was unredeemable? That was why, other than
impalement, he had turned to many other gruesome forms of execution over the
years. Methods such as boiling people alive, roasting babies over the fire,
flaying a man’s skin until the victim would scream from the air hitting his
sensitive muscles, the shrieks of agony getting quieter as he slowly went into
shock and died, and cutting off the soles of a person’s feet then rubbing salt
into the wounds and letting goats lick them clean. These were a few of these
methods, though not the worst he did.

These unspeakable horrors may have seemed to be
going too far, but each act was part of a stratagem in his greater design. For
maybe, if he became God’s own personal Anti-Christ—as many priests were
beginning to call him despite the funds he gave them to build churches—then God
would get off His “Holier-Than-Thou” pedestal and smite Cain off the face of
the Earth.

He didn’t understand why so many priests didn’t like
him despite the torturous murders he committed. He had the pope’s blessing—not
the one who had met him as a child because he had passed on, which was a good
thing or everything would have been ruined. When it came down to it, the new
pope
loved
Cain’s enthusiasm when it came to fighting the Ottomans.
Sure, the head of the Catholic Church had much different reasons for financing
the war—supposedly “holy” ones—but Cain wasn’t about to say no to gold.
Besides, it was ironic that he was funding his mission to substantiate his satanic
nature to God with money raised by “His” holy church. And if Cain loved
anything on this God-forsaken planet, it was irony. Why else would he be
fighting his own forces? Certainly not for any other reason.

“Sire,” Seneslav said one day while Cain was busy
standing over a map, perusing it to decide where to strike next.

He had now gained the entirety of Wallachia for
himself. The boyars who had been too powerful in the beginning were now either
dead or slaves. Peasants who would forever remain loyal to Cain for him doing
so had been given their titles. The few princes who could assassinate him and
claim the throne for themselves had long been an integral part of the beautiful
artwork he had created by organizing occupied stakes into geometric patterns in
his fields, though he had left alone the real Vlad’s older brother, Vlad the
Monk, since he’d determined the boy had no desire to rule himself. The boy was
too much like the real Vlad had been: kind, and
weak
. Plus, it would
look odd to murder his own “brother.” The economy was strong, the crime rate
non-existent. His people loved him. As a mostly Christian country, they
believed he was the second coming of Christ Himself.

“Sire,” Seneslav repeated.

“What?” he asked, his eyes still on the map.

“Emissaries have arrived. From the sultan,” he said
in an important tone of voice that had Cain picturing him standing tall, his
chest out.

Cain looked up, a victorious grin across his visage.
If the sultan had sent emissaries to speak to him—most likely under the guise
of coming to collect the tribute due to him of ten thousand gold coins and five
hundred boys—then it could only be because Cain’s actions were finally scaring
him.

Outside the windows were thick rainclouds, as though
God was warning Cain not to feel too gleeful about the plots skipping around
his mind like young princesses in ringlets. But Cain couldn’t help it. Finally,
all his hard work was paying off.
Finally
, the sultan was threatened
enough by “Vlad” to recognize the tyrant as a man on equal ground. And Cain
would now prove that the sultan was incorrect in his thinking. Somehow, Cain
would find a way to use the emissaries as a message to tell the sultan that he
was out of his league with Cain. That Cain was much,
much
better than he
could ever hope to be.

“Well don’t be unkind. Show them in,” he said,
putting unimportant papers over his map and walking to his throne.

“Yes, sire.”

With a knowing grin of his own, the man went to the
large, oversized doors, telling a servant to bring the emissaries in.

Within moments the two Turks sauntered in dressed in
the typical garb. They had large white turbans wrapped around their heads, and
both wore neutral clothes covered in elegant burgundy caftans with gold
embroidery. The caftans swallowed their small frames, making them appear lost
in all the thick fabric. As it was, they were already several inches shorter
and almost a hundred pounds lighter than he was, and not even the amount of
layers they wore as an attempt to appear larger—and, in turn, wealthier, since
only poor men were thin—could help.

They both had skin the color of tea with milk;
similar to Cain’s skin, yet with a different undertone than he had. However,
even with the rich color to their skin, one was lighter than the other by
several shades. Their dark beards were full, sweat glistening in the strands as
they moved. Or, perhaps, not sweat. Another Wallachian storm was brewing
outside. Perhaps God’s tears had washed away their sins before Cain could
murder them, as he inevitably planned to do. He only needed an excuse.

As they walked forward, their footsteps soft and yet
resounding through the great throne room, they looked at each other, confusion
written all over their faces.

“What can I do for you?” Cain asked in perfect
Turkish.

“We come with a message for the prince,” the darker
one answered.

“You’re speaking with him,” he said as pleasantly as
possible.

The darker one shook his head. “The sultan showed us
a painting of the prince. You are not him.”

“Yes, I am a much handsomer man,” he said with a
grin.

The man smiled, though it didn’t reach his
fear-filled eyes. “So may we speak with the prince?”

All charm gone along with his patience, Cain said, “
I
am the prince. I had a different man painted in my stead. Too many people wish
me dead.”

His face pinched as though he was getting angry
himself, the emissary told Cain, “The painting we saw is how the sultan
remembers the prince from his many years in captivity. That is why I am sure
you are
not
the prince.”

Cain glanced toward Seneslav, who was standing to
his left, a fine tremor coursing through him under the thick leather armor he
wore under chainmail in battle, faded blood stains marring its russet color.
Like a hunting hound on a leash, he was anxious for the order to kill these
men. And, though he only spoke Church Slavonic and had no idea what the
conversation between Cain and the emissaries consisted of, he could read Cain’s
tone and rigid posture. He knew his master was upset.

The only other people present were the two soldiers
stationed at the door, and he could tell by their faces that they had no clue
of what Cain was being told either. It made it safe for Cain to say whatever he
pleased.