A Girls Guide to Vampires (5 page)

Miranda's predictions weren't real, couldn't be real, I told myself. At least, they weren't real in any sense a normal, feet-on-the-ground woman of moderate intelligence would recognize.

So why did I feel like I was being dragged slowly, but inexorably, to the edge of a black chasm from which there was no return?

Chapter Three

"So, what do you recommend as the sights to see around Blansko?"

"Oh, there are many magnificent tourist sights," the tall man sitting across from us answered, pushing his glasses higher up on his nose. "There
are the karst
, of course: Catherine Cave, Sloupsko-Sosuvske Cave, and Balcarka Cave are some of the better-known examples. And the Macocha Abyss is not to be missed; it is 138 meters deep, you know."

I didn't know, as a matter of fact, which was why, when I found an English-speaking ex-Czech national on the train heading north of Brno returning to his homeland for a brother's wedding, I pumped him for information on the area.

Roxy looked up from one of the
Book of Secrets
novels that I had secretly reread before the trip—secretly because I didn't want Roxy thinking I was reading it less as fiction and more as a guidebook to the area, as she was.
"An abyss?
There's an abyss? Is it dark and mysterious and bottomless? Are there things lurking in its hidden depths, things that no man has lived to tell about?"

"Ignore her," I told the man and his companion. "She refuses to read guidebooks, preferring to be surprised instead." I pulled out my own guidebook and flipped through it until I found the item mentioned.

"The Macocha Abyss is a famous geological formation," I told Roxy, "and the picture shows it's not in the least bit dark or mysterious. There's a trail you can take to walk down into it, to the Punkevní cave."

"Oh," she said, clearly disappointed. She glanced out the window at the scenery—heavily forested land, rising in elevation as we headed into the Moravian Highlands and the small town of Blansko. I knew from my glance at the map that Drahanská Castle, cuddled up close to Blansko, sat hidden in the forests of the eastern edge of Bohemia.

"Caves sound cool, but what is that other thing you mentioned?" I asked. The man looked confused by my question.

"I think she's asking what a karst is, Martin."

I nodded to Martin's wife, a lively blond American named Holly.
"On the nose.
I haven't a clue what a karst is."

"Ah," Martin answered, smiling and rubbing his hands. It turned out I was asking the right man, since Martin was a geophysical expert who told me more than I ever wanted to know about the canyons, gorges, and more than four hundred large and small caves that honeycombed the surrounding area. Even Roxy pulled her nose out of her book and paid attention once he described some of the more spectacular caves, ones that had underground rivers running through them. I rustled through my guidebook looking for information on the ones that were open to the public.

"Sounds cool."
I smiled, trying to cut off the flow of information about the biochemical makeup of the limestone and the effect it had on the surrounding water table.

"What about the castle?" Roxy wanted to know.

"Oh, yes, the castle.
Drahanská is the name. Very impressive, but not open to the public as it's privately owned, but the grounds are very fine and open year round. You should visit them; the sculptures were by Schweigl."

I made an impressed. "No! Not Schweigl himself!" face, and nodded, hoping our source of unbounded information wouldn't go into detail on the chemical composition of the soil in the Schweigl-decorated gardens.

"The castle itself is limestone, of course."

"Of course," I agreed, and hurried another question forward before Martin continued that particular thread of conversation. "My friend is interested in some of the folklore which I understand is particularly rich in this area."

"Yes, it is," Holly answered for Martin.
"Very rich.
Moravia was a separate state for centuries, you know, and they have a fascinating history. Much of their folklore has been carved from the dark roots of their past."

She must have noticed the look Roxy and I slid each other because she gave a little laugh and explained, "I have a degree in Eastern European history. That's how I met Martin—I was studying at Ostrava University when he was finishing up his metallurgical degree. This area is a veritable hotbed of folklore, everything from heroic tales of knights to more traditional examples of what we think of as a standard fairy tale involving princesses and enchantments."

"Fascinating," Roxy said, leaning forward. "Tell us more. These dark roots you mention sound thrilling—you mean like horror tales? Burning witches and all that?"

"Oh no, much darker than that," laughed Holly. "Supposedly—this is just folklore, mind you—this area is second only to Transylvania for its population of supernatural beings. Vampires and necromancers, secret societies practicing blood sacrifices, shape-shifters, cursed families, centuries-old feuds between families with seemingly unholy powers—that sort of thing."

"Foolishness," snorted Martin, pulling out a Prague newspaper. "I grew up not more than thirty kilometers from this area, and those stories were only used to keep small children from wandering the forests alone at night."

"Yes, of course, foolishness." I smiled brightly, pinching Roxy on the wrist to keep her from disputing the statement. She glared at me and angrily rubbed her arm, but didn't say anything more when I turned the conversation to less interesting topics.

An hour later we arrived at our destination, the "bustling market town of Blansko" as the guidebook called it. I looked up from the book and peered around me.

"Not much bustle," Roxy commented sourly, slinging the strap of one bag over her shoulder while grabbing the two other pieces. "More like a limp, if you ask me. There's not even a porter or someone to bribe into carrying our bags. What sort of place is this?"

"Exactly what you wanted, missy, so stop your whining.
If you hadn't insisted on bringing three bags, you wouldn't need anyone to carry your stuff."

Luckily for my peace of mind, there was a taxi in the small town, but it was off running someone else to their destination. I chatted with the stationmaster in my high school German for a few minutes, then went over to where Roxy sat camped out on her mound of luggage next to the taxi stop. She got up and wandered over to the station wall to read all the bills posted announcing local bands playing taverns, housecleaning services, tour times to the various caves, et cetera.

"Hans the stationmeister says the taxi guy should be back in fifteen minutes, so if we sit tight, we won't have to haul
all your
luggage up that hill. Brrr, kind of cold out here, isn't—"

"OHMIGOD, Joy, c'mere!"

"What?"

She jumped up and down in place, her breath puffing white in front of her as she beckoned me over to a spot on the wall. "You're not going to believe this! Look! Just look! Just stand right there in front of me and read that, and tell me that Miranda didn't foresee this!"

"What?" I asked again, warily this time as I approached a large black and red poster. "It doesn't have anything to do with axe-murdering maniacs, does it?"

"Stop being such a poop and read it! Oh, what a glorious, glorious time we're going to have!" She hugged herself with happiness, and whirled around until the fringe on her jacket spun out.

"I
knew
it, I
knew
it," she chanted to herself. I looked around quickly, hoping no one could see us in the gathering darkness of the late afternoon. I was ready to disavow her if she was going to stand in a foreign country and act like an idiot.

"Read it!" she demanded, pointing a finger at the poster.

"Stop acting
like
a boob, and I might."

"Read it!"

I read it. The sign was printed in English, German, and French, GOTHFAIRE!
it
proclaimed in bold, red letters: TAKE A JOURNEY TO THE DARKNESS THAT DWELLS WITHIN US ALL, EXPERIENCE DARK PASSIONS AND DARKER SINS. INDULGE IN YOUR DEEPEST, MOST SECRET GOTHIC DESIRES AS YOU PLUNGE INTO A WORLD FILLED WITH THE MACABRE, THE BIZARRE, THE ENDLESS NIGHT.
TICKETS available beginning 24 October.
"Sounds like a carnival or something like one of those Renaissance fairs, only this one is devoted to the Goth scene. What about it? You don't plan on going to it, do you?"

"Look at the bottom," Roxy chanted, dancing a grapevine dance past the luggage. "Look at the bottom, look at the bottom."

"You need serious medication," I muttered before bending over almost double and squinting at the tiny red print.

GOTHFAIRE IS PROUD TO SPONSOR THE ALL HALLOW'S EVE FESTIVAL OF THE DARK, 31 OCTOBER AT DRAHANSKA CASTLE, BLANSKO, CZECH REPUBLIC. TICKETS TO THE FESTIVAL WILL BE AVAILABLE AFTER…

"Oh, Lord."
Just what I needed, a big party celebrating a fictional cult of vampires.
It wasn't bad enough that Roxy had planned for us to spend every evening scouring the area for any possible Dark Ones who might be roaming the streets in search of prey; no, now she would drag me to a week-long fair and festival with a bunch of pimply teens
who
were heavily into the Goth scene. "No, no, no," I groaned.

"Yes, yes, yes," Roxy sang as she danced by me. "You see?
Now
do you believe in Miranda's powers? She said you'd meet a Dark One, and just look! There will be a whole fair full of them! Not to mention the ones we'll find at the Festival!"

"Oh, for heaven's sake, Rox, there are no such things as vampires!"

My words fell on deaf ears, but before I could shake some sense into her, a small, beat-up blue Peugeot that looked like it had been through a couple of wars squealed to a halt beside us. I grabbed Roxy and shoved her toward the car. "Taxi's here. Grab your luggage while I tell the driver what hotel we're staying at. And for God's sake, stop dancing! You want everyone to think Americans are lunatics?"

The Hotel Dukla wasn't really that far from the train station, but it was up a steep hill, and off the main square on the edge of the town. Within half an hour of arriving in Blansko, we had checked in, hauled our luggage up the three flights of twisting, uneven stairs to the loft rooms assigned us, and quickly changed out of wrinkled travel clothes to something a little more decorous. Roxy beat me to the communal bathroom, so I had to wait until she was finished before I could wash up.

"See you in the bar," she called out to me a few minutes later as she skipped down the stairs. I grimaced at the careless way she raced down, hoping she wouldn't break her neck on the steps' uneven tread, and set about making myself presentable to the local populace. I had this Audrey Hepburn image in my head of how I wanted to appear: sophisticated, elegant, and unmussed. I carefully unpacked my long black velvet dress that made me look thinner, pinned up my plain brown hair that a stylist once kindly referred to as chestnut, and dabbed on a little perfume.

"You're a long way from Audrey Hepburn." I wrinkled my nose at the reflection in the tiny mirror over an oak bureau. "But you'll do."

I don't quite know whom I had pictured as the patrons in the hotel's bar, the most popular in the city according to the proud hotel owner, but the sight that met my eyes was not it. I imagined people in tweed hats and dirndls and such, but what I saw was a room with a low ceiling made of dark, smoky beams crossing in a herringbone pattern. The few people already in the bar were for the most part in jeans and sweaters, and there was nary a dirndl to be seen. At the opposite end of the room, two large windows ran ceiling to floor, overlooking a balcony that opened to a grassy meadow that brushed up against the darker purple rise of the Moravian mountains. Peeking through the dark trees, I could see a part of a turret of Drahanská Castle. The sky above it was deepening into an indigo that matched the soft lines of the mountains nestled against the town. There was something about the rich shades of blues, blacks, and purples that struck a chord deep within me, but before I could wander over to the window to look out at the scenery, I was hallooed.

Roxy called out from a long table that hugged one of the side walls. She sat in the middle of the table with two women on either side of her. At least I guessed they were women; they could have been men in drag. It was hard to tell, what with the layers of pancake and kohl and the crimson lipstick that slashed their mouths into hard, unbending lines. They were dressed similarly, both in black vinyl lace-up bodices over red chiffon blouses. Although their lower halves were hidden by the thick polished plank that served as a table, I assumed they also had spiky, high-heeled black leather boots, and probably micro miniskirts with the visible garter belts that so many young women thought looked sexy.

"Damn. She's found herself some Goths," I swore to myself, looking around the room for an escape. There was none, so I slapped a pleasant smile on my face and wound my way through the chairs and tables to where Roxy was waving vigorously at me.

"There you are. I thought you'd never get here. Joy, this is Arielle and Tanya. They're both witches."