V. Preventative Quarantine Measures

A ghastly wind blows in and carries the fog away with it, leaving Penelope and Dorian standing where the road ends. The bright orange sunset breaks through, casting the village gate’s shadow over them. Lit torches are fixed to the front of each home. Within these houses, in the cracks between planks hastily nailed to windows and barring doors shut, the ravenous horde waits, trapped.

Pry as the beasts may, their attempts to tear down their prisons are doomed to failure. These are captive animals, feeble reflections off the horrors my siblings encountered before. Queer ornaments hang upon each door, silhouetted by the torchlight and indiscernible from their distance.

“Since when are vampires locked inside houses,” Dorian whispers.

“And why?” Penelope asks. “Who benefits from keeping them alive?”

Though the town has been reduced to gangs of ravenous monstrosities, even if they were to escape, widespread outbreak would never occur. The likelihood that any of these abominations would reach another human is zero. Any survivors who turned would starve just as their eviscerators would. The Inhuman can not feed upon the inhuman.

A dirt road divides the village in two, with houses facing one another on each side. Eight homes, mostly farmsteads and practical trades. To the uninitiated it would appear to be a circle, but those with eyes to see would recognize the heptogram, with an ominous mansion built in the center. A towering masterwork of carpentry and craft amidst the stone, wood, and nettle of these peasant hovels.

The village of Rukriz, officially, does not exist. Small, remote, and short-lived, born of wandering gypsies and those who purposefully wandered to be forgotten. Wars came and went, Kings and Crowns exchanged heads, but the land always seem to bear some clan or four of people upon it.

However, over the years, that number has steadily dwindled.

When Rukriz was officially founded, an old man with a dying wish sought refuge from a war he had lost. A war that I had won. But it was here, in a place without a name until it had already begun to vanish, that he committed the most profane ritual ever written.

Glory to the Nothingess that Shines, let us pray my protections do not fail.

A cobblestone base and a wrap around porch extend out from the entrance to the mansion and a wide set of stairs lead down to where foot and cart worn dirt paths intersect. There is a well there, with a stone base. A bucket tied to the post justs out from one side. Even in this dim torchlight my sister can see that the bucket, and the well, are bone dry.

There is a man standing before it, wearing a pinstripe suit, violet lined black cape, and a one-eyed pyramid for a hat. An old man with sunken hollow eyes that has seen the face of God, the sins of man, and come back to Earth to wallow in his own.

To some, he is a heretic, the wickedest man in the world, in league with the forces of the Devil to bring the antichrist to life. To others his is a charlatan, a pimp, an embarrassment who squandered his life pursuing vain fantasies. To me he was a teacher, a mentor, until he revealed himself to be a weak and broken pervert enslaved by his own trauma – the pettiest of human failings.

“Isn’t that Aleister Crowley?” Dorian asks.

“Of course,” Penelope grumbles. “I was wondering when he would show up.”

When they were in the Amazon investigating the whereabouts of a fabled saurian frightening local tribes, it was Aleister Crowley who led my sister to evidence that a contract developer was using a bulldozer disguised as the aboriginal cryptid to scare away the natives. And it was Crowley who leapt out from behind a lone acacia tree with a smoke grenade when they were ambushed by the Nandi Hyena of North Kenya –the sole surviving prehistoric twelve-foot-tall marsupial and not the international wild game hunter turned outspoken British nationalist Ser Hersham A. Grenwick in a costume.

Crowley turns to my brother and sister, says nothing – then, with a flourish of his hand, he whips his cloak in the air and runs away into the forest.

“Can’t imagine why people don’t trust him,” Dorian quips.

“Doctor Arthwitte says he’s evil,” Penelope says, unsure whether she agrees. “We should find the others before night falls.”

The mansion is the only home without signs of vampires inside. The windows may be nailed shut and boarded over, but a warm, inviting light from oil lamps within manages to leak through. A glistening film sheen covers the mansion and outlines large, shadowy masses hanging from the bannisters.

“Imagine it,” Penelope says with a shudder. “Life without electricity.”

“Who would want to live like that?”

The low, grumbling snarl of the Nosferatu grow as they near the manor. She listens to the vampire’s low moans, their wails of hunger. It is like a sick house, where the infirmed paw at their soiled sheets for their nurse, their clenched teeth muffling howls of anguish. By Penelope’s count, each home contains two to three pairs of red eyes, even if these houses once held more than twice that amount.

What happened, she wonders, to the rest of the village?

As they approach the well, Dorian notices that one of the houses is missing. Burned to nothing but blackened spikes of wood protruding from a pile of ashes, inhuman corpses skewered upon them like pikes.

“What do you think happened there?”

“Probably what happens when one of them does break out.”

A swift kick sends the mansion door swinging open. It slams against the wall as a man with greying blonde hair and narrow, sunken eyes under metal spectacles storms out. He is wearing a white coat and wielding a German military issue rifle, the Kar 98AZ, which he readies and aims.

“Don’t shoot,” Dorian says.

“We’re the ones you sent for,” Penelope adds, their arms both in the air.

The sound of splintering wood and tearing metal precedes a loud thud behind them. A door hits the ground, signaling that the home opposite the burned wreckage has been breached. Two Nosferatus feebly stumble out of the house. One loses balance and falls forward then crawls towards them like a starving animal. The other growls and makes an awkward dash for the children.

With hawk like precision the man swings his rifle barrel to the left and fires. Dorian and Penelope turn around as the Noseferatu falls face down on the dirt, a clean shot between its eyes. A click of the bolt and another fired round from the rifle puts the second down with the same ease.

“Get inside. We’re fortified against them in the mansion.”

“You mean like you fortified the houses?” Dorian asks.

He points to the two beams outlining the porch entrance, both smeared with oil that flickers orange and red. A wreath of sage and wheat bound into rope is nailed to each one. Fat bulbs of reeking garlic hang like half rotted fruit from the tangled brush, and encircled within is a cluster of greasy onions, cracked open to let their aroma fill the night air.

They ascend the wooden steps to a chorus of whining, aged wood. Old white sheets cover mounds of junk pushed against the mansions’ outer wall. Broken and delapidated furniture litter the porch floor, and the seat of a wooden chair with half the back rest lies at Dorian’s feet, which he gently kicks out of his way.

“We had to… salvage most of our supplies,” the man says, noticing that the children have stopped.

“Supplies?” Dorian asks.

“Firewood,” Penelope says. She heaves the lantern up onto a table by the wall and cracks her knuckles. “I would guess it was making stakes to kill the vampires, but that doesn’t seem to be what’s going on here.”

“Very astute,” the man says, noticeably impressed. “You’re rather perceptive for a little girl.”

“I’m a research assistant,” Penelope says, maintaining perfect eye contact with him. She remembers the villager they encountered on the roadside, the man who warned him that all is not as it seems in Rukriz. He did not die of a vampire bite or a stake to the heart. He was shot, most likely with a rifle, perhaps the one this man is holding.

“Is that so?” he asks. “I meant no offense.” He opens one of the two doors and smiles. “Do come in.”

“What are those wreaths for?” Dorian asks.

“Wards,” he says. “If you believe in such things.”

My sister makes a quick assessment of the room: a large square space cleared of all furniture, blood red walls and floors like the outside. A grand staircase used to be in the center, but now it is collapsed into a useless heap. There are two doors at each side with sconces for oil lamps. Carved into the door frames are rows of sigils and glyphs, including words in Latin, Hebrew, and what appears to be Romani script.

“Protection seals – are you an alchemist as well, Doctor…?” Penelope realizes she does not know his name.

“No,” he says with a low, condescending laugh. “The old wives’ magick is the work of Rukriz’s self-proclaimed mystical advisor, Mami Hrobar. My specialization is in Biochemistry.” He nods to the right. “The gypsies are tending to your mentor.”

Off to the right, by the collapsed stairway, is the kitchen’s threshold, replaced by cold grey stones and rough mortar. There is a wood burning stove on the far back end, and the smell of wood smoke and beef stew lingers. Pots and pans, utensils, sprigs of vegetables and herbs dangle from the rafters.

At the table is Doctor Arthwitte, face down and ostensibly asleep. Bapo Hrobar has taken the doctor’s bag and spilled the contents out. His wife is rummaging through the doctor’s books and supplies like a church inquisitor preparing a case to burn them as witches.

Mami Hrobar huffs. “Nothing in here is silver. They are charlatans! Why would you invite blasphemers to village, little andel?”

“Why not?” Angelica Mathers retorts, pacing and wringing her hands. “We’ve exhausted every other resource. Who better than the same team that escaped the Himalayan Drukpa Monks?”

“Is myth,” Mami Hrobar snorts. “Your grandfather always talked of such monks but grandfather talked to many things. Mami Hrobar knows they are myth.” She picks up one of the doctor’s many handwritten journals. “And what of this? These books: ‘Secrets of Alchemy: Unlocking of New You,’ ‘Speaking with Spirits and Spagyrics: A Memoir,’ and this! – ‘The Book of Black Magic and Pacts!’ And nothing here is silver. Is not so smart for scientists.”

“What’s this?” Bapo Hrobar asks, picking up a glass bottle from the debris.

“Is bottle for water.”

“Is no ordinary water. Look at label,” Bapo Hrobar says. “Is Holy Water.”

“Let me see,” Angelica says, reading the label out loud. “‘Patented: Edward Mountebanc Arthwitte, Hon. PhD., 1920. One hundred percent distilled divinity down to the last drop.’ What do you think that means?”

“Is blasphemy,” Mami Hrobar says.

Penelope throws the door open. “I was surprised myself, at least at first.” She marches up to the table and sets both of her palms down on, leaning in. “But after today I think we should all keep an open mind.”

“We should make wizard scientist drink it,” Mami Hrobar says, elbowing her husband. “Is best test.”

“I would love a drink, madame.” Doctor Arthwitte smacks his lips and blinking his eyes, face almost as red as the mansion, “But that is our last bottle. There is no perceivable reason to doubt what horrors we may yet face within the night.”

“Would cure vampirism,” Bapo Hrobar suggests.

“Or kill vampire,” his wife adds with a suspicious glare.

“You have my assurance that he is no longer infected,” Herr Raubtier says, entering behind Dorian. “This is my latest version of the serum.”

“What do you mean latest?” Dorian asks.

“He mean, if serum work, is first time,” Bapo Hrobar says. “Is maybe yes, is maybe no.”

“Herr Raubtier is an excellent physician,” Angelica Mathers assures them.

My sister turns back to Doctor Arthwitte. “He looks awful.”

“No, he always looks like that,” Dorian replies.

“We should lock him in houses with others,” Mami Hrobar says. She draws her shawl up around her shoulders and folds her arms. “Is danger to all of us.”

“You want to quarantine him?” Penelope asks, aghast. “Is that what you did to this whole town?”

“What is quarantine?” Bapo Hrobar asks.

“There’s no need for such drastic measures,” Angelica says. She takes another look at the bandage on Doctor Arthwitte’s neck. “At least not yet.”

“Do we have confirmation that this is an infection?” Penelope asks. “What sort of sample analysis did you employ to reach this conclusion?”

“Sample analysis?” Bapo Hrobar says.

“How do you know what is going on here? Where is your proof for any of this?”

“How do we know?” Bapo Hrobar tugs at his beard then flicks an errant flake of dirt. “Is good question.” With a shrug and a chin scratch, he adds, “How does anyone know anything?”

“Proof?” Mami Hrobar says after sizing up the doctor. “Do you want proof?” She saunters over. “Do you know why they call me ‘Mami Hrobar’?”

“No,” Penelope says. “Is that a grandmother or something?”

“But I do not look so old, yes?”

“I guess.”

Penelope does not mean to be insulting; she is simply unable to place the age of this woman. Mami Hrobar appears old, her husband much more so. But there is a strange youth to her face. Her wrinkles are less pronounced than would be expected and her bold demeanor is more youthful than matronly. When she stares directly at Penelope, its as if a javelin of ice pierces my sister’s chest.

“Is title for women in tribe with special powers,” Mami Hrobar says. “Or with family ties to old ways, those who remember time before history, when Earth did not belong to humans.”

“How conveniently unprovable,” Penelope says.

“My grandmother was also called Mami because she had visions, even when she was young girl like you. When I was little girl, she would sit by bed and tell stories of monsters, of wicked demons who ruled Earth in old days. Invinsible giants with scales who drank fear and relished in suffering. One monster then was same as vampires attacking village now. This is ancient blood curse, is dark magick of old gods – wicked, ancient gods; is sign of their return.”

“Well if that’s all the evidence we have, I suppose we should begin our investigation at the beginning,” Penelope says. “Who was the first person cursed.”

“About a month ago,” Herr Raubtier says matter-of-factly. “It all started when one of the village children came back from the dead.”

“Was that Marcel?”

“Ne,” Mami Hrobar says. Her voice cracks when she says it and her lip quivers slightly. “Her name was Lina.”

“So then how does Marcel fit into all of this?”

“Because he is original. He was monster who killed little girl. He was one to turn her!”

“There’s no proof,” Angelica says.

“Proof is body in graveyard. Proof is him standing over body. You choose to doubt.”

Angelica leaves the table then walks to the exit. She throws one last cold look at Mami Hrobar then leaves, slamming the door behind her. A silence falls over them.

“You are too blunt,” Herr Raubtier says.

Mami Hrobar huffs. “She thinks of him as child when she should think of him as vampire.”

Penelope shakes her head. “So then this girl, Lina, she was the first?”

“We buried child,” Bapo Hrobar says. “Is big graveyard, plenty of space.”

“But you said she was a vampire,” Dorian says. “Why didn’t you take any precautions?”

“Most myths involve burning the body or staking the heart as the only way to prevent their return,” Penelope says. “Why didn’t you do anything like that?”

“If not for grieving mother, I would,” Mami Hrobar says. “But there are other ways, old ways.”

“Poor mother, she cries over little girl,” Bapo Hrobar says. “She won’t even let me put her in box.”

“She will not let us work,” Mami Hrobar says. “And so I take three silver coins and put them on little girl’s face, two for eyes and one for lips.”

Herr Raubtier pulls a chair out from the table next to Doctor Arthwitte and sits. He locks his fingers together and sets his hands out in front of him. “Before, I would have dismissed these sorts of tales as superstition or some fundamental misunderstanding of fact. But after what I’ve seen here… Have you heard of any scientific breakthroughs on the reanimation of inanimate flesh?”

“You didn’t examine the girl for yourself?” Penelope asks.

“I am a unlicensed medical doctor dealing with an outbreak,” Herr Raubtier says. “After a thorough examination of her corpse, what was left of it, I followed proper quarantine protocol. I assumed you would be aware of such procedures.”

“Let me guess, the onions and garlic?” Penelope asks.

“Is not just garlic and onions,” Mami Hrobar says, cooly. “Is sacramental oils. Is more than ‘black magic’ and ‘pacts’ you know of.”

“I deferred to Mami Hrobar on these subjects.” He smirks and casts a judgmental glance at Doctor Arthwitte. “We hadn’t the expertise of an alchemist at our disposal then.”

“The Nosferatus tore down the front door of the house they were locked up in – clearly the wards don’t work.”

Mami Hrobar snorts. “Is non-believers and heretics who interfere! We have nothing without God!” She emphatically points to the ceiling. “He only serves faithful. Doubters weaken power.”

“Doesn’t sound so God-like to me then,” Penelope grumbles.

“The wreaths and markings need constant… replenishing,” Herr Raubtier says. “There are rituals, Mami Hrobar conducts the ceremonies. In fact, we should begin our nightly procession. There was another break out. The Nesvadba family.”

Mami Hrobar clicks her tongue in disappointment and shakes her head. Bapo Hrobar removes his hat and places somberly over his chest. Doctor Arthwitte, exhausted, brushes his hat off onto the table and slaps his palm down, then signals a thumbs up before going limp.

“The Lina… what did she look like?” Dorian asks. “Did she turn into a Nosferatu too?”

“What is this word the two of you use?” Herr Raubtier asks. “Is it something I should be aware of?”

“It’s from a silent film,” Penelope replies. “There was a vampire in it.”

“Oh,” Herr Raubtier says, amused. “They were something in between themselves and the… Nosferatus. The same eyes and fangs, their limbs were longer and their faces were feral, but we could recognize who they were. At first.”

“Curse changes body,” Mami Hrobar says. “Takes time.”

“They didn’t attack us,” Herr Raubtier says.

“They waited for screaming whistle,” Bapo Hrobar says. “Then fog.”

“We were unprepared,” Herr Raubtier says. “The dead in the graveyard started coming back. Even those who had passed years ago. They rose up with flawless bodies. Even the Novak boy who died of an infected wolf bite – no markings. Like he’d never been wounded at all.”

“And that’s when you called for help,” Penelope says.

“How many people did you call in before us?” Dorian asks.

“I’m not sure,” Herr Raubtier says. He turns to his fellow townsfolk and asks, “Who was first? I believe we contacted the Fuhrer first.”

“Ano,” Bapo Hrobar says. “First Germans, then Americans.”

“Both refused a response,” Herr Raubtier says. “Typical.”

“Let me think,” Bapo Hrobar says. “Is maybe League of Nations was next?”

“No,” Mami Hrobar says. “That was after Romanians.”

“Yes, the Romanian vampire hunters,” Herr Raubtier says. He smiles and taps his chin for a moment then chuckles. “All dead before sundown. Then a team of cryptid hunters from the America showed up – those we never sent for. They lasted a day longer than expected. After that I contacted the Vatican.”

“Also dead,” Mami Hrobar says. “We should have asked Great Holy Synod.”

“When I sent an official letter the Russian Orthodox Church at your behest, Patriarch Rasputin and General Secretary Stalin both signed the official rejection that was sent back,” Herr Raubtier says. “That was when we contacted you, at the behest of our ‘lord heir’.”

“The report didn’t mention any ‘lord heir’ of Rukriz,” Dorian says.

“I suppose it’s strictly a symbolic title,” Herr Raubtier says with a grin. “The former ‘lord’ of Rukriz was titled that by the villagers. He built this mansion, most of the houses, even the road you followed to get here. After he died it exchanged hands through his relatives, but his last surviving heir has owned this estate for years.”

“This big house?” Dorian asks.