[Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Novel, Episode 20] Where the Lightning Finds the Stitches
The chain struck the castle wall directly in front of Alucard’s face.
Crash.
A chip of stone grazed his cheek. He slid his right foot backward and leaned away without moving the rest of his body. The tip of his scabbard scraped across the floor, and what remained of his cloak rose a moment later in the wind.
The chain did not stop when its attack ended.
Its thick links dragged across the outer corridor. A black scar appeared on the stone. The far end vanished into the mist, and whatever was pulling it could not be seen.
One step.
Iron struck stone.
A moment later, another step.
The shape within the mist retreated at the same pace, as though it were waiting for Alucard to follow.
He rested a hand upon Mormegil’s hilt. When he tensed his right arm, the place where one of Medusa’s serpents had bitten him swelled hard beneath the skin. The poison had chilled his fingertips before settling above the elbow.
It had not disappeared.
With every beat of his heart, it pushed a little farther inward.
A curved blade had also left its mark across his abdomen. Blood had spread beneath the lower edge of the Spike Breaker, leaving the space between armor and clothing cold and wet. The left shoulder plate torn away by the Darkwing Bat was still missing. Rain entered through the gap, soaking an old burn and the fresh wound beneath it.
The rain fell upward.
The clouds lay far below his feet, but droplets rose from them toward the inverted castle. They crossed the edge of the corridor, struck the underside of the stone floor, and then crept toward Alucard’s boots as though recovering their sense of gravity.
Lightning split the clouds.
White light swept across the outer wall.
The shape in the mist appeared again.
One shoulder stood higher than the other. Its head did not rest upon its neck. It hung tilted to the left, fastened to the chest with thick black thread and iron spikes. Its right arm reached below the knee, while the left was much shorter. In its long hand it held a blade as tall as a man.
It resembled an axe, though the shape of its edge was uneven. It looked as though a shattered executioner’s sword and a war axe had been forced together.
Blue current moved between the spikes in its neck.
The shape remained even after the light had vanished.
Inside Alucard’s coat, the three relics began to beat.
Thump.
The Ring of Vlad.
Thump.
The Rib of Vlad.
Thump.
The Heart of Vlad.
A fourth beat answered from within the creature beyond the mist.
Thump.
The sound was harder than a heartbeat. It was the pulse of something trapped between bone and metal, grinding its teeth.
Alucard did not take out the Holy Glasses.
There was no illusion here.
The thing before him was far too real.
He followed the scar left by the chain.
The wider the corridor became, the more iron rings appeared in the walls. Some had been fixed at the height of a standing prisoner. Others were set low, as though meant to restrain a horse—or something larger.
Every ring was bent inward.
Something had torn itself free.
A finger hung from one of them.
It had not been severed from a hand. The single finger had been removed and stitched directly to the metal. Its skin had dried black, but the nail remained clean. The first joint was thick, like that of a man who had spent years holding a sword.
Hair clung to the next ring.
A fragment of shoulder armor hung from another.
A little flesh remained inside the armor. Saw marks showed along the cut.
Alucard did not let his gaze linger.
The relics continued to beat in the same direction as he walked. Their three pulses overlapped, then separated again.
He placed his palm over the breastplate.
“Be still.”
The beating did not cease.
The fourth pulse beyond the mist drew closer.
Thump.
The chain moved again.
This time, it came from the side.
Alucard lowered himself. The heavy links passed above his head and struck the wall. The chain pulled taut and tore a stone pillar from its base.
The pillar fell across the corridor.
He leapt.
His boot touched the side of the falling pillar, and the Leap Stone carried him through a second step in the empty air. He passed through the rain and landed beyond the collapsing stone.
As he touched down, his right arm stiffened.
The poison had moved beyond the elbow and into the shoulder. His fingers spread wide enough to lose Mormegil’s hilt before slowly curling again.
Alucard looked down at his right hand.
Medusa’s poison was trying to rob him of movement before it killed him. A single sword stroke delayed by an instant, one finger failing to close completely—that was enough.
Inside the castle, such small differences divided the front of the throat from the back.
He drew his sword with his left hand.
Gray fractures remained across the hand where the petrification had receded. Black lines left by Akmodan II’s curse ran beneath them. Stone dust fell when he bent his wrist, but he did not lose the blade.
The mist cleared.
A broad chamber opened at the end of the corridor.
Half of its outer wall was gone. Beyond it lay black clouds and, far below, the lights of another castle hanging in the darkness. Copper rods stood at regular intervals along the surviving wall. Cables rose from them toward the ceiling, converging above a massive chair in the center of the room.
No one sat in it.
Only torn leather restraints remained.
The creature stood before the chair.
From this distance, the boundaries of its body became clearer.
The left side of its face belonged to an old man. The eyelid sagged heavily, and an ancient sword scar crossed the cheek. The right side was much younger. The skin was a different color, and the length of the jaw did not match. Black thread joined the two faces, descending from the bridge of the nose, passing through the lips, and continuing down the neck.
Its chest was unnaturally wide. The ribs of different men seemed to have been layered together, one side raised while the other caved inward. A warrior’s knee guard had been driven into one thigh along with the flesh beneath it. A fragment of priestly cloth had been stitched into the other calf.
The end of the chain was wrapped around its waist.
The creature raised the enormous axe with its long right arm.
The iron spikes in its neck shone blue.
Current flowed from the shoulder into the forearm. Each seam lit in turn and hardened. Fingers that had hung slack closed around the axe handle.
The creature lifted its head.
Two different eyes looked toward the same place.
Alucard’s chest.
The three relics hidden within.
The creature did not roar.
Its mouth opened, but no single human voice emerged. Several breaths escaped at different speeds. One lung gave a long moan. The other coughed three times.
The axe rose.
Alucard watched the shoulder.
The right arm was heavy. Before the weapon fell, the elbow moved outward. Alucard judged the distance and stepped once to the left.
The axe came down.
It was faster than he had expected.
The creature’s muscles did not pull the arm.
The lightning in its neck did.
Alucard raised Mormegil and caught the blade.
Metal struck metal.
Blue sparks ran down the sword to the hilt. The current did not stop at the steel. It passed through the wet glove and entered his left arm. Lightning forced its way into the cracks left by the petrification.
His hand locked.
The weight of the axe pressed down on the sword.
Alucard tried to retreat, but the rainwater beneath his boots shone blue. Current spread across the floor and seized both legs.
The creature twisted the axe.
Mormegil flew from his hand.
The black blade slid across the stone and stopped at the far end of the chamber.
A moment later, the creature’s short left arm struck Alucard in the chest.
It felt less like a fist than a block of stone thrown from a wall. The Spike Breaker thundered inward. Alucard staggered several steps before falling to one knee.
The wound across his abdomen opened again.
Blood ran beneath the armor.
The creature did not immediately pursue him.
It dragged the axe forward and took one step.
The long right leg moved first. The short left leg followed late, catching against the stone. Every second step twisted the waist. Each time, current leapt from the spikes in its neck and forced the body upright again.
Alucard rose.
His first judgment had been wrong.
He had tried to read the creature’s weight and joints.
But muscles did not move that body.
The body gave warning, and the lightning erased the warning.
The creature raised the axe sideways.
This time, the elbow did not open.
Current raced from the neck to the wrist first.
Alucard ducked.
The axe passed above his hair. The wind lifted the remains of his cloak. Unable to stop the force of its own rotation, the creature turned and exposed its back.
Alucard closed the distance empty-handed.
He placed his left palm against the seam at the creature’s waist. Beneath the black thread, he felt the temperatures of several bodies. Some parts were cold as ice. Others held the heat of decay.
He hooked his fingers beneath the thread and pulled.
One seam snapped.
The creature’s side opened. Instead of blood, black liquid and fragments of old cloth spilled out. Two layers of ribs and tangled copper wires showed within.
The body stopped.
Alucard stepped back.
The spikes in its neck flashed.
Current passed through the broken seam. The copper wires burned blue, and the separated flesh drew together. The black thread did not return, but the electricity forced the muscles to interlock.
The creature turned.
Its left hand reached for Alucard’s throat.
He leaned backward. The fingertips brushed his chin. The creature planted the missed hand against the floor.
It dropped to one knee.
The axe came down beside it.
Alucard thought it had lost its balance.
Mormegil lay across the chamber. He could use the Leap Stone to pass over the creature’s head and reach the sword. This kneeling posture offered the longest opening he had seen.
He ran.
On his second step, the creature’s shoulders folded inward.
Its long arms wrapped around its chest.
The head dropped between its knees.
The enormous body curled into a sphere.
Alucard tried to stop, but his boots slid across the wet stone.
The creature began to roll.
At first, slowly.
Then its weight crushed down upon the floor.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
The stitched body, axe, and chain became a single mass crossing the corridor. Current from the neck spikes circled the rolling form like a blue ring.
Alucard leapt aside.
The chain followed a moment later.
A heavy link caught around his boot.
His body struck the ground.
The rolling creature came directly toward him.
Alucard used the Form of Mist.
Black vapor scattered over the stone. The creature passed through its center. The axe, bones, and spikes could not seize the mist.
The lightning around its body could.
Blue current divided the vapor.
Alucard’s awareness scattered into dozens of fragments. Some hung above the creature’s head. Others mixed with the rainwater on the floor. The electricity forced each piece of mist in a different direction.
He compelled himself back into human form.
The instant his body reassembled, the creature struck the opposite wall.
Crash.
The stone caved inward.
The creature did not stop.
The force of impact sent it back the way it had come.
The spherical mass rolled toward him again.
Alucard had no time to stand. He drew upon the Leap Stone, kicked away from the floor, and stepped a second time in the empty air.
The creature passed beneath him.
His hair and cloak did not escape.
The electricity surrounding the body scorched the edge of the red cloth. What remained of his cloak caught fire and tore free from his shoulder.
Alucard twisted in midair.
He placed his right hand against the ground as he landed.
The wrist, stiffened by poison, failed beneath his weight.
His arm folded.
His shoulder struck stone.
The creature hit the wall again.
Crash.
Stone dust poured down.
The second crossing began.
Alucard now understood that kneeling was not weakness. The creature folded its mismatched limbs into a circular frame. The imbalance that plagued it while standing disappeared when it rolled.
But each time it struck a wall, the whole body came loose.
For a brief instant.
Immediately after impact, before lightning flowed again, the stitched shoulder, waist, and knees sagged in different directions.
In that instant, the creature had no single body.
The third crossing began.
Alucard did not rise.
He remained with one knee raised, watching it approach. The spikes within the spherical shape flashed blue. The chain dragged behind, sweeping across the chamber in a wide arc.
He moved at the last possible moment.
When the creature was one sword’s length away, he threw himself sideways.
His shoulder scraped the floor.
The creature passed beside him.
The chain wrapped around his abdomen.
The links pressed into the reopened wound.
His breath stopped.
The chain dragged him forward.
Stone tore at his armor. The exposed skin of his left shoulder split open. He seized the chain with both hands, but the right lacked strength and the left could not bear the current.
The wall drew closer.
If he struck it with the creature, not even the Spike Breaker would save his ribs.
Alucard transformed into a bat.
His body shrank and slipped between the links. Black wings opened. He cut through the rising rain and flew toward the upper part of the chamber.
The creature struck the wall.
Crash.
This time, the fracture reached the outer surface.
A piece of the wall broke free and fell toward the clouds. Wind rushed through the opening. The copper rods shook, and one of the ceiling cables snapped, hanging over the center of the chamber.
The creature’s body loosened.
One arm dropped to the side.
The head half-detached from the chest.
Its mouth opened wide.
Alucard stopped beating his wings.
A dim white gleam showed inside the mouth.
The two jaws belonged to different men. The teeth did not match in shape or color. Most were black with decay or had been replaced with iron.
But one fang in the center of the lower jaw remained whole.
It was longer than any human tooth.
A blood-red root passed through the jawbone and reached the copper wiring in the neck. The current did not begin in the iron spikes.
It passed through the white fang first, then spread into the neck and chest.
The three relics inside Alucard’s coat beat at once.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
The fang answered from within the creature’s mouth.
Thump.
The Tooth of Vlad.
His father’s tooth was biting into that body.
It held the arms and legs of dead warriors, the mismatched hearts and lungs, and kept them from falling apart. The lightning did not give them strength.
It carried the bite through the entire body.
The creature’s jaw closed.
Current flowed again.
The hanging arm was dragged back into its shoulder. The half-fallen head locked between the spikes. The legs found the floor.
The creature rose.
This time, it did not lift the axe.
The seam in its right arm had opened widely where Alucard had torn it. Several fingers would no longer move. The creature looked at the useless limb, then seized it with the left hand.
It tore its own arm from the shoulder.
Black liquid poured across the floor.
The creature raised the severed arm like a club.
The fang in its neck shone.
Electricity flowed through the copper wire inside the detached limb and reached the fingertips. The dead hand closed into a fist.
The creature swung its own arm.
Alucard folded his wings and dropped.
Blue current passed above his head. He returned to human form and rolled across the floor.
Mormegil was close.
His left hand closed around the hilt.
The black blade gave a low hum.
Countless deaths lay inside the creature’s body. Mormegil trembled more violently than before. The sword tried to move toward them on its own.
Alucard tightened his wrist and forced the point down.
“Not yet.”
The creature brought the severed arm down again.
Alucard stepped aside. The dead hand struck the floor and released a fan of blue current across the water.
He placed one boot upon a dry stone between the currents.
The next attack came from the right.
After swinging the arm, the creature could not turn its body back into position. The short left leg twisted first. The long right leg tried to catch up.
Alucard entered the opening.
Mormegil cut across the creature’s side.
Two lines of black thread snapped.
The waist opened.
Electricity moved to seal the wound.
Alucard cut the same place a second time.
The copper wire broke.
This time, the flesh did not return.
The creature’s upper body tilted sideways. Instead of falling, it planted its remaining hand on the floor. Its neck turned, and two different eyes fixed upon Alucard.
The creature dropped to one knee again.
Alucard did not move.
The body folded into a sphere.
The rolling charge.
But this time, something had changed.
With the severed arm gone, one side of the body was hollow. The creature wrapped the chain around the empty space. The iron links tightened around the waist and shoulder, forming a new outer skeleton.
Blue current illuminated the entire chain.
The creature rolled.
It moved faster.
The lighter side prevented it from traveling in a straight line. It curved across the chamber, following Alucard.
He leapt with the Leap Stone.
The creature changed direction.
Instead of striking the wall, the spherical body circled beneath him. The end of the chain rose like a whip.
Alucard struck it with Mormegil.
Blade and link collided.
The current bit into his hand again.
The gray cracks in his left hand opened. Blood spread across the palm.
He did not release the sword.
Instead of pushing the chain away, he drove the blade between two links.
The creature’s rotation caught Mormegil and pulled.
Alucard was dragged downward.
He seized the sword with both hands. His poisoned right hand closed over the left. The fingers could not fully grip, but they could press the other hand against the hilt.
The creature rolled toward the wall.
Mormegil remained trapped in the chain.
Alucard was pulled with it.
The wall approached.
At the final moment, he released the sword.
Mormegil flew with the chain and the creature.
The sword point struck a gap between the stones first.
The chain pulled taut.
The creature’s rotation did not stop.
Crash.
Its body struck the wall, but the chain remained caught between Mormegil and the stone. The links that had bound the spherical body tightened around its waist and neck all at once.
The creature’s body bent backward.
Its jaw opened wide.
The Tooth of Vlad was exposed.
Electricity gathered around the fang.
Alucard ran.
The creature’s short leg struck the ground. It twisted, trying to break the chain. The long arm without its axe reached toward him.
He slid beneath it.
His foot landed on the creature’s chest.
The Leap Stone carried him upward a second time.
His hand reached the jaw.
With his left hand, he seized the seam along the upper jaw. His right hand entered the open mouth. The poison-stiffened fingers closed around the white fang.
The creature’s jaw began to shut.
Alucard braced his elbow against the lower jaw.
The teeth pierced his glove.
Blood ran.
The current in the neck erupted.
Blue light swallowed his right arm.
Lightning followed the veins where Medusa’s poison still pulsed. His shoulder and chest locked. His sight turned white.
Countless hearts beat inside the creature.
Some had belonged to warriors.
Some to prisoners who had died long ago.
Some had been taken from bodies that could no longer be identified.
Beneath them all, the Tooth of Vlad forced a single rhythm upon them.
Thump.
The Ring answered inside Alucard’s coat.
Thump.
The Rib answered.
Thump.
The Heart answered.
The creature’s jaw closed farther.
The bones of Alucard’s right arm screamed.
The four pulses pulled at his chest. His father’s body was trying to form in the place where no body remained. Hand, rib, heart, and tooth called to one another.
Alucard clenched his teeth.
Within those pulses, he searched for another.
It was neither fast nor deep.
Poison and injury had made it irregular, but it obeyed no one.
His own heart.
Thump.
He twisted his hand to that rhythm.
The root of the fang shifted within the jaw.
The creature convulsed.
The chain pulled against Mormegil. Cracks spread through the wall around the sword. The creature’s long arm struck Alucard across the back.
The Spike Breaker thundered.
Once.
Twice.
On the third blow, the red scars across the breastplate shone.
Alucard did not release the fang.
He twisted again.
A copper wire broke at the root.
The current in the neck faltered.
The creature’s left eye closed.
Alucard pressed one foot against the spike in its chest.
He pulled with his right hand.
The Tooth of Vlad came free from the jaw.
The sound was small.
No louder than a nail being drawn from wet wood.
But the creature’s entire body stopped.
The electricity vanished.
The jaw fell open.
Alucard dropped to the floor with the fang in his hand.
The creature remained standing.
Its two eyes looked in different directions.
The long leg stepped forward.
The short leg stepped backward.
The remaining arm tried to seize Alucard, but the shoulder turned toward the opposite side of the body. The ribs within the chest rose and fell at different speeds.
What had been one body became many deaths again.
The creature tried to roll.
It dropped to one knee.
Without the current binding the limbs together, the waist seam opened first. The upper body leaned sideways, and the long leg folded in the wrong direction.
The black threads broke one by one.
The head fell from the chest.
The long arm struck the floor.
Its fingers continued trying to grasp something. There was no axe handle and no chain, yet they curled once in the empty air like the fingers of a man remembering a sword.
Alucard did not cut the hand.
The creature’s chest opened.
Fragments of mismatched armor, broken arrowheads, and rusted insignias spilled out. They were the traces that had been erased to create a single body.
The severed head faced the floor.
The old side of its lips moved.
No sound emerged.
The younger eye closed as well.
The body did not explode.
It did not burn.
It simply loosened along every stitched seam, surrendering the shape it had borrowed for so long.
Only two iron spikes remained in the neck.
A blue spark passed between them once.
Crackle.
Then it went out.
Only the sound of rain remained inside the chamber.
Droplets rose from below, crossed the broken wall, and settled upon scattered armor, severed fingers, and nameless bones.
Alucard did not move for some time.
The fang in his right hand was long and heavy. Black blood and broken copper wire clung to its root. It was slightly warmer than human flesh, and its point remained sharp despite the passing years.
The Tooth of Vlad.
He opened his palm.
The fang beat once.
Thump.
The Ring answered.
Thump.
The Rib answered.
Thump.
The Heart answered.
Thump.
The four pulses overlapped.
Strength returned to Alucard’s right hand.
Medusa’s poison had not disappeared. Cold remained in the fingertips, and the bite along the arm was still swollen black.
But his fingers closed completely once more.
He did not drop the Tooth.
He did not mistake his father’s power for his own.
He could merely endure the weight in his hand.
That was enough.
Alucard crossed to the wall where Mormegil remained embedded. He placed one boot on the chain and pulled the sword free. A thin fracture left by the blue current ran along the blade, but the steel had not broken.
He did not wipe it clean.
Rain washed the black blade before the creature’s blood could dry.
He placed the Tooth of Vlad inside his coat.
When the four relics drew close, the wall trembled.
Thump.
This time, only one answer returned.
The sound of small pieces of metal touching.
Ching.
A moment later, again.
Ching.
Scythes.
More than one.
Dozens of small scythes were circling in the darkness, their blades brushing against one another.
The sound came from deeper within the castle, from a passage where raw stone had swallowed the walls.
The iron door behind the creature’s chair began to move.
At first, it opened only wide enough for a finger. Then rusted gears turned, drawing the entire door upward. Beyond it stood a narrow stair descending between roughly carved cavern walls.
Cold air flowed out.
It carried no scent of incense.
No scent of rotting blood.
It was air without smell, like a blade polished for many years.
Alucard stood before the stairs.
Behind him, the dismantled bodies lay beneath the rising rain. No lightning descended to stitch them together again.
He wrapped the bite on his right hand with the last strip of his cloak. Black blood appeared when he tightened the knot.
The sound of scythes ceased below.
Perfect silence followed.
Alucard did not return Mormegil to its sheath.
He stepped onto the first stair.
A silver blade flew from the darkness.
He tilted his head.
The small scythe cut a single strand of hair and buried itself in the doorframe behind him.
There was no blood on the blade.
Instead, a thread of familiar black cloth had wound around it.
It came from the garment of the one who had taken his weapons and armor at the castle entrance.
Alucard did not remove the scythe.
He passed beside it and descended the stairs.
From deep within the darkness came laughter, long and soft as an exhaled breath.
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