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Free COVID-19 Vaccines Are Luring Visitors to Dracula’s Castle in Transylvania

Residents of Romania who find themselves in central Transylvania this May now have the option of getting vaccinated at a legendary location from horror history: Bran Castle.

Every weekend this month, the fortress that’s believed to be the inspiration behind Count Dracula’s lair in Bram Stoker’s 19th-century gothic novel Dracula will be home to a free COVID-19 vaccination center where Romanians can get a Pfizer-BioNTech shot without making an appointment—or, as a Facebook post announcing the event put it, “another kind of sting.”

A banner reading "Who's afraid of the vaccine?" in Romanian and depicting syringes as vampire fangs advertises the vaccination marathon organized at "Bran Castle" in Bran village in the central Transylvania region of Romania on May 8, 2021.
A banner reading "Who's afraid of the vaccine?" in Romanian and depicting syringes as vampire fangs advertises the vaccination marathon organized at "Bran Castle" in Bran village in the central Transylvania region of Romania on May 8, 2021.Daniel Mihailescu—AFP/Getty Images

The first of the castle’s weekly “vaccination marathons” began on May 7, reportedly resulting in nearly 400 people receiving a dose from Friday to Sunday. “We wanted to show people a different way to get the [vaccine] needle,” Alexandru Priscu, the marketing manager at Bran Castle, told the Associated Press, noting that people who get the shot also receive a fanged “vaccine diploma” and free entry to the castle’s medieval torture exhibit.

The Pfizer-BoiNTech vaccine is a two-dose vaccine, and was authorized for emergency use in the United States by the Food and Drug Administration last December.

Despite numerous requests from foreigners, only Romanian residents are eligible to be jabbed at the gothic site, Priscu said.

The so-called vaccination marathons are part of a series of initiatives implemented by the Romanian government in an effort to vaccinate 5 million people by June 1. Romania has recorded more than a million coronavirus cases and over 29,000 deaths since the pandemic began, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

Bran Castle did not immediately respond to TIME’s request for comment.

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Write to Megan McCluskey at megan.mccluskey@time.com