by Brian Lumley
But the story had been oddly atypical in this kind of publication; not at all lurid or sensational (certainly not in Millie’s eyes, with her E-Branch background and inside knowledge), but a straightforward steal or direct transcript from an original Greek newspaper report, done without recourse to this dubious rag’s usually hysterical attempts at dramatization.
The story had been simple: a band of Gypsies had wandered down from Hungary on some pilgrimage or other, and one of their young womenfolk had taken sick. Diagnosed with anaemia, she had been hospitalized in Kavála—until her menfolk had taken her by force out of the hospital before leaving the area! Traced to a nearby village, Skotousa, which lay on their route north, the band were then discovered in the act of burying the girl, as in the picture. Since there was no evidence of foul play, the local police had been reluctant to interfere with the ceremony.
A day or so later, pathologists at the hospital in Kavála had decided that since the cause of death was suspected but not known for sure, the body must be examined, the death registered, and a certificate issued. The doctors were of course simply covering for themselves and their hospital.
But when the grave in Skotousa was opened … the girl was found with a grimace on her face, burns on her eyelids—and a stake through her heart! Someone (if not one of her own band of Travelling folk, someone else) had obviously seen her as a dire threat to the local community. A vampire, of course …
Trask hadn’t been too much impressed. He knew from experience that old myths and practices die hard in the Mediterranean islands and the Balkans, and these people were after all Travelling folk, Gypsies, with ancestral memories that went back centuries. Also, and for various reasons (mainly financial), Gypsies weren’t the only ones who “believed” in vampires. Filmmakers in Hollywood were soon to release three new vampire movies, including yet another Dracula, the so-called vampire fad in popular fiction was still filling more than its fair share of shelf space in the bookshops; the Downliners Sect, a cult London rock group resurgent from the late ’70s, were at number three in the charts with a grotesquery titled “Somethin’s Up That Should Be Down” … ad infinitum.
As for “Somethin’s Up”: Millie had even caught herself singing the words from time to time:
Hey, man, look what’s walkin’ round.
Somethin’s up that won’t stay down.
Somethin’s up from the rotten ground.
—Time we all got outta town.
Outta town. Get outta town …
“Thus for a world that in the main doesn’t really believe in the vampire,” Trask had responded, “we appear to be doing a damn good job of promoting the fiend!”
And, much like the Head of Branch, the Old Lidesci hadn’t been too impressed with Millie’s find either. “Travelling folk, you say?” he’d queried Trask when the subject was broached. “Do you mean like those original Travellers—Szgany from Sunside—that you once told me about? Those misbegotten, fleabitten Wamphyri supplicants, banished through the Starside Gate with their vampire masters two thousand years ago? Aye, it could be them—their descendants, that is. But then again, most of the Gypsies of your world are Szgany descendants, all of them with the true Traveller blood, that is. Not that there was much of good blood in any accursed supplicant tribe that I ever heard of—huh.”
“Which is why I want to send you out there,” Trask had answered. “You and a locator, and a couple of minders to make sure no harm befalls. I need to know that this burial ritual is just a ritual, something that has come down the centuries. I mean, I know that in some of the Greek islands, the Balkans, and especially Romania, even today they bury people who die in suspicious circumstances with silver coins on their eyes … presumably to keep them closed! Just in case, you know? But this stake thing is something else. We know what that’s all about. So who suspected this poor girl, and why? And was it just superstition, or what?”
And so it had been Lardis’s task—because he was a Gypsy himself, and with any luck would be acceptable to the Hungarian band—to fly to Greece and find out.
And now, finally, the Old Lidesci told his story …
“We got into Kavála in the early evening, just as the sun was failing. There was myself, Bernie Fletcher, and that burly pair of likely lad minders you found for us” (Special Branch men on loan from Whitehall’s Corridors of Power, courtesy of the Minister Responsible). “We took a taxi—a short drive of just a few miles—into Keramoti on the coast where we could eat and hire a car. Bernie got the car while the minders and I ate at a taverna on the seafront.
“But the sea, Ben, the sea! Even with the sun going down—no, especially with the sunset—I never saw such a sight in my entire life! That incredible blue, like some vast mirror of the sky, turning darker as night drew on. It made me realize what I was missing—tied down in London, I mean—to see that wonderful ocean all curved on its horizon. You must use me more; send me out into the world so that I can see it all. Ah, the stories I’ll take back with me to Sunside one day!
“Where was I? Ah yes: Kavála, and Keramoti.
“We didn’t go to the local police. Bernie thought it would only complicate matters. We were, after all, only ‘tourists’ and chances were they wouldn’t care for us interfering in their business. Worse, they might want to know what was our business! And anyway, Bernie wanted to show off his skills.
“He got out his maps on the table where we’d eaten, picked a route to Skotousa. And:
“‘I have a feeling that that’s the way they went,’ he said, ‘from Kavála to Skotousa. So we’ll take the same route, see if I can get the feel of them.’
“And we did. Me, I kept wanting to tell him he was driving on the wrong side of the road, but of course I was wrong. They drive on the right in Greece! I can’t see why you people don’t choose a system and stick to it! Likewise your languages. What, a hundred or more different tongues, with as many and more dialects? No wonder you’ve been plagued with so many wars, nation against nation. In Sunside we have just the one tongue: Szgany! No chance of errors in transla-, er, translation. And no roads at all, just leafy tracks through the cover of the woods.
“But I’ll tell you something: that Greek tongue has a damn sight more in common with mine than yours does. Why, in no time at all I could understand almost everything they were saying!
“Skotousa was some seventy-five miles; by the time we were there the sun was down and the light was going fast. I’ll never get over your sunsets … you can actually see it going, especially in Brisbane, Australia. Bang—and it’s gone!
“Anyway, in Skotousa:
“Lodgings weren’t difficult. We stayed at an inn, and that night went down into the bar. I had changed into Sunside clothing for comfort’s sake, but it wasn’t all that far removed from the way some of the locals were dressed. Farmers and such, they came in for their ouzo and Metaxa, or just to cool off from the day’s work in all that terrible heat. They sat under those big, slow fans, played board games or watched television, and didn’t seem to find me at all out of place—not at first—though the bartender did ask if I was Szgany.
“‘Aye, from a long time ago,’ I told him, with a nod. But I didn’t say from how far away! ‘My people used to wander through these parts, or so I’m told,’ I went on. ‘But they sold me when I was just a boy.’ This was a lie, of course, a story I’d heard from Millie Cleary, about your world’s Travellers, which hadn’t surprised me a jot! Old habits die hard, Ben. What, descendants of gutless supplicants out of Sunside? Hah! But their ancestors used to give their children away, to the Wamphyri!
“‘Sold you?’ The bartender looked shocked.
“‘To English people, who could care for me better.’
“‘Ah, that explains your friends, these English,’ he said, nodding towards Bernie and the others. ‘So then, what were your parents? Romanian Gypsies, maybe? I’ve heard they’ve been selling their children for years!’
“‘That’s what I’m here to find out,’
I answered. ‘I’m told my people used to wander this way in their caravans, about this time of year. I’m looking for my roots, you know?’
“‘Going back to the Gypsies, after what they did to you?’
“‘No, not going back to them,’ I answered. ‘I just want to know what they are like, how they live. Wouldn’t you be curious if you were me? About where you sprang from, I mean?’
“And then he looked around, all sly like, and said, ‘If I were you, I’d forget about them. We get the Szgany through here from time to time. Some strange folks pass through Skotousa …’”
“‘Recently?’ I said.
“‘Recently,’ he nodded. And then he leaned across the bar and said, ‘Try across the border into Bulgaria, a place called Eleshnitsa.’
“‘You think they’re there?’ I questioned him. ‘But how do you know?’
“‘They’ve been travelling these old routes for years,’ he told me. ‘And aye, they were here, but the law moved them on. A dubious lot, my friend, your Gypsy clan. Once across the border they were out of Greek jurisdiction, which I say is a very good thing. Leave well enough alone, eh? I certainly wouldn’t want a Gypsy curse on me! Can’t blame the police for letting them go.’
“‘So what had they done wrong?’ I persisted. ‘For the police to move them on, I mean.’
“Again he leaned across to me and quietly explained, ‘They buried one of their own, a young girl, in the woods nearby. But some folks didn’t think they’d made too good a job of it. Local superstitions—you understand?’ At which he must have seen how intent I was. Straightening up, he gave himself a little shake, glanced all about the room, and said, ‘But there, I’ve said too much already, so let’s have done with all that.’
“And so I was forced to push my luck. Before he could move off and serve someone else, I grabbed his arm. ‘Haven’t I heard something about that?’ I said. ‘Didn’t someone dig her up again, open up her grave, and put a stake through her heart, as if she were a monster or something—or one of your vrykoulakas, eh?’ For I knew that was what the Greeks call the Vampire.
“And how he backed off then! Him and the entire inn or taverna or whatever with him, each and every man of them in there. For if they’d heard nothing else, they had certainly heard that one ugly word: vrykoulakas!
“So that was that. From then on no one talked to us, and the next morning we moved out. Still, I didn’t find it too odd, and I still don’t. For it’s like you said, Ben: in places like that old myths and superstitions never die. What, with Romania and the primal Gate at Radujevac just a hundred and fifty or so miles away? And the Szgany wandering those roads for a thousand years or more? Oh, I could well understand the fey of the folks in Skotousa … I even understood them digging up that girl and putting a stake in her heart, perhaps because they remembered a time when such had been routine. I could understand it, aye …
“But Bernie Fletcher couldn’t. He wanted to know what the local police had done about it … apart from letting the Travellers go, that is. So the next morning, before we crossed the border, he sought out old newspapers for the last few days and read up on it. It was a good idea of yours, Ben, to send Bernie out there with me. Him being a Graeco-, er, a Graecophile? Is that it? Being able to speak and read it and what all.
“And there it was in the newspapers:
“When the pathol-, er, the doctor from Kavála—when he’d looked at the girl’s body, cut her open and what have you, he’d seen that she had been well dead before she’d been staked. Dead of this anaemia, that is. And since there’s no crime in killing the dead, and since there was no proof against the Gypsies anyway, it had been thought as well to let them go on their way.
“Almost enough to see us on our way back home, too—hah! Now see—I’ve even begun to think of this place as ‘home’! But no, we carried on to Eleshnitsa in Bulgaria. Incidentally, that was Bernie Fletcher’s choice, too. Before I’d even mentioned it to him, why, he’d already fathomed it for himself! These men of yours, Ben Trask: their skills are strange and rare …
“The people in Eleshnitsa told us where we’d find the Gypsies: in woods to the north of the village. And do you know, it was almost as if I really was back home again, when I saw those ruts in the track through the trees. The hooves of horses can’t be that much different from those of shads, I reckon; anyway, I knew for sure that caravan wheels had chewed those deep ruts in the good rich soil, and I felt it in my bones that we were that close. And we were.
“When we saw the smoke of their fires rising over a clearing in the trees, Bernie dropped me and our minders off. Expert in covert—er, in covert sur-, er, in watching without being seen, damn it!—that pair of likely lads just seemed to vanish into the greenery. Quiet as mice they were, so as never to disturb a bird in the trees, but I knew they’d be watching out for me. And so I went on alone, on foot into the Gypsy camp.
“The leaves were all brown on the trees from this terrible summer, but at least the camp was in shade. The smoke came from the chimney stacks atop their caravans; only a madman would set a fire in open woods with everything as dry as this! But some of the Szgany folk were about, and they saw my approach. Of course they did, for I wanted to be seen. I even jingled as I came on, all dappled under the wilted trees. And long before their first greetings rang out, they knew that I was Szgany, too. But they … didn’t jingle!
“Well, not strange. Wamphyri supplicants—and their descendants, too, apparently—don’t wear silver. Perhaps there’s a lesson in that, Ben. If you see a Traveller in your world, in this world that is, and he doesn’t wear silver, you can be sure he’s the son of the sons of some scurvy supplicant servant of a Lord or Lady of the Wamphyri in olden Starside! Take bets on it, if you like, for I don’t think you’d lose. And yet again we see how old habits die hard.
“But whatever their customs, they didn’t seem to notice my silver, though it should be said we didn’t shake hands or clasp forearms either. So perhaps they only use silver in their money, or when they place it on the eyes of their dead when they lower them into the ground …
“In any case I was Szgany; they didn’t shy from me or seem to consider me an outsider; I asked to see their chief, and was taken to him in his varnished caravan. But he was old, that one, an old, old man. If you think I’m old, he could give me fifteen years at least!
“He was all dark-stained leather, a glint of gold tooth, a plain gold ring in the lobe of a hairy right ear, and more gold on his gnarly fingers.
“After he had looked me over, satisfied himself that I was Szgany, he gave a nod and my escort left us alone together. And then he asked me: ‘Why do you come here? Is there something you would tell me? Are you a messenger? For I can sense that you’re from far, far away.’
“‘I have no message,’ I answered. ‘I’m just a Traveler—as you and your people are Travelers—but indeed I have come from far, far away. What is this message you’re expecting?’
“He had seemed eager at first, expectant, but now withdrew a little into himself, and mumbled: ‘No message. Ah, no message for old Vladi!’—only to brighten in a moment, and say, ‘Then perhaps you are something of a message in yourself!’
“‘In what way?’ I asked him.
“But he only cocked his head on one side and winked, saying: ‘That’s for me to know, and for you to answer.’
“‘Then question me by all means,’ I shrugged, ‘and if I’m able to answer, be sure I will.’
“‘Hmm!’ He nodded his wrinkled old head of white hair, as if he pondered on something, and fell silent awhile. But then he started up again and said, There are some strange, strange places in the world, don’t you think?’ His voice was a dry rustle, like dead leaves stirred by a breeze.
“‘A great many,’ I answered. ‘Vast deserts, mighty oceans, and mountains high as the sky. But I fancy that’s not what you mean. In what way strange, old chief?’
“Of a sudden his rheumy old eyes cleared, and clasping my kne
e he said, ‘What clan are you? What Traveller tribe? What’s your name, eh?’
“‘I’m Lardis, a Lidesci,’ I told him at once. And why not, for I’m proud of it.
“‘A Lidesci … eh?’ He blinked at me then. ‘Ah, a Lidesci, you say! Huh! I don’t know it, never heard of it—or if I did I can’t remember. Perhaps in the old days …’
“‘We were only a few, and it was a long time ago,’ I told him. ‘Now we’re no more, except me. And when I see the Travelling Folk, I always stop and speak to them. For the old times, you know? It seems only right.’
“‘Aye, you’re right,’ he answered. ‘But not many remember the old times. And fewer still the strange old places!’
“‘The places of which you spoke?’
“He tapped his veined, crooked old nose and nodded wisely. ‘Places this beak of mine can smell! Places it takes me when an owl hoots just so, or the bats flit sideways in the face of the moon. Strange and timeless places, aye. Places the Szgany remember—some of the Szgany, a few of us, anyway—which we visit from time to time. Old places we have always visited, but sometimes a new place if it smells right to this old beak. Huh! But this time it let me down. So perhaps I’m past it, eh?’
“Well, he was infirm of body—and probably of mind, too—and it seemed to me he was rambling. And despite that his forebears were most likely a dubious lot, or perhaps because of it, I felt sorry for him. For a while at least, until he said:
“‘So then, Lardis of the Lidescis: well met, whoever you are. But your use of the old tongue is strange—even antique—which is why I thought you were my messenger, for whom I’ve waited an entire lifetime, as my father and my father’s father before me. For I am Vladi Ferengi, and much like you, the last of my line.’
“He must have seen me start, for he said, ‘Eh? Eh? Do you know us then, know of us?’ And now his voice was sharp.
“Did I know of them? But in Sunside their name has been a curse-word since time immemorial! Ferenc, Ferenczy, Ferengi—in all its forms, an evil invocation! Why, they had been legendary even among their own kind, the Wamphyri! The mutant giant Fess Ferenc had been the last of them that I knew of, one of a handful who escaped alive from the battle at the Dweller’s Garden. Hah! Did I know of them? And so these people were the descendants of some ancient line of Ferenc supplicants, eh? Oh, a long time ago, I’ll grant you: two thousand years or more, and all of it long forgotten if not in its entirety. But still, it had given me pause …
