jars. It must be stated, however, that Ursula had not availed herself of these souvenirs while yet their owners lived. For despite that she knew the toll to be paid for the denial of her Wamphyri flesh, she was Zolteist to a point, whose nature was neither cruel nor entirely sanguinary.
The list extended itself: Lord Eran Painscar; Lady Valeria of Valspire; the Lord Tangiru; Zun of Zunspire; Gorvi the Guile; the Lady Devetaki Skullguise (who today, for whatever reason, wore her smiling mask); Wran the Rage and his brother Spiro Killglance of Madmanse… all of these and many more. Thirty-six Lords in all and seven Ladies. The introductions took the best part of an hour. And all the while Maglore aware of Zindevar's growing impatience, and of her hot fat thigh against his; and all of their various thoughts impinging upon his own, until he could reel from the innuendoes and infamies, the dooms and desires of their collective mind.
They kept the bulk of their thoughts suppressed, of course, for the Lord of Runemanse was not unique in telepathic skills. All of the Wamphyri had them to some extent; at the very least, they could sense the direction of another's thoughts. Zindevar, for instance: That Lady was as much aware of Maglore's close presence as he was of hers, which might well account for her impatience and the lewd scenes with which she filled her mind. She'd probably reckoned, and correctly, that these would suffice to keep him out.
Taken with the idea, he glanced at her from the corner of his eye — and caught her staring back at him! Her eyes were hot and burned on him, and her nostrils pinched with suspicion. So then, and what did she have to hide?
But by now Vormulac had reached an end, and only one was left to announce: Wratha the Risen. Maglore put all else out of mind in order to concentrate on the Tithemaster's introduction: The Lady Wratha,' Vormulac intoned, narrowing his eyes, 'of Wrathspire…' But now there was an edge to his gravelly tone, so that all fidgeting and murmuring stopped at once and all eyes turned to Wratha — which was no great hardship.
Maglore looked along the table to where she was seated at the very end facing Vormulac down its great length, and knew that he had never seen her looking more… delicious, indeed edible! And in that selfsame moment the mental ether was full of two waves of thought: one of lust, and the other a jealous loathing. No need to search for the origins of such sweeping emotions. Ah, but the crests of both waves foamed with something of respect, too, and even admiration! Aye, for Wratha the Risen had style.
She had not seated herself properly in her chair but was curled there, entirely at ease, with both elbows on one rest and her hands supporting her chin. Her hair fell in plaits almost to her shoulders, which were fitted with a torque of finely worked gold. Depending from this golden harness, ropes of black bat fur hung down vertically to form a smoky curtain. Wratha's pale shoulders showed through, likewise her arms, the points of her tilted breasts, a large area of immaculate thigh and her knees where her legs were folded. Seen as pale curving stripes through dusty black bars, the rest of her was scarcely secure from viewing.
Paradoxically but not unusually, Wratha's eyes were least in evidence; they were protected by the scarp of figured bone upon her brow, their fire subdued by the ornamentation of blue glass ovals at her temples, and matching earrings where they dangled from the fine-furred lobes of her ears. But apart from her Wamphyri ears and the tilted, somewhat flattened aspect of her nose, whose convolutions were not exaggerated to any great degree — and the red-flickering fork of her tongue, of course — apart from these things, she might well be Szgany: a clean- limbed Gypsy girl from Sunside, whose flesh was still untried, just as she must have appeared to Karl the Crag almost a hundred years ago.
Except… where was Karl now?
A few chairs away from Maglore, Grigor Hakson made small choking noises deep in his throat, which Maglore sensed rather than heard. He turned his attention to the Lord of Gauntmanse, whose mind was now an open book. If I could have her (Grigor lusted for all he was worth). Ah, that mouth.' And how I would fill it! She beds Szgany whelps, so whelmed by her curves they dribble on her thigh. But if I could have her… my liquids would scald her like steam, even to the core!
Maglore scanned no more; in any case, they were all thinking much the same thoughts. The men, at least. As for the women: they thought other things. Devetaki Skullguise was amused, well in keeping with her mask; one or two others were envious, their glances sour; Zindevar of Cronespire thought: Pale and skinny bitch! Szgany whore.' She shows herself to men, gives herself to men! And to think… upon a time I even thought to have her for myself! Well, let leprosy rot her softest parts, and worms crawl in all her openings!
'Aye, Wratha the Risen,' Vormulac repeated, his eyes staring and forelocks beginning to quiver. 'Whom some might say has risen too far!' He put his great hands on the table as if ready to come to his feet; and farthest away from him, Wratha likewise straightened up and lowered her feet to the floor.
'If your tone and words have any meaning, Lord Vormulac,' she hissed, 'then perhaps you'd better explain it!'
'Better?' the flesh at the corner of his mouth twitched, tugging at his beard. 'Better!'
'I came here at the polite behest of a Lord!' Her voice was also rising. 'It is not the case that some… some swaggering lieutenant lout has crooked his finger at me, and like a scullery girl I have hastened to his beck. What? I am the Lady Wratha! Not some Sunside slut to be bullied, abused, and… and insulted! 'Risen too far', indeed!'
As Wratha's blood grew heated, so she herself changed. It was her vampire, reacting to her emotions, her anger, pumping its essence into her veins in the same way that lesser mortals pump adrenalin. For she had sensed that she was to be something of a focus here, and this was her response: to gird herself for whatever was in the offing.
Without so much as blinking an eye, she gained inches in height as her flesh and bones stretched, so that she seemed to grow in her chair. Her cheeks shrank inwards, ageing her face to gauntness in a moment. The ridges of her nose took on clear definition; its flat flange turned darkly moist, with nostrils which flared and gaped. Her breasts, beautiful and girlish one moment, in the next became wrinkled, fell flat, withdrew under the bat-fur ropes of her gown. And her eyes…
….ittle wonder she keeps them hooded! thought Maglore. For now beneath the carved cowl of bone upon her brow, Wratha's eyes were blobs of hellfire, starting like scarlet plums from their sockets.
Among the Wamphyri there had always been those of hybrid origin; their mutations were many; their metamorphism allowed transmutation into endless varieties of form. But few manifestations were ghastly as the Lady Wratha's eyes.
It was mainly that she had no control over it: only anger or threaten her, and this was the result. It was nothing that she willed; rather, it was something she would unwill, if that were possible. For it was this — this swift transformation from a girl into a demonic thing — which even the most hardened Wamphyri Lord found monstrous and, yes, unnatural. Well, and its cause had been unnatural, as Maglore knew well enough.
Reading minds the way he did, he'd long since learned the source of it, which lay one hundred years in the past, in the time of Wratha's premature burial. For it was then, awakening from death to undeath in her cavern tomb, that Wratha's eyes had first started in this way. Except hers was no mere claustrophobia of the flesh, nor even of the mind, but of her leech itself. Oh, it reacted like all vampires to threat or pressure — by fighting, or by attempting to break out or away from the immediate hazard — but it reacted more so, and more violently. For in the time of her entombment, Wratha had been driven partially mad, which madness had later transferred to her parasite. And now, host and leech alike, their moods and sporadic rages were fused inseparably.
Guilty as sin itself! Vormulac thought, where he sat and trembled with fury and outrage at the head of the table. The reaction of her leech, and of her flesh, is at once apparent.' She gives herself away, in front of everyone. Her accusers, myself included, are correct in their every suspicion. Except, I have gone too fast; this is not going the way Maglore, Devetaki and I planned it. Where/ore and for the moment I must back off. But how?
The Lady of Masquemanse came to Vormulac's rescue, though whether by chance or design Maglore couldn't say; but he did note that Devetaki had replaced her smiling mask with one that frowned. And now, tut-tutting, and glancing from the tail of the table to its head and back again, she said:
'But Wratha — ah, Wratha my child — and why is your mood so poor tonight? The Lord Vormulac intended no slight or accusation, I'm sure, but merely stated a fact. For as you yourself must be aware, there are several here who do envy you that you are risen so high, even as Vormulac intimated. You know it and so do we all, for they protest your status at every opportunity. So? But they protest mine also, and even Vormulac's! And isn't that just the way of things? Why, we are all full of such petty jealousies, of one thing or another! And surely it's better to be envied than ignored.'
Clever! thought Maglore, who now saw how Devetaki deliberately cooled the proceedings, not only giving Vormulac the chance to make amends but also allowing time for their scheme to take its proper course, both within
