“Who is ‘we’?” snapped Kate.
“The Order. The group my family has belonged to for centuries. Our struggle has been not just for the political survival of our country, but for the survival of its soul. Behind the Ceauşescus, behind the previous Communist regimes, behind Ion Antonescu, behind them all…have been the strigoi. The evil ones who walk like people but who are not. The Dark Advisors. The ones with power who drain our nation’s future away as surely as they have drained the lifeblood of its people.”
“Vampires,” said Kate. Her attention was so focused on Lucian at that moment that the periphery of her vision seemed to fade.
The young man did shrug this time. “That is the Western name. Most of the myth is yours…the sharp teeth, the opera cape… Bela Lugosi and Christopher Lee. Your nosferatu and vampires are stories to frighten children. Our strigoi are all too real.”
Kate found herself blinking rapidly. “Why should we believe you?”
“You don’t have to believe me, Kate. You were the one person who could discover the truth of the strigoi on your own. Go ahead…tell me what you and your fellow researchers found at America’s famous CDC. Tell me!” He did not wait for her reply. “You found a child’s immune system which can repair itself, reverse the effects of even Severe Combined Immune Deficiency…if it has blood.”
Kate tried to swallow but her throat was too constricted.
“Did you isolate the blood-absorption mechanism in the stomach lining?” asked Lucian. “I have. In the corpses of their dead and the bodies of their living…like Joshua. Were you able to track the immunoreconstruction process in T-cells and B-cells as the retrovirus revitalized the purine pathway? Do I really have to convince you that there are human beings here who rebuild their bodies using the DNA properties from other people’s blood? Or that they have amazing recuperative powers? Or that they could—theoretically—live for centuries?”
Kate licked her lips. “Why did you and Popescu take Joshua from the Tîrgovişte orphanage? Why did you lead me to him and pull strings to have me adopt him?”
Lucian sighed. His voice was tired. “You know the answer to that, Kate. You’ve seen our medical equipment in this country. We know that the strigoi disease is similar to the HIV virus. We know that the strigoi retrovirus has amazing properties. But serious gene-therapy analysis is beyond this country’s abilities. My God, Kate, you’ve seen our toilets…do you really think that we can construct and operate an effective Class-VI lab?”
“Who is ‘we’?” repeated O’Rourke. “What is the ‘Order’?”
Lucian looked at the priest towering over him. “The Order of the Dragon.”
Kate heard the sudden intake of her own breath. “I’ve read about that. Vlad the Impaler belonged to that—”
“He defiled it,” snapped Lucian, his voice angry for the first time that night. “Vlad Dracul and his bastard son pissed on everything the Order stood for…stands for.”
“And what does it stand for?” asked O’Rourke.
Lucian jumped to his feet so quickly that Kate thought he was attacking O’Rourke and her. Instead, the young man ripped the buttons off his shirt and exposed his chest.
The amulet there glinted gold: a dragon, talons extended, body curling in a circle, the circle of scales superimposed on a double cross. The amulet was very old, the words inscribed on the cross almost rubbed away. “Go ahead,” Lucian said to O’Rourke. “You can read Latin.”
“‘Oh, how merciful is God!’” read O’Rourke, leaning closer. “And ‘Just and Faithful.’” He stepped back. “Just and Faithful to whom?”
“To the Christ defiled by Vlad Dracul and his spawn,” said Lucian. He closed the front of his shirt, sealing it with the only remaining button. “To the people whom the Order was created to defend.”
“To defend by stealing babies,” said Kate, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
Lucian wheeled on her. “Yes! If the baby is the next Prince of the Voivoda Strigoi.”
Kate began laughing. She backed up until she felt the wooden chair behind her legs and dropped onto it, still laughing. She stopped just as the laughter began sounding like sobs. “You kidnapped Dracula’s baby so that I could adopt him…”
“Yes.” Lucian smoothed his hair back with both hands. His hands were shaking slightly. He nodded toward O’Rourke. “Ask him, Kate. He knows more than he has told you.”
She looked at the priest.
“The Franciscans here have heard rumors of the strigoi for centuries,” said O’Rourke. “And of the Order of the Dragon.”
“How do we know you’re not one of the strigoi?” said Kate, never looking away from the young medical student.
Lucian paused. “Did you see John Carpenter’s remake of Howard Hawks’ The Thing?”
“No.”
“Shit,” said Lucian. “I mean, that doesn’t matter. Anyway…they find out who’s human in the movie by testing the other guys’ blood. I’d be willing to give some if you two would.”
O’Rourke arched an eyebrow. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“You’re goddamn right I’m serious, priest. I can vouch for Kate, but between thee and me, I’m not too sure about thee.”
“What would a test prove?” said Kate. “If you don’t show signs of having the retrovirus, you could still be working for the…strigoi.”
Lucian nodded. “Sure. But you’d know I wasn’t one of them.”
Kate sighed and rubbed her face. “I think I may be going crazy.” She squinted up at Lucian. “What was all that with Amaddi tonight…some sort of elaborate scam?”
“No,” said Lucian. “My father and other members of the Order have known about Amaddi’s contacts with the strigoi Nomenclature for some time. But none of us have been able to approach him.”
“But you did business with him.”
“To gain his confidence.”
“So the name he gave us is real?” asked Kate. “The man is really strigoi?”
Lucian shrugged. “During the past few months, both the strigoi and the few surviving members of the Order have gone into hiding. If this person is strigoi, it explains several things.”
“I’m not saying that I believe any of this,” said Kate. “But if it’s true…and you say your parents are members of the Order of the Dragon…can they help us find this man?” Kate had only met Lucian’s parents once, but it had been a gracious afternoon of special wine and home-cooked treats in a lovely old apartment in east Bucharest. Lucian’s father, a writer and intellectual, had impressed her as someone of great wisdom and influence.
“The strigoi murdered my parents in August,” said Lucian. His voice was soft. “Most of the members of the Order here in Bucharest were tracked down and killed. Most simply disappeared. My parents’ bodies were left hanging in the apartment where my sister or I would find them. A warning. The strigoi are very sure of themselves these days.”
Kate fought down the urge to hug Lucian or touch his cheek. He may be lying. Every instinct she trusted said that he wasn’t.
“You talked about the hospital administrator… Popescu…in the past tense,” said O’Rourke.
Lucian nodded. “Dead. The police found his body, drained of blood, in the same week that Mr. Stancu—your Ministry man—ended up on the slab at the medical school.”
“Why would they kill Mr. Popescu?” asked Kate. She heard the answer in her own mind a second before Lucian spoke again.
“They tracked the child… Joshua…from the orphanage to Popescu’s hospital. I’m certain that the weasel told them everything he knew about you…and me…before they cut his throat.”
“And you’ve been in hiding since then?” said O’Rourke.
“I’ve been in hiding since the day Kate left,” said Lucian. “I urged my parents and friends to flee, but they were stubborn…brave.” Lucian turned away, but not before Kate saw his eyes fill with tears.
Maybe strigoi are good actors, she thought. She was exhausted. The l
ingering smell of the hot soup in the room made her a bit dizzy.
“Look,” said Lucian, spreading his large hands on his knees as he sat on the sofa arm. “I can’t show you any other credentials than this…” He tapped his chest. “…proving that I belong to the Order, or that the Order exists. But use common sense. Why would I have helped smuggle Joshua to the hospital and then helped you adopt him if I were strigoi?”
“We don’t even know if your strigoi exist,” said Kate.
Lucian nodded. “All right. But I think I can give you a demonstration that may prove it.”
Kate and O’Rourke waited.
“First we go to the medical school tonight and do a blood test on me to prove that I am not strigoi,” said Lucian. “The equipment is primitive, but a simple interactive test should show whether my blood exhibits the strigoi retrovirus reaction.”
“J-virus,” Kate said softly.
“What?”
“J-virus.” She looked up. “We named it after Joshua at CDC.”
“OK,” said Lucian. “We do a simple J-virus test, and then we stake out…if you’ll pardon the expression…the house of the man Amaddi named. We follow him wherever he goes.”
“Why?” said O’Rourke.
“Because if he’s strigoi,” said Lucian, “he’ll lead us to the others. My father was certain that Joshua had been the child chosen for the Investiture Ceremony…and it must be almost time for that to begin.”
“What is—” began Kate.
“I’ll explain when we drive over to the medical school labs,” said Lucian. He lifted the soup onto the burner and plugged the hot plate in again.
“What are you doing?” asked O’Rourke.
“If we’re going vampire hunting, I want something in my stomach,” said Lucian. He did not smile as he began stirring the soup.
The University Medical School was dark except for the south wing, where a guard sat dozing. Lucian led them through leaf-scattered gardens to a basement door. He fumbled with a heavy ring of keys and unlocked a portal that Kate thought would have looked more at home on a Gothic castle than as part of a medical school.
The basement corridor was narrow, crammed with battered chairs and cobwebbed desks, and it smelled of rat droppings. Lucian had brought a penlight. At one point he unlocked a side door which swung open with a creak.
Who’s waiting for us? thought Kate. She tried to catch O’Rourke’s eye but the priest seemed lost in thought.
The room appeared to be a storage room for even more ancient medical texts—Kate could smell the mildew and see the rat droppings here—except that a blanketed cot, a reading lamp, and a countertop hot plate had been added. Kate noticed recent American paperbacks stacked alongside medical texts.
“You’ve been living here?” asked O’Rourke.
Lucian nodded. “The strigoi ransacked my apartment, terrorized homes of friends of mine, and… I told you about my parents. But they only made a cursory check of the medical school.” He smiled. “If I were to return to classes…well, a dozen of my ‘friends’ and instructors would inform on me…but this wing of the building is empty at night.” He shut off the light and led them farther down the corridor, then up two darkened flights of stairs.
In the lab, Kate said, “I don’t understand. Are the strigoi in charge of the police and border guards? Are the police part of this?”
Lucian paused in arranging his microscope and equipment. “No,” he said. “But in this country…and others, I am told…everyone works for the strigoi at one time or another. They control those who control.”
Kate was finding it hard to believe that this area was the working section of a medical school laboratory: there was a clutter of pre-World War Il-type optic microscopes, cracked beakers, dusty test tubes, chipped tile counters, and battered wooden stools. The place looked like someone’s nightmare image of an American ghetto high school’s science lab years after it had been deserted. Only Lucian had said that this was the laboratory area for the medical school.
“So Ceauşescu was a strigoi?” asked O’Rourke.
Lucian shook his head. “Ceauşescu…both of the Ceauşescus…were instruments of the strigoi. They took orders from the leader of the Voivode Strigoi family.”
“The Dark Advisor,” said O’Rourke.
Lucian glanced up sharply. “Where did you hear that term?”
“So there was a Dark Advisor?”
“Oh, yes,” said Lucian. He moved an antique autoclave onto the counter and plugged it in. “Kate, would you find some lancets?”
Kate glanced around, hunting for sterile-pacs, but Lucian said, “No, there in the sink.”
A chipped enamel bedpan held several steel lancets. She shook her head and handed the pan to Lucian. He set the pan in the autoclave and it began to hum.
“This test isn’t important,” she said. “It proves nothing.”
“I think it does,” said Lucian. He pulled down blackout shades on the windows and turned on a light over the microscope bench. “Besides, I have something else to show you.” Lucian crouched in front of a small refrigerator and removed a small vial. “Standard whole blood,” he said. He used an eyedropper to prepare three slides with the whole blood. Then he removed the lancets from the autoclave and brought alcohol and swabs out from under the counter. “Who’s first?”
“What are we supposed to see here?” said O’Rourke. “Little vampire platelets leaping on our blood cells?”
Lucian turned to Kate. “Do you want to explain?”
“When Chandra…when the experts at our CDC had isolated the J-virus,” she said, “it became easy in retrospect to notice the effect on whole-blood and immunodeficient precultured samples. The J-virus…it’s really a retrovirus…binds gp120 glycoprotein to CD4 receptors in T-helper lymphocytes—”
“Whoa, whoa,” said O’Rourke, “You mean you can just look at blood samples in a microscope and tell if they’re strigoi?”
Kate paused and looked at Lucian. “It’s not quite that simple. We can’t just look in the eyepiece, but…yes, you can tell a difference when the J-retrovirus interacts with alien blood cells.”
Lucian set the first slide in place. “Did you discover the amazing ratio of infected cells?” He was talking to Kate.
“We placed it at almost ninety-nine percent,” she said.
“What does that mean?” asked O’Rourke.
Kate explained. “The HIV retrovirus goes after about one CD4 cell in a hundred thousand. That’s a lot when you realize how many billions of cells we have. But the J-virus…well, it’s greedy. It tries to infect all of the alien blood cells it encounters.”
O’Rourke took a step away from the counter. His face looked very pale above his dark suit and Roman collar. “But it can’t be that contagious…we’d all be vampires…strigoi…if it worked like that.”
Kate made herself smile. “No, it’s not contagious at all, as far as we can tell. It’s generated in the host’s body by a complex recessive-recessive gene trait that we don’t understand. It’s also co-dependent upon the SCID-type immune deficiency disease that comes as part of the package.”
“Which means?” said O’Rourke.
Lucian answered without lifting his face from the microscope. “Which means that you have to be dying of a rare blood disease in order to gain virtual immortality from the same disease. It’s not catching.” He looked up. “Although we might all wish that it were. Who goes first?”
Kate made a “you first” gesture.
“Awesome, dude,” said Lucian in his mock mutant turtle dialect. He lifted a lancet, pricked his finger, squeezed enough blood free so that he could transfer a smear to the prepared slide, and handed the lancet pan to Kate. “You want to do the honors with our Father here?”
Kate swabbed O’Rourke’s middle finger, drew blood, prepared his slide, and did the same for herself. “I still say that this proves nothing,” she said.
Lucian spent several minutes treating the samples while Ka
te watched. “Well, at least it proves that we can’t see any little vampire platelets in my sample,” he said at last, standing back from the microscope. Kate bent over and peered through.
O’Rourke waved away his turn. “I could never see anything but my own eyelashes,” he said. “What’s all the stuff you’re doing to it?”
Kate’s sample went onto the slide tray next. “Preparing it for an assay to check reverse transcriptase,” said Kate.
O’Rourke sounded disappointed. “So we couldn’t see little vampire platelets even if we tried?”
“Sorry, dude,” said Lucian and brought out a centrifuge that Kate thought looked as if it had been designed in the Middle Ages. “But the assay shouldn’t take too long.” He held up a clean vial. “Now I want to take one more sample.”
Kate had the impulse to glance over her shoulder. She wondered what she would do if someone were standing in the shadows there. “From whom?” she said.
“Exactly,” said Lucian. He doused the light and led them by penlight down the corridor, back into the basement, and then down another flight of stairs into an even deeper basement.
Kate smelled it first. “The morgue,” she whispered to O’Rourke.
Lucian stopped at the last set of swinging doors. “It’s OK. This is the old morgue. The students and teachers use the newer, smaller one in the west wing. But this is where the cadavers are stored before the students get them. And sometimes the city uses it as an overflow depot for unclaimed bodies.”
“Mr. Stancu from the Ministry?” said Kate.
“Yeah, this is where I saw him. But my letter to you wasn’t totally candid, Kate. I’d been tipped by a friend in the Order that Stancu had been murdered. Just like Popescu.”
“Can we meet this friend of yours?” said O’Rourke.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“He was murdered the same week they killed my parents,” said Lucian. “They cut his head off.” He opened the doors and the three of them went into the chilly darkness. Bare steel tables with ceramic basins and pedestals loomed in the darkness. They were not clean.