by Brian Lumley
But moods or none, he worked because he had to. Chosen men were trained in the use of alien arms (a good many weapons had been salvaged from the battle in the pass), and transported via the Mobius Continuum into the several camps of Traveller groups who could not bring themselves to trust or accept Nathan’s invitation. As support teams, these trained men would add firepower to Szgany determination, helping the loner parties to withstand whatever the coming night might have in store.
Through Grinner (now much improved, and eager to be rid of his dressings), Nathan was kept updated on affairs in the barrier mountains, on the boulder plains and Starside in general. Despite that it was sunup, there had been some movement: Devetaki had replaced the observation posts destroyed by Wran the Rage’s bombardiers, and she’d also
643
dispatched men and creatures into selected areas west of the great pass. Flying low over the plain of boulders, and safe in the constant shade of the mountains, they had established a number of camps in trog caverns behind the Starside foothills. It was all part of the continuing containment of Wratha in the last aerie, of course, but the Necro-scope was more concerned about the Gate; he worried about the proximity of the vampire camps to that all-important portal.
Finally he took Trask aside to tell him, ‘Ben, I don’t see how you can help any more. It might be a good idea to get you out of here while we still can. I can have Grinner send a wolf or two to check on movement near the Gate. Then, if the way is clear, I can get you, Zek, and the others as close as possible, and from then on you’re on your own.’
Trask nodded. ‘And you, Nathan? Won’t you be on your own, too? But we have two whole days, Sunside days, before we have to get back, before Turchin brings the weight of the mountains down on that place in Perchorsk. And the longer the better, if Zek and lan are to use the Romanian route.’
‘Two days less travelling time,’ Nathan answered. ‘Through the Gate, I mean … provided, of course, that the route to the Gate isn’t blocked.’
‘What, your way blocked?’ Trask cocked his head. ‘Are you joking?’
‘I can only get so close,’ Nathan reminded him. ‘But Devetaki’s creatures don’t suffer the same restrictions.’ Now, more than ever, the Necroscope was aware of the constant danger he was in; he knew that the Lords and Ladies were aware of him!
Trask shook his head. ‘We’ve talked about it and we’re all of the same mind. While you can use us, we want to stay. And by “we”, I do mean all of us. I’m including John Carling, Jim Bentley and Orson Sangster. They’re good men, and they can handle guns. They —’
‘— No.’ Nathan shook his head, cut Trask short. ‘Least of
all those three. They didn’t come of their … well, I hate to sound like a vampire, but they aren’t here “of their own free will”. They got caught up in things, that’s all. And now, well, they at least are leaving - and no argument.’
Trask set his jaw stubbornly. ‘Don’t think you’ll shake me and Zek that easily, or Chung and Goodly - or even Anna Marie, for that matter! We’re espers, and you need us. We were a team on Earth — our earth - when you helped us out with that problem in the Nightmare Zone, so we’ll continue to be a team here. We’re staying until we have to go!’
‘Even until it’s too late?’
‘If it comes to it, yes. But I don’t think it will. You’re Harry Keogh’s son, Nathan . ..’
‘Is that a recommendation? You put faith in that, do you? The Wamphyri killed him in the end.’ And again Nathan thought of just how close he, too, had come, and how recently. Simple carelessness. But on Sunside/Starside, that was all it took.
Zek was looking for them; she saw them where they stood at the camp perimeter, under mighty ironwoods, and came hurrying. She looked lovely as ever - but they saw that she held a hand to her temple, where the corners of her eyes were creased in a frown. David Chung was right behind her.
‘Nathan,’ she said, closing with the pair. ‘You are being watched!’
David Chung joined them, and said, ‘She’s right. I picked up a locating probe, one that I’d know anywhere. The last time I came up against him was west of the Urals, when we snatched Nathan from the Russians. It’s Alexei Yefros!’
Nathan nodded. ‘In thrall to Devetaki, yes. It hardly surprises me. We saw them together in the pass.’
Chung nodded. ‘But his talent is that much better now. He can switch it on and off like a light! I’ve fancied there was a locator at work for some time, but he’s been dodging me.’
‘He’s a vampire,’ Nathan pointed out the obvious. ‘Even as a,lowly thrall, his talent has been enhanced.’
644
645
Again Chung’s nod. ‘And you’re the one he’s on to. His probe is a carrier -‘
‘— For Devetaki!’ Zek finished it. And again her hand went to her temple. ‘She’s … powerful!’
‘Stop it!’ Nathan told her at once, reaching for her hand, dragging it from her face. ‘Don’t interfere with that one! Devetaki’s the leader of the Turgosheim army. And that speaks for itself. She’ll know it immediately if you break into her probe - and then she’ll try to hurt you!’ He had seen enough women hurt, and worse than hurt. Murdered, and worse than murdered. He looked around. ‘Where’s lan Goodly?’
They found Goodly; Nathan came straight to the point, and the precog agreed with him. The cavers are out of it.’ He was matter-of-fact about it. ‘I don’t see them here from now on.’
‘Is that all?’ Nathan asked. And Goodly frowned.
‘It’s all vague,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t firm up until it’s closer - closer in time, I mean. But I’m going with you to the Gate. Oh, and Grinner, too.’
‘You see that?’
‘Yes, and I’m ready.’ Which meant they were going now! Zek went off to tell Carling and the other cavers to get ready, and Nathan called for Grinner. The great wolf came, tongue lolling.
Why me? he wanted to know.
It’s foreseen, Nathan could only shrug.
Good! For I wanted to see that place again.
The Starside Gate?
Yes, but also the other place. The Between Place!
The Mdbius Continuum? Why?
To smell the directions!
Wolf mind-pictures were weird, full of scents and sensations, spacial and even temporal currents. But there was little or nothing of numbers in it, and whatever else it was, the Necroscope had neither a nose for it, nor the mental compass required to understand it. The thought did cross his mind, however, that the senses of a homing pigeon must
be somewhat similar to those of a wolf — minus the hunting instinct, of course.
Waiting for the cavers to get ready, Nathan made a quick jump to a spot just one hundred yards west of the glaring hemisphere Gate; he felt its strange repulsive forces acting on his door, which was beginning to warp even as he exited. But he was there for the merest moment — sufficient to scan the plains in all directions, and send tentative telepathic probes inwards to the barrier mountains and the great pass, and eastwards to the petrified lava camps of the Wamphyri before conjuring a second fragile door and getting out again.
He had detected the Wamphyri everywhere, but none of them close enough to cause any real concern. He knew, however, that things could change in very short order, so couldn’t delay the departure of the cavers a moment longer. Zek had fashioned a rope collar and lead for Grinner — who hated it! But it was the easiest way.
Nathan took the wolf’s- lead in one hand and guided Grinner and the triple-linked men, Carling, Bentley and Sangster, with Goodly bringing up the rear, through his entirely invisible door …
… To Starside.
The men were used to it now, if not Nathan’s nephew wolf. Coming out of the Mobius door almost at the run, John Carling and company went loping, with their packs bouncing, to the low crater wall, helped each other up, paused for a moment in the sighing white illumination of the Gate to look back. Its glare was such that the Necr
oscope and Goodly saw the three as dark silhouettes that waved, turned away … and were gone. They had their instructions: to tell Turchin and E-Branch that others could soon be coming through, both in Perchorsk and in Romania.
‘On their way home,’ Nathan sighed, and glanced at Goodly. But the precog was staggering, which wasn’t an after-effect of their brief Mobius trip! ‘What is it?’ Nathan was at once solicitous.
647
646
Goodly straightened up, steadied himself, shook his head. ‘It will keep,’ he said, ‘until we get back.’
Grinner had noticed nothing. He was still fascinated by the Gate, the fact that the three men had vanished within it. He stared at it with his ears pricked up, his head cocked curiously to one side. Gone, he said. To the world of my father’s father. Except… there are other ways than this!
Nathan was interested in that, but:
We can’t stay here any longer, he told the wolf. The One-Who-Scans will find me if we do, and the Wamphyri will know my business. That’s something I can do without.
Nathaaaaan! There were other voices invading his mind now; the voices of Thyre Ancients, speaking out from their tombs in the burning deserts. He knew the first of them at once: Tharkel the gardener, but excited as never before. Nathan, I was dreaming again, and . .. you were there!
Yes, he answered, I am here.
No, no! Tharkel shook his head. I mean, you were there -at the place of the fountain!
A fountain of light? The Starside Gate? Was that what this was all about? But before Nathan could ask or comment:
Necroscope! And this was Ethloi, equally excited. Forget about Tharkel’s fountain for the moment — unless it’s significant of a spring — for you are standing at the very source!
The source of what? (Nathan couldn’t stay here any longer, and his frustrations were mounting.)
Where you’re standing now - right now, at this very moment - is the shore of a lake! And at your feet, I see a sea of stars! And in their centre, a brilliant sunburst!
‘A sunburst?’ Nathan repeated him out loud. ‘A lake? A sea of stars?’
And: ‘Yes,’ said Goodly, reeling again.
The answers could be sought later; right now, Nathan had to get his charges out of here. Conjuring a door, he led man and wolf through it and made to return to Sunside. But on the way:
There, Uncle! Grinner’s telepathic voice was a hushed whimper.
What now? Nathan asked.
Don’t you feel them? The directions?
Directions to where?
To … other places. But one place especially. Your father’s world, Nathan - the world of Harry Dwellersire!
It might make sense at that. For after all, Grinner was a child of The Dweller; he and Blaze, and poor Dock, too. And The Dweller had travelled between worlds without using the Gates at Perchorsk and Radujevac. Indeed, there’d been no Gate at Perchorsk at that time, and the one underground in Romania was still undiscovered.
So, had Grinner inherited something of his werewolf father’s metaphysical talents, or was it simply his wolf’s or dog’s sense of … well, direction? Or a combination of both? Nathan knew that he had to look into it, but he would drop lan Goodly off first. He did so, then at once returned with Grinner into the Mobius Continuum.
But it was a fruitless exercise. Grinner had something of his father in him, certainly, but he didn’t have his metaphysical maths and wolf numbers just weren’t sufficient. I can feel the way, he growled in Nathan’s mind, but I don’t know … how to go there! There is no way to walk, to run. No way to smell the trail. No spoor to follow. 1 am lost.. . here.
Nathan tried scanning Grinner’s mind more deeply, his sensations rather than his thoughts, but it didn’t work out. There was a peculiar feeling of sorrow or anxiety for the loss of the mountains, the moon and stars, the trees of the timberline, the rearing crags and moon-silvered passes: namely, all of the familiar points of reference by virtue of which a wolf of the wild is a wolf - and also an awareness that was totally unwolf-like - but never a hint of the real direction of parallel Earth.
You can’t show me the way?
But I can! Grinner protested. It’s … there! (It was as if he pointed, but there was nothing there, just the emptiness of
649
648
the Continuum.) Except . .. there’s no way to get to it! Now his anxiety and discomfort were such that he was beginning to pant and whine. Nathan knew the other’s frustration and sensed there was no answer for it, not yet at least. Regretfully, but unwilling to prolong Grinner’s distress, he conveyed him back to the camp. Where Goodly was waiting.
Giving Grinner into the hands of Misha, to care for him, Nathan asked the precog, ‘What was it all about? I mean, what was it you felt, back there on Starside?’
‘What did you feel?’ Goodly countered.
‘Are you so afraid of the future that you can’t answer a simple question?’ Nathan’s frustrations were starting to spill over.
‘Yes,’ Goodly answered. ‘Sometimes I am. It’s not knowing what might come about that worries me, it’s understanding it.’
Nathan had heard all this before. ‘But you did see something of the future?’
‘I saw, and felt… something strange.’
‘The world turning? The wild rush of water, like a river between the worlds? Gardens in the desert?’
‘All of those things, yes. Yet nothing definite. The only sure thing is this: you won’t be moving any more of us back to the Gate. Not until the end, anyway.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘Because I saw it, and it’s the only thing I know for certain. At the end, we’re all in it together.’ Goodly’s eyes had a faraway look; they were hazy as a river with the morning sun on it, unblinking, as if gazing on the unknown and unknowable.
‘When?’ The Necroscope could feel the short hairs rising at the back of his neck.
‘Soon,’ said Goodly.
‘Was it dark or light, day or night?’
‘It was night,’ Goodly answered with a sigh. ‘And yet it was … it was morning, too!’ His eyes cleared and he shook his head. ‘Nathan,’ he said, when he could properly focus again. ‘I know
this is difficult for you, but you’ll just have to believe me when I tell you that… that you really shouldn’t fool with the future.’
Now it was Nathan’s turn to be stubborn. ‘I’m not going to call you a coward,’ he said, ‘but there are some things we have to know. And I’ve been putting it off just like you, and for the same reason.’
Tutting it off?’
‘What we can’t put off,’ the Necroscope answered, ‘not any more. For it’s creeping up on us even now. But me, I believe in forewarned, forearmed. You can help me — you’re about the only one who can help me - or you can step aside. It’s up to you.’
‘You’ll … go there?’ The cadaverous, gaunt-faced precog backed off a pace.
‘And I’d like you to go with me.’ Nathan nodded. ‘I don’t know what I’ll see, or even if I’ll understand it. But you and the future, well, there’s something between you. So maybe —’
‘—I … don’t know,’ said Goodly. ‘And anyway, what good will it do? You can’t materialize there, can’t “experience” it. You can only travel through it!’
‘As far as it goes, yes.’ Again, Nathan’s nod; but a curt one this time, and decisive. The meaning was obvious.
‘And if it doesn’t go … far?’
Then I’ll know it’s all for nothing anyway! But it won’t matter, for I’ll have nothing to lose.’
Goodly relaxed, shrugged, said, Then I’ll go with you.’ And he sighed, adding, ‘You don’t know how much of a temptation it’s been, or how hard I’ve had to fight not to ask you!’
Nathan was astonished. ‘What? But aren’t you the one who always -?’
‘- Yes!’ Goodly cut him short. ‘Even so, we have a saying: “better the devil you know”. And if I had been able t
o go there, instead of having to wait for it to come to me …’
They both felt something of trepidation then, as the Necroscope made ready to conjure a door. Which was when Ben Trask came over. ‘What’s happening?’ he asked conver-
651
650
sationally, his face wide open . .. until he saw their looks and knew that something really was happening.
‘We’re going to have a look at something,’ Nathan answered before Goodly could speak. But glancing from man to man, Trask knew the truth of it anyway.
‘Is it wise?’ he said.
‘No.’ They both shook their heads. And Nathan added, ‘But we have to know.’ And the fact of it was, Trask wanted to know too .. .
In the Continuum, Goodly had second thoughts, knew a moment’s panic when he felt motion and knew that Nathan was heading for a future-time door. It was strange; in ordinary space-time he could sense the future; but here, so close to it, he couldn’t! Because this place was the future . .. the present, too … and the past. A junction of all times and places.
And he wanted to know, How do we get back?
We have blue life-threads, in effect life-lines. They are us! When we’ve seen what we want to see - if there’s anything to see - we follow them back.
You … you can do that?
Yes, I fee) that 1 can. Else 1 wouldn’t go.
And … I can do it?
Just keep a good hold on me, Nathan told him, where they stood framed in the blue light from the threshold of the door. And Jook … there it is, all of it, going on forever. All we have to do is find out how long we go on!
Despite that the light from the door was blue, it was warm. Not physically warm, just .. . warm. And Goodly knew why. It was the light of human life! For even as he stood or floated there in the metaphysical void, a blue thread of light - like a living neon filament, a weird ectoplas-mic extension of himself - issued endlessly out of him, and another out of Nathan, seeming to unwind indefinitely into the future.
