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'Oh, they were!' Maglore answered, 'in those early days after Turgo Zolte brought his people here out of the west. Aye, they travelled, before the Wamphyri brought them to heel, as it were. Hmmm!' He stroked his chin. 'How is it, then, that while your Szgany do not live in "towns", still you know the word?'
Nathan shrugged, and thought quickly. 'But I know it as in "Vladistown", master,' he said. 'Also as an old word of my own people. Though I was only a child of four or five years on the night of the burning clouds and the thunder over the barrier range - when the last of the Wamphyri were destroyed, or so it was supposed
- I remember that some of our leaders said we should build "towns" again. Others, however, were against it. No, they said, for the vampires would return one day, out of the swamps or from other places.' His answer was deliberately confused and confusing, to throw Mag-lore off the track. And to distract him even further, he scratched for a moment at the leather strap on his wrist, then took it off and placed it on the table where Maglore could not help but see it. And continuing to scratch at his imaginary itch, he watched the Seer Lord's scarlet eyes grow large as he pounced.
'A-ha!' Maglore cried, snatching up the strap. And just for once his telepathic mind was so open that Nathan clearly 'heard' the thought: Just as that old Sunside fraud informed me! Why, I had almost forgotten
- till now! Then, a moment later, his thoughts were guarded again. But not nearly as close as Nathan's.
And: 'What are we to make of this?' Maglore said.
'Where did you get it? And do you recognize it?' 'It is my wrist strap,' Nathan shrugged,'- master.' 'Of course it is!' Maglore shook his head - then glanced at Nathan sharply, suspiciously. 'Do you play word games with me? If so you should know: I'm good at them.'
Nathan looked blank, and again Maglore grunted, 'Hmmm!'
And: 'Ah!' Nathan said after a moment. The sign over your doors! I recognize it now: your sigil! And mine, it would seem. Except ... it's nothing but a strange coincidence, master.'
'Perhaps it is,' Maglore nodded. 'And strange indeed - or would be, if I believed in coincidences. But on the other hand, I am fascinated by mysteries! So tell me now, how did you come by this thing?'
'But I've always had it,' Nathan answered truthfully. 'I think I first remember it... on the night of the thunder over Starside, and the fire in the clouds.'
'How long ago?' Maglore hunched forward in his chair.
'Nearly sixteen years,' said Nathan.
'Ahhh!' Maglore sighed. And again his mind was open. The night of the Light-in-the-West, the tremors in the earth, when I dreamed of the sigil and found it potent, and took it for my own! This is a mystery; there is an affinity, between this man and myself/
Then ... perhaps he knew he was read. At any rate he sat up straighter and glared at Nathan. There are talents in you, hidden, I sense them,' he insisted for the third time. 'When I have an hour or two to spare, we must dig them out. Perhaps we might even make a start now.'
Footsteps sounded at the top of the spiral staircase, and a hulking lieutenant appeared on the landing. He paused uncertainly. Maglore scowled at him. 'Well? Is it urgent?'
'Your creature waxes in its vat, Lord,' the lieutenant reported. 'Alas, it has wrenched loose the breathing tubes and so may drown in its fluids.'
'What!' Maglore sprang up. 'Why did you not reco
'Go into the vat?' The lieutenant fell back. 'But the creature is voracious, and ill-humoured!'
Take me there, now!' Maglore shouted. 'If aught befalls that construct of mine ... by Turgosheim, you'll know the meaning of ill-humour!'
Half-way across the floor he paused and looked back. 'You, Nathan. Explore the manse. If you are weary, ask any thrall to show you your room. Nowhere is forbidden to you, but avoid the women ... at least until I have spoken to them. Now I must go, but one last thing: I shall keep you as a friend, for I value you for yourself and not as a cringing vampire thrall. But let me make myself plain: I will take it very hard if you should try to run away. And always remember, a man without legs ca
He had made himself plain. In any case, Nathan couldn't see where he might run. What, into Turgosheim? Or up on to the roof of the manse and the rim of the gorge, and so across the mountains to Sunside? To be picked up and brought back again? No, for his stay here was to be a long one. According to Thikkoul, anyway.
Nathan remembered Maglore's words (it seemed as well to remember everything the Seer Lord said): 'Nowhere is forbidden to you.' But did that include Maglore's chambers? Whether or no, he explored his master's rooms first. At least he felt comparatively safe here, which was probably more than could be said for the rest of the place.
As a powerful Lord of the Wamphyri, Maglore didn't stint himself: his apartments were huge. While some of the rooms were natural caves, massive cysts in the volcanic wall of the gorge, others had been carved from the virgin rock. And above every doorway Maglore's familiar sigil was plainly visible: the loop with a half-twist, chiselled in bas-relief into arch or lintel.
Maglore's bedroom faced north, away from the sun. There Nathan looked out through narrow windows on the blue-glittering rim of the world, where strange auroras wove over a coldly distant horizon. But while the windows were wide enough to take a man, he made no attempt to step up and pass through the thick exterior wall; it was enough to simply put his head out. For out there where a precarious ledge or balcony clung to the face of the turret, and a low wall of grafted cartilage was the only protection against a fall of what must be at least twelve hundred feet ... the whole affair seemed very unsafe! In any case, the view was mainly away from Turgosheim and so uninteresting. That was Nathan's excuse, anyway ...
As he explored Maglore's kitchen, a vampire thrall came ghosting, making the place clean. Once-Szgany and male, he was small, thin, ghastly pale; only his eyes contained a spark, and they were yellow, feral, dangerous. When he saw Nathan he gave a start, and then was curious. 'You'll be the new one,' he nodded. 'Well, and you've a lot to learn. For one thing, you're in the wrong place. A room has been set aside for you. If Maglore were to find you here .. .'
'He left me here,' Nathan answered. 'There are no restrictions upon me.'
'Oh?' The other raised an eyebrow, offered a half-sneer. 'Then you must consider yourself fortunate - for now!' He busied himself about the room. 'At any rate, you've been warned.'
Watching him at work (he worked hard, making the kitchen scrupulously clean), Nathan thought: This man was Szgany, like me. Now he's a thrall, a vampire, the next step between Szgany and lieutenant. Except he's reached his limit because he isn't ... the right stuff? In Settlement, Lardis Lidesci burned such as him, before they could head for Starside. Should I pity him, or should I be afraid of him?
'Why do you watch me?' Nostrils gaping, eyes glaring, the other rounded on him; and Nathan saw that he really should not pity him. It was much too late for that.
'You must know this place well,' he said, mainly for something to say.
'Runemanse? Turgosheim? I know them well enough,' the vampire answered. 'I know what I may do and what is forbidden, the places where I may pass safely and those where I must never go. For unlike you I am not "privileged" in that respect.'
Nathan climbed wooden stairs to peer out through a high, round window. Looking west and a little south, it gave him a good view of all Turgosheim. 'Maglore says he will not change me,' he said, half to himself. 'He wants me for a friend. It seems he desires that I should retain my Szgany initiative.'