"A Knight For Merytha" by Roger Zelazny (1967)

Originally appeared Kallikanzaros #2, 1967 and Eternity SF, 1974.

Plot: While leading the ghost army to Dilfar, Dilvish has to pass through a range of mountains. While camped, he and Black hear a woman scream. They investigate. A woman in a ruined castle claims a dragon is about to kill her. Once inside there proves to be no dragon. Black is for going back to camp but Dilvish goes on alone with the woman. She makes him a nice meal and then beds him. Upon waking Dilvish finds she has been feeding on his neck. She tells him she wasn't trying to drain him but only taking a small taste. A loud banging at the door proves to be her insane husand, the Lord Morin. He breaks down the door with his axe and attacks Dilvish. Dilvish draws the sword of Selar and kills the man though he doesn't want to. As he is dying Morin explains he wasn't mad but under the influence of a drug givien him by his wife. He has been her jailer since he married her without knowledge of her condition. He did not have the heart to destroy her. Merytha begs Dilvish to stay with her and be her new husband. He refuses and leaves, despite her screams and cries, and her final, "I love you."

Monsters:

Merytha - a vampire who married a mortal man then was imprisoned by him because he could not bring himself to destroy her.

History: The last of the four tales written in 1965-1967, this story no longer has the high-tone language of a Dunsany story which is so obvious in "A Passage to Dilfar". Zelazny seems to be writing more in a Henry Kuttner/robert E. Howard style. The next tale of Dilvish would be 12 years later.

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