TEXT: Wratha threw wide the curtains!
    
   In a moment Karl woke up screaming - and found himself chained to his bed. His cries gonged like great
  cracked bells as his skin peeled back and his blood boiled. The sun'srays were in his eyes, which
  blackened to craters in his head! His hair became smoke, while his limbs and various parts cracked open
  to issue jets of steam and stench! Through all ofthis Wratha laughed like a madwoman, danc ing from one
  foot to the other in her excitement and hauling on a rope to drag Karl's bedmore surely into the focus of
  the sunlight.
    
   His body shrivelled and shrank; his vampire leech deserted him, came writhing from his bursting belly.
  Wratha closed the curtains and rushed to his side. Like Karl, his leechwas fatally burned. Dying, it
  produced its egg - and she had what she wanted! Of her own free will, she opened herself to the thing,
  which entered without pause to fuse with herflesh.
    
   Now her agony would seal the contract. But the deed was done, and Wratha was exultant.At last she
  was Wamphyri.'
    
   VAMPIRE WORLD I
   BLOOD BROTHERS
    
    
   BRIAN LUMLEY
    
    
    
   A ROC BOOK
    
    
  
   ROC
   Published by the Penguin Group
   Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England
   Penguin Books USA Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA
   Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia
    Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2
    Penguin Books (NZ) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road, Auckland 10, New Zealand
   Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England
    
   First published 1992
    1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
    
   Copyright © Brian Lumley, 1992
   All rights reserved
    
   The moral right of the author has been asserted
    
    
    
   Roc is a trademark of Penguin Books Ltd Printed in England by Clays Ltd, St Ives plc
    
   Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to
   the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent,
   re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's
   prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in
   which it is published and without a similar condition including this
  
   condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser
    
    
    
    
   For Nick Austin, my guiding light for many years.
   So far we must have got through our weight in Metaxa,
   but there's a lot more left where that came from!
    
    
    
   CONTENTS
    
   part one           Looking Back                                       1
    
   part two          Looking Further Back, and
   Scanning Forward                               87
    
   PART THREE         Now                                                         167
    
   part four         The Brothers - The Raids                  255
    
  
   part five            Vampires.' - The Sundered
   Tribes - The Search                            347
    
   partsix              Szgany Sintana - Dissension in
   the Aerie - The Thyre                         433
    
   part seven        Nestor - Titheh'ng –Turgosheim      527
    
   part eight        Runemanse - Flight - In the
   Blinkof an Eye                                     625
    
    
    
    
   PART ONE
    
   Looking Back
    
   1
    
   Morning. Sunrise. Sunup!
   The sun had risen up fifteen times since the battle for The Dweller's garden; risen up over the
  southwestern horizon, travelled a predestined path accordingto its cycle, sunk down again into the
  south-east. Fifteen times that low, warm, oh so lazy golden arc across thesky, making for a like number
  of sundowns.
   Sundown: night, darkness, peril!
   Sundown. A time of terror since time immemorial: when the last yellow glints would slip silently from the
  high crags of the great barrier range, until its topmost peaks turned a pale ochre, then ashen, finally
  
  wolf-grey and silver under the stars of Starside. A time of terror, yes .. . but no longer. For the battle in
  The Dweller'sgarden had been fought and won, and the near-immortal masters of Starside's aeries, the
  Wamphyri, were immortal no longer. Indeed, they were either dead or flowninto the Icelands. Of the
  latter, only a few had survivedto flee.
   Sundown, and nothing to fear from it. Not any more. It was strange ...
   On the one side of the mountains, that closest to the sun (Sunside, with its forests and rivers, and, to the
  south, its pitiless furnace lands), daylight would persist for a further twenty-five hours; but on Starside the
  barrier mountains shut out the sun's life-giving warmth, leaving only the stars and the aurora over the
  Icelands to light the rugged land. So it had always been, so itwould always be.
   Except upon a time there had also been the Wamphyri!... But now there was none. Not in Starside,
  anyway. No vampires here but one, and he was different. He was The Dweller.
   And at the beginning of that new night, that fifteenth sundown in the New Age of Starside, The Dweller
  had called for Lardis Lidesci to attend him at his house in the garden high over Starside's boulder plains.
   Lardis was a Traveller king, leader of one of Sunside'sSzgany tribes. He was short, barrel-bodied,
  apelike in the length of his arms; his lank black hair framed a wrinkled, weather-beaten face, with a
  flattened nose and a wide mouth full of strong, uneven teeth. Under wild eyebrows, Lardis's brown eyes
  glittered his mind's agility, even as he himself was agile despite his stumpyshape. Yes, he was Szgany, and
  it showed.
   'Szgany': in fact the word had two meanings. Star-side's trogs, cavern-dwelling neanderthals, likewise
  called themselves Szgany. To them it meant 'The Obedient Ones' - obedient to the Wamphyri! As for the
  genesis of Traveller usage, that was lost in time. Now whenthe Gypsies used the word to define other
  than a trog, it best described themselves, their way of life: tinkers, music-makers, seekers after refuge
  (often in deep caverns, like the dwelling places of the trogs), wanderingmetalworkers, fey people:
  Szgany.
   Travellers. Ah, but upon a time - an oh so recent time - there had been reasons aplenty for the nomadic
  existence of the Gypsies! And each and every one of those reasons monstrous, and all of them inhabiting
  the stone- and bone-built aeries of the Wamphyri! But theWamphyri were no more.
   It was strange; Lardis was not yet accustomed to it; the sun was setting for the fifteenth time since the
  great battle and still he shivered, longing for the mistedvalleys, wooded slopes and forests of Sunside.
  Across the mountains it was still twilight and true dark many hours away. Plenty of time to find sanctuary
  in one or another of the many labyrinthine systems of caverns, there to wait out the night until ... But no,
  all of that was yesterday. Yet again Lardis must remind himself:Fool! The yoke is lifted.The Szgany are
  free!
   Pausing where he made his way through the garden,Lardis looked back and up at the topmost crags.
  Theywere ashen now: charcoal dusted a pale blue-grey from the brightening stars, the colour of a wolf at
  twilight.Soon the hurtling moon would be up, half golden in the sun's reflected light, half blue as Icelands
  sheen. Then the wolves of Sunside would sing up from the dark forests and down from the pine-clad
  mountains, and those of Starside would hear them, yawn and stretch,emerge from their treeline dens and
  answer with songs of their own. For the moon was mistress to all the greybrothers.
   Shivering (from the chill of twilight?), Lardis glancedall about in the dusk. At trog workers, leathery,
  shuffling, nocturnal, already up and about and seeing to their various duties; at the dim but reassuring
  
  yellow lights of Traveller dwellings huddled to the gently sloping walls of the saddle; at the misty
  silhouettes of greenhouses, the glitter of starlight in a shimmeringgeothermal pool, a creaking wind-vane
  atop its skeletal tower, turning in the breeze off Starside. And then he shivered again, and started out
  more urgently for TheDweller's house —
   - Only to slow his pace in the very next moment. Noneed for haste. It was sundown, yes, but there was
  nothing hurtful here. Not any more. So...why shouldhe feel that something was wrong?
   Lardis trusted his instincts. His mother had used to
   read palms, and his father had seen far things; all of the Lidescis had been fey. And tonight Lardis was
  jumpy without knowing the reason. Could this be why The Dweller had called him, because something
  was wrong? Well, he would know soon enough. But one thing Lardis already knew: that he had heard
  the call of Sunside, its rivers, forests and open spaces, and come what may his stay in The Dweller's
  garden would notbe long.
   Three acres in a row front to rear, the garden was - it had been - a marvellous place. It was a small
  valley ina gently hollowed mountain saddle. In this region Nature had flattened the barrier range
  somewhat; thus when the sun stood at its low southerly apex, it somehow managed to shine between
  even the highest peaks and down the long slopes, glancing off the crags to light here. From twilight to
  twilight, the aching light of Sunside struck through the pass in a great warm mistywedge.
   A long, curved dry-stone wall defined the garden's forward boundary, beyond which the ground dipped
  sharply towards frowning cliffs, weathered shelves,more declivities, gentling foothills, and finally Starside's
  barren plains. Encompassed by the wall, the slopes of the saddle, and a narrow pass at the rear, were
  small fields or allotments, greenhouses, wind-vanes, sheds and storehouses, and clearwater ponds. A
  number of pools were astir with trout; others bubbled with thermal activity. Lush with vegetation, much of
  it crushed and ravaged in the battle but already sprung up and growing again, a surprising number of the
  garden's vegetablespecies would have been at home in The Dweller's own world. Hardy, improved or
  developed by The Dweller himself, they had grown accustomed to Starside's longnights and longer,
  occasionally dreary days.
   Repairs to the garden were nearing completion. Even stones slimed by exploding gas-beasts or
  evaporating Lords and their lieutenants had been cleaned, or removed to the rim and avalanched down
  onto Starside. Vampire debris had gone into a crevasse, been drenchedwith The Dweller's fuels, burned
  up with hideous stenches. Eventually the last taint had been expunged. Broken dwellings had been
  mended, flattened greenhouses re-erected, The Dweller's generators repaired. Many of the garden's
  systems were fragile, requiring frequent attention; tending them was how The Dweller's people earned
  their keep, and the work served to instruct them in his ways.
   His 'people': trogs sent by the Wamphyri to work mischief against him, only to be converted to his
  cause; a few Travellers from tribes other than Lardis Lidesci's, grateful for The Dweller's sanctuary; and
  Starside's grey brotherhood, the wild ones of the mountains, who hunted under the moon. These latest of
  his volunteers were wolves, but it was as if he were their brother -which indeed he might well be. For
  The Dweller's vampire had been passed to him by a wolf...
   A vampire, aye - indeed, Wamphyri! For he carried a true egg. And if he were not The Dweller, with his
  own place here in the garden, what then? On Starside's boulder plains, east of the shining hemisphere
  portal to lands unknown, there stood the last great aerie of the Wamphyri. In its prime it had been the
  property of theLord Dramal Doombody who, upon his demise, gifted it to his heir the Lady Karen. Might
  not The Dweller, himself Wamphyri, feel the aerie's alien lure, make it his own, take his machines there to
  
  light that monstrous stack as now they lit the garden?As for the Lady Karen herself: In the battle for the
  garden, Karen had sided with the
   defenders; moreover, she had brought first warning, and with her hybrid warriors had fought like a
  wildcat against the vampire Lords! Engaging Lesk the Glut,she'd opened his chest with her gauntlet, cut
  through the pipes of his heart, torn it smoking from his body while yet Lesk stamped and snorted! The
  Lady Karen: she had been something! But now ...
   Some said she lived in her aerie still, though Harry Keogh (called Hell-lander, and sometimes
  Dwellersire) would doubtless dispute it;if he were fit and wellenough to dispute anything. Harry Keogh:
  The Dweller's father, his bloodsire.
   After the battle, Harry had sojourned awhile with Karen in her aerie; who but a magician out of the
  hell-lands would dare? She was, after all, Wamphyri! But upon his return to the garden he'd reported
  Karen's demise: how, in order to avoid some dark, unspoken fate, she had killed herself. Perhaps it was
  so, but mention her name to The Dweller and he would only smile. Except... these days he wasn't much
  given to smiling.
   Lardis arrived at his destination: a white stone bungalow with round windows and a chalet-styled roof,
  situated close to a hot spring. An exterior staircase of yellow-varnished pine zigzagged up to a small
  balcony under projecting eaves, which fronted The Dweller's bedroom in the hollow of the red-tiled roof.
  After the battle in the garden, when the house suffered exploding gas-beast blasts, only its shell had been
  left standing.Trogs and Travellers, working together under the direction of The Dweller, had soon put it
  back to rights. Now it seemed The Dweller no longer took pride in it. Nor inany of his previous works.
   The Dweller waited in his doorway. He wore his golden mask, of course, and a voluminous yellow robe
  which covered his entire body down to his feet. Lardis
   paused before him, raised a clenched fist and uttered acustomary greeting: 'Tear down the mountains!'
  Customary, habitual, indeed instinctive, the ancient Szgany imprecation no longer had meaning. In return
  The Dwellernodded, took Lardis's elbow and escorted him to thelong room which was his study. A
  circular window in an end wall looked out over Starside to the distant,shimmering horizon and the
  auroras of the far north. Asecond window in the opposing wall viewed the garden, the narrowing funnel
  of the saddle, the gaunt cragsrising on both sides and merging into peaks. In the cleft of the pass the sky
  wasa banded blue, where the sapphire in the well of the V shaded upwards intoindigo to accommodate 
  the first glitter of Sunside'sstars.
   Seated on simple stools in soft yellow electric lamplight, the two men faced each other across a small
  pinetable. Despite the fact that Lardis was The Dweller'ssenior by a good six or seven years, and a
  leader in hisown right, he was ill at ease in the other's presence. Hehad felt this way, indeed increasingly
  so, almost fromfirst arrival here. His discomfort might have its sourcein The Dweller's alien origins - the
  fact that he was abeing from an unknown world, commanding awesome weapons and powers - but that
  was only part of it.Rather Lardis sensed in him something of the ancient powers of this world (or more
  properly, of Starside),and for the most part his disquiet lay in knowing what stared back at him through
  the orbits of The Dweller'sexpressionless golden mask - scarlet Wamphyri eyes!Well, no secret there. 
  For much to his credit, The Dweller had disclosed all: the fact that he was therecipient of a vampire egg -
  from the bite of a wolf!
   Lardis, however, suspected that there was even morethan this to his persistent disquiet. Gazing
  somewhat
  
   obliquely on his host, he felt that The Dweller's unseen eyes saw more than was their right, that they
  might even peer into a man's soul. Lardis's soul, like his conscience, was crystal clear, but his thoughts
  were never less than searching. He didn't much like the idea thatperhaps The Dweller was also a
  thought-thief, a mental- ist. Certainly the majority of the Old Wamphyri hadhad the power, in one degree
  or another.
   Finally The Dweller spoke. 'You are silent.' His voicewas young, yet old with knowledge, with
  strangeness. It had a rough edge, a rasp of physical pain. Beneath his robe, The Dweller's burns were not
  yet healed. Notentirely.
   Lardis shrugged awkwardly, felt lost for an answer.'You sent for me. I came to discover your needs.'
   'My needs?' The Dweller answered Lardis's shrug with one of his own. 'I myself don't know what they
  are! But for the moment they are the needs of my people. Later ... we shall see.'
   Lardis waited, and eventually:
   'I fear there are changes in the offing,' said The Dweller, sighing. 'There are several subjects to discuss.
  My mother, my father, myself. Yourself, and your people.The garden, and its future. If it has one.'
   Still Lardis waited.
   'The garden served a purpose, in its time,' The Dwellercontinued. 'It was a home, a refuge, even a
  fortressagainst the Wamphyri. Against their arrogance, anyway: their "invincibility". Well, they were not
  invin cible. Nor am I. Nothing is. Also, the garden proved apoint: that while a fixed, permanent home
  may be vulner able, still it may be defended, and successfully. One of several things which made the
  Wamphyri strong was their territoriality. They would not suffer rivals within their spheres. Once they laid
  claim to a place - or to anything, for that matter - it was theirs forever, or as long as they could hold it.
  This was no weird idiosyncrasy; most creatures, once they have found their place, will not move lightly
  aside. And men are much the same. Which is how and why we held the garden andbrought the
  Wamphyri down.' He paused.
   'In my father's country,' The Dweller continued in awhile, 'in his world, they have this saying: "An English
  man's home is his castle." It may be translated as a warning: "Make no threat against me on my own land,
  for here I am strong. Here,I am the master!'" Again The Dweller paused, then asked, 'Do you understand
  whatI'm saying?'
   Lardis wasn't sure he did understand, but certainly he was worried. The Dweller's mode of expression
  sounded like nothing so much as a Wamphyri word game! And suddenly Lardis wondered:In the battle
  for the garden, wasit his purpose to simply defend himself against the Wamphyri... orto usurp
  them? If thelatter, what did that make Lardis Lidesci and his people? Free men... or thralls? Now that
  The Dweller alone held sway on Starside, how would he use hispower?
   Finally Lardis found his voice. 'Are these things applicable to me?'
   'To you and yours, yes,' The Dweller replied. The Szgany fought for me and my garden. What they paid
  in blood has been returned in skill and knowledge; and in future, should the need arise, your people will
  know how to defend themselves. But for now ... what is there for you on Starside? What was there ever,
  but a threat? Well, the threat is no more. So go back to Sun-side, quit your travelling, build settlements
  and live in peace - for as long as you may. You've earned yourselves a breathing space, time of your own
  in which togrow strong. Only remember: the vampire swamps are still there. If ever the Wamphyri should
  
  return, whether bred in the swamps or... other places, next time beready for them.'
   Lardis had been holding his breath. He let it out in a sigh which was almost a gasp. For while still
  puzzled, he was also relieved. He need no longer feel guilty about his intentions; his mind had been made
  up to leave, which coincided with The Dweller's advice. As for certain other fears in respect of The
  Dweller's purpose, he saw now that they had been unworthy.
   'Before the next sunup,' he finally replied, ‘I’ll take my people out of here. Until then, if you'll help us,
  we'lllearn all we can from you. As for fighting the Wamphyri, in that we are of one mind. I have always
  fought them.And if they return I'll fight them again.'
   Under the rim of The Dweller's mask where it enclosed his cheek bones and housed his nose in a prow,
  his lips twitched into a smile. He nodded and said, 'Yes, I know - but in the past you have fought with
  muscle, blood, bone. The next time will be with "science". Ah, you think you don't know the word, but
  you do! You've seen it at work, here, all about you! In your permanent settlements, the towns you'll
  build, there will be time for it. Time for all manner of things, now that yourendless trekking is at an end!
  "Science", yes: it means to learn and to understand ... everything! What? And is everything too much for
  you? Well, perhaps it is. But you Szgany are a crafty people: metalworkers, weapon-makers, skills left
  over from a time before the Wamphyri. Just a little learning, even a little science ... Why, there's nothing in
  this garden you couldn't make! Nothing of my technology which you can't discover andduplicate for
  yourselves, given time.'
   Lardis felt a great excitement, but at the same timehe was frowning again. For now he detected
  something else in The Dweller's tone, words between his words. There was a sense of - finality? - in the
  things he said. But if the Szgany were at a beginning, who then was at an end? Or... who suspected that
  his end was uponhim?
   'Other matters,' The Dweller painfully rasped, his urgency cutting into the Gypsy's thoughts; so that again
  Lardis wondered, Mentalist?Thought-thief? While outloud he said:
   'You, yourself, Dweller?'
   The Dweller gave a small start, and now it was his turn to wonder. The Gypsy was shrewd. Had Lardis
  been anticipating his host or simply answering some question of his own? Had he seen the pain in The
  Dweller's scorched face, heard it in his voice? Had he perhaps guessed that The Dweller's sun-poisoned
  flesh was dying? Well, possibly, but even a shrewd man could scarcely guess the whole truth, the final
  truth -that even now The Dweller's vampire was reshapingwhat untainted flesh remained. But into what?
   'Myself?'
   Lardis nodded. 'If we Travellers - we Szgany, since itappears we'll journey no more — if we leave the
  garden, then what of you, your trogs, your people? What of those Travellers who were here before me
  and mine? What of your mother ... aye, and your father? What of Harry Hell-lander? This is the second
  sundown he's tossed and babbled in his strange fever. Who knows how long before he'll recover? Last
  but not least, whatof the garden?'
   The Dweller nodded. 'We'll deal with all of these things in their turn. My mother... is failing. I have
  watched her grow old while in fact she's still young. In the world where she was born, women of her age
  are still in their prime, but that was never her destiny.' Now his rasping voice turned a little sour. 'From
  the day she met my father the shape of her life was preordained, with never a chance that it might run a
  straightcourse. She wasn't weak, but neither was she strong ... enough. She was ordinary, and Harry is -
  
  he was -extraordinary. And yet her life has not been miserable; indeed she has been happy, here in the
  garden. The nature of her affliction is that it shuts out all manner of horrid things from her mind, until
  almost everythinghas been shut out. And now she dwells alone, within.'
   'Not alone, Dweller!' Lardis protested.
   The Dweller held up a slender hand. 'I know, I know: my people look after her well, and are rewarded
  with her smiles. But such responses are automatic; she merely obeys her instincts; she is mainly alone -
  but not for long. Soon she'll join that throng who went before, going on from this place like a vine
  growingover the wall. Well, and it's true there are worlds beyondand I mustn't be greedy. So let it be: let
  her simple smile brighten some other's garden awhile. Until then I'll stay with her, along with a few others
  of my people who won't leave her ...' He paused a moment. And in a littlewhile:
   'As for you and your people, Lardis: you'll prosper onSunside, I'm sure. And myself? Well, I looked
  after myself, my mother, the garden, long before the first of you Szgany joined me here; and now... I have
  friends other than trogs and Travellers. What's more, I nolonger have any enemies.' He stood up,
  seeming to flow to his feet in the weird way of the Wamphyri, and paced the floor to the window that
  looked out on thegarden. Lardis followed him, watching as he opened the window, leaned out a little
  way, and inclined his head upwards to the misted mountain peaks. The ghost of ahowl came ululating
  down, thin and eerie, echoing in flooding moonlight. And behind his golden mask TheDweller smiled.
   'No harm will come to me or mine," he eventuallycontinued, when the howling stopped. 'Shortly, even
  my most faithful will leave me; I shall ask them to leave, by which time they'll be ready.'
   'But ... why do you isolate yourself?' Lardis was atpains to understand his motives. 'Will you stay on
  here,alone?'
   'Stay here? Ah, no. But I shall return from time totime, to talk to her, in my way ...'
   'To your mother? When she is -'
   'When she's dead, yes.'
   For a moment Lardis believed he saw red fires reflected on the rims of the eye sockets in the golden
  mask, and he was hard put to contain a sudden shudder. Wamphyri, The Dweller, aye - and much more
  thanthat. For like his father before him he had... ah,powers!
   The Dweller looked at Lardis, clasped his broad shoulders in pale thin hands, and thought: He's brave,
  thisman. Brave and loyal. He should fear me, even run from me, but he stands his ground. Whatever
  comes to pass- however itshall be -I'll not hurt him or his. Never!
   It was as if Lardis heard him. All of the fear went outof him; a great deal of fear which, until the moment
  itleft him, he'd scarcely realized was there at all. At least he'd never admitted it, not even to himself.
  Finally he straightened up and nodded. Then it seems we haveno more to talk about,' he said. 'Ah -
  except your father,of course.'
   The Dweller's answering nod was thoughtful, deliberate. 'How goes it with him?'
   Now Lardis gave a grunt and offered a frustrated shrug. 'We care for him, feed him, watch over him in
  his fever,' he answered. 'Everything as you instructed -but we've no knowledge of his sickness. You say
  that both of you were burned by your own weapons, those brilliant beams of sunlight with which you
  
  destroyed the Wamphyri. Well, and your burns were plainly visible, Dweller, their effect immediate - it's
  a miracle yousurvived! But Harry Hell-lander was not burned, notthat I ever saw.'
   The Dweller had his answer ready. 'I was burned onthe outside,' he said. 'My flesh was physically
  scorched by the sun's fire. But my father's sickness is in his blood, a slow poison, like silver or kneblasch
  to the Wamphyri. It causes this fever in him. But when the fever has burned itself out, he will be cured.
  Then I'll take him back to his own place. And then at last I'll bealone here.'
   'And that's what you want?'
   'It's how it has to be.' The Dweller's voice was now a low growl. He began to turn away - then swiftly
  turnedback, face to face with the Gypsy. And urgently, perhaps pleadingly, he said: 'Lardis, listen. I am
  Wamphyri!When I fought for this place, the fighting roused something up in me, in my blood. You trust
  me, I know.Likewise your people, and mine. But I don't know howlong I may trust myself! Now do you
  understand?'
   Lardis believed he did, and a little of his escaped fearcrept back in. 'But how ... how will you survive?'
  Unintentionally, he placed some small emphasis on the word'will'.
   Before the other could answer, an echoing chorus of howls floated down out of the hills. With long,
  loping strides, The Dweller took himself back to the window, again inclining his head to the heights. And
  to Lardishe said, 'How do they survive, the grey brotherhood?'
   'They are hunters,' the Gypsy answered, quietly. 'Andwill you also ... hunt?'
   'I know what you are thinking,' The Dweller said.'And I don't blame you. Your times have been hard.
  The Wamphyri have made them so. But this I vow: I shallnever hunt men.'
   Lardis shivered again, but he believed The Dweller'swords. 'You are... a changeling creature,' he said. 'I
  can't pretend to understand you.'
   'A changeling, it's true,' The Dweller agreed. 'I had two fathers, only one of which was a man! My
  humanflesh is dying now, but I can feel my vampire at work in me. He remembers his former host, and
  has other clayto mould.'
   There was that in his voice ... Lardis was not afraid ... but there was weirdness in the air... the moon had
  turned the garden yellow, with black mountains beyond,split by the deep blue V of the pass. 'I should be
  going,'the Gypsy said, his normal rumble of a voice little morethan a whisper.
   'See my hands,' said The Dweller, 'how thin they are,like paws?' He stretched out his arms, until his
  hands and wrists stood free of the wide cuffs. These I shallretain, as best I can - the hands of a man - to
  remind me of what I was.' And cocking his head curiously on oneside, he glanced at Lardis. 'Also that
  you and your peopleshall know me, when I am ... other than I am now.'
   Lardis looked; The Dweller's hands were pale andslim as a girl's; but his wrists and forearms, what
  couldbe seen of them, were grey-furred! Backing towards thedoor, the Gypsy hissed, 'You, Dweller? A
  grey one?'
   'When they call down from the peaks under the moonlike that,' the other sighed, 'ah! - I hear them! And
  Iknow they call for me.' He opened the door for Lardis,and the Gypsy tremblingly stepped out into the
  night.
  
   'I... I knew they were your friends, of course,' hetold The Dweller, where now that one stood framed in
  the doorway. 'But -'
   'My friends?' Again that quick tilt of The Dweller'shead; his eyes, gleaming now in the eye-holes of his
  mask, no longer red but feral in moonlight. That andmore than that. My kin!'
   'Yes,' Lardis gulped, nodded, backed away. 'I understand.'
   And as he turned more fully into the garden: 'Lardis,' The Dweller called after him. 'Remember - we shall
  not hunt you. Be sure that you never hunt me or mine ...'
    
   Harry Keogh tossed and turned in tortured dreams. Hehad been tortured, a little. What his son, The
  Dweller,had done to him could not have been accomplished by any other means: the Necroscope's
  metaphysical mindhad been entered like a house in the night, its innermostvaults penetrated, its owner
  deprived of his treasures.The intruder had been none other than Harry Jr himself,called The Dweller,
  soon to be Harry Wolfson. Excepthe had stolen nothing, merely changed the combinationson certain
  locks and booby-trapped certain passageways. During the course of work such as this, inevitablythere
  had been some 'structural' damage which, while he had kept it to a minimum, was the real cause of his
  father's 'fever'. It was not so much that Harry Keogh'sblood was poisoned, rather that his mentality had
  beendepleted.
   Harry dreamed of the forbidden Möbius Continuum.Trapped in its flux, he drifted useless as a ship with
  neithersail nor rudder, a waterlogged hulk rocked andslowly twirled by mathematical tides and algebraic
  whirlpools, through straits of Pure Number where he was now innumerate. And in the primal darkness of
   that place beyond or between such places as men are allowed to know, he was aware of a thousand
  locked doors, all of them drifting with him, around him, even through him, each one of them a mystery to
  him, closed to him forever. For he was no longer empowered toconjure the Möbius equations which
  were their keys.
   They were doors, yes, to other places, even other times, but without their keys the immensity of the
  Möbius Continuum might as well be the narrow confines of a dungeon... or the innermost chamber of
  some sunken Pharaonic tomb, lost forever in the Valleyof the Kings.
   Such imaginative associations were cyclic and muta-tive as the stuff of dreams has ever been. Ideas
  evoked fresh visions as the focus of Harry's dream now shaped itself to this Egyptian motif. So that in the
  next moment he wondered: Doors? But if these myriad eerily drifting shapes are doors, then why do they
  look so much like sarcophagi?
   Sarcophagi, coffins, caskets: now they were made of glass, allowing him to see into them. And within, all
  of those teeming dead thousands, the GreatMajority, couldsee out! They could see Harry drifting
  helplessly by,and soon commenced toshout at him. He saw theirmouths working, death's-head jaws
  grimacing and snapping, the leather of mummiedfaces cracking where un natural stress was applied to
  otherwise inanimate, ex-aminate tissues. They rapped on their glass lids withivory knuckles, ogled him
  through empty sockets,waved X-ray hands as he went floating by.
   His countless deadfriends: they talked to him as ofold, questioned him, begged news, items of
  information,this, that or the other favour. But the ex-Necroscope couldn't hear them and in any case
  
  daren't listen, and he knew that he must never ever again try to answerthem. Oh, Harry wasn'tafraid of
  the dead and neverhad been, but he /eared, indeed dreaded, their attempted communication with him!
  For his deadspeak talent had beenforbidden to him, even as the most basic numberswere now
  unknowable. Worse, there would be a penalty to pay: such agony as might easily win him a boxof his
  own!
   He could only offer them a negative shake of his head(and even then believed he took a risk] as he
  bobbed heavily along where once he'd skimmed, no longermaster but captive of the Mo'bius Continuum.
  I shouldn't even be here, he told himself. How did I get inhere? How will I get out?
   As if some One had answered, he saw that thecoffins were doors again, one of which opened directly
  in his path.Offering no resistance (he had none tooffer), he was drawn through into another place,
  another time. Drawn into time itself, but time in reverse! And soHarry began to fallintohis own past.
   Gathering speed, he was drawn backwards in time like a thread rewinding itself on to its bobbin. Indeed,
  he watched his own blue life-thread - nothing less than the course and continuity of his fourth-dimensional
  existence from birth to the grave - streaming back into him as he backtracked years already lived. And
  the thought occurred: I am going back to my beginnings. I will have it all to live - all to do, all to suffer -
  all overagain!
   That was too much. It was thedifference between adream and a nightmare. And Harry Keogh woke up
  -
   -         Drenched in his own sweat, and gasping: 'No!'
    
   'Don't!' she told him at once, her voice almost as startled and frightened as his own, but less hoarse.
  'You're hurting me.'
   'Brenda!' Harry croaked, almost sobbed her name, while at the same time doubting that it was her name,
  but hoping anyway. Praying that it had all been a dream - and not just this part but all of it, everything -
  and amoment later knowing that it had not. No, for her fierce breasts, where now on impulse she
  suddenly huggedhis face against them, weren't Brenda's; she didn't smell like Brenda; and anyway he
  remembered now that the Brenda he'd called out to had been many long yearsand an entirely different
  world ago.
   'Brenda?' she repeated him, her accent husky, Szgany,as he relaxed his grip on her arms and flopped
  backinto his damp bed. 'Were you dreaming, Harry Dweller- sire?' She leaned over him, supported his
  head with acool hand, stroked his brow.
   'Dreaming?' He looked up at her, tried to focus on her. It wasn't easy; he felt weak as a kitten, drained.
  And that last word - coupled with what she'd called him, Dwellersire - was a trigger which released more
  memories. No, not drained, merely depleted. Robbed. By his own son, The Dweller. And none of it had
  been a dream, or only the last part. And even that had been soclose to reality as to make no difference.
   He turned his head, looked around the small, stone-built, whitewashed, electric-lamplit room. A crude
  dwelling, little more than a cave. But luxury to some. Certainly to Travellers, who hadn't known what a
  permanenthome was before The Dweller and his garden. AndHarry's voice turned as sour as the fur
  lining his clammy mouth as he mumbled, 'Starside?'
  
   She nodded, 'Yes, Starside, the garden. And your feverhas broken.' She smiled at him. 'You're going to
  be wellagain.'
   'My ... fever?' His eyes went back to her face. Itlooked very lovely in the soft, uneven yellow flow of the
  lamplight; most of the electricity from The Dweller's generators went to the greenhouses. 'Yes, my
  "fever",' Harry said again, nodding wrily. No fever, he knew. Just his shattered mind, gradually pulling its
  bits together again. 'How long have I been lying here?'
   This is the second sundown,' she told him. She withdrew her hand from under his head, replaced it with
  a bundled fur for a pillow. Then she stood up from herstool and said, 'I'll prepare soup for you. After you
  haveeaten, The Dweller will want to know that -'
   'No!' he cut her short, his anxiety very tangible. 'Not ... yet, awhile. He doesn't need to know yet. I want
  alittle time to myself, to get my thoughts in order.'
   And she wondered: Is heafraid of his own son? Thenperhaps we all should be.
   Harry looked at her standing there, a frown on herattractive if careworn face. She was small, amply
  proportioned, with dark eyes slightly aslant, a small nose for a Gypsy, and hair glossy black where it fell
  to her shoul ders. Passionate as all her race - dressed in soft, supple leather - even motionless there was
  something animal,sinuous, sensual about her.
   Still frowning, she crossed to a fireplace built into the virgin rock of the innermost wall and hung a
  prepared pot from a tripod. Prodding the fire's embers to glowing life, and aware that Harry's eyes
  followed herevery movement, she finally told him, 'But The Dweller'sinstructions were very clear: Lardis's
  people are to tend your needs as best possible until such time as you recover, upon which - and
  immediately - he is to beinformed.'
   'My needs are that I'm not to be disturbed,' Harry's wits were a little sharper now. 'I'm not to be excited.
  You mustn't ... mustn't argue with me.' All of thisthinking, all of these words, were a big effort. Wearied,
   he lay back and wondered why he felt only half here.No, he knew why: it was because hewas only half
  here. He had lost, been deprived of, several of his senses -like losing touch and taste. Which left him
  feeling numb,and life flavourless.
   The Gypsy woman smiled and slowly nodded, as if the sharpness of Harry's words had confirmed some
  unspoken thing. 'You are wilful,' she said what was on her mind. 'All of you hell-landers are alike, wild
  and wilful. Zekintha, called Zek, and Jazz Simmons: they were the same. If only they had stayed here.
  Their hot blood - their children - would be welcome among the Travellers. We would be the stronger for
  it.' It was aSzgany compliment.
   'Szgany blood is hot enough,' Harry answered, also a compliment. 'So ... will you report my awakening?
  What's your name, anyway?'
   'I am Nana Kiklu,' she answered, coming back to sit beside him as before. 'And no, I will not report
  yourawakening. Not for a little while.'
   'Not until morning? Sunup?'
   She cocked her head on one side. That's a long time.We're only half-way into the night. There will be
  others looking after you before sunup, who will surely see thatyou are recovered.'
  
   'Not if I'm asleep,' Harry answered.
   'Perhaps not ...' But now she could see how important this was to him, and so made up her mind. 'Mine
  isthe last shift,' she said, thoughtfully.'Ifyour recovery isstill undiscovered when I return, then it can wait till
  daylight.'
   Harry held back a sigh of relief, settled down moreeasily into his bed. He did actually need the time,
  didn't want to be transported back to his own world while hewas still in...in a state of shock? And so,
  'Fair enough,'he said. And in open admiration: 'Your man is fortunate,Nana Kiklu. At one and the same
  time, his woman isaccommodating and charming.'
   'I thank you,' she answered at once, 'but as for my man - alas, no.' And now a certain longing, an
  emptiness, crept into her voice, and a sadness on to her face. For like Harry, Nana, too, had been
  deprived. 'My man was ... less than fortunate,' she explained. 'In the battle for the garden, the Lord
  Belath's gauntlet, dipped in poison, sliced Hzak's shoulder to the bone. I prayed hewould survive. He did
  survive - for six sunups.'
   Now Harry Keogh sighed, more a groan than a sigh proper, and turned his face away; but not before
  she saw the sympathy living in it, and the regret. The time had been - but now was gone — when he
  might have contacted Hzak Kiklu to comfort him, tell him that the Wamphyri were no more. But
  ex-Necroscope, the deadwere beyond Harry now.
   'All things pass,' she said, bravely. 'Now - can you sit up? I have soup for you, with chunks of soft meat.
  Your blood has grown thin as water through all the hours you've lain here. This will thicken it up.' She
  brought soup and bread. Harry was suddenly very tired,but he was hungry too. While he ate, Nana Kiklu
  looked on in silent approval. She approved of him wolfing thefood she'd prepared, and she approved...of
  him.
   Under his bedclothes lay the body of a hunter, a fighting man; hard-muscled as Hzak's had been, yet
  pale and different. Well, of course he was different, for he came out of the hell-lands of legend! But ...
  not that different. She'd washed him tip to toe and so knew he wasn't that different. But handsome, aye!
  Tall, and lean in the hip. Strong too, before his sickbed, and would be again. Nana had no concept of the
  word 'athlete', but she could picture Harry chasing a wild pig and castinghis spear: the ripple of his
  muscles, the narrowing of his strange honey-brown eyes. She could picture himdoing ... many things.
   As for the waving grey streaks in the russet of his hair: it seemed unlikely that age could have put them
  there. Harry Dwellersire was - what, ageless? When she'd listened to him rambling in his fever, he had
  sounded like nothing so much as an innocent boy; for afact his body seemed older than his mind! Nana
  couldn't know it, but in that last thought she had struck uponthe absolute truth.
   So, why was he greying? Did it result from great learning, the wisdom that came from it, the weight of
  mighty knowledge? But knowledge of what strange things? In her reasoning, too, she came closer to the
  truth than she knew. But as things were she could only offer a small, unselfconscious shrug which went
  unnoticed. Why strive to understand anything? He was after all a hell-lander. It was probably as well that
  sheneither knew nor understood.
   Harry was asleep almost before the last spoonful of soup was down, and a half-hour later Nana Kiklu
  handed over her duties to another, much older woman.Good as her word, she said nothing about their
  charge's partial recovery ...
  
    
   Harry woke up at the end of the six-hour shift, saw the oldGypsy woman nodding on her stool, closed
  his eyes andmoaned until she started awake. Then he kicked his limbs, but feebly, convincing her that he
  was feverish still. Whenhe calmed down she spooned soup into him, crooned tohim until he slept again.
  Six hours later he employed thesame subterfuge with a third Szgany woman, but this timethere could be
  no hiding his rapid improvement. He wasonly saved by the prompt arrival of Nana Kiklu.
   'He looks well,' his unknown Gypsy nurse told Nana as she came in from Starside's long night, shrugging
  herself out of a heavy coat of fur. 'His fever is in abeyance; all the clamminess has gone out of him; he
  took enough soup for two men! I think he'll wake soon. Weshould tell The Dweller.'
   And feigning sleep, Harry heard Nana's answer:
   'Let's not be too hasty. The Dweller is resting. Sunup is five hours away and the dawn will be time
  enough.Don't worry, I will see to it.'
   'As you will,' the other answered, and left.
   Harry had done most of his thinking in his sleep, which in the main had been restful; also in his dreams,
  which were less so. He was aware that his son would soon take him out of this world into his own and
  leave him there, and that he would be a free man again. But only a man, no more Necroscope, and no
  way round it. He wasn't reconciled to it but had no choice. For the time being, however, his frustration
  seemed all burned out of him; except... he supposed it must return. Yes, as long as there were locked
  rooms in the mansion ofhis mind - while he remembered the Möbius Continuum, and the myriad dead
  friends who were lost to him now— it would always return.
   But looking at Nana Kiklu where she came to stand over him, looking at her through three-quarters
  shuttered eyes, which yet feigned sleep, he found himselfremembering other, more mundane things.
  Earthly, even earthy things; yet notof the earth, and certainly not of the grave. For Nana Kiklu was far
  from that. On the contrary, she was full of life. And he remembered how her breasts had felt against his
  face when she'd huggedhim.
   And then he knew why he continued to feign sleep: so that he could watch her watching him. He wanted
  to
   consider her expression, and see if he could sense thatin her which he felt in himself. It had been a long,
  longtime since he'd known a woman.
   When Nana sat beside him he merged into hershadow, felt drawn to her. The top buttons of her soft
  leather blouse were open; leaning over him to straightenhis pillow, the curves of her elastic breasts were
  partly exposed. Only lift his hands a little and he could testtheir weight. It was a struggle not to. And to
  control hisbreathing.
   She cocked her head a little on one side, half-shuttered her own eyes, frowned at him. But her eyes, like
  her thoughts, were very deep. She had noticed the rise and fall of his chest: a trifle ... irregular? Both
  Harry and the Gypsy, each wondered what were theother's thoughts.
   In the same moment that he felt he must touch her,finally she moved, got up, went to the door - and
  barred it. And Harry knew, in the way people do, what wasgoing to happen; also that he wanted it to
  happen.
  
   She came back, her Gypsy hips swaying hypnotically,and sat down again. But as she adjusted his
  blanket, soher hand crept beneath it on to his naked thigh. Harry stopped breathing, stiffened with the
  shock of hertouch, and her suspicions were at once confirmed. Her laugh was low and husky. 'I thought
  your fever hadcooled a little. But look, here you are hot as ever! Hot - and hard ...'
   Already erect, his manhood grew more yet into hertightening, deliciously mobile fist, to hammer like a
  heartagainst her palm. Until he groaned, 'No! Wait! Nana, don'twaste me!' His trembling hands found the
  buttons of herblouse and her breasts tumbled free. While he fondled andkissed their softness, teasing her
  brown nipples to life, shestruggled to be rid of her clothes and into bed with him.
   'Fill me, Harry Dwellersire,' she moaned, 'for we've both been empty and aching for far too long. I'm not
  sure why you ache, but this may be part of the cure.'
   He made no answer, found the sucking gate to hersex and drove into it. In the next moment, for a
  moment, he held himself back, then panted: 'I can't - daren't -damn it, I'll get you pregnant!'
   'No,' she shook her head, rolled over on top and camedown slow and heavy on him, trapping his flesh
  deep in her lava core and his face in the silky curtain of her hair. And slowly working her body, with her
  breasts lolling in his face, she gasped, 'I'm ... barren.' It was a lie; Hzak's seed had been at fault, she
  knew. But as forNana, she wanted a child - so why not Harry's?
   Harry felt himself swelling, shook his head wildly.'Nana, I can't hold it!'
   'Don't try,' she told him, and instantly felt him jerking,geysering into her. His long bursts seemed
  unending,lubrication for the hot engine of her womanhood.
   Too quick,' he moaned, angry with himself. 'Toodamned quick!'
   'Yes,' she murmured, smothering him in her breasts, her kisses. Too quick. But that one was for you.
  Thisone will be for me, and it will be slower.'
   It was. And so was the next...
    
   In the grey twilight, just before sunup, Nana crept fromHarry's bed and dressed, went to The Dweller
  and told him that his father's fever had broken. When she lefther lover of a few brief hours, he was
  sleeping a dream less, exhausted sleep, and somehow she knew it wasthe last she would see of him.
   But, warm inside, she also knew that it was not thelast of his works.
    
    
    
   II
    
  
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
   Four years later:
   Lardis Lidesci's house stood on a rise a little aboveSettlement, where the grassy, temperate but abrupt
  foot hills of Sunside climbed towards rocky outcrops and steep, forested heights. He liked sitting in front
  of the house at sundown, to catch the last rays of the sun; likewise before sunup, to watch it rise.
  Unthinkable four short years ago (two hundred 'days', or sunup-sundown cycles), and even now
  nerve-tingling: to be upand about, safe and sound, and the parent star itself not yet risen. Strange, too, to
  live in one place, in a house; though almost all of the Szgany did these days -certainly the majority of
  Lardis's prosperous, ever-increasing band.
   The Szgany Lidesci: Lardis's people.
   Oh, there were still a few families who preferred their hide-covered caravans along the valley trails, and
  those who dragged their scant belongings on travois from place to place, unwilling to rest, relax, rejoice in
  the fact that the scourge of the Wamphyri was a thingof the past. But in the main they were settled or
  settling now, while other tribes, clans, bands of Travellers were following suit, building their own places
  along the forest's rim, east to west down the spine of the barrierrange.
   Lardis's cabin was styled after The Dweller's houseon Starside. Providing shelter for Lardis, his young
  wife Lissa, and not least their small son Jason - who had been named by his father after someone he very
  muchadmired - it stood a mile east of Sanctuary Rock. Lardishad chosen the spot himself, built the
  house, finally taken a wife and settled here, all in that period of twenty-four solar rotations following
  immediately uponThe Dweller (whom some saw fit to call 'the changeling' now, and others Harry
  Wolfson) sending the Szgany out of his garden on Starside. And while Lardis had toiled to construct his
  home here in the lower foothills,so his people had followed his example, felled trees andbuilt Settlement.
   Since the place was the first community of its kind in more than two thousand years of wandering, Lardis
  found its simple name in keeping - if not the high, stout fence which the Gypsies had seen fit to throw up
  around it. With its catwalks, turret watchtowers and various defensive systems ... perhaps 'Fortress'
  would have been a more suitable name! But memories of hard times die hard, and Szgany dread of
  Wamphyri terrorand domination was instinctive and immemorial.
  
   The Wamphyri, aye!
   Sitting here in the faint, false-dawn light of Sunside, looking down on Settlement - with its tiny gardens
  and allotments, blue smoke spiralling from its stone chimneys, the first antlike movements in its cramped
  streets - Lardis wondered if the Wamphyri would ever return. Well, possibly, for they were like a
  recurrent nightmare which fades but not entirely from inner memory, bloating anew when least expected,
  resurgent in the night. But not, he prayed, in his time. Let it not be in his orlittle Jason's time.
   It wouldn't be, not if he could help it.
   And yet... it was reported that the vampire swamps were acrawl again. Creatures and ignorant, lonely
  menwent there to drink, and came away more than creatures and less than men. Or more than men,
  depending onone's point of view: that of someone entirely human, orthat of something other. Impossible
  and therefore pointless - and not least very, very dangerous - to attempt to quarantine, patrol or monitor
  those great boggy tracts sprawling west of the barrier range, those morasses ofbubbling, festering evil.
  Their extent was unknown, un mapped; no one fully understood the nature of vampirecontamination,
  infestation, mutation.
   How then to keep the threat at bay? The Szgany Lidesci could only do their best. Lardis's plan had been
  simple and so far had seemed to work:
   West of the jagged barrier mountains, where the cragsfell to earth, petered into stacks, knolls and
  jumbles,became foothills which eventually flattened into quaggy hollows, that was where the swamps
  began. Fed by streams out of the heights, the marshes brewed theirhorrors through the long, steamy
  sunups, released them into the gurgling, mist-wreathed nights. At least one tribe of Starside trogs,
  inhabitants of deep caverns far to the west of what was once The Dweller's garden, knew the danger well
  enough: they kept a constant watch for any suspicious creature emerging from thatregion. And since all
  such were dubious, they destroyed them whenever they could. Wolf, goat, man - it made no difference -
  if he, it, whatever, came stumbling or stalking out of reeking, moisture-laden darkness intotrog territory,
  then he was doomed.
   Lardis had taken his cue from the trogs. One hundredand forty miles west of Settlement, where the
  mountainswere less rugged and the green belt of Sunside narrowed down to something of a thinly
  forested bottleneck, that was where the Szgany had always drawntheir line of demarcation. In all Lardis's
  travelling days, he'd never taken the tribe across that line, neither him nor any other leader that he knew
  of. Apart from ahandful of solitary types - lone wanderers who always kept themselves apart, perhaps
  for safety of body and soul - apart from these and the rare, nomadic family group, the territory beyond
  the line of demarcation was unknown to men, unexplored. But as for the line itself:now at least it was
  manned. And constantly.
   There were two well established Gypsy communities west of Settlement: Mirlu Township only twenty
  milesaway, and Tireni Scarp, three times as far again. Volun teers from all three of these 'towns' took
  turns guarding the brooding vampire frontier. Even now two dozen men of the Szgany Lidesci were away
  from home, an entire sunup's march to the west. There they'd stay for four long days - and four fraught,
  eerie sundowns -until relieved of their duties by the Szgany Mirlu. Eventually it would be the turn of a
  band from Tireni Scarp, and so forth. This way, just as Starside's trogs kept a lookout for incursions into
  their territories, so theSzgany protected Sunside.
   It was as much as could be done; Lardis had agreed all of the procedures with Anton Mirlu and Yanni
  Tireni; the Lidescis - because they were situated furthest from the boundary and so had further to trek in
  pursuance of their duties - would seem to have got theworst of the deal. At the same time, however, they
  
  were the furthest away ... but never to the extent that Lardis was out of touch. No, for he must always
  maintain his intelligence, keep up to date where and whenever vampiric outbreaks or manifestations were
  concerned ...
   Hunched in his chair in his small garden over Settlement, Lardis chewed over all of these things,
  considering what had been and wondering what was still to be; until suddenly, feeling a chill, he turned up
  the collar of his jacket. Not that this would warm him, for his wasa chill of the soul - maybe. He snorted
  and gave an
   agitated shrug. At times he cursed the seer's blood in him; it told him things and gave warning, true, but
  never told enough and sometimes warned too late.
   A thin mist was gradually (and quite naturally) risingout of the earth, up from the streams and rivers,
  advanc ing through the forests and gathering in the hollows. Already Settlement's walls were fading into
  the grey of it. Lardis didn't much care for mists; he'd seen too many which were other than natural; he
  remembered their clammy feel against his skin, what had issued them, what all too often issued out of
  them. But this one -
   - He narrowed dark Szgany eyes and merely scowled at this one. Knowing its source he could afford
  to, for it was simply the dawn. In just a little while now the glorious, laborious sun would lift its rim up
  over the far furnace deserts, pour its light on fringes of scrub, crab-grass, savanna where they gradually
  merged into forest,until finally its golden rays would light upon Settlement and the barrier range itself.
   Sunup, soon! The land knew it, stirred, breathed a moist breath of mist to wake birds and beasts alike,
  and cover the shimmer of trout in the brighteningrivers.
   Sunup, aye ... And with the thought, all manner of morbid omens and imaginings slipped quietly from
  Lardis's mind. For a little while, anyway ...
    
   'Halloo!' The cry broke into Lardis's solitude, broughthim to his feet.
   Going to the front of the garden and looking down the zigzagging, rudimentary stairway of stones which
  he'd wedged into the steepest part of the descent, Lardis saw two disparate figures climbing towards
  him, their feet swathed in a milky weave of ground mist. One ofthem, whose familiar voice had hailed
  him, was Nana Kiklu. The other - male, gnarled, and somewhat bent -was the mentalist Jasef Karis; or
  the 'thought-thief, as most people knew him, except that was an unkind expression. Oh, the old Gypsy
  could get into your head right enough, and steal your thoughts if he wanted to! But that wasn't his way.
  Usually he kept his talent to himself, or else used it to the tribe's advantage as awhole.
   As for Nana: her man had died following the battlefor The Dweller's garden, which itself had followed
  fast on the hell of the bloodbath at Sanctuary Rock. And Lardis remembered that only too well...
   Then: the Wamphyri Lord Shaithis had come intoSunside looking for Zekintha Foener and the
  hell-lander Jazz Simmons. In fact Zek and Jazz were both hell-landers, but while Lardis had admired
  them individually, his memories of Zek were that much fonder.Though it would have been impossible to
  mistake her for a Gypsy (what, with her colouring, like a burst of sunlight?), still there had been something
  of the Gypsy about her. While she'd never once encouraged Lardis, nevertheless he'd entertained hopes.
  Perhaps if things had worked out differently ... but they hadn't. Zek was gone now, returned to her own
  world. Anyway, Lardishad Lissa and Jason, and loved both of them. He channelled his thoughts afresh:
  
   After the slaughter at Sanctuary Rock and the period of sojourn in The Dweller's garden, when the tribe
  had returned to Sunside to build Settlement, then Nana had been given the task of caring for old Jasef;
  for there were no drones among the Szgany. Indeed, if circumstances had been as of old, then Nana
  would have been obliged to find herself another husband. And as for the old man: surely the day had long
  since dawned when
   the mentalist would have been no more. His rapidly shrivelling brain, desiccated bones and knotted
  ligaments must certainly have done for him by now, whenduring some nightmare raid from Starside - with
  neitherwit to hide himself away, nor agility to flee - Jasef would have ended his days as fodder in the belly
  of a hybrid Wamphyri warrior creature. Except ... that had beenthen and this was now, and things were
  very different.
   Lardis continued to follow the progress of the pair as they climbed towards him, and his thoughts in
  respect of the aged Szgany telepath were neither callous norcalculating, merely honest:
   Old Jasef, with his mind-reading abilities and what-all: what he ate didn't amount to much, nor was he
  troublesome. In his lean-to adjacent to Nana's cabin, he lived out his time in what small comfort was
  available and was grateful. For he knew that in certain Szgany tribes he might not be so fortunate; he
  might even be put down, like his father before him, because there was something of the Wamphryi in him.
  It was very little and showed itself only in his mentalism, but in Lardis'seyes that made him valuable.
  Especially now that things were starting to happen again, albeit things which theSzgany could well do
  without.
   Now Lardis looked back some thirteen sunups to the last time Nana brought Jasef Karis to see him -
  and towhat had resulted from the visit:
   'Karen's in her aerie and worried!' The old man's hands had fluttered like brown-spotted birds.
  'Likewise Harry Wolfson where he prowls with the pack on Star-side's flank, howling under the racing
  moon. Their thoughts are strange and ominous. I have seen with their eyes how the auroras writhe and
  pulse over the Icelands, and smelled with their nostrils the weirdwinds that blow from that cold realm!'
   Lardis had nodded, and asked: 'What are theirthoughts?'
   'Karen is uneasy - very! She makes monsters!'
   'Out of men?' Not wanting to believe it, Lardis hadheld his breath. It had been hard enough, that time
  four years ago, to believe she still lived! What, Karen alive? And Harry Dwellersire so sure that she was
  dead? Butwhen The Dweller returned to Starside after delivering his father back to the hell-lands, then
  the truth of ithad been seen: the Lady Karen herself had come visiting!She and The Dweller (two of a
  kind?), walking, talkingtogether on the silvered slopes, in the heights over Star- side's boulder plains. But
  why not? She had been his ally against the Wamphyri Lords, hadn't she? She hadbeen the one to bring
  first warning.
   And now this: she practised the arts of the Wamphyriand made monsters! But from what? Perhaps it
  was aswell after all that The Dweller had become a changeling, whose powers waned like his waning
  man-flesh. Aye, for he was the leader of the grey brotherhood now - a wolf! - albeit a wolf with the pale
  slender hands of a human youth. Had it been otherwise .. . ah, what unthinkable nightmares he and Karen
  might have bredtogether! And what blood-lusting progeny, to come raiding again out of Starside!
   Jasef, however, had given a shake of his palsied head.'No, Karen took no men to make her creatures.
  
  Neitherflesh of Travellers nor even trog flesh, but ... stuff, which she discovered alive in the workshops of
  the Lords Menor Maimbite and Lesk the Glut, buried beneath the ruins of their toppled aeries.' Then with
  ashrug he'd added: 'But what odds? For it, too, had beenthe stuff of men ... upon a time.'
   While word of Karen's weird industry and Harry Wolfson's fretful prowling was bad enough news in
   itself, still Lardis had wanted to know why they'd been driven to these extremes; had Jasef gleaned the
  reason for it? Had The Dweller's metamorphosis driven him mad? What did Karen fear that she made
  guardiancreatures, when she herself was the last of the Wamphyri? There had been rumours: some said
  she'd taken men for lovers and never harmed a one of them. What had Jasef divined of these things?
  Anything atall? Or was he merely groping in the dark?
   'Awful winds whistling out of the Icelands,' the ancient had moaned, rolling his eyes. 'The changelingand
  Karen, they have watched the auroras weaving, andlistened to voices out of the living ice!'
   At which Lardis's eyes had narrowed. Twice now theold man had mentioned the Icelands, those far
  northern regions beyond Starside, into which the Wamphryi hadbanished malefactors of their own kind
  since time imme morial. After the battle at the garden, several surviving Lords were known to have fled
  there: the gigantic, acromegalic Fess Ferenc, the entirely loathsome VolsePinescu, the squat and
  vindictive Arkis Leperson - eventhe great Lord Shaithis himself, plus an unknown number of lieutenants
  and thralls. Well, and they were only the last of many gone before them. But none had ever returned. Not
  yet...
   And Lardis had shivered and husked: 'Are you tellingme that they fear the return of ...?'
   'Wait! Wait!' Old Jasef had fluttered his hands. 'In the hour before dawn I dreamed of The Dweller, the
  changeling, the wolf with a man's hands. Except it wasmore than just a dream, and he asked for you,
  Lardis. If you would know more, then go and speak to him who runs with the pack.'
   'Oh?' Lardis had grunted, shrugging in that jerkyway of his, to indicate his irritation. 'Just like that? And
  should I, too, run with the wolves? And will they also respect my life, like the tame wolves of Settlement?
  Now tell me: even if I wanted to see The Dweller, how would I seek him out and where find him?' But
  he'dknown the answer even before the question was out.
   'Where else?' said Jasef, cocking his head on oneside.
   At the grave of his mother, of course ...
    
   Nana and Jasef had reached the topmost flight. Puffing and panting where the going was steep, the old
  man leaned heavily on Nana. Their errand must be important. Lardis called down, 'You should have sent
  arunner. I would have come to you.'
   A runner - even those simple words conjured images:Of a racing moon in the skies over Starside, and
  Jean grey shapes, running like quicksilver, whose silhouettesseemed part of the night. Never fully seen - a
  grey blur on the peripheryof sight - they meltedinto the ridges, the crags, the shadowsof black and
  stirless trees. Their triangle eyes had been luminous in the garden's preternatural gloom.
   For of course Lardis had known his duty, and despite his fear had gone there; climbed up to the high
  pass andthrough it to the garden, to meet with Harry Wolfson at the grave of the Gentle One Under the
  
  Stones. Oh, he'd not gone alone or unarmed; five of his best men had accompanied him, and he'd carried
  his shotgun and abox of silver-shot cartridges from The Dweller's armoury. It wasn't that Lardis didn't
  trust Harry Wolfson: he hadtrusted, almost worshipped him in his time and would doso even now - to a
  point. But there had been word of him.Hunters on the evening slopes of Sunside, returning lateto
  Settlement, Mirlu, Tireni Scarp, had seen him running with the pack. And he had howled with the best of
  them!
   They had their pact, however, and not a man of thewestern Szgany townships would ever shoot at a
  moun tain wolf. Still, to be absolutely sure they'd not be tempted, Lardis had left his men to wait for him
  at theback of the garden, where the pass led down to Sunside. And then he'd gone on alone to the
  rendezvous, at the grave of The Dweller's mother. Except it had not been the changeling whom Lardis
  met in the now ruined garden. Not him but his father, the Necroscope HarryKeogh, returned at last out
  of another world.
   Lardis could remember the first moments of that meeting in detail: how first the garden had been empty,
  thenthe tall figure of the hell-lander, standing there at thewall, alone, shoulders slumped, forlorn, where a
  moment ago there had been an empty space. And Lardis had known at once who this must be, for no
  other could come and go like that; and he'd wondered: Is this whatThe Dweller wanted me to know, that
  his father is back in the barrier mountains?
   But then, at Lardis's approach, so Harry had straightened, turned, seen him there. And in that selfsame
  instant Lardis had known that The Dweller wasn't the only changeling in Starside. Grey and gaunt,
  Harry'sflesh, and crimson his eyes. Wamphyri!
   As for the rest of that meeting - their actions, the substance of their conversation - it was all but
  forgotten. Lardis had wanted nothing so much as to be out of there. Perhaps he'd mentioned The
  Dweller's fate, and something of his fears of a threat out of the Icelands; perhaps they'd spoken of the
  Lady Brenda, and the cairn where she lay buried; perhaps at that there had been something other than
  blood in the Necroscope's eyes. One of the few things Lardis did remember, and clearly - one action of
  which he would always be ashamed - was that he'd discharged his weapon, uselessly, and that the
  hell-lander could so easily have killed him ... but hadn't.
   Later: they had stood together in silence at Brenda's grave. But when Harry inquired after the Travellers,
  then Lardis had been instantly suspicious. Worried about the other's intentions, he'd asked: 'And will you
  hunt on Sunside, Harry - hunt men, women and children - when the nights are dark?'
   'Does my son hunt the Szgany?' was Harry's answer.'Did he ever?'
   But by then the atmosphere had been sour as Lardis'smood. And as he'd headed for the pass where his
  menwere hidden, his parting shot had been: 'Oh, you'll comea-hunting soon enough, for a woman to
  warm your bed, or a sweet Traveller child when you're weary of rabbitmeat!' And the howling of the
  wolves had followed him and his men all the way down to Sunside ...
    
   Nana and Jasef had reached the top of the steps; Lardis took the old man, led him stumbling to his own
  chairand seated him there; Nana said:
   'I could have come on my own but Jasef said no, he wanted to speak to you in person. Also, you have
  privacy here. Such things as Jasef would tell you are bestsaid in private. He doesn't wish to panic the
  people.'
  
   'And you?' Lardis looked at her, giving the mentalist time to compose himself, catch his breath. 'Has he
  toldthese things to you?'
   She shrugged. 'I look after him; he mumbles in hissleep; from time to time I overhear things.'
   'I mumble, aye,' the old man agreed, showing his gums in a wry grin. 'But ah, the substance of my
  mumbling!'
   'Let's have it,' Lardis nodded grimly. 'What is it now,old man?'
   Jasef made no bones of it: The Wamphyri are backon Starside!'
   Even though Lardis had feared as much, still he wasaghast. He shook his head, grasped Jasef's arm. 'But
  how can it be? Is it possible? We destroyed theWamphyri!'
   'Not all of them,' said Jasef. 'And now they've returned, Shaithis and one other, out of the Icelands. They
  plot against Harry Hell-lander, the Lady Karen,even the changeling. Their voices are in the wind over the
  barrier mountains, and in my dreams I hear themtalking.'
   'Of what?'
   'Of sweet Traveller flesh, of the blood which is thelife, of bairns to roast like suckling pigs, and women to
  rend with their lust! All of these things, which they've missed in exile in the Icelands. Even now they
  inhabit Karen's aerie, flying out from it with their warriorsinvincible to raid on eastern tribes.'
   'Just two of them?'
   'What?' Jasef's rheumy eyes peered at Lardis in wonder.' "Just" two of them, did you say? "Just" two
  WamphyriLords?' And of course Lardis knew that he was right. Itmight as well be an army. Except ...
  armies weren'talways victorious.
   Jasef read his mind. 'Aye,' he nodded, 'the SzganyLidesci are protected: we have The Dweller's
  weapons!Those weapons in which he instructed us, at least. But what of the other tribes and towns?
  "Just" two of them - for now! But do you think the Wamphyri won't takelieutenants? Do you think they
  won't breed, make mon sters? Lardis, I'm only an old man whose days arenumbered, and so I have very
  little weight in the world. But I'll tell you what I fear the most: that this is thebeginning of the end for all of
  the Szgany.'
   Suddenly Lardis was desperate. He grasped Jasef's arm that much tighter. 'How can we be certain that
  you've read aright? You aren't always so sure of yourself. Even your dreams are sometimes ... only
  dreams.'
   'Not this time, Lardis,' the old man shook his head.'Alas, not this time. Do you think I enjoy playing
  harbin ger, bringer of ill omen, like a man whose very breathcarries the plague? Believe me, I do not. But
  Iknow the Wamphyri, and especially Shaithis, who was ever theclever one ...' He paused to issue an
  involuntary, uncon trollable shudder. 'Aye, that one's thoughts are strong; they carry on the aether like
  cries across an echoing valley, and my mind the valley wall, which traps themfor me to read.'
   Lardis turned this way and that in search of some unseen solution, but in the next moment hope lifted his
  voice. 'What of Karen?' he demanded. 'What of Harry Dwellersire? That one has powers, which he put
  
  to work in the battle for The Dweller's garden. And thepair of them - forgive me for saying it, for even
  thinking it - they are Wamphryi in their own right! I can't see them sitting still, doing nothing, while Shaithis
  regains his old influence, recoups his old territories. What?Unthinkable! We were allies before, we'll be
  alliesagain.1
   Jasef nodded, however tremulously. 'Better the devils you know, eh, Lardis? But weren't you listening?
  Karenhasalready fled her stack! She's ..^h the hell-lander atthis very moment, in his son's garden. As for
  the changeling: almost certainly he'll side with them against Shaithis and the others. But tell me, what can a
  wolfdo? Ah, he isn't The Dweller which once we knew!'
   Lardis paced back and forth, to and fro. 'Well, at least I know what I must do!' he said, finally. And
  turning to Nana: 'Go back down into Settlement, speak
   with Peder Szekarly, Kirk Lisescu, Andrei Romani and his brothers. Tell them to report to me, and at
  once -with their guns! We go again to the garden on Starside. If Harry Dwellersire and Karen are in need
  of soldiers ... I'll wait here and ready myself, until the five join me. We go to parley with them who defend
  the Starside garden, as they defended it once before. We go to offerour alliance, and to talk of war!'
   Nana nodded. Silent all of this time, now words tumbled from her lips in a breathless gush. 'Lardis, do
  you think that I ...? Could you possibly ...? I mean to say... only that I should like very much to go with
  you!'
   Astonished, he looked at her, frowned, tucked hischin in. 'You? Starside? Are your wits suddenly
  addled, Nana? You, with two small sons to care for, and them only a year older than my own Jason?
  How could I allow such a thing - and why would you want it? Don'tyou know the danger?'
   'I... of course I do,' she looked away. 'It was just ... it was nothing but a whim.' And then, in another
  burst: 'But I... I nursed Harry Dwellersire that time, and I wondered how he fares now that he is -'
   '- Changed!' Lardis finished it for her. 'For he was only a man then, Nana - albeit a strange one - and
  now is other than a man. You may not go with me. What, to Starside? Of course you may not! Stay in
  Settlement and care for Hzak Kiklu's children, while you may. Awhim, you say? A damned foolish one, I
  say! And should I let a vampire Lord, even one such as Harry Dwellersire, lay crimson eyes on one of
  my own Szgany women? Such a fate could be yours... I would not wish it on adog!'
   But: Ah.' she thought. You don't know, you don'tknow!
   It was Lardis's last word on the subject, however, and Nana was left silently cursing her own tongue,
  which had so nearly betrayed her ...
    
   Returning downhill to Settlement was easier. As Nana and Jasef approached the last flight, where she
  would run on ahead with Lardis's message to his men, the old man panted, 'Nana, that was a mistake
  back there.'
   While she, too, was short of breath, still she held itfor a moment. 'What was a mistake?'
   'Forty sunups, thereabouts, a woman swells with her child,' the old mentalist played at being thoughtful.
  'But four years ago' (he did not say 'years' but continued to use terms suited to Sunside and Szgany time
  scales) 'there were events of great moment, when no one waskeeping count.'
  
   'What are you saying?' But she knew very well whathe was saying, even before he answered.
   'Hzak Kiklu died after the battle in the garden,' Jasef mused at length (a completely unnecessary
  reminder, which proved what Nana had always known anyway: that old as he was, still Jasef wasn't the
  old fool that others believed him to be). 'But before he died he was still very much the man. Obviously
  so, for you have your sons! Ah, but a long, slow pregnancy that, Nana,'he went on, 'which lasted ...
  what? Almost tenmonths?'
   Ten and a half,' she muttered low. 'But as you yourself have observed, no one was counting. Get to the
  point, Jasef.'
   'I was given into your care,' he said, 'since when you've been good to me. There are some who wouldn't
  have cared much one way or the other. What, an old thought-thief like Jasef Karis? As well forget to
  feed him, let him lie on his pallet, fade away and die. But with you, I've wanted for nothing ... well, maybe
  a new
   set of pumps in this old chest, a couple of decent teeth,new knees! But of comforts I've all I can use. So,
  I havemy own reasons for being fond of you, Nana.'
   'It works both ways,' she answered. 'You're not sucha bad one. So?'
   He was silent a moment, while they negotiated thefinal bend. But at last: 'I saw you start,' he said, 'when
  I told Lardis that Harry and Karen were together in thegarden. Those black eyes of yours turned hot as
  coals,Nana.'
   'Hot for a moment,' she turned her face away. 'Butonly a moment. His blood is in my children, after all.'
   He nodded, thought it over, and said, 'What promptedyou to keep it secret?'
   'Common sense,' she answered, 'and maybe something other than that. There are a couple of women in
  Settlement who might have made much of it, and severalwho would have made too much! But at the
  time, when Harry lay ill in The Dweller's garden, I didn't think about him being a hell-lander. To me he
  was just a lonely man in a strange land, even as I myself was lonely. But you're right; a lot was happening;
  by the time the twins were showing, events were crowdingfast. Everything became a blur in the mind's
  eye.'
   They were down on to the level. Nana released hercharge's arm, handed him his stick. 'And now, even if
  Iwould tell, I can't. Harry Hell-lander is Wamphyri! What would I gain from the truth? The best that
  could happen, my boys and I would be watched - always,and very, very closely - even in the best of
  times. And right now, with the Wamphyri back on Starside?' She shook her head. 'When men are
  panicked, they are wont to stampede, Jasef. And then the innocent gettrampled underfoot.'
   He nodded and watched her start away from him.
   The innocent, aye,' he agreed. And a little louder, as she put distance between: 'My father paid the price
  in full! Impaled, beheaded, burned. But then, he was no longer innocent. Indeed, and as the vampire
  changetook hold on him, he was no longer a man!'
   She came to a halt, looked back. 'But my babies are men’ she said, slowly and dangerously. 'And that's
  allthey are.'
  
   'Of course, of course,' Jasef waved her away. 'On you go, Nana Kiklu! Be about Lardis's errand. Yes,
  yes, and we shall keep your secret, which no one else knows ... Nor shall they ever ... Only men, your
  babies, onlymen ...' But to himself:
   What, only men, Nana? Spawnof the Necroscope, the helWander Harry Keogh? And only men? Ah, I
  wonder.I wonder . . .
    
   Two of the brothers Romani were off hunting in theforests; Kirk Lisescu was fishing; none of them
  returned to Settlement until mid-morning, by which time their movements were slow and tired. By then,
  too, Lardis had grown disenchanted waiting for them, and hadcome down from his house to discover for
  himself what was the delay. His arrival coincided with that of a weary, travel-worn party of terrified
  Gypsies from theeastern foothills - survivors of a Wamphyri raid!
   That last took a little time to sink in, but when finallyit did...
   ... Then the fact of it hit Settlement like a thunderbolt - stunningly! Even Lardis, who had received at
  least some prior warning, was shocked. And if in the past there had been times when he'd doubted the
  veracity of old Jasef Karis's telepathic skills, well, his doubtingdays were over.
   Lardis talked a while with one of the seven survivors, aman of about his own age. Plainly he had been fit
  and strong, but now was mazed and mumbling. 'When didthey strike? When?' Lardis shook the other,
  but gently.
   Two, maybe three hours after sundown,' the man answered, his face hollow and haggard. 'Earlier, some
  of the children had wandered home in the twilight; they'd been chasing goats in the peaks; said they'd
  seen many lights in Karenstack. Perhaps we should havebeen warned. But it's rumoured the Lady Karen
  is dead,and these were only children. They could be mistaken.'
   'Where were you? Where?' Lardis shook him again.
   'Beyond the Great Pass,' the other gave a start, blinked rapidly, 'on a plateau under the peaks ...' His
  eyes fastened on Lardis's, seemed for a moment to gaze into his soul, and in the next glazed over again.
  Butsomehow he managed to continue:
   Two years ago, we went into the heights and found a lake there. There was good fishing, goats in the
  peaks,game on the wooded slopes. We are — or we were — the Szgany Scorpi. Emil Scorpi, my
  father, was our leader. There were thirty of us... then. And now, only seven. We built homes for
  ourselves in the woods around the lake. Our boats were on the water. At night, under the first stars, we'd
  sit round our fires on the shore, cook our fish, eat together. Why not? For there was nothing to fear. All
  of the great aeries lay broken on Starside: Wenstack, Menorstack, Glutstack - all tumbled andlying in
  ruins. Only Karenstack remained, and they said Karen was dead. Maybe she is, what odds? It wasn't
  the Lady Karen who fell on us ...'
   Lardis groaned and nodded. 'Shaithis, aye.'
   The young survivor grabbed his arm. 'Yes, Shaithis... and one other! I saw him! He isn't a man!'
   'Not a man?' Lardis frowned. 'No, of course not. Noneof them are. Wamphyri!'
  
   'But even the Wamphyri were once men,' the other insisted. 'They arelike men. Except this one ... was
  not.'
   Now Lardis remembered. Jasef had not been clear onthis point. 'What was he like?'
   The other's throat bobbed. He shook his head, failed to find words. 'A... a slug,' he finally gasped. 'Or a
  leech, upright, big as a man. But ridgy as a lizard, cowled, and his eyes burning like embers under the
  hood. A weird worm, a snake, a slug ...'
   'His name?' The hairs had stiffened on the back ofLardis's neck.
   The survivor nodded. 'I... I heard what Shaithiscalled him. It was Shaitan!'
   Shaitan! A gasp escaped Lardis before he could checkit. Shaitan: first of all the Wamphyri! But how
  was it possible? Shaitan was a legend, the darkest of allSzgany legends.
   'I know what you're thinking,' said the other. 'But I saw what I saw. One was a Lord, but there was also
  the great slug. I heard them conversing. Shaithis was the manlike one, whom I heard call the other - him,
  it, whatever - by the terrible name of Shaitan. As for the rest of what I saw, before I fled like a coward
  with the others, don't ask me. This much I'll tell you, and no more: their warrior creatures were lean and
  hungry, and not just for food! It was a nightmare! My mother!My sisters! The Wamphyri have bred
  monsters with theparts of men!'
    
   After that: Lardis asked no more questions of these ragtag remnants of the Szgany Scorpi, but went
  aboutSettlement seeing to its defences. A guard from now on,on the catwalks and in the towers, and no
  more sendingmen west to man the vampire frontier. No, for now thethreat was closer to home; and now,
  too, Lardis thankedwhichever lucky stars shone down on him that he'dbeen outvoted that time during the
  construction of Settle ment, when the other council members had insistedupon huge weapons built into
  the very walls.
   Catapults armed with boulders girdled in spiked chains; great crossbows to fire bolts hewn from entire
  trees outwards into the cleared area around Settlement;trenches covered over with tentlike frameworks
  of coarse hide, painted in imitation of small warrior creatures and supported by sharp-pointed pine
  stanchions.Any enemy warrior, spying one of these grotesque sem blances, would attack at once and
  doubtless impale himself; and men, safe in the trench below, would leap out, hurl their oil, set fire to the
  monster where hewrithed and roared!
   While all of these devices were still in place, theynevertheless required attention. Frayed ropes to be
  seen to, and if necessary replaced; the great crossbows must be loaded, their launching tillers greased;
  children hadplayed at climbing in the frames of the lures and broken them in places. All to be put back to
  rights. So that as Settlement recovered from its shock, there was plentyof work for everyone.
   It was like slipping from a tranquil dream into a living nightmare, the old horror resurgent after a brief
  respite. It was the Wamphyri! And sloth fell from the Szgany Lidesci like the shucked-off skin of a snake,
  so that they emerged startled but fresh, alert, agile. Andvery, very afraid.
   Lardis called a council meeting, revoked the powers of his fellow councillors, declared himself leader as
  of old. Councils are useful when times are peaceful, but in times of war a tribe needs a leader. None was
  
  better qualified than Lardis. In fact, since he'd neverrelinquished his position, this was simply his quick
  and efficient way of re-establishing his authority. Andno one argued the point.
   He made arrangements:
   Two-thirds of the able-bodied men would stay in Settlement; the remainder and all of the women and
  children were to disperse into the woods to the west, farbeyond Sanctuary Rock and even so far as
  Mirlu Town ship. Runners would meanwhile pass on the warning to the Szgany Mirlu, who in turn would
  relay it to TireniScarp. Lardis's own party of fighting men were to accom pany him to the garden
  overlooking Starside, where hehoped to form an alliance with Karen and Harry Dweller-sire.
   Most of Sunside's 'morning' of twenty-five hours' duration was used up by the time Lardis was satisfied
  with his arrangements. The 'day' of seventy-five hours and 'evening' of twenty-five would be consumed
  during the various phases of the climb and the rest periods between. For the trek into the mountains,
  along the high trails and through the passes, would be a long one ...which was probably just as well.
   For such as the three in the garden were, it was unlikely they'd be abroad during sunup ...
   Lardis called in at his house on the first leg of the trek. He told Lissa what was happening, kissed Jason,
  sent them off down to Settlement. There they'd join up with Nana Kiklu and her boys, old Jasef, and one
  younger, more capable man, before heading into thecomparative safety of the forest.
   Lardis watched wife and child begin their descent, studied for a moment the hivelike hustle and bustle of
  Settlement, finally turned to his five companions.
   'Well,' he said, 'and so it's come to this. But we've all been here before, right? And this is nothing new to
  the
   Szgany Lidesci. However, if any one of you would ratherstay with his family, take care of his own, let's
  hear it now. You know that it won't be held against you. Oursis a job for volunteers.'
   They merely looked at him, waiting.
   And Lardis nodded his satisfaction. 'That's it, then.Let's go.'
   As the six set out, the great golden ball of the sun was gradually, oh so slowly closing with the highest
  point in its low southern arc ...
    
   They toiled upwards for six hours, through the foothillsand into the first scarps, then collapsed with
  fatigueamong cliff-hanging trees which gave them shade from the glaring sun. There they slept; later they
  ate; the sun seemed to hover, and moved a little to the east. Withabout sixty solid hours of daylight
  remaining before the 'evening' and twilight, Lardis was not displeased withtheir progress.
   Phase two saw them traversing a series of mistedlesser scarps made treacherous by waterfalls, and skirt
  ing several boggy, steamy false plateaux of sedge, reeds and tough creepers, before the ground dried out
  and started sharply upwards again. The going was much harder here; taking longer to cover a shorter
  distance proved frustrating and wearisome. But eventually they made camp, fed themselves from their
  supplies, took their second sleep period at the foot of steep cliffs where an ancient fault cut a narrow and
  precarious causeway to the top. When they awakened it was plainthat the sun had already commenced
  
  its not quite interminable descent.
   Climbing the causeway, now they were up into the mountains proper. Sunside's levels had been left far
  behind, almost lost in a faintly purple haze of depth and distance where only the glittering snakes of rivers
  showed through a grey-green canopy of forest. Further south, at the curving rim of the world, the furnace
  deserts formed a searing yellow band across the entire east-west horizon; way up ahead, the mountain
  peaks seemed hidden behind wave upon wave of ridges andfalse summits.
   Already it seemed they had climbed forever, and a like distance yet to go. But Lardis was not dismayed;
  his directional instinct told him that he was on course; he recognized many mountain features. If all
  continued to go according to plan, they'd be passing between theultimate peaks even as twilight darkened
  towardsnight.
   Which was precisely where all ceased to go accordingto plan ...
   Climbing an easy, rocky ridge towards a new summit,Ion Romani was last in line. Where the others had
  passed without incident, he disturbed a stone which harboured a small, sleeping snake. The creature
  hissed, emerged from its hiding place and bit him; he rearedback from it, missed his footing, went sliding
  and skitter ing down a tearing flank of sharp stone to a shallow fall on to a bed of boulders. He landed
  awkwardly and broke his arm, and so made himself useless for anymore trekking.
   They dressed the moaning Ion's wounds as best theycould, made a sling for his arm, divided up their
  provi sions. Franci Romani would stay with his younger brother, deal with his snake fever when it came
  on, eventually discover for them an easier, more gradual descent to Settlement. In all the incident wasted
  three hours of valuable time, leaving only four men to continue the expedition ...
   Later:
   A spiral of frothy clouds, lured south from the peaksby thermals rising off the distant deserts, afforded
  inter mittent relief from the sun's glare; a promising goat track ended disappointingly in sheer, unscalable
  cliffs, so that a new route must be found; for the toiling men, time's passing became a meaningless blur as
  hours slipped by in straining, swearing, sweaty procession. Finally, with every muscle in every limb a fiery
  ache, Lardis called a halt some three hundred feet below thetree-line.
   In the time frame of another world of men, two and ahalf days had passed since they set out upon their
  climb. This was their last chance to sleep, and thencover more ground before the twilight came down. Al
  ready the sun was settling towards the south-easterlyhorizon.
   ... They set no watch and overslept, and Lardis woke up ill-tempered and creaking in every joint. He
  feared that four years of easy living had sucked all of theenergy out of him, and was angry to discover this
  weak ness now, just when he most needed his great strength. With the sun an orange hemisphere clinging
  to the rim of the world, and the preternatural hush of twilight already settling, he urged his men to greater
  efforts as they climbed up through the last trees and into the winding passes and trails between the peaks.
  Bird songfaded into the hooting of owls; the moon raced headlong,tumbling on high; out of the west, the
  first wolf howleda lone appreciation of his fleet, sky-floating mistress.
   But at last the four struck upon a trail recognized of old, and Lardis was able to state with some certainty
  that from now on the going would be easier. Nine more hours should see them up the last rise, through
  the final pass to what was once The Dweller's Starsidegarden where ... where they would see what they
  would see.
  
   Except that they were to see it, and know the worst,long before then ...
    
   Half-way through the peaks and with the twilightfading into night, as the four proceeded cautiously along
  the dried-out bed of an ancient watercourse, suddenly Lardis felt a leaden weight on his heart and a
  clammychill in his soul. He knew the sensation of old: a legacy of talented Gypsy forebears. At the same
  time, as if at a signal, the distant howling of wolves tapered down intouneasy ululations and ceased, and
  the small mountainowls where they called to each other across high-walledravines likewise fell silent.
   Scarcely breathing, the four crouched down in theshadows of looming rocks and looked all about.
  Behindthem, wan spokes of pink and yellow light probedthe southern sky over Sunside like a fading fan.
  Sundown, yes ... but not just another sundown. Lardiscrouched lower still and pulled the others down
  withhim. Fingers to his lips in the darkness, with a breathlesshiss, he cautioned them to continued silence.
  And theywaited ...
   Faint yellow patches turned powdery grey on thereflective flanks of the surrounding peaks; the velvet
  gloom settled that much deeper; there came a high-pitched, querulous squeaking, a sudden throb of mem
  brane wings - bats! But there are bats and there arebats.
   Lardis's fiery Gypsy blood ran cold. His world hadmany bat species, not least the insectivores, like tiny
  winged mice. But these creatures which suddenly appeared out of the night to speed overhead in close
  groups of three, with their silhouettes etched blue in
   starshine, were of no such small, harmless variety. Full-grown adults, they were not unlike the Desmodus
  or true vampire of a world known to the Szgany only as the hell-lands - but the span of their wings was
  almosta metre tip to tip.
   Despite the size of the creatures, and the fact that campfire legends were full of alleged attacks, Lardis
  knew that in themselves they were not especially danger ous; it was what they stood for which froze him
  to a statue. More than four years had passed since he had seen a swarm so intent, so full of purpose, but
  even as he'd known it then, so in his own instinctive way he knew just exactly what it meant now.
   Familiars of the Wamphyri were abroad in the night skies again, winging ahead of their masters on an
  errand of utmost horror ... searching!
   But searching for what?
    
    
    
   III
    
    
    
  
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
   In four speeding arrowhead formations, three bats to a group, the nightmare familiars of the Wamphyri
  set the air throbbing overhead, disappearing without pause inthe direction of Starside and The Dweller's
  garden. Long moments stretched out, and only the cold stars forcompany in a sky darkening from
  amethyst over Sunside to indigo between the peaks. Lardis remained frozen, but Peder Szekarly, the
  youngest of his men, made as if to stand up. He lacked experience and didn't share Lardis's prescience in
  these matters.
   Lardis felt the other shuffling impatiently, stretching a limb beside him; he reached out a hand and his
  hard fingers dug irresistibly into Peder's shoulder, holding him down and still. And sensing the way their
  leaderseemed to have shrunk down into himself, Lardis's three crouched lower still, becoming one with
  the humpedsilhouettes of the boulders.
   'Wha—?' Peder began to speak, his voice the merest whisper; but Lardis at once cautioned him with
  hoarse,breathless whispers of his own:
   'Say nothing! Do nothing! Neither move, breathe, nor yet think - orif you must, then thinkof silence,of
  sleep, of what it must have beenlike in your mother'swomb, with nothing to fear but being born! Do
  exactlyas I tell you,if you want to live!'
   It wasn't the first time Peder had heard words such as these; they were cautions he'd learned as a child.
  For like every Traveller child before him, he'd been instructed in the art of silence: of not being heard, not
   being seen... of not being. And he remembered how his father had breathed just such words in his ear
  one monstrous night, and how at sunup he had neither father nor mother. It was so long ago, so terrible
  toremember, that he'd almost forgotten, that was all.
   But now Peder Szekarly wanted very much to live;likewise his colleagues, who grew still as stones; and
  so the seconds lengthened into minutes.
   Then, as time itself slowed and contracted down to now, so the night air thickened, turning leaden with
  an unspoken but tangible dread. It was as if the heartbeats of the four took on the volume of drums
  sounding against their ribs, so that each man believed the next must surely hear him - and prayed that
  nothing else would. And all four of them, they turned their heads and looked back the way they'd come.
  That was where the great bats had come from, and if their masters werewith them...
   They were, and in the next moment Lardis and theothers saw them.
  
   Dark blots, like gigantic kites, or curious leaves whosescalloped rims undulated in the breeze off
  Starside, they rose menacingly out of the smothering blanket of night. Up from the tree-line - up into the
  lesser peaks, and rising over them — up into the night sky, where they blotted out the clean stars with
  their foul, nightmare shapes.
   A flock of speeding night birds, winging east, sensed them and fragmented squawking in a dozen
  different directions. Mating owls launched themselves in pairsfrom rocky crevices, to glide and hide in the
  deep gulleysaround. Lardis's companions, brave men all, closed their eyes and literally stopped breathing,
  leaving their leader himself to identify and plot the course of the terrible shapes in the star-bright sky. And
  on they came, thoseobscene diamond designs whose manta wings pulsedoh so silently, lifting them into
  the upper heights.
   They were flyers, their once-human flesh converted and fashioned into metamorphic airfoils ... vast webs
  of membrane over spongy, arching alveolate bones, form ing air-trap wings for lift and support... their
  flattened, spatulate heads nodding this way and that on long necks, sniffing out the breezes from Starside
  that came blustering between the peaks to form thermals. Flyers, a pair of them: they were the aerial
  observation andcommand posts of their Wamphyri makers and masters; and not only this, they were also
  their mounts!
   For a moment Lardis glimpsed two lesser shapes humped in their saddles at the base of each flyer's
  neck. One was manlike, and the other - Lardis couldn't be sure. But he remembered what a man of the
  decimated Szgany Scorpi had told him about a sluglike thing called Shaitan ...
   Still climbing, the flyers passed directly overhead anddisappeared into the upper peaks. But Lardis
  maintained his frozen crouch, his breathless immobility. For where the Wamphyri Lords aboard their
  flyers had gone silently, the things that followed in their wake were anything but silent! As they came
  powering intoview, with their propulsive orifices rumbling and throb bing, it took every ounce of Lardis's
  iron will to keepfrom closing his eyes and shutting out their totalhorror.
   They were warriors, six of them.
   Warriors! Ah, but whatever that single word might convey in other tongues, when the Szgany used it to
  describe the grotesque fighting beasts of the Wamphyri, then it meant only one thing - shrieking madness!
  But as for these creatures... in the case of at least one of them, even that description seemed inadequate.
  Seeing
   the beast, Lardis flinched uncontrollably; his lips drewback from his teeth in an involuntary grimace.
   While the five - lesser? - creatures flew in a tight arrowhead formation, their far more monstrous cousin
  came on centrally and slightly to the rear. Its pulsing outline against the stars was such that it riveted
  Lardis's gaze; he had merely glimpsed the others beforethis one stamped itself on his disbelieving mind.
  Longer,bulkier, and carrying more armour than its companions,it seemed impossible that a creature like
  this could ever lift its bulk an inch from the earth, let alone fly! Yethere it was, squirting like an enormous
  octopus through the inky, star-spattered sky.
   Details burned themselves into Lardis's brain:
   Its grey-mottled flesh, with scales tinged blue in star-shine like smoothly hinged plates of some weird
  flexiblemetal ... clusters of gas bladders like strange wattles, bulking out its throbbing body and detracting
  from itsmanoeuvrability, but necessary to carry the extra weight of dinosaur body armour... its grapples
  
  and hooks, cutting appendages in the shape of crab claws ... theevil intelligence of its many eyes, some of
  which peered forwards, while others scanned the peaks all around.And yet none of these various parts
  seeming additional to the warrior but integral, built-in, like the armour and weaponry of any smaller
  creature of the wild. Except Nature in her wildest mood and deadliest dreams hadnever equipped
  anything like this!
   Like the flyers and their riders before them, the warriors passed directly overhead, so that the last and
  most terrible of these Wamphyri constructs left a lasting impression of its size and power. With its
  leathery vanes fluttering like the mantle of some vast cuttlefish, itsbladders vibrating as they shrank and
  expanded, balancing the whole, and the exhaust gases from its propulsorsdrifting in a cloud of
  gut-wrenching stench down into the hiding place of the four Szgany, it was awesome.But at last it too
  was gone.
   Lardis's companions, hearing the roaring and sputtering of the monster fading into distance, opened their
  eyesin time to get a final glimpse of it spurting for Starside; then its trail of foul fumes drifted lower and
  envelopedthem like a fog, and it was as much as they could do to hold their breath while the hot moist
  stuff settled all about.
   Peder Szekarly wasn't so fortunate and snatchedbreath at precisely the wrong moment; inexperience has
  its price. He had only joined with the Szgany Lidesci in the six-month after the battle at The Dweller's
  garden;his knowledge of warriors consisted of a scattered hand ful of obscure, reluctant memories from
  childhood, and sightings glimpsed distantly from the fringes of Wamphryi raids, when as a youth he had
  fled with otherrefugees from centres of nightmare activity.
   To give him credit he was quiet about it, but before he was done he'd emptied both stomach and
  bowels, and then must rest for an hour before he was useful for anything else ...
    
   Andrei Romani wasn't really the rebellious sort, merely inquiring. 'I see no point,' he argued, 'in
  proceeding to the garden now. If there was to have been a fight it's already happening, and we're already
  out of it! Also, how may we fight such vileness as crossed our trailless than two hours ago? It makes little
  sense to me.'
   The moon was up again, flying, while from eastern peaks and ridges came the inveigling howls of the
  grey brotherhood, those great wolves who owned the silver moon for mistress and Harry Keogh Jr for
  master. But their howling was strange and strained, and Lardisread bad omens in it. To Andrei he said:
   'Do you hear that, my friend? And can you read it?Those are The Dweller's dogs, I fancy, but I can't
  decide if they're whipped or what.' Pausing only slightly in his striding, where he led his party across a
  long, high saddle of stony ground, he let his querulous companion catch up and grasped his arm. 'Now
  listen, Andrei Romani - you too, Peder Szekarly, Kirk Lisescu - and I'll tell you again what we're about
  and why we're stillabout it. This is how I see it:
   'The old Wamphyri, Shaithis and at least one other, are back on Starside; it was them and their creatures
  passed over us in the gulley back there. They inhabit Karenstack and raid from it among the Szgany as of
  old. Except now it's been made much easier for them; we Travellers travel no more; instead we have
  houses and tend gardens of our own, which makes us sitting targets. All of this is proven ...
   'Upon a time, however, the Szgany fought theWamphyri off - fought and won - and when they were at
  their most powerful, at that! It was the Szgany stood up to the Lords Belath, Volse Pinescu, Lesk the
  
  Glut and Menor Maimbite; aye, and even this same wilyShaithis, returned now out of the Icelands.
   'But ... you and your brothers were actually there in the garden that time, Andrei! Need I tell a Romani
  how the Szgany fought with The Dweller's own weapons — these very shotguns we carry now, brought
  from another world - while he used the sun itself to blast hisenemies to stinking shreds? Of course not!
   'Well, and now he runs with the wolves, I know, and we've only a pact to keep us safe ...
   'Ah, but now his father, called Dwellersire, has returned to Starside! I've seen him, even talked with him
  - though I'll admit that my words weren't so very sweet. Well, now they shall be sweeter. For who could
  even guess what weapons he might have brought back with him, eh? What, Harry Dwellersire? I tell you,
  we must go to the garden, if only to seek alliance!' He paused, released his grip on Andrei's arm,
  continued in a softer tone. 'Or perhaps, in some future time, you'd prefer tofight against Karen, the
  changeling, and his father, eh?'
   'What?' Andrei Romani, a lithe, rangy man, at once frowned and drew a little apart from Lardis. 'But you
  know I would not! Come what may, I have my loyalties. Why, we fought side by side, even as you've
  told it -the Szgany, trogs, and the three together - against our common enemies. Nothing can change that.
  Nothing ofmy doing, anyway.'
   'Agreed, aye,' Lardis answered with a curt nod. 'Nothing of our doing. But wouldn't you deem it "of our
  doing" if we did ... nothing? Monsters the three maywell prove to be in their own right, though as yet
  they've done us no harm, only good; but tell me, should we let them stand and fight - and possibly die -
  alone, when it's more our fight than theirs? And what then, eh, when they're dead and gone? Simply
  return to Sunside and wait for sundown, and the one after that, and ... however few we have left? Ah, but
  suppose they win, and having won pause awhile and think? And what, pray, will they think? Where were
  the Szgany in thereek and the roil, eh?'
   After a long moment, Andrei shrugged or perhapsshivered in the cooling air. 'Let's get on,' he said
  gruffly, turning up his collar, and his face to the north. 'Six or seven miles to the last pass, and an easy
  climb to TheDweller's garden. It's possible that the Wamphyri merelyspied out the land - a
  reconnaissance flight. If it was morethan that, then maybe they've missed their prey; there areplenty of
  hiding places, as we know. Why, just like us, the three could be on their way to the garden even now ...'
   In a little while, striding out, Lardis spoke to Andrei in a low aside, confidentially. 'For a moment there
  you had me worried, old friend,' he said. 'After all these years I've known you, I was beginning to think I
  didn'tknow you!'
    
   When the four reached the back of the saddle which formed the hindmost boundary of The Dweller's
  garden,they found signs of a ferocious confrontation: the lingering stench of furiously expended gases,
  scales of armour plate torn from some huge creature's underbelly, massive clots of dark red plasma
  drenching the hardy mountain heather. That was all for the moment - enough to draw their nerves taut as
  the wire on a loaded crossbow.
   But keeping low and moving silent as shadows between the garden's derelict outbuildings and untended
  plots, they soon came to the forward boundary wall where Lardis had talked to Harry Dwellersire that
  time three months ago. And there they discovered the first victim of whatever battle had occurred: a
  warrior, dead on the ground, dispatched like a pheasant by a fox! Its squat neck had been bitten through
  armoured scales, leathery hide, flesh and gristly cartilage down to the spine and through it. Almost
  
  decapitated, the thing lay there in a pool of its own steaming liquids: fifteen tons of savagery, itself
  savaged! No need to inquire what living engine of destruction had done this.
   Awed, Lardis Lidesci moved cautiously around the giant corpse. He pointed out dislocated main eyes in
  the crimson-rimmed, empty sockets of the grotesque skull. And, 'See!' he whispered. 'No fight this, but a
  slaughter! And the butcher, he thrust his claws in through those eyes, to nip the tiny brain and get it done
  with. And these fluids, still warm and reeking ... Why, thiscreature of Karen's, it was alive no more than
  fifteenminutes ago!'
   'Lardis!' Kirk Lisescu's call came husking from cragswhich he'd scaled at the eastern extreme of the
  wall.'Quickly! Come see!'
   Keeping low, Lardis and the others ran, loped to the foot of the crags, climbed them to Kirk crouching
  on aledge in the scoop of a fallen boulder. 'Do you see?' thesmall, wiry man whispered. 'Do you hear?'
   He pointed out over Starside. The others could see well enough, and eventually even hear, though not at
  first.
   Far out over the boulder plains, drifting east like a small cloud of midges, black specks darted, glided,
  spurted under the dome of a glittering sky. Midges at this distance, yes, but up close they'd be monsters.
  Likewise in the lee of the barrier mountains sprawlingeastwards: shapes in flight, and others in pursuit. It
  was the Wamphyri, friends and foe alike; though impossibleto tell one from the other.
   'Who's who?' gasped Peder, jaw slack, eyes peeringfirst this way, then that.
   Lardis shook his head, slitted his eyes against the blue glitter of starblaze, tried to count those shapes
  which spurted. 'How many fighting beasts do you see?'he grunted. 'We know Shaithis had six.'
   'Karen and Harry Hell-lander had two at least,' Andreimuttered, however sourly. 'We found signs of the
  oneand the carcass of the other!'
   'Better pray they had more than that,' Lardis growled.'Better pray they had a Jot more!'
   Carried on changing winds, sounds of the aerial skirmish ebbed and flowed: the hissing and roaring of
  warriors, the low rumble of their bio-propulsive systems,the clatter of scales on armoured scales as huge
   bodies collided in mid-air. But as the commotion fadedinto distance, Kirk Lisescu had finished counting.
  There hadn't been much to it, after all.
   Two flyers and six warriors out over the boulder wastes,' he reported, 'all heading east, towards the
  sphere Gate and the tumbled stacks of the Wamphyri.Two more flyers in the lee of the mountains,
  pursued by a warrior.'
   Lardis's tally agreed. 'And the big one's with themain party,' he added. 'Seven warriors in all, and
  Shaithis hasn't suffered any losses - unless I'm wrong and that huge corpse beside the wall was one of
  his.But even at best, it's still two against five ...'
   Andrei Romani shook his head in dismay and stated,quite simply, 'They're done for, finished!'
   Lardis scowled at him. 'If they are, then be sure wewon't last much longer - or fare any better!'
  
   He looked out again over Starside, scanning the horizon from the eastern boulder plains inwards to the
  mountains. The larger cluster of airborne specks wasbeginning to descend, elongating into a straggling
  line; the smaller party, consisting of two flyers with a lone warrior in pursuit, was also losing altitude
  where itskirted the lower peaks. Even as he continued to watch, this secondary group of three
  disappeared behind adistant jut of crags.
   Lardis clambered back down to the garden. 'Comeon!' he growled.
   Recognizing the urgency in his voice but failing tosee the point of it, the others followed him down.
  'Come on where?' Peder Szekarly wanted to know. He was somewhat recovered from his poisoning
  now but stillfelt he could sleep right through sundown.
   At the foot of the crags Lardis turned to him. 'Eastalong the high ridges, where else? However far is
  necessary to fathom the outcome of that fight. Guess-work isn't good enough - we've got to know which
  way it went! The future of the Szgany, every man, womanand child of us, hangs in the balance.'
   He turned abruptly and made as if to head for the garden's upward sloping eastern flank ... and just as
  suddenly the shadows came alive with a massed, furtive creeping motion! Lardis and his three froze.
  They'dheard nothing, yet found themselves surrounded. But by what? Had Shaithis and the slug-being out
  of the Icelands left something behind to act as a rearguard?How many things had they left here?
   'My father would be... it would please him,' came alow, faltering voice from the darkness, one which
  coughed, growled, and was scarcely human at all. 'Please him to know... to know that he still has ... has
  friendsamong the Szgany.'
   Legend had it that in the long ago the olden Travellershad owned to a benevolent God. More recently,
  however,they had only recognized demons ... called Wamphyri! Not that anyone ever prayed to them,
  nor yet used their name as a curse; let it suffice that they were a curse! So that when it came to praying,
  the Szgany usually held to the sun; not as a form of true deity, but as a symbol of good fortune. Or, if a
  man had been born during sundown, he might give thanks to whichever star had been overhead at the
  hour of his birth. Lardis Lidesci was hardly superstitious; at the moment of the voice out of darkness he
  couldn't have said if his star was in the sky or not - but he hoped it was!
   Flanking Lardis on the left, Peder Szekarly nockedhis crossbow; on the other side, Andrei Romani
  snapped shut his shotgun; both aimed into the shadows. A little apart, Kirk Lisescu frantically shoved
  shells into hisdouble breech.
   But: 'Don't/' Lardis warned them. The grey brothers are all about us, and that was their leader speaking.'
  The others must give Lardis his due: if anyone would recognize that awful voice, it was surely him.
  Similarly, he who had been The Dweller knew Lardis. He came padding forward out of the shadows - a
  great greywolf!
   Eyes aslant, yellow, feral - and crimson in their cores - Harry Wolfson paused half in darkness. But his
  hands were visible in the starlight...
   He looked at Lardis and cocked his head a little on one side, inquiringly. And the look on his face was
  never seen on the face of a dog as he half-said, half-snarled, 'I... know you. Come talk to me, where my
  gentle mother sleeps under the stones.' He began to turn away, paused and looked back. 'But only you.
  Your men ... they will wait here.'
   'Lardis!' Kirk Lisescu snapped shut his weapon,began to crouch down.
  
   'I said don't!" Lardis barked, as fifty pairs of yellow eyes blinked and moved nervously in the shadows.
  'Only let a man of you shoot one of these, I swear I'llkill him with my bare hands!'
   'No,' Harry Wolfson coughed at once, 'you wouldn't have to. The grey brotherhood takes care of its
  own. So put down your ... your weapon, yes ... and come talk.'
   At the cairn, the great wolf was silent for long moments. He nuzzled in turn each of the larger burial
  stones, marking them, whined a little, gazed burningly on Lardis. And eventually he said, 'She, too,
  remembers you. It was a while ago. After the battle, you joined us here. You were kind. Despite your
  own privations, your people ... were kind. To me, to my mother, my father. And you and I, we talked
  together, when I was ... wasa man. I remember it.'
   'All of this is true,' Lardis nodded, discovering a lump in his throat which had little or nothing to do with
  fear.'We talked on several occasions. At the last, you seemed to know what was coming.'
   The other looked at him in that curious, alert way of his, and Lardis found it weird that a wolf should
  understand his words and answer them with a nod and snarled words of its own: 'And now ... now it has
  come. Strange, even sad in a way. Sometimes I feel I've lost so much; at others I take pleasure in what
  I've gained. Except ... my man-memory is fading, and allthe time more swiftly. I forget the man-times and
  remem ber only the wolf-times, and it has made ... made a traitor out of me. For I swore I would be... be
  here, when the Wamphyri came a-visiting Karen and my father. But I...forgot, and so was late.'
   'You couldn't have helped them,' Lardis shook his head. 'This time the Wamphyri have made invincible
  creatures, monsters of unbelievable ferocity and power! You and all your grey brothers together, what
  couldyou have done?'
   The other loped this way and that. 'Still, I shouldhave been here.'
   There was nothing you could do,' Lardis insisted.
   Harry Wolfson came closer, stood still. 'Did you see it?'
   'We saw them fly away eastwards,' Lardis answered. They were still fighting. I think that Harry and
  Karen... I think they got the worst of it.'
   The great wolf blinked his slanted eyes, and their cores burned yet more scarlet. 'No, not yet - but soon!
  The worst is what Shaithis has in store for them!'
   And suddenly, so suddenly that Lardis gave a great start, the wolf that had been a man pointed his
  muzzle straight at the stars and howled, and from the derelict garden's shadows came the answering
  howls of hisbrothers. Then, he sprang up on to the cairn, glancedonce more at Lardis and growled, 'I go.'
   As he made to leap away, Lardis called after: 'But where will you go? And what do you intend? Perhaps
  we'd do better to go there together.'
   The Gate,' the other paused again, however momentarily, and sniffed the night air. 'I sense them there. I
  don't know what the grey brothers can do, but you andyours would only slow us down.'
   Again he turned away - only to collide with a sleekshe-wolf who came loping from the shadows. Her
  eye brows were bushy, white as the snows of the higher peaks. They faced each other; perhaps some
  
  message passed between them; she whined a little, and Harry Wolfson snapped at her, deliberately
  clicking his teeth on thin air. Plainly the bitch was his. And to Lardis hesaid, 'She'll stay here, where
  there's no more danger.'
    
   Lardis tried one last time. 'My men and I, we're going,too. We need to see. I have to know.'
   The changeling thought about it for the briefestmoment, then snarled his throaty answer: Then I'll leave
  you a guide. Follow him closely, for he knows the easiest route ...'
   Lardis returned to his men and found them on their own; the wolf pack had melted away into the
  shadows, leaving only one of the grey brothers behind. Lardis marked him: a flame-eyed silhouette,
  nervous and impatient, atop the garden's eastern flank. Kirk Lisescu nodded and remarked, That one's
  stayed back, apparently to keep watch over us!'
   Lardis shook his head. 'No,' he corrected his colleague, 'he's our guide. We're to follow him to the
  hell-lands Gate. Or at least, we'll try to get close enough tosee what goes on there.'
   They struggled up the sloping eastern flank, gazeddown on Starside laid out in weird, blue-tinged mono
  chrome beneath them. The boulder plains, reaching out to a curved and shimmering, aurora-lit horizon;
  the jagged spines of mountains on their right, sprawling eastwards; seemingly endless miles of crags to
  coverbefore they would arrive at their destination, where the peaks looked down gauntly on the
  pockmarked craterwhich housed the hell-lands Gate.
   Lardis had been there only once before, in his youth(and then at the height of sunup, of course, when the
  Wamphyri slept and dreamed their scarlet dreams behind the draped windows of their aeries), but even
  then he'd found the place ominous, unquiet, unknowable. That great ball of white light, glaring up and out
  of the earth like the eye of some buried giant from its socket, unblinking, malevolent, lending all the region
  around a leprous white and grey-blue aspect as of rotting flesh. And the stony crater itself, which formed
  the Gate's rim: pocked like rotten wood when the borers have been at work, shot through and through
  withalien wormholes. Even the solid rock ...
   While Lardis was there, a flock of bats had come tohunt midges, moths, other insects hatched or
  awakened by the sun's natural light blazing through a pass in thebarrier range. One small creature,
  perhaps dazzled, hadflitted too close to the Gate; its membrane wing touchedthe solid-seeming surface of
  white light; it disappeared without trace, apparently sucked right into the glare!For some little time Lardis
  had continued to watch, butthe bat hadn't returned.
   It had been a lesson in caution: don't approach the Gate too closely. Ah, but that time it had been sunup,
  while now it was a fresh sundown. And Lardis definitely did not intend to approach too closely. What,
  with the Wamphyri there? Madness! But he did have aplan, which as always was simple.
   'See the grey one go?' he said. 'Heading down towards the timber-line? He'll know every tree like an old
  friend,and all the winding trails between. We'll make besttime if we follow in his tracks.'
   'Lardis,' said Andrei Romani, conversationally, 'you'rea madman, I'm sure! Indeed, we all are, each and
  everymother's son! Made crazy by the blue-glittering stars!'
   'Oh?' Lardis scarcely glanced at him, picked his waydown between scree-littered spurs. 'Tell me more.'
  
   'It's sundown on Starside,' the other continued, 'andall sensible folk hidden away. But us? We're
  following a mountain dog to see what the Wamphyri are up to!We should be in a hole somewhere on
  Sunside, waiting for the sun to rise and praying we'll still be around tosee it!'
   'But it's because we hate hiding in holes on Sunsidethat we're here!' Lardis reminded him. 'Me, I prefer
  thecomforts of my house on the knoll, believe me - except Iknow I can't find peace there so long as the
  Wamphyriare wont to come a-hunting in the night. And right now ... why, I've a chance to see with my
  own eyes howmany they are and what are our chances. So that when we go back to Sunside, we'll know
  to do one of two things: either advise the Szgany of Settlement and the other townships of the precautions
  they must take, or tell them definitely that the Wamphyri are no more!And let me tell you something else,
  Andrei ...' But herehe paused.
   For at the last moment Lardis had recognized a certain dangerous passion blazing up within himself. It
  was in the heat of his blood, the way he spat out hiswords, so that he knew he'd been on the point of
  uttering a vow. He was Szgany and proud of it, and a leaderof men at that. Once spoken, a vow like that
  couldn't berevoked. Not and live with it, anyway.
   'Oh?' Andrei prompted him. 'You were about to tell me ...?'
   Lardis bit his tongue, changed the subject:
   'Do you know how far it is to the Gate?'
   'Too far,' said Kirk Lisescu, clambering behind. 'Evenon Sunside's levels it would take us an entire sunup
  to get from Settlement to the great pass. But up here, through all these crags and peaks..." He let it tail
  off,but Peder Szekarly at once took it up:
   'Eighty-five miles from Settlement to the pass. But weaving through these high crags... a hundred, atleast.
  And hard going at that.'
   'Something less than forty hours to sunup," Lardis mused. 'Which is when we want to be there. For if by
  then the Wamphyri are still alive, still abroad, that's when they'll head for Karenstack - to be out of the
  lightwhen the sun blazes between the peaks!' He made rapidcalculations and continued:
   'A generous ten hours for sleep, leaves almost thirty for travelling. Why, at something a little more than
  three miles to the hour, we'll be there in time aplenty!'
   'But to see what?' Andrei gloomed. To discover ...what? Hah! The worst, perhaps.'
   Lardis gave a grunt and for a little while was silent.
   The boles of tall, straight pines loomed out of the darkness below; along a track dappled with starlight,
  feral eyes gleamed silver and sentient; the grey brother waited patient and passionless while the four
  gained on him, then turned and headed east. They followed as close as possible in his tracks where he
  chose the leastcluttered, most direct route through the straggling trees.
   But while the wolf's passions were at an ebb, Lardis'swere still flowing strong. He thought of Lissa and
  Jason on Sunside, the Szgany Lidesci in its entirety, all of the Traveller tribes in their various camps and
  townships across the barrier mountains. And then he thought ofthe horror of the Wamphyri, which he'd
  once consideredover and done with.
  
   But no, it wouldn't be over until it was over ...
   Until it was finished ...
   Finished utterly!
   And at last Lardis's passions got the better of him.
   'Whichever way it goes,' he ground out his Szgany vow from between clenched teeth, ‘I’ll see them
  dead! Beheaded, staked out, pegged down - spreadeagled in clean yellow sunlight - and steamed away
  in smokeand stink!'
   His words were hot as hell, fiercely spoken: a growl of hatred, a promise, a threat, so that his men knew
  itwas his vow. But it wasn't over yet.
   'So far there are only the two of them,' Lardis finallycontinued. 'Two that we know of for sure, though
  they'll make lieutenants soon enough. Ah, but they are Wamphyri! And where can they go at sunup, eh?
  Whereelse but Karenstack, the last aerie! So mark well my words:if Harry and Karen are done for and
  we're left to fight on alone, and if Shaithis and his lot take up residence in that last great pesthole of a
  stack ... then that's where we'll finish this thing. Not in the next sunup, no, nor even the one after that - but
  maybe in the next!'
   "Ware, Lardis!' Andrei cautioned. 'Is this your vow?'
   'It is,' Lardis answered, nodding his head in the gloomof the trees. 'It's mine, yours - it's that of all the
  men ofthe Szgany Lidesci! Now listen:
   'Their works, the terrible works of the Wamphyri,take time. Time to take men and make them
  lieutenants, and time to make monsters from the flesh of Travellers and trogs. Two or three sunups are
  nothing, not timeenough. But in Karenstack they'll think themselvessecure. What? And who would dare
  to attack them ontheir own ground? We will, that's who!'
   Peder Szekarly was astonished. 'Go against the Wamphyri, on Starside?' he whispered.
   'During sunup, aye,' Lardis replied. 'With crossbowsand sharp staves, hammers and stakes! With
  kneblasch,silver, and The Dweller's shotguns.'
   'What?' said Kirk Lisescu, his voice hushed. Toysagainst the Wamphryi? And what about their
  warriors?'
   'But their fighting creatures are vampires no less than the Wamphyri themselves!' Lardis replied, grabbing
  Kirk's arm for emphasis. 'We'll go there with our mirrors, given to us by The Dweller; we'll set fire to the
  drapes at the stack's doorways and lower windows;we'll reflect the sun's cleansing rays deep into the foul
  darkness. That's how we'll do it! Who would know the way better than us? Why, it was The Dweller and
  his father who showed us how! Well, and now it will beour turn.'
   'Tear down the mountains!' Andrei Romani snarledaloud to match the spirit of the other's vision. And
  then (but a little less vigorously), 'But let's hope it won'tcome to that. After all, we could be wrong ...
  maybe it's not such a hopeless case ... it's a fact that Karen and the hell-lander are - or were - enormous
  powers intheir own right.'
  
   Andrei could hardly know it but his qualifying 'were'was close to the mark. For even as the four men set
  outupon their timber-line trek, far to the east, in the regionof the glaring hell-lands Gate, Harry Keogh and
  theLady Karen were already Shaithis's prisoners.
   Which is to say, they were as good as dead ...
   Events followed slowly and seemed of little consequence, yet later would become concertinaed in
  Lardis'smemory, each one hastening after the last, assumingvarying degrees of importance.
   After six hours trekking along the timber-line, the four were so exhausted they had to pause, eat, sleep,
  allow their aching muscles time for replenishment. Theyawakened with the coming of the hurtling moon,
  by thelight of which their progress was that much faster.
   Later, with the moon down again, they took it a littleeasier and fell into the natural, jingling, fast-striding
  pace of accustomed Travellers. They held back fromtalking, saved their breath for the work. Now and
  then they must climb where ridges and spurs broke the timber-line, but mainly they followed level
  contours. Plainly The Dweller had been right; their guide wascompletely familiar with these heights; either
  that or hewas a creature of unerring instinct. They forged steadilyeast.
   Another rest, another meal...
   A string of long, flat, shallow saddles between elevated peaks like wave crests, where their striding ate
  up mile after mile unending, until finally and far toosoon the easy going was eaten up entirely ...
   A region of sliding scree which the trees had gatheredinto a treacherous, teetering barricade. Only tread
  unwary, trip the wrong pebble, and the whole thing -trees, scree, men and all - would go avalanching
  downon to Starside. To prove it, there were plenty of breakswhere the green belt had been swept away
  right downto the raw rock ...
   Another sleep period...
   When they sat down, the grey one sat apart; whenthey lay flat, he stretched himself out. Coming awake,
  he'd be up first, waiting for them. They tossed himscraps of dried meat, which he 'wolfed', naturally. His
  job didn't allow for hunting.
   Then, an odd thing:
   Twenty-five hours or almost two-thirds of the wayinto the trek, the wolf bitch which Lardis had seen
  with the changeling overtook them. He recognized her fromher pure white, extraordinarily bushy
  eyebrows. Shecarried something in her dripping mouth, which she put down on approaching their guide.
  Then the twowolves went through a careful recognition ritual, following which she sat down with the other
  a while. PederSzekarly tossed meat, which she gratefully accepted.
   But Lardis was more interested in the item she'dcarried in her mouth: a grenade, from The Dweller's
  armoury in the garden. Lardis knew what it was well enough; there'd been several left over from the
  battlefour years ago; devastating devices, he'd wanted nothingto do with them. Aye, for there are
  weapons and thereare weapons. A shotgun is controllable until the momentyou pull the trigger, but one of
  these ...?
   Only arm it...and from then on, no way to changeyour mind. The rest was out of your hands - indeed it
  must be out of your hands, and as quickly as possible!What The Dweller's bitch would want with such a
  
  thing was a mystery, but as far as Lardis was concernedshe was welcome to it. And in a little while she
  gatheredit up in her mouth again, and set off east as before. Then-
   Six more hours of trekking, followed by a break (alltoo brief) before the next incident: a small, unequal
  dispute. But long before that the beacon of the sphereGate was already making itself visible from time to
  timein the east. At first, as the distance between graduallynarrowed down, it was the merest firefly
  glimmer; laterit became a weird glow-worm radiation - light withoutheat — in the shadows of the barrier
  range where easternfoothills met boulder plains to merge into Starside'sblue-tinged moonscape.
   As for the dispute:
   This came where Lardis wanted to leave the pine-clad margin and climb diagonally towards the saddles
  between the high peaks: his escape route into Sunside, in the event a bolthole should become necessary.
  Their wolf guide thought differently, however; he had been told to stick to the timber-line and head for
  the ball of glaring white light close to the great pass, and he didn't intend straying from his duty. So that
  when the grey brother simply refused to change his tack ... that was the end of the unspoken argument.
  But in any case(Lardis consoled himself), the way up had looked pretty rough going just there. And so
  the four men followed on behind their lupine guide as before, except that nowthey were constantly on the
  lookout for easy climbing.
   They found it an hour later, just as a parting of the ways became absolutely necessary. For if indeed the
  Wamphyri were still abroad and active in the vicinity of the Gate, then from this point forward it would be
  madness to remain too far Starside of the peaks.
   Climbing along an easy diagonal fault towards a system of crags, saddles and flat-topped plateaux, the
  four waved a farewell to their guide. For his part he simply watched them out of view, whined a little
  deep in his throat, finally put them out of mind and headed east...
    
   Lardis and his colleagues took an hour to climb to the flat summits, a little longer to rest from their
  labours, then set off again in the direction of the great pass. The ground was unknown to them but the
  going was fairly easy. On those rare occasions when they caught a glimpse of the southern horizon
  between the peaks, it was a faint crack of amethyst streaked with silver.Three more hours and the silver
  would turn to gold.
   Sunup, soon, and Lardis should be feeling happier. But he wasn't. Coursing through his veins, the blood
  of his unknown seer forefather was warning him of ominous times ahead ...
   Three hours later it started to rain; the way soon became slippery and precarious; Lardis deemed it
  dangerous to proceed. After their prodigious trek, they hadreached a spot some four to five miles
  south-west of the Gate and now looked down on it from a vantage point in the high jumbles. Behind
  them, a promising looking pass wound between the peaks and presumably down to Sunside. And the
  sky in the south was brightening,however marginally, from minute to minute.
   Lardis and his three huddled beneath the groping branches of a wind-blasted, grotesquely malformed
  tree until the rain stopped. And now their view of Starside and the glaring hell-lands Gate was that much
  clearer. Some miles east, the plains were heaped with thestrange stumps and tumuli of tumbled
  Wamphyri stacks - Wenstack, once Volse Pinescu's place; the madLord Lesk's shattered Glutstack;
  sprawling, hugely humped sections of Shaithistack; the acromegalic Fess Ferenc's exploded Grosstack;
  the lesser Lord Grigis'sGougestack; Lascula Longtooth's Fangstack, and several more. Indeed, all of the
  
  great aeries of the Wamphyri,lying prone on the plains where they had fallen.
   All save one. Karenstack.
   But no lights in Karenstack's kilometre-high windowsnow, no smoke going up from its chimneys, no
  sinister motion behind its plateau battlements or in its launching bays. For the moment it was ... inert. But
  notquiescent.
   Looking at it, Lardis shivered and felt the blood of his forefather stirring. Like a vision out of some future
  time, he watched the high windows come blazing intolife, smoke start to belch from the chimneys, flyers
  cruis ing in the updrafts about the bays, where they queuedfor landings.
   Then, as quickly as it had come, the vision passed,leaving Lardis to shiver again, breathe again, and
  remem ber again his vow ...
   'What now?' Andrei Romani grunted, but on a risingnote. His attention was riveted on the Gate.
   'Eh?' Lardis was drawn from his reverie.
   'Fires!' Peder Szekarly gasped. His young eyes were that much sharper, keener. 'And some movement
  down there, close to the Gate. See, the sudden blazing up casts shadows. But things that big ... can only
  bewarriors!'
   'The Wamphyri are camped there, aye,' Lardis's eyeshad narrowed under the frowning overhang of his
  brow. The Lords, their flyers, their warriors. But why are they leaving it so late? Sunup is coming. They
  should be heading for Karenstack, before the first rays strike through the great pass. What's their
  business down there, so close to the sphere Gate?' He screwed up his eyes, vainly trying to make out
  those details whichdistance had forbidden them. Vainly, and perhaps mercifully, too.
   'Look'' Kirk Lisescu's voice was no more than a tremorin the gradually brightening air. They saw where
  hepointed: the timber-line some hundreds of feet below their vantage point, but full of motion now as The
  Dweller's entire wolf pack came bounding in a silent flood upthrough the trees! They headed for the high
  crags, headed west, headed in any direction as long as it was away fromthe Gate, the Wamphyri, and
  their bonfires!
   'Now what -?' Andrei began - but Lardis grasped hisarm and shut him off.
   'Get down!' Lardis gasped, hurling himself out from under the tree's sparse branches and diving behind
  upthrusting crags. The seer in him had surfaced at last; he knew that whatever was coming ... was already
  onits way!
   As a single, brilliant, prolonged flash of lightning lit the peaks, so Andrei and Kirk joined Lardis where he
  crouched down, hugging the naked rock. And as thun der played a booming, lingering drum-roll across
  the sky, so the three heard Peder Szekarly's croaked question: 'But what is it?' Peder had been the last to
  leave the gnarled tree; he made no attempt to seek cover; he stood trembling, looking down on Starside
  through ajagged gap in the rocks.
   From where Lardis crouched, he couldn't see Peder,didn't know that his young friend stood exposed. 'I
  don'tknow what it is,' he finally answered, 'but I saw it - felt it - like a burst of brilliant light, searing my
  eyes, my soul!'
  
   The lightning?' Peder didn't understand.
   At last Lardis looked up and saw him standing there,and knew that the thing of his premonition,
  whatever,was almost upon them! 'Peder, get down!' he cried.
   Too late.
   Down on Starside's boulder plain, the sphere Gatedisappeared in a LIGHT which ate it in a moment, a
  light to sear a man's eyes, his soul, as Lardis had said. But it was much more than that, more powerful
  than that, more terrible than that. In the smallest fraction of a second it leaped the gap between and shone
  on Peder.Only for a moment, but long enough. Smoke leapt from him. He screamed, clutched at his face,
  tottered backaway from the gap in the rocks. Even as he stumbled, agiant's hand seemed to slap at him,
  hurling him down!
   In the next moment there commenced such a howlingof torn earth, riven rock, crazed winds... it was like
  the combined hissing, mewling, and bellowing of every warrior the Wamphyri had ever spawned! And as
  the sky turned red over Starside and the frightened clouds went scurrying, so Lardis looked out -
  because he hadto know, had to see.
   And what he saw ...!
   It was as if something of the hell-lands themselves had erupted through the sphere Gate. Which was as
  close to the truth as Lardis or anyone else might ever guess, except perhaps a handful of men a universe
  away, who knew the truth in its entirety.
   For the Gate itself was no longer visible, only a mighty mushroom of frothy white and dirty grey, shot
  through with red and orange fires, boiling for the sky.Already its billowing dome towered high as the
  moun tains, and even now its stem was leaning towards the Icelands, as if bowed down by the weight of
  its roilinghead.
   Lardis's jaw fell open; he mouthed unheard, unremembered things into the warm wind off Starside, that
  demon breath which whipped his hair back and hurled hot grit in his face. And as the furnace blast died
  away he shielded his eyes against the tracery of lightningsthat leaped and crackled between the incredible
  mushroom and the boiling earth.
   Then, hearing Andrei and Kirk calling to him, he pulled himself together and went to them where they
  crouched beside Peder. Miraculously, the youth hadclosed his eyes in the moment of the fireball; though
  the skin of his face, neck, hands was badly seared, his sight was returning with each passing second.
  Clutching at his leader's hand, he gasped, 'Lardis, Lardis! Itwas...it was —'
   'I know,' Lardis nodded. 'It was hell!'
   Later, Peder's hair would fall out and his gums and fingernails bleed, and when his face grew new skin it
  would always be white. But at least he would seem to recover, for a while, and be the whole man again.
  However that might be, he would die six years later, by which time his appearance would be as grey and
  gnarly as the aspect of an ancient. Nor would there be heirs to survive him ...
    
   In the wild woods to the west of Settlement, in the predawn silence of sunup, old Jasef Karis had
  dreamed hislast dream and now tried to rouse himself, shake himself awake, stand up. But something
  
  was desperately wrong; his arms hurt as if they were cramped, and there was a grinding pain in his chest.
  It was as much as he coulddo to open his eyes.
   Above him, Jasef saw the oiled skin which Nana had draped over low branches like an awning, to keep
  the dawn rains from his wrinkled hide. Except he'd rolled to one side in his sleep and so lay uncovered,
  drenched and shivering. The way he felt - hot on the inside, cold out, yet sweating from the pain of the
  thing in his chest - he suspected that the dawn light in the green canopy overhead would be the last he'd
  ever see. It must be the end of him, yes, for he had never felt like this before and didn't much want to feel
  it again.
   But first he must tell someone about his dream. He must tell... Nana, of course!
   His dream. His dream of -
   - A corpse, smouldering, with its /ire-blackened armsflung wide, steaming head thrown back as in the
  final agony of death, tumbling end over end into a black void shot through with thin neon bars or ribbons
  of blue, green, and red light; indeed descending or retreating
   into this tunnel of streamers.A tortured thing, yes, but dead now from all of its torments and no longer
  suffering, unknown and unknowable as the weird things of dreams often are. And yet...there had been
  something morbidly familiar about it, so that Jasef had wished he could look closer at that endlessly
  rotating, silentlyscreaming, scorched and blistered face.
   And when his dream had drifted him closer - then Jasef had seen, and finally he had known. Had known
  who, and believed he also knew what.
   After that:
   The corpse's gyrating flight into eternity - through this alien continuum of green, blue and crimson bars
  -had speeded up, leavingJasef behind. But then, in themoment after the thing had sped away and dis
  appeared -
   - An explosion of golden light in the distant haze,where the corpse had been! And a rush of golden splin
  ters like living darts, speeding towardsJasef and pasthim, each blinking out as it escaped out of this
  unknowable place into other, more real times and places.'
   That was when the scene had changed:
   To Nona's four-year-old twins, wrapped together in a blanket under a tree, with a roof of oiled skins
  just like Josef's to keep the rain off. And suddenly - appearingout of nowhere - one of the golden darts,
  which hovered undecided, first over one twin and then the other. At which the pair stirred in their sleep,
  which had seemed to decide the matter. Hissing his horror,Jasef had seen the dart lance down, to enter
  into the head of one ofthem! Except there was no scar, no blood, nothing but asmile spreading on the
  face of the sleeping innocent!
   And: 'Innocent?' Jasef had wondered, like a memory from some earlier dream, some previous time. 'Still
  innocent?'
   Which was when he had awakened, or tried to, only to discover himself bound by these pains like tight
  thongs across his chest and limbs. But he knew now that indeed he was awake, and also that he must
  passon his dream, his vision, while yet he might.
  
   He tried to call out for Nana, and couldn't, for the pain wouldn't let him. His cry came out the merest
  gasp. Well then, and so he must simply lie here and listen to the first birds calling, and wait until Nana
  came to him.
   But he hoped she wouldn't keep him waiting too long ...
   Only a moment earlier, Nana Kiklu had woken up. But she was some little distance away and so failed
  to hearJasef's gasping. There had been a noise - the dull, distant booming of thunder, perhaps? - and a
  little later one of the twins had come tottering, rubbing at his eyes, on the point of tears. Obviously he'd
  been nightmaring, or else would not have left his bed for his mother's. Small as they were, Nana's twins
  preferredsleeping alone.
   Pulling him down under her blanket, giving him her warmth, Nana had comforted him: 'Oh, dear! There,
  there,' and stroked his hair. Then, still half-asleep, she'd automatically fumbled for the small leather strap
  he wore on his left wrist. It was Nana's way of identifying her babies in the dead of night: Nestor's was a
  plain band, a simple strip of leather joined with a few strong stitches, while Nathan's band had a
  half-twist. Now, recognizing the child as he snuggled closer, feeling thepounding of his little heart, she
  asked:
   'What was it, eh?' She hugged him closer still. 'Adream? A bad dream?'
   The forest was waking up; the birds were filling the
   air with their dawn chorus; light came down in hazy beams through the trees. Sunup, and all was well.
  And yet ... something felt wrong. It was in Nana's bones: agnawing ache, a nagging concern. But for
  what?
   'Mama?' The child in her arms was almost back tosleep.
   'Yes?'
   'My... my daddy ...' he said. And that was something he'd never said before.
   'Shhh!' she said. 'Shhh!' And to herself, perhaps a little bitterly: Your daddy's on Starside, asJeep in the
  armsof the Lady Karen, where they hidefrom the lightof the new day.
   'Dead,' the child mumbled, where he snuggled to her breast. One word, but such a word! It filled Nana's
  veins with ice.
   'What?' she questioned him. 'Dead? Is somethingdead?'
   'Is he?' came the not-quite-awake question-answer,freezing her blood anew. 'Is he - my daddy - dead?'
   Nana knew she wouldn't sleep again and so got up.There in the dawn glade she found Jasef Karis
  sprawled on his back, eyes glazed, dew dripping from his cold nose, and believed she now understood
  what her small son had tried to tell her. He had not been talking about the daddy he'd never known (and
  couldn't possiblyknow), but the old seer, the old mentalist, Jasef.
   But far to the east and across the peaks, an omen!
  
   The boiling sky over Starside was black, and thebellies of its clouds flickered red with reflected fires ...
    
    
    
   PART TWO:
    
    
    
   Looking Further Back, and Scanning Forward
    
    
    
    
   1
    
    
    
    
   This much has been told:
   Shaitan, first of the Wamphyri, remembered neither mother nor father, nor yet understood his own
  genesis. To him it was as if he had simply sprung into being, full grown, with a will but no memories of his
  own tomention. Following which he had fallen, or been thrown, to earth; but fallen, on this occasion, to
  'earth' as opposed to Earth. In any event, he discovered himself upon the surface of one of many worlds,
  in one of themany universes of light. And dimly (and quickly fadingin the eye of his mind), he remembered
  something of...of an expulsion.
   The world into which he had fallen was in one sensean old world, and in another a new one. Recently it
  hadsuffered calamity: a Black Hole, losing most of its mass and deteriorating to a Grey Hole, had
  likewise fallen out of space and time and settled here, reshaping the planet. But where that had been a
  calculable disaster, the disaster which was Shaitan would be quite incalculable.
   From him would spring an order of beings whose nature was such as to threaten not one but two
  
  worlds, filling the myths and legends of both with dread anduttermost horror. For Shaitan was a vampire.
   And yet, when he fell (or was thrown out), he was not yet a vampire. That was still to come: a matter of
  choice, of exercising his own free will, his human curi osity. And this is how it came about...
    
   Starting into awareness, Shaitan cried out...!
   It was the shock of consciousness cloaking an intelligence previously bereft, will without knowledge
  inhabiting a mind wiped clean. And as his cry echoed intosilence, so he discovered himself kneeling at the
  edge ofstagnant water, with his naked image mirrored in scummy depths. But seeing that he was
  beautiful, hewas proud.
   Standing upright, Shaitan saw that he could walk; and in the twilight of a dim, misty dawn he moved by
  the edge of the dank, rank waters, which were a swamp.And seeing how dismal and lonely was this
  world where he had fallen, or into which he had been cast, he assumed himself a sinner and that the place
  must be hispunishment.
   Such assumptions defined not only Shaitan's intelligence but also his nature: that he instinctively
  understood such concepts as sin and punishment. And he thought his crime must be that he was beautiful,
  which was his pride working ... which was in fact his crime! For he saw beauty as might, and might as
  right, andright as he willed it to be.
   Which was a will he would impose.
   So thinking, Shaitan moved away from the rank waters and went to impose his will upon this world. But
  behind him the mud boiled and spattered, so thathe paused to look back where black bubbles came
  burst ing to the surface. And with the parting of the weeds and the scum, Shaitan saw a figure floating up
  intoview.
   In its body it was bloated and burned, but its face was almost whole. And in that face was an innocence
  beyond comprehension. Shaitan knew it for an omen, but of what? He had will; he could wait and
  discoverwhat would be, or move on, according to his will. Also,
   he suspected that this thing in the swamp harboured evil; why else would such a blackened, blistered
  thing be here, in this emerging dawn world? For again it was Shaitan's instinct to know that all things are
  balanced,and that for any measure of good there may be an equalmeasure of evil.
   For a moment he stood still, as at a crossroads, then ... turned back and knelt again beside the swamp.
  Forhis will was that he would know this evil.
   He gazed upon a face he had never known, which he would not recall to memory for numberless years,
  and sensed nothing of moment except that he tempted fate, which he was proud and glad to do. And as
  the beasts of this dawn world came to the water to drink, and asthe mists were drawn up from the
  swamp, so the Fallen One, Shaitan the Unborn, gazed upon his own futurewhere the weeds anchored it
  in scum and slime.
   In a while the scorched, bloated limbs and trunk ofthe corpse split open and small black mushrooms clus
  tered there, growing out of the rotting flesh and openingtheir gilled caps. They released red spores into
  the twi light before the dawn, which rose up and drifted on the warm reek of the swamp. Shaitan saw the
  
  clouds of drifting spores, and of his own free will breathed them into his lungs, the better to know of them
  . . . his lastact of any innocence -
   - At least in this incarnation.
   All of this has been told before. What follows has notbeen told: it is the tale of Shaitan's travels and
  travails, his triumphs and torments from this time forwards ...
    
   Shaitan travelled east through the foothills of gradually rising mountains. He sought for that thing or those
  things upon which to impose his will. The swamps hadnot been to his liking, nor the boggy region
  between theswamps and the foothills. The creatures of these places, while seeming largely unintelligent,
  had yet been waryto a fault!
   Sunlight had first come streaming, then blasting from the south, where a golden orb had climbed
  gradually into the sky to commence a low, slow arc eastwards. Its rays had dried out the land around
  and lured clinging fogs up from the sodden earth. In those places wherethere was little or no shade, the
  yellow rays had irritated Shaitan, reddening and roughening his skin.
   After that - forever after that, in every way - he would always walk in the shadows. And just as he
  chose to stay on the left-hand side of the mountains, away from the sun, so would he choose a dark and
  sinistral path through life. He did not know it but he had ever chosen that route, even in worlds before this
  one.
   When Shaitan was thirsty, he drank. The sweet water quenched his thirst but there was no satisfaction in
  it. When he hungered, he ate grasses, herbs, fruits. They filled him but ... the hunger remained. Within his
  body a red spore had taken root, forming the nucleus of thatwhich had hungers of its own.
   He was unclothed but unashamed. Knowing that he was beautiful, he would display himself; except he
  would prefer to make himself known to others of his own design, made more nearly in his mould. For the
  creatures of the swamps and foothills were other than he was and innocent, so that all of them had fled
  before him. Therefore, he was unable to impose his will uponthem, because of their innocence.
   And so Shaitan journeyed east across a land where the northern sky was dark blue to black and full of
  the flicker of stars and the cold weave of weird auroras; but always in the south the golden orb of the sun
  blazed perilously in the pale blue heavens, so that he must keep himself to the shadows in order not to be
  burned. And he called all of the land lying to the south of the foothills 'Sunside', despising it greatly, and
  all the land to the north 'Starside', claiming it for his own. And where finally the foothills grew into
  mountains like a wall on his right hand, shutting out the sun's harmful rays, there Shaitan discovered
  creatures which were not afraid of him but merely curious - at first.
   For Shaitan's part, he was likewise curious, even astonished. These creatures were not human, yet
  seemed full of an almost-human purpose and intelligence. Theycommunicated among themselves,
  however witlessly, in a near-inaudible range which Shaitan sensed rather than heard (for the
  spore-spawned Thing within him was growing, and causing a strange intensification of his five mundane
  senses ...). They were small, lowly, weak creatures, which yet commanded aerial flight: a skill far in
  excess of Shaitan's own meagre, as yet unformed talents.
   And when he saw their aerial agility he scowled and was jealous of them; for it seemed to Shaitan that
  upon a time he too had flown - but with such authority and in such places as to put all the best efforts of
  
  these small creatures to shame! Why, if only he could will it, he would fly again, right here and now, and
  show themhow it was done!
   ... Except, having physical limitations, it was beyond the power of his will. He could not will it. Not yet...
   But while Shaitan envied them, in some small part he also admired these children of the twilight, the night,
  the velvet darkness, and chose them for his familiars. And when he called out to them with his mind, he
  saw that they heeded him and hastened to his beck; for they knew that they were his. But these were
  only the smallcousins of greater creatures, who likewise 'heard'Shaitan's mind-calls from the shadows of
  Starside; and when they also came to swerve and dip about him, crying out with their shrill voices, then
  his pride was great. For he saw that indeed he had imposed his willupon all the bats of this world.
   They were his first conquests; he enjoyed his triumph,however small; other victories would follow in
  shortorder.
   Always heading east, Shaitan ate sparingly of tasteless berries gathered on the border of the swamps
  and in the foothills. Where streams trickled down from the heights, there he would drink, though the
  brackish water was never to his taste. And before sleeping, he had learned to gather in unto himself his
  bat minions great and small, for their warmth; so that he quicklybecame expert in their habits.
   The smaller bats were insectivores; their greatercousins . .. drank blood! Which seemed only right to
  Shaitan: that small life-forms should sustain themselvesby devouring even smaller forms, and greater
  life-forms by devouring ... why, the very source of life itself! Andhe believed he now understood his
  personal dissatisfac tion with the common fare of wild animals. Berries, fruits, grasses? What sort of
  foods were they for onesuch as him? Water? What was that for a drink? And:
   'No, no!' Shaitan now promised himself. ‘I’ll have no more of them. They are for the hooved beasts and
  thescuttling foragers of this world. But for me ... the bloodis the life!' And within him (however vacuously,
  instinc tively) the as yet embryonic spore-creature exulted, forit was or would be of a like mind and
  nature.
   Beyond the mountains the sun sank down; the lastyellow glints vanished even from the highest peaks; the
  stars shone that much brighter in the north and spread
   themselves like a sprinkling of jewels all across the domed vault of the sky. A breathless moon raced on
  high, begging of the wild ones in the mountains their adulation. Eerie wolf voices echoed up into the night
  of Starside, and Shaitan was impressed by the howling of the hunting packs.
   And again he reached out his growing vampire awareness to contact and impose his will upon them,
  even as he had instructed the bats. Except these creatures shied from such contact. For while they were
  untamed, still they were of a high order of organized intelligence - far higher than the bats - and
  suspicious; and anyway they had their own leaders, who were jealous of theirsovereignty.
   'Dogs!' Shaitan called them then, snarling his frustration at them and abusing them with his mind-voice.
  Which was why (in this world at least), total domination of the wolves by the Wamphyri never came to
  pass.Later generations of vampires, all springing from Shaitan, might occasionally produce a Lord who
  would master or befriend this or that lone wolf, but in themain the grey brothers would retain their lupine
  integrity ...
   Then, three hundred miles along the north-western fringe of the barrier range of mountains, there Shaitan
  came across his first tribe of men or sub-men. Aboriginal even before the advent of the Grey Hole - grey
  
  and leathery, cavern-dwelling, slow-moving and -thinking -now, in the seventh century of aftermath, the
  trogs were grown truly primitive. Highly photophobic, they took to their caves at sunup, came out to hunt
  at sundown. They lived mainly on the grubs of a species of giant moth with a wingspan wide as a man's
  hand, on mushrooms, and on small bats which they netted and roasted. But still they were men; they
  understood and used fire, and had a language of their own. And as suchthey made perfect subjects for
  the imposition ofShaitan's will.
   This is how it was:
   He saw a group of them bring down a tawny mountain cat which had strayed down on to the Starside
  levels. They netted the animal, clubbed it unconscious, finished thejob with bone knives. And as they set
  about to skin it, so Shaitan emerged from the shadows of a boulder where he had rested, coming upon
  them suddenly. They saw him and their jaws fell open. For while they were not conscious of their own
  ugliness, Shaitan's beauty was inescapable.
   He stood before them, naked and proud in starshine, and his appearance - springing up out of nowhere
  like this - was next to magical. Tall and straight, where thetrogs were hunched and shambling, smiling in
  his darkly sardonic way, where they could only gawp andgabble, he was like a ray of light fallen among
  shadows. Which was entirely contrary to the fact, for he was theGreat Corrupter come among innocents.
   And as they came forward to examine him, so Shaitanstood still and suffered their timid touchings and
  awed, astonished exclamations. He listened attentively to their language, for it had dawned on him that his
  own (as yet largely untried) was very rudimentary, a vague string of sounds left over from ... from when?
  From what? He could not say, except that he felt his few words to be the fading echoes of many tongues;
  but he knew that the ability was in him to learn and use all tongues. For he was able, however dimly, to
  see into the minds ofmen and creatures alike, from which it is the very small est step to tie pictures to the
  spoken words.
   'It is un-man!' one of the trogs reported of Shaitan tohis companions. 'Its skin is soft, pale, easily
  broken.'
   'Its eyes are blue, not yellow,' another pointed out.'Yet they see in the dark like ours.'
   'Blue, yes,' grunted a third. 'But in their cores... is that a fire burning behind them? From time to time, his
  eyes burn!'
   'He is... a man!' said the first. 'Not unlike the men beyond the mountains, who live in the light - and yet,
  not like them.'
   And another, perhaps wiser trog desired to know:'But is he a friend?'
   Shaitan's guile was great; first he would be friend, then master. 'I am what I am,' he told them, 'and I
  havecome to show you the way.'
   They shambled back from him, in awe of their own language slipping so easily from Shaitan's lips. But in
  a little while the wise one told him: 'We know all of the ways. We are born, we wax, we hunt and forage
  for food, we make young ones. Then we die and leave ouryoung to do as we have done. These are the
  ways.'
   At which Shaitan smiled and nodded. 'But there are other ways,' he told them. And from within, for the
  first time, he heard a voice which was not his voice, saying: These shall be yours.' The voice of his
  
  conscience (or lack of it), or of something else? At any rate, Shaitan was not troubled. But seeing the
  mountain cat lying there red and gleaming and shorn of its skin did troublehim. And again, as from within:
  The blood is the life!
   And taking a knife from one of the trogs, he cut himself a portion from the hind leg of the slaughtered
  beast and squatted down to eat his fill. And as the trogs gathered round him, one of them said: 'See, he
  eats his meat raw!'
   And another: 'His smile is beautiful!'
   And a third, the one who had made previous mention of Shaitan's eyes: 'And where is the blue of his
  eyes now? Gone, as if the blood of the beast had flowed intothem!'
   Which was true in more ways than one ...
    
   Shaitan lived a while with the trogs and learned theirways. They showed him those cavern mushrooms
  which were edible, but he would not eat them. They showed him those that were deadly poison, which
  he must not eat. And later, taking meat with the tribal elder (the wise one of the first meeting; who was
  wary of him and his new ways), Shaitan put what he had learned to use.The wise one died in agony, and
  Shaitan took his place.
   The tribe was small, its people ugly of form and countenance, its caverns smoky and full of stenches.
  Shaitan quickly became disenchanted. He would instruct these people in... oh, in diverse ways, but their
  capacity for learning was small. He would open their eyes, take away their childlike innocence and
  replace it with ... what? Again he was not sure, except that he desired to impose his will. But to what
  end? Existencewith the sub-men was severely limited and limiting.
   Shaitan was full of vice. He had a man's passions,lusts, desires; and all enhanced, multiplied by the devel
  oping thing within him. He detested the trog women, yet gathered together a harem of all their ripest.
  When an enraged young male protested the theft of his prospective mate, Shaitan castrated him and
  made him the eunuch overseer of his carnal chambers. When a group of trogs rose up against him to kill
  him, he hid in a cave where he trembled and sweated ... and his sweat formed a mist that hid him from
  view and frightened his vengeful enemies away. They ran off to other tribes, spreading Shaitan's legend
  abroad.
   He practised arts which were instinct in him, for he knew that he was corrupt in all his parts. And
  bleeding himself with ticks, he used them to contaminate the storehouses of the trogs until their food
  seethed with his evil. More of the sub-men ran off, while yet they were unblemished. As for those who
  stayed: they were sick now in mind and body and called Shaitan master, and followed in his footsteps. Of
  all Wamphyri thralls, theywere the first.
   Shaitan planted seed in his women and several brought forth. Such offspring as were produced were
  hideous, scarlet-eyed, shrieking . .. and hungry. They suckled blood from their mothers' paps and grew
  too fast. And their own mothers smothered them, all but one which Shaitan ate ... Until finally he had had
  enough of the cave-dwellers, for he knew that there wasflesh in this world other than the lowly flesh of
  trogs.
   And always his parasite guided him, living on his blood as he lived on the blood of others. It was a very
  subtle symbiosis, however, so that except in Shaitan's darkest dreams and certain rare waking moments,
  
  he believed he was the sole author of his affairs and master of his own will and destiny. But ... he could
  never be sure. And from that time forward the questionof free will, self-determination, and all connected
  theories of integrity of spirit, became matters of vast importance to Shaitan, even assuming dimensions of
  obsession in him. In him, and in all subsequent vampires ...
    
   Shaitan remembered how, in his first meeting with the trogs, they had likened him to men on the other
  side of the barrier mountains. Now (having almost forgotten the irritation of the sun's golden rays, and
  with only one way to test for a recurrence of the problem), he determined the conquest of Sunside. But it
  would be subtle, as were all his works. First he would approachthe Sunsiders as a friend, and later as
  their master.Thus it would be as it had been with the trogs.
   So thought Shaitan ...
   Leaving his trog thralls behind to fend for themselves,he climbed the mountains diagonally, heading east
  asalways. He climbed at sunup but was shielded from the sun by the wall of the mountains. Still the sky's
  bright ness troubled him and the light hurt his vampire eyes,so that he wondered if all of this world's
  creatures werephotophobic, himself included. But high over the tree- line and into the peaks, he saw
  great birds soaring on high, which were not bothered by the sun. They werebirds of prey, kites, which
  scoured the land for food in the last rays of the sun. Also, there were great shaggy goats in the peaks,
  which had no fear of the light, andlikewise small creatures in the coarse grasses andheather.
   Shaitan shrugged. Well, he would put his theories tothe test soon enough; indeed, he might even impose
  hiswill upon the sun! (At which the spore-grown vampireinside him shrank down and was small, for in
  this matter Shaitan was too wilful and his vampire could neither guide nor control him. Immature in its
  ownright, it must simply go along with him.) While for hispart Shaitan felt merely uneasy, as a result of his
  parasite's concern.
   As fate would have it, he crested the mountains in that hour when all that remained of the sun was a
  spoked wheel of pink and yellow light fanning the southern horizon, and so felt no discomfort. And the
  gradu ally developing thing inside Shaitan, which was now irreversibly part of him, relaxed somewhat.
  For afterall, it could feel the power of its host and knew that hewas strong.
   And as twilight turned to night, Shaitan saw theflickering fires of hunters where they camped on the flank
  of the mountains. While down on the Sunside levels, the glowing fires of their camps and settlements lit
  the night in all directions, as far as his eyes couldsee. Their tribes were legion!
   And in his heart Shaitan was glad, believing that at last he had found true men upon whom to impose his
  will...
    
   The Sunsiders as a race of men were still recovering from the Grey Hole's holocaust, which had
  reshapedtheir 'Earth', realigned its orbit, and redesigned its geological features. They were recovering
  from earthquakes and tidal waves, from seasons of torrential rains andwhirlwinds of black frozen ash
  (which in another world might well have been termed 'nuclear winters'), and from other seasons which
  had baked half of the planet to a desert while the other half lay cold and wasted, mainly under frozen
  oceans. But as a race they were recovering, and gradually rebuilding their decimatednumbers.
   Upon a time: 'Earth' had had continents, oceans, islands, seasons of winds, sun, rains, snow. It had
  
  speciesgalore, and a quarter billion of people. They had thewheel, used fire and sails, experimented with
  rudimentary medicines and coarse chemistry. While gunpowder had not yet been discovered, still they
  understood thebasic elements of the forge and of metalworking; they hadmetal tools, and the crossbow
  for hunting. And all in alltheirs had seemed a bright future, whose explorers sailedout across the seas in
  wooden ships to seek new lands.
   But that was before the Grey Hole. And now, seven hundred or more years later, in the time of Shaitan?
  This is what the Sunsiders - less than thirty thousandof them now — knew of their world:
   That it had been ravaged of most of its species along with its peoples, and might well be considered
  dead except in that temperate zone whose spine was the barrier range of mountains between Sunside and
  Star-side. And in their legends (which were confused and contradictory, because the written form of their
  language had been at best basic and was lost in the aftermath, so that history had become a thing passed
  down immemorially by word of mouth), the scourge which had visited itself upon them to destroy their
  world hadbecome synonymous with a forbidden place on Starside known only as 'the Gate to the
  hell-lands'.
   And the legend was this: that one night a strange 'white sun' had appeared in the southern skies... a
  portent of terrible times in the offing!
   At first it had seemed to move slowly, like a comet, then more swiftly, and finally in a rush like a bar of
  white light where it speared down out of space to glance off the moon and blaze across the surface of the
  world! But as it fell to earth so it shimmered and shrank, untilit skimmed across the land like a huge flat
  stone bounc ing on water; and at last it thudded down into a crater of its own making, on a world gone
  mad by reason of its coming. Not a shooting star or a comet, no, but aForce far greater than these whose
  occurrence in Nature is mercifully rare: a Black Hole which had eaten itself, until only the event horizon
  remained. A Grey Holenow, and a bridge between universes.
   In any case, such science was beyond the people of this world. To the handful of stumbling, stunned
  survivors it was sufficient - and more than sufficient - that a deadly white sun had fallen out of the sky and
  destroyed everything they had known, leaving them and their descendants to live through a sort of hell for
  more than two and a half centuries. Until eventually,as the
   planet's orbit stabilized and its climates polarized -however dramatically - all that was left of humanity
  dwelled as best they might in the narrow belts of forest and on the plains south of the great barrier range,
  andin the southern flanks of the mountains themselves.
   And now, whenever hunters climbed those mountainsin their central region, or strayed through the great
  pass to Starside's boulder plains, they saw how an awful revenant of the cataclysm yet survived to
  reinforce its legend: a crater socket with its sunken, blind white eye glaring up and out, as if some fallen
  demon lay paralysed, unblinking, and wondering at his lot. And the gaze of his cold, dead white eye was
  like a beacon, a forbidding pharos, not guiding but warning souls away ...
   A demon, yes, why not? Something from hell, anyway.Something which had brought hell here with it.
   And in the legends there was also the story of a wandering adventurer, first through the pass after those
  turbulent centuries of stabilization, who climbed down to the mainly buried sphere of white light to touch it
  ...and was never seen again. For it had opened like a Gateto take him into hell.
   Which was why the place had been named like that and why it was now forbidden, along with all of
  those desolate lands lying north of the mountains: the boulderplains, and further east a region of dizzily
  
  rearing stacks of volcanic stone, like vast spears of rock rising to rival the barrier range itself; and beyond
  the northernmost horizon, sending up a blue shimmer and sheen under the diamond stars and weirdly
  writhing auroras, thebitterly frozen Icelands.
   All of these places, forbidding and forbidden. But in any case, who would want to go there? Nothing
  lived there; nothing could live there, but bats in the caves,and wolves up in the peaks and passes over
  Starside,and certain lesser creatures. Surely it was no fit habitation for men. Not for any sort of men.Not
  yet, anyway ...
    
   Shaitan came across his first true men by the light of their campfire, and saw that they were clad in the
  furs and skins of animals. There were three of them and they saw him at the same time, saw also that he
  was naked; which was just as well for Shaitan, for theywere hunters. If he had clothed himself and come
  upon them suddenly like that ... with his height, he couldhave been mistaken for a great bear. As it was he
  found himself covered by their crossbows as they scrambled to their feet and turned more fully towards
  him. Butthen:
   'A man!' one of them grunted, frowning.
   And: 'An idiot!' said another. 'I very nearly put a boltin him!'
   Shaitan read their expressions, their lips, in part their minds. Their words fitted readily with everything
  else he saw, so that he understood much of their language from the start. As they came forward to peer
  at him in the firelight, the last of them queried nervously, 'Amadman? Do you think so?'
   And the second: 'What else? Up here in the night on his own, naked under the stars.' And to Shaitan,
  coldly,'Who are you?'
   Smiling his sardonic smile, he answered, 'I am what Iam.'
   'And your name?'
   'Shaitan!' Because finally he remembered it.
   'Well, Shaitan,' the first of the three chuckled, but not unkindly, 'you'll excuse me for saying so, but it
  seems to me you're a bit daft!'
   'You think I'm ... demented?' He looked at them, and down at himself. 'But if I am mad - a harmless
  idiot -then why do you point your weapons?'
   At that the second man again spoke up, saying: 'Because "idiot" and "harmless" don't necessarily
  coincide,that's why. Down on the levels, in the camp of Heinar Hagi, we've one such "idiot" who works
  for his living -and Janni Nunov lugs boulders which I can't evenbudge!'
   Moving artlessly so as to disarm them, Shaitan approached their fire, hunched down and fed a stick to
  the fitful flames. The three put up their weapons and approached him again, and he pretended not to
  study them where he warmed his hands. It seemed they had no leader with them but were equals. One
  was short, squat and bearded; the next of medium height, sturdy, heavy-jawed; the last young and wiry,
  whose mindseemed entirely innocent. But since they likewise stud ied him, Shaitan kept his scarlet eyes
  half-shuttered and gazed mainly into the fire. The red would be takenfor reflected firelight.
  
   And finally the squat one, Dezmir Babeni, mused, 'You're soft and pale, whoever you are! For all that
  you're a big 'un and strong, you haven't known much of hard work. What's your tribe?'
   Shaitan shook his head.
   The muscular, prognathous Klaus Luncani wanted toknow: 'Why are you naked? Were you set upon?
  Ah, there are too many wild ones in the mountains these days, loners who'd kill a man just for his good
  leatherbelt!'
   Again Shaitan shook his head, and shrugged.
   But the young and wiry one, Vidra Gogosita, opened a pack and took out a long leather jacket, which
  he draped over Shaitan's shoulders by the fire. It was anold jacket but comfortable. And he said, The
  nights are cold. A man - even a fool - shouldn't go naked on thehillside!'
   And Shaitan smiled and nodded, and thought:Of thethree, he alone shall live - but only as my thrall For
  heissensitive, wherefore his agonies in my service will be that much sharper!A 'fool' has willed it...so be
  it.' But out loud he said, 'I thank you. But of myself... I wish I could tell you more. Alas, I can't
  remember.' It wasmainly the truth.
   'Set upon, aye,' Klaus Luncani grunted, as if it werenow decided beyond all doubt. 'By outcasts in the
  moun tains. Clubbed on the head, all memory flown. Stole hisclothes, they did. A man who hunts alone
  risks much!'
   Dezmir Babeni moved closer, went to touch Shaitan's head, perhaps discover a wound there. Shaitan
  put upa hand to ward him off. 'No! There is...a pain.'
   Dezmir nodded, and left it at that.
   The matter seemed to be settled: Shaitan was obviously the victim of thieves. He was lucky they'd
  sparedhis life.
   'Well, and Dezmir's right about one thing,' Klaus Luncani offered Shaitan a chunk of cheese and a bit of
  coarse bread. 'You certainly look big and strong enough!You'll live, I'm sure.'
   Alas, but you won't, Shaitan thought, looking at the food in Luncani's outstretched hand. It was
  execrable stuff and he shook his head. 'I... I killed a creature,' helied, 'for its flesh. It wasn't long ago. I'm
  not hungry.'
   'A creature?' This was young Vidra Gogosita.
   'With horns, curving back. Like this.' And Shaitan used his long slender hands to demonstrate. 'A small
  one, but sweet...' Though youwill be far sweeter.
   'A goat,' said Dezmir Babeni. 'A kid, anyway. Huh!Why, it seems he's had better luck than all of us
  together!'
   'A...goat, yes,' Shaitan slowly repeated him, with ahand to his forehead, to indicate gradually returning
  memory.
  
   'It'll all come back in time,' said Klaus Luncani,making a bed for himself in a triangle of boulders ashort
  distance from the fire. 'But listen, we've been hard at it for most of the day - though there's only a couple
  of piglets in our bag to prove it! So now we'll catch a little sleep. A sight safer than climbing in the dark,
  for sure! A few hours, that's all, until the moon's up again; then it's back down to the levels and the camp
  of ourleader, Heinar Hagi.'
   Dezmir Babeni took it up. 'You'd do well to come with us, Shaitan, as you've nothing better in mind. Oh,
  you're a strange one, to be sure: tall and pale, with your brains all shaken up in that handsome head of
  yours. No memory to mention, nor even a tribe to claim you.But the Szgany Hagi have taken in a few
  strays in theirtime. So...what do you say?'
   Shaitan looked up at him, and in that same moment Babeni was struck by the way the fire lit in his eyes.
  But Shaitan was quick to turn away again, gazing intothe glowing embers as before. And: 'Get your sleep,
  all of you,' he told them. 'I shall likewise sleep. And later... we'll see what we'll see.'
   Babeni shrugged, walked off a little way and trampled a bed of bracken for himself; he lay down, pulled
  ablanket over his lower half, snorted once or twice and fell silent. In his nest of boulders, Klaus Luncani
  was already snoring. But the youngest of the three, Vidra Gogosita, simply seated himself by the fire,
  close toShaitan.
   'I'll not sleep,' he said, 'but keep watch. It's my turn. You, however, would do well to get your head
  down.There's a blanket I can throw over you.'
   Shaitan nodded, and in a low voice answered, 'In alittle while.'
   Aye, in a very little while ...
    
   Of the rest:
   Vidra remembered very little, and all of it ill-defined, unclear in a mind which had rapidly succumbed to
  the hypnotic allure of Shaitan. He remembered talking to the - man? - and the feeling of drowsiness,
  lethargythat had crept over his limbs, his mind, his will.
   There was something about a face (but not Shaitan's handsome face, surely?) which had changed
  hideously to a bestial, nightmare mask with the forked tongue and dripping fangs of a snake. The face's
  approach ... a blowhole stench, of sulphur? ... and a pain, like the hot sting of a wasp where the artery
  pulsed in Vidra's neck ... no, two wasps, stinging him there, inches apart. And Shaitan's crooning, and his
  kisses where he sought to suck the stings from -
   Vidra came awake with a small cry, seemingly in answer to some other's cry. He was cold and cramped
  in all his limbs, his neck stiff and caked with a greatscab...of blood? His dream!
   ... Not a dream?
   He lurched to his feet, stumbling in the ashes at the edge of the fire. But where was his strength? He was
  dizzy, staggering, weak as water! And tangibly present in his mind - indeed visibly present, burning
  behind the night scenes which his eyes showed to him - were other eyes, like malignant crimson scars on
  his soul. Which was precisely what they were. And somethingwas looking at him through those windows
  on his mind,smiling at him sardonically, leering at him.
  
   The moon was up, arcing over the mountains; the firewas out except in its heart; a ground mist lay all
  about, writhing where it lapped the scrubby hillside, filled the small hollows, twined in the roots of
  bracken and heather. No owls hooted, nor wolves sang, nor any earthly or human sounds at all. But in
  the shadows over there ... something slobbered!
   That was where Dezmir had made a bed in the bracken, and Vidra lurched in that direction. But here on
  his right, the triangle of boulders which sheltered Klaus and gave him protection; his legs were sticking
  out even now, where the mist lapped about them. Vidra stooped, went to grab Klaus's ankle and shake
  him awake. Before he could do so, the extended foot gave a massive start, trembled violently, flopped
  loosely andwas still.
   Vidra's flesh crept. He jerked upright, took two staggering paces down the length of Klaus's prone body
  to the cluster of boulders, leaned on them to look down on his sleeping friend - and saw that he wasn't
  merelysleeping. Not any longer.
   For someone or something had taken a huge and impossibly heavy rock, levered it up over the top of
  the three embedded stones, and let it fall squarely on Klaus's face! Its roughly circular rim entirely
  obscured the area where his head would be, and in the flooding moonlight it seemed that a tarry
  substance seeped or was squeezed out from beneath. But Vidra Gogosita knew that the moonlight lied: it
  wasn't black but red.
   Scarcely in control of his limbs - choking, unable to cry out by reason of his gulping, the dryness of his
  throat — the youth went flailing through the sentientmist to where Dezmir Babeni lay in the bracken.
  'Dezmir!' he finally forced a warning croak. 'Dez ...
   '. .. mir?'
   For Dezmir's blanket had been thrown aside, andover him now Vidra's own long jacket, which his
  mother had begged him to bring with him. Except the jacket seemed alive, humped and mobile, fluttering
  like somehuge black bat fallen to earth!
   Vidra reeled, cried out! And the jacket, and what it contained, flowed upright, stood up and faced him.
  Shaitan - but no longer handsome, indeed barely human - his monstrous metamorphic face scarlet from
  gorged blood! And the slimy, alien mist pouring off him like sweat, and billowing out from under his
  borrowedleather jacket!
   Then ... Shaitan's talon of a hand reaching out to grip the youth's arm and steady him, and Vidra
  knowing for certain the source of those eyes in his mind; knowing, too, the terrible truth of his dream.
  After that: what else could he do but crumple to his knees before his new master? In any case, his legs no
  longer had the strength to hold him up. No, for the strength wouldcome later.
   And Shaitan's burning eyes gazing down upon him, and the monster's voice a clotted gurgle as he said,
  'My ways may seem very strange at first, though in the endyou'll gladly embrace them. Only tell me, did I
  hear you calling for Dezmir Babeni? Well, his blood is still hot, vital, if you are ... ready for that?'
   And then, with perhaps a trace of disappointment, 'Ah, a pity. For I see that you are not...'
    
   The climb down to Sunside's levels on the fringe of the forest took four hours. By then most of the
  
  Szgany Hagi's lesser campfires were out, and many of the folk asleep in their makeshift tents of animal
  hide. But the night watch kept a central fire blazing, and when they were not patrolling the perimeter they
  gathered beside it to talk. There was, too, a little lamplight issuing fromthe flap doors of several of the
  larger tents.
   Typically, the tents of the single men formed anevenly spaced outer perimeter: a barrier against intruders
  or marauders, though in these settled times that was unlikely. A few animals were tethered inside this
  loose outer circle, or left to graze in corrals roped off between the trees. The larger, family tents stood to
  wards the middle of the camp, with the fire marking thevery centre.
   There were several carts, a few of which were coveredover with stretched skins, the largest being
  HeinarHagi's caravan. Though the trails around the borders ofthe tribe's foothills and forest territories
  were scarcely better than rutted tracks, still it seemed only decent and right to Heinar - as leader or 'king'
  of his three-hundred-strong band - to jolt along behind snorting beasts rather than haul a small cart or
  travois like therest.
   As for 'beating the bounds' of his enclave: it was either that or have some other Szgany group move in
  and settle on it. Only by constantly measuring his acreage, patrolling its borders, and every mile or so
  posting his sigil (a highly stylized face, with a turned down mouth and one eye painted over with a black
  patch), could Heinar ever hope to hold on to it for his and the tribe's descendants. The perimeter of these
  territorieswas perhaps thirty-six miles, all of which Heinarguarded jealously. It was the same for most
  bands and tribes, so that in this respect they had been travellers -indeed, Szgany - right from the new
  beginning.
   But not all of the tribe of Heinar Hagi was on themove. Eastward, in honeycombed cliffs in the roots of
  the mountains, were caves which housed almost a third of his people. They had sheltered there ever since
  theholocaust, and there would stay. Likewise in the south,at the edge of the forest where it gave way to
  grasslandsand finally the desert: fifty pioneers of the Szgany Hagi,tending their crops where they'd built
  permanent homesamong the trees. Since both of these locations were on Heinar's roughly triangular
  route, he looked forward eagerly to sojourning first in the woodlands camp, thenat the caves.
   As his people grew and expanded, so they would build more towns around the perimeter of Heinar's
  lands, safely enclosing them. Finally he might be able to settle and live out the rest of his days untroubled
  bythoughts of land-thieves - except by then Heinar himself would likely be no more, but his sons and their
  sonswould reap the benefits.
   These were his thoughts; and at a hundred campfires large and small, east and west all along the Sunside
  flank of the barrier range, a hundred leaders just like him thought them alike. And he sat at the central
  fire, chatting with members of the night watch, with a brewof herb tea simmering on its tripod.
   Then, close by, on the perimeter ...
   ... The familiar half-growl, half-cough of a wolf! -one of the camp's wolves, it must be. None of the wild
  grey ones would ever stray so close to such a largebody of men. Heinar looked up, his brow furrowing,
  his good eye glinting in firelight. His men picked up their crossbows; the fire crackled; they all listened to
  thenight.
   There came fresh sounds: of a voice raised in challenge, and of another answering with a gasp, a sob!
  Heinar believed he knew that second voice. He startedto his feet and snapped, 'Who's still out?'
   'The lads you sent into the forest and down to the river, all are safely back,' one of his men answered. 'If
  
  these are ours at all, they can only be Klaus, Dezmirand Vidra.'
   'Aye,' Heinar gave a curt nod of agreement. 'That wasVidra's voice just then, for sure. But what ails the
  lad?' No one ventured to answer; they would find out soonenough.
   A party of three entered the clearing: a watchman with his wolf, ushering two others ahead of him. The
  two came stumbling, dishevelled, apparently exhausted.Heinar recognized only one of them - Vidra
  Gogosita.
   'Heinar!' the youth cried. 'Heinar!'
   'What is it?' Heinar demanded, as Vidra all but collapsed in his arms. 'What's happened? Where's Klaus
  and Dezmir? And who's this?'
   'Klaus ... Dezmir ...' Vidra babbled unashamedly.'Both .. . both of them ... dead! In the hills.'
   'What?' Heinar gasped. 'Dead, you say? How?'
   'We were ... were set upon, ambushed!' Vidra appeared to make an effort, pulled himself together. 'Out
  laws! They came out of the twilight. And I'd be dead too, if not... if not for... for this one. He... fought
  them off, saved my life. His name is...is...is..."But he could say no more; his eyes rolled up; he sagged in
  Heinar's arms.
   The stranger swayed, began to topple. Eager handscaught him, lowered him to a prone position. The fire
  lit strangely in his eyes as they slowly closed. And hisvoice was a sigh, trailing into silence as he told them:
   'My name...is Shaitan.’
    
    
    
   II
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
  
    
   At first, all had been chaos in the camp of Heinar Hagi.
   For almost an hour Heinar and his men, and various women, had chased about, doing their best to care
  forand see to the immediate needs of young Vidra Gogosita and the stranger he'd brought into the camp,
  the mancalled Shaitan.
   Vidra's mother, the slender but voluble widow Gogosita, had been first on the scene; she had been
  awake, waiting in her small tent for her only son's return from the mountains. Hearing something of the
  excitement, and sensing the sudden tension, the horror creeping in the night, she'd gone to the campfire of
  her own accord. And when first she'd seen her boy stretched out like that - such a weeping and wailing!
  But ... Vidra was alive, merely exhausted and sleeping! And how she'd cradled the youth in her arms
  then, while the men told her what little they knew of the tale. And the endless blessings she'd heaped on
  the tall pale stranger who had saved her son's life: Shaitan, who lay there close at hand, as in a coma,
  absorbing all he could of thesepeople and their ways.
   Then they had sent for the grown-up daughter of Dezmir Babeni, lovely Maria; at first she could not
  accept the fact of her father's death, so that she looked in vain for his face among the men. And finally her
  grief, strong but silent, when at last she went to sit alone, rock herself and weep. And the wife and sons
  ofKlaus Luncani, all dazed and staggering from the impact of this unexpected, unacceptable news. So
  that thetraditional peace and quiet of the campfire had beenquickly transformed into a scene of tragedy,
  grief, trauma.
   No one felt the Szgany Hagi's loss more than Heinar himself. He couldn't face the weeping women;
  giving instructions for the welfare of the survivors of this atrocity, he retired to his bed. He would be up
  and about at intervals through the long, forty-hours night, of course, but long before sunup he would lead
  a search party into the foothills, to recover the bodies of the dead. And if by any chance they should
  stumble on a party of loners or outcasts up there ... But Heinar knew that the odds were all against it.
   Meanwhile, the widow Gogosita had had her son carried to their tent where she watched over him. The
  badly bruised flesh of his neck was puffy, lacerated, probably infected. His fever was high and he tossed
  and turned, moaning in his sleep. As for what he moaned: they were things of blackest nightmare,
  resulting no doubt from what he'd experienced in the hills.
   At the campfire Shaitan had been made comfortable, a blanket thrown over him, his head propped up
  on a bundled skin. And Maria Babeni had come to sit beside him, staring at his drawn, handsome face in
  the flaring of the fire. It seemed to her he should be taken in, given proper shelter, cared for and
  protected until he was fully recovered. Hadn't he risked his life for the men of the Szgany Hagi? All in
  vain where her father and Klaus Luncani were concerned ... but at least he had saved young Vidra
  Gogosita! When the night watch returned she'd have them bring him to her small caravan(hers now, aye,
  and lonely at that), where she could give him the care he deserved.
   Which was exactly what she did.
   But most of the camp slept on, with the majority knowing nothing of the night's events; nor would they
  know until they got up to eat, tend their animals, take turn at watch. Unless something should happen
  beforethen, to break the routine.
   And the stars turning in their endless wheel, dappling the clearing at the edge of the woods; and high in
  
  the mountains a lone wolf howling for his mistress moon, to rise up again and lend him her light for the
  hunting ...
    
   As Maria Babeni prepared for bed behind a curtain, she heard Shaitan stirring, then his moan. Making
  fast her night clothes, she went to him where he had her father's narrow bed at the other end of the
  caravan. By the light of a wick burning in oil, she saw that his face waspale as ever, with long, dark hair
  swept back, the colour of a raven's wing, and lips very nearly as red as a girl's. He would be perhaps
  forty years old (his looks, atleast); his proportions perfect, his brow high, intelligent, lordly. For a man,
  Shaitan was quite beautiful.
   And she thought: Wherever he comes from, he is notSzgany.
   Then Shaitan opened his eyes.
   And now there could be no mistaking it: his eyeswere red!
   Maria gasped where she leaned over him. And quick as her thoughts - just exactly as quick - he grasped
  her arm, rose up half-way on an elbow ... then closed his eyes, released her and fell back. And knowing
  what she had seen, he said, 'My eyes... my eyes! They hurt.There's blood in them. Someone struck me
  there ...'
   'Bloodshot?' The word fell from her lips as if conjured,which it had been, half-way. His eyes were
  bloodshot?So very evenly?
   For a moment, only for a moment, Maria had seensomething other than a handsome man. Something
   hideous lurking behind the beauty. But...it could only be the strangeness of the situation: this man in her
  father's bed, and Maria alone with him in the night. Maria, who for all that she was nineteen years old,
  had known only her father's close company since the day of her mother's death. And the fact of a new
  bereavement slowly sinking in. The aftershock; the enormous holeinside of her; the loneliness. Of course
  she saw shadows where there were none, and phantoms to inhabit them.
   He moaned again, tried to sit up, again opened his eyes- but kept them half-shuttered. She helped him,
  propped him up, said, 'How did ... how did he die? My father,Dezmir Babeni. He was the short one,
  bearded, laughing.'
   Shaitan avoided the question. 'I didn't see it all,' he answered. 'I only heard their cries, and went to help.
  But ... your father?' And glancing around the caravan, as if noticing his whereabouts for the first time:
  'Wheream I?' His question was so innocent, childlike.
   She sat on the edge of his bed and told him everythinghe desired to know. About the Szgany Hagi, the
  Szganyin general, herself, her situation - everything. And ashis eyes opened more fully (but oh so slowly,
  so gradu ally), so Maria's small feelings of anxiety retreated, herill-formed suspicions fell away, her will
  was subverted.
   His voice was so low - like the rumble of a great cat, deceptively gentle but full of a fierce energy - and
  fluent despite its as yet alien use of her tongue. And behind every word a hint, a suggestion, an
  enticement. Shaitan beguiled, entranced, seduced; of course, for he was the great seducer. He seduced
  with his eyes, his tongue, the lure of his magnet personality, so unlike anything Maria had ever known
  
  before. And despite his strangeness, and the strangeness of her own innermost feelings, awakened now
  for the first time, she wasdrawn like a moth to the blood-red fire of his eyes.
   She knew his fingers were at the fastenings of her night clothes, turning them back, laying her flesh bare;
  but as if to salve each burning brush of those fingers against her sensitized skin, Shaitan poured forth his
  balm of words. And his furnace heat enveloped her, spreading into every region of her body. So that she
  grew hot, so very hot.
   Maria felt the perspiration swelling in her pores, forming droplets, trickling from neck and shoulders,
  breasts and belly. And she heard Shaitan's honeyed voice confirming the sultry oppression of the night,
  telling her how hot it was, how good to be free of such clammyrestrictions as clothes and bed covers.
   He had turned back his blankets; he sat up and helped her disrobe entirely; their sweat mingled as he
  rubbed his body against hers. Maria's breasts were firm and proud, with dark brown buds ... erect, now,
  where Shaitan stroked her. Before, she'd known only Szgany lads, clumsy buffoons whose hands and
  faces she'd slapped. But now, when Shaitan stood up, drew off his shirt, stepped from his breeches ...
  she clung to him and kissed his nipples, and stroked his horn where itsteamed and jerked.
   'See?' he said. 'My body would know all of you! For while my eyes have observed this softest of soft
  fruits,' and while my hands have touched its perfect skin, still the lips of my probe would test its flesh for
  succulence. Aye, for I fear it may be bitter, that a worm may have crept into your juicy core, to itch there
  in the heart of your heat and spoil your flavour. But don't you feel himitching?'
   He touched her belly, the cleft in her bush, and herthighs lolled open. And: 'Ah, you see? You see?'
  Shaitan's face showed his amaze, and a very little of his lust. This dark and secret hole, all unsuspected!
  That'swhere he entered, be sure. So let me in, of your ownfree will, to drown your worm with my cock's
  wet kiss.'
   He entered her in one, long, slow pulse, breaking her without pause and feeling her sweet virgin's blood
  hot on his bony shaft. And Maria's hunger was such that she might cry aloud for more, but could only
  gasp and gurgle as he rode to and fro, in and out between hersalivating lips.
   And for a long, long time Shaitan took Maria in everyway he knew and others which he invented, until
  his lust was sated, however temporarily. And sprawling there lewdly, with the girl all bruised and
  insensible between his thighs, and his sperm like foam on all heropenings, he thought:
   These people are clever,yet in many ways they are innocent as trogs. And like the trogs, the Szgany
  Hagishall be mine!
   It was Shaitan's first major error. His stay with the trogs had lasted for two long years, and little
  occurring in all that time to tax or stimulate his superior mind andtalents; so that in certain respects he had
  grown lax, andperhaps as naive as the trogs themselves. But as he wouldsoon discover, the men of
  Sunside were in no way trogs.
   For now, however ... his excesses with the girl hadwearied him. He would join Maria in sleep a while.
   Which was his second big mistake ...
    
   One third of the way into the night, Turgo Zolte was called to his duty watch. Zolte was a big, taciturn
  
  man; tough, iron-grey in the eyes, with shoulder-length hair to match. He wore silver earrings, a silver
  buckle on his belt, silver buttons to fasten his black clothes; like allSunsider men he jingled when he
  walked, only more so. Zolte was a loner, not quite an outsider. The SzganyHagi had accepted him now.
   He'd come to them only a year ago, chased out of his own far western band by a chief whose son he'd
  killed. According to him, it was a fair fight; the other had called him out over a woman, and Turgo had
  broken his neck. Well, he had the brawn for it, certainly; and since there was no lack of space among the
  Hagis for big, strong fighting men - so long as they were working men, too - Heinar had let him stay.
  Since when no one had bothered with Turgo Zolte very much, and he'd kept mainly to himself. But if a
  man could catch him inthe right frame of mind, with a jug of good plum brandy inside him, he might
  occasionally tell a few wild tales of his latter days along the western reaches. Campfiretales, of bogeymen
  and beasts. His audience might snorta bit, but none called him a liar.
   This night, when Turgo reported to the fire, the tableswere turned; the man he relieved was the one with
  the tale to tell. Turgo heard it out, scowled and narrowedhis glinty eyes, finally said, 'You saw all of this?
  YoungVidra with his neck torn and scabbed? And thisstranger - he was pale, you say? Not much of a
  description!'
   The other shrugged. 'What's to describe? A man: tall, pale, with a girl's long soft hands. Somehow, he
  didn't look Szgany - he was all smooth and unweathered, like he'd lived in a cave all his days. And his
  eyes were ...they seemed full of blood!'
   'Blood? In his eyes?'
   'Exactly! Like he'd been poked in them, or had sandthrown in 'em - which no doubt he had, in the
  fighting.'
   Turgo's own eyes narrowed more yet and he nodded,mainly to himself. And sitting down by the fire, he
  said, 'Tell me more, everything, but in finer detail. Leavenothing out.'
   The telling didn't take very long.
   And shortly -
   - Heinar Hagi came awake instantly, looked at the earnest face of the man who had given him a shake,
  grunted and glanced up through an opening in the roof of his caravan at the night sky. He knew the hour
  at once, from the position of the stars, grunted again andgrowled, 'Anyway, I was due to be up about
  now.'
   Turgo Zolte wasn't much of a diplomat. He shrugged and said, 'Due or undue, you're up.' And: 'It looks
  like there's business to attend to, Heinar. Bad business, Ifear.'
   Heinar threw on his clothes, put on his eye-patch tocover the hole which an eagle had torn in his face
  whenhe was just a lad. Teach him to hunt eggs in the heights! 'Business?' He repeated the other. 'You'll
  be talking about murderers in the hills, right? Aye, we'll be doing what we can - but at sunup. You want
  to come along,you're welcome. Couldn't it wait?'
   Turgo shook his head, stepped down from the caravan into the night, waited for Heinar to join him. 'Not
  what I've got to say,' he answered. 'Not unless you want to see plague in the camp, spreading through all
  your people!'
  
   And now Heinar was very much awake. 'What?' hegrasped the other's arm. 'Plague?'
   Turgo nodded. 'But quiet! Let's not wake the entirecamp. Not yet. Now listen, and I'll tell you what I
  heardfrom the watch. Except I know it may have been exaggerated. But you were there, so if all tallies
  ...' He repeatedthe story of the watchman. And when he was done:
   'Aye, that's the story,' Heinar grunted. 'Blow forblow.'
   'Huh!' Turgo returned his grunt. 'Well, and now I've adifferent story for you..."
   And after a moment, as they made for the campfire: 'Icame from west of here, as you know,' Turgo
  began, 'out of the tribe and territories of Ygor Ferenc. That's way up at the end of the barrier range,
  where the hills slump into misted valleys, fens and mire. The swampsare dire: quicksands, mosquitoes,
  leeches, but the Ferenc's borders fall short of them by a good seventymiles - which to my mind is still too
  close by far!'
   They had reached the fire; the watchmen were out, patrolling the camp's perimeter; Turgo seated himself
  on a stool and Heinar chose the well-worn branch of a fallen tree. They each took tea, strong and bitter,
  andeventually Turgo continued.
   'Well, about eighteen months ago, some funny things began to happen there on the edge of nowhere. As
  you'd imagine, they have their share of mountain men up there, much as you do down here: loners who
  take to the hills, look after themselves, live on their own in the wild. And now and then such a one will
  come into camp with a beast he's killed, too much meat for oneman, and they'll usually make him
  welcome. There'll be a feast, and brandy to wash it down; the women will dance till sundown; the likely
  lads will end up fighting ... and so on. That's how it goes.
   'But there in the western reaches, that wasn't always the way it went, not in the last six-month. Some of
  the mountain men up there in the misty hills where they descend to the valleys and swamps, and even the
  occasional lone wolf ... they were suddenly changed, different. Something weird had got into them.
   There were rumours: about men with red eyes,madmen with the lusts of beasts, and wolves that
  snatched people right off the fringes of their camps and territories! Always by night, or in the light of the
  moon. It was like an infection, a sickness spreading out of the swamps, and people grew wary of any
  stranger who might come into their camps at twilight or sundown. But in the Ferenc's camps, or on the
  march, beating his bounds ... well, as I've said, all of this was rumour. The other camps may have been
  hit, if the stories were true, but old Ygor was the lucky one. For a while,anyway.
   Then, just before I landed in trouble - Ygor's hotheaded fool of a son, Ymir, forcing me to kill him over
  awoman's favours and what all - that's when the luckof the Szgany Ferenc ran out. It happened like this:
   'I was out with Ygor and maybe a dozen others, beating the bounds just like now. One twilight, we
  reached this old clearing where we'd make camp. Ygor knew the place well enough: it was about as far
  west as folks have ever journeyed, except for the loners, of course, who often step where no one else
  would. Nothing superstitious about that, it's just that west of there the ground's no good for growing
  things; the water's scummy and the mists are far too frequent. It's like the end of the world! But old Ygor,
  he likes to beat the ground there anyway, to make sure no one will comedown out of the hills and settle
  on it.
   'And there in the clearing, that's where we foundOulio lonescu - something that looked like Oulio,
  anyway ...'
  
   As Turgo paused, so Heinar cast him a sharp glance.'Eh? Something that looked like him?'
   'Give me a chance and I'll explain,' the other held up a restraining hand. And after a moment's thought:
   'Oulio was one of these types who'd come into camp for an evening's entertainment. Oh, he liked his
  own company best, but from time to time got a little too much of it. His parents had been mountain
  people, too - until an avalanche killed them - and Oulio had a cave up there somewhere. Also, he was
  known to wander west and trap big lizards in the swamps. See this belt ofmine? A bit of Oulio's good
  leather.
   'So, we knew him well. Or thought we did. But thistime he was in trouble.
   'At first we didn't know what we'd stumbled over. The Oulio we knew was big and wild as they come:
  clothes all in patches, eyes black as night, hair like a waterfall. And garrulous? He was full to the brim of
  words that didn't mean much, all spilling out of him because he'd kept them so long bottled up. He played
  his fiddle like no one I ever heard, drank brandy like water, would dance till he fell. But he danced alone,
  because he was wary of the women.
   'But now? Well, he wouldn't be doing any dancingfor a while, for sure.
   'How long he'd wandered like that, who knows? But it had slimmed him down a lot. All of his fat was
  gone, and quite a bit of his skin, too. Why, he was ... black! Burned black, by the sun, as it turned out.
  But he was red, too. Red where the skin had peeled from his face and limbs, and red in his eyes. Aye,
  red as blood. And there he lay, sprawled like a dead man in the clearing, with only the occasional twitch
  or moan to hint of anylife left in him at all.
   'We looked after him. We didn't know what had befallen him, but despite all rumours and old wives'
  tales we cared for him. Even as we're now caring for this stranger ...'
   'Eh?' Heinar gave a start. 'The stranger? But he washere, by the fire!'
   'Until Maria Babeni took him in,' Turgo noddedgrimly. 'She had him carried to her cart.'
   And now Heinar thought that maybe he understood something of what was going on here; for he knew
  that Turgo had paid one or two small, polite attentions to
   Maria, even though the girl hadn't seemed to notice or acknowledge them. But Turgo saw the Hagi's
  thoughtswritten plain in his one good eye, and:
   'Better let me finish,' he said, 'before you go jumpingto any conclusions.'
   'Get on with it, then,' Heinar told him.
   'Oulio was taken to the tent of one of the younger men, a man who had his young wife with him. There
  were four couples like that, who'd come along to form the germ of a settlement in the woods to the south,
  much as you've started a permanent camp south of this place. He and his slip of a wife knew Oulio from
  othertimes; they took him in, bathed him, laid him on a clean blanket and rubbed good butter and salt into
  all of hissore places. By which time it was night.
   'As darkness came down in full and the moon came up, so this same young man was called to keep
  
  watch. And he left his girl wife tending the much-ravaged Oulio. Ah, but when he came back all those
  hours later...
   '... Only picture it, only imagine the lad's horror, to discover his much-ravagedwife! And Oulio still
  grinding away at her like a pig; her breasts all bruised and bloodied from his long nails, and the beast
  they'd cared for using her as worst he could. He'd gagged her, tied her hair to the tent's pole at the floor.
  But he'd hit her once or twice, too, and broken her nose and jaw, before having her whichever way he
  fancied. And he'd fanciedthem all!
   'And there stood this young man, at the flap of his tent, and his wife broken like a doll and still being
  usedby this flame-eyed fiend! Worse, Oulio's teeth were like fangs, which he'd stuck in her neck to suck
  her blood! And as he heard the lad's horrified gasp behind him, sohe bit down on the artery and sliced it
  through!
   'He turned his head and glared at the intruder, snarling at him like a wolf! And his face wasn't dissimilar
  tothat of a wolf, except his eyes weren't feral but crimson!Red as the blood which spurted with each
  falteringheartbeat from this poor girl's torn neck!'
   Heinar's eye bulged and he gripped Turgo's arm.'Man, what a story!' His voice was hoarse. 'But finish
  it.'
   The other nodded, and continued:
   The lad had been on watch and carried his crossbow with him, loaded. For a moment he'd been
  paralysed, unmanned; but now he screamed his outrage, let fly, put a bolt through the sod close to his
  black heart. Itwould have finished any other man, to be stuck through and through like that with a
  hardwood bolt, only a hairbreadth from his heart. But not Oulio, not the thingwhich Oulio had become.
  With the strength of a maniac, he knocked the husband aside, kicked him in the face, and rushed out of
  the tent into the sleeping camp. Hishissing and howling woke all of us up...
   'Well, everything I've told so far is the way I heard itand how I remember it. But from here on in it's the
  way I saw it. And I've no sinister motive for telling this tale,Heinar; no, for I've learned my lesson where
  women are concerned, and I'm not much of a one for subterfuge. But the Szgany Hagi took me in and for
  that I owe youa favour. So here's how the rest of it goes:
   'Before the camp was fully awake, before anyone could say, ask, or do anything, this young lad - who
  was now mad as Oulio himself — put another bolt in him, in his spine. Oulio toppled into the campfire,
  andthe lad had him! He grabbed a leg, dragged him scream ing out of the cinders, noosed him round the
  neck and strung him up from a tree there and then! And then hetook us to his wife, so that we'd
  understand.
   'We'd understand some of it, anyway ...
   'And no one cut Oulio down, so that he might well be swinging there yet, except ... that wasn't the end of
  it.No, not by a long shot.
   'For at sunup, Oulio's coughing and grunting brought us awake again! He was still alive, yes! With a rope
  round his neck, his face all purple, dangling there in mid-air; one bolt skewering him through the chest,
  and another deep in his spine. And none of these things hadkilled him! But something was in the offing
  which would for sure. It was the sun, coming up over the trees and blazing down into the clearing. And
  when it lit onOulio - how he smoked and steamed!
  
   'And then ... this awful, impossible commotion: he choked and kicked and danced up there! Until the
  knot came loose, letting him down. And so he crumpled to the ground and lay there, staring at us with
  those scarlet eyes of his. And we called for the lad, who'd just finished burying his poor wife, to come
  and finish it. It seemed only right...
   'He brought a machete and went to Oulio where he lay. But before he could take his head ... the
  monster spoke to him! Oh, he didn't cry out, beg for mercy, plead for his life; none of that. His throat, all
  puffy and grooved, wouldn't have allowed for it, and anyway he had no wind. And in a voice no more
  than a hoarsewhisper, he said: "I'm sorry! It wasn't me!"
   The liar! For of course the lad, and everyone else, knew it had been none other! Half crazy, the poor
  bereaved husband snarled and his machete went up, but before it could fall ... Oulio began to choke and
  flop about, so that we knew it was the end of him. And perhaps the lad thought, "Why should I make it
  easierfor him?" At any rate, he stayed his hand.
   'And so Oulio flopped about in his death agonies; his mouth yawned open and his neck grew fat, and his
  purple face swelled up as if to burst. Until at last...atlast something came out of him!'
   Heinar half started to his feet. 'Something? What sortof something? Was he sick? Did he throw up his
  guts?'
   Turgo shook his head. 'His guts, no. He threw up nothing. I saw it and I remember. I remember what I
  thought: that this thing wanted to be out of him! Because while he was finished, there might be another
  chance for it. Don't ask me where the idea came from,but that's what I thought.'
   'But what was it?'
   Turgo shrugged, then shuddered, which was something Heinar had never seen him do before. 'A huge
  slug, a leech, a great fat blindworm — don't ask me, for I don't know. It was partly black, grey, leprous,
  ridged, writhing. Big as a boy's arm, I thought it would splithis face! And it dragged itself out of him and
  wriggled for cover - because just like Oulio it felt the sunlight. Its head was flattened, like a snake's, but it
  was blind,eyeless. Yet somehow, it sensed the lad's machete still raised on high and reared back from it.
  But too late ...he was quick...he struck off its head!
   'A moment more and men unfroze, sprang forward,kicked the wriggling pieces into the fire. Then ... we
  alllooked at each other - all of us, with faces white as chalk - and we looked at the lad, who used his
  great knifeagain. This time he took Oulio's head: two, three strokes...it was done. And again we tossed
  both parts into the fire, then stood there till they'd burned to ashes ...'
   Heinar stared hard at Turgo, who gazed back unblinkingly. And Heinar knew that every word of it had
  beenthe truth. For who could embellish a thing like that?Finally he said, This Shaitan's eyes were red. I
  thoughtit was only the firelight, reflected in them. Well, maybeit was - and maybe it wasn't.'
   'We'll know for sure at sunup,' the other answered. 'But do you really want to wait that long? Right now,
  who or whatever that man is, he's with Maria Babeni, in her caravan. And maybe he's with her just like
  Oulio was with that girl. Also, Heinar, my story still isn'tfinished.'
   There's more? But what else can there be?'
   'A plague, I said,' Turgo reminded him, 'and a plague'swhat I meant. For in the dead of the next night -
  
  and after that poor lass's husband had buried her in the woods - who should come ghosting into camp
  but thegirl herself! Oh, her flesh was pale and her nails broken from the digging, but her appetite was
  healthy enough,and good long teeth to match it!
   'Well, the men around the fire had all taken strong drink; at first they didn't know her. She went among
  them like a whore, tempting, stroking, biting their necks. But suddenly her bites were real! Aye, and her
  eyeswere red! Then, they knew her.
   'Well, this time we knew better what we were doing. But we had to hold her poor raving husband down
  while we did it..."
   Heinar shook his head in utter bewilderment. Untilat last: 'A plague, aye,' he said. 'But Turgo, what are
  we talking about here? A creature that lives in a man - or a woman - making him or her crazy enough to
  live bythe blood of other men?'
   That's exactly what we're talking about,' said the other.'A wampir which makes its host victim strong,
  lusty,devious, and very hard to kill. Old Oulio lonescu wasn't a rapist, and he certainly wasn't a murderer!
  And whatabout this girl, who came back from the grave?'
   'Isn't it possible she was buried alive?'
   'No,' Turgo shook his head in firm denial. 'She wasdead for sure. And later - undead!'
   Heinar could scarcely take it all in. 'What was thatword you used? Wampir?'
   Turgo nodded. 'In certain western regions, that's whatmen call the great bats that suck on goats. If they
  find acrippled goat under the moon, they'll suck him dry.'
   Heinar's mouth was likewise dry. He looked nervously all about - at the tents, the carts and caravans,
  and not least the shadows - then licked his lips andfinally nodded. 'Well, I know about such bats, of
  course:we Hagis call 'em "vexies". Catch them at our goats, we sneak up, club them, break their wings.
  But men with giant leeches in them?' He didn't try to hide a small shudder. 'No, I have to admit, you're
  the expert on thisone, Turgo Zolte. So what next? How do we handle it?'
   'What we don't do is act too hasty,' Turgo said. 'For we'd never live it down if this Shaitan's innocent -
  anda hero to boot.'
   'Which he could well be,' Heinar let himself down from his branch. 'For after all, young Vidra Gogosita
  reckons he saved his life!'
   Turgo's deep-etched frown showed his dilemma, hisuncertainty. 'That's the hell of it,' he nodded. 'It's
  possible all this talk's for nothing - indeed I hope it is! - butcan we risk it?'
   'No,' Heinar gave a short, sharp shake of his head,convinced that he'd be far better safe than sorry.
  'Vidra's had his head down for a while now. Perhapswe should go and have a word with him.'
   They did. The widow Gogosita heard them coming,met them at the flap of her tent with a finger to her
  lips. 'Shhh/ The poor lad's asleep. And Heinar,' she graspedhis arm, 'it's very good of you to show your
  concern this way. Ah, but it must have been terrible up there! Suchnightmares! Vidra rambles as in a
  fever...he speaks ofblood, and murder!'
  
   They went in, all three, to stand quietly beside the youth where he tossed and turned. The night had
  turned cold, and yet the sweat stood out on Vidra's brow. He was pale as a ghost, with grey hollows in
  his cheeksand under his eyes.
   Turgo glanced at Heinar, went to shake the lad's shoulder. His mother got between. 'What's this?' she
  hissed. 'But can't you see he needs his sleep? Well,whatever, it will have to keep.'
   'No, Elana. It can't keep.' Heinar was familiar with her, but firm. He put her to one side, and ...
   ... And Vidra came breathlessly, babblingly alive!
   He was still asleep, but the cold sweat welled up that much faster, and the words jerked out of him in
  squalls, like sudden bursts of spattering rain. 'No, no... keep off... keep away!' He tugged at his blanket
  until it was a damp knot. 'Ah, great ghoul ... but do you murder men for their clothes? No, no, for I see
  it's more than their clothes you're after! ... Keep off! Go torment Dezmir ... not me, not me.' He flopped
  this way and that. 'Ah, but now I know you, fiend! ... Your eyes like lamps ... they let you find your way
  in the dark! But not me, not me! Go suck on Dezmir's neck and let mebe!'
   And with that last he turned on his side, and hisneck was visible where his mother had washed it. Turgo
  and Heinar looked - and saw.
   'Punctures,' Turgo growled. 'Tears in the flesh. Andthe flesh itself inflamed, poisoned!'
   Heinar nodded his grim agreement.
   The widow's hand had flown to her mouth. 'What did Vidra say? About murdering men for ... for their
  clothes? But now it comes to me. That stranger was wearing Vidra's long coat. Also Klaus Luncani's
  trousers! Much too short for him ... they have a patched right thigh. I'd know that patch anywhere, for I
  put it there. His poor wife is no good ... with needle and thread... at all!' Her eyes opened like great mad
  windows.
   And so did Vidra's as he came awake, sat bolt uprightand snarled his terror, then reached out his
  trembling arms for his mother. 'Ma! - Mama! - Ma-aaaaa!' His cry was a gasp, a hiss, not loud, but it
  penetrated Turgo, Heinar and the widow like a long hot iron sliding intotheir flesh.
   And for all that it was quiet, still its echoes reached out a great deal farther than the tent of the Gogositas
  ...
    
   In Maria Babeni's caravan, Shaitan came awake!
   What was that? A cry in the night? From whichquarter?
   The night seemed still, quiet, but Shaitan's vampire intelligence was not. It was unquiet. He sensed
  movement; men other than the watchkeepers were awake inthe camp, stirring furtively.
   ... And they were with his thrall!
   He reached out with his mind - and gasped as the scene in the tent of the widow Gogosita flooded his
  awareness in all its vivid, telepathic detail. Not a scene from the youth's dreams, no, but from life. Vidra
  
  was awake - and talking his head off!
   No! Shaitan sent his command like a flung knife. Oh, you faithless one! Much too Idle now to change
  sides, Vidra Gogosita ...
   In the widow's tent, suddenly Vidra's terrified eyeswent wide where he clasped his mother and babbled
  the true story to Turgo and Heinar. His words were shut offas Shaitan closed a telepathic fist on his mind;
  groaning,he slumped to the floor. But the others had heard enough.
   'Look after him!' Heinar snapped as the frantic widowgot down beside her son. And Turgo thought:
   Aye, lookafter him very, very well!
   Then the two men were out of the tent, and Heinar blowing on his alert whistle. From out on the
  perimeter came answering cries, the strange cough of a wolf, sounds of men hurrying to investigate. The
  girl's caravan is on the other side of the clearing,' Heinar grunted, leading the way. They skirted the
  campfire, and Heinarblew again.
   'He'll be alerted by now,' Turgo warned.
   'Distracted, I hope!' Heinar answered.
   Turgo loaded his small crossbow, knocked off thesafety. 'There are only the two of us.'
   'Huh! How many do we need?'
   Turgo wasn't known for his patience. Baring his teeth,he snarled, 'More than just the two of us, be sure!'
  Andhe grabbed Heinar's arm to slow him down.
   By then they had almost reached Maria Babeni's smallcaravan. Heinar shook himself free of the other's
  hand,growled, 'Yes, I know: he'll be strong, this creature. But poor Maria, she's just a weak girl - and
  me, I'mSzgany!'
   'Both of us,' Turgo snapped. 'Both fools, too.'
   Arriving at the small covered cart, Heinar blew one last blast on his whistle; a glimmer of lamplight
  shining through the wicker weave of the caravan's door went out at once; the shadows lengthened as
  watchmen came loping in starlight. But before they could arrive, thedoor was flung open!
   Shaitan stood there, his face a pallid mask, alert butcalm. And no disguising the scarlet fire in his eyes
  now. He made no attempt to do so but said, simply, 'Heinar, my ways will be strange to you at first. But
  only followthem, and I shall make you the most powerful leader theSzgany ever knew, until the Hagis are
  feared throughoutthe length and breadth of Sunside.'
   Heinar shook his head. 'It wasn't fear made me a leader,' he answered, 'but respect. That ... and justice!'
  And to the man beside him, in a voice which crackedlike a whip to activate his trigger finger: Turgo!'
   Turgo's bolt zipped from the tiller of his weapon. Butin the same moment, Shaitan snarled and slammed
  thedoor in their faces. Still the heavy hardwood bolt struck through the wickerwork to find its target;
  most certainly, for Shaitan's cry of pain sounded from withinlike the howl of a stricken animal, and the
  flights of the bolt were sheared from its shaft as it was wrenchedthrough the tough weave and out of sight.
  
   Men arrived on the scene: three of them, one with hiswolf to heel. 'What's going on? What's happening?'
   Heinar had no time for explanations. 'That man in there, the stranger Shaitan. I want him brought down.
  Maybe even dead. Turgo here has shot him; that might be enough ...'
   Turgo, fitting another bolt to his crossbow, thoughtnot. And he was right. But before he could say
  anything:
   A mist sprang up; it sprang into being, literally!
   One moment, the five men stood at the door of Maria'ssmall caravan - with lamps in the other tents and
  carts beginning to flicker into life at the commotion, and grumbling voices raised in inquiry - and the air
  was dry and sharp. Then, suddenly, as if the earth and the forest had exhaled mightily, a ground mist
  lapped at their ankles, and the air was damp, even greasy. Time only for one of the watchmen to murmur,
  'What?' - andanother, 'Eh?' - before the mist was thickening, writhingin the trees, obscuring the camp's
  silhouettes.
   Then, from the covered cart, Maria Babeni's cry rangout!
   Galvanized, forgetting for the moment the weirdness of the night, Heinar bounded forward up the single
  wooden step, charging the door with his shoulder. Simul taneously, there came the sound of ripped
  leather andthe cart rocked a little.
   The door burst inwards under Heinar's weight and awall of mist greeted him, collapsing around him,
  issuing outwards from the caravan like water when the dam breaks. Then the Hagi was inside, with Turgo
  hot on his heels; and Maria, naked and sobbing, collapsinginto their arms.
   A hole gaped in a side wall. Framed in the ripped hide, briefly, they saw the tall pale figure of Shaitan
  before he fled outwards to the night. Turgo's bolt was in his shoulder, blood flowing freely .. . but not
  onlyblood. For when Shaitan breathed, he breathed a billow ing mist. And the pores of his body, open
  like tiny pouting mouths, secreted milky vapour as a slug issuesslime!
   Turgo cursed, fought free of Maria's arms, loosed hissecond bolt through the hole into Shaitan's mist,
  hopefully into Shaitan. But no, there came no answering cry,only a red-eyed shadow loping soundlessly
  through themist-damp shrubbery.
   'Loose your wolf!' Heinar shouted to the men outside.
   With a snarl, the animal went bounding, and thewatchmen after it. 'Yes, get after him!' Turgo leaned out
  of the door, urging them on. 'And don't just catch him -kill him on the spot!'If you can ...
   Heinar had wrapped his coat around the girl. They laid her on her bed, examined her neck. Nothing, just
  bruises, and more on her body. They were proper about it: they merely glanced at her naked flesh, but
  that was enough. There were signs which both men knew. Andconfirming their unspoken thoughts:
   'I... had thought I was dreaming,' her voice was tiny, a sob. 'But ... when I woke up, I... I knew whathe
  had done. Except I...I couldn't stop him! I swear it! He... he has this power. It's in his eyes ...'
   Heinar called for women, left Maria in their care. And a little while later, at the campfire:
  
   'Well?' he asked Turgo. 'And what now?'
   The mist had thinned out, seeped into the ground, disappeared. The stars were bright again and the
  hurtling moon just risen. From away in the forest came far,faint shouting. 'For now,' Turgo answered, as
  the distant cries died away, 'let's just wait and see if they get him.'
   Heinar grunted, nodded, said, 'Well, Turgo Zolte, itseems the Szgany Hagi are firmly in your debt. And
  me, I'll not forget it. Hah.' Who could forget a night likethis? But at least young Vidra and the girl are all
  right.'
   The other made no answer, merely stared into the fireand wondered,Ail right, are they? Are they
  really?
    
   Before the dawn two of the three men returned. They had got cut off from the third watchkeeper and
  hadn'tseen him since. Neither him nor his wolf.
   At sunup Heinar found Turgo packing his small tentand a very few personal things, and sniffing out the
  breezefrom the east. 'Something on your mind?' he inquired.
   'I came to you with nothing,' Turgo answered, 'and I'm not taking much more away with me. What little I
  have, I've earned. Any complaints?'
   'None. But I don't like to see you go. Has last night upset you? Is it the girl? What happened wasn't her
  fault; this Shaitan was full of arts; she would still makea good wife ... for someone.'
   'Not this someone,' Turgo shook his head. Then, galvanized, he hugged the other, and said, 'Heinar,
  listen ...be careful!'
   Astonished, the Hagi freed himself. 'I always am careful,' he answered. 'But of what this time?'
   Turgo shrugged, looked away. 'Something of innocence has gone,' he said, finally. 'In its place,
  something full of dark knowledge, power, evil, has come. Like theSzgany Ferenc before them, the
  Szgany Hagi are touchedby it.' Grey-faced, he turned to Heinar and grasped his shoulders. 'Listen: I can't
  watch it happen again, not to you and yours, and stand there powerless to stop it! Itcame from the west,
  and so I'm heading east.'
   Frowning, Heinar inquired, 'And if this evil lingerson, how should I guard against it?'
   'Chiefly with your eyes. And whenever you see it, putit down! One of your men hasn't returned. If he
  does, watch him - and his wolf! Watch the ones who didreturn, likewise Maria Babeni. Most obvious of
  all,watch Vidra Gogosita.'
   'Vidra? His mother's in a state. He wandered off inthe night, apparently. His fever ...'
   'Oh?' Turgo hardly seemed surprised. 'Then say a prayer that he never comes back. Aye, and you'd do
  well to watch his mother, too.' He put his pack on hisshoulder, headed off.
   Heinar felt the sun warm on his weatherbeaten face and was seduced by a feeling of well-being. He
  calledafter Turgo: 'I think you exaggerate! Whatever evil came with this Shaitan, whatever sickness he
  
  carried, it's disappeared with him. Also, and wherever he is, it's bound to kill him in the end. There's
  nothing here nowto run away from.'
   'Running?' Turgo called back over his shoulder, dappled by sunlight where he strode among the trees.
  'Yes, I suppose I am. It's the only way I know to put distancebetween.' When he paused to look back,
  his lips weretight and grim. Then:
   'In certain ways we're alike, you and I, Heinar,' he said. 'And do you make camp beside a poisoned
  pool? No, for you know better than that. Well, and so do I know better. For I've seen this thing before
  and know that I can't live with it. Now let me warn you one last time, and I pray you'll heed these final
  words of mine: keep watch, Heinar - keep watch!'
   But the sun still felt very warm and reassuring to Heinar. He would keep watch, of course - well, for a
  while. 'Eat well, then,' he called out after Turgo, perhaps a little too gruffly. 'Stay healthy. Have many
  children ... eventually.'
   Turgo's nod was his only answer. And then he was gone...
    
   Turgo Zolte was right: it would take Heinar Hagi eight long years to eradicate Shaitan's vampire taint
  from his people, a task which in the end would amount to culling the tribe down to less than half its
  current numbers. It was to be man's first real stand against vampires (if not the Wamphyri proper), out of
  which would be learned many a valuable lesson for the future.
   Of the Szgany Ferenc who had featured in Turgo's tale of Oulio lonescu: the taint in their blood never
  would be washed away but would stay with them to the end of their days, not only in this world but also
  inone other.
   That, however, is a tale already told ...
    
    
    
   Ill
    
    
    
    
    
    
  
    
    
    
   Raging, Shaitan fled from the camp of Heinar Hagi. He flowed through the night, which was his element,
  and covered himself with its darkness; but behind him a watchdog - indeed a wolf - came fast on his
  heels. And behind the wolf came Sunsiders, Szgany, which he had discovered were in no way trogs.
  Difficult to impose one's will on such as these. Their own will was so verystrong! Shaitan would have
  more sway over their women, who at least appreciated his beauty. But to remain beautiful, indeed, to
  remain alive ... this wasnow his chief priority.
   Turgo Zolte's bloodied hardwood bolt stood out fromhis right shoulder, giving him pain. He might will
  something of the pain away, but not the bolt itself. That would have to be drawn out. And despite the
  speed ofhis flowing flight along the forest's fringe, the wolf was gaining. Its eyes were very nearly the
  equivalent of Shaitan's own in the night and the darkness.
   Cliffs reared suddenly on Shaitan's left hand; he lengthened his stride, flowed through the uneven foliage,
  climbed up onto a low ledge. Vines and creepers hung down from above. But it was not his intention to
  climb.
   He jammed the flight end of the bolt in his shoulder into a niche, wrenched his body sharply to one side.
  The bolt snapped ... and Shaitan cried out! Bloodflowed freely, its smell inflaming him. Now he felt
  behind his shoulder with his left hand. The barb of the iron arrowhead protruded an inch, but he had no
  leverage to pull it out. He tore down a length of tough vine, looped it over the arrowhead, tied its ends to
  acreeper growing from a crevice.
   The wolf had heard Shaitan's cry, smelled his blood. It came snarling, leaping to attain the ledge,
  scrabbled there a moment to regain its balance. Then it saw Shaitan and leaped again, locking its jaws on
  his arm. Its weight overbalanced him; locked together they fellfrom the ledge; the bolt was torn from
  Shaitan's back.
   In the near-distance, Shaitan's closest human pursuer called out to his wolf: 'Seek him!' But the wolf had
  already discovered Shaitan, who was himself on thepoint of discovering a new and terrible weapon.
  Within him, his vampire was at last mature. Metamorphic, itsflesh was Shaitan's flesh.
   The wolf had jaws like a bear-trap, clamped fast nowto the bones of Shaitan's forearm. Their eyes met,
  feral yellow against evil scarlet, and the man felt something of the beast's ferocity. So did his vampire,
  which must make him ferocious to match. Something was summoned to his flesh, summonedfrom his
  flesh! He felt aburning in his fingers as if they were on fire, an agony in his face and jaws far greater than
  the mere pain in his back. And yet these additional pains were not without ... pleasure?
   It was not unlike those occasions when he had summoned his vampire mist; but he had not summoned
  this, not knowingly. For this was the instinctive response of his metamorphism, the tenacity of his
  vampire,its lust for life; and suddenly the great wolf was nomore than a puppy!
   Shaitan's fingers, grown to claws, rammed into theanimal's sides and tore them; his jaws, yawning
  impossibly wide, elongated into a nightmare cavern of serrated tusks which sprouted from red-gushing
  gums; his eyeswere blobs of sulphur shot with scarlet fire. Gutting the wolf, he let its entrails spill. And
  when its agonized jaws flew open, then Shaitan's closed - upon its throat. Which he tore out in a welter
  
  of pipes and gristle andgore!
   In just a moment, the wolf was wolf no more but a mangled carcass; it hadn't even cried out but died
  silently, in vast astonishment...
   A second passed ... another ... and a third.
   'Lupe?' A voice called from close at hand. 'Where in all that's ...?' A man stepped out of the trees into
  starlight - in time to see something move in the undergrowth at the foot of the cliffs. 'Lupe?' the man
  repeated,but in a whisper now, wonderingly, as he lifted his crossbow.
   Crouching down a little, he ran to the place beneaththe cliffs. As he got there, so the darkness came
  flowing to its feet! Starlight gleamed on the horror that was Shaitan, which reached out a bloody hand
  and caughtthe other by his throat.
   The watchman would have discharged his weapon -but he'd left the safety on! Shaitan knocked it from
  histrembling hand and drew him closer. And:
   'Lupe?' he quietly, almost conversationally growled, his monstrous head cocked on one side. 'Ah, no -
  for my name is Shaitan!' And as he lowered his face to theother's throbbing neck, 'But from this time
  forward you must call me master ...'
    
   With his new disciple or lieutenant, who was the first entirely human underling of the Wamphyri, Shaitan
  headed east as before. There were no more pursuers; the night was long; they covered a good many
  miles —before the sun found them out.
   For Shaitan's symbiont or parasite was a two-edgedsword: one could not accept its advantages without
  its disadvantages. Sunlight, which had irritated Shaitanfrom the outset — almost from the moment of his
  breath ing the red, corpse-spawned spores — now became a seething agony in his eyes and against his
  hide. Itburned him, visibly steamed the moisture from his flesh, ate into him like acid and sapped his
  strength. He could stand to go out from the shade for seconds, but minutes would deplete him horribly,
  and an hour would kill him. His thrall was less susceptible for the moment; given time, however, and he,
  too, must surely succumb to direct sunlight. Such was the measure of Shaitan'scorruption, and his
  contagion.
   They were climbing diagonally eastward, above the foothills and towards the tree-line, when sunup came
  with its fogs in Sunside's valleys and forests, and itsprobing golden beams on the peaks; beams which
  gradu ally joined up to become a wall of yellow fire, creeping down towards them where they went all
  unsuspecting,like ants on the flank of the mountain.
   And yet perhaps Shaitan (or his leech) did suspect something; for there was an anxiety in him, not yet
  fathomed, to be out of this place and once more into the cool of Starside. But when he felt the effect of
  the first of those as yet hazy beams on his nakedness, and when he observed in astonishment the rapid
  evaporation of his body's fluids and the scorching of his flesh, then he understood well enough his instinct
  - or that of his vampire - to take cover. And so, forced into the shade of a deep cave, Shaitan and his
  thrall, Ilya Sul, waitedout the long day.
   The cave had been the lair of some creature but now was empty; lesser caves and branching fissures
  within were cool, damp, dark; Shaitan felt reasonably secure. But he also felt hungry. The sun's rays, in
  
  howeverbrief a time, had depleted him sorely. He fuelled himselfon Ilya Sul, which weakened the man
  more yet but bound him even closer to his master. Also, it fed the vampire fire in Sul's blood, and
  hastened his change. So that when he went out on to the slopes with his crossbow, to find food for
  himself, he returned within the hour, feeble and blistered by the sun. But at least he'd shot a kid, which
  Shaitan gorged upon before tossing the less appealing parts to Sul.
   So they fed themselves.
   And then they slept, because by now they could feel the weight of the risen sun, like an immovable
  boulder, blocking the door of the cave; which meant there was no going on for a while. And Shaitan
  could hear the land outside sizzling with a deadly heat; he could even smell the scorching of the rocks, so
  that his skin crept with the knowledge of what that golden furnace coulddo to him...
    
   Shaitan came starting awake!
   He shook Sul, cautioned him to silence. The sun is high,' he whispered. 'I can feel it. Also, I feel
  Sunsiders! So come, find a dark hole for yourself.' They retreated into the cave deeper still, found
  shadowed niches inwhich to crawl.
   And the weary trackers, with a wolf, came after; but not into the cave. For lying there, Shaitan fought
  down the urge to create a mist and flee into it (what, into the sunlight?) and instead willed it that the men
  would turn back. The grey one was their guide: he fastened upon its mind with his vampire awareness,
  spelling outthe doom which would befall if it should enter.
   The wolf pawed the remains of their meal at the entrance where they'd tossed the scraps, but came no
  farther. The men, Szgany Hagi, saw the skin, hair andbones, and knew that this had been a goat. And
  one ofthem said, 'A bear, probably a big one. This must be his lair. See, these remains are fresh. Why, he
  might evenbe at home!' And so they passed on by.
   Shaitan waited a moment, then crept to the entrance. And keeping well back from the dazzle, he taxed
  his eyes to watch the men move away, marvelling greatly that they went in brilliant sunlight, with no
  apparent harm! Then... he was filled with bitter resentment. They lived here, where he could not; they
  hunted here, living on the earth's simple things, which he could not.It was their place, their haven (their
  heaven?) and could never be his except...in the dark of night.
   Well, and so they lived and hunted here: indeed, theyeven hunted Shaitan himself! But tomorrow and
  tomorrow there would be other days, and long dark nights, when he would hunt in his own right - for
  men! Aye,and then he would turn their heaven into a hell.
   It was a solemn promise, which Shaitan made unto himself...
    
   Sunside's day was long and long, seeming interminableto Shaitan; but at last the shadows lengthened, the
  sun became a hot, smoky red blister on the south-eastern horizon, and the first pale stars blinked into
  being high over the spine of the barrier mountains. Twilight camedown, and it was time to move on.
   At which point there came a diversion.
  
   Emerging from the cave into the gloom of evening, Shaitan was startled to hear a wailing and moaning,
  and to observe the approach of two figures — whom he recognized at once. The one who cried out and
  tore at his hair came, after all, as no great surprise: for thiswas the treacherous thrall, Vidra Gogosita,
  who seemed in a bad way indeed. But the other figure, advancing upon Shaitan quietly, hollow-cheeked
  and flame-eyed,was a shocking sight indeed. For he -
   - was a dead man! He — was in fact Dezmir Babeni!
   Ah, but there had been changes. He was still bearded,and shortish in the limbs and trunk as before, but
  much of the fat was gone from him now so that he nolonger appeared squat. He was a leaner Dezmir
  Babeni, certainly, but just as surely the same man. And he wasno longer dead.
   This was a new thing. Before Babeni, Shaitan had never so depleted a man, or even a trog, as to kill
  him. The creatures who were his thralls had not died but lived only to accommodate Shaitan's needs. This
  man,however, had died. Babeni was dead...or undead?
   'Master! Master!' the young Gogosita came ghostingto Shaitan, hands fluttering. 'Take me back, I beg
  you! I have nowhere else to go, nowhere else to be.' Shaitandid not even look at him but put him aside.
  For his gaze was rapt upon Babeni. And Babeni's rapt upon him,and full of hatred!
   The undead man growled and lurched forward, his pale grey hands reaching, his eyes like sulphur pits, lit
  with fire in their cores. 'You!' he accused, his voice harsh and rasping. 'You, Shaitan, you did this thing to
  me. And now this youth tells me you've done otherthings to my daughter!'
   He bore down on Shaitan, grasped him, went to fastenhis teeth in his neck. And Shaitan saw how those
  teethwere grown into fangs! Stunned until now, immobilized, finally he summoned his vampire strength to
  throw the other off, then leaped on him to choke him. Babeni's grey face turned purple under the crushing
  power of Shaitan's hands, but still he fought back and his bodyheaved with an impossible strength.
   Amazed, Shaitan knocked Babeni's head again andagain upon the hard and stony ground, until the skull
  at the back was soft and dented. Finally the other quit fighting and lay back. But he was not dead and his
  limbs twitched, and his yellow eyes followed Shaitanwherever he moved.
   And Shaitan looked at him and thought: The strength of your body is second only to mine, and its
  wounds heal even as fast. In relieving youof your frail human life, I have given you this unlife. However
  unwittingly, it seems I have bestowed certain powers upon you! And yet you are not my thrall and will
  not accept me as your master. Wherefore I must kill you, lest you become arival. Buthow mayI kill you,
  if you are undead?
   Babeni was even now taking up a jagged rock, staggering to his feet, mewling brokenly as he lurched
  towards Shaitan. Spittle dribbled from a corner of his mouth and his head and neck were soaked in
  blood; because of his damaged brain, he came on lopsidedly, like an idiot. Shaitan stepped aside, tripped
  him, looked for alarge stone with which to finish it. But:
   'How may I kill you?' he asked out loud, as yet againthe mewling thing clambered upright.
   'Master,' Vidra Gogosita clawed at his arm. 'I know how to kill him!' For Vidra had sat at the campfire
  onetime when Turgo Zolte had been telling his stories.
   'Oh?' Shaitan looked at him, at the same time avoidingthe staggering cripple. 'And would you redeem
  yourself? Well, and maybe you have your uses after all. Say on then: what will it take to put him down?'
  
   'A stake through his heart,' Vidra gasped. 'To fix him in place. Then cut off his head. Finally, burn him -
  allof his pieces!'
   'All of that?'
   Vidra nodded. 'This is how the Szgany Hagi will dealwith you, if they catch you!'
   Shaitan nodded. 'Indeed? Then we must test this thing. You shall build me a fire.' And to Ilya Sul where
  he fended off the thing which had been Dezmir Babeni: 'Put your bolt through his heart.'
   The other obeyed and Babeni was knocked down, stretched out upon the ground, with only the flight of
  the bolt sticking up from his chest. He bled the merest trickle, even when Sul took a knife and
  commenced sawing through his neck, its pipes and the bones of his spine. Through all of which the
  undead man's limbs jerked and twitched, and air whistled in and out of his chomping jaws, until the pipes
  were severed and thehead detached.
   Then they burned him, but even burning he thrashed about while his fats were rendered down ...
   Observing all, Shaitan nodded again. 'And this ishow they would deal with me? Hah! But if you think he
  died hard, then you don't know the half of it. The Hagishall not catch me, Vidra Gogosita; and if they do,
  I willnot be the one to die.'
   Meanwhile, Ilya Sul had built the fire to a roaringblaze. 'I...I can't seem to warm myself,' he complained,
  examining his cold grey arms.
   'I am the same,' Vidra agreed. 'For we have known thekiss of the great Wampir, our master Shaitan.'
   And again Shaitan was interested. 'Wampir?'
   Vidra explained, repeating all that he had heard fromTurgo Zolte. And when he was done:
   'Ah, no!' said Shaitan. 'For the wampir is a common bat, a dull creature which is my Starside familiar.
  But I am uncommon. Wherefore I shall be called ... Wamphyri! Aye, for I like the sound of it. The great
  Lord Shaitan, first of the Wamphyri! So be it.'
   They crossed the mountains in the night, and on theway Shaitan questioned Vidra as to how he had
  found him. The youth answered that he had 'felt' his master in his mind, and had known that he must go to
  him. On the way, as the power of the sun's rays waned, he had met with Dezmir Babeni, who had hidden
  in a crack ina cliff to keep himself out of the sunlight. Being undead, he had been more nearly like unto
  Shaitan, and the sunwas his mortal enemy.
   The night passed, and as the three - Shaitan, Vidraand Ilya Sul — descended into Starside, so they
  discovered Shaitan's trog thralls waiting. They, too, had known where to find their master. And now they
  numbered thirteen in all: the three, plus seven female trogs and three male. And Shaitan called all of the
  others hisdisciples.
   Then they saw a light shining up into the night, a white and hazy shimmer unlike the coldly flickering
  auroras of the north, which Ilya Sul said must be thefallen white sun, which some called a gate into hell.
   'White sun?' Shaitan had drawn back.
  
   'I've heard it's cold,' the other answered. 'It isn't harmful, if you keep your distance. But you must never
  touchit.'
   Shaitan was curious, however, and said he must seethis hell-gate.
   They climbed the low crater wall and stood at the rim, and looked down upon the ball of cold white fire
  within. The trogs were blinded and staggered this way and that. One tripped and fell, landing on a ledge
  close to the white glare. Terrified, he put up a hand to fend it off. His hand touched the surface of the
  dazzle, sank into it... and he cried out in his guttural fashion as thehell-gate dragged him in and swallowed
  him whole!
   The trog was gone, and only his strange slow cry came echoing back. Shaitan believed he could see him
  down there, a small frightened figure, dwindling, butthe light hurt his eyes so that soon he must look away.
   And he said: 'This shall be the punishment for those who offend me three times. Three times, aye - for I
  amforgiving, as you see.'
   'A fitting punishment,' Vidra fawned upon him.
   'As well you think so,' Shaitan answered. 'And as well you mark my words. One: you told the Hagi
  about me. Two: you told Dezmir Babeni how I had honoured his daughter. Do not wrong me a third
  time.' His voicewas dark, and very frightening.
   'And there shall be other punishments,' he told them all. 'For I am Shaitan who can make men undead.
  Any who would do me harm, let them think on this: I shall take their blood and bury them deep in the
  ground. And when they awaken, they shall lie there and screamforever, until they stiffen to stones in the
  earth.
   'Also, that land there to the north; I perceive that it is icy cold. No fit habitation even for such as we.
  Therefore, let him who would deny me beware. For in my house there shall be no warm bed or
  woman-flesh for him; no kind master to guide and instruct him; neither wonders to be witnessed, nor
  mysteries revealed. For Ishall banish him north, to freeze in the ice all alone.
   'But for him who would obey me in all things, and be my true servant and thrall, a rich red life forever!
  Aye, even unto death - and beyond! So be it...'
    
   'Where shall your house stand, Lord?' Ilya Sul venturedwith a shiver, as they left the Gate behind to
  cross the widemouth of a pass where the light from Sunside was a palepurplish haze in the' V of the split
  range. 'For this seems adesolate place - a plain of boulders, lacking rivers, where lichens live and scrubby
  grasses - with wolves in the mountains and bats in the crags, but never a man.'
   There are men of sorts,' Shaitan answered him.'Under the mountains, in their caverns, dwell trogs. They
  shall provide - they shall be - my food. Until we are established. But on Sunside there is life galore!
  Common fare will suffice, at first, but the true blood which is the life lies beyond the mountains. And in all
  the nights yet to be we shall hunt. As for my house: it shall stand east of here a ways, for I am drawn
  east.'Then, looking sharply at Sul: 'But do you doubt me?'
   'Never, Lord!'
  
   They trekked for several miles, and came to a regionof stone stacks worn out from the mountains, which
  littered the plain like the petrified stalks of giganticmushrooms. Their bases were fortified with scree jum
  bles, but in their columns were ledges and caverns,many of which were vast as halls.
   Shaitan admired these stacks, for they were very grand and very gaunt. And: 'One of these shall be my
  house,' he said.
   Sul answered him: They are like the aeries of themountain eagles!'
   And: 'Aye,' said Shaitan. The aeries of theWamphyri!'
    
   And so Shaitan set to and commenced the building of his house. The task was huge; only a vampire and
  his thralls, with their longevity, could ever have accomplished it. And Shaitan would build not only a
  housebut an empire of vampires.
   He recruited trogs out of their caverns in the lee of the mountains, and sent his lieutenants into Sunside's
  nights to hunt and recruit Szgany. And in dark chambers in the base of the stack which he had chosen, he
  experimented with his own metamorphic flesh andpowers to furnish himself with all of his requirements.
   He bred trogs which were no longer trogs but cartilage creatures, whose minds were small and bodies
  elastic. From these he made leathers and coverings for the aerie's exterior stairways, and articles of
  furniturefor his rooms. And all of them still living a life of sorts, gradually petrifying and becoming
  permanent in their places. He mated men with trog women, the issue from which was not seemly. He got
  foul, bloated things, all gross and mindless - but even these were not wasted. In nether caves he bred
  them into gas-beasts, for the heating of the stack, or into Things-Which-Consume,for his refuse pit.
   He took mindless vampire flesh and experimented with it; he would imitate the aerial prowess of the
  great bats, build flying creatures, soar out from his aerie upon the winds. At first he knew failure, but later
  he provided his flyers with the metamorphosed brains of men, that they should have something (but never
  too much) of volition. All of which creatures, nascent andfull-formed alike, were Shaitan's thralls.
   Word of his works went abroad, even into Sunside. And now Starside was double-damned and
  shunnedutterly...by men, at least.
   But by now the Szgany of Sunside had problems other than Shaitan and his night-raiding lieutenants, for
  in the west the swamps were an entire spawning ground for monsters! Foolish men and innocent
  creatures went down to the scummy waters to drink, and things other than men and wolves came up
  from that place. So that in the first twenty years several beings who were very like unto Shaitan had come
  across from Sunside to build their houses in the rearing stone stacks. And because they were even as
  strong as him and much of a kind, he made no protest but let them build. In any case, there was space
  enough among the many stacks, so that even Shaitan was unable to lay claim to all of them; and,just
  across the mountains,there was food and entertainment for all.
   And it happened that at this time Shaitan's lieutenants went a-hunting, and brought back from Starside a
  certain man of their master's previous acquaintance. And as he went among the captives, inspecting them,
  he knew this one at once. Why, there was still a scar in his shoulder, put there by this very man, which
  Shaitan had kept as a reminder of that first night on Sunside!For the man was none other than Turgo
  Zolte, not quite so young but just as proud and independent as ever.
  
   Shaitan laughed and hung him in chains, tormenting him at will from that time forward. But the man had a
  trick: he could turn pain aside, much like Shaitan himself. And in his fashion, Shaitan liked Turgo for his
  pride and bravery: the fact that he would not cry out but rather faint from his agonies. So that in a while
  he took him down and made him his chief lieutenant ...which was an error.
   For Turgo was strong in many ways, and had this streak in him which would not accept thralldom to any
  creature. Let the Lord Shaitan drain him all he would, to the very dregs of his blood, but while he lived he
  would be his own man. Which were feelings he kept very much to himself; likewise the fact that on
  Sunside he had been the great vampire hunter, who in twenty years had learned many a diverse thing
  about the swamp-born menace. There was, for instance, a white metal, also the root of a certain plant,
  both of whichwere common on Sunside and poison to vampires. Per haps even to Shaitan himself ...
   And so Turgo grew close to the Wamphyri Lord Shaitan, who placed his trust in him. And if Shaitan had
  a brother it might well be Turgo Zolte, except ...
   Turgo had no blood-lust. Or if he had, then it was special and deeply hidden ...
   Eventually Turgo took Ilya Sul aside and spoke tohim. And because Turgo was strong, Ilya listened to
  his treason - that they should kill Shaitan in the approved fashion, but with the new skills which Turgo had
  learned. 'I've made a long knife of silver,' he explained, 'to take his head! And I can devise a hardwood
  spear, with a barbed silver point. Silver will hold Shaitan inplace while I rub him with oil of kneblasch
  root, whichwill poison his flesh. Then we'll burn him.'
   'And Shaitanstack will be mine?' Sul was greedy.
   'Of course,' Turgo shrugged, 'for you deserve it.' Buthe intended no such thing; for Sul was contaminated
  and his blood changed, and in the end he must go thesame way as his master.
   Then Turgo sought out Vidra and said much the same things to him, to which the other agreed readily
  enough. But when Turgo's back was turned, then the traitor went straight to Shaitan ... who listened,
  smiled and nodded grimly, and did nothing ... but merelywaited.
   And down in his workshop, forbidden now to all others, he worked with an angry zest upon the flesh of
  trogs and men, designing a great abomination. Andwhere Shaitan's cartilage creatures were for the
  fashion ing of useful things, and his flyers for conveyance and scanning out the land around, and while all
  of hiscreations served to supplement his works in one way or another - even his flaccid siphoneers and
  puffing gas-beasts - this new monster writhing in its vat was athing entirely apart. Indeed, it seemed
  nothing so muchas a death machine.
   It was just such an instrument of death! For fearing the treachery of his thralls, Shaitan had brought into
  being the very first Wamphyri warrior! And fashioned in part from his own metamorphic flesh, the thing
  was his in every part, mind and body alike. So that when in due time Turgo and the others came to find
  and destroy him, this was the nightmare he called down upon them. And no one - not even a dozen
  Turgo Zoltes - could stand against this. His knife, spear, oil of kneblasch, allwere useless to him.
   Then Vidra Gogosita cried out to Shaitan, reminding him of his warning. But Shaitan in turn reminded
  Vidra of his warning, telling him that this was his third andlast great treachery.
   Vidra was frozen, astonished! How had he offended?
  
   His offence lay not in the direction of his treachery, but in that he was treacherous. Also, in the very fact
  that he had warned of Turgo Zolte's intended insurrection: Turgo, whom the Lord Shaitan had
  befriended. That was a bitter taste on Shaitan's forked tongue, andVidra had put it there.
   Without further ado he was taken to the Gate and tossed yelping into its glare, protesting his innocence
  to the last, and so disappearing there ...
   As for Ilya Sul: Shaitan drained him of his life's blood until he was pale and dead, then took him out into
  the boulder plain where his trog army dug a deep grave in the stony ground. And as time passed and the
  first rays of the sun shone through the great pass, and as Sul cried out and would rise up, naked and
  undead,soShaitan said:
   'I have made you a vampire. The sun is the proof, which burns you even as it burns me. But you need
  notfear it, for you shall feel its rays never more. You sought to do me great harm, Ilya, but I am a kind
  master and shall not hurt you in any degree, except that I shall putyou from my sight.'
   Then, at his signal, Sul was hurled screaming into the hole, which the trogs filled in with rocks and earth.
  There let him lie forever,' said Shaitan, gravely, shielded by his bat-fur cloak from the risen sun. 'Even
  until hestiffens to a stone. So be it!'
   And he turned to Turgo Zolte, who stood there pale, bound and scowling, saying: 'You ... are a special
  case. For you were only a man and I liked you. Oh, yousuffered some small torment in my care, but I
  drank not of your blood. As I am what I am, so I allowed you tobe as you would be, to see if time could
  sway you to mycause. It amused me to have a man — not a vampire, nor even a thrall, but a mere man -
  among them that are mine. Well, my amusement is at an end. I am no longer ... amused.'
    
   They went back to Shaitanstack, where Turgo was thrown into a dungeon to repent a while. A very
  shortwhile.
   Then the stack's master came to him and said, 'Vidra Gogosita is gone into unknown places, a land
  beyond. Call it hell, if you will. Ilya Sul cries out from the dark earth, and sometimes it pleases me to
  listen to him. But upon a time I decreed three punishments, one of which remains untried. You are a hard
  man, Turgo Zolte, but only a man for all that. If I send you north as a man, then you'll die - but too
  quickly! Wherefore I shall firstmake you a vampire.'
   Turgo was bound to the wall, with his feet dangling inches above the stone floor. Shaitan reached up and
  cut him down, so that he collapsed in great pain, drained of his strength. Then Shaitan went down on his
  knees beside him, and gloomed upon him with his scarlet eyes. And his anger was very great. 'I treated
  you as my brother, even my son,' he said. 'And youwould repay me by killing me! It would be fair and
  just if I killed you in your turn, but I want you to freeze in the ice and repent your iniquities.'
   Turgo looked at him and knew his time as a man was up. But while he was a man he would never bow
  to Shaitan. And he said, 'Me, your son? You could never father a son, you swamp-thing! You only look
  like a man, but your tongue is a snake's, and your blood is the blood of trogs, dupes, thralls. Your
  familiars are bats full of lice, and the clean sunlight boils your flesh like a snail in its shell.Hah! I, Turgo
  Zolte, Shaitan'sson? No, for I am the son of a man!'
   The other was no longer capable of controlling his anger; his parasite creature amplified his passion by
  ten; his jaws cracked open and his great mouth gushed blood from torn gums as teeth grew out of them
  
  like bone sickles. Handsome one moment - even with his blood-hued eyes, handsome - in the next he
  was the embodiment of all horror. And his passion incensed that of the creature within him, which now
  was him.
   He went to his knees beside his victim, used red-spurting talon claws to tear, prise open his chest, and
  laid his razor nails upon the pipes of Turgo's pounding heart. None of which meant anything to Turgo,
  because he was already in the pit of oblivion. But as Shaitan saw his innards, his blood, the very circuits
  of his life ... something new happened.
   His creature went into spasm within him. It gripped his spine, put out suckers into his veins and organs to
  revel in his, its, passion. Shaitan coughed, gagged, felt a rising in his gorge, something creeping in the
  contracting column of his throat. He choked the thing out: apale sphere no bigger than an eyeball.
   It shimmered; it was alive with flickering cilia; it fell in a froth of spittle to Turgo's open chest. And in the
  next moment it turned scarlet ... and was gone, soakedinto him!
   Shaitan reeled to his feet. He felt dizzy, nauseous; he knew instinctively that this thing — whatever it was
  — was irreversible as the breathing of swamp-born spores. Which was reason enough to see it out to its
  end. And so he left Turgo lying there unconscious, with his chest laid open and bloody, and the scarlet
  vampire egg burrowing in him and hiding in his flesh ...
   Turgo Zolte recovered; his torn flesh healed, and quickly; he was Wamphyri!
   And he hated Shaitan as no creature was ever hated before. Shaitan knew it, and would say to him: 'But
  you are my son - my true son - which is why I now name you Shaithar Shaitanson. You are not the ugly
  spawn of trogs, many of which I have made and put down, but Wamphyri! Oh, you had a father before
  me, but he made you mortal. And I have made you immortal. Whythen do you despise me?'
   'I was what I was,' Turgo would growl in answer, from where he hung in chains of silver. 'And I
  preferred it. You have made me other than that -'
   '- More than that!'
   '- Which disgusts me. I spit on your name and won'ttake it! Nor will I drink the blood of men.'
   'Oh, but you will, eventually, or wither and die. Theblood is the life.'
   'Not my life.'
   'Fool!'
   'Ordure of blood-sucking bats!'
   And always Shaitan would be enraged. But he couldnot kill him. For Turgo was his son, of a sort.
   In the end he turned him loose, sent him forth, banished him out of Shaitanstack. Not to the north, for he
  would watch his progress. No, he merely turned himout on to Starside, to make his own way in the
  world.
   Turgo went to Sunside but could not stay there. TheSzgany pursued him; the sun threatened him; his
  foetalvampire tugged at his will, so that if he stayed he mustkill. He did kill - but only to live on
  
  beast-blood. Finallyhe sought out men vampirized in the swamps, recruited them, returned to Starside
  and gathered together anarmy of trog thralls. And in thirty years he built Shaith- arsheim, but well away
  from the aerie of his so-called 'father'. And so in the end Turgo did take his great enemy's name, calling
  himself Shaithar Shaitanson ... by which to remember his 'father' the better and hatehim all the more.
   By then Shaitan's house was finished and furnished;his banner - a skull head with horns - fluttered from
  the high ramparts of his aerie, and he was known on both sides of the mountains as Lord Shaitan of the
  Wamphyri. Which pleased him greatly.
   Turgo was still a lesser Lord, and much given to nightmares. One night he dreamed he drank Szgany
  blood, and when he woke up it was true. In the night he had taken from his odalisque, a girl stolen from a
  Sunside tribe. He could deny it no longer: he was Wamphyri! Then, blaming Shaitan and loathing him
  more yet, he devised a sigil of his own: Shaitan's hornedskull-head - but split in two halves by a silver
  axe!
   Shaitan saw how he was abhorred and bred more and better warriors. Turgo bred them, too, as a safe
  guard. And through all of this men came lurching fromthe vampire swamps to build their aeries in the
  stacks.Their industry was great, so that they had little time forwars.
   Two hundred years flew by and the Wamphyri weremighty and many. Too many ...
   Now, on Sunside, the Szgany had become Travellers, nomads, Gypsies who went from place to place
  by day, and slept in deep forests or caves at night. And for them it was as bad or worse than the
  aftermath of the white sun. The Wamphyri gave them no peace; nightafter night they raided; the toll of
  blood was monstrous!
   While on Starside ... Shaitan saw his error in permitting the other Lords to wax so strong and so many.
  He determined to make sons for lieutenants, bloodsons, which he would get out of comely women. In
  this way he would overwhelm the Wamphyri Lords and keep them down. He made a harem of six
  Szgany women, took from them and gave to them. And his vampire sons and daughters were many. Of
  the latter, when they were ripe, he used them in their turn; for his own flesh was the sweetest. Which
  would be the way of it with vampires down all the ages ...
    
   And Shaitan begat Shaithos Longarm, Shailar the Hagridden (who was half-mad, for insanity was a
  curse which the Wamphyri would never eradicate), Shaithag the Harrower, and many others. And his
  egg-recipient son, now Shaithar Shaitanson, begat Shielar the Slut, Turgo Toothbreaker, Zol Zolteson,
  and Pedar Slough-skin, who at the age of thirteen contracted leprosy during a Sunside hunt. And
  thereafter Pedar (also 'the Leper') killed Szgany women on sight and went onlywith trog females.
   And in the great aeries of the Wamphyri the other Lords begat egg-sons and bloodsons of their own,
  made vampires and warriors galore, and generally filled their stacks with beastliness of every description.
  Lagular Ferenczy begat Nonari the Gross, whose left hand was a great fist, its fingers fused into a club;
  Lagular also begat Freyda Ferenc, who for her pleasure suffocatedmen with her sex. Freyda was a
  Mother of Vampires,who in a single confinement produced an hundred eggs, being so depleted during
  the which that she died. Butthe eggs of Freyda, all save one, were gross and diseased and likewise
  expired; the one fused with Bela Manculi,a Szgany thrall, who became heir to Freydastack.
   And Pedar the Leper begat Tori Trogson, who wenton all fours and became Lord of Trogstack. And
  Shielar of Whorestack brought forth Thador Thornskull; shethen made a warrior with an Organ, and died
  
  of fornica tion in the Thing's embrace. And so Thador became Lust-lord of Whorestack. But from that
  time forward itwas generally agreed among all the Wamphyri that none would make monsters with the
  parts of men, for Shie-lar's creature had proven difficult to put down.
   And as the many Lords and fewer Ladies proliferated,so they degenerated; even the Wamphyri, going
  from evil to evil and descending from depth to irredeemable depth ...
   Eventually all of the greater aeries had masters or mistresses; the lesser stacks were occupied; there was
  no more room in all the vampire heights for men and their sons, their women, thralls and creatures. Some
  built their aeries in the sheerer crags of the barrier range, looking out on Starside; but they were prone to
  avalanches, brought about by enemies. Also, they were scorned as worthless Lords, who had not proper
  aeries of their own. And finally they warred for possession of the lofty stacks, until the winds over
  Starside were filled with flyers and warriors which fought in the dark sky under blue-glittering stars, and
  did battle in thehigher ramparts of the great aeries.
   And gongs sounded as warriors were brought mewling out of their vats and launched into battle all
  untried; the drums of war pounded, and banners flew from all
   the stacks, displaying the sigils of their masters; vampire destroyed vampire, even sons and brothers, as
  the boulder plains and the lands around the great aeries were drenched in blood and littered with the
  grotesqueand shattered corpses of fallen beasts.
   Even Shaitan came under attack, but he was clever and defended his aerie, and went not out to war. But
  as various Lords were weakened in stacks close by, then he would swoop on them and put them down.
  And in this manner a cluster of aeries all came under Shaitan'scommand.
   When his strategy was seen, the others called a truceand came upon him as a single force. Surprised,
  Shaitan found himself trapped in the higher levels of Shaitan-stack. The flyers of his enemies were landing
  in his launching bays; he was cut off from his warriors; theirwarriors landed on his roof to seek him out!
   He was forced out of a window and exposed upon the highest ledge. Flyers closed in, to knock him
  fromhis perch. He formed the metamorphic flesh of his hands into great suckers wherewith to clasp the
  sheer face of the stack, and went in this fashion to find a secure niche. But a warrior, dashing itself into
  the wall close by, shook him loose. Then, by dint of his great will -coupled with the tenacity of his
  vampire tenant, which dared not allow him to be broken in such a disastrous fall — Shaitan stretched his
  flesh into an airfoil and swooped, in a fashion, to earth. Even so he crasheddown, but was not greatly
  harmed.
   And meanwhile his forces had regrouped under his lieutenants, and Shaitanstack had not been taken.
   So Shaitan was the first of the Wamphyri to fly inhis own right. Which seemed hardly strange to him, for
  he fancied that upon a time, somewhere and when, hehad known the power of flight before ...
   The stack wars continued for a hundred years; men and monsters were born and died fighting; the
  fashioning of flyers and warriors became an art, and Wamphyrinumbers were decimated in all the reek
  and roil and mindless slaughter. And this was the era in which the Szgany of Sunside stepped back from
  the brink and breathed again, reorganizing their lives and what littlewas left of their society. Except it
  couldn't last.
   For Shaitan was now the undisputed Lord of Vampires, the high magistrate to which lesser Wamphyri
  Lords took their disputes for his judgement. And as the clamour of war subsided, so the period of
  
  mercifully infrequent raids on Sunside was over, and the nightmare sprang up again with renewed
  consistency. For now the Wamphyri must see to the replenishment of their ravaged and undernourished
  aeries, whose sustenance roamed on Sunside.
   For sixty years this was the way of it: three thousand sundowns of horror and misery, while Shaitan
  doled out hunting permits and took his tithe of trembling flesh from whatever the others brought back. But
  in thesame sixty years, his egg waxed in Shaithar Shaitanson, once Turgo Zolte, and made him a crafty
  vampire indeed. And Shaithar was strong; likewise his sons, Zol Zolteson and Turgo Toothbreaker. And
  all of them together, they hated Shaitan worse than any other.
   The Lord of Vampires knew it, for he had his spies inall the aeries. And when the coup came at last he
  was ready to put it down, with never a loss to mention. Then he brought Shaithar to trial with his sons
  and their lieutenants, and banished them north to the Ice-lands - all of them that were of his own egg.
   They were allowed flyers, certainly, and a female thrall or two, but neither provisions nor beasts to spare
  and never a warrior between them. So they launched themselves north, and held to that course a spell
  -before swinging east to follow the spine of the barrierrange into lands unknown. Shaitan's familiar bats
  brought him word of their deception, which was nogreat surprise. For this, too, he had foreseen.
   And he said to himself: Ah, TurgoZolte, what a sonyou could have been! Why, we could have ravaged
  this entire world together, you and I! But 1 havealreadyshown my weaknessfor you in banishing you
  whenby rights I shouldkill you, and I know now that you must die, else return one day to plague me
  with your mischiefs. Well, so be it...
   Even as he thought these things, his warriors were aloft and spurting through Starside's night skies, falling
  towards their prey where Shaithar and his outcasts winged east. And Shaitan reached out to mind-jab his
  beasts, commanding that they: Destroy them to a man.'
   And riding east, exiled, expelled, Shaithar was Turgo Zolte once more. Oh, he was Wamphyri, but his
  intentions were human so far as he could determine. A pitythere was no room now for humanity on
  Starside.
   His plan was simple: find a new home for his small group in the east, far beyond the Great Red Waste
  which was known to lie there. Perhaps something of their old humanity could still be salvaged from what
  they had become. Perhaps they could find a new way tolive.
   Turgo was in no hurry; his flyers were already burdened; he would not exhaust them by spurring them
  on. To what end? To crash in the Great Red Waste and to go on foot till the rising sun found them out
  and reduced them all to tar? Better to take them up to their ceiling, then glide them on whichever thermals
  wereavailable, and so conserve their energies. Which he did.
   Shaitan's warriors, coming from behind but still someway off, saw the small knot of flyers spiralling up
  towards the stars; they too must climb; their propulsors throbbed and gas sacks inflated, and their
  mantles extended to give them lift. But flyers were fashioned forflying and warriors for warring; they had
  not the endurance for prolonged pursuit. Shaitan must sacrifice them. Do not return, but destroy them
  utterly, was his final command, over such a distance that he barely reachedthem. But it was enough.
   Turgo's party flew on, gliding down the wind ... butnow they spied behind them the instruments of
  Shaitan's wrath. They urged their flyers to greater effort, sped out across the Great Red Waste. The
  warriors pursued, gaining however gradually. But in the south the mountains were no more, only flatlands
  of rust-redsand, beyond which showed spokes of sunlight strokingthe sky! Sunup, soon!
  
   And the golden fan was even now slanting over therim of the world, and Turgo must fly lower, ever
  lower, to avoid the deadly rays. His creatures were tired, their energy expended; Shaitan's warriors, too,
  but in them there was only one goal, one requirement. No need forconservation: this was their last
  mission.
   Then, beyond the Great Red Waste, Turgo spied a secondary range of mountains, with deep gashes and
  gulleys facing north, where the sunlight could neverreach. There.' he mind-called to his people. In the lee
  ofthe mountains. Build your aeries there.
   But they knew from his tone that he would not bewith them. And whatof you?
   My flyer is finished,he told them. Anyway ... I'vedone with running away. Now go!
   Shaitan's warriors were almost upon them. AsTurgo's people sped off into the shadows of the lesser
  range, he turned back, passed between the pursuers
   (but barely), hauled on his reins and climbed for the fading stars - and climbed into blinding sunlight! And
  the warriors followed at once!
   The vampire stuff in them was very strong, for they were of Shaitan's fashioning - which was also their
  weakness! The sunlight ate into them that much deeper, pitting their flesh into craters and steaming them
  away. All but one fell, exploding as their skins shrivelled and gas bladders ruptured. Turgo was likewise
  burned and blistered, until finally he could take no more. Then he guided his hissing beast into a dive,
  down to the shadeof the mountains.
   Too late, for he was blind! Fly on, he ordered his creature. Into the east, asfar and asfast as you can.
  For he knew that one warrior yet survived; he could feel its tiny, savage mind intent upon his destruction;
  he would lure it from his people.
   And he did, for thirty more miles: lured it to a place where mists came writhing out of the earth, drawn
  upby the risen sun, where once more the mountains crum bled into bogs and quagmire. There at last
  Shaitan's warrior caught him, and tore him and his flyer both. And Turgo Zolte, his flying beast and the
  warrior, all three, surrendered what was left of life and crasheddown into the swamps.
   Turgo's flight from the stacks of the Wamphyri had been long and long, but he was of the line of Shaitan
  and carried a leech grown from his egg. When Turgo died Shaitan knew it. And he sighed, once ... and
  thenforgot him.
    
   But on the gluey bed of the eastern swamp Turgo's tornbody rotted down and was buoyed up with
  gases trapped in its tissues, and floated to the surface. And there in the weeds and the quag, black fungi
  sproutedin his flesh, which as they ripened put out drifting spores from their gills.
   The vampire is tenacious . . .
    
    
  
    
   PART THREE:
    
   Now
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
   I
    
    
    
   That was the way of it,' the Historian thrall Karz Biteri intoned, pleased to be moving towards the end of
  his period of instruction, when he could pass on these recent tithelings down the line for assignation... or
  whatever. 'It was the end of Turgo Zolte, called Shaithar, but it was also the beginning of Turgosheim and
  a new era of Wamphyri domination. Far in the west Shaitan might have certain doubts with regard to the
  continuation of Turgo's people, but it suited him to suppose thatthey had died along with their leader;
  anyway, he hadplenty of problems to deal with closer to home. This last is also supposition, but we do
  have the Seer-Lord Mendula Farscry's written word in support of the theory, for which reason it must
  stand.
   'Mendula Zolson - better known as Farscry, and later "the Cripple" - was Wamphyri that time more than
  two thousand years ago; indeed he was the first bloodson of the bloodson of Turgo Zolte himself! But in
  Mendula the secret arts were very strong; his mother had been a Szgany witch-wife, whose talents came
  out threefold in her son. And Mendula had the power to read minds at a great distance, and scry out
  scenes afar. In this he was not so far removed from the current Lord Maglore of Runemanse, a powerful
  thought-thief and seer in hisown right. But...I must not stray from my subject.
   'In his youth, Mendula developed a crippling bone disease which twisted him in his joints, bent him over,
  and made him useless in the hunt or fray; which waswhy his mind turned to learning instead of more
  physical pursuits. And such was Mendula's inspiration to discover and record the history of all the
  
  Wamphyri, that he even invented glyphs in which to write it down; without which the present Lords of
  Turgosheim must rely on all manner of legends, immemorial myths, and word of mouth handed down
  father to son. And the Lords would be the first to admit that they don't much lean toward that sort of
  thing; neither are they inclined toward the unravelling of glyphs, which is my good fortune .. .
   'And so, clever as he was, Farscry the Cripple was made clumsy and vulnerable by virtue of his
  deformity. But he was safe from the torments of others because he dwelled in Vladsmanse, the house of
  his younger brother, who valued Mendula's sound advice in all manner of things. And he lived mainly to
  work on thehistories, as I have said, also to mind-spy for his brother, likewise to keep his scryer's eye on
  the brooding west, where the olden Wamphyri had their aeries in the stacks of Starside. And so Vlad
  Zolson was Mendula'sbrother and protector.
   'Which brings us almost to the end of the pre-histories, because after Mendula died there was no one
  with the power to scry on the western Wamphyri and record their works. But there were always Lords
  who were interested in Mendula's writings, and so some small measure of understanding of his glyphs
  was passed down. All of which came to me in my turn, sothat now I am the Historian.
   'Of the history of Turgosheim: I may say that I am writing it in Farscry's own glyphs, from immemorial
  legends and a few fragments of pictorial tapestries and skins which have survived all the years flown
  between. It will be my duty to instruct you further in these ancient matters, those of you who are fortunate
  enough ... enough to... to win places for yourselves in theservice of the Lords.'
   Karz Biteri paused a moment to scan over the faces of his class of tithelings, seeing them as a blur of
  sun-browned flesh and dark Szgany eyes, and trying not toremember them. No, for he knew there were
  some faces here which he'd never see again. Except that from acertain point of view, they might be said
  to be the lucky ones...
   The Historian licked his suddenly dry lips, blinked his eyes rapidly, and scanned their faces again. They
  were all so young, so strong! For the moment. But ...better not to dwell upon it. And so:
   'As for now,' he continued, somehow keeping his voice from trembling, his words from blurting out, '-
  now we must return to Shaitan:
   'Well, eventually Shaitan's lust for power, his greed, maladministration, and - for all that he was the
  self-appointed "Justice" - his injustices became too much.The others rose up against him in a body to be
  rid of him,and he was overwhelmed. Some suggested he should go to the Gate; others insisted he be
  walled up under the barrier mountains, or buried on the boulder plains to "stiffen to a stone" in his grave.
  Ever the slippery one, somehow he swayed them to the least of his own prescribed punishments and was
  banished north.
   'They also cast out a crony of Shaitan's, one Kehrl Lugoz, who went with him. But with these two out of
  the way the unity of the Wamphyri quickly dissolved; they returned to feudalism, warring, inbreeding and
  the insularity of their stack communities. Since when until the present day, such has been the enmity
  between them that none have sought or had time to expand their empire beyond its olden boundaries.
  They do not even know that we are here. But...
   '... We, at least, have reason to believe that they are no longer there! For the last eighty years' (he made
  no mention of 'years' as such but said 'four thousand sundowns') 'since Maglore the Mage's ascension to
  Runemanse, he has listened and watched in his fashion, like Farscry before him. Eighteen years ago he
  reported a mighty war; the cause was not certain, but it seems that in the aftermath the obliteration of the
  olden Wamphyri was almost total! Then, fourteen years ago, there was a bright white light in the sky far
  
  to the west; there came a thunder which heralded warm, black rains, and the more sensitive among the
  Lords of Turgosheim even reported that they felt the earth shaking under theirfeet.
   'After that, from then till now ... nothing! The Lord Maglore has proposed a theory: that some great
  magician among the survivors of their war brought down such a DOOM on their heads that none
  escaped. Perhaps he is right, but there are certain hotbloods among the younger Lords who would put
  his theory to the test. They say: "If a handful of the olden Wamphyri remain, then let them pay for the
  crimes of their ancestors!" And they say: "We were thrown out, upon a time, but now the gauntlet is on
  the other hand! We are in the majority, and they don't even know that we exist! We shall fall on them like
  rain on dust to dampen it down — permanently! For now it is our time! Time we went home again, to
  Starside and the lofty aeries of theWamphyri!"
   'Aye, for Turgosheim confines these young Lords, whoare restless and hungry for expansion into more
  seemlymanses and aeries of their own. They feel their burgeon ing strength and would vie with one
  another, and day by day they make practice and flex their muscles. For the time being all of this
  gauntlet-rattling is verbal; but soon, if they can't go abroad to make war, who can guarantee that they
  won't make it here? It wouldn't be the first time - no, nor even the tenth - that Turgosheimwas torn with
  internecine war!'
   Karz Biteri's voice fell to a hoarse whisper. Taken in the grip of his subject, he was no longer the
  Historian but a commentator on current events: a dangerous pastime at best, and more so for a thrall.
  Even so, he wasn't voicing his own specific fears but those of his master, Maglore of Runemanse, who
  was himself much given to rumination and often out loud. 'Even now,' Biteri continued, 'in the secret
  caverns of certain of thelarger manses..."He paused and glanced nervously all about, cautioning: '— this
  next is rumour, you understand, which may not be repeated - warriors designed for aerial combat are
  mewling in their vats! Abominations which have been forbidden ever since that creatureof Shaitan's
  slaughtered Turgo Zolte in the swamps, on the day his people came fleeing out of the west to makehomes
  for themselves in...in the ...'
   He paused again and once more cast all about with startled eyes, this way and that. Had someone come
  into the room unseen? Suddenly, for all the flaring of the gas jets and the searing glare of their mantles, it
  seemed darker. But then, it always seemed darker whena Lord was about.
   Karz Biteri gulped and his parched throat clenched in upon itself like a fist. But somehow he croaked out
  the last few words: 'Homes for ... for themselves in... in the dark clefts and crags.'
   And as the echoes of his words died away, now the unseen intruder made his - no, her - presence
  known, and flowed into view from the shadows. Seeing and knowing her, Karz gulped that much harder
  and fell tohis knees. 'My ... my Lady!'
   This was a public place in the lower levels, set asidefor aspiring lieutenants, thrall nurses,
  manse-managers, beast victuallers, brewers, and other specially talented thralls such as Karz Biteri.
  Honeycombed with lesser rooms, it was a sprawling cavern system which looked out over eastern
  Starside towards the sunless and forbidding Icelands. At the current hour one would notnormally expect
  to find any Lord or Lady in this vicinity;there was precious little here for them, or so Karz Biteri had
  always supposed. And this close to sunup (even though the sun could not harm them in the depths of
  Turgosheim) they usually preferred to be in their own apartments. But right here and now the presence of
  theLady Wratha was living, or undead, proof of the unpredictability of the Wamphyri.
   Wratha the Risen: she was herself like a ray of sunlight falling upon some dark jewel. At least, that was
  her guise. But Biteri knew that on occasion she looked far more like something risen up from hell! For
  
  indeed she had returned from hell, or its brink, this ex-Szganygirl who was now a powerful Lady of the
  Wamphyri.
   She laid a hand upon his bowed, balding head and her perfume fell on him cloyingly. 'Up, Historian,' she
  sighed. 'What? And is this not a free place? You haveevery right to be here, you and these tithelings of
  yours. But I was passing by, on my way through the levels to Wrathspire, and I heard something of your
  words as you instructed these ... young people.' She drew him toone side, while he fluttered his hands
  and said:
   'My ... my words, Lady? But there was nothing ofany deliberate mischief in them. I merely recounted the
  histories, what little is known of them, in accordance with my Lord Maglore's command. It is part of the
  induction, and ...'
   'I know these things,' she stopped him with a glance.
   'But I thought that something which I heard was more of the present than the past, and I wondered at the
  presumption of any thrall that he should so speculateupon the affairs of his superiors.'
   'My Lady,' again Biteri went to his knees, almostcollapsing there this time. 'If I have ... offended?'
   'Up/' she hissed, almost dragging him to his feet. 'Perhaps you have offended. But if so... well, you are
  not my thrall to punish, and as yet I've no reason to repeat what I heard.' She glared at him, and her huge
  eyes opened a fraction wider. Their fire held an almost physical heat, which would normally be contained
  beneath the scarp of carved bone worn upon her brow, and subdued by small circular plates of a deep
  bluevolcanic glass fixed to her temples in front of her conch- like ears. But when she opened wide the
  doors to those furnace eyes, like this ...
   She saw the cold sweat on Biteri's brow, the poundingof a vein in his neck, and inquired: 'Do you fear
  me,Historian?'
   'I am but a thrall,' he gave his stock answer, the onlyentirely safe answer. 'Here in Turgosheim, the
  Wamphyri hold sway. If I do or think incorrectly I may die, or worse! Wherefore I fear no one but
  myself, for my own actions underwrite the terms of my existence. I repeat: in Turgosheim the Lords, and
  of course theLadies, hold sway.'
   'Only in Turgosheim?'
   'And in all the world,' he added hurriedly, 'when the sun is down and shadows creep. As for me: things
  areas they are, and mine is not to fear but to obey.'
   'Then obey me now,' she told him, her voice low,languorous, deadly dangerous, 'and make no more
  speeches of warriors mewling in their vats. Ah, I know where you have heard these whispers - which are
  thefears of old, old men, whose learning has stunted their manly appetites - but put them out of your
  mind. Aye,while yet your mind is your own.'
   'Of course, Lady, yes!' he answered, following herwhere she moved back towards the tithelings.
   She paused and took his arm, as if he were the friend of a lifetime, saying, 'Do you know, Historian, but
  just as Maglore has you, I too had a trusted thrall upon a time. Oh, I've had many such, aye, but this one
  was ... very special. No hard and thorny lieutenant, but a soft-skinned song-bird out of Sunside. Yes, it's
  true: he bathed me and sang me songs! Alas, but the manyintimacies I allowed him were not enough; he
  
  would be my husband and lord it over Wrathspire as my equal! For he was a strong, comely young man,
  and what wasI but a woman, after all?'
   She let go his arm and suddenly her voice was cold as ice. 'Well, he's not much for singing now, though
  I'lladmit he grunts a bit. For now when I go to my bed, the bulk of his warty hide guards my doorway,
  and what small part remains of his brain cringes from the lash ofmy thoughts!'
   And Karz shuddered deep inside as he remembered what he'd heard of the guardian of Wratha's
  bedchamber: that it once was a handsome Szgany thrall, whose ambitions had been bigger than his
  member. And hewas reminded of an old thrall adage: 'Never attempt the seduction of your master,
  neither by word nor deed. Remember: seduction was only the first of his disciplines!'
   But Wratha's voice was light again as she commanded, 'And now you must show me these likely tithe-
  lings of yours, fresh out of Sunside.'
   The Historian couldn't deny her. What she suggested went against the general rule, but she'd caught him
  preaching less than orthodox lessons, which gave her the upper hand. And now she would inspect the
  tithelings, likewise unorthodox, but what could he do? Nothing, except step aside as she went among
  them smilinglike a girl: the Lady Wratha, dead and buried ninety-five years ago, but undead all the years
  flown between.
   As she turned her eyes away from him, Karz couldonly marvel at this thing anew. He was forty-five
  years old and looked seventy, while she was more than onehundred years but looked only twenty - at the
  moment, anyway. It was her vampire, he knew, moulding hermetamorphic flesh to the shape she desired,
  presenting her as fresh and vital as life itself. Ah, but only anger her and the thing inside would respond
  instantly, a transformation which even the greatest of the Lords would avoid at any cost! For Wratha was
  no simple Szgany girl, and it astonished the Historian that sheever had been -if she ever had been.
   He thought on what Maglore the Seer had told him ofher:
    
   Wratha had been a Sunsider, living in a small tribalcommunity with her father. The leader's son had
  wantedher, but her father, a strong man in his own right, saidshe should have the husband of her choice.
  Being contrary as well as beautiful, she wouldn't make a choicebut scorned all of the tribe's young men
  alike. Whenher father died, the leader made it plain that her choicehad now narrowed down: she could
  be his son's woman, or she could be listed for the tithe. It was simple asthat.
   Not so simple after all, for she ran off! Angered beyond reason, and despite the pleas of his son, her
  tribal leader put her on the tithe list. If she wouldn't goto his son, then let her go to the vampires.
   She lived wild in the hills awhile and managed to avoid the first tithe. Like her father before her, she was
  opposed in every way to vampire supplication and believed they should be fought, destroyed, even
  followedStarside of the mountains and put down in their manses. Madness! For at sunup, warriors were
  let out to roam on the floor of the gulleys and ravines of Turgosheim, to keep the Wamphyri safe from
  attackthrough their most vulnerable hours. And anyway, howmay you kill men who are already dead?
   Well, there were ways, but on the few occasions theyhad been tried — when lieutenants and lesser
  Lords had come over the mountains at sundown to collect the tithe, been ambushed, dealt with-
  Wamphyri retribution had always been swift and merciless. The last of these 'risings', which had taken
  place some forty years ago, was still told of around the campfires; but the heroic insurgents in question,
  
  and their tribe to its last member, were no more. The story itself was still theultimate deterrent.
   In any case, Wratha was captured, kept prisoner,tormented and threatened (but never harmed
  physically, neither marked nor sullied, for that was not the sort of tribute one paid to the Wamphyri), and
  finally handed over at tithe-time to collector lieutenants on their titheroutes through the tribal territories.
  But somehow, during her captivity, she had managed to obtain and conceal a small amount of kneblasch
  oil and a packet of silver filings upon her person ...
   At that time and to the present day it was the practice of the collectors to march most of the tithelings
  back to Turgosheim. Special cases (beautiful girls, strappingyouths, clever musicians and men skilled in
  the working of metals) went on the backs of flyers. In this way they were spared any small ravages which
  might occur enroute, so ensuring their pristine presentation. Wratha's hands were loosely bound; she was
  strapped into the long saddle behind the pilot-lieutenant of a flyer; at the last moment the leader's son
  came to sneer, and tossedup to her a small bag of belongings.
   On their way back to Turgosheim, she got her hands loose and began to stroke her captor's back, and
  towhisper sensual suggestions in his ear. He was an aspir ant but in no way Wamphyri; once a Sunsider
  himself, he found this beautiful Szgany girl's attempt at his seduction pleasing; he made no objection to
  Wratha's stroking and her fondly beguiling words .. and all the while she worked kneblasch oil into his
  broad back, and now and then fingered the handle of the ironwood knife which she'd discovered in the
  bag given to her bythe man she'd spurned.
   The pilot lieutenant's blood was infected with vampirism, of course; he was in thrall to the Wamphyri
  generally, and to his own patron Lord especially. And this was the source of his downfall: his own tainted
  blood,which made possible Wratha's poisoning of his system. She worked the kneblasch deep into his
  spine, his back and shoulders, until he grew at first fatigued, then ill where he began to rock in the saddle.
  The tree-line wasbelow them and the dark peaks beckoned, but his hands trembled on the reins and his
  body was clammy withthe sweat of fever.
   'You are sick!' Wratha told him, feigning concern. Take us down before we crash, and let me care for
  youuntil you're well again.'
   Gripped by this dread lethargy, he began to do as Wratha suggested, settling his flyer down towards the
  trees. But deep within he suspected that she was thesource of his discomfort, and instead of landing
  squared his shoulders to fight off whatever it was that sickenedhim. Which was when Wratha used her
  knife, driving it into his back to the hilt. In fact the knife had been given to her as an instrument of mercy,
  so that shecould take her own life. But that wasn't her way. Indeed, life had never been so dear to her.
   She wrenched the ironwood blade this way and that in the lieutenant's back, until he cried out and his
  spine arched in agony. Then, as he slumped sideways in the saddle, Wratha toppled him into space. He
  crasheddown in the pines, and a moment later his flyer followed suit. Unhurt, Wratha jumped free and
  went to look for him where she'd seen him fall. She found him under the canopy of the trees, groaning
  and badly broken, and hurled dust of silver in his face until he breathed it in. And as he coughed and
  choked, so she stabbed him again and again: in the eyes to blind him, then in the heart to make an end of
  it. And finally she set aboutdismembering him.
   But in the twilight hours before sunup, the light of her fire was seen by a late patrol out of Turgosheim.
  Suspicious riders came winging to investigate - and discovered Wratha burning the lieutenant's pieces!
   She was retaken - this time knocked unconscious -and so at last was brought in with the other tithelings.
  Except of course where they were innocent, she was guilty of this 'heinous' crime against the Starside
  
  Lords, and naturally her life was forfeit. No question of what should become of her, or to whom should
  go the task of execution. For her thrall victim had a brother, also a lieutenant...
   The other tithelings were assigned, but Wratha was handed over to Radu Cragsthrall, to do with as he
  wished, so long as his final act was to kill her. Radu was the brother of Lathor, the lieutenant she had
  killed. But he was also thrall-in-chief to Karl the Crag, anddwelled in Cragspire. Karl was a rock of a
  man,Wamphyri through and through, but of all that a capricious Nature had given him in physical strength,
  shehad taken back in wits. In short, he was a dullard.
   And Radu paraded Wratha proud and naked before his Lord Karl, listing all the many things he would
  do to her, before she paid the ultimate price; which list was long and detailed. At first Karl applauded his
  chief lieutenant, but Wratha had caught his eye and was not cowed by Radu's threats. Hers was a
  stunning beauty, with hair blacker than night and eyes to match, legs long as sundown, pointy breasts, and
  a behind firm as an apple. And her mouth was a special delight: shaped like a crossbow's wings, pouting,
  and fitted with a soft dart of a tongue whose sting ... Karl might not find displeasing. A dark Gypsy jewel,
  she tilted her breastsat him, so that he lusted after her.
   Radu saw the girl's ploy, ceased numbering his intended torments, knocked her to her knees. She cried
  out and fell against Karl where he sat, and hugged his legs to her breasts. And as she begged his
  protection, so Radu rushed upon her. But the Lord Karlof Cragspire held up a hand ... simply that, but
  more than enough. Which was when Radu, stalled, had made what could so easily have been a fatal
  error. 'She is mine!' he had snarled. 'She was given tome!'
   'Aye,' Karl nodded his great head. 'Just as you are mine, given to me. But with the heat of your words -
  this which you would do to her, and that which you will do - you have set my juices working, and I
  wouldtry her first. So tell me: do you make objection?' And all the while Wratha hugging his thighs,
  saying:
   'Save me, Lord! Save me! I killed his brother because he would have taken me, to which end he landed
  hisflyer in the hills. But am I to be given to mere thralls,while even the greatest of Wamphyri Lords goes
  wanting?'
   Radu calmed down. Blood was in his Lord's eye and a dab of spittle at the corner of his mouth. True,
  Karl was a great fool and easy to handle when he was at peace with the world, but when his mood was
  sour ... then the vampire in him took over. No sensible idea toturn him sour now. And so he said: 'Do I
  make objection? No, of course not, Lord - except that she is unworthy! But if it will amuse you, have her
  first by all means, and instruct her in your ways. For after all, what betterteacher could she have?'
   'Exactly,' Karl growled, and that was that.
   Then ... the Lord Karl took his time about the 'trying' of Wratha, the while becoming enamoured of her.
  Finally she bowed to being vampirized by him, which was inevitable: stuff of his got into her from his
  kissesand embraces, also from those acts which she performed to entertain and ensnare him. However
  and for all of which, she let herself be Karl's thrall only insofar as that without him she was doomed, and
  no further. Her will was that strong, and in Wratha's case his was that weak. But at least as Karl's
  paramour her life was spared- for the moment. A respite she must put togood use.
   Now Karl knew he must let Radu have Wratha in theend; or if not 'must', then 'should'. She had been
  rightlycondemned to death by Radu's hand, and Karl could only lose face among his Wamphyri peers if
  he prolongedmatters. And so he was in the dilemma of being, as it were,in thrall to a thrall. And
  meanwhile Wratha pleaded thatshe would do anything to avoid her fate, if only Karl couldshow her the
  
  means of her delivery. She did not wish todie but live forever ... with Karl, in Cragspire, of course.
   The time came one night when she fell asleep in his arms, crying how she loved him and must be with him
  always. And Karl determined that she would be. Drain ing her to the last drop of blood while first she
  slept, then swooned, and finally died, he laid her prone in a private room and crossed her arms on her
  breast; then called Radu to see what he had done. 'There,' he said. The sentence is carried out. What
  does it matter whokilled her or how? She is dead. Soon she will be undead, and mine, wherefore you
  need no longer concern yourself.' Dullard that he was, he didn't see the glint in Radu's eyes, or the way
  his chief lieutenant chokedback his anger.
   For Radu was no fool; he'd seen for himself the strength of Wratha's will, her tenacity, her lust for life.
  Now, for the moment, she was dead, but when - if -she rose up again, then she would be even stronger.
  And no room for both of them in the service of Lord Karl of Cragspire then ...
   So that when Karl was out and about seeing to his affairs, Radu took Wratha down into a secret place
  away from the spires and manses and prepared a cham ber for her. And the chamber was a niche at the
  back of a deep dark cave, which he walled up with many tons of boulders, even bringing the entrance
  crashing down with his furious energy. So that at last the sentencewas carried out, and Radu was
  satisfied.
   Later, when Karl returned to Cragspire and found Wratha's room empty, he raged a while. Radu could
  only shrug and look mystified. A flyer was missing:obviously Wratha had woken up, stolen the beast,
  flown off. Perhaps they could track her down? They tried,Radu, Karl and two lesser lieutenants, to no
  avail. Then, because it would soon be sunup, they returned to Crag-spire. It was possible Wratha had
  tried to go back toSunside. Well, too bad. By now the sun would be melting her away.
   But in fact it was only melting the poor flyer, which Radu had ordered south for as long and as far as it
  could fly. And so life returned to normal in Cragspire, while in a walled-up niche in a blocked cave in a
  deserted ravine, death returned to undeath ...
    
   Wratha woke up!
   She woke up with a small cry, in darkness like that of the tomb ... and could see as if it were daylight!
  She could see in fact that this was a tomb - hers! And in amoment she knew what had happened, and
  even guessed something of how it had happened and whowas chiefly responsible. Then for a while she
  wept, tore her hair and beat her breast, for she believed that already she could feel herself turning into a
  stone, petrifying in the earth.
   Madness swiftly followed. She screamed and tore at the wall of boulders, which shifted ominously and
  threatened to roll inwards and crush her. Then, sobbing,she sat and hugged herself, and wondered how
  long theair would last; certainly the jumbled rocks were airtight,sealing her in like wine in a jar.
   But ... what did the air matter? Even when it was putrid she would live on, for she was a vampire now
  and could not die twice except she die as a vampire: by the stake, the sword and the fire. Which meant
  thatin a century - or two, or three - she would quite literally stiffen to a lonely fossil here in the earth. But
  long before then, in days or weeks, she would be so weakened that movement was impossible, when she
  must simply lie here remembering her miserable life, and loathing the miserable creatures who had
  brought herto this unthinkable end.
  
   Her madness returned! She cried out, shriek upon pealing shriek! Until it seemed to her that out of the
  very walls of rock far faint echoes ... came back to her?
   But echoes? In an airless tomb?
   Then Wratha sprang up and searched the cave top to bottom, end to end, what little space had been left
  for her to search. And at last she found a hole no wider than her shoulders, no higher than the distance
  between her chin and the top of her head, out of which came abreath from gulfs beyond. A breath of
  fresh air!
   She went head-first into the hole: a nightmare ofsuffocation, of wriggling, inching forward until ex
  hausted, then resting as best possible, at whichevertortured angle, before starting again; and never
  knowing when the passage would come to an end, but knowing that if it did there was no way back, no
  way to wriggle in reverse. And so like a snake she progressed through the pressured rock, with all the
  tons of the mountainsoverhead weighing down on her.
   Eventually there was a cave, with other cavelets leading off. On hands and knees, fingernails broken,
  bloodied, Wratha explored every crack and crevice. At ground level, nothing; all of the lesser caves were
  deadends. But there, confined in darkness, entombed in rock, her vampire senses were at their best.
   She was not Wamphyri, no, for no egg or spore was lodged within her body, but she was a vampire: the
  vampire thrall of Karl of Cragspire. His thrall - hah! But they would see about that! He had used the
  entrances of her body, her very throat, for his amusement, and she had absorbed the liquids of his lust
  like old, dry leather sucking at oil. And this was her reward. Well, and she knew who she must blame as
  well asKarl. And she did. And he would know of it, if only she could find a way out of here ...
   She rested awhile, and when she was still felt once more the flow of air across her dirty, rock-scarred
  body and torn hands, and on the cold-sweating mounds of her bruised breasts and buttocks. And yet
  what pain she felt was small, and all the while her fear receded.She had no egg, no, but her body was
  infected nonethe less. The tenacity of undeath complemented her own, and heightened her senses in a like
  degree. Moreover, the wounds of her hands were healing, and where new flesh grew it was paler but
  stronger than before. And she felt a certain sinuosity in all her limbs, as if theyhad a new flexibility. Now
  when she walked, she would seem to flow, and move with an evil grace. And even her beauty would be
  greater than before - unless shebecame mummified first!
   She sprang up with a new energy, turned her face to the cave's ceiling, searched for the lungs of this
  place.And sure enough a hole was there, like a chimney going up. Ah, but it would take some climber to
  reach it! She started up the wall of the cave, and at once discovered that she was just such a climber!
  Her fingers and toesfound secure holds in the smallest of cracks; the muscles of her arms were springy as
  the green branches of trees; she did not seem to have any weight at all! And clinging like a leech, she
  inched her way up the scarredrock interior and across the cave's ceiling.
   And so Wratha progressed. But slowly, oh so very slowly ...
   She had been sealed up in the first third of sundown, and was out again by the next sundown ... but so
  depleted that her hunger raged like a fire in her heart.And emerging on to the dry and dusty plains of
  Starside, in the shadows of the eastern range, Wratha's first thought - indeed heronly thought, for the
  moment -was of sustenance.
   She located a trog cavern, from which the first leathery inhabitants were even then emerging into the
  gloom, andtook one on the spot. He was only a trog, but blood is blood.And from the moment of the
  
  piercing, when her freshlylengthened, keenly serrated eye-teeth bit into his neck andfound the spurting
  jugular, Wratha knew the meaning ofthat immemorial Wamphyri phrase, 'the blood is the life!'
   The trogs made no protest as she drained the life of one of theirs. She was a vampire, thrall and servant
  of the Wamphyri. What could they do? Only interfere and the rest of the monsters would fall on them
  with alltheir might, like an avalanche out of the crags. Anyway, they rarely suffered in this fashion, for the
  human leeches of Turgosheim were far more fond of the sweet flesh of Sunsiders. It must be hoped that
  this attack was the exception to the rule. And as Wratha moved on, they dragged the drained corpse of
  her victim into their cave and burned it, for even trogs had come to know the nature of vampires ...
   Strengthened, Wratha made for Turgosheim, for the passes leading to Sunside. It was sundown and the
  Wamphyri were awake in their manses and abroad on their flyers. But she knew that their warrior
  creatures were confined in their pens under the crags and spires,which gave her heart. And keeping
  always to the deep est shadows, eventually Wratha approached a pass.
   Here the ground rose sharply, from the bed of the vast gorge which housed Turgosheim to the mouth of
  the pass, and there was no cover to mention. She couldn't risk it, not with the high beacons flaring red
  and orange, and lights burning in all the manses, and flyers overhead where aerial patrols came and went
  through the pass. Time to rest, and move on in the hour before sunup. Which she did, finding shelter
  under a shelf of rock away from the trail through the pass ...
   ... The hissing and roaring of hungry warriorsbrought her awake. They had been let loose from their pens
  into the gorge where they roamed at will. When two came together they would challenge and rear upbut
  not strike; their Wamphyri masters had lodged com mands in their small brains, forbidding fighting among
  themselves; they were, quite simply, watchdogs. And they were not watching for other warriors.
   For centuries ago, when the tithe system was first established, a party of Sunsiders had come through the
  mountains at high sunup to seek out and kill the Wamphyri in their manses. And they had actually
  achieved some small measure of success — the deaths of several lieutenants and thralls, the capture of a
  lesser spire, the murder of its Lord and master - before the surprised habitants of Turgosheim had put
  them down.Since when, this daily release of monsters into the gorge had become a matter of habit,
  passed down all theyears between.
   Emerging from shelter, Wratha spied the loathsome grey-blue bulk of a warrior moving in the darkness
  close by! She fled with all speed for the pass; scenting her, the creature roared and snorted all the more
  and followed after; she might have made it... but another warrior was waiting in the mouth of the pass
  itself!
   Wratha was trapped between them. They came upon her mewling, and glaring murderously with their
  crimson, night-seeing eyes. She could flee no more, and so simply stood and waited. At least they would
  make a quick end of it. But snuffling and snorting, and issuing their vile stenches, the warriors came no
  closer. They had her full scent now and knew that she was vampire stuff no less than they themselves.
  And Wratha moved between them into the pass ...
   Sunup came and Wratha proceeded south, but in thedeep, twining ravine which was the pass she felt
  nothing of the sun, merely spied its light spreading through the sky overhead like a pale stain. And all the
  long dayshe marched the route of the tithelings and kept herburgeoning vampire senses alert for any
  strange or inimical thing. So she came to the descending slopes of Sun-side, where rather than brave the
  furnace sun she restedin the opening of the ravine till sundown. And in thetwilight she bathed in a tumbling
  stream, then madeher way through the long night down to the place whereher tribe had built a small town
  on the Wamphyri tithe-route within the border of its territories.
  
   Avoiding the watch, she moved silent as a wraith tothe leader's house of woven withes and skins, where
  she found him home and abed. His wife was manyyears dead; he lived on his own and in a slovenly fash
  ion; his loud snoring caused Wratha to smile, for sheknew that this was his last sleep. But her smile was
  awful in the night, having nothing of warmth in it andeven less of humanity. And standing naked in the
  shadows of his room, she called his name but softly.
   He grunted and came starting awake, demanding:'Who is it?'
   'Wratha!' she answered, moving into the moonlightwhere it flooded through his window, but keeping her
  feral eyes hidden for the moment.
   'You!' he gasped, seeing her outline, and that she was naked. And, coming more nearly awake: 'But...
  you?'
   'I escaped!' she told him in a low whisper. TheWamphyri think I'm dead. Tonight I must rest, andbefore
  sunup go off into the forest like a wild thing tohide there all my days.' She intended no such thing.
   He sat up straighter in his bed. 'You ... you daredcome back here? Why, you'll bring them down on us
  like-'
   'Only for the night, as I've said,' she answered, cuttinghim off. 'And anyway, they don't even know I'm
  alive... you poor blind fool!'
   'What?' He sat there astonished as she moved closerto his bed. 'Me, blind? What are you saying?'
   'You who would give me to his son, when all that I really wanted ... was you!' It was a ploy: words to
  immobilize him, keep him from exclaiming too loudly. She lifted his blanket, stole beneath it, pressed
  herself against him. She was a vampire, strange and sensual. He felt her body's weird heat, which was
  cold at thesame time, and grew dizzy from her fascination.
   'But...I was old,' he stuttered. 'And you . . .'
   'You were the leader!' she answered, her stroking bringing him burning alive, jerking like a hooked fishin
  her hand. And in a moment:
   'Let me...let me feel you,' he husked, with his coarsehands on her body. She allowed it — until he bent
  his headto kiss her breasts. And then she saw the throb of his neckwhere her caresses had caused the
  blood to course like ariver, and he heard the hisss of her breath as her hand slidfrom his member to the
  seed-swollen source of his lust.Then, as she tightened her grip with a vampire's strength,and as her nails
  dug in, he tried to draw away... too late!
   He saw her eyes yellow as molten gold in the night, saw the moonlight gleaming white on her mouth of
  knives, hich she closed on his windpipe to sever it. Perhaps, in the instant of her striking, he issued the
  small scream of a gelding, cut off along with his airand, less rapidly, his life …
   ... And perhaps, in the smaller house alongside his own, his son Javez heard or in some way sensed his
  father's small scream. At any rate he woke up, and listenedawhile to the silence, then came padding to
  investigate.
   Wratha, a child of the night, saw Javez in all detail;
  
   he saw only shadows and moonbeams in his father's room, and a humped outline moving under the
  blanket. But he also heard the sounds of Wratha's hungry suction. It sounded like something else: like his
  father was with a woman! Which he was, but not in the way Javezthought it. The younger man's jaw fell
  open as he beganto back out of the room.
   Wratha stuck her head further out, tossed back her hair, and in a 'shocked' voice said, 'Oh! - Javez!'
  Whichspoke volumes, however falsely.
   He knew that voice at once, and his eyes started from his head as he whispered, 'Wratha?' Then, jaw
  lolling more yet, he choked: 'Father.1' And blood surging, he leaped to the bed and tore aside the
  blanket. What had been his father lay there ...
   Stunned, Javez fell back, tripped, would have fallen.But Wratha was standing beside him, smiling her
  smile. She held him upright, watched his face, mouth and throat, all working in unison, doing nothing. And
  the knob of Javez's throat going up and down like some strange dumb bird's wattle, as he gathered saliva
  to cryout. But before he could gather enough -
   — She showed him a splinter of ironwood stripped from a shattered tree in the mouth of the pass. And:
  'Doyou remember?' she said, dragging him by the hair back on to the bed with his father. 'You gave me a
  knife like this, upon a time - to kill myself, I suppose. But no, Iused it for another purpose. And now I
  give it back.'
   'Wratha-a-o-a!' he gurgled, as she drove the splinter deep into his groin, and drew it out; into his
  shuddering belly, and drew it out; into his heart, and twisted it there, and wrenched it until it broke . ..
  Then, when allwas still, she kissed them both gently, upon their clammy foreheads, and left them
  sprawling in their blood where they had died ...
   In the morning they were found; the tribe built upthe campfire and burned them, and elected a new
  leader. A search was made, but nothing was found. And no one slept for long and long, because they
  suspected a vampire had come to them out of the swamps. Theywere wrong, for she had come from
  Starside.
   And now she was on her way back.
    
   In the hills Wratha waylaid a hunter in the night, killedhim, and drew sustenance from his red-pulsing
  lifestream. And each time she appeased her hunger in this fashion, so the changes in her metabolism
  accelerated, and her undead vitality went from strength to strength. Her vampire senses developed; she
  felt therestless, eerie zest of the vampire and a renewed, replen ished Just for life - albeit for the lives of
  others. In the way such passions took her, she knew that she was rare; it was as if she were a vampire
  born. Perhapssome credit was due Karl of Cragspire, for he contained a leech within him, grown from an
  egg, whose essencehad mingled with Wratha's.
   In the next sunup she went down into the stony gullies and bottoms of Turgosheim, between the spires of
  the Wamphyri with their massive scree jumbles, and under the very fapades of their manses fretted in the
  glooming faces of soaring ravines and jutting crags. And no warrior bothered her where she flitted like a
  shadow to the base of Cragspire, whose guards kept watch on the ramps and in the entranceways.
  Guards, aye, but thralls for all that; but Wratha was more than any mere thrall now, for she went under
  her owndirection.
  
   She climbed Cragspire at its rear, to an unguarded lower level, then came up onto a walkway of
  cartilage grafted to the stack's exterior. The walkway spiralledsteeply for the heights but there was no
  one there tostop or challenge Wratha. Higher, the spire was hollow in many of its parts, so that she
  entered within and proceeded all the faster, from hall to hall, stairway tostairway.
   She knew the rooms where Karl's lieutenants kept their Szgany odalisques, and the closets where the
  women kept their clothes. And dressed in just such a sheath, which revealed far more than it concealed,
  finally she made her way to the Lord of Cragspire's quarters. And all the spire asleep now except for
  those withduties, whom Wratha had known to avoid.
   But in all three of the approaches to the penultimate levels under the seared ramparts of the spire itself,
  there she found small warriors on guard, protecting their master's privacy. And in the third such entrance-
  way, because her patience was used up, she approachedthe tethered monster openly, with her head held
  high.The creature blinked its many eyes at her and shuffled, but merely grunted and made no move to
  stop her. Forthe beast recognized Wratha: that she had used to come and go with the spire's master. And
  HE had instructedthat this one should be allowed to pass, with no interfer ence. It was an order which
  had never been rescinded. Also, the master's scent was on Wratha, even in herblood.
   And she passed the armoured bulk of it by, where itspincers and stabbers worked unceasingly at thin
  air,and its cavern of a mouth chomped however vacuously.
   And so Wratha came to Karl in his rooms, and knewwhere to find him asleep. Except he wasn't asleep,
  forthe vampire in him had warned of someone's approach. And entering his bedroom, she found Karl
  waiting for her. Then ...
   ... His astonishment was great! He drew her to him,lifted her up, gazed upon her from every angle. There
  was no word in his mouth, which gaped. And Wratha ... she had been beautiful before, even as a lowly
  thrall (though in truth, she'd never been lowly). But now ... everything about her was a man's fondest,
  darkest dream. Just looking at her, Karl knew she could make even the most erotic dream reality. And
  he saw withevery glance what he had made: such a vampire!
   Aye, and he knew what he had missed all thistime . ..
   She took off her dress for him and sat on his great knee, and as he fondled her, he was now more thrall
  than she - far more. Then, when he would have her, she made him wait and told him everything, sparing
  nodetail.
   Hearing her out, Karl's rage flared to match his inflamed passions. For just as Wratha had guessed it, so
  now the Lord of Cragspire likewise knew the author of this thing. His eyes bulged and his snout flattened
  back and grew ridged and convoluted, like that of a great bat, while the teeth sprouted in his jaws like
  scarlet scythes! Until he came roaring to his feet with a nameon his bloodied lips:
   'Radu!'
   'But my way,' she insisted, clinging to his arm. 'Do itmy way.'
   'He dies tonight, now - the death he planned for you - changed to a vampire and buried forever. Not in a
  cave, no, but in a grave fifty feet deep, whose construction I shall supervise personally. Especially its
  filling!'
  
   'Ah, no,' she advised, 'for as we've seen, even the best-buried persons sometimes return. And Radu is a
  traitoryou must be rid of always. Do it my way.' And she told himher way. Karl listened, and smiled in his
  fashion; which inthe circumstances was hardly a smile at all. Then:
   He called for Radu, who got dressed and attended his Lord at once, wondering what it could be, at this
  hour of sunup. And in Karl's quarters Wratha washidden away, watching and listening to everything.
   'Lord?' Radu stood before Karl's great bone chair.
   Karl's crag of a body hunched there, his scarlet gaze accentuated by the uneven flaring of gas jets in the
  walls. Such was his doomful silence, that for a moment Wratha feared he'd lost the words. But then: 'It is
  ... it is this business of the Szgany thrall, Wratha,' Karl growled, breathing heavily as he reined back on
  his Wamphyri rage. 'I am finding some difficulty sleeping, because it puzzles me. And you know how I
  hate amystery.'
   Radu shrugged (negligently, Wratha thought), andwithout Karl's leave seated himself upon a carved
  stool. 'Where's the mystery, Lord? Strong-willed in life, she remained unchanged in undeath. Rising up
  from your fatal kiss, she stole a flyer and departed Cragspire, Turgosheim, the world entire. She flew
  south for Sun-side, into the risen sun. She is no more.'
   Karl nodded. 'So we have supposed,' he answered,breathing easier now. 'So you ... have suggested.'
   Now Radu detected the edge in his Lord's voice andcame to his feet. Again his shrug, not so negligent
  now, as his eyes slid this way and that. 'But the evidence was such -'
   '- What evidence?'
   'Eh? Why, her absence - the missing flyer!'
   'Ah! That evidence.' Karl fingered his chin, studiedRadu intensely.
   And for the third time Radu's shrug, now absolutely genuine in its bewilderment. 'But ... what other evi
  dence is there?'
   Karl nodded again, and sighed deeply. Then,apparently changing the subject, he said: 'Do you know,the
  other Lords see me as a dolt?'
   'What, you, Lord?' Radu's attempt at astonishmentwas less than convincing. 'I cannot believe it.'
   'Oh, you can, you can! You've heard it said, I'm sure.'
   'Never, Lord! Why, if ever I heard such a..."
   '... And yet I fancy,' Karl stopped him short, 'that among my ancestors was a scryer of considerable
  skill. An oneiromancer, perhaps, and one of great power!Which is why I cannot sleep - because of my
  dreams.'
   'Dreams, Lord?'
   'Of treachery, aye!'
  
   Radu said nothing, but waited. For after all, a dream of treachery is still only a dream. And in a while,
  Karl continued: 'Do you see that skin there, on the table? That chart of Turgosheim and all the lands
  around?' He pointed to a table close by. 'Look at it closely. For Ihave marked it.'
   Radu stepped to the table, checked the chart, and his eyes were drawn irresistibly to a certain secret
  place — but secret no more, for Karl had ringed it with a line ofblack dye! Radu staggered back a pace,
  regained control of himself as best he could, and said: 'I... I see yourmark.'
   'Come,' Karl crooked a finger, beckoning. 'Come here, where I can look upon your face.'
   Radu stood before him.
   And Karl's voice was very soft as he said, 'Now admitit to me: that you have buried her there, as I saw
  in mydreams.'
   Stunned, Radu opened and closed his mouth but saidnothing. So that Karl warned him: 'Better if you tell
  mewith your own tongue, while still you have one.'
   Radu remained dumbstruck.
   Karl sighed and spread wide his arms, as in a gestureof defeat. 'Then, Radu my would-be son, we must
  go and dig there, you and I. And all of my thralls and trogs to boot, digging in a certain blocked cave.
  Until we have dug up what you put down. Then, if my dream has not lied to me... you shall replace her
  there in the cold, cold earth, forever. But if you'll be brave and tell me with your own lips how it was, and
  so save me the trouble ...?'
   'But...!' Radu's dam had cracked at last.
   'Oh?' Karl cocked his head and looked at him, looked into him. But Radu only hung his head. It was an
  admittance of sorts - but not good enough.
   'Very well,' said Karl, in a voice which was softer yet.'Then go to my bed and bring me the sharpest of
  thosecrossed swords from where they decorate the wall. Alas, they are not very sharp, but sharp enough
  in a strong hand. The one is of iron and the other silver. I dislike silver as well you know, but its grip is of
  bone and it is the sharpest, and the other hangs there red with rust.So bring me the silver sword.'
   Radu looked, saw the dull glimmer of gaslight on ancient Szgany weapons. 'Swords..." he said, tone
  lessly.
   'Do it now,' said Karl.
   Radu brought the sword. And as he returned with it to Karl many thoughts passed through his mind. To
  leap on him and kill him ... hah! - what madness - try killing a warrior! To kill himself, then, which was far
  more feasible. Or... perhaps he should try to brazen itout; for surely Karl knew nothing for a fact, not yet,
  and all of this was a trial by nerves. Later, if it came to the worst, Radu could always make a run for it.
  That is, if there was to be a later ...
   By then he was back in front of his master's chair, and the time for action, perhaps even for thinking, was
  past. Karl reached out a hand. 'The sword,' he said. 'Put it down.' Radu did so, and his master took it up
  — butcarefully — by the bone hilt.
  
   Then Karl stood up, and Radu backed off. But: 'If youso much as think of running,' Karl warned, 'I shall
  take you down into the bottoms and let the warriors fight over you. Now kneel beside the stool there.'
  That was easy, for Radu's knees were giving way. 'Good!' said Karl. 'And place your hands behind your
  back, andclasp them. Then lower your neck across the stool. Even so ...'
   'Master, I ...!' Radu's eyes bulged where he stared atthe stone floor.
   'Aye?' Karl's inquiry was almost casual.
   'IfI say nothing, I lose my head,' Radu gabbled. 'And if I speak the truth — even though I have done
  nothingfor myself but everything for you — still I lose my head!Where is the justice?'
   'Tell me the truth,' Karl said, 'and I swear that I shallnot harm you in the slightest degree. Neither myself
  norany man or monster in all Turgosheim.'
   Radu knew better than to try bargaining, not with his neck across a block. And now his dam broke and
  the words flooded out of him. 'It is... as you have dreamed it! But she was Szgany filth; she was not good
  enough; she made your bed a mire!'
   'Ahhhh!' said Karl.
   Radu heard the swish as the sword went up, and screamed, 'Master! Your word, not to harm me:
  neitheryourself nor any man!'
   'Indeed,' said Karl.
   Sensing in that final moment the presence of someother, Radu's eyes swivelled up - even as Wratha's
  silver sword came slicing down. And in the instant of death, still Radu didn't believe who he saw standing
  there ...
   Then it was done, Wratha's way, and in every instance but one Karl had stood by his word. For neither
  himself nor any man of Turgosheim had killed RaduCragsthrall.
   But a monster ...?
    
    
    
   II
    
    
    
    
  
    
    
    
    
    
   Some hours after his meeting with Wratha, Karz Biteri, Historian to the Wamphyri, thrall to Maglore of
  Rune-manse, reported to his master in one of his several workshops and recounted the occurrences of
  the day.But not in every detail.
   When Karz was done, Maglore looked up from hisexamination of stretched, rune-inscribed skins (the
  bleached skins of trogs, mainly) and various fragments of carved bone, and said, 'Continue.' Simply that.
  A man of words, he nevertheless knew how to use them sparingly. And the implication of this single word
  wasthat he already knew there was more to be known.
   Maglore was one hundred and sixty years old. By Wamphyri standards he should be in his prime, but he
  looked old. He and certain others of the Lords andLadies - mainly the so-called 'high-caste' of the
  Wamphyri - were modern disciples of Turgo Zolte: so far as possible, they followed Zolte's olden ascetic
  die-turns. These were simple and all based upon one ideal:
   To fight vampirism throughout life and undeath, evenincluding the ultimate condition of vampiric
  contagion,which is to be Wamphyri! To deny oneself — and there fore one's parasite — those things
  which are the fuel ofall evil works: blood, the carnal lusts of the flesh, suspi cion and hatred of one's
  fellows, and the pride which comes before a fall. In short, to be Shaitan's opposite, or as much opposed
  to him and his ways as possible. It had been a losing battle for Turgo Zolte and all hisfollowers ever
  since, but still they tried. And itaccounted for Maglore's shrivelled aspect; for as he'd learned well
  enough, though still he would deny it, theblood is the life.
   Yes, Maglore looked old, but Karz knew that he didn'tneed to. On those infrequent occasions when he
  called for his woman, then he would appear young again, and the Historian would know that he had
  taken the bloodof a man.
   'Continue, master?' Karz looked blank, and for all that he should know better wondered what Maglore
  was thinking.
   'My thoughts are mine alone!' the Mage told him atonce, in a voice that rustled. 'Unlike yours, which are
  to me like scenes in a shewstone, except when I'm not given to exertion and would prefer to hear them
  from your mouth - such as now! Or perhaps you'd have me look more deeply inside your head? That
  can be arranged, though it might cause you some small pain. YetI admit to temptation; for who knows
  how many other secret things I'd find in there, kept back from me, eh? Now, stop playing the fool and
  tell me about Wratha:what else did she say and do?'
   Karz had not wanted to annoy Maglore, for whichreason he'd held in reserve various parts of his
  conversa tion with Wratha the Risen: for instance, that part in respect - or lack of it - to the self-styled
  aristocrats ofTurgosheim, such Lords as Maglore and his peers, who were thought of as elders, sedate
  and sedentary in their ways. But now, at the Mage's prompting, Wratha's words were recalled and
  floated back to the surface ofhis mind:
  
   '. .. Obey me now, Historian ... make no morespeechesof warriors mewling in their vats ... these are the
  fearsof old, old men, whose learning has stunted their manly appetites ...'
   Maglore read her words there in Karz's mind, andsmiled however bitterly. 'Huh.1' he grunted. 'Because
  we deny ourselves - because we are, well, yes, it may be said, kind rather than cruel, inquiring rather than
  inquisitorial, and retiring rather than rampant - she thinks us dodderers! Nothing new in that. But is that
  all? Threats to you and insults to me? If so, then youprize my sensitivity much too highly, Karz, for
  Wratha has been known to say far worse things than these! Sotell me now, what else did this so-called
  "Lady" say anddo?'
   Karz looked at his master and was at one and the same time fascinated and repulsed by him, who once
  was a man. His deeply scored skin like stained, ancient leather grooved by time and use; his white
  eyebrows tapering upwards into temples whose coarse, receding hairline lay as strands of grey lichen on
  his slopingdome of a head; the crimson orbs which were his eyes, deep-sunken in their purple sockets:
  eyes which were narrowing now moment by moment, as Maglore's patience grew thin.
   Karz snapped out of it. 'Why, she walked among the tithelings, Lord!' he burst out. And then, more
  stumblingly (for he knew how unseemly it was to criticize the Wamphyri), 'Which is not ... not according
  to... which goes against... which -'
   '- Which was simply wrong!' Maglore finished it for him; and reminded him: 'We are alone here,
  Historian! If you offend here, to whom shall I report you?I amyour master, who makes punishment - if
  and when it isrequired.'
   'Yes, Lord.'
   'Say on, then.'
   Karz nodded, moistened his dry lips, and continued:'One of the young male tithelings was tall, very
  strong, proud and even forward. He invited with his posture and hot eyes; he did not flinch when Wratha
  smiled at him and tried the muscles of his arms, nor lowered hiseyes when she stood close - very close -
  to him.'
   'More fool him!' Maglore growled. 'What then?'
   'As I took the tithelings away for assignation, she told me: "Tell the assignor that I have ... noticed this
  one." Which I did.'
   'And?'
   'A strange thing,' Karz answered (but here he hung his head a little, as if ashamed of his own Szgany
  blood). 'The assignor was Giorge Nanosi, called Fatesayer, thrall to all and to none. He is no one's
  favouriteand calls no Lord master, but merely performs his duties ... impartially.'
   Maglore nodded, and what was human in himthought: This Karz Biteri is a wasted man. Butif he were
  my thrall proper, then the waste would be somuch greater. Among his own sort, doubtless he would be
  a great thinker, even a wise man. Which is whyI have made no change in him but left him a man entire,or
  almost: for the originality of his thoughts, which are not merely imagesof my own. I allow him thefreedom
  of thought, for he has a mind and is a thinker! Andbecause he considers me a'fair' or 'reasonable'
  master, he is faithful in his way and accepts my concerns for his own. Ah, but it's hard enough to be a
  
  common man, Szgany, in Turgosheim, without being a thinker too! Hence this brush with Wratha the
  Risen, when the words she overheard were mainly mine but from his mouth ...
   But that which was inhuman in him thought: On the other hand, and as he gets older, this honesty and
  outspoken spontaneity could become a problem. And so, in a year or two - when he has translated all of
  theremaining histories - it might be in my interest to favourhim and replace those brittling bones of his with
  far more flexible stuff. For with his agile brain, why ...Karz Biteri would make me a crafty flyer!
   All this in a moment's thought, while out loud he said: 'Giorge Nanosi, called Fatesayer for obvious
  reasons? I know him, aye. So - what struck you asstrange?'
   'First,' Karz continued, 'Giorge examined the tithe-lings and separated out those which he considered
  inferior. These were taken away for processing. The ... therequirements of Turgosheim; the provisioning;
  the needsof the manses and spires.'
   'Yes, yes,' Maglore waved a hand, dismissing a concept which to Karz was sheerest horror.
   Then,' the Historian went on, 'the Fatesayer lined up the rest and began drawing out the sigils from his
  leather bag, to which I was witness, as is the custom. First in line stood that young man whom Wratha
  had ... noticed. Giorge had put him there. And lo, the first bone shard he drew from the bag bore
  Wratha's sigil: akneeling man with bowed head!'
   'Yes, yes,' Maglore growled again. 'I know her blazonwell enough.' And then, if not explosively with a
  dealmore animation: 'Corruption, Karz! What? Why, it might have been named after her! Not Wratha the
  Risen but Wratha the Sunken - into the quag of her own corruption! And you know it, and the Lady
  knows you know. Wherefore, in future, avoid her at all cost. For I valueyou.'
   'I avoid all of them, Lord,' said Karz, before he couldstill his tongue.
   But Maglore only nodded, and said: 'Corruption, aye.But should I be surprised? No, for all of us - the
  Wamphyri entire - are corrupt! We are not our own
   masters but governed by our creatures, even as wegovern our thralls. Except where we are merely
  corrupt, Wratha is corrupt!'
   Karz said nothing but merely waited, and Maglorefinally went on, 'Did I ever tell you her story?'
   Karz nodded. 'Yes, Master. To the point where shekilled Radu Cragsthrall.'
   Then let me finish it,' the other sank back in his chair and steepled his hands. 'For it's as well that men
  know this witch and her ways, as long as they steer clear from knowing her too well...'
    
   'Wratha lived with Karl a year in Cragspire. But she was not Mistress of Cragspire, only of Karl ...
  which we may suppose she found irksome. It may also be supposed that eventually she would get his
  egg, buteventually can be a long time.
   'Now, Cragspire was one of the tallest spires; at sunup the rays of the sun, striking between the high
  mountain peaks, turned all its upper ramparts to fatal gold. For which reason Karl shielded the windows
  of his chambers with heavy curtains of good black bat fur. His several small warriors within the aerie, and
  
  the sun without, were all the protection he needed in thosehours when the Wamphyri prefer their beds.
   'Came that season when the sun is hottest and the coarser produce of Sunside - nuts, fruits, grains and
  wines - never more plentiful, when Wratha made her move. She exhausted Karl with her sex upon his
  bed(no small feat in itself!), and made him drunk with good wines. Then, when he was sound asleep, she
  bound him to the bed with chains. It has even been said thatshe sprayed the forbidden kneblasch oil
  about the room, more deadly to him than to her, for she was but a vampire while he was Wamphyri!
  Mind you, I can'tswear to the last, but as for the rest: it is exactly as Wratha boasted of it to the other
  Ladies after the deedwas done.
   'She decked the walls with bronze - shields out of the olden times, when the Szgany had used to fight
  back, removed from the halls of Cragspire and burnished to mirrors - and all directed upon Karl in his
  stupor. And then ... then she threw wide the curtains!
   'In a moment, Karl woke up screaming. But he was exhausted, drunk. He lolled upon his bed, chained
  down, and his cries were like the gonging of great cracked bells as his skin peeled back and his blood
  boiled! The sun's rays were concentrated in his eyes,which blackened to craters in his head! His hair
  became smoke, while his limbs and various parts cracked open to issue jets of steam and stench! And
  through all of this Wratha laughing like a madwoman in a shaded part of the room, dancing from one foot
  to the other in her excitement, and hauling on a rope which she had fixed to his bed, dragging Karl more
  surely into thefocus of the sunlight.
   'Karl's body shrank and shrivelled; he was finished; his leech deserted him, came wriggling from his trunk
  as finally he burst open at the belly. Seeing all of this, Wratha closed the curtains and rushed to Karl's
  bed, and took his cindered head with the same silver swordwhich she'd used to slay Radu Cragsthrall!
   Then she turned to his vampire, which was alsofatally burned and dying. In its final throes, the creature
  produced its egg - and at last Wratha had what she wanted! Of her own free will she opened herself to
  the thing, which entered her without pause and hid itself away in her flesh. It was done, and Wratha was
  or wasabout to become Wamphyri!
   'Karl's warriors had been hauling on their chainsfrom the moment of his first scream. Now one of them
  burst free and came hurrying to discover and destroy his master's tormentor. Wratha, consumed by that
  ecstasy of agony which ever attends the transfusion of an egg, nevertheless stood tall and showed herself
  to thecreature. For her time in Cragspire had been well occu pied, and she'd made herself known to all of
  these children of Karl's vats. However dully, they had grown used to Wratha and responsive to her
  vampire techniques and aura; and so she'd exercised her will overthem, practising for this very day.
   'Now the time had come when these preparations must be put to the ultimate test. Wratha faced the
  warrior down, shouted at it with voice and will both ... and the monster at once backed off! Then,
  knowing that she had won, Wratha ordered the warrior to a new post right there in a corner of Karl's
  bedroom; except that the room was now hers, no less than the warrior itself was Wratha's. For her will
  was abroad in all the corridors of Cragspire (soon to be Wrathspire), andKarl's other creatures were
  likewise quickly quelled.
   'Beasts are beasts, however, and men are men, of which there were several sleeping in the spire. But
  Wratha's sigil — an unseemly device, to my mind -shows all too well what she thinks of men! She called
  for Karl's lieutenants one by one, showed herself andher handiwork to them, demanded their allegiance,
  their obedience. Some were common thralls, while others were undead vampires who had perhaps
  aspired to Karl's seat; whichever, none made objection. Let one so much as frown or make wry face,
  Wratha's attendant warrior would rumble and vent furious gases. And so now she was risen in every
  
  respect, Wratha of Wrath-spire, and ready to announce that fact.
   'Come sundown, she sent out a lieutenant and flyerwith messages of invitation to certain other Wamphyri
  Ladies, such as Zindevar Cronesap and Ursula Tor-spawn, informing them of a gathering in Wrathspire.
  Vastly intrigued, they all attended of course; but Wratha's special guest was Devetaki Skullguise, the
  so-called "virgin grandam" of Masquemanse, whom she much admired. Devetaki, when she was a thrall,
  had vied with a vampire girl for her master's egg. She won the ensuing fight but lost the right half of her
  pretty face, flensed from the cheekbone. Since when and to this very day, she wears gold-filigreed
  half-masks of lead: a smiling mask if her mood is good, and one which frowns when it is sour. In this way
  the twohalves, both living and leaden, always concur. But being Devetaki, usually she wears the frowning
  mask. Ah, but when she is most angry, then she wears no mask at all...
   'Well, I will make a long story short: the Ladies accepted their new sister (Zindevar of Cronespire,
  perhaps grudgingly), and following the Ladies the Lords. For after all, Wratha was Wamphyri now;
  which was, is, and presumably always will be the way of things. The route to ascension is not important,
  only the getting there. And it should be remembered: for every one of us born to the spires and manses,
  there is one who was born on Sunside or in the swamps.
   'So Karl died, and Wratha was risen. Long liveWratha! In Turgosheim only a blind man or a fool would
  ask why beings who could live as long as the Wamphyriusually live so short.
   'But who shall dictate otherwise, eh? As I've said often enough before: we are not true masters but
  slaves to our parasites, and not even entirely to them but to blind Fate, who leads us all upon our
  teetering march across the abyss of life and undeath. Such is the natureof the Wamphyri, and jealousy,
  greed, hatred and lust —and blood — their way of life. So be it. Perhaps it's as well to leave it at that...'
   Maglore paused, then said, 'Very well then, Karz Biteri, Historian, and now you know the history of
  Wratha the Risen.' Following which he sighed and fellsilent.
   And in a while, Karz answered, 'For which I amgrateful, Master. But if I may make so bold, all that you
  have told me was yesteryear - even a hundred years in the past - and this is today, when we know that
  the Lady Wratha breeds warriors in secret for the fightingof aerial battles. But against whom? Which man
  or mendoes she hate now, and to what new, even higher station does she aspire?'
   Maglore looked at Karz and said, 'Hmm?' But he hadheard him well enough. And he thought:Aye, a
  clever man and a fine brain, but perhaps a dangerous tongue.I'll grant you a year, Karz my friend, or two
  at most.After that: you'll retain someof your intelligence at least - but flyers aren't much sought after for
  theirconversation.
   While out loud: 'Mark this well,' he said. 'Let there beno more frivolous discussion of things you may
  hear from time to time in Runemanse. And never again let the substance of my conversation form the
  body of yours. Not even with the best of motives or intentions.Do you hear?'
   'Of course, Lord. From now on I'm deaf, dumb andblind.'
   Smiling grimly, Maglore shook his head. 'Let dumb suffice,' he said. 'Which I can arrange, and swiftly, if
  you cannot!
   'As for Wratha and certain forbidden flying thingswhich I've reason to believe she's breeding in the
  bowelsof Wrathspire: she'll be called to give account soon enough. And not only Wratha but others I
  could name.As for now, let it rest.
  
   'And as for me: I must rest, for it's sunup and I growweary!' He stood up, and Karz backed away,
  bowing.
   'Put these things of mine away,' Maglore told him, peering about his study workshop. 'Make all tidy,
  then return to your studies or tend your duties. Not least,prepare my good clothes, complete with chain
  and sigils. And my gauntlet: get the rust off it, if you can. Doubtless I shall be up and about from time to
  time during thelong day, but be sure I am up at sundown!'
   'Indeed, Lord!' Karz answered, who knew why his master must rise with the sinking of the sun, but in
  light of their conversation made no comment nor even thought about it, not until much later when Maglore
  was abed.
   Then:
   Looking out through a window and up at the spires and high crags, each one tipped gold in sunlight -
  andgazing far across the miles-wide gorge of Turgosheim, whose honeycombed walls contained the great
  manses, to where the pale lights of melancholy Vormspire still burned like glowworms despite that it was
  day - Karz did think about it, and wondered at its meaning. For itwas this:
   That the Lord Vormulac Unsleep, who in his prime had been the most powerful of them all, and still
  retained a measure of his former might, had called ameeting in Vormspire in the second hour following twi
  light. And no simple gathering this, for all of the Wamphyri had been called, Lords and Ladies alike,with
  tithe-penalties for any who might think to abstain.
   Aye, times were changing in Turgosheim; Karz Bitericould feel it in his water! And he fancied that soon
  there'd be new histories to write, possibly even inblood ...
    
   Lord Vormulac Taintspore, called Unsleep after his insomnia of seventy years, had seated himself at the
  headof the great table; this was only proper, for he was convenor and host both. Tithemaster, adjudicator
  and 'aesthete' (the word must be read in the same light as 'ascetic' as applied to Maglore, insofar as such
  wordsmay be said to apply to any of the Wamphyri), Vormulac was greatly respected . . . generally.
   He was no strict adherent to Zolteism, but neitherwas he a glutton. He had not dealt his fellow Lords ill,
  not even in his prime. His forces had never attacked, other than to defend Vormspire; but when they had
  made war, then it had been utter and ruthless! Eighty years ago, Vormulac had lain Gonarspire and
  Trog-manse to waste, decked their masters in silver chainsand hung them from their own battlements to
  await therising sun's hot melt. Since when Turgosheim hadstayed relatively free from internal feuding.
   In aspect:
   Vormulac had kept his shaved head and thrall's forelocks for all of a hundred and thirty years. What had
  suited his old master Engor Sporeson in that earlier time had suited Vormulac ever since. His own thralls
  were similarly cropped, including the women. His forelocks, having lost most of theirjetsheen through
  longyears of sleeplessness, were iron-grey; they were plaited and finished with tassles, which dangled
  down on to his nipples. His eyes, not quite uniformly crimson butmarked with curious yellow flecks, were
  close-set anddeep-sunken in ochre orbits.
   Vormulac's nose was long and thin, and sharply hooked at the bridge; it might be that in some former
  
  time it had been badly broken. Its convolutions and the gape of its nostrils were less marked than in most
  of the Wamphyri, but its great length was a singular anomaly, with a pointed tip which came down almost
  to the centre of his upper lip and lent his frown a hawkish severity. He wore iron-grey moustaches which
  dipped at their ends to meet the 'V of his goatish beard, and within this boundary of bristles his mouth
  was wide, thin as a gash, and held slightly but notcynically aslant. He wore a thin white scar in the hollow
  of his left cheek, from the orbit of his eye to the corner of his mouth, which might account for the latter's
  tilt. His ears lay flat to his head, and their conch-like whorlswere tufted with coarse white hair.
   A huge man, he stood almost seven feet tall. The histories had it that gigantism was common among the
  olden Wamphyri, when some had reached eight feet and more! Vormulac was happy with his seven,
  whichwere especially advantageous on occasions such as this. Since the seat of his chair was also an inch
  or two higher than the rest of them about the table, he madean imposing figure indeed.
   And yet, overall, Vormulac's face and form were as melancholy in aspect as Vormspire itself, and the
  aura of his rooms, furniture, and tapestries - despite their richness, intricacy and questionable 'beauty' -
  was likewise doleful. Neither overtly dull nor doom-fraught as such, yet full of some sad nostalgia, theirs
  was a silent conspiracy to evoke visions of fled or stolen youth,mordant mistakes, and everlasting
  poignancy.
   Maglore, Vormulac's contemporary down the years, knew the reason well enough. So might several of
  the others if they had cared to mark and remember such things; but in a world without proper records,
  timeitself becomes an efficient eraser.
   The reason was this:
   That in his youth, after Vormulac received the dyingEngor Sporeson's egg and ascended in his turn to
  Vorm spire, and while still he retained something of Szgany humanity, he had returned to Sunside to
  reclaim the love of a sweetheart lost when he'd been taken as a titheling. She had come back with him to
  Vormspire, where their passion was such that in a very short timehis vampire, however immature,
  produced an egg which passed to her through intercourse.
   Alas, what Vormulac's former master had not toldhim was this: that he, Engor, was a leper!
   The Wamphyri, whose metamorphic flesh shruggedoff most of the common Szgany diseases, were
  prone to leprosy. While it made itself manifest in several forms and was little understood, they believed
  that one strain at least was genetic and passed on through the egg. It might skip one or more generations,
  but sooner or later must recur somewhere down the line. In the Lord of Vormspire's case it had skipped
  just one generation:his own.
   After several years, when his love's flesh had taken on the hue of decay and begun to slough (and only
  then recalling his former master's swift deterioration anddeath), Vormulac had opened Engor's
  mausoleum to see if he might discover some clue there. Within, Engor's body lay in many crumbling
  pieces, with more thansufficient evidence to show how the filthy rot had contin ued to work on his flesh -
  from his leech outwards -even after he himself was dead!
   Then, to make a quick end of it, Vormulac had poisoned his exhausted, ravaged love with kneblasch
  and silver, and placed her body with Engor's in the mausoleum. The tomb had then been fired like an
  oven; when all was cold again it had been sealed up - forever. Fromwhich day forward Vormulac had
  dreamed of her burning, and of his own flesh slowly softening, until he'd vowed to sleep and dream no
  more. Well, and he hadn'tslept, but it was Maglore's belief that he still dreamed.
  
   The story accounted for the first of his self-given names, Taintspore, likewise for the melancholy aspect
  which both he and Vormspire wore like shrouds ...
   These were some of Maglore's thoughts and memorieswhere he sat at Vormulac's right hand at the head
  of the table. And as their host named and formally introduced the other guests (such introductions were
  mainly unnecessary, for each knew the others well enough; itwas simply a formality, by way of starting
  the proceedings), so the Mage of Runemanse also considered them:
   'The Lady Zindevar of Cronespire,' Vormulac intoned,his voice gritty as gravel. And, with some small
  effort atgallantry: 'Never in all her years more ... more beautiful.'
   'Hah!' she snorted, and her eyes flashed fire at him.'All what years, pray?'
   Vormulac shrugged. 'A handful of handfuls, Lady,'he made amends, however drily. 'And after all, what
  are a few years to the Wamphyri? Why, you are the merestgirl!'
   Much to Maglore's dismay, Zindevar was seated on his immediate right, and she was no 'mere girl' but a
  contemporary. When he had come out of the swamps that time ('lowborn', as it were, a Szgany mystic
  who went into the forbidden places to meditate, breathed a spore and came out Wamphyri), Zindevar
  had already ascended to Cronespire. Then she had been young, buteven then she had not been beautiful!
   She was squat, hairy, of lesbian persuasions, and the atmosphere about her pervaded with a manly
  odourwhich all her many perfumes together could never hopeto obscure. And despite her years - whose
  number fell far short of Vormulac's and exceeded Maglore's - she lookedyoung or in her middle years at
  most, which said a dealfor her mode of life. Zindevar was no great 'ascetic'.
   Rouged and painted, with her elbows on the table and one hand scratching at her chin while the clawlike
  fingers of the other rapped upon the old oak, there wasthis overpowering air of aggression about her, this
  impa tience, this great disdain - mainly of men, Maglore supposed. He could scarcely contain the urge to
  shrink his nostrils and creep away from the touch - even from the thought - of that great fat thigh of hers
  bulging against his where they sat at table. And he refrained from more than a glance into her mind, which
  was full of breasts and behinds of various shapes and styles; and red-rimmed, yawning, pulsating orifices;
  and blood, ofcourse. But the worst of it lay in knowing that he shunned the lascivious display of her mind
  not so much because it was disgusting, but because it was seductive! For whatever his alleged
  sensitivities, Maglore wasWamphyri no less than the Lady Zindever herself.
   As for the mainly derisory agnomen 'Cronesap': while its use was common among the Wamphyri, it was
  never used to Zindevar's face except as a deliberate insult; for which reason Vormulac had avoided it. It
  referred to the way in which she had ascended: by gradually sapping the blood and energy of the ancient
  Lady who had occupied her aerie before her. Nor was she any different now, as her many female thralls
  could doubtless testify. Only a handful of her lieutenants were men in the fullest sense of the word
  (necessary for the protection, maintenance and administration of Cronespire), and even then she kept an
  equal number of female officers, to guarantee a balance. As for Cronespire's menials: all of its males were
  eunuchs to... to a creature.
   So much for Zindevar; Maglore had missed several cursory introductions of lesser lights; even now
  Vormulac was moving on again:
   'Now I bring to your attention the Lord Grigor Haksonof Gauntmanse,' he said, 'with whom we
  commiserate; his get from the draw these several tithes has been scarcely sufficient to his needs.' Grigor,
  tall, thin and shifty-eyed, nodded sourly, perfunctorily, all about the table, then returned to examining his
  
  fingernails. 'Following these proceedings,' Vormulac continued, 'and in the event there are persons
  present who would care to barter with him, Lord Grigor will doubtless make himself available in the
  pursuit of a mutually advantageousdeal or two.'
   Maglore leaned forward a little to scan down the table at Grigor of Gauntmanse, or 'Grigor the Lech' as
  he was known. One of the younger Lords and full oflust, recently his share of the Sunside tithelings — of
  the lottery in human lives - had been low in women; almost without exception his tokens had matched up
  with Szgany males, of which he had plenty. Maglore read it in his mind how tonight, if Grigor could find a
  taker, he would offer four strong men for just two half-decent girls! Someone would make a killing,
  certainly. In othercircumstances it might well be the Lady Wratha. Except,and as Maglore knew, tonight
  she'd be otherwiseengaged.
   So the introductions went on, and next came Canker Canison. To see the Lord of Mangemanse was to
  know that somewhere in his ancestry was a spore-infected dog or fox. Named for the disease of the
  inner ear which had driven his father baying mad (till mountinga flyer he'd soared south into the rising
  sun), Canker had caused the fleshy lobes and fine whorls of his own ears to fret themselves into curious
  and intricate designs,including his sigil, a sickle moon. His hair was red and the gape of his jaws vast; his
  long-striding walk was more a lope; when laughing, he would throw back his head and shake tip to toe.
   Lorn Halfstruck:
   The Lord of Trollmanse was a dwarf among the Wamphyri, with legs which were stunted to little more
  than thighs with feet. But with his barrel chest, hands like grapples, and arms almost as long as himself,
  any who would think to belittle him must maintain a safe distance. His reach was phenomenal, and he
  knew the vulnerability of a man's essential parts ...
   Vasagi the Suck, who was likewise deviant of form:
   Vasagi was the victim of an hereditary bone disease. The small handful of Wamphyri diseases were
  mainly hereditary: various animalisms, several forms of insanity, aggressive autisms, acromegaly and other
  bone disorders; though with the exception of leprosy, they were rarely fatal. But when the growth of
  Vasagi's jaws and teeth had threatened to outstrip the metamorphic fleshof his face, then he'd simply
  extruded them. Which is to say, he'd stripped his upper jaw of teeth, unhinged hislower jaw, withdrawn
  all flesh from the offending bones and so been rid of them. Now, chinless, his mouth was a tapering pale
  pink tentacle tipped with a flexible needle siphon, not unlike the proboscis of a bee, which he could slide
  into the finest vein with amazing dexterity. Needless to say, he was not an ascetic.
   So the list went:
   Ursula Torspawn of Tormanse, who affected analmost human guise even to the extent of wearing
  Sun-sider clothes, with all their leather tassles and tinklingbells (but bells of tin, not silver). Yet at one and
  the same time, she swore by the use of the rendered fats of Szgany women as lotions to hold at bay the
  sag andscathe of more than a century, and kept preserved various mementoes of her lovers down all
  those longyears...in jars. It must be stated, however, that Ursulahad not availed herself of these souvenirs
  while yet their owners lived. For despite that she knew the toll to be paid for the denial of her Wamphyri
  flesh, she was Zolteist to a point, whose nature was neither cruel norentirely sanguinary.
   The list extended itself:
   Lord Eran Painscar; Lady Valeria of Valspire; the Lord Tangiru; Zun of Zunspire; Gorvi the Guile; the
  Lady Devetaki Skullguise (who today, for whatever reason, wore her smiling mask); Wran the Rage and
  
  his brother Spiro Killglance of Madmanse... all of these and many more. Thirty-six Lords in all and seven
  Ladies. The introductions took the best part of an hour.And all the while Maglore aware of Zindevar's
  growing impatience, and of her hot fat thigh against his; and allof their various thoughts impinging upon his
  own, until he could reel from the innuendoes and infamies, thedooms and desires of their collective mind.
   They kept the bulk of their thoughts suppressed, of course, for the Lord of Runemanse was not unique in
  telepathic skills. All of the Wamphyri had them to some extent; at the very least, they could sense the
  directionof another's thoughts. Zindevar, for instance:
   That Lady was as much aware of Maglore's close presence as he was of hers, which might well account
  for her impatience and the lewd scenes with which shefilled her mind. She'd probably reckoned, and
  correctly, that these would suffice to keep him out.
   Taken with the idea, he glanced at her from the corner of his eye - and caught her staring back at him!
  Her eyeswere hot and burned on him, and her nostrils pinchedwith suspicion. So then, and what did she
  have to hide?
   But by now Vormulac had reached an end, and only one was left to announce: Wratha the Risen.
  Maglore put all else out of mind in order to concentrate on theTithemaster's introduction:
   The Lady Wratha,' Vormulac intoned, narrowing his eyes, 'of Wrathspire ...' But now there was an edge
  to his gravelly tone, so that all fidgeting and murmuring stopped at once and all eyes turned to Wratha -
  whichwas no great hardship.
   Maglore looked along the table to where she was seated at the very end facing Vormulac down its great
  length, and knew that he had never seen her looking more ... delicious, indeed edible! And in that
  selfsame moment the mental ether was full of two waves of thought: one of lust, and the other a jealous
  loathing.No need to search for the origins of such sweeping emo tions. Ah, but the crests of both waves
  foamed withsomething of respect, too, and even admiration! Aye, forWratha the Risen had style.
   She had not seated herself properly in her chair but was curled there, entirely at ease, with both elbows
  on one rest and her hands supporting her chin. Her hair fell in plaits almost to her shoulders, which were
  fitted with a torque of finely worked gold. Depending from this golden harness, ropes of black bat fur
  hung downvertically to form a smoky curtain. Wratha's pale shoul ders showed through, likewise her
  arms, the points of her tilted breasts, a large area of immaculate thigh and her knees where her legs were
  folded. Seen as pale curving stripes through dusty black bars, the rest ofher was scarcely secure from
  viewing.
   Paradoxically but not unusually, Wratha's eyes were least in evidence; they were protected by the scarp
  of figured bone upon her brow, their fire subdued by the ornamentation of blue glass ovals at her temples,
  andmatching earrings where they dangled from the fine-furred lobes of her ears. But apart from her
  Wamphyri ears and the tilted, somewhat flattened aspect of her nose, whose convolutions were not
  exaggerated to any great degree - and the red-flickering fork of her tongue, of course - apart from these
  things, she might well beSzgany: a clean-limbed Gypsy girl from Sunside, whose flesh was still untried,
  just as she must have appearedto Karl the Crag almost a hundred years ago.
   Except... where was Karl now?
   A few chairs away from Maglore, Grigor Hakson made small choking noises deep in his throat, which
  Maglore sensed rather than heard. He turned his attention to the Lord of Gauntmanse, whose mind was
  now an open book.If I could have her (Grigor lusted for allhe was worth). Ah, that mouth.' And how I
  
  wouldfill it!She beds Szgany whelps, so whelmedby her curves theydribble on her thigh. Butif I could
  have her ...myliquidswould scald her like steam, even to the core!
   Maglore scanned no more; in any case, they were all thinking much the same thoughts. The men, at least.
  As for the women: they thought other things. Devetaki Skullguise was amused, well in keeping with her
  mask; one or two others were envious, their glances sour;Zindevar of Cronespire thought:
   Pale and skinny bitch! Szgany whore.' She showsherselfto men,gives herself to men! And to think...
  upon a time Ieven thought to have herfor myself! Well, let leprosy rot her softest parts, and worms
  crawl in all her openings!
   'Aye, Wratha the Risen,' Vormulac repeated, his eyes staring and forelocks beginning to quiver. 'Whom
  some might say has risen too far!' He put his great hands on the table as if ready to come to his feet; and
  farthest away from him, Wratha likewise straightened up andlowered her feet to the floor.
   'Ifyour tone and words have any meaning, Lord Vormulac,' she hissed, 'then perhaps you'd better
  explainit!'
   'Better?' the flesh at the corner of his mouth twitched, tugging at his beard. 'Better!'
   'I came here at the polite behest of a Lord!' Her voice was also rising. 'It is not the case that some ...
  some swaggering lieutenant lout has crooked his finger at me, and like a scullery girl I have hastened to
  his beck. What? I am the Lady Wratha! Not some Sunside slut to be bullied, abused, and ... and
  insulted! "Risen toofar", indeed!'
   As Wratha's blood grew heated, so she herselfchanged. It was her vampire, reacting to her emotions,
  her anger, pumping its essence into her veins in the same way that lesser mortals pump adrenalin. For she
  had sensed that she was to be something of a focus here, and this was her response: to gird herself for
  whatever was in the offing.
   Without so much as blinking an eye, she gained inches in height as her flesh and bones stretched, so that
  she seemed to grow in her chair. Her cheeks shrank inwards, ageing her face to gauntness in a moment.
  Theridges of her nose took on clear definition; its flat flange turned darkly moist, with nostrils which flared
  and gaped. Her breasts, beautiful and girlish one moment, in the next became wrinkled, fell flat, withdrew
  under the bat-fur ropes of her gown. And her eyes ...
   .. . Little wonder she keeps them hooded! thoughtMaglore. For now beneath the carved cowl of bone
  upon her brow, Wratha's eyes were blobs of hellfire, startinglike scarlet plums from their sockets.
   Among the Wamphyri there had always been thoseof hybrid origin; their mutations were many; their
  meta- morphism allowed transmutation into endless varietiesof form. But few manifestations were ghastly
  as theLady Wratha's eyes.
   It was mainly that she had no control over it: only anger or threaten her, and this was the result. It was
  nothing that she willed; rather, it was something she would unwill, if that were possible. For it was this
  -this swift transformation from a girl into a demonic thing - which even the most hardened Wamphyri
  Lord found monstrous and, yes, unnatural. Well, and itscause had been unnatural, as Maglore knew well
  enough.
   Reading minds the way he did, he'd long since learnedthe source of it, which lay one hundred years in
  the past, in the time of Wratha's premature burial. For it was then, awakening from death to undeath in
  
  her cavern tomb, that Wratha's eyes had first started in this way. Except hers was no mere
  claustrophobia of the flesh, nor even of the mind, but of her leech itself. Oh, it reacted like all vampires to
  threat or pressure -by fighting, or by attempting to break out or away from the immediate hazard - but it
  reacted more so, and more violently. For in the time of her entombment, Wratha had been driven
  partially mad, which madness had later transferred to her parasite. And now, host and leech alike, their
  moods and sporadic rages werefused inseparably.
   Guilty as sinitself!Vormulac thought, where he satand trembled with fury and outrage at the head of the
  table. The reactionof her leech, andof her flesh, is atonce apparent.' She givesherself away, in frontof
  every one. Her accusers,myself included, are correct in theireverysuspicion. Except, I have gone too
  fast; this is not going the way Maglore, Devetaki and I planned it. Where/ore and for the momentI must
  back off. Buthow?
   The Lady of Masquemanse came to Vormulac'srescue, though whether by chance or design Maglore
  couldn't say; but he did note that Devetaki had replaced her smiling mask with one that frowned. And
  now, tut-tutting, and glancing from the tail of the table to itshead and back again, she said:
   'But Wratha - ah, Wratha my child - and why is your mood so poor tonight? The Lord Vormulac
  intended no slight or accusation, I'm sure, but merely stated a fact. For as you yourself must be aware,
  there are several here who do envy you that you are risen so high, even as Vormulac intimated. You
  know it and so do we all, for they protest your status at every opportunity. So? But they protest mine
  also, and even Vormulac's! And isn't that just the way of things? Why, we are all full of such petty
  jealousies, of one thing oranother! And surely it's better to be envied thanignored.'
   Clever! thought Maglore, who now saw how Devetakideliberately cooled the proceedings, not only
  giving Vormulac the chance to make amends but also allowing time for their scheme to take its proper
  course, both within and without this meeting. For it would never do to have the Lady Wratha leave in a
  huff - not now, at this very moment — and perhaps discover for herselfhow the wind blew. Yes, very
  clever! For Maglore like wise knew that Devetaki Skullguise of Masquemanse was one of Wratha's
  principal accusers.
   Devetaki had been there - indeed, she had been here, right here in Vormspire, with Maglore and
  Vormulac, contemporaries with whom she formed a covert Wamphyri triumvirate — at that secret
  meeting where this meeting had been decided. Here, in the privacy of Vormspire's upper levels, at that
  uncomfortable but secure hour of sunup when the peak's exterior wasblasted by scorching rays, they'd
  convened to discuss ... Wratha! Then Devetaki had told how certain unnamed informers had warned her
  of Wratha's works, which were such that they must be brought to the attention of the others; all of which
  transgressions, when they were described, coincided with Maglore's own fears and convictions, accruing
  mainly from hismind-spying.
   Thus Devetaki, no less than Maglore, had brought charges against Wratha; but at the same time she'd
  vetoed all but the mildest of the corrective or punitive measures which Vormulac had then proposed.
  Sufficient that Wratha's new breed of warriors be destroyed, she said, and the Lady herself warned off
  from any further experimentation. Like measures must also betaken against a handful of younger Lords,
  whom Wrath-spire's Lady had allegedly inveigled into producing simi lar beasts of their own. So it had
  become apparent that Devetaki still 'liked' or 'cared for' Wratha, despite thatshe'd informed on her.
   Of course, the question had also arisen as to why Wratha needed such aerial warriors? To protect
  herself? But against whom? Or... could it be that sheplanned for war?
   Here Devetaki and Maglore had agreed that the Lady did not appear especially ambitious in respect of
  
  Turgosheim itself, not yet. But from Maglore's mindreadingand Devetaki's sources, they had gathered
  that she intended to strike west - into Old Starside! At last Turgosheim's precincts had become too
  narrow, too constraining. The younger Lords would break out, andWratha would lead them.
   All very well, but in the unlikely event that the Old Wamphyri were still mighty in Starside, Wratha could
  only betray the presence of those here in Turgosheim!And if she and the younger Lords lost their fight
  against them, how long before those great and practised warriors came seeking her place of origin?
  Conversely, ifWratha found Olden Starside deserted and settled there, how long before she'd build
  armies of her own with which to return to Turgosheim, this time as a warrior queen? Ah, for she was
  quite the one for rising up and returning, this Wratha!
   Therefore, to simply let her go and to hell with her wasout of the question. Wratha was headstrong, even
  'wicked'... they dared not let her get away with it, and take the chance that in some not so distant future
  she'd make them pay for it. Vormulac, Devetaki and Maglore, theywould go ahead and apply their
  agreed sanctions. But in order to do so, first they must arrange and provide the distraction of a gathering
  of all the Wamphyri together: this gathering. Which was how it had come about...
   Such were Maglore's thoughts, which had centred(perhaps too centrally) on Devetaki Skullguise. For
  while reminiscing in the aftermath of Devetaki's concilia tory speech, so he'd unconsciously swept her
  mind witha telepathic probe. And:
   Is there no privacy? Devetaki asked him directly, suddenly, and without changing her expression or even
  glancing in his direction.
   Eh? Maglore gave a start, and at once apologized: Excuse me, dear Lady, but I was carried away by the
  proceedings.
   Devetaki was a telepath in her own right, a mentalistof no meagre talent, and so knew that Maglore's
  apology was sincere. Also, he was an old 'colleague'. Nevertheless: Handsoff my mind, Maglore.' she
  warned. Drift inthe feeble, shallow thoughts of others all you will andcatch what sprats you can. But
  beware the swirly deeps,for there dwell great and vicious fishes!
   Ah! - indeed, he agreed, and hurriedly moved on. Allof which, like his reminiscing, had been the
  substance of mental processes, literally as swift as thought. Butmeanwhile:
   'Well?' Wratha had unwound somewhat. Now she letherself slump down a little in her chair. Some
  semblanceof youth had crept back into her looks; her narrowed eyes were hidden again under the bone
  scarp upon her forehead; her body was gradually recovering its previous blush, however pale. And her
  voice, no longer hissing but a chime, reached out all along the great table to Vormulac. 'And has the Lady
  of Masquemanse read itaright?'
   Vormulac knew how he would like to answer, butmust not. He nodded instead, however curtly, and
  added creatively, 'But it is your nature, Wratha - something in the way you ... posture? - to make yourself
  a great distraction. We have serious matters to discuss here. I desire that these Lords give all of their
  attention to me, and in a moment to Maglore. Alas, but a good deal oftheir attention - far too much of it -
  goes to you!'
   No more! Grigor of Gauntmanse gave a mental shudder. He had heard tales of Wratha's awesome
  retrogressions but never before witnessed one.I am saved in thenickof time. She is a hag!
   Wratha, however, seemed appeased. She pouted a little, then deliberately took up her former relaxed
  
  and revealing position, that 'posture' to which Vormulachad referred.
   Maglore, allowing himself a wry grin, glanced out ofthe corner of his eye at Zindevar. Aha! she was
  thinking. These men! But they are all alike: dogs who shag uselessly against the thighs of trogs. Except
  now they haveseen this 'Lady' as she really is: a great crone! Hah! Well, and I, Zindevar, have dealt with
  cronesbefore! This Wratha ... she should be fed to the beasts which she breeds in her not-so-secret vats!
  Ah,if only I couldhave persuaded Devetaki to a like solution ...
   This told Maglore something and at the same time explained Zindevar's impatience and furtiveness, the
  way she shielded her mind against intrusion. Quite obvi ously, she was one of Devetaki's informants in
  respect of Wratha's illegal activities. But since Zindevar was known to operate a spy network second to
  none among Turgosheim's spires and manses, this hardly came asany great surprise.
   As to why Zindevar should be so keen to conceal herpart in all of this ... two reasons, possibly. One: she
  feared the Mistress of Wrathspire's reprisal, should she emerge unscathed. (Aye, for Wratha had a good
  manymen at her disposal, while Zindevar's crew were mainly women.) Two: despite that Zindevar was an
  envious bloodbag, she didn't much relish her ugly reputation as a sapper of crones and a curse on her
  own sex in general. Or, if she did relish it, still she would seek todisguise the fact. So that where on the
  one hand Wratha must be considered corrupt, Zindevar on the other wasdevious to a fault!
   Ah, well (and the Mage of Runemanse gave a mentalshrug), no one was perfect...
   Meanwhile, things had simmered down. All around the table, the Wamphyri were taking wine and a little
  raw red meat - the halved hearts of suckling wolves, Maglore noted — to moisten their throats. He
  glanced from one face to the next, penetrating to their thoughtswhen and wherever he could.
   Wratha's mind was shielded. As was her wont, she conjured thick banks of fog in her head to exclude
  unwanted mental attentions. Wratha was no great telepath but knew how to block the stuff. Perhaps
  understandably, there were several others around thetable who employed similar devices:
   Zindevar of Cronespire, of course, with her crudely lascivious gallery; but also Vasagi the Suck? Canker
  Canison? The brothers Wran and Spiro of Madmanse? Gorvi the Guile? Strange bedfellows, these! Or
  werethey?
   Maglore nodded knowingly, if only to himself. Oh, yes, they'd be careful, all right, this bunch. For they
  were in it to a man, even as deep as Wratha herself! Aye, for these were those selfsame Lords which she
  had inveigled. And their minds were clamped shut likelichens to rocks.
   But ... might that not indicate that they knew, or at least suspected, that something was in the wind? And
  indeed Wratha had been quick off the mark, when in his anger Vormulac had almost given the show
  away. No time to worry about it now, however, for on Maglore's left Vormulac was on his feet and
  holding uphis arms to quiet the murmur. And:
   'Now to business,' Vormspire's Master grunted. 'But first, in order to refresh your memories with regard
  to the background of the matter in hand, allow me to reintroduce Maglore of Runemanse, whose
  knowledgeof our history, from Turgosheim's humble beginnings to the present day, is unsurpassed. I give
  you the SeerLord Maglore.'
   As Vormulac sat down, so Maglore climbed creaking to his feet. Now it was his turn to keep the show
  going. Ah, but if only he could be sure that it wasn't already over ...
  
    
    
    
   Ill
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
   'Two thousand years ago,' Maglore began without pauseor any further introduction, Turgosheim was a
  vast canyon: a place where the mountains had torn themselves asunder, a deep dark stony gash with its
  mouth opening towards the Icelands far to the north. Its uneven body gaped like a wound in the belly of
  the mountains, and its several tails tapered into the passeswhich lead to Sunside.
   'Within the canyon stood a good many stacks andspires eroded or split from the original rock, some
  whose roofs were flat and others which were craggy. And in the canyon's walls were caverns and
  overhangs and ledges galore, so that the very rock was honeycombed.The gorge was some four miles
  long north to south, two and a half to three east to west, and mainly sheltered from the sun at its zenith by
  the body of the range itself. Only the highest spires and flat summits ever feltthe full force of the sun.
   'In its bed, the canyon was a jumble of fallen boulders, scree, lesser ravines and olden watercourses,
  with some deep caverns in the walls where lowly trogs livedout their lives in gloom and ignorance. In the
  beginning, our ancestors were obliged to utilize these dull creatures as best they could, at least until they
  could explore Sunside for the bounty of its forests and lakes, and itsSzgany settlements, of course.
   'In short, Turgosheim the canyon was much as it is now, with the exception that it was empty, and only a
  handful of Turgo Zolte's people to furnish and inhabitits spires and manses. But to them, despite that in
  reality Turgosheim was a small place, it looked huge! Not so vast an area as Olden Starside with its
  rearing stacks and endless boulder plains, no, but enormous to them who were so few. And trog meat
  plentiful, andeventually the sweeter meats of Sunside, too.
   'Plentiful, aye, in that time when Turgo Zolte's people,who had fled here from the devil Shaitan in Olden
  
  Starside, were only a handful...
   The great manses were built, extended, and furnished with cartilage and bone; and all the spires likewise,
  their external stairways covered over and protected by oiled skins, in imitation of those mightier stacks in
  Olden Starside. The passes to Sunside were opened up; at sundown our ancestors hunted in the forests,
  flying home before sunup with their booty. Life was good, and the Wamphyri prospered ... for a while.
  'They prospered,  and they multiplied.  Turgo had crashed and died in the swamps; his body produced
  spores; animals and men from Sunside were infected. Some of them joined with Turgosheim's Wamphyri
  and no one objected. For despite that these outsiders were lowborn, of spores and not the true egg, still
  they made us strong. And as yet there was room galore in the great canyon. Ah, but all the time what
  space there was... it was narrowing down!
   'Lords begat Lords and Ladies, likewise the swamps, and in six hundred years Turgosheim was
  crowded.Even the smaller manses, the lowliest spires, were occu pied, and Wamphyri blazons fluttered
  from the merest mounds. And the road to ascension was hard indeed, when the new Lords must inhabit
  stacks which in anearlier time had been rejected as mere stumps!
   'Meanwhile, Zolteism as a creed had waned. Hard to deny oneself with all of the good things of life so
  closeat hand, a twilight's flight away over the peaks or through the passes. They, our ancestors, revelled
  in blood and the hunt, and the fulfilment of their leechesbecame their only pastime. As for their carnal
  appetites: they satisfied those, and with enormous zest, among the tribes of the Szgany. But to what end?
  Yet moreLords and Ladies, and no more room to house them.
   'Men go to war for two main reasons; to feed themselves, and to expand into new territory. No, three,
  for even the most peaceful of men will retaliate against anaggressive neighbour who seeks to relieve him
  of those selfsame commodities, food and space. The Wamphyri were no different. Of food there was
  plenty - as yet -but space was limited. Lesser Lords of low-huddlingmansions envied those in their
  rearing spires, and slovens in crumbling caves could only imagine the opulence of Ladies in their vasty
  caverns. As for fresh-spawned vampires: they must be satisfied with their lot in whatever niches were
  available in the canyon floor!
   'Satisfied ...? Oh ...?
   'It was a scenario for war!
   'Younger or less affluent Lords banded together and made vampire thralls, lieutenants, warriors, more
  thanany legitimate requirement. They marched on the greater spires, to take them one at a time. And for
  every Lord vanquished, staked out, beheaded, burned, there werethree or four to occupy the various
  levels of the ravaged stack. And then the new masters of these levels, being freshly blooded and full of
  battle, would make warwith each other: level against level, stack against stack, manse against manse!
  Even so, amidst all the reek and roil, most of the Warlords held back from breeding warriors with the
  power of flight, for any who broke this rule would soon find themselves under attack fromall the others in
  a body.
   'But after each wave of fighting, victors and vanquished both would see how worn down and rag-tag
  they had become, and raid on Sunside like recurrent plagues to replenish themselves. And we may
  readily understand how, in order to fuel themselves for more war - or restore themselves in its aftermath -
  our Wamphyri ancestors raped and depleted Sunside. How, with never a thought for the future, they
  harried the Szgany who were that future almost to extinction! Aye, for while some of us may have
  resisted it all our lives, we nevertheless admit that the bloodis the life, and in those early days of
  Turgosheim Szgany blood was rapidly running out!
  
   'Eventually, common sense prevailed; the Lords calleda Grand Truce; they gathered together and talked.
  And here, thirteen hundred years later, we may considerourselves fortunate that among the hotheads
  were think ers. They saw now how Turgosheim was small in comparison with Olden Starside in the west.
  Turgosheim was small; the range in which it was a gash was small; the region across the mountains —
  called Sunside forobvious reasons — that, too, was small. Quite obviously, to destroy Sunside would
  have been to destroy themselves. So they saw how close they'd come to disaster. Well, the upshot was
  this:
   'No more wars, not for some time, anyway; a resurgence of Zolteism; a ban on raiding, even hunting on
  Sunside, and likewise on the breeding of unnecessary creatures. Peace returned to Turgosheim .. . but at
  a price. What price? Suppression of Wamphyri passions, the outlawing of territorial expansionism, and
  the introduction of the tithe-system. Which rules apply even to the present day, and we've each sworn by
  our sigils toabide by them.
   'Oh, there have been feuds, even wars between times,but never so wasteful, and never so threatening to
  all ofus. So things have stood for long and long.
   'Except .. . times are changing, and the changes have crept up on us all but unseen. My meaning? Simply
  this: that once again Turgosheim is filling up, with toomany thralls, lieutenants, Lords and Ladies. Except
  this time it's our duty to heed the lessons of history, and never again allow matters to reach such a head
  that wego up against each other.
   'In short: we need to expand! - but outwards, to avoid a great clashing of heads. Aye, and some among
  us may even feel the need to abandon Turgo Zolte'sdoctrines entirely, and let their parasites hold full
  sway. For they fear the stagnation of their leeches, which arethe driving force of the Wamphyri as a race.
   'Expansion, then - but to where? In all this range there is only one gorge suitable to our needs, whose
  spires and caverns are protected from the sun: Turgosheim. As for new blood for our young Lords and
  Ladies - from what source? Already Sunside feels the strain, as it did those many hundred years ago. The
  Szgany are grown unwilling to breed; some put their girl babies to death, and disfigure their boys rather
  than let them grow up and be taken in the tithe. Oh, they'll part with their fruits, wines, grain and livestock
  readily enough; but their children were harder come by, and so harder relinquished.
   'Nor may we assist in that respect; that is, with regardto their reluctance to impregnate their women. For
  whileour lustier Lords would doubtless relish such ... suchforays into Sunside, the seed of vampires
  breeds onlyvampires. Of which we have enough.
  'And so I say again: expansion, which seems to be our only recourse. But the question remains, where to
  expand? Into which legendary land of plenty? Wellexactly, into a literally legendary land of plenty - into
  Olden Starside itself!'
   As Maglore paused a murmur went round the table. There had been some small background noise
  before, when first he'd commenced to speak: a cough or snort here and there; a disinterested shuffling of
  feet, chairs; the occasional whisper. But now their attention wasvery much riveted upon Maglore, and the
  Mage of Runemanse could feel the weight of every scarlet glare, sense the swirl of hot, speculative
  thoughts, where he stoodwaiting for their low mutterings to fade. Until finally:
  
   'I am a seer, as well you know,' he continued. 'Seer and mentalist both. And for many years I have
  scried upon Starside - but carefully! For in their time the Old Wamphyri had wizards, too; indeed, and
  until recently, there were still great minds in those remote western reaches, where mighty sorcerers had
  come among the descendants of Shaitan in their aeries. I sensed their presence there, and knew they
  commanded Powers outof alien worlds!
   'Eighteen years ago there was a war, then four years of peace when nothing of their thoughts reached out
  tome, and finally . . .
   '... Finally, fourteen years ago, the time of the Light-in-the-West. Sensitive eyes detected it: like the
  glimmerof a white sun rising, but westwards; it cracked like dawn, and then was gone. But sensitive flesh
  recordedthe tremor which accompanied it, racking the earth in its passing. And sensitive dreamers felt its
  rolling thunder deep in the floors of their manses, which brought them starting awake. I was one of them
  who shot awake thattime, and in my mind there burned a sigil out of nowhere,which I have taken for my
  own from that day to this.
   'As for the meaning of the light itself:
   'I, Maglore, have voiced a theory: that the last of thegreat old Wamphyri magicians brought down a
  calamityon Olden Starside, since when they are no more. Except...I could be wrong. They might be there
  in their aeries as before, but quieter now and biding their time. Till what? Till when? No way to know,
  unless we go anddiscover for ourselves, one way or the other ...'
   The Mage of Runemanse shrugged and scratched hischin;he had played his part; he was glad to sit
  down.
   Replacing him, Vormulac came to his feet and held out his arms for silence. For following the momentary
  lull as Maglore had finished speaking, now Vormspire's great hall was suddenly alive with the shouts and
  queries of many of the younger Lords, reacting with feverish excitement to the Mage's hints of ventures
  and explorations - and possibly even war - in the west.
   'Wait!' Vormulac commanded - and again: 'Wait!' -as the clamour threatened to become an uproar and
  drown him out. But gradually the din subsided as they all leaned forward in their chairs and focused their
  attention on the Lord of Vormspire; all except Wratha, who made small but significant gestures to her
  cohortssitting there. Maglore saw or sensed these urgent covert signals, but made no effort to alert
  Vormulac. By now the deed was done, anyway, and nothing Wratha coulddo about it - except rage!
   The rest of them were under Vormulac's control now,eager to hear what he had to say. He glanced
  down at Maglore on his right and nodded, and said: 'Our thanks to the learned Lord of Runemanse, for
  detailing the histories and background to these times and circumstances in which we live; certain of our
  circumstances, at least ...' His voice was low, dark, insinuating. Andafter a pause in which the hall grew
  even quieter: 'There are, however, other circumstances to which I wouldalert you, and they are these:'
   (Wratha was sitting up now, and making more of her urgent signals, even as Vormulac commenced what
  would quickly become a series of grave accusations): 'First,' he began, 'Maglore has mentioned the
  making of unseemly warriors, fighting creatures with the power of flight. They have been forbidden in
  Turgosheim since Turgosheim's first day. Second, territorialism, or rather expansionism: forbidden,
  except in the near future outside Turgosheim, where now it has become a necessity. We must seek to
  move out, and soon, but it is still a crime to prepare for war within. Third, the tithe, a subject which I
  know certain of you hold close to your hearts, because of what is seen as its... inadequacies? For while
  the grain, beasts, fruits, wines of Sunsidehave always been distributed evenly, fairly, and accord ing to
  
  individual needs, its human produce has been apportioned on the basis of pure chance. "Pure", yes .. .
   'This was necessary, certainly, lest the flower of Szgany females go to Zindevar of Cronespire, Grigor
  Hakson of Gauntmanse, and others of the younger Lords; and likewise Sunside's young males to persons
  of other persuasions. I make no discrimination here: we are what we are, and no one's needs are less
  than any other's, except in the requirements of their spires andmanses, which differ according to size.
   'So -' (he gave a shrug) '- occasionally the finger of fortune points the other way: those who require girls
  get youths, and vice versa. But time usually evens up the score, and if not we resort to barter,
  occasionally at a loss depending on our needs. And because it has been - or rather, while it was - a
  matter of random but equal chance, the system was seen to work well enough. Until now ...
   'Well, I have made certain points, but without beingspecific. Time now to be specific!' He looked at
  Wratha,directly, the glare of his eyes reaching out to her downthe full length of the table. Glaring back at
  him, her guard slipped, and Maglore read in her mind a singleword: Flight.'
   He looked at the others sitting there: Gorvi the Guile,whose thin face was void of expression, and his
  mind shielded by a white, impenetrable glare. The brothersWran the Rage and Spiro Killglance of
  Madmanse: the one remarkably placid, while the features of the second were twisted (as was Spiro's
  custom when cornered) into a hateful mask. Canker Canison: more wolf- ordog-like than ever, his feral
  eyes shifting this way and that but mainly watching Wratha. Lastly Vasagi theSuck: whose thoughts were
  usually strange as his coun tenance and often unreadable - never more so than right now - though
  Maglore did glimpse monsters in them, and knew that Vasagi's mastery over metamorphism must give
  him the edge in the breeding of weirdwarriors.
   All of them: they had pushed their chairs back a little; they cast sporadic glances over their shoulders,
  checking that the way was clear behind them; they controlled their hearts, which to a man were beating
  faster.
   For Vormulac's gaze had transferred from Wratha tothem, bathing each in his turn in the red glare of his
  eyes. And now he spoke to them:
   'For long and long we the Wamphyri Lords and Ladies of Turgosheim have known the penalties to be
  paid by any among us who would transgress against our laws. Penalties great and small, depending on
  the wrong which must be righted. Recently, accusationshave been made which I, Vormulac, have
  investigated. First the matter of the titheling draw, its supposed "impartiality". What? The draw impartial?
  Hah.' Andindeed the Lord Grigor of Gauntmanse has a right to feel dissatisfied at his poor get, from a
  system whichfor some time now has been manipulated!'
   What?.' The astonished, outraged thought blasted outas from one mind - almost. For of course to some
  of them gathered here, Vormulac's accusation came as no great surprise. But among the majority: jaws
  dropped as if hinged; split tongues flickered and damp black nostrils gaped; eyes opened wide and
  scarlet. A furious fist (Grigor's) slammed down upon the table and made it shudder; speechless for the
  moment, in the next hewould doubtless demand a name or names.
   And perhaps he had one already. For Canker Canisonhad somehow contrived to slink away from the
  table to one of the great open windows, where even now he drew the curtains and leaned out. In a
  moment he was noticed; heads turned in his direction; he faced backinto the room, staggering this way
  and that. 'Such treach ery!' he barked, his muzzle wrinkling back from canine teeth. To rig the draw! It
  makes me sick! I grow nauseous from the lack of good clean air ...'
  
   And as Canker stumbled towards Wratha's end of the table, close to the arched exit from the hall and
  the stairway to the landing bays, so Maglore thought: Hehas given a signal.' Beyond the window,
  somethingwaits.'
   But already, and apparently unperturbed, Vormulac was continuing. 'Second,' (he once again held up his
  arms for quiet), 'of the making of warriors beyondcommon requirements: why, I have it on good authority
  that just such monsters are waxing even now, in secretcaverns in certain spires and manses!'
   What?.' Again the outrage, the astonishment, hurled out from their massed mind. But before it could be
  given voice:
   'Warriors, aye!' Vormulac raged, at last giving vent topreviously suppressed fury. 'And for what, I ask, if
  notfor war? Enough! Now I accuse!'
   Sidling away from their vacated chairs, Gorvi the Guile, the twins of Madmanse, and Vasagi the Suck
  joined Canker Canison where he edged towards Wratha. Vormulac pointed them out, and all heads and
  eyes swivelled to follow his trembling, stabbing finger. 'There they go,' he spat the words out as if they
  were poison. 'Full of guilt, as witness their stealth. Canker,with his tail between his legs: a mangy cur
  indeed! And Vasagi the Suck, who alienates himself even furtherfrom his fellows. Also Gorvi the Guile,
  never so deceitful as now. And Wran and Spiro of Madmanse, whosemadness finally overflows!'
   Wratha was free of her chair; the others joined her;they backed off towards the arched exit.
   'See them go,' Vormulac shouted, 'who by their own actions betray themselves! For I ask you, would
  innocents react in such a fashion? See, they join their leader,the very author of this treachery, of whom I
  say again: she has risen too far! But why is everyone astir? Becalm all of you, and sit down. They shall
  not escape.'
   Many of the outraged Lords and Ladies were throwing back their chairs, springing to their feet, some
  reaching instinctively for gauntlets which were no longer there, relinquished in Vormspire's landing-bay
  antechambers. Others had commenced to surge menacingly along both sides of the great table towards
  Wratha and her five, but came to an abrupt halt as Vormulac putfingers to his lips and whistled.
   It was a short, shrill, even ear-piercing blast ... and it was a summons. He could have called his creature
  just as easily with his mind, indeed more easily, but did it this way, openly, so that all of them would
  knowwhat he was about. And now to a man they saw howWratha was trapped.
   All except Maglore, who wondered: Why has she notundergone her monstrous transformation? Why is
  sheso cool? And at once answered himself: Because now is no timefor raging but for thinking, and even
  now shecalculates!
   'Now hold!' Wratha hissed, as if to prove Maglore's point, and produced from beneath the bat-fur ropes
  of her robe a curious instrument formed of some small creature's bladder attached to a slender silver rod
  or wand. She held the bulb in her hand, pointing the wand into the hall. And: 'Oil of kneblasch,' she
  informed, squeezing the bulb however slightly. A fine spray issued out from perforations in the end of the
  rod, hanging in the air like a mist.
   The aerosol's effect was immediate. As a thin garlic waft permeated the hall, the furious Lords and
  Ladies groaned and began to retreat towards Vormulac wherehe stood at the head of the table. Their
  faces had turned pale, even sickly; they shouldered each other aside in their anxiety to put distance
  between themselves andWratha's illegal weapon.
  
   Then, as a frantic clattering of chitin and a series ofquerying animal grunts sounded from the stairwell
  beyond the arch, Wratha warned them: 'Enough poison in this bladder to drive all of you to your
  sickbeds for a sunup, and some of you permanently! Call off yourcreature, Vormulac, or suffer the
  consequences. If your guardian warrior so much as glares at me, believe me ... I'll crush this bulb flat!'
   Vormulac's warrior, his personal bodyguard, came through the archway. It was a small one of its sort,
  nomore than a ton or two in weight but very ugly: a thing of hooks and pincers, grapnel arms and
  stabbers. Slategrey and chitin-blue, with its scales rattling where it scurried like a scorpion towards the
  six accused, thecreature's intentions seemed murderous.
   'Vormulac!' Wratha bared her fangs, prepared tosqueeze her bulb.
   'Wait!' the Lord of Vormspire snarled at his warrior, and brought it clattering to a halt. And to Wratha:
  'Lady, why do you delay matters? My warrior's not here to harm you, but to ensure that you do no more
  harm! He is your escort out of this place, into the shame andseclusion which you all deserve so well.'
   Amazingly, she laughed. 'What? And do you banish us like wayward children, back to our spires and
  manses? No, I think not. For Olden Starside waits, and we would be the first to claim its aeries, and all
  thesprawling treasures of legendary Sunside.'
   ' "Would be", aye,' Vormulac answered her, grin forgrin. 'Oh, I know your ambitions well enough. But
  your plans lie in ruins, Wratha, and that's the penalty you pay. For while we've kept you busy here, our
  mosttrusted lieutenants have commandeered your aerial war riors, or destroyed them in their vats. By
  now your forbidden creatures, and those of these dogs who run with you, are either dead or redirected.
  So, you would be first in Olden Starside, eh? Well, we say you'll belast!'
   Again she laughed ... then crouched down snarling, and pointed her wand at Maglore. At that range
  there was no way she could squirt him, but still he cringedinside. And: 'You, mentalist,' she hissed.
  Thought-thief. Why, I've sensed your snooping for all of a ten-year. But you could only hear such
  thoughts as we chose tothink! Aye, and so you've followed a false trail, Magloreof Runemanse.'
   Now she pointed at Zindevar, saying: 'And you, blood-hag. Ah, I remember you! You were ever the
  jealous one, even from the first. Why, if not for Devetaki, who overruled you, you would have vetoed my
  ascension, then tried to take me for ... for your companion! How dared you ever imagine that I, Wratha,
  would make my bed with such as you? What? When there's ripe raw muck in the methane pits? And did
  you think I couldn't buy your spies, or offer them what you could not possibly give? Ah, but you've sent
  some pretty boys into Wrathspire, my Lady Cronesap! I thank you, for I had them all before sending
  them back again, but without the information you required. Or at best, with the wronginformation!'
   Now, while Zindevar fumed and sputtered, Wratha looked at Devetaki Skullguise, and saw that in her
  anger she wore no mask but had exposed the damaged half of her face down to the flensed bone. 'And
  you, Devetaki,who was my good friend,' she said, her voice low now and less spiteful. 'Indeed, I
  admired you greatly. But you've listened to my enemies, and so become one of them ...'
   She threw back her shoulders. 'Well, and you are all fools ... but none so great as you, Vormulac!
  What? Warriors waxing even now in secret caverns? But I tell you - they are waxed!'
   And as for the third time she laughed, so Canker Canison lifted his muzzle and howled like a wolf. It was
  an eerie ululation, which passed out through the high windows and into the gulf of Turgosheim. And no
  less than Vormulac's whistle, it was also a call - whichin a moment was answered!
  
   But between times: 'Rush them!' Grigor the Lech shouted. 'What? And are we afraid of a stench? If the
  bitch uses her weapon, she and her pack are vulnerable no less than the rest of us! Vormulac, use your
  warriorto crush them!'
   The Lords and Ladies took heart and surged forward again. Vormulac's creature, waiting for his
  command, sensed the tension and the fact that the six had been alienated; it clattered this way and that,
  watching them, undecided, with its stabbers and pincers at the ready. Wratha aimed her spray: at the
  skittering warrior -then at the Lords and Ladies - then back to the warrior. She was no longer in control,
  and her girl-shape wasgradually giving way to monstrous metamorphism.
   Finally ...
   ... Canker Canison laughed! He threw back his head and shook like a fox shedding fleas, and a weird
  newsound - in fact a very old sound, out of times immemor ial - sounded in Vormspire. The throb and
  sputter ofan aerial warrior's propulsive orifices!
   There came a wind from the great window, which blew the heavy curtains inwards; but in the next
  moment they were torn from their hangings by a nightmare shape whose armoured bulk barely cleared
  the gap as it slammed through the parapet wall, tore up the flags of the floor and skidded to a halt within
  the greathall! A warrior, but what a warrior!
   If the dimensions of Vormulac's poor creature were six times as great, still it would not equal this one.
  Moreover, since Vormspire's upper levels were all of two thousand feet above Turgosheim's bottoms,
  this monster was not only equipped for but had alreadyproved itself in flight.
   There!' Wratha howled in savage glee, as masonry and cartilage from the shattered balcony went flying,
  and dust from the rubble billowed up in a suffocating cloud. And as the monster's acid breath burned
  through the torn shreds of curtains draping its incredible head,she cried: 'Well, Vormulac, and will you
  also "commandeer" this one?'
   Like all Wamphyri warriors, the thing was a hybrid atrocity - a blasphemy against all the laws of creation
  -but in this case more so. In Olden Starside worse, bigger, yet more hideous creatures had been made
  from men and metamorphic vampire stuff, but this was Tur-gosheim, where nothing like this was ever
  seen before.
   Red-mottled in its softer underbelly and silver-scaled on top, with an electric sheen which reflected the
  glare and splash of the hall's gas jets, the thing was like a flexible machine, an instrument of madness,
  mayhem, murder. And it was Canker Canison's construct beyond a doubt, for its huge 'face' was that of
  a monstrously mutated fox! Scarlet eyes were set about the forehead in a semicircle, with others in rows
  along its armoured sides; but itsjaws ...
   ...The head carried three sets of jaws, one facing front and the others to the flanks, all equipped with the
  teeth of a primal carnivore. Behind those lethal blades, each throat was a cavern which could swallow a
  man whole. Shaggy, the thing had Canker's red hair, makingits looks foxier yet. Tufts of hair sprouted
  from between its scales, pushed back by their overlap, and patches ofstiff red bristles protected the
  underbelly.
   Along its lower flanks pectoral to ventral, the warrior's scales were hinged to house its retracted mantle
  and gas bladders. Angling down from its serrated spine, a ferocious array of claspers, pincers, slabbers,
  clubs, and saws of chitin plate festooned its sides. A dozen 'launchers', like fleshy springs, were coiled in
  
  depressions in the segmented belly. At its rear and flanking the anus, propulsor tubes like the siphons of
  an octopusvented their hideous vapours. Tip to tail, the thing measured forty feet; through its middle it
  was nine.
   Now that the dust had settled, its many eyes were staring, taking in the total scene. And its tiny brain
  waswaiting for a command - any command - from its maker and master.
   There were exits from the great hall other than through the archway, boltholes in its rear wall, behind
  Vormulac where he stood as if transfixed at the head of the table. Even if he had felt capable of
  answeringWratha's derisory question with regard to 'commandeer ing' this monster, he could not have
  done so; for in themoment that he blinked his astonished eyes and recov ered from his paralysis of shock,
  so the vast invadercommenced to roar!
   That was enough for the Lords and Ladies; they fled,all except a pair of lesser lights who had been
  bowledover by the creature's destructive arrival. Young Lords, as they dragged their broken bodies free
  of the debris,so they came within range of the warrior.
   Kill! Canker Canison issued a mental command. Thewarrior fell on the crippled Lords and worried them
  like a wolf worrying rabbits; it tossed one out screaming through the shattered gash of the window,
  trampled the other flat, then rose up and fell on the great table,whose pieces flew in all directions.
   And that was enough for Vormulac!
   Making for a bolthole exit in the wake of his fleeing guests, he sent similar instructions stabbing towards
  the bewildered mind of his own small guardian: Killthem - all six of them!
   The creature at once hurled itself at Wratha and herfive. She held out her weapon at arm's length,
  squeezed the bulb and vaporized its contents directly into the charging beast's face. It breathed every last
  drop of moisture into its vampire lungs, into its system ... reared back, all of its appendages clashing in
  unison ... came on with yet more determination, but gaggingand frenziedly shaking its great head.
   And meanwhile, Canker had called to his warrior.
   In a short-lived, stomach-churning sputter of propulsors, with a thrust of powerful launching limbs, the
  horror skidded and flopped twice its own length down the hall. Overwhelmed by its sheer bulk,
  Vormulac's beast was made impotent, forced back from Wratha and her group. And without pause
  Canker's warrior grasped the lesser creature in its left-flank claspers andcommenced to dismember it.
   It was the grisly work of moments, seconds, nothing so great as a minute. Stabbers slammed in and out
  like pistons, damaging and loosening joints; pincers went into the wounds, grasping and tearing; saws
  were a blur of chitin. Vormulac's creature screamed - high-pitched, throbbing, a piercing agonized whistle
  - butbriefly. There were grunts of satisfaction from the greater warrior, and thuds as various detached
  appendages and other portions were tossed aside. Fluidssplashed: grey, yellow, red, and a reeking pink
  mistrose up.
   Then the screaming stopped ...
   Canker's monster grunted again (in disgust, even disappointment?), thrust aside a shuddering mound of
  steaming meat, turned its triple-jawed head a little toglare down the ruined hall at pallid faces gawping
  fromthe bolthole exits.
  
   Canker Canison laughed and danced, cavorting in a gleeful frenzy ... then stopped abruptly and fell to all
  fours, saliva dripping from his muzzle. And after the briefest pause: Kill! he commanded a second time,
  hisscarlet eyes ablaze.
   His creature ploughed debris where it went roaringdown the hall.
   'No, hold!' cried Wratha, taking Canker's elbow, assisting him to his feet. 'No beast could reach them in
  there; that wall is solid rock, with a warren of escapetunnels. Best save your creature's energy.'
   The six ran down the hall to where the warrior had come to a halt. And from there Wratha called,
  'Vormulac, Maglore, Zindevar, Devetaki and all you others. Remember: it was you who turned on me,
  not out of fear but jealousy! We posed no great threat, me and myfive. What, against all of Turgosheim in
  a body? No, not even if we had made a dozen creatures like this one.But all we have is four ... for the
  moment.
   'Four of them, all tested and airworthy, and made of good strong vampire stuff; not to mention other
  good stuff, even the very best stuff, out of Sunside. Aye, and to hell with your tithe-system! By now
  they're en route to a peak in the western reaches of the range, where we've hidden away a cache of food
  to replenish us -flyers, warriors and all - before we leap the Great Red Waste. This was always our plan;
  not to war with you but to fly west, to the aeries of Olden Starside and make new lives there. Except you
  were greedy and jealous and would be first, and you envied those of uswith spirit enough to try it.
   'Well, Vormulac, I'm sorry to disappoint you and yourlieutenants; your men will find nothing in our
  houses but a handful of thralls and empty vats. Whatever else we're obliged to leave behind, you are
  welcome to it. Take our spires and manses and keep them. We've nolonger any use for them.
   'And so we fly west — let him follow who dares! Foryou have set yourselves against me and mine, and
  so are become our enemies. We shall know how to deal with you, when at last you have the nerve for it.
  So be it...'
   She and her five headed for the stairwell to the landing bays. But before passing under the archway, she
  paused, looked back and shouted.
   'Vormulac, Maglore: send no mind-message ahead ofus. For if in leaving gloomy Vormspire we should
  sufferany hindrance, then Canker's warrior will fire its propulsors directly into your hidey-holes. And if in
  the pastyou've found kneblascha trifle bothersome, why, youdon't know the half of it!'
   With which she and her renegades were gone.
   In the tunnel escape routes, Vormulac and the otherswere torn two ways. These man-made passages
  leddown into the rock, eventually emerging onto exterior walkways which descended to the lower levels.
  But to go that way would take time and in the end exposethem to whatever other dangers waited in the
  gloom ofTurgosheim's canyon. For shortly, Wratha and her gang would mount and launch their flyers;
  likewise theirlieutenants out of Wrathspire and Madmanse, and the other houses of treachery. Indeed, the
  latter would beout there even now, spiralling on thermals out of Turgosheim, waiting in the night for
  Wratha and the others,ready to join with them like a swarm and thrust westwards.
   Ah! But what if they'd left a rearguard to watch their backs? Only Wratha's word for it that all their
  warriors except this one were already fled. An unthinkable fate:to be caught on a flimsy exterior staircase
  of cartilageand bone, by some cousin of the monster which snarledand sputtered in the great hall!
  
   Crowding there in the low, narrow tunnels, these were some of the more mentionable thoughts of the
  Wamphyri Lords and Ladies where they huddled and cursed. Until Maglore clapped a hand to his
  foreheadand cried: 'Canker has called for his monster to attendhim! Our siege is ended!'
   The mentalist was right. Sputtering and snarling,Canker's warrior spat acid towards the bolt-hole
   tunnels, then propelled itself in its ungainly fashion to the shattered window. For a moment it perched
  there, its hideous head projecting outwards, before launching itself into the night. The rest of the balcony
  went with it, while a cloud of noxious fumes from its propulsivevents remained behind.
   Braving these loathsome vapours, Vormulac, Maglore,and half-a-dozen others left their refuge and
  rushed to the window. Outside, Wratha and her renegades, andtheir lieutenants, rode the night in a spiral
  round Vorm spire's ramparts. Behind them, climbing - with its gas-bladders bulging, mantle extended and
  propulsors blasting - Canker's creature headed west. The Lady was offand running, and nothing anyone
  could do to stop her.
   Her laughter came back to them, and a simple warning:
   'Vormulac ... send flyers and lieutenants after us ifyou will, to our refuelling station in the western heights.
  We can spare a warrior, I think, to swat them from theskies. And so for now, farewell!'
   'Whatever awaits you in Olden Starside, Lady,' he shouted after her, 'be sure not to return! You know
  thepenalty if you do!'
   Her fading laughter was the only answer ...
    
   Later: there was unaccustomed, even hurried activity inall of the great spires and manses of Turgosheim;
  new workshops with extensive vats were designed, andothers long fallen into disrepair put back to rights.
  Before sunup the word was out: the ban on the making ofwarriors was lifted!
   Wrathspire, Madmanse, Gorvistack, Suckspire, Mange-manse: all of these were put to the sack and
  their spoils, both human and material, were divided as fairly as possible; likewise the possessions of the
  two Lordsmurdered by Canker's creature in Vormspire's great hall. And so a rapid re-shuffling
  commenced, whichsaw lesser Lords arguing their individual merits as they vied for ascension to these
  redesignated, soon to berenamed, cavern mansions and crag aeries.
   While in Runemanse:
   ...In the hour before sunup, the Seer Lord Maglore called for his thrall Karz Biteri to attend him in the
  topmost apartment, a cavelet with a dual purpose: on the one hand to act as a lookout, and on the other
  tohouse the manse's siphoneer. It was a place Karz avoided, except to feed its grotesque inhabitant
  whichreclined flaccid, mindless and motionless behind drawncurtains. For even the Wamphyri held
  certain things asunseemly, and knew when to hide them away.
   There Karz found his master, lost in weird reverie, gazing gravely out through the horizontal slit of a
  window, across the gulf of Turgosheim towards melan choly Vormspire in the canyon's south-eastern
  bight.And after he had stood before him for some little while, finally Maglore blinked his strange eyes and
  focusedthem, and turned them on Karz.
  
   'Being an intelligent man and curious,' he said, hisvoice rustling as ever, 'by now you will know what has
  happened.'
   Karz could only nod. 'Something of it, Lord.'
   'Well, and we shall discuss it at length,' Maglore tookhim by the shoulder and turned him about face.
  'And you shall write it down in the glyphs of Mendula Farscry, as part of the modern history of
  Turgosheim. But before that ...' (he guided the Historian toward theroom's curtained area), 'I would
  remind you of my warning about Wratha, and the pleasures and pains of knowing her too well. Indeed,
  of the perils in knowing any ofmy contemporaries.'
   'But...I have not forgotten, Lord!' Karz protested.
   'Be still and listen,' Maglore told him as they arrived before the curtains, where he turned Karz so that
  theystood face to face. 'For you see, despite all of her crimes, no harm has befallen the Lady Wratha; the
  witch and her coven are fled into Olden Starside. But what of their thralls, their manses, and spires, their
  dupes? I will tell you: all tossed aside to fend for themselves, disassembled, apportioned and scattered.
  They are left to count the cost, not Wratha. But I also mentioned her dupes ...'
   'Dupes, master?'
   'Indeed,' Maglore nodded. 'Indeed.' And in a moment:
   'How long since you opened these curtains, Karz?'His hand was on the rope.
   'A while,' the other gulped a little, his throat suddenly dry as he wondered what Maglore was about.
  'Not long.I wash the creature and turn him thus and so, and fill his trough. I search his flesh for sores, and
  if and whenI find them apply your ointments. I know that he is old,and so look for signs of decay. And -'
   'I know,' Maglore stopped him. 'All of these tasks which you perform. I know. For you are faithful,
  Karz, and observe your duties well. But I know of a one - we both know of him - who was unfaithful,
  who did not fulfil his trust, who was suborned and bought... by Wratha!' Suddenly Maglore's voice was
  hard, cruel.'Well, and he also counts the cost.'
   'Huh - huh - he?' And now Karz was terrified, without as yet knowing why.
   'My siphoneer is old, Karz,' Maglore cried at last, yanking on the rope. 'And despite that you tend him
  so well, soon he will die. Where there is no will, there isprecious little will to live, eh? For which reason,
  amongothers, I have got myself a new siphoneer. Behold!'
   The curtains swished open, and behind them -
   - Two siphoneers: one wrinkled, mottled, old but still functional, for the moment at least; the other pink
  and new, and not yet fully .. . formed. The Historian saw the bulk of them, in this topmost room of
  Runemanse, but not all of them. What he did see lay on a platform over the vast bowl of water whose
  outlets supplied the manse's needs; the mouth of the older one dribbling water into the bowl, like the
  drool of an infant or an idiot, except the falling droplets were sweet and clear.Their bodies were
  trembling like jelly from the pounding of hugely enlarged hearts; their limbs, cleverly boned and
  amputated at knees and elbows, were filmed in vampire slime; their living veins, similarly sheathed and
  elongated by metamorphism, extended from the butchered nubs and disappeared into conduits of dead
  bonewhich descended through the floor.
  
   What Karz Biteri could not see (and what he had trained himself not to think about) were the many
  hundredsof feet of these living capillaries, all dangling down inside their bone pipes through Runemanse
  above and Madmanse below, to the wells in the floor of Turgosheim from which they drew up the water!
  But for allhis training, Karz could imagine them well enough.
   He looked at the new siphoneer — at its head, all shaven, with dark sutures and blue bruises betraying
  some recent surgery: an extraction of brain, of most of thebrain, he knew — and at its vacant,
  grin-grimacing face, which Karz recognized only too well. For this was the face, and what was left of the
  form, of Giorge Nanosi, called Fatesayer, whose veins were even now extrudingfrom his stumps, and
  inching down the pipes to the wells!
   Unable to restrain himself, the Historian reeled away from the curtained area to the window, and there
  stuck his head out to draw long and hard on the dark air.
   Maglore, reading his mind, came to stand beside him.'And so you see what is become of the Fatesayer,'
  he said, 'who was less impartial than we thought. Aye, for when Wratha stuck her hooks in him, she said
  hisfate loud and clear. So be it!'
   Karz's shoulders jerked. Maglore pulled him away from the window, saying: 'What? And would you foul
  Runemanse with your vomit? I'll not have it, neither within nor without! Go tend your duties, make clean
  my workshops. For soon I'll be practising my arts.'
   Karz staggered away, out of the room, and madeunsteadily for the lower levels.
   Maglore followed him a little way, but beyond the arched entrance paused and looked back. His eyes
  went to the blazon carved in bas-relief over the doorway, asit was carved over all of Runemanse's doors:
    
    
   This was that sigil of which he'd dreamed at the time of the Light-in-the-West, from which time forward
  he'd taken it as his own. As for its meaning (if it meant anything at all), that was anybody's guess.
  Maglore's guess was that it must be potent; else why would he, amage, have dreamed it?
   And what other potent things would Wratha find, hewondered, in Olden Starside?
    
    
    
   PART FOUR:
    
  
    
    
   The Brothers - The Raids
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
   I
    
    
    
   Predawn twilight on Starside, sunup a few hours away, and the peaks of the barrier range already
  changing from one massively homogeneous black-fanged silhouette to gaunt, grey-featured sentinels in
  their own right, each taking on its own unique shape. Soon the sun's rays, glancing through the high
  passes, would colour them gold. The change from dark to light was alwaysinspiring, even gladdening.
   So thought Lardis, head man of the Szgany Lidesci.
   But to have spent the best part of a night here - on Starside! at sundown! - under the silver light of the
  moon and the blue glitter of the stars ... and to haveslept here! It was a thought which invariably set
  Lardis's scalp to tingling, brought gooseflesh creeping, and a sense of awe, wonder and heart-pounding
  horror bursting out afresh from every inch of his body and soul...
   Every fifty sunups or thereabouts, Lardis would make this . .. this what, pilgrimage? - this passage of
  exorcism, anyway - into Starside, and across the barren boulder plains to the tumbled stacks of the
  Wamphyri; to Karenstack, the last aerie, and back again through the great pass to Sunside. But he knew
  he would never make it alone, that the ghosts of all that had been would journey with him, touching their
  
  cold fingers now and then to the knobs of his spine.
   A rite of exorcism, aye: to drive out the demons from his dreams and the olden nightmares even from his
  waking hours. A renewal of his faith, his belief – thatthe Wamphyri were no more, and would never
  return —in the shape of one more trek across their ancient territories, through all the long lonely hours of
  sundown, which had been their time. That was why Lardis came, why he continued to come and always
  would, as long as his legs could carry him: to convince himself of themarvellous truth, that they were no
  more.
   'Dead and gone forever,' he muttered, mainly to himself, pausing to look back on Starside from a
  vantage point in the foothills, not far from the mouth of the pass. 'Wiped out in a body and cleansed from
  the world in what they thought was the hour of their triumph, when they toyed with their victims and
  glutted themselves at the shining sphere Gate. All of them that were left: Lord Shaithis, and even Shaitan
  the Unborn himself, who was their father, destroyed with their creatures. Likewise the Lady Karen,
  burned up in a single breath of hell, in the searing fire of something more hateful than all of them together!
  All gone, those creatures of evil. And possibly ... possibly some that were good, too, even if they did
  bear the seeds of evil withinthem.'
   'Some that were ... what, "good", did you say?' An old and trusted friend and companion of Lardis's,
  Andrei Romani, stood there with him. 'Oh, really? TheWamphyri, d'you mean? Then perhaps you'll be so
  kindas to refresh my memory, for I'm damned if I can remember any that were good!'
   Lardis glanced at him and nodded knowingly. 'Yes,you can. You're being contentious, that's all. What
  aboutHarry Hell-lander, called Dwellersire, who came from a world beyond the Gate to stand side by
  side with his son in the battle for the garden? And what of The Dweller himself, who with his father
  toppled all thestacks of the Wamphyri down on to the plain? Aye, andeven the Lady Karen, who stood
  with them and foughtagainst her own kind.'
   Andrei looked astonished. 'Her own kind? Their ownkind, you mean! She and the others, they were all
  Wamphyri! Harry Hell-lander, who could come and go in atwinkling, and call up the dead: he was
  Wamphyri, as well you know. Likewise his son, called The Dweller, whobecame a wolf ... and how was
  that for a hell-spawningmenace? As for Karen: you forget, Lardis, that I was therein the garden that time,
  when she tore the living heart outof Lesk the Glut, and stood there laughing, drenched in hisblood! Now
  she was Wamphyri! Aye, but the plague was inall of them, so don't tell me what's evil and what isn't! Me,
  I say that somewhere there's a God, and that finally He'dhad enough of them. So that night He took 'em
  all, everylast one, which left us to act as custodians of the peace.'
   Lardis and Andrei: they were older now and their joints stiffening just a little, their hair mostly turnedgrey,
  and their eyes not quite so bright. But their mem ories were still sharp. And after all, fourteen years isn't
  such a very long time, not for memories such as theirs. So for all that they argued, each knew that the
  otherwas right in part, and so a balance was maintained.
   'You're right,' Lardis grunted at last, 'and it's bestthat they're gone, all of them. But still I often wonder: if
  not for Harry, The Dweller, Karen ... what would havebecome of us? Where would we be now?'
   'Dust, most likely,' Andrei answered, 'and nothingwould matter any more.'
   'And our children?'
   There was no answer to that. Instead of searching forone, Andrei shivered and stamped his feet, then
  changedthe subject. 'What the hell are we waiting for, anyway?'he wanted to know, raising his voice.
  
  And: 'Where thehell is that misfit son of Nana Kiklu?'
   'What, me, a misfit?' came a loud, laughing inquiry from the shadows in the mouth of the pass. In the next
  moment there was movement there, where Nestor Kiklu and Lardis's son, Jason, had gone on ahead.
  They came out of the shadows into full view, and again Nestorinquired: 'Is someone taking my name in
  vain?'
   'No, not you, but your dumbstruck brother Nathan,' Andrei shouted back. 'It's him who's keeping all of
  uswaiting!'
   Their shouting echoed reverberatingly through the pass, rolled up into the mountains and bounced down
  again, rang out across the plains of Starside. Lardis didn't much like it; it caused the small hairs to stir to
  life at the back of his neck, and made his breath plume that much faster in the cold air. Nor did he care
  forpeople calling Nathan Kiklu names, not even in miscon ceived jest, and not even Andrei. Oh, Nathan
  was a dummy, true enough, but there was a lot more than thatto the lad. And: 'Quiet!' Lardis warned.
  'For all that Star- side's empty now, still it's no place for shouting ...'
   But someone had heard them, at least.
   Down on the rim of the low crater which housed the Gate, Nestor Kiklu's twin brother Nathan came
  back to life where he stood gazing into the white hypnotic glareof the half-buried sphere of alien light. He
  mustn't touch that shining surface, he knew, on penalty of being drawn into it and vanishing forever. Out
  of this world,anyway. But still he was tempted.
   Tempted ... but not entirely stupid. For there were times when life seemed very good to Nathan right
  here, or rather, on Sunside. Sometimes life was good, anyway ...
   It was just that the Gate was such a weird, inexplicable thing. If it were really a doorway into some other
  place, for instance - a place where there were people - then why didn't they come through it and make
  themselves known? Lardis Lidesci said that in the old days they had come through now and then, and
  that the Wamphyri had prized them for their strange powers. Maybe that's why they'd stopped coming.
  On the other hand, Lardis had been known to say many things about the Gate, the old days, the
  hell-landers ... everything.
   Why, Nathan had even heard it rumoured that there'd once been a hell-lander woman Lardis had
  fancied! Except she already had a man, also a hell-lander. Her name had been Zek, short for Zekintha,
  and she could pick a man's thoughts right out of his head! Well, andso could Nathan, sometimes;
  Nestor's thoughts, anyway.But this Zek: she'd been pale and blonde, blue-eyed and ... beautiful? Now
  how could anyone with colours like those be beautiful? None of the Szgany had them -with the exception
  of Nathan himself, of course.
   Anyway, most of these events Lardis spoke of hadtaken place before the Kiklu brothers were even
  born, and as Nathan had noted, with the passage of time Lardis found a great deal to say about almost
  everything ofyesteryear. It wasn't so much that he was very old (thoughcertainly his youth, as the leader
  of a wandering Szganytribe in the shadow of the Wamphyri, must have taken its toll of him), but that
  there was little now to occupy hismind, so that he was wont to dwell too much in the past. Which was
  something Nathan understood well enough,for on occasion he was himself given to dwelling in other
  worlds, and adventuring in lands of fantasy. It helped shut the real world out: the sounds of Settlement
  and its scathing voices, with all the taunts and questions which in the main Nathan no longer bothered to
  answer, or answered with his stumbling stutter. For ever since thenight of the red clouds and the thunder
  in the hills, he hadspent his time withdrawing from this world.. .into others.
  
   Other worlds, yes, and lands of fantasy ...
   ... The twilight mountainsides, for instance, when hewas alone and his wolves would come whining out of
  the hills to be with him. That was a secret, however,something he kept to himself, lest Settlement's
  Szgany youths call him a liar. For as everyone knew, wolves must be caught as pups and trained, or else
  they can'tbe trusted.
   ... And in his daydreams, which he knew weremorbid things, however much they fascinated him.
   ... But especially when he slept and dreamed of...oh, of all manner and shape of things! Of the crumbling
  dead in their graves, who could talk to him if they wanted to but would not, though he frequently
  overheard them talking to each other; of meaningless yet maddeningly familiar numbers, cluttering his
  reelingbrain until he thought his head must fill and burst fromtheir constantly mutating rush and whirl; and
  of a differ ent world of men which was weird and unknown asthe spaces between the stars.
   . .. Perhaps like the world beyond the Gate?
   Again the shouting of the others reached out to him from the foothills and the pass; until at last Nathan
  backed away from the coldly glaring source of his fascination, and jumped down from the low crater
  wall. Butas he picked his way very carefully between the gaping mouths of giant, perfectly circular
  wormholes wherethey pierced the ground and angled down into otherwise solid, compacted earth and
  rock all around the perimeter of the Gate, still he sensed the lure of the silent,shining sphere, and felt it like
  a magnet in his mind.
   'Nathan!' Andrei Romani's call came yet again, distantly, followed in a while by the echoes of his bull
  voice rolling down from the hills: 'Nathaaan!'... 'Nath- aaan!... Nathaaan!'
   Nathan had moved away from the Gate now, but still was unable to tear his eyes or his thoughts from it.
  TheGate to the hell-lands, another world, and possibly aworld that was terrifying.
   When Lardis talked of what had happened that nightfourteen years ago, he usually spoke of 'a breath of
  hell', which came roaring out of the Gate to burn theWamphyri in its fire. But at other times and less
  romanti cally, he had admitted that it might have been some kind of unthinkable weapon, whose power
  was such that the hell-landers themselves had little or no controlover it. 'Whatever their world was like
  before,' (he would say), 'it really must be hell now, if that was merely the backdraught of one of their
  wars! Zekintha told me allabout that: how their weapons were devastating.'
   Measuring his pace, Nathan started to run. He hadkept the others waiting too long and they'd be
  impatient. He was right: almost a mile away, Andrei Romani wascomplaining again. 'Is he deaf as well as
  dumb?'
   Coming lithely, jinglingly from the mouth of the pass,Nestor and Jason joined the two older men. 'No,'
  Nestorshook his head and gave a disdainful grimace. 'My brother's neither deaf nor daft, nor even dumb.
  He doesn't want to speak, that's all. He's just... Nathan.'
   Lardis glanced at Nestor, could almost taste the bitterness where his mouth puckered on his sour words.
  Apity they weren't closer, he thought, like they'd been aschildren. For then they had been inseparable.
   Nestor had looked after his brother until they were well into their teens. Maybe he'd looked after him
  toowell, fought one too many fights for him, taken one too many knocks on his behalf. Whatever, it
  
  wasn't thesame between them now. And then there was Misha, of course. Young boys will always be
  boys and friends,until they grow into youths and become rivals.
   Nathan and Nestor Kiklu: Nana's sons ...
   Twins, yes (Lardis continued to consider them), but in no way identical. Indeed, they seemed poles
  apart: intheir looks, philosophies, lifestyles. Nestor upright,brash, devil-may-care, outspoken and even
  noisy; Nathan weighed down (but with what?), withdrawn,serious, and silent of course.
   Nestor was like his mother. Only see them together, and there could be no hiding the fact that he was
  her son. Except where Nana was small, Nestor was tall; as would his brother be tall, if only he would
  stand up straight! Long-limbed, both of them. Which was somewhat strange in itself; for their father,
  Hzak Kiklu, had been small like Nana. All the better for hiding in holes in the ground. Perhaps that was
  the reason. Many children had grown up tall and strong, since the destructionof the Wamphyri.
   Nestor had his mother's dark, slightly slanted eyes, her straight nose however small, her glossy black hair
  fallingto his broad shoulders. Her smile, too, which could be mysterious at times. His forehead was wide;
  his cheekbones high; his chin jutted a little, more so when he wasangry. His body was that of an athlete,
  and he wore hisjacket with the sleeves rolled back, to display the width of his forearms. He looked
  Szgany through and through.That was Nestor, a youth to be proud of. But as for Nathan:
   Well, a throwback there! Though to what, Lardis couldn't imagine. Nathan's eyes were less tilted, and
  for all that they were the deep blue of a sapphire, still they lacked the gem's great depth. Their gaze was
  usually vacant, misty, or at best wandering (much like the mind which directed them, Lardis supposed,
  and indeed,much like the lad himself). But the strangest thing about him was his hair, which was the
  colour of damp straw! It was like Zek's hair, but a little darker, and Nathankept it cropped as if ashamed
  of it. Possibly he was, forlike his other anomalies it set him apart.
   As for the rest of his features: they were not too dissimilar from Nestor's. A strong chin, high
  cheekbones, broad forehead... his mouth was fuller than Nestor's, less cynical, but given to twitching a
  little in the left-hand corner. Then of course there was his skin, which was pale to match the colour of his
  hair; so thatall in all, he scarcely looked Szgany at all.
   His mother said his pallor was due to spending too much time indoors, or walking abroad at sundown,
  when most of the Szgany stayed close to home. Accord ing to Nana, his health in general was poor, so
  that heavoided the common activities of Settlement's moreactive youths and preferred his own company.
  Well, the latter was quite obviously true enough. But to Lardis's knowledge, the rest of it simply didn't
  add up. On the contrary, Nathan seemed a wanderer born, and was forever out and about. Sunup and
  sundown alike, you would find him in the forest or on the mountain slopes, anywhere but indoors. And
  sickly? Lardis didn't think so. A disinclination towards japing, girl-taunting and -chasing, and
  rough-and-tumbling with the other loutsdidn't automatically make him sickly, did it?
   No, Nathan wasn't just the runt of the litter, he wasa throwback. But to what? And if he didn't look
  Szgany,then what did he look?
   Lardis had pondered that question time and again: who did Nathan remind him of? Whose was that soft,
  that compassionate, indeed that innocent look in his eyes? But as always it remained a puzzle, an aggrava
  tion, a word stuck to the tip of his tongue which refused to eject and reveal itself. And Nathanhimself an
  aggravation, so that at times even Lardis could kick him - ifonly to stir him to life!
   That was why he had asked Nana Kiklu if he could bring her boys with him this time, into Starside on his
  
  annual pilgrimage: to get Nathan away from his old haunts, try to stir him into life. Maybe he'd find
  something here in the awesome barren wilderness to lure his mind back from wherever it wandered now
  ...
   Even as Lardis Lidesci thought these things, so there sounded the soft, regular pad of flying feet and the
  clatter of pebbles, and an approaching man-shape silhouetted against the glare of the near-distant Gate.
  And as the light grew marginally brighter over Starside,Lardis's thoughts immediately changed tracks.
   What, sickly, this one? Well, if so, then Lardis wishedhe was as sickly as that, with heart and lungs
  banging effortlessly away, as once they had used to, to power his tireless limbs. And vacant, Nathan?
  Not now at least. No, for his eyes were shining where he came panting to a halt, and shrugged in that
  apologetic wayof his. He was sorry he'd kept them waiting.
   'Did it interest you, then, the Gate?' Lardis askedhim, before anyone else could speak.
   Nathan already had his breathing under control. He looked at Lardis and nodded, however slowly. But
  anod was an answer, which in itself was an improvement; usually you wouldn't even get that out of him.
  And Lardis was pleased. It was like when they sat at the campfire in Settlement and he told his stories of
  the old times, and sensed Nathan's attention rapt upon himabove all the others put together. A dummy?
  Well, per haps ... but only on the outside.
   'Huh!' Nestor grunted. 'Oh, he's interested, sure enough. Interested in all the weird, unanswerablethings.
  Stars in the sky: how many there are. Ripples ona river: why he can't count them. Where people go when
  they die, as if the smoke from their funeral pyresisn't answer enough in itself. And now the hell-lands
  Gate? Why, of course he's interested in it! If it doesn't matter a damn, then Nathan's bound to be
  interested init.'
   Again the sourness in his voice.
   But Jason, Lardis's son, who was eighteen months younger than the Kiklu boys, was less hard on
  Nathan. 'The world's not much to Nathan's liking,' he said, 'and he steers as far clear of it as he can.
  Which is a very hard thing to do, because of course he must live in it!That's why he concerns himself with
  things which seem to us irrelevant. This way he has his world, and we have ours, and we don't cross over
  too much one wayor the other.'
   (And Lardis nodded, albeit to himself, for he considered this a statement of astonishing perception.)
   Lardis was proud of his son; Jason was open-handed,instinctively fair-minded, handsome in his dark
  Gypsy fashion, and intelligent. But just like anyone else, hewas wont to err now and then. Like now. And:
   'The Gate isn't irrelevant,' Lardis quickly corrected him. 'Come up here a moment.' They climbed a small
  knoll - no more than a hump of jagged rock - to aslightly higher elevation, and from there looked back on
  Starside. Specifically at the Gate.
   'It's getting lighter now,' Lardis pointed out whatmust be obvious to anyone. 'Another hour or so and the
  peaks will turn to gold, and so what I wanted to show you isn't so clear any more. Far better in the heart
  ofsundown. And anyway it's fading with the years, washed down into the barren soil by the rains, and
  carried away by warm winds out of Sunside. But doyou see the glow?'
   They saw it:
  
   Maybe a hundred and fifty paces beyond the Gate, araw crater in the earth whose sides were rough and
  broken, with a rim of fused slag like puckered skin around a giant wound. More stark and jagged than
  Starside's usually rounded boulders and other natural features, which had been worn down by the
  elements through untold centuries, this was a more recent thing, as if a shooting-star had crashed to earth
  here only afew short years ago.
   Spreading out from the crater's farthest rim, a faintly glimmering plume of light lay upon the earth like the
  luminous early-morning ground mists of Sunside. A long, tapering spearhead, feather, or finger, it pointed
  towards the Icelands on the blue, aurora-lit horizon. But it was the earth itself - the barren soil and the
  stony ground - which glowed with this soft yet sinister radiance; as if some giant slug had passed this
  way,leaving its slime-trail to shine in the light of the stars.
   'And over there,' said Lardis, pointing, his voice very quiet. Westwards, following the base of the
  mountains to the horizon and out of sight - given clearer definition in the shadow of the barrier range - the
  earth shone more brightly yet, with a light which came and went by degrees, like the foxfire of rotten
  wood or the coldluminescence of glowworms.
   'Light,' Lardis gruffly continued. 'But not like the goodclean light of day, nor even the light of a fire. A
  body can't live by it, and mustn't stay in it too long. It blasted Peder Szekarly that time, fourteen years
  ago: turned his skin white as a mushroom and robbed him of an heir. Aye, and it killed him, too, in the
  end. As for the trogs dwelling in the lee of the mountains: they paid the price, all right. It took them in their
  hundreds! But for their deep caves, they were finished for sure. Why, there are freaks among them still,
  whose fathers' blood was poisoned on that night of nights! The one good thing about it: it also fell on the
  swamps, since when we've had precious few vampire changelings ...'
   'Aye, hellfire!' Andrei Romani nodded in agreement. 'And it's burning still, though not so hot now. Me, I
  say leave it be, and all of Starside, too. There's nothing but ghosts here now, and it's a wise man who
  leaves themto their own devices."
   'So you see,' said Lardis to Nestor, when they'd climbed down again and were headed for the pass, 'the
  Gate is hardly irrelevant. It's a marker shining there still, to remind us that this is the spot where the
  powers of the hell-lands and those of the Wamphyri clashedand cancelled each other out.'
   'All very well,' Andrei put in, 'but what's all that to Nathan? Do you think it matters at all? I mean, do
  you think he understood or was interested in a single damn thing we've talked about? If so, well, he's not
  much forshowing it!'
   'He showed plenty of interest in the tumbled stacks ofthe Wamphyri,' Lardis replied. 'And in
  Karenstack, thelast aerie, blackened like a chimney flue on that side facingthe Gate. Aye, and I firmly
  believe he would have enteredKarenstack to climb it, if we'd let him! And finally, it seemshe also felt the
  mystery of the shining sphere Gate. If youask me, I'd say that's a whole lot of interest - for a dummy.'
   Just as they entered the shadow of the pass, he glanced at Nathan and saw the youth looking back at
  him. Nathan's eyes were shining again. With gratitude,Lardis thought.
   But Nestor only said, 'About the Gate: I don't like to contradict you, Lardis - especially not you, a
  Lidesci, and leader of your people - but what is the Gate really except a ball of white light? So it
  attracted my brother... so what? Don't moths flutter to a candle just asreadily? And don't they get singed
  just as often?'
   Which, however much he disliked it, was another statement Lardis couldn't dispute ...
  
    
   For fifteen minutes or so they walked in shadows and silence, with only the jingling of their silver baubles
  tokeep their thoughts company. Then a yellow glow came filtering down from above, as the first of the
  range's topmost peaks turned gold in the rays of a sun risingeven now on Sunside. And:
   'I timed that well,' Lardis grunted, pleased with himself. He struck off from the trail and climbed towards
  a ridge jutting over the western side of the pass. The others, all except Nathan who followed on directly
  behind Lardis (unquestioningly, of course), came to a halt and watched the two go. Until Nestor inquired
  ofAndrei Romani:
   'What now?'
   'It's a ritual,' the other answered, 'which Lardis follows every year. Something he likes to see, back there
  on Starside. That jut of rock's his vantage point. Me, I've seen it before and can get along without it. I'll
  waithere and save my pins for walking. But you two can goon up, if you like.'
   Nestor and Jason went scrambling after Lardis and Nathan, and after a steep but safe climb came upon
  them standing on a shelf from which they gazed northand a little east. The sunlight on the peaks was
  stronger now; it found passage between the high crags and cast a fan of beams out across Starside's sky.
  Up there, only the brightest stars survived; the stars, and the rippling auroras where they warped and
  fluttered over the farnorthern horizon.
   'Sunup,' Lardis panted, his breathing still ragged fromthe climb. 'She rises slowly, the sun, along a low
  flat curve, and in the old days used to light on all the tallerstacks one after the other in their turn. Now
  there's but one aerie left, as you've seen. But still I like to see the sun striking home in its topmost
  ramparts, and know that there's nothing hiding within, behind bone balconies and black-draped windows.
  Somehow, it's a very gratifying sight. But don't take my word for it; just waitand watch, and see for
  yourselves.' And he continued to gaze out across Starside.
   Out there in what was once vampire heartland -rising up dramatically from a plain littered with the
  broken stumps and shattered segments of all the once-great stacks, which had not survived The
  Dweller's war on the Wamphyri - there stood Karenstack. Reaching almost a kilometre in height, the last
  aerie stood out as a lone fang of rock against the banded blue background of the north, its awesome
  shadow falling like a black, spastic arm far across Starside, and visibly stretchingitself in the improving
  light, as if blindly groping for the north-eastern horizon.
   The group on the bluff waited - a minute or two, three at the outside - for the sun's rays to sweep down,
  find them, and flood over them. Following which, in thevery next moment, they observed the effect which
  Lardis had so desired to see: a golden stain spreading itself across the uppermost levels of the stack,
  burning in windows as hollow as eye-sockets, lighting up the grim mouths of launching bays, and seeming
  to set the highturrets and embrasures afire in a blinding effulgence.
   And so like a giant candle, Karenstack stood falsely radiant amid Starside's silence, desolation and
  devastation ...
   For long minutes the four stood there, their attention rapt upon the molten grandeur of Karenstack's
  crest,which had become the centrepiece in an otherwise bleak and barren scene. But as reflective angles
  changed andthe golden fire began to fade on the stack's stone face,so their momentarily uplifted spirits
  settled down again and the sense of wonder departed.
  
   And from below: 'Ahoy, up there! Time we got on..."
   Lardis blinked, nodded, turned his face to the others. 'Andrei's right,’he said, shading his eyes against the
  unaccustomed dazzle. 'Let's get down.'
   The young men went first, with Lardis bringing up the rear. But before following on behind, he cast one
  more glance out across Starside: its moonscape of endless, boulder-strewn plains, the distant glitter of a
  frozen ocean, the unvisioned but imagined Icelands under their fluttering aurora banners, and of course
  Karenstack. And at last he sighed and began to followthe three youths down into the gloom of the pass
  ...
   .. . And having descended a little way paused, rooted to the spot, suddenly frozen in his tracks. For
  Karen-stack was burning still in his mind's eye and on the lenses of his retinas. Karenstack and something
  else he'd seen, or thought to see - but what? He closed his eyes and the picture came up clearer: the
  aerie's crest aglow with its false halo of fire. But below the area ofreflected light, where the golden rays
  could never reach:
   Black motes swirling, jetting, settling towards the yawning mouthof a vast landing bay; midges at this
  distance, but what would they be upclose?
   As if in answer to his inward-directed question, a small black bat hovered close to his face, fanning his
  cheek before side-slipping and stooping on a moth which he'd disturbed. In the next moment it was gone,
  and Lardis breathed easier. Bats, yes, that was what he'd seen: great clusters of them, closing on the
  stack. Except that unlike the little fellow who fanned his cheek, they'd been the great bats of Starside -
  aye, and familiars of the Wamphyri, upon a time - which Zekhad called Desmodus. And their home
  would be Karen- stack itself, deserted now except for their black-furredcolony.
   'Father?' Jason's voice came from below. 'Are youcoming? Can I give you a hand?'
   'No, no,' Lardis husked from a dry throat, then swallowed and found his voice. 'I'm fine. I'm coming.
  Get ondown.'
   But from then on, and all the way back to where theyhad tethered their animals at the head of the
  descent to Sunside, and for most of the trek back to Settlement -which took the greater part of sunup to
  complete, for they had friends to see along the way - Lardis was farless given to talking and kept his
  thoughts to himself.
   'Bats, yes,' he would mutter, and nod his head furiously, when the others were out of sight and hearing.
  The great bats of Starside.' Until, by the time they werehome again, he had almost convinced himself.
   During his waking hours, at least...
    
   In his dreams, however, Lardis Lidesci was not convinced. For the blood of a seer still ran in his veins,
  andtormented him whenever he closed his eyes to sleep. Itwas weaker now, this sixth sense, this blessing
  or curse passed down to him out of a lost Szgany history, from some long-forgotten ancestor whose
  second sight must have been potent indeed, that its trace had survived all the sunups - and sundowns -
  flown between. But potent then, in some unknown long ago, and this wasnow.
  
   It was now, and what small reserves of the thing remained in him seemed to have been running out ever
  since that time on Starside, when the Gate spewed fire and fury to write THE END on the last chapter of
  the Wamphyri. Or... perhaps it ran as strong as ever inhis veins, except in recent years there had been no
  usefor it. For the Wamphyri were no more.
   So why had it started to bother him again now? Andwhy did it continue to bother him?
   For on the long trek home he had slept and dreamed, and all of Lardis's dreams were nightmares, from
  which he would start snarling awake, wide-eyed and panting. Until, even in his waking hours, at last the
  four who travelled with him had heard him muttering: 'Bats, aye - the great Desmodus bats of Starside.'
  And they hadseen him nodding his head furiously.
   'What ails you?' Andrei Romani had wanted to know,as they approached Settlement in the hour before
  evening twilight. The youths had gone on ahead, to meet up with their young friends about the campfires
  -Nestor and Jason to dance a while perhaps, to enjoy themusic, good cooking, company, conversation:
  to be Szgany - and Nathan to seek out and be with hismother.
   'Nothing ails me!' Lardis had snapped. And then, almost in the same breath: 'Well, if you must know, my
  dreams ail me. And the mists. And the smoke from all those fires up ahead. And all the busy sounds of
  Settlement, which are a tumult even here, almost a mile away!What? Has all the caution gone out of the
  world? Do they tempt fate? Don't they know the hour, and thatsoon it will be sundown?'
   He glanced all about, at the ground mist and the shadowy forest, finally at Andrei, who gazed back at
  him in amazement. And: 'Where is the watch?' Lardis continued. 'We haven't even been challenged!
  We've seen neither man, youth nor wolf, despite that wecrossed into Lidesci territory well over an hour
  ago!'
   Andrei's astonishment, and his concern, were very genuine now. 'The watch?' he repeated. 'Man, you
  stoodthe watch down all of ten years ago! But the markers which define your boundaries are well
  maintained, andwe haven't had a border dispute in...oh, I can't remem ber! So why now, after all this
  time, do we suddenlyneed a watch?'
   Lardis blinked his fierce brown eyes and something of the passion went out of them. He blinked again,
  frowned and shook his head. 'I... I actually did that? I stood down the watch? Yes ... yes, of course I
  did.' Fora single moment he looked shaken, confused, lost -
   - But in the next the passion was back, and with it all the grim determination of his youth. He glanced
  knowingly at the darkening sky, where the first stars glittered like blue ice chips over Starside beyond the
  barrier range, sniffed suspiciously at the evening air, stared piercingly at a ground mist rising out of the
  woods. And: 'Great fool that I've been,' he growled, as if he couldn't believe it, 'I stood the watch down!
  ... Andnow must start it up again!'
   Andrei Romani recognized it: that visionary fire inLardis which had made him a great leader of the
  Szgany in a time when leaders were few and far between. But where once it had inspired men, now it
  caused a shiver to travel the length of Andrei's spine. 'What is it, Lardis?' he husked, gripping the other's
  arm. 'What didyou see from that bluff in the great pass? I know you as well as any man, and you've not
  been the same since you climbed up there to watch the sun burning onKarenstack's face.'
   Lardis felt Andrei's fingers digging into his arm, pausedin his striding and turned to face him. His eyes
  heldAndrei's as in a vice as he answered: 'I don't know what Isaw, except that it frightened me and
  straightened out myaddled senses. Or else addled them more yet.' He pulledhimself free, turned and
  
  headed for Settlement as before.
   Andrei frowned after him, then hurried to catch up.'But you did see something?'
   'Bats,' Lardis growled. 'Starside's great bats. That'swhat I took them for, what I've been telling myself
  they were ever since. Certainly they could have been, for I merely glimpsed them - a scattering of dots in
  the sky around Karenstack - which made no impression until after I'd started on my way down again.
  Well, and I know my eyes aren't all they used to be. But on the other hand, and if they weren't bats ...
  then what werethey?'
   Andrei's shrug tried hard to be careless but didn't' quite make it. 'But they were,' he said. 'It's just that
  you've been letting the old times crowd too close in your memory. Perhaps it's a warning: that you should
  give it a rest and quit trekking into Starside every fiftysunups or so. After all, you're not as young as you
  usedto be.'
   'No, and neither are you!' Lardis snapped.'If you're so sure of what I didn't see, then why is your voice
  so anxious, eh? Who are you trying to convince, Andrei, me or yourself? But I'll tell you this..." He broke
  his striding and rounded on the other. 'Since then it's like I've been asleep and I'm only now waking up.
  And my sleep had dulled senses which are only now coming alive. I can see, hear, feel, smell - I can
  remember -things! Things which I thought had gone forever.'
   More stars had blinked into being. Again Lardis sniffed the night air, glared at the rising mist. 'Comeon!'
  he said, striding harder yet for Settlement. 'And say no more. If I'm wrong - and I pray that I am wrong
  -then I'm nothing more than an old fool, frightened ofmy own shadow. Ah, but if I'm right... We have
  family and friends in the town, Andrei, and the long night isonly just beginning!'
   Together now, Lardis and Andrei, and breathlessly silent in the deepening shadows of the forest's fringe.
  And for all that they were tired where they followed sounds of laughter and music, smells of wood smoke
  and cooking fires, still they hurried. Hurried, yes; for as one man they were suddenly aware that those
  same sounds and smells were permeating the night air, rising through the wooded slopes into the peaks of
  the barrier range. And they were also aware that the campfires would be blazing like ... like beacons.
   But more than that, they were aware of all the life in Settlement. And of all the hot Szgany blood ...
    
   In the town, Jason Lidesci and Nestor Kiklu had gone one way, and Nathan Kiklu the other. The pair to
  thecampfires, which burned through the night in the gather ing places, and the one to his mother's house
  against the stockade wall.
   In the central open space, a public place where the mainfire and many lesser cooking-fires burned -
  where tablesand chairs had already been laid out in preparation for Lardis's and the others' return, for the
  Szgany Lidesci rarely missed an opportunity to celebrate - Jason and Nestor had received a boisterous
  welcome from their friends, and then exchanged more sober greetings andinformation with the town's
  elder citizens and dignitaries.
   The latter had wanted to know how the trip hadgone? And where was Lardis now - and Andrei
  Romani? - how far behind the younger, fleeter members of the party? What news from the other towns
  and villages to the east? And so forth. Jason and Nestor had restricted their answers; everyone knew that
  Lardis and Andrei would want to tell everything in their own way, in their own good time. Indeed, the
  story-telling wouldform a major part of the celebrations.
  
   Finding chairs in the quiet corner of an old stone wall, finally the two settled down with a jar of wine and
  a pair of small silver goblets between them. Theyweren't important now; Lardis Lidesci and Andrei
  Romani were the important ones, and their arrival imminent. Between times, Jason and Nestor could talk.
   'My father sometimes worries me,' Jason admitted, having washed the trail's dust from his throat with a
  gulp of sweet wine.
   And: 'Huh!' Nestor grunted. 'You should have my problems, for my brother worries me all the time!' His
  voice was at once sour, a sure sign that the conversationhad returned to Nathan.
   Jason was hardly taken aback. 'You're too hard onhim,' he said.
   'You think so?' Nestor raised an eyebrow. Eighteenmonths Jason's senior, he considered Lardis's son
  clever but naive; hardly the right kind of man to inherit the leadership of the clan when that time came,
  and never strong enough to hold it together and make it a powerin the world. There was too much of the
  thinker in him,too little of the doer. 'But Nathan's not too hard on me,right?'
   'Nathan, hard?' Now Jason was taken aback. 'Buthe's soft as a child!'
   Nestor nodded. 'He is a child, in some things, aye. And in some ways he's an idiot, despite what your
  father thinks! But I'm his brother and so know himbetter than anyone, and there's another, weirder side
  tohim.'
   'Oh?'
   'We're twins, as you know,' Nestor nodded. 'Not identical, no, but still our kinship goes deeper than
  ordinary flesh and blood. Far deeper.' He nodded again but angrily, even savagely. 'I mean, I wouldn't
  mind Nathandreaming all the strange things he dreams, or blame him for living in his daydreams - just so
  long as he'dleave me out of them!'
   'But how are you part of them?' Jason was puzzled.'In what way do they concern you? Why, I've never
  met brothers more dissimilar than you two!'
   'Huh!' Nestor grunted again. 'But up here,' he tappedhis forehead, 'in our minds, we're not that
  dissimilar.'He leaned closer. 'Listen, and I'll tell you how it's beenfor as long as I can remember.' He got
  his thoughts inorder, then:
   'Among other things,' he began, 'my brother dreams of numbers. Great waves of numbers, all
  meaningless, swirling in his head like a river in flood! There's this -oh, I don't know - this fabulous
  "secret" behind them,which he seeks to discover, except he hasn't a cluewhere to begin. And so in his
  sleep he goes through thenumbers again and again, endlessly searching them for their secret meaning. All
  very well, and I'd have nocomplaint - if only he would keep his dreams to himself!'
   'What?'
   Nestor nodded. 'Don't ask me how, but I "hear" hisdreams! I can see him, feel him there in my head, lost
  in these damned numbers! Now to me, a number is thecount of fish I've caught, division is the share-out
  aftera day's hunting, and multiplication is what rabbits do. As for schooling: I got as much of that as I
  need - and all I can use - when I was a child. So, if I can't work something out on my fingers and toes,
  then I'm not interested in it. I'm not one of these so-called "wise men" who tinker with runes and scratch
  
  on slates tokeep records and histories, or work out the distance tothe moon, which they say is another
  world. I won't bearound when the things we do today are history, and asfor the distance to the moon:
  what possible use in knowing that, except to the wolves who sing to her?'
   Jason was fascinated. 'You really hear his dreams?'
   'Not all of them,' Nestor shrugged, concerned now that perhaps he was saying too much. 'For his mind
  is deep, like a well, and there's a lot he keeps hidden. Even so, it's full of faraway worlds and dead
  people .. . and numbers, of course! Not that I'd pry, you understand, for if it was up to me I'd have
  nothing at all to do with Nathan's damned dreams and fancies! But I can't control it. His dreams find their
  way into mine, so that he's just as big a pest asleep as when he's awake!'
   Puzzled, Jason shook his head. 'But how can you be sure? How do you know you share the same
  dreams? Has he told you? A rare event that, for he scarcelyspeaks at all!'
   'He doesn't have to,' Nestor was tired of the subject now. 'I only have to wake up in the middle of the
  night in our room, and look at him sleeping there, and I know. Now and then, not very often, I can read
  his mind as clearly as the spoor of a wild pig. Read it, andhate it!'
   'Hate it?' Again Jason was astonished, by the fire inthe other's voice, and by his passion. 'Hate your
  brother's mind? But why? Is he devious?'
   But Nestor merely scowled, shook his head, and finally sighed. 'What, Nathan, devious? No, I hate it
  because he's as gentle and trusting as the doves nestingin the eaves!'
   Jason found it all very hard to understand, and not least Nestor's curiously mixed emotions. 'You share
  your brother's dreams and read his thoughts,' he shook his head in wonder of it. 'Well, the way I see it, it
  can mean only one thing: that you are true Szgany, Nestor, both of you! For there are mysteries in our
  blood whicheven we can't understand. Why, there could even besomething of the Wamphyri in you - !'
  He quickly held up a hand to ward off any protest (though in factNestor would be the last to take offence
  at his remark). '- As there is in most of us, naturally. For in the old days the Wamphyri were like a plague
  among us, and there are throwbacks even now. My father believes it'sthe source of all Szgany mysticism:
  the power of fortune-tellers who read dreams and palms, and seerswho scry afar.'
   Nestor pulled a face. 'You really believe in such stuff?'Obviously Jason was even more naive than he'd
  suspected. 'Can you show me one genuine — what, mystic?- in all Settlement? And am I, Nestor Kiklu,
  a mystic? Not likely, nor would I want to be. No, it's simply thatwe shared our mother's womb, were
  born together, and brought up almost as one. Except we're not one but entirely different. And finally ...
  I've had enough ofhim.'
   'Of your own brother?'
   'Yes,' Nestor answered. 'Of the trouble he's been tome, and the trouble still to come.'
   'Ah!' said Jason. For he believed he understood something of that, at least.
   Nestor frowned at him. 'Ah?'
   Jason saw his mistake at once and tried to change the subject. 'Back on Starside, you said that Nathan
  was neither deaf nor daft. And yet a moment ago youcalled him an idiot. Something doesn't match up.'
  
   Now Nestor scowled. 'A lot doesn't match up,' he answered. 'Like the way you're avoiding saying
  what'son your mind! Now out with it.'
   Jason grimaced, shrugged awkwardly. And: 'Misha,' he said. A single word, a name, which felt like a
  great weight rolling off his tongue. Nestor was a hard one;his hands were hard; it wouldn't be the first
  time hehad broken lips just for speaking that name.
   The other sat up straighter, pulled air into his chest, let a little of it come growling out. 'What of her?'
  Nestor's young voice was all gravel now, a man's voice, threatening and inquiring in one. Indeed, a
  jealousvoice.
   'As children you three were inseparable,' Jason said, hurriedly. 'All four of us together, all the hours of
  theday. Me, I was a friend. But you and Nathan, she lovedboth of you. She still does, I'm sure.'
   Nestor slumped down again. 'So am I,' he answered,perhaps morosely. 'And that can't be. And you're
  right, of course, for that's the trouble in store: Misha. She loves us both, but who the most? If it's me, then
  it'sbecause I'm a man and can look after her. If it's Nathan, then it's because he's still a child and needs
  lookingafter! Well, a real rival wouldn't be much of a problem. I could deal with that. But Nathan? My
  ridiculous, speechless - or at best stuttering — pale-faced, corn-cropped brother?'
   Jason nodded. 'I see now why you've gone your own ways. I saw it begin — oh, four, five years ago?
  — but didn't really understand what it was.'
   Nestor, caught up in his own thoughts, scarcely heardhim. There have been times,' he burst out, 'when I
  might have taken her - even by force!' (Jason lookedstartled, shocked.) 'Maybe I should have. It might
  have settled things there and then. But Nathan ... Nathan ... damn him.' I know he only has to smile at
  her,justsmile, and . . . and . . .'
   Jason stared at him. 'And does he know it, d'youthink?'
   Nestor sat up again and tossed back his wine in one.'No,' he said. 'Not an inkling. And now you know
  why Iconsider him an idiot. For all his dreaming of other places, and his endless quest for meaning in a
  handful of numbers, where she's concerned he can't add two and two! And if he could - or if he ever
  does - what then? If I can't live with him as he is now, how could I ever live with both of them together?
  What, Misha andNathan? And who would look the dumb one then?'
   'What will you do?' Jason's concern for his fatherwas all but forgotten now.
   Nestor poured more wine into their goblets, then snatched up and drank his own as if it were water.
  'Ask her to be mine, and soon,' he answered. 'No, tellher she's going to be mine!'
   'And if she says no?'
   'Then I'm gone, out of Settlement, away from the Szgany Lidesci forever. What opportunity for me
  here? You're the next chief of the tribe. And shall I be a hunter all my days, grow old by the campfire,
  and sitthere telling stories like your father? Forgive me, Jason, but I see little profit in that. And anyway,
  what storieswould I have to tell? How one day I caught a fish, put a bolt through a rabbit, and skewered
  a wolf where he crept up on my animals? No, the days of adventure went with the Wamphryi. But me, I
  wish they were back, and I always have! What good in being strong in a world where even the weakest
  is my equal? I feel I've a name to make for myself, but how? And where? Not here, for sure. And not
  without Misha ...'
  
   'You're ambitious,' Jason told him, his eyes narrownow.
   'And is that wrong?'
   'You don't much like it that I'll be chief one day.'
   Abruptly, Nestor stood up, swayed a little, clutched at the table to steady himself. The trek had been
  long and he was tired - they were both tired - and the winewas strong. 'Maybe I don't much like anything
  about Settlement any more,' the words came slurring out.'Maybe I should leave come what may. There
  are places to the west, and new territories far to the east. It'srumoured there's even a place beyond the
  farthest wasteland. But frontiers are few, and time is wasting.'
   'You'll take Misha and go?'
   Nestor snorted and shook his head. 'No, for her brothers are big lads, both of them! So for the moment
  it has to be her choice. But with or without her, still I'll go.And if it's the latter, then be sure I'll be back
  one day.'
   Now Jason stood up, but only to take a pace to the rear. 'Be sure you'll be back? But why do you make
  it sound like a threat? What, will you bring an army with you? To steal Misha? Or... do you also covet
  myfather's territory?'
   'Are you worried?' Nestor scowled. 'For Lardis? Butit's you who'll likely be chief by then.'
   'And should I be afraid of an old friend?' Jason's lookwas sour as Nestor's now. 'Aye, and maybe I
  should.'He shrugged and turned away. 'Anyway, it's high time Iwas home. My mother will be waiting up
  for me.'
   For a moment Nestor's expression changed, softened;but then he stiffened his back, and turned it on
  Jason where the other moved off abruptly towards the NorthGate and the dark foothills. And as that
  young friend of his childhood went off, disturbed and soured by their conversation, so Nestor chewed his
  lip and glanced all around, perhaps to avoid calling out after him ...
   Meanwhile, the old meeting place had filled up, and nowthere was movement, shouting at the East Gate.
  Lardisand Andrei were here. But in all this great crowd, nevera sign of Misha. Where was she? And
  where Nathan?
   Nestor picked up the jar, drained it, wiped his mouthon his sleeve. And:
   Tonight/ he promised himself. I'll have it out with Misha tonight. OrI'll have her tonight, one way or the
  other. Andif there's anythingof a man in Nathan - and if he cares for her at all - maybe then he'll yelp and
  bare his teeth!
   Jason had disappeared now, out through the North Gate and into the night, on his way home to Lardis's
  cabin on the knoll. But here in Settlement ... what was going on? That awful commotion and shouting.
  And angry, furious shouting, at that! Was it Lardis, bellowing like a stag at the rut? It could only be. His
  voicewas unmistakable.
   And pushing his way through the gathering crowd, Nestor went to see what it was all about...
  
    
    
    
   II
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
   Some two hours earlier, eastwards, and not quite twentymiles distant:
   ... The Lady Wratha climbed down out of the saddle of her flyer on to a high plateau still warm from the
  sun's last rays. Stepping to the rim, she looked down through hooded eyes on the fires of a Szgany town
  nestling in the lee of the barrier range; looked down on the fires of Twin Fords . .. and smiled. She smiled
  with all the delight of a young girl, and lusted after TwinFords with all the evil of an ancient horror.
   And waiting on the rim of the plateau while her band of circling renegades found landing places on the
  flat, scrubby expanse of rock behind her, she gazed on Sun-side in the twilight of early evening - a sight
  unseen by Wamphyri eyes for all of fourteen years - and let her mind drift back a little: to her flight from
  Turgosheim across the Great Red Waste, all along the spine of these unknown mountains, and deep into
  Old Starside ...
    
   Unlike Turgo Zolte's flight in the time of Shaitan the Unborn, Wratha's had been relatively easy. Where
  Turgo was pursued and unable to pause for respite, Wratha suffered no such handicap. Which was just
  as well; her flyers were unused to covering vast distances, and for all her boasting in Vormspire's great
  hall, her aerial warriors were mainly untried. Oh, no one could doubt that they were superb engines of
  destruction, but as for flying skills: there had been no way to put thoseto the test, not in the skies over
  Turgosheim.
   In the end, however, little had been left wanting in performance; all of the flyers had made the crossing;
  
  only one of the warriors had been lost.
   The plan had been to 'refuel' at the western edge of the secondary range of which Turgosheim was a
  part, then climb as high as possible on thermals out of Sun-side before commencing the long glide
  westwards. The ceiling would of course be that altitude where the sun's rays, striking tangentially across
  the curve of the world, intersected the flight path: not very high initially, for the slow-moving sun had only
  recently set. Phase two would come when it was calculated that the warriors had expended about half of
  their energy. At this point they would climb again, to whatever limit the sun and exhaustion permitted,
  before finally gliding and jettingdown into Old Starside.
   The warriors were the main cause for concern. For in the end, having converted much of their own mass
  into fuel, they might be obliged to draw on their flimsy gas-bladder reserves. Loss of weight would
  compensate in some small degree, but the equation was still a loser. Lacking energy, buoyancy, and
  conceivably even will (for while small minds are malleable, their attention span is limited), a fatigued
  warrior might well gravitate to earth. If and when that was perceived as imminent, the weak one would
  be sacrificed and torn apart inmid-air, to fuel the rest of them on their way.
   In the event, it was Canker's creature that paid the price. The energies consumed in its landing at
  Vorm-spire - its savage work in the great hall, and the subsequent launching from the spire's shattered
  window -all had served to deplete it. Thus, at the apex of the second climb, when the warrior was seen
  to be failing, then Wratha had ordered its dissolution.
   Canker had raged (naturally, and to no avail), but inany case his protest was an automatic, instinctive
  reaction, his stance untenable, and resistance inconceivable. And three to one the other warriors had
  fallen on Canker's weary creature, dismembering and devouring it in short order. After bone and chitin
  armour had rained to earth, when all that remained was a thin,skeletal frame drifting at the mercy of the
  winds, finally the bladders had been drained and the empty rag-thingallowed to spiral down to oblivion.
   And replenished, the group had flown on...
   From time to time the Lady, Lords, and their handful of lieutenants would pull cartilage stoppers from
  wells drilled in the knuckled backbones of their flyers, and sip sparingly on sustaining spinal fluids ...
   They took turns to sleep, half of them nodding in their saddles while the rest controlled the beasts and
  maintained the course ...
   On high, the stars glittered like ice-chips; far below, theGreat Red Waste seemed endless; the obscenely
  flowingshadows of the renegades, however faint, diluted and somehow polluted the starlight where they
  passed ...
   Sundown crept towards sunup and they were anxious...
   Now, time and again, the propulsors of the warriors would sputter warningly, the beasts would falter,
  and even the most vicious mind-darts would fail to inspire them. Such creatures could never turn on their
  mistress and masters, of course not, but it was conceivable that eventually they might seek to kill and
  devour one another ...
   Then, distantly but closing, moonlit mountains rose up to greet the inevitable descent — but wider,
  higher, vaster mountains far than those of Turgosheim - so that Wratha knew this could only be Old
  Starside.And, south of the towering range, Old Sunside, too.
  
   All propulsive power stilled now, the wind keenedunder leather canopies where flyers and warriors alike
  shaped manta wings and fluttering mantle vanes into gliding aerofoils. And as a thin line of silvery light
  made a crack on the southern horizon, so they skimmedlow and silent over the first peaks of Starside's
  eastern range ... and spied their first signs of life since leavingTurgosheim!
   There on the north-facing flank, in a stony basin lying midway between the foothills and the rearing
  mountains proper, a circle of small fires sent up spiralsof black smoke. Within the circle, figures capered
  andmade intricate, awkward, apparently aimless leaps andtwirls. Sounds of guttural, rhythmic grunting,
  and the jarring clatter of ceremonial crotalae, rose up with thereek of burning wood and dung.
   Huh.' Spiro Killglance, flying close to Wratha, senther a bitter, scornful thought. Trogs.' Twodozen of
  them, performing their rites.
   Her answering thought was darker, more practical,and much more to the point. Meat.'
   The warriors were ordered down: two of them wouldland between the fires and the mountains, so
  blockingthe route of the trogs back to their cavern homes, and the third would make sure that none
  escaped into thefoothills. Propulsors sputtering into hot, stinking life - with stabilizing vanes extended, and
  tiny saucer eyes in their bellies swivelling to seek landing sites - themonsters came down bellowing and
  snorting, eagerly toearth.
   On the ground, the trog ceremonies came to an abrupthalt. Wide black eyes under dark, sloping
  foreheadsscanned the starlit sky, found hideous shapes circling,rapidly descending. For a single moment,
  mouthsgasped and jaws fell open in disbelief. Then, shufflingand lurching in their fashion - their leathery
  limbsgalvanized far beyond the earlier exertions of their esoteric devotions - the trogs scattered. But all
  too late.
   A dozen flyers sideslipped this way and that, settling to earth like leaves falling in still air, or flat stones
  sinking in water. They flopped down on springy tendrils which uncoiled from their bellies; and Wratha
  and herfive, and their vampire lieutenants, took battle gauntlets from their beasts' harnesses and climbed
  down out oftheir saddles.
   After that... mayhem!
   Five, maybe six trogs attempted to slip through the murderous Wamphyri noose which threatened to
  close them in; three made it past the circle of long-necked manta flyers with their vacuously swaying,
  diamond-shaped heads; two were left, after running the gauntlet between the warriors snuffling and
  snorting in the shadow of the mountains, to make it home. But out oftwo dozen, only two. And as for the
  rest:
   It was slaughter where Wratha's renegades scythed among them, their gauntlets red in the flying spray of
  their havoc. Hoarse screams echoed through the night,became gurgles, guttered into silence like candles
  snuffed out. It was the work of minutes, three at most, which in the end saw a terrified silence fall over
  Star-side; a silence broken only by the panting of a trog priestess, grabbed up alive by Canker Canison.
  Rabid with lust, he tore her rags from her and took her three times in quick succession - once in each
  opening -before tearing out her throat and crushing her skull. Then, draining blood from her wounds while
  her heart still feebly pumped, he glared at the others where theywatched him. So, she'd been a trog. She
  was still female,wasn't she?
   The rest was routine. Wamphyri, lieutenants,warriors and flyers alike, all took their fill. But shortly, when
  the edge was off their hunger: Spiro Killglance paused to wipe his mouth on his sleeve, turning itscarlet,
  
  and gruntingly inquired, 'What now?'
   'Westward,' Wratha answered at once, dabbing a square of coloured Szgany cloth to the perfect bow of
  her girl's lips. 'The sun will be up soon, and we need tofind a place.'
   Then we should go carefully,' Gorvi the Guile's voicewas oily, insinuating, 'and spy out the way before
  us. For if Maglore is wrong and the Old Wamphyri lie in wait -'
   But Wratha only shook her head. 'No. For all my detestation of that old' thought-thief, still Maglore is
  right. When did you last see trogs out in the open in Turgosheim? Speaking for myself, never! Because
  we, the Wamphyri, are in Turgosheim. But here? ... they take no precautions but cavort grotesquely by
  the light of their fires, and when we fall on them flutter in everydirection, like Sunside chickens! No, there
  are noWamphyri in Old Starside. Not until now, at least.'
   Replete, then they had rested an hour before mounting up to fly west. The warriors, sated but not
  glutted, were ordered into a reverse arrowhead formation, one on each flank and the third to the rear.
  And thus the Wamphyri returned to the long forsaken territories of the Wamphyri...
    
   As time had passed and the air grew brighter moment by moment, so the jagged shapes and twining
  contours of the barrier range had stood out that much clearer, until finally the rays of the rising sun had lit
  golden on the very highest peaks. And as Wratha's anxiety had risen up in her again, so she'd seen
  Karenstack, the last aerie. But scattered all about that lone fang – lyingthere in total disarray, like
  dismembered stone giants with their stumps scorched as by colossal fires - she also saw the vast sprawls
  of rubble which were all thatremained of the other ancient aeries.
   But... the one stack remained.
   And before the sun could burn her renegades, Wrathaled them into the hugely frozen yawn of a cavern
  launch ing bay as big as the largest Turgosheim manse, whichopened in the east facing wall of the stack
  two thousand and more feet above Starside. And dismounting there inthat high, empty, echoing place:
   'See to the warriors and flyers,' she had instructed thelieutenants, 'then see to yourselves. I don't know
  how farthe sun will rise; it may light upon half of the aerie, for all I know! So find rooms for yourselves -
  without windows!Or if they have windows, be sure they face north.'
   Then, with her five following on behind, she had setout to explore the rest of the stack.
   They climbed.
   The aerie seemed to go up forever, and Wratha tried not to show the awe she felt. She knew she could
  house five hundred thralls and lieutenants in this upper third of the stack alone! And below, where the
  great honeycombed butte widened into its base?
   Why, given a hundred, two hundred sundowns, the place could be filled with an army and stand impreg
  nable! With its great height, it was a giant watchtower onall Starside, which none could approach unseen
  - especially not from the east. For Wratha had no doubt but that they would come one night, out of
  Turgosheim totrack her down. Except they'd be weary, and their blood thin, and their warriors spawned
  of feeble, watered-down stuff. While she ... she would be Wratha! Wrathathe Risen, but risen higher than
  ever Maglore, Vormulac,Devetaki and all the others together could ever imagine.
  
   So she pictured it; but for now, all she had was thisaching, echoing, empty shell of a stack.
   Dust lay thick; the bone water pipes had come apartin places, and likewise the complicated
  gas-channelling systems; cartilage stairways were creaking and danger ous, and required earliest possible
  attention. At windows cut through solid rock, black bat-fur drapes were all fallen into moulder, and in the
  empty storerooms rotting cocoons had long since slumped into sticky, molten-silk puddles. The great red
  spiders were still here, however, to spin more cocoons as they were required.
   As for the workshops: they were in good order, and their hollowed vats huge as any in Mangemanse or
  Suckspire. With the assistance of Canker and Vasagi, crafty masters of metamorphism both, Wratha
  could have good stuff brewing here in no time. But the basement granaries would be empty, the
  gas-beast chambersand methane pits reduced to so much dust and bone-shard, and the water in the
  wells lively with all mannerof creeping and swimming things. Oh yes, it would be a long time before the
  stack could be put back to rights.But when it was, what a fortress then!
   And glancing at her companions through half-shuttered eyes where they gawped and strutted in the vast
  rooms of the upper levels, Wratha had thought: Mine,all of this - eventually. Except she kept thethought
  to herself, of course.
   The upper levels...
   At first sight of them, then Wratha had known that this was a Lady's stack, that its last inhabitant had
  been female. For one thing, there were mirrors here: plates of gold hammered perfectly flat, polished to a
  high sheen, giving warmth and life to the features whichthey reflected. And they had been female features,
  certainly; for Wratha knew that while all of theWamphyri Lords were vain, only the vainest would ever
  adorn his walls with such as these.
   No, for generally mirrors were deemed dangerous things, which in the olden times had been known to
  reflect death (in the form of sunlight), as easily as life! Long ago, in Turgosheim's Sunside, Wratha had
  even owned a silver mirror; this despite that all such lethal devices and metals had been forbidden to the
  Szgany since time immemorial. Well, and now she could look upon her face again, admiring once more
  the beauty she'd clung to for over a century. But who last had looked in these mirrors, she wondered?
  And had shebeen beautiful, too?
   She had been slim, beyond a doubt! For in the biggestbedroom of the largest suite on the penultimate
  level, there Wratha found several dresses, or what had beendresses. They were falling into decay now,
  but if Wratha had been alone and in the mood ... she was sure they'd suit her figure perfectly well. So,
  she had been shapely, this Lady, and young; or having all the outward trappings of youth, at least.
   Her bed was still here. Built high and wide, of greatheavy slates, its polished wooden steps and carved
  head board remained intact. Wooden rails, too, suspendedfrom the high ceiling on chains, with golden
  rings which once held sheerest Szgany curtains. But all gone now, turned to dust, and ropes of cobwebs
  hanging in their place. Likewise the bed's covers: all blotched with lichens and fluffy mould.
   As for the rest of the room:
   There was an onyx water basin, with bone pipes descending from the roof's exterior gutters, or from
  some long-shrivelled siphoneer's place; narrow shelves of fretted cartilage, filled with all manner of
  worthlessknick-knacks and baubles under an inch of dust, Szgany stuff mainly; airing cupboards with gas
  jets below, and other pipes leading off to heat a great stone bath ... bigenough for two?
  
   With whom had she shared it? Wratha wondered, allowing herself a smile. Or was she a Lady in every
  respect? But no, for Wratha knew all about Wamphyri 'Ladies'. This one had not stinted herself but had
  takenpleasure in all her little luxuries. This one had lived!
   Sniffing the air as she moved through the cavernous apartments, Wratha had felt ever more at home
  here; but at the same time she'd felt that the five with her were more and more like alien invaders of her
  privacy.Until at last:
   'Out of here!' she'd rounded on them. 'This is my place. All of these upper levels which we've explored,
  they're mine.'
   'What?' Gorvi the Guile had exploded. 'Are youinsane? Why, there's room here for all of us! Our lieuten
  ants, too, and all the thralls we care to muster!'
   For all that his words were snarled, the Guile's voicewas oily as ever. Tall, slender, and with the dome of
  his head shaven except for a single central lock with a knot hanging to the rear; always dressed in black,
  so that the contrast of his sallow flesh made him look fresh risen from death; with eyes so deeply sunken
  intheir sockets they were little more than a crimson glim mer, yet shifty for all that — this was Gorvi. He
  was sinister, but who among the Wamphyri was not? Andhe cowed Wratha not at all.
   'My lieutenants!' She wrinkled her nose and gloweredat him. 'And all the thralls1 care to muster! But...
  did I hear you call me insane?' Now she also glared at thebrothers Wran the Rage and Spiro Killglance.
  'But mad ness is their speciality, surely?' And, redirecting theblaze of her scarlet eyes to Canker Canison
  where he prowled like a dog, sniffing the floor. 'Nor am I toocertain of him!'
   'Now hold with these insults!' cried Wran, his eyes flaring dangerously, but not without a certain shrewd
  intelligence. 'For at best they're a blind - eh, Wratha? And Gorvi's right: we all should have a say in this.'
   'No!' Wratha turned on him, on all five of them. 'Now you hold, all of you, and listen! I was the one who
  schemed and plotted, and drew you all together, and brought you here out of Turgosheim unscathed.
  Why,but for me you'd be skulking in your hovels still. Mange- manse, indeed! Suckspire! Madmanse!
  My place was the best of the lot - a worthy spire - and so I lost the most. Well, now I've regained it. So
  here's how it willbe:
   'Gorvi the Guile. As your name can't help but hint, you are an insular creature, little trusting of your
  fellows. You are crafty and would not feel safe in a manse without a bolt-hole. I make no accusations but
  merely state the facts. Therefore, take the wide and spacious base of the stack - say, the two lowest
  levels? - for your own. This will give you a dozen escape routes from your windows out on to the plains.
  Also, you will have control of the wells, whereby you are guaranteed our aid in the event of any future
  attack from Starside's bottoms. At the same time, however, it means that the wells will be your
  responsibility, and to judge by the rest of this place they'll be bound to require your most urgent attention.
  A task for the first of your thralls, to be recruited in the next sundown.
   'Wran and Spiro. Despite that you are brothers and even twins - who among the Wamphyri normally
  despise each other - you two prefer to be together, within certain limits. So be it: choose yourselves
  apartments inthe several levels immediately above Gorvi's, where thewidth of the stack should provide
  not only ample accommodation but also plenty of room for privacy. I fancy you will be well suited. Also,
  from what I saw of the crumpled ruins which litter this region, your area of responsibility will be great
  indeed! Namely, control of the refuse pits and methane chambers. For I noted thatalmost every one of
  those former aeries was burned and broken in the same section, and I can't doubt but thatthis stack is of
  
  a similar design.
   'Vasagi. You were ever a loner, no less than I myself.I suggest you take the next levels down from my
  own. No fear of claustrophobia, with all this air surrounding us! Your warriors, when they are made, may
  have joint use of my vast launching bays. In return for which, I may require some small assistance in the
  fashioning of creatures of my own. As you see, I acknowledge yourmastery of the metamorphic arts .. .
   'Ah, but I acknowledge yours no less, Canker, and would also enlist your aid! You shall be central
  among us, occupying the levels between the brothers and Vasagi. This way, when the moon rides on
  high, we may all share your ... singing, and the ... delights of your devotions together! Alas, not much in
  the way of duties, but what is that to an artist like you?'
   Canker was not fooled, nor any of the others; they knew that apart from his skill in the fashioning, the
  only reason he was here was to make up the Lady's numbers. But the levels she had assigned to him
  required an overseer, certainly, and at least she'd apportioned the rest of the duties, displayed her
  powers ofreason (however warped), and reinforced her leadership.In the end they must accept, but
  meanwhile:
   'No need to go rushing off immediately,' she'd told them, while they thought it over. 'Outside, it's sunup.
  Our lads will have seen to the beasts, and to themselves.All will have their heads down by now, and we
  shoulddo the same. We've come a long weary way, and nothing more to get excited about till the sun
  sets. So find beds for yourselves - several levels down, I'd suggest - andcatch up on all the sleep you've
  missed. Come nightfall,we'll all of us have work.'
   'On Sunside?' Canker had grinned and winked.
   'Aye,' she'd answered. 'Where else?'
   It had been like a promise, which above all else placated them ...
    
   Then it had been sundown. And almost as quickly asthat, or so it seemed.
   For Wratha and the others had been weary as neverbefore in their long lives, their sleep deep and
  dreamless, undisturbed even by calls of nature. This latter was not strange; such was Wamphyri
  metabolism that theirbodies wasted very little; what was consumed was transformed.
   Once, towards twilight, Wratha had come half-awakewith some weird fancy or anxiety niggling either at
  her or the vampire within her. For a moment, opening her eyes, she'd thought to see sunlight blasting in
  through the undraped window! .. . But it was only moonlight. And propping herself up she'd seen the
  auroras writhing over the Icelands, and Starside's barren boulder plains turning a uniform, ashen grey as
  clouds covered the moon. Then, remembering that she'd made her bed in a room facing north, Wratha
  had relaxed. And hearing Canker's mournful howling rising from some netherplace of his choice, she
  knew what had lured her fromsleep and gladly returned to it.
   But the next time she came awake, that was because she knew! Knew that the last glint of gold was
  gonefrom the peaks of the barrier range, that all of Starside lay in shadow, and that the others were even
  now stirring, called up from their sleep by the long night just beginning. And her eyes blinked open like
  shutters thrown back, and her forked tongue moved luxuriously,sensually, in the thirsting tunnel of her
  mouth.
  
   Sundown! And now she would see what this new butancient land had to offer.
   Knowing that the others would be just as eager to be up and about, Wratha had no time to spare. In the
  launching bays she'd found Gorvi and Vasagi mustering their lieutenants and rousing their beasts, and in a
  little while Canker, Wran and Spiro had joined them. Gorvihad been surly.
   'The climb is crippling!' he'd complained. 'But I won'tbe making it again. While the rest of you slept I
  went below, looked my place over, and saw what you have not seen: that the sun strikes only these
  higher levels. Wratha, you are welcome to them! But down there, I have launching bays of my own, and
  stables for my flyers. When we return I'll take my creatures below. As for the wells: you're right, they are
  foul. When I have the material, then I shall make a creature to eat theslime and purify the water.'
   'You have no complaints, then?' Wratha was pleased.
   Gorvi shrugged, and grudgingly replied: 'Only that I must dwell in the basement, as it were, and see to
  the wells for all to share. As for my levels, apartments, facilities: they are or will be ample. But all this talk
  of responsibilities prompts me to inquire: just what are your duties, Wratha? I mean, now that you've
  risen tothe top, as it were . . .'
   'I shall house and tend the siphoneers,' was her immediate response. 'A place of these dimensions will
  need more than one, for no use having water if youcan't deliver it.' She frowned at Gorvi. 'What? And do
  you imply that I would shirk responsibility?'
   Without waiting for an answer, she turned to the brothers Wran and Spiro. 'And did you inspect your
  levels, also?'
   Despite that they were physically identical (or perhaps because of it), the twin bloodsons of Eygor
  Kill-glance affected opposing styles and mannerisms: one was loutish, the other a 'gentleman'. In the main
  their allegedly inherited 'madness' was also affected, though this was a matter for conjecture and
  argument among the Wamphyri. Undeniable, though, that in Turgosheim the destructive rages of Wran
  had been notorious, giving licence to the general consensus that he, at least,was quite insane.
   As for their disparity in appearance: paradoxically it was Spiro who went in rags and sandals, with a
  strip of cloth upon his forehead to keep his hair out of his eyes, while Wran dressed impeccably in a
  cloak and finely Grafted leather boots out of Sunside. Physically, their looks were nothing extraordinary:
  broad in the shoulder and narrow in the hip (if running a little to fat), they stood six and a half feet tall. A
  small black wen on the point of Wran's fleshy chin, together withhis elegant dress, distinguished him from
  his brother.
   But it was the ragged one, Spiro, who answeredWratha's question about an inspection of their levels:
   'Briefly, aye,' he glowered, as was his wont. 'We, too,have a serviceable launching-bay for flyers and
  warriors, and like Gorvi we'll move our beasts down there atfirst opportunity. But it seems that when this
  place was deserted, the gas-beasts were left behind to die and rotin their chambers. Now their dust is
  everywhere, drifted into every nook and cranny, and clogging all the ducts.As you know, impurities can
  cause blockages, stenches,even explosions. Which means that before we can hopeto bring back light and
  warmth to the stack, all must be made clean, the walls of the chambers polished, thepipes flushed to
  discover the leaks, and all repairs madesafe.'
   Wratha nodded. 'Well, in one more sundown - two atmost - we should have thralls enough for all such
  
  work. Meanwhile, we'll have to live with it. Ah, but as I recall, luxuries were also scarce in Turgosheim!'
  And toCanker:
   'How about you? Do you have complaints, too?'
   He shook his head, set his mane flying. 'None!' hebarked. 'I have a small but useful workshop, a
  launching-bay, and veritable mazes of apartments on all levels. My windows are wide and face north,
  with suitable balconies from which I may ogle the moon. When I sing ... the walls reverberate with
  choruses all their own, and my rooms are filled with sound! All I need now is a bitch to warm my bed, a
  bone to sharpenmy teeth on, and I shall be content!'
   'You shall have all of that and more,' Wratha nodded,and turned to Vasagi the Suck. 'Last, but by no
  meansleast?'
   Vasagi had no voice as such. Below his dark, flattened, convoluted nose his face was a trunk of pale
  pink flesh which tapered into a quivering proboscis. But the Suck had developed his sign-language to an
  extraordinary degree; there was meaning in his slightest glance, each turn and tilt of his head, every
  wrinkle of his forehead or flutter of his long, tapering fingers. So that between this and his telepathy,
  which was an artshared by all of the Wamphyri to one degree or another, his 'voice' was as clear as any
  other's and clearer thanmost.
   I have no complaints, he answered as 'simply' asthat, with a complicated shrug that said it for him.
  Except Wratha could swear that she also 'heard' him say: However, andif or when I do have complaints,
  then you shall hear of them first, Lady.
   If there was a threat in it, she ignored it for the moment. But she would not forget it. Meanwhile, there
  was enough to keep everyone occupied.
   'Mount up!' Wratha cried. 'Up, all, and into the air -warriors, too! The sun is off the peaks and it's
  twilight on Sunside. And now, if Maglore has it right, we shallsee what no one else has seen for all of
  fourteen years.'
   With which they had headed west over the boulder plains, then south across the mouth of the great pass
  and the glowing hemisphere of the legendary hell-landsGate, finally to this very plateau where now -
   - Where now Wratha's renegades landed and joined her on the rim. And as they returned to earth and
  the present, so did the Lady's thoughts ...
    
   There!' she said, pointing. 'Look there!'
   Below them, maybe three miles distant in the lee ofthe twilight mountains, a Szgany town or more
  properly a village stood on slightly elevated ground between twin streams which tumbled down from the
  heights. Southwards, the streams joined up and formed a river through the forest; to east and west, at
  ancient fording places, stout wooden bridges spanned the cascading waters. The lands thus enclosed,
  between mountains on the one hand, streams on the other, were sufficient to support the township.
   Szgany! Vasagi's facial anomaly quivered his anticipation.
   'Women!' Canker fell to his knees and might have offered up thanks to the moon in his fashion, but
  
  Wratha stopped him with a glance.
   Thralls galore!' Gorvi's whisper oozed his delight.'And fresh lieutenants to oversee them in their duties.'
   'Flesh for the shaping,' Spiro scowled. The first smallnucleus of our army. But a town as big as this?
  Why,Turgosheim never saw the like!'
   'And all ours,' Wratha nodded. 'But I think you'll find this a small place, compared with what's waiting
  out there!' She threw her arms wide as if to enclose all of Sunside, and their greedy scarlet eyes took in
  something of its span:
   The curved horizons to east and west, and betweenthem a dozen and more campfires clearly visible,
  dotting the darkening land like glowworms as far as the eye could see. Broad forests lying dark to the
  south, andbeyond them furnace deserts, cooling now underbanded amethyst skies. In all, a vast expanse.
   'How many of them?' Wran, who was normally silent except in a passion, spoke up. The Szgany, I
  mean. Ten thousand, do you think?'
   'What?' Wratha smiled at him. 'Why, even in Turgosheim's Sunside there are that many! No ... fifty
  thousand, and more!'
   Spiro gripped his brother's arm. 'Just think, Wran! Fifty thou ...!' But the words were choked off as his
  emotions overcame him. He cleared his throat. 'Our tithewill be massive!'
   Tithe?' Wratha laughed, a young girl's laugh, which in the next moment became a woman's voice again,
  indeed a Lady's. 'No tithe-system here, Spiro. We takewhat we want!'
   'Oh?' said Gorvi. 'But if they're so many, surely theycan fight us? We only talk of building an army; they
  arealready an army!'
   Wratha shook her head. They are Szgany, yes, butit seems that in fourteen years they've become as
  territorial as we ourselves. See how they've settled, divided their lands, built their towns. Fight, did you
  say? With what and against whom? Against each other, perhaps, but not against us. Have you forgotten
  the trogs we fell upon in their devotions? The Wamphyri are nomore, Gorvi! We are the stuff of legends!'
   Gorvi was astonished; for this time his natural duplicity - his devious mind, which usually examined every
  angle, expecting trouble from whichever quarter - had worked against him to obscure the simple facts,
  which Wratha had made clear. 'But of course.'' he said, his face agog. They are unprepared. They don't
  know we'rehere, or even that we exist!'
   'But they will,' Wratha told him, 'eventually. And then it will be as it was in Turgosheim, too late - for
  them! Then they might choose to fight, by which timewe shall be too many. Which is why we start by
  increas ing our numbers ... start now, tonight!'
   Then why do you keep us waiting? Vasagi mightlook alien, but his eager thoughts were all Wamphyri.
   'Simply to remind you why we are here," Wratha answered. 'I know you have certain needs, all of you;
  also that you must put them aside, for the moment. Now is no time for wasteful self-indulgence, but for
  structuring our future. Tonight we kill, but only to rekindle! Tonight we destroy, in order to create!
  Canker -' she turned to him, '- take as many women and make as many vampire babies as you will, until
  you are exhausted. But remember this: the rest of us will be making thralls! Bring a Szgany slut back to
  
  your manse, by all means, but your flyer has room for just two passengers. And we shall be taking back
  fine young Szgany flesh, for the making of lieutenants. Enough. I hope you take my meaning ...' She
  turned to Wran.
   'Wran, you are handsome tonight, as ever. A finecloak and boots, and your good gauntlet at your belt.
  Ah, but should you rage, your cloak and boots will be ruined with blood! Aye, and your every effort
  wasted. So kill by all means, slay with your gauntlet all youwill, but remember this: a dead man is only a
  dead man. Not until he has something of you in him will he rise up again, trek for Starside before the
  rising sun, and be your thrall in the bowels of the stack. Now, your rages are legendary, I know, but not
  tonight, Wran, not tonight. Instead, let it be like this: don't maim but make each kill a clean one, for we've
  no use for thralls whoare cripples. And every time you slay, take a little some thing, a sip, from your
  victim - but at the same time give a little something back! That way you'll makeuseful vampires, Wran,
  not useless corpses.'
   She looked at the rest of them. The same applies toall, of course . ..
   'Now: these are the instructions you should give to those who become your thralls: that when they rise up
  undead and flee from the rising sun, they should bringwith them into Starside grain from their storehouses,
  nutsand fruits, tools and other metal things - but never silver! -and any woven items which they can carry.
  They can bring them on their travois or carts, through the great pass;which is why this place makes a
  good choice, because it is close to the pass ...' She paused for a moment's thought.And eventually: 'Well,
  I think that covers it.'
   They began to turn away, head for their flyers, butshe stopped them. 'No, wait: two more things.
   'I remember a time - oh, long ago - on Turgosheim's Sunside, when I was a Szgany titheling. A captive
  of the Wamphyri, I was given into the charge of a young lieutenant and taken up on to his flyer's back.
  Then ... I killed him! Any live prisoners you take, make surethey're either tightly bound or unconscious,
  or both!
   'Finally, don't let the warriors glut themselves. Amorsel here, a tidbit there, sufficient only to fuel them
  selves and no more.' She nodded sharply. There! Is allunderstood?'
   All was understood. Again Wratha's nod. 'Good! Nowlet their fires guide you down to what will be
  glory for you, hell for them. And if all goes well, later there'smaybe a treat for you . . .'
    
   The Szgany of Twin Fords scarcely knew what had hitthem. Two of the warriors landed at the bridges,
  destroy ing them in seconds, and the third towards the junction of the rivers, from where it herded fleeing
  villagers back towards the town. The flyers were guided down closer to Twin Fords itself, to encircle it in
  a ring of lolling grey primordial shapes. Largely harmless when grounded, still these manta-shaped beasts
  were fearsome to look at, and they had orders from their riders to roll upon and crush anyone who came
  too close. They could eat flesh, of course, but were instructed not to; their food consisted of a special
  preparation, whichWratha hoped soon to manufacture on Starside.
   But in Twin Fords their arrival had not gone unnoticed: the rumble of warrior propulsors was
  unmistakable to certain of the older inhabitants, also theamorphous, squid-like silhouettes which blotted
  out the stars as they passed overhead, and the stench of exhaust gases which fell on the town like the
  smoke of a hundred corpse-fires. And a concerted sigh of horror went up and was passed on, swelling
  to a choking cryin the suddenly reeking twilight: Wamphyri! Wamphyri.'
  
   Issuing a clinging vampire mist as they advanced into the village, the raiders heard that massed cry
  -indeed, theyfelt the terror which their presence engendered - and laughed. They fed upon it, and with
  Wamphyri passions inflamed met the fleeing inhabitants head-on. The result was carnage.
   Wratha and her five were in the streets, blocking every exit as best they could. Human yet inhuman, they
  were simply figures in the stinking, slimy mist ... until the people who fled into their arms saw their eyes,
  their melting, changing faces, and the metamorphic poisonswhich dripped from their fangs!
   Wran raged, of course, but he also rememberedWratha's words and his fury was controlled. Having left
  his gauntlet tied to his saddle, instead he drove fingers like talons into the chests of his victims, nipping
  their hearts a little until they fell twitching to the ground. And kneeling, he would fasten his teeth in their
  necks to taste their blood, which served to transfuse his own blood's monstrous fever into them. So he
  dealt death and undeath to a score of victims in asmany moments.
   And 'dying', they all sensed the instructions ofWran's hideous vampire mind, which spoke to them as one
  body although they were many: When you rise up and come to me in my manse in Starside, bring me
  your goods and chattels, which are now mine. Only remember: comebefore thesun is risen! For your
  Szgany flesh is as a soft metal beside the fire of the sun, and whathas beenforged may be melted.
  Aye, and what I havemade can be unmade forever.
   Within the hour he killed sixty like this, men, womenand youths, of which less than one third would make
  it to Starside. For before they could escape from the sun, first they must escape from the raid's survivors;
  and of course, there would be some who woke up too late, or not at all, but slept on with stakes in their
  hearts untilthey were burned. In its way, it was not unlike a process of natural - or unnatural - selection.
   Spiro's way was simpler than his brother's: hesnatched up people where they fled through his mist and
  bit their faces, then struck them down with hands like hammers. Pain and shock did the rest. They would
  not die but wake up with sore heads and strange cravings, and hear the message which he'd left in their
  changeling minds.
   As for Canker: to the terrified people streaming out of the stricken town, he must seem like a tame wolf
  who fled with them. But he was not a wolf and he was nottame. Loping among them on all fours, he
  chose only the fleetest, and for every male he chose a female. He was tempted . .. there were plump
  young beauties here... but like Wran the Rage, Canker, too, remembered Wratha's words. Why waste
  his energies now in the cold comfortof the streets, when he'd be using all these women later in whichever
  way he chose and to his heart's content?-those of them who made it, anyway. His brand would be
  unmistakable when he saw it: they would be limping where he'd savaged their legs to bring them down,
  and chewed a little in the junction of neck and shoulder.
   Gorvi the Guile crouched in the arch of a mist-wreathed doorway, from where he called out softly,
  urgently to people rushing by: 'Quickly, there's safetywithin!' Upon entering, they stumbled over the
  sprawled heap formed of previous victims, saw the smoking blobs of sulphur which were his sunken
  eyes, and at the lastfelt the needles of his gleaming teeth.
   Vasagi the Suck waited around a corner, grabbed up any who passed too close, and stabbed them
  deep in their ears - even to their brains - with his darting, spurting proboscis. For Vasagi, all was
  accomplished in this one, simple, flowing action; if he desired it, his toll might be huge. But he did not.
  And his message to theundead was likewise simple:
   It wasVasagi the Suck who tasted your brains and bent them to his will. Report to me on Starside. You
  
  will know me by myface, which is unique.
   So the six and their shadowing lieutenants advanced into the town, leaving death and undeath in their
  wake. And each of them was like a plague in his own right,except Wratha.
   She wore her gauntlet, but only for protection. Andkilling no one, her method was the simplest of all.
  Step ping close on the heels of the others where they went, flitting from one to the next as they advanced,
  she would go to certain of their male victims and touchthem, saying:
   I am Wratha. He who killed you is to me what you were to him: nothing! Where/ore you are mine.
  Whenyou come into Starside, be sure you come unto me.
   So she recruited her thralls, all of them men or youths.But still she did not see herself as a thief. No, for
  as theleader of the pack, in order to ensure that all went well for the rest of them, she needed her wits
  about her. Personally, she could not afford the additional distraction of the kill. Thus Wratha excused
  herself.
   And indeed all went very well, for a while ...
   ... Until the six and their lieutenants came together in an open space where the fires burned in the town's
  centre. And face to face, with the warrior stench fading and only their own mist draping them, victory
  shone from their redly luminous eyes. It had been almost tooeasy. It had been too easy!
   For suddenly, a voice from behind snarled: 'Murdering- bastard - things!' And human, Szgany, the voice
  itself was a threat. Whirling as one, falling to defensive half-crouches, the twelve turned outwards. Behind
  them in aring, a dozen or more men of the village hemmed themin. But these were mature, experienced
  men: men of theold days. Their faces were filled with horror, hatred, and resolution; they carried
  crossbows, loaded andaimed.
   Wratha had half-expected it. Szgany herself upon a time, she knew there were always some who
  retaliated, who could not be crushed utterly: these people, for instance. In the old days this band - these
  wanderers, always on the move from place to place in their avoidance of Wamphyri raids - had not been
  supplicant; they'd not surrendered easily to Wamphyri oppression but fought back. And these men ...
  they remembered how! Their bolts would be silver-tipped, steeped inkneblasch, deadly. There were long
  knives in their belts,and wooden stakes!
   And: Come! Wratha called to her warrior. But in thatsame moment, the men began firing.
   Wratha's lieutenant, a young man and very bloody, witha gauntlet which was clogged with red flesh (her
  restrictions had not applied to thrall watchdogs such as him),hurled himself in front of her - and took a
  bolt in his throat! He gagged, threw up his arms, was hurled back againsther - to be grasped and held
  there by Wratha, as a shield.
   The other lieutenants had acted in a like fashion, three covering their masters, the others leaping head-on
  to confront the threat. Bolts took one of them in mid-flight, skewered him and stretched him out, but the
  other got in among the would-be avengers. He struck left and right, his gauntlet spraying red, until silver-
  edged swords hissed to cut him down.
   Vasagi the Suck's mental screech sawed at his colleagues' nerve-endings; he had been struck in the side,
  where his vampire flesh was now poisoned. A master ofmetamorphism, he would quickly shed the
  infected flesh and cure himself; but his cry served to galvanize hisfive Wamphyri colleagues to action.
  
   Until then they had been stunned and immobilizedby the attack, even Wratha, for in Turgosheim's
  Sunsideit would have been impossible. But now:
   'Wran,' Wratha cried, 'now you may rage all youwill!'
   Gorvi cursed where he issued a screening mist for all he was worth; Vasagi reeled and tore out the bolt
  from his side, hurling it down; the rest sprang tojoin theirlieutenants in the fray.
   The men of the village were reloading. One of themgot off a frantic, lucky shot which took Canker's
  lieuten ant in the heart. In the next moment Canker was on the crossbowman, tearing out his throat...
   Wratha came face to face with a man just finished reloading who elevated his weapon point-blank
  against her breast. Even as he squeezed the trigger, her hand closed on the projecting head of the bolt.
  Ignoring the 'pain' of kneblasch and silver (she was partly immune, anyway), her fist clenched the bolt
  more tightly yet and her awesome vampire strength held it back. But the crossbow itself answered the
  laws of physics. Flying backwards, its thrumming wire sliced the man's windpipe like a razor, even as
  Wratha's gauntlet disembowelled him.
   Gorvi's mist settled over everything, and Gorvi himself was central in it. His gauntlet turned one man's
  face to ruin, sheared through the rib-cage of another as if the bones were twigs. And the screams of the
  deadand dying were like music in the ears of the Wamphyri.
   Through all of this Wran raged, and likewise his brother Spiro. So that they were still raging as Gorvi's
  mist cleared and it became apparent that nothing more threatened. Distantly, briefly, there sounded the
  patter of flying feet, but that was all. The dead lay where theyhad fallen.
   As Wran and Spiro grew calm, so there sounded the stuttering throb of propulsors and Wratha's
  warrior, followed in short order by the others, began circling overhead. Gorvi the Guile looked from the
  warriors to the smoking red ruins of men where he stood amongthem, and said, wonderingly:
   'So they did fight, after all . . .'
   And with a nod, Wratha answered, 'A handful ofthem, who remembered the Old Wamphyri. But we
  mustnever tolerate resistance.'
   They should pay for it!' Canker declared. 'Let's followthem, hunt them down!'
   Wratha looked at Vasagi and her face framed a question. His eyes were wide with fury where he stood
  holding his side, but he shook his head and glanced at his warrior spurting over the rooftops. He sent a
  message, and the beast at once crashed down on a huddleof dwellings, shattering them outwards!
   And: The Suck is right,' Wratha declared. 'Let the fools run and hide and think it over, and when they
  return discover the retribution of the Wamphyri!'
   Her creature likewise crashed down, with more sod and timber buildings disappearing into rubble, and
  Wran and Spiro's warrior followed suit.
   And leaving all of the monsters wallowing together in the town's debris, Wratha, her renegades, and their
  two remaining lieutenants returned to their flyers. Now the warriors would fuel themselves on the victims
  of the brief battle, human defenders and vampire lieutenants both. It should not occupy them for too long
  
  ...
    
   Later, airborne, Wratha said: All accomplished, exceptwe've lost four lieutenants andfailed to recruit
  more. So,we have a choice.We can wait and make new lieutenantsfrom our thralls when they come over
  into Starside, or...
   The others waited, and in a moment:
   Do you remember, she continued, I said thatif all went well there might be a treat for you? They did,
  andshe went on: Vasagi, are you up to it?
   With telepathic perceptions sharper than the others, the Suck knew her mind. And: Yes, he answered,
  asbrief as ever.
   They rose up level with the peaks and Wratha pointed west. The night's still young, she said, and we
  have lieutenants to recruit. So let's see what else thismarvellous Sunside has to offer, eh?
   No one disagreed.
   At about which time, and twenty miles away:
   The three more youthful members of Lardis Lidesci's party, returning home from their Starside trek, had
  goneon ahead into Settlement. But Lardis and Andrei Romani still had the better part of an hour to go
  before they in turn would enter through the town's East Gate ...
    
    
    
   Ill
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
  
    
    
   Something less than an hour later, in Settlement:
   Attracted by a sudden commotion and surge in the crowd, Nestor Kiklu made his way through the
  milling people to discover what was going on. And he saw that he'd been right: it was Lardis Lidesci's
  voice making all the fuss. As for what it was all about: that remained tobe discovered.
   At the forward edge of the crowd, where the people who had come out to welcome Lardis home now
  held themselves back, shocked by their leader's outburst,Nestor felt himself swaying with an
  unaccustomed dizziness. Complementing the natural excitement of the night - that and his passion of a
  minute or two earlier, when he'd talked to Jason about Nathan and Misha - theSzgany wine was quickly
  going to his head. Reeling, he paused to lean against a cart, and became just one moreslack-jawed
  witness in a sea of astonished faces.
   For there at one of the old decoys Lardis stomped about in the tired, broken-down framework of torn,
  weathered skins and rotting wooden ribs — and raved! Ever faithful, Andrei Romani followed on behind
  his leader, trying to calm him down and imploring the crowd to hold back and not concern themselves;
  the old Lidesci was just worn out from the trek. But to Nestor and the rest, Lardis looked far less tired
  than ...
   '... Crazy!' some woman muttered, close by. 'He must have been drinking on the way in, and had a
  skinful.Why, listen to the man! Playing at being the Big Leader again, after so many years of doing
  nothing! What? Butif his Lissa knew the state he was in, she'd be down here boxing his ears by now! But
  no, they have their fine cabin up on the knoll, well away from us commonfolk.'
   Old bag! Nestor thought. He didn't think much of Lardis, but old sows like that were worse far. All the
  same, what on earth was Lardis up to?
   'Lardis!' someone shouted from the crowd. 'Nowwhat's all this about? Why, you sound like you've lost
  fifteen years out of your life, and gone back to the bad old days! As for these lures and all such rubbish:
  we abandoned their upkeep a lifetime ago. They should be stripped down for firewood. So what's all the
  fuss?'
   Now Nestor began to understand, and to believe that maybe Lardis really was crazy; certainly he'd been
  acting strangely since they came back through the pass. In order to get a better idea of what was going
  on, he pushed himself upright and moved closer still.
   Fuming and sputtering, with Andrei Romani still in tow, now Lardis stalked around the perimeter of the
  decoy. 'What?' he snarled. 'But look at the state of these lures! The skins are tattered and the timbers
  rotten. What could you impale on stakes as wormy as these? Nothing! They'd crumble at a touch. As for
  a warrior impaling himself, ridiculous! What creature would everfeel challenged by...by this mess?'
   'Lardis,' Andrei tried to keep pace with him, catching at his arm to slow him down. He kept his voice
  low but still Nestor heard what he was saying. 'Lardis, you'll only excite the people, worry them, frighten
  them silly. Can't this keep, at least until you've rested? You have no proof, after all. I mean, you're not
  sure, now areyou?'
   Nestor's head felt light, even giddy. He wondered: proof of what? Not sure about what? Perhaps Lardis
  
  was tired after all - or sick, maybe? Even now he was looking at Andrei with burning eyes, turning his
  gaze on the muttering crowd, finally holding up a trembling hand to his sweating brow. But no, he wasn't
  sick, forin the next moment he was raving again.
   'The stockade fence!' he shouted, heading in that direction. 'You've cut doors in it, gates on all four
  sides.Except they've stood open for so long that they're warped and won't close any more. And just look
  at the great crossbows and the catapults!'
   He went at a stumbling run, up the rickety wooden steps where they climbed the fence, to tug at the
  lashings of a catapult whose huge spoon of a head stood taller than his own. In a moment, rotten leather
  hadfallen to mould in his powerful hands. Disgusted, Lardis let the dust trickle through his fingers and
  looked around. And his fevered eyes went at once to frayed hauling ropes where they dangled from the
  pivoting hurling-arm. Then, risking life and limb, he used theseself-same ropes to slide back to earth.
   'Oh, they take my weight, all right,' he panted, landing. 'But how do you think they'd stand the strain of
  hauling that bucket down against its counterweight,eh? Well, I can tell you that for nothing: they wouldn't!'
   'Lardis!' Now Andrei had stopped trying to reason with him, and his voice was suddenly harsher, angrier
  - sorrier? 'Man, I don't think you... I mean, it seems to me that you're not ... that you're no longer respon
  sible!'
   Lardis had meanwhile turned away to head for theSouth Gate. Still following him, Andrei cried out:
  'Lardis, do you insist on being right? But man, you can't be! You mustn't be!' Sensing a drama, the crowd
  moved as one man to shadow the pair. But finally it seemed that something of Andrei's words had got
  through toLardis. What? What was that he'd said? That Lardis Lidesci was no longer responsible? Or
  did he simplymean sane? His footsteps faltered, stopped, and heturned.
   And as Andrei caught up and went to him, pleadinglynow, so Lardis hit him once and stretched him out.
  Then he turned and went more quickly yet - but crookedly, brokenly - towards the South Gate and the
  forestbeyond. And this time the crowd let him go.
   Nestor shook his head, partly in amazement andpartly to clear it. The wine lay like a blanket in his brain
  and on his tongue. Alcohol: even as it deadened the senses and killed off common sense utterly, still it
  generated passion and excitement. Drunk, Nestor was excited about what had happened, which must
  surely signal the beginning of the end for Lardis Lidesci, his decline and fall - and the rise of his weakling
  son, Jason? And he was passionate about...
   ... 'Misha!' He spoke her name out loud, and turningbumped into someone. The other, a youth he knew,
  whose face was now a frowning blur, steadied him andsaid:
   'Misha? I saw her earlier, heading for your mother'shouse, I think. But what do you reckon about -'
   But Nestor had no more time to waste here. Not waiting to hear the youth out, he thrust him aside and
  went stumbling in the direction of the houses huddledin the western quarter of the stockade, in the lee of
  the fence and the watchtower. One of those houses had been 'home' to him for as long as he could
  remember,but perhaps no more.
   And the strong wine churning in his stomach, andlikewise the thoughts in his fuddled head:
   Misha at his mother's house ... And who else would be there? ... Why, none other than Nathan!... The
  twoof them together,like lovers reunited after a longabsence.
  
   Well, Nestor knew what he must do about that!
   With the murmur of the crowd fading behind him, hewalked unsteadily through the empty streets of low
  cabins, store and barter-houses, stables, beehive grana ries; and with every thudding beat of his heart his
  resolve grew stronger and his course seemed more clearly defined. If what he planned was a crime, at
  leastit would be justified. To Nestor, at least.
   The west wall loomed, and there was Nana Kiklu's house, one of several built close to the fence: a long
  sloping roof of wooden shingles at the front, and a short one at the back, covering the stable and barn.
  Hanging open, the louvre-covers at the windows let out lamplight and the low murmur of voices. His
  mother's voice, Misha's tinkling laugh, and Nathan's stumblingstutter. Inside, all would be light and
  warmth.
   Perhaps wistfully, Nestor thought about that: all lightand warmth ... but the narrow alley leading to the
  back of the house and the hay barn was as dark as his intentions. And suddenly he knew how dark they
  were; so that he might have gone straight to the door and entered, been one with the others, and woke
  up in the morning with a thick head, a sigh of relief and a clear conscience. But it was not to be, for at
  that precisemoment he heard laughter and the door opened a crack,and he stepped back a pace into the
  shadows of the alley.
   Then Nestor heard his mother bidding Misha goodnight, the door closing, and the lingering footsteps of
  two people coming towards him as they made for Misha's house. And when they stepped into view, and
  paused silhouetted, her arm hugged Nathan's, and thestarlight gleamed on her smile. And Nestor was
  cold asstone again, but the fire inside him raged up hot as hell.
   He felt his feet carrying him forward, had no control over them, or over the hand that made a fist and
  drove for Nathan's chin, striking him and rocking his head back against the wall. Misha had time for a
  single gasp as Nathan crumpled - time to stumble backwards,wide-eyed, away from his attacker, and
  gulp air to make a shout - which came out as a shocked exclamation asfinally she recognized ...
  'Nestor.'?'
   And as her eyes went wider yet he grabbed her up, muffled her mouth with his hand, and dragged her
  kicking and biting - but all in silence - along the passage to the barn door, where he lifted the bar with his
  elbow. Inside, the piled hay made a musty-sweet smell, and the inky darkness was striped with starlight
  filtering faintly in through a loosely boarded side wall.
   Nestor was aroused now; with his free hand, he tore Misha's dress open down the front and fondled her
  firm breasts, and she felt him hard where he pressedhimself to her. And the incredible became possible,
  even likely, as he half-pushed, half-fell with her on to thehay.
   Misha had always known Nestor was strong, but the strength she felt now was that of the rapist:
  mindless, brutal, fevered and phenomenal! His breath was hot and sweet with wine, his kisses rough and
  lusty, and his hands even more so where they alternated betweensqueezing her breasts and dragging her
  legs apart, posi tioning her on the hay. And to accompany every move, each panting breath, he tore at
  her clothing, and at hisown.
   Now she fought him in earnest - raking his face, trying to butt him, bite him, bring her knee into his groin
  - all to no avail; in just a few seconds she was exhausted. Pinned down, breathless and gasping, her fate
  seemed certain. She drew air massively to scream,and Nestor brought his face down on hers, crushing
  her mouth. How she tossed and wriggled then, desperate to be rid of him as he threw her dress up over
  
  the lower part of her face .. . and a bar of starlight fellacross her forehead and eyes.
   Seeing the fear in Misha's eyes, Nestor flinched inside,in his guts. Perhaps for her part she felt the change
  inhim, which came and passed in a moment. And: 'Why?' she panted, as he completed the work on her
  underclothes. 'Nestor, why?'
   He began to come down on her, his hand behind andunder her, opening her up. 'When your father and
  broth ers know,' he husked, 'they'll either kill me or see to itthat we're married. Whichever, it will be
  decisive.'
   His mouth closed on hers; she felt his manhood throbbing, thrusting, searching her out, and wondered:
  Married? Then why didn't youjust ask me? For after all, she had always known it would be one of them,
  Nestor or Nathan. She hadn't known which one, that was all.Now she did, and it wasn't Nestor.
   But maybe she knew too late ...
    
   Nana Kiklu kneeled by her stone fireplace and choppeda few last vegetable ingredients into the stew
  bubbling in a copper pan. Her boys would be in soon, Nestorfrom the welcoming party and Nathan back
  from walk ing Misha home. They might have eaten already, butwith their appetites it would make little
  difference. Andhome cooking was always best.
   Nana smiled as she thought of Misha: that girl was really smitten with her boys. But then, she always had
  been. Sooner or later she would make her choice, and Nana hoped ... but no, she must be impartial, and
  certainly she loved them both and had no favourite. But Nathan, Nathan ...
   The smile fell from her comely face, became a frown,and she sighed. If not Misha Zanesti, then who
  wouldtake Nathan? And if it was him, then what of Nestor?For they had grown up together, all three, so
  that whichever way it went the choosing would be painful and the parting of the ways hard.
   And again Nana thought: Nathan, ah, Nathan!
   Misha understood him and his ways; something ofthem, anyway. And as for Nana: she, of course,
  understood them only too well! She need only look at him tosee his father, Harry Keogh, called
  Dwellersire, lookingback at her. Fortunate that no one had ever noticed orremarked upon it; but times
  had been hard in thosedays, when people had enough to do minding their ownbusiness without minding
  the business of others. AndNathan's differences hadn't become really marked until he was five, in the
  year after the last great battle, whichhad destroyed his alien father along with the first andlast of the
  Wamphyri.
   On occasion, infrequently, Nana had seen Lardis Lid-esci look strangely, wonderingly at Nathan. But
  even if he suspected, Lardis would never say anything. Hehad always been the strong one, Lardis: the
  protector. And anyway, he got along well with Nathan and likedhim; that is to say, he got on as well as
  could beexpected with someone who kept so far apart.
   Nathan had always kept himself apart, yes, exceptfrom Misha, of course ... And now Nana was back to
  that.
   Finished with her vegetables, she sighed again, stoodup, crossed to the window and looked out. Twilight
  was quickly fading into night now; the stars were very bright over the barrier range, and a mist was rolling
  
  down off the mountains and across the lower slopes. Inthe old days a mist like that would have sent
  shiversdown Nana's spine, but no more. And her mind went back all of eighteen years and more to just
  such times -and one night in particular - in The Dweller's garden onStarside. What she had done then ...
  maybe it hadbeen a mistake, maybe not, but her boys were the result and she wouldn't change that.
   Nestor and Nathan: they'd never known their true father; which, considering what came later, was
  probably just as well. But for all that Harry had been (and must now forever remain) a stranger to them,
  the one unknown factor in their young lives, still he'd left his mark on them, and especially on Nathan. Oh,
  Harry Dwellersire had marked both of her sons, Nana knew, but in Nathan it burned like a brand.
   Burned! She sniffed the air and went back to the fire.For that would never do, to let her good stew burn.
  But in the pot, the water was deep, simmering, not boiling over at all. And so the smell must be something
  else entirely. A smell at first, and now... a sound, whichNana remembered.
   Impossible!
   She flew to the window. Out there, the mist wasleprous white in moon- and starlight, undulating, thickly
  concentrated where it lay on the foothills and sent tendrils creeping over the north wall and through gaps
  in the stockade's inner planking. Nana had never seen a mist like it. No, she had, she had! But there are
  certain things you daren't recall, and this mist was one ofthem.
   The sound came again - a sputtering roar - and ashadow blotting out the stars where it passed overhead.
  And drifting down from the darkness and the night,that nameless reek, that stench from memory, that
  impossible smell. Utterly impossible! But if that were so...
   ... Then what was the meaning of the sudden, near -distant tumult which Nana now heard rising out of
  thetown? What was all that shouting? What were thosehoarse, terrified, Szgany voices screaming?
   No need to ask, for she knew the answer well enough.'Wamphyri! Wamphyri!’
   And as the throbbing sputter of propulsors soundedagain, closer, shaking the house, the one thought in
  Nana's mind was for her boys and the girl they loved:Nathan! Nestor! Misha!
   She ran to the door and threw it open.
   Nathan! Nestor! Misha!
   The bellowing of warriors seemed to sound fromevery quarter, and the sickening stench of their exhaust
  vapours touched and tainted everything. Nathan!Nestor! Misha!
   Something unbelievable, monstrous, armoured, fellout of the sky, directly on to Nana's house. Along
  with the adjacent houses, her place collapsed into dust,debris, ruins, like a ripe puffball when you step on
  it. Shattered, the door flew from its leather hinges andknocked Nana down in the billowing dust of the
  street. But even as she dragged herself away from the hissingand the bellowing - and now the screaming,
  which roseup out of the smoking rubble of the nearby buildings -still she repeated, over and over:
   'Nathan! Nestor! Misha!' And wondered, would sheever see them again?
    
   Five minutes earlier, in the barn:
  
   Misha felt Nestor beginning to enter her, and in desperation gasped, 'Let me...let me help you.'
   He lifted his face from her breasts and stared at herdisbelievingly. But then, as she reached down a hand
  between their bodies, he could only grunt an astonished, 'What?'
   Certainly Nestor could use help; not only was his drunkenness a handicap in its own right, he was also
  inexperienced. For all his swaggering and boastingamong Settlement's youths, and his apparent familiarity
  with certain of the village girls, he was a virgin no less than Misha herself. Indeed, more so, for she at
  leastseemed to know something.
   She caught him up where he jerked and strained, andtightened her slender hand to a yoke around the
  neckof his pulsing member. As she began to work at him he murmured, 'Ah!' and rose up from her a
  little, to allow her more freedom. Never releasing him for a momentbut continuing to gratify his flesh, she
  at once took theopportunity to roll him on to his back.
   He was young and full of lust; her hand was a warmengine of pleasure, squeezing and pumping at him; it
  couldn't last.
   Aching to touch her, tug at her, feel the warm resilience of her perspiring breasts, he reached out a
  trembling hand - but too late. And as his fluids geysered and splashed down in long, hot pulses on to his
  belly, so Nestor groaned and flopped back in the hay. But even lying there in a mixture of mindless
  ecstasy and empty frustration, still he sensed her straightening herclothing and drawing away from him.
  And as his totter ing senses found their own level, suddenly he wondered:
   How? How had she known what to do?
   And trapping her wrist before she could stand up and run from him, his question was written there onhis
  face plain for her to see. As was the answer on hers.
   'Nathan!' he snarled then, as she snatched her hand away, got to her feet and backed off. He made to
  getafter her, came to his knees. If she'd learned that muchfrom his not-so-dumb brother, then obviously
  she knewall of it. And now more than ever, Nestor desired to beinto her. If only for the hell of it.
   Misha saw it in his face, shuddered her terror and flew for the door; he hurled himself ahead of her,
  slammed it shut. And moving menacingly after her where she stumbled in the dark, he huskily asked: 'But
  why? Why with him? Why Nathan?'
   'Because he... he needed someone,' Misha's voice was a frightened whisper. 'Because he needed
  something. But mainly because ... because there was no oneelse who cared.'
   'Well, now there is someone else,' Nestor growled, hishead clearing. 'Me! Except I don't care, not any
  longer.No, but there is something I need.'
   He caught her and lifted her skirts, and when his hand went to her throat she knew that this time she
  mustn't fight. But she could still protest. And: 'Nestor,please don't!' she begged him.
   'What you've done for him, you can do for me,' hisvoice was choked with lust and fury.
   'But we didn't ...' she gulped as he pinned her to the wall and positioned himself between her legs.
  'We'venever
  
   'Liar!' he snarled. For in his mind's eye he'd seen them: Nathan and Misha, panting out their lust as their
  flesh heaved and shuddered. And hoarsely he ordered her: 'Now do it, put me in. And after that ... just
  pretend that I'm Nathan!'
   It was like an invocation.
   'B-b-but you're not!' said a stuttering voice from wherethe barn door now stood open. And it was
  Nathan, silhouetted against the night, one hand to his face, and the other a fist which was wrapped round
  the door'sinch-by-three ironwood bar.
   Nestor half-sobbed, half-moaned as he thrust Misha aside and went for Nathan's throat - and ran
  head-oninto the flat side of the other's ironwood club! It smacked him in the face, shook his teeth and
  flattened his nose, struck him down like a swatted fly. He laythere groaning, clutching his face, while
  Misha stumbled towards Nathan where he stood with legs spread wide and feet firmly planted, and the
  bar held high for asecond blow. Maybe he would do it, and maybe not, but Misha knew she couldn't let
  it happen.
   And neither could Nathan. Even before she could reach him, he'd turned away and let the bar fall.
   At which point both of them heard the uproar swelling out from the town's crowded meeting place, and
  the throb of powerful propulsors overhead. If they had heard that ominous sound before, then they'd
  been too young for it to make any lasting impression. But still it was strange, frightening, evocative; as
  was the waftingstench which suddenly accompanied it.
   They looked at each other, clung in each other's armsfor the very briefest moment -
   - Only to be wrenched apart as the roof caved in and the barn flew apart! Then, as their entire world
  collapsed in chaos all around them, the nightmare they had just lived through commenced its long spiral
  down from one dark level to depths more lightless yet...
    
   Nestor was a child of ten again, playing in the woods with his lieutenant, Nathan, and the Szgany thrall
  Misha. He, of course, was the vampire Lord Nestor. That was what he had wanted to be all of his young
  life - what he wouldalways want to be, and the only rolehe would ever accept- Wamphyri!
   But this time, and for all that the plot was simple, the game wasn't working out. Nathan and Misha had
  joinedforces to escape from the aerie (a ramshackle treehouse)into the woods, and Nestor was intent
  upon findingand punishing them. Indeed, and after a decent interval, they were supposed to let him find
  them, except today they didn't seem to be playing according to the rules. And though Nestor had
  searched for all he was worth for at least half an hour, still they continued to elude him. So that his
  mounting anger where he slipped through the green maze of the forest, pausing every now and then to
  sniff at the air in approved vampirefashion, might well be equal (in young boy measure) to that of the
  legendary Wamphyri themselves. And how he would punish this wayward lieutenant, and thisingrate
  Szgany slut, when he discovered them!
   Normally it was easy to find them. He might lean against the bole of a great tree - stand there absolutely
  motionless, holding his breath in the forest's often preternatural silence - and wait for a telltale sound to
  givethem away: a furtive rustle of undergrowth, the snap ofa dry twig, their whispering, conspiratorial
  voices. Or if not 'voices' in the plural, one voice at least: Misha's. For of course Nathan could not, or
  
  would not speak, not without sputtering and stuttering like a fool. And so itwould be Misha leading the
  way, doing all the whispering, the planning, the ... cheating?
   That's what it was: cheating! Spoiling the game! Forby now Nestor should have found them, chastised
  them,sent them to pick nuts and berries for him as punishment, and stood over them scowling while they
  filled his mother's basket. Which was the real reason they were out here in the first place: to fill Nana
  Kiklu'sbasket with wild fruit and nuts. Except, and as always,it had seemed a good idea to turn work into
  a game.
   And now he shouted into the green haze all around,'Nathaaan!. ... Mish-aaa!'...and waited for their
  answer.
   Hah! Try waiting for a birthday, or a wish to cometrue!
   So now there was only one thing for it, the one infallible method. Nestor didn't like to use it, for it
  seemed tohim an intrusion: like that time he stumbled over loversin the long grass of the foothills, and
  watched them attheir play. He had never forgotten it: all naked backsides and thrusting, jerking flesh. And
  hurting, too, from the sound of it. If that was love you could keep it! But at the same time he'd known it
  was wrong of him towatch them...as had the young man when it was over and finally he'd sensed a
  peeping-tom there! What achase that had been, and Nestor lucky to get out of it unscathed.
   This wasn't the same, he knew, but it was similar, and he and his brother had this unwritten rule never to
  use it. Even the very young have things they would rather keep secret, entirely to themselves. Especially
  their thoughts ...
   But on the other hand, didn't Nathan intrude uponhim, too, in his dreams?
   Of course, Nathan would know what he'd done; he would feel him there in his mind, and slam it like a
  door in his face. Ah, but if he and Misha had played thegame as had been intended, Nestor wouldn't
  have to doit, now would he?
   He sat down with his back to a mossy bole, closed his eyes and let his mind drift. Somewhere out there,
  Misha and Nathan were hiding from him. Somewhere in the deep woods, which they all three knew so
  well, his brother (no, his 'lieutenant') and the Szgany thrall Misha trembled in terror where they huddled in
  the forest's green expanse. But being Wamphyri, Nestor could smell them out! He could extend his
  senses, or issue a vampire mist, and know when its lappingtendrils touched their shivering flesh! He could
  scry onthem from afar and see them where they cowered! And only let him catch a glimpse of their
  surroundings, hewould know their secret location on the instant!
   And so his thoughts drifted out until they touched upon Nathan's. It was difficult and would have been
  even harder if his brother weren't distracted, if he'd been looking inwards, as was his wont. But this time
  his thoughts weren't clouded; his mind was clear foronce, and concentrated upon something entirely differ
  ent from Nestor and the game. Concentrated in fact upon Misha...
   ... Misha, swimming naked in sun-dappled shallows, sleek and agile as afish, and just as innocent.
  Misha,all silver and gold from the sunlight shimmering on her brown pixy body, laughing as she taunted
  Nathan, daring him to join her in the water. And seeing Misha through Nathan's eyes - seeing her exactly
  as Nathansaw her — it was as if Nestor saw her for the first time, from a different viewpoint or through a
  different soul.. . which of course was precisely the case.
   Then Nathan knew he was there and Nestor felt his shock, which caused him to start and bang his head
  
  against the tree. In that same moment, the scene on his mind's eye blurred and blinked out. But not
  before he recognized their location: the sandy shallows at the river's bend, where the speckled trout
  played in thepebbles and eels wriggled in the long grasses.
   Nestor knew all the shortcuts; he could be there in four or five minutes, before Nathan accepted Misha's
  dare and got into the water, and certainly before they were out again, dry and into their clothes. He could
  be there as quickly as that... but he wouldn't.
   It wasn't so much what Nestor had seen through Nathan's eyes that stopped him, for if anything that
  would have goaded him on; it was what he'd felt in the other's inner being. The tumult of emotions there in
  hisunguarded, for once unsuspecting mind. The young man trapped in a little boy's skin, stretching to
  break free of it, but held back by the knowledge that he'd be a stranger here alone in a strange land. A
  fear, then, of growing up, when at last he'd be obliged to accept that he was a part of this world and
  forced to live in it. The lonely depths of his feelings; the awareness of his own outsideness; the sure
  knowledge that he was without purpose here and could never belong, except to Nana, and to Nestor ...
  and to Misha, of course.
   All of this concentrated in Nathan's rapt mind, given focus there and highlighted by this crystal clear
  vision of innocence: a little girl, naked, swimming, laughing and real - undeniably real! - as if she were a
  mainstay, a prop, one of the precious few reliable factors in Nathan's entire world of unreality; which
  made him fear to reach out and touch her, in case she too was justa mirage.
   At the time - the real time, the waking moment of the actuality eight years ago, before the dream -
  Nestor hadn't understood what he felt. It was hard enough to fathom 'love', without trying to understand
  something so far beyond it. And much too hard to understand the jealousy which held him back, to walk
  slowly home on his own; that cold void opening between him and his brother, which made him wish that
  Nathan really didbelong in some other world, and that he would go there,soon.
   One thing he had known, however, and that was the pain and the anger inside, which Nathan had
  caused. Yes, and Misha, too. So that if Nestor really were Wamphyri -
   - Then - then.'
   But he wasn't, and Nathan and Misha weren't his thralls. They were just children playing a game. One
  which they'd used to play, anyway. For from that timeforward they would never play it again ...
   Nestor's dream was fading, slowly giving way to crushing darkness and the return of physical sensations,
  most of which were feelings of pain. Pain andanger, a monstrous claustrophobia, and a namelessstench.
   The dream gradually receding, yes, but in its wakethe pain lingering on.
   And the anger...
    
   Nathan drifted in a darkness shot with brief, brilliantbursts of violent illumination, scenes from the recent
  past:
   Misha smiling where she held his arm tightly againsther body . .. Nestor attempting to rape her against
  thewall ofthe barn, his voice husky with lust andfury, hishands hurting her with their fierce fondling ... the
  ironwood bar from the door in Nathan's hand, feelinggood and hard and solid there.
  
   Then he had hit Nestor, hard! Following which something a great deal bigger had hit him, and harder!
  Andnow this claustrophobic darkness as his memories triedto piece themselves together and become
  whole again.
   Nathan knew he wasn't dreaming; he was sure of that; his dreams were very special to him, and this
  wasn't one of them. No, it was the period betweensleeping (or lying unconscious) and waking; the
  interval when the real world starts to impinge again, and themind prepares the body for a more physical
  existence. It was him trying to remember exactly what had happenedbefore the world caved in, so that he
  would know howto act or react when it all came together again.
   And occasionally in such moments, those graduallywaking moments as the mind drifts up from the
  fathom less deeps of subconsciousness, it was also a time forcommunication. Sometimes Nathan would
  hear the dead talking in their graves, and wonder at the things theysaid, until they sensed him there and
  fell silent.
   It wasn't so much that they feared Nathan; rather they were uncertain of his nature, and so held
  themselves reserved and aloof. This was understandable enough, for in their terms it wasn't so long ago
  that there had been things in this world other than men, more evil than men, which had preyed upon the
  living and the dead alike; the former for the blood which isthe life, and the latter for all the knowledge
  gone down into their graves with them. Things whose alien nature, whose condition, was neither life nor
  death but lay somewhere in between the two, in a seething, sunlessno-man's-land called undeath! They
  had been the Wamphyri, who were known to spawn the occasional necromancer: one of the very few
  things that the dead fear. Which was why the Great Majority were wary ofNathan.
   He knew none of this, only that he sometimes overheard them talking in their graves, and that where he
  was concerned they were secretive. He was like aneavesdropper, who had no control over his vice.
   But in fact, and despite that he could hear them talking and might even have conversed with them (if they
  had let him), Nathan was no eavesdropper in the true sense of the word, and no necromancer. He did
  come close to the latter, however; very close - perhapstoo close - though he wasn't aware of it yet. But
  the deadwere, and they daren't take any chances with him. They'd trusted his father upon a time, and at
  the end even hehad turned out to be something of a two-edged sword.
   And so Nathan lay very still and listened neither maliciously nor negligently, but out of a natural curiosity,
  and in a little while began to hear the thoughts of the teeming dead in their graves: the merest whispers or
  the echoes of whispers at first — and then a great confusion of whispers - going out through the earth like
  sentient, invisibly connecting rootlets, and tying the Great Majority together in the otherwise eternalsilence
  of their lonely places.
   It didn't feel at all strange to Nathan - he'd listened to the dead like this, between dreams and waking,
  for as long as he could remember - but this time it was different. Their whispered conversations were
  hushed as never before, anxious, questioning, even ... horrified?
   For on this occasion there were newcomers among them - too many newcomers, and others who came
  even now - bringing tales of an ancient terror risen anew. Nathan caught only the general drift of it. But it
  was as if, along with a background hiss and shiver of mental static, he also heard the rustling of a
  thousand pairs of mummied hands all being wrung together. And so in the moment before they sensed
  him, he became aware that their fear was no nebulous thing but in factvery tangible.
   This much he learned, and no more. For as soon as they knew he was there ...
  
   ... Their thoughts shrank back at once, were withdrawn, cut off, and there was only a shocked,
  reverberating silence in the otherwise empty mental ether. It was as sudden as that, giving Nathan no time
  to probe any deeper into the problem; but at least he thought he knew how they had sensed him so
  quickly: because they had been alert as never before, almost as if they were expecting some ... intrusion?
  The only thing thatworried him about it, was how in the end he'd sensedthat they identified him with the
  source of their terror!
   And finally, before their withdrawal, there had been the name of that terror, which at the last was
  whispered from the tips of a thousand shrivelled tongues, ortongues long turned to dust: Wamphyri!
   But why should that be - how could it be - that these long defunct legions of the teeming dead fearedthe
  Wamphyri, who were themselves dead and gone forever?
   Nathan knew he would find no answer to that here, not yet, not now that the dead had fallen silent. And
  so he left them to return to their whispered conversations, and rose up from his dreams to seek the
  answer elsewhere ...
    
   ... Rose up from dreams, to nightmare! To a memory complete with every detail of what had gone
  before, except the answer to the question: what had happened here? But in his first few waking moments
  Nathanknew he had that, too, for the dead had already suppliedit.
   It was a fact, all too hideously reinforced by the alien stench of warrior exhaust gases, the rubble in
  which he lay sprawled, the distant screams of the dead and the dying, and other sounds which could only
  translate as inhuman . .. laughter? Unless all of these elements were figments of his imagination, and
  Nathan himself a raving madman, it could only add up to one thing: theWamphyri were back! And they
  were here even now, inSettlement!
   Which prompted other questions: how long had he been unconscious? Minutes, he suspected, a handful
  at most. And what of Misha, and his mother ... andNestor?
   Nathan dragged himself upright, clambered shakily out of the debris of the barn - and back into it at
  once! For out there, maybe fifty yards towards the town centre, he'd seen the incredible bulk of a warrior
  hurl itself against a barter house and reduce it to so much rubble. And overhead, a huge, kite-shaped
  flying thing had arched its wings as it came down like some weirdleaf into the main street.
   Someone moaned in the litter of timber and straw atNathan's feet: Misha!
   He tore at the rubbish, hurling it aside, and stared down at Nestor's face, all bruised and bloodied. He
  was stretched our flat, unconscious, three-quarters buried; but it was his moan Nathan had heard, not
  Misha's. And even as he looked at him, so Nestor moaned again. But there in the rubble beside him... a
  slender whitearm. And this time it must be Misha!
   Trying not to bury Nestor deeper yet, Nathan dug her out. He slapped her face, gathered her up in his
  arms, whispered her name urgently in her ear. She was wan, dusty, pale in the starlight falling through
  wispy smoke and gut-wrenching stench. He couldn't tell if she wasbreathing or not.
   In the near-distance, the Wamphyri warrior roared as it moved inwards towards the town centre.
  Nathan looked around. The stockade fence was buckled outwards behind what had been his mother's
  
  house. There was a gap there, where the great wooden uprights had been wrenched apart. And beyond
  the gap, the darkforest. The darkness had never seemed so welcoming.
   Nathan saw how it must be, what he must do: first carry Misha to safety, then search for his mother,
  who was probably buried in the ruins of the house, finallycome back one last time for Nestor.
   He picked Misha up and staggered from the ruins towards the break in the stockade fence. But half-way
  there he heard a panting and a patter of feet and lookedback. A great wolf-shape - obviously one of
  Settlement's trained animals - had come from the direction of the main street and seemed to be making
  straight for him, seeking human company. All very well, but Nathan would have problems enough saving
  the girl he lovedand his family, without having to worry about . . .
   Nathan's eyes went wide, wider. The 'wolf seemed to be enveloped in a drifting cloud of mist, and one
  of its forepaws was bulky with something that made a dull glitter. More biped than quadruped - loping
  towards him at an aggressive, forward-leaning angle - it only went to all fours in order to sniff the earth
  and turn its great ears this way and that, listening. Worse: its eyes were scarlet and glowed like lamps in
  the dark, and to cover its hindquarters it wore belted leathertrousers!
   And now Nathan saw that it wasn't coming throughthe mist, but that the mist was issuing from it!
   He had heard all the campfire stories of the old Wamphyri - their powers, hybridisms, animalisms -and
  knew what he was facing. And of course knew that he was a dead man.
   Canker Canison came loping, reared up snarling, as tall and taller than Nathan ...!
   Nathan tried one last time to stand Misha on her own two feet and shake her awake, to no avail. He
  held up a hand, uselessly, to ward the dog-, fox-, wolf-thing off. Canker came to a halt and leaned
  forward. He sniffed at Nathan, then at the girl in his arms, and cocked hishead on one side, questioningly.
  And: 'Yours?' hegrowled.
   Nathan held Misha back from the monster; Cankerlaughed, caught him by the scruff of the neck and
  hurledhim brutally aside, against the stockade wall. Unsupported, Misha crumpled to her knees. Canker
  caught her up, sniffed at her again, and snatched her rags ofclothing from her in a moment.
   And as Nathan slumped to a heap in the long grasses at the base of the damaged wall - even as his eyes
  glazed over and he passed out - he was aware of Canker's eyes on him and his writhing muzzle, and the
  spray of foam coughing from his jaws as he laughedagain and said: 'No, not yours - mine!'
   What he did not see or hear, because he was alreadyunconscious, was the scream of a terrified woman
  run ning through the streets: the way Canker let Misha fallto go chasing after her, and his grunted
  philosophy:
   'Better a live one than one half-dead.' And his half-bark, half-shout - 'Wait my pretty, for Canker's
  coming!'
   - as he plunged after his doomed, demented victim ...
    
   The pain and the anger...
  
   And not only inside, but outside, too.
   It was an hour later and Nestor's turn to come awake
   - slowly at first, then with a sickening rush! And like Nathan before him, he too woke up from a dream
  to anightmare. Except where Nathan had remembered everything, Nestor remembered very little: a
  handful of scat tered, uncertain fragments of what had gone before. Mainly he remembered the pain and
  the anger, both of which were still present, though whether they sprangfrom dream or reality or both, he
  was unable to say.
   Three-quarters buried in rubble, dust, straw, his bodywas one huge ache. His face was a mess and some
  of his teeth were loose; at the back of his head, above his right ear, an area of his skull felt soft, crushed.
  Whenhe put up a tentative, trembling exploratory handthrough the debris to touch it, agonizing lances of
  white light shot off into his brain. Something shifted and grated under his probing: the fractured bone of
  hisskull, indenting a little from the pressure of his fingers.
   He asked himself the same question that his brother had asked: what had happened? But unlike Nathan,
  hehad no answer. Not yet.
   He pushed at wooden boards pressing down on him, shoved them aside, choked as dust and stench fell
  onhim from above. But framed in the gap he could see the stars up there, drifting smoke, and strange
  dark diamond shapes that soared in the sky. And he could hear a throbbing, sputtering rumble, fading
  into the distance.
   Yes, and other sounds: faint, far cries ... moaning ... sobbing ... someone shouting a name over and over
  again, desperately and yet without hope.
   Nestor kicked at the rubble, extricated his arms, dragged himself into a seated position and shoved the
  clutter from his legs. He looked around, at first without seeing or recognizing anything; there was nothing
  here that his glazed eyes and stunned mind were prepared to take in. No, there was something: the tall
  stockade fence, which for a moment focused his attention. But even that was different, gapped in places
  and leaningoutwards a little.
   He stood up, staggered, stepped from the debris. Whatever had happened here, his clothing seemed to
  havebeen ripped half from him! Automatically, fumblingly - like a man flicking dust from his cuffs after a
  hard fall - he made adjustments to his trousers, his leather shirt. And slowly, reeling a little, he headed for
  the towncentre, away from the rubble of his mother's house.
   His mother's house?
   Now where had that thought come from? And turningto look back at the freshly made chaos - at the
  black,jutting, splintered timbers and smoking mounds of debris, under a dark shroud of still settling dust -
  he slowly shook his head. No, for his mother's house hadbeen a warm and welcoming place. Hadn't it?
   Along the way, voices continued to cry out from shattered buildings; people stumbled like ghosts here
  andthere, calling for help, or for lost families; flames gouted up where hearth fires turned ruined homes to
  funeral pyres. There was nothing Nestor could do about any of this, for there were far too many people
  in need of help.And anyway he needed help himself.
   He began to remember names and fractured, jumbledfragments of conversation:
  
   Jason, Misha, Nathan, Lardis, Andrei... Nestor?
   Jason: 'What will you do?'
   Nestor, growling: 'It's Misha's choice. With or withouther,I'llgo. But besure I'll be back one day.'
   Misha, afraid: 'Because ... because he needed someone! AndI was the only one who cared. But
  Nestor ... why are you doing this?'
   Nestor, determinedly: 'When yourfather and brothers learn what's happened, then they'llkill me!'
   Misha, astonished: 'No, they may not, for you are theLord Nestor!'
   Nestor: 'Of course! And I fear no man, for I amWamphyri!'
   Nathan: (But here there was nothing, no words at all but a cataract of numbers foaming down the falls of
  Nestor's mind and forming endless, meaningless patterns there, one of which was a weird figure-of-eight
  symbol like a discarded apple rind or wood-shaving lying on its side. And rising over the rush and swirl
  of numbers, a distant, dismal howling of wolves. And superimposed over all these things a haunted,
  haunting face, all sad and lonely and ... accusing?)
   Lardis: This is where the powers of the hell-lands and those of the Wamphyri clashed and cancelled
  eachother out.'
   Andrei: 'But they're gone now, reduced to dust andghosts, and we should let them lie.'
   Nestor, in anger: 'What, ghosts? The Wamphyri?Never.' For I am the Lord Nestor!'
   The voices came and went in Nestor's head: voices out of the past, the present, the imagination. Voices
  from child-reality, adult-reality, and unreality alike, all seeking the stability of a central focus, revolving to
  gether in the grand free-for-all of his trauma. True memories merged into pseudo-memories as his past
  life fadedaway and devolved to a single, self-repeating phrase, I am Nestor of the Wamphyri! Until it
  seemed certain that the present, surreal and incoherent as a dream, could only be a dream, given
  substance by the subconscious will of its creator. And Nestor felt relieved toknow that he was only
  dreaming.
   In the near-distance, amid smoky, flame-shot ruins close to Settlement's east wall, a last lone flyer
  flopped up hugely on to a pile of rubble and craned its swaying head towards the sky. Pausing to watch,
  Nestor was vaguely aware of a rider in the saddle where the creature's neck widened into its back. But in
  anothermoment the flyer had thrust itself forward and aloft on powerful coiled-spring launching members,
  and rising up from the ruins it banked in a wide circle over the town and rapidly gained height. Feeling its
  shadow on him as it passed overhead, Nestor gaped at its massive diamond shape flowing black against
  the stars, andwondered at its meaning.
   Then, slack-jawed, with his head tilted back at an angle and his half-vacant eyes still fixed on the alien
  shape in the sky, he continued his shambling walkthrough the reeking smoke and scattered rubble; until
  his path was obstructed and he felt something splashwet and warm against his torn trousers.
   Sprawled at his feet, he saw the shattered body of a man whose face had been flensed from the bone. A
  dark red fountain was spurting in bursts from his savaged throat; but even as Nestor considered the
  meaningof this, so the crimson fountain grew spasmodic, lost height and gurgled out of existence. And
  
  with it theman's life.
   But it had been only one life, and this was only one body among many. Looking around, Nestor could
  seeplenty of others, almost all of them lying very still.
   And so he came to the old meeting place, that greatopen space which stood off-centre in Settlement, a
  littlecloser to the east wall than the west, and there discovered life in the midst of all this death. But not
  immediately.
   First:
   The East Gate was burning. Yellow and orange flameswere leaping high over the stockade wall, where
  the gate seemed to have been set on fire deliberately. The wide path from the gate to the gathering place
  wasstrewn with bodies; Nestor dimly recalled, however, that there had been a crowd here. Well, while
  the corpses were a great many, still they would not have made acrowd. So some had escaped, anyway.
  But from what?
   Wamphyri! said a voice in the back of his mind.
   But another said: Impossible, for they are no more!
   And a third, his own, insisted: But I am the LordNestor!
   The smoke was clearing now and the vampire-spawned mist evaporating, sinking into the earth.People
  were starting to come out of hiding, stumbling among the dead, crying out and tearing their hair asthey
  discovered dead friends, lovers, relatives. Central in the open space, where tables lay overturned and the
  ground was strewn with the spoiled makings of a feast,a young man, Nestor's senior by five or six years,
  stood over the body of his girl and tore his shirt open, beat his breast, screamed his agony. She had been
  strippednaked, torn, ravaged, brutalized.
   Stepping closer, Nestor stared at the man and believed he knew him ... from somewhere. And a frown
  creased his forehead as he wondered how it was heknew so much yet understood so little. Then he saw
  the rise and fall of the girl's bruised breasts and noticed aslight movement of her hand. And as her head
  lolled in Nestor's direction, he saw a strange wan smile uponher sleeping or unconscious face.
   He moved closer still, touched the sobbing man onthe arm and said, 'She isn't dead."
   Wild-eyed, the other turned on him, grabbed him up with a furious strength, shook him like a rag doll.
  'Ofcourse she's not dead, you fool - you bloody fool! She's worse than dead!' He thrust Nestor away
  and fell to hisknees beside the girl.
   Nestor stood there - still frowning, still mazed - andrepeated the other's words: 'Worse than dead?'
   The man looked up, peered at him through red-rimmed eyes, and finally nodded. 'Ah, I know you now,
  Nestor Kiklu, covered in dirt. But you're one of the lucky ones, born at the end of it. You're too young to
  know; you don't remember how it was, and so can't see how it must be again. But I do remember, and
  only too well! I was only six years old when the Wamphyriraided on Sanctuary Rock. Afterwards, I saw
  my father drive a stake through my mother's heart, watched him cut off her head, and burn her on a fire.
  That's how it was then and ... and how it must be now.' He hung hishead and fell sobbing on the girl,
  covering her nakedness.
  
   There were more men in the open space now, a handful, but these were different, older, harder men.
  They had grown hard in their young days, spent in the shadow of the Wamphyri, and were now filled
  withsome grim purpose. Nestor seemed instinctively to knowthese things, and felt he should know the
  men, too, buttheir names wouldn't come. They were hurrying towards the east wall, where colleagues on
  the high woodencatwalk beckoned to them, urging them on.
   Nestor followed in their wake, but more slowly, andtried to understand what one of the men on the
  catwalkwas shouting to them. In the still night air - with onlythe dazed, bewildered, trembling voices of
  other survivors, and the whoosh and crackle of the fires to compete with - his words carried over the
  open area loud andclear. And for all that they were hard words, still therewas a catch and even a sob in
  his familiar voice:
   'Too late now, you dullards!' he cried. 'Didn't I try towarn you? You know I did. What? And you took
  me fora madman! And now ... now I think I am a madman!But all those years of building, of being
  prepared, goneup in smoke, gone for nothing. And all this good Szganyblood, spilled and wasted, and
  unavenged ...'
   And at last Nestor remembered him: Lardis Lidesci, whom even the Wamphyri had respected, upon a
  time.And beside him on the catwalk, Andrei Romani; between them they'd wound back the loading gear
  of agiant crossbow, and manhandled a great ironwood boltwith a barbed, silver-tipped harpoon into its
  groove on the massive tiller. Men's work for sure, but they weremen.
   So were the others on the ground, whose names nowsprang into Nestor's mind:
   They were Andrei Romani's brothers, Ion and Franci,and the small wiry one was the hunter of wild
  boars, called Kirk Lisescu. Together with Lardis, these men had been legendary fighters in the days when
  theWamphyri came a-hunting on Sunside and the Szgany dwelled in terror; even now Kirk Lisescu
  carried a weapon from those times, a 'shotgun' out of anotherworld. But Nestor knew that except in
  dreams all suchthings were over and done with long ago.
   Weren't they?
   While he puzzled at it, the men had moved on towardsthe east wall. But up on the catwalk Lardis was
  shouting again and pointing at the sky - over Nestor! Andnow, shutting out the stars, a shadow fell on
  him.
   He looked up, at the lone flyer where it side-slippedto and fro, deliberately stalling itself and losing
  height. For a moment it seemed poised there, like a hawk on the wing, before lowering its head, arching
  its membrane wings and sliding into a swooping dive. It was heading directly for the bereft young man
  where he sobbed over his ravaged love. And its rider was lying far forward in his saddle, reaching out
  along the creature's neck, directing its actions with voice and mindboth.
   Suddenly something snapped into place in Nestor's befuddled mind. For if this was a dream it had gone
  badly wrong. And if it was his dream, then he should have at least a measure of control over it. He
  started lurchingly back towards the ragged figure crouching over the girl in the centre of the open area,
  and as he ran he shouted a warning: 'Look out! You there, lookout!'
   The man looked up, saw Nestor running towardshim, and beyond him the others bringing their weapons
  to bear, apparently on him! Then he glanced over hisshoulder at the thing swooping out of the sky,
  gasped some inarticulate denial, and made a dive for the shallow gouge of an empty fire-pit. As he
  disappeared from view the flyer veered left and right indecisively, then stretched out its neck and came
  
  straight on - forNestor!
   Coming to a skidding halt, suddenly Nestor sensed that this was more than a nightmare. It was real, and
  the reality gathering impetus, rushing closer with every thudding heartbeat. He glanced all about, saw
  open space on every side and nowhere to take cover. Frombehind him someone yelled, 'Get down!' And
  a crossbow bolt zipped overhead. Then ...
   .. . The flyer was almost upon him, and the underside of its neck where it widened into the flat
  corrugated belly was splitting open into a great mouth or pouch lined with cartilage barbs! Nestor turned,
  began to run, felt a rush of foul air as the flyer closed with the earth to float inches over its surface. And in
  another moment the fleshy scoop of its pouch had lifted him off his feetand folded him inside.
   As darkness closed in, he saw twin flashes of fire from the muzzle of Kirk Lisescu's shotgun; up on the
  stockade catwalk, Lardis Lidesci and Andrei Romani were frantically traversing the great crossbow
  inwards. Then .. . cartilage hooks caught in Nestor's clothing,and clammy darkness compressed him.
   Squirming and choking, denied freedom of movementand deprived of air and light, he breathed in vile
  gases which worked on him like an anaesthetic, blacking him out. The last things he felt were a massive
  shuddering thud, followed by a contraction of the creature's flesharound him and its violent aerial
  swerving.
   Then his limbs turned to lead as the flyer fought desperately for altitude ...
    
    
    
   PART FIVE:
    
    
    
   Vampires.' - The Sundered Tribes - The Search
    
    
    
    
    
    
  
    
    
    
    
    
   I
    
    
    
   Lardis and Andrei were asleep when the searchers found Nathan and brought him in along with five
  more. By then sundown was one-third spent, and Nathan had lain unconscious in the grass at the foot of
  the west wall for more than nine hours. He was still unconscious when they dumped him unceremoniously
  on his back on a huge plank table salvaged from the wreckage at the site of the meeting place. This was
  where the survivors were being examined - all the survivors - to see ifthey really were survivors.
   Between times, a lot had happened and was still happening. After the attack - after Wratha and her
  henchmen had done their worst, taken the best, destroyed what they could of the rest and left - then
  Lardis had taken charge, issued hurried instructions, finally rushed at killing speed up to his cabin on the
  knoll, where he'd hoped against hope to find his wife and son waiting and unharmed.
   But he had doubted it. For he knew that Lissa always kept lamps burning in the cabin's windows when
  he was away, to guide him home, and he hadn't seen Jason since he and the Kiklu boys had gone on
  ahead into the town. That soft glow, from Lissa's lamps, could be seen for miles around - as indeed
  Lardis had seen it through the treetops during his and Andrei's approach to Settlement, but as he no
  longer saw it - burning up there against the dark flank of the mountains. And as he had driven himself like
  a madman up the steep side of the knoll, so he'd wondered who or what else had seen thatglow, and
  why his son hadn't come back down when he heard the uproar and saw parts of the town burning.
   It could be, of course, that Lissa had seen a suspiciousmist on the slopes and stifled the lamps, and that
  thenshe'd restricted Jason to the house. It could be...
   ... But it wasn't. For when finally Lardis had got there it was to find his place in ruins. Following which
  he'd spent a back-breaking hour digging in the rubble, finding neither Lissa nor Jason. In a way it had
  been arelief: at least they were - or might still be - alive! But it was also the greatest tragedy of Lardis's
  life. For hedidn't know where or in what circumstances they lived.
   Taken by the Wamphyri? To be used by them, slaughtered by them, perhaps even ... altered, by them?
  That hadn't borne thinking about. And so for a while he'd thought nothing but sat there in dumb silence,
  amidst the ruins, already grieving or preparing to grieve their loss. So that by the time Andrei came to sit
  with him -saying nothing but simply being there in silent commiseration - Lardis's unspoken agony was
  already turningoutwards, to everlasting hatred and cold fury.
  
   But even so, and for all that his loss was great, he had known he wasn't the only one. And when finally
  he'd looked at Andrei, to inquire in that gravelly voice of his, 'Well?' ... then his friend and ally of so many
  years had known that the old Lardis was back. Andnodding grimly he'd told him:
   'In the old days you were iron, my friend. Now it'stime to be iron again. For we're ready, down there.'
   Then Lardis had come to his feet, straightened his back and shrugged off his weariness. And: 'Then let's
  be at it,' he'd said, as simply as that.
   But half-way down, pausing briefly, he'd beggedAndrei's forgiveness for striking him; also for the fact
  that he'd been deep in the woods - alone and lonely,bitter and raging, far beyond the South Gate - when
  the Wamphyri had struck so devastatingly at Settlement. To which the other had answered:
   'You have it, and on both counts, but only if you willforgive me: that I ever doubted you ...'
    
   Since when, the pair had done or directed what mustbe done, between times catching up on a little
  sleep; the latter out of sheer exhaustion. Mercifully their weariness was as much mental as physical, so
  that they hadn't dreamed; otherwise their task might be impossible. Work such as this did not make for
  easy dreaming. And so they were asleep, in a hastily erected tent closeto the meeting place, when Nathan
  Kiklu and five others were brought out of the darkness into the light from thelamps and the blazing central
  fire.
   It was nothing new to Lardis and Andrei, this processof screening, the investigation or inquisition of the
  injured in the wake of a Wamphyri raid; in the old days they had seen plenty of this. But the last raid had
  been eighteen years ago and they were no longer inured to it. Of course, the friends and families of those
  they examined were invariably present, their dark Szgany eyes soulful in the flickering firelight, mutely
  questioning the examiners in their turn.
   But if the horror wasn't now, at the direction of free men - men who were still their own men - then it
  would only come later, and from a different source entirely. And all of them knew it.
   Coming to the table, Lardis shivered under the blanket round his shoulders and tied a knot in its corners
  under his chin. The accidental fires had been put out hours ago, since when the night had grown chilly...
  or maybe it was just him. At least the stink of monsters had cleared away now. He glanced up at the
  mountainsblue-edged with starshine; no mist on the peaks now. In any case, the Wamphyri rarely struck
  twice in the same place, not in the space of a single sundown. And usually their raids followed fast on the
  setting sun,when they were most hungry.
   It seemed unreal: to remember all of these things now. And to know how very necessary it was that he
  remember them.
   The first figure on the table was that of a woman inthe middle of her life, maybe thirty-six years old.
  Lardis shook himself awake, rubbed sleep from his eyes and stared hard at her face. He knew her: Alizia
  Gito. Her man was three years dead; he'd broken his back in afall while hunting in the mountains.
   Upon the index finger of Lardis's left hand, he wore a ring of gold set with a large, flat, reflective stone.
  Holding this over her open mouth, he watched for signs of breathing, the filming of the polished stone.
  Patiently he waited, and was rewarded when the stone's glitter faded to an opaque moistness. She
  breathed, but very slowly and faintly. As yet this proved nothing, except that she lived. Lardis had seen
  
  people dying before, and knew how their breathing was wont to fade away like this. Ah, but he also
  understood how well undeathcould imitate life!
   Alizia's face was very badly 'bruised and her jaw looked broken, but she had no wounds that Lardis
  could see: no cuts, and her neck was unmarked. Hecalled forward two older women. 'Strip her -'
   - And a haggard young man stepped forward, a growl rumbling in his throat as he grasped Lardis's arm.
  Lardis looked him in the eye, unflinchingly, and contin ued: '- but let her keep her dignity, what's left to
  thepoor woman. Put a blanket over her.'
   The young man was Nico, one of Alizia's sons, aboutseventeen years old. Lardis recognized him, and
  nowasked after his younger brother. 'Vladi?'
   Nico released Lardis's arm, shook his head. His eyeswere very bright with unspilled tears. Taken,' he
  reported, with a gulp. 'I was in hiding under a cart. Towards the end of it I looked out, saw one of them
  knock Vladi on the head, toss him into the saddle of aflyer and make off with him. I found my mother
  later. Is she .. .?'
   'I don't know,' Lardis could only shrug and shake hishead. 'I have to look under this blanket to find out.
  Listen, I've looked at a lot of women tonight. It meansnothing to me, but I know it means a lot to you.
  We can look together, if you like?' He put an arm across theother's slumped shoulders. And they looked.
   Alizia was naked now; she'd been half-naked anyway.Lardis saw ... obvious signs, but he had to be
  sure.'Nico, I want to touch her, turn her over,' he said. 'Canyou help me?' Very carefully, they turned her
  face down. There were indentations in her thighs and buttocks,deep as claw marks, some of them
  bleeding.
   Lardis shuddered and let the blanket fall. His face was working as he stepped back a little, nodding to
  three men who waited at a discreet distance. One ofthem was Andrei Romani.
   'No!' said Nico, his voice the merest gasp, a breath ofair.
   Lardis caught him by the arm, held him back. The executioners - three merciful killers - came forward
  very quickly. Nico screamed high and shrill, but Lardistrapped his neck in a powerful armlock and turned
  hisface away.
   The three lifted Alizia in her blanket and carried herto the very end of the table. And there they
  hammered astake through her heart. The sound was meaty, soggy,and crunching where ribs splintered.
  'But she's alive,she's alive!' Nico was gurgling. 'She's my mother! I cameout of her!'
   'Yes,' Lardis told him through gritted teeth, holding him even tighter, 'but what's in her now must stay
  there. She's no longer the mother you knew but a foul,undead thing. But you're lucky, for soon she'll be
  cleanand merely dead. So forgive us if you can, and be thankful.'
   'You ... bastard!' Nico spat in his face. And on the table, his mother sighed and struggled into a seated
  position!
   A ring of blood oozed from the rim of the stake between her breasts, also from her mouth where she'd
  bitten through her bottom lip. But her eyes were open now, and they saw Nico. She sighed again,
  bloodily,and held out her arms towards him. 'My son! Nico!' and as Lardis turned the youth's face away
  a second time, so Andrei took her head off with one clean sweep of abright-gleaming sickle.
  
   Nico had passed out in Lardis's arms. He was carriedaway by Kirk Lisescu, taken to people who
  would lookafter him. The parts of Alizia Gito were carried in theirblanket to another fire on the other side
  of the openspace, and there disposed of.
   Lardis hung his head and Andrei went to him. 'Steelyourself,' he said. 'We're only half-way through.'
   Lardis looked at him from a face made haggard bysorrow. These people were mine, and I'm killing
  them.'
   The other shook his head. 'We're killing Them,' hesaid. 'Or should we let them live, run off into the forest
  and hide, and come back at the next sundown to killus?'
   Lardis half-turned away, then nodded, and looked at the next one on the table. And saw that it was
  NathanKiklu. They had already stripped him and thrown a blanket over him. Lardis went to him, saying,
  'Nathan! Ah, no... this is the worst! I had hopes for him. Therewas something different in him, something
  better.'
   He threw back the blanket, searched Nathan's body. There were bruises galore, but no cuts. Neither
  had he been violated, and the lining of his mouth was clean. As Lardis examined him, he coughed and
  groaned,began to stir.
   Lardis was excited. 'Do you know -' he said, more to himself than to anyone else, 'do you know - I
  think he's clear!' In the next moment his excitement turned to despondency. 'But his brother, Nestor: we
  saw himtaken by that flyer.'
   'A goner,' Andrei nodded, 'like so many others.'
   'We don't know that for sure,' Lardis propped up Nathan's head and gave his face a sharp slap. 'We put
  our bolt in that beast good and deep!'
   Andrei nodded again, and said, 'Aye, and Kirk's shotgun blew its rider right out of the saddle!' He
  looked up and a little apart, to where a Wamphyri lieutenant was nailed with silver spikes to a heavy
  wooden cross. He hung there like a bloody rag, apparently dead and certainly unconscious - for the
  moment. 'But the flyer madeoff, so what hope for Nestor now? If the wounded creature dropped him,
  then he's dead from the fall; likewiseif it crashed. But worst of all if it made it home.'
   Nathan coughed again and rolled his head a little in the crook of Lardis's arm. Lardis glanced at Andrei,
  said: 'Where, home? Aye, Karenstack, I know - but where before that? These bastards might be new
  here, but they weren't new to their hellish game. They werefull-fledged! They had flyers, warriors; they
  wore gauntlets! So where did they come from?'
   Andrei looked again at the lieutenant on his cross.'When this one comes to, maybe we'll find out. But
  let's face it, he hasn't much of a choice one way or the other.If he talks he's for the fire, and if he doesn't
  .. . he's forthe fire. Personally, I think we should burn him now.What if they come back for him?'
   Lardis shook his head. They won't. They have otherbusiness to occupy them now.' For a moment he
  thought of Lissa and Jason, then shut them out of his mind. If he wanted to carry on here, then he must
  shut themout.
   'But,' he continued,'if they suspect it wasn't just an accident and we actually brought this one down and
  
  killed him ... they'll certainly wonder about it. Strangers here, they're not yet sure of our capabilities. This
  was their first raid on us, and they had the advantageof total surprise. Even so, it's possible we killed a
  lieuten ant, which means we might also be able to kill one of them. That in turn guarantees their eventual
  return -notjustout of curiosity - probably at the next sundown.So catching this one is a point in our
  favour, especiallyif we can make him talk. He must talk, for I want toknow who they are!.. . For later, if
  for nothing else.'
   This was no idle threat and Andrei knew it; he also knew that Lardis must die one day at the hands of
  theWamphyri. He must, for it was them or him now, to the end. And he was just a man and mortal, while
  theyapparently went on forever.
   Nathan woke up. Lardis knew it at once, for suddenlythe youth's neck in the crook of his arm had
  stiffened,and Nathan had stopped breathing. He was holding his breath. He lay still, rigid, petrified by
  knowledge of what had gone before, and by ignorance of what was going on now. Then he opened his
  eyes a crack atfirst, then wider, saw Lardis - relaxed again and breathed out.
   But Lardis hardened himself and narrowed his eyes alittle. He wasn't yet satisfied that the youth was in
  theclear. 'Nathan,' he said, 'can you hear me?'
   Nathan nodded and Lardis helped him to struggle into a seated position. He saw where he was, that he
  was naked, and clutched his blanket to him. Then, with Lardis still supporting him, he looked along the
  table: at one end, prone figures lying side by side, and at the other a great wet patch, gleaming red.
  Finally he saw the Wamphyri lieutenant on his cross and gasped histerror, his lips drawing back from his
  teeth in an involuntary snarl.
   Lardis could well understand that; neither Nathan nor anyone else would require the benefit of previous
  experience to recognize such as this when they saw it; not with the beast in a state of metamorphosis, as
  thisone had been when the silver shot from Kirk Lisescu's twin barrels ripped him out of his saddle. He
  had been laughing or shouting, filled with blood and frenziedelation as his creature swooped to claim one
  last victim. And for all that his eyes were closed now, his passion was still plainly visible, written in every
  line of histerrible face:
   The distended jaws, hanging open, their serrated incisors at least an inch longer than his lesser teeth,
  whichwere themselves as jagged as the peaks of the barrierrange. The bunched muscles of his face,
  frozen, drawingback grey flesh from his gaping jaws in a mad laugh, or perhaps in a rictus of instant
  unbearable agony as he was hit. The flaring nostrils in a squat, flattened nose, whose bridge showed the
  first signs of convolution, a symptom of his condition: that he was a vampire oflong standing. He wasn't
  yet Wamphyri, but given timehe would be. Or would have been.
   Nathan took all of this in and more. He took note ofthe jet-black lacquered gleam of the lieutenant's
  forelock, where a silver spike had been driven through its knot, holding back his head to the upright.
  What he could not know was that the forelock's sheen came from the human fat used to grease it. He
  saw the man'sheavily muscular arms pinned horizontally to the cross bar through the wrists and elbows,
  with huge hands dangling loose; hands whose fingers were half as long and thick again as his own, and
  tipped with broad, two-inch nails filed to a chisel edge. What he did not know was that the power of this
  creature was such that he could drive those hands into a man's body to crush his heart or tear through the
  vertebrae of hisspine.
   'Ugly bastard, eh?' Lardis's voice was full of hate.
   Nathan tore his eyes from the figure on the cross and nodded. Then, glancing at the sky, the position of
  
  the stars against the mountains, he gave a start and made to get down from the table. All of the Szgany
  were expert in gauging the time from the stars, but none sogood as Nathan. He knew how long he had
  been uncon scious. And meanwhile ... what of his mother? AndMisha?
   Lardis grabbed his shoulder. 'Hold on, lad,' hegrowled. 'First tell me about the bruises on your back.In
  fact your back is a bruise, one big one!'
   Nathan nodded. 'A...a creature - a wolf, man, fox, Idon't know what - threw me against the stockade.'
   Lardis's eyes were still narrow, suspicious. But in fact he had heard reports of a hybrid thing among the
  Wamphyri raiders. Hideous reports. 'Threw you? Hedidn't bite you?'
   Nathan clutched his arm. 'He t-t-took ... took Mishafrom me!' His eyes were wide again, brimming with
  thehorror of it. Then, shaking Lardis off, he got down from the table, staggering as soon as his legs took
  his weight. His back was a column of molten agony from nape of neck to base of spine, so that he might
  have fallen ifLardis hadn't caught him under the arm.
   'Don't try to go rushing off, lad. You're in no fit statefor it. Anyway, what can be done is being done.'
   'B-but my m-mother, and Misha!' He looked dazedly around. 'W-Where are my clothes? And what
  aboutN-N-Nestor?'
   Lardis opened his mouth ... but he could only say,'Ah!' and look away.
   'Nestor?' And now Nathan's voice was steady. Verysteady.
   Lardis looked at him again, frowning. In other circumstances it might even be funny, for this was the
  most anyone had ever had out of Nathan in as long as he could remember! Was it just the shock, or
  what? What had got into him? Had something got into him? 'Areyou sure you're all right?'
   'What about Nestor?' Nathan looked straight at himwith those weird, bottomless blue eyes of his.
   There was nothing for it but the truth. Lardis had too much to do; he'd not had sufficient time to give rein
  to his own sorrow yet, so mustn't concern himself with the tears of others. Straight out with it then:
  Taken!' he said. 'We saw it: a flyer got him and carried him off. That one on the cross was its rider. Kirk
  knocked him out of the saddle; Andrei and myself, we put a bolt in his mount's belly. But we didn't stop
  it. It made off andtook Nestor with it. I'm sorry, lad.'
   Nathan made to stumble away. Like Lardis, he wouldsave what grief was left for later. But right now:
  'Mymother was in our house,' he said. 'She's buried!'
   Again Lardis stopped him. 'Nathan, wait. We've beendigging in all the fallen houses.' He called forward
  awoman with a simple map of the town scrawled in charcoal on a piece of cloth, and said, 'What of
  NanaKiklu?'
   The woman didn't need to look at her map and its smudged symbols; she'd known Nana well; she said
  nothing, simply shook her head inside her black shawl.
   'Speak!' Nathan cried out, and Lardis stepped back a pace, astonished. 'What?' Nathan shouted. 'A
  shake of your head? What does that mean? Did you find mymother? Is she dead? Speak!'
  
   Grief-stricken herself, with losses of her own, finallythe woman found her voice and sobbed, 'Your
  mother isn't there, Nathan. They didn't find her. Neither your mother, nor the Zanesti girl, Misha, who
  was at your house. Her father was here to see if she'd been found. He was mad, tearing his hair! He lost
  not only Mishabut also a sonthisnight.'
   Misha, lost! Finally the truth of it hit Nathan. He sat down in the dust and cradled his head in his hands.
  There were no tears, just a vast weariness. For he knew now that he must wake up —really wake up -
  andbecome part of this world he had spurned. Before...it hadn't mattered. Nothing had mattered very
  much. This world hadn't been his, hadn't even been real, because he'd thought it held nothing for him.
  With only a few exceptions, its peoples had seemed like aliens. But the loss of Misha was real, and he
  couldn't deny it; the onewarm spot in his heart was empty now and cold.
   No, there was one other warm place there, occupied till now by his dear mother. And was she, too,
  lost? In which case his heart must freeze entirely. He turned toLardis. 'Did anyone see my m-m-mother
  taken?'
   Lardis sighed. 'Nathan, I've many things to do. Toomany things, and too little time. But when all's done
  be sure I'll ask around. You're not the only one with questions. By sunup we'll all know who was taken,
  murdered, raped, changed. And by then, too, we'll have ... dealt with all this. Right now, however, there's
  nothingto be done. Not by you, at least.'
   'And what am I supposed to do?'
   Lardis shrugged, sighed. 'Find a warm place. Getsome sleep.'
   'And you? Don't you need your sleep?' Amazingly, Nathan was almost defiant. Lardis might expect such
  as this from his brother, Nestor, but from Nathan?
   ‘I’ll sleep later,' he answered roughly, turning away.'But for now . . . I've work to do. So be off, I'm
  busy!'
   Nathan shook his short-cropped yellow head.'If you can be strong, then so can I. Anyway, how could I
  sleep? Lardis, I...I don't have anyone!'
   Lardis heard the emptiness in his voice, like an echo of his own emptiness, and thought: Neither do I
  haveanyone, not any longer. Except maybe you.
   But out loud h^ said, Then be strong somewhere else, for the moment at least. This is a bloody place,
  Nathan, and what we're doing here is bloody work . ..'
   After that there was no more time for talk, for Andrei had lifted the blanket off the next one and was
  beckoning urgently. Lardis went to him and looked where his finger pointed. The man under the blanket
  had been bitten in the neck, and wide-spaced punctures had formed scabs over heavy blue arteries.
  There was nobreath in him, no pulse, and he lay utterly still.
   Nathan backed off a few paces and stood there watching. He had to learn what he could of this sort of
  thing now, for it was no longer a game which he, Nestor, and Misha played in the woods. The Wamphyri
  were real, and so was the horror they brought with them.
   Lardis yanked a bauble from its stitches in the cuffof his jacket, opened the cold grey fingers of the
  corpse'sleft hand and folded them around a small silver bell which he forced into the palm. Then he
  
  stepped back and waited. And in a little while ...
   . . . The 'dead' man (whom Lardis had been fairly surewas undead, but must test anyway), moaned and
  gave a shudder that shook his entire body. His eyelids flutteredbut remained mercifully shut. He wasn't
  ready to wake up, but even unconscious the poison in his blood was protecting its changeling. His hand
  vibrated on the table's boards, unclenched, and in its agitation tossed aside the silver bauble. Finally he
  sighed and lay stillagain. And Lardis nodded, sharply.
   The gaunt-faced, strong-willed executioners came forward, and Nathan saw what Lardis had meant by
  'bloody work'. He forced himself to watch this one,justone, and was sickened. All the rattling, grimacing
  skeletons of whispered campfire stories took on rotting flesh now, and every bad dream of his childhood
  was realizedat one and the same time.
   Against this surreal background of smoky, ruddy firelight and terrifying burnt-pork stenches - where
  gaunt figures came and went through the night, carrying their burdens of blanketed bodies, and Lardis
  Lidesci wasthe Ultimate Authority, who determined life or death — finally Nathan was set free from his
  deep-rooted mental shackles, became a man of Sunside, Szgany, and leftthe shucked-off chrysalis of his
  weird other-worldlinessbehind him.
   The shell was left behind, at least.
   But a man is more than flesh and blood. When he isconscious a man can control his body and even, in
  large measure, his thoughts. But when he's asleep ...? Arehis thoughts entirely his own?
   When he was very small, Nathan had sometimes asked his mother: 'Why do the wolves talk to me in my
  pillow? Why do I hear all of the dead people whispering?' Then she would seem to close up on herself
  like the flowers at sundown; an uneasy look would come into her eyes; she would shush him and beg him
  not to ask things like that, for such questions were strangeand people wouldn't like or understand them.
   These were only a few of the strange questionsNathan had learned not to ask, until he'd rarely asked
  anything at all but remained silent. Even in his dreams,he'd learned how to stay mainly silent.
   But that had been then, in his childhood.
   And this was now, and he was a man . . .
    
   Lardis had told Nathan to go away, find himself a warm place, sleep. But he could not. Indeed, it would
  not surprise Nathan if he never slept again. Instead he turned his back on Lardis's and Andrei's 'bloody
  work'- what was happening on the great table, the monstrous but necessary examination of the dead and
  the undead by those who still lived, while they still lived - and went to sit cross-legged close to the foot of
  the cross,where the Wamphyri lieutenant hung on his silverspikes.
   Someone brought Nathan his clothes and he dressed himself automatically, almost without conscious
  volition, then sat shivering under his blanket and waited for the lieutenant to regain consciousness. For
  Lardis intended to question this creature, this man or once-man, and whatever the old Lidesci's methods
  would be - however cruel - Nathan intended to hear for himself whatever answers they might elicit. He
  was Szgany now and had made himself a vow; it was unpublicized but a vow for all that, and it would be
  a hard thing to accomplish. In order to destroy his enemies he mustfirst understand them.
  
   There was a lesser fire close by, which slowly warmedhim through until he began to nod. And despite
  that he had thought it impossible, in a little while he curled up on his side and went to sleep. It was the
  beginning of a healing process, but only partly physical. For mainly it was an opportunity for his mind to
  consolidate theundeniable fact of his existence, at the same time assimi lating something of the monstrous
  facts which had focused that reality.
   That was partly why he slept: to heal himself in body and spirit, and let the subconscious Nathan create
  some kind of order out of the chaos of the physical Nathan's new reality. But his mind was not like those
  of other men; complex as the genetics which had built it as a reflection of another's mind, it was living
  proof of that universal axiom, 'like father, like son'. The only difference between him and his Necroscope
  father was this: that Harry Keogh, in his own world, had had the benefit of a mathematical science, and of
  a million dead people who cared for him and were not afraid. While in this world . . . now the Great
  Majority had plenty to fear, and felt that they could only trust each other. And so they continued to avoid
  Nathan when his dreams impinged too closely upon theirs. Like now .. .
    
   ...He felt them shut him out, withdrawing into the silence of their tombs! More quickly than ever before,
  the teeming dead had sensed and rejected him. And sohe must dream of the living.
   Misha was at the forefront of his mind: naturally he would dream of her. Not as he had last seen her, in
  the clutches of a beast-man (his mind shied from that), but briefly, in snatches out of time. As a child, as a
  girl, andthen as a young woman.
   First as a child:
   Misha as he'd seen her that first time: all naked, sleek, shining, and agile as a fish in the water, swimming
  in the sun-dappled shallows and beckoning himtojoinher there. Strangely her innocence had deprived him
  of his own! And despite that he had been a child, his thoughts had been a man's thoughts. After that there
  had been other times, but always he kept hissensual self from her; they had played as children, sexless at
  first, until the passing years had broughtchanges.
   One time, when they had been swimming together and after they'd scrambled back into their clothes - as
  they laughed and rough-and-tumbled each other on the riverbank - finally they'd fallen into each other's
  arms and she had felt him hard against her. At once, he'd sensed her catching her breath and drawing just
  a little apart. But then, as curiosity got the better of her, she had let her arm fall 'casually' across Nathan's
  lower half, to test the response of the small rod where it throbbed in his trousers.
   Misha had older brothers; she wasn't blind; she knew about such things.
   One day as they wandered in the forest, when he was fifteen and she something less than a year
  younger,they'd come across a plum tree. It was late in the season and the fruits were very ripe. Lifting her
  up until shecould reach the shining, purple plums, Nathan had been more than ever aware of her thighs
  swelling into firm, rounded, still boyish buttocks, and conscious of the buds of her breasts where she
  strained her arms upwards. So that after she had picked several of the fruits,and he relaxed his grip to let
  her slide down between his hands -
   - He'd marvelled at the sight of her brown legs, revealed where her dress rode up about her waist. She
  had seen his eyes on her and felt him against her where she stretched her toes for the forest's floor; and
  she'dtold him, however breathlessly, impulsively:
  
   'Ah, see! Your little man is jumping again .. .'
   And when he'd turned away, embarrassed and reddening:
   'Nathan, wait!' she had taken his elbow. 'It's all right. I understand. There's no harm in him. He jumps for
  joy-for thejoyof me!'
   For her brothers had girlfriends, too, and Misha knew how they dealt with their frustrations, how they
  gained relief from the overabundance of their emotions. 'You should let him out,' she told Nathan then,
  still clingingto him, 'before he bursts!'
   And in the secrecy of the long grass under the plum tree, she had whisperingly, wonderingly compared
  the purple of his swollen glans to the tightly stretched skins of ripe plums, and stroked him to orgasm.
  Since when and for three long years, she had satisfied him inthisway, and allowed him to return this most
  tender compli ment. But wise beyond her years, she had not once lethimintoher.
   'Ah, no!' she would say when his flesh seemed mostinsistent. 'For when my children come along I must
  be ableto teach them, which I can't do while I've still so much tolearn. Also, I have not made up my mind.
  I may love you, Nathan, but I can't be sure. What if I discover someoneelse to love, but too late? If I let
  your flesh into mine now,thisvery minute, it might decide me against my will.'
   And finally, just a year ago, walking in the twilight before the night, when they paused to fondle a while
  on a grassy bank and she'd held him throbbing in her hand, and Nathan had told her:
   'H-h-he wants to k-kiss you, too. Where only myf-fingers have kissed you.'
   And again on impulse she'd taken him deep into her mouth to draw his sting, and afterwards told him:
   'There. Flesh is flesh, Nathan, but this way makes no new flesh.' And putting her finger to his lips, she'd
  added, 'Shh! Say nothing, make no protest! We are grown up now. Give mejust another year, and then -
  I shall make up my mind. But it won't be easy. My father and brothers see many men in Settlement, and
  they see you. Oh, I know - I know you are more different than even they suspect - but harder far to
  convince them ofthat. And anyway, there could be someone else.'
   The only 'someone else' there could be was Nestor and Nathan knew it, but he'd said nothing. Except ...
  he had wondered. For there had also been times when Nestor and Misha were alone together, too, and
  who could say but that - ?
   - But no, for Nestor chased after the other girls of the village, while Nathan had no one but Misha.
  Surely thatmust make a difference?
   Now that his brother had entered his dream, Nathan moved on, moved forward, to the present. And
  nowMisha was no longer a slip of a girl but a young woman, sitting there in his mother's house, like some
  warm wild flower in the light of lamps and the glow of thefire.
   Small but long-legged - elfish as the creatures of Szgany myth, which were said to inhabit the deep
  forests - Misha Zanesti was the focus of Nathan's fascination; indeed, she was his only fascination in the
  world! So that it was hard to concentrate on what they were saying, she and his mother, when all he
  really wanted to do was look at Misha. Even now, dreaming, he couldn't remember what had been said,
  but he certainlyremembered the way Misha had looked:
  
   Her hair dark as the night, velvet, the darkest Nathanhad ever seen, which in the light of the sun shone
  black as a raven's wing. Her eyes - so huge and deeply brownunder black, expressive, arching eyebrows
  that they, too, looked black - all moist and attentive where she listened to Nana Kiklu's warm low voice,
  and now and then nodded her understanding and agreement. Her mouth: small, straight and sweet under
  a tip-tilted nose which, for all that it flared occasionally in true Gypsyfashion (indeed, a great deal like her
  father's) had nothing hawkish or severe about it. Her ears, a little pointed, pale against the velvet of her
  hair where it fell in ringletsto her shoulders.
   She might be less wild, voluble, deliberately voluptuous — less enticing and far more retiring — than
  certainof Settlement's Szgany girls, but she was in no way lessthan them. Misha lacked nothing of fire,
  Nathan knew, but kept it subdued and burning within. So that he alone (and perhaps Nestor, too?) saw
  its light blazing out from her in all directions, like the white of her perfectly formed teeth when they smiled
  into the sun. Ah, but he'd also seen those teeth snarl and knew of several village youths who'd felt the lash
  of her tongue when they sought to be too familiar! Well, they'd been lucky, those lads, for they might
  have felt a lot morethan that if he...if Nathan . . . but that wasn't his way.Or it hadn't been, not then.
   In any case, Misha could look after herself and had her own philosophy. He remembered her words:'If a
  girl flaunts herself and acts the slut, she can only expect to be treated as such. I do not and will not!' But
  with Nathan she'd always acted as the mood took her. For which he was glad ...
   His mother and Misha faded from Nathan's dream and were replaced by Nestor. Nestor striding in the
  streets of Settlement, admired by the girls and adoredby his friends even as the stuttering Nathan was
  shunned. Nestor proud, strong — arrogant? — but neverthe bully. Not until that night, last night, when he
  wouldhave used his physical strength to bend another to his will. Nestor who had cared for and
  protected Nathan through all the years of their childhood, and cared forMisha, too, until he'd seen how
  closely she and Nathanwere drawn together.
   Nestor gone, taken, stolen by a Wamphyri flyer intoStarside.
   No.' said a voice in Nathan's dream, one which he recognized at once. For it was a mind-voice, and
  telepathic voices - even the whispers ofthe dead - are not unlike their more physical counterparts; they
  'sound' the same as if spoken. But this was no dead personspeaking, not even a 'person', though Nathan
  hadalways considered him as such. And:
   No, the mental voice came again, like a snarl, a cough,a bark in Nathan's dreaming mind. Your brother -
  our uncle — has not beenstolen away into Starside. Theflying creature which took him crashed to earth
  in theeast, on Sunside.
   Nathan pictured the speaker. He had his own namefor him: Blaze, after the diagonal white stripe across
  his flat forehead, from his left eyebrow to his right ear, as ifthe fur there was marked with frost. Blaze,
  whose eyes were the brown of dark wild honey in the twilight, and feral yellow at night. Lean but not
  skinny, all muscle, sure-footed as a mountain goat and fleeter far. And intelligent? - oh, far beyond the
  average intelligence of the pack! He admired and respected him, and knewthat it was mutual. Why else
  should the wild wolves of the barrier mountains call Nathan their 'uncle', and come to him in his dreams
  as they sometimes came tohim in his waking hours?
   The grey brother read Nathan's thoughts, which were focused now beyond the scope of casual
  dreaming. Because you are our uncle! he insisted. Mine, and likewise the ones you call 'Dock' and
  'Grinner', my brothersfrom the same litter. And because you and we areof one blood and mind, we are
  curious about you and consideryourwelfare. Our father would have wished it, we think... (A mental
  shrug, the twitch of a grey-furred ear.)You are notof our kind, but you are of our kin, after all.You are
  
  our uncle, as is Nestor. But you are the one who understands us. You, Nathan, of all the Szgany,
  translate our thoughts and answer them.
   Nathan had never understood the way they included him in their wolf family-tree; it could only be a
  compliment; he considered it as such, and was satisfied to be their friend. But now it seemed his
  friendship with thewolves was bearing fruit.
   'What of Nestor,' he was eager. 'Does he live?'
   Our grey brothers in Settlement saw him taken intothe creature's mouth, the other's snarling answer
  came at once. He was snatched up, whirledaloft, carried east and towardsthe barrier peaks. But in the
  hills and all along the spine of the mountains, we observed the creature's clumsyflight. Wounded where a
  great bolt was lodged in its flesh, it could not clear the mountains. Withfluids raining from its wound, it fell
  to earth, came down inthe pines andexpired on the slopes above a Szgany township. And so your
  brother, who is our uncle Nestor, is not in Starside but Sunside. But .. .I cannot say if he lives. Members
  ofthepack were close to hand, but not that close. And the men of the town arefearful now of creatures
  other than men. Aye, and even of strange men! The grey brotherhood must staywell clear.
   'Which town?' Nathan could scarcely contain hisexcitement, which threatened to wake him up. 'Where
  did the flyer crash? If Nestor is still alive, I have to findhim. He's all I have left.'
   You have us.
   'Among men, he's all I have.'
   You have the Lidesci, who was our father's friendevenbefore we were littered.
   'But Lardis Lidesci...is not of my blood.'
   (A nod of that wise wolf head.) The town is the nextone to the east, between the rivers.
   Twin Fords?'
   That is its name, we think. But Nathan, you have your mother, and a young female of the Szgany. We
  have seen you together, and she is always in your mind.
   'Misha? I don't know if she lives. And if she lives, I don't know where or for how long. She was taken
  by a...by a human dog! By a beast-thing, Wamphyri!'
   The Dweller, our father, was a wolf-human, a werewolf.
   Nathan shook his head. 'Your father could not have been like this one. You are animals, not-humans.
  Butthis one was a...a beast! He was inhuman.'
   We know of him. (That nod of a wise head again.) Inthe east, beyond the pass, the grey brothers have
  heardhim singing to the moon in Karenstack. For he worshipsour silver mistress much as we do. But you
  are right: heis not like us. We are . . . animals, and he is a man-beast.
   'Wamphyri,' said Nathan, 'aye
   And your mother? What of her?
  
   'I don't know. Perhaps she was taken; I pray by my star that she was not; perhaps she ran off into the
  woods. But if she did, then why has she not returned?Do you know anything of her?'
   No. It is only by chance that we know of Nestor. Wewish you luck in your search for him.
   'Do you leave me now?' Nathan was reluctant to letthem go.
   New things have come to pass.(In Nathan's mind, Blaze's golden eyes seemed to burn on him. But their
  yellow fire was fading, and the wolf's telepathic voicewas faint now, retreating.) Strange and monstrous
  crea tures are comeinto Starside, from where they raid on Sunside. The woods and mountains are no
  longer safe, neitherfor wolves nor men. These are problemsfor which we have no answers,but there is
  one at least who might know. Now we go tofindout about thesethings.
   Desperately, Nathan tried to retain him, hold on to this one familiar thread - however weird, tenuous, un
  believable - in a world which in the space of a few shorthours had become a nightmare. 'Answers? But
  there isno answer to the Wamphyri.'
   You may be right. You may be wrong. (The voice wasfading out and starting to lose all sense and
  meaning. How else could Nathan translate the next and last words he heard, exceptthat he
  misunderstood them?)But our mother speaks to our father, who is yourbrother. And if anyone would
  know, he isthatone. And so we go to speak totheone who suckled us.
   'Your mother, a wolf?'
   Aye, where her bones lie bleached in a secret place . . .
   It seemed that a cold wind keened upon Nathan then,as the wolf-voice went out of his dreams –
    
   - But the wind was only the night air where someone had uncovered his head. Squinting his eyes in the
  firelight he saw Lardis kneeling beside him, turning back his blanket. 'Nathan,' the old Lidesci growled.
  'Be up, lad, and away from here. This one you've guarded sowell, he wakes up - and I have business
  with him.'
   As dreams are wont to do in the light of reality,Nathan's was quickly disintegrating, breaking up. Those
  parts concerning impossible relationships were quickly forgotten; his wolves had always called him uncle,
  so that he saw nothing strange or new in it. It wasn't worth retaining. But as for the one important item of
  information, about Nestor: he clung to that,repeating it to himself:
   The flyer that carried Nestor away has crashed toearth in the east, close to Twin Fords.
   Strange to think that just yesterday, in the late afternoon, Nathan and the rest of Lardis's party had
  passed through Twin Fords on their way home. Since then, itwas as if a new age had dawned. An age of
  darkness.
   Perhaps he had spoken out loud before he was fullyawake. For Lardis at once demanded: 'Eh? Twin
  Fords?What of it?'
   'I... I was dreaming,' Nathan answered. 'Of Twin Fords, I think.' He'd long ago learned not to talk about
  
  his dreams. Especially the stranger ones.
   But Lardis was shaking his weary, hag-ridden head. 'No, it was no dream. Twin Fords was hit last night,
  as prelude to what happened here. A handful of refugees came in while you lay sleeping, and you must
  have overheard us talking. Twin Fords is no more; its people won't go back there; the tribes are
  sundered, Nathan, and we're all to be Travellers again. The days will be ours, and the golden sun our one
  sure friend, but all thelong dark nights will belong to them, the Wamphyri!'
   The Wamphyri lieutenant was groaning, stirring on his cross. Nathan stood up, eased his cramped bones
  and feltfire in his bruises. He glanced at the stars over the black barrier range, saw that the hour was well
  past midnight.He had never slept so long in one place, at one time. His bladder was full of water, which
  he must be rid of.
   Stumbling awayinto the shadows, he found a place to relieve himself. The ground all around was already
  desecrated, steeped in vampire mist, warrior stench, and unavenged Szgany blood. A little urine couldn't
  hurt. Already Nathan's thoughts had turned as sour and cynical as the bitter brown taste in his mouth . ..
   When he got back to the cross the lieutenant was fully awake, turning his head this way and that, as far
  as the spike through his topknot would allow, glaringat the handful of men who were gathered there to
  ques tion him. For a moment the vampire's scarlet eyes lit on Nathan, burned into his soul, drove him
  back a pace before they moved on. Nathan was no threat; he was amere youth, of no importance. But
  the men were some thing else. Especially the apish, hollow-eyed leader ofthis Szgany rabble.
   Vratza Wransthrall brought his scarlet gaze to rest upon Lardis and scowled at him. 'Man,' he croaked,
  'you are doomed. For what you have done and will do to me -' his eyeballs swivelled left and right,
  observing the silver spikes which pinned him to the cross, '- my master, the Lord Wran, will stuff your
  throat with your own tripes, rip out your living heart and eat it smoking, and feed your tatters to his
  warriors. Whoever youwere, you are no more.'
   Lardis looked up at him, tilted his head a little on one side, sniffed at the air suspiciously, disdainfully.He
  glanced at the men around him: Kirk Lisescu, AndreiRomani and his brothers, and one or two others,
  inquiring: 'Do the words rise or fall from his lips? I think they fall; or is it the stench of warriors lingering
  on the night air? No, for that is sweet by comparison. And so it seems we've erred and should have
  nailed him higher. But what the hell...a stench is only a stench.'
   The vampire's muscles bunched as he flexed greyarms on silver spikes; he gave a shudder that wracked
  his entire body, then groaned and hung still. But inanother moment, lifting his head to glower at Lardis as
  before, he said: 'Aye, make your jokes while you may. For all of this -' he snorted and tossed his head
  derisively in a small, sneering gesture which dismissed Settlement in its entirety, '- is finished. And all of
  your people are as dust. Let every man, woman and child of them that are yours count each breath he
  takes from this time forward, enjoying it individually as if it werehis last. For thelucky ones have very little
  of breathing left to do. As for them that are unlucky: they shall be heir to the dubious delights of the great
  stack on Star-side; from the mills where their bones will be ground down for meal, to the pens of the
  warriors and thereeking methane pits. They shall be fuel for my master's lusts, flesh for his fashioning,
  fodder for his beasts. Sobe it.'
   Someone had brought Lardis a stool where he satwith a hiked knee supporting his elbow, and his square
  chin resting on the knuckles of a calloused hand. His attitude towards his captive seemed almost casual,
  butanyone in his acquaintance would recognize how doomful was his calm, quiet voice as he answered,
  'Long-winded bastard, aren't you?' And then, morebusinesslike:
  
   'Do you have a name, vampire, or are you satisfied tobe remembered as a stench and a puff of black
  smokerising from our fire?'
   The creature gave a start, and glared harder than ever; but he also trembled a little where he hung sus
  pended on the cross. Poisoned by the silver shot whichhad ripped into his great chest - also by the long
  silverspikes which pinned his wrists, elbows, and the twitch ing muscles of his calves to timbers hard as
  iron – hewas weak by a vampire's standards, but still strong by a man's. Even now, if only he could get
  down from this cross, he'd wreak havoc among his tormentors before someone put a bolt through his
  heart. That was how he would prefer to go: fighting bloodily the one minute, with a bolt through his chest
  the next, and finally his head flying free in a crimson welter! After that, they could burn him all they
  wanted. But ... not while hewas still alive.
   It was as if Lardis read his mind. 'Oh?' he said. 'And is it that the fire worries you?' He knew it was, for
  a vampire burns slowly, and the thing inside him fights itall the way.
   Meanwhile, Kirk Lisescu had slipped away and returned with a spade. Whistling tunelessly, he bent his
  lean, muscular back at the foot of the cross and commenced digging in the loose soil there. Whenever his
  spade struck the upright, it shivered a little. Looking at the lieutenant, Lardis nodded to indicate Kirk's
  activity,and said:
   'He digs here at the front, so that eventually the cross will be weakened and topple towards the fire
  there.' Standing up, he jerked his thumb negligently to his rear where a long, deep pit of glowing embers
  lay behind him. And: 'Phew!' Lardis wiped his brow, 'but it's hot!' Then, walking to and fro - with his
  great head jutting a little, though not aggressively, and his hands claspedbehind his back - he continued
  conversationally:
   'Of course, if you were to loosen up a bit and talk -why, my good friend here might stop digging in order
  tohear what you were saying!' He gave a shrug. 'And really it's as simple as that: while you talk you live,
  at least as long as you make interesting conversation. And when you stop talking you burn. Meanwhile,
  you still haven't told us your name, or where you come from, orhow many there are of you... or anything
  at all whichwemight find remotely interesting!'
   Snarling the last few words, finally Lardis gritted his teeth, sprang forward and snatched Kirk Lisescu's
  spade, and began shovelling himself with a vengeance; until the cross gave a lurch and an ominous creak,
  and tilted forward a fraction towards the fire in the trench.
   But a fraction was enough, and now at last the vampire started to talk...
    
    
    
   II
    
    
    
  
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
   'My name?' the undead creature on the cross gabbled, his red eyes starting out, staring at the fire-pit into
  which he would topple slowly, face down, unless he chose to speak first. 'Is that all you want to know?
  My name and a little useless information? Well then, and for all the good it will do you, they call me
  VratzaWransthrall. There, and what else can I tell you?'
   Lardis tossed the spade aside, stepped back a little and filled his labouring lungs. Then he looked up at
  theother, nodded, and smiled albeit humourlessly. 'So you've taken your master's name, eh? And was it
  alsoyour plan to step into his shoes one day?'
   Beneath lowered eyebrows, the vampire's slitted eyesshot scarlet loathing at him. 'In Turgosheim,' he
  grunted, 'the Lord Wran the Rage had several lieutenants. Here and for the moment, he has just the one -
  myself! Yes, Iwould be Wamphyri. Or I would have been.'
   Again Lardis nodded. 'Turgosheim, eh? And where,pray, is Turgosheim?'
   The other glared at him, flared his nostrils, remained silent ... until Kirk Lisescu took up his spade again.
  Then:
   'East!' Vratza cried, straining on the silver spikes until the blue veins jerked and writhed in his arms, but
  straining uselessly. He might tear his flesh but he wouldn't tear those nails loose. And: 'East,' he croaked
  again, relaxing as best he could and hanging there shiv ering, panting. 'Beyond the Great Red Waste.
  There are mountains there, a lesser range — Starside to the north
   and Sunside in the south, much the same as here - butsmaller. Turgosheim lies hidden from the sun in a
  gorge. It was our home but Wratha brought us away, to this.1
   'Wratha?' Lardis cocked his head on one side. 'Agirl's name? A Lady, your leader?'
   'Wratha the Risen, a Lady, aye. She led us out of Turgosheim.' Vratza's floodgates were fully open now;
  Lardis need only question him.
   'Why did she bring you here?'
   'Because Turgosheim was used up. Too many vampires, too few Sunsiders.'
   'Ah!' Lardis craned his neck, narrowed his eyes. 'Andhow many Lords were there, in Turgosheim?'
  
   'More than forty, less than fifty. Including the Ladies.'
   'And how many here, now?'
   'Six. Wratha and her five.'
   'And lieutenants?'
   'Myself, and one other.'
   Lardis drew in his chin. 'What? Six of them and onlytwo of you?'
   'Four of us died last night,' Vratza scowled, 'when wecame out of Starside to raid on a town standing
  east ofhere.'
   Andrei Romani nodded and clapped his hands appreciatively. And: 'Well done, Twin Fords!' he
  chuckled, however grimly. 'A little good news at last. At leastthey were prepared!'
   'No,' Vratza shook his head. 'It was that we were notprepared. Some of the men fought back! In
  Turgosheim, that would have been unthinkable. But afterwards, strik ing here, by then we were prepared.
  As for myself, Iwas unlucky .. .'
   'Very,' said Lardis, quietly, 'for it will cost you your life - this loathsomeness which your life has become,
  anyway. But in fact we'll be doing you a favour.'
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   'You'll burn me anyway?'
   'You know we will.'
   'And you call that a favour? Hah! Why then should Italk to you?'
   To live a little longer,' Lardis answered, as Kirkrammed the spade into the earth again.
   The cross gave a jerk and Vratza cried, 'No, wait!'And in a moment: 'What else?' he groaned.
   Lardis considered it, stroked his chin. 'Six of theWamphyri, and two - no, one - lieutenant. Andthralls?'
   'Only those which we recruited in Twin Fords. And afew recruited here tonight, perhaps.'
   'Aye, precious few,' Lardis told him, grinding his teeth.'For we're old hands at dealing with your victims!'
  Clenching his fists, he took a pace forward; Andrei Romaniwas there to grab his arm and bring him to a
  standstill.
  
   But the passion had gone out of Lardis in a moment;he was his own man again; he sighed and let his
  shoulders slump. 'And we have dealt with them,' he said.'Most of them...I think.'
   He drove from his mind all of the gaunt, accusing faces of those he had examined and found wanting,
  and tried to concentrate on the business in hand. But it was hard, for he was very tired now. And:
  'Warriors,'he growled at last. 'How many?'
   'Three,' came back the answer. 'But they will makemore, as soon as they have the stuff for it.'
   What? The 'stuff? Lardis couldn't contain a shudder.This nightmare thing was talking about people -
  decent human beings, good Szgany flesh - mutated by theWamphyri into monsters! Deep inside he felt
  his gorge rising, also his fury and everlasting hatred. And he knew that he wouldn't be able to talk to
  Vratza Wrans-thrall for very much longer.
   But for now he must control himself, keep a tight rein on powerful Gypsy emotions, and say: 'Something
  hererings like a bell without a clapper - hollowly. You say the Wamphyri came here out of this
  Turgosheim withonly a handful of lieutenants and warriors betweenthem? What, and were they
  banished?'
   'Not banished, no,' Vratza answered, sweat drippingfrom him where he suffered the agonies of the silver
  spikes. 'But she would have been, the Lady Wratha, if the others had known of her works earlier. It was
  thisway:
   'Warriors, the aerial sort, are forbidden in Turgosheim. But as you have seen, Wratha the Risen andher
  colleagues made fighting creatures that flew. To do so they must work secretly, in the privacy of their
  manses; it was the only way they could escape the restrictions of Turgosheim and make new lives here.
  But in the end they were discovered, and so forced toflee.'
   Lardis frowned, scratched his head. There are nowarriors in Turgosheim?'
   'Not which fly. Of other types: a few lesser creaturesare kept in the spires and manses, and there are
  thosewhich roam in Turgosheim's bottoms, guarding against intruders.'
   Lardis frowned, tried to picture all he'd been told,and slowly nodded. He looked around at his men, nar
  rowed his eyes, and continued the questioning. 'But eventually- I mean, now that this Lady Wratha has
  found her way here - it's entirely possible that theothers will breed monsters of their own and follow her,
  right? And is that why she's in such a hurry to makenew lieutenants, warriors, thralls?'
   Up on his cross, Vratza was growing weaker by themoment. The alien stuff in his blood, which made
  him a
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   vampire, was poisoned; his flesh could not repair itself;each of the small silver balls in his peppered chest
  
  was an agony in its own right. Even so, and for all his suffering, he was beginning to see Lardis Lidesci in
  anew light. He nodded, as much as the spike through his topknot would allow, and grunted, 'I can see ...
  can see that they will have their work cut out ... with such as you. And I believe that I...that I am not the
  first thrall of the Wamphyri with whom you've spent an hour or so in... in poJite conversation. A shame
  we weren'tdestined to meet on terms more equal.'
   'Aye, too true!' said Lardis with a snort. 'What? Equalterms? You with your gauntlet and the strength of
  five men, undead and almost impossible to kill? Hah! Do you remember how you were taken? And were
  those equal terms? No, don't try appealing to my humanity, Vratza Wransthrall. For where you and your
  like areconcerned, I am a monster in my own right!'
   Kirk Lisescu tugged urgently at his elbow. 'Get on with it,' he whispered. 'He grows weak. Get what you
  can out of him and then make an end of it.'
   Vratza scowled down on them. 'I have a vampire's ears,' he growled, 'in which your whispers ring like
  shouts! Anyway, you are right: I am weak and fading fast. You should go away now and let me die. That
  iswhat I wish.'
   'A few more questions,' Lardis told him, 'and then I'llsee to your wishes personally.'
   'No! No!' Vratza protested, groaning. 'It is... it isenough. I...I am finished.' He hung his head, slumped
  down on his spikes.
   Lardis nodded, but grimly. 'So you're finished, are you?' he repeated the other. 'Yes, and I'm the village
  idiot, lured away from a nest full of eggs by a partridgewith a "broken" wing!'
   Vratza said nothing but simply hung there, evenwhen Kirk took up his spade again.
   Lardis waited a little while, then said, 'Vratza, listen to me. We can't stay here but must move on; all of
  us, the entire village. And we certainly don't intend to take you with us. Now, you are going to die, I
  make no bones about that. But how you die is up to you. This isyour choice:
   'Answer a few more questions, and then go cleanly, without even knowing it. Or hang there till morning
  when the sun comes up, and suffer the worst of all possible deaths - for such as you. Now listen: you are
  right and I've had dealings with vampires before. I have seen and heard the likes of you melting in
  sunlight: the swift blackening and peeling of your skin, the black smoke boiling as your fats begin to melt,
  the awful screaming as your guts rupture and your eyeballs start out upon your cheeks. After an hour,
  two, three at most, you will be a black and tarry rag-thing hanging there, with all your bones protruding
  and your black skull frozen in a final scream! Is that what you want, Vratza Wransthrall?'
   Vratza twitched a little but made no answer.
   'So be it,' Lardis nodded. And: 'Men, bind this creature more firmly yet, with good silver wire round his
  arms, legs and neck. And knock a few more nails in him, so that he won't jerk himself loose when the
  sun's first rays hit him. Then clear the village. We're movingout, right now, within the hour.' It was a bluff,
  of course, but Vratza didn't know that.
   'Wait.'' The vampire's scarlet eyes shot open as he began to strain again, but less powerfully, against the
  spikes where they pierced his flesh. Then, panting, genu inely exhausted, he hung there glaring at Lardis
  asbefore; but helplessly now, hopelessly. And:
  
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   'I'm good as dead anyway,' he choked the words out. 'Your silver is in my blood. But... do I have your
  word? Will you make a clean end of it?'
   Lardis nodded, and growled: 'Which is more thanyou ever granted.'
   Vratza lay back his head against the cross, closed his eyes and breathed deep, and said, 'One bolt won't
  be enough. I was Wran's thrall for long and long. I've come very close to being Wamphyri...'
   Lardis nodded again, and quietly said, 'So I've noted.Be sure we'll take care of it.'
   'Then ... ask your damned questions and be done!'
   To one side of the cross and a little behind it, just outof sight of the crucified vampire, Andrei Romani's
  broth ers placed loaded crossbows in readiness on the now empty table, and Kirk Lisescu snapped his
  shotgun shut. They didn't want Vratza to see their preparations,in case he should resolve to remain silent
  to the end. But,strangely, there was no hatred left in them now - not for this one, who was finished - just
  a grim determination.
   And Lardis said: 'You've told us about this Lady Wratha, who is the leader of the six. Also about your
  master, Wran the Rage. Now tell me about the rest.Who are they, and how may we know them?'
   Vratza levelled his head and stared out bleakly acrossravaged, smouldering Settlement. And as if he
  werespeaking to the night:
   'Gorvi the Guile is one of them,' he said. 'As his namesuggests, he's smooth and slippery as oil. Then
  there'sSpiro, Wran's brother, called Killglance. They are twins, Spiro and Wran, whose Wamphyri father
  had the evil eye. In his youth he could kill men - kill the Szgany, burst their hearts - just by looking at
  them! The brothers have tried it, too, though as yet with no success tomention. Also, there's Lord Vasagi,
  or Vasagi the Suck,
   as he's known. I will not try to describe him but ... you will know him anyway, when you see him. Last
  but not least there's Canker Canison, who sings to the moon and leans to the fore, loping like a dog or a
  fox, but upright on two legs ...'
   A choked cry - half-gasp, half-shout - rang out from the flickering shadows a little beyond the range of
  the fires, and Nathan Kiklu stumbled into view, his eyesfixed on the terrifying yet tragic figure on the
  cross.
   Standing in the shadows of an upended cart opposite the dull-glowing fire-pit, listening to all that Lardis
  had asked and every answer that Vratza Wransthrall hadgiven him, Nathan had been witness to
  everything. Until a moment ago his eyes had been like misty mirrors: full of starlight, firelight, strangeness.
  But now, suddenly, he was alert as never before. Coming forward to stand beside Lardis, he gazed up
  
  hard-eyed at the wretchedcreature on the cross. And:
   'What was that?' he said, his clear youth's voice contrasting with the coarseness of the night, cutting it
  like a knife. 'About a dog or a fox, a loping thing? CankerCanison, did you call him?'
   The vampire angled his huge head to look down on Nathan. He recognized him: this was one of the first
  faces he had seen when he regained consciousness, before the questioning commenced. Then ... the
  youth had seemed terrified; he'd backed off a pace and stumbled, moved away to where Vratza's scarlet
  gazecouldn't follow. Even now he was unsteady on his feet,but no longer awed.
   And so Vratza was brought to this: even childrendared to gaze upon him now, without cringing!
   Curling his fleshy upper lip, the vampire snarled and showed Nathan his twin-tipped tongue and dagger
  teeth. But still the youth stood there. Until finally Vratza
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   smiled - if what he did with his face could be called smiling - and said: 'I was your age, when I was taken
  in the tithe. Since when ... I've come a very long way.'He glanced at Lardis. 'Aye, even to the end.'
   Lardis put an arm across Nathan's shoulder. The lad has... he has an interest in all of this,' he said. But
  looking at Nathan, he knew it wasn't a healthy one.
   'Oh?' Vratza cocked his head a little on one side, ques-tioningly.
   Nathan's mouth twitched in the left-hand corner. 'It...it's my girl. This dog-thing, Canker, knocked me
  downand took her from me. Since when ... she hasn't beenfound.'
   'Ah!' said Vratza, matter-of-factly. And as if Nathan no longer existed, his red eyes swivelled to look at
  Lardis. 'Is it done? Am I finished?'
   Lardis nodded; Kirk Lisescu and the others took uptheir weapons, came from behind the cross into
  view.
   Vratza saw them, and fire and blood sprang into hiseyes together. He opened his nightmare jaws and
  hissed, vibrating his forked tongue in the red-ribbed cavern ofhis throat.
   'No, wait!' Nathan shrugged free of Lardis's arm, pointed a steady hand and finger at the monster on the
  cross. 'I want you to tell me: about Canker Canison,and about Misha. How will it be for her?'
   'No!' Lardis got in front of Nathan, throwing up his arms as if to ward off some horror; indeed, to ward
  offa very real horror. 'Vratza, don't tell him anything! Yourtime has come.' He glanced at his men where
  they took up their positions, and nodded. But the vampire wasalready speaking - to Nathan.
   'My last act,' he said, in a voice which bubbled like tar in a volcanic pit, 'to curdle your dreams now and
  
  forever. You ask about Canker? And your girl?'
   'Yes,' Nathan had to know. But behind him the menwere lifting their weapons, aiming them.
   'Canker takes women for one thing only,' Vratza gurgled. 'To use them. And when he has used them —
  in whichever of the many ways he favours - then he worries them, as a wolf among goats!'
   'Be quiet!' Lardis roared.
   A crossbow thrummed and its bolt took Vratza close to the heart, burying itself in his torn and bloody
  chestuntil only the flight protruded. He jerked massively and coughed up blood, then sucked at the air -
  and continued to speak! And with his voice rising to a shriek,and finally a gale of mad laughter, he said:
   'Boy, do you see this shaft in me, how it tears me? Soshe is torn, even now. And Canker's shaft is just
  as vicious. Be sure he'll fuck her heart out! Oh — ha, ha,haaaaa!'
   Nathan staggered to and fro, his face pale as a paperywasp's nest, with dark punched holes for eyes and
  mouth. And as a second bolt joined the first (thoughstill not on target, for the men were shooting in haste
  to shut Vratza up, and so missing their aim), the youthwhispered:
   'And now ... now I want you to die.'
   Kirk Lisescu granted Nathan's wish. Twin blasts, coming in quick succession, turned the vampire's head
  to pulp as silver shot removed any last trace of a face.
   Blood flew in gouts and splashes; booming echoescame back thunderously, first from the stockade's
  walls, then from the hills; Lardis dragged Nathan roughly aside, out of the red rain. 'You don't want that
  on you,' he gasped. 'What? Even the air that bastard breathed istainted!'
   Again Nathan shook him off, then staggered away into the night to be sick. Once, hearing shouting, he
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   looked back and saw the cross and the thing upon it as a black silhouette against the glow of the fires -
  but thesilhouette was hideously mobile!
   Vratza Wransthrall had told how he was close tobecoming Wamphyri, and he'd been right. Undead
  meta- morphic flesh formed nests of writhing tentacles whichsprang from his guts, chest, and all the
  massive parts of his body. Whipping and vibrating, they lashed themselves - lashed him - to the cross's
  upright and horizontal bar. But the men had lassoed both arms of the cross and were hauling on it
  furiously, until it leaned overand toppled into the fire-pit.
   Nathan heard the hiss, saw white smoke or steam rising, which he knew would soon turn black. Lardis
  had it right: in an hour, Vratza would be reduced to a stench and a final puff of smoke. Nothing more
  wouldremain of him -
  
   — Except, of course, that monstrous picture which he'd painted in Nathan's head. And that might very
  well last for a lifetime.
   Meanwhile, Nathan's stomach in its entirety desired to be out of him ...
   Afterwards:
   Nathan went back to his mother's house and dug in the ruins. He wasn't satisfied that the searchers had
  done everything in their power. And in order to beabsolutely certain, when he was finished with the house
  he laid bare the floor of the barn. And found nothing,not even a bloodstain.
   He stood on the spot where he'd last seen Misha inthe embrace of a snarling red-eyed fiend, hung his
  head, gritted his teeth, clenched his fists. But he didn't cry.No, he told himself,I'llshed notears until I've
  shed hisblood, taken his shaggy head, smeJJed the stenchof his
   burning hide and seen his last black trace godriftingon thewind!
   It was his Szgany vow.
   He slept again, and before the dawn went to theZanesti house where it stood undamaged. Misha's father
  and surviving brother were there, pale as ghosts, sitting in silence. Before, they hadn't much cared for
  Nathan; now, her father cradled his head and cried on it. ButNathan wouldn't. And Misha's brother
  (perhaps thoughtlessly, but surely he could be forgiven) said, 'She never knew a man; she'd been with no
  one; she wasn't even whole. Once, I would have killed the man who looked at her like that! And now I
  would kiss him - because Misha had loved him.' And he'd looked atNathan, perhaps hopefully.
   But the youth could only shake his head and say,'Always remember, you have each other." Which, while
  he'd not intended it that way, caused them to see that Nathan had no one. Before they could say anything
  he left them and went looking for Lardis, only to discoverthat the old Lidesci had experienced the
  selfsame doubts and returned to his ruined cabin on the knoll.
   Nathan joined him there, where Lardis had been atwork again in the wreckage. He came across him
  sitting in what had been his garden, with eyes as vacant as hissoul, staring south, waiting for the first
  glimmer of light to make a silver stain on the far faint curve which was the rim of the world. And when at
  last Lardis sensed him there, blinked life back into his eyes and looked athim, then Nathan said:
   'What will you do, Lardis? Will it be as you told it to Vratza Wransthrall? Will you trek with your
  people, and turn them into Travellers as in the old days, tokeep them from the Wamphyri?'
   Lardis  shook  his  head.  'Some will move  on,'  he
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   answered, gruffly. 'Can you blame them? But I will stayhere. Not "here", you understand, but in
  
  Settlement.And I fancy a good many will stay with me. Maybe that way, by adopting at least this one of
  the Wamphyri'smethods, we'll defeat them in the end.' 'By adopting their methods?'
   Lardis nodded. 'When the Wamphyri have something,they fight to keep it. Especially territory. They are
  fiercely territorial, Nathan. In the old days, most of their wars were for territory, for the great aeries, the
  Starside stacks. Oh, they were for blood, too, and forthe sheer hell of it; but mainly they were about
  territory. It's what drove them to go against The Dweller, and why they were destroyed. And now,
  finally, it's whythey've returned.'
   'And how will you keep Settlement?''By defending it! This sunup you'll see activity asnever before in
  Settlement. So much to do...I shouldn't be sitting here...I must get on down!' He stood up.
   Nathan touched his arm. 'I won't be seeing it,' hesaid, shaking his blond head. 'I'm heading east.' Lardis
  was disappointed. 'You're deserting me?' 'Never that,' the other answered. 'I came to find out what you
  would do so that eventually I'd know whereto find you. But first I must find Nestor.'
   'Nestor?' Lardis's eyebrows peaked. 'Why, anyonewould think you weren't there last night! Nestor's
  goneinto Starside, Nathan, in the mouth of a flyer. Look, I'veno time for this and so must speak plainly:
  Nestor's dead,or worse than dead! Can't you get that into your head?'
   Nathan followed him down the first flight of steps cut in the steep side of the knoll. 'But you wounded the
  flyer with a bolt from one of the great crossbows,' he replied. 'What if it crashed? In fact, I dreamed that
  itcrashed - on the wooded slopes over Twin Fords.'
   Lardis turned to him. 'You dreamed it? What, and areyou a seer? Since when?'
   A seer? Am I? Nathan wondered. No, I don't think so.But my wolves talk to me, and sometimes I hear
  the dead whispering in their graves ...
   He shrugged. 'No, I'm no seer - but I know how to hope when hope is all that's left. And I fancy you
  do, too, Lardis. Isn't that why you came back up here: to dig again where you have already delved
  enough, evenknowing you'd find nothing?'
   After a moment Lardis sighed and nodded, turned away and continued on down. 'Then you have to go,'
  he said. 'Except - if your star is good to you, and likewise mine to me - you'll promise to come back one
  day andbe my son.'
   'I feel I'm that already,' said Nathan, lying yet at oneand the same time, and however paradoxically,
  remain ing sincere. For certainly the old Lidesci had been as much a father to him as any he had ever
  known. Andyet behind Lardis's back where Nathan couldn't be seen, he frowned wonderingly. Because
  just for a moment then he'd seemed to remember something else from last night's dream ... something
  which his wolves had told to him? Some connection between his father - his real father, Hzak Kiklu - and
  theirs? Some blood relationship between the two? And was that why they calledhim uncle?
   Still unseen, Nathan shook his head in bewilderment. But how could that be? For quite obviously, their
  fatherhad been a wolf!
   It was all very mysterious and puzzling. But then, that was frequently the way of it with Nathan's dreams:
  some things appeared as real and solid as the ground under his feet, while others were vague and
  ephemeral as ripples on a pool, or frost on the high peaks before
  
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   the dawn. Some things he remembered, and others he was glad to forget, mainly because he couldn't
  understand them. Best to fasten on what he perceived as real, he supposed, and leave the fanciful stuff to
  its owndevices.
   It was a mistake, but all men make them. Especially when they are under pressure. And Nathan was no
  exception .. .
   In the hours after dawn, as Nathan trekked for Twin Fords, the thought or question would frequently
  recur:But why would they take my mother?
   He would understand - and detest his understanding of it - if she had been raped, vampirized, murdered
  out of hand. For after all, so many had been. But taken? Nana Kiklu was no mere girl. On the other
  hand, she was or had been a warm and beautiful woman. Hersons had always thought so anyway, and
  without prejudice — especially Nathan.
   But . .. did the Wamphyri take people indiscriminately? Were they so insensitive of human life that they
  would simply take, defile, use or waste whatever, whoever, was available? Perhaps they were and did.
   Or perhaps it wasjust that they followed a simpler set of rules: blood is blood, and flesh is merely flesh.
  For when a hunter is hungry, is he concerned that the rabbit he shoots should have pleasing marks? Does
  he really care if it is past its prime? And what about the sandal-maker? What difference does it make to
  him which beast supplies the leather for his sandals, aslong as it's supple, hard-wearing stuff?
   But on the other hand, the Wamphyri were or had been men, and the 'beasts' they hunted were likewise
  men - and women! So that they didn't just hunt formeat, or even for stuff to fashion into monstrous
  undead
   creatures, but for ... other reasons, too. And so Nathan would always come back to that, and end up
  wondering if Nana shared the same fate as Misha Zanesti.If Nanahad been taken.
   And if she hadn't? Then what had happened to hismother, and where was she now?
   Nathan had seen a monstrous, massively armoured warrior creature ravaging destructively in the streets
  of Settlement, and knew that these Wamphyri fighting beasts were carnivores, indeed vampires in their
  own right. Maybe that was the answer: a horrific answer, to be sure, but a quick end at least. Could it be
  that the same monster which flattened their home had also snatched up his mother? If so, she would have
  been dead instantly. But never a trace of her, nothing, noteven (Nathan was obliged to consider it,
  however flinch-ingly) a splash of red.
   The same for Misha; except that with Vratza Wrans-thrall's deliberately cruel picture still burning in
  Nathan's all-too-vivid imagination - and Canker Cani-son's slavering dog-voice reverberating in the
  vaults of his memory - he suspected or feared even worse forMisha! And however much he loathed
  
  himself for thinking it, he could only wish her dead.
   Striding east along an old Traveller trail, he found himself thinking back an hour or two, to when he and
  Lardis had climbed down from the house on the knollinto Settlement. Lardis's band of old comrades had
  been waiting for him there, with all of Settlement's citizens -those that remained, anyway - gathered
  together at the central meeting place to hear his words. What Lardis had said to them then had been
  simple and to the point,and entirely typical of him:
   'All is as it was twenty years ago,' he had said. 'The Wamphyri are back, and we are their sport, their
  food,
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   their cattle. The townships will soon be broken down,and all the Szgany sundered, scattered into small
  groups throughout the length and breadth of Sunside. So they, the Wamphyri, would have it. But there
  are differences.
   'Now we have made our homes here in Settlement, and we travel no more. This is our place, built with
  our own strong hands - with which we must likewise defend it! And our hands are strong, even against
  the Wamphyri! Last night .. . we were taken by surprise. Next time it will be different, when we'll make
  these creatures pay - and heavily! For as I've as good as said,it's my intention to face up to them. That's
  my intention, yes ...
   'You, however, have a choice. For I make no bones about it, the risks will be great and I won't ask
  anyoneto stay who isn't willing to face up to it. Men will die, of that you may be sure - but so will
  Wamphyri! And sothe choice is simple:
   'Go off on your own and become Travellers, if that's how you see your future, and I'll make no
  objection.Live as best you may and as once we lived, never know ing what the next sundown has in store
  for you. Youare welcome to wander wherever you will in those lands bounded by my markers. Except I
  would tell you this: when sundown comes, and if you're in the vicinity of Settlement, don't come here
  looking for succour. Those who fight for it are welcome to it, but those who desertme are gone for good.
   'Now, I see that some have already moved on. Well, and I wish them luck. But any more of you who
  wouldjointhem, do so now. I see no profit in talking to people who'll pay me no heed anyway ...' Then
  Lardis had waited a while, but none had stirred. Those who wouldgo had already left. And so at last he
  had continued:
   'Very well. And this is what I want of you:
   'You men, you take your orders from me. Likewise you women. If you lost a wife or husband last night,
  don't mourn but find a new one. If you lost a son or daughter, don't mourn but hate! And let your hatred
  beyour strength.
   'You old ones, sick ones who can't work or help ...you can work, you must help! No, not by furious
  
  fighting or hard labour but in those areas where your help is most needed: in keeping the fires, harvesting
  the fruitsof the forest, tending the animals. For it's you who must feed the builders and fighters, and when
  they've time to rest make sure they do so in comfort, or whatever ofcomfort is available. For we all have
  our parts to play.
   'Now, to the tasks ...' And he had gone on to listthem.
   Nathan had been witness to all of this; he'd listened to everything the old Lidesci had said, and his
  admiration was boundless.
   And Lardis was inspired; he forgot nothing; so that in something less than half an hour, Settlement was
  more abustle than at any time in all of fourteen years. And its people were doing exactly what they had
  done then: preparing for war! Which left Nathan feeling likea deserter, for he knew that soon he would
  be out of it.
   He had mentioned this to Lardis, who told him: 'Son, you have your reasons which you've explained well
  enough. And still I say come back one day, to wherethere'll always be a place for you. But before you go
  ..." He'd called for Ion Romani, who had got together afinal list of all the night's victims.
   Scrawled upon a piece of bark were the sigils ofthose whom the Wamphyri had been seen to steal
  away, those who had been found slaughtered or changed, and those who were simply missing. Of the
  latter: by now a
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   small number would be vampire thralls, hiding from the sun in the woods or the depths of mountain
  caves, waiting for the night when they could make for Star-side.
   And of course there were also marks for Nana Kiklu and Misha Zanesti. They were shown as missing,
  too, as was Nestor. And Nathan had known that Lardis didn't have the heart to show the three as he
  believedthem to be, dead and gone forever. No, for his own wifeand son were similarly listed.
   Then Lardis and Nathan had embraced, and the latter had gathered up his small bag of things and left
  Settlement for Twin Fords . . ,
   Nestor would remember very little of his brief flight in the fetid pouch of the stricken flyer. Even if he'd
  remained conscious during the trip (impossible, for the creature's gases were noxious and anaesthetizing,
  and it was only by a tremendous effort of will that he had stayed upright and mobile in the first place,
  before being taken), still he would remember very little; just darkness and clammy reek, and flexible
  cartilage hooksfixing him firmly in place in the pouch's confines.
   As for the beast's rapid and erratic descent from mountain peaks it had neither the strength nor the
  altitude to surmount - the way the massive bolt lodged deep in its body snagged in the green canopy of
  trees to set it spinning, crashing through pine branches and brambly undergrowth, finally to come to rest
  shudder-ingly on a steep wooded slope over Twin Fords; and Nestor's subsequent partial ejection from
  
  the gaping slit of the pouch - he would remember nothing whatsoever of that.
   The wonder was that he lived through any of it, let alone all of it... and yet perhaps not such a wonder
   after all. For the flyer was of vampire stuff; Nestor hadbreathed the essence of its body; the oils of its
  man-trap pouch had got into his various scrapes and gouges. Insufficient to change him substantially, but
  perhaps enough to assist in his healing. That and his youth, his great strength, hiswill to survive - all of
  these thingshad combined to pull him through.
   But healing takes time, and the greatest healer of all issleep. Up there on the hillside over the ravaged
  town of Twin Fords - where the leaping, cleansing flames of funeral pyres blazed up in the night, and
  gaunt-eyed people went stumbling through horror and chaos in the wake of Wratha's raid, much as they
  did in Settlement -Nestor slept. It was the sleep of exhaustion, of traumaticphysical damage, of the
  poisons in his system which on theone hand deadened him, and on the other supported and repaired his
  damaged functions. And so it was a healingsleep. It would help towards healing his body, at least...
   Even so, he might have died from exposure. But the grotesque flyer was still feebly alive, its body was
  still warm, and only Nestor's head, shoulders and one arm dangled from the palpitating flap of its pouch.
  The rest of him remained inside, as yet 'unborn', in a metamor-phic womb of cartilage and quivering,
  insensate flesh. And all through the night the creature leaked its fluidsand its life into the loamy soil, and its
  remaining warmth into Nestor. So that he lived.
   He lived and slept through the longest night of his life, and awoke in the hours before dawn to wriggle
  free of the flyer's pouch and fall a few harmless inches into springy moss and soft leaf-mould. And with
  the creature's broken body supported on the shattered stumps of pines, forming a sagging,
  diamond-shapedceiling overhead, there he lay for a long time recoveringhis reeling senses. Some of them,
  at least.
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   But the one which had suffered most, and one of the most basic and important at that, was memory. So
  that when finally Nestor could find the strength to crawl away, sit up and examine the sources of his
  aches andpains, the one facet of being which he could not examine was his past. Not in any great detail.
  Misty faces were there, only half-recognized, distorted and grimacing in his mind's eye; scenes out of his
  childhood, and the early years of emerging manhood; even something of the violence of his most recent
  past. But all of it so vague, disjointed and kaleidoscopic that it was impossible, even painful, to piece
  together. And Nestor hadhad quite enough of pain.
   The one incontestable 'fact1— the one answer which surfaced time and time again whenever he
  considered the question of identity and being - was the repetitive phrase: 'I am the Lord Nestor.' So that
  in a little while he knew who he was at least. But what sort of a Lordwas he?
   Physically: his skull still felt soft at the back, where plates of fractured bone were agonizingly mobile
  under an area of rough, puffy skin and subcutaneous fluids; but at least he could touch himself there
  without feeling sick. Apart from a slight blurriness of vision, his eyesight seemed sound in the pre-dawn
  
  light. Other than his lumpy, tender face — his nose which was definitely hooked now and still sore where
  the bone was knitting, split lips, and several loose teeth - no bones appeared broken in his limbs or body.
  In short, he knew that whatever he had survived, he would probably continue to survive it. Certainly he
  was hungry and thirsty for two men, and a good appetite is usually indicative ofgood health.
   With this in mind he looked down on the fires in Twin Fords and the black smoke hanging like a pall
   over the town, and wondered if he'd find breakfast there. Probably, because after all he was a Lord.
  Also,he wondered if he would find some answers, clues as to his and the world's circumstances in
  general.
   As for the three-quarters dead flyer: Nestor had seen its grotesque carcass as a hugely anomalous lump
  in the darkness of the trees: a sprawling blanket or tent ofskins, or more likely a tangled platform of fallen
  branches. He had considered it no further than that.
   Its true nature — the fact that it had transported him to this place, and that he had emerged from it- these
  things were entirely forgotten. But as twilight brightened into dawn and the rising sun lit up the peaks, and
  its golden light fell like a slowly descending curtain towards the tree-line, so he had cause to regard the
  creature anew. For now the thing in the trees was mostdefinitely alive!
   It tried to arch its broken wings, craned a prehistoric neck for the sky, and cried out in a hissing,
  clacking voice. But the shattered pines had pierced its membranous wings and crushed their fragile
  alveolate bones, and all its energy had drained away along with itsfluids. Pinned down, grounded and
  broken, the creature could only despair its fate, for the vampire stuff in itsensed the sunrise as surely as a
  lodestone senses north, except the flyer wasn't attracted but repulsed. Or wouldbe, if it still had the
  power of flight.
   Walking unsteadily, gingerly around the perimeter ofthe triangular stand of pines at the rim of the bluff
  where the flyer had crashed down, Nestor observed the slate-grey, leathery skin of the thing; its long
  neck and spatulate head, and dull, near-vacant eyes. Despite that its head was huge, blunt and
  acromegalic, stillthere was something vaguely, disturbingly human about it; but nothing remotely human
  about the tentacular
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   thrusters which it drove into the pine-needle floor each time it arched its torn manta wings, as if to assist
  in launching itself into flight. These reminded Nestor of nothing so much as a nest of giant maggots
  eruptingfrom the belly of some dead thing.
   And at the base of its neck, where its back widened out into swept-back wings ... was that some kind of
  saddle?
   He might have climbed back under the canopy of the trees to make a closer inspection, but such were
  the thing's struggles that he feared it might flop down on top of him; and so he held back. At which point
  thejagged rim of sunlight creeping down across the tree-linefell squarely upon the creature - to devour it!
  
   So it seemed to Nestor.
   For the pines filled with stench and steam at once, as the doomed flyer's skin shrivelled and turned from
  slate-grey to the unwholesome blue of corruption andthe texture of crumbling pumice. Its flesh quaked,
  bloated, split open in a dozen places, out of which its smoking fats ran like water! Then the thing
  screamed -a sound so thin, high and penetrating that it sliced likea sharp edge of ice on Nestor's nerves -
  and commenced a shuddering vibration which only ceased when several of the shattered pines were
  displaced and the flyerslumped down between them to the forest's floor.
   And there the sun continued its cleansing work, blazing through the trees to reduce the monster to so
  much glue and blackly smouldering gristle. But in a little while it became obvious that this would take
  hours, and what with the poisonous odour and disgustingmess, Nestor didn't wait for the end.
   But in his mind's eye, now more visions were waking;and as he began to climb down the wooded slope
  towards the near-distant town - and as a waft of foulness
   reached down to him from the dissolving flyer - he'remembered' a previous rush of reeking air...
   .. .Wind in his hair, yes, and dark diamond shapesadrift on theupdrafts under glittering ice-chip stars -
  flyersjust like thatone back there, with riders proud andterrifying in saddles upon their backs - and a
  distant cry of horror faint on the morning air, but fading now as the scene itself faded back into vaults of
  memory. 'Wamphyri!'
   Wamphyri? The cry had been real, carrying to him from the town in the 'V of the rivers; but the Lord
  Nestor ignored it in deference to its evocation.
   He paused, looked back and up the slope to where smoke and steam continued to pour from the pines,
  spilling out of them like a slow-motion waterfall over the rim of the bluff. Had that been his flyer back
  there? But that couldn't possibly be, for here he stood in sunlight and felt no harm.
   But at the same time ... did he still feel com/ortabJe in the sun's warm rays? Had he ever?
   Lord Nestor of the Wamphyri...
   It seemed like a dream, some game which he'd played as a child, but he remembered now how he had
  hunted his human prey in the deep forests, sniffing them out, searching for them with all of his vampire
  senses alert! Except... where were his vampire senses now?
   A vampire - indeed, Wamphyri - was he? He shrank down a little from the sun, which paid him no heed
  but burned, as ever, benevolently on the southern horizon.
   Had he been a vampire, then? But if that were so, how may one of the undead return to human life? And
  why would he want to? And what of the people in the town down there, Twin Fords? How would they
  receivehim if he werht' among them?
   He frowned, sat down in the long grasses of the slope
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   and considered his position. He must be cautious; he must know himself, before he dared show himself
  to others. But where was his past? What had it been? If people asked him, what could he tell them? That
  hewas the Lord Nestor of the Wamphyri? Hardly!
   Then, close by, a distraction:
   A rabbit, emerging from its hole, blinked pink eyes and turned twitching ears this way and that before
  hopping tentatively forward — and uttered a short shrill scream as a wire snare tightened around its
  neck! Then, triggered by the animal's sudden frenzy, the weighted branch of a sapling slipped its anchor,
  sprang erect andhauled the poor creature aloft to hang it.
   Now here at last was something that Nestor remembered and understood well enough: hunting and
  trapping. So what did it matter that the trap wasn't his; surely it would make good sense to satisfy his
  hunger here rather than in Twin Fords, whose people mightwell be suspicious of him?
   Just a few short paces away, Nestor had alreadynoted the reflective glitter of a flinty outcrop weathering
  up out of the shallow soil. Using a fist-sized rock toknock a pair of good firestones free of the mass, now
  he gathered together the rabbit and the makings for a fire. And in a nest of tall boulders which provided
  him with shade and cover both, he set about to prepare his meal. If the smoke of his fire was seen from
  below, then he'd probably be reckoned forjust another lonely hunterhaving his breakfast up in the hills.
   But for some reason as yet unfathomed (perhaps it had to do with the many fires burning down there, the
  black smoke roiling, and a too-familiar stench carried up in the heat and the smoke?), Nestor fancied that
  the people of the town would have problems enough thismorning, without worrying too much about him .
  ..
   Unknown to Nestor and fourteen miles due west of himwhere he cooked and ate his breakfast, his
  brotherNathan was striding out for Twin Fords. And in Settle ment-
   - Nathan had been gone for well over an hour when Misha Zanesti came through the forest from the
  southand slipped into town through the South Gate. She was seen, recognized by a girl who had been
  posted to keep her eye on the gate, and her presence reported to Lardis Lidesci. Misha, too, would
  report to Lardis, but notuntil she'd been home.
   And in her father's house ten seconds after she entered:
   Astonishment! Rejoicing! A great flood of laughter,questions, tears! The joyful madness (for Misha) of
  being whirled about, crushed, lifted off her feet, gazed upon!And for them the joy of whirling, crushing,
  gazing.
   Finally, they demanded to know what, how, where -everything.
   But she only wanted to know about her brother, and about Nathan. And then the sadness all over again
  -for her brother, Eugen, taken by the Wamphyri. As for Nathan: he had been here, yes. And her
  surviving brother, Nicolae, remembering Nathan's visit and how he'd felt then, said: 'Misha, you should
  
  marry that oneas soon as possible - even today!' And her father sayingnothing, which meant that he
  agreed.
   By which time Lardis and Andrei Romani had come knocking at the door, and Varna Zanesti knew
  why; but so did Misha. For Nana Kiklu - who remembered what it had been like in the time of the
  Wamphyri, and how it must be again - had warned her it would be thisway. So that Misha knew exactly
  how to handle it even if her father, the huge and tempestuous Varna, didn't.Neither him nor her brother
  Nicolae, who was the model
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   of his father but on a younger, only slightly smaller scale. They let Lardis and Andrei in, but as soon as
  thedoor was closed:
   'Lardis,' Varna rumbled, 'I'm reunited with my daughter, as you see. But my emotions are in turmoil, and
  so Iwarn you: do nothing to further disturb them. As for Misha: you need only look at her to see that she
  iswhole and well.' He stood like a rock - glowering, tower ing over Lardis — with his huge hands
  knotted at hissides.
   Varna was massive. But while he dwarfed most othermen of the Szgany Lidesci, his size had its disadvan
  tages: it left him slow-moving, lumbering. Black-browed,bearded, and barrel-chested: by virtue of his
  aspect and dimensions alone he might appear brutal. And he couldbe, if he or his were threatened. A
  very determinedman, Varna (some might say pig-headed, but not to his face), whose remaining son was
  scarcely less massive,and no less resolute.
   And Nicolae, casually fitting a bolt to the groove in the tiller of his crossbow, said: 'Andrei Romani,
  you're my elder and I respect you. But if you're hunting for vampires, best go do it somewhere else. The
  girl is mysister.'
   Before the others could so much as speak, Misha placed herself in the middle of the four men. And:
  'Lardis, Andrei,' she said, 'you've nothing to fear fromme. And if I'm to be examined, then do it here,
  now, in my own home, and be sure I'll understand. For just this morning both Nana Kiklu -' she paused
  briefly, lookedat Lardis and smiled, '- and your own wife, Lissa, havetold me the way of it. And so I'm
  ready.'
   Suddenly Lardis felt weak at the knees; his mouth fell open and his dark eyes opened huge as saucers;
  ignoring Varna and Nicolae, he stumbled forward a
   pace and took the girl by the arms - as much to steady himself as to confine her. And scarcely breathing
  the words, he said, 'You ... you had this from Lissa? Thismorning?'
   'Yes, oh yes!' she answered. 'Where we waited forsunup near the place of the lepers!'
   Lardis staggered again, clapped a hand to his forehead and cried: 'Ah! The leper colony! Of course - I
  remember - yes!'
  
   For upon a time, some ten years ago, Lissa had accompanied him when he was out beating the bounds
  of his territory. They'd camped a mile from the colony, and it had been then that he'd told Lissa: 'In the
  old days, if we were in this vicinity when the night came down, we would always camp as close as
  possible to the place of the lepers. For there was one thing you could be sure of: that no Starside Lord
  would ever come a-hunting here! No, for leprosy strikes terror in their black hearts,and it's as much a
  plague to them as they are to us!'
   And Lissa, by the mercy of her star, had rememberedhis words . . .
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   Ill
   'Lardis,' Misha said, while still he sputtered and gaped, and before he could explode with all of his many
  questions, 'first look at this.' She split off a small piece of garlic, the Szgany kneblasch, from one of
  several cloves on a shelf over the fireplace. And popping it into her mouth, she began to chew. Then she
  pulled a wry face -but one which was normally wry - and swallowed. 'There,' she said, still grimacing.
  'Now I won't be able to breathe on anyone for the rest of the day! But it's worth it. Now then, give me
  one of your silver bells.' He fumbled one out of his pocket and handed it over. Misha rubbed it between
  her palms, hung it for a moment from the golden ring in her left ear, pressed it to hercheek and finally
  kissed it.
   And giving him back his bell, she went to the door and threw it open. Daylight flooded in, turning her hair
  a shiny raven black as she stepped out into glaring morning sunlight. And whirling the skirts which Nana
  Kiklu had repaired for her during the long night, she said: 'Under all of this grime my colour is my own,
  Lardis, not the lifeless grey of a vampire. When I've bathed myself - and how I need to! - then you'll see.
  Buttell me: what do you think of this blouse I'm wearing?'
   He looked, and saw that it was one of Lissa's blouses; his own wife's design and stitching couldn't be
  mistaken. And finally he was convinced, which in any case he'd wanted to be. 'Yes, yes,' he drew her
  back inside the house. 'You had that from Lissa too, I know. But now ... now tell me about Jason!'
   Misha looked at him. Lardis's face was alight withhigh expectations, but a shadow had moved across
  hers. Her father and brother knew that look; they made sure Lardis was seated, with Andrei close at
  hand, thenwent to stand quietly in a cool, shadowy corner. And:
   'Lissa was hoping -' Misha began, stumblingly, '- she was hoping that you - that you could tell her some
  thing.'
   Lardis groaned and hung his head, but in another moment he lifted it and said: 'An hour ago I had no
  hope for either one of them, and now you tell me my wife is alive and well.' He glanced at her sharply.
  'She ... she is well, isn't she?'
   Misha nodded and answered, 'A few bumps and bruises, but that's all. She had a narrow squeak - sodid
  we all - which I'll tell you about in a moment.'
   Lardis sighed, and continued: 'And so there must behope for my son, too. Yes, I'm sure there is. But
  
  now tell the rest of it your way and in your own time, so that I may take it in. But tell all of it, and so
  make an end ofmy foolish, fumbling questions.'
   She nodded, and began:
   'Your place on the knoll was hit first. But Lissa had seen a mist on the hillsides. Dousing the lamps, she'd
  gone out into the garden. It was a flyer which wrecked your cabin, Lardis. It came from the east,
  following the contours of the foothills, and settled on your house which collapsed under its weight. And
  riding the creature's back - a man!'
   'Wamphyri, aye,' Lardis growled. 'Or one of their lieutenants. I had thought that perhaps it was a
  warrior; but now, thinking back on it, the stench was not sogreat.' He nodded his head, indicating that
  Misha shouldgo on.
   'This man - this vampire - was tall and slender, with
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   eyes tiny as jewels, deep-sunken in his face,' the girl continued. 'He was dressed all in black, with a
  black cape and boots. His skull was shaven, except for a topknot. He looked like a corpse, and yet was
  lively, sinuous as a snake. But for all that he was Wamphyriand powerful, he also seemed nervous,
  cautious, furtive. At least, this is how Lissa describes him.'
   Lardis said nothing but thought:Gorvi the Guile?Possibly.
   'Lissa had hidden herself in the trees behind the house,' Misha went on, 'from where she could watch
  what happened. That was a mistake, for the vampire sensed her there! And satisfied that there was no
  danger, he stood in the garden with his hands on his hips and sniffed Lissa out! She felt his hypnotic
  power in her mind, and knew that she'd been discovered.
   'She tried to make a run for it, past the vampire Lord to the steps cut in the steep side of the knoll. But
  he got in her way and showed her the killing gauntlet on his hand. And closing with her, he said: "Where
  is your man? Where are your sons? Show me your daughters!" He caught her up by the hair -' (Lardis
  almost started to his feet)'- and then Jason was there!'
   'Jason!' the word burst from Lardis's lips.
   'He had come up from Settlement,' Misha was breathless, 'to discover this creature threatening his
  mother. Crying out his rage, without pause he hurled himself at the vampire. Distracted, the monster
  released Lissa, turned on Jason and struck at him with his gauntlet. Ducking the blow, Jason stabbed the
  other with his knife, whose silver blade glanced off the vampire's ribs, tore along his forearm and caught
  in his gauntlet, which Jason wrenched from his hand. And Jason's knife wasred with the vampire's blood!'
   'What then?' Lardis couldn't contain himself.
  
   'Lissa saw your hatchet in a tree stump ...'
   'My axe?' Lardis cut in again. 'No other axe like it in the world - and I left it in the garden? To the rain
  and the rust? Just see how lax I had become! Jazz Simmons gave me that axe; he brought it with him
  from the hell-lands, and for nine hundred sunups it kept its edge!But go on.'
   'She worked the hatchet out of the stump,' Misha continued, 'and went to leap on the vampire Lord
  where he clutched his side and arm. He saw how keen was the weapon's edge, and knew that even in a
  woman's hands it could take his head. And both Lissa and Jason together, they were intent upon killing
  him! Well, perhaps he's a coward, this one -'
   They all are!' Lardis cried.
   '- But he fled before them, snatching up his bloodied gauntlet as he went. And as he got behind his flyer
  where it wallowed in the ruins of your cabin, Lissaheard him cry out: "Roll on them! Crush them!"
   'The creature made to thrust itself upon them; they ran in different directions; Lissa was struck by the
  flyer's wing and knocked over the knoll's steepest rim! And . . . and that was the last she saw of Jason.
  Then: she fell through the brambles, bracken, saplings of the hillside, tumbling most of the way to the
  bottom. Her clothes were torn - you see how this blouse is stitched, here and here? - and so were her
  hands and arms, but not seriously. And when she came to rest, then shewould climb to the top again!'
   Lardis groaned and clutched his head. 'What a fool of a women I married,' he said. And then, with pride:
  'But what a woman!'
   'Hear me out,' Misha told him. 'Shewould have climbed back to the top - to be with her son and help
  him fight the vampire Lord - but missed her footing
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   and went plunging the rest of the way to the bottom! Then, shocked out of her wits, half-stunned, she
  made for Settlement where she hoped to find you and tell you what had happened. But at the North Gate
  ... she saw the town was burning, saw what was loose and ravaging in its streets.
   'Weak now and terrified, hoping to find a place to hide, Lissa went into the forest and skirted Settlement
  to the west. And that was where she bumped into Nana Kiklu. Nana had hidden in the woods after her
  house was wrecked, but when things had seemed to quiet down a little she'd gone back in through a gap
  in the stockade to look for her sons. Instead of finding them,she found me. And so I have Nana to thank
  for my life.
   'She dragged me out of there and brought me round, and as I regained consciousness . .. that was when
  Lissa came stumbling and crying through the night. Nana calmed her, and then would have returned again
  into Settlement. But by then there were monsters every where. Their roaring, and all the screaming... it
  was terrible. And Lissa and I, we couldn't be left alone. We ... we were no longer capable. I feel so
  ashamed — ofmy own weakness!'
  
   'You've nothing to be ashamed of, daughter,' Varna Zanesti rumbled, but with a catch in his voice. He
  came forward to put his arms round her and glower at Lardis. And: These women,' he growled. 'Why,
  they put therest of us to shame!'
   Lardis nodded, but neither he nor Varna knew how true it was; especially in Misha's case. For she had
  avoided explaining a single detail of why she'd been so close to Nana Kiklu's house in the first place. And
  so like Nathan before her, she'd covered up for Nestor'sshameful lapse. But now:
   'I have to know,' she said, eagerly. 'Where is Nathan?
   I would have expected him here by now ... oh!' And to cover her immediate embarrassment: 'Oh, and
  Nestor,too, of course! Nana is eager for news of both of them,naturally.'
   'Aye, "naturally",' her father repeated knowingly -and in the next moment fell deathly silent. For he
  remembered now about Nathan's brother. And poor Nana Kiklu, after all she had done and been
  through: still at the leper colony, knowing nothing about her son takenby the Wamphyri.
   Then, low-voiced, Lardis told Misha about Nestor, and went on to explain Nathan's absence: how
  Nathan believed that the flyer which took Nestor might have crashed to earth somewhere in the east, and
  had goneto see if he could find him there. Misha was sad to have missed him, but at the same time felt
  glad that he hadforgiven Nestor. For after all, nothing had come of that one's bad behaviour in the end.
  And if Nestor stilllived, perhaps all this would serve to reunite them.
   'Of course,' she said, when Lardis was done, 'Nathanwill be back, won't he? I mean, whether he finds
  Nestoror not... Nathanwill return?'
   'Of his own free will?' Lardis shrugged. 'Immediately?I can't promise it. Oh, I want him to come back -
  and sodo you, I know - but Misha, he thinks that you, too,have been stolen away! So what is there here
  for Nathan now?' And there followed more explanations: how the last time Nathan had seen her, Misha
  had been in thegrip of a slavering, hunch-shouldered Wamphyrihybrid.
   'Ah!' her hand flew to her mouth. And: 'But Nana sawthat creature too!' she gasped. 'She had just
  returned to the gap in the stockade fence, and saw the dog-thing drop meto go loping off after some
  poor screaming woman. But thatmeans ... Nathan was right there, just a few paces away!'
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   Lardis nodded. 'Crumpled in the grass at the foot ofthe fence, aye. If Nana Kiklu had known where to
  look, she might even have seen him there. But with the vam pire mist and what all - everything that was
  happening - and you and Lissa to care for ...'
   Misha's eyes were wide; she made an instinctive, almost involuntary move for the door. Her intention
  was all too obvious, but her father stood in the way. 'No!' he said. 'I forbid it! The old Szgany trails
  where they skirt the foothills are no safe place for a girl evenat the best of times. But now? Why, there'll
  
  be change ling people hiding in the thickets and caves, trapped by the sun as they headed for Starside.
  And there are bound to be vengeful men out hunting them! I'll not lose you a second time, Misha.' He
  turned to his son.'But Nicolae ...?'
   It was Lardis's turn to object. 'What, and am I stillthe leader of my people, or has Varna Zanesti taken
  my place, to do my work and my thinking for me? Well, and you're a fine strong man and all, Varna -
  likewise your son - but no one would call Nicolae fleet of foot! Anyway, you've both of you mourned
  enough and nowhave reason to rejoice. And while I am still the leader, I won't have you split up again.
  Finally, I need both of you, indeed all three of you, right here in Settlement. What? But there's work to be
  done! On the other hand,I do have a number of runners to choose from, who'll be after Nathan in a
  flash.' Turning to Andrei Romani, henodded. 'See to it.'
   As Andrei went off in great haste, Lardis spoke againto Misha. 'I love Nathan Kiklu like a son, and I'm
  surethere's more to him than he's been given credit for. Willyou and he get together now?'
   She looked at her father and Varna shrugged. 'The choice is yours, daughter. But it's true the lad came
   looking for you, and I have to admit, he seemeda likelyson-in-law to me.'
   Nicolae nodded, and added: Til have him for abrother, certainly.'
   'Good!' Lardis clasped Varna's broad forearm.
   Then:
   It was as if the old Lidesci had woken up from a nightmare. He straightened up and squared his shoul
  ders, as if to throw off some great invisible weight, andto Varna and Nicolae said: They could use your
  help repairing the stockade, for it's heavy work. And then the great catapults and crossbows need
  bringing up toscratch. Also, Dimi Petrescu is convinced he can dupli cate the black, explosive powder
  from The Dweller's shells and grenades. Old Dimi's been working at it foreighteen years, on and off, but
  he's very weary now and needs the strength of others to make purest charcoal,break rocks, and grind
  sulphur and iron into dust."
   He nodded. 'So ... it's a long day ahead, lads, but you can't say it hasn't started well enough. All we have
  to do is keep it rolling, right?' And to Misha:
   'Girl, the way I see it you've done more than your fairshare already. Yet now I'll ask you to do one more
  thing. If I get a couple or three likely lads together and arm them, can you lead them back to the leper
  colony, and so bring Lissa and Nana Kiklu safely home? I askthis of you, Misha, in order to save time.
  You know the whole story, you're sympathetic, and so the women will have word of their sons from
  another woman. What doyou say?'
   And as he'd known she would, Misha nodded andsaid, 'Just bring me my escort, and I'm ready ...'
   Within the half-hour she was on her way back through the woods with Lardis's 'likely lads': three tried
  and
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   trusted friends. The way was fairly easy going; as thecrow flies it was maybe seven miles, nine if you
  counted the winding trail. Misha knew all the shortcuts, however, and also the shallow fording places
  across the many streams. Last night in the darkness, with only star- and occasional moonlight to see by,
  Nana Kiklu had provided the strength and will, but Misha had beentheir guide.
   Then it had taken five hours; now, as she'd already discovered, it would take less than two and a half to
  retrace her steps. By then, too, Lardis's runner should be catching up with Nathan on the approaches to
  TwinFords. Such was the span of Sunside's day — more than one hundred and twenty hours - that with
  luck the two should be together again a third of the way through the morning. By then she would be very
  tired, but for nowthoughts of Nathan sped Misha on her way.
   While at the leper colony:
   Nana and Lissa were camped less than a hundred yards from the colony proper, at the edge of the
  forest where it gave way to rolling savannah, then scrub, and finally the mainly uninhabitable desert
  wastes knowncollectively as the Furnace Lands. Out there, only ten tofifteen miles south of the leper
  colony, there was nothing much worth mentioning: sand, scorched earth, rockpiles; snakes, scorpions,
  and other poisonous creatures; a scattered handful of aborigine tribes. Of the latter:
   In the old days when the Szgany had been true Travellers, these primitive desert nomads — who
  seemed no further advanced along the evolutionary trail than Star-side's trogs - had sometimes bartered
  with men. They would meet at high sunup, in the dry savannah margins between desert and forest, to
  trade fancy lizard leathers and healing salts for Szgany knives and knick-knacks, wines, gourds and
  garlic. And now, here at the rim of
   Lidesci territory, the nomads traded just as in the old days; except now they traded with the lepers.
  Nana Kiklu knew this for a fact; for, far out on the savannah, she'd noticed a tall springy pole with a
  fluttering ragpennant, like a fly on the face of the sun.
   As a girl, travelling with a small tribe, she'd seen just such markers before and knew that the listlessly
  flapping pennant indicated a nomad trading place. She supposed it was just as well that the lepers had
  some sortof trade, even with the mysterious, little known or under stood nomads; for certainly the bulk of
  the Szgany weren't likely to come too close. No, for leprosy was ascontagious among them as it was
  among theWamphyri.
   Not that the colony had been entirely abandoned bythe Szgany Lidesci. On the contrary: it had been
  Lardis's father who conceived of it and built the first nucleus of airy lodges under the trees at the forest's
  edge. As to how that had come about:
   Twenty-four years ago a good friend of the elder Lidesci had contracted the disease. Before the
  affliction made itself obvious, it had been passed on to every member of his family. In those days - in that
  earlier period of Wamphyri domination - the old ways had been simple and hard: such sufferers were
  usually banished out of camp to wander alone until they died, on penalty of an even swifter death if they
  should ever try to come back. Some tribes had even been known to put lepers down out of hand. But
  Lardis's father wasn't able to do that, and so instead he built the leper colony here at the rim of Szgany
  territory to house the familyof his friend.
  
   Later, hearing about the place, other lepers had made their way here from the wilderness and from
  various tribes, and so the colony was established. And seven
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   years later as Settlement had grown up and prospered, it had been a younger Lidesci, Lardis himself,
  who had continued to send supplies to the colony on a regular basis, so helping those who were mainly
  incapable of helping themselves. And even though in those early years the Szgany Lidesci rarely had a
  surplus of anything, still there was always enough to give a little tothe lepers.
   Now it was the turn of the lepers to give in return . . .
   These were Nana Kiklu's thoughts where she stood in the shade of a tree at the forest's very edge, and
  thought back on the events of last night. Not on the painful scenes - such as the destruction of her house,
  and the fact that she'd not been able to return and search for Nathan and Nestor, which had left such an
  ache in her heart that it would not be driven out until she and her boys were reunited - but on her
  exhausted arrival here at the colony. Exhausted, yes, for she and Misha Zanesti between them had been
  mainly responsible for getting Lissa Lidesci here safe and sound. PoorLissa, cut by thorn and thicket, and
  very nearly insanefrom what she'd seen and been through.
   And yet while Nana had the strength both physical and mental, it had been Lissa who was wise enough
  to advise their coming here, and Misha who was artful enough to lead the way. Misha Zanesti, to whom
  as a child the forest had been a vast and glorious playground. So all three had played their parts, until at
  last the woods were behind them and they came upon thesavannah by moonlight.
   Then, too, Misha had known or divined the way; studying the stars and stating her belief that they had
  strayed too far west, she had led her companions in the other direction, along the edge of the rolling
  grassland. Until finally, in the lee of great trees which stood like
   sentinels looking out towards the inhospitable deserts, they'd seen the soft glow of lamplight and knew
  thatthis must be the colony.
   Then there had been a low wooden fence, a robed and hooded watcher at the gate, holding up his lamp,
  and the hoarsely whispered, mumbled query: 'Whocomes? Are you lepers?'
   'No, not lepers,' Nana had answered, turning her eyes from the lamp's bright glare, 'but friends of those
  thatlive here.'
   'Not lepers?' the other shrank back. Then go away -and go quickly! For we lepers have no friends. And
  it's not so much that we live here, as that this is where we come to die ...'
   'No friends?' Now Lissa had found voice to speak up.'Not even Lardis Lidesci whose land this is,
  whosefather built this place, and whose wife I am?'
   'Ah!' the other hissed, and they caught a brief glimpseof his face where he held his lantern higher yet: the
  
  grey bone showing through his cheek, and the fretted gape of his nostrils. The Lidesci? His wife? But in
  the dead of night? And you —' he swung his light towardsMisha, '- only a girl, yet dishevelled, full of
  bruises, and your clothes all in tatters? And ... and ... the Lidesci's wife, you say?' He turned back to
  Lissa. 'But likewisewild and torn? Now say, what is this thing?'
   'Old man,' it was Misha's turn to speak, 'hard times have come, and we must spend the night here and
  wait for sunup.' And innocent, she reached out a hand totouch his sleeve.
   'Ah!' he said again, a gasp this time, and swiftly drewback out of reach. And: 'I am not . . . not old,' he
  shookhis head, however slowly .. .
   But in the next moment, 'What hard times?'
   The Wamphyri are back in Starside,' Nana told him
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   then, breathlessly. 'And tonight they raided on Settlement!'
   Finally they had made an impression. The Wamphyri!' the leper croaked, bobbing about in sudden
  agitation. 'What? They are back, did you say?' Abruptly he turned, hobbling off down a path towards the
  wooden buildings under the trees.
   'Wait!' Misha called after him. 'We can't spend thenight in the open!'
   He glanced back. 'I only keep watch,' he husked. 'Butwe have a leader, too. Now wait here, and I'll
  bringhim.'
   In a little while he returned; several more lepers, all dressed alike, came with him. One of them was tall,
  shuffling, obviously in great pain. The sleeves of his robe seemed empty from the elbows down ... but his
  cowl was thrown back so that his face at least was visible and clean. He was pale, hollow-cheeked, with
  dark expressive eyes.
   'I'm Uruk Piatra,' he told the women, looking at them.The others call me Uruk Long-life. And you..." He
  looked long and hard at Lissa - her oval face with its gentle almond eyes; her slim, long-limbed figure -
  and said, 'Yes, you are Lardis Lidesci's wife. You've beenhere before, am I right?'
   'With my husband,' she nodded. 'When he was beating the bounds. Twice, I think, but long ago.'
   'Aye, long ago,' the other agreed, 'when I had hands.' He looked at all of them again, blinking in the
  yellow light of the lanterns. 'But I've been told a terrible thing:that the Wamphyri have returned to raid in
  Sunside!'
   By then Lissa had taken a firm grip on her nerves. 'It's true,' she told him, 'all horribly true! We've come
  here from Settlement, which was burning when last we saw it. There were vampires in the streets, killing,
  
   raping, making thralls. But I remember that long ago, my husband told me that this was a place safe from
  allvampires. That's why we've come here: to hide through the night from the Wamphyri, and to shelter
  from the forest and its beasts - till sunup at least, when we'llthink what to do.'
   The leper leader shook his head and his expression grew more haunted yet. 'A monstrous thing!' he said.
  'But there are terrible things and terrible things. For a woman to fall into the hands of the Wamphyri
  would be a nightmare, I know, and to live with them evenworse than dying. But to live here...is a slow,
  lingeringdeath in itself - which you risk just by being here.'
   Nana Kiklu had had enough of this. 'So, we are turnedaway by lepers!' Her words were bitter. Then
  we'llsleep here, outside your gate. Only bring us clean blankets and a lantern, and we'll look after
  ourselves.'
   Uruk Piatra looked at her and nodded slowly. 'Being what I am,' he said, 'does not make me any less
  theman. Upon a time I was Szgany, like you. Not a Lidesci, no, but I was a man. And even now I know
  my duty. I meant simply this: that I could not invite you in, for your own sakes. But certainly we can do
  better than blankets and a lamp! When lepers come here, we build them homes. Until they are built,
  however, a tent of skins must suffice. I suggest you pitch it under thetrees, over there.'
   Nana went to speak again, then hung her head.
   And again he nodded. 'It's all right. I understand.Only looking at you I can see how much you've
  suffered.'
   He gave orders and the other lepers went back to their sprawl of dwellings, returning in a while with a
  tent, blankets, vegetables, an iron pot and tripod. And: 'Stay here,' their leader told Nana, Lissa, and
  Misha,
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   'while they build your tent under the trees and light a small fire. Then you must make your own soup,
  withwater from the stream there.'
   And while their refuge from the night was put in orderfor them, so the three had told Uruk their entire
  story ...
   That was how it had been for them at the leper colony, in the early hours of the previous night. But as
  they had settled in to wait out the long hours of darkness, their worries were not so much for themselves
  asfor their loved ones.
   Not unnaturally, Nana's thoughts had been forNathan and Nestor:
   How had they fared through Settlement's devastation,she wondered? - wondered it in her sleep, and
  through all of her waking hours - till at last, still wondering, she'd shivered awake with the dawn. Had it
  
  been just as bad for them? Surely it must have been even worse!And how were they faring now?
   Now in the light of early morning, in the foothills over Twin Fords, Nestor finished his rabbit and
  stretchedout his limbs in the long grass to digest it. While behind him and somewhat higher, at the sheer,
  rearing rim of an outcrop, vile evaporation continued to spill out of the trees and tumble down the cliff like
  a frothing waterfall - but less vigorously now - from the three-quarters liquefied flyer destroyed by
  sunlight.
   As for Nathan ...
   Following old Traveller trails between the forest and the foothills, striding east towards Twin Fords,
  Nathan was tempted to seek out his brother in a way neither ofthem had used since childhood. It would
  mean breakinghis easy, long-legged, mile-eating lope for a few minutes, which he was scarcely willing to
  do, but if it provedsuccessful at least his mind would be at rest.
   For there had never been a time in Nathan's life when he was more aware that he was only one half of
  twins; when, as if to accentuate his and Nestor's physical differences, he could feel this new rift between
  them like a great canyon, yawning ever wider the closer he came to its rim. And he knew that Misha
  Zanesti had been only a part of it, that it had been coming anywayand she had been merely the catalyst.
   But it had all culminated so swiftly. First Misha:
   Because of her love for Nathan (rather, because of Nestor's jealousy), the brothers had drifted apart;
  that rivalry which had seeded itself in childhood had finally bloated into life, separating them. But they
  weren't thefirst brothers to come up against such a problem; it wassomething which might well have
  righted itself, eventually. Especially now that. . . now that Misha . . .
   But no, Nathan couldn't bring himself to dwell upon that - Misha with the dog-thing, Canker Canison -
  not in the way Vratza Wransthrall had so gleefully described it. And yet he must, for back in Settlement
  he'd vowed against the Wamphyri, especially Canker. And though he felt choked inside, still a low growl
  escaped his throat as he pictured that one! Aye, and his vowwas a double, even a triple vow, surely; for
  the Wamphyri were also responsible for whatever fate hadbefallen his mother, and for tearing him
  physically apart from his brother. As for the latter... he could onlyhope that it wasn't permanent.
   A terrible, terrible thing to have lost all of them: hismother, Misha, and Nestor. He neither knew nor
  wanted to know what effect the death of his brother wouldhave on him, but he supposed it would be like
  losing an even bigger part of himself - perhaps the last part.
   For he and Nestor: they'd shared their mother'swomb, her milk, the love of the same Gypsy girl -
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   though she'd loved one as a brother and the other for himself. But their blood was one blood, and even
  their minds had seemed fashioned of like stuff; at least, they were similar enough that sometimes they
  touched uponeach other.
  
   Which was what Nathan intended now: to touch Nestor's mind, and in so doing prove that he still lived.
  And if there was nothing there, a vacuum? That was the chance he must take: to be part of something
  which once was whole, at least, or to be even emptier than thehusk he inhabited now.
   With all of these thoughts and others swirling in his head and clouding the psychic ether, it was hardly the
  best moment for such an experiment, but Nathan drew off from the trail anyway, sat down with his back
  to a boulder and closed out the day, his furious loathing of last night's raiders, all other emotions,
  everything, and let his mind drift...
   The dead drew backfrom him!
   He felt that at once; their shock, even their horror.But this time Nathan's interest Jay with the Jiving...he
  hoped. And up in the high hiJJs, in deep caves, grey-furred ears sprang erect, grey heads werelifted, and
  triangle eyes blinked in gJoomy lairs. There were threeof them, three together, who knew his mind as if it
  were one of theirs: Blaze, whose brow was marked with hismother's white; Grinner, whose damp bJack
  lips forever twitched, as if on the verge of smiling; Dock, whose tail had been shortened when he was a
  cub and wanted toplay with some brave vixen's brood.
   They divined Nathan's purpose at once but couldn't help him, not this time. For none of theirs was
  abroad in the daylight, and no further reports of Nestor had reached them. If it were night, that might be
  different.But not now.
   Nathan acknowledged them anyway, where theywhined a little, curJed up and resumed their contempla
  tions. And moving on, he let his thoughts drift, drift. ..
   .. .Until they struck upon a mind he knew, yet at oneand the same time did not know! For it seemed
  different, changed, wiped clean. Or perhaps wiped unclean, with a dirty, bloodstained rag? For this was
  Nestor, and yetit was not him.
   Nathan couldn't understand. It was as if Nestor's mind itself was undecided about his identity! And a
  great rage of pain and frustration, of need and ambition,and of loss and discovery seethed in the core of
  him!
   Such was Nathan's shock that he snatched himself back from the stranger which was his brother - and
  jerked erect where he sat with his back against therock!
   And all of his thoughts fled back to him like whippeddogs, and his quandary was deeper than before
  where he took up the trail again and headed east...
   Nestor was asleep, digesting his meal, converting the strong food into energy. He was asleep and
  wandering in the most fragile of dreams - which were scattered onthe instant that the alien Thing entered
  his mind!
   Alien, yes, and a hated enemy! He knew it from the whirlpool of numbers, symbols, meaningless
  equationsand other mathematical devices behind which the Thing concealed its identity and purpose. That
  same enemywhich had plagued him all the days of his life! Shiveringdespite that the sun blazed down on
  him, Nestor opened his eyes .,.
   .. .and looked up at two men, one about his own age and the other much older, who had come across
  himwhere he lay!
  
   The enemy of his dreams was at once forgotten; he
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   saw the men - saw that just for the moment they were looking at each other, not at him - and closed his
  eyes again, feigning sleep. But what he'd seen stayed etchedon his mind's eye:
   One of them, the young one, was kneeling beside himwith his fist knotted round the handle of a knife
  whose sharp blade gleamed like liquid silver in the sunlight. Slender, wide-eyed, nervous, he looked more
  than a little frightened. The other, a weathered, surly-looking man in his middle years, stood erect with a
  loaded crossbow held in his strong brown hands. He had beenscowling and was now quietly muttering to
  himself:
   'Steal a rabbit right out of my trap, would you, boy?And what are you doing up here anyway, eh?
  Especially this morning, after last night...'
   'No vampire,' the one on his knees whispered, still glancing over his shoulder at the first speaker, 'else he
  wouldn't be out in the sun. And look at the state of him, all bruised and banged about! Was he a lone
  hunter, perhaps, scared down out of the mountains?What do you think, father?'
   'What do I think?' the first one's answer was a low rumble of unreasoning hatred and suspicion. 'Oh, I'll
  tell you what I think: that the bloodsucking bastards have thought up some new tricks, and that this one's
  some weird Wamphyri changeling! So he's not changed far enough yet that the sun will hurt him... so
  what? You saw his flyer up there, all melting away, and its black bones poking through the rot. Too much
  of a coincidence to find a thing like that up there, and thento find this one down here. That's what I think!'
   Nestor's flyer? He remembered it. Indeed, it was one of the very few things which he did remember. But
  what was that the older man had called him, a changeling? Hah! Little he knew. For Nestor was no mere
   thrall but a Lord! He was the Lord Nestor - of theWamphyri!
   The word was like a fire in his blood - Wamphyri.'
   And now he tensed himself - but carefully, guardedly — for action. His arms were folded comfortably
  on hischest, and one knee was bent a little. All to the good.
   'So what do we do about him?' the one who kneeledwanted to know.
   'First we wake him,' the other growled. And reluctantly: Then... I suppose we'd better drag him down
  into Twin Fords, and find out about him there. For I'dhate to make a mistake.'
   Too late! thought Nestor. You've made too manyalready.
   He felt the younger one's hand grip his arm above the elbow, shaking him, and heard him bark: 'You,
  
  wakeup!' Following which, all was a blur of motion.
   Nestor's eyes blazed open! Stiffening his hands and shooting them wide in a slicing motion, he knocked
  aside the young one's knife arm, simultaneously wrench ing his hand from its hold on his right arm.
  Suddenly unbalanced, with his hands sliced out from under him, the youth could only topple forward.
  Grasping his advantage, Nestor slammed his bent knee into the other's groin, and jerked his head up off
  the ground to butthim full in the face.
   Lips which were already snarling their shock andterror split open bloodily; teeth and bone crunched
  sick- eningly; the youth's yelp of astonishment turned to a red gurgle as Nestor grabbed for the knife. He
  found it in the other's slackening fingers and gashed himself wrenching it free. But the slicing pain served
  only togalvanize him further.
   The older man was hopping left and right, trying to line up his weapon, shouting, 'Stab him! Kill the
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   bastard!' He would get off a shot but his son was in theway, and what he couldn't see was that Nestor
  had theknife. And suddenly it seemed that the sprawling, jerk ing body of his son lifted itself up a foot
  from the onehe was pinning down, and in mid-air shuddered convul sively. Then the youth was thrust
  aside, turned byNestor's arm and knee, and his awful face was a bloody mask with a gasping hole for a
  mouth. Also bloody was the slit in his jacket, from which Nestor drew out theknife.
   'Son!' With a cry of anguish, eyes popping, the fatherwatched his son's brief death struggles, saw him
  flopmotionless on the bloodstained grass. Then:
   'You!' he snarled, swinging his weapon towardsNestor and pulling the trigger. But Nestor was on his
  feet, his arm already fully extended forward, and the red-blotched knife in flight! Nestor was good with a
  knife, but on this occasion he was lucky, too. It took the man in the throat, in the 'V of bone directly
  under hisAdam's-apple, punching a hole there which penetratedto the spine.
   Even crumpling to the earth he was as good as dead,and so didn't see his bolt take Nestor in the side,
  skewering his flesh like a needle through a blister. He didn'tsee it, but there were others higher up the
  hillside whodid.
   Nestor heard them cry out, looked up from where shock had knocked him off his feet, and saw them
  through the wash of scarlet agony flooding over him. A group of four or five men, something less than
  two hundred yards away, descending the hillside towards him in a series of breakneck leaps and bounds
  - vampire hunters!
   Nestor got his fingers into the tear in his jacket andripped it open. The bolt had entered his body under
  the
   ribcage on his right side, scraping a rib at the backwhere its barbed head had emerged. Its flight was
  sticking out at the front, and both holes were dripping thick, dark splashes of blood where a five-inch
  
  bridge ofwhite, puffy flesh joined them like a bulging roll of fat.
   Nestor didn't think twice but gripped the head of thebolt with his right hand and the flight with his left,
  and bent the wooden shaft against his side until it snapped.He saw the skin of his side bulge as the
  broken shaftforced the white flesh outward, and almost passed out; but he knew that if he did, it would
  probably be the last thing he ever did. And in any case, breaking thebolt had been only half of it. Now he
  must draw it out.
   He did so without pause, and had to fight from gagging as the red blood spurted. Then, cinching his
  jackettightly to his body, he somehow got to his feet andmade off down the steep slope. But weak and
  desperate as he was, his heart was already pounding and his breath faltering. And those men back there -
  Szgany, and full of bloodlust - they'd not give him a second's respite or his life a moment's thought once
  they hadhim. It would be the stake, the knife, the fire for LordNestor of the Wamphyri!
   He limped to the rim of a bluff and looked over, sawdeep water rushing into the foam and spray of
  broad falls, and white water all the way down to the levelsand the broken bridges of Twin Fords. But
  from behindas if to spur him on, rising above the hiss and surge offoaming waters, he could hear the angry
  shouts of hispursuers.
   And looking back just once, to glimpse raised weapons and furious faces, he shouted his defiance - and
  jumped!
   Nathan got into Twin Fords a little less than two hours
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   later. He found the town a shambles - a pesthole of stumbling, slack-mouthed survivors; a bubbling
  cauldron of narrow-eyed, suspicious, would-be avengers; achaos of terrified, demented people - with
  little or nothing of Settlement's order and discipline about it. Beforethat, however:
   There were guards on the approach roads to the town,who stopped him the moment he crossed the
  river through the shallows of the fording place, where all that remained of a once-sturdy bridge was a
  weir oftimbers crushed down into the mud. He was recognized as one of Lardis Lidesci's party, which
  had passedthrough heading west for Settlement just yestereve, andallowed to go on into the devastation.
   And the chaos was at once apparent. At least two fires were still smouldering where granaries had been
  gutted; the dead - or their pieces, if they had been vampirized - were still being dragged through barely
  recognizable streets to be burned on funeral pyres; the wailing of women and weeping of children was
  nerve-rending. Inside a more or less intact perimeter of woodenbuildings, the destruction was enormous,
  far worse thanin Settlement. Here, where a great many houses hadbeen simply smashed flat, it appeared
  that the Wamphyriand their creatures must have raged out of control.
   Approaching the centre, where the leaders and elders of the Szgany Zestos were holding a meeting,
  Nathan witnessed the discovery and destruction of a vampire thrall who had slept too late. Flushed from
  her hiding place under the eaves of a house by men brandishing torches, a woman was driven into the
  
  street and ringed about. With the sun beating down on her she shrank back and tried to cover herself, all
  the while raving and gibbering, and cursing the men about her in languageso filthy that Nathan couldn't
  believe it.
   Wild, grey as a cloud, with eyes bubbling like sulphur, finally she braved their torches and launched
  herself at the nearest man. And as she snarled at him it was at once obvious that her eye-teeth were un
  naturally long, white and sharp!
   The bolt which cut her down was equally sharp, likewise the knives with which they took her head ...
   Then Nathan arrived at the meeting place in the shadeof a large, hastily erected, open-sided tent. And as
  thegathering broke up he recognized Karl Zestos, the oldest son of Twin Fords' former leader. His
  father, Bela Zestos, was dead now, a heroic victim of the vampire raid; if from the wreckage of his
  people Karl could salvage a number sufficient to lead, then he wouldbecome a Traveller King in his own
  right.
   Recognition like sorrow was mutual; the two spent a few moments trading their grim stories; Nathan
  picked up several details of last night's raid on Twin Fords which had not been available in Settlement.
  More than anything else, he was interested in Canker Canison. But when he explained why . .. then the
  other's faceturned grey. And:
   'My friend,' Karl told him, shaking his head, 'you must pray that your Misha is dead! The reports I have
  heard ...'
   'I know,' Nathan answered, cutting him short. 'And when I think about it, I'm tempted to try willing her
  dead! Except that's not possible, and I'm glad it isn't.'
   'I understand,' the other nodded, then frowned at Nathan and added: 'But something is strange here. I
  remember you differently: not only from your colouring, which is rare among the Szgany, but also for the
  fact that you were quiet and retiring. You have a brother, right? He's the one I remember as forward and
  outspoken!'
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   'Am I forward and outspoken?' Nathan was surprised. Then perhaps I've gained from Nestor's loss.' He
  explained his meaning and his mission: how his brother had been taken, and how he had 'dreamed' ofthe
  flyer crashing in the hills close by.
   That ... rings bells,' Karl told him then; but if anything his frown was more deeply etched than before.
  'Some men were up in the hills this morning, looking for changelings who had escaped out of town. You'll
  understand that there are many people we can't accountfor. Anyway, they discovered a flyer and...a
  man. Ayouth, at least.'
   Nathan grabbed his arm. 'A youth? Alive?''He was -living - when they found him, yes,' theother replied.
  'But "alive"?' He shrugged. 'Undead, perhaps.'
  
   Nathan groaned. And: 'Explain,' he said.Karl told him the story as he'd had it, finishing with:'He leaped
  into the torrent and was swept away. Theysaw him go under in the white water, but they didn'tsee him
  surface.'
   'And you say he...he murdered two men?' The other could only nod. 'He was seen to do it, aye.'Nathan
  shook his head. Then it couldn't be Nestor!'Again Karl's shrug. 'Who else could it be? The description I
  was given fits. Also, you've related how things werein Settlement. So how do you know Nestor wasn't
  vampir-ized before the flyer took him? You don't.' He sighed. 'I'mnot unsympathetic, Nathan, but it
  seems to me you shouldforget him now and go back home to those you have left.'Nathan was bitter. 'I
  have no one left!'Then follow me,' Karl urged. 'I need good, strongyoung men. I'll take my people out of
  here and return to my father's way of life before he built this place, and bea Traveller.'
   But Nathan's mind was still on Nestor, and now he mused: There are two tributaries plunging out of the
  heights. Which one did he jump into?'
   The one that descends to West Ford,' Karl answered.'But what will you do?'
   Til try to find his body,' Nathan told him. 'And thenI'll know, for better or for worse.'
   The other nodded. 'Good luck. But Nathan, if you dofind him...be prepared.'
   Nathan didn't find Nestor, but at least he found wordof him.
   He spoke to the guards at the ruined bridge. They'd seen the body of a man go drifting down river.
  There had been blood in the water and the body was facedown, motionless. They would have dragged
  him out but had failed to notice him until he was over the slippery weir and drifting deeper. He could be
  one of two things: a murdered victim of last night's raid, or avampire thrall caught by the sun in the
  foothills.
   Anyway, that had been more than two and a half hours ago. By now he'd be tangled in roots somewhere
  down river, or sunk to the bottom in the mud and the weeds ...
   Nathan thanked them for the information, if not for their 'assurances', then forded the river and set out to
  follow its course downstream. Walking a path used bythe town's fishermen, and scanning the overgrown
  banks as he went, he followed the rushing waters to where the river joined with its twin in a broad green
  swath, but saw never a sign of Nestor. At which point most men might have given up, but not Nathan. He
  would follow the greater river all day, if need be. And when night came? ... Well, sundown must find him
  wherever it found him.
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   And for that matter, what difference did it make?
   Fifteen minutes after Nathan passed from sight of the West Ford bridge, Lardis's runner made the
  
  crossing. He had been held up by a string of vampire huntersalong the way.
   By then the guards at the fording place had changed;one of them reported that he'd seen a man of
  Settlement talking to Karl Zestos in the town; the runner hurried on into Twin Fords without ever
  knowing that Nathan was less than three miles away but in a different direction.
   Having found and spoken to Karl, the runner quickly returned to the sunken bridge. This time the guards
  could only shrug and offer their opinions that Nathan must be on his way back to Settlement, and that the
  two had passed each other by on different trails. It seemed the only logical explanation. Thus the runner
  gave up the chase, and began retracing his steps . . .
   PART SIX:
   Szgany Sintana - Dissension in the Aerie The Thyre
   Where the river swung east in a languid curve throughdeepening forest, broadening out until details on
  the far bank were hard to discern, there Nathan was about ready to admit defeat. By then the morning
  was more than half-way through and he was exhausted; he had been on the move nonstop since before
  first light, a period of some thirty-two hours. Also, since the path had come to an end just four or five
  miles south-east ofTwin Fords, the going had been very difficult.
   Now, in a sun-dappled clearing by the bank, he lay down in the long, sweet-smelling grass to sleep, and
  was just beginning to drowse when he was startled to hear a familiar clop, clop, clop, of cloven hooves,
  the creak and jolt of caravans, and the jingle of trappings and Szgany bells. Somewhere close to hand,
  hidden bythe river's rearing fringe, there must be an old Traveller trail; for these were surely the sounds of
  a party ofGypsies, who were even now passing through.
   Nathan was wrong: they weren't just passing through but making camp, which he saw when he left the
  river, pushed his way through a tangle of soft-leaved shrubbery, and emerged on the old trail. And as he
  appearedin the open, on the ancient rutted track, so they likewisesaw him.
   Brown, soulful female eyes met his deep blue ones across the trail's width, and Nathan froze on the
  instant as the girl melted back into the greenery and out ofsight. He'd suddenly remembered that these
  were strange times, and the last thing these people would be
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   expecting was a wild man jumping out at them from the forest! On the other hand there were a good
  many of them, and Nathan was just one. Also, the sun was high, and so there was little chance of
  vampires abroadin the woods.
   Certainly they were aware that the old threat lived anew in Starside; that was obvious from the moment
  of their first greeting. Tear down the mountains,' said asoft Szgany voice from one side, startling Nathan.
   Jerking his head in that direction, he saw a tall, lean, incredibly weathered man of indeterminate years,
  propped casually with his shoulder against a tree. And just from looking at him Nathan could tell that
  these people were real Travellers, Szgany in the fullest sense. No permanent dwelling place for such as
  these; township comforts had never lured them from their ways, not for more than a night or so; they had
  been on the move all their days, as much a part of the wilderness asthe creatures of the woods.
   Which meant that they might not know of the returnof the Wamphyri after all. For among the true
  
  Travellers the old ways were still remembered as yesterday, and the old greetings - which could as well
  be maledictions as pleasantries, depending on the times and situation -were still very much alive. 'Tear
  down the mountains,' this one had intoned, and Nathan knew the answer. He'd heard it from time to time
  when Travellers passed through Settlement trading their good skins, sharpening knives and axes, and
  reading palms. He had heard it before, but never used it. Because then he'd neither needed nor wanted to
  speak to anyone. Things weredifferent now, however. And so:
   'Aye, tear down the barrier range,' he answered. 'Let the sun blaze full upon the last aerie, and melt it
  downto the ground!'
   The man acknowledged Nathan's understanding of the old curse and nodded, but at the same time he
  frowned and said: 'And yet ... you're not a Traveller. Then perhaps your town has made us welcome in
  the past. For we don't hold it against you town people that you have chosen to settle. We visit now and
  then, and sometimes find it good to talk with others. We merely think it foolish to stay trapped in one
  place, like a fungus on a tree. For when the tree falls, the fungusgoes with it..."
   He brought out his right hand from where it had been hidden by the bole of the tree, and in full view
  applied the safety catch to his loaded crossbow. Then, nodding again, he added: 'Aye, foolish -
  especially now that the Wamphyri are back! But then, we've always said that they would be. And can
  you tell me a better reason for having spent all these years on the trail?'
   Nathan shook his head, and answered, 'Right now, that's why I'm here, too. But I'm not running away
  from them, just searching for ... for my brother, who was their victim. I...lost him last night, in Twin
  Fords. A man was seen to fall in the river. I thought that it mightbe him, and if I followed the river I might
  find him.''And did you?'
   'No,' he shook his head. And stepping forward he offered his hand. They clasped forearms, and Nathan
  said, 'I'm Nathan Kiklu, of the Szgany Lidesci.'
   The other smiled, however humourlessly. 'Szgany, yousay? The Szgany Lidesci? From Settlement? Well,
  it's true at least that old Lardis used to be a Traveller! I'mNikha Sintana, and these are my people. We,
  too, stayed in Twin Fords last night, and I also lost a brother. At least, I lost one who would have
  become as a brother to me. So much for the safety of towns! As for running away...'
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   Nathan saw his error at once and went to correct it. 'Imeant no slight or insult!'
   'None taken,' the other shook his head. 'We are running away! What? Should we sit in a burning tree,
  drink poisoned water, tie boulders to our necks and carry them into the river? And should we live in a
  town, lighting great communal fires to welcome the Wamphyri to their feast?' Again he shook his head.
  'From now on I think a great many will be "running away", just like me and mine. But last night - what an
  error! Of all the nights to choose to spend in the company of settled men!'
   While Nikha Sintana talked, Nathan made him the subject of a thorough appraisal. He did so openly,
  
  witha display of natural, friendly curiosity; it was the Szgany way when meeting strangers. And what he
  observedwas impressive.
   Nikha was— he could be — oh, anything between thirty-five and forty-five years old. The actual
  number of his years was a secret hidden in the agelessness of his penetrating, intelligent brown eyes, in
  skin weathered to a supple leather, in the oiled flexibility of sleek-muscled arms and the easy litheness of
  his posture. When Nikha leaned against a tree he didn't just slump; the tree seemed not only to support
  him but became one with him, lending him its strength. Indeed, there appeared to be a great deal of
  Nature's strength inevery part of him.
   His hooked nose was almost as sharp in profile as a kite's beak, but without its cruelty. His brow- for all
  that it was broad to accommodate a good brain and wide inscrutable eyes - had the flat slope of a wolf's.
  His lips were thin, grooved as old bark, and maybe not much given to smiling; but at the same time
  Nathan could not fail to notice the laughter lines, too, at the
   corners of his eyes and mouth. Overall, with his dark-grey, shoulder-length hair, Nikha Sintana reminded
  him of nothing so much as a lean and rangy hunting owl.
   The Traveller had fallen silent now, waiting forNathan's response. And Nathan was not remiss. Tm sorry
  you lost someone. I feel for you and know yourpain well. For just like me, you also lost a brother.'
   Nikha nodded. 'But my sister's pain is the greater. She was to have married this one. Which is how he
  would have become my brother.''Ah!' said Nathan, quietly.
   He looked around. The Gypsies had led their animals into the forest's shade; a few tents of skins were
  being erected; a cooking fire was already smoking under a tripod of green branches, fuelling itself on dry
  bark tinder. Men were moving like shadows under the trees; a crossbow thrummed and a pigeon fell in
  the sun-dappled glade; a youth with a fishing line made for theriver bank, collecting moth larvae bait as he
  went. There was something very natural, very appealing, about all of this almost casual activity. Nathan
  felt ... comfortable here, in the company of these people. Except comfort was a feeling he couldn't afford.
   He straightened his shoulders and said, 'I should getback to my search.1
   Nikha took his arm. 'We've stayed in Settlement fromtime to time. Lardis Lidesci was always a friend, in
  the old days and in the new. I'm not a man to incur debts, but where they exist I always try to square
  them. You are tired, Nathan Kiklu. You look fit to drop. As well sleep here among friends as alone along
  the river, and when you've rested eat with us. That way, in some future time, my debt will have
  transferred to you. It's from small debts such as these that friendships areforged.'
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   Nathan felt his weariness dragging on his bones and remembered now that he'd been about to sleep.
  Also,his back was a mass of blue bruises, whose aching was such that it might soon immobilize him
  entirely unless he rested first. 'I'm tired, it's true,' he said. 'But I don'twish to inconvenience you.'
  
   'No such thing,' the other replied. This is where wemake camp, eat and sleep. You've come across us at
  the right time. Our lives may be short but Sunside's days are long. At least while the sun is in the sky we
  may sleep safely. As for your search: the river is wide andits banks overgrown, with miles of forest on
  both sides. I understand your need, but I can't say I'm envious of the task you've set yourself. A rest can't
  hurt ... andthen a little food, to fuel you on your way?'
   In this way Nathan found his mind made up for him.'I'm in your debt,' he said.
   Leading him into the camp past a small caravan, Nikha said: 'My wagon. I shared it with my young
  sister, and cared for her until she was a woman. Then, when Eleni found herself a man in Twin Fords, or
  when he found her, we made them a tent of skins. This time passing through Twin Fords she would have
  been married; this very day, in fact! But last night, in the middle of a small celebration ... well, you know
  what happened. All of that became as nothing. Now for a while she'll put up her tent and sit in it, and
  mourn this man she never got to know.' His voice hardened. 'Butshe'll forget about him soon enough, and
  the tent won'tgo to waste. Maybe it's just as well.'
   Nathan glanced at him, perhaps a little sharply.Nikha saw his frown and raised a defensive eyebrow. 'If
  she'd known him well, then she would mourn him that much harder. And what if there had been children?'
   'That seems a hard point of view,' Nathan was frank.
   'Because I can remember hard times,' Nikha answered. 'And harder still to come, I fear.' He paused a
  while to fondle the ear of a beast of burden, a shad, one of a pair hitched to the thill of his vehicle. Shaggy
  as a hugely overgrown goat and of a like intelligence - but less boisterous, wider in the shoulder and
  sturdier inthe legs - the creature and its companion waited uncomplainingly for someone to unhitch them
  and put them to graze. Turning its head, it offered up a grateful bleatand allowed Nikha to scratch behind
  its ear.
   And: 'Aye,' he finally continued, as if he talked to himself or to the shad, 'even the smallest comforts will
  be hard come by from now on, I fancy. For men and beasts alike ...'
   Meanwhile, Nathan had looked the camp over andnoted its size and composition. There were two
  caravans and a flat, covered cart, half a dozen shads and two calves, and a few goats tethered at the
  back of thevehicles. Dangling outside the caravans, festooning theirsides, were all the tools and utensils
  necessary to Travel ler life, each item muffled now to prevent unwanted jangling and clattering. And
  under the trees at the rim of the clearing, three good-sized tents stood cool in the shade. Finally, the camp
  had its own wolves, a dog and a bitch. Capable hunters, they would see to themselves and provide early
  warning of intruders - which explained how Nikha Sintana had been so quick off themark and waiting on
  Nathan's arrival.
   According to Lardis Lidesci's campn're stories, there had been hundreds of groups such as this one
  upon a time. Scarcely larger than a few family units - able to melt away like ghosts into the forests, or
  hide in small caves during Wamphyri raids - they had made hardertargets than the larger, more prominent
  Traveller tribes.
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   Several of Nikha Sintana's earlier statements had more than suggested his solitary nature, which the size
  of his party might appear to confirm; but to Nathan it seemed more likely that he simply adhered to this
  old tenet,that small is synonymous with secure.
   Of people, the group was made up of thirteen in all:four men, including Nikha, three women, and five chil
  dren whose ages ranged from a small infant to the youth in his early teens who had gone fishing. The
  thirteenth ... was Eleni Sintana, that sister of whomNikha had spoken.
   Nathan had caught only the briefest glimpse of Eleni in the moment he broke through the undergrowth on
  to the track, but in that same moment he had seen something in her eyes which had seemed to strike a
  resonant chord within himself ... perhaps it had been her eyes, so much like Misha's. In any case, he'd
  been aware of her presence ever since but was careful not to look ather directly. Travellers are often
  fiercely protective where their women are concerned, and they don't care for forwardness in strangers.
  He was aware of her now to one side of the camp's central area, where she usedan axe to break up
  dead, fallen branches into firewood.
   This is Eleni,' Nikha confirmed, leading him acrossthe clearing, 'my sister. She cuts firewood to occupy
  hermind.'
   She looked up as they approached - looked at Nathanand smiled, however wanly - and he saw now
  that it was her eyes. They took him by surprise, for he'dthought that only Misha's eyes could be so warm,
  black and caring. Obviously he'd been wrong; or perhaps it was just that Misha had been so much on his
  mind lately, that...
   This is Nathan Kiklu,' Nikha said, breaking into his thoughts, and possibly into hers, too. 'A man of
  Settle-
   ment, from Lardis Lidesci's people. He could use a wash,a place to sleep, a blanket to keep him warm.
  Until ourmeal is prepared. Will you see to it, little sister?'
   She nodded and straightened up. And now that they'dbeen introduced, Nathan allowed himself to look
  at her.
   Maybe twenty or twenty-one years old, she was typically Szgany. All lithe and sinuous, with movements
  as smooth as oil, her hair was shiny black, her skin tanned to a glow, her mouth generous and sensuous
  at one and the same time. And there was something wild as the woods about her - even moreso than her
  brother - so that if Nathan didn't know better he might think there was room for only one mood in her:
  she should bevivacious and live life to the full, joyously, with a husky laugh that teased, taunted but never
  quite seduced.Because when finally Eleni did love, then her man wouldget all that she could give.
   Mainly nai've, Nathan was wont to make judgements such as this at first sight. And sometimes he was
  right. Eleni shouJd be that way; perhaps she would have been and could be again, one day. But for now
  ... she wassmall and sad and lonely.
   As Nikha walked away, back towards his caravan and animals, Nathan began: 'Your brother has told
  me -' and paused. '— I mean, I just want you to know that we're two of a kind. For just as you have lost
  yourman, so I have lost my girl.'
   She nodded seriously, and answered: 'I know how much you have lost, for it's in your eyes. I knew from
  
  the first moment I saw you. Ah, but I saw much more than that in those strange blue eyes of yours,
  Nathan! They are filled with all sorts of things, and you're notmuch given to hiding them.'
   He was surprised, not quite sure of her meaning. Perhaps he looked at her too openly. He turned his
  eyes
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   aside at once. 'Have I...been forward? If I've seemedso, then -'
   'No, no, notthat,'she cut him short. 'And if you were,what of it? Gypsies are forward. If a person is liked
  no one complains, and if he is not liked we say that he is forward. No, but you have been the sad one for
  a long,long time, and now is the worst time of all.'
   He shook his head, frowned, fingered his chin. 'But... how can you know?' And now her smile was
  warmer.
   'Oh, I read palms,' she said, tossing her ringlets backout of her eyes. 'Like my mother before me.
  Except, whyit's easier far to read faces! And as I said, your face -especially those eyes of yours - tells a
  long, sad story.'She reached out and touched his brow. 'Such lines, and so very deep, in a face so young
  ...' She shook her head, wonderingly. But before he could question herfurther:
   'Enough of that for now,' she said. 'Come over here, to my tent. Nikha says you need a wash. We can
  takecare of that. And then I'll get you a blanket.'
   Close to her tent she set up a tripod and bowl, and brought hot water from the fire. A piece of bark pro
  vided a cleansing, milky sap, with which Nathanscoured his face and hands. But watching him, Eleni.saw
  him wincing whenever he stretched his arms.
   He had removed his leather jacket but still wore hisshirt. Take it off,' she said.
   He looked at her sideways, questioningly. They werealone in the clearing now, almost. The men were off
  hunting; women tended their offspring or performed other duties; Nikha was seeing to his beasts. Take
  what off?'
   'Your shirt. When you bent over it rode up yourback. I have seen your bruises. Were you beaten?'
   Beaten? No, merely tossed aside — butby a Thing asstrong asfour men! The thing that took my Misha.
  'ALord of the Wamphyri very nearly killed me,' he finallyanswered. 'I suppose I was lucky.'
   He tried to reach over his shoulder and grasp the fabric of his shirt, but couldn't. Perhaps it was as well;
  Nikha had come back and was sitting on the steps of his vehicle. Seeing Nathan glancing that way, Eleni
  asked him: 'Are you concerned that my brother is watch ing us? Well, you shouldn't be.' And before he
  could answer she took the hem of his shirt in both hands and lifted it, and as he bent forward stripped it
  from hisback.
  
   'Now your brother will know I'm forward,' he groaned. 'Or that you are!'
   And now for the first time she laughed, and her laugh was as husky as he had guessed it must be.
  'Nathan, Nikha will be delighted!' she told him. 'Can't you see that he's still trying to marry me off?' But
  as she saw the extent of his bruising her laughter diedaway. And: 'You suppose you were lucky?' she
  repeated him. 'But your back should have been broken in threeplaces! Now wait.'
   She ran to Nikha and past him into the caravan, and was back in a moment with ointment wrapped in a
  leather pouch. 'It smells, but it's good!' she said, applying the stuff liberally to his back. 'Next sunup the
  sting will have gone, and by midday the bruises fading. I guarantee it. When we pass through the
  townships, we Gypsies guarantee all of our products!' And again shelaughed.
   Then she helped him on with his shirt, took him intoher tent and gave him a blanket. Her bed was a huge
  watertight skin stuffed with down, herbs and driedferns; more than sufficient for Nathan's needs, he made
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   no complaint. As he lay down she threw the blanket over him, and almost before she left the tent and
  closed its flap he was asleep ...
   Numbers formed a whir/pool which sucked Nathan in,whirled him round and around, and dragged him
  unpro- testing down the centra/ funnel of warping algebraic equations. To anyone else it would be a
  nightmare, but not to him. Unlike the dead, who could have talked to Nathan if they wished it but never
  did, the numbers were his friends. In a way, they did 'talk' to him; except he didn't have the math to
  understand their language. In a world largely without science, Nathan had no mathat all. What would
  probably have been instinctive,intui tive in him from his first serious lesson, had never hadthe chance to
  develop. Not yet.
   But he did understand that the numbers could sometimes carry him - his thoughts at least - to other
  places, other minds. It was a telepathic talent he shared withNestor, part of which was to reach out with
  his mind andmake a connection with that of his twin. Another part ofit, which was his alone, allowed him
  to contact and speak with his wolves. In his waking hours this might only be accomplished by an effort of
  conscious will, and even then it had sometimes failed him, but when he slept itwasquitebeyond his control.
  For then his talent seemed to work on its own, or occasionally with the help of whatNathan had long
  since named 'the numbers vortex'.
   Now he was in that vortex, but only for a moment. For in the next he felt himself expelled, hurled out and
  down - into water! Into the river!
   And because he had searched for Nestor, now he was Nestor. He was one with his brother's mind. He
  knew what Nestor knew, felt what he felt, observedwhat he observed. Which was nothing.
   Nathan knew what 'dead' minds feel like. This wasit, and yet at the same time it was less than death. For
  the dead know many things, and this mind - Nestor's mind - knew nothing at all! And Nathan believed he
  
  knew what that meant: that his brother was freshlydead, and as yet had learned nothing from all of those
  others who had gonebefore.
   He felt what Nestor felt: nothing. Or perhaps he didfeel or was aware of something: the gentle flow of
  cold,cold water - his lungs full of the stuff, which weighedlike lead to drag him down - and the first,
  tentative nibble of some small, curious fish. He observed whathis brother observed: nothing. Or if not
  that, a drift ofdark green weed sliding slowly across his blurred, sub merged view, to fill the screen of his
  gaping, glazingeyeballs .. . before the final darkness closed in!
   And with that he knew that Nestor was dead,drowned, and gone from him forever.
   He started awake —.'
   - To find Eleni Sintana down on her knees beside him, her brown eyes wide and anxious where they
  stared into his. She had hold of his shoulders, holding him down under the water. Except ... there was no
  water. And at last he breathed, stopped struggling, allowed her to push him back into his own depression
  inher bed. And:
   'A dream?' she inquired, her concern clearly apparent.
   Nathan nodded, felt cold sweat drip from the tip of his nose. More than that, Eleni, he wanted to say,
  but couldn't, because he knew that she wouldn't understand. But looking up into her face, her eyes ... she
  soreminded him of his mother ... and of Misha... he wished she would wrap her arms around him, for his
  protection.
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   He saw that she was going to - until Nikha's soft voice sounded from the door of the tent, saying: 'We're
  about ready to eat, Nathan. Will you join us?'
   And the spell was broken.
   Nathan joined the others to eat, but he was quiet and had no appetite. There was nothing wrong with the
  good food, nothing wrong with the company, just withhim. For he knew now that he was alone, entirely
  alone, and that what he'd mistaken for his awakening into this world had only been the beginning of the
  end. The Wamphyri had wrought reality out of a fantasy -changed everything, made him aware of his
  place here, and given him an identity - only to rob him of his roots. Now he was drifting, as Nestor's
  body had drifted, and not even the weeds of what might have been to anchorhim.
   For the last link had been broken, Nestor was dead, and Nathan felt in his heart the coldness of his
  brother's watery grave ...
   And two miles down river, in a shingly bight, a burly, bearded fisherman cried out, tossed aside his rod,
  wentplunging into the water to his thighs.
  
   He had been monitoring the progress of a log drifting out of the main current and into the shallows of the
  backwater. And knowing that fish sometimes swim in the shadow of floating debris, he had thought to
  see abig one accompanying this piece of driftwood. But loll ing closer to the bank, suddenly the log had
  given alurch and turned over, and in the next second the fisher man had seen that what had come adrift
  from it to slipdown into the clear water was anything but a fish!
   That had been a moment ago; now Brad Berea wadedto the log and thrust it aside, sank to his knees in
  the shingle, and gathered up the body of a young man from
   where it bumped slowly along the bottom. The youth'sclothes were ragged, waterlogged; he was limp,
  cold ...dead? Well, very likely. But his flesh seemed firm, hislimbs were still flexible, and his lips were not
  entirelyblue.
   In fact Nestor Kiklu was dead or as close as could be,and had been for several long seconds, but as yet
  hisspirit had not flown the flesh. What his brother Nathan had experienced was not true death but the
  final sleep which leads up to it, except this time that sleep hadbeen interrupted.
   Brad Berea carried Nestor to the bank, dragged him out feet first to let the water rush out of him, and
  thumped his chest until he coughed up mud, small weeds and more water. Coughed them up, lay still ...
  and breathed!
   He breathed - however raggedly, shallowly - and slowly but surely a semblance of life crept back into
  him.
   Into his body, at least...
   After their meal, Nikha Sintana and his people took their rest. Later, they would spread out into the
  forestand hunt more diligently; for they must find game now, in the daylight hours, to see them and their
  familiesthrough the long night ahead. After the hunting - assum ing it was successful - they'd be more at
  their ease;they would play, make music, talk over their short-term plans. The plans of travelling folk were
  ever short-term, Wamphyri or no; but by midday they would be back onthe trail again.
   Nikha's idea, which he had told to Nathan while theyate, was this:
   He and his party would follow the old trail south to the narrow strip of prairie where it bordered on the
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   furnace deserts. He knew the location of a spring there, which in all his years of wandering had never
  dried out. There was no shortage of game, and the fruits of the forest were always plentiful. In the woods
  at the edge of the prairie, well away from the customary haunts and routes of other Travellers, there
  Nikha's group would disguise their caravans in the thickets, stain them green to match the foliage, and
  pitch theirtents under cover of the great trees.
   In short, they would quit travelling for a while at least, if only long enough to see how the wind blew.
  
  And if it seemed they had chosen a good, safe spot, then perhaps they'd make it permanent. Settling
  there would go against the grain with Nikha, of course; itwould be a solitary, ingrown existence with no
  company to mention and no external contacts. But at least theywould exist, and more or less on their own
  terms.
   As for the Wamphyri: there would be richer pickings for them elsewhere. Word of their return would be
  spreading even now, but many townships would not hear of it until it was too late. In Twin Fords and
  other towns, there were plenty of old people who could not or would not move; these must soon fall prey
  to the vampires. And there would be a great many parties of refugees on the move outwards from
  threatened towns alongthe southern flank of the barrier range, whose leaders had forgotten or never
  known the skills necessary for survival in the wild. For a certainty, the Wamphyriwould pick these off
  first.
   In Settlement and possibly a handful of other places, men would stand their ground, fight and inevitably
  die. The vampires loved to fight, and such bastions of defiance would present irresistible challenges. All
  of which should provide Nikha and his party a breathing space, ample time to settle into their secret
  place, discover
   hiding holes and prepare themselves against every hideous eventuality.
   One of the first things they would do would be to breed more watchdog wolves, and train them to be
  alert for strange sights, sounds, smells . ..
   With luck the vampires would never find their camp - or if they did would discover it deserted, its
  people fled into the woods or grasslands. And as any fool must see for himself, the closer you live to the
  sunrise, the safer you are from vampire slavery, death and undeath. Why should the Wamphyri bother to
  fly across all these miles of woodlands, when they could reap their tithe of blood so much closer to
  home? For to raid in the southern extremes of Sunside would mean a greater distance to travel back to
  Starside, before sunup. It was a smallpoint but it seemed to make sense.
   As to why Nikha told Nathan all of these things: simply, he hoped to tempt him along. And so Nathan
  saw that Eleni had been right: Nikha was angling to catch her a husband before he and his people
  disappeared into solitude. Well, and Nathan supposed he could do much worse. But before that -
   - His thoughts were all for Misha, despite that she was lost or dead... or worse than dead. Misha and
  Nestor, yes. If only Nathan could see Nestor again, find him and take him from the river, and give him a
  decent grave. For while the teeming dead couldn't bring themselves to speak to Nathan, he was sure they
  would allow him a little time, a few words, with his own brother at least. The chance to make things right
  withhim?
   Which was why, when they had finished eating and talking, he mumbled awkward excuses and headed
  for the river. Eleni said nothing but went to her tent; but Nikha Sintana, on his way to his bed in the
  caravan,
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   came after Nathan at once and took his arm. 'Won't youcome with us, then?'
   'I can't,' Nathan answered. 'Maybe I would, for Eleni'ssake, if she'd have me - and if you think I'd make
  her a capable husband, of course. But first I must try one last time to find Nestor's body. Find and bury
  him, so that I'll know where he is always. For I think ... that he must be quite close to this place. I have a
  feeling, that'sall.'
   'I understand,' Nikha nodded, and gave Nathan a skin with a route marked on it, to bring him to their
  camp. 'We'll sleep now, then hunt, finally move on,' he said. 'By midday we shall be gone from here, and
  by sundown we'll be in our place, which I've kept in mindthese many years. How long will you search?'
   Nathan offered a despairing shrug. 'Until I can no longer hope to find him. Perhaps there's no hope even
  now, but I must try. And Nikha, even then I can't swear I'll be back. There are things in my head... I
  have memories as fresh as yesterday .. . it's not easy to swing this way and that, like a reed in the wind. It
  only lookseasy.'
   Nikha nodded. 'Very well. But if you should decide that ... well, however you decide, only be sure to
  reach us before sundown, for after that there'll be no fire to guide you, and it might prove dangerous to
  cometoo close unannounced.'
   Then they clasped forearms, and through the trees Nathan could feel Eleni's eyes upon him until he
  passed from sight into the undergrowth ...
   He searched the river bank until the middle of the afternoon, when the ground on his side of the river
  turnedinto a bog and became impassable, and the overhanging branches were so full of creepers and
  rank, secondary
   foliage that the water was shaded, dappled, opaque. If his brother was down there, there could be no
  findinghim now. As for burying him: Nestor would be buried already, in the weeds which had been part
  of Nathan's'dream'.
   Now, too, Nathan must decide what to do. Earlier, hehad seemed to feel something for Eleni Sintana.
  Or perhaps he had simply felt it for himself: a yawningvoid, an aching need. In any case, he had a choice:
  join the Szgany Sintana in whatever future would be theirs, or return to Settlement and be Lardis
  Lidesci's son,replacing the one he'd lost. Whichever he chose to be - husband to Eleni, or a son to Lardis
  - he would be a replacement, not the real thing; and he would alwaysknow that he was the second
  choice.
   Settlement seemed a long way off from Nathan, andhe knew it could never feel the same if he went back
  there. If a girl passed by he would look at her, hoping it was Misha. When the women stamped their feet
  and snapped their fingers thus and so in the dance, he would think of his mother. And if some brash youth
  came striding, laughing along the road, it would always be Nestor from this time forward. No, the town
  would be full of ghosts now; indeed, Settlement itself wouldbe a ghost.
   But Eleni Sintana was warm and alive ...
   And what of his vow against the Wamphyri? All verywell, when there was a chance that Nestor lived.
  Together, united under a banner of vengeance, the two ofthem could have fought alongside Lardis
  Lidesci and taken whatever revenge was available to them, beforethey too paid the price. They could
  have, but no longer.For Nestor was drowned and cold. And again thethought came to Nathan: Eleni is
  
  warm and alive.
   It was a little more than half-way through the after-
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   noon; there were still some twenty-five hours of full daylight left, and five or six more of twilight; Nathan
  was feeling worn out, as low as he had ever felt, and quite at the end of his tether. Over a period of time
  which would equal almost four days in the time-frame of the world beyond the Starside Gate - of which
  as yet Nathan knew nothing other than that it was there - he'd managed to snatch only a few hours sleep.
  Now he must sleep, and sleep his fill, before heading south for ... for the encampment of the Szgany
  Sintana, wherethe forest met the savannah.
   Back up the river he had passed a tiny sandy island with a few reeds, shrubs and trees. Now he made
  hisweary way back there, waded out to the island, curled up under a bush half in the shade, and almost at
  once fell into an exhausted, dreamless sleep. His last conscious thought as the darkness came down was
  that he would sleep for a good seven or eight hours, and still haveplenty of time to trek to Nikha's camp
  before sundown.
   But the fact was that both physically and mentally Nathan was far more depleted than he thought. And
  while he slept... on Starside the vampire plague-bearers were wide awake, active, and filled to over
  flowing with their loathsome poisons, their unspeakableambitions ...
   Though as yet the rays of a slowly setting sun continuedto paint the higher peaks of the barrier range a
  dazzling gold, its cleansing glare had lifted from the face of that one remaining aerie, whose name upon a
  time wasKarenstack. And in the hour of the sun's passing, Wratha the Risen had called a meeting in her
  vertiginous apartments; several of her familiar bats had been dispatched into the stack's lower levels,
  where Wratha's renegades understood their messages far better than men under-
   stand the whining of dogs. And now the changelingvampire Lords attended her, however sullenly.
   They had all been up and about since the arrival of their first new thralls out of Sunside: allotting quarters,
  'victualling' their beasts, choosing lieutenants and instructing them in their duties, apportioning work to
  commoner thralls ... and last but not least, sating themselves, of course. Which surely accounted for
  Canker Canison's ravaged look, for where females were concerned he was ever the Great Dog. In
  Settlement he had excelled himself: at least two thirds of his recruits fromthe Szgany Lidesci were
  women.
   But even in Canker's case the choosing of new lieutenants had taken priority for a while; for with the
  singleexception of Gorvi the Guile, all of the Lords and the Lady too had lost their right-hand men in the
  first raids on Twin Fords and Settlement. In Turgosheim's Sunside it would have been unthinkable, and
  here it was a major setback which not even Wratha had anticipated. Of the six of them, Gorvi had been
  the fortunate one; or... could it be that his lieutenant had learned something of the wiles of his master?
  Whichever, he had survived,and the one thing Gorvi lacked now was a warrior.
  
   Ah, but the makings were to hand in the shape of a procession of dazed Szgany thralls drawn irresistibly
  out of Sunside and across the boulder plains to the last aerie, all bemoaning their fate even as they came
  shuffling through the lengthening shadows of the barrier range. The Guile had wasted no time; in the
  bowels of the stack his vats were seething even now, where altered metamorphic flesh shaped itself to
  Gorvi's design.
   Canker, too (once he'd inspected his get, chosen his men and rutted among his new harem), had set to
  work at the vats. In just nine or ten sundowns he would have a warrior to beggar the one which he'd lost
  over the
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   Great Red Waste! And in thirty more there would be a litter of yelping bloodsons to replace the ones left
  totheir fate in Mangemanse.
   And so the Lords had been busy when Wratha's great bats called them to attend her. But since they
  desired words with the Lady anyway, it seemed as gooda time as any.
   Gorvi, Wran the Rage and Spiro Killglance took the easy route up from their freshly peopled manses,
  and landed their flyers in Wratha's spacious bays. Cankerand Vasagi the Suck, situated that much closer,
  climbed the stack's internal staircases of hewn stone and grafted cartilage. However they chose to come,
  upon arrival they all greeted Wratha in the same way: with surly, suspicious, even angry stares and
  glances. She had anticipated no less and was ready for them.
   'So, all goes reasonably well,' she started without preamble, speaking to them from where she sat in the
  gaping jaws of a huge bone-throne at the head of a table in the largest of her several halls. 'Our new
  thralls attend us, and though they are fewer than we bargained for their blood is good and strong and
  fresh: superior in every way to our get of tithelings in Turgosheim. At least we can all agree on that, I
  think.' The way sheexpressed herself indicated her presentiment of trouble.
   'As far as you go you state hard facts,' Gorvi answered at once, his voice a sly, oily, accusing gurgle.
  'Alas, you don't go far enough. And the hardest fact ofall is the one you choose not to mention.'
   The five were seated with her: Vasagi and Gorvi onone side of the table, Canker and the brothers
  Killglance on the other. Wratha was dressed in her robe of bat-fur ropes. She had chosen to look like
  some wanton young Gypsy: precocious, provocative, proud of the power which her sex gave her over
  men. It was her way of
   distracting them from their course, their argument. Butnow she saw that it might not be enough. These
  Lords had taken their fill of women; for now, there was nolust left in them.
   Putting all posing and posturing aside she sat up straight, pulled a wry face and uttered an exaggerated
  sigh. 'So, here we are,' she said. 'Right at the onset ofour great adventure, and already you find something
  to complain about, Gorvi. Better, I think, if they'd namedyou Gorvi the Grouch!'
  
   'What you think becomes less important momentto moment!' Gorvi snarled. He stood up and put his
  knuckles on the table, hunching his shoulders and thrusting his head forward like a great carrion bird.
  'Wratha, you are a thief!'
   His words seemed to freeze her ... for perhaps a second. Then she reached up and lifted the bone scarp
  upon her brow, until her eyes were no longer in shadow.And in a moment her image of true life had fallen
  away and her flesh was grey as undeath. Her nose becameridged and convoluted, with black, flaring
  nostrils, and her top lip curled back a little in the right-hand corner,displaying a gleaming fang. And:
   'A thief?' she hissed.
   Before matters could deteriorate further, Vasagiflowed to his feet and put himself between Gorvi andthe
  Lady. The Suck was extremely susceptible to kneb- lasch - even more so than the others - and knew
  Wratha's mind and therefore her temper better than them. She considered this her place now; only
  subject her to too many 'insults' in her own aerie ... she would very likely stink them all right out of here
  into their sickbeds, so making an end of their complaints. Well, for the moment Vasagi had enough of
  healing pains. If that bolt which he took in his side last night had been
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   dipped in kneblasch ... even Vasagi, with all of his powers of metamorphism, would have been in trouble
  then! It didn't bear thinking about.
   So, time now to make their point - merely that, and delicately if at all possible - so that at least she
  would see how she had offended. Time later for correction, if or when she tried it again. There were five
  of them, after all, and only one Wratha; it should not be too difficult to take her unawares and so even up
  the account. And if the instrument of such correction were a crescent of sharp metal to scythe the bitch's
  headfrom her neck...so be it! But for now:
   We are all thieves, Vasagi's thoughts were given formby an elaborate, intricate shrug. He fluttered his
  hands, shaped his fingers into expressive webs, struck a pose and angled his head a little. It'sjust that we
  think it unnecessary to take from one another. Especially in aplace like this.
   The Suck is right,' Wran tweaked the small black wen on the point of his chin. 'Sunside teems, so why
  poach your colleagues' thralls, eh, Wratha? We converted them, and yet they have come to you. Why, if
  mybrother and I had not been quick to recognize some of them who climbed through our premises on
  their way to yours, we'd have lost even more! And them with ourmarks upon them, which are
  unmistakable.'
   'Did you think it solely for your benefit, Lady,' Wran'sbrother, Spiro put in, 'that we went recruiting last
  nighton Sunside?'
   She studied the five sourly, each in his turn - Gorvi and Vasagi on her right, standing - the brothers and
  Canker on her immediate left, still seated. But her gaze lingered on Canker, whom she believed most
  easilyswayed. 'Well, and have you nothing to say?'
  
   He shrugged, scratched a fretted ear, finally barked:
   'I haven't the patience for all this yelping and bickering.Also, I'm weary unto death! But you've kept your
  promises as far as I can see. There are women now in my kennel, and a new warrior brewing. But if you
  must know how I feel - well, I'll admit to being a little disappointed.'
   'How so?' She was genuinely curious; Canker was astrange one, whose true mind was hard to know.
   'Of men,' he answered, his voice a low whine now, 'of lieutenants,' (he shrugged, awkwardly) 'well, I
  converteda few, not many - but all of them well-fleshed and strong, mind! And now it seems I've lost
  most of them to you! Wherefore a pat on the head won't suffice, Lady, not this time. If you expect me to
  fashion you another warrior, like the one I made for you in Tur-gosheim, then first you'll return my thralls
  to me.'
   'What?' she hissed at him. 'Didn't I warn you against taking too many women?' She jumped to her feet
  andglared at all of them. 'And how was I supposed to watchyour backs and still find time to make
  changelings of myown? A thief, am I? Is that what you think? Only countmy thralls and you'll see who got
  the better of it. You did, all of you! Now listen: so far I've had time to fuel mycreatures, choose my new
  lieutenants - just two of them -and set about the fashioning of my siphoneers. And howmany thralls do I
  have left, eh? Well, I'll tell you: I haveseven! And you, Wran?' She swung to face him. 'Whatwas your
  get? And you, Gorvi the Greedy?' She spun onher heel. 'How few for you? Twice as many, I'll warrant!'
   'But you were the one -' Wran thundered, his blood beginning to boil, so that he must calm himself
  beforegoing on, '- who said there'd be no such thing as a tithe, not here in Old Starside. Yet now you
  make yourself atithemaster, or mistress, no less than old Vormulac himself in Turgosheim! They were our
  best which you took,
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   Wratha, as well you know. Now enough of prevarication, admit your guilt!'
   'And what of the provisioning of the stack?' She glared back at him. 'Do you breed gas-beasts or
  warriors, Wran? Hah! I thought so! Never a thought for the rest of us, but you can stand and accuse me.
  And you, Gorvi: have you fashioned a creature to clean the wells, or is it something else that waxes in
  your vats? Andhow many things wax there?'
   They made no answer but stood there enraged andglowering; all of them, with the sole exception of
  Vasagi, whose wound was not yet healed. And again looking at each of the vampire Lords in his turn,
  Wratha saw that she was right: never a thought for the stack in a single head, only for their own
  well-being. But she saw more than that, for to a man they had reached the end of their tether - where
  Wratha herself had driven them.
   Ah, and these were furious Lords! Despite that they kept their thoughts cloaked, Wratha could read
  them clearly enough in their scarlet eyes. They had tasted war and wild, untamed blood, finding both
  
  much to their liking. Why stop now? The stack was a big place, true, but bigger still without Wratha.'
  And what wasshe anyway but a woman?
   She did not like the way Canker looked at her, stripping away her bat-fur robe with his feral dog's eyes;
  neither that, nor the way in which Gorvi sidled closer. Her hand went inside her robe ... and Vasagi,
  bobbing wildly and gesticulating like a madman, finally held upa quivering hand.
   NOW HOLD! His thought came so hard, a mental shout, that all grew quiet in a moment. But beneath
  that great blast of a thought were others, which the Suck kept closer to his chest. Cloaked though they
  were, Wratha could read something of them at least:
   Last night after Vasagi had been shot, before the attack on Settlement, Wratha had asked him if he felt
  capable of further venturings. Knowing he was wounded, she'd taken his condition into account. Oh, he
  had known that her concern was not for him alone but for the party as a whole: seeing herself as a
  general, she needed her troops in fine fettle. But still it had beenworth something. Also, Vasagi could see
  the value of an aerie properly maintained and provisioned. Right now the stack was little more than a
  hollow fang of rock, a pesthole of vampires, but it could become a fortress. In that respect the Lady's
  ideas were good and sound.
   And finally ... finally Wratha's hand was still inside her robe, where she kept oil of kneblasch in a small
  bladder, to fill the air with poison. That, too, was worth taking into account, for now at least. But later,
  when the stack had been put to rights ...
   Gorvi's oily voice broke the uneasy silence. 'Well?' heinquired of no one in particular. But he, too, saw
  the Lady's hand inside her robe, and wisely he drew back apace.
   Have we come allof this way, Vasagi gestured, outofthetyrannyof Turgosheim, tofight among
  ourselves?
   'But —' Wran continued to glower at Wratha. Heart pounding and chest heaving, he remained
  uncomfortably close to raging.
   Now listen to me, Vasagi cut him short. For it seemsthatI'm the only one who can see what's
  happeninghere. We are Wamphyri! And now that the restrictionsof Turgosheim arelifted, we are
  reverting to type. But isn't that why we desired to come here in thefirst place: to give our leechesfull
  rein? To be as our nature intended us to be? He paused ...
   ... And seeing that he had their attention, continued:
   Wratha is no thief - but she is Wamphyri! And apart
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   from this one incident, this one — lapse? — she hasn't put afoot wrong. Well, except in her belie/ that
  she could lead us like a warrior Queen. For we're all of us men and warriors in our own right, and as
  
  such we resent giving up our hard-earned spoils to any self-styled leader. And I say again: to any leader!
   Very well, so from now on we are our own men and Wratha is her own woman. But on the other hand
  she's right: without that we show a degree of co-operation,the stack can't survive and we are doomed. It
  is impera tive that Gorvi puts the wells in order, that Wran and Spiro service and maintain the refuse pits
  and methane chambers, and that Wratha fashions siphoneers to draw up water from the wells, for the
  benefit of the whole stack. To this extent - if only to this extent - we mustbe of one mind. To this extent,
  we need each other.
   Wran, fingering his wen as before, was calmer now. And: 'I agree all of that,' he said. 'Except —' and he
  scowled at Wratha, '- she appropriates no more of ourthralls!'
   Wratha, too, was calm and 'lovely' again. So, she'd lost her army at a stroke. Well, and so what? She
  could soon build another, and next time loyal in every way. 'So from now on we hunt alone,' she nodded,
  curtly. 'We attend to the needs of the stack, for everyone's sake, but other than that we fend for
  ourselves and tohell with the rest! Very well, see if you like it better thatway.'
   Gorvi had second thoughts. 'But what if we are attacked out of Sunside, or worse, out of Turgosheim?
  Am I required to hold the lower levels on my own?'
   'Oh, we'll be attacked, eventually,' Wratha assured him.Though I think not from Sunside. When it
  comes, once again we stand or fall together. The stack is our refuge;though we may never be friends, we
  must be allies.'
   All the more reason, Vasagi made elegant shrugs andwriggles, to practise a modicum of co-operation
  now.
   Spiro, clad in his customary rags of breechclout andheadband, took his brother's arm. 'Come,' he said.
  'Enough of talk. We have tasks aplenty. But when dark ness falls we'll leave our lieutenants to supervise
  the work, and go raiding for ourselves in Sunside.' He cast a vilifying glance at Wratha. 'Except this time
  we'llkeep what we catch!'
   'What of me?' Canker barked. 'Do I get my thrallsback?'
   'Ungrateful wretch,' Wratha was openly scornful. 'You who have nothing better to do but whine and
  wench! What's that for co-operation? Best quit youryelping, Canker, if you'd have gas to warm your
  kennelsand clean water to drown your fleas!'
   In return, Canker snarled a little and bared his canines, but while Wratha had the kneblasch that was as
  much as he could do.
   And with that it was over. Their courses set - as individuals, as well as interdependent members of the
  stack - the Lords took their departure from Wratha's apartments. Vasagi was last to leave ...
   On his way down, Vasagi must pass close by the Lady Wratha's draughty landing bays. There he found
  Wran the Rage waiting for him, still seething like an activevolcano. Wran came straight to the point: 'Why
  did you defend her? We could have been rid of her at a stroke; I would have taken her apartments, and
  left the ones Ishare now to my brother.'
   She had kneblasch, Vasagi shrugged, gestured,backed off a little. Also she has commenced to fashion
  siphoneers. Why waste the Lady's best efforts? Time later to punish her - if such is required - when the
  
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   stack is in working order. You agreed as much yourself,ifnot in so many words.
   'It isn't simply that you fancy the whore?' Wran grinned unpleasantly. 'After all, you and she would make
  a grand team. You with your freakish face, and Wratha a hag under all that sweet girl-flesh! Is that it? Do
  you hope to partner her? Are you so tired, then, of the shrieks of your odalisques when you go to service
  them? Do they insist you mount from the rear, so thatthey need not see your face?'
   Vasagi flowed forward now, his gestures sharper, less subtle, his telepathic 'voice' a hiss: Why do you
  insult me, Wran? Do you seek to provoke me?I have no chin, it's true, but that isof my choosing. Rather
  that than your chin, with its black and possibly leprousgrowth!
   'Now who speaks insults?' Wran thrust his red faceto the fore. 'As for my wen: it is a beauty spot.'
   Oh? the Suck laughed scornfully. Then you could useafew more! But as Wran grunted and stepped
  closer still, Vasagi's tapering snout stiffened and his sharp siphon proboscis slid into view, dripping saliva.
  And: Best to remember, he warned, that your gauntlet is inyour apartments, Wran. But me, why, I carry
  my weaponwith me at all times!
   Wran knew that Vasagi could strike at lightning speed, to pierce or pluck an eye, or penetrate an ear to
  the brain. He withdrew, however grudgingly, then turned on his heel and headed for the launching bays.
  But over his shoulder: 'Let's have one thing understood, wormface,' he snarled. 'Eventually the Lady's
  options will be down to two: to be my most obedient wife in Wranstack, or to die and make room for
  her betters! If it's the first - I'll en;oy cutting the sting out of Wratha's tail, believe me! And if it's the
  second,' he shrugged, 'so
   be it.' With that he passed from sight behind a jut ofstone.
   Not to be outdone, Vasagi sent after him: Better stickto your girl-thralls, Wran! Wratha'sfar too much
  womanfor a fop such as you! His dart was too late; Wran had closed his mind; Vasagi's thoughts came
  echoing hollowly back to him.
   It was probably as well. Wran was a maniac, after all. And shrugging off his irritation, Vasagi continued
  on his way . ..
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   II
   Nathan stirred. The sun had been off his island for quite a while now and he was cold. The river gurgled
  
  close by; a fish jumped for flies, making a splash; thecombination of sounds woke him up.
   He awoke cold, stiff, aching, and saw in a moment how long - and how late - he'd slept. The sun was a
  bright flash of fire glimpsed through the treetops to the south; except for silvery glints striking from the
  river's ripples, its entire expanse stood in green, gloomy shade from bank to bank. Nathan had been
  asleep for... aboutfifteen hours?
   He waded to the bank and began to backtrack westwards. As he left the boggy region for firmer
  ground,sosomething of the stiffness went out of his muscles and a little of the gnawing ache out of his
  back: Eleni's ointment, he supposed, and wondered where she andthe Szgany Sintana were now.
   ... Jingling along the approach route to fheir new home, most likely. Tonight they would set up a make
  shift camp, and tomorrow camouflage the place, make itsemi-permanent, settle in. And if only Nathan
  could make his legs go a little faster, he would be with them -with Eleni -- and have a place among them.
  In a way hefelt like a traitor: to Lardis, to the memory of»Misha'and his mother, especially to his Szgany
  vow. But in another way he felt ... new? Certainly he was making a new beginning. And in any Case, he
  knew that as long as helived his vow would never be entirely forgotten.
   In a spot where a beam of slanting sunlight fell
   through the riverside foliage, he paused and unfoldedNikha's map. The route didn't seem too difficult: go
  back to where the Sintanas had made camp, follow the disused trail east by south-east for some fifteen
  miles, then head south along the bed of a narrow, curving valley inthe woods. Where the valley bent
  westward to follow the course ofa stream, there climb a gentle slope onto level ground once more.
  Finally, still heading south for five or six miles through a broad belt of ironwoods (where with luck Nathan
  might strike another ancienttrack), he would come upon the grasslands. By then the woods would be ash,
  walnut, wild plum, and a fewgiant ironwoods. And depending upon where he emerged from the declining
  forest, the Sintana campshould be no more than two or three miles east or west.An accomplished tracker
  would conceivably followdirect in their footsteps.
   That was what Nikha had said, anyway ...
   Nathan was furious with himself. If he had woken up just three hours earlier there would be no problem.
  He would be able to see where the wagons left the trail to turn into the forest, the ruts their wheels left in
  the loamy earth. There would be signs: crushed foliage, broken twigs, beast droppings. But the best of
  the light was gone now, and as yet he wasn't even back to theirfirst meeting place.
   He put on a little speed, loping through the treesparallel with the river until he was winded, then break ing
  into a stiff walk. Now, too, he began to feel just a little panicked, and he knew that that wouldn't help,
  either.
   How far did he have to go: thirty, thirty-five miles? And how long in which to do it? It would be
  sundown in... oh, ten to twelve hours. Plenty of time, if he'd been out in the open on a good trail. But in
  the forest
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   ... the light would be failing long before then. Of woodland creatures there wasn't much to fear; but if he
  gotlost, that would be a problem. His new Traveller friends would worry about him; at least he supposed,
  hoped, that Eleni would. And for his part, he certainly didn'trelish the thought of spending a long, lonely
  night in the forest...
   It seemed a long time - too long by far - but at last Nathan was forcing his way through the shrubbery
  onto the old trail, back where he'd first seen the Szgany Sintana. Breaking camp, they had been careful to
  cover their tracks; if he didn't know better, he might not suspect that anyone had been here at all! Even
  so, they hadn't been able to disguise the deep ruts in the overgrown trail, which now he followed east at a
  steady, mile-eating lope. And as he went the forest grew uparound him, the light faded, however
  imperceptibly, and the long afternoon grew longer ...
   Nathan discovered an ancient and entirely unscientific fact: that time in short supply diminishes faster than
  it is spent. He also found that concentration can be self-defeating: only do enough of it and sooner or later
  you will be concentrating upon your concentration, and not the matter in hand. His limbs and muscles had
  grownaccustomed to their continuous, rhythmic effort until the dull pain of constant motion was very
  nearly hypnotic.Indeed itwas hypnotic; for suddenly the trail was over grown, with nowhere a sign to
  show that men, animals, vehicles had passed this way ... because they hadn't! Despite all his best efforts
  of concentration, Nathanhad passed the turn-off point without even noticing it.
   Again he backtracked - a mile, two - and eventuallydiscovered the truth: that the Travellers had left the
  trail where the soil was thin and the ground full of flints
   and pebbles. They had deliberately used the hard, stony earth itself to obscure their tracks and make
  them thatmuch more difficult to follow; not to discourage Nathan,no, but to confuse anyone else who
  might come sniffingon their heels.
   Going much slower now where the way wound alonga narrow, thickly forested gully, he found shad
  droppingsand commenced tracking again, following on until the valley widened out and turned west along
  the course of a deep, darkly gurgling stream. There, where the earth was stony again, he toiled up a
  gentle incline between the trees until once more he stood upon level ground. But somewhere along the
  way he'd lost the trail, andnow the light was fading much more rapidly.
   By now Nathan had been on the move for some elevenhours and his fatigue was rapidly gaining on him.
  Under the claustrophobic canopy of the trees his lungs couldn'tseem to draw enough air, and with every
  staggering step his legs felt ready to crumple up under his weight. He needed to rest very badly but knew
  that he daren'tstop. And so he pushed on...
   Always he headed directly into the sun where its light was most evident in the sky and through the trees.
  But there were streams to cross, bramble and creeper thickets to negotiate, places where the forest's
  canopy was so dense as to shut out the light entirely. Until suddenly ... the light improved a very little, the
  trees thinned out, lesser shrubs, brambles, undergrowth disappeared under a brittle carpet of poisonous
  needles. He had found the ironwood groves; but nowhere a sign that the Travellers had come this way,
  and no track for him to follow. He hurried on, skirted the thicker needlepatches and passed safely
  through the groves.
   The trees thinned out more yet; light, what little was left of it, flowed palely into the forest from the south;
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   the ironwoods gave way to ash, walnut, wild plum. At least Nathan was heading in the right direction.
  But just when he believed he was through the worst of it, then he felt the sting of a needle sliding through
  thestitching of his sandal into the ball of his right foot.
   Agony! And he must pause a while to draw the thing out. That was a mistake; in just a few minutes of
  sitting down his muscles stiffened up; from now on he must stumble half-crippled through the gathering
  twilight. Twilight, yes, and on the rim of the world the sun an orange blister that leaked liquid light onto
  the coolingdeserts. And the forest very still now, where small crea tures rustled and the cooing of pigeons
  was quiet, afraid, and all else was silent...
   And coming to the edge of the woodlands he looked south across the broad savannah belt, and saw a
  greatwheel or fan in the sky whose spokes were pink, yellow, gold; a wheel that turned, faded, and
  passed like a rainbow after the rain, when the sun comes out. Except here the opposite was true, for the
  spokes of the fan were fading rays of sunlight, a reminder of the golden glory that had been. It was
  sundown, and for a few hours more the land would lie in velvet twilight; stars would come out, glittering
  over the barrier range; true night would come down like a creeping thing, paintingeverything the colours
  of darkness.
   Nathan turned his head this way and that, looked east and west in the deceptive light. Which way to go?
  He cocked his head, listened for a distant, familiar jingle, and heard nothing. But then, he hadn't really
  expected to. A wind came up and rushed through the woods, making the branches toss and sough.
  Streamers of cloud rushed south, following the sun. And to the east ... was that a shout carried on the
  wind? Or justthe shriek of a night-hunting bird?
   He limped west a mile, then spied a knoll out on thesea of grass. A further half-mile to the knoll and
  Nathanwas ready to give in, lie down, spend the night there. But he forced himself panting to the top and
  scannedthe land around, and spied in the east at the edge of theforest - a fire? Hardly a bonfire; a dull
  flicker at best,but better than nothing.
   It must be Eleni! Despite Nikha's warning to Nathan, that there'd be no friendly light to guidehim after
  sundown, Eleni had kept a small fire burning. Uplifted, he climbed down again to the plain andstarted out
  diagonally across the grasslands in the direction of the fire. And now the going was easywhere he
  swished through tall, windblown grassesunder ashen skies, wispy clouds and gatheringstars.
   But ... the sky was strange tonight; there seemed tobe several belts of cloud at various levels; some
  scuddedone way and some another. Directly ahead of Nathanand high above the forest, small black rags
  of cloudsped north for the mountains and were quickly lost inthe deceptive velvet of night.
   On the level, the light of the fire was no longer visible.Nathan hurried; he covered a mile, two, and was
  intohis third when he saw the light again. After that, as thenighted forest grew up on his left hand, and a
  racing moon rose over the distant barrier range to light his way, the beacon eye of the fire shone ever
  brighter.Until at last he was there.
   Where the trees met the prairie he saw the carts andcaravans of the Sintanas sheltering under the
  
  branchesof a trio of mighty ironwoods. Their fire was a welcoming splash of leaping orange and yellow
  light where itheld back the shadows in the triangular space betweenthe trees. It welcomed Nathan ...
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   ...In the same way it had welcomed others, who hadbeen here before him!
   He slowed down, reached the clearing, stumbled forward with his bottom jaw slowly lolling open. He
  smelled a certain odour which the squalling wind had almost but not quite blown away. And Nathan
  remembered the dark, ragged clouds which the wind had also blown away over the forest, towards the
  distant Star-side pass. And he saw how the doors on the caravans swung to and fro in the eddies, as if
  they were protesting at their emptiness. The place was ... deserted?
   No, not deserted, just empty. Of life ...
   Nathan couldn't accept it. He looked beyond the caravans where an area had been roped off into animal
  pens. Everything stood in shadows cast by the guttering firelight and starshine made pale by the wind and
  thescudding clouds. The animals were lying down, forming low, humped, motionless silhouettes; which
  should have been evidence enough in itself. Shads rarely lie down, and never in a group ...
   He made his way to a great ironwood where the ground had been swept free of needles to form a small
  clearing in its own right. But as he paused there and turned in a circle, bloated black shapes like
  windblownweeds went lumping and fluttering low along the ground into the shadows. He gasped, took a
  pace to the rear, glanced this way and that as the wind sighed and the branches soughed. And as
  Nathan's eyes focused so he saw other eyes - like tiny crimson pinpricks - reflected by the fire and
  glaring back at him from theencircling underbrush.
   One of the things, whatever they were, was hiding behind a broken table where it had been tipped on its
  side, crouching there like a vulture. Nathan stood breath lessly still, paralysed under the great tree, until
  some-
   thing made a shrill chittering sound in the surrounding darkness .. . and was answered from the other side
  ofthe circle!
   Then, as he gave a start of recognition —
   - Something dripped down and splashed against Nathan's forearm where his sleeves were rolled up, and
  looking down he saw that his arm was red; likewise the ground under his feet. And looking up... he saw
  the tree's strange ripe fruit, male all three, hanging by their heels with their throats slashed, and the last of
  their scarlet juices running down their dangling arms to dripinto space!
   A giant desmodus bat, glutted with blood, released its hold on a drained corpse and fluttered to earth.
  Too bloated to fly, the creature scuttled and flopped out of sight, joining its companions in the shadows
  ...
  
   All the demons of hell rode the wind then, shrieking mad with laughter as Nathan staggered to the fire,
  took up a brand and lit his way to Nikha Sintana's caravan. Inside, the place was a shambles, and
  outside, at the back ... Nikha lay there with his eyes staring and the halves of his chest laid back, and his
  heart ripped outof his body for a tidbit!
   Now Nathan knew he must look for the others -search for Eleni, and pray she'd run off into the woods -
  but first there was something else he must do. His blue eyes blazed with a sort of madness when he found
  oil in a large stone jar on the ground beside Nikha's caravan. Lifting it, he sniffed at the uncovered rim:
  nutoil, mainly, for cooking. But a little kneblasch, too. Little wonder they hadn't wanted it! And carrying
  the jar back to the slaughter tree, he knew how he must use it.
   There under the ironwood, the bloated black familiars of the Wamphyri - more than a dozen of them -
  had gathered once more in the cleared space to lap like
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   ghouls at the bloodsoaked earth. Keeping well back,Nathan looked at them a moment, shuddered and
  grim aced. Then without further pause he loped through theunderbrush around the perimeter of the great
  tree, delib erately slopping oil as he went; and when the circle was closed, he tossed his firebrand into the
  tinder-dryscrub.
   The fire crept slowly at first, then with a vengeance as the wind caught it, and finally roared up in a wall
  of blistering heat and yellow light. Forced back, Nathan laughed, danced, and shook his fists like a
  madman,which for the moment he was. And: 'Burn, you bastardthings, burn!' he yelled.
   Greedy tongues of fire licked at the lower branches, took hold, and spread into the whole tree. Jets of
  fire,whipped by the wind, leaped from bough to bough like demon imps, till all three trees blazed up in
  unison andthe heat was an inferno.
   Still Nathan danced, and laughed all the louder whenthe shrill chittering of the bats turned to shrieking
  anda handful tried to flee the holocaust. Singed and smok ing they rose up into view, burst into flames,
  spiralled down into the furnace under the mighty torch trees. And so they burned ...
   Later, when the wind swung south and blew a wideningswath of fire across the grasslands, Nathan's
  madnesspassed and he returned to the carts and caravans. Standing to one side of the huge trees and
  mainly away from the fire, the vehicles had been licked by the flames,blistered by them, then passed by
  and left intact. Nathan examined them thoroughly ... and found whathe found.
   Then, skirting the trio of burning, skeletal trees and the blackened scar of undergrowth, he went into the
   forest. He knew he was taking a chance, that the wind might easily change again, but he had to search.
  And searching he discovered, and laboured a while carrying what he discovered back to the cleansing
  fire. Not that these children were going to become vampires - they were mainly pieces, scraps - but it
  seemed the right thing to do. Nathan knew that Lardis Lidesci would have done it, anyway. As for
  Nikha's men where they had been bled under the tree: well, the fire had dealt with them. They were still
  
  burning where they had fallen, like slow candles slumped upon the earth. Andnow their leader, Nikha
  himself, joined them there.
   Finally Nathan must see to the women. Dragging themfrom their various places, he dealt with each in her
  turn. They had been savaged and raped - no, more than that: they'd been used hideously - then
  vampirized. The skulls of two of them were dented as by terrific blows; while the other two, including
  Eleni...
   ... Nathan could only shake his head in horror anddisbelief. There were fist-sized holes to the left of
  centre in their chests between their breasts, where someone, something, had thrust its hand into their
  bodies to nip their hearts. Not to kill them, no, but to stun them. Foreven now they were alive, or
  undead.
   There was no putting it off, not even for Eleni's sake; especially not for her sake. Lardis had shown
  Nathan how to do it, and now it was up to him. He did it - did it to Eleni, too - and only at the last felt
  someone's eyes on him. It was the sole survivor, the youth who had gone fishing in the river, now
  standing at the edge of the firelight gaunt as a ghost and vacant-eyed, withcaved-in cheeks the colour of
  chalk.
   Nathan spoke to him; the youth ignored him. He went to him, took his arm; and the other - a mere boy
  -snarled at him and bared his teeth. At that Nathan
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   stepped back a little and stared hard at him, very hard; but there wasn't a mark on him, neither bruise
  nor puncture. He'd simply been ... lucky? If living to witness this could be called luck.
   Eventually Nathan left him standing there, watchinghis world burn. And salvaging a blanket from a
  caravan, he walked out a little way into the grass at the edge of the scorching, found himself a hollow in
  the earth and went to sleep. Later, waking up, he looked back and saw the boy standing where he'd left
  him. He thought to call out, shook his head instead, left the lad to hisgrief and went back to sleep.
   Eight hours later the wind had died away; the fireswere smouldering; the ironwoods were blackened
  corpses of trees at the forest's rim. And the boy was no longer there. Nathan got up and went back to
  the burned-out place to look for him. And remembering the last time he'd come here, this time he looked
  up. Sureenough the boy was hanging there, cold and dead.
   There was no life in him - not any sort of life - but Nathan couldn't leave him for the crows. He reached
  up, took hold of his legs and added his own weight. It seemed a cruel thing to do but Nathan was
  drained of energy; there was none left for climbing, anyway. Itworked: the thin rope snapped, and the
  boy came thumping down.
   And now Nathan must build another fire ...
   In the middle of the long night, under the coldly glittering stars, Nathan wrapped himself in his blanket,
  
  headed south and walked out across the prairie. He never once looked back at the last funeral pyre
  burningbehind him.
   He took nothing with him but the blanket, the clothes he was wearing, the leather strap with a half-twist
  on
   his left wrist, by which his mother, in what now seemedanother world, a different age, had recognized
  him in the darkest of nights. Because the strap was a familiar thing - his sigil, a token of his identity? -
  Nathan had kept it through his childhood, replacing it as his wristthickened first to a boy's, then a youth's,
  finally a man's. Likewise Nestor: he, too, had kept his wrist band, the straight one, without the half-twist
  ... but he no longer featured in Nathan's thoughts, except as an echo.
   Nothing much featured in his thoughts. Just the faces of the dead: his mother, Misha, Nikha Sintana and
  his Travellers, Eleni; but all of them fading now as hismind discovered ways to obliterate them. For
  sometimes a memory - a face or scene out of the past - can be toopainful to remember. And Nathan had
  reached the stage where alJ of his past was much too painful. It was a peculiar thing, but the thought had
  come to him that a man without a past has very little on which to build a future. Which was why he now
  walked out across the grasslands into the desert: because he no longer wishedfor a future.
   When he felt tired he sat down, weary he went to sleep, hungry and thirsty he went without. And he
  knew that while weariness couldn't kill him, deprivation most certainly would: what he had been deprived
  of, and what he now deprived himself of. That was how hewanted it and how he willed it to be.
   There was no bitterness in him; he didn't feel that he was quitting; only that he had never got started and
  so had nothing to finish, except his life. And even that might not be The End. For of all living men, Nathan
  knew that death was just another beginning. And maybe then, when his body was dead, all of them who
  had gone before would talk to him at last and explainthe things which he'd never understood in life.
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   Would he be able to talk to his mother, he wondered, and to all the rest who were lost to him? And if he
  still couldn't find peace or purpose, would there be otherworlds beyond?
   The last clump of withered grass was far behind him when the stars began to fade and the first crack of
  light showed on the horizon. He made straight for it. The stony ground turned to sand under his feet as
  the sun cleared the shimmering horizon, but Nathan averted his eyes and continued to wander south.
  Soon he was warm, then hot, finally sweating. It meant nothing tohim: just another discomfort, of which
  he'd had enough. At least this would be the last.
   He came to cliffs of sandstone rising out of the desert,and at last looked back. And saw nothing but sand
  or perhaps, in the far faint distance, a dark wrinkle where blinding blue met dazzling yellow on the
  shimmering rim of the world. The barrier range? Possibly. But now Nathan had his own barrier to cross.
  And after that the greatest barrier of all...
   The sandstone cliffs were high and sheer. Nathan could not climb them so must skirt around, and so
  
  proceed towards the sun and his inevitable end. He turned east, walked a mile in the cool shade of the
  escarpment, and came to a great gash where the cliffs were split open into a gorge. Perhaps at the back
  he would find a way to climb the cliffs. He entered the gully and followed its wall half a mile to the rear,
  then in a semicircle, and finally back to the entrance but on the opposite side. He had discovered no way
  to climb the cliffs, but what did it matter? This would make asgood a place as any to die.
   He was hungry now and thirsty, more so than he had ever been in his entire life. If there had been food
  he would eat it, and if there was water he would drink it,
   naturally. But there wasn't. And no way back to Sun-side's forests now; for the sun would sear him in an
  hour, crush him to the earth in two, and shrivel him toa stick by midday. Which was all according to plan.
   Nathan stood in the shade at the foot of the cliffs in the eastern lee of the gorge and looked around. In
  the otherwise sheer face of the cliff, a narrow ledge or fault climbed diagonally a third of the way to the
  top. Shading his eyes, he saw the mouths of many caves cut into the cliff where the split in the sandstone
  petered out.Perhaps this was a natural feature carved by water two orthree or ten thousand years ago, in
  an age when the gulleywas a watercourse; or perhaps the caves had been cut by men when the desert
  was more hospitable. As for now,they could only be homes for lizards and scorpions.
   While Nathan thought these things, still they were neither curious nor even conscious thoughts; they were
  simply the activity of his human brain, which for all his traumas functioned as before. For in fact, even as
  heconsidered the origin of the precipitous caves and 'won dered' at their meaning, he couldn't really give
  a damn. After all, they made no slightest difference to his planone way or the other.
   For his plan was simply to die.
   But Nathan had grown cold in the shade and desired to die warm. Stumbling now, he came out from the
  shadow of the cliffs into the blazing heat of the sun,and stood shivering until it burned through to his
  bones. Finally he returned to the shade, wrapped himself in his blanket shroud and lay down. And with a
  stone fora pillow he went to sleep.
   With any luck he would not wake up but if he did ...hopefully it would be to a painless and terminal
  delirium.
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   Nathan dreamed of the numbers vortex. He floated in black and empty space and the vortex rushed
  upon himout of the void to sweep him away to other places. But hewas determined to stay here and die.
  He heard the voicesof his wolves calling to him out of the spinning core of the maelstrom of numbers, but
  they were too far away and thedin of clashing equations and mutating formulae was tooloud; he couldn't
  make out what they were saying. Something about Misha? About his mother? About death?
   Nathan supposed they were commiserating with him, but he didn't need that. 'I know,' he called out into
  the vortex, and hoped they would hear him and leave him alone to die. 'I know they're dead. It's all right.
  I... I'mgoing there too.'
  
   The wolf voices became impatient, frantic, angry; finally they snapped at him. But why? Did they
  consider him a deserter? Or were they angry because he refused to understand? Whichever, the numbers
  vortex had given up trying to snatch Nathan and was shaking itself to pieces, disintegrating into fractions
  which it sucked into its own core. It snapped out of existenceand left him alone, suspended in his dream.
   Or perhaps not quite alone.
   Did I hear you taJJdng to...to wolves just then? Thequestion startled Nathan. So much so that he shot up
  right in his blanket, awake!
   'What?' He looked all around in the shade of the cliffs, whose shortening shadows told him that he had
  been asleep for only an hour or so. The voice had been so real, so close, that he felt certain someone
  must be hiding behind a boulder close by. Or maybe this was that terminal delirium he had hoped for.
  And less energetically, forcing the word up from a throat dry as the desert itself: 'What?' he croaked
  again. But of course hewas talking to himself, for there was no one there.
   Oh, but there is someone here/ The 'voice' spoke againin Nathan's mind, from as close a source as
  before.Indeed, there are many someones here.
   Many someones ...? The short blond hairs at the back of Nathan's neck stood on end and his skin
  pricked up in gooseflesh. For now he 'knew' what this was, and where he must be. And of course there
  would be a great 'many someones' in that beyond world calleddeath: more than all the living in all of
  Sunside. Indeed,a Great Majority!
   Are you dead then? the voice inquired, puzzled.If so,it'sastrange thing. You don'tfeel dead. But on the
  other hand, I can't see how you can be alive. I never be/ore spolte with a living creature. We]], not since
  myown time among the ]iving.
   Nathan had meanwhile stood up: slowly, achingly, as if all the oils of his body were already dried out.
  But he felt the pain of it, the emptiness of true hunger and the desiccation of thirst. That was what would
  kill him: his thirst. But he wasn't dead yet, just delirious. He must be, surely. For he knew that the dead
  shunned him.And yet here was one who spoke to him with no slightest hint of fear or shyness. It was
  wish fulfilment, nothing more.
   For both of us, perhaps, the voice agreed.
   Nathan's throat felt raw as freshly slaughtered meat. His lips were cracked, beginning to puff up. He
  tried to speak, to say; 'What, and did you also desire to speak to the dead?' But only the first three
  words came out. It made no great difference; the thought was sufficient initself.
   Did I wish to speak to the dead? No,for 1 can do thatalready. Being oneof them, of course I speak
  to them. But to be able to speak to one of the living ... ah, thatwould be a precious gift indeed!
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   Nathan sat down on a boulder and thought: I'mdelirious/
   But I amnot, said the voice. And I don't think you are, either. And you're certainly not dead. So who are
  you?
   Nathan looked down at himself, visible, solid, unwavering. He was real. The voice in his head was the
  unreal thing. Surely it should be answering the question whoare you?
   First and foremost, I am Thyre, said the voice at once.But I see that you doubt my presence. You
  believe me tobe a figment of your own imagination.
   Nathan forced spittle down into his throat for lubrication. 'Your name is Thyre?'
   My name is a secret, to any creature who is not Thyre. My race is Thyre. I am - or was - of the desert
  folk. But you are not. I perceive now that you are Szgany, of the forest and hill folk. You can only be, for
  if you were Wamphyri, then by now the sun must have melted you away. And the trogs likewise prefer
  theirdarkness. So, what is your name?
   Again Nathan looked all around, satisfying himself that no one was playing some grotesque, macabre
  trickon him. 'I'm called Nathan,' he finally answered, speak ing more to himself than the unbodied
  presence, and thinking: how strange, to be a presence without a body!While out loud: 'Nathan Kiklu, of
  the Szgany Lidesci.'
   And you came here to die? Ah, yes, I know! For I've been listening to your thoughts for some little time.
  But when you talked to wolves, and them so far away ... then I knew I must speak to you. For even
  though youare Szgany, still you have the secret talent of the Thyre!
   A talent? Nathan wondered.
   To speak mind to mind with other creatures - telepathy!
   'Or to mumble and mutter to myself,' Nathan said outloud, nodding wryly. 'Delirium — or madness!' But
  at thesame time he knew that it was partly true. How often had he listened to the whispers of dead
  people in hisdreams, and sometimes when he was wide awake? Andwhat of the thing he used to have
  with Nestor? Or hadall of that, too, been madness?
   To which the voice answered: And am I also mad?
   'Not mad,' Nathan shook his head, 'but probably notreal, either. You're a mirage, heat haze over a tar
  pit, anhallucination. When I was a child and ate toadstools, Isaw things which weren't there. Now,
  because I'mhungry, hot and thirsty, I've started to hear things whicharen't there.'
   Wrong, said the other. For I can prove that I am. Or if not that, I can at least prove that I was.
   'You don't have to prove anything,' Nathan shook hishead. 'I only want you to go away. I have to sleep
  andnot wake up.'
   Oh, you'll do that soon enough, if you don't let mehelp you!
   Nathan was curious despite himself. 'Why shouldyou want to help me? What am I to you?'
  
   A boon! said the other at once. A miracle! A light in thedarkness of death! The chance to exchange
  thoughts,knowledge, legends, with living Thyre! That is what youare to me! There were others before
  you who spoke to dead men; they dwelled in Starside and talked to the spiritsof Szgany and trogs. They
  didn't come here and in theend never could, because by then they were Wamphyri!
   Nathan nodded. 'I've heard that: that sometimesamong the Wamphyri there would be a necromancer.'
   What? The other was aghast. No, no - not that! The ones of which 'I speak merely talked to the dead;
  theywere beloved of the dead; they didn't torture them!
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   Beloved of the dead? But hadn't Nathan heard that expression before, as used by Lardis Lidesci in
  respect of certain hell-landers he'd known? The old Lidesci had never been too explicit with regard to
  The Dweller and his father, however, and had always spoken of them in hushed tones. It was a subject
  Nathan might like to pursue, but suddenly ...
   ... His senses were spinning! He swayed dizzily, staggered, and sat down with a bump. He pictured
  himself standing under a waterfall, letting the water flow over him. It was an entirely involuntary thing: an
  instinctive longing for old, irretrievable pleasures. But it was easy to see how, under extremes of
  deprivation, a man'smind might turn to the conjuring of false comforts in his final hours. Except in
  Nathan's case, his mind seemedto have called up a personal devil to torment him!
   So that in answer to what this - this what? mental mirage? - hadjust said to him, he croakingly replied:
  'Why does the idea of the living torturing the dead shock you so? Can't you see how you've reversed the
  process, so that now the dead torture the living? But for you I would be sleeping my last sleep, dying.
  And youare keeping me from it, prolonging it, making it worse.'
   The other was horrified at Nathan's determination. What has brought you to this? The most precious
  thing any creature can have islife. And you, so young, rejectit? The abnegation of alJ earthJy
  responsibility? Best be warned, Nathan: give up your pJace among the living -go willingly to an
  unnecessary death - and you'll find no solace among the Great Majority. What extreme isthis you've been
  driven to, andwhy?
   Nathan took his head in his hands and stared at the sand between his feet, and despite himself the events
  of the recent past were mirrored in the eye of his mind,where his inquisitor saw them. So that in a little
  while:
   In the Thyre there is no urgefor vengeance. The 'voice' was quieter now. When we are hurtwe move
  away fromit, and never go back there.
   'So would I,' Nathan told him. 'If you would let me.'
   But in the Szgany (the other ignored him), there is this deep-seated needfor revenge upon an enemy.
  
  Justas there was in you. So what happened toit?
   'My vow against the Wamphyri? Perhaps I saw its futility: they are indestructible. But I am Szgany, and if
  I've allowed my vow to die within me, then I might as well follow it into oblivion. No great loss, for what
  useis a man who can't even honour his own vow?'
   Self-pity? (The shake of an incorporeal head.) And inany case, you are mistaken. What, you? No great
  Joss, did you say? But you must believe me whenI tell you that you would be the greatest loss of all.' As
  for the Wamphyri: they are not indestructible. They were destroyed, upon a time, some of them. And by
  others like yourself. And... I perceive ... that what was in those others is also in you! You thought I spoke
  of necromancy, but you were wrong. There have been - will always be - necromancers among the
  Wamphyri, that is true. But these were men who talked to the deadbefore you, Nathan! By no means
  ordinary men, no, butcertainly not necromancers! Neither are you a necromancer. But you are...a
  Necroscdpe!
   Nathan had given up answering with his voice. He didn't need to, anyway. Necroscope? I don't know
  theword.
   Neither did I! It is one of their words. As I am Thyre and you are Szgany, and the great vampire Lords
  are Wamphyri, so they were Necroscopes. And so are you. Its meaning is simple: you talk to the dead.
  And I amthe deadproof of it.
   Then why don't they talk to me in return? Nathan's
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   question seemed perfectly logical. I mean the Szgany,ofcourse.Why don't the dead of my own kind talk
  to me?
   Perhaps later there will be time to ask them, theother told him. Someof them, your people, have spoken
  to me from time to time; thoseof them who have graves at least. But you Szgany have strange ways:
  you'veburned so manyof your dead, and when they are burned it is that much harder. Harder stillif their
  ashes are scattered. Perhaps that is why your people scatter the ashesof vampires: to deny them even the
  slightestchanceof some monstrous nether-existence.
   'I suppose it is,' Nathan answered thoughtfully, reverting to the use of his physical voice again, which
  after all came more naturally to him. 'But what of the Thyrewhen they die? What is their lot?'
   We are not put down into the darknessof the earth but elevated, the other told him. Neither are we
  scattered but gathered together. Eventually we are dust, but not for long and long... He paused, and in
  the next moment suddenly gasped: Ah, you see! Proof that you are a Necroscope! You asked me a
  question whose answer is a great secret, and yet I made no complaint but merely answered you. For I
  know that you are good and would never torment me, or use the knowledge toany evil advantage.
   'What knowledge?'
  
   Ofthe last resting placesof the Thyre.
   'But you've said nothing, only that they are brought up instead of being put down. I didn't even
  understandyou.'
   You would understandif you tried to, the other insisted. You Travellers live on the surface, in the woods
  and hills of Sunside, and when you die you are put down into the earth. Or you were upon a time, until
  recently. And you would be again, if the Wamphyri
   should be driven out or destroyed. You spend your lives in the air and the light, and your deaths in the
  earth and the dark. But among the Thyre the oppositeis the case. Our lives -
   '- Are spent in the earth?' Nathan finished it for him. 'And your deaths ... where?'
   You have seen the place, the other answered, reverently. One of the places, at least. One of many such
  places.
   A picture formed in Nathan's mind, which he recognized at once. He looked up, at the stairway cut into
  the precipitous sandstone cliffs, and the gloomy mouths of caves leading off from it into unknown
  darkness. Thetombs of the Thyre?'
   Indeed, and much more than that. For this is one ofthe places where our world enters yours.
   Which was something else Nathan didn't understand. He thought back on what he knew of the desert
  folk: very little, actually. Only that they were thought of as primitive nomads who wandered at the edge of
  the furnace desert and occasionally crossed the grasslands to trade with the Szgany. It had always been
  assumed that they lived above ground, perhaps in caves or tents, but apparently ... and there he got a
  grip of himself. For without even realizing it, suddenly he had begun tobelieve.
   That I am real, an incorporeal mind? That I was real, upon a time? But didn't I say that I could prove it?
  Well, and theproof lies up there.
   Nathan was tempted, but he was also sceptical. Was this really the mind of some dead creature, or was
  it his own mind trying to provoke him into a futile attempt at saving his life? 'Are you telling me that your
  bones -your remains - are up there?'
   Yes.
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   Though it was something of an effort, and probably wasted at that, Nathan stood up again. And knowing
  that it would take a far greater effort to climb the sandstone stairs, nevertheless he made his way to the
  foot of the cliffs and looked up at the mouths of thecaves.
  
   The place is sacred, the Thyre voice sighed in his mind. Only go there and my people will know, and
  eventually come to see what you are about. In this wayyou can save yourself.
   'But if it's a sacred place,' Nathan answered, startingup the steep climb, 'surely they'll kill me?'
   The Thyre don't kill.
   Then they'll chase me away, or carry me into the desert to die.' Suddenly giddy, he closed his eyes for a
  moment and clutched at the sheer face.
   In which case you have nothing to lose, said the other, grimly, since that is why you came here. But then,
  knowing his answer had been cruel: No, they won't harm you in any way. Notif you tell them youwere
  speaking to me. Not if you speak my secret name.'
   Already a third of the way to the top, Nathan dragged one leaden foot after the next up the ancient
  stairway. The ledge was narrow and the sandstone badly weathered. One slip ... and none of this would
  matter anyway. 'But I don't know your secret name,' he said.
   It is Rogei. Ro-gay. Now you know it.
   'You have a good deal of faith in me, I can tell,' Nathan told him. 'Perhaps more than I have in myself.
  And I thank you, Rogei, for telling me your secret name. But can you also tell me why it was secret?'
   It is our way. The other offered an unbodied shrug, which Nathan sensed. In life all of the Thyre are tele
  pathic, among themselves and sometimes with the creatures of the desert, too. Yes, and very rarely we
  may
   even 'hear' one of you Szgany whose mind is similarly gifted - like you, Nathan. And very often we hear
  the great shouted thoughts of the Wamphyri! But unlike the Szgany we don't fear them, for they would
  never come into these lands which are closest to the sun. Being telepathic our minds are open, yet we
  would remain private unto ourselves. Wherefore our secret names are known only to those who are
  closest to us. This way, if a person does not know your name he won't pry. And thus we remain
  individuals. It is ourway, and that is my best explanation.
   'I think I understand,' Nathan said. 'Your secretnames protect your privacy.'
   That is correct. But...be careful/!!
   Almost at the top of his climb, Nathan's foot had slipped and he had very nearly fallen. He clutched at a
  knob of projecting sandstone, regained his balance and clasped himself to the sheer face. And even
  withoutlungs, still Rogei gave a sigh of relief:
   What, and are you trying to frighten a dead creatureout of his wits?
   Nathan shook his head, stilled his trembling, and gradually straightened up. 'No need to be... to be
  frightened on my behalf, Rogei,' he gasped, his words atortured rasp. 'Do you see what has happened? I
  stopped myself from falling. Just an hour ago I thought I wanted to die and might even have been glad to
  fall; but having spoken to you - perhaps there's some purpose to my life after all. Anyway, I no longer
  wish todie. I only hope my living will prove to be worth it.'
   For my purposes it will be, certainly! (The other was eager.) For through you - only through you,
  
  Nathan - I can talk to my children, to their children, and theirs, and know what is become of them in the
  land of the living. I will talk to all the Elders of the people, and
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   explain to them the truthof our world beyond life; they always suspected it but had no proof. Now they
  shaJJhave proof! And I can teJJ them the secrets of this place, so that when their time is come they won't
  fear it. Allthrough you, Nathan, only through you.
   Nathan had reached the place where the ledge becamehorizontal and stood in the entrance to the first
  cave. 'Secrets? In death? But ... what can there be to know?Immobile, incorporeal, doomed to
  everlasting darkness, what do the dead do in their afterlife?'
   But that is one of the secrets! His dead friend answered at once. However, since you are the
  Necroscope,I can tell you. I must, for who else can I tell? Ah, and these are things which I have longed
  to say.' Nowlisten:
   Whatever a man was, thought, and did in life, so he continues to be, think, and do in death. The
  storytellers make up new stories, which they can only ever tell to the dead. And I have heard some
  wonderful stories, Nathan! Great thinkers and philosophers - of which, in all modesty, I was one - pursue
  their thoughts andbeliefs to logical conclusions, then exchange their ideas with others of similar leanings.
  The mystics among us think the deepest, subtlest thoughts of all, and may not be disturbed where their
  minds fly out beyond the world's rim; by which I mean they are lost in their own con/ecturings. In life, I
  had a friend who fashioned leather buckets for the wells; now he designs the most wonderful machines,
  driven by the rivers of the underworld itself, to carry precious water into all the cavernsunder the desert!
   'You have purpose, then,' Nathan nodded. 'Yes, andyou achieve.'
   But of what use achievements which bring no benefits? The other drove home his point. Donlt you see?
   Through you we can pass on this secret knowledge -which is only secret because we have no way to tell
  it -to all of those we left behind! And so you, too, mayachieve and have a purpose.
   Nathan had gone a little way into the first cave. It was more a tunnel, narrow and low-ceilinged, so that
  he must bend his back. In there, it had quickly grown dark and cold. Uncertain, he paused and felt Rogei
  looking through his eyes, even as his brother Nestor had once been able to look through them, And:
  Stop! the other cautioned. This is not the Cavern of the Ancients. The entrance is the next cave but one.
  Youwill know it from its ornamentation.
   Retracing his steps, Nathan groped his way backwards out of the cave into sunlight. Almost spent, his
  thirst was a constant agony; each rasping breath he took sucked more moisture out of his throat, his
  entire body. Turning, he looked out and down at the gully'srocky floor...an error; the world seemed to
  rotate andhis head swam dangerously! He went to all fours, waited until he'd regained his balance, then
  crawled the rest of the way along the ledge to the entrance of the unmanfane.
  
   Unman? Rogei queried. Yes, there have been timeswhen we were called that by the Szgany. For they
  con sider that of all thinking creatures, they alone are the true men. Nathan sensed a shrug. But then, so
  do thetrogs! Aye, and so do the Thyre, I suppose. We all have our pride; but pride is only one thing, and
  we are alikein more ways than one. The main difference is this: thatin our becoming, we followed different
  paths.
   Nathan could no longer speak; his thoughts had to speak for themselves.1 mean no insult, he said, but
  there's no help for it. Each and every thought I think, you hear it - everything! There's nothing I can hide
  from you.
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   He sensed the other's nod of understanding. It seems unfair, I know. But I was born with my telepathy
  and practised it aJl my days, while in you it is a fledgeling thing. And as a Necroscope you are likewise a
  novice. But these are skills which may well grow in you withtime.
   Nathan snorted, perhaps bitterly. Granted, that is,that time is on my side!
   Rogei continued to sense his needs. Of food there is none. But water ... there may be a little. Except you
  must get to it.
   In here? Nathan looked at the cave's entrance, muchlarger than the others.
   Perhaps, but deep inside, a long way. And that delirium you so desired is much closer now. Rogei's
  mentalvoice despaired. I can feel the flickering of your flame.
   It would be a shame, Nathan thought wanderingly, todie now when I no longer want to! He stood up,
  leaned against the arched entrance to the cave, peered with swimming eyes at its weathered carvings.
  The bas-reliefs were almost as old as the desert and sand-blastedto obscurity, but his trembling fingers
  could followtheir still flowing contours in the stone.
   And for the first time he knew something of awe to match the sensation he had known when he stood on
  the crater rim of the Starside Gate. From out of the cave, an aura of antiquity flowed over him; from
  unsuspected deeps a cool breath of air carried a not unpleasant musk and a hint, the merest suggestion ...
  of moisture?
   Water, yes, but deep down below, Rogei said again. Beyond the Cavern of the Ancients. Come in,
  NathanKiklu, Necroscope. We welcome you.
   From some secret inner well, Nathan forced the last drop of spit down his throat, and with it croaked:
  'We?
   How many of you? And why are you the only one who has spoken to me?' Staggering out of the glaring
  sunlight into the cool shade, for a moment he was blind, but in the next he saw the walls of the tunnel
  extendingbefore him into deepening gloom.
  
   When we sensed your presence and heard your thoughts and dreams (Rogei answered, from very much
  closer now), and when we heard how you spoke to wolves so far away - which was not a dream - then
  we decided upon a spokesman. Since it seemed you were Szgany, and since in my life I occasionally had
  dealingswith the so-called Travellers, I, Rogei, was honoured.
   Nathan leaned forward until he felt he was falling. Then, mustering his feet into reluctant life, he went
  weaving, stumbling down the high, wide tunnel. Weight less, it seemed as if he floated from wall to wall.
  But for all that his body was suddenly light, he knew that in fact he was sinking, and each step threatened
  to be his last. I feel. . . that I should rest now, he thought! I feel I should rest for a very long time. Except
  now that it'stime, I'm afraid to do it.
   Then don't! Rogei's mental voice was vibrant with alarm. Take it from us, Nathan: while death is not the
  desert which living men believe it to be, life by comparison is an oasis!
   Nathan nodded deliriously. But this oasis is dryingup.
   The passage widened out, became a cave, a cavern. Nathan entered from gloom into light and fell to his
  knees in drifted dust. Lolling there, knuckles on the floor, shoulders slumped and head swaying, he knew
  that this could only be the Cavern of the Ancients, a Thyre mausoleum. And from the look of it, it was
  probably the greatest of them all.
   He craned his neck to look up.
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   Across the centre of the sandstone ceiling wall to wall, set into the yellow rock like the slit pupil of a cat's
  eye, a gash of white quartz seemed carved fromlight. The cavern was riven right across its width, which
  was huge, but the seepage of centuries had filled the gap with crystals which had hardened to stone.
  Crystalstalactites hung from the ceiling, and glowing humps of it like shining candles reached up from the
  floor. And all around its perimeter - in alcoves and niches, onshelves and ledges carved from the stone
  itself - lay the mummied ancients of the Thyre, whose socket eyesgazed back at Nathan where he
  observed them.
   And: 'Here I am,' he croaked, rolling over onto his back, surrendering to the weirdness of it all without
  further question.
   Again Rogei was anxious for him, telling him: Nathan, you may sleep, but you may not die!
   Oh? he thought back. And will you stop me again?Itmight not be so easy a second time.
   Brothers/ Rogei cried out, this time speaking to his dead companions and not to Nathan. And were we
  notright? Only feel the warmthof his thoughts? Is he not a light in the darkness? We dare not let him die.'
  Andthey knew that he was right.
  
   The massed voices of more than a hundred dead Thyre rose up in a tumult at first, and sighed like awind
  in his strange mind: Nathaaan! But they soon saw the error of that and began to speak as individuals, so
  that shortly he could distinguish them one from another:
   You must not die, Nathaaan . ..
   Rogei is riiight...
   Szgany youth, you are the light. Continue to shineforus,Nathaaan...
   You are like a bridge between worlds, Necroscope:should youfall, one world is cut off foreeever!
   On and on, so many of them ...
   Much like Nathan's own thoughts, those of the dead Thyre were warm as blankets; they wrapped him
  wherehe lay. And with their warmth surrounding him, comfort ing him, he began to drift into sleep. But
  Rogei was concerned that Nathan might possibly drift beyondsleep, and even in death the anxiety of the
  Thyre spokes man was such that it gnawed at him. He must be sure, and take whatever measures must
  be taken.
   Nathan thought he heard a groaning of antiqueleather and a clatter as of dry sticks rattling together. It
  was a curious sound, but not enough to lure him back from what might well be his last sleep. Neither was
  the hand which at the last clasped his hand. They were small and shrivelled, those fingers, cool and dry ...
  and dead. But the thoughts which accompanied them were warm, so that Nathan was not afraid, as other
  menwould, assuredly, have been.
   The final proof, NathanKiklu, Rogei whispered, his awed voice trembling with the wonder of it.A secret
  which not even I knew! And now rest, Nathan, rest.
   Aye, rest, Nathaaan, the others sighed in unison from their many niches and benches in the walls. Your
  flame is strong and will not die. But should the spark burnlow, we will be here to blow on the embers.
  And so you may sleep, Necroscope, sleep ...
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   Ill
   The Thyre were not people to desert their dead and leave them unguarded against scavengers; a fox or
  mangy dog might wander here from the grasslands, or a vulture discover the way in. But as Rogei had
  been well aware from the start, the Cavern of the Ancients was a natural sounding-chamber. Only let a
  footfall sound within - the snuffle of a beast's snout, the tearing of old leather or breaking of centuried
  bones - and itsechoes would find their way below.
   Down there, beyond a labyrinth of natural and carved passageways, caves and grottoes, the guardian of
  the place already knew there was an intruder. Nathan's rasping words, 'Here I am,' had thundered down
  to him like the shout of a giant; the slap, slap, sJap of his sandalled feet had reverberated, and ... there
  had been other sounds, more dreadful sounds. Plainly the ancients were discovered and molested.
  
   Throughout his long watch the guardian, out of respect for his ancestors, had sat in an antechamber
  within sight of the sacred cavern. He had not entered it, for even the dust was fashioned of men and thus
  holy. Towards the end of his watch, hearing the signal trill of a whistle blown far, far below, he had set
  out to meet his relief half-way. But now, before they could even come together, exchange a few words of
  greeting and pass each other by, there was this: an intruder had entered the Cavern of the Ancients.
  Worse, a human intruder, but not of the Thyre breed of humanity.
   Whistling an alarm, a shrill warning which he knew
   would be taken up by his relief and passed back into the more populated underworld, and sending a
  thought - Someone has entered the Cavernof the Ancients.' -the guardian turned on his heel and sped
  back silently the way he had come, along a well-worn path climbingthrough bedrock, limestone, finally
  into the upper sand stone. And approaching the sacred cavern, he fitted along arrow to his bow.
   All was silent now; the intruder was still; perhaps hehad heard the guardian coming and was lying in
  ambush! The guardian went cautiously, allowed timefor the huge green pupils of his eyes to shrink
  commen surate to the light in the quartz chamber, and finally entered. He stood stock still, bowstring
  drawn and arrow pointing ahead, and saw ...
   ...A man — the intruder, Szgany! - collapsed there on the floor, but not alone. For with him lay a
  harmless old mummied thing, a clutter of rags and old bones. Itwas one of the ancients. Desecration!
   The guardian crept closer and aimed his arrow directly at the young man's heart. He did not know him,
  but he knew that he should die - for what he had done to the old one, whose smallest bones lay scattered
  in a thin trail across the dusty floor. The Thyre do not kill men, but this one should die! Except ... what
  had beendone here?
   The two were together, sprawled, feet pointing away from each other, right hands touching, indeed
  clasped. One of them was very dead and had been for, oh, a long time, and the other one was not quite
  dead. But the Thyre guardian was a skilful tracker who hunted in the desert and often at night, and the
  tracks in the Cavern of the Ancients were plain for any man to see. The dust lay thick and mainly
  undisturbed, and the guardiancould not be mistaken.
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   And putting up his bow he backed off, walking slowly and in his own tracks, and returned to the
  antechamber to wait for his relief and others of the Thyre, by now alerted. And on his way out, he could
  not take his eyes off the tracks in the dust of the chamber: one set of footprints coming from the passage
  to the outside world and leading to where the Szgany youth had fallen to the floor, and the other ... was
  scarcely a trail at all. Just a few scuff marks in the dust, where something light and thin had dragged itself
  towards the fallen youth, shedding its bones as it went...
   Time to wake up.'
   Nathan heard the 'voice', so much like spoken words that he couldn't differentiate, and felt a gentle hand
  
  on his shoulder, shaking him awake. For a moment he thought it must be his mother, come to get him out
  of his bed; it had the same kind of warmth. But then, all of the voices which had tried to speak to him
  recently hadbeen like that. He remembered them very dimly, as if he had dreamed them: their careful
  probing and questioning. Only that, with nothing of any detail, except thatthey had all been warm.
   But as he stirred and mumblingly protested his awakening, and the void of his mind began to come alive
  with true memories, Nathan knew that this couldn't be Nana Kiklu's voice for she was dead. At which,
  activated by the sad thought, the cool hand at once transferred from his shoulder to his brow, where it
  smoothed away the furrows with gentle strokings.
   'And now you hear me,' the voice said - actually said it - a throaty rasp which nevertheless conveyed
  both anod and a smile. A female voice. That of a Thyre female! And all of Nathan's memories came
  flooding back atonce.
   Even as he gasped, lifted his head and opened his eyes, so the hand moved to cover them. And: 'Don't
  start so!' the husky voice chided. There's nothing harm ful here. But...it will be strange,' she warned.
   Nathan tried not to swallow and was reluctant totest his voice; but he must, for his question was instinc
  tive. 'Where am I?' Then: relief as the words came outwithout pain! His throat was moist, flexible,
  responsive. Which prompted a second question: 'How long was Iasleep?'
   'Sleep?' she said, slowly removing her hand, knowingnow that he knew she was not one of his own. 'Is
  that what it was? More like death's doorway, Nathan- and you upon the threshold! But now you are in
  the Place-Under-the-Yellow-Cliffs.'
   He looked at her ... and looked away, beyond her. Ina way the experience was shocking, in that he had
  never before seen a living female of the Thyre and had notknown what to expect, but in another it was
  less strange than when he was with his wolves. At least his nurse was - what, human? Well, not animal,
  anyway. Never a wild creature. Nathan checked himself: that was a line of thought he'd do well to avoid.
  What had Rogei toldhim: that even trogs consider themselves true men? This Thyre female was human, of
  a sort. It was just that shewasn't Szgany. Another line of thought best avoided.
   And so he looked at the Thyre female again; also at the - room? - in which he now found himself. And
  she was right: his surroundings were strange! He must givehis mind time to absorb them, and slowly.
   Seated on a stool beside his bed, the ... girl was alertand her demeanour erect, graceful, somehow regal.
  Nathan saw that standing she would be quite tall. Her youth shone out of her eyes: young eyes are
  self-apparent in all creatures; they shine and have a brilliant
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   clarity. She was also brown as the kernel of a freshly cracked nut but not at all wrinkled, and like all of
  the Thyre she was slender to the point of emaciation. The highly sensitive pupils of her large eyes were
  lemon green against a background of olive irises, and were shaded by the horny ridges of her eyebrows.
  
   She wore a red skirt and sandals, nothing else. Her small breasts were loose, pear-shaped, slightly
  pendulous; not at all 'deflated paps', which was how Nathan had heard Lardis Lidesci describe the
  breasts of trogs. Her ears were large, her mouth and chin small, her nose wide and flattened, with dark
  flaring nostrils. The odour of her body was a light musk, but she also carried apleasing scent of lemons.
   'Is there something?' she said, tilting her head a little. And Nathan was surprised to recognize the source
  of the sweet lemon smell: it was her breath. Somehow, he had not expected it to be so clean and
  refreshing. But... if she was reading his thoughts that, too, was onewhich she might easily find offensive.
   He sighed and shook his head. 'Nothing I think conies out the way it was intended,' he said. 'Each time I
  give my brain free rein it issues insults which then requireapologies. I'm sorry.'
   'But your thoughts are your own,' she told him, seemingly taken aback. 'I would not enter unless it was
  necessary. That is an unspoken rule. You, too, have thetalent. And would you come into my mind
  uninvited?'
   'Rogei said much the same thing,' Nathan answered, 'that I was gifted. He said it might grow in me. But
  right now your mind is a blank to me. When I was young I would sometimes read my brother's mind, and
  ... I havea knack with certain wolves of the wild. But Iam not a telepath.' He shook his head.
   'You will be,' she said. And then, obviously curious:
   'But this ... Rogei? Who is he? And for that matter, how do you know that the Thyre are telepathic?
  That isone secret which we have kept well. Or so we thought.'
   Nathan was cautious. It might - just might - have been delirium, all of it. But if so his feverish mind had
  forecast all of this with remarkable accuracy. And so it seemed he must accept what had taken place as
  fact: he had indeed talked to a dead creature (no, a dead 'man'), and so discovered the things he knew
  about the Thyre.He was...a Necroscope? That being the case, it seemed Rogei had supplied him with a
  real reason for living; the Thyre Ancient had not only saved his life but had given it meaning - but had also
  made it meaningJess, if he couldn't pass the knowledge on.
   'Rogei is the one who told me about your telepathy,' he finally answered, aware that she was listening
  intently and sitting up that much straighter. 'He demonstrated it to me. Except his talent is different now.
  As Rogei has suffered... a change, so has his telepathy, which in turn allows me the use of my talent. For
  wherethe Thyre mind-talk with the living, I..."
   'Yes?'
   '... What is your name?' He stalled.
   'That is a secret!'
   'Of course it is,' Nathan sighed, shrugged. 'And so are the things which you have asked me. But you've
  been my nurse and I thought that made us friends.'
   She understood his comment: faith and trust is a two-way system or it doesn't work. 'My name is Atwei-
  At-we-ay. Now then, who is Rogei?'
   Nathan took a deep breath. 'Rogei's body lies in the Cavern of the Ancients, Atwei,' he said. 'He was
  Thyre. Now he is an Ancient! And I... am a Necroscope and talk to dead people. My talent lets me talk
  
  to the deadof the Thyre.'
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   If Atwei was surprised it scarcely showed. Nodding, she answered quietly: 'There are desert folk who
  practise such an art. They are a far-away tribe, not Thyre, and do other things which are unseemly.
  Once, when they would spread into the lands of the Thyre, they made war with us; their warriors invaded
  our colonies under the earth. The Thyre trapped them there, opened floodgates and drowned them all.
  Since when they have sent no more armies against us and we no longer kill men, for the mind-cries of the
  dying are awful! Instead, they are satisfied with their lands beyond the Great Red Waste and the Last
  Mountains. They are called necromancers, after that art which they use to torture the dead for their
  secrets.'
   'Rogei the Ancient called me a Necroscope,' Nathan told her. 'He knew the word from the dead of the
  Szgany, with whom he had spoken mind to mind as you speak to the living. Upon a time, not long ago,
  the Szgany had known just such men as I am. They were not necromancers and neither am I. I've
  tortured no one, Atwei, neither the living nor the dead. But if you're not convinced, only look inside my
  head. It is that I hear the dead whispering in their graves, and on occasion they hear me. Rogei was one
  of them who heard and talked to me. He saw that I had problems andguided me to the Cavern of the
  Ancients.'
   She nodded. 'So, you are not deranged. The Thyre elders have read certain of these things in your mind.
  They could not be sure but thought you might be mad. If what you say is true, plainly you are sane and
  have a weird, unique talent. And who am I to decide if it is forgood or for evil?'
   Nathan frowned. 'It seems I remember something of that: voices which questioned me while I slept.
  About the Cavern of the Ancients and what happened there.
   Also about my past. But ... did I invite them into mymind? I don't think so. Which is strange, for as I
  recall you mentioned an unspoken rule. Also, you awakened me with a mind-call! Do you make and
  break theserules of yours so easily then, Atwei?'
   She drew back from him. 'But several strange things had happened, and there were matters which the
  eldersrequired to understand. At first it seemed you might not live. Before you could die, it was necessary
  that they look into your mind. As for myself: how could I determine your progress, without that I first
  inquirewithin?'
   He nodded but this time made no apology. 'And didthey get what they wanted, the elders?'
   'Not everything. Your mind is closed to the past, locking out all of the pain which lurks there. There is a
  great deal of pain in you.'
   'I no longer feel it.'
   'Because it is locked out - or in! This is not a physical thing, Nathan.'
  
   He changed the subject. 'What will become of me?'
   'That is for the elders.'
   'Then you should call them, or take me to them.'
   'I have called them and they will come, soon. Beforethen you should eat. Will you eat with me?' She
  seemedeager now to make up for any possible misunderstandings. And after all, she had told him her
  name.
   'Here?'
   'Oh, yes. For it will be a while before you can get up.A long day has passed, and a night. Up above, the
  sunis freshly risen. And all while you have lain here.'
   An entire cycle! Nathan thought, easing his bones alittle and stretching in his bed. But he wasn't
  surprised: it felt at least that and more. And Atwei was right: hewas hungry. Til gladly eat with you,' he
  told her.
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   'Food has been prepared,' Atwei nodded, stood up, backed away and out through an archway. 'I shall
  return.' Left alone, he studied his surroundings.
   The place where Nathan lay was a cave. Despite its rudimentary furniture, whitewashed walls, and crude
  mosaic floor of white and green flagstones, which gave it something of a room's appearance and made it
  habitable, it was still a cave. Central in the high ceiling, anirregular shaft three feet in diameter and
  possibly artificial ascended out of sight. But in an apparently subterra nean room without windows, the
  most surprising features were the light and the warmth.
   Down through the shaft in the ceiling streamed a beam of light, catching drifting dust motes in its ray in
  exactly the same way as sunlight coming into a barn through a gapped roof. Not solid sunlight, no, but
  light diffused and scattered, so that it emerged into the room almost as a haze. And falling onto a table
  near the foot of Nathan's crude wooden bed, the beam or shaft of soft yellow light struck against
  polished mirrors of goldto further permeate the room.
   While Rogei had caused Nathan to believe that the Thyre colonies went deep indeed, as yet he had no
  idea how far he'd actually been carried underground. With sunlight like this to warm and light the place,
  however, he was sure it couldn't be far. Perhaps there were passageways leading from the Cavern of the
  Ancients to caves in the foot of the cliffs. In that case the shaft oflight was nothing more than sunlight
  penetrating through some ancient chimney, and the warmth wasresidual of the desert.
   Wrong! said a voice in his head, one which he recognized at once as Rogei's. The
  Place-Under-the-Yellow-Cliffs isvery deep, Nathan. But the temperature in the Thyre colonies is a
  
  constant. It is a natural thing and a
   great many of the caves under the desert are like this.Why would we dwell in the cold places, or for that
  matter the hot ones, when so many temperate labyrinthsystems exist for our habitation?
   Used to this thing now, Nathan sat up in his bed. Hesaw that under his quilt of furs he was naked. His
  clothes, washed and mended, lay folded on a shelf atone side of the room. Now, with some effort -
  leaving his bed and dressing himself on the one hand, and onthe other concentrating upon Rogei - he said:
  'Well, itappears you were right. I was rescued from the Cavernof the Ancients and brought here. And
  now the eldersare coming to question me.'
   Like me, Rogei answered, they've waited patiently foryou to wake up. But you must be careful how you
  answer their questions. They demand respect, elders,and until you prove otherwise they will doubtless
  accuse you of desecration. Merely to enter a forbidden place is bad enough; and as for the rest of it...
  Nathansensed the other's shrug.
   The rest of what?' He was mystified. 'You welcomedme in and I entered; I could go no further and
  collapsed;I spoke to the old ones dead in their niches and upontheir shelves. Then, at the end, I dreamed
  you came tome and comforted me.'
   And touched you? Took your hand in mine?
   'Yes.'
   No dream that, Nathan.
   'I don't understand.'
   Probably as well, for the time being. Anyway, all isback to rights now.
   Nathan frowned but didn't press him; there were toomany other things he wanted to know. For example:
  'Ifthis place is so deep underground, where does the lightcome from?'
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   From thesurface.
   'The shaft falls straight? Like a well? In that case the sun would have to stand directly overhead, which it
  never does.'
   7 doubt that the shaftfalls straight, Rogei answered.No, for the cracks of the earth are like a maze. But
  someofthese mazy cracks have mirrors at every junction!
   'Mirrors?'
  
   Where the bedrock breaks through the desert sand, Rogei patiently explained, there, in certain protected
  places, the Thyre tend and polish their mirrors. The sunlightfalls upon them and is deflected into the
  earth'spotholes and passageways. Passed from mirror tomirror, it descends into the dark places under
  the desert. Thus the Thyre bring a little light into their colonies.
   Nathan nodded. 'Else you'd all be blind down here.'
   No, for our eyes are like trog or Wamphyri eyes...orperhaps not like the letter's, for the night is their
  element. But given even a little light, the Thyre see well enough. It isjust that the light is a special comfort.
  Down there in the hollow earth, it is treasured.
   Nathan would ask next about the Thyre talent fortongues. Apart from some small initial hesitation,
  Atwei's conversation had been in perfectly good Szgany.He knew of course that the Thyre traded with
  Travellers from time to time, but would find it astonishing if theyshared the same native tongue.
   Seeing the question coming, however, and perhaps far too many more of them, Rogei cried: Wait!
  Enough of these questions for now, Nathan. There are more important matters. First we must talk about
  the Thyreelders . . .
   But before he could continue, Atwei returned with a yoke round her slender neck from which depended
  a pair ofthin silver trays laden with small wooden bowls
   of various edibles. And looking at the bowls as she transferred them from the trays to the table, Nathan
  found his mouth watering. For the first time in a very long time he knew which matters were most
  importantto him. Most immediately important, anyway.
   Seated on tiny stools on opposite sides of the table and between the mirrors, Nathan and Atwei ate.
  Therein the shaft of diffused sunlight, she looked more golden than brown, and he noticed how her pupils
  shrank tomatch the light's greater intensity.
   The foodstuffs were fascinating, even exotic. Nathan had never imagined that these 'primitive' desert folk
  enjoyed such variety. Insisting that the food was for him, Atwei took only a little; she was simply keeping
  him company while he ate. And at that Nathan feltprivileged. He rightly supposed himself to be the first of
  the Szgany to ever learn of such things. Certainly hewas the first to ever taste them.
   There were walnuts marinaded in vegetable oils,yellow bladder-roots with a bittersweet taste which
  stung the mouth as the vegetable was crushed, fried slivers of meat in aromatic sauces, several varieties of
  mushroom, and small, eyeless fishes baked whole. Vari ous fruits followed: tangy cactus apples, figs and
  round ripe lemons, a bunch of small grey grapes. Everything was delicious, but Nathan had found a sort
  of small sausage especially succulent and asked Atwei what itwas made of. That was a mistake.
   'Grubs of the earth,' she answered.
   And after a pause: 'Worms?' He cocked his head alittle, inquiringly.
   'Of a sort. We breed them . ..'
   The meal was at an end.
   They cleaned their hands in tiny fingerbowls, following which Atwei closed her eyes, placed the fingertips
  
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   of her left hand upon her brow, and sat still for amoment. Then she smiled and asked: 'Did you enjoy?'
   'Greatly. I thank you.'
   Again she smiled. 'And I have thanked Him,' shesaid.
   'Him?'
   'Whoever listens.'
   'Do you believe there is some One?'
   'Don't you?'
   'Many of our beliefs died in the day of the white sun,'he quoted Szgany 'history', of which there was little
  enough. 'Men had writing, numbers, science, and some believed in a god. Very little of science survived,
  and almost nothing of religion. In the close vicinity of the Wamphyri, it's hard for men to have faith in a
  merciful god! Now when the Szgany pray or give thanks, theyoffer them to their stars, which are remote
  even beyondthe influence of the vampires.'
   Then if I were you, Rogei said in his mind, Iwould seek out my guardian star right now! Nathan, I have
  kept apart outof common decency; the Thyre requireprivacy for eating; Atwei has honoured yougreatly.
  Butfinally the time has come when we musttalk about theelders!
   'Very well,' he answered.
   'Your pardon?' Atwei lifted an eyebrow.
   'I was talking to Rogei,' he told her.
   Her eyebrows went up higher yet, worriedly. 'Youshould not have got up and dressed yourself. I told
  you that you must wait, until you had your strength back.You were delirious for a long time and ... you
  could beagain!'
   Nathan sighed and shook his head. 'I'm a little weak,'he said, 'that's all.' But then he had an idea. 'Atwei,
  listen to me: could you be delirious, too?'
   'I? Now? Of course not!'
   'Good! Now tell me if I'm correct: while I am limitedin my ability to read minds, you are not. Right?'
   'Ifa mind is telepathic, I can read it,' she said, frowning. 'Also, I can partially block another mind trying to
  
  read mine. These things come with practice. As yet,your talent is undeveloped. But your mind has the
  capacity.'
   'I was wondering,' he said, 'if you could talk to Rogei through me? If you were to enter my mind right
  now,would you be able to overhear our conversation?'
   'Eavesdrop on an Ancient?' She sat up straighter, looked more worried yet. 'Even an elder would think
  twice!'
   'You believe me, then?'
   'We are friends,' Atwei hesitated a little, 'you said it yourself. It takes two to build a friendship. If one lies
  it may be broken and have no value. This is proven; not only among the Thyre but also the Szgany, I
  think? And so I must believe you - at least until you are aproven liar.'
   Rogei sighed in Nathan's mind. Very well, try your experiment. Get it over with. Actually, it has merit. It
  will save a lot of time if it works.
   There,' Nathan spoke to Atwei. 'He has nothing against it. And you needn't fear him for after all he's
  Thyre, one of your own. Also, Rogei's a dead creatureand harmless.'
   A dead 'man', Nathan, Rogei reminded. And notall dead things are harmless, believe me! Well, will she
  orwon't she?
   'Will you or won't you?' Nathan repeated him.
   'If you wish it,' she said. She came round the table and hemade to stand up. 'No, remain seated, and ...
  talk to thisRogei.' She placed a small, trembling hand on his brow.
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   Atwei, 1 am Rogeithe Ancient, once Rogei the elder.His mental voice was suddenly stern.
   She snatched back her hand and placed it on her breast. Nathan got to his feet. 'You heard him?'
   Her mouth had fallen slightly open. She closed it, shook her head and said, 'No ... but I felt something. A
  presence!'
   An echo, said Rogei. Atwei sensed the merest trace, the smallest ghostof me, amplifiedby your mind. It
  doesn't work, and I didn't think it would. You are theNecroscope, Nathan. Such talents are not
  commonplace.
   Soft, padding footsteps sounded from outside the room. Atwei backed shakily away, turned and went to
  meet the elders. Rogei read Nathan's concern and said, Well, too late /or that now. We must deal with it
  as itcomes. More ways than one to strip a cactus.
  
   The elders entered.
   There were five of them, not all 'old' by any means and certainly not decrepit. Nathan calculated their
  ages on what he knew of the elderly among his own people. The youngest of the five was possibly
  forty-five, while the oldest would be well into his seventies. Revise your estimates upwards by at least
  fifteen years, Rogei told him. The Thyre are long-lived. Since each colony has only jive elders, a man
  cannot even aspire to become one until he is at least sixty.
   Nathan looked openly, respectfully, at each of the elders in turn. The youngest of them was spindly and
  quite bald, but as yet largely unwrinkled. His eyes were somewhat smaller than those of his companions;
  their pupils were grey, dartingly alert and (Nathan felt sure) more than a little suspicious. Three of the
  remaining four were quite simply Thyre; dressed in knee-length, pleated, belted yellow skirts, apart from
  the difference in their ages there was nothing to distinguish one from
   the next. The final member of the group was the one anomaly: bearing a torque of gold around his neck,
  he was heavily wrinkled, bent, and wore flowing white hair to his shoulders. His eyes were huge, moist,
  and uniformly yellow as the gold of his torque. He was at aglance the Elder of elders.
   They peered at Nathan obliquely, blinkingly as they gathered to the table and their eyes adjusted to the
  extra light. Each carried a small stool, which they placedin a semicircle to enclose him. Then,
  straightening, theystood facing him.
   Atwei, standing behind them, said, 'Nathan, please sit.' And as he sat down, so did they. And without
  pause the interview and question session got underway.
   'We shall dispense with formalities,' said the youngest of the five in a high-pitched, superior tone. 'You
  are after all Szgany and cannot know the ways of theThyre.'
   Excellent.' said Rogei. This spokesman thinks heknows it all, a common /ailing among the young. So you
  must prove him wrong. Bow your head twice to him,then three times - but more slowly - to the Elder.
   Nathan did as Rogei instructed and the Thyre, includingAtwei, sat up straighter. Then the five turned
  their headsto look at her, until she huskily protested, 'No, I have notinstructed him!' In this way, and
  without saying a word,Nathan had their attention. But more than that, he hadapparently earned himself
  the enmity of their spokesman.
   'So,' said that one, frowning, 'your telepathy is not as embryonic as we thought, for patently you stole
  this greeting from my mind. What is more, I failed to detect the theft! Yet in your fever these unseemly
  skills of yours were not obvious, which tends to showa naturally deceptive turn of mind.'
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   Rogei was quick off the mark. Point out how a man, even an elder, who jumps to concJusions to prove
  anelusive point may well deceive himself/
  
   Nathan did so, and added: 'One who investigates the mind of another while he is feverish risks
  discoveringphantoms.'
   At which point the Elder himself took over. In a voicewhich creaked like the branch of an old tree in the
  wind, he asked: 'And how many of these phantoms arethere in your mind, Nathan of the Szgany?'
   Agreat many, Rogei whispered in his inner ear, speaking now as Nathan himself. Someof them are the
  ghostsof my past,which are mine alone to reveal or hold at bay as I see jit. But there are also the voicesof
  anhundred Ancientsof the Thyre, who would gladly speak through me to prove my innocence -if the
  Elder ofelders so desires.
   Nathan repeated it.
   'That is a blasphemy!' the spokesman made to stand up, but the Elder took his arm and held him down.
  The spokesman glanced at the venerable one and frowned,saying, 'But plainly he is a necromancer! He
  entered the Cavern of the Ancients in order to molest and tortureour dead for their secrets!'
   'Ifso,' the Elder nodded, patiently, 'the more we lethim speak the more his words will condemn him. So
  far he is correct in one respect at least: namely that some are too quick to jump to conclusions! Let him
  say on.'And again he turned his great soft eyes on Nathan.
   Tell them your story in brief, said Rogei, while I spyon them through your eyes.
   Nathan complied. The Wamphyri have returned to Starside where they inhabit the last aerie. They
  raidedSettlement, my home in the west of Sunside. During the raid, my mother and .. . and a Szgany girl
  were stolen
   and my brother went missing. Searching for him, I followed his trail east where I met a band of
  Travellers and determined to join them. But first I had to try one last time to find my brother. Finally,
  learning that he was dead, I tracked my Traveller friends to their camp at the edge of the grasslands and
  discovered that theywere —' He paused and shook his head. '- They were no more. The Wamphyri ...'
  He hung his head for a moment to drive out the memories of these very realphantoms, then looked up.
   'I had nothing left in the world, and no longer wishedto live. But remembering how I sometimes overhear
  the dead whispering in their graves - a strange gift, I know, and one which I had kept hidden - I thought
  that I might join them in death. Perhaps then I would be able to talk to my mother again, to my brother,
  my girl. Wandering beneath the stars, I crossed the grasslands into the desert, where sunup found me at
  the foot ofsandstone cliffs. There I decided to die.
   'But as I lay down to sleep I heard the voice of a man,an Ancient of the Thyre, who called himself Rogei.
  He told me certain things, led me to the Cavern of the Ancients. By then I was weak and fell
  unconscious. Iwoke up and was here. And now I'm accused of desecration and blasphemy.1
   The elder spokesman was angry again. 'Despite that Rogei is a revered name among the Thyre, it is not
  uncommon. There is more than one Rogei in the Cavern of the Elders, as this Szgany necromancer
  guessed there would be. He must have learned the name from ourtraders, and remembered it to put to
  evil use.'
   'How so?' The Elder looked at him. 'Who among the Thyre would reveal his secret name to a Szgany
  youth met briefly at the trading? For what good purpose? No,I think not.' He shook his head. 'Also, if it
  
  were so, does
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   it mean you have changed your accusation? If so, then what is this man's crime? Is he a vile necromancer
  ormerely a clever liar?'
   The other pursed his lips. 'I say we should speak in our own tongue,' he said sharply. 'He listens; he is
  intelligent; he is a talented deceiver!'
   'I say again: you deceive yourself,' Rogei promptedNathan into speech. 'I can prove what I've said.'
   Then do so,' the spokesman snapped, 'and so condemn yourself!'
   I do believe I know this one, Rogei spoke to Nathan.Yes, and also the Elder. Even under the trappings
  of hisgreat age, still I know him. But the Spokesman: he has the looks and mannerismsof my own son.
  Why, it could be that he is my grandson! It would explain his vehemence, which is rare among the Thyre.
  Don't you see? He believes you interfered with the remainsof hisgrandfather'.
   'But I didn't!' Nathan burst out - and the Thyre eldersdrew back a little on their stools, staring at him
  curiously.
   No, but I did touch you.' No dream, Nathan. You arethe Necroscope which I named you, belovedof
  the dead.In the Cavernof the Ancients, when I thought you wereabout to die,I was - moved - to come
  to you! And risingup,I was beside you, tocomfort you in your fever!
   'You ... came to me?' Nathan wasn't able to holdback from blurting it out loud. 'But you're a dead man!'
   'Hah! He speaks nonsense!' The spokesman sneered,and went on to add some choice invectives in the
  Thyretongue. But the Elder had read something in Nathan'sstrange eyes, causing him to caution his chief
  accuser:
   'No, make yourself understood to him also. For if wedesire to bring charges, he must have the benefit of
  thedoubt.'
   Rogei came to Nathan's rescue, telling him what to say and how he must say it. And looking at the Thyre
  spokesman he repeated Rogei word for word, faithfully, only leaving out his acid sarcasm. 'Ah, but your
  grandfather recognizes you at last, Pe-tey-is!' he said, gazing directly into the spokesman's eyes and
  nodding slowly. 'Petals, son of Ekhou and grandson of Rogei the Ancient, born in that same hour that
  your grandfather took to his sickbed. But before he died he saw you in your mother's arms and was
  proud of you, just as he isproud now to see that you're an elder! Rogei knows you not only from your
  premature loss of hair, familiar features and bearing in general - which is to say, moulded in an almost
  exact likeness of your father, his son - but also from your abrupt mannerisms and the heat of your
  argument. As Ekhou was ever the fiery one, so are you!'
  
   Petais's mouth had fallen open. He couldn't speak and so gurgled a little, his eyes bulging. Under Rogei's
  expert guidance, Nathan gave him no time to recover but carried on. 'Now tell your grandsire, do you
  accept that these are his words? I hope so, for if not we must summon Ekhou your father and Amlya
  your mother, who will know me better. I know that they are not dead, for if they were I would have
  spoken to them inthe Cavern of the Ancients!'
   Petais shook his head wildly, stood up, sat down again. He was still lost for words. But the Elder of
  elders was not. 'Who is it speaks, you or Rogei?'
   'A little of both,' Nathan answered. 'I repeat hiswords, faithfully if I can.'
   The Elder nodded, reached out a trembling hand to touch Nathan's arm. 'I perceive that it is true,' he
  said, his eyes rapt on him and unblinking. 'Plainly a greatwonder has come among us!'
   Petais groaned and said, 'Still we must be sure!'
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   'I am sure,' the Elder answered him. 'You do not remember, Petals - of course not, for you were a child
  newborn - but I too was there when your mother tookyou before the dying Rogei, and indeed he was
  proud of you. I know, for I was Rogei's nephew, the son of hisbrother!'
   Nodding, Petais seemed to sag a little. 'What must bemust be. But it had to be decided, one way or the
  other.'
   I was right, Nathan, Rogei sighed. The Elder is mynephew, Oltae!
   Even as he spoke his ethereal words, the one he had named turned from Petais to Nathan. 'I know you
  will understand that Petais is correct,' the Elder said. 'Wehad to be sure. Even now, we must be sure.'
   Test me however you will, Oltae,' Nathan told him.
   The Elder gasped, gave a small start, and his hand tightened on Nathan's arm. 'That is my name, aye,' he
  nodded. 'And I know you did not steal it from my mind, for I have built a wall there which is
  impenetrable!Wherefore, one final test, and I shall be satisfied.'
   Rogei prompted Nathan to say: 'Now I speak as Rogei.Let me guess this test, nephew. Has it to do with
  your examination for a place among The Five? You were a young man then, as Petais is now, but I
  remember your examination well for I was your examiner! I had many questions for you, but your answer
  to one of them wonexceptional marks! Do you remember it, Oltae?'
   'I do indeed,' the Elder whispered.
   'And I asked,' Rogei spoke through Nathan, '"Whenwill we know if The One Who Listens exists?" And
  youanswered —'
  
   '- My answer was this,' Oltae the Elder cut him short.' "We shall know that He exists when finally He
  speaks,which will not be until we are better capable of knowing and understanding Him.'" And as he
  gazed deep into
   Nathan's eyes, for a moment Oltae thought he saw animage of Rogei looking back at him, smiling. But as
  theNecroscope blinked, it was gone.
   The Elder sighed, nodded in his fashion, and creaked to his feet; likewise his four colleagues. But before
  theyleft, Oltae said to Nathan (also to Rogei): 'It is my thought that today, perhaps we are one step closer
  tounderstanding Him!'
   And then to Nathan alone: 'Rest, get back your strength. We shall talk again ...'
   In the long days which followed - days which would each have been as long as a 'week' in the time-scale
  of Nathan's unknown hell-lander father - he learned a great many things and did a great deal of 'teaching'.
  The Thyre called it teaching, anyway, though to Nathan it seemed he merely passed on the messages of
  theAncients. But certainly the previously irretrievable knowledge of the dead was of enormous advantage
  tothe living.
   Long sessions were spent with The Five in the Cavernof the Ancients, where Nathan's talent as a
  Necroscope was proved beyond any further doubt; and as the livingof the Thyre warmed to him, so did
  the Ancients them selves. And just as Harry Keogh had been a lone, bravely flickering candle to the dead
  of a far distantworld, so now his son became a light in the darkness ofthe Thyre beyond.
   Much like the Szgany, the Thyre had very little of true writing; rather than words, they used a system of
  complicated glyphs to illustrate whole ideas, so that a lot of the detail was inevitably lost. Most of their
  'history' had come down to them in this way, and in the form of myths and legends passed mouth to
  mouth (or mind to mind), from generation to generation; out of
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   which had sprung their art-form of storytelling. Foremost amongst makers of Thyre romance had been
  one Jhakae, dead for more than two hundred and eighty years. Now, through Nathan, Jhakae could
  relate all of his best stories, created for a limited audience of dead Ancients, and know that they would
  be passed down tothousands of the living.
   Nathan relayed tale after tale, each of them furiously scribbled down and recorded as best as possible in
  the Thyre glyphs: the Story of the Fox and the Kite, the Fable of the Gourd and the Granule, the Taleof
  Tiphue and the Dust-Devil. Twenty of them, then thirty, finallyforty, and all jewels of Thyre fantasy. But
  Jhakae's latest and greatest tale, as yet unfinished, would be that of the Szgany Youth in the Cavern of
  the Ancients: aParable. And so Nathan was honoured.
   In everything Nathan transcribed from death into life,and vice versa, he had the invaluable advice and
  assistance of Rogei. But such was the body of information to be passed on, the enormous bulk of
  
  questions from both sides, that priorities must be decided, time apportioned, and the practical take
  precedence over theoretical, philosophical, and theological subjects. Within the comparatively narrow
  confines of Thyre existence, allsuch subjects were limited forms anyway; far more im portant and
  immediately applicable were ideas and devices such as Shaeken's 'Water Ram', his 'HydraulicHoist' and
  'Wheel of Irrigation'.
   Shaeken was that Ancient whose name Rogei had mentioned at their first meeting, who once designed
  leather buckets for the drawing of water from the wells. Pursuing his obsession in death as in life,
  Shaeken had proceeded to far greater things; but even without the benefit of his genius, Nathan might
  have brought the principle of the water wheel to the Thyre. Desert folk,
   they had never journeyed beyond the grasslands to suchtownships as Twin Fords, and had not seen how
  theSzgany used the raw energies of the river to assist themin their work.
   But they were the Thyre; the better Nathan knewthem the more he understood their pride; making noth
  ing of his own (in any case limited) knowledge, he spent long hours with a graphite stylus and the skinsof
  lizards stretched on frames, creating meticulous sketches of machines direct from Shaeken's mind. And
  joiners of wood and other artisans pored breathlessly over each drawing as it was completed, so that as
  his work progressed the principles were grasped and thefirst models began to be carved.
   There were times when Nathan grew tired but he made no complaint. His life had purpose; his mind was
  so occupied as to hold at bay all the mourning andmiseries of his past; he had a deal more of respect
  from his new friends than his own had ever shown him. He was satisfied, or believed he was satisfied, for
  a while at least...
   He was pleased to perform personal favours. Rogei felt compelled to discover the fortunes of various
  kithand kin; Nathan stood in his debt and so made inquiries on his behalf; Rogei was enabled to 'speak'
  with those who were here, still alive. Others however had moved away, to far colonies beyond the range
  of Thyre dead-speak. For just like the telepathy of the living, that of the dead had its limitations, too.
  Many of the ones Rogei sought were dead in distant places, beyond hisreach.
   Meanwhile Nathan's fame had spread abroad; Thyrefrom other colonies began to arrive at the
  Place-Under-the-Yellow-Cliffs, all bearing invitations from theirelders. Invariably they would seek
  audience with
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   Nathan and let it be known that he would always find a welcome should he ever decide to visit. He
  promised Rogei that if ever he accepted such an invitation, he'd be sure to seek out his old friend's
  relatives en route,wherever his travels took him.
   But in the interim he worked ...
   With the exception of trivial items vetted out by Rogei, first Nathan satisfied all the personal queries of
  the dead in the Cavern of the Ancients, and of thecolony's living alike, before setting to with a will. Then:
  
   He made known all of the gourmet Arxei's myriad secret recipes, which that one had never revealed in
  life; he delivered a formula of preservation from the mirror-polisher Annais, a vegetable varnish to protect
  the Thyremirrors and keep them from tarnishing; he gave voice to the gardener Tharkel's conclusions on
  bees, pollination, and the keeping of hives. In life Tharkel had made an oasis with his own hands, which
  had failed only through the lack of an adequate water supply; sincewhen he'd planned bigger and better
  ones. Now, with the advent of Shaeken's Hydraulic Hoist, they could be real!
   Nathan did all of these things, and as the work gradually slackened off even found time for a little local
  travelling and studying among the Thyre. And since theelders did not consider it fitting that a person of
  Nathan's importance should concern himself with thebasic requirements of life, Atwei became his aide
  among the living just as Rogei was his spokesman among the dead. Dealing with all mundane matters, she
  left Nathan free to explore the possibilities of his unique talent.
   In fact he was given too much freedom and failed to use it to his best advantage. For as the furious pace
  of his life slackened, so he allowed a host of dreams and memories of past, unbearable things to creep
  back in to plague him. He dreamed of Canker Canison's barking
   laugh as the loping dog-thing carried Misha away to thehorror of some unthinkable future; and of his
  mother, a flame-eyed thrall in the service of a hideous vampire Lord; and of Nestor rotting in the river, a
  thing ofweeds and sloughing grey flesh, dissolving into the mud. Nightmares such as these invariably
  brought Nathan gibbering awake, and Atwei would come running tocomfort him . ..
   In black bowels of earth beneath the colony, where even the fishermen of the Thyre must cast their nets
  by flaring torchlight, Atwei showed Nathan a section of the Great Dark River and explained as best she
  could its source and destination.
   'As Sunside's rains roll down off the barrier mountains,' she said, her husky whisper echoing into the
  darkness and back from unknown places, 'and as storm- clouds burst less frequently over the furnace
  desert itself, so great bodies of water find their way underground. Many major tributaries may be found
  in the west, and others to the east, between the desert and the mountains. And so the Great Dark River
  under theearth is the sump of the world!
   The hard bedrock of the underworld is tilted eastwards; likewise, naturally, the course of the river.
  Wherethe rocks are softest, the rain of centuries has formed many cavern systems. Of these, the safest
  and most suitable have become Thyre colonies. The underworld is as important to the Thyre as your
  forests are to you Szgany. Temperate, it provides shade from the sun in the heat of the long day, and is a
  refuge from the bitter chill of desert nights. We could not live without it, orwithout the river which is its
  dark lifeblood.
   'During its life the river has carved wide ledges in the rock. Of these, the driest and safest are used as
  paths
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   along which we may follow the water's course where it rushes through dark gullies. In parts the river is
  navigable over long miles, forming vast sunless lakes wherethe blind fishes swim; but in other places the
  way istighter and the water roars furiously!
   'As for its length: the river parallels the barrier mountains; it passes under the Great Red Waste, and
  meanders past a range of lesser mountains where dwellpeople much like yourself...or perhaps unlike
  yourself, for they give of their young to the Wamphyri. And so the river flows into the unknown. Some
  say it journeys to a sea far in the east, beyond the caverns of thenecromancers; but this is rumour,
  because no one of theThyre has ever been there.'
   Nathan listened attentively to Atwei; he looked at theledges carved by the river in the canyon walls of
  the channel through ages immemorial, at the blackly gurgling water flowing swiftly by, and the catches of
  the fishermen wriggling in their nets. And at one and the same time the river both repulsed and fascinated
  him.Merely to think of its sheer length was an awe-inspiring exercise in itself: more than three thousand
  miles ofsubterranean waterways, if Atwei was right, and Nathan was sure that she was. Why, Sunside's
  riverswere streams by comparison; the Great Dark River covered more miles than Nathan had seen in his
  entire life!
   And yet it wasn't so much the river's size as its course which most affected Nathan's imagination: acourse
  that followed the mountains east into that region beyond the Great Red Waste where the Wamphyri held
  sway, out of which they had returned into Starside. And as the river was a road to the Thyre, which they
  might follow on foot and by boat, colony to colony forall its many leagues, so might Nathan follow it...
   Sunups came and went; Nathan's work in the Cavern of the Ancients neared completion; he told The
  Five that he planned to move on, and they swore him to secrecy. He promised that whatever the future
  held, he would never tell his brothers in the outside world what he had learned of the Thyre and their
  ways.
   In the meantime his nightmares had got no better; if anything they were worse. Over and over Nathan
  livedthrough the hell of that night and morning in Settlement, the time of the Wamphyri raid. Also, he was
  aware of time fleeting by, and wondered how Lardis and the Szgany Lidesci fared now. Often in the
  Cavern of the Ancients he would sense his wolves trying to contact him. But they were distant and he
  was shielded by massive walls of rock; and anyway, what would they have to say except - it seemed
  likely - things he did not wish to hear? For by now, surely the Wamphyri weremighty again, a plague
  throughout all of Sunside.
   Once (for once on his own), he fell asleep in the Cavern of the Ancients and dreamed that the numbers
  vortex waited for him. That mighty, bottomless whirlpool of figures tugged at him insistently; he felt that if
  only he knew the meaning of all of these rapidly mutating symbols . .. they could open up whole new
  worlds to him. Any world would be better than the one he'd left behind, providing that it let him live
  among his own kind. And again he felt like a traitor who had turnedtail and fled from his enemies, his
  friends, even from himself.
   And now he must flee again, put greater distance between himself and the past, go searching for some
  shadowy fulfilment just around the corner of to morrow ...
   In the Cavern of the Ancients he said his farewells. The dead were silent for a while. They would miss
  him.
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   But...he might return, one day? He couldn't say fordefinite, but possibly. Well, they had had their fair
  share of him, and the dead of other places were eager tomeet him.
   Nathan spoke to Shaeken. Working so much together,they had developed firm bonds, a warm
  friendship andunderstanding. And: 'In time, your works will be ablessing to the Thyre,' he told the great
  engineer.
   They were nothing without you, Nathan, the otherwas flattered. But in a moment, and much more seri
  ously: Nathan, these numbers which plague your dreams .. .
   'Oh? You've been spying on me?' Nathan knew itwasn't so.
   Hardly that! We can't help it. After all, you are theNecroscope. But the numbers: I've seen them, it's
  true.And as you know I have a small understandingof numbers.
   'You understood the vortex?'
   He sensed the shake of a head. Did I understand it? No. Was I afraid ofit? Yes: even as a child fears the
  lightning! By comparison, my own calculations are ant tracks in the sand - quickly blown away - while
  yours are alive and work towards an end. Andjust as your deadspeak is unique among the living, so is
  the vortex yours alone. It is a part of you, Nathan! I'm no philosopher; my thoughts are shallow,
  mechanical things; butI sense that if one day you should fathom it, then you will be that much closer to
  your destiny. In Open-to-the-Sky there was upon a time an elder who was a mathematician. He is dead
  now, but what is that for a barrier? Perhaps you should seek him out.
   'Maybe I will.' Nathan was grateful.
   Finally he spoke to the one who would miss him themost, Rogei, and discovered himself incapable of
  even a
   small white deception. This will be my last visit to the Cavern before I leave,' he told him. 'And I don't
  thinkI'll be back.'
   I know it, the other answered, trying to make light of it. Only think of me now and then; reach out with
  your mind and . . . who knows? I might be there. But if youcan't speak to me, try speaking to Him Who
  Listens, for I feel sure He would listen to you. As for what Shaeken told you: will you seek out this
  mathematician? I think you must, for I am a philosopher and believe a manshould follow his destiny.
   Til probably seek him out,' Nathan nodded.
   Also, Rogei said, there is that which you shouldknow. In your time here you've proved yourself a friend,
  to both living and dead alike, and I have tried to be the same to you. I have spoken to the dead of the
  Szgany on your behalf, to tell them what an opportunity theyhave missed. Alas, only mention your
  powers, they withdraw. For whatever reasons, they are afraid of you.
  
   'I knew that,' said Nathan.
   The reason is simple: the dead have always feared necromancy, and now that the Wamphyri are back in
  the land they fear it more than ever. Somehow, they associate you with necromancy. Now . . . they will
  nolonger speak to me! But you Szgany have a saying: 'like father, like son'? Well, I kept reading that
  thought in their minds before they closed me out. And so I am given to wonder - I hesitate to ask - but
  could it be, perhaps, that your father did something to alienate theSzgany dead, which now causes them
  to shun you?
   'My father, Hzak Kiklu?' Nathan frowned. 'But he was just a man, murdered by the Wamphyri like so
  many before and since. Why, I never even knew him ... I wasn't born ... what could he have done?'
   Rogei's baffled shrug. I could only try; I failed; I
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   know no more. However, there is one other matter onwhich I would advise you.
   'I will always value your advice."
   Nathan, I know you have put this thing from your mind. The elders have not mentioned it; the subject
  hasnever come up; men are wise to leave well enough alone.But thefact is that when you needed
  someone I came to you. Your power goes beyond simply speaking to thedead. Do you understand me?
   'I think so, yes. What is your advice?'
   Simply this: beware what you call up to a semblanceof life, Nathan, for some things may be harder to
  putdown .. .
   Nathan wasn't sure he did understand, not fully, but he thanked Rogei anyway. And then he said
  goodbye ...
   PART SEVEN:
   Nestor — Titheling — Turgosheim
   Equipped with new clothes, a good leather belt and a polished ironwood knife with a bone handle,
  Nathan was ready. He would journey east downriver, for west would take him too close to home, or to
  what had once been his home. Only go that way... it would be very hard to resist returning to Settlement,
  and he dreadedthe thought of what he might find there now.
   Atwei accompanied him upon the first leg of his journey; she took the lead, striding out along the stone-
  carved 'banks' of the Great Dark River.
   Ostensibly he went to visit other Thyre colonies, to talk to their elders and their dead; but there was a lot
  
  more to it than that. Now that he was possessed of talents (his deadspeak, full-fledged among the Thyre,
  and his telepathy, as yet inchoate but promising, at least according to Atwei and others of her people), his
  confidence was that much greater. Where the past must remain a wasteland, anathema, it seemed the
  future might hold something of fulfilment at least. He had things to learn and people to talk to; whether
  they wereliving or dead .. . that no longer made any difference.
   Nathan's new clothes were quite remarkable. Fashioned in the Szgany style generally but of soft,
  sand-coloured lizard-skin, the cut was all Thyre, the work of a very high standard, and the fitting exact.
  In short, theThyre of Place-Under-the-Yellow-Cliffs had dressed Nathan tip to toe much as they saw
  him: as a person of very special qualities. His fringed jacket had a high collar and wide lapels; his trousers
  were flared to fit
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   snug over soft leather boots; his silver belt-buckle wasscrolled to match the ornamentation on the sheath
  housing his knife.
   All in all, with his startling blue eyes, and his yellow hair grown shoulder-length (outrageous colours in a
  man of the Szgany, and impossible among the Thyre), the ensemble gave him a mystical, even alien look
  in keeping with his standing. The only irony was that having done so much for the Thyre, gained so much
  in the way of respect, he should remain impotent to do anything for his own people. But they were not
  forgotten, and perhaps there was time yet.
   For the first time in his life, Nathan was a person of substance, albeit in a world remote from his largely
  insubstantial previous existence. And he could not help but wonder: while his stature was vast among the
  Thyre, what would it be outside their limited sphere?What would he be now among his own kind, the
  Szgany Lidesci? Would he still be a freak, a mumbling fool, or were those days gone forever? And what
  of Sunside'sTravellers themselves: all of them, the Szgany as a race? What were they now to the
  Wamphyri?
   Cut off from them in self-imposed exile, he could not know. But two thousand miles away down the
  Great Dark River, where others of his kind cowered under the tyranny of grotesque Wamphyri masters,
  he might yet find an answer. For as they were now — stumbling serfs, cattle, scarlet sustenance for
  hideous vampire Lords - so must his own people inevitably become! Horrific as the thought was, it was
  also fascinating. And the more Nathan dwelled upon it the more he saw his obligation unwinding before
  him, much like the black canyon walls of the serpentine river ...
   Every half-mile or so along the way, Atwei would pause to point out caches of tarry torches wrapped in
   oiled skins in niches in the damp walls. The torches were long-lasting; she would let two or three of these
  replenishment points go by before renewing her own and Nathan's brands. Torches came and went like
  fireflies through the utter dark on both sides of the blackriver, as other Thyre passed them along the way.
  Nathan strained to hear the thoughts of these torchbearers in this blackest of black nights but heard
  nothing, onlythe far faint whispers of the dead...
   Only fifteen miles to the east along a course that wounda little deeper into the desert, Open-to-the-Sky
  was the next colony. Nathan and Atwei were there in less than five hours. As to the colony's name: the
  reason for that was immediately apparent. The place was, quite literally, open to the sky.
   The first indication that they approached their destination came in a stirring and freshening of the air; the
  light improved and the sputtering flames of their torches were buffeted; ahead of them, the way seemed
  
  shrouded in a misty haze. Soon they were able to extinguish their brands and proceed in the gathering
  light. As the farbank receded, so the pace of the river slowed to a crawl. Then the swirling waters
  widened into the neck of a lake, and the scene which gradually opened to Nathan'seyes was such as he
  could never have anticipated.
   For suddenly... it was as if an oasis flourished underground! At first there were only ferns and mosses
  growing out of cracks in the walls, then small bushesoverhanging the high ledges, eventually trees, vines
  and creepers, all straining for the indirect but beckoning sunlight. And where the river's roof opened at
  last into a real canyon and the light of day streamed down from overhead, finally there was lush foliage
  springing up onevery hand.
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   Here the river had shingle beaches and timbered jetties; true banks of red silt rose up to level ground on
  both sides of the water, where rudimentary stone wharves had been built to defend against flooding. All
  of which lay in the forefront of patchwork fields and allotments; while at the rear, houses on stilts rose in
  terraces where the higher ground backed up to the cliffs. Between and beyond the houses, dizzy
  pathwaysclimbed vine-shrouded scree slopes, faults in the canyonwall, and cliff-hugging ledges,
  zig-zagging up and acrossthe rising rock from cavern to cavern and ledge to ledge. And the Thyre came
  and went along these paths and causeways like ants about their daily business. While high overhead -
   - A marvellous sight! The canyon walls reared up two hundred feet and more; the light where it came
  slanting in from the south to burst against the opposite wall was blinding after the Stygian dark of the
  river; despite that Nathan knew the surface must be mainly desert, still he saw the silhouettes of palms
  crowdingthe canyon's rim. And so Open-to-the-Sky was an astonishing place.
   Thyre elders met them where the worn-smooth graniteof the river path met the rudimentary paving of the
  access road into the community. Nathan would have preferred to speak for himself from the onset, but
  by now well-versed in their code of conduct, he let Atwei act on his behalf; it was Thyre custom to open
  proceedings through an intermediary. His own name had been known in advance but theirs, of course,
  were secret. No introductions of that sort were necessary.
   Nathan found himself greeted by a good deal of gravity, tempered with (he suspected), a small measure
  of scepticism; while Atwei, acting as his aide and spokeswoman - his dupe? perhaps his colleague in
  deception
   and blasphemy? - suffered an initially cool receptionindeed.
   As they passed through the lower levels of the colonyand climbed a walled pathway to the Cavern of
  Long Dreams, a Thyre mausoleum one quarter of the way up the cliff, something of the stiffness and
  formality went out of The Five and they conversed with Nathan in cordial if restrained monotones. He
  continued to sense their hesitancy, however, and suspected there were those among them who thought he
  had somehow madefools of their colleagues in Place-Under-the-Yellow- Cliffs. Once inside the tomb he
  felt more at ease, andcommenced to verify his credentials in very short order.
  
   The Five had worked out a series of questions for Nathan to ask their dead ancestors, whose answers
  would permit of no deception or obfuscation. The dead, for their part, had heard faint rumours of the
  Necro-scope's coming from the Ancients of Place-Under-the-Yellow-Cliffs, and immediately recognized
  the purpose of these opening questions: that they were designed to detect any charlatanry in Nathan. For
  which reason, once rapport was established and they felt the Necro-scope's warmth, the response of the
  dead was accurate and not without a measure of Thyre sarcasm directedat the elders themselves.
   The most 'junior' of The Five, perhaps irritated by Nathan's dry and very un-mystical delivery of answers
  allegedly from beyond the grave, brought about an early interruption by asking: 'Perhaps you could tell us
  why our ancestors converse so readily with you but not withtheir own kind?'
   At which Nathan lost patience. This one reminded him of Petais, and he wasn't about to go through all of
  that again! He might have answered in his own way, without prompting, but a voice in his head cautioned
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   him against it and in a moment supplied the perfectanswer:
   'Quatias, your father Tolmia begs you to remember atime in your childhood - you were five? - when you
  lostyour way in the desert just a mile from Open-to-the-Sky. All you had to do was climb a dune and
  youwould have seen the oasis clearly, you were that close.But no, you were only a child and afraid; you
  sat down and cried. Be sure not to lose your way again, in themaze of your own doubts, now that you
  are even closer to a great truth.'
   Quatias opened his mouth, closed it and made a strangled sound in the back of his throat. Finally, in a
  brokenvoice, he said: 'Only my father Tolmia could have known.. . thought... said ... that which you just
  said. Wherefore I no longer doubt. Nathan, please tell him that Ilove him very much!'
   'He knows,' Nathan answered, all anger fled in amoment. 'And he loves you in return, even as he did in
  life.'
   Shortly after that the initial session broke up. Shaken, The Five must now reconsider things, think how
  best toemploy Nathan - if they still had his good will. So theymade to go off to their council chambers
  and discusshis awesome talent. But before he let them go:
   'I want you to know,' he told them, 'that the girlAtwei is my dear friend. She was my nurse and brought
  me to health when I was sick. Now, I understand why you had doubts, about both of us. Of course you
  did and I don't hold it against you. But that is over now,and you should know: he who dishonours Atwei
  dishonours me.'
   He couldn't know it, but from that time forward she would be part of his expanding legend. Atwei of the
  Thyre, friend of Nathan ...
   And so, as in Place-Under-the-Yellow-Cliffs, once againNathan became a bridge between two worlds:
  that ofthe living, and the darkness of those who had continued beyond it. But before that there were
  
  certain priorities:for instance, Shaeken's inventions.
   In accordance with the Ancient's wishes, he passed onto the artisans of Open-to-the-Sky detailed
  drawings of his water wheel, ram, and hoist, all of which were of especial relevance here. Once
  constructed, Shaeken's Hydraulic Hoist should provide effortless irrigation forthe oasis high overhead;
  and so the Thyre would prosper.
   Then, as soon as these technical details had beenpassed on and understood, for five more sunups
  Nathanchannelled all of his energies to the task of communica tion between the living and the dead. And
  as in Place-Under-the-Yellow-Cliffs, so now the results of his workwere uniformly beneficial; exactly as
  before, word of the Necroscope spread abroad and emissaries fromThyre colonies further down the
  river came to see him.
   But now that the work was no longer new to him it became ... simply work. Despite that it was satisfying
  in its way and the number of his friends among the dead grew apace, Nathan no longer took pleasure in
  it.Also, time seemed to pass by ever more swiftly, and hefelt he should be elsewhere, doing other things.
   It was time to move on.
   Atwei sensed it in him. She may even have read it in his supposedly 'inviolate' mind. But seeing how she
  was saddened, Nathan made no complaint...
   One day they went up to the oasis, and there in the living sunlight Nathan saw how pale he had grown.
  He was pensive and gave voice to an idle thought. 'Why are you so brown,' he asked her, 'when you
  spend somuch time in the deeps and the dark?'
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   'But before you,' Atwei answered, simply, 'I spent a good deal of my time in the light. The Thyre are
  desert folk, after all, and most of our work is done on the surface. Also, I was born brown. But why are
  you so pale, when you were born in the woods and the sunlight?'
   He shrugged. 'So, we're different.'
   'Are we so different, Nathan?'
   He looked at her and wondered, Are we? And almost before he realized it, he knew - he heard - what
  shewas thinking:
   If I were Szgany, or he were Thyre, we would be lovers. He would lie in my arms and I wouldfeel him
  pulsing within me. And I would stroke his back, whilemy thighs squeezedhimfor his juice.
   Telepathy, or...did she do it deliberately? No, neverthe last, for she was Thyre and it would be
  unseemly. And now, as Atwei's thoughts continued, she too was pensive. But Nathan is right: we are
  different. And Imust love him as if he were my brother.
  
   Then ... his look must be curious, wondering; she noticed it and quickly looked away. In order to save
  her embarrassment, he immediately acted as if nothing had happened, as if he knew nothing. In any case
  her mind was covered now; she had drawn a blanket over it, and he must assume that she suspected. But
  at the same time, suddenly, there came a second flash of inspired understanding as a riddle was solved.
  From the beginning he'd wondered how the Thyre, the living Thyre, knew and understood his tongue so
  well. And now heknew the answer:
   When Nathan talked to the Thyre dead it was in deadspeak, but behind their mental voices and pictures
  he'd always sensed echoes of their spoken tongue, too. And now he saw how easy it was for a telepath
  to be a
   linguist. When thoughts are backed up by the echoes of words, a language is quickly learned. That was
  how it worked for the living Thyre: they had not stolen the Traveller language from his mind, not directly
  (they had always traded with the Szgany and so knew something of his tongue from the first). No, they'd
  not stolen it but read it in his expressions, seen it in his eyes, and -despite certain taboos and 'unspoken
  rules' - heard itin the echoes of his thoughts!
   And he knew, too, why suddenly he understood large parts of the Thyre tongue when he heard it
  spoken all around him - because he had learned it the same way!And Atwei was right: he would be a
  telepath, in time.
   But all of this coming at once... it was a shock, a revelation to Nathan! Especially Atwei's feelings for
  him. And it was that more than anything else - the way she felt about him - which served to convince him
  that indeed the time had come to move on, while yet she thought of him as a brother ...
   In the Cavern of Long Dreams, alone with the mummieddead and sharing their thoughts, Nathan spoke
  to Ethloi the Elder, who knew numbers. They were firm friends from the moment he mentioned
  Shaeken's name, for inlife Ethloi and Shaeken had been colleagues.
   How may I help you? Ethloi was eager to assist inany way he could.
   'I have dreams,' Nathan told him. 'I dream of numbers.I have always thought they had meaning, and so
  did Shaeken. You are the expert, or so I'm told. Perhapsyou can fathom them.'
   An expert in maths? Is there such a thing? Ethloi seemed vague on the subject. Shaeken required maths
  to calculate the numbers of cogs in his wheels, it's true, but his was a practical application. I was able,
  through
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   trial and error, to help him somewhat. Not a lot. As for me: I only know that like yourself, I too have
  dreamed of numbers, in death as in life. They are some of the several things I continue to explore, but not
  in depth. For since all such knowledge is useless fno one may confirm or deny my findings, because no
  one understands them), how may I determine if the things I know have value? There is no source of
  
  reference. And as for helping you... we do not even know that Szgany andThyre numbers are the same.
  Explain to me yoursystem.
   The Szgany system?'
   Yes.
   'Do you mean, how do we count? But surely all creatures count the same?'
   Not so. A bird has only two numbers: the number One and a number larger than One. If it has an egg in
  its nest it has an egg. If it has two eggs, three, or four, ithas more than one. So how dotheSzgany count?
   'We count in fives, the number of fingers on a hand,' Nathan told him. 'We make gates,' (he showed the
  othera picture), 'like so:'
   I, II, III,III
   The Thyre have the same system, Ethloi replied, but as for me,I count in Tens! The picture he displayed
  to Nathan's mind was of two gates struck through.
   Nathan frowned. 'But that is simply a count of thefingers on two hands. Is there a difference?'
   Oh, yes, the other answered. The difference is simplicity! Now look:
   1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20.
   The numbers he showed to Nathan were not these but symbols of his own, which had these values.
  Nathan
   studied them a while - sufficient that he understood that the last of these numbers was the equivalent of
  four gates - and shook his head. 'A different shape forevery number? Simplicity? But this seems to me a
  complicated thing.'
   Ethloi was frustrated (a great many mathematiciansare), and sighed. But in a moment: Now tell me, he
  said,how do you divide?
   'Divide?'
   How many of these: I I, are there in this.'J.-H'T + I ?
   'I I I,' Nathan answered at once.
   And how many of these: J-H"T in this:III?
   Again Nathan frowned. 'There are only parts,' heshrugged.
   And again Ethloi sighed. As I supposed: you cannotdivide.
   It was Nathan's turn to be frustrated, and: 'I know enough to divide a large orange between friends,' he
  blurted. 'Because it has segments!'
  
   Yes (the nod of a wise although incorporeal head),and so does my system. Infinitesimally small
  segments, and infinitely large numbers. Just asI count upwards in tens, so I may count down into the
  single unit. Into tenths, and tenths of tenths! But listen, about yourorange: what if it has eight segments and
  there are onlysix friends?
   Then two of them are lucky!' Nathan's thoughts weresour now, because it was beyond him. Already he
  wastired of this.
   Ethloi felt it in him and shook his head. Numbers arenot easy, Nathan. Oh, I could show you a great
  many -and a great many tricks to play with them, too - but without an explanation they are only symbols.
  Such knowledge won't come instantly but must be learned.And somehow I don't think you will make a
  good pupil.
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   'Show me some more numbers anyway,' Nathanbegged him. 'So that I may at least consider them.'
   Ethloi did as Nathan requested and sent his calculations rolling across the screen of the youth's mind.
  Decimals, fractions; a little basic algebra and trigonometry; calculations to determine the size of the world,
  the distance to the moon, the sun, and the stars. It was impressive, but it wasn't shocking. Nathan might
  not understand it, but he knew it for pretty rudimentary stuffcompared with some of the things he had
  seen.
   It did have something of an effect upon him, however;for as if conjured by this lesser display, now he felt
  the numbers vortex churning within his mind like some incredible mathematical dust-devil, just waiting to
  blast these intruding calculi to infinity. Ethloi detected nothing of the latter through his effort of mental
  projection, but he did note the Necroscope's unguarded thoughts: his apparent lack of regard for the
  display. And the images he transmitted to the screen of Nathan's mindwere shut off at once.
   Very welJ, Ethloi growled then, now Jet's see whatnumbers you have dreamed.
   'Usually they come to me when I'm asleep,' Nathantold him. 'But my time here grows short. And when
  you produced your numbers for me, I... I felt my own inside of me, almost as if they waited to be
  summoned.'He closed his eyes. 'Perhaps I can call them up.'
   What happened then was ... swift as thought! The numbers vortex seethed with power; it sucked
  mutating calculations into its core as quickly as they formed on the rim; incredible metaphysical equations
  were fired in bursts from its rotating wall, like shooting stars in ameteorite shower! Until:
   Shut itoff! Ethloi groaned.
   Nathan did so, opened his eyes, said: That is what I
   have dreamed.' He took no pride in it; he only wanted to understand it, desperately. And Ethloi read that
  inhis mind, too.
  
   But how can you have such a thing, without understanding it? His question was in the form of an awed
  whisper.
   'Just as I have feelings,' Nathan answered, 'in myheart and in my head, without understanding them.'
   Ethloi nodded slowly, and said, Aye, and perhapsyou have answered your own question. For as
  telepathy is in the Thyre - come down through the bJoodofGutawei the Seer, the First Remembered, and
  spread by his children, and theirs, throughout all the Thyre - so the numbers vortex is in you. It seems as
  much a partof you as your blueeyes and yellow hair. And spawned in some awesome ancestor, it came
  down to you thesame way as theydid!
   'Iinherited it?' This was much the same as Rogei had told him. 'But from whom? Not my father for he
  was anordinary man.'
   Then from that same ancestor who gave you yourdeadspeak, Ethloi answered.
   'But my deadspeak is a talent while this... is a curse!' Nathan shook his head. 'It plagues me! I can't
  fathom it!'
   Ethloi was obliged to agree. Not a/1 inherited thingsare for the good, it's true. In me it was my father's
  poor hearing, which turned me deaf in the end, much as he was deaf before me. A small trouble: I had
  my telepathy.
   The numbers vortex baffles you then?' Nathan wasdisappointed. 'You don't know what it does?'
   What it does? Numbers are, Nathan. They don't necessarily do things. And yet...I sensed something
  behind it,yes. What it was, I can't say. Perhaps the vortex is a key.
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   'A key? To what?'
   To a door, or to many doors. I sensed them there, in your mind. Doors to far, far places - even tofar
  times! -allof which lie in the swirlof the vortex.
   'But first I must understand the numbers?'
   And control them! Ethloi nodded. When you can bringthem to heel, like a hunting dog - show them
  ordered on the screenof your mind, as I showed you my punyfigures - then the key will be yours.
   Nathan was silent for long moments. EverythingEthloi had said was much as he'd long suspected. The
  numbers vortex hid a key which he must find. And then he must find the door in which to turn it. But as
  yet he was like a babe in arms who wanted to runbefore he could walk.
  
   Ethloi remained silent, waiting.
   And finally Nathan sighed and said, 'Perhaps you should show me some more numbers, and explain to
  me your system. I'll probably make a poor pupil, as you rightly said, but who knows? Something might
  sink in.Anyway, I have to start somewhere.'
   He stayed for an hour until, head reeling, he could take no more ...
   Nathan slept one more time, ate a strangely tasteless, silent meal with Atwei, then told the elders he was
  leaving. They came down to the river route to see him off. Quatias, who was still spry, volunteered to go
  with him tothe next colony just eight miles away. But in a garden ofyellow flowers, where hazy sunlight fell
  dappled through leaf and vine, he begged a moment's privacy with Atwei. She gave him a slender silver
  chain and a locket, which he opened. Inside, a tight coil of jet black hair. 'It is a custom of the Thyre,' she
  told him. 'A secret thing which siblings do when they are parted.'
   He drew her to him and kissed her forehead. 'And this is how a Szgany brother parts from his sister.'
  Then he hung the locket round his neck and said, Til never forget you, and I thank you for this lock of
  hairfrom your head.'
   'My head?' she said, lifting a coarse eyebrow. 'Ah, no,for that would be unseemly!'
   He raised his own eyebrows in a frown, looked at Atwei again, then at the locket, finally shook his head
  and smiled. The Thyre and their strange and 'secret' ways, their 'secret' things! Then, while she remained
  standing there, he went and said his farewells to theelders . . .
   'You waste your time with that one,' Brad Berea spoke gruffly to his daughter, Glina. 'He can fish, fetch
  and carry, hit a bird in flight, and eat - oh, he can eat! - but make sense? You ask too much of him. He
  spoke to me only once, to tell me he was the Lord Nestor: but whatsort of a "Lord", I ask you? Since
  when, nothing.'
   To be kind to her, Glina was only very homely. AndNestor, man or Lord or whatever, was a handsome
  speci men. He was a natural hunter, too, and upon a time had doubtless been a valuable member of a
  Traveller band, or citizen of some Szgany township. But now: Brad hadseen more activity, more urgency,
  understanding, intelli gence, in the geckoes which inhabited the rafters andchased flies when the sun fell
  hot on the roof. They, too,were hunters, but they didn't need to be told how to do it! It was instinct in
  them. But this one - hah! - it surprised Brad he knew enough to wake up after sleeping! Beggars can't be
  choosers, however, and Glina would lure him to her bed if she could. And what then, Brad wondered?
  Idiots in the camp? Better perhaps if he'd leftNestor in the river to drown.
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   'What happened to him, do you think?' Glina glanced at her father across the smoky room, where he
  took a taper from the fire to light the wick of the first lamp ofevening. The fire would be allowed to die
  down now, as night came on. For if not its smoke, going up through the quiet forest into the air, would be
  like a beacon to ... well, to anything which might pass this way, overhead. But the cabin in the trees was
  
  warm and a lamp was enough. With blankets at the open windows, to keep the light in and the night air
  out, the Bereas weresafe and snug.
   'Happened to him?' Brad grunted.'If you'll just feel the back of his head, above his right ear, you'll know
  well enough what happened to him. He received onehell of a clout from something or other, a blow that
  very nearly caved in his skull! The bone has knitted now but it's left a fat, hard knob just under the skin,
  and probably on the inside, too. Also, he was shot and lost a deal of blood. The scars are clear enough in
  his side. Finally, he fell or was tossed into the river, and very nearly drowned. And all of this occurring
  about the time of the first vampire attacks on Settlement and Twin Fords. I didn't know about those
  when I dragged him out of the water, else I mightn't have been in such a hurry. What? Why, for all I
  knew he could have beena victim of the Wamphyri! But if so, well, it would have showed before now.
  So that's what happened to him. All in all, he's a simpleton with a damaged brain, and only his natural
  instincts seem in order - some of them, anyway. But even they might be a bit askew, else he'dknow for
  sure you were after his parts!'
   'Brad Berea?' His wife's voice came from the curtainedplatform which was their bed under the rafters.
  'Come to bed and leave the young ones be.' After a hard day she'd retired early; but she would be up
  early, too, in
   the first hours of true night. It was as well to be awake in those most dangerous of hours, when the sun
  was down and the stars bright over the barrier range, andthe vampires thirsty after their long sleep.
   'Huh!' Brad grunted, and thought: Aye, go and doyour duty, Brad my son.
   But in fact Irma was a good woman and had stood by him uncomplainingly for twenty years and more,
  living a solitary existence out here in the forest. Brad had been a loner when she ran away from her
  Szgany band to be with him, and he was a loner still. A tripinto Twin Fords every so often; it was the
  only pleasure Irma ever had out of life; that and Brad's love, and the knowledge that he would look after
  herself and their daughter all his days. In days like these, it was more than enough. As for Twin Fords:
  nothing there now but ruins, empty streets, and doors slamming in the windlike shouts of denial. And so
  no reason to visit.
   'And you two?' The bearded Brad looked at Glina and Nestor sitting by the open door. 'Will you sit up
  again all night, girl? To be with that one? A pointless exercise! For I wonder: does he sit and think? Or
  does he just sit?' He took off his jacket and went to the footof the ladder-like stairs climbing to his bed.
   Glina looked at Nestor, whose eyes followed Brad where he began to climb. There wasn't much in
  those eyes, but they did have soul. Brad was hard-voiced, but he was soft-hearted, too, and Glina
  believed Nestor knew it. 'I'll sit and talk to him a while,' she said. 'I think he knows what I'm saying, but it
  doesn't mean much to him, that's all. Maybe we'll walk down to the river under the stars. Nestor likes
  that.'
   Brad thought: Oh, and what else does helike? 'What, the strong, silent type, is he?' He called down,
  grinning despite himself. He went through the curtains to take
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   off his clothes, and hung them on pegs in the rafters.Shortly he was in bed.
   Down below, Glina listened a while to the creaking of her father settling himself, the low, murmuring
  voice of her mother cautioning him to: 'Shhh! Be quiet... the young 'uns ... here, let me.' And then the
  rhythmicsounds of their sex. Little privacy in a timbered cabin.
   Then Nestor's arm went around her waist, and his hand up under her blouse, to squeeze her large
  breasts. It was an automatic response to being left alone withher; something which he had learned to
  expect, to enjoy; something which Glina had taught him. 'Yes, yes,' she breathed in his ear, stroking him
  through his trousers with her fingertips. 'But not here.' And he followed herout of the open door and into
  the night.
   The night wasn't yet cold; they walked slowly at first in bright starlight, then more hurriedly, finally
  breathing heavily, almost panting along a well-worn path to the river. And on the sand and shingle bank
  they threw off their clothes and fell on top of them, and she guided him jerking into her flesh. She knew
  how it would be but surrendered to it, as she had since the first time. But since Glina had been the one to
  lead him on right from the start, she could hardly complain. And he wasa man, and filling her he filled the
  loneliness, too.
   The first time . . .
   That had been when he was back on his feet again, five or maybe six sunups after her father had rescued
  him from the river. Until then Glina had washed and tended his wounds, fed him, cared for Nestor
  generally. And she'd rocked him in her arms when, in a fever, he'd called out strange names, shouted his
  passion at unknown persons and wept bitterly over obscure grievances and disappointments. Despite
  what Brad Berea said about him now, then there had been fire in Nestor.
   But as the fever went out of him so the silence entered,and for a while his eyes had been empty.
   In a little while he'd been strong and made no complaint about work. He hunted with a crossbow, fished,
  used an axe and carried wood and water well enough.Twice a week, when he went to bathe in the river,
  Glina spied on him. He was big and stirred her inside.
   Once, three years ago when she was sixteen, the Bereas had gone into Twin Fords. Brad required new
  tools; her mother wanted a new dress, pots, pans; Glina just wanted to see and be seen. Then some boy
  might make inquiries, and find his way to the cabin to see her. Forlorn hope, for even then she had
  known she was homely: her brown, lustreless hair, nose just a little too sharp, heavy buttocks. She'd
  been to Twin Fords asa child, often, and had seen the many pretty girls there.
   That time when she was sixteen, some young couple had got married. There'd been a party, music,
  laughter, and in the evening there would be drinking and dancing. An old friend of her father's had said
  they couldstay the night. Well, Brad Berea knew how to drink and dance, and he had seen how Irma
  needed it. It seemedonly fair.
   But while Brad and Irma whirled to the wild music, Glina was simply ... whirled away! A Gypsy lad
  sharedhis wine with her, and walked her behind a tree where thebranches came down low. Now, she
  couldn't even remember how he'd looked. But then he had been the handsomestboy in town, and unlike
  Nestor he'd known exactly what to do. His mouth had sucked the breath from her lungs,and lifting her
  skirts he'd slipped into her slick as an eel.Afterwards...he was gone as quick as he came. No one had
  
  known but Glina - oh, and the boy, of course - but she'd dreamed of him almost every night since, right
  upuntil Nestor came. And then she'd dreamed of Nestor.
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   One day when her father was off hunting, and her mother washed clothes and stored vegetables, Glina
  had finished her tasks about the cabin and gone down to the river where Nestor was fishing. She
  deliberately wore a short dress and a blouse buttoned to the waist. And as soon as she was out of sight
  of the cabin, she'd quickly unbuttoned the top of her blouse to show the inner curve of her soft breasts.
   Sitting down beside Nestor, she'd made a great play of lifting her dress so that her thighs would show,
  and talking to him she'd held his face towards her and leaned forward, tempting his eyes to her cleavage.
  And he had looked at her. There had been something in his eyes at least, even if she couldn't say what.
  But despite that while she talked to him she leaned her hand on his thigh and squeezed it, always when
  she stopped speaking and relaxed, his attention would return to the riverand his line.
   Committed, finally Glina had stripped naked, waded into the water, and bathed there right in front of
  him. He wasn't likely to tell anyone, after all. No longer able to fish, Nestor had watched her; and as she
  came out of the river gleaming wet, breasts lolling, at last he had stood up. Then ... she'd definitely seen
  something in his eyes, and a little more than something in his hand.
   Hurrying him out of his clothes, she had kissed him all over that body she'd so cared for, and guided his
  hand to her aching flesh while she sucked on his rod. And Nestor: he might be damaged in his mind, but
  his body was whole; it wasn't long before the fire in his loins sparked faint, fleeting, disjointed memories
  in his head. And then ...
   ...It had been as it was now, as it had been eversince.
   In the sun-dappled shade of a willow, driving into
   her as if to split her, Nestor's face had been a mask of -what? - hatred? Oh, he had wanted her body,
  desperately desired to pour all of his angers, his frustrations into her, and so empty himself of them for a
  little while at least. But it wasn't love or even lust that he felt. No, for if anything Nestor took revenge
  against something which even he had forgotten, something which he hadnever understood in the first
  place.
   His hands had crushed her breasts, which were scarcely hurt but yielded to the pain, the pleasure, and
  his mouth had crushed her mouth. And Nestor had moaned as he came again and again into her, and she
  felt the burn of his hot spray deep in her core. He had moaned a name - Minha? Minya? - Misha! And it
  was like a curse coughed from his damp slack mouth as his right hand left her breasts to tighten on Glina's
  throat.
   But Glina was no weak little thing to be throttled. Now as then, she took his hair, yanked back his head,
  grasped him with her sex and sucked the last drop of loathing out of him; until he fell exhausted on his
  side, and rolled over on to his back. And then she hugged him, and sobbed while she worked his
  
  shrivelling flesh in her hand. She sobbed for herself, because she wasn'tthis Misha who had hurt him so
  much — whom he must have loved — and for Nestor himself, because he had been hurt so much ...
   And so Glina loved him, and was in turn 'loved'.
   Later she used him, sat on him where her hands had brought him back to life. But because his eyes were
  dull again and his body's responses simply that, responses, she took cold pleasure in it...
   On their way back to the cabin, suddenly Nestor paused and his face turned up to the sky. He sniffed -
  an animal sound — and his dark eyes flashed starshine. A
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   moment later and Glina felt, sensed, heard it too. Andgasped!
   The moon was floating low over the distant barrier range. But there was more than moon and stars in the
  sky. Small dark shadows flitted high overhead; they blotted out the starlight and passed on. Then larger,
  more sinister manta shapes came gliding behind, whilebringing up the rear —
   - Something pulsed and throbbed, faint at first butgrowing louder.
   'Down!' Glina whispered, dragging Nestor to hisknees in a clump of night damp bushes. And a pair of
  Wamphyri warriors went spurting and pulsing overhead, their chitin armour tinged blue in the glitter ofthe
  stars.
   A breeze had come up; it formed the blue-grey exhaust gases of the warriors into a veil across the sky; it
  fell on the forest in an acrid stench of something dead and crawling with maggots. Glina held her breath,
  but Nestor breathed deep. And suddenly... he was alert! Brushing her hand away, he stood up, came
  slowly erect as the shapes of nightmare passed from view. He saw the sentient, liquid eyes of the
  warriors swivelling and scanning in their underbellies, and never knew how lucky he was that they didn't
  scan him. The hunting party sped off into the deepening night, headingnorth and slightly west.
   And: 'Wamphyri!' Glina breathed, when they had gone.
   Wamphyri.' The word burned like cold fire.
   Nestor looked at her. He was pale; there was recognition, a question in his eyes. His mouth twitched a
  little,and spoke at last. 'Wamphyri?'
   'Shhh!' she cautioned, despite that they had gone.
   Seconds passed and he spoke again, urgently.'Wamphyri?'
   Brad Berea came rushing along the path from the cabin. He was buttoning his jacket, his breath forming
  plumes in the suddenly cold air. 'Nestor ... and Glina!' He brushed Nestor aside, fell on his daughter and
  
  hugged her. 'We heard them - their warriors - and Iknew you were out here. But we're well hidden away
  in the trees and they passed us by, again ...'
   Nestor took his arm, and Brad looked at him in surprise. 'Eh?' he said. 'What's this? Life in the dummy?
  Has it scared some wits into him, then?'
   'Again?' said Nestor. 'They've passed us by, again?'
   'A yellow mocklark!' Brad grunted. 'He repeats my words like a bird, without understanding a one of
  them!'
   'Wamphyri!' Nestor suddenly shouted, and grabbed Brad by the throat. But Brad was strong, and now
  that the danger was past he was also angry. He trippedNestor and knocked him flying into the bushes.
   'Father!' Glina cried. 'He was only frightened!' But she wondered ... Nestor's eyes had been so strange
  watching those monsters fly overhead . .. she had sensed his fascination.
   Nestor stood up and she took his arm. 'Aye, look after him,' her father grunted, turning back toward the
  cabin. Tor if he goes for me again you'll be tending hiscracked skull a second time!'
   As he faded into the darkness, Nestor whispered:'Again? Have they passed ... before?'
   'When you were sick,' she told him. 'It was like tonight, just an hour or so after the sun was down. They
  had been doing some early hunting. We saw them head ing home again, toward the Northstar, which
  shineson Starside's last aerie.'
   The Northstar!' he said, turning his head unerringly in that direction, and gazing at the evilly glittering star,
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   frozen like a chunk of ice over the barrier range. 'Heading home. The Wamphyri...'
   'Come on,' she said, almost dragging him along thepath. 'Let's get in.'
   But not far from the cabin she pushed him against a tree and felt to see if there was life in him yet. There
  was still time, barely. Sometimes, even though she'd had him more than once, he would be ready; but not
  tonight. And as she took his hand again and led him back to the cabin, still his eyes were fixed on the low
  silhouette of the mountains, and the star of ill-omenwhich lit them. And in Nestor's mind, all unheard:
   Home - the Northstar- the last aerie - the Wamphyri!Compared to which, the lure of Glina's body was
  nothing...
   He left the cabin silently, in the long night. And when Glina woke up to answer a call of nature she saw
  hisbed, empty.
  
   Such a howling then! It woke up the two in the loft. Her father came down and told her: 'What, gone?
  But he'll probably be back... if not, good riddance! Only one master here, Glina, and I don't much care
  for a dog that bites his master's hand.'
   Then, seeing that Nestor had taken a crossbow andknife, he cursed him long and loud. But what the hell:
  itwasn't his good crossbow. And certainly the idiot would need some protection, out there on his own in
  the night.
   In a while Brad went back to bed, and even through Glina's sobbing he slept like a baby ...
   Lured irresistibly by the Northstar, Nestor travelledthrough the night-dark woods. Where streams were
  shallow he waded them, and where gullies looked dangerous he skirted around. But always his point of
  reference
   was the ice-chip star glittering cold on the barrier mountains. Beyond those mountains lay Starside, the
  last aerie, home of the Wamphyri. And now that he had seen them again, soaring dark against the night,
  at lasteverything had seemed to come together.
   Nestor knew he'd been there before; he couldn't remember the circumstances, but he had been there.
  Perhaps Starside was his source, his origin. Certainly it was his destiny. Maybe he was an outcast, a
  changeling freak banished from his own kind to make his way as best he might in the world. Well, and
  now he was onhis way back again.
   As for Sunside:
   He had enemies here; he must be careful along the way; men had pursued him, hurt him, would kill him if
  they could! He had scars to prove it. And he remembered ... things. All of his time with the Bereas, he
  had remem bered them but could not, dared not, speak of them. Once, without thinking, he had told
  Brad Berea, 'I am the Lord Nestor.' But after that he'd said no more. For like his many unfocused
  thoughts and memories, his tongue was a traitor; it would betray him; there hadbeen enough of betrayals
  already.
   Once, he had a friend, a so-called 'brother', a child who played with him when he himself was a child.
  But he had been a traitor whose cheating thoughts were hidden behind a screen of numbers, which he'd
  used like a plague to torment Nestor, even in his dreams.Now: that one was his greatest enemy!
   Once, Nestor had loved a girl, who did not love him back. She, too, was treacherous. But like it or not
  she would 'love' him one day. And she would die lovinghim. It was his vow.
   Once, he had had a flyer. He remembered itsfate: boiling away into rottenness in the hills. He also
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   remembered taking a bolt in his side; and the river whose cold caresses had nearly drowned him; and
  Glina, whose warm caresses had given him his manhood. If she had known who and what he was ...
  
  perhaps she would not have been so eager. Not eventhe homely Glina.
   I am the Lord Nestor, of the Wamphyri!
   But a Lord in exile, stripped of his powers, who was now returning home ...
   He trekked through all the hours of night, effortlessly.Given purpose, he was tireless. But there would be
  timeenough for sleep in the daylight, before moving on again towards his Starside destination. And always
  the North-star tugging at him, and the miles flying under his feet.
   He let instinct guide him. Only set his sights on that bright blue ice-shard in the sky, and let his body take
  over . .. the idea itself would do the rest. The hours sped by to match the miles; eventually his footsteps
  faltered; his body was not as tireless as he'd thought.
   He drank from a stream, washed the grit of the forest from his eyes, sat down with his back to a tree.
  Almost without knowing it he slept, and woke up shivering, lost, wondering where he was. But the
  Northstar was there, and the idea lived again. As he got his limbs in motion, so his hot blood pounded
  and soon he waswarm.
   He came upon an encampment of Szgany. There wereguards out, with at least one wolf. No doubt
  alerted by their watchdog, the men heard him, called out a password; Nestor made no answer but
  hurried on. They released their animal, which came bounding in his tracks and found him at once. He
  turned snarling, aimed his bolt right down its throat. But ... the wolf wagged its tail, came sniffing, jumped
  up to lick his face! Dimly then, Nestor remembered how he and... he and ... one other (someone close?
  But he had no one who was
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   close!) had had a way with canines. As a child, wild dogs had come out of the woods to play with him;
  domesticated wolves, 'guard dogs' like this one, had permitted the very roughest of games without turning
  on him; wild wolves in the hills had moved cautiously,but without animosity, out of his path.
   He'd never made anything of it. Nor did he now. Indeed, he saw the wolf's friendliness as a stupid mis
  take. He wasn't Szgany. He was the Lord Nestor! But he was one and they were many, and they would
  be smarter than their tame wolf.
   He moved on...
   In the night he wasted a deal of time: sleeping, trekking around obstacles, getting mired in this or that
  bog. But seen through breaks in the trees, black against the dark-blue sky and ice-blue stars, the
  mountains drewever closer. Likewise the dawn.
   Where the forest thinned out and grew into foothills he rested a while, gazed out over Sunside and saw
  the first pale blush of light on the horizon. Hours yet to the true dawn, and more to go to sunup, but this
  was the start of it. Nestor had no fear of the sun: it was part of his freakishness, that the sun had no
  power over him. His flyer had not been so fortunate. That . .. puzzledhim, but it was so.
   He seemed to remember a pass through the mountains. But where would that lie? To the east or to the
  west? He thought east. But as he made to follow an old and half-familiar trail through the foothills -
   - A sound, even movement up ahead! Grey shadows in the pre-dawn dusk, which was as yet much
  
  closer to night than day. Nestor loped silently through a ground mist swirling round his ankles like a
  disturbed shroud.On his right hand, the forest, and on his left the foothills rising towards the barrier range.
  But up there where
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   the way was steep: something huge, grey and weird, projecting over the rim of a bluff, nodding and
  swaying against the dark-blue sky. It scanned the night with dull, disinterested eyes in a diamond-shaped
  head at the end of a long, tapering neck. An unmistakable design: a flyer! Ideally situated for launching, it
  waited there. Which could mean only one thing: that somewhere down here its vampire master, a Lord or
  lieutenant of the Wamphyri, was even now abroad in thenight!
   Night for the moment, aye, but dawn was fast approaching. Whoever was the beast's keeper, he'd have
  to be back soon. If he was not already here ...
   Desiring to see without being seen, to know without being known, Nestor went more quietly yet. He
  moved like a cat along the trail, and keeping to the darkest shadows passed under the flyer in its launch
  site. But in a while, higher up the slope and vague in the deceptive light, he saw a second creature. So,
  two of the flying beasts, and apparently no one in attendance. Itcould only be a small hunting party.
   Though it seemed unlikely that such dull, stupid creatures would be used as observers, still Nestor took
  no chances but kept himself hidden anyway. A further fifty paces, and . .. what was that down there,
  where an outcrop of boulders tumbled to meet the trees? Afire?
   It was a fire, flickering red and yellow in the lee of boulders; smoke rising in a grey spiral, carrying a
  whiff of roasting - what, rabbit? - to Nestor's nostrils and making his mouth water. And ... was that a
  figurehunkered down, as if turning a spit? Some Szgany loner, fixing himself an early breakfast? It was
  surely so; for the Wamphyri weren't keen on roasted meat. And they weren't much for rabbits, either!
  But didn't this idiot
   know there were vampires about, two of them at least;or three, if Nestor included himself?
   He glanced back over his shoulder. The pre-dawn mist was rising, obscuring the trail. No sign of the
  creatures perched on the hillside now; they were there, of course, but had disappeared utterly in mist and
  gloom. This fool at his fire was surely unaware of them. But the Wamphyri must return soon. And Nestor
  hadno doubt but that they would be aware of him!
   The man had food; Nestor was hungry; he could warnhim, share his breakfast. And no treachery to the
  Wamphyri, his own kind, in this. He was an outcastafter all. And his appearance would fool this loner
  even as it had fooled Brad Berea. But in any case, best totake precautions.
   Nestor's crossbow was ready, loaded. Taking care toavoid loose pebbles which might be dislodged, he
  climbed down boulder to boulder; while below him thefool at the fire coughed where he turned his spit,
  grunting and grumbling to himself as if he were the only manin the world! Nestor got close, very close,
  until suddenlythe hunched figure fell silent and sniffed the air, looked up and began to turn his head.
   The man would be armed; Nestor didn't want anotherbolt in him; he ducked down behind rocks,
  waited, gradually nerved himself to look out, even to cry out, and so warn the other of his presence. The
  mist was thickening, and it had a slimy feel to it. Nestor felt his flesh creeping as he looked out between a
  'V in therocks.
  
   The loner was still there, crouched down. But —
   - He was no longer alone!
   Emerging from a dark copse to one side, and flowinglike some swift and deadly shadow over the
  mist-wreathed ground, a second figure approached him. But
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   there could be no mistaking this one - or his intentions. He was Wamphyri, and his mind was full of
  murder! Even in silhouette and little more than a dark blot, still his face was freakish; a jutting bulge of a
  head with a stunted, vibrating tentacle extended towards his victim.
   Nestor scarcely required it, but as if to finally prove this creature's nature it glanced at him - the merest
  glance — where it sped silent as smoke to its target. Its eyes were red as coals, burning in the hideously
  misshapen, quivering mask of its face!
   Unable to contain himself - jerking with an involuntary, spastic movement - Nestor stood up, anda
  pebble was squeezed out from beneath his sandal! The man at the fire heard it clattering in the rocks; he
  swivelled onhis heel, came to his feet in one smoothly flowing move ment. But in so doing he turned his
  back on the thingbearing down upon him!
   Without conscious thought - all instinct - Nestor cried out a warning, aimed his crossbow, discharged
  the weapon at the vampire. It seemed he knew, again by instinct, where his loyalties lay. He reacted as a
  Traveller, Szgany, and not the changeling that he thought he was. Or perhaps it wasn't as complex as
  that. Maybe it was simply that when the tentacle-faced monster had looked at him with its scarlet eyes,
  Nestor had known that he was next!
   Almost within striking distance of his intendedvictim, the vampire Lord was hit in the neck, sent
  staggering. And as Nestor lost his footing and came sliding over the dome of the last great boulder to
  crash downon his back, so the would-be 'victim' snatched up a brand and turned towards his attacker.
  Nestor lay there on his back, winded, gaping at the two. For now in the full firelight he could clearly see
  his mistake: that both ofthese creatures were Wamphyri!
   II
   The Wamphyri Lords Wran (the Rage) Killglance and Vasagi the Suck glared at each other red-eyed
  acrossNestor where he lay on his back, winded. They ignored him; they would not let him distract them
  from their quarrel, their duel, their mutual hatred. Now that he had shot his bolt he was nothing to them
  anyway. Butfrom Nestor's point of view, they were awesome, huge -and hugely malevolent.
   Treacherous bastard!' Wran snarled at Vasagi, waving his sputtering brand in the other's hideous face
  and kicking Nestor out of the way. 'So, you thought to come upon me under cover of this fool's
  blundering approach, eh? What, and did you think it likely I'd mistake his clatter for your own oily
  slither?' (In pointof fact he had done just that.)
  
   Vasagi's wet, glistening siphon was like the piston shaft of some alien penis; it made an almost sexual,
  sucking sound as it slid in and out of its sheath in thetip of his defensively mobile trunk or tentacle. He
  tugged at Nestor's bolt, which had penetrated the base of his thick, corded neck above his left shoulder
  and emerged at the back, having missed the spinal column by a hair's-breadth. He made no answer that
  Nestor couldhear, but Wran the Rage heard it well enough:
   Killglance, you spotted dog! OnJy good fortune and this Szgany scum together saved you from my
  single, clean, killing thrust. So now you face my gauntlet -before Iram my probe deep in your spine, to
  drain yourcringing leech.'
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   He was more voluble than was his wont; it was bluff and Wran knew it; Vasagi dared not let him see the
  true colour of his secret thoughts. His wound was not serious: an inconvenience, at worst. But even a bee
  sting can swing the balance of a fight, and the youth's bolt was more than a bee sting. Wran knew that the
  Suck was off balance, so why prolong it?
   Holding the blazing firebrand awkwardly in his left hand, he flicked back his cloak from his right side and
  so displayed his gauntlet. It glittered red and yellow in the firelight as he flexed his hand within its metal
  sheath. Vasagi feinted to the left, the right; his movements were quicksilver; even with the ironwood bolt
  skewering his neck at an angle from side to back, stillhe was no mean opponent.
   Still sprawling on his back but no longer winded,Nestor attempted to scramble away from the two. But
  theSuck was moving in the same direction. As Vasagi madea lunge at Wran, his feet got tangled in
  Nestor's threshing legs. That was the opening Wran needed. While Vasagi stumbled he moved in, hurled
  his torch into the Suck's writhing face and shrinking eyes, grasping his facial anomaly behind the wad of
  muscle which propelled itssiphon. And with Vasagi's gauntlet tearing his back open to the ribs, Wran
  aimed a blow at his enemy's proboscis.
   Wran's mind telegraphed his grisly intention; Vasagi saw it coming; he had no answer except to scream a
  desperate mental denial: Nooooo!
   Such was the force of the Suck's telepathic terror that even Nestor heard it. With Harry Keogh's blood
  running in his veins, and with his own share of his brother's as yet undeveloped mentalist talent, Vasagi's
  mind-shriek got through to him and froze him to the marrow. Somehow he lurched upright, but incapable
  offlight he simply fell back against the outcrop.
   While Vasagi had somehow avoided his enemy's firstblow, still Wran had not relinquished his hold on
  the Suck's proboscis. Now the Rage flexed his metal-clad hand in a certain way, and in the moment
  before he struck a razor spine like the curved frill on a lizard'sback sprang erect from his gauntlet's
  knuckles to Wran's wrist. And Nestor saw the rest of it as a blur ofbloody motion.
   Wran's gauntlet sliced into the Suck's shuddering snout and cut it half-way through, and with a tearing,
  sawing, snatching action, Wran quickly completed the job. Then he stepped back a pace to toss the
  severed trunk and its siphon tip hissing into the fire, and laughed at Vasagi where he staggered to and fro,
  clawing at his crimson face.
  
   Despite Wran's own agony - the fact that the back of his cloak had been torn open, and bloody tatters
  of meat hung from his gouged ribs - he laughed! 'Ah, and what shall they call you now?' he crowed.
  'Vasagi theSlobber?'
   Vasagi's face spurted blood from the sleeve of raw flesh which had housed his probe. His pain was
  greater than Wran's, so much so that tears of agony started out of eyes half-blind from the other's
  torch-thrust. He held out his gauntlet before him, waving it to and fro like a blind man's stick. But there
  was no mercy in Wran theRage. Still baying with laughter, he moved in and snatched up the blazing brand
  again. Vasagi turned to flee, stumbled blindly over sharp, jutting rocks, andwent down.
   Wran was on him in a flash; he leaped .. . came downmassively with both booted feet on Vasagi's
  outstretchedgauntlet forearm. Bones snapped sickeningly, and even Vasagi managed a gurgling shriek -
  an actual sound -through the scarlet orifice which was his ruined face.
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   Nestor's mouth was dry as kindling. He glanced here and there in the oh-so-gradually brightening air,
  looked for his crossbow. It had tumbled with him from onhigh, gone clattering into the scree. He saw a
  dull gleam among the rocks and edged towards it, but yet continued to watch the now totally unequal
  fight.
   Wran kicked at Vasagi's gauntlet hand until the weapon came loose, then booted it out of reach.
  Half-blind, siphon-severed, ungauntleted, and his arm flopping loosely, still the Suck tried to stumble to
  his feet. Every time he almost got up, Wran kicked his feet from under him again. Finally, close to
  exhaustion, Vasagi flopped and jerked on the ground. Then Wran went to one knee beside him, grasped
  the ironwood bolt in his neck, and twisted it until the other's writhing wasalmost a vibration of sheerest
  agony.
   Nestor's trembling hand dragged his crossbow out from a crack in the rocks. He primed it two-handed,
  undipped the spare bolt from its housing under the tiller. And -
   'Aye, load your weapon,' Wran's deep bass voice growled from only four or five swift paces away.
  'Load it, and bring it here.' Nestor obeyed the first instruction, but as for the second: he aimed the
  crossbow at Wran. The other straightened up but kept a booted foot on the writhing Vasagi's neck. 'Well
  then,' he said, his scarlet gaze rapt on Nestor, 'and what are you waiting for? Shoot me, if you're sure you
  can hit my heart. But ifyou're not, best do as I say.'
   Nestor found his voice. 'You ... are Wamphyri!'
   Wran nodded. 'And you're a fool! But a fool whoprobably saved my life. Who saved me a deal of
  trouble, anyway. I owe you for that. But only fire that bolt into me, I'll owe you a great deal more. And
  I'll pay you back bit by bit, until your screams ring out so loud as
   to bring down the avalanches! Now then, boy. Don'tmake me wait but put your bolt in this loathsome
  thing's heart.' He took his foot off the other's neck and Vasagisat up.
  
   Nestor looked at him, and was more frightened of him now than he'd been before ... such a hideous,
  pitiful sight... it would be a mercy to kill him. He had only one bolt. He looked at the ugly, broken,
  bleeding Vasagi, and at Wran. The latter was more the man; he was - what, handsome? Handsomely
  dressed, anyway. He looked every bit the vampire Lord that Nestor had always pretended, imagined,
  and now believed himselfto be.
   'Hah/' Wran snorted. 'No guts for it, eh? But when Igive orders, I expect my thralls to jump!'
   Thrall?' Nestor growled back. 'I... am the LordNestor!'
   'Eh?' Wran frowned, stepped away from Vasagi, tooka pace towards Nestor. 'You're what? A Lord,
  did you say?' Behind him, Vasagi took up a jagged rock in hisleft hand, came flowing to his feet.
   Nestor yelled, 'Look out!' And Wran hunched his shoulders, ducked down, stepped aside. An instant
  later, Nestor's bolt was sent thrumming through the air to bury itself to the flight in Vasagi's already scarlet
  tunic. Except this time when the Suck was knocked down, he stayed down ...
   The bolt had struck close enough to Vasagi's heart to paralyse him. With Nestor's aid, Wran dragged
  him by the legs, flopping, away from the rocks and up the slope to a place where the hard earth faced
  squarelysouth. There he pegged him out face-down, to await therising sun.
   'Of course, we shall be long gone from here by then,'
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   Wran said. 'A pity, for I fancy I'd relish the Suck'sscreams as the sun reduces him to so much smoulder!'
   'His screams?' Nestor looked in horror at the pegged-out thing. 'But how can he scream?'
   'With his mind,' Wran explained. And Nestor remembered how he had 'heard' Vasagi's shriek of denial
  asWran went to sever his proboscis.
   'Ah!' he said.
   Wran turned his scarlet gaze upon him and snorted.'Huh! You don't know too much for a "Lord", do
  you?' He grinned, in his way. 'And just what sort of a "Lord"are you, anyway?'
   'An outcast,' Nestor lifted his chin. 'Cast out of Star-side. And now I'm on my way back.'
   'Really!' the other nodded, fingered his wen soberly.The lad amused him. 'Cast out, you say? For some
  heinous crime or other, perhaps? Against theWamphyri?'
   'I don't know,' Nestor shook his head, ran a hand through his hair, felt the plate of new bone where his
  scalp was thick and rough at the back. 'I don't ...remember.' Wran looked deep into his dark eyes; they
  
  seemed dazed, and the mind behind them not entirely there. Obviously this one had survived some raid or
  other - barely! But he was well enough now, physicallyat least.
   'So, you'd be a Lord of the Wamphyri, eh?' Wran noddedagain. An amusing scheme was taking shape
  in his mind.How it would work out he didn't know, must wait and see.But as far as Vasagi the Suck was
  concerned, certainly itwould give Wran the last and loudest laugh. 'Well, it's noteveryone who gets to be
  a Lord,' he said. 'But in your case-maybe I can arrange it.' Then he glanced south and saw thepale stain
  blossoming on the horizon, and his red eyesnarrowed at once. 'Except we must do it quickly.'
   'Do what?' Nestor was innocent as a child. He started as Vasagi made a slobbering sound and blew red
  bubbles, and began to come awake.
   Wran made no answer but his eyes were totally evil, menacing - inviting? - when he asked: 'Are you ...
  hungry?' He glanced at Vasagi. 'Me, I'm hungry, and this one has a leech in him. If our roles were
  reversed,he'd do the same to me.'
   Again Nestor felt prompted to ask, Do what? But he kept the question to himself and backed away. For
  Wran had gone to his knees, and his metamorphic face was less manlike now. His mouth was a gash that
  opened like a trapdoor, impossibly wide. Teeth grew visibly in that crimson hole, elongating, curving like
  white daggers from the ruptured ridges of his jaws. They were fangs, with eye teeth like knives; their
  'blades' were long as Nestor's own knife, and overlapped Wran's trembling lower lip! His nose - dark
  and squat before, with large black nostrils - grew yet more convoluted, quivering, sensitive as a bat's.
  And his eyesseemed almost to drip blood.
   'Aye, leave me now,' he coughed the words out, shooting Nestor a look that brooked no argument. 'But
  not too far. And when I call out for you, come at once.' His blunt fingers tore Vasagi's tunic open, and
  commenced to knead the ridge of his exposed spine.
   Nestor left him, went stumbling back down to the trail, and along it to the dying embers of Wran's fire.
  The roasted meat smell was heavy in the air now. Some wild creature moved there, a fox or feral dog,
  scurrying at Nestor's approach. It grabbed up the spit and meat entire from where it lay toppled to one
  side, dropped the hot food and slunk into the shadows, returned in a moment to snatch up the meat
  again.
   Nestor had not looked at Wran's roast before; but
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   now, as it lay there smoking, and as the fox - it was a fox, yes - snapped it up a second time, he saw
  what it was. At least, he believed he saw what it was. And then he no longer wished to know what it
  was, except itsshape was something his mind couldn't erase: the black ened form of a tiny Szgany infant!
  The 'bait' which Wran had used to alert Vasagi to his presence here andlure him to his doom.
   'Nestor, attend me now!' Wran's shout drifted down to him through the thinning mist. Nestor looked up,
  saw how the dawn was advancing. Above the barrier range, the Northstar's glitter was much reduced.
  
  Ah, but as he saw that star of ill-omen the idea returned to burn as brightly as ever, and his horror shrank
  down. What, fear? Trembling? Trepidation? No, for this was his legacy. He was the Lord Nestor, and he
  was goinghome.
   He returned to Wran and saw what he had done, what he was even now about: a nightmarish act or
  acts! But Nestor's sensitivities were severely blunted, reduced, even reversed. What would so recently
  have horrified him merely fascinated him now. These were thingswhich he had somehow forgotten or
  been caused to forget, which he must now remember, re-learn, if he was to be successful in Starside.
  Perhaps his failure to appreciate such things in thefirst place was responsiblefor his current privations!
   Wran saw his morbid fascination and nodded. 'Well, you're a rare one, I'll grant you that. I gave you the
  opportunity to run for it - it's almost dawn; I have to go; I would not have pursued you - but you're still
  here.You really do want to be Wamphyri.'
   Nestor only half heard him, glanced at him, saw that his face and mouth were more nearly 'human' again,
  however bloody. But mainly he gazed at Vasagi: his
   back laid open to the naked bone, and something black- his leech? - writhing there, but feebly, like a
  dyingsnake of black muscle, half welded to his spine within his body. The black thing had been punctured
  andleaked crimson, the richest colour Nestor could imagine, whose shade matched precisely the blood
  on Wran'sface and lips.
   In a voice filled with wonder but little or no fear, finally Nestor asked: 'What caused you to fight? For
  plainly you are both Wamphyri.'
   Wran laughed. 'Isn't that enough reason?' And then,more soberly: 'He insulted me.' (He shrugged.)
  'Well, we insulted each other. Our rivalries were various and couldn't continue. We dwelled too close
  together andcrossed each other's paths too often. When it came, the challenge was mutual and could only
  be resolved likethis: one of us must die. But even so, we had no desireto entertain our "brothers" and our
  "sister" in Starside's last aerie. And so our duel would be a private thing and take place here, on Sunside.
  No rules except that we come on our own, with all the length and breadth of Sunside for a battleground,
  and the long night fromsundown to sunup for duration.'
   'What if he had not come to you?' Nestor's eyes stayedrapt upon the black thing's spastic movements
  where itgradually detached itself from Vasagi's spine.
   Then there was always tomorrow night,' the other answered. 'But that was unlikely. For to live another
  night here meant living another day here. Which was the other proviso: that once we set out from
  Starside,we could not return until it was finished. Aye, and only one of us could go back. Anything else
  would be seen as - what? — half-hearted at best, cowardice at worst.But we were not cowards, the
  Suck and I, nor were wehalf-hearted.'
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   That ... thing,' Nestor nodded towards the maimed, tortured, outstretched form of Vasagi, 'is coming out
  
  ofhim.'
   'His leech?' Wran answered. 'Indeed it is! For it knows he is a loser. Perhaps it will have a better chance
  ... elsewhere?' Grinning hideously, he cocked his headon one side.
   'Elsewhere?' Nestor watched the thing's struggles asit emerged like a long, corrugated slug from Vasagi
  on to the hard earth. Blind, indeed eyeless, still its 'head' turned in Wran's direction as it sensed him there.
  And it lingered like that a moment, swaying this way and that as if it were exhausted and about to
  collapse. The thing was all of eighteen inches long, ridgy, shiny black and mottled green, and red from the
  Suck's spilledblood.
   'A strong new host,' Wran's chuckle was a clottedgurgle, 'whose precious blood would save its life.
  Except I can't allow that, for there's far too much of Vasagi init. So...give me your knife.'
   Nestor handed over the knife, and as he moved so Vasagi's leech turned towards him. Wran had been
  appraised; he already had a leech; he'd been rejected as a possible host. But Nestor ... had not. And
  with slow, painful contractions of its underbelly, it commenced toglide towards him.
   But: 'Ah, no, my friend!' Wran cried. He fell on it, grasped its body with an iron hand, quick as a flash
  detached its six-inch 'head' and hurled it away, out over the misted trail. There was very little blood left in
  it to bleed, and very little strength. At first it flexed and whipped like a fish fresh from the river, but then in
  a moment lay still. Wran stood up from it and grunted: 'Now ... watch!'
   Nestor scarcely needed telling; he couldn't take his
   eyes off the thing, which had turned a sick, glistening grey. It lay on its back now, more slug-like than
  ever, its belly silvery in the rapidly improving light. Something like a blister formed in the slit which might
  be a reproductive organ, and Wran pointed, saying: 'Ah, thevery thing! Newborn, it knows nothing. In its
  way, why, it's much like yourself, Nestor! Aye, Vasagi's egg is allinstinct. See!'
   The blister was now a small grey sphere no larger than a man's thumbnail, which detached itself from the
  parent body and slid down the thing's belly to the earth. Nestor saw that there was something mobile
  within it. He had watched tadpoles emerging from frog-spawn when he was a child; it was like that, but
  the casing of the egg was more like a film than a jelly. Suddenly it popped like a bubble, releasing its
  contents. The small, silvery sphere which emerged was frantic; covered with hundreds of flickering hairs,
  it skitteredto and fro among the pebbles.
   Wran said: 'Can you believe it? Can you understand, Nestor? For this tiny, harmless thing... is what you
  would be! It is Wamphyri!' He went to one knee again, reached out his hand to touch it - and the sphere
  ran along his finger on to his palm and spun there like a top. He held it out so that Nestor could see it
  more clearly: this whirling thing in his palm - which suddenlygrew motionless! And:
   'Ah!' Wran said. 'It would test me. Watch closely.'
   Nestor moved closer, gaped; his eyes were wide and his jaw hung open. The egg put out a single red
  thorn which sank effortlessly into the horny flesh of Wran's hand. And it tested - it tasted - him! Then ...
  the stinger was withdrawn in a moment, and the egg commenced spinning again.
   'Ah, shame!' Wran cried. 'It rejects me! Only enter my
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   body... it would be devoured in a moment, and knows it. But your body is an entirely different thing!'
  Wran stopped smiling; his eyes were suddenly huge, blazing with hell's fires; he blew the vampire egg off
  the palm of his hand like blowing a kiss - directly into Nestor'sface!
   Nestor closed his mouth, turned his face aside as the stench of Wran's breath hit him. But the egg hit him
  at one and the same time, and clung like spittle to his cheek - for a single moment. Then he felt it mobile
  on his flesh, inside his shirt, moving to the back of his neck. And Wran was right: from then on it was all
  instinct. Instinct told him to crush this thing, remove it, kill it, before he in turn was tested, tasted. Too
  late, for in his case that wasn't necessary. The egg had instincts, too, and knew that Nestor was innocent.
   In position, the shimmering pearly sphere turned scarlet. Requiring no ovipositor, it soaked into him, was
  absorbed into Nestor's flesh like water into sand. Settling to his spine, it made contact and fused with his
  shrinking nerve cells. Until which time, Nestor hadnever really known what pain was. But now he knew.
   He started, cried out, leaped, gave a reflex bound into the air with his limbs flying in all directions. He
  came down on his back among sharp stones and didn't even feel them, but he felt the thing exploring his
  spine. He jumped up, bounded again, as if to shake it loose. And the pain, which was now spreading
  through every part of his body - back, skull, all of his limbs - increased. There was a fire in his veins,
  which burned worse thanvinegar in an open wound.
   He tripped, fell, rolled among rocks which cut him, and felt nothing of it. For his cuts were like scratches
  compared to a lashing whip, except there were a hundred whips and they were all lashing inside him.
   Through all of this Wran the Rage laughed like a madman - a mad thing - laughed, danced and held his
  sides, and finally sat down, rocking this way and thatin hellish glee. He laughed until tears streamed from
  his red eyes, ran down his grey cheeks to drip from the wen on his chin; laughed till he leaned back
  against a rock and the raw flesh of his back was rubbed. And at that ... perhaps at last he appreciated
  something ofNestor's pain, too.
   Nestor had passed through panic and desperation and was well on his way into hell. He thought he was
  dying, that his agonies must soon kill him, but not soonenough, and knew he would welcome Death as a
  friend, a merciful release. His skull was bursting; his spine was on fire; acid coursed in his veins where he
  rolled and writhed upon the ground. But as Wran approachedhim, he summoned strength from
  somewhere and jerkedto his knees, and begged him, 'P-p-please!'
   'Aye, enough,' Wran nodded, and hit him justonce...
   'Wake up!' A hand hard as old leather slapped Nestor'sface, rocking his head to and fro. He sat
  propped against a boulder, exhausted, with the agony of his internal conflict gone now but all of his new
  cuts and bruisesburning and throbbing. Opening his eyes, he saw Wran of the Wamphyri standing huge
  against the dawn. Dawn, yes, for the vampire Lord was a silhouette withSunside for a backdrop; while
  beyond him on the rim of the world, a fan of golden spokes was already probingthe sky.
   'I go now,' Wran grunted. 'Up there on the bluff,' he jerked his head, 'two flyers are waiting. One of
  
  them was Vasagi's. As you're aware, he no longer has need of it. You have his egg, so why not his flyer
  too, eh?
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   Earlier, as you approached me in the night, my earsfollowed you along every inch of your route. Unless
  you were blind you saw the beasts. Am I right?'
   Nestor nodded, which was as much as he could do.
   'Well then, my Lord Nestor, the rest is up to you,'Wran told him. 'If you would come to Starside, the
  way stands open. Command Vasagi's beast and fly it home. Or if you're too weak, then it's best you stay
  here. Except I would warn you, the egg is sensitive: when it feels the sun upon your flesh its frenzy may
  well killyou. So fly or die, it's simple as that.'
   Again Nestor nodded. But his eyes were less vacant now; indeed they were unwavering, hard, fixed
  upon Wran's face as if to remember every last line and pore of it. The night is flown,' Wran said. 'An hour
  at most before a golden blister bursts on the world's rim, and splashes these barrier mountains with
  yellow pus. Butin Starside, all is safe and dark.'
   He turned and strode away, and could feel Nestor's eyes burning on his back as he climbed the rugged
  slope towards his flyer ...
   Nestor couldn't walk, so he crawled on hands andknees. But as he passed the pegged-out form of
  Vasagi,something spoke in his head: Boy, loosen these pegs.
   It was a whisper, faint, tortured, pitiful. As yet, Nestorcould still pity. He looked at Vasagi where he lay:
  his bloody, mutilated face blowing scarlet froth into thedust; his broken arm and ravaged spine; a bolt
  project ing from his back, and his neck a gaping mess where the first bolt had been wrenched free and
  tossed aside.Yet still alive!
   Aye, but dying, the voice came again. Wran hurt me sorely, but it was you who brought me down. So
  perhaps you're worthy to be Wamphyri at that. But you
   have my egg, my flyer . .. must you take my life, too? Itis finished anyway - but not like this, I beg you.
  Pull out the pegs, and let me crawl away into some cave to die. But not in the sunlight, for you can't know
  what itis...for one like me...to die in sunlight...
   Nestor knew well enough. Hadn't his flyer gone the same way, melting into stench and evaporation? But
  to pull out the pegs ... what if this creature were stilldangerous?
   The laughter which swelled in his mind then was bitter, and filled with a painful irony. Dangerous? Oh, I
  was, it's true! But now? I have no leech; I am broken,gutted, an empty shell. But you ... you are, or you
  were, Szgany. And you have things in you other than the morbid emotions of the Wamphyri. For a little
  while longer, at least. Which is why I beg you one last time;pull out the pegs.
  
   Nestor did it, and crawled on. In a little while he could get to his feet. He looked back, and Vasagi was
  still stretched there; he hadn't moved; perhaps he couldn't. Nestor put him out of his mind and went tohis
  flyer.
   The beast saw him coming and looked at him throughstupid, lustreless eyes. He approached it carefully,
  for he saw how it could roll or flop on him and crush his life out. But it was of vampire stuff and sensed
  the vampire in Nestor; it blinked its great eyes nervously as he took hold of its trappings, no more than
  that. Then, as he dragged himself up into the saddle, he saw Vasagi's bloody gauntlet hanging from a
  strap, whereWran had left it for him. Of course, for what's a Lord of the Wamphyri without his gauntlet?
   Sunside was all hazy grey and green now, with mists rising out of the dark forests and blue smoke from
  distant campsites and townships, and all the birds
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   waking up, commencing their dawn chorus. Central onthe southern horizon, a yellow glow threatened at
  anymoment to become a golden furnace.
   Nestor dug his heels into his mount's sides at the base of its swaying neck, and gave a tentative jerk on
  the reins. 'Up,' he grunted. 'Let's be away.'
   The creature craned its neck, looked at him curiously,stretched its manta wings - and did nothing.
  Nestorslapped its neck and the grey flesh twitched a little - that was all. 'Up!' he shouted, digging harder
  with his heelswhere rasps on Vasagi's boots had furrowed the beast'sflanks. It grunted and quivered, but
  sat still. The answerwas in Nestor's head, and finally he found it there.
   I want you tofly! he told the creature. Up, now, into thesky, and home to Starside. Or would you rather
  melt when the sun comes up? Metamorphic muscles bunched then, and the flyer's thrusters coiled
  themselves as tight as springs. But still the beast would not, could not obey him. Till suddenly Vasagi's
  almost exhausted 'voice' joined Nestor's:
   Aye, you were ever a faithful beast. When I told youto stay, you stayed. But now you are his. It pleases
  meto give you to him . ..for a while, at least. Sofly -fly!
   The beast's wings extended from its sides as alveolatebones, membrane and muscle stretched and
  flowed inmetamorphic flux. A moment more and it tilted forward on the rim of the bluff. Nestor clung
  with his knees,gripped hard on the reins. The flyer's thrusters uncoiledto hurl it aloft and forward...it flew!
   Wind whipped in Nestor's face as his weird mount glided out over Sunside, gaining height. But Sunside
  wasn't the way to go. And: 'Starside!' he shouted, with mind and mouth both. 'Starside!' Until the flyer
  arched its manta wings into vast scoops or air-traps, turned ina rising thermal, and climbed for the peaks.
   And down in the misted valleys and forests, everything Nestor had been and done - everything which
  he'd known and had now forgotten, forsaken - was left far, far behind ...
  
   Nathan followed the course of the Great Dark River,visiting Crack-in-the-Rocks, Many-Caverns, the
  twincolonies Lake-of-Light and Lake-of-Stars, and Place-of- the-Beast-Bones. Mostly he travelled the
  river route, deep under the desert; on occasion, where the river became a borehole with no path as such,
  he must be ferried through black bowels of earth; sometimes he went on the surface, from oasis to oasis,
  where wells or potholes connected the drifted sands to the subterranean silt of the river.
   There were many Thyre colonies, though few of themaccommodated more than a hundred or so
  individuals. Even Open-to-the-Sky, which was the largest so farvisited, had only supported some two
  hundred and sixty inhabitants. According to Atwei, the total count of Thyre did not exceed five thousand.
  To expand in excess of that number would be to reduce their livingstandards in the limited space
  available.
   Nathan passed on lore and learning wherever he went, firmly establishing himself as a friend of the
  Thyre, never once forgetting the humility which the desert folk - and their dead - so admired in him. And
  in the process of teaching, Nathan learned.
   He came across others who said they 'knew' numbers,but no one whose understanding surpassed Ethloi
  the Elder's rudimentary grasp. He studied what Ethloi hadshown him, worked with his 'Tens System' and
  exploreddivision, multiplication, even decimals; all without know ing his purpose or even if he had one
  beyond that he had been told it was important to him. And sometimes
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   he conjured the numbers vortex, trapping whole sections of its fluxing configurations and bringing them to
  immobility on the screen of his mind, so that he might examine them. They revealed nothing but remained
  as alien as the farthest stars. Only relax his concentration for a moment ... they would flow, mutate, rejoin
  thevortex and be sucked back into an infinity of fathomless formulae ...
   The Thyre gave him news of the Wamphyri. Here, farto the east of the great pass into Starside, their
  works were less in evidence. What Nathan was able to learn fitted well with what he already knew: that
  only a handful had crossed the Great Red Waste into Starside, and that they had settled in Karenstack,
  the last aerie. There they consolidated their position, built their army, created vampires. Since all of the
  'makings' could be found just across the mountains, an hour's flight away, as yet they'd felt no need to
  strike east; for the moment it satisfied them merely to scout on the eastern territories; coming in the dead
  of night, they'd been seen as shadows against the moon and stars, mapping out the land from on high, and
  gazing down rapaciously on thehuman wealth of tomorrow's conquests.
   West of the pass, however - among the displaced and dispossessed, ensieged and embattled people of
  Settlement, Tireni Scarp, Mirlu Township, a half-dozen more towns and encampments, and all of the
  Szgany tribes which now wandered there - things were different. For there could be found the first real
  victims of the scarlet plague, but only the first. For just as soon as the Wamphyri had recruited sufficient
  thralls and lieutenants, made enough of flyers and warriors, and established themselves as an utterly
  incontestable conquering force, then it would be time to advance their borders east. The rape of Sunside
  would continue,
  
   expand, and finally engulf all. The old order would fall,and the Szgany ... would be as cattle ...
   En route east, Nathan spent less time in each new Thyre colony; he felt himself drawn east, to the very
  roots of the cancer which was even now spreading through Sunside. Perhaps that was the main
  attraction:no longer satisfied to run from the plague, he had deter mined to meet it head on. For unless he
  was preparedto spend the rest of his life with the Thyre, eventually it must overtake him anyway. Why,
  given time, it mighteven overrun the Thyre themselves!
   Thyre place-names became a blur in his mind as weeks grew into months underground or in the seem
  ingly trackless sands of the surface: Eight-Trees-Leaning, Glowworm Lake, Garden-Gorge-Over and
  Garden-Gorge-Under, Seven Wells South, Place-of-the-Hot-Springs, Big Swirly Hole and Crumble
  Cavern.Until, from the dead of Saltstone Sump, he learned the name of an Ancient in River's Rush
  beyond the GreatRed Waste: Thikkoul, who had read men's futures in the stars. Alas, Thikkoul had gone
  blind before he died, and the stars had become invisible to him. But now, through Nathan ... perhaps it
  was possible he could read them again? Perhaps he might even read Nathan's future in the stars.
   Nathan determined to speak with Thikkoul, but manymiles yet to River's Rush, and a great many
  colonies in between ...
   On the fertile rim of Crater Lake, rising like a false plateau from the surface of the furnace desert,
  Nathan spoke to his guide Septais, a young Thyre male only five or six years his senior. Septais had been
  with him now for a three-month; they were firm friends and felt little or nothing of strangeness or alienage
  in each
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   other's company. Nathan's voice was hushed, evenawed, as he asked: 'How can it be that Szgany and
  Thyre don't know each other? We've dwelled so close, so long, and yet apart from the occasional
  trading contact, we're strangers!'
   'But ... we do know you,' Septais answered, blinking.
   'Yes,' Nathan nodded, 'you know us - you know something of us, anyway - but the Szgany have never
  reallyknown you. And they certainly haven't known this!' He held out his hands as if to encompass all of
  CraterLake.
   The place was simply that: a giant crater a mile across, with a raised inner caldera. The river entered
  through caverns in the base of the west wall; it formed a great blue lake which emptied through a gap in
  the reef-like central node of jutting rocks, and from there down into the sump of a whirlpool. After that,
  deep inthe earth again, the Great Dark River ran east as before. And so the colony was an oasis, but vast
  and verybeautiful.
   'You mean our oases, our secret places? But if you knew of them they would not be secret. And if you
  knew of them ... how long before the Wamphyri learned of them, too?' Septais gave a shrug. 'You
  
  Szgany haveyour places, the forests and the hills, and we desert folkhave ours.'
   'I don't blame you for not wanting to share this,'Nathan told him.
   'Perhaps different men should live together,' Septaisanswered. 'But our experience is that they can't.
  Upon atime, the Eastern Necromancers invaded. In aspect, theyseemed much like the Thyre - far more
  like us than you Szgany - but they were not. For one thing, they did not have our telepathy. But they did
  have ... other arts.'
   'I've been told about them,' Nathan nodded.Again Septais's shrug. 'We trade a little with theSzgany, so
  that they may know us for a peaceful people.It is enough.'
   'I understand,' Nathan said. 'But I still can't understand whywe don't know about you. So close, and yet
  so ignorant. And your telepathy: I know that certainmen of the Szgany have had such talents before me.
  Didthey never hear your minds conversing? Did they neverwonder?'
   'Our thoughts are guarded,' Septais said. 'From birth to death, we are careful how we use this skill.
  Amongthe Szgany, telepathy is rare. But among the Wamphyri- it is not!'
   Nathan nodded. 'That makes sense, for I couldn't bear the thought of them here!' Giving an involuntary
  shudder, he fell silent for a moment. But he was still curious, puzzled. 'That aside,' he said in a while, 'we
  are very close — I mean physically, geographically — with nothing so vast as the barrier range to
  separate us. It surprises me that men, Szgany loners, haven'tstumbled upon your oases.'
   'Really?' said Septais. 'You are surprised? Well, yourgeography may be sound in Sunside, Nathan, but it
  lacks something here in the furnace deserts. You ask,why have men not stumbled upon us?' He pointed
  north and slightly west. 'Over there, some sixty miles, lies the eastern extent of the barrier range, where
  the mountains crumble to the Great Red Waste.' Keeping his spindly arm raised, he turned slowly east
  through ninety degrees. 'And all of that, for a thousand miles, is theGreat Red Waste. Beyond it lies a
  continuation of Sun- side, the mountains, the Szgany and the Wamphyri: anunknown or legendary land, to
  you. Men, Szgany, havenot crossed the Great Red Waste. How could they, when
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   even the Thyre have not crossed it on the surface? You shall be the first of the Szgany, but you shall pass
  around and beneath it!'
   Nathan looked where Septais had first pointed. 'Sun-side, only sixty miles away,' he mused. 'And not
  even acrag showing on the flat horizon, because the mountains lie beyond the curve of the world. And of
  course you are right, Septais: why should any sane man of the Szgany ever venture out here? The forests
  blend into grasslands, which turn into scrub and sand, and the deserts sprawl sunwards forever. Only the
  strange, thin, dark-skinned nomads may dwell in the desert,and theirs is a fragile existence among the
  sun-bleached dunes, the rocky canyons and barren mesas. So we have always supposed; little we knew.'
  He pulled a wry face. 'But I wonder: if my people are to die out, killedoff or...changed, by the
  Wamphyri, mightn'ta few be saved, out here in the desert?'
  
   'That is for the elders,' the other sighed. 'If I were oneof them . .. you know I could never deny you but
  would try to arrange it. For I have felt your sadness: how it washes out from you in great waves. A great
  deal ofsadness, but hatred, too - for the Wamphyri!'
   'You "feel" it?' Again Nathan's wry smile. 'Do youspy on me, then?'
   'No need for that!' said Septais. 'But I think: perhaps you should learn how to guard your thoughts,
  Nathan, like the Thyre. Why, sometimes they are so strong Imust steel myself against them, unless they
  repel me!'
   That strong? He looked at Septais and nodded, butgrimly now.Aye, maybe, but1 wish they were
  stronger: so strong thatI could thinkall of the Wamphyri intoextinction! Especially the one called Canker
  Canison.
   The other shook his head, took Nathan's arm. 'The will is not enough,' he said. 'No man can think some-
   thing into existence, Nathan, or out of it. Nor would welike it if we could. For as well as good, there is
  evil in all men. Who knows what a man might think, in somesad, frustrated moment?'
   'Evil in all men,' Nathan answered. 'Yes, you're right- but more of it in the Wamphyri! I know, for I've
  seenit first hand. And you may believe me, I would drownthem in my numbers vortex, or think them to
  death, if Icould!'
   'Well then,' said Septais, 'in that case you have a great deal of studying to do, for as yet your numbers
  are weightless and could not drown a fly. Likewise agreat deal of thinking; for while your thoughts are
  pas sionate, they are also ungovernable, and you are theonly one who is likely to die of them!'
   And in this Septais showed wisdom far beyond therange of his two-score years .. .
   Nathan had been with the Thyre for a year and fivemonths - some seventy-three 'days' - when he
  surfaced through Red Well Sump on the edge of the Great Red Waste. He had parted company with
  Septais elevensunup cycles earlier, since when he'd had various Thyre guides along the course of the
  Great Dark River. But from here on in the name of that subterranean torrent would be different: it was
  now the Great Red River, after all of the mineral wastes washed into it from therusty, ruined earth.
   Nathan's new guide was a spry Thyre elder called Ehtio, whose knowledge of this entirely uninhabitable
  region was as good as anyone's: at best rudimentary. In the ghastly glow of a crimson twilight, Ehtio
  showedNathan a map drawn on lizard skin, which detailed the course of the river from their last stop,
  Ten-Springs-Spurting, to their current location.
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   'The river has swung north,' he husked, 'taking us under the Great Red Waste. And this —' he gazed all
  about, his soft Thyre eyes blinking, '— is the Great Red Waste, its southern fringe, anyway. Aptly
  
  named, as
   you see.'
   They had come up steps cut in the wall of a vast well. A hundred and fifty feet below them, their boat
  was moored where Thyre oarsmen waited. There was no colony here; their stop was to be of the
  shortestduration, just long enough for Nathan to see and loathethe place. And from his first glance, he did
  loathe it.
   Standing on the pitted wall of the well, behind itsparapet, he turned in a slow circle and gazed out across
  the Great Red Waste. And in every direction he saw the same thing: wave upon wave of red and black
  dunes, with areas between like massive blisters which hadburst and turned brittle, and crumbled back
  into them selves, and others which were lakes of seething, bubbling, smoking chemicals. Nathan smelled
  tar, sulphur,the overpowering reek of rotten eggs, the stench of mordant acids. The contours of the dunes
  were like wrinkles in diseased skin, as if this entire landscapewere the body of some cosmic corpse dead
  of its lesions and infections, its flesh torn and rotting, and Nathanand Ehtio standing in its navel.
   It was the twilight of evening. South, the horizon wasa sick, shimmering, smoky ochre: the sunset seen
  through a smog of rising vapours. North, the horizonwas black, humped, alien. Overhead, the stars
  wavered; they blinked on and off like sick fireflies, dying in the
   rising reek.
   The air is bad,' said Ehtio. 'We can't stay.'
   'A thousand miles of this?' Nathan shook his head,
   turned towards the stairwell. 'I don't want to stay ...' The damp, musty air rising from the well seemed
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   sweet by comparison. Descending in flickering torchlight, Nathan asked: 'What happened, up there?
  Doesanyone know?'
   'Not for sure,' Ehtio shook his head. Too old to bepart of history, it is myth, lore, legend. I cannot
  guarantee it.'
   Tell me anyway.'
   'One day in the long ago, a white sun fell from thesky. It skipped over the world like a flat stone
  bouncingon water. This was one of the places where it bounced; such was the impact, its iron shell was
  broken and fellon the land in so many pieces they could not be counted. The land became hot; chemicals
  in the soil gathered into pools; acids ate the white sun's metal skin intorust. It is a process which continues
  to this day. But the core of the white sun made one final leap. Shrinking, it sped west and slightly north;
  such was its fascination,it drew up the mountains to form the barrier range, and was in turn drawn to
  earth.'
   Nathan nodded. 'We have much the same legend. Thewhite sun fell on Starside and fashioned the
  boulder plains. It sits there even now - I've seen it - like a cold blind eye, glaring on Starside. But that's
  not all, forSzgany legend has it that this sphere of cold white lightis a kind of doorway, to hellish lands
  beyond.''Beyond what?' Ehtio looked at him. 'Beyond itself, beyond this world.' Nathan shook his head.
  
  'Beyond my powers to describe. But ... it's not just a legend, for men have come through that Gate from
  the world beyond. And creatures from Starsidehave likewise crossed to their side.' 'Creatures?'
   'Wamphyri! I've heard it said that sometimes they would cast one of their own out - cast him into the
  Gate.'
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   'Indeed,' said Ehtio, offering a sad, slow, very thoughtful nod. 'And so vampires have passed through this
  "Gate", eh?' He nodded again. 'Well then, it strikes me that if these lands "beyond" were not hellish
  before, they are now.' Which reminded Nathan that LardisLidesci had once said much the same thing ...
   From Red Well Sump the river swung south again and back under a comparatively healthy desert. Such
  was its load of rust, its waters would run red for a furtherhundred miles.
   Forty miles east of Red Well Sump and eighteen southof the Great Red Waste, the next Thyre colony
  wascalled Place-Under-the-Orange-Crags. It remindedNathan of Place-Under-the-Yellow-Cliffs; also
  of Atwei,his Thyre sister. The Cavern of the Ancients was similar, too, except there was no Rogei and no
  crystalceiling.
   Place-Under-the-Orange-Crags fronted a sprawlingplateau lying roughly east to west. Looking north
  fromits summit towards the Great Red Waste, Nathan sawthat the entire northern horizon was a dirty red
  smudge. The barrier range lay far to the west; likewise Sunsideand Settlement, which through all of his
  formative yearshe'd called home. He was homesick; no, he was sick for anything Szgany. Once, he'd
  been a loner even among the Sunsiders; he'd wanted nothing so much as to escape to an alien world,
  while in this one Misha had been his only anchor. Now Misha was gone and he actually lived in an alien
  world, which palled on himmore every day.
   'Men are contrary,' Ehtio husked from beside him. 'Aye, Szgany and Thyre alike.' His voice drew
  Nathanback to earth.
   'Oh? Was I thinking out loud again?'
   'Often,' said the other. 'Do you no longer practiseyour mind-guard?'
   Nathan thought of Misha's face - he couldn't help it; it flashed into his mind - but just as he had been
  taught by Septais during many an hour of trial-and-error instruction, so now he 'cloaked' both the thought
  and the picture. And: There,' he said. 'How's that?' Hefelt Ehtio's probe: a tingle on the periphery of his
  awareness, which he held at bay.
   'Quite excellent,' said the elder after a moment. 'But now that your thoughts are in order and guarded,
  you must concentrate more on your emotions. The two areclosely linked.'
   Nathan nodded. 'I've heard much the same before.'
   'Nathan,' said Ehtio, 'I have been asked to tell you that should you desire it, there will always be a place
  for you with the Thyre.'
   It was a great honour and Nathan acknowledged it. Except: 'First there are things I must do,' he said.
  'Andeven then ... afterwards...I don't know.'
  
   Things you must do? Put your life at risk, do youmean? Go among the eastern Szgany, who give them
  selves - and their children - to the Wamphyri withoutprotest? Oh? And how then shall they deal with
  you?'
   'It's hard to believe they do that to their own,' Nathanshook his head. 'Not without protest. As for me...
  Ihave to know how it is for them there, and how it's yetto be in Sunside.'
   Ehtio made a hopeless gesture. 'But what good will itdo? What can you change? You have nothing to
  gain, everything to lose. Yes, and we too, the Thyre, haveeverything to lose.'
   'In me?'
   'Of course.'
   'You value me too highly.'
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   'How so? You are invaluable!'
   'I have to go,' Nathan was determined. 'But I'm grateful to the Thyre for all I've learned from them. And
  Iwillwork on my telepathy - yes, my emotions too - and on the numbers shown to me by Ethloi. It strikes
  me there has to be a reason, a purpose, in all of thesethings. But I must go east, if only to speak to
  Thikkoulin River's Rush and discover my future in the stars.'
   The first two are things you can do without riskingyourself,' Ehtio answered. 'And the last is an excuse,
  orat best a forlorn hope. It seems to me you go to sacrificeyourself.'
   'No,' Nathan denied it. 'I go to improve myself. Sometime ago - it seems a long time now - I made my
  Szgany vow. It may be I made it in anger and horror, but it was still my vow. If I forsake it now, that
  wouldbe...unseemly. Perhaps these gifts of mine are tools, which I must learn to use in order to fulfil my
  obligations. In which case it will be a useful thing to knowmy future.'
   'You are stubborn,' Ehtio told him, but withoutrancour.
   'I'm Szgany,' Nathan answered, simply...
   A further twelve sunups and Nathan reached River'sRush. Here the Great Red River's course became a
  borehole, and the river itself a solid chute of water hurtling through eleven miles of narrow, subterranean
  sumpsbefore widening out and being reasonable, placid again. Below ground those miles were
  unnavigable; it made little or no difference to Nathan, whose route now layto the north, across the
  surface.
   As for the Thyre: there were only two more coloniesto the east, beyond which the river flowed on into
  mythand mystery. But the two must remain unvisited; River's
  
   Rush was Nathan's last stop at the end of a journey which had carried him more than two thousand miles
  from his birthplace.
   On the surface, the place was a small oasis twenty miles south of 'Sunside' (the Sunside of these
  unknown eastern regions, at least). Beyond Sunside were mountains, and across the mountains 'Starside'.
  There the Wamphyri dwelled in a mighty gorge, whose name Nathan had learned from the Thyre:
  Turgosheim. But even though the vampires were the undisputed mastershere, still the restrictions upon
  them were the same: the night was their element, but the sun was their mortalenemy.
   Upon a time the Thyre had traded with the Szgany inthe grassland fringe between desert and forest,
  much as they did in the west; all that had come to an abrupt,bloody end some three years ago. For the
  Szgany of thisregion had become a gaunt, greedy people. Worn down by the Wamphyri, their
  sensitivities had been erodedaway until they were little more than feral creatures, nolonger trustworthy.
   When the members of a Thyre trading party had seenhow they were being cheated, even threatened by
  theSzgany, they had tried to withdraw back into the desert. The Szgany fell on them and murdered them;
  their fewgoods were stolen; they paid with their lives for a hand ful of medicinal salts and a few polished
  lizard skins. Only one man, wounded in his side, had returned toRiver's Rush to tell the tale.
   The story made Nathan afraid, and not a littleashamed. For these were Szgany, his people. Also, hehad
  intended to visit among them. Maybe now he would change his plans ...
   In any event, his work came first, and for the duration of a single sunup he proved his credentials in the
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   mausoleum called the Hall of Endless Hours. There,when at last his time was his own, he spoke to
  Thikkoul: a bundle of venerable rags in a niche lit by a constantlyflickering candle.
   And so you've come, that one's deadspeak came as a whisper in the Necroscope's mind. Well, it should
  not surprise me, /or I remember how, before I went blind, I saw it in the stars: a visit from one who
  would makeme see again, however briefly. Then I died and still you had not come. And I thought: so
  much for my astrology! And all my life's work was in doubt. Ah, howcould I know that even in death
  there may be light!
   'Did you really read men's futures in the stars?'Nathan was fascinated.
   Do you doubt me?
   'It seems a strange talent, this astrology.'
   Oh, and is it stranger than telepathy? Stranger than this deadspeak which allows me to communicate
  withmy myriad colleagues among the Great Majority?Stranger than your own unique talent?
  
   'It's not that I'm without faith,' Nathan answered. 'But even the Thyre bolster their faith with fact. Showit
  to me.'
   The other chuckled. Gladly! Only show me the stars,and I will show you the future.
   Nathan nodded. 'But there are no stars in the Hall of Endless Hours, Thikkoul. I'll have to go up into the
  desert. Stay with me . ..'
   Above, it was night. The stars were diamonds, butthey shone softer here than over Starside and the
  barrier range. Nathan walked out over sands which were coolnow, away from the oasis. And in the
  silence and achingloneliness of the desert, Thikkoul's thoughts came more clearly into his inner mind. Lie
  down, look up, gaze upon the heavens. Let me look out through your eyes
   upon all the times which were, are, and will be. Forjustas the light from the stars is our past, so is it our
  future. Except...
   'Yes?' Nathan put down a blanket, lay upon it, andlooked up at the stars. Likewise Thikkoul.
   Except . .. first I should warn you: things are rarelyas I see them.
   'You make errors?'
   Oh, I see what I see! Thikkoul answered at once. Buthow the things which I see shall come to pass, that
  isnot always clear. The future is devious, Nathan. It takesa brave man to read it, and only a fool would
  guaranteeits meaning.
   'I don't understand,' Nathan frowned, shook hishead.
   Thikkoul looked out through Nathan's eyes at the stars - looked at them for the first time in a hundred
  years - and sighed. Ahh! he said. Boy and man, they fascinated me, and continue to fascinate me. I am in
  your debt, Nathan Kiklu of the Szgany. But repaymentmay be hard, for both of us.
   'No, it will be easy. Read my future, that's enough.'
   But that was my meaning. What if I read hard thingsfor you? Must I tell you your fate as well as your for
  tune?
   'Whatever you see, that will suffice.'
   I shall do as best1 can, the other told him, and for awhile was silent. Then...it came in a flood, in a flash,
  a river bursting its banks. So fast that Nathan could scarcely cling to the words and images as Thikkoul
  threw them into his mind:
   I see ... doors! Like the doors on a hundred Szganycaravans but liquid, drawn on water, formed of
  ripples. And behind each one of them, a piece of your future. A door opens. I see a man, Szgany, a
  so-called 'mystic'.
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   His name is - lo... Jo... lozel! And his game - is treachery! NowI see Turgosheim; the manse of a great
  wizard; you and he together. He would use you, learnfrom you, instruct and corrupt you! The door
  closes, but another opens...
   The sun rises and sets, and sunups come and go in a blur where you wander in a great dark castle of
  many caves. I see your face: your hollow eyes and greying hair? NowI see... a /light to freedom, yes! But
  ... upon a dragon? One door closes, and another opens. I see... a maiden; the two of you - three of you?
  -together. You seem happy; doors continue to open andclose; and now you seem sad .. .
   Some hours are long as days; others fly like seconds; long and short alike, they draw you into the future.
  And always the doors of your mind, opening and closing. I see... a battle - war! - Szgany and
  Wamphyri! You win, and you lose. Now I see an eye, white and blind and glaring, much like my own
  before I died, but vast as a cavern! You stand before it and the eye... is another door! It blinks! And in
  the blink of a great blind eye, you ... are ...
   Thikkoul paused, like a man breathless.
   'Yes?' Nathan's real voice was hoarse with excitement... but Thikkoul's deadspeak was hoarse with
  horroras finally he continued:
   You are - gone!
   Ill
   In the chill, cheerless hours before dawn, made all the more cold and lonely because he was on his own
  now, Nathan walked away from the oasis over the blown sands which kept the subterranean caverns of
  the Thyre secret. He had been told that the going was firm between here and Sunside; but in any case,
  he'd grown used to walking in the desert and found it no great discomfort. The night was bright and the
  stars clear; Nathan's shadow walked behind him, cast by the moon as it hurtled over the mountains of the
  barrier range, whose serrated ridge made a scalloped horizon in the far dark distance. Frequent meteorite
  showers left brilliant, ephemeral tracks across the sky.
   After so much time spent underground, Nathan's night vision was much improved; he could see almost
  as well as in full daylight. As for direction: no chance that he could lose his way. No one among the
  Szgany knew the stars as well as he did; not even among the Thyre, that he knew of... except Thikkoul.
  And as he went at a brisk, long-striding pace across the featureless desert, Nathan thought back on what
  Thikkoul hadtold him, the conversation which had followed fast upon the dead astrologer's reading:
   'What does it mean?' He had wanted to know.
   Everything. And nothing, Thikkoul had answered, alittle sorrowfully now.
   'I can ignore it?'
   Of course. But alas, it won't ignore you.
   'Can't you make yourself plainer?'
  
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   Thikkoul had sighed. Didn't I warn you? The future is a devious thing, Nathan. This is the problem: will
  what I have read in the stars come to pass because, believing it, we make it come to pass? Or will it
  happen whether or no? And whatif we should try to avoid it, how then? Could it be that our actions will
  cause the very event we seek to avoid? But infact (Nathan had sensed the other's incorporeal shrug),
  there's no riddle - nothing contrary - in anyof this. The answer is simplicityitself: what will be will be!
  And that is all. 'I can set about making it happen,' Nathan had scratched his chin, repeating what the
  other had said but in his own way, 'or take steps to avoid it, or simply let it be. But whichever I choose, it
  will makeno difference?'
   Exactly. But there is one other complication. My readings are often symbolic. I don't understand the
  doors1 saw in your future: they seemed to be part of you. Nor do I understand the dragon-flight, or the
  vast eye which swallowed you in a blink. For these are things of your future, which are perhaps linked to
  your past. And so it's for you to know and understand them. Jf not now, most certainly later ...
   Nathan had frowned as he held to one of the things Thikkoul had told him. 'How may a thing come to
  pass because I try to avoid it? What if I know of this blind white eye which you mentioned - for indeed I
  believe I do - and make sure I go nowhere near it? How then canI be swallowed by it?'
   There was a man, the other had answered. He feared water and had bad dreams, premonitions, about
  his death. He came to me that I would read his stars. I told him the dangers but he insisted. The forecast
  was this:that in the course of a single sunup he would drown in theborehole of River's Rush, and his body
  never be found!
   I did not want to tell him but he insisted. Then, when he knew the truth he left River's Rush and climbed
  to the surface, and travelled west, alone, into the desert. He would escape his fate, do you see? Well, he
  found himself a little shade and sat out in the desert for all of that sunup,until the evening was nigh. Then,
  making to return, he stumbled and took a fall which broke his skin of water. Close by was a well; he
  went to it and lowered the bucket. But then, when he hauled up thewater, the wall crumbled and he fell
  in.
   The well was fed by the Great Red River; the riverswept him> away; he was seen, alive, lifting his hand
  up from the torrent, before being swirled into the borehole, lost forever ...
   At the end of his story Thikkoul had sighed again before lapsing silent, waiting for Nathan's response.
   'But if he went into the desert alone,' Nathan had queried eventually, 'how can you know the sequence
  of events?' At which, once again he had sensed the other's simplistic shrug, enabling him to guess the
  answer even before he heard it. It was deadspeak, of course: theability of the Great Majority, and of
  Nathan, to converseamong themselves in their graves.
   Because he told me all on the day I died! Thikkoul confirmed it. And his is a singularly awful 'resting
  place', Nathan, where in fact he knows no rest at all! For he was trapped in a swirling sump, where to
  this day his body remains, rotated and whirled in the frothing tumult. And all of his flesh long sloughed
  away; his bones all broken and reduced to rounded marbles, from the action of the waters. But at least
  he no longer fears the water, which has done its worst.. .
  
   Later, Nathan had asked The Five of River's Rush if they knew of a man - Szgany, a 'mystic', perhaps -
  who dwelled in Sunside. Indeed they did: his name was lozel
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   Kotys, who upon a time had had dealings with the Thyre. He had traded with them: low-grade iron
  knives for their good skins and medicines. But a mystic? That was a device which lozel had used all his
  days to avoid being taken in the tithe, until now he was well past hisprime and had no need of it. But he
  was still the cunning one, lozel Kotys! Why, it was rumoured among theSzgany that he had even been to
  Turgosheim in Starside! If so, then lozel was the only man who ever returnedunchanged from that
  dreadful place.
   After that, there had seemed nothing for it but that Nathan must go into Sunside. For quite apart from
  Thikkoul's predictions - even despite them, anticipating or pre-empting them - he had after all travelled
  the length of the known world in order to do just that. His original intention had been to see how the
  Szgany of these parts lived, and so discover how his own people must live one day, in the shadow of the
  Wamphyri. Butbeyond that, his reasons were now several.
   The things which Thikkoul had told him had come thick and fast, but among the purely verbal had been
  blurred, indistinct scenes, even as the astrologer had seen them for himself. The impression of
  insubstantial doors opening and closing; dim figures (chiefly Nathan's) weaving in and out of a succession
  of situations and locations; strange faces ogling and peering. Except ... two of the latter had not been
  strange at all butloving, and beloved.
   Nathan remembered Thikkoul's words, and the fleeting scene which had accompanied them. I see a
  maiden;the twoof you - three of you? - together. You seem happy . ..
   Of course he would seem happy, if such were true. But how could it be? For those dim, wavering
  female forms had worn the glad shining faces of his mother,
   and of Misha Zanesti! Which was why, at the end of Thikkoul's reading, Nathan's voice had been
  hoarse with excitement. Ah, but now, thinking back on the rest of the astrologer's words, his excitement
  was replaced by doubts and uncertainties.
   Nathan had always assumed that his mother and Misha were dead, or worse than dead, even though he
  had never seen their bodies or known for sure their whereabouts. And how should he think of them now?
  Thikkoul had told him: These are things of your future, which are perhaps Jinked to your past. And so it
  is for you to know and understand them.
   But how was he to understand them? Had the faces of those loved ones out of past times been simply
  that: scenes from the past, which yet influenced his future? Of course they had influence over him; they
  always would have. Or... was there more to it than that? What if they were alive even now: not as
  monstrous Wamphyri changelings but as simple slaves, thrall servants in some Starside aerie or craggy
  mansion? And ifso, how to find them?
  
   Which was why he walked to Sunside in the brightening air, with the stars gradually fading overhead,
  and the barrier range growing up before him like a mirage out of the desert. For his future was right here;
  time bore him forward into it with every passing second; and since he couldn't avoid it, he might just as
  well meet it head on. And somewhere along the way, all unsuspecting, lozel Kotys was waiting for him.
  Which seemed as good a place as any to start. ..
   In the Sunside of Nathan's infancy the Szgany had preferred to stay close to their mountains. Most of the
  Traveller trails had been in the foothills, rarely in the forests. The reasons were several: clouds breaking
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   the peaks provided good water; wild life was plentiful on the slopes and the hunting was excellent; the
  roots of the mountains were riddled with hiding places in therocks, where cavern systems abounded.
   Here things were different. While these eastern peoplewere Szgany, or of the same basic stock, they
  were notTravellers. Perhaps- almost certainly - they had been in the long ago, but no longer. Now, under
  total Wamphyri domination, they lived in sorry townships (corrals or pens, in effect) and wandered no
  more. In the Sunside Nathan knew, in the old times, his people had become Travellers in order to avoid
  and defy the vampires, and had only settled after their supposed 'destruction'. But here the people had
  settled because the Wamphyri ordered it, which had marked the beginning of the infamous, immemorial
  tithe system. And so their towns werespread out evenly and in the open, like market places, where the
  Starside Lords and Ladies sent their lieutenants on regular, long-established errands to replenish their
  spires and manses. Except that unlike a market, the Wamphyri 'purchased' nothing, but took what was
  deemed to be theirs by right of conquest. Which amounted to a percentage of everything, from grain and
  oils to beasts and blood - but mainly blood, and human.
   North of the grasslands at the edge of the forest, some twelve townships out of a total of around fifty
  stood roughly equidistant: four in the west, and eight towards the sprawling morass which lay beyond the
  habitable region to the east. The Thyre estimated that the distance between the Great Red Waste on the
  one hand and the swamp on the other was more than sixhundred miles; and so Nathan considered
  himself fortu nate that the first of the four towns to the west, a place called Vladistown after its founder,
  was the origin andlast known home of lozel Kotys.
   Dressed in his good rich clothes, and with the first rays of the sun warm on his back, Nathan came out of
  the desert and crossed the savannah, and saw thesmoke of morning fires going up in lazy blue-grey spir
  als along the forest's rim. Angling a little to the left, he headed for the closest huddle of houses where the
  woods had been cut back into a clearing.
   The first man he met was in the grasslands at thevery edge of the forest: a hunter, he was shooting
  rabbits with a crossbow. Nathan heard the deceptively softwhirrr of a bolt and ducked, saw a rabbit
  bound spastic- ally and fall back dead in the grass. Then... he saw the man with the crossbow, where he
  rose from his knees in a patch of gorse; and a moment later the hunter saw him. At first, facing each other
  across adistance of no more than a dozen paces, they froze; then the hunter's jaw dropped, and his face
  
  turned pale.
   Nathan approached him fearlessly. The man was Szgany after all, and the Thyre had told him that
  although these people were not trustworthy, they could at least be trusted not to take his life. No, he was
  far too valuable for that. They might give his life away — give it to the Wamphyri, in return for their
  dubious favours — but they would never dare to take it forthemselves. Also, apart from the ironwood
  knife he car ried, Nathan was unarmed; he posed no obvious threat.But from the reaction of the other,
  one might very easily suppose that he did, and an extreme threat at that!
   The man dropped his weapon, fell to his knees again, and shivered like a naked child in morning sunlight
  which was warm and bright. He choked out some inarticulate greeting, an apology, and a question all in
  one. His speech was Szgany but the accent was difficult. Nathan frowned, looked into his eyes ... and
  suddenly the man's words and their meaning gained resolution.
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   But even assisted by his as yet immature telepathy, still Nathan found the other's thoughts a
  kaleidoscopicjumble, and his speech even more so:
   'Morning!' the other gasped. 'You are early ... the tithe is not until sundown! I mean ... why are you
  here? No, no,' (he fluttered his hands), 'for that's nobusiness of mine! Forgive me, Lord, I beg you! I'm a
  fool taken by surprise, whose words fall all wrong. But ...the sun! Come, take cover in the woods! Hide
  yourselfin the shade!'
   Now all was apparent. The man thought Nathan wasWamphyri, a lieutenant at least! Comparing himself
  with the other, he could see how easily the mistake had been made: his clothes of fine leather, yellow hair
  andstrange eyes; but most of all his pale, unblemished flesh, which, seen in silhouette against the sun,
  might evenappear grey.As for the hunter:
   The man was Szgany, certainly, but not like any otherNathan had ever seen. Where was his personal
  pride?Where was any sign of pride at all? Maybe twenty-sevenor -eight years old, he was dirty, ragged,
  grovelling; his hair was matted and full of lice, and there were opensores on his face and hands. Why,
  even the wildest old loner of olden Sunside had cared for himself better than this one! Perhaps he was an
  idiot; but if so, whydid they trust him with a crossbow? Certainly he knewhow to handle the thing.
   'Get up,' Nathan told him, shaking his head. Tm notWamphyri.'
   'You're not ...?' A puzzled frown crossed the other'sface; only to be replaced in a moment by narrowed
  eyes which glittered their suspicion. 'But you are one oftheirs.'
   'I'm nobody's,' Nathan said, stepping closer. Tm myown man, free, and you have nothing to fear from
  me.'
   He went to take hold of his shoulder, draw the man to his feet. But the other fell backwards away from
  him,terrified in a moment.
  
   'Your own man,' he babbled. 'Yes, yes, of course youare! And I'm a fool who says and questions too
  much, when in fact you are the one who should question, andI should supply the answers!'
   Nathan felt sick with disgust. Perhaps this creature was the village idiot after all; but at least his words
  hadgiven him an idea. 'You're right,' he said, nodding. That's what I need: a little shade and a few
  answers.'
   'Then ask away!' the other cried, coming to a crouch and backing away towards the forest, and leaving
  his crossbow where it had fallen. 'Whatever questions youlike, Lord. And if I can answer them I will, be
  sure!'
   Nathan took up the weapon, loaded it with the spare bolt from under the tiller and applied the safety;
  and the other at once groaned and put up his trembling hands, as if to ward off a shot. Nathan looked at
  him, then at the crossbow in his hands and frowned again.'What?' he said. 'Man, I won't shoot you! Do
  you always greet strangers this way?'
   'Strangers!' the other was almost hysterical. 'Do I greetstrangers this way ... always? But there are no
  strangers! Who would come? Who can come ... except such as you? As yet you are unchanged ... but
  soon, ah, soon! You're one of theirs, I know it, come to practiseyour deceptions among your slaves!'
   'Deceptions?'
   'Ah! No! I did not mean it!' The other threw his armswide and fell to his knees for a third time in the
  dappledshade of the trees. 'Forgive me! I am confused!'
   'You're... a fool!" Nathan couldn't contain himself.The hunter burst out sobbing at once, crying:
   'No, no! I was not taken in the tithe! Please don't take
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   me now! Whatever you want, only ask it of me, but let me be a man all my days and not... not a
  monster!
   'Now listen to me,' Nathan hardened his voice. 'Youare wasting my time. There's something I want to
  know. And that's all I want with you.' He tossed the crossbowaside.
   'Ask away! Ask away!'
   'lozel Kotys - where can I find him?'
   'Eh? lozel the mystic? lozel the hermit?'
   'If that's what you call him,' Nathan nodded.
  
   'lozel, aye!' the other's eyes started, as if he madesome connection. 'For he has been there, of course!'
   'Do - you -know him!?' Nathan's patience was exhausted; he spoke through clenched teeth.
   'Yes! Yes, of course!' The hunter turned, pointed northacross the forest to where a steep, thinly clad
  knoll or outcrop reared above the trees. There... a mile ... the knoll. And at its foot, a cave. lozel lives
  there, alone.Only head for the knoll, through the woods, you'll cross a path, well-worn, which runs
  between the town andhis cave.'
   'Show me,' said Nathan.
   'Indeed, yes, of course!' The hunter made to set off atonce, but Nathan stopped him.
   'Pick up your crossbow.'
   'My weapon, aye!' the other licked his lips, tremblingas he did as he was told ...
   Along the way were other hunters; glimpsed dimly between the misty trees, they were like wraiths drawn
  out of the earth by the warmth of the new day. No oneapproached, and in a few minutes Nathan's guide
  found the path: a narrow way cut through the woods. By then it was almost full daylight, and Nathan had
  had more than enough of the cowed hunter's company. 'You saythis path will lead me direct to lozel's
  cave?'
   'Indeed, Lord. Indeed it will.'
   'I thank you,' said Nathan. 'From here on I go alone.'
   'I...can go?'
   'Of course.' Nathan turned his back on him and followed the path. But he was aware that behind him the
  hunter backed off - slowly at first, breathlessly - then turned and tiptoed away, and finally ran for Vladis-
  town. Shaking his head, Nathan went on.
   lozel Kotys was up and about. In the mouth of his cave, the hermit braised slivers of skewered pork on
  hot stones at the rim of his fire. Becoming aware of Nathan's approach about the same time as Nathan
  smelled his cooking, lozel looked down from the elevated shelf in front of his cave and saw a vague, grey
  figure where his feet stirred the lapping mist.
   'Now hold!' the hermit's voice rang out, wavering and a little infirm. 'Who comes and why? I receive no
  casual visitors here ...'
   'But you'll receive me,' Nathan called back, coming onwithout pause. And if lozel wouldn't receive him...
  somuch for Thikkoul's stargazing!
   There was a ladder at the foot of the rocks. As Nathanstrode closer lozel went to draw it up. Nathan
  caught at the lower rungs and held on, and gazed up at the other'sfurious face scowling down on him.
  Against the strength of Nathan's arms and the weight of the ladder both, the hermit could do nothing.
  Anyway, he'd noted his visitor's dress and curious colouring, and as the anger drained out of him
  something of anxiety, feartook its place.
  
   'Who are you?' he gasped, releasing the ladder andbacking off a pace, until only his grey-bearded face
  wasvisible. Nathan fixed him with his eyes, and climbed.
   'I'm a Traveller,' he said. 'And I've travelled a longway to see you, lozel Kotys.'
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   lozel was small, wrinkled, middling clean and reasonably clothed in well-worn leathers. While he wasn't
  extremely old, he did suffer from some infirmity which caused his limbs and voice to tremble. And his
  dark eyes ran a little with rheumy fluids. 'Eh? A Traveller?' he said, his eyes darting, taking in all they
  could of Nathan where he stepped off the ladder on to the shelf.'And you've come a long way, you say?
  How is it possi ble? Unless - from Turgosheim?' And now his voice,fallen to a whisper, was hoarse.
   Nathan had learned something of the ways of thesepeople, and something of their fears. 'lozel,' he said,
  'I'm not here to harm you. I'm simply ... here!' It was difficult to find a reason for being here. He didn't
  have one, except that Thikkoul had foreseen it, and beyond it to a possible reunion with loved ones
  whom Nathan had long thought dead and passed from him forever. That alone would be reason enough,
  but how to explain allthat to lozel?
   'Simply here?' the hermit repeated him, shaking his head. 'No, if there's one thing I've learned in life it's
  this: that nothing is "simply" anything, and no one is"simply" anywhere. You were sent - by him!'
   'Him?'
   'Maglore! You are my ... replacement!'
   Nathan sighed. Nothing these people said made anysense. 'I don't know this Maglore,' he said.
   'Maglore of Runemanse - in Turgosheim!' the othertold him.
   Things began to connect. Nathan said: 'That makestwice today I've been mistaken for Wamphyri, or one
  of their changeling lieutenants. But I'm not. I'm Szgany.' He decided to tell it all. 'I'm from the west,
  beyond the Great Red Waste. Upon a time the Wamphyri were there, but they were driven out, beaten
  in a great battle.
   Now they've come back- from here. Or rather, fromTurgosheim. I came to see how you people lived
  here in this land of vampires, so that I would know how best to advise my own people in the west.' He
  shrugged.'Well, and it seems I must tell them to fight on - even to the last drop of blood! For obviously
  you don't "live" atall but merely exist, like goats fattened for the slaughter.'
   While Nathan talked he scratched vigorously at his left wrist. A grain or two of sand must have got
  under his strap to irritate him, and he still felt lousy from having walked too close to his hunter guide. But
  as hepaused from speaking, finally the itch became too great. In order to scratch more freely, he rolled
  the leather strap from his wrist and slipped it free of his fingers. Circling his wrist, a band of white skin
  showed glassy grains embedded and inflamed. Nathan got them out with his fingernail, rubbed spittle into
  
  the red patch,and went to pick up his strap.
   lozel had been watching closely, however, and beat him to it. Frowning, he took up Nathan's wristlet
  strap and looked at it - curiously at first, then with studiedintensity. Finally his eyes narrowed in what
  seemed to be recognition, and nodding knowingly, he gave thestrap back.
   Nathan said: 'Is there something ...?'
   The other shrugged. 'A strange thing to wear as ornament, that's all. Some weakness in your wrist, that
  youneed to keep it strapped up, "man of the west"? Or is the twisted loop some sort of sigil? Your
  brand, perhaps?' There was that in lozel's quavering voice which Nathan didn't like, which more than
  suggested that thehermit considered his visitor a liar.
   'You people are suspicious, full of fear,' he said. 'You meet strangers like dogs: yapping and snarling. It
  was a
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   mistake to come here. Even if I could help you, I can'tsee that it would be worth it.'
   lozel looked beyond him, down at the trail where sunlight came filtering. But more than sunlight had
  come. And: 'Oh yes, you made a mistake coming here,all right!' the hermit said.
   Nathan looked, felt his first pang of apprehension as he saw a handful of men approaching. They were
  led by the ragged hunter. There! That's him!' the hunter pointed. As the party arrived at the foot of the
  ladder, Nathan climbed down; lozel stayed where he was, up on the rim of the ledge. Nathan faced the
  newcomers, and saw that they were much of a likeness; inbred,ugly, rough and ragged. The hunter was
  no village idiot: they were all cut of much the same cloth. And all ofthem were armed.
   'My name's Nathan,' he said, perhaps lamely. 'I've come from the west, beyond the Great Red Waste,
  as afriend.'
   'He has come from the north,' lozel called down. 'Rather, he isfled here from the north - from
  Tur-gosheim - and comes as an enemy, albeit unwitting ... maybe! They'll be after him in a trice, and if
  they find him here ...'
   The men ringed Nathan about, looked at him, fingeredhis clothes. One of them took his knife. Nathan
  stood tall, tried not to appear afraid. He turned to their obvious leader, a man who was burly and
  big-bellied; the only one who looked as if he ate well. His eyes werepiggish in a red, puffy face. Nathan
  spoke to him. 'lozelis wrong. I'm from the west.'
   'Aye,' lozel called down again, his voice heavy with sarcasm. 'And he's come across the Great Red
  Waste. Why, certainly he has! Only see how desiccated he is,all poisoned from the wasteland's gases.
  And his clothes
  
   all in tatters.' His voice hardened. 'He's fled out of Tur-gosheim, believe it. Some Lord's unwilling pet,
  and Ithink I know which one. Why, he even wears Maglore'ssigil upon his wrist!'
   The burly one nodded, scratched his chin, looked Nathan in the eye and gave a musing grunt. 'lozel's
  right,' he said. 'No one has ever come out of the west. In any case, the lands beyond the Great Red
  Waste are legendary: we're not even sure that they exist.' He frowned. 'But I'll grant you one thing: you
  don't lookSzgany.'
   'One of Maglore's experiments,' lozel interrupted again from the safety of his ledge. 'This one's a change
  ling!'
   'Eh?' The leader of the bunch at once drew back fromNathan, likewise his companions. 'A vampire
  thing?'
   'Not him,' lozel shook his head. 'And that's puzzling,I admit. But I was cooking and my hands are
  smeared with oil of kneblasch, which I rubbed into the leatherof his strap. If he were Wamphyri we'd
  know it: he'd be in pain from that strange strap of his. Also, he carriessilver on his person. Last but not
  least, sunlight falls onhim and he suffers no ill.'
   'It's true!' the scabby hunter put in. 'He came fromthe grasslands, with the sun full on him!'
   'So,' said their leader, eyeing Nathan up and down.'And what's to be done with you?'
   Nathan glanced at him in disgust, then looked up at lozel until their eyes met and locked. And: What are
  you thinking, youscruffy, treacherous old dog? Nathanwondered. Treachery, yes - just as Thikkoul had
  warned.
   lozel's thoughts were easy to read; his mind had beenopened before, often, so that he couldn't close it.
  Even Nathan's small talent found no difficulty in breaching
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   his mental defences. Or perhaps it was simply that Nathan was desperate to read the other's thoughts.
   He is or was Maglore's, I'm sure of it, lozel was thinking. But is hea runaway, or was he sent? Is he here
  to replace me, or did he hope to enlist my aid inhiding himself away?
   'So,' Nathan said, 'what I've heard about lozel Kotysis true.' (Two could make accusations.)
   'What's that?' the burly one was interested.
   Nathan glanced at him again, contemptuously. 'Why,that the Wamphyri use him as a spy against the
  Szgany. Against you! Except he blinds you with the lies of a so- called "mystic", so that you don't see him
  for what hereally is. Now tell me, who else have you ever met whoreturned out of Turgosheim?'
  
   'Don't listen to him, Dobruj!' lozel screeched. 'What, me, a spy? I spy on no one. To what end? Why, all
  I ever ask is to be left alone. But this one: just look athim! His clothes, his alien colours, his story! Hah!
  Frombeyond the Great Red Waste, indeed! His lies are obvious.'
   Dobruj was the burly one, the chief. Craning his neck,he scowled up at lozel. 'Aye, and this isn't the first
  time you've been suspicioned, old hermit! If I had the proof of it, one way or the other ... huh!' He
  fingered his chin again, and looked at Nathan. 'But meanwhile, what's tobe done with you?'
   'Only listen to me,' lozel had managed to compose himself, 'and you'll know what to do with him. Put
  him in the tithe and so save one of your own! Vormulac's tithesmen come tonight, and already your tally
  is short, because of deserters. So why not let this one make up the numbers, eh? If he, too, is a runaway
  - from Turgosheim - they'll surely take him back again. Which will stand you and Vladistown in good
  stead, Dobruj. Ah, but if he's a spy, they'll find reasons not to take
   him! And then ... there will be time later, to deal withhim. Either way, you've nothing to lose.'
   Dobruj thought about it, cocked his head on one side and glanced yet again at Nathan before making up
  his mind. Finally he nodded and said: 'It makes sense.' At which, two of his men grabbed Nathan by the
  arms. He tried to fight them off until a third held the point of hisown knife to his ribs. But:
   'None of that!' Dobruj commanded. 'If he's going in the tithe we don't want him damaged. Right, enough
  of this. Back to town ...'
   As they bundled Nathan along the path, Dobruj calledup to the hermit: 'You, lozel - be sure you're close
  to hand in town when the tithesmen come. For should these accusations of yours make a fool of me, I'll
  be wanting words with you ...'
   'Hah!' the hermit called out, shaking his fists from onhigh. 'You'll see! You'll see!'
   Dobruj paused a moment and narrowed his piggisheyes at him. 'Aye, we'll see what we'll see,' he said.
  'But make sure you're there anyway.' It was a command, notto be denied. And it was a sure threat.
   lozel watched them out of sight, then went to a ledge in the cave and took up a sigil shaped in gold. It
  had been given to him by the Seer Lord Maglore of Rune-manse. Maglore's sigil: whose shape was the
  very imageof the strap on Nathan's wrist, but moulded in heavymetal. Muttering curses, lozel carried it to
  a dark corner, sat down on the edge of a stool, and closed his eyes. And just as Maglore had instructed
  him, so the hermit held the golden shape warm in his hand and felt itsweird contours, and sent his
  thoughts winging, winging, winging -
   - All across the mountains to Turgosheim ...
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   In Vladistown - a huddle of maybe one hundred and twenty drab dwellings of timber, sod, withes and
  skins; nothing so sophisticated or large as Mirlu Township, Tireni Scarp or Settlement - Nathan was
  detained with six other young men in a timbered pen which was largely open to the sky. On the inside, a
  few narrow awnings kept the sun off the prisoners. These were not criminals but tithelings: the 'legitimate
  get' of vampire tithesmen, who would arrive out of Turgosheim aftersundown to collect their miserable
  flesh-and-blood levy. Since male and female tithelings were kept apart, there were two such stockades.
   Nathan's belt had been taken from him and replaced with a length of twine. To offer him up to a
  lieutenant of the Wamphyri bearing silver upon his person ... the consequences would be unthinkable! He
  would never see that belt, buckle or sheath again. As for the silver locket and chain given him by Atwei at
  their parting: they went unnoticed under his flowing hair and soft leather shirt. After dark and before the
  tithesmen came,he would secrete them in an inside pocket.
   Nathan was mortally afraid but tried not to show it.The others penned with him were less reticent.
  Listening to their whispers, it was plain they'd given up all hope. They saw themselves as fodder for the
  Wamphyri; even when loved ones came to speak to them through the perimeter fence, they could
  scarcely be bothered. The place was heavy with depression, rank with the acrid stench of fear. A tented
  privy in one corner did nothing to improve the atmosphere. Nathan would like to shut the hushed
  conversations out and think his own thoughts, but could not. In the end he listened howeverlistlessly,
  gleaning what scraps of information he could.
   The tithesmen would come an hour or so after sundown, when the last soft flush lay low on the southern
   horizon. Should all go well they would take Dobruj's tribute of flesh and be out of here in less than one
  hour; but if anything was amiss ... someone must be made to pay for it. Dobruj was the town's headman,
  whose back bore the scars of past failures, when the tally had been short now and then. He wasn't likely
  to make that mistake again. Yet even now a pair of defectors had brought the count down: the tally was
  two men short -or one man, now that this flashy stranger had been taken — so that Dobruj must find one
  more, when thetithesmen came.
   The day was no shorter than any Sunside day, yet somehow time flew. Nathan likewise thought of flight,
  but outside the stockade the guards were cautious for their lives; only let a titheling escape ... who would
  take his place? When water was brought Nathan drank it, but he refused the tasteless food. It was
  snapped up by the others as if they hadn't eaten in a week. Well, things were not that bad, but neither
  were they good. He continued to listen to their stories ...
   For a year and nine months now Wamphyri demands had been on the increase, tithe collections more
  frequent, the sack of Sunside's resources more utter. The Lords of Turgosheim were draining the
  townships asnever before; they seemed unable to get enough of any thing; there was such a thirst, a
  hunger and fire in themas to outdo all previous greed. As for its cause or source: who could say? What
  man would ever dare to ask? But one thing for sure: their monstrous works across thebarrier mountains
  were grown more monstrous yet!
   Things had crashed in the foothills - gigantic, hideousWamphyri constructs; mad, mewling, ravaging
  carnivores - word of which had found its way through the forests to the towns on the rim. The Wamphyri
  made aerial monsters in Turgosheim, from innocent flesh and
  
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   blood! But these were creatures far removed from their doleful, nodding manta flyers. As to their
  purpose:again, who would dare ask?
   Nathan didn't need to ask; for remembering only too well that night almost a hundred sundowns ago,
  when a... a creature called Vratza Wransthrall had died on a cross in Settlement - and the things that
  creature had told to Lardis Lidesci - Nathan knew! Wratha's raiders had been first to fly the coop, yes,
  but others would soon follow her. And they were preparing even now, in Turgosheim. If the quality of
  their warriors was such that they were still crashing in the hills, however ... well, obviously Wratha had a
  head start. And how dearly Nathan would love to get that information back to Lardis Lidesci, if Lardis
  was still alive. Somehow, Nathan fancied that he was ...
   In the heat of the day Nathan drowsed, and when the flies would let him he slept; it seemed as well to
  conserve his energies for whatever was to come. Sleeping,he dreamed of several things, most of which
  were forgot ten whenever he started awake. Dimly, he remembered the mournful howling of his wolves in
  the faraway. And certain of the Thyre dead, whose sad thoughts hadreached him even here.
   Midday came and went; more water and a crust of bread; the stockade guards changed and changed
  again. Nathan slept, jerked shivering awake in the shade of his awning, put out an arm into the waning
  sunlight to absorb a little warmth. Waning, yes - already. For all that Sunside's day was like half a week
  in the world of his unknown father, still time's inexorable creep wasthe same in both worlds.
   Later . .. Nathan was hungry. This time when food came he ate it, and appreciated it. Already his
  perspective was changing. Once, he read the mind behind a
   child's sad eyes peering in at him through the stockadefence: Whenwill it be my turn? Not for a long
  time, forI'monly six.Aye, but soon enough, soon enough.
   Another Visitor' as evening drew in was lozel Kotys. His mind was loose as ever; it overflowed with
  venom, but also with wonder and not a little fear. Who are you,and wherefrom? Out of the west? Is it
  possible? NotMaglore's man, as I've discovered, though he wants youbadly enough now. But who?
  How? Why?
   Nathan looked up at the glaring eyes in the bearded face, which glowered at him through the gapped
  fence. 'Oh?' he said, in a low voice. 'And have you spoken with your master, then? Are you his thrall, in
  mind ifnot in body?'
   And lozel gasped and went away ...
   Nathan slept again, long and deep, and woke up cold andcowed. The first stars were out, and beyond
  the stockade'swall a fire blazed up. Tables had been set, where barrelsof wine stood in a row. A low
  platform had been erected,with a number of great wooden chairs at its centre. Dobrujwas there, striding
  nervously this way and that, waiting.
  
   Then: it happened all at once.
   The stars were blotted out; they blinked off and on again as something black, several things, passed
  between. There came the throb of powerful wings to fanthe fire, as shapes of midnight flowed overhead,
  settling to a rise in the near-distant grassland border. And finally the tithesmen, Wamphyri lieutenants,
  were here.
   They came striding, four of them - tall, powerful, cruel, arrogant; certain of themselves, showing nothing
  of fear, only scorn - with lesser vampire thralls bringing up the rear. Nathan saw them through the
  stockade fence, and knew where he had seen such before. Theywere much of a kind with Vratza
  Wransthrall.
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   No time was wasted: Dobruj met them grovellingly,and was pushed aside. He followed them to the
  platform where they took seats. And: 'Bring them on,' one of them, the chief among them, commanded.
  His scarlet eyes glanced towards the stockades. 'But quality this time, if you please, Dobruj. For I was
  here a year ago,remember? You won't be foisting any more scum on methis time!'
   The tithelings were paraded, females first. One at atime, eight girls were taken up on to the platform,
  where the lieutenant ripped their blouses to the waist, exposing their breasts, and lifted their skirts to
  admire their thighs. And while they stumbled there in tears, trying to cover themselves, he licked his lips
  and sniffed at them lewdly, like a dog, but without seeming much impressed. In any case: They'll do,' he
  grunted shortly,grudgingly. 'And the men?'
   As the girls were led away, Nathan was brought out along with the six other young men. He was the
  fourth put up on to the platform. 'Oh?' said the lieutenant.'And what have we here?'
   Dobruj answered breathlessly: 'A stray — we don't know from where. I thought maybe he'd come ...
  out ofTurgosheim?'
   The lieutenant was all of six inches taller thanNathan; pinching his face in a massive hand, he squeezed
  until Nathan opened his mouth and displayedhis teeth, much like a shad examined by a man. 'What?' The
  lieutenant released Nathan, sent him staggering, and turned to Dobruj. 'Eh? Out of Turgosheim, did you
  say? How so?'
   Dobruj flapped his pudgy hands. 'His clothes, Lord, and his colouring. He's not a man of these parts.
  We thought perhaps ...'
   'Be quiet!' the other told him. 'You're not supposed to
   think. We don't need you to think. But this one was never in Turgosheim, believe me! However, he is the
  best of what we've seen, so I'm not displeased. Now,let's see the rest.'
  
   The other three were brought up together; the lieutenant merely glanced at them, then at Dobruj. 'One
  short,'he growled, warningly, his eyes reduced to crimsonslits.
   The eighth comes now,' Dobruj answered, as a scuffling sounded from the edge of the firelight. His men
  dragged lozel Kotys into view, kicking and screaming.But as soon as he saw the vampires he fell silent,
  gasping.
   The chief lieutenant looked at him for several long seconds, then at Dobruj. Until from deep in his throat,
  soft and dangerously low, 'Some little joke, perhaps, Dobruj?' He took hold of the headman in the
  armpit,squeezing him hard there as he drew him close. 'I certainly hope not.'
   Dobruj gulped, gasped his pain and fluttered his freearm. 'Lord,' he cried out for his life. 'Please listen!
  All ofyour provisions have been put aside on travois, exactlyas required. Fruits, nuts, honey in jars,
  grains, beast-fodder by the bale, and wines. As for the barrels you see on the table there: they are extra
  to the tithe - foryou! Take a sip, a taste, I implore you!' One of his men ran forward with a jug. The
  lieutenant grabbed it up,drank until it swilled his face, and spilled the rest overDobruj's head.
   'Aye, it's good!' he said, tossing Dobruj aside. 'Butwhat shall I do with this?' He pointed at lozel,
  grovelling in front of the platform.
   lozel looked up. Take me to Maglore!' he cried. 'He will have me. I was his upon a time, until he
  returned me here ...'
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   'Ah!' the lieutenant's eyes opened wide. 'So you are that one! The Seer Mage mentioned you, of course
  - his spy!'
   'There! There!' lozel grinned, however lopsidedly,aware of Dobruj's eyes - and the eyes of many
  another - burning on him. 'I knew it would be so.'
   'Indeed,' said the lieutenant. 'And Maglore told me: "If lozel is offered in the tithe, by all means bring him
  in, but don't bring him to me. For if he is a traitor to his own, how then will he serve me? Ah, but the
  manses will always require provisioning, and even offensivemeat is still meat!" So spake Maglore!'
   'No - no/' lozel jumped up, turned to run.
   'Still him!' Dobruj ordered it, grimly and with some satisfaction. And one of his men cudgelled the hermit
  behind the ear, so that he fell asprawl. With which itwas over.
   The chief lieutenant came down off the platform andwent among the tithelings. He singled out the two
  comeli- est girls, plus Nathan and one other youth, then spoke to the lesser vampire thralls who
  accompanied him. 'These four go with us. The rest are for the march through the pass. Be sure not to
  lose any on the way.'
  
   He saw them off with their laden travois along a forest track, and without another word headed out of
  town across the plain to where the silhouettes of flyers nodded grotesquely at the crest of a rise. Nathan
  and the other youth were each given a small barrel to carry; they and the girls were shepherded ahead;
  the lieutenants brought up the rear, carrying barrels as if they wereweightless. And the rest was
  dreamlike:
   The great grey beasts nodding in the night; the barrels loaded into their fetid pouches; the tithelings made
  fast at the rear of long saddles, where they were warned: 'One false move and we'll ditch you into space,
  and seeif you can fly like the Wamphyri!'
   Then the launching and dizzy climb as hugely archedwings trapped wafts from below; the sick, soaring
  flight over twelve or thirteen miles of forest, foothills, ragged peaks; finally the sighing, slanting descent
  between crags, spires, flaring orange and yellow gas jets and reeking chimneys. Down, down into a
  vampire realm, past grim battlements, ruddily glaring windows and balconies, towards communal landing-
  and launching-bays in the great dark gorge which was Turgosheim ...
   In normal circumstances, Maglore would rarely if everlower himself to attend a draw and allocation of
  common tithelings; he would send a thrall, to collect his get on his behalf. But these were scarcely normal
  times, and if lozel Kotys could be believed this 'Nathan' wasno common or ordinary Sunsider.
   Three 'lots' of tithelings had been brought in: fourfrom Vladistown, five from Gengisheim, six out of
  Kehrls- crag. These were the so-called 'cream', flown in for special treatment; the commoner stuff would
  follow on foot. But the draw was the same for all: bone sigils in abag, and luck the only arbiter.
   The draw for the best of the batch was worked on a strict roster. Maglore must consider himself
  fortunate that it was his turn in the round, else he must do some serious bargaining and even then be lucky
  to obtainthis oddity, this Nathan, before it could be...damaged. But his luck was out (his sigils had
  already been drawn; he'd got two middling girls and a loutish youth), and so was obliged to wait and do a
  little bargaining after all. Which was his reason for lingering until Nathan hadbeen 'won' by Zindevar
  Cronesap.
   Zindevar wasn't at the fatesaying in person; neitherwere the Lords Eran Painscar, Grigor Hakson, and
  Lorn Halfstruck of Trollmanse. All were busy elsewhere -
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   occupied or preoccupied with their various creative endeavours, most likely — but lieutenants were
  there in their stead. Eventually Zindevar's man had his three -two more males, to go with that 'item' which
  Maglore found most interesting - and headed for the launchingbays. Maglore left one third of his get (the
  surly youth)in the care of one of his two thralls, and with the half-naked, whimpering girls in tow caught
  up with Zindevar's unhappy-seeming lieutenant in an antechamber.
   'No luck, then?' he said, coming up behind him.
   'Eh?' Taken by surprise, the man turned, saw Magloreand said, 'Oh!' He bowed clumsily. 'My Lord
  
  Maglore!'His confusion was understandable; it wasn't usual for Wamphyri Lords to pass the time of night
  with the lieutenants of other Lords or Ladies; even one's own lieutenants could scarcely be considered
  worthy persons. Then Maglore's query struck home.
   'Luck?' the man's face turned sour as he eyed Maglore's girls. 'It appears that you at least have morethan
  enough! As for Zindevar ...' He shrugged sorrily.
   Maglore nodded. 'She won't be happy with just threelads, be sure.'
   'Huh!' the other scowled, then rounded on his chargesand glared at them for being male.
   Nathan, no less uncertain and afraid than his fellowprisoners, was nevertheless fascinated to recognize
  Mag-lore from two separate sources; one was his name (lozel Kotys had mentioned him as a former
  master); the other was his awesome and awe-inspiring aspect. He was without question that same 'mage'
  glimpsed however mistily in the eye of Thikkoul's mind as he gazed on Nathan's stars to read his future:
  the one of whomhe'd warned, He would use you, Jearnfrom you, instructand corrupt you.'
   So that where the other captives cringed back, avert-
   ing their eyes from Zindevar's lieutenant as he roundedon them, Nathan continued to stand tall and gaze
  uponMaglore. It was merely his way - the Szgany way, innocent and even nai've - and never intended as
  a slight or an insult, neither to Maglore nor even to the bullyinglieutenant. But that one's eyes blazed up
  like fires as hemistook Nathan's natural curiosity for dumb insolence.
   'What?' he roared, catching Nathan up by the front of his jacket and shirt. 'Why, you - !' He held him
  like that a moment, then hissed and thrust him violentlyaway, and snatched back his hand as if he'd been
  stung. Nathan's jacket was torn open; a button popped at the neck of his shirt; Atwei's silver locket,
  which he had replaced around his neck, dangled into view. And thelieutenant still astonished, gazing at his
  huge, iron-hardhand. Then:
   'What?' he said again, a whisper this time, as finally he noticed the locket at Nathan's neck. 'Silver? Can
  I believe it? Would you poison me, then? You ... prissy ... little ...!'
   Pointing a shaking hand at the locket, he grated:Take it off! Throw it down!'
   Nathan did so, and stood with his back to the hewn stone wall. The lieutenant stepped forward snarling,
  stamped on the locket with a booted foot. It flew into several pieces, and a tight curl of hair sprang free.
  'Hah!' The man pounced, snatched up the black wispand showed it to Nathan. 'And this?'
   'A...a keepsake,' Nathan gasped. The pubic hair of...of a maiden.'
   'Indeed!' The man grinned, kicked bits of locket in alldirections, held out his free hand palm up for
  Nathanto see. The flesh of his palm was grey, calloused, horny. Even as Nathan watched, it formed
  sharp scales or rasps like some hideous flensing weapon. Then the
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   lieutenant clasped his hands together, crushing the lock between them. And with a grinding motion he
  reduced the tight coil to so much black snuff, inhaling it withgusto, in pinches, into eager, quivering
  nostrils.
   'Hah! Delightful!' he crowed then, smacking his lips. 'And was she beautiful?'
   'She was Thyre,' Nathan at once answered him, with a great deal of bravery and more than a little
  satisfaction. If he was going to die it might as well be now. 'She was a desert trog!'
   For a moment there was a silence broken only by the whimpering of Nathan's fellow tithelings. Then . . .
  the lieutenant's grey-mottled face turned greyer still as he swelled up huge as if to burst. He grabbed
  Nathan by the throat with one hand, and drew back the other to slap him. Just one such slap would ruin
  Nathan's faceforever. Except -
   'Now, hold,' said Maglore, quietly, yet in a voice whichbrooked no argument. 'Only damage him and it's
  no deal. And I shall tell Zindevar you lost her a pair oflovely little playmates for her bed.'
   The lieutenant's hand froze in mid-air; his head swivelled on his bull neck and he glared at Maglore, then
  frowned and said: 'What deal?' Finally he remembered his manners, blinked and relaxed a little. And:
  'Lord Maglore,' he said, 'I mean no disrespect, but it is theLady Zindevar commands me, not you.'
   'Aye, and she'll command that you are disembowelled!' Maglore chuckled, however humourlessly, '- If
  you don't take these girls into Cronespire in exchangefor that one foppish youth. Make up your mind,
  quick!'
   Now the other was suspicious. He glanced at Nathan again. 'Oh? And what is it with him? Why would
  you want this one, who is either an idiot, or just plaininsolent, or both? Bringing silver into Turgosheim,
   indeed! What madness! Don't the Szgany teach their Sunside brats anything these days?'
   Maglore shrugged, and answered mysteriously, Thereis Sunside and there is Sunside, and Szgany and
  Szgany, and what is taught in one place may not be deemed necessary in another ... not yet. But this one
  -' he shrugged again,'- I like his colours, which are weird.Also, he seems stupidly docile, dumb, even
  innocent; he shall follow me around Runemanse like a pet. As for Zindevar: she shall have these girls to
  tweak, which isbound to stand you firmly in her favour.'
   A moment's pause for thought, and: 'Done!' Zindevar'slieutenant released Nathan, sent him flying along
  the wall and out of his sight behind Maglore. And the Mageof Runemanse told his girls:
   'Go with this gentleman and he will take you to your new mistress, a very lovely Lady who will show you
  many wonderful things!' Hearing which, even Zindevar's 'gentleman' burst into baying laughter, as
  Maglore took Nathan's shoulder and quickly walked away with him ...
   Along the way to Runemanse - a route covering almost two and a half miles of caves, crags, causeways;
  often climbing internally through communal cavern systems, or externally over vertiginous chasms and up
  dizzily spiralling walkways of bone and cartilage - Maglore kept up an onslaught of seemingly innocuous
  questions. But Nathan knew for a fact that his interest was anything but innocent, which was made
  obvious by the veritable barrage of mental probes which Maglore used in a prolonged simultaneous
  attempt to penetrate the shield around Nathan's secret mind. Given the chance (if Nathan were to relax
  
  his guard for a single moment), he knew that these probes would at once enter and explore the innermost
  caverns of his brain.
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   Even before meeting Maglore, Nathan had known thatthe Wamphyri Lord was a telepath; however
  stupidly -unwittingly, whatever - Maglore's spy lozel Kotys, the so-called 'mystic', had given him away.
  But Nathan could never have anticipated the full range of the Seer Lord's mind, whose insidious energies
  seethed in his vampire skull like the smoke of balefires, sending out curling black tendrils of thought in all
  directions.
   In order to maintain and reinforce the telepathic wall with which Nathan had surrounded himself, he used
  the subterfuge of asking questions of his own: he knew how difficult it would be for Maglore to scry upon
  his mind and construct meaningful answers to his questions at one and the same time. And why shouldn't
  he question? Nathan knew that Maglore would not harm him, not yet at least and perhaps not ever. No,
  for Thikkoul had foreseen a long stay for him in Rune-manse, but nothing specifically harmful that Nathan
  could remember.
   The sun rises and sets, Thikkoul had read in his stars, and sunups come and go in a blur where you
  wander in a great dark castJe o/ many caves.I see yourface: yourhollow eyes and - greying hair?
   Well, that last was ominous, admittedly. But now that Nathan was here, what had he to lose? Very little
  of his own, for in Turgosheim his life was nothing; but still there were certain interests he must protect. His
  knowledge of the Thyre, for instance: their secret places over and under the desert; also his familiarity
  with old Sunside, where Wratha and her renegades (and in a little while the vampires of Turgosheim)
  would do to his people what had been done here. He must give nothing of such knowledge away to
  benefit theWamphyri, not if there was a way to avoid it.
   'Why didn't we fly to Runemanse?' he asked Maglore
   where they crossed a swaying bridge of sinew andarching, alveolate cartilage. 'Do you have no flyers?'
   'I have one, aye,' Maglore answered, offering him a curious, perhaps indulgent glance. 'It is in use now,
  where a man of mine flies back a surly Kehrlscrag youth to Runemanse. But flyers are for the younger
  Lords, my son, and for the generals to ride out and command their armies. Oh, I have made a flyer or
  two in my time, but mainly I prefer to walk. When I can go on foot I do so, but where the way is too
  sheer ordistant I fly. Personally, I dislike great heights; for grav ity is a curious force and insistent. I have
  never flown in my own right, as certain Lords are wont to do, for that requires an awesome strength, and
  alas my body is feeble - by comparison.' But he did not say with what.
   They were in the middle of the span. In the dark, distant sprawl of the gorge, the lights and flaring
  exhausts of some of the spires came up level with their eyes. More than a thousand feet below,
  Turgosheim'sdepths were lost in dark velvet shadows. Maglore paused and drew his charge to him, and
  with an arm around his shoulder leaned out over the fretted cartilage wall to look down. Behind Nathan
  and Maglore, one of the mage's vampire thralls waited silent but alert.
  
   And: 'About flying,' said Maglore quietly, huskily, with a scarlet, sideways glance at Nathan. 'Can you
  imagine flying from here? To leap out upon the air, and form your flesh into stretchy scoops like the wings
  of a bat? To trap the currents rising out of Turgosheim, and so glide from peak to peak? Ah, but what an
  art that would be! Even though I've never used it, I have it, for I am Wamphyri. I probably could do it
  even now, despite the lack of that special strength which could only be mine by virtue of... a certain
  lifestyle. But you: you would fall like a stone, and splash like an egg ...'
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   Maglore drew Nathan closer in an arm which contracted like a vice, crushing his shoulders. Nathan felt
  the other's awesome strength, and for a moment thought it was his intention to lift him up and throw him
  down. For all his protestations about his 'feeble body', the vampire Lord could do it... just so easily.
  Nathan looked at his hideous face, so close - that long-lived, evil face, grooved as old leather; its white
  eyebrowstapering into veined temples under a lichen-furred domeof a skull; the crimson lamps of
  Maglore's eyes, set deep in purple sockets - and tried not to be afraid. Perhaps Maglore sensed it: the
  bolstering of Nathan's resolve, his determination, and perhaps he admired it. At anyrate he released him,
  and said:
   'Go on, cross the bridge and I shall follow on.' And as Nathan set out: 'Aye, there's a great art to flying,'
  Maglore repeated himself from close behind, but in a lighter tone now. 'One of the more physical arts of
  theWamphyri, called metamorphism. But there are arts and there are arts. Arts of the body, of the will,
  and of themind. Indeed, for will and mind are not the same. I have known splendid minds with little or no
  will at all, and creatures with a rare and wilful tenacity but hardlyanything of mind!'
   Nathan walked on, across the bridge of bones, the fossilized cartilage of mutated men, and spied ahead
  at the end of the span a walled staircase carved from the face of the gorge itself. It went up a hundred,
  two hundred feet, to where Turgosheim's rim had been notched and weathered into wind-, rain- and
  time-sculpted battlements. But there were landings, too, withdark-arched passageways leading off to
  rooms and regions within that vastly hollowed jut of rock, that massive promontory turret, Maglore's
  manse over an abyss of air and darkness. And there were also gaunt win-
   dows - some of them aglow with fitfully flickering lights, and others dark as the orbits of a skull - which
  gloomed out from it.
   'Runemanse!' Maglore whispered in Nathan's ear,when his charge came to a stumbling halt. 'In which I
  practise my arts. And where you will practise ...yours?'
   At the end of the bridge, as he stepped up into awalled landing or embrasure, Nathan turned to
  Maglore.'My arts?'
   Peering at him through red-glowing, slitted eyes, Mag-lore grasped his shoulder in a hand like iron. 'I
  havesensed arts in you, yes,' he said. 'Undeveloped as yet ...perhaps. Do you understand mentalism?'
   Nathan was almost caught off guard. 'Mentalism?'
  
   'Call me master,' Maglore growled. 'When you answer me, you must call me master. Here in Runemanse
  I havecreatures, thralls, beings which are mine. I shall requireof you what I require of them: obedience. If
  your waysare seen to be slack, so might theirs grow slack. Wherefore you will call me master. Do you
  understand?'
   'Yes, master.'
   'Good.' And returning to his previous subject: 'Mentalism, aye. Telepathy. To read the secret minds - the
  thoughts - of others, and so discover their wily plotsand devious devices.'
   'I know nothing of it,' Nathan shook his head. Hisguard was solid now, or as near solid as he could
  makeit. But Maglore's eyes grew huge in a moment as for one last time he tried to enter his charge's
  mind. Nathan could almost feel his disappointment as he failed andwithdrew.
   Then Maglore nodded, and: 'Perhaps you don't at that,' he said. 'But you do have a capacity for strange
  arts, believe me. Yes, for I sense them in you. Perhaps
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   we can develop them. One such is the opposite of mental-ism: it is to create a wall which shields the
  user's mindfrom outside interference. In some rare men it is a natural thing. One cannot read their minds,
  however craftyone's skill.'
   Nathan shrugged and tried to look bewildered. 'I amtrying to understand, master.'
   Maglore relaxed, sighed, and said, 'Let it be.' He indicated an arched entrance across the landing. 'This
  is to be your home. Enter now and be with Runemanse asyou have been with me: unafraid. For to walk
  with fearis to fail, especially here.'
   Nathan held back a little, pausing there on the external landing. But in fact it wasn't fear this time, more
  the oppressiveness of the place, like the pause before lowering oneself into some deep and lightless hole.
  Or perhaps it was the sigil carved in the virgin rock of the arch which held him back: the twisted loop
  which Nathan had known all his days, which indeed was part of him and was now to be even more a
  part of his life.And so he stood there, looking up at it; until, but impatiently now: 'Enter!' Maglore
  commanded again. 'Enternow, of your own free will, into Runemanse.'
   Nathan could only obey, while in his secret mind hewondered: But at the endof the day, will it be so
  easy to leave, 'of my own free will'? And as Maglore's handclosed like a claw on his shoulder, guiding
  him forward into the perpetual gloom of Runemanse, he supposed that it would not.. .
   PART EIGHT:
   Runemanse - Flight - In the Blink of an Eye
  
   Within, there was no lack of activity. Huge sighings (animal or mechanical, Nathan had no way of
  knowing) issued up from the bowels of the place; draughts of air, some warm and others bitterly cold,
  blew busily here and there as if out and about upon missions of their own; there were sounds of vast,
  animal exhalations, gasps and grunts, and other echoes which seemed of entirely human origin: voices
  and/or sounds of thrall work in progress. In the weird acoustics of the place it was difficult to locate any
  specific source; the sounds penetrated from above, below, around. Eerie snatches of conversation, the
  slap of sandalled feet on hollowed flags, the chink, chink chipping of cold stone, or the reverberating,
  nerve-shattering clanging of a door slammed shut. Occasionally, shadows would flit apace in parallel
  corridors, and Nathan would glimpse feral eyes turned in his direction. Once, a hulking lieutenantloomed
  large, only to shrink back as Maglore's presencedwarfed him.
   Extensive, Runemanse filled the honeycombed rock like a warren in a bank of earth. Innermost was a
  hugehall illumined by flaring gas jets, leading off from which were the rooms of Maglore's various aides:
  his two lieutenants, his thralls and women. The vampire Lord's own apartments were reached up steps
  which spiralled around a central core, and had balconies overlooking the hall as if it were an
  amphitheatre. At the foot of the steps a... Thing was chained, manacled to the natural pillar. Unseemly by
  any standards, it had its own place
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   behind a curtain of ropes, out of sight in a small cave in the central stem. But as Nathan, a stranger,
  approachedthe foot of the stairs . ..
   ...It burst out, mewling, towering eight feet tall andshaped — very much like a man! Yet paradoxically
  andappallingly, not like a man at all. Not any longer. Nathan felt himself shrinking back, unable to
  proceed, and feltMaglore propelling him irresistibly forward. And as they went the Wamphyri Lord told
  his guardian creature: This man is mine. Who harms him harms me, and will answer for it. Now begone,
  for you are ugly.' At which the awful thing fell to all fours and scurried backwards,grovellingly, through
  the curtain of ropes. Nathan could hear it panting and rumbling in there as they passed byand climbed the
  spiral staircase.
   In Maglore's rooms, food had been prepared. Nathan could scarcely contain his suspicion of the
  contents of the various platters. They looked innocent enough -steaming portions of rabbit and partridge,
  roasted vegetables, and bowls of fresh fruit - but on the other hand .. .
   'What?' said Maglore, noting Nathan's expression across the table, and chuckling darkly to himself as he
  dined delicately on thigh of rabbit and red wine. 'And did you expect raw flesh, possibly Szgany, and
  perhaps still alive? Well, I have to admit that in certain spires and manses you would not be disappointed
  - but this is Runemanse. Certain of my thralls and creatures have their "requirements", but in the main I've
  learned to curb my own appetites. You need not concern yourself, Nathan: your food will not disgust or
  harm you, nor will I give you cause to throw it up; not here at least. For when I have need of... coarser
  sustenance, I take it in private. And even then I'm no great glutton. So have no fear; for unlike the raw
  red regimen of some ofTurgosheim's Lords, you'll not hear my food screaming!'
   Despite the terrible pictures Maglore's words conjured, Nathan tried the food and found it very good.
  And as his hunger took hold,so a little of his natural caution deserted him. 'Aye,' Maglore nodded
  approvingly. 'Eat, and when you've eaten explore the manse. Step boldly and no harm shall befall you.
  But beforethen and while you're about your meal, we have a chance to talk.' He put aside his own plate.
  'On our way to Runemanse I asked you many things: your age, full name, birthplace; I inquired especially
  about the colours of your eyes, hair, skin, which seem scarcely Szgany colours at all, and yet are not so
  weak or freakish as the pallid pastels of an albino. Patently they are not the result of disease, deformity or
  
  experimentation, and so must be inherited. But from whom, mother or father? Your previous answers
  were vague at best.'
   Nathan swallowed scooped-out oyster of partridge from his index finger, and washed it down with a sip
  ofwine. 'My mother was Nana, a Szgany woman of course,and my father was Hzak Kiklu, a common
  Traveller.' He shook his head. 'I didn't get my colours from them.'
   Just looking at him, Maglore could see that he told the truth. He frowned and said, 'Let it pass, for now.'
  But Nathan's answer had prompted another question.'Your father was a...a "Traveller", did you say?'
   'I came out of the west,' Nathan answered, 'which I also told you.' (No harm in it, since lozel had
  probably told him the same thing in advance.) But remembering himself in time, Nathan quickly added,
  'Master.' And continued: There in the west, the Szgany of Sunside don't live in towns but travel by day
  and hide by night.The word "Szgany" means, among other things, "Travel ler". Which is what my people
  are. Perhaps your ownSzgany were Travellers, upon a time?'
   'Oh, they were!' Maglore answered, 'in those early
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   days after Turgo Zolte brought his people here out of the west. Aye, they travelled, before the
  Wamphyri brought them to heel, as it were. Hmmm!' He strokedhis chin. 'How is it, then, that while your
  Szgany do notlive in "towns", still you know the word?'
   Nathan shrugged, and thought quickly. 'But I know it as in "Vladistown", master,' he said. 'Also as an
  old word of my own people. Though I was only a child of four or five years on the night of the burning
  clouds and the thunder over the barrier range — when the lastof the Wamphyri were destroyed, or so it
  was supposed
   — I remember that some of our leaders said we should build "towns" again. Others, however, were
  against it. No, they said, for the vampires would return one day, out of the swamps or from other places.'
  His answerwas deliberately confused and confusing, to throw Mag- lore off the track. And to distract
  him even further, he scratched for a moment at the leather strap on his wrist, then took it off and placed it
  on the table where Maglore could not help but see it. And continuing toscratch at his imaginary itch, he
  watched the Seer Lord'sscarlet eyes grow large as he pounced.
   'A-ha!' Maglore cried, snatching up the strap. And just for once his telepathic mind was so open that
  Nathan clearly 'heard' the thought: Just as thatoldSunside fraud informed me! Why, I had almost
  forgotten
   - till now! Then, a moment later, his thoughts were
   guarded again. But not nearly as close as Nathan's.
   And: 'What are we to make of this?' Maglore said.
  
   'Where did you get it? And do you recognize it?''It is my wrist strap,' Nathan shrugged,'— master.''Of
  course it is!' Maglore shook his head - then
   glanced at Nathan sharply, suspiciously. 'Do you play
   word games with me? If so you should know: I'm good
   at them.'
   Nathan looked blank, and again Maglore grunted,'Hmmm!'
   And: 'Ah!' Nathan said after a moment. The sign over your doors! I recognize it now: your sigil! And
  mine, it would seem. Except ... it's nothing but astrange coincidence, master.'
   'Perhaps it is,' Maglore nodded. 'And strange indeed - or would be, if I believed in coincidences. But on
  the other hand, I am fascinated by mysteries! So tell menow, how did you come by this thing?'
   'But I've always had it,' Nathan answered truthfully.'I think I first remember it...on the night of the
  thunderover Starside, and the fire in the clouds.'
   'How long ago?' Maglore hunched forward in hischair.
   'Nearly sixteen years,' said Nathan.
   'Ahhh!' Maglore sighed. And again his mind wasopen. The night of the Light-in-the-West, the tremors in
  the earth, whenI dreamed of the sigil and found itpotent, and took it for my own! This is a mystery;
  thereis anaffinity, between this man and myself/
   Then ... perhaps he knew he was read. At any rate he sat up straighter and glared at Nathan. There are
  talents in you, hidden, I sense them,' he insisted for the third time. 'When I have an hour or two to spare,
  we must dig them out. Perhaps we might even make a startnow.'
   Footsteps sounded at the top of the spiral staircase, anda hulking lieutenant appeared on the landing. He
  pauseduncertainly. Maglore scowled at him. 'Well? Is it urgent?'
   'Your creature waxes in its vat, Lord,' the lieutenant reported. 'Alas, it has wrenched loose the breathing
  tubes and so may drown in its fluids.'
   'What!' Maglore sprang up. 'Why did you not reconnect the tubes?'
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   'Go into the vat?' The lieutenant fell back. 'But thecreature is voracious, and ill-humoured!'
  
   Take me there, now!' Maglore shouted.'If aught befalls that construct of mine... by Turgosheim, you'll
  know the meaning of ill-humour!'
   Half-way across the floor he paused and looked back. 'You, Nathan. Explore the manse. If you are
  weary, askany thrall to show you your room. Nowhere is forbidden to you, but avoid the women... at
  least until I have spoken to them. Now I must go, but one last thing: I shall keep you as a friend, for I
  value you for yourself and not as a cringing vampire thrall. But let me make myself plain: I will take it very
  hard if you should try to run away. And always remember, a man without legs cannot run very far at all..
  .'
   He had made himself plain. In any case, Nathancouldn't see where he might run. What, into Tur
  gosheim? Or up on to the roof of the manse and the rimof the gorge, and so across the mountains to
  Sunside? To be picked up and brought back again? No, for his stayhere was to be a long one.
  According to Thikkoul, anyway.
   Nathan remembered Maglore's words (it seemed aswell to remember everything the Seer Lord said):
  'Nowhere is forbidden to you.' But did that include Maglore's chambers? Whether or no, he explored his
  master's rooms first. At least he felt comparatively safe here, which was probably more than could be
  said for therest of the place.
   As a powerful Lord of the Wamphyri, Maglore didn't stint himself: his apartments were huge. While
  some of the rooms were natural caves, massive cysts in the volcanic wall of the gorge, others had been
  carved from the virgin rock. And above every doorway Maglore's familiar sigil was plainly visible: the
  loop with a half-twist, chiselled in bas-relief into arch or lintel.
   Maglore's bedroom faced north, away from the sun. There Nathan looked out through narrow windows
  onthe blue-glittering rim of the world, where strange aur oras wove over a coldly distant horizon. But
  while the windows were wide enough to take a man, he made no attempt to step up and pass through the
  thick exterior wall; it was enough to simply put his head out. For out there where a precarious ledge or
  balcony clung to the face of the turret, and a low wall of grafted cartilage was the only protection against
  a fall of what must be at least twelve hundred feet ... the whole affair seemed very unsafe! In any case,
  the view was mainly awayfrom Turgosheim and so uninteresting. That was Nathan's excuse, anyway ...
   As he explored Maglore's kitchen, a vampire thrall came ghosting, making the place clean. Once-Szgany
  and male, he was small, thin, ghastly pale; only his eyescontained a spark, and they were yellow, feral,
  danger ous. When he saw Nathan he gave a start, and then was curious. 'You'll be the new one,' he
  nodded. 'Well, and you've a lot to learn. For one thing, you're in the wrong place. A room has been set
  aside for you. IfMaglore were to find you here .. .'
   'He left me here,' Nathan answered. 'There are norestrictions upon me.'
   'Oh?' The other raised an eyebrow, offered a half-sneer. 'Then you must consider yourself fortunate —
  fornow!' He busied himself about the room. 'At any rate,you've been warned.'
   Watching him at work (he worked hard, making the kitchen scrupulously clean), Nathan thought: This
  man was Szgany, like me. Now he's athrall, a vampire, the next step between Szgany and lieutenant.
  Except he's reached his limit because he isn't ... the rightstuff? In Settlement, Lardis Lidesci burned
  such as him,before
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   they could head for Starside. Should I pity him, orshould I be afraid of him?
   'Why do you watch me?' Nostrils gaping, eyes glaring,the other rounded on him; and Nathan saw that he
  really should not pity him. It was much too late forthat.
   'You must know this place well,' he said, mainly forsomething to say.
   'Runemanse? Turgosheim? I know them well enough,'the vampire answered. 'I know what I may do and
  whatis forbidden, the places where I may pass safely andthose where I must never go. For unlike you I
  am not"privileged" in that respect.'
   Nathan climbed wooden stairs to peer out through ahigh, round window. Looking west and a little south,
  itgave him a good view of all Turgosheim. 'Maglore sayshe will not change me,' he said, half to himself.
  'Hewants me for a friend. It seems he desires that I shouldretain my Szgany initiative.'
   Sniggering, the other followed him up the stairs.'What?' he said. 'You're to be his friend, you say? Well,
  and he's had "friends" before, has Maglore. I'm not sosure I envy you your clean blood after all. Here in
  Runemanse ... some things are easier for a vampire.'
   Nathan read his mind, however loosely. There was agreat red hunger in him, and also a great fear, of
  Mag-lore. But there was pain, too, and curiosity, and a longing like the ache for a loved one who is far
  away,or lost forever. Which Nathan understood only too well.'Have you been here long?' he said.
   'Who counts the time?' the other shrugged, andlooked at Nathan through seething eyes. 'We seem ofan
  age, or I might be a year or two older. But I camehere when I was sixteen, out of Sunside. Perhaps I
  might live-so long again. And how's that for a night-
   marish thought? Why, if I were not a vampire, I would throw myself down from this window for the
  guardian warriors to find broken in Turgosheim's bottoms when the sun lights on the barrier mountains!
  Ah, but I am a vampire, and tenacious!I might do it, but my weirdblood won't let me.'
   'Do you drink the blood of innocent men?' Nathan supposed he was taking a chance with a question like
  that, but asked it anyway.
   'Rather the blood of girls and women!' the other answered gurglingly, out of a phlegmy throat.
  'Sometimes,when the tithelings come, we are given our share. Mag-lore tries to keep his creatures happy,
  at least. The females will pass from hand to hand; we share theirblood and bodies, until their lust is as
  great as our own. And the males are shared by Maglore's women. Those who are to be kept are then
  given employment underthe supervision of Maglore's lieutenants or senior thralls, while any who are
  deemed unworthy ... aredrained, and their bodies go to fuel the manse.'
   'Fuel?'
   'The provisioning,' the other nodded, flame-eyed andgrinning, however grimly. 'A manse can't run on air
  andwater alone, you know. But why waste time with questions? If as you say your movements are to be
  
  unrestricted, and you'll have access to all of Runemanse'schambers, workshops, and storerooms, why,
  you'll soon enough see for yourself!' His answer seemed like a threat in its own right, so that Nathan
  didn't ask him toelaborate but looked out through the great roundwindow.
   And after a moment: 'Do you have a name?' he inquired.
   'Nicolae,' said the other. 'Nicolae Seersthrall ... now.And you?'
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   'Nathan. Nathan Kiklu.'
   'Ah, no!' the other grinned again. 'You are NathanSeersthrall. For here in Runemanse, we are all
  brothersand sisters. To keep your second name would mean you were a free man, which you are not.
  No one in Tur-gosheim is free.'
   Turgosheim,' said Nathan musingly, continuing to scan the gorge through the empty window. 'All of its
  spires and manses. Can you name them?'
   'Why should I?'
   'Because I would consider it a favour,' Nathan answered. 'Which one day I might return.'
   Nicolae Seersthrall shrugged. 'I doubt that you'll bein any position. Also, it's a waste of my time. But on
  the other hand — and as I believe I said before — whocounts the time in Runemanse?'
   He settled down on the great stone windowsill, wherehis arm touched Nathan's - the merest touch. But:
  'Ahhh!' he said, half-sigh, half-gasp, and Nathan knew why. For where Nathan's flesh was warm,
  vibrantlyalive, Nicolae's was cold as clay.
   'And yet you are not undead,' Nathan said, drawing alittle apart.
   'No,' the other shook his head. 'I have never been "dead". I am merely changed, the lowest of the low.
  Vampire blood has contaminated my blood, that is all. But to touch one such as you, whose blood is
  clean .. .is thrilling nevertheless! And it will be even more so for Maglore's women! That's something for
  you to avoid, ifyou can, Nathan Seersthrall.'
   'I know nothing of women,' Nathan shook his head.'Or ... very little.' Half apologetically, he shrugged.
   'What?' Nicolae laughed. 'You are a virgin?' But hisface went deadly serious in a moment. 'Never tell
  them that, do you hear me? For if you do, they'll not let you
   alone for a minute but seek to suck you dry of morethan just your blood! And despite all of Maglore's
  commands, they'll get you in the end!'
  
   Nathan said nothing but simply nodded, and after awhile Nicolae looked out over Turgosheim. 'Very
  well,' he said. 'And so you would know about this place ...'
   He pointed to the east, right across the three-milemouth of the gorge to where the mountains fell down to
  the Starside plains. 'As you see, the barrier range was like a long, edible root, out of which some giant
  took a great bite - or a bight? But several of his teeth were stumps and others were missing entirely, and
  so a number of stacks and spires were left standing in the"bight" of the gorge, like pulp in the "bite" of an
  apple.' He let his arm swing to the right, south-east through an arc of thirty degrees. 'There against the far
  wall of theravine, the scrapings which those great teeth missed:
   'In fact they are stacks weathered from the old face of the gorge. Stacks, spires, and sometimes
  chimneys, where the fault has not quite managed to break away from the bulk of the cliff. Tonight, despite
  that the vats of the Wamphyri are bubbling with a vengeance, the light is good; smoke and steam have
  not obscured the view; a wind over Starside's plains is drawing the vapours away. But in any case it
  would make no difference; I would know the various spires and manses fromtheir shapes alone, or from
  their fires, whose coloursare distinct.
   To the left of the group, that one with the flaringyellow gas jet is Cronespire, the lair of the Lady Zinde-
  var. Aye, and from the brightness of the flare you can see how hard she works tonight...'
   Nathan looked at him. 'At what does this Lady ...work?' He had guessed it but desired corroboration.
   'At her vats, of course,' Nicolae's glance was scorn-
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   ful. 'At the shaping of human flesh into other thanhuman flesh. At the making of monsters - out of men!'
   'Warriors?'
   'Warriors, flyers, creatures,' said the other. 'TheWamphyri are building an army! But...do you want to
  know about Turgosheim, or don't you?'
   Nathan nodded, and Nicolae continued. 'Next in lineafter Cronespire, a hand's span south, or so it
  appearsfrom here - that great stack of stone standing all askew in a lesser bight of its own, haphazardly
  piled as by an infant balancing shards of slate - is melancholy Vorm-spire. Note the paleness of its lights,
  like glow-worms, or the foxfire on a corpse left unburied. Vormspire isthe aerie of Lord Vormulac
  Unsleep, perhaps the mighti est of all the Wamphyri. But the stack's illuminationsare ever dim, its aspect
  shrouded, and its vampiremaster morose. Vormulac and Maglore are "friends", oras friendly as the
  Wamphyri ever get to be.'
   Nicolae's arm traversed south. 'There, where the bightcurves west along the rear wall - that series of
  caverns like sockets in some weathered, freakish skull carvedfrom the face of the hollow cliff itself - is
  Gauntmanse. Its lights, fires and smoke have a uniformly purple tinge, which among the Wamphyri is the
  colour of sexual prowess. Lord Grigor is the master there, or "Grigor the Lech", as he's better known.
  
  One of the "younger" Lords, Grigor's cognomen says it all: for asfast as the Lech acquires female
  tithelings, so he wearsthem out! In Gauntmanse, young girls have withered tohags in the space of one long
  night...'
   So it went: Nicolae pointed out the more prominentspires and manses, naming them all and detailing
  many of the characteristics of their masters and mistresses.His discourse covered Zunspire,
  Masquemanse, Tor- manse, and many others along the rear wall, until the
   angle of observation became too acute. Then he looked into the gorge itself, where numerous lesser
  stacks and knolls made gargoyle humps among the shadows of Turgosheim's lower reaches. 'Down there
  dwell the lowly Lords and certain newcomers, and others who merely aspire. Yet even in the depths
  some Lords are well-established and powerful among the Wamphyri, who have chosen to live there for
  reasons of their own. One such is Lom Halfstruck, master of Trollmanse. His place is that square, squat
  knoll there, with turrets in its corners and red lanterns in their windows. Lom is a dwarf among the
  Wamphyri, whose legs are stunted. He says that since he was born close to the earth, it suits him to stay
  there, and he scorns the soaring aeries of the others ...
   '... But there,' Nicolae Seersthrall blinked twice, and turned his feral gaze from the gloomy gorge of
  Turgosheim inwards upon Nathan. 'There's a lot more, butthat's enough for now.'
   Nathan nodded and said, 'Despite that you're no more than a prisoner here, you seem to have acquired
  a greatdeal of useful knowledge.'
   Nicolae's turn to nod and sigh. 'I've spent many a longhour at windows such as this one, overlooking Tur
  gosheim,' he said. 'But in Runemanse there are things to look into as well as out of. I tidy Maglore's
  rooms, all ofthem. In one of this workshops he keeps an amazingmodel of the gorge, where all of its
  spires and manses arerepresented. For the Lord Maglore is a mage and seer, and believes in the magical,
  mystical things. If another Lord is spiteful towards him, Maglore utters curses against thelikeness of his
  manse, to bring down a doom upon it! Also, being a mentalist, the model helps concentrate his mindwhen
  he sends out his thoughts to spy upon his contemporaries. It provides the targets for his mind-darts.'
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   'You should be careful,' said Nathan, 'that he doesnot look in your mind!'
   'Why would he?' said the other, with a small start. 'For what am I, after all? I am nothing!' But still he
  drew back a little, in sudden alarm. Then: it was as if a wind had blown in through the window; the pair
  felt an inner chill; and in a moment Nicolae's alarm wasvery real. 'MagJore!' he snatched a breath.
   There was a shadow in the room, at the foot of the stairs, one of many cast by the flaring of the kitchen's
  gas jets. This one had been there for some little time, though neither Nicolae nor Nathan had noticed it
  until now. But it wasn'tjust a shadow, for as finally theireyes focused upon it, they saw that its own were
  scarlet.And: 'Maglore, indeed!' it said.
   Nicolae was on his feet in a moment and flying, gibbering down the wooden stairs so quickly as to shake
  
  them. But Maglore trapped him at the bottom, grippedhis shoulder in one clawlike hand and drew him
  yelpingto a halt. 'Not so fast,' he murmured in a doomful voice.'For one who talks so readily to strangers,
  Nicolae, youdon't do nearly enough talking to your master.'
   'My tongue ran away with me!' The other was in astate.
   'Oh?' Maglore answered. 'Well, and now it may runawayfrom you entirely. Indeed, I might bite it right
  outof your face!'
   Nathan had stood up. Looking down on Nicolae andMaglore, he could read the Seer Lord's passion.
  Despite Maglore's quiet tones, his anger was enormous. Startingdown the stairs, Nathan said: 'Master, it
  was I who asked the questions. If I had not, Nicolae could not have answered them. I asked only about
  Turgosheim and meant no harm. And his answers seemed likewiseinnocent.'
   Maglore glanced at Nathan as he reached the bottom step, then glared at Nicolae again.'If he speaks so
  readily to you, perhaps he would speak with others -but of what? The room of the miniature, perhaps,
  whereby use of small spells and conjurations I try to put rightwhat wrongs are worked against me? Ah,
  but there are those among the Lords and Ladies of Turgosheim who would seize most swiftly upon that,
  whose belief in themagical, mystical things is no less than mine!'
   'I would never work against you, master!' Nicolae denied it, wriggling like a worm in Maglore's grasp.
  'But to talk to this Nathan ... why, he is yours! In Runemanse, we are all - each and every one of us -
  yours!'
   'But we are not all so nosy,' Maglore answered.
   Nathan took a chance and said,'If Nicolae is in any way guilty, then so am I. But I say again, we are inno
  cent, master.'
   Maglore released Nicolae and thrust him stumblingaway, but fixed him with his eyes and held him incapa
  ble of flight where he came to a trembling halt againstthe wall. And growling, the Seer Lord answered
  Nathan, 'You may be innocent - possibly. But this one ...?' He continued to glare at Nicolae. Moreover,
  his upper liphad wrinkled back from his eye teeth like the muzzle ofa dog, and his fangs showed
  metamorphic growth where blood crept on ivory down from the ruptured gums.
   'But since nothing is forbidden to me in all Rune-manse,' Nathan spoke hurriedly, gasping the words out,
  'what could he tell me which I cannot discover formyself?'
   Slowly, very slowly, a little of the fire went out ofMaglore's eyes. He had seemed huge, awesomely
  power ful, but now in a moment shrank down into himself and was merely ... old. Then, to his errant
  thrall, he
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   said: 'Ah! Now see how he pleads for you, Nicolae. Yetif the boot were on the other foot, and if I were
  
  to giveyou leave, you would have his blood in a moment! What it is to have compassion, eh? Why, if I
  don't take care, I can see this Nathan beguiling all of Runemanse withhis winning ways!'
   Nicolae, cowering to the wall, nodded his eager agreement. 'Oh, he's a one to watch, master, be sure!'
   Maglore gave a phlegmy chuckle, then stood upstraighter. 'Oh, I am sure — but you're the one I'll be
  watching, my lad! Now begone, you scummy, treacherous thing!'
   Nicolae licked his lips, slid along the wall, fled wailing past Maglore and out of the kitchen. His footsteps
  receded into distance, pattering through his master's rooms ...
   Nathan took the opportunity to repeat, 'I meant noharm. Nor do I think that Nicolae meant any harm.'
   Maglore nodded. 'I'm satisfied that you didn't. Butthat one - is a beggar! This time I have let you
  intervene on his behalf. But let's have it understood: I don't welcome such interference. And I would
  advise you,Nathan: even one who is to be my ... friend, shouldknow when to step carefully.'
   Nathan said nothing, and in a little while Maglore asked him, 'Have you begun your exploration of Rune-
  manse?'
   'Your rooms, yes.'
   'My rooms?' Maglore arched an eyebrow. 'Do youalways take people at their word?'
   Nathan shrugged - he hoped not negligently - andsaid, 'Only liars may not be taken at their word,
  master.'
   Maglore blinked and slowly nodded, then laughed and slapped his thigh. 'Aye! It must be true! Well,
  well
   — and so you are good at word games! And we shall getalong famously. I look forward to many long
  conversations with you, Nathan. Except now I have things to do.A creature of mine lies damaged in its
  vat and I have repairs to make, lest a deal of hard work is wasted. And so I say again: go and explore
  the manse, or seekout your room and rest, and when I call for you come to me. Ah, but when I call, then
  make haste! Never keepme waiting, Nathan. Now, do you understand all?'
   'Yes, master.'
   Maglore turned away, and at once turned back. 'Perhaps I have already warned you, but if not I do so
  now:avoid my lieutenants if you can, for they are impatient men and unkind. Aye, and you must also
  avoid my women, who are patient beyond words and only tookind! And if you follow my meaning and
  my advice, all will be well...'
   Runemanse was a queer mixture of rocks, mainly volcanic, whose outer sheath was of quartz and
  feldspar fused to granite. Many of its caverns were natural, formed from cysts of expanding gas trapped
  in theancient magma as lava cooled to rock. But where softer pumice had formed in the primal flux, there
  the Seer Lord's thralls were at work even now, tunnelling in thebody of the place like maggots in an
  apple.
   Nathan found his 'room' (a small cyst or cavelet, in fact, situated directly below Maglore's own
  expansive apartments but unconnected except through the central stairwell with its hideous guardian), set
  
  back from the perimeter of the great hall at the furthest reach of a corridor hewn through the fibrous
  pumice of an oldlava run. There were several other rooms off that corri dor; their low, arched entries
  lacked doors but were equipped on the inside with screens of animal skin
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   stretched over cartilage frames, which kept their interiors private from the view of casual passers-by.
  Nathan'sroom, however, had a wooden door with a peephole anda latch ... but no key. Still, it was
  privacy of a sort.
   Directed there by a slender young female thrall - a waif-like creature no less than Nicolae, but a vampire
  for all that, whose eyes were luminous in the darkerplaces and cunning when Nathan found them
  observinghim - he quickly examined his accommodation, or more literally his prison: a room four paces
  by five, paved with featureless, irregular slabs, with a bed under the high window and a small curtained
  area containing acrude commode and chamber pot. Low-burning gas jets in the walls gave flickering light
  but very little ofwarmth.
   From the bed he stepped up into the deep, curtained window embrasure, opened the drapes and found
  the gap barred. Just as well; beyond the bars the drop was vertical and terrific! Looking out, the view
  was almost exactly the same as from Maglore's kitchen windowoverhead, which solved the problem of
  orientation. Then, climbing down again, Nathan found his vampire guide sitting on the rough blankets of
  his bed. He had left her outside the open door, without indicating that he desired company. But these
  creatures had minds oftheir own, and came and went like smoke.
   Thank you for bringing me here,' he told her. 'Butnow I intend to sleep.'
   'Well,' she indicated his bed with a languid hand, 'you have a bed. It's good for sleeping, among other
  things.' Her smile was enticing as she slowly unfastened her blouse, showing Nathan the inner curves of
  her breasts. But her flesh was sallow, and her eye-teeth long, white and sharp. Fascinated, he stared at
  her where she stretched like a kitten, and saw the stains of
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   her aureoles under thin material forced up into sharp,twin peaks by the stiffening of her nipples.
   He got down from the bed, looked towards the door.'You had better go.' His voice was shaky.
   'Or what?' Hers was sultry, hot, teasing. 'How will you punish me, if I don't?' She lay back, lifted her
  dress, showed Nathan how she was naked underneath,and everything displayed. Then, spreading her
  legs wan tonly, she ran her fingers through her bush. Her dark flesh quaked and opened like a small
  mouth, moist and pouting, so that from where Nathan stood two paces away, still he could feel its sweet
  suction - and itsvenom.
   'Go now,' he said, hardening his voice, 'at once, orrisk Maglore's wrath!'
  
   'Hah!' she was up on her feet in a moment. 'But wethought you were fresh from Sunside, a young lad
  burst ing with seed. We did not know that Maglore had bought you from Zindevar, who has doubtless
  kept you as a gelding in Cronespire, where your sole duty hasbeen to oil the creaking leather of her
  flaccid teats! And did she steal your dark Gypsy colours, too, as well asyour manhood, you pale
  trembling whelp?'
   'Out!' Nathan went to the door, held it open.
   'What?' She was furious now: her nostrils flaring,eyes blazing crimson, mouth a writhing, hissing, cursing
  gash. 'Do you really spurn me? Do you dare? I see that you do! Fuck you then, you pallid, sapless
  freak!' Sheswept by him and out of the room.
   It had been the first of Nathan's several encounters with Maglore's women; in respect of which, it
  seemed that both Nicolae and the Seer Lord were perfectly correct...
   Nathan was mentally and physically exhausted. Fully
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   clothed, with all three of his blankets covering him, he did eventually sleep but it was a long time coming.
  In the end he only succeeded after reminding himself that awake or asleep Runemanse was a place
  fraught with terrors, and that like it or not and for as long as he stayed here he must sleep and replenish
  himself atfrequent intervals. Then, as he felt himself slipping from eerie awareness into the darkness of
  equally weird dreams, he remembered to cloak his telepathic mind with the vast and incomprehensible
  swirl of the numbers vortex, hopefully to protect it from the incursionsof other minds with similar abilities.
   In this way he shrouded his secret mind at least, which in any case would be cluttered with the debris of
  his waking hours and hard to decipher. But where telepathy is communication between living, physical
  minds, deadspeak is something else entirely. Only the minds of the dead were tuned to it, and Nathan's
  mind, of course...
   Nathaaan! The dead voice was only a whisper at first, a sigh in the dark, uneasy drift of subconscious
  wandering. But as Nathan heard it, focused upon it, and drew closer to its source, so all other memories,
  pseudo-memories and dream-clutter were brushed aside; and the voice grew stronger. Nathaaan? It was
  a clotted gurgle, a dead and rotten thing, and despite itsincorporeality, it was still the very 'embodiment'
  of evil. So that Nathan was instinctively aware that this was avoice from the pit.
   'Who are you?' he asked it breathlessly, as his sleeping body grew cold and the short hairs stood erect
  on the back of his neck. 'What... are you?'
   Ask what I was, the thing answered, its voice mournful now and racked with a sob. For that is
  something1 can tell you, aye, and perhaps even show you. But as
   for what 1 am ... why, 1 am no longeranything! Orifanything at all, an old dead thing in his lightless
  grave, blind and shrivelled and leathery as themummifiedThyre in their cavern mausoleums. That is what
  1 am.
   The Thyre? What do you know of them?' Nathanremembered his vow: he would never reveal his know
  ledge of the desert folk to the outside world. But itseemed that this one already knew of them. Something
  of them, at least.
  
   Do I know of them? Ah, better than you think! Why,for fifty long yearsI have lain here in my solitude
  andlistened to them through the long blind night: the echoes of their dead thoughts, drifting in from their
  dusty tombs, over Sunside and the barrier mountains, and down into Turgosheim. They are dead things
  no less than I myself, and so in my solitude I am privy to their thoughts. Except they are unkind and will
  not speak tome, and I no longer try to speak to them. But you ... aredifferent.You are alive, Nathan!
  Your works have definition in the land of the Jiving. You can make change, can bring things into being!
  Whereas I myself and all the dreaming Thyre, because we are only dead things, canchange nothing.
   Nathan was wary of the thing, whose evil was a miasma in his mind. 'You know my name, knew that I
  was here. How could you know these things, withoutthat we've met before?'
   How could I know? But I feel your trembling footstepsin the rock, which reverberate down to me like
  thunder!By comparison, Maglore's comings and goings are a patter of raindrops, and his thralls' a slither
  of leaves.Also, I hear your dreaming thoughts, called deadspeak,which are solid as spoken words to me,
  while the living hear nothing at all. Ah, you can build your barrier of numbers against the living, Nathan,
  but you may not
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   shield your mind fromthe dead! We knowyou, Necro-scope!
   The thing seemed to know altogether too much. 'We?' Nathan answered. 'But the Thyre shun you,
  you've admitted as much. And you talk about your "solitude", which would seem to imply that all of the
  dead shunyou. You can only be Wamphyri!'
   Wamphyri,of course! said the other. It's no big secret.I am what I am. But I'm also dead, and you are
  the Necroscope. Or does your pity exclude such as me, as I have been excluded from light and life and
  existence itself, except as an old and crumbling thing in the rock?
   Despite his instinctive caution, still Nathan was curious. 'Where are you - exactly?'
   Where I dwelled for an hundred years; where I was blinded by treacherous sons and buried; where
  even now I stiffen to a stone, to become one with all the stones of Turgosheim. Upon a time my home
  was Mad-manse. Now it is only my tomb . ..
   Madmanse? Nathan didn't know about Madmanse.
   Ah, no! The thing at once explained. Despite that Maglore and I were neighbours, you won't see
  Madmanse from his windows. For he was above and I wasbelow.
   'In Turgosheim's lower reaches?'
   Look you, said the other. You know that Runemanse is like a turret, a hollow promontory of rock
  jutting from the rim of the gorge? Well, its column goes down into the roots of Turgosheim itself. The
  upper levels are Maglore's, but down below... is Madmanse! You must visit me one day. Maglore
  
  knows the way: an old stairwell, winding down, down. We shared the same wells, upon a time ... The
  other's voice had sunk to a ghastly gurgle, suggestive, insinuating, inveigling. It was overpowering, very
  nearly hypnotic ...
   But even dreaming, still Nathan sensed his danger. 'Very well,' he said, pushing back the reek of mental
  contagion. 'So now I know where you are. But I stilldon't know who you were. Did you have a name?'
   A name? Oh, indeed!The other's oozing, poisonousvoice was more ghastly yet, like an evocation of
  immemorial horror, shuddering into life from beyond the grave. My name was muchfeared inits time,
  even among the Wamphyri. I was Eygor Killglance, whose very eyes were instruments of death - which
  was the reason mytwin bastard bloodsons blinded and destroyed me! Also why they fled in the end; for
  they knew that I was still here, and theyfeared the dreams I sent them, to plague them all their days.
  Well, now the dogs are gone, evenbeyond the reach of my dreams. But they'll be back one day, and I
  shall still be here, waiting ...
   A little of Eygor's loneliness, his helplessness - but a great deal more of his bitterness, hatred, and
  frustration - touched Nathan's metaphysical mind, clinging there and burning like hot tears, or perhaps
  like acid. In themoment of its passion, the old thing in its long-forgotten vault had become more than just
  a disembodied mind; now it was more truly a Being in its own right, and Nathan took the opportunity to
  look deeper at what the once-master of Madmanse had been like towards theend of his time.
   The other sensed the extension of Nathan's mind and knew that he had drawn closer. Aye, seek me out,
  he said. First in dreams and then in life. Here I am, here -in the dark and the dank and the drear of my
  prison,where I died in the mire of Madmanse ...
   Nathan could see, but dimly. He stood in a gloomycathedral of a cave, vast and high-ceilinged, whose
  walls dripped slime and nitre. The floor was a clutter ofanomalous debris, humped, fibrous, boggy.
  Spongy
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   bones and white-shining cartilage gleamed everywhere,like a boneyard of monsters. The place was a
  vampirerefuse pit, diseased, disused, and sealed up forever. But not everything here was refuse. Or
  perhaps it was —now.
   Something leaned or slumped against the wall. At first Nathan took it for some strange stalagmite
  formation: a fantastic dripstone creation of nature. But he saw that its shape was much too irregular, and
  itstexture darker than the salty, nitre-streaked stone.Lured by a morbid fascination, he willed his
  dream-self into motion and approached until the thing toweredover him, clinging to the curve of the
  cavern's wall. And as Nathan's perspective changed so details stood outclearer, and the true nature of
  the thing was known.
   It was... a monstrous amalgam, a welding together of everything unwholesome! Like Maglore's guardian
  creature in its curtained niche under the central staircase in Runemanse's great hall, this thing's general out
  line was manlike. But the Seer Lord's creature was not eighteen feet tall and composed of fused bone,
  
  blackmummied flesh, knobs of gristly cartilage, and plates of gleaming-blue chitin. Nor did Maglore's
  guardian have additional mouths in its bloated body and rubberylimbs, as well as the one in its face!
   Nathan's dream-self drew back a pace. His fevered eyes scanned the size, the shape and diseased
  design of this thing slumped in a kneeling position against thewall. Its horny fossil feet and shrivelled,
  leathery thighs; its arched back and shoulders, and misshapen, screaming skull. Fused to the wall by nitre,
  the great head was thrown back, jaws frozen in some everlasting rictus. Awithered arm lay along a ledge
  of rock, terminating in a talon that drooped from a wrist almost as thick as Nathan's thigh, where
  blackened bones protruded from
   dusty, fretted, crumbling flesh. Or at least, from the desiccated stuff which once had been flesh.
   And: Welcome to Madmanse, the awful voice said, and Nathan knew that it was this gargoyle who
  spoke to him. You entered o/ your own freewill, and I shall make you heir to aJlof my mysteries -if you
  so desire.ForI had powers in my time, Necroscope, just as you have powers now. And who knows
  but that one day we might trade something for something, and sobenefit mutuallyfrom our ... transaction?
   Nathan knew he should leave, and now. But this was a new experience. This dead creature - this
  otherwise extinct mind - was no innocent Thyre ancient dreaming incorporeal dreams of the past, but a
  Lord of the Wamphyri still hoping against hope and scheming forsome highly improbable future! Indeed
  an entirely impos sible future, without Nathan. Eygor's tenacity was that of the vampire, and Nathan was
  his one thread of contact, his one chance of continuity.
   'There's nothing I want from you,' he said, backing off farther yet. 'All you knew in life was horror, of
  which I've had more than enough, and probably a greatdeal more to come. All thanks to the Wamphyri.'
   But can't you see the irony in it? The other was insistent. That I couJd be the instrument to right allofthe
  wrongs you'vesuffered?
   Was it possible, Nathan wondered? To fight the Wamphyri with their own evil? Was that the way to go?
  But what power did this creature have? And how, now that Eygor was dead, might Nathan become 'heir
  to all of (his) mysteries'?
   Ah, there.' The other sighed in Nathan's mind. Now see how I have sparked your interest, Necroscope.
  Aye, and I fancy we shall speak again, and soon. But for now - 'ware! For I know the patter of
  Maglore's sly,
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   slipperedfeet. And the Mageof Runemanse approaches even now. Until the next time, then ...
   Abruptly, the cavern and its occupant disappeared; the numbers vortex sprang up in its place; Nathan
  feltthe familiar, furious tugging of alien formulae, and also Maglore's mind-probes recoiling from the whorl
  andsuck of his mental barrier.
  
   'Nathaaan! Nathan!' The transition from one evil voice in his metaphysical mind to another in his entirely
  physical ears was confusing ... until a claw-like hand grasped his shoulder and shook him, rocking him in
  hisbed.
   'Who? What...?' He came gasping awake.
   'Who indeed?' Maglore's face was hideous - and accusing? - in the yellow-flaring light of the gas jets,
  where he leaned over him. 'Who is it comes to visit you in your sleep, Nathan? Who do you talk to,
  secretly, inyour dreams?'
   'My dreams?' Nathan's guard was firmly in place.Quickly awake, he tried to sit up and Maglore
  withdrew a little to let him. 'Was I dreaming?' His brow wasfeverish and he was trembling. 'Yes, yes I
  was! But nota dream, a nightmare, which now has gone.'
   'Ah, a nightmare!' Maglore nodded curtly, his red eyes swivelling this way and that, as if seeking out
  some vestige of the unknown visitant. 'That whichcomes in the darkness to terrify the sleeping mind. The
  memory of some fearful event out of the past, perhaps, or the prescience of that which is yet to befall.'
  He cocked his head in a listening attitude, sniffing at the air like a hound before seating himself on the
  edge of Nathan's bed. The result of gluttonous overeating, or merely a case of conscience. But ... guilty
  conscience,perhaps?'
   Nathan kept his mind shielded and played the inno-
   cent. It wasn't difficult, for after all he was innocent. 'Did I eat too much, Master?' He ignored the
  impliedaccusation.
   Maglore narrowed his eyes, but still Nathan saw rightinto them. The master of Runemanse was thinking,
  Doeshe continue to play word games with me? One thing forsure: he's nofool, this Nathan.
   But as Maglore stood up, so he made inquiry; 'Andare you hungry?'
   Nathan threw back his blankets, thrust his feet overthe edge of the bed and joined the Seer Lord on his
  feet. 'I think I am,' he said. He glanced out of the high window and noted the orientation of the stars. And
  so he should be hungry, for he'd slept half-way throughsundown!
   Then you did not eat too much,' Maglore told him.'And so we're left with a case of conscience; or
  perhapssome real however intangible thing, which came to youin your sleep. Do you believe in ghosts?'
   'Yes,' said Nathan at once, relieved that he could speak the truth. Of course he believed in ghosts, for he
  of all men knew that they were real, even though theywere not always the dark phantoms of myth which
  men supposed. But Maglore, for all that he was a mage,didn't know that.
   The Seer Lord nodded. 'And so you should believe inthem, and especially here. Let me advise you,
  Nathan, that Turgosheim has known a variety of terrible men and creatures. Though they themselves are
  gone, their auras dwell here still. And in Runemanse, you are notthe only one who dreams dark dreams.'
   He looked Nathan up and down. 'But tell me, why areyou dressed? You did not simply fall asleep on
  top ofthe bed, for I saw you under the covers. Is there some thing here which you fear? Has someone ...
  bothered
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   you?' His frown brought his eyebrows crushing inwardsunder a warp of wrinkled forehead. And once
  again he glanced this way and that, and sniffed the air. Until, ina moment: 'A woman!' he said.
   'She did me no harm,' Nathan shook his head. 'Sheshowed me the way here, that's all.'
   Maglore glared at him furiously. 'What? She showed you the way? Oh, she would do that, all right! Any
  oneof them would do that!' He grasped Nathan's arm. 'Who was she? Did she touch you, kiss you, offer
  you her body? Speak, fool! Did you take her?' But even as Nathan began to shake his head: 'What? Do
  you lie to me? Why, there's not a horny red-blooded man born of woman who could deny those whores
  of mine, exceptmaybe a whelp who doesn't know whata woman is!'
   Nathan felt his ears burning red ...
   Astonished, the Seer Lord gazed deep into his eyes, and saw the truth written there. 'What?' he said. 'A
  strapping man, Szgany, almost twenty years old and never bedded a woman? Hah!' He slapped his thigh.
  'Little wonder they're prettied up and on the prowl! I've never seen them so agitated! But ... can it be
  true?You're a virgin?'
   'I...I had a...g-g-girl, Szgany,' Nathan answered. Itwas the first time he'd stumbled and stuttered in a long
  time. And now he resolved never to do it again. 'She was stolen away by Canker Canison, into Starside,'
  his voice hardened. 'Perhaps she would have been mine, if things had been different. Anyway, we kept
  apart fromtaking lovers, and waited for each other.'
   'Ah, true love!' Maglore fluttered long, almost furryeyelashes and sighed sarcastically. 'The dog Canker
  gother, yes?' He shook his head, made sympathetic clucking noises. 'I trust you have forgotten her? If
  not, you maysafely do so.'
   Nathan was not required to reply.
   'Now, try to understand my concern, my anger,' Mag-lore's tone was conciliatory. 'If you are seduced
  by some creature of mine, you will no longer be your own creature, and therefore of no earthly use to
  me. It is my desire to keep your blood, body, and very mind clean and free of other influences - except
  my own. For I have enough of vampires, and at times the fawning of thralls becomes an annoyance. This
  is no unique situation, however; you will not be the first entirely human being who ever stayed in
  Runemanse..." He paused,and in a little while continued:
   'Well, and no doubt you are wondering why I'm here. Since I was passing this way I thought to look in
  on you, and if you were awake bring you to table. You shall take all of your meals with me, for
  sometimes I crave the company of common men. Also, it seems I must keep you safe - for the time
  being, anyway - until I can make other arrangements.' He spoke musingly,almost to himself. But then:
   'Come,' he made for the door. 'You can wash in my apartments, and while we eat we shall continue our
  conversation. I desire to know you better, my son. For after all, your welfare is in my hands ...' Maglore
  glanced at Nathan sideways where he hurried to keep up, but the Seer Lord's thoughts were now as
  
  inscrutable as his expression ...
   Entering the great hall from the corridor, Nathan came face to face with the vampire girl who had at
  tempted his seduction. She turned her face away immediately but Maglore had seen. He paused in his
  striding, nodded grimly, and called her back. She came smiling, eager, but ghosting in the awful flowing
  fashion of avampire.
   'So,' said Maglore. 'It is Magda. You were the one.'
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   She glared at Nathan and faced up to Maglore, determined to brazen it out. 'But he's one of yours,
  master, which you have brought into Runemanse. I thought to have him before the others, that's all, and
  he gave me the opportunity by asking me the way to his room. But as it happens, he's one of three things:
  a eunuch, or queer, or a child who still thinks it's for pissing! Me: I like a man with backbone. And so no
  harm done. Besides which, I had no instructions to the contrary.'
   'Perhaps not, at the time,' said Maglore nodding,chucking her under the chin almost affectionately.
   She rubbed against him and brushed his shoulderwith her cheek. Then I have not offended?'
   Maglore had been half-smiling. Now the mask slippedfrom his face and he called for one of his men. At
  the sound of his voice, a silence fell on the great hall. Then a lieutenant came striding, and Magda tried to
  backaway. But Maglore held her.
   Nathan glanced around the great hall. Nearby, a squad of pallid thralls gouged with heavy flint chisels at
  a wall of pumice; but work stopped as gaunt, hollow faces turned inwards on the drama. Feral eyes lit
  withmorbid fascination, and perhaps with something of grim anticipation, too. A small group of women,
  pounding washing at a trickling water sluice, looked up and nudged each other, and grinned. They were
  drudges, most of them, older than Magda and perhaps jealous ofher.
   Maglore saw that, too. 'Did you wager for him?' he asked her as his lieutenant approached.
   'We drew straws,' she snarled, still struggling. 'And Iwon.'
   'Fool!' Maglore told her. 'You lost! Where orders existyou obey them, and where there are none you do
  nothing. That is the rule, in Runemanse. The others know
   that, and so they let you win. They were baiting you, trying Nathan, and testing ... me!'
   He tossed her into his man's arms, grew taller andglowered all about the cavern. 'Testing me?' he
  shouted, his face livid with a fire which seemed to burn through the very bone. 'Well, and let this be a
  lesson to all of you. I need not say more than this ...' He glanced at hislieutenant, and twitched his head in
  a negligent gesture: '... Magda is for the provisioning!'
  
   The girl screamed once and clawed for the lieutenant's eyes; he jerked back his head, struck her with a
  massive fist that broke her jaw and knocked her senseless. And the last Nathan saw of her, she was
  beingcarried away.
   For a moment the silence seemed to ring ... then Maglore headed for the spiral staircase with Nathan
  following on. But this time he knew better than toplead for the girl, for the Seer Lord's mind was seething
  like a cauldron full of poison. And as they climbed the central stairs, slowly the great hall came back to
  life behind them ...
   At Maglore's table, Nathan had no appetite. He picked at his food when the Wamphyri Lord insisted,
  but hisspirit felt so weighted, depressed, that the morsels would not go down. And he wondered about
  Magda. Perhaps he'd left his mind unguarded; in any case he was joltedand learned a lesson from it,
  when Maglore said:
   'Forget about her. You won't see her again. Andanyway, why concern yourself about someone who
  would have drained you in a trice?'
   'Because I feel it was my fault, master.'
   'It was no one's fault. It was Nature's fault: the natureof the vampire. But I am glad you refused her. So
  should you be glad, for your continued existence.'
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   'Everything in Runemanse appears a threat,' Nathananswered before he could control his thoughts or
  words. 'There's no innocence here.'
   'Well, there is now,' Maglore contradicted him. 'Aye,and there was before. Perhaps not entirely
  innocent, but certainly human. Didn't I tell you that you weren'tthe first human being to stay in
  Runemanse? If I let my ... ladies see you and she together, then perhaps they'llleave you alone. I have
  sent for her and she will join usin a little while.'
   'She, master?'
   Maglore waved a dismissive hand. 'Ask no more. NowI have questions for you. For instance: you say
  you don't know women, yet wore a locket with a curl of pubic hair. And Thyre hair at that! Explain it, if
  youwill.'
   Nathan shrugged. 'It's a custom of the Thyre whenbrother and sister part. Atwei was like a sister to me.'
   'And how did you know her so well?'
   'I got to know her, in my long wanderings in thedesert.'
   'Ah, yes, I remember,' Maglore nodded. 'You told meabout that on our way here. After Wratha and her
  
  renegades fell upon your tribe and destroyed it, you walked out into the desert to die. But the Thyre
  foundyou and you joined them, and wandered east with them from oasis to oasis. You skirted the Great
  Red Waste and lived like the desert trogs themselves, on the flesh of lizards and the juice of cactus
  plants.' Maglore blinked and shook his head. 'So much sunlight and solittle colour. Why did you not
  burn?'
   'I worea cowled Thyre robe,' Nathan lied, 'and kept to the shade wherever possible. Then, when I came
  toTurgosheim's Sunside, I lived on the fringe of the forest a while before I heard of lozel and sought him
  out. In
   the forest's shade, my skin grew pale ... which in anycase had never been dark.'
   'Why did you seek lozel out?' Maglore's questions were coming closer to the mark. Nathan must think
  fast, and guard his thoughts at the same time.
   'I heard he was a mystic who understood strange things. Perhaps he could explain the numbers which
  plague my dreams, and the reason I feel like a stranger in the presence of my own kind.' He tugged at the
  twisted strap on his wrist. 'He might also know why Iwear this, which has become a part of me.'
   'Ah!' Maglore was distracted, fascinated at once, justas Nathan had hoped he would be. 'Take it off.
  Let me see it again.' Nathan did so, and Maglore picked it up and said: 'So, the sigil puzzles you even as
  it puzzlesme. Why did you not say so?'
   'I have lived with it,' Nathan answered. 'I wear it likemy hair. Yet while it seems nothing special, I know
  that it is special, for it is also your sigil. It seemed presumptuous of me to claim it for my own.'
   And at last Maglore chuckled. 'Not to say dangerous,eh?'
   'That, too,' Nathan answered.
   'Well, and we learn more about you all the time,' the Seer Lord nodded, tossing the strap onto the table.
  'You're not so naive after all. And did lozel know thesigil? Could he tell you anything about it?'
   'Oh, he knew it, master,' said Nathan. 'But did he know about it? - no, nothing. He was a fraud! I myself
  know more.'
   'You do? Explain.'
   Nathan took up the strap. 'I have ... noticed things.In quieter moments, I have studied this device.'
   'A device?' said Maglore, raising a feathery eyebrow.'Oh, really? Do you think so? Ahhh!'
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   'How many sides has it?'
  
   'Eh? A question?' Maglore leaned over the table andtested the leather between thumb and forefinger.
  'Sides?Why, two, of course.'
   'One,' Nathan shook his head. 'For it defies the eye, do you see?' He brought a sliver of charcoal from
  the fireplace and drew a line on the brown leather, downthe centre of its width. As the line lengthened he
  turned the strap on the table, until the head of the line met upwith its tail.
   'Ahhh.'' Maglore's great jaw fell open.
   And Nathan asked him: 'How many edges has it?'
   'Eh? Edges?' Maglore's eyes darted from the strap toNathan's face and back again. 'Why, two, plainly.
  What is it but a strip of leather, after all? There must be twoedges, if only to separate the space between
  them!'
   'One,' Nathan said again.
   'No!' said Maglore, astonished. 'Let me try it!' He blackened the strap's rim with charcoal, until 'each'
  edge (in fact there was only one, as Nathan had pointed out) was smudged with soot. Then ... the Seer
  Mage's eyes were very wide as he carefully put the strap down.And:
   'For all of sixteen years I have known this thing,' he said, 'even taking it for my sigil. Yet I have never
  "known" it! But now, through you..." He gazed at Nathan in something approaching wonder. 'Well, in
  alerting me to your presence, lozel Kotys has paid hisdues at last. For indeed there is this bond between
  us.'
   He might have gone on to say more, except that was when 'she' arrived ...
   II
   She was beautiful in a wan, subdued sort of way, but it was obvious that she was not a vampire. Her
  eyes were as black as any Szgany eyes Nathan had ever seen, and despite the lack of sunlight - or
  perhaps because of it — her flesh had taken on a unique creamy texture. No longer the tanned, natural,
  light golden brown of a Gypsy, still her colour appeared healthier than Nathan's, and it could never be
  mistaken for the pallor of athrall or the sickly grey of an undead vampire thing.
   Long-legged and dressed in a black sheath split up the sides to mid-thigh, and in a gauzy blouse which
  scarcely concealed the elastic globes of her breasts, she approached the table and bowed from the waist.
  Her hair, straight, black as jet, and cut in a fringe over her eyes, was long at the sides and fell forward to
  frame her oval face. But as she straightened her back and stood tall, waiting for her master's command,
  her eyes were only for Maglore. So that Nathan supposed she dared not look at him, not in the presence
  of herWamphyri Lord.
   'Orlea,' Maglore acknowledged her presence with a smile, indicating that she should take a seat at the
  table. 'Eat with us.' And, as she sat down: This is Nathan, and you shall know him well. He is new here
  and Runemanse is very strange to him. I shall require you to show him all of its levels, rooms, and
  functions. Nowhere shall be forbidden. He shall be as you are, afree person - within those limits which I
  impose.'
   While Maglore placed some choice tidbits on a plate
  
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   and passed it to her, Orlea glanced at Nathan, perhapscuriously. Then, lowering her eyes, she picked at
  herfood.
   Nathan thought it might be as well to make conversation. 'Despite my colouring,' he spoke to Orlea, 'I
  amSzgany. But I came here out of the west, from beyondthe Great Red Waste.' Perhaps she, and
  Maglore too,would take it that there were other anomalies of pigmentation in those distant regions. In any
  case, it was anopening.
   She looked at Maglore for his approval, and he nodded. And turning a little more towards Nathan, she
  asked: 'How is it now, on Sunside?' Her voice was soft,pleasant, but completely lacking in animation; and
  nevera smile to betray her emotions. In fact she seemeddrained of all emotion. Nathan could well
  understandthat.
   'My Sunside, in the west, or yours?'
   'My own,' she answered.
   'Do you miss it?' Maybe he was taking a chance.Perhaps she would also take a chance, and answer him
  truthfully. But she didn't, or so he believed at that time.
   'No,' she said. 'My life was hard there.'
   Then why do you ask after it?'
   Maglore interrupted. 'Good! And so you'll converseand find things in common. But I suspect my
  presenceinhibits you, and anyway I have things to do. Orlea,first I would speak to you..."He stood up
  and moved apart; she went to him and they talked a while inlowered tones; finally Maglore left the two
  on their ownand went about his business.
   As they made an end of their meal, Nathan looked at the spread table. 'What about these things?'
   'Just as you and I have our duties here, so others have theirs,' Orlea answered him. She indicated the
   table. 'All of this will be attended to; but for now Mag-lore has tasked me to show you Runemanse, and
  taskedyou to observe closely and remember the things yousee. No great difficulty in that; I know you will
  remem ber, just as I remembered in my time. Indeed, I cannotforget.'
   He followed her to a room with a staircase, whichthey climbed to Runemanse's highest level. 'The
  topmost fang of the aerie,' she told him without looking back.'We'll start there, and work our way down.'
   'Why did you ask after Sunside?' Nathan was curious.
   'Because you were making conversation,' she answered. 'If I had not answered, Maglore would have
  made me. He admires that such as you and I are civiltowards each other. It pleases him that within the
  limits he imposes we govern our own bodies and minds, and that we temper ourselves and are matched
  
  on an emotional level - unlike vampires, who are commanded bypowerful, alien urges to argue and fight
  at every opportunity, often for the sake of it!'
   'Is that the only reason?' They had arrived at thetopmost landing.
   'No, for it was also my thought to ask ... after thechildren.' She waited for him to step up beside her.
   The children?'
   'My life on Sunside was hard,' she said, 'but I remember the little ones. They were sweet, pure,
  innocent.'
   Nathan shrugged. 'All young things are.'
   'Ah, no!' she answered with a small shudder. The young of the Wamphyri are not...'
   'And are there young ones here?'
   'In Runemanse? No. Maglore cannot abide them. Butwhen I asked him once for a child, he showed me
  the nurseries of the Wamphyri. The children of Sunside
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   take milk from their mothers or wet-nurses, but in Tur-gosheim . .. they take other than milk. If Maglore
  couldbe sure he would father other than a vampire, then he might give me my child, but until then he won't
  spoilme for the sake of "some usurper brat!'"
   'You asked Maglore for a child?' Nathan couldn't believe it. 'Do you mean ... you wanted to bear his
  child?'
   'Yes,' she answered, leading the way through a labyrinth of empty rooms to one with a window and, set
  back in an alcove, a curtained area. There, for the first time, she looked Nathan full in the face. But her
  chin was raised and her eyes defiant. 'You have not seenMaglore when he's young. You're not a woman.
  You do not know what it is to be with a vampire Lord. Youhave no understanding of the word
  "fulfilment".'
   'No,' Nathan replied, drawing back from her. 'But I have seen what remains after women have been ...
  fulfilled! And if they're not dead, they're doomed!'
   She nodded, looked away. 'Yes, you are right. But with me ... Maglore has been careful, and gentle. I
  am not changed. Or if I am, it is that I hated him and now love him. A woman can be in thrall to a man in
  moreways than one.'
   'You actually love him?' It seemed impossible.
  
   'I love Maglore!' she snapped. 'Not his works or thething inside him, but him!'
   It was beyond understanding. For a moment, lost for words, Nathan shook his head. Then he said: 'But
  surely, it's his vampire that makes him what he is?'
   'And thatis the paradox,' she answered, 'which tears me like rotten cloth. I hate that thing inside Maglore
  asmuch as I love its host! For where he is my master, it is his master! And I am jealous of it and hate it
  because it shares him with me. Also, it shares me with him! But
   when he is with me in the guise of a young man, then Icannot help but love him.'
   Nathan had backed up to the curtained alcove; Orlea had followed and was standing close to him, with
  her hand on the curtain rope, when he said, 'I think ... that I pity you!' He spoke before considering his
  words, perhaps without even meaning them; for he had no way of knowing what her life had been like
  before Rune-manse. It was simply an expression of his horror. But whatever else she'd lost, Orlea still
  had her pride. Herdark eyes blazed as she told him:
   'Save your pity for yourself, Nathan, for you've not yet seen Runemanse.' With which she pulled the
  rope. The curtains swished open, and Nathan saw ... Mag-lore's siphoneer. At first he did not recognize
  what he was looking at, but then he did, and staggered awaygrimacing and gasping.
   'So you see,' she let the curtains fall and followed him, taking his arm to steady him, 'there are times
  when it's useful to have someone to love and cling to ina place like this. Aye, even a thing like Maglore.'
  Looking into her eyes, Nathan saw nothing of the feral yellow of a thrall's evil intelligence, or the scarlet
  of tumultuous Wamphyri passions. But perhaps he did see something of the vacancy of madness ...
   Next on her list, Orlea showed Nathan Maglore's study or 'room of meditation', to which only a few
  trusted thralls had access. His eyes were drawn at once to a heavy golden model of the Seer Lord's sigil
  upon a slender onyx base, and he wondered at its use; or perhaps it was merely ornamental. And seated
  for longhours before a marvellous model of Turgosheim, he ab sorbed what Orlea told him of the
  vampire gorge. This was a great deal more than he'd learned from Nicolae
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   Seersthrall, and went a long way towards completing his knowledge of the geography of the place and
  thehistory of its inhabitants. More than two-thirds of Sundown had passed by the time they were finished
  there.
   'Are you tired?' she asked him. 'Or do you wish to continue?'
   'I don't know if I am tired,' Nathan answered truthfully. There's so much to see, learn. And what I've
  seenalready will keep me awake, I'm sure. Anyway, I needto be fatigued in body as well as mind, to
  sleep soundly.' But inside he knew that he really should sleep, and doas much of it as possible, at every
  opportunity. For if he should allow himself to become overtired, sooner or later he would let his guard
  down. His secret talents must remain secret; his knowledge of the Thyre and their desert places was a
  
  trust he could never break; hemust see about the fabrication of a false geography and lifestyle for that
  olden Sunside in the west, which he'd left so far behind. For eventually Maglore would wantto know
  about it, he was sure.
   'Now would be a good time for sleeping,' Orlea told him as if reading his thoughts, though in fact she had
  not, for he kept them guarded and could sense nothing of telepathy in her. 'For the deep sleep which you
  require, if you'd stay strong in Runemanse. Fear saps your strength here - everyone's strength, except
  Mag-lore's. One's nerves are stretched to breaking point; breathing and heartbeat fluctuate; will withers
  to a husk, even as Maglore's grows stronger. For it's notonly blood that vampires suck, Nathan. They
  suck everything.'
   He followed her back down to the great hall, where there was little of activity now. Several female thralls
  were still out and about, however, and a group of themstood in secretive conversation. Seeing Nathan
  and
   Orlea together they fell silent, frowning, and apparentlyfrustrated. Then, when he would have made for
  hisroom, Orlea took his elbow and guided him in a differentdirection, down a passageway carved in
  pumice.
   'Where are we going?' Nathan inquired.
   'To a place where those women won't bother you,' she told him. 'For they fear me almost as much as
  theyfear Maglore.'
   'And where is the Seer Lord now?' He felt uneasy,but was not quite sure why he wanted to know.
   'Asleep,' she answered. 'He has his routines. This is one of the times when he sleeps. Sunup will rouse
  him from his bed, when he'll retreat to his workshops in the lower levels. Unlike the other Lords, most of
  which work only at night and cower in the dark when the sunstands on high over Sunside, Maglore has
  regulated hissleeping evenly between day and night.'
   They reached the outer wall where a narrow windowlooked towards the north-east, and stone steps
  spiralled down around a mortared stone core. At the bottom was a lesser hall like a warren, with
  passages leading off. She led the way down one of these to a room with a door like Nathan's. It was
  Orlea's room, but inside ... the door was fitted with a bolt. This wasn't the only difference, for her
  apartment was very well appointed.She had a bath, furniture, furs on the floor, and tasselled drapes at a
  tiny window punched through the massive wall; and her bed was curtained with gauzy drapes,which hung
  to the floor from rails between the posters.
   There were several gas jets with low yellow flames. She went about the room plugging them with bone
  dowels, until the light was reduced to a smoky dusk. And as Nathan's imagination began to run rampant,
  she said: 'No one will bother you here. Here you maysleep safely.'
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   'Orlea,' he headed for the door, 'I appreciate your concern for me, but I fear that if Maglore knew I was
  here...'
   'He does,' she cut him short, stopped him in his tracks. 'Do you think I would dare if he did not? He
  ordered it.'
   Mind whirling and senses numb, Nathan faced the door, his hand reaching for the bolt. But hearing the
  rustle of curtains, he turned and looked back. Her clothes lay where she'd tossed them on a stool beside
  the bed, and the drapes were still mobile, shivering intostillness.
   Tingling with an electric awareness, scarcely daring to breathe, Nathan asked, 'What... did he order?'
   'Everything,' her voice came back to him, very small and somehow sad. 'I'm to take your innocence, until
  there's nothing left for them.'
   'His vampire women?'
   'Yes.'
   He went back to the bed. 'Orlea, I know better now. Iknow that I'm to avoid them, which in turn makes
  thisunnecessary.'
   'Do you spurn me and defy Maglore?'
   'No, I don't spurn you,' he said, trying hard to make her understand, without belittling himself. But in the
  end he knew there was only one way, which was to tell the truth. 'It's just that I have no experience of
  women,'he finally blurted it out. 'I don't know ... anything!'
   'Well,' she answered, 'and weren't we all innocent,upon a time?'
   Even as she spoke, Nathan's ringers were trembling as if they were some other's where they removed
  hisclothes. 'I mean it,' he said. 'I really don't know anything at all.' Even now it wasn't the whole truth, but
  closeenough.
   'But you will,' she whispered, 'you will. Even as Iknow, so shall you.'
   He was naked. 'Orlea, I..."
   'Come to bed and warm me,' she told him. 'At least I'll know that there's only one of you, that your
  actionsare your own and not directed by some other. At least itwill be you, and not some slimy-black
  thing inside thatdrives you on.'
   He passed through the curtains to where her slender hand greeted him. She turned back the covers and
  he slid in beside her. She covered him with the blankets,then with her strange cold love ...
   Later, in the dusk of the curtained bed and the musk oftheir bodies, Nathan asked: 'How did you come
  here?'
   'I was a child on Sunside,' Orlea told him, 'just fourteen years old, when the headman of my village,
  GoborTulcini, noticed me. He was a brutal man, Gobor, with afrail and much abused wife. But then, he
  abused everything: his position, his people - phah! - the very air hebreathed. Why, wild dogs are better
  
  behaved! One tithetime, he engineered a deficiency, and at the last moment chose my father to make up
  the number. After my father was taken, my poor mother died of grief. Then Gobor took me into his
  house, so that he might "bring me upas his own". So he said ...
   'My duties were to look after the village children, which I loved. For after all, I was only a child myself.
  But while I looked after them, Gobor ... looked afterme. His wife knew but feared him terribly, and so
  madeno complaint. Twice in a year, by his order, she helpedme lose the child he had made in me.
   'I bided my time, until I could stand it no longer. Then, one night when the tithesmen came out of
  Tur-gosheim, I crept to the square and offered myself for
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   the taking. Gobor would have snatched me back and beaten me, but a lieutenant, seeing that I was more
  comely than some of the girls on offer, questioned me. I told him my mother was dead and my father had
  been taken by the Wamphyri, and Gobor had kept me for himself, out of sight of the tithesmen. Well, the
  truthwas that I was too young for the tithe, but most of what I said was true.
   'Also, I said that I vastly preferred Turgosheim to thegreat brute Gobor, which was the whole truth.
  Even death was preferable, though that was not the entire reason. But being a child and still nai've - in my
  thinking, at least - I also thought I might find my father here. And despite that I was young, I was brought
  intoTurgosheim.
   'Luckily, a man of Maglore's drew me in the fatesay-ing, and so I came here. I had learned the ways of
  menfrom Gobor, and used a woman's wiles on Maglore. He was fascinated to know how I, a child, was
  such a woman. And when he knew ... then he arranged formen of his to be tithesmen for a spell, going
  into Sunside to collect the pitiful human tribute of the Szgany. And he instructed his men to choose a new
  leader for the people of my village, and to bring Gobor back withthem. Thus the great brute met his end
  in the provisioning of the Lord Vormulac's melancholy Vormspire,which I believe was my father's fate
  before him ...'
   As she finished her story Nathan slipped out of bed and began to dress himself. She watched him
  throughthe curtains a while, then said, 'You don't have to go.'
   'But I do have my own place here,' he told her, 'which I had better get used to.'
   'As you wish. And there will be another time, when you will be more at ease. Then I'll show you the
  thingsyou still don't know.'
   'By Maglore's command?' Even as he said it, Nathan knew that it was churlish of him. Especially now
  that he knew what her life had been. But with the wordsalready out, it was too late to make amends.
   And after a moment she answered quietly, 'Maybe ... and maybe not. We all must do as we're told, but
  the way in which we do it is our own concern ...'
  
   He left and made his way to his room. There were several vampire thralls in the great hall, a handful of
  women and one or two males. The latter glanced at Nathan, perhaps enviously, but he was pleased to
  note that the females ignored him. They had learned Mag-lore's lesson. And anyway, he was no longer
  an innocent. Oh, he was, in many ways, but not in that way.That part of him was gone forever.
   In one way he felt more the man, but in another he felt dejected, made small. And he remembered what
  his mother Nana had used to tell him when he'd been hunting, that good meat is always the tastiest when
  you've caught it yourself ...
   From then on time passed quickly, and as Nathan got to know Runemanse, so its menace receded a
  little, but never entirely. And Orlea had been right: there were times when he would wake up in the night
  (even during the long days), with his nerves screaming andhis heart pounding in his chest. It was simply
  the know ledge that terror and morbid works were all around, and that every other creature in
  Runemanse, and indeed Turgosheim, was a plague-bearing vampire. With thesole exception of Orlea
  herself.
   And as for Orlea: she was as good as her word and showed Nathan those things he still didn't know.
  She took him to her room a second time, and on a third and final occasion he made his own way there by
  prior
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   arrangement. And again he saw how she had been right, for he was more at ease and pleased to take
  theinitiative. Being young and potent, he enjoyed her slen der body and might easily have fallen in love
  with her,except she warned him against it.
   'I am Maglore's,' she told him, when on that third occasion he proved hard to drive from her room. 'And
  Ihave done my duty by him and obeyed his orders.'
   'Maybe,' he said, at her door. 'But you've loved meanyway, and you found it pleasant.'
   'No,' she shook her head, 'but I made you think so.' And as his face fell: 'From now on you must never
  look at me with those eyes, Nathan, for if he sees it he'll punish both of us, which in my case would be
  unfair. You mean nothing to me, not as a lover. But as a friend ...?'
   'Shall we be friends, then?' She was closing the dooron him, for good.
   'Best if we are,' she answered. 'There are a hundred rooms and workshops in my master's house, and he
  wants you to see all of them. But if you would prefer the company of some other ...?'
   'No,' said Nathan, as the door closed in his face, and he heard the bolt slide home. 'No, but I'll always
  begrateful for your company, and for your friendship.'
   'So be it,' she whispered from beyond the door ...
  
   After that she was cold and withdrawn as ever, and Nathan made no further advances towards her. But
  when it was Maglore's time for sleeping, and when Nathan would see Orlea on her way to her master's
  apartments ... sometimes he felt embittered.
   Maglore called for him often during that early period,and whatever Nathan was doing he must rush to
  the Seer Lord's side. Once, entering Maglore's apartments,
   he found a handsome, slim, broad-shouldered vampireLord waiting there. But as this stranger spoke to
  him he started, and actually staggered from the shock. For thevoice, if not the vibrant body it came out
  of, was unmistakable: it was Maglore's!
   'How do I look?' Maglore inquired, when Nathan hadrecovered.
   'Young!' He blurted out the first word that came tohim. 'A man in his prime, forty or forty-five! You look
  ... like a Lord!'
   'Like a "real" Lord, do you mean?' Maglore chuckled.But his amusement was brief, and in a moment his
  brow clouded over. 'All my life I've denied the thing within,' he growled. 'Except when I may no longer -
  when I cannot deny it! Then, briefly I am as you see menow. For this is how I am "rewarded" for my co
  operation. Which only goes to prove that however much I deny my creature, and myself, still the bloodis
  the life.Now go, my son, and reflect on the wonder you haveseen, and how it was achieved. And always
  remember, I am Wamphyri!' And to give his words more emphasis yet, he yawned his jaws to show
  Nathan the forkedtongue that flickered in the red vault of his mouth.
   But as Nathan headed for the spiral stairwell, soMaglore called after him: 'My son!' He looked back,
  andthe young Seer Lord stood there smiling. 'Now tell me,do you understand the provisioning?'
   Nathan shook his head. There's a great deal of Rune-manse I've not yet visited.'
   Then do so, today, now.'
   Nathan nodded. 'And shall Orlea take me there?'
   'Ah, no - not this time. Take yourself there, or go with one of my men. But along the way, you may tell
  Orlea that I am waiting ...'
   Nathan did as he was told. The last had been a cruel
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   command and Maglore knew it, but not as cruel as ordering Nathan to visit the rooms and workshops of
  the provisioning.
   He went there with Karpath, a thrall of Maglore's for three years, a lieutenant for eleven, and now the
  SeerLord's right-hand man. Karpath was interested in Nathan, and as they descended through the many
  
  levelsasked him: 'How do you find our master?'
   Nathan looked at the other. Two inches taller than Nathan, Karpath was broad as a door, heavy-jawed,
  grey as slate and more than three hundred pounds of solid vampire flesh. His eyes held an inner fire
  which, however mutely, spoke volumes. No common thrall -nor even an ordinary lieutenant - it was
  obvious that Karpath had known the virulent bite of a trueWamphyri Lord, and often. Something of
  Maglore himself was in his blood.
   'How do I find Maglore?' Nathan repeated him. Butthen, remembering the Seer Lord's emphasis, he
  replied: 'He is Wamphyri, and I'm not even a thrall. I find himawesome!'
   'You would like to be like him, then?' Karpath kept his voice low, but it was full of some inner passion.
  Nathan read his mind, made open and receptive throughprevious invasions of Maglore's. He was
  thinking:
   This one grows close to the Seer Lord. But is he arival? I crave Maglore's egg and will have it, come
  what may! There may not be room for the two of us - this Nathan PalebJood and Karpath Seerson - in
  Rune-manse.
   Nathan had to work hard to avoid recoiling from theseveral vicious, bloody, and terminal scenes which
  came seething out of Karpath's skull then, and knew he must take care how he answered. Not only had
  Karpath chosen his own name in advance of his anticipated
   succession to Maglore's seat, but that of his supposedrival too!
   'Be like him? Like Maglore? Wamphyri?' Nathan's shudder was only half-feigned. 'I think I would prefer
  to die first!'
   And you would, most assuredly/ Karpath thought. But . . . perhaps I concern myself unnecessarily. This
  Nathan's blood is indeed pale, and weak as water. Outloud, he said nothing.
   They reached the lowest level of Runemanse. Below lay Madmanse, and Karpath showed Nathan the
  dank, disused steps: 'an old stairwell, winding down, down',just as Eygor Killglance had described it.
   Nathan wanted to know: 'Can we go down there?'
   Karpath looked at him. 'We can - but we won't. Now that Wran and Spiro are flown, it is an empty
  place.Only a ghost dwells there now.'
   'A ghost?' Nathan played the innocent, but knewvery well who Karpath meant.
   The ghost of Eygor Killglance,' the other confirmed it. The Seer Lord suspects that he was murdered but
  no one knows the truth of it, except perhaps his murder ers. Eygor was very powerful and had the Evil
  Eye: hedestroyed his enemies with a glance! His ghost is strong, too, and wafts like a giant shadow in
  Madmanse. When Wratha and her traitors fled from Turgosheim, their spires and manses were sacked
  and offered to others. Several tried to dwell in Madmanse, but all felt Eygor's presence there and could
  not stay. The place is hollowand echoing now. Maglore goes there from time to time, but alone.' Karpath
  gave a shrug. 'Perhaps he will extend his holdings downwards. I do not know ...'
   Then Nathan was shown the provisioning:
  
   The granary, where grain, fruits, wines and otherproduce out of Sunside were stored; the mill and mixing
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   rooms where the raw materials of food were ground down and prepared in various ways, for many of
  Mag-lore's creatures had special requirements; the bakery and kitchens, and finally ... the slaughterhouse
  and storerooms. The first of these was not in use at the time. Nathan saw huge stained chopping blocks,
  saws, cleavers and other implements, buckets for blood andtroughs for offal, that was all. But it was
  enough.
   He had already visited the odious pens in a high, south-facing flank of Runemanse, from which at sunup
  goats and pigs were driven out on to a false plateau to enjoy a few brief hours of sunlit freedom in a small
  field of shallow earth, scrub, and coarse grasses behind a low stone wall. And there, where a handful of
  rabbits ran wild, such animals spent the last of their days. For these larger beasts were hard to breed;
  they sickened quickly in Turgosheim and could not be kept alive. That was no great problem; the
  provisioning was anongoing process; Runemanse's turnover was swift.
   Karpath took him into a cold-storage room with huge windows open to the north, where the draughts
  were freezing cold. In there, rows of heavily salted carcasses hung from hooks - but not all the cadavers
  were of animals. Suddenly and without warning, Nathan came upon two which were not...
   Then, as he choked and reeled dizzily from the room, he found himself caught up under the arm, and
  supported until his stomach had stopped churning. Finally Karpath released him and said, This is what
  Maglore wanted you to see. It is something of an incentive if men see what might befall them, should they
  fail intheir duties.'
   'In there,' Nathan choked the words out, 'I saw two men. One of them was a surly youth out of
  Kehrlscrag. He was taken in the tithe at the same time as I
   myself, so that we came to Runemanse together. Andthe other —'
   '- Was Nicolae Seersthrall, aye,' Karpath grunted. The first was too surly, and the second - too
  talkative, I think? Had you stayed long enough, you might alsohave seen the girl Magda. But obviously
  you've no stomach for it.'
   Fighting to control his gagging, Nathan said, 'I take the water which I use for drinking and bathing from
  the catchment sluices in Runemanse's outer walls. So does Orlea, Maglore's woman. It's rainwater, pure
  and simple. But I also know that the majority of Maglore'sthralls and creatures drink water which has
  been passed through and purified by a... a man, or what'sleft of a man, a siphoneer. Then there's...my
  food?' He looked at the lieutenant pleadingly. 'Karpath, I've got toknow. Have I eaten food which was
  prepared here? Just how are those human bodies used?'
   The other grinned. 'Don't you trust Maglore, then?'
   Trust him?' Feeling desperately ill, Nathan leanedhis upper body out of a window embrasure.
  
   Karpath was right behind him, whispering, 'Can youtrust any of us, in Runemanse?'
   Nathan saw a picture in the other's mind: one of himself, tumbling, turning, rushing to earth! But it was
  whimsical and meant nothing. It was simply wishful thinking, accompanied by the thought: No,for itwould
  only jeopardize my future. ThisNathanis weak, a freak, nothing. Maglore's egg would wither and die in
  him. While out loud he continued:
   'Your fears are empty, Nathan. Nothing of nasty vampire stuff will get into you via your food. Why
  should Maglore wish to poison you that way, when a simple bite would suffice? Aye, and there are other
  ways: a fond fatherly kiss or a little sodomy, or simply by giving
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   you to his women for a night...or to his men? No, onlythe lowliest thralls - who lack the power of
  infection, except by direct contact - prepare food for my master's table. And as for Maglore: except
  when he requires blood, he is satisfied to eat the meat of beasts andbirds. But then, so do we all in
  Runemanse ... mainly.'
   Nathan stood up straighter, glanced towards the coldroom, and said: 'How ... was it for them?'
   Karpath shrugged. The men, if you would call them that - personally I prefer to call them boys - were
  given to the women of Runemanse for their pleasure, to be drained of their sex and their blood, and
  Magda wasgiven to the younger male thralls. Dead, all three wouldsoon become undead, which was not
  desirable. So while they lay in their vampire sleep, they were butchered, quartered, and their parts hung
  up for keeping. That ishow it was for them. As for how it's yet to be:
   'Maglore may well require flesh for the fashioning. Also, there's meal and bone to be ground down for
  the manse's flyers, its gas-beasts and emergent warriors. The flyers and gaslings consume grain, mainly,
  and alittle Sunside honey for energy, and blood or flesh natu rally; for they are vampire creatures, as are
  all of Mag-lore's constructs. But warriors, especially young onesfresh out of their vats, must have it red!
  As for Maglore's lieutenants and thralls: well, it's good to have a roast now and then. All of these uses are
  in order ...'
   'A...roast?' Feeling his blood draining again, Nathan turned away. 'Cannibalism!'
   Karpath grabbed his shoulder, spun him around,snarled: 'No, vampirism! If ever you get to be one, then
  maybe you'll understand.' Except the knowledgewill come too late, /or I shall not suffer a rival in Rune
  manse!
   Nathan  shut  out  Karpath's  murderous  thoughts,
   pulled himself together, stood up straighter and remembered what Maglore had told him: to walk boldly
  and without fear. Then, shrugging the grinning lieutenant's huge paw from his shoulder, he said: 'Are we
  finishedhere?'
  
   Karpath sensed his resolve. The grin slid from hisgrey face as he growled, 'I've nothing else to show
  you.'
   Then I'll be on my way.'
   'Where to?'
   'Wherever I wish. For as you know well enough,Maglore has given me access to all of Runemanse, and
  Ieven eat with him. I shall go to him; perhaps he already misses me; he worries constantly, for my safety.'
  Hesaid these things deliberately.
   Karpath was suspicious at once. Waves of jealousyflooded out from him. 'What will you tell him?'
   Nathan looked him straight in the eyes. 'Karpath,listen to me and listen carefully. Maglore prizes me for
  my colours, and for my "innocence". Well, I'm no longer entirely innocent, but he'll keep me free of
  vampireinfluences, if he can; you've said as much yourself. But on the other hand he prizes you for your
  strength and for your ... loyalty? And so we're not rivals, you and I. But think about this: if he is forced to
  make a life ordeath choice between us, which of us shall live?'
   'What?' Karpath's brows gathered like thunderheadsas he considered it.
   Nathan shrugged. 'Maglore can always make himselfa new lieutenant, but where would he find another
  familiar like me? Now, I say again: we are not rivals, but if you're determined to be my enemy -' he
  turned and walked away,'- so be it.'
   And behind him, Karpath made no reply but let himgo...
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   Time passed. Nathan spent a great deal of it asleep,conserving both his physical and mental reserves.
  When he was awake, however, he scarcely went short of exer cise: Runemanse was a far more vertical
  than horizontal place, and the stairwells seemed interminable.
   Now that the provisioning was behind him, he felt fit to tackle anything; he didn't think Runemanse would
  contain anything worse than what he'd already seen or experienced. In a way he was right and it didn't,
  but in other ways ...
   He saw the Seer Lord's warriors 'waxing' in theirhugely excavated vats. Apart from their armour plating,
  which reminded him a little of his deadspeak dream ofMadmanse and Eygor Killglance's anomalous blue-
  gleaming appendages, the creatures in their loathsome entirety were like nothing else Nathan had ever
  seen before. But in any case, they were not things which a healthy mind would want to dwell upon, not if
  a man desired to sleep soundly. One thing he did notice: for warriors, they were a good deal smaller than
  those beasts of Wratha's which had ravaged in Settlement, and they weren't built for flying. However
  Maglore intended to use them, they wouldn't be taking part in anyattack upon Wratha the Risen in olden
  
  Starside.
   But the intentions of Turgosheim's other Lords were less ambiguous. From the window of his room,
  night after night, Nathan spied upon the training flights of monsters. Any excessive use of torches or
  brighteningof the gasjetflares, or unaccustomed activity in this or that launching-bay along the wall of the
  gorge, would tell him where to look. And then he would hear again,even as he'd heard it in Settlement
  that time, the sputtering throb of propulsive vents as nightmare shapes wentspurting through the rising
  vapours of Turgosheim.
   Most of the Lords and Ladies tested their creatures
   from time to time, but not all were successful. During a session in the twilight hours before sunup, Nathan
  watched one especially disastrous test-flight. Vast and lumbering, the creature flew out from Vormspire
  with the rumble of its propulsors echoing over Turgosheim, its armour glinting ruddily in the lights of the
  manses, and its exhaust vapours shaped by the winds into afantastic, billowing slipstream. A monstrous
  and terrify ing sight, it came throbbing across the gorge with a row of sentient saucer eyes flickering this
  way and that within the visor of its triple-horned, heavily plated prow. But it was perhaps too heavily
  plated, and itsbalance ill-aligned.
   Tilting to avoid the jutting promontory of Devetaki's Masquemanse, suddenly its nose dipped and the tilt
  became too steep. It attempted to adjust its balance butovercompensated. There followed a lurching roll,
  then a shuddering, total capsize! Upside-down, the monster's starboard gas bladders were torn open on
  the jaggedflank of Masquemanse; deflating in a moment, they flut tered like curtains in the wind as the
  damaged warriorwas deflected out over the gorge.
   Then ... the thing seemed to sense that it was finished. At the last an anguished howling was clearly
  audible. Mingling with the angry sputtering of propulsors, this formed a combination of alien,
  nerve-rending sounds which carried to Nathan as a groaning, echoing ululation: a death cry. And the
  doomed Thing spiralled down into deepening darkness, then plummeted, finallyglanced from a corner
  turret of Trollmanse and slammed headlong into the rocky bottoms. Chunks of red, fleshy debris and
  shattered chitin armour flew everywhere, and the sounds of the crash echoed into silence ...
   Failures of this sort were not infrequent at first, but as time passed and the Lords became more
  proficient in
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   the making of aerial warriors, they were fewer. And always Nathan was aware that these living engines
  of destruction were destined for olden Starside, and that eventually they would rain terror on Sunside,
  too. His Sunside, from which he'd fled like a coward to die in the desert...
   Nathan visited the gas-beast caverns located close tothe refuse pits, and understood the reason for that
  prox imity. But the gaslings themselves ... were something else which he would try in vain to forget. The
  horror of the thing - of all Runemanse - lay not so much in the physical reality of the system, but in its
  morbid and pitiless efficiency; for all of Maglore's creatures had once been men and expendable. And
  
  whenever Nathanlooked at them, always the vestiges of men remained ...
   Eventually, when he had lived in Runemanse through thirty-odd sunups, Nathan went to see Maglore's
  flyers penned in the yawn of the landing-bay. The reason he'd not done so before was that Maglore had
  warned him off it: the north-facing wall was notorious for treacherous updrafts and freakish, blustery
  winds; the polished rock of the launching ramps was slippery as ice; there were no protective walls to
  impede the flyers on take-off. The Seer Lord had lost a lieutenant there once, who stepped in the wrong
  place and shot himself screaminginto eternity.
   Two of Maglore's three flyers were recent constructs: he had fashioned them as an exercise preparatory
  to starting work on his warriors. Skittish (for they sensed that Nathan was no vampire), the pair rolled
  their eyes and reared their diamond-shaped heads as he passed carefully along a railed walkway in front
  of their pens. But Maglore's scent was on him, and they quickly settled down again.
   The third creature was different, however. Housed to one side of the precipitous launching bay, beneath
  anoverhang in the lee of the cavern, it was far less nervous. Something about the thing attracted Nathan's
  attention. He gazed at the flyer in its pen: huge, grey, mute and comparatively docile, its huge head
  nodding at the end of a swaying neck, with eyes large as fists, moist and gleaming black in a weirdly
  manlike face. Eyes which might well be...
   ... But here Nathan paused in his musing. What on earth had he been thinking about? Manlike? And
  eyes which might well be ...? For of course there was no manlike about it; those eyes were or had been
  human, Szgany! And again he reminded himself what he was looking at: a mutated, vampire thing -
  something that Maglore had changed - which, having undergone itsmetamorphosis, was human no more.
   Leaning his elbows on the gated wall of the pen, he gazed into the great, sad, human eyes in the
  elongated, mutant head; gazed deep, and wondered: Who wereyou?
   I was a youth upon a time, like you. The answer came back at once, shockingly, jerking Nathan rigidly
  upright against the wall! Then I was a man, a titheling, and Maglore's thralJ. But never a vampire thing ...
  not until the end. Perhaps I of/ended him, though even now I don't know how. What does it matter? It is
  enough that what you seebefore you is all that remains of aman. Ah, but the Seer Lord of Runemanse
  was generous with my brain and made himself a crafty flyer this time - damn his black heart!
   Shaken to his roots, Nathan clung to the wall and whispered: 'He left you your brain, a man's brain ...
  entire?'
   Not entire, no. The flyer's thoughts were vaguer now.
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   But enough that I remember ... things. And amongthem my name. You asked me who I was. 7 was a
  thrall who knew writing and faithfully recorded the historyof a race, according to the word of my master,
  Maglore.And my name was Karz Biteri. . .
  
   Later, Nathan would spend many a long hour with Karz, or what had been Karz, learning Turgosheim's
  history from its onset. But on that first occasion he hadbeen far more interested to know how the —
  creature? — had read his mind and been able to answer him solucidly.
   That was the way of it with all flyers, he was told, for they were the aerial command-posts of the
  Wamphyri with immediate access to their minds, so that they might react instantly to any order. In the
  reshaping of Karz's mind, when Maglore had given itsomething of his own alien essence, telepathy had
  been the governing factor. Desiring something special, he'dlet Karz retain much of his memory and all of
  his know ledge of old Turgosheim. Thus Karz Biteri, Maglore's flyer now, was also a reference library on
  all Turgosheim's morbid past.
   You, too, are a powerful telepath, Karz had told him then, andso we may converse. But you must learn
  howto shield your thoughts, and you should always remem ber: a man is never alone in Runemanse.
  When you thought you were on your own down here, I read a good many things in your head which
  Maglore wouldnot like. If I could read them, so could he.
   'I have shielded them,' Nathan had answered, 'constantly, or so I thought. But you're right: I thought I
  was alone here. And when I saw you, and realized whatyou were . . .'
   You were shaken and forgot yourself, I know . . . The
   answer had been a sob, soliciting Nathan's pity; so thathe'd said:
   'You too should guard your thoughts, Karz, for I canfeel your hatred for him. If Maglore should discover
  it...'
   Ah, but he has, the other had cut him short. He knows! Why do you think he won't ride out upon the
  air? Because he fears I would tilt him into space. And so he made these new creatures, but doesn't trust
  them either! For if I can have such feelings, perhaps theyhave them, too. Oh, he knows they do not, but
  will not trust them anyway. It seems I have given him a baddream that won't go away, for which I'm glad!
   'Those are thoughts you really should watch,' Nathanhad answered, 'and very carefully.'
   He'd sensed a mental shrug as Karz answered, Sometimes I do, and sometimes I don't care. What is my
  life, anyway? It were as well to launch myself at sunup, andcross the mountains into the sun!
   At which Nathan had remembered Thikkoul's readingof his future in the stars:
   'Now I see...a flight to freedom, yes! But ... upon adragon?' And Nathan had wondered: a dragon, or
  something that looks like one? And the thought had enteredhis head: why fly into the sun when there are
  other places to go and good works to accomplish along theway? Yes, and scores still unsettled?
   Perhaps Karz had 'heard' the thought, perhapsnot. But his great head had stopped nodding for a
  moment, and his huge dark eyes had gleamed a shade brighter...
   Maglore made more creatures and cocooned them awayin forbidden vaults. The more he worked at the
  fashioning, the less time he had for Nathan. Apart from taking
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   his meals with Maglore, Nathan rarely saw the Seer Lord, for which he was glad. But that was during his
  waking hours, while sometimes in his dreams —
   - He often wondered about his dreams:
   How he would start awake to discover his guard down and something other than his own thoughts
  oozing in his head, but something which always withdrew at once, leaving him his own man again.
  Maglore? But who else could it be? Not Eygor Killglance, for the old dead Thing in Madmanse made no
  bones about his presence but invariably introduced himself when hecame in the night to wheedle and
  inveigle.
   As for what Eygor wanted: some kind of bargain he wished to strike, some sort of promise to extract,
  and something evil to engineer from beyond the grave. So far Nathan had resisted him, but still he was
  curious and had long ago determined to go down into empty, echoing Madmanse one day ...
   Once, when the moon was full and floating outside his window, Nathan woke up and went to dash his
  face with water from a bowl beside his bed. But before he could lower his hands to the bowl, he saw the
  moon mirrored in the still water, and likewise his face. Then, as so often before, the stargazer Thikkoul's
  words hadcome back to him:
   'I see your face, your hollow eyes and greying hair ...' For indeed his eyes were sunken in dark orbits,
  and his yellow hair was flecked with grey ...
   Time passed ever more swiftly, and Maglore grew sparing in his use of thralls and recent arrivals out of
  Sun-side. Now that he had enough warriors, it seemed he was conserving his energies and the raw
  materials of his metamorphic art in anticipation of some new endeavour.
   One evening he called Nathan to him, asked for his wrist strap and snapped it into short sections. 'You
  with your fine clothes,' he said, 'wearing this scrap of leather like a brand! If you must be branded do it in
  style. Here ...' And he gave him a sigil in solid gold, an inch long, whose design was the same familiar
  loop with a half-twist. Fashioned on Sunside, it was an earring, which Maglore told him to wear in his left
  ear.
   By way of explaining his gift, the Seer Lord said, 'Since you're the very jewel of a lad yourself - and it
  being a well-known fact how much you Szgany likeyour jingly bits and pieces - I knew you would
  appreciate it.'
   Til need my ear pierced,' Nathan said, without considering his words. Maglore feigned a coy look, then
  grinned and displayed eye-teeth as sharp as needles.
   'If you were a lass, I might consider doing it myself!' he said. 'Why, I might do it anyway! Except I prize
  youfor what you are, not for what I can make of you. You'd best have Orlea do it with a hot needle, and
  remain inyour room until it's healed.'
   Then, as Nathan was leaving, Maglore said: 'When Orlea's finished with her jabbing, send her to me.
  
  Forwhile some jabs hurt, others are a pleasure. Oh, I follow Turgo Zolte's teachings, it's true, but even
  the strictestadherent has certain needs..."
   Nathan chose his time carefully. And at the height of sunup when Maglore slept and the aerie was quiet,
  hemade his way down into Madmanse.
   I've been expecting you, Eygor's deadspeak voice cameoozing in his mind, as he descended the
  cobwebbedstairwell to the uppermost, deserted levels of thestripped, haunted manse. For plainly you're
  an inquiring youth who can't bear a mystery to go unfathomed.
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   Even though a hazy light came in from the gorge, Nathan struck flints to a torch; the innermost rooms
  and passageways were dark, and the place had the feelof a tomb. Ah, but it is a tomb.' Eygor told him.
  Thatof a blind, blameless thing discarded like re/use into a pit,to die there andstiffen to a stone.
   'Blameless?'
   I was Wamphyri! How can you blame a creature for acting out its nature? Is the wolf to be blamed for
  worrying rabbits? Or did you only come here to scold me for those deeds whichI was obliged to
  perform, byreason of the monstrous leech which all my life controlled and corrupted me?
   'All men have urges,' Nathan answered, descending another stairwell towards the source of Eygor's
  dead-speak, and checking that his footprints lay clear in thedust behind him. 'But we don't all give in to
  them.'
   Which is of course thedifference between us, the other came back at once. For where mere men are
  notobliged to vent their passions, 1 was Wamphyri.
   Tell me your story,' said Nathan. 'I've had some of it,from someone who knows all the history of
  Turgosheim,but not the end of it. That is the mystery. How did youdie, Eygor?'
   I died as I lived — asI was, yes, obliged to live — cruelly, even by Wamphyri standards. For I died at
  thehands of my own bloodsons. Would you hear of it?
   That's why I'm here,' Nathan told him.
   Then I'll not keep you. It was like this:
   I had the evil eye. Only show me a man, a target,Szgany, and I could crush him with a glance. Such was
  the energy of my Wamphyri mind, I could store it upand release it from my eyes like lightning - like a pois
  oned dart - to wrench my targets and stop their hearts!Do you believe me?
   Nathan shrugged. 'Why should you lie - ?' he began.
  
   Just so, Eygor cut him off.
   '- You poor, "blameless" creature ...'
   The other's turn to shrug. Well then, perhaps not entirely blameless. But... it was my leech! With a
  creature like that inside me, how might I denymyself? Why, even 'aesthetes' such as Maglore are still
  Wamphyri.'
   And how well Nathan knew it! By now he had descended to the heart of Madmanse, where he paused
  in a hall with a walled well. But when he held his torch out over the low wall, he saw that the irregular
  throat of the pit was choked with boulders. The place could hardly be a real well, not this far from
  Turgosheim'slowest levels, but had more the look of a methane cham ber or refuse pit. So why had it
  been sealed? Nathan'sthoughts were deadspeak, of course, which Eygor heardand answered:
   It was sealed to .keep me down! The dead thing's nightmare voice was very close now, gurgling like a
  sucking swamp. You've come as close as you can get tome, Nathan Seersthrall, except in your dreams.
  A stinkingrefuse pit, aye: the tomb of Eygor Killglance!
   Suddenly the darkness was alive with unseen presences. The smoke from Nathan's torch writhed into
  unearthly shapes as if he'd breathed through it, or as if some draught had come moaning into the room.
  Except his breathing was more or less controlled, and if therehad been a draught, he hadn't felt it. A
  moment ago, he'd thought to feel the clinging touch of cobwebs where theyhung in festoons from the low
  ceiling, but as the flame of his torch melted them away, they were replaced by the fingers of some
  invisible wraith which brushed him asgently and secretly as a lover. It was as if something triedto know
  him, to be sure of his presence, his identity.
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   Ah, yesss! Eygor's voice seethed in his mind. And now you feel it, whichall of the othersfelt before
  you. But you feel it more, for you are the Necroscope.
   'What ... was that?' Nathan had been holding hisbreath.
   This place was mine, said the other. The porous stone,the very air. I was partof it and it was partof me.
  Mybreath and my sweat seeped into it, so that even now it remembers me. What was it? Call it my spirit,
  if you will. It has no form and cannot hurt you. But it guardsthis place for me and no one else shall ever
  dwell here,until those sonsof mine return.
   Nathan felt enclosed, strangled, dizzy. It was thesmoke, the claustrophobia of the old, echoing place. He
  moved back a little from the choked pit. But at the sametime, to keep the other engaged and know his
  mind: 'Howdid your bloodsons kill you?' he inquired. 'And why?'
   Because they were cowards! And because ...
   'Yes?'
  
   Perhaps I was hard with them ... But it's a hardworld (he was quick to defend unspoken brutalities) in
  which I wanted my sons to be strong. And so they were strong in the end, but not as I intended. They
  were strong against me! I should have seen it coming: they were lieutenants and would be Lords, and
  their fatherwas the one thing that stood in their way.
   Wran played the gentleman: he used his fine clothes as a shield against me, like the snobbery of a
  'superior'whelp! As for Spiro; he dressed in rags, and made himself pitifulbefore me so that I would not
  strike him.Like a young male wolf, he wriggled on his backbeforethe leader of the pack. But there was
  treachery in both of them. It was ... my evil eye. Above all else, theyfeared that.Having seen it used
  against common thralls,they believed that one dayI might.. .
   'Use it against them?'
   Eygor chuckled, as evil a 'sound' as Nathan ever heard. One thing to kill a mere man with a glance, he
  said, but something else entirely to kill a true vampire that way. Occasionally I lashed out at them,I admit
  it, but against them my eye was like a whip on the shaggy backs of dogs: it made them yelp, no more
  than that. But they felt my power growing stronger day by day,and finally I stung them once too often.
   They gave me strong drink to deaden my senses, poisoned my food with silver, and while I lay in a coma
  ... blinded me! Hot irons fried thesurface of my eyes, until I leaped shrieking awake! And they taunted
  me as I followed after them in my agony, weeping acid tears and stumbling like a fool through the inky
  blind blackness of Madmanse.
   Then ... they were close and I sensed it. They stood right therebefore me, only a few paces away. I
  formed my hands into talons and rushed at them. And ... they had brought me here, to a refuse pit! My
  legs struck thewall which you seebefore you; I fell! And while 1 lay atthe bottom, broken in the mire,
  Wran and Spiro choked the pit with boulders.
   For half a yearI lived on muck and bones. And while my metamorphic flesh was still willing,1 gathered
  to me the remnants of extinct creatures: the armour of warriors, and all of that which you saw in your
  dream. I made a giant ofmyself, my plan being to break out. But the pit was as deep as my 'food' was
  bad, so thatmy strength waned even as my size increased.
   As for my eyes, I would repair them. But nothing I fashioned was nearly so good, and all of the evil had
  been burned right out of them. FinallyI was starved. Too weak to struggle on, atlast I slumped against
  thewall, where in the course of fifty years J commenced my
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   stiffening.Thus Eygor KiJJgJance became the mummy-thing which you saw in your dream ...
   Nathan, who was almost inured to horror now, nodded and said, 'Your just deserts.'
   You think so? Ah, but you're a hard one.' And whatofmy bastard b/oodsons? Should they go
  
  unpunished?
   'Punished? They should be destroyed utterly!' Nathananswered. 'Not for what they did to you but for
  what they've done - and what they're doing even now - toOlden Sunside in the west.'
   Ahhh! said Eygor, and Nathan read approval in hissigh. And so we areof a mindafter all!
   Nathan's torch was wavering; he turned to go, to follow his own tracks back the way he'd come. Wait!
  Eygor begged him.
   'For what?' Nathan kept going, putting distance between. 'We've nothing in common. There's no way
  you can help me. But I sense that you would help yourself,even now!'
   Nathan, it can be yours ...
   With his foot on a bottom step, Nathan paused. 'Whatcan be mice?'
   The evil eyeof Eygor Killglance. I've read your dreams, your wildest /lightsof fancy, and know that
  you'd make war on the Wamphyri. But only think ...what a weapon it would make.'
   To kill men with a glance? To be a monster as youwere a monster?'
   But you said it yourself: 'All men have urges, butsome control them.' You, the Necroscope, would
  control this special urge. My power would be yours to use /orgood, not evil!
   'I don't want it.' Nathan climbed away from the voice,through the hollow shell of Madmanse.
   But now that you know it's there you will, eventually.
   And now that you know where I am, you'll be able tofind mealways. I'll never befar away, Nathan,
  whereveryou are.
   'Suppose I did ... want it? What then? How wouldyou give me your power? And what would you want
  inreturn?'
   Oh, I would give it to you, neverfear. And in return... myfreedom1.
   'Freedom? From what? You're a dead thing.' "Away from the miasma of Eygor's mind, Nathan's
  dizziness quickly cleared. He went faster, and as he approached the outer wall and light came in from the
  gorge, so the other's deadspeak began to fade and break up. It wasn'tso much that Eygor couldn't reach
  him, but that Nathan no longer desired to be reached. He felt that he'd escaped - but just in time - from
  something which woulddamn his soul forever.
   Myfreedom from that, from deathitself! Eygor wasdesperate now. You can do it, Nathan. I heard it
  fromthe Thyre, carried on their dreaming deadspeakthoughts ... you, the Necroscope... itfor Rogei
  ... Cavernof the Ancients .. . was a dead thing, too ... gave himlife .. . you willed it, you and Rogei
  together... because you needed...he was alive!
   Nathan had heard enough. 'Return you to life? Never!'His torch went out and he ran in near-darkness to
  the final stairwell. And the night-dark spirit of the placewas right behind him, snapping at his heels.
  
   Not now but ... somefuture time. If you should needme, I...here. All I ask . .. don'tforget me...
   Panting, trembling, Nathan came up into Runemanse,which seemed a healthy place now - almost. But in
  hismetaphysical mind, burning like ice: Don'tforgetmeeeeee! It was Eygor's last word, for the moment at
  least.
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   Nathan fled to the great hall, slowed down a littleand headed wearily for his room. But in the
  passageway he ran into Orlea, who caught his arm to steady him. She saw his condition but made no
  comment except totell him, 'Maglore wants you ...'
   In his spacious apartments Maglore paced to and fro,not worriedly but perhaps contemplatively, as if he
  delib erated upon some course of action. Approaching him, Nathan wondered what was on his mind. He
  suspected that this would not be the best time to try reading it,which was confirmed almost at once.
   'Mentalism,' Maglore said enigmatically, but as yet not threateningly. He came to a halt, crooked a
  finger, and beckoned Nathan closer. 'Telepathy. There was atime when I asked you if you knew the
  meaning of it, towhich you answered no.'
   Nathan's shields were up, his thoughts impregnable.'I remember, master.'
   'Ah!' Maglore sighed and shook his head sadly. 'Youremember, do you? And so we are come to this.
  You my friend and companion, a liar who hides his every waking thought from me. And why? Because if
  I were to see inside your head, I would know the treacheryyou plan.'
   Nathan shook his head. His mouth was dry as dust but he forced words out of it anyway. 'I have
  planned no treachery against you, master.' It was true, and because his words were simple they carried
  conviction. No treachery against Maglore, but merely an escape from him ... Nathan clamped down on
  the thought atonce. If Maglore were to suspect that he and Karz Biteri plotted flight ... and again he
  screwed the lid down onthe contents of his mind. The effort caused perspirationto break out on his
  forehead.
   Maglore saw it and smiled. 'You are hot, my son.'
   'I've hurried,' Nathan answered.
   The other nodded, and thought: Aye, and you're neverlostfor an answer, are you? No, for you are
  clever, andwill serve my purpose ideally! You shall be my eyes andears on the worksof my enemies:
  those who exist now,across the world in Olden Starside, and those who areyet to be.
   Maglore's probes were groping at the slippery, rotating wall of the numbers vortex, trying to find
  purchasethere and so form a link with Nathan's mind. But it wasa one-way system: Nathan read
  Maglore, but the SeerLord couldn't read him! His mentalism was greater than Maglore's; he read him
  effortlessly, without even trying to, and as yet without attempting to understand whathe read. And with
  
  the knowledge of his mental superiority, something of Nathan's confidence returned.
   'And so you've hurried here,' Maglore nodded. 'Indeedyou have - but from where?'
   Obviously he knew, and Nathan dared not lie about it. 'I went down into Madmanse, but there was
  something there. I felt it, a presence. I fled before it, andreturned here.'
   Clever. He will survive. Why, this one might even try to outwit Shaitanhimself. Maglore withdrew his
  probesand turned abruptly away. And his voice was slightly sour as he said, 'In your dreams you are not
  so stubborn.'
   'My dreams?' So it had been Maglore after all. Unableto spy upon Nathan's waking mind, he had
  attempted to invade his sleep. But how often, and how well hadhe succeeded? 'Have you looked upon
  my dreams? But what harm is there in dreaming? And is it treachery to dream of freedom? I have no
  control over my dreams,master.'
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   Maglore faced him. 'You have no sinister purpose,then?'
   'None.'Only a desperate desire to be out of here now;to convince Karz thatwe mustflee; to get back to
  my own hind in OJden Sunside. But his secret mind wasshielded, of course.
   Then I've accused you falsely and you deserve an explanation,' Maglore nodded, however reluctantly; or
  was that, too, only part of the game which he played?'Very well, I will tell you:
   The time rapidly approaches when I shall be masterhere. Not only in Runemanse, but the gorge entire,
  Tur- gosheim itself! You will have noticed how the Lords have perfected their flying warriors? I know
  you have. And for what? An attack upon Olden Starside and the renegade Wratha, who destroyed your
  tribe and in so doing sent you to me. Four months, sixteen sunups,until they set out. But Maglore stays
  here! I shall "keep" the gorge for Vormulac and be its caretaker, while the others go warring in the west.
  For I'm no warlord, do you see? And all the tribute of Olden Sunside shall be theirs, in that land you
  called home beyond the GreatRed Waste.
   'But here in Turgosheim: my responsibilities will be onerous, with much to watch over - all Starside and
  Sunside, too - and I'll harbour no dubious characters here in Runemanse to work against me while I
  perform my duties. Which is why I must be sure of my thralls, mylieutenants, my...friends? To that end
  I've visited you inyour dreams, aye; for you're a strange one, Nathan, a most uncommon man. You say
  you have no knowledge of mentaliam, and yet your thoughts are unreadable, as ifkept behind closed
  doors. Perhaps it's a "natural" thing,inherited like your freakish colours. But it's hard to trust aman whose
  thoughts are like the breath of bats, invisible.
   'What's more, your dreams are stranger still! Who isit you talk to in your sleep? I have watched you
  sleeping; I know that you converse - but with whom, with what? Or is it just a dream? I doubt it, for I've
  sensed the thoughts of others from outside striving to reach you here. Who are they? Why is it I can't
  
  read them? And often the thought occurs: was this Nathan sent here, to spy upon me, perhaps? Ah, but
  wouldn't that be athing: the Great Watcher, himself watched!
   'But enough; I doubted you; perhaps I still do and should study you more carefully, or draw you closer
  to me... in one way or another. I've neither bloodson noregg-son, as you know. A man can't live forever;
  especi ally not a Zolteist. Who knows but that you could bemy vehicle, my window on tomorrow?
  Would you make a fitting vessel, Nathan, to carry Maglore's egg into thefuture?'
   He clutched Nathan suddenly, his eyes gazing scarletinto blue, his nostrils flaring under convoluted
  ridges. Nathan was rooted to the spot, frozen, near-hypnotized by Maglore's proximity. Behind his thin,
  cold, cruel mouth were jaws which could gape in a moment, a cloven tongue, and teeth - but such teeth -
  that could ruin a man's face, rend his throat or poison his blood forever ...
   ... But Maglore released him, turned away again, andsaid, 'You see what a quandary I'm in? So much to
  do and so little time, before I'm left alone here of all the Lords. And in addition to caring for Turgosheim,
  my own works to consider. For instance: an unruly flyer to change, an errant creature whose loyalty is
  suspect. Perhaps I'll bring him to heel, or simply reduce him tofats and fluids and vampire stuff for the
  fashioning.'
   Nathan was aghast. He could only mean Karz!
   'Leave me now,' Maglore said. 'I shall continue to
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   trust you, for the moment at least. But for now I'mweary. We shall talk again. What will be will be.'
   Nathan said nothing, made to creep away.
   'But Nathan -' Maglore stopped him, as was his wont, '- I want you to think on this. I believe you would
  make a good son and a better Lord. You with your freakish colours and talents. It may not be your
  choice, but think on it anyway. Indeed, you must give it your most serious consideration ...'
   He need not concern himself: Nathan could think of little else. On legs heavy as lead he made for the
  central stairwell, and pale as death descended. But he did not see Maglore watching him, or the grin on
  that one'smalevolent face as Nathan passed from view.
   Aye, think on it, Maglore thought (but secretly now, for he was sure of one of Nathan's talents at least).
  Think well on it, my son - on how you mustflee from it - and so become my eyes on the great wide
  worldbeyond!
   Ill
   Nathan waited out the long day and watched Maglore, but from a distance. The Seer Lord kept himself
  busy all day, and as night came down he retired. In this he was different from the other Lords; he took to
  
  his bedwhen he needed it, never on account of the sun alone.
   But as soon as Maglore slept, then Nathan hurried to the launching bay ... and found Karz ready and
  waiting. Say nothing, that great sad creature told him, for there's really no need. Maglore was here today
  and looked at me, and I read it in his eyes that my time was up. Since when I have waited for you. So
  Jet's beup and gone from here.
   The saddle was huge, heavy, and awkward. Karz assisted where he could: lowering his neck, offering
  advice in respect of belts and buckles. At any moment a vampire thrall or lieutenant - especially the surly
  Kar-path, who had been hovering over Nathan like a hawk for weeks now - might appear out of one of
  the stairwells. But the worst fears of the pair were not realized; there was only the wind and the
  deepening twilight, and the morbid lights of Turgosheim spread below andbeyond.
   Nathan opened the gates and edged his mount out to the rim of the launching ramp, and shivered as he
  climbed up into the saddle. He had food, which he placed in a saddlebag to the right of the pommel.
  Karz felt him in position - and felt his fear, tangibly clammy- as he flopped forward on to the ramp.
   Hold on, he warned, unnecessarily, and in the next
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   moment they were airborne. They soared out over the gulf, were buffeted into a steep climb on spiralling
  ther-mals, turned and passed high over the darkly jutting turret which was Runemanse. Nathan held his
  breathand looked down.
   The wind was in his eyes, bringing tears; he could see nothing; the rearing west wall of the gorge was a
  blur. From somewhere in the east there sounded the dull rumble of propulsors: a training flight, it could
  only be. Then the gorge lay behind and the mountainrange stretched ahead. 'Will we make it?'
   I'm well fuelled, Karz answered, well rested, and Ihave volition and motivation. I want to make it. In this
  I surelydiffer from anyflyer who came this way be/ore. We'll make it, yes. Even as he fell silent a tail
  wind came up, driving them west with a vengeance. Nathan's eyes were clear now; he felt the exhilaration
  of his flight 'upon a dragon'; he breathed deeply, almost as if he had never really breathed before, of air
  which tastedclean and sweet.
   And down below, behind, on the very plateau of Runemanse, Maglore and Karpath watched them go;
  and the Seer Lord said to his lieutenant:
   'Two birds with one stone. I have rid myself of Karz, who in any case was problematic, and I've gained
  a window on a far new world. For Nathan is a telepath, and powerful. Awake he hid it for me, but
  asleep ... oh, I found my way in, from time to time. Now, whenever his guard is down, I can be in again.
  Why, he wears my sigil in his ear, only six inches from the centre of hisbrain!' He glanced at Karpath. 'Do
  you understand?'
   'No, Lord,' the other shrugged apologetically.
   Disgusted, Maglore grunted, scowled and lookedaway. 'On the other hand, perhaps there'll be times
  when I'll miss him.' While to himself: And I still don't
  
   know who he talked to in his dreams, except that theywere notof this world .. .
   The night was long, but barely long enough. Only Karz'swill sustained him, while Nathan lolled in the
  saddle like a zombie: awake one minute, drowsing the next, then starting awake again. But as an
  amethyst dawn crept in like some glowing tide along the rim of the world, and secret watchers in the
  barrier mountainsyawned and relaxed after their long night's vigil, making ready to go down into Sunside,
  so the great grey shadow which was Karz went wafting overhead on arched, aching manta wings, and
  dipped down towards the foothills over Settlement. He was seen, of course; the blast of a shotgun
  sounded, not aimed at Karz or Nathan for they were already gone into the gloom; the echoes rolled
  down into Sunside, faintly butloud enough, and the pair were guaranteed a welcome.
   Nathan had not anticipated that there would be men out and about in the pre-dawn heights. The sound
  ofthe shotgun had come as a surprise. Several such weapons existed, he knew, all in the hands of the
  Szgany Lidesci. So then, the Lidescis had not suc cumbed to vampire domination. Good, and Nathan
  had prayed it would be so; but the very fact of it made for a change in those sketchy plans which he'd so
  hastilyprepared in Turgosheim.
   'We've been seen,' he told Karz. 'I had hoped to go downinto Sunside on foot, in secret; show myself to
  the Szganyin streaming sunlight; approach them as a man - obviously a man! Now ... they will surely
  connect me with aflyer seen settling towards the foothills. Namely, you.'
   It's your problem, Nathan, the other answered, but weakly. I have played my part and for the moment
  can do no more ...
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   They landed on a slope high in the foothills two miles west of Settlement, and while Karz munched on
  resin-laden pine branches, Nathan found flints and lit a fire under a hornet's nest in a patch of mountain
  gorse. Stung three times for his efforts, he didn't mind. He broke a small corner off the huge comb,
  chewed wax and honey alike for instant energy, then fed the rest toKarz.
   Thatwill get me where I'm going. The flyer was grateful.
   'I've been giving it some thought,' Nathan told him, despondent for the other: that Karz, even a vampire
  changeling like him, should contemplate so hideous a suicide. For it seemed to Nathan that Karz's
  humanity was proven. 'Why don't you fly west, beyond the range of Wratha and her creatures in
  Karenstack? For yousaid it yourself: you're different from any flyer that ever was. You can find a
  Starside cave and make it your own, sleep out the days and forage for your food in thewarm evenings or
  the long dawns before the sunrise.'
   I'm a vampire thing and bulky, Karz answered simply. Pine cones and honey are not enough.
   Down the slope someone stepped on a branch; there sounded a breathless, whispered query. Karz
  turned his huge soft eyes on Nathan and said, Szgany, even as I was once Szgany but no longer. These
  
  are your people,and it's time I was on my way.
   Nathan slowly nodded. 'At least you are your own ... man.' Then he backed off, and Karz launched
  himself south for the sun and rose up into a bank of cloud heading in the same direction. For a moment he
  was a misty outline, then gone ...
   Nathan knew how it must be and wouldn't go rushing to his doom. But neither could he flee from it, for
  that would be to admit his guilt when in fact he was inno-
   cent. Waiting for them to come, he sat down on a flintyoutcrop. But when he saw the first head bobbing
  in the gorse, and heard the climber's hoarse panting, he stood up to shout: 'You on the hillside, listen to
  me! I'm not Wamphyri! My name is Nathan Kiklu! I'm Nathan, ofthe Szgany Lidesci!'
   'Oh, really?' a young voice, hoarse with fear andbreathless from the efforts of its owner's climbing, came
  back. 'And you came here on a flyer out of Starside,right?'
   Nathan was cold, tired; the wonder was that he was alive, that he hadn't died of exposure. Now that his
  feetwere on the ground, all he wanted to do was rest. Wearily,he held out his arms and said, 'I have no
  weapons. Onlylook at me. Do I look like a Wamphyri Lord or lieutenant?'
   Gorse bushes parted and an anxious face peered through; a youth shouldered his way into view; he
  looked carefully all around, then gave a piercing whistle. His crossbow was loaded, and now he aimed it
  at Nathan's heart. 'What do you look like to me?' he said,squinting down his sights. 'You look like a dead
  thing!'
   In Nathan's entire body, there was no ounce of resistance left. But he tried one last time. 'I'm Nathan,' he
  said, 'Nathan Kiklu. I'm just a man.'
   'You're a liar,' said the other. 'I saw you and the flyertogether. Say goodbye to all this, Nathan Kiklu.'
   'What?' A gruff voice sounded from behind him, anda wiry shoulder knocked him aside. 'Did you say
  Nathan Kiklu?' A face which Nathan knew stared into his across a distance of no more than nine or ten
  feet.Then, however slowly, recognition registered, and with his jaw hanging slack the other stepped
  forward. In his arms he cradled a weapon from another world: a shotgun, all gleaming for the care and
  attention he gave it.And finally: 'Why, I'll be ...!'
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   Small, wiry, weathered, it was Kirk Lisescu ...
   In Old Starside's last aerie a young Lord came starting awake in a cold sweat. His dream had been very
  vivid, very weird, and very uneasy. For even the Wamphyri were men upon a time, whose dreams are
  like those of common men, with the power to transport them back to other times and places; so that the
  terrors they knew in their youth, before they were vampires, may rise up totrouble them again.
  
   In this dream there had been no blood. Instead, the young Lord had battled through the ranks of a
  thousand dead men whose bloodless, crumbling bodies stood up again as quickly as he cut them down!
  But even though his every effort had seemed useless, still he'd fought through them to get to That which
  they protected, the Thing which they guarded, his Great Enemy from ayouth which was now almost
  entirely forgotten.
   And when finally he had stood upon a mound of crumbling, stinking human debris - pieces which yet
  clutched and clawed at him to pull him down - then the aerie of his alien foe had materialized: a rearing
  cone of whirling, mutating numbers! And within the rush and swirl of the cone, the infinitely sad face of a
  yellow-haired, blue-eyed giant; made sad, perhaps, by the sacrifice of his teeming dead army, but not by
  that alone. For strangely, inexplicably, he also felt for hisvampire enemy.
   Nestor had somehow known it, that his enemy caredfor him. And that was when he'd been wrenched
  awake,as the sad sapphire eyes of the face in the numbers vortex had gazed right into his soul, or what
  was left ofit...
   Now, standing naked and trembling beside thethickly curtained windows with his hand on the rope,
   Nestor's scarlet eyes stared almost vacantly west and a little south, as if his gaze might penetrate to the
  outside and over the boulder plains to the mountains, and across them into Sunside. The drapes were of
  black bat fur, thick and heavily weighted; not a chink of lightpassed through from the outside, and nothing
  of Nestor's gaze the other way. But he could imagine wellenough. The peaks of the barrier range would
  be golden, and in a little while the sun would aim its beams thisway, too, and shine on Wrathspire.
   Wrathspire. That was what the Lady had finally named this place, these upper levels: Wrathspire, after
  herself and after the memory of another aerie which she'd fled from in the east. The Lady Wratha, aye:
  Nestor's Lady, now, for as long as that would last. Why, he might even love her, if he were capable of
  loving anyone. But all of that had gone out of him a long time ago; a dream which was wrenched from
  him, just as he had been wrenched from his dream. Except...
   . . . Something of the dream remained, niggling there in the back of his wounded mind. The whirling wall
  of numbers, fading but - real? Absent for so long and onlynow — returned?
   Returned ...
   The thought of that - of his Great Enemy, returned -made Nestor's vampire flesh tingle. And what of his
  stolen love? Was she out there even now, together withhim? And were they lovers again, plotting against
  Nestor anew as once before they'd plotted in a timelong forgotten?
   'What's on your mind? Do you walk in your sleep?' Wratha's sleepy mumble reached him from their
  bed, or her bed, to which she invited him ever more frequently, until it was hard to remember when he'd
  last slept in
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   his own. 'Have no fear but open the drapes if you want to look out, for I would know it if the sun were
  up. Oh, it is, and burning - but in Sunside! Not on Wrathspire, not yet. No, for I would feel it there,
  scorching thestone.'
   He glanced at her sprawled unashamed, half-in, half-out of the sheets; then looked again, stared, and
  held his breath. One marble breast that lolled a little, tip-tilted; a flat, dimpled belly; a pale, rounded hip;
  thecurves of thigh, leg, ankle and delicate foot. And central, a tight black mass where her thigh joined her
  body, half-hidden by the sheet. He breathed again. She was awanton, this Wratha, and beautiful.
   'I don't need to look out,' Nestor told her, his voice already choked with lust, like his bruised manhood,
  reacting to the lure of her sex as if he'd never known her. 'For I know what's out there ... and also what's
  inhere.' The room was in total darkness; it made no differ ence, for they were Wamphyri. Wratha lifted
  her head and saw him as clear as daylight, his shaft rising andhardening as his red eyes fed upon her.
   Then come to bed and ride awhile,' she said. 'Or letme ride you, until you fire your juices into me. Or let
  mytongue tease the sweet nectar from you. Whichever way you will it, so long as we then may sleep. For
  thoughI'm weary, still I won't rest, not with you at the windowlike that.' And to herself:
   You are young, strong, beautiful, and mine.' And innocent? Oh, you were, you were.' Not a virgin, not
  quite, but next best. Some duJJ Szgany cow had known you, without knowing how to handle you. Ah,
  but Wratha knew! A touch was all it took. Why, I remember howyou almost came in my hand the first
  time I touched you, and how I brought you along like an infant learning towalk ... since when you've
  learned to run/ But to think of
   you running with someone else...I would kill her first,or you, or both of you! Is that what disturbed you?
  Did you dream of her again? Of Misha? Only let me come upon a Misha - any Misha - among Sunside's
  sluts ...I'llthrow her from the highest balcony!
   He went back to the bed and at once sank into her flesh, which sucked at him as powerfully as the first
  time. That was how it was with Wratha: always like the first time. It was hot and it was cold and it was
  pain and it was pleasure, and when he thought he had nothing left there was always more. But it was not
  love, and both he and Wratha knew it.
   Before they slept he let his mind drift out, out across the boulder plains to Sunside. But the searing sun
  was higher now and he felt it on the mountains; it leeched on his probe and weakened it, until he could
  feel its heat even from here. If the numbers vortex was there, it was shielded by an impenetrable veil of
  golden fire, which would last even as long as the day. But when the long day was done -
   - There was always the night...
   Two miles into the woods, in an area of freakish rock formations, hot springs and volcanic blowholes,
  there Lardis Lidesci and a team of tried and trusted men worked hard and sweated in tropical heat and
  acrid reek. Settlement lay to the north-east something less than three miles away, and the honeycombed
  outcrop of Sanctuary Rock stood half a mile closer, due north inthe foothills. But here where the
  sprawling forest thinned out into an ugly scar or natural clearing, and the earth was a treacherous,
  crumbling, steamy grey crust streaked with ashes, sulphur and other mineral deposits, Lardis and his team
  built warrior traps.
   The morning was already a quarter spent when Kirk
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   Lisescu and three others, one of them a stranger, came out of the woods from the north. They hailed the
  old Lidesci where he supervised the lowering of the last framework of brittle poles into position over a
  lethal sulphur pit, to be covered with a camouflage of coarse nets and tufts of withered gorse dipped in
  sulphur to simulate life; the finished effect being to imitate firm ground. Tonight someone would stay out
  here, just one brave soul in all the empty miles around, to light small, discreet fires in the centre of this
  vast trap. The first would be lit an hour after sundown, the second when the first went out, and the last - if
  the others proved ineffective - midway through the night. From on high the place would have the
  appearance of a Szgany encampment, where some fool had forgotten to dampdown the evening's fire.
  But as for any flyers or warriors who fell to earth here to investigate .. . they'd veryquickly discover that it
  wasn't earth!
   Eventually Lardis was satisfied; he looked up, squintedhis eyes and frowned inquisitively at Kirk and his
  party,then walked a well-marked path to the safe margin where they waited. And: 'Kirk,' he called out.
  'But you should be at the Rock and resting by now! And a well-earned rest atthat! So what brings
  you...?' His query petered out, for inthat moment Lardis had taken a closer look at the stranger.
   'Someone I thought you'd like to see,' Kirk answered with a grin. 'For it's been ... what, almost a
  three-year?'
   'Lardis,' Nathan smiled, however tiredly. They had slept on the way here, under the trees, but he was
  still bone-weary. His eyes were hollow and his flesh wan; there was grey in the corn of his hair, which
  was no longer cropped but fell behind his ears and over the back of his collar; he stood taller, and his
  voice was deeper. But still, of all the Szgany in all Sunside, there could be no mistaking this one. And
  yet...
   ... For a moment Lardis stood stock still, blinking like a man struck between the eyes. For it seemed as
  if there were two men here, and that he should know both of them. Or was it simply that his mind made
  connections with times, places, and faces? No, for Nathan wasn't born then. What possible connection
  could there be between him and ... Harry Hell-lander?
   But in another moment the double picture swam into one as Lardis's eyes focused and finally goggled.
  And as his mental confusion receded, so his jaw fell open and his breath was expelled in a gasp of
  acceptance, recognition. 'Nathan Kiklu!' He choked on the words, staggered forward, grabbed Nathan
  and clasped him tohis barrel chest.
   'Careful, Lardis!' Kirk warned, only half-jokingly. 'It'sNathan, all right, but he came out of Starside - on
  theback of a Wamphyri flyer!'
   'What?' The old Lidesci stepped back a pace, heldNathan at arm's length. 'You did what?'
   'It's a long story,' Nathan nodded.
   'Long and daft,' Kirk agreed. 'I know for I've heard it! But I believe it, because no one could lie like
  that! Why Nathan's been where Wratha and the others came from,and come out of it unscathed!'
  
   'Unscathed?' Lardis had a grip on himself. Narrowinghis eyes, he looked at Kirk more seriously,
  questioninglynow.
   'Oh, I've tested him,' the wiry hunter nodded his understanding. 'Silver, kneblasch, whatever. But the
  best test of all is sunlight, and here he stands soaking itup! He's pale as ever, is Nathan, but he's still one
  of us.'
   Everything from three years ago came back to Lardisin a rush. 'Nathan! We sent a runner after you but
  he didn't find you. You don't know about your mother,and Misha, and -'
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   '- I know it all,' Nathan cut him short, laughing. But the laughter went out of him in a moment. 'And all
  that time wasted, when I could have been here with you ...with them.'
   Unashamed tears filled Lardis's eyes and for amoment he couldn't speak. Then, gruffly, 'But now you're
  back, and you can make up for lost time. Man,you've been a trouble to me!'
   'What?' It was Nathan's turn to frown. 'What makes you say that? How could I be a trouble when I've
  beenaway?'
   'Aye, and left a broken heart behind you! I gave her ayear, then suggested she should marry. Now hold
  on! -don't look at me like that! - for she, too, told me what todo with my suggestion! So she takes care
  of her father still, but only him now, for her brother Nicolae's been dead a year. Well, and he's one
  among many, but thereare enough left to remember you and welcome you back.Your mother, too, brave
  women that Nana is. She never stopped hoping; she knew you would be back! Why, even now she's
  always talking about you ... and ...' He paused and fell silent, and something of the excitement went out of
  him.
   Nathan understood and shook his head. 'I picked upNestor's trail, but lost it in a river. I think he
  drowned.'
   For a moment they were both silent, until Lardis said,'Look, we're all finished here. We can talk on the
  way back to Sanctuary Rock. Then, this afternoon, I'll be busy again while you ... renew old
  acquaintances?'And the familiar grin was back on his face again.
   The rest of Lardis's men had joined him; Nathan knew one or two of them; he clasped forearms with
  them Szgany style but was too choked up to speak. After that, until they were underway for Sanctuary
  Rock, it was all business again for Lardis.
   'You men, get out into the woods and hunt,' he toldthem. 'Food for the people, and for the fire.'
   The fire?' Kirk Lisescu looked at him.
  
   Lardis nodded. 'This place looks like a trap pretending to be an encampment. But if we leave some
  portionsof meat to be thrown on the fires, then it will smell like an encampment! Should any Wamphyri or
  the like happen this way, they'll know there's food down here. And where there's food there's always ...
  food. Theywon't look too close before coming in for the kill.'
   As Lardis's men dispersed into the woods, he calledafter them, 'As soon as you're finished here, make
  for the Rock and get your heads down. We'll be at it again thisafternoon.' He turned to one who stood
  apart. 'You, JanosRaccas: you volunteered to stay back and see to the lure.Well, I won't wish you luck,
  for I'm sure we'll be having a drink together tonight at Sanctuary Rock, or tomorrow morning at latest.'
  He clasped the other's forearm. And finally, to Nathan, Kirk, and his watchmen: 'Right then, let's be off.
  There's never enough sunlight, and it's too precious to waste just standing around in it...'
   Nathan told his story, only holding back when it came to his mainly subterranean journey along the
  course ofthe Great Dark River. His debt to the Thyre was beyond value, and he wouldn't repay it in
  treachery. But in any case Lardis made no comment; obviously a man can travel a long way in three
  years; Nathan had simply skipped his uneventful trek across the desert.
   Still, while Nathan talked, he did feel Lardis's eyeson him from time to time: frowning, wondering,
  speculat ing? But about what? He suspected that he would be able to read the older man's mind quite
  easily ... but he wouldn't. He'd learned from the Thyre how it was aswell to respect the private thoughts
  of others.
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   And indeed Lardis was thinking strange and speculative thoughts: about Nana, and a man called Harry
  Hell-lander out of another world, and about Nathan: abouthis origins. The son of Hzak Kiklu? Not this
  one. Lardis should have seen it before. But if not Hzak's son, whose? Harry's? Nathan had always been
  the strangeone. But how strange? He had lived with vampires, and returned ...
   Then, feeling the lad's eyes upon him for a change, Lardis had snapped out of it. It was all speculation
  anyway, and only Nana would know the truth of it. Nana, aye. And now there were other things which
  Lardis remembered . .. but he must put them aside, forthe moment at least.
   Far more important was Nathan's warning of the bloodwar to come: the news that the Wamphyri of
  Tur-gosheim planned an invasion of Wratha and her colleagues in Starside, which they would launchjust
  four months from now. In the aftermath of that war, no matter what the outcome, the shadow over
  Sunside must surely be that much darker, and the final dissolution of the Szgany as a free people so much
  more certain.For the vampires would be depleted, and could onlyreplenish themselves in Sunside.
   Then for a time Lardis was quiet, his thoughtsshrouded, his mood gloomy where they strode out alonga
  woodland trail. But in a while: 'Only if we're weak enough to let it happen,' he growled. 'In which case
  we would deserve it. But we're not weak, lad - far from it -and forewarned is forearmed. Now, let me
  tell you how it's been for us while you were away ...
   'The Wamphyri have raided Settlement eight times since then, but never so effectively as that first time
  
  and always to their cost. Does it surprise you thatwe're still around, still fighting back? It shouldn't.
   Wratha and her bullies are a handful, it's true, butthey're still only a handful. Me, I remember when I was
  your age, when the vampires were a plague! We fought back then, and we always will. And never forget,
  wehave two great allies: the barrier range and the goldensun.
   'Eight times they've been back, but a while now since thelast time. That was when Misha lost her second
  brother, Nicolae. But as for the Wamphyri, they lost a great dealmore. We have weapons, Nathan, and
  intelligence, andhumanity! But all they have is their lust for blood andtheir mutual hatred. The first time
  they came - thatnight they took your brother, Nestor, and my own son,Jason - they were organized
  under Wratha; since when,they've become a rabble! They've split up and gone theirown ways; they have
  no single leader as such but squabble with each other as in the old days, and with muchthe same result:
  vampire anarchy, disorder, fragmenta tion. Recently there have been rumours that they'reworking
  together again, some of them, but I doubt it.
   'Do you remember Vratza Wransthrall, the night weburned him? I'm sure you do: how could you forget
  thethings he said, when you thought that Canker Canisonhad taken Misha? Well, he as good as admitted
  thatWratha's plan was to build herself an army, with which to fight off the rest of them when they
  followed herout of Turgosheim. Or she might even use it to invadeTurgosheim in her own right. Except it
  hasn't workedout that way.
   'For now, as individual Lords — and "Lady", of course- they are lessened. Their raiding parties consist
  of a leader, two or three lieutenants, three flyers at most, and a warrior or two. They daren't keep more
  than a handful of lieutenants each for fear of treachery, ofbeing usurped! Which has been to our
  advantage.
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   'I say again, they've raided Settlement just eight times since that first time, and each raid has cost them
  dearly!Do you remember the shotgun shells, the tubes of silver shot and black powder which provide the
  energy andkilling substance of our guns? We exhausted them eight een months ago, fighting off an attack.
  But then - a miracle! I sent a party of men across the mountains intoThe Dweller's garden, his armoury.
  The whole place has fallen into ruins; but in one of the little houses backed up to the wall of the saddle -
  in a cave at the back, snug and dry under dust and old leathers they found a box of shells. A whole box!
  Perhaps it was handed out to someone at the time of the battle for the garden, someone who never got
  the chance to use it. But it wasan important find for two good reasons.
   'One: we had one hundred and sixty good shells for use as early warning devices — not to mention lethal
  weapons - against the Wamphyri and their lieutenants.Two: ever since I saw The Dweller's weapons in
  action, I knew that we must have them. Which is why I've kept old Dimi Petrescu hard at it all these
  years trying to duplicate that black powder. Now that we had these shells, I could give Dimi a little more
  of the originalstuff to work with. Until finally he succeeded!
   '.. . Or almost. Dimi's stuff isn't as good and it doesn'tmake effective cartridges, but it does make a bang!
  You remember the giant crossbows in Settlement? We still have them. But we also have rockets, and a
  
  lot of them! But dangerous? I've had a man blind himself, and another who blew an arm off. Ah, but on
  the other hand, when these things work properly, then they really do work! During one raid a year ago -
  Gorvi the Guile, it was, with a small handful of his lads and a warrior -didn't we make him pay? You can
  bet your life we did!Just you wait, Nathan, and you'll see! You'll see!
   'And we've learned, lad, we've really learned. More than we ever knew before, and faster. Do you
  know what a flyer is? Certainly, for you flew one here out of Turgosheim. But do you know what a flyer
  in a pit is? No? Then I'll tell you: a flyer in a pit is a dead thing! Stick a flyer in a hole in the ground and it's
  useless; it can't launch itself, and has to be dragged free before it can get airborne again. So we dug pits
  in strategic positions in and around Settlement, with spikes in the bottom to impale their ugly bellies. That
  worked for awhile, until the Wamphyri got the idea. Then they began crashing their beasts onto our
  houses, and launchingthem from the rubble. So we made dummy houses, frag ile frameworks, with pits
  underneath! What's more, we left barrels of Petrescu's powder down there, all fused-up and ready to
  detonate! We've learned how to blast those wormy launching limbs right off them, melt 'em down hissing
  in their pits, and bury 'em for good when the stink has blown away!' Lardis smacked his lips, found relish
  in detailing the more gruesome aspects ofhis defensive systems.
   Their warriors are the worst, of course,' he eventually continued, 'but even they are not invulnerable. We
  used to run from them once, but not any more. If you can get an explosive device into a warrior's gasbag,
  that's half the battle. And if you can explode oil of kneblasch in there, that's even better! You see,
  warriors manufacture gas for lift, buoyancy, but when they're on the ground the gas soaks back into their
  systems and the bladders are retracted. So, if you doctor a warrior's bladders with kneblasch just as he's
  coming in to land - he's done for, poisoned! Oh, they thrash around a bit and they're noisy about it, but
  they quiet down after they've burned a while ...' He gave a sharp, vicious nod.
   'As for the Lords themselves, silver shot is the best
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   bet. If you could hit one in the eyes he'd be finished. We've taken out lieutenants that way, with our
  shotguns, no trouble at all. But a lieutenant isn't a Lord. They're just too damned clever, the Lords, and
  we haven't managed to stop a one of them as yet. It's their Wamphyri senses. With more than the five
  we've got, they can sense trouble coming. They send their troops in first to clear the way, and as often as
  not to die for them. But a Lord is different. He can breathe a mist and melt right into it ...' Lardis paused
  to get his breath,then said:
   'Aye, and I've gone on a bit, haven't I? But I wanted you to understand. We haven't given in to them,
  andwe're not about to.'
   Finally the old Lidesci fell silent, which gave Nathan the opportunity to say: 'But you've done so well! It's
  all .. . wonderful! And is it like this for all of the Szgany?Right across Sunside?'
   Lardis glanced at him, shook his shaggy head and looked away. 'How can it be? Charity begins at
  home, son, and as far as I know it's only like this for the Szgany Lidesci. What do you expect? How far
  do youthink we can stretch ourselves?'
  
   'And the people of Twin Fords, Tireni Scarp, Mirlu Township and all the other towns and tribes?'
  Nathan'sexcitement was swiftly ebbing.
   Lardis shrugged, but not callously. 'Should I give them gunpowder, so that they in turn may give it to the
  Wamphyri? How long before supplicant tribes startedmaking it for them, eh? Or are you asking why I
  haven't gathered all of the tribes together? I'll tell you: because I've been through all of this before,
  Nathan, and small is safe. Now listen, Sanctuary Rock is only so big. Its caverns will take my people, but
  barely. And only my people know its secrets! Lad, why do you think I built
   Settlement where it stands, or leans, now? Because it was close to Sanctuary Rock, that's why! I never
  did trust my luck all that much, and as it happens I was right not to. No, for I knew that if there was a
  way back, the Wamphyri would find it. You know how a lichen clings to a rock? Well, that's nothing,
  comparedto the way they cling to their filthy, miserableexistence!'
   'And Travellers when they pass through?' Nathan'svoice was much quieter. 'Do you still give them
  shelter?'
   'If they come in daylight, and if I know them, aye. Butin the evening, or the night ... you're making jokes,
  Nathan! Think, man! Things aren't like that any more. Would you harbour a leper in your camp? Of
  coursenot. Well, then, how much more virulent is a vampire?'
   Nathan nodded. 'You're right, of course ...' And after a moment's silence: 'What about the other
  townships?How have they fared?'
   'Badly!' Lardis answered at once. 'Karl Zestos leads the people of Twin Fords, what's left of them.
  They'reTravellers now, a small band torn to pieces in the raids. Karl's no fool, though. He's learning, just
  like I had to learn when I was his age. They have caverns in the cliffs east of here; not as good as
  Sanctuary Rock andnot so easily defended, but they're working on it.'
   Nathan nodded. 'He asked me tojoin him that time when I passed through Twin Fords. I liked him well
  enough, but I was still looking for Nestor. What aboutMirlu Township?'
   'Swept away!' said Lardis. 'Scattered, gone! Four or five sunups after Settlement, then it was Mirlu
  Township's turn. We expected them to come back here, if only to punish us for what we did to Vratza.
  But they fell on Mirlu instead. The brothers Wran and Spiro. They must be madmen!' (And Nathan
  thought: they
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   are!) 'Sent in a warrior to wreck the place, and waited outside for the people as they fled. Aye, and the
  bastards recruited a few that night! The survivors are Travellers now, like all the rest. Only me and mine,
  and the folk of Tireni Scarp, have managed to hang on to whatwas theirs. And then by the skin of our
  teeth.'
  
   Through the trees Nathan could see the foothills and the dome of Sanctuary Rock. The morning was
  only a third done and he was almost home. Or if not homeexactly, back among his own people at least.
  He felt his heart leap inside him. His mother was alive and well... and Misha! All weariness fled, he felt he
  must run therest of the way; and Lardis sensed it in him.
   'Can't let you go, lad,' he said. There'll be some who know you, but others who don't. And there's not
  much of trust in men these days. You go in there bragging how you flew home on a vampire thing .. .' He
  shook his head. 'Anyway, I'm just as eager as you, if only to see your mother's face.' He glanced at
  Nathan andgrinned. 'Not to mention Misha's.'
   Nathan grabbed his arm. 'Is she... is she ...?'
   'She's a beauty!' Lardis stopped him. 'Ask any one of the young, single men and they'll all tell you the
  samething: that Misha Zanesti is beautiful.'
   Nathan's face fell. 'The young men? But, does she ... has she ...?'
   'Now hold!' said Lardis. 'What's all this? Are we back to stuttering again? And why ask me? I'm an old
  lad and past that sort of thing - well, almost. Anyway,another hour and you'll be able to ask the girl
  herself.'
   An hour! It sounded like a lifetime.
   But it wasn't. ..
   On the final approach to Sanctuary Rock along dusty foothill trails, Lardis and the others stepped very
  care-
   fully. 'Pits everywhere,' Lardis informed. 'Can you seethem?'
   'Now that you mention it, yes,' Nathan answered. 'Aman would have to be a fool to fall into one.'
   Lardis gave a grunt and shrugged. 'Well, people do forget from time to time, and then we have
  accidents. But flyers and the like aren't as bright as men -' (then, remembering Nathan's story about Karz
  Biteri) '- well, not usually. And anyway, at night they use their nosesas much as their eyes.'
   They climbed closer to the Rock, a gigantic outcrop jutting from the wooded hillside, bald and domed
  on top, but hollow as a rotten tooth in its base. 'And do you live here now?' Nathan had been inside the
  place as a child; it seemed a dire sort of existence, to actuallylive here.
   'We hide here,' Lardis answered, 'but we still "live" in Settlement - because I won't let go! It's no great
  distance, and we always come back to the Rock atnights. But the Wamphyri? Territorial? Hah.' They
  don'tknow the half of it!'
   'But if you still live in town, why have we come uphere?'
   'Because right now this is where the work is. Enough for everyone. We're hollowing the place out,
  making itliveable, and charging the larger outer caves with Dimi's powder. Yet another way to kill a
  warrior: flatten the bastard under a hundred tons of rock!'
   'Without flattening yourself?'
  
   'We've tunnelled our way through to the back and farside. It's quitea maze in there. So that now the
  Rock's a sanctuary, a makeshift home, a lethal trap and an escaperoute all in one. The Wamphyri haven't
  discovered us yet and with luck they never will. If they do...' Again Lardis'sfatalistic shrug, 'it will cost
  them as dearly as it costs us.'
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   In the main entrance a chain of people, men and women, passed heavy leather buckets laden with dirt
  and small rocks from the inside to the open, and there tipped them over the rim of a shallow bluff on to
  the scree slopes below. Sweating and grimy, the people looked much alike. Most of them merely glanced
  at Lardis and his party, nodded, and carried on working.But one of them dropped her bucket and the
  work cameto a halt.
   Then... it was as if a whirlwind had struck! Nana rushed at Nathan so as to almost knock him down. He
  wrapped her in his arms, grabbed her up fiercely, kissedher dirty neck and hugged her like a lover. His
  mother! Alive and well! Finally they held each other at arm's length, and Nathan's eyes drank Nana in; he
  let her aura, her smell - no, her scent - wash over him, andthought, She's so...small!
   'You're so...big!' she said. There were tears behindher eyes, but she wouldn't cry in front of people.
   Lardis put an arm round each of them. And to Nana:'Take him to your place in the Rock,' he said. 'Let
  the work go. No one here will grudge you that.' His voicewas husky, too.
   On their way inside, still holding each other, they found their way blocked as a huge, frowning figure
  stepped out of the line. It was Varna Zanesti, Misha's father. He clasped forearms with Nathan, nodded
  andsaid, 'Well, what a sight for sore eyes you are! And do I have a son at last, or what?' As ever, Varna
  was straightto the point.
   At first Nathan didn't understand, so Varna prompted him, 'That conversation we had, in Settlement that
  morning?'
   Then Nathan understood, sighed and said, 'I'mhonoured.'
   'Huh!' Varna grunted. 'Damn right you are! Very wellthen, I'll see to it - and at once!' Finally he grinned.
   'Where is she?' Nathan asked.
   'In the woods with the children, teaching, gatheringnuts, fruits. Will midday suit you?'
   'Eh?'
   'To be wed, of course!'
   Nathan looked at Nana, who nodded. And: 'Yes, whatever you say,' he answered Varna.
  
   'Consider it done then,' said the other. 'Now be off,and enjoy what time you have left as a free man.'
   Nana had a large cave close to the main entrance. There, where beams of sunlight shot in through holesin
  the perforated rock and dust motes drifted likespecks of gold, she sat Nathan down on a blanket on a
  ledge carved in the wall. And while she saw to the needs of two old ladies in her care - in the course of
  preparing their food - she talked to him and questioned him over her shoulder. In a little while he stopped
  answering, and Nana saw that he'd stretched out andgone to sleep.
   Then, as the old ones ate their food Nana sat besidehim. She stroked the lines from his brow, cried all
  the tears she'd stored up for so long, and loved her son forall the lonesome times she'd missed loving him
  ...
   Nathan dreamedof Maglore, who in any case had never been far from his thoughts since his escape
  from Rune-manse; an imageof the man, the vampire Lord, themonster, had seemed printed indelibly on
  his inner eye,but faintly, like an after-image.
   Maglore in his aerie, in a darkened room, alone, with a smile on his ancient, evil face and his eyes
  half-closed, and spider hands with spindly fingers resting upon an image of his sigil, the hammered gold
  loop with a
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   half-twist. Nathan dreamed of the Seer Lord, and knewthat Maglore in turn dreamed of him, of Nathan!
   He conjured the numbers vortex and washed Magloreaway in its seething swirl - and saw the smile on
  his fading face turn to a scowl - before he drifted deeper into sleep ...
   He dreamed of his wolves. They had felt the swirl ofthe vortex and stirred in their mountain cave. He
  knew that their yellow eyes blinked in the gloom, and could feel their warmth and smell the musty heat of
  their curled bodies. But they were tired and he should let them sleep; it was sufficient that they
  acknowledged his return ...
   His freely drifting mind touched upon the deadspeakminds of Sunside's Great Majority: a Jiving mind
  listening in on the dead. They knew him at once, but themessage of their swiftly receding whispers was as
  vagueand mysterious as ever:
   That one, Nathan!'
   'But the Thyre speak for him; they say there's noharm in him, only good.'
   'So was his father good, in his time. But in the end
   .?'
  
   'We could tell him much.'
   'We daren't!'
   Among them was a voice which was very faint. 'I,/asef Karis, could tell him most of all.'
   'And be shunned among the dead forever?' The otherswere alarmed.
   'You are cold and cruel,' the faint one replied.
   'But not as cold and cruel as the Wamphyri necromancer who is his brother!'
   'He is a vampire. They are not the same.'
   'Can Nathan live forever, then? And what will he bewhen he dies? Ah, and will he stay dead?'
   Finally, reluctantly: 'Perhaps you are right,' said /asef Karis. With which their dead voices faded away
  entirelyas the teeming dead fell silent in their graves and resting places ...
   At last it was Eygor Killglance's turn; the leathery amalgam which was Eygor, blind and dead in his pit in
  Madmanse. But Eygor didn't talk about Nathan, he talked to him. The killing eye, Nathan. It can be
  yours!' The clotted gurgle of his mind spanned all the milesbetween. 'Now look, and see what my sons
  did to me!'
   Nathan stood at the feet of the Thing in the pit again, and stared up at its dead face, its closed eyes
  which even now, in his dream, creaked open! And a pair of blind white orbs huge as the eggs of swans,
  white as shining marble, wept acid tears on to a fretted, crumbling cheek!
   'Only see how I cry,' said Eygor, 'because my eyes areblind and white. Ah, but upon a time the right one
  was filled with blood! See!' And at once, the right eye of the gargoyle dripped scarlet. 'While the left was
  full ofpus!' And indeed the left one turned yellow, and swelled like a boil about to burst. And Nathan
  knew that if it did and the poison splashed him, then that he would beinfected, heir to Egyor's eyes!
   He came shouting awake ...!
   But the eyes were gone. The original great white blindglaring eyes (like the eye which Thikkoul had seen
  in Nathan's stars, perhaps?), the bloody eye and the yellow one, too: gone! Only his mother's eyes,
  Nana's, were there to greet him where he jerked violently upright. And gazing back worriedly into his, all
  they containedwas love and concern.
   For Nathan was more than ever like Harry Keogh before him, and she knew from his mumbling that he
  talked to... people, in his sleep; or at least listened to
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   them talking to each other. But mainly she was concerned because of who these people were, and the
  factthat they were no more ...
   Aye, he was more than ever like his Necroscopefather, which could be a blessing -
   - Or a curse.
   Nathan and Misha were married at 'noon', when the sun stood at its highest point far to the south and
  central over the distant desert. The ceremony wassimple; Lardis presided; all of Sanctuary Rock's
  workforce was present, almost a hundred and forty of them. Times were hard but Lardis had done his
  best, provid ing bread and wine and a beast turning on a spit over afire.
   At the high point of the affair the old Lidesci gatheredthe couple and their parents to him - Misha in
  white,Nathan in his freshly cleaned Thyre clothing, which by Szgany standards was still exceptionally fine
  gear -and with Nana standing face to face with Misha, andVarna glowering at Nathan, then Lardis
  commenced tosay the approved words:
   'Varna Zanesti, what can you say of this girl, yourdaughter Misha?'
   That she's innocent, unknown by man or monster,'Varna growled. 'Also that she's obedient and good.
  Fartoo good for this one!'
   Nathan was obliged to back off a step and lower hishead. It was all part of the ritual.
   'And Nana Kiklu,' Lardis turned to her. 'What haveyou to say to that?'
   'No mere girl is good enough for a son of mine,' Nana answered, tilting her chin and sniffing at Misha.'I
  can only hope that their children take more after him.'But not too closely after their grandfather!
   Lardis turned to the couple. 'And do you love each other?' They answered yes. 'So you may, and from
  this time forward you have that right - to love with yourhearts and your bodies - for you're now man and
  wife!'
   They kissed; people applauded; everyone enjoyed a little food, and toasted the health of the couple in
  wine. There was music and the younger ones danced, those who had the strength for it. But at their first
  opportunity, Nathan and Misha slipped quietly away ...
   Their travois was waiting behind bushes under the south-west facing wall of the Rock. There Misha
  made; "Nathan look away - Three years is a long time, after ; all!' - while she changed into Traveller
  clothes andfolded her dress into a pillowcase, and discreetly averted her eyes as he likewise changed. It
  was the Szgany way. Then, dragging the light-framed travois behind them, they went out into the forest.
  Heading south-east, they skirted the Rock along an old trail, buthalf-way towards Settlement turned off
  into virgin woods and found a place where the bracken stood tall.
   In the heart of the bracken Nathan put up their shelter, a skin stretched over the bole of a fallen tree,
  made fast to projecting branches, while Misha cleared the ground and spread their blankets underneath.
  And with mixed feelings they stood looking at the finished job. Everything seemed to be melting into a
  blur now for Nathan. He still daren't believe that he had really escaped from Turgosheim; yet here he
  was, married to Misha, and their first bed ready for them. She didn'tseem changed; it might be as if he'd
  never been away.
  
   'Our home for half a day,' he finally said.
   'And for part of a night,' she answered. 'For I won't go back till the stars are out at least. Tonight of all
  nights, I won't scurry and scuttle in fear of Them.'
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   Nathan looked ruefully at their rude shelter. 'Notmuch of a little house, is it?'
   She smiled in a way he remembered and loved well enough - a smile she'd kept only for him, which was
  half-innocent, half-brazen - and answered: 'People have lived, and loved, in worse than this, Nathan.
  Anyway, you'll remember this "little house" for the rest of yourdays. I shall see to that.'
   Following which ...
   ...It was as it has always been and always will be between lovers. And for an hour, two, three, they
  excited, explored and exhausted each other. Misha was mainly innocent, for which they both were glad.
  And Nathan... if Misha suspected anything she said nothing. And anyway, he was careful not to 'know'
  too much. From now on they could learn together, or at least he must make her believe that it was so. It
  wasn't so much that he deceived her, rather that he would notdisappoint her.
   And he didn't, not in any measure ...
   In the time scale of the world of Nathan's father, the couple stayed in their love nest for an entire day,
  andone more to go before sundown. Like all young animalspaired off, they loved and slept to excess;
  between times they replenished themselves on bread and cheese froma bundle in the travois.
   Three years without each other; now each moment spent together filled the space of an hour apart, and
  the husks of empty years fell aside. They got to know each other all over again, but more surely now,
  more certainly: like a broken wall repaired and made stronger. And the extra wrinkle here or line there:
  all smoothed themselves out, or seemed to, until their faces were the same yet more than before. Nathan
  had used to think
   Misha's shape was boyish; now it was all woman. She had likened his yellow hair to sunlight; now it was
  amisted morning, with some of the gold fading to grey.
   Eventually they left their bower and walked to Settlement, which served to revive more old memories. A
  handful of people were working there; Nathan met some old friends, saw a few new faces. They
  wandered the forest ways they'd known as children, bathed in the same shingly pool at the river's bend,
  fell more deeply, truly in love than ever. Back in Settlement they ate a meal with friends, and Nathan
  stood for a while outside his old home under the stockade's west wall. Some repairs had been made but
  the place seemed like a shell now; at least there wasn't a flyer trap underneath it; maybe one day Nana
  would live here again. But livehere, as she had used to in better times.
   In the shade of the forest as they returned to thebower, suddenly Nathan shivered, paused, listened.
  
  There was only the cooing of pigeons. Misha looked athim curiously. 'What is it?'
   Frowning, he touched the golden sigil in his ear. Thenhe shrugged and offered an awkward smile. 'Only
  theghosts of memories.' Or the feeling of someone listening, watching, waiting. Instinctively he shielded his
  mindand conjured the vortex: two perfectly logical moves, of which only the first was a good one. For
  Nathan didn't know that where the vortex kept certain evils at bay, it lured one other more surely than
  crows are lured to a cornfield. And even if he did know it would make littledifference, for that one was
  dead.
   In any case, and long before they reached their love nest, the feeling had passed ...
   Evening fell on Sunside, and the first stars came out as the sky slowly darkened towards night. In their
  bower
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   the lovers slept, touching all along their length, so close they might be one. In Settlement and other places
  the first fires were burning even now, lures for Starside's Lords. But the last vampire raid on Settlement
  had been a while ago; there was no reason why any monster should come hunting here now, and
  certainly not in this private place. In Nathan's metaphysical mind the numbers vortex whirled, and in its
  heart the mysteries of the universe were hidden behind countless mutating formulae; as were his secret
  thoughts. Thus the vortex was his protection -
   - And his betrayal.
   High in the mountains, in a saddle between peakswhere the gold had faded to grey, a Lord and his
  lieuten ant gazed down on Sunside, the first through scarlet eyes and the other with eyes which were
  feral. Thelatter was Zahar (once Zahar Sucksthrall, but no longer), and his master was the Lord Nestor
  of the Wamphyri, an awesome necromancer whose rapid rise to power had made him a living legend on
  all the levels of Starside's last aerie. Their flyers rested a little apart, nodding their great, slate-grey heads
  in that curiouslyvacant way of theirs.
   Zahar knew why they had come here: it was a habit of Nestor's to rest here a while, this very spot, and
  gazedown on Sunside before a raid. Always here, over Settle ment. But while he found a constant
  fascination with the place, he had never once raided in the town. In the past he'd always given the same
  reason: 'I think... I know this place. But there's nothing here that I want,not any longer.'
   Tonight was different. Wratha had suggested that she and Nestor might raid together, yet he had flown
  out early with just Zahar in attendance. Just the two of them, without even a warrior. And Nestor's gaze
  was
   very keen, even eager tonight as he looked down on the glow-worm flicker of the town's fires; and
  Zahar sensedwithin him an eagerness, a strange cold passion, and apurpose.
   For a while the lieutenant fidgeted, then asked: 'Dowe raid here tonight? Do we recruit? If so we should
  
  be careful, for these people have a reputation. Those firescould well be lures!'
   Nestor merely glanced at him, but at least the question had drawn him back to earth. 'We hunt,' he
  answered.
   'Hah!' Zahar snorted appreciatively. Tor women?'
   'For a couple, male and female,' Nestor's voice waslike a low wind out of the Icelands, cold and
  foreboding. 'A great enemy of mine who went away and is nowreturned. A treacherous Szgany dog and
  his bitch, who plotted against me. Even now they are hiding from me, in the woods where they always
  hid. But I shall findthem now as I found them then.'
   Zahar stared at him, feared him. Nestor had no background. There was nothing in his past to guide his
  future. Except this, perhaps, whatever it was. And he was pure as pure Wamphyri! All Nestor knew,
  he'd learned in Old Starside's last aerie. And despite that the ways of the aerie were hard, he'd learned
  fast. Add to this the fact that he was a necromancer ... the LordNestor's mind and his ways were
  unknowable.
   Still, Zahar thought that he should make some answer. 'How will you find this enemy, Lord?'
   Again Nestor's glance, and his grim smile. 'He sleepsand dreams,' he said. 'But I know his dreams, for
  theypenetrate my own like darts.'
   Zahar said nothing. He had been right: his master'smind was entirely unknowable.
   'Now listen,' Nestor continued with more animation.
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   'In the twilight before the dawn I sensed his return, and dreamed that I went to fetch him into Starside to
  punish him. But my dream was ominous, and in the hour of my triumph I fell foul of some nameless fate.
  Tonight, leaving Wratha to sleep on, I rose early and came down to my apartments, from where I heard
  theLord Canker Canison singing to the moon. Because they say he is touched with oneiromancy, I
  mentioned the dream to him. He howled like a wolf and told me that the future is inviolable; the only
  danger lies in trying to read or alter it; what will be will be. I agree with that last: what will be will be.
  Except...'
   'Yes, Lord?'
   'If aught befalls me, will my enemy go free? I can't bear the thought of that.' He shook his head. 'No, for
  if I'm destined for hell I want to know that my enemy gotthere before me, or follows close behind, at
  least! Theseare my instructions:
   'He is mine and you shall take the girl. If all goes wellwe head direct for Starside. But if I should come to
  grief my order is this: drop the girl and take him! Doyou understand?' His voice was suddenly sharp.
  
   'Yes, Lord.'
   'For I don't mind that she lives, only that he should not! And in no circumstance are they to be allowed
  tolive together. Which is why you will take him and head for Starside. For I've heard of a certain legend,
  and I'mdetermined that he shall be the one to test it.'
   He explained his meaning in more detail, then continued: 'Zahar, a dream is only a dream and I'm not
  afraid of it. Nor do I fear anything. But if aught should go astray, don't fail me. For I am the Lord Nestor
  and life and death are one to me, and even in the worst possiblefuture, I shaJI be back!'
   'I believe you, Lord,' said Zahar.
   They went to their beasts and mounted up. And Nestor said, 'Now follow close behind, and I'll take you
  to them.'
   Zahar kept his thoughts well guarded where he goaded his flyer into the air. But in the eastern foothills
  and along the peaks he'd seen banks of mist forming, and knew that the Wamphyri hunted there. While
  Nestor pursued dreams and ghosts out of his unknown past, they hunted for the good things of life: for
  the blood which is the life, for women and slaves, and for the sheer joy of it. Huh.' Not much of joy in
  Nestor. But then, there'd not been a deal of it in Vasagi either! Andthis one had his egg.
   Nestor 'heard' none of this; his damaged mind was full of other things and remembered only those which
  he wanted to remember. And as his flyer arched its wings and soughed down the wind towards the
  tree-line, he was maddened by the swirl of alien numbers rushing faster and faster in his brain. Now, at
  long last, he would track the maelstrom to its source and destroy it - destroy him - forever. As he should
  have destroyed him in the far, dim, all but forgotten past...
   The mist on the mountains. Like Zahar, Nana Kiklu had seen it, too, and had gone straight to Lardis.
  Now they were out searching for the newlyweds, Nana in one direction and Lardis in the other. He was
  the one who found them, and with time to spare, or so he thought.But in fact he was just too late.
   Arm in arm, they headed for the Rock along a foothill trail. Trudging and weary, they dragged their
  worldly goods behind them. Lardis saw them, sighed his relief and hurried forward ... only to freeze as
  the night air throbbed and the starlight seemed to dim a little, and ashadow went wafting overhead!
  Lardis fell into a
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   crouch, snapped his shotgun shut, and looked up. Hesaw them - flyers, a pair - banking against the
  hillside, and stooping towards the lovers like hawks! And now they too felt the throbbing of the air,
  looked up andsaw the swooping flyers. Instinctively, Misha flew intoNathan's arms.
   This way!' Lardis bellowed. To me!' They saw him, ran towards him. The flyers veered a little and their
  belly pouches yawned open; their wings formed archeswhere they seemed almost to drift down upon the
  
  pair.
   'Down!' Lardis yelled. 'Get down!'
   The flyers were upon them, buffeting them apart; theone which pursued Nathan made to scoop him up;
  he stumbled and the flap of the thing's pouch sent him flying. It formed its wings into air-traps and
  hovered,following him where he tumbled down a scree slide.
   Frantically, Lardis swung his weapon towards theother beast but daren't fire; Misha was in the way. The
  creature was almost upon her when suddenly ... she gave a scream and disappeared! She was the victim
  of one of Lardis's pits! But better that than the other. Far better! She might be injured, but she was safe
  for themoment. And the old Lidesci launched himself feet-first down the scree slide after Nathan.
   Nathan was on his feet. He turned to look back up the slope - and the flyer was there, right behind him!
  He saw it, and saw that its rider was ...
   . . . Nestor!
   Nathan might not know the face - that twisted, snarling visage with its scarlet, glaring eyes - but he
  wouldrecognize the mind anywhere, however warped and changed it had become. At close range there
  was no mistaking it; hefelt its hatred, and knew that recognition was mutual. Nestor was a Power now,
  and Nathan's own telepathy that much more enhanced.
   You! The word was a hiss, burning like acid as itflowed from Nestor's mind.
   'Nestor!' Nathan gasped, as the flyer's head passed over him and its belly pouch yawned. He smelled its
  stench ... and in the same moment heard Lardis's yell:
   'Get down!' A split second later and the old Lidesci came skidding on his heels and his rump, collided
  with Nathan and sent him flying. The two of them rolled and tumbled; but relentless as a shadow and
  almost as close, the flyer followed after. They hit the bottom of the slope, and Lardis was first on his feet.
  Growling like a bear he turned his weapon on the flyer and discharged it pointblank into the creature's
  eyes - once,twice!
   The thing screamed high and shrill, lashed its head left and right, and its wings pounded frantically,
  uselessly at the air. Then, as a wingtip struck the slope, the beast tilted to one side, which threatened to
  unseat itsrider. Yelling like a madman, Lardis reloaded and aimed at the vampire Lord.
   And even if Nathan would wish it otherwise, there was nothing he could do about the rest of it. Dazed
  and still trying to climb to his feet, he heard the twin shotgun blasts andfelt Nestor's agony! And again he
  andLardis were bowled over as the stricken flyer's thrusters uncoiled downwards and drove it out and
  away intothe night, with Nestor lolling and jerking in the saddle.
   By now Sunside lay under a blanket of mist, andbecause the main body of Wamphyri hunters were in
  theeast, it could only be a natural mist rising from the woodsand rivers of the region. Nestor's flyer
  dipped low and torea soft hole in the stuff, which quickly filled in behind it.
   Lardis was yelling, 'I got the bastard! I got him in the eyes, like I told you! If my aim had been better I
  couldhave taken his head off!'
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   The mist rolled up and covered them, and passed up the slope. And despite that Lardis had been talking
  about Nestor, there was only one thought in Nathan'smind now: 'Misha?'
   'Come on,' Lardis growled. 'She fell into one of our own pits. And that other flyer may still be around,
  might even have landed!' Reloading his shotgun, he headed up the slippery scree slope. But even as they
  began climbing, so Zahar came gliding from above and fell on them. It was as swift as that: the mist
  openedand the flyer was there.
   Lardis got off a shot before he was buffeted aside. He was on his feet again in a moment, aiming at a
  nodding, mist-wreathed head, squeezing the trigger. And the gun blew up in his hands! One of the old
  cartridges, a bad one, had finally let him down. Blown backwards and off his feet, he waited for the
  shock to pass, then struggled upright and looked for Nathan ... and saw nothing but the mist. But in a
  little while he found the wind toclimb the slope.
   Misha was waiting at the top, shivering and dishevelled but otherwise unharmed. She took Lardis's hand
  and helped him up, then grabbed him and looked intohis eyes. He could only lower his head and look
  away ...
   EPILOGUE
   Unconscious from the flyer's gases, Nathan lolled in Zahar's arms where the vampire lieutenant carried
  him across the wormhole-riddled terrain surrounding the hell-lands Gate and tossed him down on top of
  its low crater wall. Beyond that wall, snug as an eye in itssocket, the vastly glaring Gate shone with a cold
  white light, causing Zahar to lower his eyelids half-way shutand put up a hand against the dazzle.
   He found a toe-hold and stepped up onto the wall, picked Nathan up and paced forward to the very
  'skin' of the shining hemisphere of light. There he paused, looked at the man in his arms and shrugged.
  There seemed very little of a 'great enemy' in this one, and as any vampire would know, there were better
  uses for good Szgany flesh than this! On the other hand, his master's warning couldn't be ignored; Zahar
  dared not fail him who had sworn to return. For Nestor was a Lord and crafty necromancer, while Zahar
  was only alieutenant.
   Well, time now to get it over with. He cradled Nathanlike a child in one arm, and slapped his face until
  his eyes flickered open. 'What?' Nathan groaned, rolling his head and seeing first Zahar's awful face, and
  thenthe blinding light spilling from the Gate! The hell-lands portal, which he knew at once, glaring like ...
  like 'agreat blind eye'!
   Zahar grinned at him and said: 'Courtesy of the LordNestor. Whoever you are, this world has seen the
  lastof you. But I hope they make you welcome in hell!' And
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   so saying he spilled Nathan out of his arms into the glare, which absorbed him in a moment, effortlessly
  and without a sound, like an eye blinking away the irritation of a dust mote ...
   Far to the east in a blocked pit in Madmanse, the gigantic monstrosity which was Eygor Killglance lay
  where he had died, slumped against a nitre-streaked wall, and groaned a vast and terrible deadspeak
  groan. He was dead, the physical Eygor, but his mind of course went on. Except there was no one now
  to know it, not with any certainty. For like the guttering of a distant candle jn the ultimate darkness of
  death, Eygor had seen Nathan's light go out. Which could mean only onething: that the Necroscope was
  no more.
   In the higher levels of the promontory, called Rune-manse, perhaps Maglore 'heard' something of
  Eygor's groaning; perhaps he 'felt' something of Nathan's passing. At any rate he rushed to his room of
  meditation and placed his trembling fingers on the sigil shaped in gold, and let his mind drift out from
  Turgosheim, then hurtle west at the unthinkable speed of thought, which is instantaneous. But the sigil was
  lifeless now, merely a strangely twisted mass of heavy metal, and Maglore's 'window on an unknown
  world' was closed. It was weird, because even though Nathan's aura was gone, the feeling persisted that
  he was not dead. What, then? Undead? Locked in that metamorphic sleep which precedes the vampire
  condition? Had he finally succumbedto the seduction of vampirism? Did Wratha or one of hers have him?
  And Maglore sighed. Better perhaps if he had made him his own after all...
   In all the dreaming places of the Thyre, suddenly the darkness was that much deeper. For the ancients
  also knew of Nathan's passing from this world, but they
   knew a little more than the rest: that he was not dead. For if so he would be one with them, an honoured
  member of an elite, 'extinct' society, where his dead-speak voice would always be welcome. No, he was
  not dead but removed from them, taken away, transportedto a place from which no one ever returned.
   The teeming dead of Sunside knew it, too, and felt safer for it, however shamefully. But men reap what
  they sow, and in the child there is always that of the father. Perhaps Nathan had posed a threat, and
  perhaps not. Whatever, it made no difference now for he was gone. And of all of them who had passed
  into Sunside's air and earth, only Jasef Karis missed him and wishedthat he had spoken to him.
   But not a one of them - not Eygor, Maglore, the Thyre, or all the dead of Sunside put together - could
  ever have dreamed that they would hear Nathan's dead-speak voice again, or see his candle burning in
  the darkness as before .. .
   Nestor's awakening was slow and painful. His eyes were burning, his back had been very nearly broken,
  but his mind ... was free of numbers! And with that, itall came back to him:
   ... His flyer, blinded, with its face half shot away and its tiny brain peppered with poisonous silver pellets.
  Nestor, too, reeling in the saddle with sightlesseyes, his face a raw red mess and consciousness slipping
  as he fought to command his crippled beast up, away, back to Starside. He remembered a long low
  glide, and his inability to impress himself on the flyer's mind. The wonder was that the beast had stayed
  aloft so long.
   . .. Then the crash: the whiplash as he was hurledfrom the flyer's back, his body somersaulting, smashing
  against the bole of a great tree, falling through branches
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   which snapped under his weight, down to the forest'sfloor. And the darkness.
   Following which:
   Ministering hands? Kindness? Ointments and bandages, to assist in the healing process which Nestor's
  leech had already commenced? Brief bouts of conscious ness, in which he had known that people moved
  abouthim, caring for him, even feeding him a vile soup, which his body accepted readily enough despite
  that it was not his usual fare. It could only mean that he had made it back to Starside, where Wratha had
  found him crashed among the great hardy firs of the barrier rangebelow the tree-line, and brought him
  into the last aerie.
   But when he had tried to speak to her, it was not the Lady Wratha's voice which answered him. And
  because his eyes were so badly damaged and bandaged, he'd not seen the ones who covered his
  shivering body with blankets to keep him warm, and fed him, and pricked the silver shot out of his face,
  and generally succouredhim through his fever.
   Until now, finally, he heard their whispers, and felt once more the pain in his back, the agony of his
  ruined face. But he held still as they peeled away the bandages, and listened to their whispers tailing off as
  they sensed that he was awake. Then, despite the pain of tearing scabs, he gradually forced his eyes
  open and felt pusbegin to ooze as something of sight returned. But —
   - Was the room dark, or was it his eyes? It was both, he knew. He was healing, but not yet fully healed.
  For even a dark room would appear as daylight to one who was Wamphyri. But this room seemed full of
  a thick grey mist, and his eyes burned like fire when he blinked them to clear his vision. Except his vision
  would not clear. He was half-blind, and a long way yet to gobefore his vampire repaired him back to
  new.
   He stirred, groaned, moved his limbs and tested hisbody. And like shadows the ones who had saved
  himbacked off, melted away and out of this misty room ofvague grey shapes and musty odours. Their
  movementsseemed strange, stumbling, crippled as badly as Nestorhimself and perhaps worse. For he
  was at least awareof his blood surging and knew that his limbs were hisown again. He was weak but
  would be strong, andgiven time he would see as well as ever. But not yet fora while.
   Now that Nestor was alone he put out a tremblinghand to feel his bed, the wall, the edge of a table. All
  ofwood, and warm. In no way the familiar cold grey stoneof the last aerie. So what was this place?
  Where was heand what had awakened him? Deep down inside, somestrange instinctive terror grinned
  and gurgled, and in the eye of memory showed him a picture out of thepast:
   Of a flyer, gouting smoke and steam and shrivellingas its hide split open; then spilling its loathsome fats as
  the sun ate into it like acid and reduced it to so muchslop! The sun ...! Was that what had awakened him,
  fear of the sun? But why? Where was he...and whatwas the hour?
   Someone entered the room and Nestor froze, then fought to control his fear as the grey shadow came
  closer and stood beside his bed. His fear? But of what?He was the Lord Nestor of the Wamphyri! 'What
  ...?'he gurgled from scabby, tattered lips. 'Who ...?'
  
   'Ah!' The grey shape nodded. 'And so you'll recoverand return to Starside. Good!'
   But though the voice was warm and not unkind, stillits tone was strange, bitter, and ... satisfied? And
  whatwas that it had said? About a return to Starside? Suddenly, anger and frustration flooded Nestor.
  He
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   struggled to a sitting position and focused his damagedeyes until the grey one's misty silhouette filled in a
  little and his features took on shape beneath the cowl of his robe. But they were still grey features, poorly
  defined and oddly ... incomplete? The wraithlike figure leaneda little on a crutch which fitted under his
  right shoulder, and his robe hung like a shroud from his insubstantialframe.
   'It's so dark in here,' Nestor said stupidly, or perhapshopefully.
   The other shook his head. 'No, it's light enough. Orwill be soon.'
   Nestor's pain threatened to engulf him again. He was Wamphyri, but he was still learning their
  disciplines. As yet he couldn't suppress pain. He fought it back as best he was able, and asked: 'Who are
  you, and what isthis place?'
   'My name is Uruk Piatra, called Uruk Long-life,' the grey one answered with a shrug. 'But a misnomer, I
  fear. And as for this place ... it's a leper colony.'
   For a single moment Nestor's brain froze: a leper colony! Leprosy, the great bane of vampires! - but in
  the next he was galvanized to activity. Then, swinging his legs out from under the blankets, he grabbed
  the dangling arms of the other's robe. But they were onlyempty sleeves and couldn't take his weight. They
  ripped at the shoulders and came away in Nestor's hands where he fell back again onto the bed. And he
  saw how Uruk's twig arms ended in swollen fungus nubs atthe elbows!
   After that: a rush of adrenalin - a madness ofvampire-induced flight in which all of Nestor's previous
  agonies were forgotten - a blundering confusion of blind terror as he fled the colony out into the forest.
  And even then no respite, for in the south the light was
   improving moment by moment. Grey shapes stood gauntas ghosts in the mist of Nestor's perception as
  he rushedthis way and that under the trees, trying to avoid them. He crashed among a cage of squawking
  chickens and wrecked it, fell against a fence and tumbled over it, and felt no pain now but only fear as he
  careened deeperinto the dawn woods in search of a place to hide.
   A deep hole in which to find safety from the sun and wait out the long day. A sanctuary in which to rest
  and recuperate, sleep and dream ... and nightmare,certainly.
   About what had been, and what was yet to be...
  
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SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Necroscope/EXTRA/Novel/Blood Brothers (17421)/Blood Brothers - Brian Lumley.pdf