by Brian Lumley
Accordingly, he made inquiry:
Who are you? Were you looking for me?
Harry Keogh? the new voice came up stronger. Thank God I’ve found you!
Do I know you? Harry was a little cautious.
In a way, said the other. We’ve met. Indeed, I tried to kill you!
Now Harry recognized him, and knew why he hadn’t made the connection earlier. It was simple: this was a voice he would normally associate with life — until now, anyway. It wasn’t, or at least it shouldn’t be, the voice of a dead man. Wellesley? he said. But… what happened?
You mean, why am I dead? Well, they put me through quite a lot, Harry. Not physical stuff, no, of course not, but lots of questioning — you know? Physical I could probably handle, but mental? The deeper they dug into me the more clearly I could see what a shit I’d been. It was all over for me. A long term to serve, no career to go back to, no real prospects. Well, it sounds hackneyed, I know, but the simple fact of it was that I was ‘a ruined man’. So… I hanged myself. See, they don’t offer you a gun anymore — the honourable solution, and all that rot — so I used a pair of leather bootlaces. I was half-afraid they’d snap, but they didn’t.
Harry found it hard to pity him. The man was a traitor after all. So what do you want from me? he said. Would you like me to say how sorry I am? Offer you a shoulder to cry on? Hey, I have lots of friends among the dead who didn’t try to kill me!
That’s not why I’m here, Harry, Wellesley told him. No, for I got what I deserved. I think we all do. I came to say I’m sorry, that’s all. To apologize that I wasn’t stronger.
Harry gave a snort. Oh, wow! he said. Gee, Harry, I’m sorry I wasn’t stronger. Hey, if I had been I would’ve fucking killed you!
Wellesley sighed. Well, it was worth a try. I’m sorry I bothered you. It’s just that when I killed myself, I didn’t know my hard times were only just beginning. He began to withdraw.
What’s that? Harry held him. Your hard times? Then he saw what the other meant. The dead don’t want to know you, right?
Wellesley shrugged. He was a beaten man. Something like that. But it’s like I said: we get what we deserve. I’m sorry I bothered you, Harry.
No, wait… Harry had an idea. Listen, what would you say to a chance to square it with me? And with the dead in general?
Is there a way? (Sudden hope in Wellesley’s voice.)
There could be. It all depends.
Just name it.
You had this negative sort of talent, right?
That’s right. Nobody could see into my mind. But… as you can see, it died with me.
Harry shook his head. Maybe it didn’t. You see, what we’re doing now isn’t the same. It isn’t telepathy but deadspeak. You control it yourself. You don’t have to speak to me if you don’t want to. That other thing you had was uncontrollable. You didn’t even know it was there. If someone hadn’t noticed it — hadn’t discovered that your mind was a stone wall — you still wouldn’t know you’d ever had it. Am I right?
I suppose you are. But what are you getting at?
I’m not sure, said Harry. I’m not even sure if it’s possible. But it would be one hell of a bonus if I had that talent of yours!
Well, obviously it would, Wellesley answered. But as you’ve just pointed out, it wasn’t a talent. It was some kind of negative charge. It was there all the time, working on its own, without my knowledge or assistance.
Maybe so, but somewhere in your mind there’s the mechanism that governed it. I’d just like to see how it works, that’s all. Then, if I could sort of imitate it, learn how to switch it on and off at will…
You want to have a look inside my mind? Are you saying there’s a way you can do that?
Maybe there is, said Harry, with your help. And maybe that’s why no one else ever could: because you just kept them out… Now tell me, did you ever read my file?
Of course, Wellesley gave a wry chuckle. At the time I thought it was fantastic. I remember one of the espers seeing your file lying on my desk, and telling me: ‘I wouldn’t be caught dead speaking to that guy!’
That’s not at all bad! Harry laughed. But he was serious again in a moment. And did you read about Dragosani, and how he stole Max Batu’s evil eye?
That, too, Wellesley answered. But he cut it out of his heart, read it in his guts, tasted it in his blood.
Yes, he did, Harry nodded, but it doesn’t have to be that way. You see, that’s always been the difference between me and Dragosani’s sort. It’s the difference between a necromancer and a Necroscope. He would take what he wanted by force. He would torture for it. But me, I only ask.
Anything I have, I give it willingly, Wellesley told him.
Again Harry nodded. Well, that will go a long way with the dead, he said.
So how will you do it? Wellesley was eager now.
Actually, said Harry, it’s you who has to do it.
Really? So tell me how.
Just let your mind go blank and invite me in, Harry answered. Just relax like I was a hypnotist putting you to sleep, and say to me: enter of your own free will.
As easily as that?
The first part, anyway, said Harry.
Very well, Wellesley was committed. So let’s try it…
15. Thracians — Undead in the Med — Szgany
Later, Möbius came calling:
Harry? Listen, my boy, I’m sorry I’ve been so long. But those mental doors of yours were giving me real problems. However, and as you well know, the more difficult a problem is, the more surely it fascinates me. So, I’ve been in conference with a few friends, and between us we’ve decided it’s a new maths.
What is? Harry was bewildered. And what friends?
The doors in your mind are sealed shut with numbers! Möbius explained. But they’re written as symbols, like a sort of algebra. And what they amount to is the most complicated simultaneous equation you could possibly imagine.
Go on.
Well, I could never hope to solve it on my own — not unless I cared to spend the next hundred years on it! For you see, it’s the sort of problem which may only be resolved through trial and error. So ever since I left you I’ve been looking up certain colleagues and passing it on to them.
Colleagues?
Möbius sighed. Harry, there were others before me. And some of them were a very long time before me. But as you of all people know, they haven’t simply gone away. They’re still there, doing in death what they did in life. So I’ve passed parts of the problem on to them. And let me tell you, that was no simple matter! Mercifully, however, they had all heard of you, and to my delight they welcomed me as a colleague, however junior.
You, junior?
In the company of such as Aristotle, Ptolemy, Copernicus, Kepler, Galilei, Sir Isaac Newton, Ole Christensen Roemer… even I am a junior, yes. And Einstein a mere sprout!
Harry’s thoughts whirled. But weren’t they mainly astronomers?
And philosophers, mathematicians and many other things, said Möbius. The sciences interlace and interact, Harry. So as you can see, I’ve been busy. But through all of this there was one man I would have liked to approach and didn’t dare. And do you know, he came looking for me! It seems he was affronted that he’d been left out!
So who is he? Harry was fascinated.
Pythagoras!
Harry was stunned. Still here?
And still the Great Mystic, and still insisting that God is the ultimate equation… But here Möbius grew very quiet. And the trouble is, I’m not so sure any more that he’s wrong.
Still Harry was astonished. Pythagoras, on my case? My mother told me there were a lot of people willing to help me. But Pythagoras?
Möbius snapped out of his musing. Hmm? Yes, oh yes!
But… does he have the time for it? I mean, aren’t there more pressing — ?
No, Möbius cut him short, for him this is of the ultimate importance. Don’t you realize who Pythagoras was and what he d
id? Why, in the 6th Century b.c. he had already anticipated the philosophy of numbers! He was the principal advocate of the theory that Number is the essence of all things, the metaphysical principle of rational order in the universe. What’s more, his leading theological doctrine was metempsychosis!
Lost, Harry could only shake his head. And that has something to do with me?
Again Möbius’s sigh. My boy, you’re not listening. No, you are, you are! It’s your damned innumeracy which makes you blind to what I’m saying! It has everything to do with you. For after two and a half millennia, you are living proof of everything Pythagoras advocated. You, Harry: the one flesh and blood man in all the world who ever imposed his metaphysical mind on the physical universe!
Harry tried to grasp what Möbius had said but it wouldn’t stand still for him. It was his innumeracy getting in the way. So… I’m going to be OK, right?
We’re going to break down those doors, Harry, yes. Given time, of course.
How much time?
But here Möbius could only shrug. Hours, days, weeks. We have no way of knowing.
Weeks doesn’t cut it, Harry told him. Neither does days. Hours sounds good to me.
Well, we’re trying, Harry. We’re trying…
In the heights over Halmagiu, close to the ruins of his castle, Janos Ferenczy, bloodson of Faethor, ranted and raved. He had brought Sandra and Ken Layard up onto the sloping crest of a wedge of rock that jutted out into space, a thousand feet above the sliding scree and the steep cliffs of the mountainside. The night winds themselves were disturbed by Janos’s passion; they blustered around the high rock, threatening to tear the three loose and hurl them down.
‘Be quiet!’ he threatened the very elements. ‘Be still!’ And as the winds subsided, there where the clouds scudded like things afraid across the face of the moon, so the enraged vampire turned on his thralls.
‘You.’ He drew Layard close, gathered up the skin at the back of his neck like a mother cat holds its kitten, thrust him towards the edge of the sheer drop. ‘I have broken your bones once. And must I do it again? Now tell me: where is he? Where — is — Harry — Keogh?’
Layard wriggled in his grasp, pointed to the northwest. ‘He was there, I swear it! Less than a hundred miles, less than an hour ago. I sensed him there. He was… strong, even a beacon! But now there is nothing.’
‘Nothing?’ Janos hissed, turning Layard’s face towards his own. ‘And am I a fool? You were a talented man, a locator, but as a vampire your powers are immeasurably improved. If it can be found, then you can find it. So how can you tell me you’ve lost him? How can he be there, and then no longer there? Does he come on, even through the night? Is he somewhere between? Speak? And he gave the other a bone-jarring shake.
‘He was there!’ Layard shrieked. ‘I felt him there, alone, in one place, probably settled in for the night. I know he was there. I found him, swept over him and back, but I didn’t dare linger on him for fear he’d follow me back to you. Only ask the girl. She’ll tell you it’s true!’
‘You — are — in — leagued Janos hurled him to his knees, then snatched at Sandra’s gauzy shift and tore it from her. She cringed naked under the moon and tried to cover herself, her eyes yellow in the pale oval of her skull. But in another moment she drew herself upright. Janos had already done his worst; against horror that numbs, flesh has no feeling.
‘He’s speaking the truth,’ she said. ‘I couldn’t enter the Necroscope’s mind in case he entered mine, and through me yours. But when I sensed him asleep, then I thought I might risk a glimpse. I tried and… he was no longer there. Or if he was, then his mind was closed.’
Janos looked at her for long moments, let his scarlet gaze burn on her and penetrate, until he was sure she’d spoken only the truth. Then -
‘And so he is coming,’ he growled. ‘Well, and that was what I wanted.’
‘Wanted?’ Sandra smiled at him, perhaps a little too knowingly. ‘Past tense? But no longer, eh, Janos?’
He scowled at her, caught her shoulder, forced her down beside Layard. Then he turned his face to the northwest and held his arms out to the night. ‘I lay me down a mist in the valleys,’ he intoned. ‘I invoke the lungs of the earth to breathe for me, and send up their reek into the air, to make his path obscure. I call on my familiars to seek him out and make his labours known to me, and to the very rocks of the mountains that they shall defy him.’
‘And these things will stop him?’ Sandra tried desperately hard to control her vampire scorn.
Janos turned his crimson gaze on her and she saw that his nose had flattened down and become convoluted, like the snout of a bat, and that his skull and jaws had lengthened wolfishly. ‘I don’t know,’ he finally answered her, his awful voice vibrating on her nerve-endings. ‘But if they don’t, then be sure I know what will!’
With three vampire thralls (caretakers, who looked after his pile for him in his absence and guarded its secrets) Janos went down into forgotten bowels of earth and nightmare, to an all but abandoned place. There he used his necromantic skills to call up a Thracian lady from her ashes. He chained her naked to a wall and called up her husband, a warrior chief of massive proportions, who was a giant even now and must have been considered a Goliath in his day. Both of these Janos had had up before, for various reasons, but now his purpose was entirely different. He had given up tomb-looting some five hundred years ago, and his appetite for torture and necrophilia had grown jaded in that same distant era. While still the Thracian warrior stumbled about dazed and disorientated, crying out in the reek and the purple smoke of his reanimation, Janos had him chained and dragged before his lady. At sight of her he became calm in a moment; tears formed in his eyes and trickled down the leathery, bearded, pockmarked jowls of his face.
‘Bodrogk,’ Janos spoke to him in an approximation of his own tongue, ‘and so you recognize this wife of yours, eh? But do you see how I’ve cared for her salts? She comes up as perfectly fleshed as in life — not like yourself, all scarred and burned, and pocked from the loss of your materials. Perhaps I should be more careful how I gather up your ashes, as I am with hers, when once more I send you down into your jar. Ah, but as you must know, she has been of more use to me than you. For where you could only give me gold, she gave me — ‘
‘ — You are a dog!’ the other shut him off, his voice cracking like boulders breaking. Leaning forward in his chains, he strained to reach his tormentor.
Janos laughed as his thralls fought hard to keep Bodrogk from breaking loose. But then he stopped laughing and held out a glass jug for the other to see. And: ‘Now be still and listen to me,’ he commanded, harsh-voiced. ‘As you see, this favourite wife of yours is near-perfect. How long she remains so is entirely up to you. She is unchanged from a time two thousand years ago, and will go on the same for as long as I will it — and not a moment longer.’
While he talked his creatures made fast Bodrogk’s chains to staples in the wall. Now they stood back from him. ‘Observe,’ said Janos. He took a glass stem and dipped it in the liquid in the jug, then quickly splashed droplets across the huge Thracian’s chest.
Bodrogk looked down at himself; his mouth fell open and his eyes started out as smoke curled up from the matted hair of his chest where the acid had touched him; he cried out and shook himself in his chains, then crumpled to his knees in the agony of his torture. And the acid ate into him until his flesh melted and ran in thin rivulets, red and yellow, all down his quivering thighs.
His wife, the last of the six wives he’d had in life, cried out to Janos that he spare Bodrogk this torture. And weeping, she too collapsed in her chains. At last her husband struggled to his feet, the orbits of his eyes red with agony and hatred where he gazed at Janos. ‘I know that she is dead,’ he said, ‘even as I am dead, and that you are a ghoul and a necromancer. But it seems that even in death there is shame, torment and pain. Therefore, to spare her any more of that, ask what you will of me. If I know the answer I
will tell it to you. If I can perform the deed, it shall be done.’
‘Good!’ Janos grunted. ‘I have six of your men in their burial urns, where they lie as salts, ashes, dust. Now I shall spill them out of their lekythoi and have them up. They will be my guard, and you their Captain.’
‘More flesh to torture?’ Bodrogk’s growl was a rumble.
‘What?’ Janos put on a pained expression. ‘But you should be grateful! These were your warrior comrades in an age when you battled side by side. Aye, and perhaps you shall again. For when my enemy comes against me, I can’t be sure that he’ll come alone. Why, I even have your armour, with which you decked yourself all those years agone, and which was buried with you. So you see, you shall be the warrior again. And again I say to you, you should be grateful. Now I call these others up, and I call upon you, Bodrogk, to control them. Your wife stays here. Only let one treacherous Thracian hand rise against me… and she suffers.’
‘Janos,’ Bodrogk continued to gaze at him, ‘I will do all you ask of me. But for all that I was a warrior in life, I was a fair man, too. It is that fairness which prompts me to advise you now: keep well the upper hand. Oh, I know you are a vampire and strong, but I also know my own strength, which is great. If you did not have Sofia there, in chains, then for all your acid I would break you into many pieces. She alone stays my hand.’
Janos laughed like a great baying hound. ‘That time shall never come,’ he said. ‘But I too shall be fair: when this is done, and done to my liking, then I shall put you both down, and mingle your dust, and scatter it to the winds forever.’
“Then that must suffice,’ said the other.
‘So be it!’ said Janos…
As the sun painted a crack of gold on the eastern horizon, Harry Keogh slept on. But in the Aegean Sea off Rhodes Darcy Clarke and his team were aboard a slightly larger, faster boat than last time, and already passing Tilos to port where they forged west for Sirna. Watching the sea slip by like blue silk sliced by the scissors prow, Darcy again went over the plans they’d made last night and looked for loopholes in their logic.
