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Pulling the stopper back, I expected the thick consistency of coagulated blood—and came away empty. An audible gasp raced around the lower ring in the hall, echoing like a choir singing a soul into heaven as it reached the upper levels.
Percy pointed out tools and procedures, this time in Romanian.
I stepped back, my gaze traveling over the nearly nude body, too focused on the mystery to blush. And that’s when I noticed it—the absence of postmortem lividity.
I ducked closer, trying to find a hint of that bluish-gray pooling of blood that should have been present. Whenever a person perished, his blood stained the lowest area of the body where it last lay. If he died while lying on his stomach and then was flipped over, discoloration would still be present on his stomach. I searched each of Wilhelm’s sides and under his limbs for lividity. None could be found. His pallor was odd even for a corpse.
There was something very wrong with this body.
“It’s all right,” Percy said, taking up a larger syringe. “Sometimes it’s a bit trickier to remove a sample from the deceased. Nothing to feel embarrassed about. If you don’t mind.”
“Probably her weak constitution,” someone muttered loud enough for me to overhear, and pretend not to.
Stepping aside, I allowed Percy room to draw a sample of his own, ignoring the snickers of my classmates. I flicked the side of my syringe, wondering how on earth it had failed to remove even a bit of blood from Wilhelm. The size of the needle shouldn’t matter. I wanted to glance at Thomas but didn’t give in to the urge.
“Interesting.”
Percy picked up the left arm and slowly sank the needle into the thin skin of the deceased’s elbow. When he pulled the plunger toward him, no blood accompanied it. The professor drew his brows together and tried another spot. Again, the syringe came away empty. Unsurprisingly, no one mocked his inability to withdraw blood.
“Hmm.” He murmured to himself, trying to take samples from each limb. Every single time, he failed to draw blood. He stepped back, hands on hips, and shook his head. A few locks of ginger hair fell across his brow the way freckles were tossed about his face.
“Our mystery death deepens, class. It appears this body is missing its blood.”
I cursed myself for doing so, but I couldn’t help but search out Thomas’s reaction in the crowd this time. My gaze drifted from stunned face to stunned face, everyone talking amongst themselves in anxious tones. Andrei pointed at the cadaver of his fallen friend, terror slashed into his every movement. I wanted to tell him that fear would cloud his judgment, that it would only complicate and delay our search for the truth, but I said nothing.
It was a horrific discovery.
I spun in a slow circle, eyes tracking around the tower room, but Thomas had already gone. A flicker of sadness lit within before I could extinguish it. It was better this way. I would need to learn to eventually stop looking to him for comfort he wasn’t equipped to give anyway.
The prince leaned over the railing, knuckles going bone white. “Are there strigoi marks on his neck?”
“What?” I asked, hearing but not understanding such an absurd question. I bent down and turned Wilhelm’s head to the side. Two little holes were crusted with dried blood.
I ran a hand over my plaited hair, not thinking about the rib cage I’d just cracked open as I did so. There had to be some explanation that didn’t point to a vampire attack. Strigoi and pricolici were stories; they weren’t scientifically possible. No matter how much local folklore Professor Radu fed us.
I rolled my shoulders, granting myself permission to lock my emotions away. Now was the time to adopt Thomas’s method of deduction. If a werewolf or vampire hadn’t bitten Wilhelm, then what had? I flipped through pages of scenarios in my head—there had to be a reasonable explanation for the two points on his neck.
Young men didn’t simply drop dead and lose their blood due to natural causes, and I wasn’t aware of any living thing that could leave those—bite marks. I shook my head. Bite marks indeed. That was hysteria clawing its way into my mind. An animal couldn’t have made that wound. It was too neat. Too clean. Teeth marks wouldn’t have been so precise when entering flesh.
Animal attacks would be brutal, leaving many indications on the corpse: flesh torn, nails broken, scratches. Defensive wounds would have been present on the hands, as Uncle had pointed out in cases of a fight. Bruising.
Vampires were no more real than nightmares were. Then it hit me.
The marks could have been made with a mortuary apparatus. Though I wasn’t sure about what method morticians used to extract blood.
“Are there strigoi marks on his neck?” Nicolae asked again, a demanding edge in his voice. I’d forgotten all about him. There was something else in his tone, too. Something tinged with dread. Possibly even fear. I wondered what he knew of the rumors being discussed by the villagers. That his vampiric ancestor had returned from the grave and was thirsty.
The headline from the newspaper revisited my thoughts. has the immortal prince returned? Did villagers secretly hunger for their immortal prince? Had one of them gone to great lengths to stage this death, draining the body and leaving it for display? I did not envy Nicolae in this moment. Someone wanted people to believe Wilhelm had been murdered by a vampire. And not simply any vampire—possibly the most bloodthirsty of all time.
Without glancing up, I nodded in response to the prince’s inquiry. It was barely a perceptible movement, but it was enough. I hadn’t the slightest clue how to go about solving this riddle. How had a body been drained of blood without anyone noticing?
We’d been in the village for only an hour or so. That was scarcely enough time to accomplish such a task. And yet, was it possible for a skilled hand? I had no idea how long it took to drain a body of blood.
Whispers rushed throughout the surgical theater, and several drifted over to my spot on the main floor. A few chills tingled my spine as I stood straighter.
It seemed the villagers were not alone in their superstitions; some of my classmates were also convinced Vlad Dracula lived after all.
Dearest Liza,
