in on the dead. They knew him at once, but the message of their swiftly receding whispers was as vague and mysterious as ever: That one, Nathan!'
'But the Thyre speak for him; they say there's no harm in him, only good.'
'So was his father good, in his time. But in the end
?'
'We could tell him much.'
'We daren't!'
Among them was a voice which was very faint. 'I,
'And be shunned among the dead forever?' The others were alarmed.
'You are cold and cruel,' the faint one replied.
'But not as cold and cruel as the Wamphyri necromancer who is his brother!'
'He is a vampire. They are not the same.'
'Can Nathan live forever, then? And what will he be when he dies? Ah, and will he stay dead?'
Finally, reluctantly: 'Perhaps you are right,' said
At last it was Eygor Killglance's turn; the leathery amalgam which was Eygor, blind and dead in his pit in Madmanse. But Eygor didn't talk about Nathan, he talked to him. The killing eye, Nathan. It can be yours!' The clotted gurgle of his mind spanned all the miles between. 'Now look, and see what my sons did to me!'
Nathan stood at the feet of the Thing in the pit again, and stared up at its dead face, its closed eyes which even now, in his dream, creaked open! And a pair of blind white orbs huge as the eggs of swans, white as shining marble, wept acid tears on to a fretted, crumbling cheek!
'Only see how I cry,' said Eygor, 'because my eyes are blind and white. Ah, but upon a time the right one was filled with blood! See!' And at once, the right eye of the gargoyle dripped scarlet. 'While the left was full of pus!' And indeed the left one turned yellow, and swelled like a boil about to burst. And Nathan knew that if it did and the poison splashed him, then that he would be infected, heir to Egyor's eyes!
He came shouting awake…!
But the eyes were gone. The original great white blind glaring eyes (like the eye which Thikkoul had seen in Nathan's stars, perhaps?), the bloody eye and the yellow one, too: gone! Only his mother's eyes, Nana's, were there to greet him where he jerked violently upright. And gazing back worriedly into his, all they contained was love and concern.
For Nathan was more than ever like Harry Keogh before him, and she knew from his mumbling that he talked to… people, in his sleep; or at least listened to them talking to each other. But mainly she was concerned because of who these people were, and the fact that they were no more…
Aye, he was more than ever like his Necroscope father, which could be a blessing -
— Or a curse.
Nathan and Misha were married at 'noon', when the sun stood at its highest point far to the south and central over the distant desert. The ceremony was simple; Lardis presided; all of Sanctuary Rock's workforce was present, almost a hundred and forty of them. Times were hard but Lardis had done his best, providing bread and wine and a beast turning on a spit over a fire.
At the high point of the affair the old Lidesci gathered the couple and their parents to him — Misha in white, Nathan in his freshly cleaned Thyre clothing, which by Szgany standards was still exceptionally fine gear — and with Nana standing face to face with Misha, and Varna glowering at Nathan, then Lardis commenced to say the approved words:
'Varna Zanesti, what can you say of this girl, your daughter Misha?'
That she's innocent, unknown by man or monster,' Varna growled. 'Also that she's obedient and good. Far too good for this one!'
Nathan was obliged to back off a step and lower his head. It was all part of the ritual.
'And Nana Kiklu,' Lardis turned to her. 'What have you to say to that?'
'No mere girl is good enough for a son of mine,' Nana answered, tilting her chin and sniffing at Misha. 'I can only hope that their children take more after him.' But not too closely after their grandfather!
Lardis turned to the couple. 'And do you love each other?' They answered yes. 'So you may, and from this time forward you have that right — to love with your hearts and your bodies — for you're now man and wife!'
They kissed; people applauded; everyone enjoyed a little food, and toasted the health of the couple in wine. There was music and the younger ones danced, those who had the strength for it. But at their first opportunity, Nathan and Misha slipped quietly away…
Their travois was waiting behind bushes under the south-west facing wall of the Rock. There Misha made;'Nathan look away — Three years is a long time, after; all!' — while she changed into Traveller clothes and folded her dress into a pillowcase, and discreetly averted her eyes as he likewise changed. It was the Szgany way. Then, dragging the light-framed travois behind them, they went out into the forest. Heading south-east, they skirted the Rock along an old trail, but half-way towards Settlement turned off into virgin woods and found a place where the bracken stood tall.
In the heart of the bracken Nathan put up their shelter, a skin stretched over the bole of a fallen tree, made fast to projecting branches, while Misha cleared the ground and spread their blankets underneath. And with mixed feelings they stood looking at the finished job. Everything seemed to be melting into a blur now for Nathan. He still daren't believe that he had really escaped from Turgosheim; yet here he was, married to Misha, and their first bed ready for them. She didn't seem changed; it might be as if he'd never been away.
'Our home for half a day,' he finally said.
'And for part of a night,' she answered. 'For I won't go back till the stars are out at least. Tonight of all nights, I won't scurry and scuttle in fear of Them.'
Nathan looked ruefully at their rude shelter. 'Not much of a little house, is it?'
She smiled in a way he remembered and loved well enough — a smile she'd kept only for him, which was half-innocent, half-brazen — and answered: 'People have lived, and loved, in worse than this, Nathan. Anyway, you'll remember this 'little house' for the rest of your days. I shall see to that.'
Following which…
… It was as it has always been and always will be between lovers. And for an hour, two, three, they excited, explored and exhausted each other. Misha was mainly innocent, for which they both were glad. And Nathan… if Misha suspected anything she said nothing. And anyway, he was careful not to 'know' too much. From now on they could learn together, or at least he must make her believe that it was so. It wasn't so much that he deceived her, rather that he would not disappoint her.
And he didn't, not in any measure…
In the time scale of the world of Nathan's father, the couple stayed in their love nest for an entire day, and one more to go before sundown. Like all young animals paired off, they loved and slept to excess; between times they replenished themselves on bread and cheese from a bundle in the travois.
Three years without each other; now each moment spent together filled the space of an hour apart, and the husks of empty years fell aside. They got to know each other all over again, but more surely now, more certainly: like a broken wall repaired and made stronger. And the extra wrinkle here or line there: all smoothed themselves out, or seemed to, until their faces were the same yet more than before. Nathan had used to think Misha's shape was boyish; now it was all woman. She had likened his yellow hair to sunlight; now it was a misted morning, with some of the gold fading to grey.
Eventually they left their bower and walked to Settlement, which served to revive more old memories. A handful of people were working there; Nathan met some old friends, saw a few new faces. They wandered the forest ways they'd known as children, bathed in the same shingly pool at the river's bend, fell more deeply, truly in love than ever. Back in Settlement they ate a meal with friends, and Nathan stood for a while outside his old home under the stockade's west wall. Some repairs had been made but the place seemed like a shell now; at least there wasn't a flyer trap underneath it; maybe one day Nana would live here again. But live here, as she had used to in better times.
In the shade of the forest as they returned to the bower, suddenly Nathan shivered, paused, listened. There was only the cooing of pigeons. Misha looked at him curiously. 'What is it?'
