"Elrod, P N - Quincy Morris, Vampire e-txt" - читать интересную книгу автора (Elrod P N)

"Such as?"

"You will learn without doubt that your soul is still your own . . . and His," he added, with a quirk of his heavy brows toward the sky. "You will find the truth of it when next you walk into a church, which is something you are still very much able to do."

Well, time alone would tell on that one, if Dracula allowed me to test it.

"With some small changes you are free to live as before, but as you choose, for good or ill, as all things will be judged in the end. For me, it is not so simple."

"What do you mean?"

"I can do that which you cannot. The wolf, the bat, the curling mist are natural forms to me, but not for you. I prefer the shadows, but may walk in the sun if necessary; you would die from it and must sleep in darkness while it rules the sky. You can influence people and to some extent certain animals to your will, which makes the hunting easier, but can no more command the weather now than you could as a human, but that is of no matter. I've read in your heart and by your manner that you are a man who would refuse to pay the price for such powers. Long ago I paid and still do. My body bears the signs of that payment, marking me as different from other men. And as for my soul . . . I think you would be more comfortable to remain ignorant of such fearful things."

From the look that crossed his face I silently agreed with him. "And what of Lucy? Am I supposed to approve of what you did to her?"

"The matter of your approval is of no import to me. I did nothing with her that was not a part of my nature, a part of any man's nature. She was beautiful and willingЧno, do not gainsay me for you were not there and never knew her true heart. I loved her in the only way left to me."

"Until she died."

"We all die, but I will allow that her time had not yet come."

"You kept taking her blood. I watched her weaken horribly with each passing day. You were killing her!"

"Her body was merely adjusting to what we shared. Another few nights and she would have gradually regained her strength with no harm done."

"I find that hard to believe."

He made a curt waving gesture, indication that my believing him on this was also of no import. "If you wish to fix a blame for her death, then you need look no farther than her attending physicians. Had they left her alone she would still be walking in the sun. 'Twas their ignorance that finished her, not my love. Doctors, bah!" His ruddy lips curled with contempt.

"And what about my own tainted blood going into herЧ?"

"I do not know. The seeds of becoming Un-Dead were within you, but you were not Un-Dead then. It may have helped or made no difference to her health or worsened things. That is beyond my knowledge. I have heard of such transfusion operations, though, and they fail more often than succeed. Some patients are not able to tolerate anything put into their veins and die from it. No one knows why as yet. In my own heart I believe that is what really happened to her."

And were that to be true, then by trying to help her Jack Seward and Van Helsing had . . .

"The poor, sweet child never had a chance," Dracula said heavily.

A painful thing it was to hear him refer to her in that manner, for I had loved her myself as truly as a man could. I could not imagine a dark creature such as he being able to love anyone. It angered and sickened me to think of her giving herself to the likes of him, of his even touching her. He must have hypnotized or forced her, though it may have been as it had with me and Nora, with her surrendering from honest innocence, unaware of the consequences. Were that the case, then I certainly had not known Lucy's true heart. With difficulty, I pushed all my emotions to one side for later reflection. Right now I needed still more information.

"So my blood might not have changed her?"

"It is barely possible, of course. I rather think it more likely that to create your own offspring you must first take blood from your lover, then return it, just as Nora did with you."

"As you've done to Mrs. Harker."

His face went hard.

"What is to happen to her?" I demanded.

"Nothing. The miracle she prayed for"Чhe touched the mark on his forehead, for it nearly mirrored the one she'd carriedЧ"came to pass. Seward and Van Helsing will not bother her now. That alone should suffice to guarantee her a long and fruitful life."