Prince Drakulya Read online

  Prince Drakulya

  Paul Doherty

  Copyright © 1986, 1997 Paul Doherty

  The right of Paul Doherty to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.

  First published as an Ebook by Headline Publishing Group in 2013

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library

  eISBN : 978 0 7553 9586 6

  HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP

  An Hachette UK Company

  338 Euston Road

  London NW1 3BH

  www.headline.co.uk

  www.hachette.co.uk

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Letter to the Reader

  About the Author

  Also by Paul Doherty

  Praise for Paul Doherty

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Letter to the reader

  History has always fascinated me. I see my stories as a time machine. I want to intrigue you with a murderous mystery and a tangled plot, but I also want you to experience what it was like to slip along the shadow-thronged alleyways of medieval London; to enter a soaringly majestic cathedral but then walk out and glimpse the gruesome execution scaffolds rising high on the other side of the square. In my novels you will sit in the oaken stalls of a gothic abbey and hear the glorious psalms of plain chant even as you glimpse white, sinister gargoyle faces peering out at you from deep cowls and hoods. Or there again, you may ride out in a chariot as it thunders across the Redlands of Ancient Egypt or leave the sunlight and golden warmth of the Nile as you enter the marble coldness of a pyramid’s deadly maze. Smells and sounds, sights and spectacles will be conjured up to catch your imagination and so create times and places now long gone. You will march to Jerusalem with the first Crusaders or enter the Colosseum of Rome, where the sand sparkles like gold and the crowds bay for the blood of some gladiator. Of course, if you wish, you can always return to the lush dark greenness of medieval England and take your seat in some tavern along the ancient moon-washed road to Canterbury and listen to some ghostly tale which chills the heart . . . my books will take you there then safely bring you back!

  The periods that have piqued my interest and about which I have written are many and varied. I hope you enjoy the read and would love to hear your thoughts – I always appreciate any feedback from readers. Visit my publisher’s website here: www.headline.co.uk and find out more. You may also visit my website: www.paulcdoherty.com or email me on: [email protected].

  Paul Doherty

  About the Author

  Paul Doherty is one of the most prolific, and lauded, authors of historical mysteries in the world today. His expertise in all areas of history is illustrated in the many series that he writes about, from the Mathilde of Westminster series, set at the court of Edward II, to the Amerotke series, set in Ancient Egypt. Amongst his most memorable creations are Hugh Corbett, Brother Athelstan and Roger Shallot.

  Paul Doherty was born in Middlesbrough. He studied history at Liverpool and Oxford Universities and obtained a doctorate at Oxford for his thesis on Edward II and Queen Isabella. He is now headmaster of a school in north-east London and lives with his wife and family near Epping Forest.

  Also by Paul Doherty

  Mathilde of Westminster

  THE CUP OF GHOSTS

  THE POISON MAIDEN

  THE DARKENING GLASS

  Sir Roger Shallot

  THE WHITE ROSE MURDERS

  THE POISONED CHALICE

  THE GRAIL MURDERS

  A BROOD OF VIPERS

  THE GALLOWS MURDERS

  THE RELIC MURDERS

  Templar

  THE TEMPLAR

  THE TEMPLAR MAGICIAN

  Mahu (The Akhenaten trilogy)

  AN EVIL SPIRIT OUT OF THE WEST

  THE SEASON OF THE HYAENA

  THE YEAR OF THE COBRA

  Canterbury Tales by Night

  AN ANCIENT EVIL

  A TAPESTRY OF MURDERS

  A TOURNAMENT OF MURDERS

  GHOSTLY MURDERS

  THE HANGMAN’S HYMN

  A HAUNT OF MURDER

  Egyptian Mysteries

  THE MASK OF RA

  THE HORUS KILLINGS

  THE ANUBIS SLAYINGS

  THE SLAYERS OF SETH

  THE ASSASSINS OF ISIS

  THE POISONER OF PTAH

  THE SPIES OF SOBECK

  Constantine the Great

  DOMINA

  MURDER IMPERIAL

  THE SONG OF THE GLADIATOR

  THE QUEEN OF THE NIGHT

  MURDER’S IMMORTAL MASK

  Hugh Corbett

  SATAN IN ST MARY’S

  THE CROWN IN DARKNESS

  SPY IN CHANCERY

  THE ANGEL OF DEATH

  THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS

  MURDER WEARS A COWL

  THE ASSASSIN IN THE GREENWOOD

  THE SONG OF A DARK ANGEL

  SATAN’S FIRE

  THE DEVIL’S HUNT

  THE DEMON ARCHER

  THE TREASON OF THE GHOSTS

  CORPSE CANDLE

  THE MAGICIAN’S DEATH

  THE WAXMAN MURDERS

  NIGHTSHADE

  THE MYSTERIUM

  Standalone Titles

  THE ROSE DEMON

  THE HAUNTING

  THE SOUL SLAYER

  THE PLAGUE LORD

  THE DEATH OF A KING

  PRINCE DRAKULYA

  THE LORD COUNT DRAKULYA

  THE FATE OF PRINCES

  DOVE AMONGST THE HAWKS

  THE MASKED MAN

  As Vanessa Alexander

  THE LOVE KNOT

  OF LOVE AND WAR

  THE LOVING CUP

  Kathryn Swinbrooke (as C L Grace)

  SHRINE OF MURDERS

  EYE OF GOD

  MERCHANT OF DEATH

  BOOK OF SHADOWS

  SAINTLY MURDERS

  MAZE OF MURDERS

  FEAST OF POISONS

  Nicholas Segalla (as Ann Dukthas)

  A TIME FOR THE DEATH OF A KING

  THE PRINCE LOST TO TIME

  THE TIME OF MURDER AT MAYERLING

  IN THE TIME OF THE POISONED QUEEN

  Mysteries of Alexander the Great (as Anna Apostolou)

  A MURDER IN MACEDON

  A MURDER IN THEBES

  Alexander the Great

  THE HOUSE
OF DEATH

  THE GODLESS MAN

  THE GATES OF HELL

  Matthew Jankyn (as P C Doherty)

  THE WHYTE HARTE

  THE SERPENT AMONGST THE LILIES

  Non-fiction

  THE MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF TUTANKHAMUN

  ISABELLA AND THE STRANGE DEATH OF EDWARD II

  ALEXANDER THE GREAT: THE DEATH OF A GOD

  THE GREAT CROWN JEWELS ROBBERY OF 1303

  THE SECRET LIFE OF ELIZABETH I

  THE DEATH OF THE RED KING

  Praise for Paul Doherty

  ‘Teems with colour, energy and spills’ Time Out

  ‘Paul Doherty has a lively sense of history . . . evocative and lyrical descriptions’ New Statesman

  ‘Extensive and penetrating research coupled with a strong plot and bold characterisation. Loads of adventure and a dazzling evocation of the past’ Herald Sun, Melbourne

  ‘An opulent banquet to satisfy the most murderous appetite’ Northern Echo

  ‘As well as penning an exciting plot with vivid characters, Doherty excels at bringing the medieval period to life, with his detailed descriptions giving the reader a strong sense of place and time’ South Wales Argus

  To the Publisher

  for revivifying a cherished child.

  Many thanks.

  One

  It is dark outside. I can see that through the prison window high in the wall, my only hour glass for the time and the seasons. There is an evening breeze, a welcome relief from the stench of this cell which draws the rats who, every night, regularly check to see if I am still alive. There must be a moon. I can hear some lonely wolf howling its protests at it, drowning the squeak of the long-horned skull-faced bats who soar through the night. I know that I am going to die. For me, there will be no pardon or remission, and I find I do not really care. I have lived a long life. At sixty-two one could even call me a survivor. I have seen the empires of the east and the west and tasted the best and worst of each. I have seen the famous rise and fall, as well as sights that you would only expect to see in the very gates of hell. Rows of bodies, young and old, male and female, impaled on thick, light brown stakes. Heads rolling and bobbing in the dust, eyes staring, tongues out. I have seen the crash and clamour of battle. The silken luxury of court and the subtle intricacies of clever men. I have felt every sensation any living man could expect to experience and all because of the Prince I served. Yes, because of him they are going to kill me. In fact, they are going to kill me because they maintain that he was not a man but a devil.

  I must pause. They want a confession from the beginning, so . . . My name is Rhodros. I am a Greek by birth, a Rumanian by adoption and the lifelong friend and servant of him they term Vlad Tepes, Vlad the Impaler, Kazikulu Bey, son of the Dragon, the scion of Satan, that Lord of Darkness, the Lord Count Drakulya, Voivode of Wallachia.

  Yet, I hurry, even dead, the Prince draws me on and I must go back to the beginning. I was born a Greek on the island of Rhodes and captured by Ottoman Turks when I was only a child of nine or ten summers. The Ottomans had brought their long, sharp-beaked ships into one of the many small ports and harbours of the island. They came for wood and provisions but stayed for plunder. Their assault on my village was sharp, quick and decisive, attacking at dawn, just as the sun rose. They surrounded the village, their kettle-drums beating and their green banners flying. The attack was led by yellow-coated Janissaries whilst their officers stood on a nearby hillock and watched its progress. Each hut was razed to the ground, the old being immediately killed, the women methodically raped and then the able-bodied survivors herded together, ropes were thrown round our necks and we were ordered to march back to their ships. No one came to help us. My mother had died in childbirth. My father, the local priest, was rash enough to offer resistance and so died at his own altar, his throat cut from ear to ear. I remember feeling shocked but not sad at this, as my relationship with my father was negligible and, with all the selfishness of a child, I was more curious about what was going to happen to me. Naturally, I had heard stories about the cruelty and the rapacity of the Turks, and was fearful of either a short life or a lingering death. Circumstances proved it was neither.

  We were bundled aboard galleys and within days I was delivered to the slave markets in the principality of Karaman in Western Anatolia. Life aboard ship was pleasant enough. I was physically examined by an eunuch, whose black, blank eyes, flabby fingers and sharp questions about my health frightened me more than the yellow-coated Janissaries or the fierce-looking seamen, who manned the sails and directed the hooked galley in its swift progress back to Turkish waters. I remember seeing these rowers grasping the oars, their muscle-bound backs straining under cruel whips, and I became frightened that I too would be forced to join them. I eventually confessed my fears to the eunuch, but he laughed and explained that I was not a convict and the Turks needed young, strong, intelligent Christians for their armies, to serve their great sultan, Murad II, friend of Allah and the Scourge of Christians, who had vowed to take the fabulous city of Constantinople before he died. The eunuch was right. I did not join the oarsmen, but he was wrong in other things. Murad never took Constantinople and I was never trained in the Turkish army. Instead, once I arrived in Karaman, I was examined once again by a slave master, an ex-Christian, an apostate priest, who questioned me carefully and appraised me knowingly. Afterwards, I was kept apart from the rest of the slaves and, following a brief conversation with a fierce-looking Turkish captain, the slave master informed me that I was to be taken to the fortress of Egrigoz to be trained as a clerk and scribe for the garrison there.

  I was quite happy with this change of life. The village on Rhodes had been dull and I now had seen more in a few weeks than I had in my young life. My Turkish captors were not as cruel as village gossip and allegations had painted them. They were cultivated men. Superb horsemen who admired courage and intelligence, and endowed with a vision of themselves as the world’s conquerors.

  The villages and towns I passed through were clean, well ordered, and I was treated well for a slave; fed, clothed and looked after with a certain amount of affection. When one of the escort soldiers became drunk and attempted to become familiar with me, a curse which afflicts many of the Turks, the man was beaten and after that I was left alone. I was young, strong and determined to adapt to the best of my capability. So impressed was I with my new Turkish masters that I even relaxed, and that was a mistake. The Turks are like children. Clever, brilliant and gentle once they have established their supremacy but if this supremacy is ever challenged, then the consequences are terrible. Just before we reached Egrigoz, I was given a fair example of this. There was a number of captives being sent to the area and among them were two young Bulgars. They openly resented captivity and they made no secret of their determination to escape. One night they were foolish enough to implement this scheme, attempting to cross a nearby river but they never even reached the water. They were captured and awakened the whole camp with their shouting and screaming. The next morning I looked round the village to see where they had been held captive, or for their corpses if they had been summarily killed. I asked the captain of our escort but I could not understand his answers. When I pressed him further, he simply tapped the side of his nose and smiled knowingly, telling me to rejoin the rest of the group for our morning meal of milk and the tough rye bread provided by the villagers.

  We then recommenced our march but, before we had travelled a mile outside the village, we came across the two Bulgars. They were still alive and I almost fainted when I saw what the Turks had done to them. Our route was bordered by poplar trees and the Bulgars had been impaled on one of these trees. Two of the stoutest branches had been pruned and sharpened and the Bulgars impaled, the stakes forcing themselves up into the young men’s entrails so that death was certain but very slow. Pools of blood and excrement dripped beneath them and I was so sickened and revolted that I had to be helped along by one of the Turkish soldiers. He became
concerned and, lifting me up, told me to lie face down in one of the carts which carried provisions and arms. He stroked my hair, speaking soothingly in a broken mixture of Greek and Turkish. The message was simple. I was not to distress myself but to remember the lesson of what had happened to those who disobeyed their Turkish masters. I learnt the lesson well that day, vowing never to try and escape but to accommodate and adapt myself to Turkish customs.

  Eventually, after a steep climb up the south-eastern slope of Mount Kociadag, we reached Egrigoz. If I had entertained any hope of escaping, then this fortress would have convinced me otherwise; dominating the approaches into the Balkans, it was surrounded by mountains and thick forests of oak, pine and beech. The area was virtually impassable except by well known roads and routes and over these the fortress kept very careful watch. The fortress of Egrigoz was under a provincial governor, Barach. An Anatolian by birth, he was now a fanatical Muslim. Short, fat, with a wispy white beard, he looked a genial uncle but appearances were deceptive. He had eyes like obsidian flint and a heart even harder. He was ruthless and cruel, and made this obvious when he first addressed us in the dusty courtyard of the fortress.

  “Prisoners,” he announced. “You are now servants of the great Murad, Sultan, Conqueror, Defender of the Faithful. You are Kepuknen, the Sultan’s slaves. You are his; body, soul and mind. Serve him well and fear nothing, but betray the trust he has in you and I will personally crucify you on these castle walls.”

  We had no reason to doubt him. We had entered the main castle gate under the decomposing body of some miscreant who had clearly forgotten the great trust the Sultan had in him. Once Barach had finished speaking, our escort left us and we were broken into groups, I and other young boys being hustled into a room at the base of the central tower. We were ordered to squat in a cold damp corridor under a watchful guard and then interviewed in a small but luxurious cell by one of the eunuchs, a Wallachian Kayzan, who had lost his nation and his testicles many years before. Like most eunuchs he was bald, very plump and almost glowed in ostentatious dress, inexpensive costume jewellery and even cheaper perfume. His flesh was white, though tinged with a yellow sallowness, and his small black eyes pierced the rough puffed tissues of skin. He finally interviewed me, running soft podgy hands lightly over my body, muttering softly to himself. I cursed him in Greek and nearly fainted with fright when he suddenly stopped his examination, stared at me and then began to talk Greek with an accent so peculiar to Rhodes that I thought he was mimicking me.