Necroscope IV: Deadspeak

other, maybe a bug he'd picked up in the Greek islands. But a strange ailment at best, which made him feel strong on the one hand and wearied him on the other! Perhaps it was a change in the water, the air, all the mental activity he'd been engaging in, including his deadspeak, so recently returned to him. It could be any of these things. Or… perhaps it was something else.

Even as he let himself drift, and as he began to dream a strange dream — of a world of swamps and mountains, and aeries carved of stone and bone and cartilage — so Mobius came visiting:

Harry? Are you all right, my boy?

Certainly, he answered. / was merely resting. Whatever strength I can muster… it could be I shall need it. The battle draws nigh, old friend.

Mobius was puzzled. You use strange terms of expression. And you don't quite, well, feel the same.

As Harry's dream of Starside faded, so Mobius's deadspeak made more of an impression. What? he said. Did you say something? Terms of expression? I don't feel the same?

That's better! said Mobius, with a sigh of relief. Why, for a moment there I thought I was talking to some entirely different person!

Between dream and waking, Harry narrowed his eyes. Perhaps you were, he said.

He sought Faethor in his mind and wrapped him in a blanket of solitude. And: There, he said. And to Mobius: / can hold him there while we talk.

Some strange tenant?

Aye, and greatly unloved and unwanted. But for now I've covered his rat-hole. I much prefer my privacy. So what is it you've come to tell me, August?

That we're almost there! the other answered at once. The code is breaking down, Harry, revealing itself. We'll soon have the answer. I came to bring you hope. And to ask you to hold off from your contest just a little while longer, so that we -

— Too late for that, Harry broke in. It's now or never. Tonight I go up against him.

Again the other was puzzled. Why, you seem almost eager for it!

He took what was mine, challenged me, offended me greatly, Harry answered. He would burn me to ashes, raise me up, torture me for my secrets — even invade the Mobius Continuum! And that is not his territory.

Indeed it is not! It belongs to no one. It simply is… Mobius's deadspeak voice was dreamy again, which caused Harry to concentrate and consolidate within his own personality.

'It simply is'? he repeated to Mobius, mystified. But of course it is! What do you mean, it is?

It thinks… everything, Mobius answered. Therefore it is… everything! But something had been triggered in him. He was fading, drifting, returning to a dimension of pure Number.

And Harry made no attempt to retain him but simply let him go…

16. Man to Man, Face to Face

'Harry!' Someone gave his shoulder an urgent shake. 'Harry, wake up!'

The Necroscope came instantly awake, almost like stepping through a Mobius door from one existence to another, from dream to waking. He saw the Gypsy he had spoken to and shared food with, whose blanket lay across his legs. And his first thought was: How does he know my name? Following which he relaxed. Of course he would know his name. Janos had told it to him. He would have told all of his thralls and human servants and other minion creatures the name of his greatest enemy.

'What is it?' Harry sat up.

'You've slept an hour,' the other answered. 'We'll soon be moving on. I'm taking my blanket. Also, there is something you should see.'

'Oh?'

The Gypsy nodded. His eyes were keen now, dark and sharp. 'Do you have a friend who searches for you?'

'What? A friend, here?' Was it possible Darcy Clarke or one of the others had followed him here from Rhodes? Harry shook his head. 'I don't think so.'

'An enemy, then, who follows on behind? In a car?'

Harry stood up. 'You've seen such a one? Show me.'

'Follow me,' said the other. 'But keep low.'

He moved at a lope through the trees to a hedgerow. Harry followed him and was aware of the other Gypsies scattered here and there throughout the encampment. Each of them to a man was silent but tense in the dappled green shade of the trees. Their belongings were all packed away. They were ready to move.

'There,' said Harry's guide. He stood aside to let the Necroscope peer through the bushes.

On the other side of the road a man sat at the wheel of an old beetle Volkswagen, looking at the entrance to the encampment. Harry didn't know him, but… he knew him. Now that his attention had been focussed on him, he remembered. He'd been on the plane, this man. And… in Mezobereny? Possibly. That cigarette holder was a dead giveaway. Likewise his generally snaky, effeminate style. And now Harry remembered, too, that earlier brush with the Securitatea in Romania. Had this man been their contact in Rhodes? An agent, perhaps, for the USSR's E-Branch?

He glanced at the Gypsy beside him and said, 'An enemy — possibly.' But then he saw the knife ready in the other's hand, and raised an eyebrow. 'Oh?'

The other smiled, without humour. The Szgany don't much care for silent watchers.'

But Harry wondered: had the knife been for him, if he'd tried to make a run for it? A threat, to bring him to heel? 'What now?' he said.

'Watch,' said the other.

A Gypsy girl in a bright dress and a shawl crossed the road to the car, and Nikolai Zharov sat up straighter at the wheel. She showed him a basket filled with trinkets, knick-knacks, and spoke to him. But he shook his head. Then he showed her some paper money and in turn spoke to her, questioningly. She took the money, nodded eagerly, pointed through the forest. Zharov frowned, questioned her again. She became more insistent, stamped her foot, pointed again in the direction of Gyula, along the forest road.

Finally Zharov scowled, nodded, started up his car. He drove off in a cloud of dust. Harry turned to the Gypsy and said: 'He was an enemy, then. And the girl has sent him off on a wild goose chase?'

'Yes. Now we'll be on our way.'

'We?' Harry continued to stare at him.

The man sheathed his knife. 'We Travellers,' he answered. 'Who else? If you had been awake you could have eaten with us. But — ' he shrugged,' — we saved you a little soup.'

Another man approached with a bowl and wooden spoon, which he offered to Harry.

Harry looked at it.

Don't! said a deadspeak voice in his head, that of the dead Gypsy king.

Poison? Harry answered. Your people are trying to kill me?

No, they desire you to be still for an hour or two. Only drink this, and you will be still!

And sick?