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The castle on the hill burned all through the afternoon. As night crept in, we could still see a red glow reflected against the single cloud in the sky.
"I like what you've done with the place."
My dear sister Florimel rolled her eyes. We were both sitting on folding chairs on the green grass of somebody's front lawn. The house behind us was silent and empty, and the front door was still hanging slightly askew from earlier, when I had broken its lock. Flora was on her second Bloody Mary, and I was nursing a beer, which was probably only increasing the loopiness of whatever pill she had given me earlier. My side still hurt from where the Count had stabbed me with a fireplace poker, but it was a low throb now muffled by the pill and the beer.
I was not being entirely sarcastic. I did like what she had done with the place. From here, we could see the long dirt curve of the street ahead and the crisp little houses on either side. In design, everything was a little bit Tudor and a little bit Black Forest and a little bit Jetsons: simultaneously quaint and electrified. Clean and precise and pleasing to the eye. Not terribly imaginative, but certainly a cohesive and coherent vision. Say what you will about my sister, but her instinct for an elegantly striking Shadow was unmatched.
Flora was not my favorite sibling, but she had her charms. We'd had some laughs together in the past. When she had asked me to join her on this trip, I had not hesitated very long before saying yes.
Admittedly, when she had extended the invitation and I had accepted it, neither of us had known about the Count.
Looking out across the neighborhood now, I could picture what sort of be-tied and be-aproned inhabitants would bustle out of those sturdy little houses. They would certainly be excited to find my sister back in residence after her long absence, though I had some trouble thinking of what role she might have played among them in days of old. In this particular Shadow, she probably resisted the ostentatious vulgarity of being a goddess or a queen. But perhaps she was the wealthy heiress of a local estate, someone who went off on long journeys to uncertain destinations. Or maybe she was a widow of a dead dictator who now exercised a genteel and velvet-gloved regency over these lands.
I could have asked her. But it was more fun to guess. And maybe I overestimated my sister. Maybe she was a goddess here. Maybe all these little houses held a dedicated altar to the Green Goddess Florida over their spotless kitchen ovens.
(It probably bears mentioning at this juncture that the Count's fireplace poker had bit deeply into my flesh. Florimel had given me "something for the pain" after bandaging me up. "That dosage would probably kill a horse," she had said dispassionately right after I swallowed the little white pill she gave me. "But knowing your constitution, you'll probably be all right." I was thinking a lot of loopy, silly thoughts at the moment as a result.)
Nobody was out on the street right now. Nobody had been on the street for hours. Probably they'd heard a radio broadcast about the Count's rather dramatic demise. Probably they were lying low, hiding inside their neat little houses, peering out their windows, and waiting to see what would happen next.
Flora gave a maudlin sigh and took a long drink from her Bloody Mary. "I've been away too long." The ice cubes in her glass rattled together. "I always forget that you've got to keep tabs on these little out-of-the-way places. Or the next thing you know, some damn parasite has shown up and is holding the whole town in thrall."
The sky was darkening overhead. The stars were beginning to appear.
"This isn't exactly the holiday you promised me, Flora."
Flora gave me a sharp look. "No? Oh, I'm so sorry. It's certainly nothing like the time you invited me to Pompeii for a little sunbathing on the beach."
"Ah, give me a break. That was just poor timing. A perfectly lovely place most of the time." I slumped back in my chair and started to peel at the beer bottle's label. "Besides, I did help you kill your parasite. At great possible peril to myself."
"Pffft," Flora said. "As if you were ever in any real danger from that second-rate Nosferatu. I don't even think his fangs worked properly."
I thought about the series of corpses we had encountered during our afternoon stroll up to the old castle on the hill. I thought about the two little holes that had appeared on each dead neck in succession. I forbore to bring this up.
Sometimes I am a patient and generous brother.
"So now that you've eliminated your parasite, what happens next? Do you pick some puppet mayor to rule in your stead? And all the townspeople just keep thinking you're such a swell duchess or philanthropist who visits them occasionally?"
"I suppose I'll just be my own granddaughter," Flora said. "I think I was the representative of some family-owned company that specialized in energy. Timber to coal to electricity to gasoline." She raised one eyebrow speculatively. "Perhaps it's time for the family firm to invest in nuclear power."
"How exciting," I said. "Glad to hear you've got some plans. Can't wait for everyone here to be zipping around on hover-cars. 'Do you remember that time we were ruled by that vampire on that hill?' they'll ask each other. 'It all seems so long ago! Lucky thing that Ms. Florage Mellificent showed up like the proverbial prodigal, staked him in the heart, and then invented cold fusion.'"
"I doubt it will be anything that obvious," she said. "Unlike you, dear brother, I don't need credit for every little thing."
"True," I said. "You've never craved the spotlight. Better to serve in heaven and all that."
I caught her giving me a sidelong look, and I mentally shook a reproving finger at myself. I probably should not have taken her mysterious white pill. It was sending me down a dangerously rambling path. But, on the other hand, the place where the Count had stabbed me -- hissing as he staggered backward, his eyes blazing red, the edge of the carpet already smoldering in flames, the room filled with smoke and confusion -- was feeling comparatively fine and dandy at the moment. So maybe it was a worthwhile trade-off.
"That was a smart move you pulled off with the Count," I said thoughtfully as the last of the bottle's label surrendered to my plucking fingers. "He backed into that corner without even realizing that you were standing there, sharpened broom handle at the ready. But how did you know I was going to try to push him into the fireplace in the first place?"
She laughed. "Oh, I didn't, Corwin. But I assumed you would do something surprising and foolish, and when you inevitably did, I was ready." She leaned over and gave my shoulder a companionable pat. "How is your injury feeling, dear brother? Better, is it?"
"Better," I said cautiously, because sudden sisterly affection from Florimel was always a dangerous sign. "Why?"
"We might need to do some more collective vampire-staking before too long."
The stars were bright overhead. None of the crisp little houses had any of their lights on.
"It occurs to me," she continued, "that the little Count up on the hill may have been here long enough to have a certain influence on the inhabitants. And maybe that influence persists even after his death."
At the house closest to us, the front door opened. It was too dark to make out what stepped forth.
"Damn it, Flora," I said as I drained the last of my beer and staggered to my feet. "Did you just think of that now?"
"I thought of it ten minutes ago," Florimel said, delicately wiping the traces of Bloody Mary from her mouth as she rose to join me. "But we were having such a nice little moment. I didn't want to ruin it."