The delicate peak of flavor, as I have heard from vampires who pride themselves upon their epicurean tastes, begins to fade into a steep decline almost instantly at death. For the true aficionado, only the cells of the living body will do.
Constantia, catching my eye, shook her head slightly in a gesture of almost prim disapproval. Knowing my own poor opinion of such cannibalistic behavior, she desired to express her sympathy. Politeness, or her idea thereof, had perhaps kept her from stating any forceful objection, beyond merely declining to partake, when the recent snacks had been brought forth and offered round. I did not think it altogether beyond the bounds of possibility that she might have been persuaded to join Radu and his colleagues in their appetizer. For my own peace of mind, I never questioned her on the matter.
But, as I have already indicated, the supply of treats was not yet exhausted. The single set of operating lungs, whose presence I had noted upon arrival, now sharply drew in air, filling themselves for a desperate effort. A small heart raced. There was a stir of motion in a far corner of the long room. The child who was to be the last hors d'oeuvre (she had hardly blood enough to provide the main course for such a gathering as this) was a small girl of five or six (thoughtfully provided by Radu? One of his colleagues thanked him for the treat), who had evidently been kept immobilized, by hypnotically enhanced fear, at the far side or end of the room.
It was soon quite clear to me that the child had mistaken my black-garbed figure for that of a priest—her eyes must have been quite well adapted to the dark by this time. She uttered a cry of desperation and came running barefoot, in her small ragged dress, to clasp both arms about the waist of the deceptively familiar figure of the newcome vampire, appealing to him in a shrill wordless cry for help.
Naturally this outburst attracted the attention of the company. One of Radu's less mature companions giggled, as a normal human might at some bizarre behavior on the part of a dog or cat; the rest reacted only in an abstracted way, even as their attention might have been drawn to a chicken bursting out of some breather's kitchen and scampering a half-winged progress across the floor. Even Constantia, I could see, was no more moved by the victim's anguished effort to escape than she would have been by the squawking of some barnyard fowl.
But I, Vlad Dracula, regarded the event quite differently. The longer I lived, the less it seemed to me that human children and chickens ought to be considered on the same level—regarding human adults I am not always so sure—and I felt constrained to honor such an appeal. Even if considerations of honor could have been set aside, the innocent but ardent contact awakened in me something that had been sleeping, perhaps for centuries. No doubt it may surprise some of my hearers now, to reflect that there had been a time when Prince Dracula's own offspring had embraced him so.
The others, except for Constantia and Radu himself, both of whom had known me for centuries, were much surprised to observe my reaction.
Listening to Radu talk, one might assume that he had never been a father. Of course I knew that, in a biological sense at least, that was not true.
Besides, though I would not have chosen this time to force a confrontation with Radu, I was not going to retreat from one. And it crossed my mind that, even leaving aside all considerations of honor, to postpone indefinitely the devouring of this particular little girl would be quite certain to irritate my brother immensely. So much for attempting to reach an accommodation.
With this in mind, I lifted the desperate child gently into my arms. Her hands clutched at my black robe briefly, but as her head came down upon my shoulder I could feel the small body express, in a long shudder, the end of its capacity to struggle. In the next moment its muscles all relaxed, in a total surrender of consciousness to exhaustion. Small mind and childish body had done all that they could do, to achieve their own survival.
My peers—if that is not too generous a term for them—watched this act in silence.
Meeting one curious set of eyes after another, I remarked: "I see now that all the talk about a truce was foolishness, and I do not intend to remain here long. Is there any business under discussion here that might affect my future welfare? If so, it would be courteous of you to let me hear it."
The members of the group exchanged looks among themselves. But as a group they could not agree upon an answer; and as individuals they were silent.
Now I concentrated my gaze upon Radu. "No doubt my brother will let me know if any important decisions on such matters are taken after my departure. His welfare and my own are very closely bound together."
Receiving no better reply from Radu than from the others, I turned to leave.
At that point another vampire, one of the younger men who did not know me very well even by reputation—in fact the one who had originally challenged me—moved to block my way.
I turned an inquiring gaze upon this human obstacle, and I have no doubt that my dark eyes expressed a keen and compassionate interest in his welfare.
The youth—my interlocutor's age was certainly under a century—was not easily deterred. "Where do you think you're going with our snack? If you are hungry, there are rats in plenty to be caught." Of course the implication that I fed on rats—which I would not dispute; I strive for a balanced diet—was meant to be insulting.
"No doubt you are mistaken, m'sieu. Your snack is probably scuttling around in the cellar at this moment, on six legs. But it is not an insect that I carry here, nor even a chicken or a rat. It is a human child. Perhaps you remember the existence of such a species. The girl, as you saw, desired to place herself under my protection. I have accepted the responsibility."
The stripling who confronted me looked over his shoulder as if inviting some comment on my speech. But none of the others, including Radu, had moved or had any comment to make. They were watching prudently to see how he might fare.
At last he faced me again, his limited intellect laboring to find a suitable rejoinder. Eventually he came up with: "What is that to me?"
I shrugged. I was cradling the girl in my left arm, and my free right hand dangled loosely. "It need not mean very much to you at all. But as to that, the choice lies in your hands."
He shook his head. Honor and logic and responsibility were all alien concepts to this man. It was as if I had been addressing him in Arabic or Swahili; all he could gather from my speech was the elementary fact that I opposed him.
He raised his voice a little. "I say the morsel you have there is ours. What do we care about what responsibility you accept or—?" and, even as he spoke, he began to reach out an incautious hand.
Since my words had not sufficed to obtain passage, I judged this a good opportunity to test how efficiently I could administer a minute dose of one of the less subtle Borgia potions, and what its effect would be upon the nerves and bones and bloodstream of one of the lesser nosferatu, such as he who stood in my way.
The nail of my right forefinger was suddenly an inch longer than it had been an instant earlier. Its sturdy thickness, and the sharpness of its point, were quite sufficient to let it stab through garments and through flesh, to scrape bone, and probe toward a certain nerve.
The fact was that before coming to the meeting, I had prudently equipped myself with a few vials of the dear Lucrezia's favorite chemicals (almost three hundred years in storage had rather mellowed them, but hardly decreased their potency), thinking they might come in handy the next time Radu and I should meet.
I had wanted to make sure, also, before using them on my brother, that those venerable toxins were unlikely to kill a vampire. No use trying to test it on an animal—no animal had the mental and spiritual power to attain the nosferatu state.