Dracula the Undead: A Chilling Sequel to Dracula by Freda Warrington

Author:Freda Warrington
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloodwine Books
Published: 2016-08-09T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

JONATHAN HARKER’S JOURNAL (Continued)

It took me half an hour to reach the churchyard on foot. I had brought a lantern, for it was full dark. I wandered down long avenues of tombstones and statues that towered over me and seemed to watch me with cold smiling eyes, whispering in Elena’s soft voice, Come to us, dwell with us in sweet death... I called Van Helsing’s name, but my voice was hoarse.

My head spun with terror and exhaustion. I was lost and could not find my way; either to the tomb I sought, or to the gate. In all directions, crosses and angels loomed over me, speckled with lichen, as if even they would be consumed by nature and sink into the ground. My trouser legs grew wet from the long grass. I seemed to wade through a sea of grass and herbs and dying wild flowers, while all around me bodies were rising up from the graves, their eye sockets black and hollow in their skulls, their voices moaning, “Come to us, come to us...”

Long stems wound around my ankles and I lost my balance, falling heavily against a gravestone. I dropped the lantern but it stayed lit; I scrabbled, with my good hand, to right it. As I did so, from the corner of my eye I saw a shadow rising over me. My head jerked round; there was a man leaning over me! I could see nothing of him but a shock of wild grey hair. Yet as he leaned down towards me, the lamplight caught the side of his face as a starkly pallid plane and I seemed to know him. I could not call to mind who he was – only that he was familiar. It was not Dracula. But the mouth opened, and I saw a red tongue churning over thick, sharp white teeth that glistened horribly and I heard the hissing breath, and I knew that this was another vampire.

I was out of my mind by now. By instinct I flung my left arm behind me to grip the gravestone – and, at that, the apparition stopped and drew back. I heard the hiss of indrawn breath through the ghastly teeth. It rose over me, its face showing a kind of anxiety before it was lost in shadow again, and then it turned and vanished into the gloom.

I am certain that this was no hallucination. All the rest may have been – but not this.

As I raised myself up, I saw that the gravestone that I clutched had the shape of a cross. A stone angel beside it seemed to have Mina’s form; I felt that she had protected me, a guardian angel, but outside our circle of light the graves were bursting open, earth turning over in new-ploughed wounds, the fresh flowers withering, birds falling from the sky like hail.

I gave a long, involuntary cry of despair; I heard voices; three more figures reared over me, and I tried to scramble back against the grave, my heels skidding on the grass.

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