by Brian Lumley
… Aye (he thought gloomily), and two-thirds of them too hungry, too hot-blooded, too loaded-down with armour-plate and all manner of fearsome but unwieldy appendages, too! Chitin-plated gouges, grapples, retractable claws … Huh!
Just how unwieldy had been seen at that first landing.
Wratha’s choice of a refuelling stop had been a flat summit, a mainly sheer-sided plateau where the last of the peaks and rockpiles tumbled to the smoking ochre desert which formed a skirt around the Great Red Waste. For her purposes the place had been ideal, because she’d landed less than two dozen creatures in all. But for Vormulac … a disaster! For he was attempting to land one hundred and seventy, and there simply wasn’t room.
There might have been space enough, if the generals had proceeded in an orderly fashion. But as the Lords at the rear of the column -had seen those at the front landing, so it had become apparent that the choicest of the laid-up provisions would go to the first down. In all likelihood, the last down would get nothing at all! And between here and Olden Starside in the unknown west - if that alleged Land of Plenty existed - there was nothing but the Great Red Waste; neither’food of any sort, nor drink, nor any sustenance at all other than what they carried. Which meant the beasts, of cours^ … and the men themselves.
Then, breaking ranks, all of the Lords and Ladies alike had vied to be first in line for food after Vormulac. And in the ensuing melee … the warrior-Lord himself had been fortunate not to get run off the edge of the plateau!
What a mess!
It should have been orderly, yes - but the Wamphyri are greedy and territorial; each man or woman for him- or herself, and to hell with the hindermost! They had practised rattling their gauntlets, aye, and parading their creatures,
the issue of their vats, but knew nothing of co-operation. Also, a good many of them were rivals; there were old feuds to be settled, and old scars still itching. Why, they would never have come together at all, if not for Vormulac’s crusade. And what with all the jostling, the jibes and the taunting . .. the suddenly electric tension . .. the throb of hot blood … nerves balanced on a knife-edge … tempers fraying!
Flyers tilting this way and that, their vampire riders cursing, shouting, hauling on the reins; all desperate to discover a patch of dust in which to flop down. Warriors accidentally colliding as they made their approach runs, then doing it again, but deliberately, as finally the tempers -of men and beasts both — shattered into shards! Wamphyri!
And in the midst of the melee, the first bloody scuffle; then two, three … an uproar! While on the rim of the rock, many of the thralls, lieutenants, flyers and warriors who were already down, found themselves pushed into space as a massive tug-o’-war over the provisions milled to and fro, this way and that. The plateau was a high one; some who fell from the rim (those of them skilled in metamorphosis) had time to form airfoil shapes and save themselves. Most of the flyers survived, of course, and several of the warriors; but others injured in the fighting simply plunged to the scree and boulder bottoms, where for them the crusade came to an abrupt end . ..
Finally the dust had settled, and Vormulac stamped here and there, shouting, clouting, browbeating the rest into submission and demanding the presence of the idiot planner whose idea it had been to refuel here, en masse. That task had gone to Zestos Kalkas, a lesser Lord who now appeared to be absent. There was a man of his, however (Gaul Kalksman, a minor lieutenant), doing his utmost to look fierce as he stepped forward in answer to Vormulac’s call. Then it had come out how Zestos and his senior lieutenants had been swept from the rim; Gaul had witnessed it with his own eyes, which now were nervous, wary.
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‘Huh/ Then it appears you’ve ascended,’ Lord Unsleep had told him without further ado.
‘But… perhaps my Lord Kalkas is alive down there!’
‘He might have been alive up here,’ Vormulac had at once growled. ‘But not for long! For if he were alive, I would bind him in chains myself and hurl him from the rim! The fool!’ And after a moment’s thought: ‘I have a suggestion …’
‘Yes, my Lord?’
Take a flyer, descend, find Zestos. Cut out his parasite and accept its egg.’
At that, Gaul’s feral eyes had seemed to light with a red internal fire, pre-empting his actual ascension. ‘Yes, my Lord. Indeed!’
‘And listen,’ Vormulac had told him. ‘You’re lucky. You’re one of his and I should kill you, too, but I need a man to lead his contingent - what’s left of it!’
‘Yes, my Lord.’ With which, Gaul Kalksman (Kalkson, now) had scurried off to find a flyer .. .
But at that, it hadn’t worked out too badly. Three flyers and six warriors lost over the edge, four more of each damaged on landing, three Lords and some seven lieutenants either killed accidentally or slain in the fighting, along with perhaps fifteen thralls. As for those injured in the fray: they had been put to death, and so became part and parcel of the provisions they’d fought over. It seemed only right.
By then the sun had been well down; the hurtling moon was up; the refuelling had been attended to. And no time to spare, for no man knew how wide was the Great Red Waste, a hundred or a thousand, or five thousand miles. But all knew how long was sundown. Morning must not find them in flight, but flown over the wastelands and landed in the west. Then:
‘We take off in order!’ Vormulac had shouted for everyone to hear. ‘Once up, spread out, make room. The sky is wide. But keep the same ceiling. I go first, and the rest follow on. Fainthearts .. . may fall out now, go back to Turgosheim,
keep old Maglore company. The blood we seek is only for the strong. You Lords are responsible for your men, as they are for their beasts, within your own contingents. During the journey, any who are lost through weakness .. . are lost. Make good use of them before surrendering their scraps to the Great Red Waste. We go.’
With which, he’d lifted off on his flyer, found a thermal and risen up until a band of orange light cracked the southern horizon. So much for altitude; any higher and they would catch up with the sun, and it with them!
So Vormulac had headed west, while behind him the whorl of his army had straightened itself out like the coils of some strange aerial snake. And before too long, the stench of acid vapours had come drifting up from the Great Red Waste …
Vormulac couldn’t know it, but despite all of Wratha the Risen’s advantages three years earlier, she too had experienced difficulties. Canker’s warrior had been the most heavily armoured of her party’s constructs, and it had used up a deal of energy and suffered some small damage in rescuing Wratha and the others from melancholy Vormspire: the landing, the fighting, the relaunching. But out over the Great Red Waste, the thing had paid the price in full.
Its loss had scarcely been mourned (well, with the possible exception of the dog-Lord himself, and then not for very long); its vital fluids and flesh had served to fuel the rest of them on their way.
Likewise with Vormulac’s army. For, less than eight hours after setting out, Devetaki Skullguise had drawn up alongside and called in his mind: Vormulac, it appears there’s a small problem. A creature of mine is nearing exhaustion. Perhaps it was injured in all that huffing and puffing at the plateau. I thought it prudent to let it fall behind a little and so conserve its energy. What would you have me do?
Devetaki had been wearing her scowling half-mask, ample evidence of her displeasure. But there had been nothing for
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it except the obvious answer: Are any of your other constructs in need of sustenance, Lady? If so, bring them up front here. If not, then as you slip back to the weak one, be so good as to pass on the word .. .
Devetaki had understood him well enough: since her warrior was doomed, best to let the others make use of it. And as she’d reined back to let the various Lords and Ladies pass her by, so she had informed them: I’ll be sending a weary creature up front; doubtless the extra effort will finally exhaust him. If
any of your warriors would benefit from a good meal … you are welcome. Never let it be said that the mistress of Masquemanse is mean.
And falling to the rear, she had ordered her tired beast to speed for the front, for: We shall be landing soon, when for you there’ll be tidbits galore! Propulsors throbbing, the thing had immediately spurted ahead … to its doom. For as the last of its propulsive gases were burned, several larger warriors fell to and in short order incapacitated, separated and finally devoured it. Only a well-gnawed skeleton and half a dozen sections of blue-glinting carapace had been left to go tumbling into the acid reek of the wastelands …
It was a scene which would be repeated many times, until, towards the end, even healthy creatures would be sacrificed in order that the rest might survive. A great many warriors, aye, so that now only thirty-seven were left. Flyers had been lost, too. Weary from inhaling the reek, they had choked, stiffened, gone spiralling into a bubbling red oblivion; and nothing for it but that their riders go with them, lieutenants and common vampire thralls alike.
But as for the rest, survive they had; for a night that seemed an eternity yet felt, paradoxically, too short by far. The Lords had food in their saddlebags, which they devoured. They had water in skins, which they drank. And when these had been used up, they unplugged cartilage stoppers in the knuckled spines of their flyers, to sip sparingly on vital fluids …
Like the Lady Wratha’s party before them, some had slept while others maintained the course …
The stars had been like foggy ice-chips on high, in the poisonous vapours rising from the open sore of the Great Red Waste . ..
Vormulac had despaired, if only to himself …
Far, faint cries had come drifting up out of the fetid fog -like the wailing of souls in hell - as even more exhausted constructs descended to the red-smouldering death of the wastelands .. .
But as the first crack of hazy golden light appeared on the southern horizon, so Lord Unsleep had spied ahead a rising moon all bitten in half, as if by some cosmic monster. And despite that his view was obscured by fading fumes, he knew it was no monster gnawing at the moon but the spires of distant mountains. The barrier mountains of Olden Starside!
And straightening in his saddle, he’d sent back: We’ve done it! The worst is over! We’ve crossed the Great Red Waste! Now spare your creatures and glide, for we need to lose height. No need to worry; these poisonous fumes are thinning, and there’s only the sun to fear now.
‘Only’ the sun! But Lord Unsleep had known that his sky-snake’s tail was many a mile long, and he’d wondered if they would all make it…
Not all of them had.
Many hours later, alighting in the shade of the barrier mountains, Vormulac had climbed a crag to a vantage point from which to gaze east and watch them come in. And peering through eyes still sore from the reek of the wastelands, he had seen a golden stain spreading on the higher peaks, and had known that a fan of deadly light was even now lowering itself as the sun commenced its tortuous climb up over Sunside’s rim.
He actually watched while that fan swept lower and lower, and saw its beams dispersing the mists over the plains between the mountains and the rough red desert. But the mists were not all that those rays would disperse. The
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men and beasts at the very tip of the sky-snake’s tail didn’t stand a chance. They were weary (unto death?); the flyers were exhausted and the warriors depleted of gases and substance both.
Mainly they were drifting in, on membrane wings that no longer had any lift in them, which threatened to collapse at any moment; or suspended from fluttering, half-empty buoyancy-bladders, whose essence had been drained off to fuel their coughing, sputtering propulsors. They knew they should lose altitude, but in fact were fighting gravity. For, once down, there’d be no getting up again, just a series of inevitable crashes in the rusty red earth.
Forming the very tip of the tail, four men and flyers had herded a small knot of forsaken warriors from as many different contingents. The latter had been too tired even to squabble. Of these dozen men and creatures, the very last pair - being also the highest - had been first to succumb. Yellowed by sunlight, then browned, blackened and incinerated to smoke and smoulder, the scorched debris that once was a flyer and rider had drifted to ochre earth. Then it had been the turn of a warrior; its gas-bladders exploding, mantle bursting into flames, armoured body plummeting like a stone to shattering extinction. And finally a seething of smoke in the brightening sky, even an explosion or two, as an unrelenting sun caught up with the rest of them at a stroke.
Vormulac had felt no remorse, only annoyance that his army was so depleted …
They had harboured in trog caverns behind the foothills. Blood of the submen wasn’t much to their liking, but beggars can’t be choosers. The warriors weren’t fussy, and the flyers were happy to subsist on lichens licked from the rocks. Rest was what they had needed most. Only Black Boris, who back in Turgosheim kept trog mistresses, had seemed happy with the way things were working out. Having taken a firm young female alive, Boris was soon in fine fettle; he had food and fanny all in one.
Exhausted beasts had been seen to as best possible and given shelter in shallow caves; thralls, too. Had circumstances been different, common vampire thralls such as these might well have expected to become one with the provisioning. A good many lieutenants had died, however, and others had ascended to the seats of lost Lords. These thralls were lucky: they would replace dead or elevated lieutenants. Some had even been ‘promoted’ that same day; their Lords had taken small measures of sustenance from them, in return transfusing copious doses of their own vampire essence. Thus, a dual purpose was served.
And thus the seemingly interminable day had crept by in the dreary dank of trog caverns and the life-preserving shade of the rearing barrier mountains …
All of these things had been ‘seen’, ‘felt’, or ‘experienced’ by the Seer-Lord Maglore in his talisman shewstone in Rune-manse. These and others: such as the onset of night, and Vormulac’s mounting-up and departure from the trog territories to journey still farther west; his soaring climb on bitter night thermals into the heights, from which to gaze down on a hitherto unknown Sunside — unknown to Lord Unsleep, at any rate. The way his previously repressed Wamphyri senses came awake! How he’d smelled strong Szgany flesh down there in the dark and the silence: the very materiel and even the ordnance of the bloodwar to come.
But there was something that Maglore had not seen, which Vormulac himself had never suspected. It was simply this: that one of two sentinel Desmodus bats, Wratha’s familiars, had witnessed the arrival of the aerial army out of Turgosheim.
The Lady had positioned them some two hundred and fifteen miles apart: one at the very tip of the range, the other in the heights where the mountains burgeoned into a true barrier. The first creature had seen Vormulac’s arrival, yes, but hastening west with its warning had failed to see the party of trogs out hunting in the grey twilight before the
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dawn. And it had only become aware of their nets, hurled skywards into its flitting path, when it was far too late.
Perhaps something of its shrill, piercing cry - of fear and warning both — had crossed the many miles to its sentinel twin, but not enough to act upon; not until the warrior-Lord’s invading army became visible to it, too. Which was why Wratha got her warning late; for despite that her second creature had near-exhausted itself in the frenzy of its flight, still Vormulac was only hours behind when it alighted on the neck of the Lady’s flyer …
By now (having seen the warrior-Lord on his way again), Maglore the Mage was eager to scan Nathan once more. Withdrawing from Vormulac’s mind, he cast his probe again, but this time with a more youthful target in mind. And a more useful one? Possibly. As yet, Maglore had no great knowledge of the legendary western Sunside; perhaps by now his ‘window’ on that unknown world had settled down and was no longer doing … we
ll, whatever it was that he had been doing.
And Nathan so rapt upon what he was doing, that when Maglore oh so tentatively entered his mind he noticed nothing at all of his presence there …
It wasn’t that Lardis Lidesci was a normally vicious or vindictive man, but that he never missed an opportunity to glean even the smallest piece of information on the doings, the coming and goings, the evil works of the Wamphyri. It was one of his mechanisms for survival. And, like his father before him, Lardis was an excellent survivor.
Anna Marie English wasn’t able to watch, which was hardly surprising. Lardis gave her into the care of a Szgany woman to be taken into the Rock and instructed in its ways. These were also the ways of survival, of course. .Everything was survival with the Szgany Lidesci.
But Nathan, Trask, Chung and the three cavers accompanied Lardis and Andrei Romani, as first they examined and
questioned the Szgany survivors of the hand-to-hand fighting, then interrogated a badly injured lieutenant and several vampire thralls. Before that, however, there was the burning of the dead - alJ of the dead, Szgany and vampires alike. And not on any funeral pyre, but in a blazing pit: a warrior-trap that was already an inferno. Without ceremony, the bodies were wrapped in sacking and bundled into the flames. First, five of the Rock’s brave defenders, while many old friends looked on with lowered heads and recalled other, perhaps better times; then, after a barely decent interval, fourteen dead (or temporarily incapacitated) thralls; finally the grotesque remains of seven lieutenants. As they burned, a handful of Lardis’s men tossed resinous pine branches into the pit to fuel the fire.
But as the lieutenants’ bodies and pieces went into the flames, Lardis had been quick to beckon his men back from the edge. This was just a precautionary measure; the dead lieutenants had all been young men, ex-Szgany, vampirized and promoted within the last three years; it seemed unlikely that there would be much of undead Wamphyri monstrous-ness in them. Nor was there, but better safe than sorry. The flames consumed them without incident.. .
