neither Dumitru nor any other who might view this scene would require any special knowledge or explanation save that of his own imagination, his own instinct. And wide-eyed and gape-mouthed, with his torch held high, the youth wandered unsteadily through the ordered remnants and relics of chaos and madness.
Not the chaos of the upper regions, which was purely physical, for these secret nether-vaults had suffered little of the destruction of the higher levels; they were preserved, pristine under the dust and cobwebs of half a century. No, this was a mental chaos: the knowledge that these were the works of a man or men — or, again taking into account all manner of Szgany myth and legend, the works of things disguised as such.
Of the vaults themselves:
The stonework was ancient, indeed hoary. Nitre-streaked and yet not noticeably damp, in places the masonry even showed signs of dripstone concretion. Wispy stalactite strings depended from the high-vaulted ceilings; and around the edges of the rooms, where the floor had been not so frequently trodden, smooth-domed stalagmite deposits formed small nodes or blisters on the roughly fitted flags. Dumitru was no archaeologist, but from the primitive roughness of the dressed stone and the poor condition of the ancient mortar alone, even he would have dated the castle — or at least these secret regions of the castle — as being some eight or nine hundred years old. It would need to be at least that for the formation of these calcium deposits — or else the solutions seeping from above must be unusually heavily laced with crystalline salts.
There were numerous archways, uniformly eight feet wide and eleven high, all wedged at their tops with massive keystones, some of which had settled a little from the unimaginable tonnage of the higher levels. The ceilings — none of them less than fourteen or fifteen feet tall at apex — were vaulted in an interlocking design similar to the archways; in several places massive blocks had fallen, doubtless shaken loose by whatever blast had doomed the place, shattering the heavy flags of the floor like schoolroom slates.
Beyond the archways were rooms all of a large size, all with archways of their own; Dumitru had descended to a maze of ancient rooms, where the tenant of this broken pile had practised his secret arts. As to the nature of those arts:
So far, with the single exception of his first terrified guess, Dumitru had avoided conjecture. But this was no longer possible. The walls were covered in frescoes which, however faded, told the entire tale; and many of the rooms contained undeniable evidence of a much more solid, much more frightening nature. Also, the voice in his head, now cruel and full of glee, would not permit of his ignorance: it desired that he know the way of these old matters.
Necromancy, you thought, Dumitru, when first your torch cast back the shadows down here, the voice reiterated. The resurrection of defunct salts and ashes back into life for the purpose of interrogation. The history of the world, as it were, from the horse's mouth, from the reanimated, imperfect wraiths of them that lived it. The unravelling of ancient secrets, and perhaps even the foretelling of the dimly distant future. Aye, divination by use of the dead!… That is what you thought.
Well (and after a small pause the voice gave a mental shrug), and you were right — as far as you went. But you did not go far enough. You have avoided looking… you avoid it even now! What, and are you my son, Dumitru, or some puling babe in arms? I thought I had called strong wine in unto myself, only to discover that the Szgaaany have been brewing water all these years! Ha-haa-haaa! But no… I make jokes… don't be so angry, my son…
It is anger, is it not, Dumiitruuu? No?
Fear, perhaps?
You fear for your life, Dumiitruuu? The voice had sunk to a whisper now, but insidious as the drip of a slow acid. But you shall have your life, my son — in me! The blood is the life, Dumiitruuu — and that shall go on and on… aaand…
But there! Now the voice sprang alive, became merry. Why, we were grown morose, and that must never be! What? But we shall be as one, and live out all our life together. Do you hear me, Dumiitruuu?… Well?
'I… I hear you,' the youth answered, speaking to no one.
And do you believe me? Say it — say that you believe in me, as your father's fathers believed in me.
Dumitru was not sure he did believe, but the owner of the voice squeezed inside his head until he cried out: 'Yes!… yes, I believe, just as my fathers believed.'
Very well, said the voice, apparently placated. Then don't be so shy, Dumiitruuu: look upon my works without averting your eyes, without shrinking back. The pictures painted and graven in the walls — the many amphorae in their racks — the salts and powders contained in these ancient vessels.
In the daring torchlight Dumitru looked. Racks of black oak standing everywhere, and on their shelves numberless jars, urns: amphorae, as the voice had termed them. Throughout these rooms in this subterranean hideaway, there must be several thousands of them, all tight-stoppered with plugs of oak in leaden sheaths, all with faded, centuries-stained labels pasted to them where handles joined necks. One rack had been shattered, thrown aside by a falling ceiling stone; its jars had been spilled, some of them breaking open. Powders had trickled out, forming small cones which themselves had taken on the dust of decades. And when Dumitru looked at these spilled remains…
See how fine they are, these essential salts, whispered the voice in his head, which now contained a curiosity of its own, as if even the owner of that voice were awed by this ghoulish hoard. Stoop down, feel them in your hands, Dumiitruuu.
The youth could not disobey; he sifted the powders, which were soft as talc and yet free as mercury; they ran through his fingers and left his hands clean, without residue. And while he handled the salts in this fashion, so the Thing in his mind gave a mental sniff: it seemed to taste of the essence of what it had bade Dumitru examine. And:
Ah… he was a Greek, this one! the voice informed. / recognize him — we conversed on several occasions. A priest from Greek-land, aye, who knew the legends of the Vrykoulakas. He'd crusaded against them, he said, and carried his crusade across the sea to Moldavia, Wallachia, even to these very mountains. He built a grand church in Alba lulia, which possibly stands there even to this day, and from it would go out among the towns and villages to seek out the monstrous Vrykoulakas.
Individuals of the townspeople would name their enemies, often knowing them for innocents; and depending on the power or stature of the accuser, the 'Venerable' Arakli Aenos — as this one was called — would 'prove' or 'disprove' the accusation. For example: if a famous Boyar gave evidence that such and such persons were bloodsucking demons, be sure that the Greek would discover them as such. But only let a poor man bring such a charge, however faithfully, and he might well be ignored or even punished for a liar! A witchfinder and a fake, old Aenos, who upon a time accused even myself! Aye, and I must needs flee to escape them from Visegrad who came to put me down! Oh, I tell you, it was a very troublesome business, that time.
But… time settles many a score. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. When he died they buried the old fraud in a lead-lined box in Alba lulia, beside the church he'd built there. What a boon! For just exactly as had been intended, so the imperishable lead of his coffin sufficed to keep out the seepage and worms and all manner of rodent malefactor — until a time one hundred years later when I dug him up/ Oh, yes — we conversed on several occasions. But in the end, what did he know? Nothing! A fraud, a faker!
Still, I evened the score. That pile of dust you sifted there: Arakli Aenos himself-and ah, how he screeaaamed when I gave him back his form and flesh, and burned the dog with hot ironsss! Ha-haa-haaa!
Dumitru hissed his horror and snatched back his fingers from the strewn 'salts'. He flapped his hands as if they too were burned with hot irons, blew on them, wiped them trembling down his coarsely woven trousers. He lurched upright and backed away from the broken urns, only to crash into another rack which stood behind him. He fell sprawling in dust and powder and salts; but his confusion had served to clear his mazed mind a little — which the owner of the voice at once recognized, so that now he tightened his grip.
Steady now, steady, my son! Ah, I see: you think I torment you to no purpose — you believe I
