"No, no please, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," Erinna wept, the distraught heartbreaking sobs mingling and blending in with the various cries of agony in Death Town.

If her pleas affected him, the Count did not show it, his grip remained sure and unyielding on her much more fragile wrist and his rigid jaw as uncompromising as ever.

Death Town was just as it name suggested, Erinna was sure even if he tried harder he would not be able to make the town any more sick. How anyone could sit down and decide to build a whole town to torture and kill others, she would never understand but this was Dracula, when she thought he couldn't be more disgusting.

The reeking stench of decomposing flesh was overpowering. The very air breathed of death. Everywhere as far as the eye could see, humans and other creatures unknown were dying a slow and excruciating death.

It was taking every fiber in her to restrain herself from regurgitating her supper all over the filthy floor.

"I know you are sorry darling, that's why I'm giving you a chance to redeem yourself. Let us see just how sorry you are."

"No please, we have to go back," she begged traitorous tears falling down her smooth cheeks, her voice breaking with distress.

"But we have just arrived."

"I'll do anything," she offered without taking a moment to maul over her stupid decision but she had already learnt in her experience with the Count that desperate situations called for drastic decisions.

She was ready to do just about anything to be taken away from this nightmare come alive.

"As tempting as that is, I don't think there is anything you can offer me that I don't already have."

"My cooperation."

"Erinna I own you,body and soul. That's all that matters. Anything else that I'll want I'll take with or without your consent."

And the sad part was she knew that this was not a terrible attempt at humor, he was actually serious and the thought sent unwelcome chills down her spine.

"You're mental."

He shrugged like it didn't affect him.

"I never said I wasn't."

Soon she was being dragged again through the nauseating streets of Death Town. Desperate cries of agony and dying gasps of those who had done the ultimate sin of ever getting on the Count' wrong side or ruffling one of his precious feathers the wrong way surrounded them.

Erinna hoped she was wrong but the unmistakable malicious glint in the creature's dark eyes and the sadistic expression on his cruelly beautiful face told her that yes, he was indeed enjoying the show. That single inhumane look chilled the warm blood flowing in her veins to ice.

They passed a man in a metal cage hanging from gallows. The cage was three sizes too small and his flesh was spilling all out of it through the spaces between the bars making the cage.

The fact that it had probably been built that way to heighten discomfit was not lost on her. She shuddered, realizing that this town had been brought to life to indulge every whim of the Count's perverse and corrupted beyond belief mind.

"That's coffin torture love," he explained with a proud smile that gave her a peak into his deranged mind.

"I never asked."

She tore her eyes from the sight; she knew very soon the scavenging birds of the night would be making the hanged man their dinner.

They arrived at a small clearing. There were thick sharpened poles lined in an orderly fashion on the ground. They were ten, the exact number of the maids Dracula had promised to slaughter.

"No, no, no," Erinna protested, shaking her head. She made a run for the girls, not knowing what she actually meant to do but sure she would never forgive herself if she didn't do something. She never got far as strong capable hands hauled her back into a granite wall of a chest.

Her body shivered and her heart accelerated beyond what was normal as she felt herself pressed against the hard planes of his body. She hated him for what he was making her witness yet the unmistakable heat coursing through her at the contact with him told another story.

"I told you love, we are only here to watch. Now be still and I'll let you go; time is not our side."

She considered continuing to fight him but realized that would only result in him keeping his hold on her and that was the last thing she wanted.

Her breath was coming too quick and she was all too aware of the heat seeping through the thin material of her dress from his skin to hers or was it vice versa? She wasn't sure. So she dropped her fight, for then.

True to his word, Dracula let her go immediately and she banished the feeling of loss before it took form in her mind.

She was not oblivious to why they were there. She had read in her novels about Vlad the Impaler, the vampire who mercilessly impaled people on poles and let them meet their death in such humiliation.

Although at the time she had been reading it she had thought it was fiction, now she knew better. It filled her with turmoil that she was going to have to watch people spiked onto the monstrous poles carefully set on the ground.

All the girls were shivering; their teeth chattering. Fear hung heavy on the air. Like her, none of them had any illusions of what was about to take place.

Dracula left her and walked around the poles, surveying them from all angles. There was an animal gracefulness about the way he walked. It was, Erinna imagined, the way a panther would stalk its prey before pouncing.

"Remove that one, it's too sharp," he commanded his men.

His request struck Erinna as odd and her confusion must have shown on her face.

"I'm torturing them Countess, not putting them out of their misery."

His meaning then dawned on Erinna and her face lost whatever bit of color it still retained. A sharp pole would pierce internal organs and quickly kill the victims and The Count didn't want that. He wanted them to suffer.

"Girls, you can now take your seats," Dracula commanded with a smile that could only be classified under evil. In fact everything about him could be put under one heading: evil. Or malicious, the two could be used interchangeably.

No one moved.

"Oh I'm sorry, maybe I wasn't clear enough. Lisa, Maria, Jules, Olive, Sarah, Trina, Fay, Mina, Eve and Trudy; those poles are meant for you to sit down on."

The girls exchanged glances; all knowing what they were supposed to do yet none was ready.

"Don't please," Erinna begged Dracula when all the girls looked at her, some pleading for her help and some condemning her with their eyes.

Dracula ignored her.

"You've worked for me for five years, you all know I don't like repeating myself," he said to them.

The words were like a switch plug and they all hurried to sit down as if the fastest would be rewarded with her life. If only.

Only Jules sat on the middle of her pole instead of the sharp pointy end and Erinna found herself fearing for the girl even though she had already been destined to die.

She was a thin, lanky girl; shaking like a thin blade of grass caught in storm. Her eyes were on the ground, refusing to meet the Count's and Erinna wanted to weep on her behalf.

Dracula just rolled his eyes and sighed impatiently, looking extremely bored.

"Jules, you know it's the end of the pole. Let's not waste each other's time shall we?"

Slowly, stumbling a few times on the way, Jules went and sat on her designated position, an endless river of tears now cascading down her cheeks, with the slightest of hiccups accompanying them.

Dracula clicked his fingers and immediately vampires she had not seen before appeared.

"You know what to do boys," Dracula said to them.

Quickly each vampire took his place at the blunt ends of the poles where the girls were not sitting on. At another click of his fingers, the vampires lifted the poles, elevating the ends which the girls were sitting on.

The girls screamed, tortured pained sounds as the sharp ends of the poles punctured through them, impaling them. Because of gravity and their own weight, they continued siding down the poles.

It was worse for Jules because the pole had gone through her orifice and out through her stomach then ripped right through her chest. The girls screamed as the pain continued assailing them unforgivingly.

The easier thing would have been to have his man take the poles and impale the girls whilst they were on the ground but like everything with Vlad, the move had been designed and calculated to maximize torture.

"Tomorrow morning they'll be dead if they're lucky but I'll give them three days at the most," the Count supplied casually as if discussing his favorite colors.

Erinna looked away, tears falling down her cheeks as she failed to continue watching. She turned to the Count.

"You bastard!" she tried to slap him but he put his fast reflexes into use and caught her hand midair.

"You don't want to do that."

He dropped her hand and turned to his vampires.

"Alexander collect their blood for me."

She didn't look as the instructed vampire went around with a bowel, collecting a few droplets of each girl's blood. The victims were still writhing and twisting in pain but the screams had quieted to grunts and groans.

"Look at what grace they exhibit, twisting there like little frogs," The Count said with an almost amused smile.

Erinna did not have an answer which did not include her spitting in his face or trying to slap him again and she could not see how either could improve the ten maids' situation.

When the vampire Dracula had sent to collect took a quill, dipped it in the blood and began writing on a calendar one of his servants provided.

"Level two," he declared and they began moving.

Erinna did not think there was anything worse than what she had already witnessed. She was still suffering from shock from the horrors she had seen. The screams of the ten girls continued ringing in her head, torturing every brain cell.

How could she have been so selfish? How could she just have thought of her own freedom and not considered the consequences?

They came to a stadium of some sort. In the middle was a brazen bull. Erinna knew about it, had read of it in one of her history books and she was not so oblivious as to believe it was there for decoration or to show off art.

The Sicilian bull had been designed in Greece, according to Melissa. It was a cast solid piece of brass with a door on the side that could be opened and latched.

The victim was supposed to be placed inside the bull and a fire set underneath it until the metal base was literally yellow as it heated. The victim would be slowly roasted to the death.

The Sicilian Bull," Dracula announced with the pride of a father showing off his son.

"Bring me the traitor," he demanded.

The crowd was chanting: Traitor, traitor, traitor

A man unknown to Erinna was shoved off, Angelica's husband she guessed. He tripped and fell down flat on his face. He was bloody from past violations that it was difficult to tell the color of his clothes.

"We're all gathered here to witness the execution of Edward Wilson, human by birth, traitor by choice, for treason against the throne which can only be atoned by death."

The crowd roared in agreement and Erinna wondered what kind of people these were who rejoiced as someone met their end so cruelly.

"Let the execution commence."

The traitor was thrust into the already red hot bull and the door locked. The pungent smell of burning flesh wafted from the bull and Edward's agonized screams filled the stadium as he burnt alive.

The bull was purposefully designed to amplify these screams and make them sound like the bellowing of a bull.

"I accelerated his death since he already got some of his torture," the Count informed Erinna, his tone telling her that he thought this was very generous of him. She glared at him.

It took half an hour for the man's screams to finally die down.

"Level two complete; time for the finale."

They got to another enclosure, where the most horrifying torture device of all was. Dracula called it the Judas' Cradle. It was an iron pyramid pointed at the top. Erinna watched the gruesome scene unfold before her.

They tied each of Angelica's limbs with tough ropes and left them dangling before forcing her to sit down on the pointy top of the cradle. Four vampires then took hold of the ropes, each pulling as if trying to tear her asunder. The action stretched her orifice, impaling her onto the cradle in the most obscene, inhumane way possible .

Adding to her overall shame, Dracula's servants had forced her to strip and the cradle didn't look like it had been washed in a long time if the dried

blood and questionable fluids were anything to go by.

By then Erinna could no longer scream, all energy drained out of her. She only watched, feeling broken in every sense of the word. It could have been better if he had just killed her rather than make her watch all of this.

Angelica's screams tore through her as the vampires continued spreading her over the cradle until she was completely stretched. It was only then that they tied the ropes to the nearby poles, fixing her in that position.

"If the torture won't kill you then infection will. You're the 679th candidate on that cradle," Dracula supplied with a lazy smile as if telling the most amusing story.

He then turned to the crowd, "Let this be an example to you all. I do not like being crossed."

They all bowed their heads in acceptance and Erinna felt like throwing up. People like Dracula should never be allowed to rule.

"Alexander, continue with the executions. I think the Countess needs a rest."

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