“You know my reputation?” I said.

“Yes. “

“You know that it is true?”

The small monk shrugged. “If you say it is so.”

“It is true,” I said softly. From the corner of my eye I could see Brother Michael blanch. Brother Jacob, who indeed looked like a Jew, was very pale and very impassive. “It is true,” I continued in the same conversational tones, “that I have tortured and murdered thousands of people, most of them guilty of no overt act against me or my regime. Many of my victims have been womenmany of them pregnant womenand many were young children. I have tortured, beheaded, and impaled many such socalled innocent women and children. Do you know why this is so, Brother Hans the Porter?”

“No.” The portly little monk stood with his hands clasped loosely in front of him, his legs apart as if standing easily to hear some peasant's confession. There seemed only slight interest in his face.

“It is so because just as Jesus was a good shepherd, I am a good gardener,” I said. “When one must cut the weeds out of one's garden, one must not only pull the weeds at the surface. A good gardener is compelled to dig deep to eradicate the roots which grow far underground and which threaten to spawn new weeds in seasons yet to come. Is this not so, Brother Hans the Porter?”

The monk looked at me for a long moment. Despite his portly appearance, his face was strong in bone and muscle.

“I am not a gardener,” he said at last. “I am a servant of Our Lord Jesus. “

I sighed. “Then answer me this, servant of Your Lord Jesus,” I said, trying to keep the asperity out of my voice. “Given that all that is said about me is true, that thousands of innocent women and children have died at my hand or my command, I command you to tell me my fate after death.”

Brother Hans the Porter did not hesitate. His voice was calm. “You will go to Hell, “ he said. “If Hell will have you. Were I Satan, l think I could not stomach your presence, even though the screams of the tormented damned souls are said to be like music to Satan's ears. But you would understand Satan's preferences much better than I.”

It was difficult for me to hide a smile. I envisioned the talk at my court and other courts when I sent these three friars away with their donkeys laden with wealth for their abbeys. I admire courage in my enemies.

“So you think I am not a saint?” I said softly.

Then Brother Hans the Porter made a mistake. “I think you are mad,” he said in his deep, soft, somewhat sad voice. “And I take pity on the fact that madness has led you to eternal damnation.”

At this comment my good humor fled. I called my guards and had them hold Brother Hans the Porter while I took an iron stake and impaled the man. Forgoing the relative mercy of impaling him between his fat buttocks, I drove short spikes through his ears and eyes and a longer one down his throat. He was still writhing when I drove a large metal nail through his feet and had him hoisted by a cable to hang head down like a piece of market poultry. I called in my court to witness this.

Then, while Brother Michael and Brother Jacob stood pale and staring, I called for Brother Hans the Porter's donkey and had the animal impaled on a great iron stake there in the court. The operation was loud and not as simple as it sounds.

When it was finished, I turned to Brother Jacob. “You have heard your companions' opinions on the chances of my salvation,” I said. “Now, what is your opinion on this matter?”

Brother Jacob threw himself face first onto the stone floor in an attitude of total supplication. Brother Michael joined him there a second later.

“Please, My Lord,” quaked Brother Jacob, his hands extended and clasped so tightly that they were as white as virgin vellum. “Mercy, My Lord! I beg mercy, in the name of God!”

I strode over the floor until my boots touched each man's cheek. “In whose name?” I roared. Not all of the anger was feigned; I was still irked at Brother Hans the Porter's final remarks before his confidence had turned to anguished screams.

Brother Michael had the quicker wit. “In your name, My Lord! We ask mercy in the Blessed Name of Vlad Dracula! In Your Name we beseech You!”

I could hear the reverence in both voices as their pleas found a focus. I lifted my boot onto Brother Jacob's neck. “And to whom will you pray henceforth when you wish either mercy or divine intervention?”

“To Our Lord Dracula!” gasped Brother Jacob.

I shed balance and set my boot on Brother Michael's neck. “And who is the only power in the universe who has the power to answer or deny your prayers?”

“My Lord Dracula!” managed Brother Michael, the air going out of him like bad wind out of an old wine bladder as I trod more heavily on his spine.

There was a moment where there was no sound in the crowded court except for the dripping of blood from Brother Hans and his donkey. Then I lifted my boot off Brother Michael's neck and walked slowly away, finally dropping languorously onto my throne. “You will leave my city and my country tonight,” I said. “You may take your animals and as much food for the voyage as you wish. If my soldiers find you within Wallachia's or Transylvania's borders when the sun rises three mornings from now, you will pray to your new Godthat is to say, to methat you could have died as easily as Brother Hans the Porter or his braying ass. Now go! And spread the word of Vlad Dracula's infinite mercy.”

They went, but based upon the lies Brother Jacob later dictated to the alltooeagertoslander poet Michael Beheim, they had not learned their lesson adequately.

But those at court that day had. As had the Franciscan friars who stayed behind in their monastery in Tirgoviste. They were sullen in there behind their cloistered walls, but they were increasingly quiet from that day forward.

And the carefully honed legend of Vlad Dracula grew sharper, and extended its reach to the hearts of my enemies.

Chapter Twenty-five

When O'Rourke was finished talking, the three of them stood in silent tableau there in the hissing lamplight, Lucian frozen halfway between the hot plate and the door, O'Rourke standing in shadow by the sprung sofa, and Kate standing closest to the lantern. Her gaze had been moving back and forth between the haggardlooking priest and the younger man, but now she stared only at Lucian. Her thought was, If he runs we will have to chase him down. O'Rourke looks exhausted. I will have to do it myself.

Lucian did not run.

O'Rourke rubbed his stubbled cheek. There was no victory in his eyes, only sadness.

If Lucian is one of them, thought Kate, then they know where we are. The men in black. The men who killed Tom and Julie and Chandra. The men who stole Joshua .... She felt her heartbeat accelerate, was vaguely conscious of her. fists knotting as if of their own accord.

Lucian stepped back to the hot plate, lifted the wooden spoon, and slowly stirred the nowbubbling soup.

Kate wanted to strangle him at that moment. “Is it true?” she asked. “Lucian, was it you?”

If he had shrugged, she would have lifted the wooden chair behind her and brought it down on his head at that moment.

He did not shrug. “Yes,” he said. “It was me.” He looked at her a second and then lifted the spoon and tasted the soup.

“Put the spoon down,” said Kate. She found herself wondering if she could dodge in time if Lucian threw the pan of boiling soup at her.

Lucian set the spoon down and took a step toward her.

O'Rourke stepped between them just a~ Kate raised both fists. Lucian raised both hands, palms outward.

“Let me explain,” he said softly. His Romanian accent seemed stronger. “Kate, I would never do anything to hurt Joshua . . .”

She felt her composure slip then and remembered pulling the trigger when the man in black had seemed to threaten her baby three months earlier . . . an eternity earlier. She wished that she had a gun now.