********
"The Seminarian"
In the Caf Spielplatz in central Sibiu, a dark-haired and not very well-dressed young lady attempted to stagger seductively towards the bar upon a pair of heels that would have looked sexy and elegant on someone who had been able to steer them competently. The rest of her attire displayed little more wisdom: her short, tight, black lurex dress was continually threatening to ride up and expose the bikini panties beneath her laddered tights (and occasionally succeeding); her make-up showed evidence of having been applied by a mad, colour-blind graffiti artist; and the dark glasses she wore indoors merely looked stupid. In spite of all these disadvantages, she was by no means unattractive, although she was clueless how to make the most of her attractiveness.
Having sidled up alongside her target – a plainly-dressed, slim, long-haired young man seated at the bar – she put on her best seductive smile and whispered provocatively, instantly causing him to spill half of his beer:
“Hey, gorgeous. How ‘bout you buy me a drink, then we can get to know each-”
“Sorry. I’m… err… wanted,” was the curt response, before the man picked up his half-empty glass and went across the room, where he pretended to be acquainted with a group of students from Lucian Blaga University, who merely ignored him. Looking nervously over his shoulder, he almost thought he detected a red flash behind the dark glasses of his spurned would-be lover, but put it down to a trick of the light, or maybe a subliminal effect on him of her intensely pissed-off expression. After she had stared daggers in his direction for a few seconds, she rose and went to rejoin her sister, who was sitting in a well-shaded corner. She was dressed in a far more subdued fashion, with a long denim skirt, a matching jacket, and no make-up, although she did share her sister’s odd predilection for wearing her shades indoors.
“Told you,” she said, as the rejected temptress stormed back to her seat. “Now, Nicoleta: can we please go back home… such as it is?”
“Bastard!” fumed Nicoleta, mainly to herself. “He hardly even looked at me!”
“Hardly would be more than enough for anyone,” remarked her sister, casting a wry glance at Nicoleta’s clownish make-up. “Honestly… You think you’re Catherine the Great already, and you’ve been a woman for all of… what now? Five days?”
“Why don’t you say that a bit louder, Andreea?” asked Nicoleta, witheringly, as nearby patrons threw them some very confused looks. “God forbid the whole room shouldn’t believe we’re completely insane.”
“That would explain a lot. I have my hopes… sis.”
“Don’t you like being this way?”
Andreea shrugged non-committally, determined not to concede a point to her sister, though it did mean fighting back against the enjoyable sensations of clingy nylon and satin against her new, sensitive, feminine body, which had just about made this evening endurable for her. “I can see that you like it, though,” she answered, ably concealing her arousal behind a mountain of sarcasm.
“I do, as a matter of fact, and why shouldn’t I? She promised to make me as beautiful and desirable as her, but can you imagine some wretched student giving her the cold shoulder?”
“He’s not a student, anyway,” said Andreea, throwing a casual gesture in the direction of the nervous young man. “I’ve seen him before, lots of times, around Strada Mitropoliei, coming and going from the college and the cathedral. He’s a priest, or maybe a seminarian. Whatever he is, he’s not exactly the best match for a vamp- ouch!” she cried, as her sister gave her a stinging slap across her cheek, which did not help to discourage their growing audience.
“Shut up, Andreea! If you can’t keep quite about that, I dread to-”
“If you’ve got a problem with each other, ladies,” said a barman, who had been quick to approach them, following the outbreak of violence, “then may I suggest you take it outdoors.”
“Might as well,” replied Andreea, “since her boyfriend’s just buggered off. Cheer up, sis,” she added, as the eyes beneath Nicoleta’s dark glasses flared red again. “There’ll be other nights for you to practice your irresistible charms, I’m sure.”
The young man had indeed left, and the curiosity of the remaining patrons was becoming all too attentive for comfort, so the sisters were both satisfied to make good their exit. They stepped out onto Piata Mica, surrounded by the picturesque Germanic architecture of the old town and surmounted by a clear, starry sky, and were about to flag down a taxi, when a black saloon car pulled up in front of them. The driver’s window slid down, revealing a neatly dressed but otherwise totally unprepossessing man: his face was a latticework of scars, and his mouth seemed to be permanently – whether by injury, natural deformation, or just a dreadful personality – etched into a cynical sneer.
“Good evening, ladies,” he said, in a voice redolent with education, breeding, and extreme unpleasantness. “Having a merry night of it, I trust?”
“Ignore him: he thinks we’re hookers,” muttered Andreea to her sister, “and one can hardly blame him, the way some of us choose to flaunt-”
“No such thoughts were in my head, my dear,” he replied, whilst the rear car door opened and a younger, decidedly tougher-looking man emerged, wearing a dark suit and a humourless expression. “Now you mention it, though, my friend and I are rather starved for company. Perhaps it might be an idea if you were to accompany us. I seriously recommend that you do, in fact,” he practically hissed, noticing how tense and alert the sisters’ postures had suddenly become. “Make it worth their while, Serghei”, he ordered, at which the younger man drew a compact revolver from his coat pocket. “Don’t be too sure of anything, ladies,” he added. “Immortality can be very overrated… and especially if you happen to get a hollow-tipped silver bullet laced with holy water anywhere in the vicinity of your hearts. Serghei, incidentally, could shoot the eyebrows off an ant at a hundred… what the?”
His surprise was due to the fact of his champion marksman having just got the sharp tip of a high-heeled shoe in the groin, which sort of thing is bound to interfere with anyone’s aim. The sisters, in the meantime, made good their escape over the bonnet of the car, across the Piata, and along Strada Mitropoliei, shots ringing out behind them. Nicoleta screamed, as one slammed into her shoulder, and an intensely horrible sensation of both burning and lightness began to overtake her. It spread from the point of impact, as if she was being transmuted into pure, non-physical pain. Andreea had to support her as they continued, and heard the car starting up behind them. They made for the nearest house they could see with lit windows, and Andreea pressed upon the doorbell like grim death, knowing that this was their final chance.
Amazed as Andreea was when the door opened, and she found herself face-to-face with the young man from the caf, she wasted no time in dragging her sister into his rather shabby ground floor flat and almost babbling out an explanation:
“Men chasing us… Shot my sister… Please help… hide us… Turn the lights off… Following…. Driving past any second… Don’t let them find us… Please…”
Her panic, and Nicoleta’s obvious misfortune, did the trick: he conducted them instantly into the cluttered lounge area, such as it was, shut the front door, and turned off the lights, while Andreea depositied her sister upon the threadbare couch. Tense seconds followed, as the car approached, then profound relief as it continued on down the street, and faded out of earshot. The seminarian turned on the lights again, and recoiled at the sight of his injured guest. If Nicoleta had looked less than perfect before, she now looked truly appalling: a network of angry red blood vessels had swollen up all over her skin and face, making a horrifying addition to her already garish make-up. Her breathing was rapid and shallow; her eyes staring and glazed; and her mouth was hanging open, exposing to full view her long, sharp canine teeth.
The only thing that served to mitigate this monstrous vision was the sight of her sister, who, equally shocked at her condition, had broken down into tears, holding Nicoleta’s limp hand in hers. After close to a minute of weeping over her, Andreea turned her face, streaked the faint, reddish trails of tears, back upon the seminarian, who had looked on in dumb amazement.
“Please… Do you have a car?”
********
Anton drove his battered, second-hand Trabant southwards, along the main road to Rasinari, doing his best to ignore his passengers, who for their part were more or less silent (minus Andreea’s weeping and Nicoleta’s stertorous breathing). Andreea occasionally spoke up to issue directions, but nothing in the way of actual conversation passed until Anton realised that they appeared to be heading for nowhere in particular with a seriously injured… something on board.
“I could have sworn that the hospital was back that way, on Bulevard Coposu,” he said, rather tentatively.
“It doesn’t matter. They can’t help her,” replied Andreea, between sobs.
“Couldn’t they? So then… You really are… ?”
“We really are, but don’t be afraid. You can see for yourself that we’re not very dangerous. Stay with me, please,” she pleaded, as Nicoleta’s breathing stalled for a few seconds, only to resume as laboured as before. “We’re almost there, sis.”
“Almost there… where?” asked Anton, casting glances to the wooded wilderness that was all he could make out on both sides of the road.
“Home… for want of a better word… but it’s the only place where we might be able to help Nicoleta. Pull over here,” she instructed, as the forbidding shape of an old, gabled house loomed into view on the right-hand side, and the words “Bates Motel” loomed equally large in Anton’s mind, but he quickly beat them down. This was no time for squeamishness, he sternly reminded himself, as he parked in an overgrown driveway and opened his door, provoking an immediate reaction from Andreea:
“What are you doing? No! Please… I can take her from here. There’s no need for-”
Bring him. He knows.
“No! I won’t! Sorry… Anton,” she said, her forced calm doing little to put him at ease. “You’ve been so kind. You may have saved her life. I couldn’t live with myself if… argh!” she cried out, and keeled over unconscious, leaving Anton in a state approaching panic. His apparently healthy passenger, having had an attack of schizophrenia, as far as he could guess, had now suffered a cataleptic fit, leaving him with two invalids to attend to. The dark house seemed so obviously uninhabited (and intensely uninviting) that he was on the point of turning his car around and heading back to Sibiu hospital, when a voice called out and he saw a figure running down from the house. As it came closer, the dark silhouette resolved into the form of a stunningly beautiful, fair-haired woman of about thirty, dressed (very bravely, both in terms of weather and modesty) in a long, sheer, black nightgown.
“Was that Andreea who called out?” asked the woman, while Anton got out of the car and tried to focus on the situation, vainly hoping that it might relieve his ill-timed sense of arousal. “Is she with you? And Nicoleta? Have you brought them back?”
“Err, yes. But…”
“There’s something wrong,” she surmised, gravely but not accusingly. “Very well. Help me to bring them to the house. I can treat them there, but don’t let us lose any more time.” That seemed to be sage advice, so Anton took Andreea in his arms and the lady took Nicoleta (with surprising ease for one so slight, not than Nicoleta herself was any great load), and they carried them both into a rotting ruin of a hallway. “Take her upstairs. Then take the first door on the left, and put her on the bed. If Michal’s asleep, try not to wake her,” ordered the lady, before taking Nicoleta into a back parlour and closing the door behind her. Anton, with somewhat less ease and grace than the lady, carried his own charge up the creaking stairs and found the room. It was a large bedchamber, full of worn antique furniture, discarded papers, loose sheets and clothing, the occasional soiled diaper, cigarette filters, bottles, and miscellaneous rubbish illuminated only by the gaunt, sickly rays of moonlight that streamed through cobwebbed window blinds. Altogether, the room had the general atmosphere of a mausoleum that had become a favourite haunt of some extremely messy teenagers. Anton deposited Andreea upon the bed – which presumably existed somewhere beneath a massive tangle of satin sheets, dented pillows, and miscellaneous lingerie – and set about trying to make her as comfortable as possible, when he was distracted by a sound from the corner: a soft, but totally disquieting whimper.
Against his better judgement, he approached its apparent location, and saw amidst the shadows and clutter a small barred enclosure. A figure was clutching the bars, and continuing to make soft, incoherent, plaintive noises that seemed to indicate some desire or distress. Small wonder, as the girl or young woman – as far as he could ascertain in the weak light – appeared to be almost completely naked, except for a diaper and a cute, but horribly incongruous pink bonnet. Just as Anton was on the point of making a break for the front door, the relative safety of his Trabant, and the nearest police station, he was stricken by a thought that seemed to come into his mind completely unbidden and apropos of nothing:
Where Mummy?
The girl in the “crib” was looking at him expectantly. Without quite knowing why, and feeling as foolish as he did frightened, he answered:
“Err… Mummy’s downstairs, I think. Lord have mercy… what is this place? What on earth happened to you?”
Miki go wee-wee in diaper.
Making a mental note not to ask any more questions, Anton turned away from the cage. He almost followed the baby-girl’s example and wet himself when he saw that the lady, in complete silence, had entered the room behind him, with a few articles of clothing draped over her arm. Smiling all-too-benevolently, she held one out for Anton to see: a lace-trimmed body in red satin.
“See this: isn’t it pretty?” she asked, not very helpfully.
“I… sure. Whatever,” he answered, very helplessly. “You’ll look great in it.”
“Thank you, darling, though that wasn’t quite what I had in mind. Oh, have you met my daughter Michal? Isn’t she the most adorable-?”
Miki go wee-wee in diaper!
“Oh, dear,” said the lady, lovingly, and proceeded to enter the “crib” and strip the mental patient (or whatever she was) of her diaper before Anton’s appalled eyes. At this point, only his conscience was preventing him from taking instant flight.
“I assume that girl… Nicoleta… I assume she’s alright… is she?”
“Of course. I extracted that filthy bullet, healed the wound, and gave her nourishment, though it will be some days before her strength is recovered.”
“And her?” he asked, gesturing to where Andreea lay, still unconscious.
“She will be well soon enough. I did nothing to cause any lasting harm.”
“You did… ? I’d better be off.” This comment instantly earned a light, airy, discouraging laugh from the lady.
“Having seen what you’ve seen, darling? Don’t be silly. Why, if those men who shot Nicoleta found out that it was you who saved her, they could use you to find us, and I would be a poor mother indeed if I let that happen, wouldn’t I, Miki?” she asked, gently nuzzling her fully-adult baby daughter, who cooed ecstatically.
“I won’t tell a soul, I swear to God,” he answered, knowing full well that it was a waste of air.
“I doubt their sort would give you much choice… unlike me. Would you like to know what your choice is?” she added, as Anton stood in silence, not quite morbidly curious enough to ask. “Well, I shall tell you anyway: since I owe you the life of my lover, Nicoleta, you may become as she is, but you must decide. Do you think you could cope with the transition, Anton? To have your memory and personality intact, but within the form… the lovely, lascivious form of a female vampire? A far cry, I grant you, from the priesthood for which you were destined, which is why I have another option for you: to become a playmate for my daughter, and, like her, to have your mind reduced to unthinking happiness and indestructible innocence. One child is a handful, but I could cheerfully cope with two, if that is your preferred… Oh really,” she sighed, as Anton held out the small pewter cross he wore on a neck-chain. “Let’s not be silly about this, Anton. I’m making you as fair an offer as I can.”
“Christ compels-” he began to say, and in spite of his immense doubt that his faith was up to the task, this seemed to make some small impact, as a look of wrath briefly twisted the lady’s beautiful face into a mask-like, fanged parody of itself and her eyes flashed red. Unfortunately, as this happened, he also felt a cold, clenching sensation all over, a rush of nausea, then total numbness, whereupon he collapsed, conscious but rapidly fading. The last words he heard were a stern injunction:
“We will resume this conversation tomorrow night, when I trust you will be in a more reasonable frame of mind.”
********
Sensation gradually returned. Hardness below… joints aching… head pounding… a voice somewhere, hard to make out… becoming clearer:
“Wake up! Please! Anton! Wake up now! We have to… Thank God!” He opened his eyes, and after a lot of blinking managed to resolve the blurriness into the form of Andreea, bent over him, and whispering urgently: “Can you move? You’ve got to get away from here. It’s morning, and the others are asleep. I kept myself awake. I knew I had to… but they can also wake up during the day, so we have to be quiet and quick about this. Can you move?”
“I think so,” he mumbled, climbing slowly and stiffly to his feet. To judge from the stone walls; the lack of windows; and the damp, still air, he seemed to have been transported to the cellar. “Not feeling great… I’ll survive, though.”
“You’ll have to hitch a lift, I’m afraid. She had me dump your car in the forest. I had to. Sorry. She’s irresistible when she really wants something, as I guess you’ve found out. But this is still your best chance to get away.”
“I hear you… and thanks for trying to warn me, last night. Sorry for all the trouble it’s cost you. Shall we go?”
“Anton… I can’t come with you,” she replied, patiently yet regretfully. “As much as I hate her, I need her, and I couldn’t leave my sisters with her, anyway.”
“After today? She’ll kill you.”
“I doubt it. She’ll punish me, no doubt, but not that. But it makes no odds, because I need her if I’m to stay alive, anyway.”
“But… will I ever see you again?” he asked, feeling compelled to do so yet incredibly foolish for having so done. Andreea blushed silently for a few seconds, stared at her feet, and barely muttered her reply:
“Well… I don’t know… Do you really want to?”
“I… would just rather this wasn’t goodbye forever… you know?”
“Yes… I know… and I do hope not. We’ll see… maybe… but you have to go, now! Come on!” She led him up the cellar stairs and back into the hallway, where she moved very gingerly, doing her utmost to avoid the weak rays of sunlight that filtered in through the small, dust-encrusted window panes. Just as he made for the front door, she planted a quick (and surprisingly cold) kiss upon his lips, then darted back down the cellar in a very embarrassed state. That stunned him for a few seconds, but his recovery was quick and decisive, and he was through the door and back down by the roadside within the minute. Nor did he stop there, but continued on foot, determined not to stop putting distance between himself and the house, until a passing truck driver eventually took pity on him and drove him back to Sibiu.
********
A check-up at the hospital discovered nothing worse than bumps, scrapes, some mild anaemia, and some considerable mental agitation, for which Anton was seriously advised to take a good deal of rest and consult a psychiatrist should matters not improve. He was secretly confident that, had he told the doctor about his experience (or delusion, as it would have been called, and who was he to say that it had not been just that?) then he would have been referred for mental care – and possibly strait-jacketed – without any further delay. He was, however, perfectly content to sleep on the matter, and that same evening took a goodish quantity of his prescribed sleeping tablets, washed down with cheap Tokay, to ensure that he would do just that.
He regretted this method in due course, as his dreams were most depressingly haunted. He heard the voice of the fair lady, repeating her “offer”, calling him to his inevitable fate in tones both loving and imperious. He lay paralysed and helpless, while her voice seemed to drift around the room, ever claiming him as her own, one way or another.
Things then became somewhat more pleasant… a lot more pleasant, in fact, as her disembodied presence faded, to be replaced with another, very much embodied presence: Andreea lay in the bed with him, and although she wept silently, she also held his unmoving form in her cold but soft arms and kissed him with her cold but passionate lips, on the shoulders, neck, mouth… then working her ways downwards, to such intimate places that he was hesitant to name even in his own head. As his arousal increased – which took no great length of time – he found the power of movement returning to him, but not of control: he tried to speak to her, but his lips refused to perform any action except returning her kisses. Never mind, he thought, content to go with the flow. He had, of course, heard of the medieval legends of succubi – the female demons who violated the chastity of monks and priests while they were unconscious and helpless, draining them of their repressed virility – but he was not given to superstition, nor was he such a puritan that he felt guilty for enjoying an unusually vivid dream.
Mind you, this one was most unusually vivid, given what little sexual experience he had had to date. They had got well beyond the kissing stage, and Andreea had gently eased him downwards, guiding his mouth to her eager vagina, and he kissed her, and licked her, tasting her cold, sweet moisture and bringing her to a breathless climax of which he would not have believed himself capable. The longer this went on, the more his desire increased, while everything else seemed to fade into the background. He felt dizzy, drunk, and as if he were becoming weaker, yet this did not seem to affect the performance of his auto-piloted body, which was finally fulfilling its almost unbearable arousal, making love to Andreea, who could barely enunciate two connected words between her soft moans of ecstasy. Nevertheless, she gave it her best shot:
“So sorry… oh God… Love you… So sorry, though… Had to… She knows… knows how we feel… Said unless… I bring you… Oh God… Said she’d take you… herself… make you like… like Michal… Lose you to her… forever… Oh my… This is better… This way… much better. So much better. It’s alright, Anton,” she said, soothingly, when he began to notice that his lovemaking, though enthusiastic, was having less effect. He still felt as aroused as ever, yet he suddenly felt conscious of becoming smaller down below, which made little sense (and though one did not expect strict logic from one’s dream, frustration of this kind was most tiresome). Very soon, it seemed that his manhood had shrunk to non-existence, leaving nothing but an eager emptiness. “It’s alright,” repeated Andreea, then gently turned him onto his back, and kissed him all the way down his smooth, sensitive body until she arrived between his thighs, where she began to stimulate him to the most incredible orgasm of his life with her tongue, as he had done to her. As he had done to her… he considered, as well as he could amidst waves of mind-numbing pleasure. The answer he was striving for came quite unexpectedly, as he reached his climax and cried aloud… and heard his voice, high-toned and seductively soft. The shock seemed to restore to him some degree of control, and he weakly lifted his head, looked down his body, and saw a slender, shapely, and unmistakeably female form, which Andreea continued to pleasure quite mercilessly. Slightly concerned at his imagination, but still finding the fantasy far from unpleasant, he lay back and allowed his dream lover to drive him (or her? Whatever…) into the most blissful exhaustion.
********
Strange what a night on sedatives, alcohol, and wild fantasies could achieve: the next thing Anton knew, he felt wonderfully fit and rested. He opened his eyes. The ceiling, though extremely cracked and mouldy, did not appear to be his cracked and mouldy ceiling. Confused, he sat up, and got a good look at the bed, and himself…
Black satin sheets, upon which lay a pale, pretty young woman, dressed only in a red satin, lace-trimmed body, which felt luxuriously soft and clingy. He knew that well enough: for she was him… her… Oh god. Must still be dreaming.
“Believe that, Antonia dear, if it makes you happier.”
The fair-haired lady had entered the room. There was a distinctly smug tone in her voice, and her face was not so loving as before, though it was decidedly hungrier. Approaching her slowly, while the new Antonia did her utmost to sink fearfully into the tangled mass of sheets, the lady slipped the sheer gown from her shoulders and let it fall to the floor. Beautiful, naked, and completely threatening, she continued her advance.
“Don’t fret, my little one,” she said, stretching out upon the bed. “You’ll see Andreea again, and I know she wants to see you, but since I’ve been put to quite some trouble over this affair, I think I deserve a little attention. Now, to complete your sentence from last night, my darling Antonia: Christ compels us to love our enemies, as I’m sure a nice little ex-seminarian-turned-vampire-slut will know full well. So then, my enemy…
Love me…”
End.
