THE HOUSE IN CLEVELAND STREET

It is like the warm days, is it not?' von Klatka said, his wolves straining their leashes. 'When we fought the Turk?'

Kostaki remembered his wars. When Prince Dracula, genius of strategy, withdrew across the Danube to redouble an assault, he left a good many  -  Kostaki included  -  to be cut to tatters by the Sultan's curved scimitars. During that last melee, something un-dead tore out his throat and drank his blood, bleeding from its own wounds into his mouth. He awoke new-born under a pile of Wallachian dead. Having learned little in several lifetimes, Kostaki again followed the standard of the Impaler.

'That was good fighting, my friend,' von Klatka continued, eyes alive.

They had come to Osnaburgh Street with a wagonload of ten-foot stakes. There was enough lumber to build an ark. Mackenzie of the Yard awaited them with his uniformed constables. The warm policeman stamped his feet against a cold Kostaki hadn't felt in centuries. Impatient steam leaked from his nose and mouth.

'Englishman, hail,' Kostaki said, clapping a salute against his fez.

'Scotsman, if you please,' said the Inspector.

'I seek your pardon.' A Moldavian survivor of the Imperial Ottoman chaos that was now Austria-Hungary, Kostaki understood the importance of distinctions between tiny countries.

A Captain in the Carpathian Guard, Kostaki was something between liaison officer and overseer. When directed so to do by the Palace, he took an interest in police matters. The Queen and her Prince Consort were much concerned with law and order. Only last week, Kostaki had trudged around Whitechapel, looking for the spoor of the crude villain they called Silver Knife. Now he was assisting with a raid on an infamous address.

They lined up either side of the wagon: Mackenzie's men, mostly new-borns, and a detachment of the Carpathian Guard. Tonight they would demonstrate that the posted edicts of Prince Dracula were not just time-wasting whims on parchment.

As Mackenzie shook hands with him, Kostaki refrained from exerting the iron nosferatu grip.

'We have plainclothes men blocking the escape routes,' the Inspector explained, 'so the house is completely bottled up. We go in through the front door and search from top to bottom, assembling the prisoners in the street. I have the warrants with me.'

Kostaki nodded agreement. 'It is a good plan, Scotsman.'

Mackenzie, like so many in this dreary land, was without humour. Unsmiling, he continued, 'I doubt if we'll meet much resistance. These invert fellows don't have the stomach for a scrap. Your English nancy-boy isn't best known for his backbone.'

Von Klatka spat blood into the gutter and snorted, 'Degenerate filth.' His wolves, Berserker and Albert, were eager to get their jaws around meat.

'Indeed,' agreed the policeman. 'Let's get it over with, shall we?'

They advanced on foot, the wagon following. What other traffic there was made way for them. As they passed, people tried to clear the street. Kostaki was proud of such a reaction. The reputation of the Carpathian Guard went before them.

Only a few years ago, he was no more than an un-dead gypsy, wandering Europe in hundred-year cycles, battening on to prey where he could find it, returning every generation to his castle to find it more neglected, forever posing as an increasingly remote descendant. Now he could walk unmolested down a London thoroughfare and not have to conceal what he was. Thanks to Prince Dracula, his red thirst was regularly slaked.

They marched into Cleveland Street and Mackenzie checked the house numbers. They were looking for Number 19. It was not much distinguished from its neighbours, respectable town-houses and the offices of ancient firms of solicitors. This was a well-lit, clean district, not like the East End. Kostaki mused briefly about the twisted wire contraptions fitted to chimneys in the fringes of his field of vision, but instantly dismissed the matter.

With a rasp, Von Klatka slid his sword from its scabbard. Kostaki's comrade was a tireless warrior, ever eager for battle. It was a wonder he had lasted through the centuries since his warmth. Mackenzie stood aside and let Kostaki march up to the front door. He raised a gauntleted hand and took hold of the knocker, which came off in his grip. That fool corporal, Gorcha, sniggered under his moustaches and Kostaki tossed the fragile bauble into the gutter. Mackenzie held his breath, the steam around him dissipating. Kostaki looked to him for approval: the policeman knew these people, this city, and deserved thus to be treated with respect. On the inspector's nod, Kostaki made a mighty fist, the blood-strength growing. His hand strained the seams of his reinforced glove.

He delivered a blow to the unpainted spot where the knocker had been, smashing in the door. He pushed through the splintered fragments that remained and shouldered his way into the foyer. Glancing about, he instantly took in everything. The dwarfish young man in footman's livery was no threat, but the shave-pated new-born in shirt-sleeves would fight. Constables and Guardsmen charged in after him and he was swept forwards toward the staircase.

The new-born put up his fists, but von Klatka set Berserker and Albert on him. The wolves latched on to his shins, and, as he yelled, von Klatka swiped with his sword. The vampire's head came free, blinking furiously, and landed upside-down at the feet of the footman. Mackenzie opened his mouth to rebuke von Klatka, who had grasped the stumbling headless body and shoved his face into the geyser of blood as if at a public fountain. Kostaki gestured at the policeman. This was no time for divisions.

'Good Lord,' said a warm constable, with disgust.

Von Klatka howled triumph and tossed the draining corpse away. He wiped blood out of his eyes. His wolves joined the noise.

'Rancid is blood of new-borns,' he said.

Kostaki laid a heavy hand on the shoulder of the footman. His spine was twisted and he had a small boy's face.

'You,' Kostaki said, 'your name is what?'

'Or-Or-Orlando,' said the creature, who, now Kostaki was close, turned out to be wearing powder and rouge.

'Orlando, guide us well.'

He spluttered, 'yes, masterful sir.'

'Clever boy.'

Mackenzie held out a document. 'I have a warrant entitling us to search these premises, on the suspicion that indecent and unnatural acts are being condoned for profit by the proprietor, one... um,' he consulted the paper, 'Charles Hammond.'

'Mr Hammond is in France, your worship,' Orlando said. He was dry-washing his hands, and experimenting with smiles of insinuation. Kostaki could taste the fear boiling off him.

Gorcha, roaring like a bear, charged into the kitchens, laying about him with a sword. There was a sound of breaking crockery and some feeble whimpering.

'What is all this rot?' said someone from the landing above.

Kostaki looked up, and saw a thin, elegant new-born with plastered-down hair and immaculate evening dress. He had with him a boy in a stained nightshirt.

'Milord,' said Orlando. 'These gentlemen...'

The new-born ignored the footman and made an announcement. 'I am Bachelor Equerry to His Highness, Prince Albert Victor Christian Edward, Heir Presumptive to the Throne. If this unwarranted intrusion is not withdrawn, the consequences for you will be vastly unpleasant.'

'Tell him warrant we have,' von Klatka said.

'My Lord, I am Kostaki of the Carpathian Guard, the private regiment of His Highness, Vlad Dracula, known as Tepes, the Impaler, Prince Consort to Queen Victoria of these isles.'

The Lord goggled at Kostaki, patently appalled. These English were always so shocked to be found out. They thought position was protection. Kostaki called Gorcha away from the kitchen-maids, and sent him up the stairs to haul down the Bachelor Equerry and his rent-boy.

'Search the place,' Mackenzie ordered. His constables snapped to, running up the stairs, barging into all the rooms. By now the house was an uproar of screams and protests. The wolves were off somewhere, doing mischief.

Two naked boys, faces painted gold, ran out from a back room, laurels flying from their brows. Von Klatka opened his arms wide, and swept them up, catching both at once. They struggled like fish and von Klatka laughed at the absurdity.

'Pretty twins,' he said. 'Twins I have.'

Kostaki left the foyer to assess the work in the street. Cobblestones had been torn up and stake-holes were being rapidly dug. Several of the poles were already erect, ready to receive the offenders. A small crowd had gathered on the other side of the street, gossiping uselessly among themselves. He growled, and they dispersed quickly.

'Thirsty work,' said one of the new-born labourers, settling a stake into a hole.

The catch were already being collected outside the house. Von Klatka was in charge, slapping exposed rumps with the flat of his blade, jeering at the inverts. An upstairs window opened and a fat man tried to throw himself out, naked rolls of flesh bouncing. He was pulled back inside.

'You,' shouted the Bachelor Equerry, pointing at him. 'You shall suffer for this outrage.'

Von Klatka slashed from behind at the Bachelor Equerry's legs, catching him just above the knees. The silvered blade bit deep, cracking bones. The new-born folded up into an attitude of prayer; as the pain hit, he tried to shape-shift. His face pushed out into a hairless snout; his ears slipped back, flaring wolfishly. His shirt-front expanded, studs popping, as his ribs reconfigured. His arms became clawed forelegs, but his wounded knees prevented the shift from carrying much below his waist. On his dog-shaped head, slick hair stretched so the pink scalp showed. The Bachelor Equerry opened his throat and howled, widely-spaced teeth loose.

'Von Klatka, impale him.'

Von Klatka and Gorcha took a foreleg each and hoisted the Bachelor Equerry up on to their shoulders, his legs dangling, trousers soaked with blood. He was reverting to his original shape. The Carpathians settled His Lordship on the first point and he sank belly-first on to it. His clothes ripped as he was penetrated, and a gush of hot blood and shit squirted down the wooden pole as his weight speared him. The stake, insufficiently banked, tilted and nearly fell. Gorcha and von Klatka held the stake steady, a workman piling cobbles into the hole, until it could stand by itself.

They were showing mercy. If the stake-end were rounded rather than sharpened, death could take up to a week, the victim's organs displaced rather than punctured. The Bachelor Equerry would die as soon as the point breached his heart.

Kostaki looked about. Mackenzie was leaning against a wall, regurgitating his last meal. He had done the same long ago, when he first saw Prince Dracula deal with his enemies in the fashion that earned him his nickname.

The assembled inverts saw what was happening to the Bachelor Equerry, and panicked. They had to be penned with swords. Several boys escaped, darting under Carpathian arms. Kostaki did not mind if a few scattered to the winds. The purpose of this raid was to catch the patrons of Number 19, Cleveland Street, not the unfortunates pressed into service there. One man, wearing the vestiges of canonical vestments, was on his knees praying loudly, a Christian martyr. A face-painted youth stood haughty with folded arms, gilded nakedness like imperial robes, outstaring his persecutors.

'Good grief,' said a well-dressed passerby to his new-born wife, 'that man's a member of my club.'

Mackenzie was hysterical now, slapping the inverts, excoriating them in Scots. A bewhiskered man in the red tunic of some high-ranking officer pressed a pistol into Mackenzie's hand and begged to be decently shot as was his right. The policeman emptied the gun into the air and threw it away, spitting after it.

A knot of three new-born youths huddled together, shivering in ladies' night-dresses, hissing through dainty fangs. Their faces were smooth, their bodies womanish. Kostaki was reminded of Prince Dracula's concubines.

Mackenzie got himself under control and started properly to supervise his men. He presented the captives with death warrants; already filled out, but with blanks for their names. This business had to be done legally.

'Masterful sir,' wheedled a voice. It was Orlando. 'Sir, if I might make so bold as to mention, there is one who has escaped your justice. An important personage is to be found in a secret inner chamber, taking his gross pleasure with two poor lads stolen off the streets.'

Kostaki looked down on the hunched footman. Under his powder, his skin was pock-marked with disease.

'If accommodation were to be made, sir, I might see a way to assisting you, sir, in the execution of your, if I might say, sacred duty to his worshipful highness the Prince Consort, God bless him and keep him in his palace, sir.'

The warm young man's throat swelled with blood. Kostaki had not dealt with his own needs tonight. He grabbed Orlando by the neck and exerted pressure with his thumb.

'Out with it, worm!'

He had to relax his grip to allow the little man to speak.

'Behind the stairs, masterful sir, there's a secret door. And I'm the only one as knows the secret.'

Kostaki let him go and pushed him across the road.

'Sir, the one I speak of is a powerful individual, masterful sir, and I doubt if even you could subdue him by yourself.'

Kostaki detached Gorcha and a burly new-born police sergeant from the impaling party. The next of the inverts were being lifted up to their stakes. The dying yells must be audible throughout the city. In Buckingham Palace, Prince Dracula would be raising a goblet of virgin wine to the enforcement of his edict.

Orlando scurried ratlike in front of them and sought out his secret door. Kostaki recognised his type: there were always those among the warm eager to serve the un-dead, just as there had been Wallachs who served the Turk.

'Remember, sir, I offered up voluntary-like the secret.'

Orlando tripped a catch and a section of wall-panel sprang out. The copper-smell of blood wafted from within, along with perfume and incense. Kostaki was first through the door. The room he entered was decorated as a bower; trees were painted on the walls, crepe foliage hung from the ceiling, dry leaves were scattered all around. The remains of a basket of fruit were squashed into the japanwood floor. Curled up by the door was a dead youth, ragged gashes all over his nude body, face a perfect blue. He might turn, but Kostaki thought him too broken to be much use as a vampire.

'Here, masterful sir, behold the rutting beast, indulging his disgusting pleasures!'

In the middle of the room, surrounded by oriental cushions, churned a reptile form composed of two bodies. Underneath a writhing vampire was a squealing youth, blood slicking his back. The important personage was using the boy as a man uses a woman, simultaneously swallowing great gushing draughts from open veins. It was Count Vardalek, his back twice its normal length. Snake-teeth sprouted from the lower half of his face. His chin and lips were studded, fangs erupting through the flesh. His green-yellow eyes floated, pupils shrunk to pin-points.

The Count looked up and spat venom.

'You see, sir,' Orlando said, grinning, 'a very important personage indeed, masterful sir.'

'Kostaki,' Vardalek said, 'what does this damned interruption mean?'

He was still moving sinuously, his body bearing upon the boy's like a serpent's coils. His sides were lightly scaled, and the scales caught the light, rainbow patterns reflecting.

'Captain Kostaki,' said Gorcha, standing by with his heavy musket, 'what should be done?'

'Get out you fools,' Vardalek shouted.

Kostaki made a decision. 'There can be no exceptions.'

Vardalek gasped and gaped. He rose from his exhausted boy, and pulled a quilted robe about himself, spine settling as he dwindled to his usual height. His face rapidly resumed its human look. With a delicate touch, he reset his golden peruke on his sweat-slick skull.

'Kostaki, we are both...'

Kostaki turned away from his comrade, ordering, 'Bring him outside with the others.'

Out on the street, von Klatka's eyes bulged to see the Count being led to the stake.

Kostaki looked up at the sky. In his mountain homelands, he was used to the bright points of the stars. Here, gaslight, fog and thick rainclouds robbed him of the night's thousand eyes.

Gorcha and the Sergeant had to hold Vardalek steady. Kostaki and von Klatka stood close to the prisoner. He was smiling, but his eyes were afraid. He was not stupid. His long life was over. There would be no more gazelle-like lads for Count Vardalek.

'We have to do this thing,' Kostaki explained. 'Vardalek, you know Prince Dracula. If you were spared, we'd be impaled.'

'Comrades, this is absurd.'

Von Klatka was shifting from foot to foot like a warm fool. He wanted to intervene but he knew Kostaki was right. The Prince was proud to be known as harsh but just. His own regiment must be more rigid in its obedience to his rule than anyone else.

'What are a few boys, more or less?' Vardalek said.

'Sir, masterful sir...'

Kostaki raised a hand. A Guardsman took hold of Orlando and quieted him.

'I regret this deeply,' he explained.

Vardalek shrugged, endeavouring to retain his dignity. Kostaki had known the vampire since the 1600s. He had never exactly liked the arrogant Hungarian, but respected him as brave and wilful. Vardalek's preference for boys did not strike him as anything to fuss about, but Prince Dracula had strange prejudices.

'One thing you must know,' the Count said. 'That elder bitch the other night, the Dieudonne creature: my business with her is not finished. I have taken steps to even things.'

'That is to be expected.'

'I have commissioned her destruction.'

Kostaki nodded. Honour required as much.

'Masterful sir,' whined Orlando, 'now I have assisted the Prince Consort's justice, might I...'

'Your stake will be sharp, Vardalek,' he promised. 'And your heart will be set over its point. The end will be quick.'

'I thank you, Captain Kostaki.'

'On a stake set low so you can look down upon him, I shall have impaled the warm worm who betrayed you.'

'Masterful sir,' Orlando screeched, mouth breaking free of the Guardsman's hand, 'please, I, sir, I...'

Kostaki turned to the human and looked loathing at him. Orlando's face was a wet twist of fear.

'And the stake which spits his guts shall be blunted.'

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