Vaseria, Romania-December 1889
A thick blanket of snow lay over the quiet streets of Vaseria. Many windows glowed an inviting, cheerful yellow, suggesting that warm fires blazed within the buildings.
Towards the outskirts of the town was a large manor-Valerious Manor, the manor that, for centuries, had been the home of the reigning Gypsy royalty. Like the houses and shops in the village, many of the windows here were alight with a soft golden glow. And…if one were to listen close enough, they would hear a loud, clear tenor voice singing out carols of the season…someone in Valerious Manor was in a festive mood…
Angels, we have heard on high
Sweetly singing o’er the plains
Inside the large manor, Gabriel Van Helsing, the reigning King of the Gypsies, was balancing precariously on a stool, trying to hang a long stretch of evergreen garland from an archway right outside of one of the spacious living rooms in the manor. Despite the fact that he had been trying to hang the blasted garland for nearly an hour with little progress, he still smiled cheerfully-a very rare thing for him to do-and kept singing:
And the mountains in reply
Echoing their joyous strains
Suddenly, a pure, clear soprano joined his own voice. His smile only grew-he would recognize that voice anywhere. The voice of his angel…
Gloria!
In excelses deo!
Gloria!
In excelses deo!
Van Helsing looked down over his shoulder. Gabrielle, his wife, the true last of the Valerious line-and Queen of the Gypsies to boot-stood about ten feet behind him. She looked around the room that the hunter had been painstakingly decorating all day; her astonishingly gray eyes sparkled with delight, and her blood-red lips turned up in a pleased smile.
“Judging by your expression, I’d say you like it…” Van Helsing said, giving her a loving smile before turning back to focus on the task of hanging that pesky garland.
“Gabriel…it’s beautiful…” she said softly, looking around the room. “Everything’s wonderful…everything looks exactly the way it did when I was a child…”
“Good,” Van Helsing said, feeling triumphant as he finally got the garland to hang the desired way. “That was my intention…”
“It’s…it’s perfect…” she praised. Her eyes took on a sort of dreamy look, the look one often got they were daydreaming or reminiscing. Van Helsing jumped down from the stool he had been precariously perched on, landing gracefully on his feet. He approached Gabrielle and gently wrapped his arms around her waist, kissing her on top of her head. She smiled up at her husband.
“Everything looks exactly as it did when I was a girl,” she sighed. “It really takes me back, Gabriel. It takes me back to all those Christmases as a child…” She could see the large evergreen tree that had been set up in the living room and decorated over the hunter’s shoulder, and she gave a small giggle. “Ah, the tree…oh, Anna used to love when the tree was decorated when she was a baby. Her and Velkan both…they’d just sit in front of the tree for hours at a time and stare at it…”
Van Helsing gave a small chuckle at the thought of both Velkan and Anna, Gabrielle’s deceased brother and sister, sitting in front of the Christmas tree for hours as babies. Then, his smile faded slightly, and he sighed. “You know…this is the first time in about eight years I haven’t spent a Christmas at the Vatican. Actually…it’s kind of nice…”
“What was Christmas at the Vatican like?” Gabrielle asked as they moved into the next room to sit on the couch near the fireplace. A thoughtful servant had placed a mug of mulled cider and a mug of warmed cattle blood out on the small table before the couch for Van Helsing and Gabrielle. They both took the mugs, sat on the couch, and sipped from them as they watched the fire crackle and pop.
“Far more extravagant then this…” he said with a smirk. “Cardinal Jinette was always left in charge of decorating all around the basilica, and he took that job very, very seriously. I often believe they over-exaggerated Christmas at the Vatican…” He paused and thought over his last few words. “Now, don’t get me wrong-I believe Christmas is a wonderful and undoubtedly important time of the year. But…at the Vatican, they really took the sanctity out of it and made it more superficial…and all the people who came to worship there, or simply look around at the lavish decorations…all the common people that believed me a murderer…I usually spent my Christmases there by myself. Hmm…wonder how Alexsei and Catherine are enjoying themselves at the Vatican this year…”
Gabrielle smiled when her husband mentioned his younger sister and her husband, both of whom were close, personal friends of hers. Both of them had returned to the Vatican to take Van Helsing’s place until he decided to return…whenever that may be.
“Well…if they get fed up with all that nonsense at the Vatican or that Cardinal Jinette fellow I’ve heard so much about, they’re more than welcome here…”
A mischievous little grin grew on her face. Van Helsing couldn’t help but let a little grin cross his face as well. “I know that grin…” he said. “You’ve planned something, haven’t you, Gabrielle? You’ve planned something that involves Catherine and Alexsei, haven’t you?”
“Perhaps…” she said coyly. She daintily crossed one leg over the other in a way the hunter found practically irresistible and took a sip from her mug of warmed blood.
“Come on, Gabby. What are you planning?”
“I never said I was planning anything…” she said, a slight sing-song to her voice. “I simply said-”
Out of nowhere, there came a knocking at the door. Gabrielle set her mug down-rather eagerly, Van Helsing noticed-and stood up, hurrying to the door with a grin on her face. As he watched her go, he smiled and gave a contented sigh-every day, he simply fell more and more in love with her…
A few minutes later, Gabrielle returned to the room. Her face was ashen and bloodless, and her large grey eyes were filled with worry. Van Helsing was on his feet in an instant, crossing the room towards her in long strides.
“Gabrielle? What is it? What’s wrong?”
She said nothing, only turned and walked back towards the front door, gesturing for him to follow. He did; his heart began to pound with dread. What could possibly be at the front door that had
Gabrielle so spooked?
The front hall was drafty owing to the fact that Gabrielle had left the front door open. She stopped at the threshold; picked something up and closed the door, then turned to face her husband.
She held a small basket, one very crude and obviously hand-woven. The inside of the basket was lined with a thin, threadbare, tattered old blanket…and nestled inside the old blanket was a baby, only a week old-if that-sound asleep.
***
Van Helsing placed the basket on a chair close to the large fireplace to help the baby warm up from being left outside with the snow, making sure to set the basket down very carefully, so as not to awaken the infant. The child didn’t stir. He smiled softly and turned, crossing the room to Gabrielle, who stood near the threshold of the room with an apprehensive look on her face.
“So…you just found the child on our doorstep?”
She nodded. “I opened the door…and the only thing there was the basket…with the child in it…”
“Was there any sort of note or anything? Any indication of who his or her parents are..?”
“Her,” Gabrielle said. “It’s a girl. I looked. And no…there was nothing. There weren’t even any footprints in the snow leading to or from the manor. Just…” She trailed off, gesturing towards the basket on the chair.
Van Helsing glanced at the basket, and after looking at for a long moment, a small smile crossed his face. He looked back at Gabrielle.
“Perhaps it’s meant to be a sign,” he said. “A sign that…that we’re supposed to raise her as our daughter. Clearly, she has no other parents…”
Gabrielle gave a small nod. She was still eyeing the basket in fear and apprehension; her strange behavior made the hunter curious. He approached her and placed a hand on her shoulder.
“Gabrielle? What’s wrong?”
She cast another nervous glance at the basket the baby girl lay sleeping in before bowing her head. Van Helsing’s brow furrowed. He was getting some inkling as to what Gabrielle’s strange behavior meant. “Gabrielle…are you nervous about taking her in? Are you nervous about becoming her mother?”
Gabrielle looked back up, blood tears brimming in her eyes. “No…it’s not as much that as…as I’m…Gabriel, someone has left an innocent, defenseless child on our doorstep. Do you know what kind of blood thrills a vampire most of all? The blood of defenseless, innocent children, especially babies…It’s been known to practically bring new life to some vampires! Some vampires have even gone mad and slaughtered dozens of innocent infants and children, simply to drink their blood…Gabriel…what if I hurt her? What if I’m like these vampires? What if I slaughter her to simply to feast upon her blood? God…I would never forgive myself!”
She stopped and bowed her head again; a few blood tears trickled down her face. Van Helsing simply stared at her for a long moment, letting what she had said soak in, pondering over what she had said. He then gently reached out and lifted her chin so they were looking into each other’s eyes.
“Gabrielle Alexandra Valerious Van Helsing,” he said softly, yet with a firmness to his tone. “Listen to yourself. You think you’re some kind of vicious, bloodthirsty monster…but Gabrielle…You’re different from other vampires. You have a heart that beats and feels for everyone. You have a lingering respect for humanity. That respect makes you much, much different from a bloodthirsty monster. I know you never would-”
A whimpering cry interrupted him. Van Helsing looked over at the basket perched on the chair. A small hand poked out, grasping at the air. The baby girl cried out again, expressing her discomfort. The hunter placed a hand on his wife’s shoulder and gave a gentle push towards the basket. She understood his implications and she cautiously approached the basket and lifted the infant from it.
For the first time, she got a good look at the girl. Even though she was barely a week old, she already had a few soft tufts of dark brown hair. Her round little cherubic cheeks were flushed from crying, and her eyes were scrunched tight. She reminded Gabrielle of Anna as a baby…so much so, it made her heart melt.
“Shush…don’t cry, little one…” she cooed softly, gently stroking the child’s face. “Don’t cry. I won’t hurt you…I won’t ever hurt you…”
As she cooed, the child’s sobs gradually quieted. She blinked up at Gabrielle with teary blue eyes, but she had stopped crying. Van Helsing moved to Gabrielle’s side and slid an arm around her waist, smiling down gently at her. He didn’t even have to say anything; Gabrielle could see the pride in his hazel eyes. She looked back down at the little girl, who had seized a strand of her raven hair and was sucking contentedly on it.
“You know, Gabriel…” she said softly. “You…you may be right. Maybe we are meant to raise her up as our daughter….maybe…I-I mean…I want to…so…”
“So raise her, we shall!” Van Helsing finished. “She’ll be our daughter. Does she…do you think she has a name?”
“I don’t know…” she said. “There’s no way to know…but I had a thought…how do you feel about Nickelia?”
“Nickelia?”
Gabrielle nodded, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “Yes…Nickelia. It’s a bit of an older name…my mother used to tell me that it means ‘beautiful angel of courage’…I always thought it was a lovely name…”
Van Helsing nodded. “Yes…yes. I agree, it is a lovely name. Nickelia…yes…” He gave the child a gentle smile. “Do you like that, little one?”
Nickelia made a soft cooing noise and reached for the hunter. He gently took her, cradling her in his arms as if he had done it many times before…even though, as far as he knew, he had fathered no children, and the closest he had ever come to caring for an infant was helping to care for Catherine when she was an infant-all memories of which were buried in the deep, dark recesses of his mind, so near, and yet, still so far. He gently stroked the tuft of dark hair on the little girl’s head, and she yawned. Gabrielle kissed her on the top of her head, then let her head rest on Van Helsing’s arm.
“One happy little family…” she said.
***
Three Days Later
Someone was pounding furiously at the door.
Van Helsing looked up from the book he was reading, which was the field diary belonging to Dracula that he had commandeered from Van Helsing Manor when Catherine had found it. Gabrielle had left about twenty minutes earlier to bathe Nickelia and put her to bed for the night.
The insistent pounding continued, and he kept listening. He could’ve sworn he heard a voice calling out as the pounding continued. Van Helsing looked around, seizing a dagger from a nearby side table, then slowly and cautiously made his way to the front door.
The closer he got, the more he realized he was right…Someone was yelling outside, calling his name over and over again. There was a thick Romanian accent to the voice, and whoever was yelling was male…It sounded so familiar…
It sounds like…though it can’t be…can it? He thought as his hand gently closed around the handle of the door. Twirling the dagger in his hand so it was ready, should he need to plunge it into something, he turned the knob gently and yanked the door open.
To his amazement, his brother-in-law Alexsei stood outside the door. A thick dusting of snow had settled overtop his ink-colored hair, and his simple white tunic and black leggings were ripped and torn, as though he had been running long and hard through dense forests…perhaps even running in his wolf-form. The knee-length black coat he wore over his clothing was also ripped, and looked as though it was barely keeping him warm in the harsh Transylvanian winter outside.
Van Helsing lowered the dagger, his brow furrowing in confusion.
“Alexsei..?”
“Gabriel…Van Helsing! Ah, thank God you’re here!” Alexsei said. “I had thought you and Gabrielle would reside here, but I knew there was always the possibility you two had chosen to reside at your family manor…”
Van Helsing took a step backwards to allow Alexsei in. He came in with a grateful nod, then proceeded to shake like a wet dog to rid himself of the snow in his hair. “Alexsei…I thought you were in Rome, at the Vatican…”
“I was. Not so much now, though.” He pushed a few messy strands of hair from his face, and the hunter noticed something he hadn’t seen on Alexsei’s face before: Twin scars, one on each of Alexsei’s temples…and they looked as though the wounds that had left them had been recently inflicted.
“Alexsei…where did those come from-?”
A piercing cry split the air, and Gabrielle came back into the front hall, carrying a squalling Nickelia and wearing a scowl. Alexsei raised a brow in surprise at the sight of the baby, but said nothing.
“God, who was pounding at the door and shouting?” she asked angrily. “Whoever it was woke Nikki-” She stopped short when she saw Alexsei. “Alexsei? What are you doing here?”
He sighed. “Gabriel…Gabrielle…there’s trouble at the Vatican…”
A/N: Nickelia is pronounced "ni-kay-lee-uh"
