'Having seen Szwart off from Malstack's lofty premises, I returned to my master and the luminous Vavara — the very opposite of Szwart — where they continued to talk in Malinari's private chambers. In his absence, Szwart had become the subject
of their conversation. Hearing his name mentioned, and because my interest had been piqued, however morbidly, I slipped back into the shadows and listened.
' 'It was in his blood,' Malinari was saying (so that I knew what next he would say), 'and what is in the blood always comes out in the flesh — or in Szwart's case, what passes for flesh!' And he went on to explain:
''Seventy years ago — a little before your time, Vavara — Szwart was born to a Lord and Lady of the Wamphyri. That alone would make him an exception to the general rule. For as you are well aware, when the time is right the Wamphyri transfuse their eggs to make egg-sons or — daughters; or we take Szgany women — er, forgive me, or men — and so beget blood-children. But it's rare that a Lord will take a Lady to wife, or vice versa. Rarer still where Lord Szwart is concerned, whose father was also his mother's brother!
' 'Incest? — not so strange among the Wamphyri. But incestuous marriage, between twins?
' 'To find a reason you must look back in time, but not too far. Szwart's grandsire, his blood-grandsire, was cursed with a certain disorder which our kind don't care to mention. Oh, as a skill — a fearsome talent — we mention it with pride! But when it runs amok, then it becomes wnmentionable. Metamorphism, aye. But note, my voice is hushed. Such matters are not to be spoken of lightly.
' 'Before he knew that this weirdest and most loathsome of diseases was upon him, Lord Szwart's grandsire got twins out of a Szgany girl. Brother and sister, they grew up in their sire's aerie — Mittelmanse as it was then, named for its proximity to the centre — and ascended. They were Wamphyri!
' 'By then their father's curse was known to all and sundry: he had practised his metamorphic flux beyond reasonable bounds, putting too great a strain on a leech which finally rebelled or went insane. Whichever, his flesh was out of control. Once in a thousand years this will happen: that instead of remaining symbiont and host — two mutually dependent creatures in one body — the flesh of both mingles, and a resultant Thing emerges as a mindless, loathsome hybrid.
' 'But the process was a slow one; the Lord of Mittelmanse was not immediately a madman, and knew as well as his children what was happening to him. The horror of it played on his mind; as his flesh gradually succumbed, he would come shrieking awake from nightmares, to find his limbs like ropes draped all about his room.' Or he would wander abroad in his sleep, to trap and convert his own loyal thralls by means of absorption and assimilation. Instead of the blood, whole bodies were the life.' And he grew gross, when at times his flesh was soft as mud, and at others horny and corrugated. And even his colour was changed — no longer that of undead flesh but the mottled and leprous hue of the leech.
' 'And when he was lucid he made his children promise that they would not spread this thing abroad. Great Vampire that he was and malicious, still he would not wish this on another man or creature. For he knew what was in his blood, and in theirs, and that given the opportunity it would out. Wherefore it must not be given the opportunity…
''The twins, grown up now, planned to put their father in a pit; for according to the lore or history of Starside — what little has ever been recorded — that was usually the best way. Or they could kill him out of hand, by trapping him in an inescapable place and setting fire to him, before he became totally ungovernable.
' 'But it didn't come to that. Fond of flying, he formed an airfoil and flew out upon the gulf one night. This involved, of course, a great effort of will — which he relaxed, perhaps deliberately, high over the boulder plains. And Thing that he was, his immediate devolution into something less than airworthy was instantly fatal. He fell like a stone, and even protoplasm will only stretch so far.
' 'So much for him.
' 'His sibling children made a pact: they would not go with others to spread the curse abroad but cleave to each other, and so keep the thing to house. And all the while, year after year, they lived in fear that it might be in them, too — which indeed it was. But because they kept their flux under strict rein, and used it sparingly, the curse skipped their generation — only to emerge in the next!
''It came out in the young Szwart, aye. Having been suppressed in his parents, the vampire essence they passed down to Szwart was of an entirely different order. How best to explain? When a man is born blind, his remaining senses may develop more fully in order to compensate for the loss. In Szwart's parents, the normal functions of their vampire leeches had been suppressed — which served only to magnify the essence that they passed down to Szwart!
''Szwart's will has kept him sane within limits, but he is a totally devolved creature. He sleeps alone, to ensure that no bloodson of his will carry this thing into the future. His ugliness is such that men might easily go insane if they saw him in the worst of his myriad… designs. Tonight he maintained something of a manlike outline in order to be here with us, but normally he can't bear to be seen, which is why he shuns light and companionship. This last is no great hardship; we Wamphyri were ever loners. But let any man speak out against him as a freak — or shrink from the horror of him — it's as if his phobias were reinforced. And despite that he knows his ugliness well enough, knows the truth of it, still he will kill the offender, if only because his action or reaction reminded him of his infirmity.'
'And Vavara said, 'Yet you say he's not mad?'
''Not yet,' Malinari told her, 'Though it must come eventually. Perhaps in a hundred years, or fifty, or maybe less. But he was here tonight; you saw him; he reasons.'
' 'I have seen him, yes,' Vavara answered. 'And his reasoning is as warped and fluctuating as his flesh! He looked like a mad thing to me, or close enough.'
''Have it your own way,' my master told her. 'But if he is a mad thing, then for the moment he's our mad thing. Also, he's the Lord of Darkspire, commander of men and monsters, and Darkspire guards our flanks…'
'Then for a while they were silent, until Vavara inquired: 'What of his parents, the incestuous twins?'
''Szwart was born beautiful and seemed perfect,' Malinari answered. 'At seventeen he ascended. And at eighteen his father found him in Darkspire's Desmodus colony, hanging with the bats from the fretted ceiling — but hanging in flaps and folds, like a blob of dough such as the Szgany use when baking their bread! In his gluttony, he had absorbed a great many bats before falling asleep.
' 'Father and mother both, they tried to trap and burn him. He trapped and burned them! So the story goes. My advice: never treat Szwart with disdain because he is not pretty. And as for his quirks: we are Wamphyri and we all have quirks — even you, Vavara, or so I've heard it rumoured. But with the exception of our mutual enemies, no one takes us to task over our little… idiosyncrasies? As for Szwart, who is our ally: neither slight nor scorn him. And don't underestimate him, either
Korath had been silent for some little time. Perhaps he brooded on the past. Whatever, Harry prodded him with a thought:
Korath? And he responded with a grunt:
Huh?
My time fare grows short now, (Harry's deadspeak voice was faint and wavering) and Jake isn't far from waking. We've come a long way, in more senses than one, but we're by no means finished. When I go, your contact with Jake goes with me. Then you will be alone. If you ever want to hear from us again — for who knows? We might yet find some mutual benefit in renewed contact — then you'd fast get on with your story. But make it as brief as possible. Here's how it goes:
Malinari and the others, they lost their bloodwar and were banished. Then for four hundred years you survived the Icelands and eventually returned to Starside. And finally you came fare. That's the story, now fill in the details.
And Korath answered, Ah, but the details may take a little longer!
But not too long, said Harry.
As for Jake: this time he voiced no complaint. He was so 'into' Starside now — Korath's story had so intrigued him — that he wanted to know the rest of it, no matter how ugly it might get. And:
Very well, said Korath. Then let's be done with it…
'So then, Malinari, Vavara, and Szwart, they were made out to be the weird ones, the freaks, the outsiders. But in fact they were no more freakish than many of the Lords and Ladies in the camp of Dramal Doombody. Ah, but Lord Doombody had problems of his own. For the time being it seemed he had his leprosy under control, true, but what of the future? Even a man as mighty as Dramal has his limits, and likewise his vampire leech. He knew it was
