The Snow Vampire Read Online Free PDF Page A

where I hit him, as if sore, but he gave me a small, dazzling smile, and I felt my body grow weak at the sight of it.
    “Yes, Ferenc,” Grandmamma said, ignoring our roughhousing. “Every single one of them, gone. Where there should have been carnage and gore, there was none. The group pushed ahead into the courtyard. Two days ago it had been a blood-stained field. Now—now, it was pure and white as a bride’s veil. As if nothing evil had happened there at all.”
    “Well obviously it had snowed, and the new snow covered everything up,” Hendrik said. I could detect a subtle shift in his way of speaking; the story had started to affect him.
    “No,” Grandmamma spoke, her voice barely a whisper. “The night had been as still as death. No snow had fallen. But then suddenly the men saw in the courtyard small dots of red, drip , drip , as if drops of liquid were being slowly trickled onto the snow itself. But quickly the men realized the drips were not falling from anywhere above, but, rather, coming up from below, emanating from somewhere under the calm, white snow. At first there were just a few, and then a few more, and soon the men saw four distinct patches of red spreading across the surface of the snow. Four patches—one for each of the village men who had gone up the mountain the day before. And then, just as suddenly, the blood—for the men had realized with much horror that, indeed, the red was blood, the blood of their fallen townsfolk—the blood began first to gurgle, and then to gush out of the snow, as if from a geyser. Well, the poor townsmen were amazed and horrified at what they saw, but they began to dig and paw at these gushes, to get to the men underneath. But as they pulled away the red, churning snow, what do you suppose they found?”
    Hendrik could not even muster the temerity to respond verbally; instead, he just shook his head.
    “ They found nothing at all ,” Grandmamma gravely replied. “The men—their friends, their kin—they were gone. Vanished.”
    “But… what happened to them?” Hendrik asked.
    “Taken—by the evil that had taken the monks, by the evil that infested that place. Taken by the vrolok .”
    “But such things are not possible,” Hendrik stammered. “There are no such things as monsters.”
    “Oh no?” Grandmamma countered mightily. She was in her element now; anyone could see that. “Well, believe what you will. But since that time, wise folk have given that evil place a wide berth. Strange things continue to happen there. Unearthly howls can be heard on the coldest and clearest of nights. And people who wander off have been known to never return.”
    “I am sure it is just an old wives’ tale, and nothing more,” Hendrik said. He turned to me. “Don’t you think so, Ferenc?”
    I could tell he was taking my measure with his question. “Of course,” I said. “It is just silly superstition.”
    Grandmamma sniffed. Clearly she did not appreciate whose side I had chosen. “And what of the noises?” she asked. “You have yourself heard them, Ferenc.”
    I shrugged, struggling to find an answer that would not have Hendrik think me provincial or—worse—foolish. “Just wolves, Grandmamma,” I said. “And the howling of the wind.”
    “There are no wolves in the pass in wintertime,” Grandmamma muttered. “You know this, Ferenc. As the deer travel down the mountain to escape the thick snows, so do they. Besides, what of the Arnok boy, hmm?” she hastily added, playing what I knew was her trump card.
    “And what is this?” Hendrik asked, a newfound curiosity playing over his face. “Has the snagov vrolok recently struck?” I could tell from the slightly smug tone in his voice that he had gotten over the fear Grandmamma’s story had raised in him and now, embarrassed by it, was determined to needle anyone—namely me—who still felt that way.
    “It is nothing,” I said. “Just a local tragedy.”
    “He wandered off,” Grandmamma said,