Invaders

by Brian Lumley

  “As to Dramal’s surname prior to his long-term but inevitably lethal error, I have no knowledge. But I do know that his aerie, Dramstack—one of the most massive of all the stacks—was avoided generally as a pesthole, even in my time. Nathless, before Dramal’s leprosy began wearing on him—which is to say, for the duration of Malinari’s war—he shared his stack with a lesser ‘colleague,’ Lord Zaddok Zangastari, who had the topmost ramparts and the aerie’s penultimate level (called Zadscar, because it was his headquarters, and also because of its external figuration of slanting gouges) for his own. Not that Zaddok was in any way careless of his health, but this sharing was an expedience of war: since Dramstack (including Zadscar) stood close to Darkspire, Lord Szwart’s manse near the centre of the clump, it were better that two armies occupy Dramal’s vast aerie, thus presenting a powerful front across the dividing gulf and threatening Szwart’s forces with a partial siege at least.

  “But as for battle tactics … I cannot admit to any great authority. These things I mention were overheard and remembered from those occasions when Nephran’s war-council of three—himself, Szwart, and Vavara—met in whichever of their aeries to consider and order the ongoing hostilities. So let me not stray but get on with naming names:

  “After Dramal and Zaddok came Lord Belath, a young Lord who had just the one name, with no sire’s name and no cognomen. Perhaps there was some secret in his ancestry that he did not wish divulged. As for a descriptive name or device which might best characterize him—there were some who fancied him ‘Belath the Beast,’ though I’m certain that no one ever suggested it to his face. Need I say more?

  “But if Belath were beastly, then what of Lord Lesk, known as Lesk the Glut? For Lesk was a young berserker, only recently ascended, who was given to abandon himself as totally in battle as in his gluttony. Easily offended, he had even been known to take umbrage at his own personal warriors! If they were idle in answering his call, Lesk would work himself into a frenzy, challenge them to combat and beat them soundly … before returning them to their basics in his vats of metamorphism. And when his fury was in abeyance and his mood improved, then he would find time to rebuild them all over again. Thus while The Glut could never be reckoned one of the great schemers, he was most certainly a mighty engine of destruction.

  “Nor were the vampire Lords alone in their awful strength and monstrous habits; many of Starside’s Ladies were certainly their peers in malign intent, and a deal more devious and treacherous in their scheming. Vavara, who took sides with Malinari (we shall get to her, aye), was only one such; there were plenty of others who came close equals in malevolence. For example: Lady Jemma Freydaskith, of Hagspire.

  “But surely the name of her manse says it all! Jemma was a hag, and a lustier, more ancient, wicked and withered hag there never was! Similarly, and where the name of her aerie describes her nature, surely the Lady’s surname describes its origin. For there was only ever one Freyda among the Wamphyri, and that was Freyda Ferenc in the days of Shaitan the Unborn. Jemma Freydaskith knew the myths associated with the Lady’s name; she likewise associated them with her own peculiarities of habit—her idiosyncrasies?—and so claimed direct descent from that ancient line. Now normally this would be disputable; the Wamphyri were bad record-keepers; living so long (some of them), history was yesterday to them; they saw no point in looking back beyond their own immediate forebears. But Jemma was reputed to be more than seven hundred years old! Since no one else had memories of that primeval time, who was there to dispute her claim?

  “Anyway, while true histories, pedigrees, and lineages were scarcities among the Wamphyri, certain myths were such as would live forever. Just so, and the myths surrounding Freyda Ferenc—white the Lady herself was long gone into oblivion—were of that order. Obviously she had been a Ferenczy, which in itself loaned authenticity to Jemma’s claim, insofar as the Ferenczys were present in every Starside myth and legend (or at least the few that existed), even the most ancient of them. And what with Jemma’s—predilections? —it seemed certain that something of Freyda’s blood had found its way down the ages to her.

  “For Freyda Ferenc had been gross of face and form, a veritable troll, with the thick skin of a trog and the fangs of a warrior! Men, even the most powerful of Lords, shrank from her person (likewise from her smell: she never washed), who for her hideous pleasure was known to suffocate male and female thralls alike with her sex! Which of itself were surely quite enough to make her a legend in her own time and a mythical figure in mine … but there was more.

  “Freyda was that merciful rarity: a Mother of Vampires who, when she was ripe and in her final confinement, produced an hundred eggs, being so depleted during the which that she withered to a wisp and expired. But her spawn, all save one egg, was diseased and likewise died. The lone survivor fused with Bela Manculi, a Szgany thrall, and Bela became heir to Freydastack.

  “And so to the final proof of Jemma’s lineage, if such were needed: her sire had been Lord Bela Belari, or ‘Bela’s son’—an ancient in his own right—which might well make Jemma the great-granddaughter of Freyda Ferenc! Anyway, and having eschewed her father’s name, ‘Freydaskith’ was what Jemma had called herself for thirty-five thousand sunups, during which her lifestyle had more than adequately supported her claim to the noxious ancestral connection in which she revelled …

  “I have digressed! Yet by your silence I’m encouraged that I have interested you—

  “—But on the other hand I sense your impatience, too, so now let me get on with it—which I would, gladly, except there is one more Lord of that era who was or is worthy of mention …

  “Shaitan the Unborn, before his banishment, had spread his spawn far and wide in Starside. And in those mythic times there were even Lords who were more trog than man … which in itself speaks of Shaitan’s depravity. But there again, among the Wamphyri, miscegeny, incest, bestiality, and other perversions could scarcely be considered uncommon. And anyway, who am I to criticize? For Shaitan was after all the first of all, and no one to show him the way when he strayed or say him nay when he erred.

  “Thus, despite that he was gone, his line lived on. Blood-sons and a few -daughters bore Shaitan’s name and likeness down the march of years. And each and every one of them proud of the connection, even as he had been proud in his time, with a pride that knew no shame, for which ultimately he had paid the price. But his heirs cared nothing for that, cared only that they were spawn of the spawn of Shaitan the Unborn, the first Great Vampire, the one true Lord and sire of the Wamphyri.

  “And just as the first of his vampire progeny had borrowed from their illustrious forebear’s name in the earliest days of Starside mythology (Lords and Ladies such as Sheilar the Slut, Shaithar Shaitanson, Shailar the Hagridden, Shaithag the Harrower, Shang Shaitari, and Shaithos Longarm), so in my time his descendants—or perhaps I should say descendant, for by then there was only one of ‘pure’ or direct line of descent—continued this great vanity. And that one’s name was Shaithis.

  “Shaithis was a ‘young’ Lord then, little more than a hundred years of age. But of course he could be as young or as old as he willed it; simply a matter of rigidly controlled metamorphism. And Lord Shaithis—who took no other name or sigil, but deemed his titular connection a blazon and statement sufficient in its own right—willed himself forever young and handsome.

  “So he was, indeed beautiful, despite that he was as evil as any of the Great Vampires, and probably more so than most of them; and clever, too, skilled in controlling the lesser Lords, who were a rabble, adrift, and of little strategic consequence under Dramal Doombody. And not only men—Shaithis was also good with monsters. His vats bred many a nightmarish warrior.

  “These and other attributes of leadership were proven during the course of Malinari’s bloodwar of a thousand sunups, so that Shaithis rose even to the rank of Dramal himself, becoming his right-hand man and equal. And while many Lords were lost in that holocaust of blood, Shaithis went fr
om strength to strength, until everyone supposed he would be a Power one day …

  “And he probably was, but alas I was not there to see it. For my master and his allies were the losers. Malinari, Vavara, and Szwart, they were whelmed under, their great aeries sacked, their possessions looted, and their thralls and creatures converted.

  “Well, as was the way of it in those days, they were banished north to the Icelands forever. And I, Korath Mindsthrall, my master’s chief lieutenant

  . I went with them, of course.

  “As to how it happened:

  “In the beginning, Nephran Malinari was short of friends. And this had always been the case, ever since his mother Illula flew off into the sun and left him Malstack for his own. It was his weird talent that cost him the ‘companionship’ of the other Lords and Ladies. They could not trust him; they even feared to be close to him, who could be into their minds so easily. Also, his stack was a mighty fortress filled with men and beasts, and it was suspected that his ambitions reached beyond his station. Which of course they did, like the ambitions of all of them who were Lords. For lust, greed, and territorialism were ever their way of life.

  “But isn’t it true that a man who cannot make friends will usually make enemies? And as easily as that, the rumours sprang up: that Malinari was searching out allies and making ready his aerie for a bloodwar to rival the mythic wars of yore. But when I say ‘easily,’ that is not to say quickly; I would remind you that time is of small concern to the Wamphyri, and in fact the enmity that developed between The Mind and the others took decades in its shaping.

  “Thus, when Malinari ravaged among the supplicant Vadastra clan on the night that I was taken and my people destroyed, his terrible tithe-gathering venture wasn’t alone of his initiation or invention; Lord Doombody was also provisioning, and likewise the rest of the vampire Lords.

  “Aye, for the simple truth of it was that they each feared each other. And fear fuelled fear, do you see?

  “So naturally when The Mind first observed how his mentalist talents had isolated him, indeed he commenced searching out others who might also be under threat, to enlist their aid. Nor were they hard to find:

  “The Lady Vavara, for one, but I use the term ‘Lady’ where she would not because I have seen and been close to her; and to see her … There never was a more perfect definition of femininity, though whether or no she affected her outward appearance (as for instance Shaithis, by means of metamorphism), of that I have no knowledge. Yet if she was Nature’s handiwork … then why was that work so perfected in a female of the Wamphyri? It is a paradox to which I have no answer. But I find it hard to ascribe so much beauty to Nature alone.

  “So, I have seen and been near her—too near and once too often, for I believe it was Vavara bade Malinari ram me in this pipe!—yet I cannot recall her clearly to memory. Perhaps that in itself defines her beauty: that its power is such as to maze common men, and no less common women. But here another paradox: for despite that she was that beautiful—a beguiler, a gorgeous witch, a sensuous sorceress—still she was unsure of herself, uncertain of her beauty. I can offer no other explanation for her habits, that a goddess (albeit a demon goddess) such as she was so offended by the concept of beauty in others that she could not bear it, and so was wont to remove the breasts, lips, noses, and other parts of her female thralls to make them ugly!

  “There, in a nutshell, we have Vavara. And just as my vampire world was separated in two parts that were opposites, Sunside and Starside, so was she separated: her luminous exterior from the dark and swirly deeps within.

  “She was Malinari the Mind’s first choice as an ally; not because he lusted after her but because he knew that certain of the other Lords did. And Vavara had determined she would not be any Lord’s woman, nor would she ever take a man until she found one who was at least her equal in desirability. An unlikely occurrence, for she was the one who had described Shaithis—generally considered godlike—as a mere ‘lump’ of a man! Oh, she took men, be sure, but they were her thralls and easily disposable in the unlikely event of complications.

  “And Vavara, too, had heard rumours of a bloodwar in the offing, and also how Lesk the Glut had been boasting of what he would do to her after he’d sacked Mazemanse, her spindly, fretted, many-spired aerie where it stood not far from Malstack and Lord Szwart’s Darkspire. How he would put out her ruby-red eyes to kill their fascination, singe her eyebrows, her long lashes, and the hair of her head to make her a hag, then fuck her every opening into great holes fit only for shads in the rut. Hah! o much for Vavara’s ‘beauty’, if Lesk the Glut had his way! Is it any wonder she sided with Malinari?

  “And finally there was Lord Szwart. But if I have found it difficult to describe Vavara, how then Szwart who was and still is literally indescribable? For of course all three of them are extant still … .

  “ … I see by your silence that you would have what I know, despite that I know so little. So be it; what knowledge is mine shall be yours, no more nor less.

  “As to who or what Szwart is: the best that I can offer—he is Wamphyri! But he is the essence of Wamphyri, distilled or filtered by the foulness of his forebears, mutated beyond recognition not by Nature but necessity, more leech than Lord, and a fly-the-light in the fullest sense of the word.

  “The flickering light of candles, torchlight, firelight—the light of man-made combustion—these are the only kinds of light his eyes can bear, and even then not with complete impunity. But if the light matches the fire of his eyes he is fairly safe. Brighter than that, he knows pain! And any who would give Szwart pain … let him first pierce himself with silver dipped in kneblasch, fasten boulders to his neck, slit his wrists, and leap from the topmost battlements of the tallest aerie! Then he might be safe from Szwart.

  “And only let someone declare enmity towards Szwart—let him broadcast his aversions or discuss them with his peers, and then have his words find their way back to the night-black master of Darkspire—and no matter who this loudmouth might be, whether high or low in the Wamphyri pecking order, be sure that Szwart would do his damnedest to put a stop to such mutterings.

  “Aye, and when Szwart did his damnedest …

  “There was one Narkus Stakis, Lord of Narkslump, a collapsed pile on the western fringe of the clump, who from the onset of all the rumourmongering and side-choosing had voiced abroad his detestation of Lord Szwart. Precisely why he held Szwart in such low esteem, who could say?—perhaps he’d had wind of Lord Doombody’s provisioning and other preparations for war, and the accompanying rumour that Dramal intended to root out all ‘deviants’ (which is to say his enemies, real and imagined) from the ranks of the Wamphyri.

  “If that were a fact, then the proximity of Szwart’s Darkspire to Dramal’s Dramstack in the core of the clump would seem certain to make Szwart just such an enemy. For if Lord Doombody wished to expand territorially (assuming that this was his real purpose) he must first annex Darkspire, Szwart’s gloomy, shadow-shrouded manse across too small a gulf of air. And so, and also because Dramal controlled a large percentage of Starside power, the very inferior Narkus Stakis had determined to side with him—whether or no Dramal required him as an ally.

  “Alas for him that he made known his decision, especially his disinclination towards Szwart … .

  “Lord Szwart was black; his aerie was black, and shadowed for the most part by mighty Dramstack; his warriors and flyers were black, and the black of night was his medium. Lord Stakis’s Narkslump, more a great cleft knoll than a stack proper, stood in the western fringe of the cluster and low to the earth, and its silhouette against the northern auroras was more a ragged hump than a fang. Gloom was its constant companion.

  “On the night that Narkus died a great drift of cloud obscured the moon and stars, and Starside was never so dark. The clouds sweeping north out of Sunside were black and swollen in their bellies, pregnant with rain that lashed at the aeries of the Wamphyri. There had been fantastic lightnings over the
barrier mountains, and the wide forests of Sunside would be awash in the aftermath of the storm. Not a good night for raiding on the Szgany, not with the air full of ozone, when careless flyers and riders might so easily attract hell-fire from the sky to singe them and send them plummeting. For which reasons most of the Lords and Ladies stayed to house. Most of them.

  “But throughout the night several watchkeepers in aeries near the western rim, where they looked down on Narkslump’s split dome, had noted how Lord Stakis’s nighttights—the braziers within his battlements, behind the merlons and embrasures, and the torches in his watchtower turrets—were going out one by one, as if extinguished by the torrential rains. Except they were still going out long after the rains were done.

  “Came morning; the Wamphyri stayed abed while the accursed sun rose up and up, to its zenith, when the spires of the highest stacks were lit by its rays, and many-layered curtains were drawn against its lethal heat. The day passed as all days must; soon it was night again, and the Lords and Ladies up and about. Lights burned in all the aeries—except Narkslump.

  “And slow but sure the truth became known. A small handful of thrall survivors came on flyers and on foot, over the barren boulder plains to neighbouring Scarstack and Lurelodge, begging refuge from the master and mistress respectively of those middling manses. A body of men flew out from Scarstack to Narkslump and down into its landing bays. And later, in the midnight hour, they reported back to Lord Oulios the Scar on Narkslump’s condition as they had found it. Also on Narkus’s condition, as they had found him, his three lieutenants, and the body (or bodies?) of his thralls.

  “Word spread swiftly abroad, to all the stacks of the Wamphyri. And now certain things were remembered from the previous night: