Blood Wine
From Prisoner to Prince: The Gruesome Feast of Vlad Tepes (Vlad the Impaler)
*** Author’s Note:
I uploaded the full version of this story titled “Vlad Tepes: A Feast To Remember” on October 2nd; however, by the time I finished researching, writing, and editing it, the original turned out longer than my normal work. So, I am turning it into smaller chapters.
The first installment, “Blood Wine.” can be found below.
Introduction:
Vlad Tepes was known for his brutality. While, of course, I do not condone his methods, one must understand his life and upbringing to understand his reasons for his behavior and beliefs. First and foremost, the trauma of his youth was seared bone-deep into him. This made him distrustful of anyone, regardless of age, gender, race, or creed, especially after his father’s enemies kidnapped him and his brother. Vlad, around the age of 11, and his brother, 9. For years, they were held hostage, kept in a constant state of fear that shaped his psyche.
However, after claiming his throne, he blamed the wealthy, untrustworthy lords of his father’s lands for the deaths of his kinsmen. So, he held a feast to “appease” his lords and their fickle loyalties.
Vlad never lied.
The sources I found offered different dates and often contradictory versions of events regarding his life, but I did my best to weave them into a narrative that shows how the pain and ruthlessness of his upbringing forged the man he became and how this had a profound impact on his mindset and actions, gruesome though they were.
I need to clarify that I am not claiming these views featured in this text, political or otherwise, as my own. But rather, I am trying to illustrate Vlad’s perspective at the time, and how he would have believed and acted, considering the particularly horrible events of his life inflicted by specific individuals and groups in his youth, which crafted the man who was remembered as both a brutal tyrant and a local hero, depending on the perspective.
Two of my main references for this story were the book, In Search of Dracula: The History of Dracula and Vampires Completely Revised by Raymond T. McNally & Radu Florescu, and the movie “Dark Prince: True Story of Dracula.”
Autumn, 1456
Târgoviște Castle
The banquet hall was rich with rosemary smoke, roasted swine, pungent scents of hearty stews, butter-baked pork and beef, fresh bread, and unsealed wine. All poured and consumed to abandon in the flickering torchlight. It was a grotesque assembly of sheep and wolves, where goblets of bronze and silver clinked in hollow cheer, toasting the new Prince of Wallachia.
Vlad’s keen gaze swept the room from the rim of his glass, his face a mask of granite.
The hall was filled with five hundred guests, including boyars (noblemen), their lavish ladies, and fawning attendants and squires. All of them were the wealthiest members of the upper political class. However, Vlad also made a note to invite several holy men of the religious soul of his realm to this particularly opulent banquet, including five bishops, abbots of the most esteemed monasteries, and even the archbishop, himself. All gathered beneath his banners to discuss matters of state and to revel in the new bright future of his reclaimed realm.
Before him lay tables groaning under the weight of bread, the hearty tochitura stews murky with rich, savory flavor, sour broths like Ciorba and Rădăuțeană. Baskets piled high with cabbage rolls, amidst bronze and clay bowls of mashed nettles and cured meats, surrounding a massive roasted pig on each table. Their glazed skins still sizzling, leaking fat and succulent juices upon the platters. Glistening, their burned hollow eyes stared at nothing.
Among the dazzling jewels and boisterous laughter, Vlad realized he felt a far deeper kinship with the roasted swine than with any human in this chamber. For he was acutely aware that these men could just as easily turn savagely upon him as the cook had done to these poor creatures.
The boyars were accustomed to such heartlessness, as he knew they had done the same to so many others who sat in his very same princely chair. By the gleam in each of their eyes, he knew they would gladly do so again. All in the interest of lining their coffers with their beloved gold.
It was the nature of things, just as it was the nature of things for a newly-throned prince to summon his boyars to his state feast. A celebration of his ascendence. It was how it was done.
But this was no feast; it was a den of lions. An arena Vlad had been baptized in since boyhood. He knew how the game was played and had grown to relish in its monstrosity, especially for the sake of justice.
A large, warm, callused hand fell upon his shoulder. Familiar and strong.
Turning ever so slightly, he spotted his companion, a man chosen for his heart despite his humble birth. The man stood like a giant behind him, grinning despite his few missing teeth. “All have arrived, save for a few, but they send their greetings and condolences.”
Vlad’s eyes narrowed, contemplating the absence of a key player. “What of Hunyadi?” His words twisted into a snarl, barely contained. The man responsible for it all had not yet shown his face.
“Unfortunately, absent,” Bruno growled. Reflecting Vlad’s masked irritation on the matter.
“A pity.” The prince nodded, an eerie calm washing over him. With a flicking gesture of his wrist, he sent Bruno out of the room. “We will make do. Go and do as I have asked.”
Bruno melted back into the shadows, unnoticed by the gilded masses.
For why would they notice him? Bruno was a humble blacksmith before he came into Vlad’s service. He was a man of large build, but little standing.
Neither Bruno nor Vlad adorned themselves with the grotesque fineries of the nobility. Their attire, though well-crafted, was intended for practicality. Even among these gilded men, Vlad’s own garments— of dark leather and simple linen- set him apart. For he wore only the finest pieces of such simple materials tailored to reflect his status— he wanted nothing more, nothing less. No embellishments bearing the fleeting allure of gold, silver, silk, or velvet.
The sight of these men swaddled in ostentatious luxury ignited a fury within him; all their sumptuousness was born of blood money, a wealth derived from the suffering of others.
His blood-kin, his people, himself.
For these men, this feast, this hall, this castle, this land, Vlad’s body, blood, and soul- even his very existence- were all but pawns in a power game. They traded princes like sacks of salt, with the boyars holding the coins. Each prince, a flame on the candle, waiting for a single errant wind to blow it out so a new one could take its place.
A princely performance of a captive upon a throne—a string-led puppet upon their stage.
Temporary. Disposable. Nothing.
And yet, it was his banner and that of his father, the Order of the Dragon, that hung from the walls. Just as they had done in Vlad’s youth. A crimson dragon holding aloft a Roman Orthodox cross against a field of night. Dracul, his father, and now he, Dracula, the son of the dragon, claimed its sigil and all the lords and kings of the oath as his own brethren in arms.
Yet, the fearsome mark held no meaning to its name or oath in this chamber. It might as well be a simple piece of cloth. No meaning, majesty, or heritage behind it. For, to them, this palace was their palace, this room, their room, his throne, their throne.
Judging by the carefree gaiety of his guests, he could see it in their eyes. They all believed themselves immortal. Eternal. Untouchable.
Vlad knew better.
All men die… and he would be next only if he sat idly by and trusted in his guests.
But Vlad knew the cost of blind faith.
Spring, 1442
Wallachia
He had spent his whole life amidst unease and uncertainty. The most stability in his life was in his earliest years, within this very palace, but it was never truly safe. Even before he reached the age of eleven, his father’s, Dracul’s, dark eyes held dark moons beneath them. His pale skin grew ever more sallow as political alliances splintered between the encroaching Ottomans, led by Sultan Murad, and the irritable wealthy boyars within the voivodes of Wallachia. As tensions crackled, sparking into political unrest, his father grew ever more desperate and concerned for his throne and princely line.
It did not take long before politics bled over the borders, hemorrhaging the blood of his people. Time was of the essence. His father needed to take action.
So, in desperation, their father made arrangements to gain more alliances. To educate his heirs on the requirements of ruling, he brought along his sons. Vlad, eleven, Radu, only nine, and his elder brother, Mircea, sixteen, all accompanied their father to meet the so-called loyal boyars who had sworn fealty to his father in this time of unrest.
They would meet at the inn on the border of his father’s lands in three days time.
Vlad vividly remembered that last morning. The mist hung in the air. Droplets of night rain clung like a memory to the towering trees around them. Mud clung to their boots as they made their way to the tethered horses.
To this day, the prince remembered the clothes he wore, how he combed his hair that morning, and the bay horse he rode. Even his breakfast of warm rosemary bread and hearty butter with cured meats. Each detail was seared into Vlad’s mind, for there were times afterward that it was all he had. All that was left to cling to was a concoction of vivid memory and desperate hope.
But, before the sun rose the morning they left the palace, while the servants were finalizing the details and supplies, his father pulled Vlad aside into an empty chamber. The man’s leather hands fell heavily on his shoulders. With heavy words, his father instructed him to look after Radu, for he was slower in his decisions and weaker in his mind, body, and soul. He told Vlad he needed to set an example for him and look after his fickle sibling during this venture.
Vlad nodded. He never broke a promise.
After they all mounted their horses, the caravan began. His father rode at the lead, the sons behind all under the watch of a small army of guards.
Along the trail, Radu kept his head down. His eyes were moist, his lip trembled. Vlad worried that his little brother had overheard their father’s words. Still, he decided it was best not to ask, for fear that Radu would break completely and inadvertently confirm their father’s suspicions.
For three days, they traveled until they came to the agreed-upon location. The non-assuming inn in the middle of a forest. Away from prying eyes and whispered words.
That night, his father and brother were downstairs strategizing with their chief general by candlelight while he and Radu slept upstairs.
Come dawn, the boyars would meet them at this agreed-upon location. They had to be prepared.
That was until the door to the princes’ chamber crashed open—Ottoman soldiers. A group of them framed in the doorway like haloed shadows. Their torches held aloft. Their silver armor and weapons glinted hungrily in the firelight.
Vlad screamed, jumping from his own bed onto Radu’s on instinct alone as the soldiers swarmed into the room.
They took them from their beds, dragging them downstairs, where he saw his father and elder brother both subdued with swords to their necks. Yet, when Vlad and Radu appeared in the room, thrown onto the ground like prized sheep, all fell silent, save for the crackling of torches and the pleased grunt of the soldiers.
The inkwell had spilled over the map. Its contents seeped into the parchment to spread to the edge of the table. The dripping obsidian blood merged with the crimson. Slain Wallachian soldiers littered the floor.
Their mission was complete. Or nearly. Vad stared around the room. If these soldiers were intent on killing them, surely it would have been done by now. So, what did they want?
Vlad hated to imagine.
The Ottoman officer’s body was adorned in silks and silver. Atop his head, a black turban. On his tanned face, a dark beard. His lean body was covered in silver plates and fine chainmail atop vibrant, blue robes of leather and linen.
His shadow bathed his father and brother in darkness. His silver curved sword grazed the skin just shy of the ruling prince’s jugular vein. A crimson line already teasingly trickled down his father’s throat.
A threat unless their father agreed. But to what, Vlad did not know.
In that moment, he realized. This was no accident. It was the boyar’s fault. Those nobles who claimed loyalty to his father had sold them out. Delivering them all into the hands of this Ottoman officer for the sultan’s bloody coin.
Foreign, strange, and utterly menacing, Vlad heard a nearly musical language hiss from the enemy leader. He spoke in that tongue to his elder captives. Head held high in utter authority. But, judging by their responses, whatever he said held the weight of a guillotine.
Vlad’s father, who knew the language, bowed his head, defeated as Mircea’s rage rose to full flame. “You bastards! You sick, twisted, sons of rabid dogs! Don’t you dare! Don’t you dare touch them!” Desperately roaring, he struggled in his bindings, trying to reach his brothers with everything he had. “Vlad! Radu! Run!”
They tried, but made it not a foot before being immediately re-restrained by the guards and slammed to the ground. The only impact of their valiant attempt, a fresh wave of jeers.
One of the soldiers kicked Mircea in the back of the head and knocked to the floor. Their father’s harsh, hissed words silenced his heir, reprimanding him with all the tender care of a blade.
“What’s happening?” Radu’s voice shook, frightened by everything that had been and could be.
In that moment, Vlad knew.
The deed was done.
He and Radu had been surrendered as hostages.
“No- No! Father-! Mmmph!” A hand clapped over Vlad’s mouth as he and Radu were dragged to their feet and carried out of the inn door like sacks of grain.
Chilling darkness and torchlight surrounded them.
Radu, in his panicked mind, kicked and called for their father, pleading for his help as they were placed before the small, but oddly-elegant horses. The beasts that would spirit them away.
The black stallion in front of Vlad tossed its mane. Its saddle embroidered with silver thread, ornamented with tassels and glittering silver bits. The officer, the one whom had spoken to his father, came to stand behind him. Towering over him with all the strength and mystery of the shadowed trees.
Once seated on his horse, the officer offered a hand, allowing Vlad a sliver of dignity to climb, albeit bound, onto the horse. As if he had a choice.
Just then, he heard Radu scream from the horse next to him.
As if God blessed him with strength, Vlad broke free. The cord was blessedly weak, and for only a second, he was able to run. But he did not flee to the trees nor the inn. But to Radu.
Swooping in, Vlad held his brother close. The boy’s head fell against his chest. Tears seeped into his shirt. His little body was trembling. “Be silent, Radu… for now. Just wait.” Vlad tried to calm him, stroking his hair. “Father will fix this. He will. We will be home soon. Somehow- just remember that!”
Faith or not, a leather hand gripped his hair, wrenching the boys apart. The officer’s second hand took hold of the back of his shirt, lifting him onto the horse and immediately retying him there. He could not even move his wrists, like he was now one with the saddle.
Looking back, Vlad spied Radu. Another soldier in a black turban was helping him onto another, pale horse, far more kindly than Vlad had been. At least that was a blessing.
His brother’s pale face looked at him with red, tearful eyes.
The officer leaned back with a sickening soft smile. Content with his work. His armor and weapons jingled as his strong arms wrapped around Vlad, securing him in place as he shouted something to his men. With a crack of their whips, all of them sped off into the night.
There was nothing to be done. For both princelings were taken to the Ottoman Empire, specifically Eğrigöz Castle, where they were held captive for the next fourteen years.
Hostages among the enemy.
Even all these years later, Vlad still vividly remembered watching the dim light from the inn’s windows grow smaller and smaller as they moved further into the night.
Autumn, 1456
Târgoviște Castle
Vlad’s head fell into his hand. The weight of his memories still felt like chains, even though he had long since shed them physically. Yet, his pale fingers trembled against his temple.
A shadow moved closer. Jerking, the prince noticed a servant stepping forward. Only half a step, but her eyes reflected genuine concern. A hand half-reached out towards him while the other balanced a jug on her hip.
But in his sight, she froze as if she were a statue carved from the very winter ice.
The prince blinked.
She was a spindly young woman with soft brown hair and freckles on her cheeks. Simple, sweet, comely. A girl he bought from slavers in the region some weeks ago, just after his arrival back home.
Raising his hand, he ensured her stillness. She stared at him, for a moment. A quizzical look in her eye. But he both silently and simultaneously waved her and any lingering concern off. With that sharp gesture, he urged her to continue her duty, filling the cups of his guests.
If a serving girl noticed a moment of weakness, surely someone else could have as well. He scanned the guests for potential damage, but found that none of the boyars noticed—nor any of the women, nor even the holy men.
Thankfully, they all remained utterly oblivious to Vlad’s momentary lapse.
With a calming breath, the Prince of Wallachia took a deep drink of his wine, letting it soothe his nerves. His hand returned to rest peacefully on the table,
With a reaffirmed sense of calm righteousness, Vlad’s attention confidently swept back across the festivities. A smile graced his lips to mask any hint of his inner unease. To persuade those around him that he found their jests and jabs worthy of mirth.
Their time would come soon enough.
He did not know who, but some of these jowly lords, some, but not all, took part in the conspiracy that had delivered them to the Ottomans on that fateful day, forcing their father to surrender them into captivity.
Yet here they were, these traitors sat at his princely tables, feasting as if this palace were their own.
“To our new prince!” One boyar, a man in velvet green and slightly silver-flecked hair, shouted across the room, prompting Vlad to give him a grateful nod. “May his reign be prosperous! Longer and stronger than any who came before him!” Vlad again nodded, raising his glass in quiet gratitude.
However, the gesture was met with laughter. While complimenting him, they simultaneously accused is predecessors, his family, of being weak.
“Praise God, for you, my prince! One who will do His work!” The boyar continued before his elegantly-adorned wife held his hand, whispering in his ear, likely reminding him to lay off the drink.
God’s work?! What would these men know of it?
His innate and violent sense of justice, perhaps one of his flaws, began to seep into his veins once more. Perhaps it was spurred on by liquid courage, but Vlad barely managed to retain his mask of composure. His knuckles tightened to marble. Weakness! The gaul! The treasonous, treacherous, vile!-
He took a deep breath. It would all be over soon.
For he, himself, was not weak; he remained lean—crafted not of fat and comfort, but of the flames of vengeance and horrors beyond imagining that seared, swirled, and crackled like a fire within his scarred body.
Just then, a particularly loud burst of laughter caught his attention, jerking his attention toward the far end of the room.
The girl. The one who had just stepped forward in an ill-advised attempt to help him was in peril. Vlad spotted the spilled wine as she let out another squeal.
One of the boyars, a particularly tall, yet mildly rotund man with balding brown hair offset by vibrant crimson robes, gripped her skirts as she filled his cup. Prompting her to squeal again as she tried to pull the plain fabric from his grasp.
But the Boyar was only spurred on. His hands moved like spiders, higher, more exploratory as they delved beneath the cloth. A second lord, thinner, younger, and hungry, gripped her arm, yanking her down to sit in his lap in a drunken fervor, making her shriek. A single sparrow cry turned to whimpers amidst a storm of lecherous cheer.
Yet, Vlad, prince or not, did not intervene. His hand balled into a fist, but he did nothing. Remaining silent and in his seat.
Had he been any other prince, he would have done this out of fear to appease the delicate sensibilities of his guests. In Wallachia, it was nearly impossible for one in his position to hold and maintain control. It had been so for decades, centuries even.
But not this prince. Of the many lessons of his life, he learned first and foremost to be patient. To wait for the opportune moment, lest he fall victim to their trap. Both his father and brother fell victim to these men… those who wove words and power like nooses.
He would strike, but not yet.
Even as her cries became screams, Vlad remained in his seat. Although he did not laugh, encourage, or partake in such behavior, he did so for a purpose. For he knew that soon, comeuppance for these and all of their heinous sins would soon arrive.
And so, despite it all, Vlad found himself smiling.
Find out more on Wednesday in the next chapter.