by Brian Lumley
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 the table 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 were they?
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 like lichens 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 up his 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 knowledge of our history, from Turgosheim’s humble beginnings to the present day, is unsurpassed. I give you the Seer Lord 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 …
III
“Two thousand years ago,” Maglore began without pause or 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 passes which lead to Sunside.
“Within the canyon stood a good many stacks and spires 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 felt the 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 lived out 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 its Szgany 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, and eventually 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 occupied, 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 an earlier 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 close at 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 leeches became 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 more Lords 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 an aggressive 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-huddling mansions 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 than any 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 were three 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 war with 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 from all 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 blood is the life, and in those early days of Turgosheim Szgany blood was rapidly running out!
“Eventually, common sense prevailed; the Lords called a Grand Truce; they gathered together and talked. And here, thirteen hundred years later, we may consider ourselves fortunate that among the hotheads were thinkers. 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 for obvious 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 to abide by them.
“Oh, there have been feuds, even wars between times, but never so wasteful, and never
so threatening to all of us. 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 too many 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 we go 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’s doctrines entirely, and let their parasites hold full sway. For they fear the stagnation of their leeches, which are the 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 regard to their reluctance to impregnate their women. For while our lustier Lords would doubtless relish such … such forays into Sunside, the seed of vampires breeds only vampires. 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? Well exactly, 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 was very 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 stood waiting 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 out of alien worlds!
“Eighteen years ago there was a war, then four years of peace when nothing of their thoughts reached out to me, and finally …
“… Finally, fourteen years ago, the time of the Light-in-the-West. Sensitive eyes detected it: like the glimmer of a white sun rising, but westwards; it cracked like dawn, and then was gone. But sensitive flesh recorded the 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 that time, 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 the great old Wamphyri magicians brought down a calamity on 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 and discover for ourselves, one way or the other …”
The Mage of Runemanse shrugged and scratched his chin; 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 cohorts sitting 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 could do 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. And after a pause in which the hall grew even quieter: “There are, however, other circumstances to which I would alert 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 Sunside have always been distributed evenly, fairly, and according 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 and manses, 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 being specific. Time now to be specific!” He looked at Wratha, directly, the glare of his eyes reaching out to her down the full length of the table. Glaring back at him, her guard slipped, and Maglore read in her mind a single word: 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 brothers Wran 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—or dog-like than ever, his feral eyes shifting this way and that but mainly watching Wratha. Lastly Vasagi the Suck: whose thoughts were usually strange as his countenance 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 weird warriors.
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 to them, bathing each in his turn in the red glare of his eyes. And now he spoke to the
m:
“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, accusations have been made which I, Vormulac, have investigated. First the matter of the titheling draw, its supposed ‘impartiality’. What? The draw impartial? Hah. And indeed the Lord Grigor of Gauntmanse has a right to feel dissatisfied at his poor get, from a system which for some time now has been manipulated!”
What?. The astonished, outraged thought blasted out as 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 he would doubtless demand a name or names.
And perhaps he had one already. For Canker Canison had 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 back into the room, staggering this way and that. “Such treachery!” 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: He has given a signal. Beyond the window, something waits.
But already, and apparently unperturbed, Vormulac was continuing. “Second,” (he once again held up his arms for quiet), “of the making of warriors beyond common requirements: why, I have it on good authority that just such monsters are waxing even now, in secret caverns in certain spires and manses!”
