sibling into the Hell-Lands Gate.
'Well, the Gate was a legend; in our time it had been used as a punishment, and no man or creature who entered, 'banished' into the white glare of the Starside Gate, had ever returned to tell of his adventures. But that was then and this was now, and for a certainty this Nathan was extant; all too soon, we would begin to experience his works at first hand.
'He was of the Szgany Lidesci. No longer nomadic, the Lidescis had built a sprawling town or fortification called Settlement. And the first time we raided on them — which was also the last time — ah, but then we discovered the meaning of 'awesome weapons!'
'Our warriors — which were far more complicated constructs than flyers — were not waxed as yet. We went in with a force of flyers and thrall riders, and a handful of lieutenants to guide the men into battle. Except it wasn't planned as a battle but a rout, when the Szgany would flee and we would pick off the hindmost. Vavara and Malinari between them made a mist (Szwart was above such devices when he could avoid them; since he could simply merge into the night, he deemed mists unsporting and indeed unnecessary deceptions). But be that is it may, the mist rolled down out of the foothills to swallow Settlement whole. We could see the fitful glow of the Lidescis' communal fires deep in its clammy heart.
'Then our flyers launched and settled towards the town… and flew straight into the teeth of hell!
'Fortunately, we leaders were not in the forefront of this offensive; instead, alerted by my master who was suspicious, we had held back to observe the initial Lidesci reaction. For when Malinari had sent his telepathic probes deep into the mist over Settlement, he had sensed something strange — a mental silence, an awareness, a threat. And he was right.
'The night came alive with deafening explosions, brilliant flashes of light and shrill screams — not Szgany screams! These were the shrieks of our thralls, and the hissing death-cries of stricken flyers. And echoing up to us from Settlement's wooden walls came sharp, spitting cracks of sound one after the other, like stones breaking in a fire or saplings snapping in an avalanche. And great, dazzling balls of fire came soaring up out of the mist into a body of flyers that was still descending. Wherever they hit,
destruction followed: flyers bursting into flame and blazing thralls leaping from their saddles!
'And finally more aerial fireballs: this time aimed at us, where we looked on in utter disbelief from our 'safe' foothills ridge. Then:
''Enough!' And uttering a curse, Szwart spurred his mount aloft and climbed into the night. A true fly-the- light, he had seen and suffered all he could bear; now he retreated from the blinding flares of man-made fireballs.
'Malinari and Vavara, they used Wamphyri mentalism to call off what handfuls remained of our forces, many of whom were too badly damaged to make it back across the barrier mountains into Starside. And as that sorry, scorched and blistered rabble came limping through the mist — glad to escape from the roil and the reek — so we launched and rose on sulphur thermals, and headed for home…
'… And for the surprise of our lives!
'As we fell towards the triangle of rubble wherein we had commenced to build our new empire, we saw what could not be — such devastation! Our central gas-beast chambers, blown asunder, and their occupants in tatters all strewn about, exploded in the blast of their own gases! And warrior vats ablaze with liquid fire that burned blue to melt the mewling monsters! And even as we circled overhead in stunned amaze, a thunderous explosion that tossed shattered vampire thralls and debris aloft over the battlement walls of one of Malinari's unfinished constructions (a warrior pen, which never would be finished now), bursting the walls themselves outwards with its force!
'We landed hurriedly, in unaccustomed disarray, and without ceremony my master and his colleagues hurled themselves in their fury upon those thralls who had been left behind to mind our works. But before a single question could be fired, a single thrall executed:
' 'Ho, there!' A strange voice from on high — but not the harsh tones, warning growl or threatening hiss of the Wamphyri. No, this was the voice of a young man, and entirely human.
'He stood on the ledge of a shattered stump, his back to the sheer rock wall. There was no way up from his position and none down, not without he encounter the Wamphyri or their lieutenants and thralls. And he was tall but slight, with nothing of the bulk of a vampire or the leaden look of a Lord. He was, quite literally, a man — Szgany.
''Who are you?' said Malinari. 'This Nathan, perhaps? And is this your work? If so you are a dead man!' I felt my master concentrating, the waves of animosity beating out from him, to enter the stranger's mind and befuddle it.
'But young as he was, and obviously mad (or perhaps not?) he only smiled a knowing smile, shook his head, and said, 'Ah, no, my mentalist friend — my mind is shielded. And if Maglore the Mage could not get to me, what chance have you? And you're right: I am Nathan, and this is my work. Nor have you seen the last of it.'
'Malinari gestured (with his mind); thralls crept towards the broken stairway that led to Nathan's position. He glanced at them, saw them coming, appeared to ignore them.' Meanwhile, the voluptuous Vavara had stepped forward. She was almost physically aglow and issued her ultimate aura of feminine allure. Her mouth blew a kiss and a promise in Nathan's direction; she smiled up at him on his ledge — the knowing smile of a whore, yet one to cut into a man's soul, if he had one — and lit the night with the lustful heat of her jewel-green, crimson-cored eyes.
'Tipping back her hood and opening her collar, she shook out her raven hair, then let her long, bat-fur cloak fall open. Her blouse was a simple band of cloth crossing from shoulder to waist, cupping one breast and leaving the other bare. Her flesh was marble in moon and starlight, and that proud, naked, stiff-tipped breast shone with the oils she used. She twirled to send her skirt of ropes flying, then came to an abrupt halt. Tantalizing she stood, with her cloak poised on the air and the ropes of her skirt outflung.
Her sturdy legs were spread wide, thighs like pillars, buttocks as round as an apple, dark-tufted in its dimple where the stem has been plucked and a leaf or two remain. And I stood there drooling my lust, for I had grown just such a stem as might replace it! Then Vavara's cloak floated back into position and she was covered. But the picture stayed printed on every eye.
'I felt my blood pounding; I might myself have rushed upon her — to my doom — but Malinari's hand was on my shoulder; he held me back. And this tall, pale Szgany whelp, this Nathan, he looked down on the priestess of lust, looked down on Vavara… and curled his lip!
'Vavara was astonished; she felt her aura repelled as this mere man scorned her, saying, 'As for you: you should know that I have been tempted by real Ladies! My mind is closed to you no less than to the mentalist there. And by the way, I know all of you. You: Vavara, Malinari, and Szwart. You were legends and now you are reality, come back from the Icelands. But if I were you I would return there, and now. There's nothing for you here but the true death. And like my father before me, who brought down these evil stacks to shatter into pieces on the boulder plains, so shall I bring you down. That is my vow, as a man of the Szgany Lidesci.'
'Through all of this, Szwart had melted himself to a dark shadow on the strewn rubble. Now, flowing like a black and sentient lichen — a living stain — he moved towards the crumbling stairway. By now, too, Malinari's thralls had climbed halfway up, which was as far as they would ever get.
' 'And you, Szwart,' said the youth from on high, perhaps fifty feet up the stony skeleton of that ancient stairway. 'Do you think to sweep over and devour me? As the legend goes, you are akin to the night and can disappear into it. But you and I know that men — and monsters — cannot simply disappear. It's true, Szwart, isn't it?' While he spoke he took something from his Szgany jerkin, twisted it in his hands, lobbed it down, to bounce from step to step. And he said, 'Well, perhaps it's true for you, at least. But as for me: I must be on my way. You may not see me, but you'll definitely be hearing from me.' So saying, he stepped back into the shadows where the wall angled.
'Lord Szwart flowed over the top of the wall where Nathan had stood, and onto the ledge from which he'd taunted all three of the Wamphyri. Szwart's darkness gathered there, shifting and seething, then rolled on into the selfsame shadows that hid the madman from view. And I knew that it was the end for Nathan Kiklu, whoever he had been. Lord Szwart's protoplasm would envelop him; its strange, metamorphic acids would work on him; he would shrink, devolve, and dissolve to become one with night's master. Or rather, his liquefied flesh would add to Szwart's bulk for a while, until it was converted into fuel.
'The egg-shaped item that Nathan had thrown bounced again, into the group of three climbing thralls. And
