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In the dark of Sister Agatha's workshop, she and the Count were now alone. Miss Murray's footsteps could be heard echoing from the corridor as she fled the room. The choice was made: Sister Agatha's life for Miss Murray's. Miss Murray would survive, live on, return to England most likely, and Sister Agatha would not survive. Or so it seemed.
Agatha removed the blade from her throat and reaffixed her wimple.
The Count frowned as Agatha's neck was re-covered. "No," he said, his tone cajoling, a confused smile flitting across his face. "No. Agatha. What are you doing? We had a deal. Your life for hers."
"Yes," said Agatha, pocketing the knife and smoothing down her habit. "But you said you would make me last." She looked at him. "Do you really think biting my neck is the way to do that?"
The Count hissed. He took a step closer. "Oh, it is. I've done it before. I could make you last a week, two weeks, three."
Agatha took a step back. "Not with me. You wouldn't have the control. Of course you wouldn't. You proved that before, when you were licking my blood from the cobbles like a dog."
"I didn't lick the cobbles."
Agatha sneered. "It was close enough."
"Well, now," said the Count, taking another step forward and smiling when Agatha stepped back further and met the wall behind her. "Perhaps," he said, "you didn't see me at my best. But I promise you I can exercise control." He smiled again. "Now be a good girl and remove that wimple; I would hate to stain it."
"No," said Agatha. She looked up at the Count and pressed her hands to the wall at her sides. "No. This is not the way to make me last and you know it. You know there is another way; I can tell that you do."
The Count stared at her, breathing heavily.
"Come," said Agatha, flashing the Count a smile, "there is no need to hide it. You know. You have known all this time. How could you not? You are a vampire."
The Count snarled.
"Look at you," said Agatha. "You have gorged yourself on all my sisters in this convent and still you want to gorge yourself on me. Straight for the jugular, always. You are greedy and predictable."
"Not actually the jugular I go for," said the Count.
"What does it matter?" asked Agatha. "It matters only that you are a beast and like a beast you have no self-control. You want to go for the throat and drain me of my life when you know there is another way: a way that would leave me healthy and fresh." She looked him in the eye. "Do you really like to drink from living corpses? From people like Mr Harker as they moulder away; their blood losing its potency and their minds losing their spirit?"
"Oh, I think your spirit would last for a while," said the Count.
"Not long enough," returned Agatha. "Not as long as you'd like."
The Count shifted his weight. A smile crawled across his face. "And you have another idea, do you?"
"You know what it is," said Agatha. She raised her chin. "Prove to me you are a man with reason, and not a spoiled child breaking all his toys."
The Count stared at her.
"I am surprised..." said the Count after a moment, reaching out and taking up Agatha's bandaged hand.
Agatha inhaled as her hand was turned over, palm exposed.
"I am surprised," repeated the Count, looking from the bloody bandage on Agatha's hand to Agatha's face, "that you would let me." He smiled toothily. "I didn't think it was something you nuns went in for."
Agatha's jaw clenched. "I am not a very good nun," she said.
"That's debatable," said the Count, looking to her hand once more, turning it this way and that. "You are very persuasive." He gave her a sly glance.
Agatha responded with a humourless smile. She pulled her hand from the Count's grasp and returned it flat against the wall. "Go on then," she said.
The Count snarled and crowded even closer, face looming above Agatha, his eyes red, teeth sharp. "You are bleeding," he breathed.
Agatha smirked up at him. "Correct."
"You are bleeding. You have been all this time. This whole evening. Even before you cut your hand I knew you were. I could feel it. I could smell it."
Agatha sneered. "You were panting like a bitch in heat."
"Nuns," said the Count, wonderingly. "Nuns. Nuns. How do you do it? How do you live together like this? So many women; at least one of you bleeding, always. How does it not drive you mad?"
"Our desires are different to yours," said Agatha.
"Are they really though?" asked the Count with a sharp smile.
Agatha did not respond. Instead she put her hands to the Count's shoulders and pushed down. The Count hesitated for a moment but then acquiesced, dropping to his knees. He looked up at her with his red eyes.
Agatha smiled. The bandaged hand ran through the Count's dark hair. "Come, boy," she said. "Suckle."
The Count pressed his head to Agatha's hip, leaning against the fabric of her habit and closing his eyes. For a moment he was still, inhaling, exhaling. Then eyes were opened and he grabbed at the hem of her skirts with a growl, raising them upwards, exposing shoes, stockings, thighs, hips. The skirts were thrust into Agatha's grasp so that the Count might curl a hand around each of her thighs. He leant forward bodily, his weight against her legs, his mouth open, breathing roughly.
"Wait," said Agatha, her voice unstable. "Wait. If you are impatient you will get nowhere." She gave the Count her skirts to hold once more, and she used both hands to untie the girdle she used to keep her rag in place.
This girdle was thrown to the floor, as was the rag, which was stained dark red, almost full with it, the blood still wet, glistening.
Hissing, the Count turned to follow it. He reached out an arm.
"No," said Agatha. "No." She wrested her skirts from the Count's grip. "Why are you so easily distracted? The rag is not important. You can save it for later: a little snack."
"And why," said the Count, turning to her, "are you so demanding?" He smiled widely. "My meals are never normally this demanding."
"You like it," said Agatha.
"Do I?" asked the Count, but it was a half-hearted question with he distracted again.
Both of his hands now curled around the backs of Agatha's knees, urging them wider. Breathing heavily, mouth open and eyes half-closed, he looked at her: dense brown curls, dark and wet at the tips, almost dripping. No. Dripping already, one thick drop, so deeply-red it was almost black, rolling down the inside of her thigh.
The Count leaned forward and caught it with his tongue, leaving in its wake a pink smear against her skin.
Agatha gasped. The Count growled. For a moment, silence followed.
Then the Count sat back, licking his lips. He gave Agatha a self-satisfied smile. "Oh Agatha, I am going to get to know you very well."
Idly, he reached out a finger and used it to trace that pink smear, running upwards. He touched her curls, parted her gently, two fingers now. Her legs trembled and the two fingers were removed, the fingertips red, glistening.
The Count held his hand up in the candlelight, observing his fingers with a smile on his face. Then he drew them to his mouth and licked the tips clean: one, two of them.
Agatha breathed in heavily.
"You've not done this before," he said, looking up at her with heavy-lidded eyes.
"Not," said Agatha, "with a man."
"Oh." The Count looked impressed. He raised his eyebrows. "You're really not a very good nun, are you? Or..." He waved a hand. "...is that sort of thing allowed?"
"Frowned upon," said Agatha.
The Count raised his eyebrows again. "Ah."
He returned to his inspection of her, the two fingers resuming their questing. Another drip rolled down Agatha's thigh. The Count caught it with a knuckle and drew it to his mouth, his tongue reaching out to taste it, his eyes dark.
"You're bleeding very heavily," said the Count roughly.
"It's my second day," said Agatha.
"This is normal for your second day?" breathed the Count, probing her some more with his fingers then slipping them into his mouth.
"Yes," she said.
The Count groaned. "And you give it to me willingly," he murmured, leaning closer to her so that there was a shorter distance between his probing fingers and his mouth. This continued for some time: fingers to mouth, fingers to mouth, like a bear drawing honey from a tree.
"You are being very quiet," he said after a while.
Agatha was watching him. "You're not doing much to keep me interested," she replied.
"You know, you are demanding," he said, smiling up at her. His teeth were pink. "First you want me to pace myself and now you don't."
Agatha snorted. "Do you even know what women enjoy?" she asked. "Perhaps you don't: you've been around for centuries but you've never bothered to learn."
The Count's brows lowered into a glare. "I have learned." He pressed his face forwards until he was against her, breathing into her curls. Then he reached out with his tongue, through her curls, finding the nub of her clitoris.
Agatha hissed.
The Count pressed even closer until his face was almost smothered by her, his tongue licking a long swipe from the back of her to the front, and then again. He drove forward further and lapped at the wet slit of her entrance, then pulled back to caress her clitoris once more.
Agatha was breathing heavily.
The Count laughed as he sat back to look at her. Blood covered his mouth, his chin; it glistened on the tip of his nose; it was smeared across his brow.
Agatha stared down at him and he flashed her another pink smile. Then he ducked under her again, pressing his face up against her. His tongue lapped at the slit of her and then probed harder, pushing up inside.
The Count groaned darkly. His hands clenched, shuddering, around Agatha's thighs.
One thrust of the tongue, two, three. Agatha's skirts fell about the Count's ears as she dropped them in favour of pressing her hands to the back of the Count's head. Her knees trembled.
The Count growled. He removed his tongue and replaced it with a finger, pressing deep into her. Leaning back, he shook his head free from her hands and from the folds of her skirts.
"Do you mind?" he asked. There were smears of blood on his cheeks now too, and matching smears on the hems of her skirts. "If I actually needed to breathe, I would accuse you of trying to suffocate me." He paused and observed her some more. "Your face is very red," he said approvingly. "I do love a red face."
Agatha snorted a laugh. She reached out and ran a thumb over his chin. "Yours is redder," she said hoarsely, observing her thumb for a moment and then shaking its drop of blood to the floor.
The Count frowned. "Don't waste it," he admonished. "I hate it when people waste precious things." He curled the finger that was still inside her, causing Agatha to inhale, and then he withdrew it, carefully extracting his hand from beneath her skirts and dipping that red finger into his mouth.
For a moment the Count merely sucked on his finger, closing his eyes and breathing hard through his nose. When, finally, the finger was released, it glistened pink with his saliva. Then the Count's eyes snapped open and he grabbed up Agatha's skirts, ducking his head beneath them once more.
Agatha sagged against the wall. "I can't do this," she breathed.
"Yes you can," came the Count's muffled reply. "You're doing wonderfully."
"No," said Agatha, clutching at the wall and scrabbling into a more upright position. "I mean this. Standing. Staying upright. It's too much. I'm not as young as I once was."
"Oh." The Count emerged from her skirts once more. "Well go on then," he said, gesturing at the floor. "Lie down and let's continue."
"Not here," said Agatha. She gestured vaguely at the door. "I have a bed. In there."
The Count sighed. He observed her for a moment, then rose to his feet. Taking Agatha roughly by the hand, he pulled her through the door and into the room beyond. She stumbled after him.
Through the door lay a dark room with a small bed covered in rough, woollen blankets. The only other piece of furniture was a chair beside the bed, which held a precarious pile of books.
Seemingly curious, the Count left Agatha by the door and paced the room, observing its walls, its small window. He stopped when he reached the chair. "'Superstitions of the Carpathians'," he said, reading out the title of the topmost book. "Not my choice of bed-time reading."
"To each their own," said Agatha. She staggered over to the windowsill and lit the candle that sat there. Then she removed her veil and her coif, leaving her hair pinned. Veil and coif were tossed to the floor as Agatha sat down on the bed to remove her shoes.
"I dislike staining my sheets," she said, making a face, "but it seems you are a messy eater."
"Not always." The Count turned to her with a smile, gesturing at the blood drying and darkening on his face. "This is just enthusiasm." He walked over to the bed and set one knee upon it.
Agatha put her hands in her lap and looked at the Count. "How long are you going to wear poor Mr Harker's stained old gown? You look dreadful."
The Count shrugged. "A man like me quite enjoys inspiring dread," he admitted, leaning closer and leering at her. "But that's not your point, is it?" He grinned, showing his teeth. "I know what this is. You don't care about my clothes. You just want to see me out of them."
"And why not?" said Agatha. "Do you expect me to apologise for it?"
"Oh, I put on a good show for you before," said the Count, standing back to tug the gown off over his head, "and you enjoyed it. You did; I know you did." He discarded the gown upon the floor and straightened. He was not wearing any undergarments. "You desire me," he declared, triumphant.
"I do not deny it," said Agatha.
The Count stepped back over to the bed. "Sister Agatha," he said, grinning. "Sister Agatha enjoys the company of other women but she desires me. He climbed onto the end of the bed, the muscles in his thighs flexing in the candlelight. "Lie down," he commanded.
Agatha scoffed. "How big is your ego?" But she kicked her stockinged feet up onto the bed and lay down. "You think you are the exception?" She pulled her skirts up around her hips and the Count growled. "Of course you are not," said Agatha. "I desire many men, just as I desire many women."
"Is that so?" asked the Count. His eyes were dark as he grasped Agatha's ankles. "But you don't have sex with men, do you?"
"I. Am. A. Nun," said Agatha. "Perhaps you haven't noticed, but I live in a convent. It is considerably easier to have sex with women."
The Count snorted. "Then I am still your first," he said. "Aren't you lucky?" He leaned forward, running his hands up her stockings to her knees. "You desire me, and I desire..." He pushed her knees apart. "...this." He looked down upon her. "We are not so different, you and I."
Agatha sneered. "We are entirely different."
The Count shrugged and ran his hands up her thighs. "You have ruined your petticoat," he said.
Agatha didn't answer. She reached up and grabbed his shoulders, pushing him down until she could grasp the back of his head and urge him between her legs.
The Count snarled but acquiesced, breathing hot and wet against her. He pressed closer with his nose, mouthing at her folds and then pushing his tongue past them and up inside. Agatha's chest shuddered.
With growling breaths, the Count continued, thrusting his tongue and then pulling back to merely lap at her entrance; dragging his lips across her and then lingering to suck at her clitoris. Agatha swallowed and clutched her hands in his hair. The Count pressed in with his tongue once more, stopping only to throw one of Agatha's legs over his shoulder. Agatha trembled.
The Count carried on for some time. Slick noises filled the room and the muscles of the Count's back shifted as he stretched out his neck. Agatha's toes curled against his shoulder.
"You know," said the Count, eventually, pulling back and resting his glistening face against her thigh. "You really have bled a lot in the short space of time it took us to reach the bed."
"Is that a compliment?" panted Agatha. She released his head to press her hands into the blankets
"It should be," replied the Count, running his thumb across the deep red of his bottom lip and sucking it into his mouth. Then, reaching out, he trailed two fingers along the length of her and licked them clean, one after another.
Agatha was peering down at him. "Why do your eyes turn red?" she said.
"Hmm?" The Count pressed a finger inside of her and leaned forward to lap at her clitoris with his tongue.
Agatha squirmed.
The Count drew back and added another finger. He thrust them a little and curled them, chuckling as Agatha's back arched. Then he leaned closer, hissing, to lick at his red knuckles as they emerged from her and pressed back in.
"Your eyes," repeated Agatha breathlessly, pressing her head back into the thin pillow. "They are red. Why does drinking blood make them turn red?"
"Why does being fingered make your neck turn red?" retorted the Count, glancing up at her. "It's not important, but it is delectable." He grinned and returned his face between her legs. "One day," he said, licking between his fingers, "I will taste your throat beneath my lips."
"Are you not drinking enough now?" admonished Agatha, her hands clenching in the blankets. "There are days of this to go, you know, and in another month there will be more of the same." She gave him a flushed look. "Or do you wish me to fade away, dying slowly and becoming less and less interesting until all you have left is your hunger and your regret at a lack of self-control?"
"I would miss you," admitted the Count, "but I would keep the memory of you with me." He removed his shining fingers from her and sucked them into his mouth. "Maybe killing you would be worth it," he said around them.
"It would not be worth it!" growled Agatha, punctuating each word by a kick to his shoulder with her heel.
The Count laughed, dislodging her leg and rolling over onto his back. He tipped his head back and looked up at her through his lashes. "You may be right," he said. "You are rather fun."
"Of course I am right," said Agatha, panting. She put her hands to his temples. "Now finish what you started."
"And you lecture me about self-control," said the Count smugly. He turned his head and leaned into her bandaged hand for a moment, before taking the hand up in one of his own and dragging it down to press his tongue to the bandage's dark brown stain.
Agatha inhaled sharply.
The Count smiled against her palm, then he rolled back onto his stomach, threw both her legs over his shoulders and pressed his face to her with a growl.
Agatha gasped as the Count set to work once more, licking and lapping and penetrating her with his tongue until Agatha's hips were rocking, her shoulders pressing back into the mattress. When he pulled back this time, his mouth was open, panting, his eyes as dark and red as his lips.
"Some kind of chemical process," said Agatha, swallowing between each word, her chest heaving.
"What?" asked the Count.
"Your eyes," said Agatha. She made a vague gesture at the ceiling with her hand. "It must be some kind of chemical... process, from the blood you are eating, that makes them turn red."
The Count shrugged. Mouth open, he traced the length of her with his tongue.
Agatha breathed heavily.
"It is desire," said the Count thickly. "My eyes turn red, your skin turns red. It's all the same." He circled her clitoris with his thumb and bared his teeth as she writhed. "You're red and hard," he said. "How long do you have to go?"
Agatha groaned at the ceiling. "And what about you?" she asked, panting. "Are you hard too?"
"Me?" The Count looked down himself. "No."
"What?" Agatha raised her head to look at him. "Not at all?"
"Not at all," said the Count. He retracted his thumb, sucked it into his mouth, and gave her a heavy-lidded look. "Are you disappointed?"
"Yes," said Agatha. "A little." Her head fell back to the pillow. "Do you never grow hard, then?" She swallowed. "Is that a thing that vampires can't do?"
"Desire does look good on you," said the Count, pressing a messy kiss to her thigh. He pushed a finger into her again, watching with dark eyes. "We vampires can get erections," he said. "Or at least I can, when I want to."
Agatha shuddered. "You don't want to now, then?"
"No." The Count pouted in mock-indignation. "Why would I? I'm eating." He slid his slick finger out of her and sucked it into his mouth. "You didn't answer me," he said breathlessly, licking the last of his finger clean and pushing it back into her. "How long do you have to go?"
"Why do you care?" grumbled Agatha, then gasped as the Count pressed a second finger into her and pushed his face up to nose at her clitoris. "You're eating," she said.
"Oh, I care very much," murmured the Count against her. He thrust his fingers more forcefully and Agatha's toes curled. "It's said, Agatha, that a good orgasm makes a woman bleed faster." He slid his tongue between his fingers. "I'm afraid you'll need new bedsheets by the end."
Agatha whimpered. The Count then latched onto her clitoris and she pressed her head down into the pillow, her hands reaching down to clutch at the Count's hair.
The Count acquiesced pliantly as Agatha tugged him into a position seemingly more agreeable to her.
"Here," she gasped. "Here. Faster."
The Count did as he was bid. For several moments all that could be heard were the movements of his tongue and fingers and Agatha's ragged breathing.
"Perhaps one day," he said roughly, curling the fingers that were inside her and breathing against them, "when you're not bleeding, I will get hard for you."
Agatha groaned.
"Would you like that?" He thrust his fingers harder. "We could try it. I could fuck you. And when..."
Agatha convulsed then, gasping hard, her hands clenching in the Count's hair hard enough to make him wince.
"Shh. Shh. Shh," said the Count, shaking his head until Agatha's hands let go to clutch in the blankets instead.
Agatha shuddered and shuddered and the Count continued thrusting his fingers throughout until Agatha's tremors finally calmed. He leaned forward then, and pressed his lips to her clitoris.
Agatha hissed, flinching her hips away.
"Shh. Shh. Shh," said the Count again. "Calm. Calm." He removed his red fingers from her and slid them both into his mouth.
Breathing heavily, Agatha raised her head and looked down at him.
"Did you know..." said the Count indistinctly, removing the fingers from his mouth. He leaned his head against her thigh and fluttered his eyelashes at her. "...that the French call it la petite mort?" He gave her a sharp-toothed smile. "Otherwise known as 'the little death'."
Agatha swallowed. "So I have heard," she said, her voice rough.
"It's funny, really." The Count reached out and slowly pressed his thumb inside her. She groaned.
"We vampires can survive la mort many times and keep on going. But when it comes to surviving la petite mort, it is you women who are remarkable." The Count slid his thumb back out and pressed it in again. He looked up at her with dark eyes. "How many more orgasms do you think you have in you?"
Agatha laughed incredulously. Her hands clenched in the blankets. "You just want me to bleed faster."
"Oh, Agatha. What can I say?" The Count flashed her a smile. "I am a man of simple tastes."