Necroscope IV: Deadspeak

and after that — ' Yes?

' — After that, I just don't know.' Mobius was silent for a moment, and then: That serious, eh?

That serious, yes.'

But Harry, all your secrets are in there, your ambitions, your most private thoughts.

'Also my desires, my vices, my sins. But it's no peep-show, August. You don't have to look where you don't want to.'

The other sighed his acquiescence. Very well. How do we go about it?

Harry was eager now. 'August Ferdinand, you're the one man among all the dead who can go anywhere — literally anywhere — in three-dimensional space. You've been out to the stars, down to the bed of the deepest ocean. Through your knowledge of the Mobius Continuum, you've thrown off the fetters of the grave. So… how we go about it is simple. I hope so, anyway. I'm going to clear my mind and drift in sleep, and simply invite you in. I'm going to say: Mobius, come into my mind. Enter, of your own free will, and do whatever is necessary to…'

AHHH! came the black, gurglingly glutinous, utterly overpowering voice of Janos Ferenczy in Harry's mind. BUT SUCH AN ELOQUENT INVITATION. NEVER LET IT BE SAID THAT I WAS THE ONE TO REFUSE YOU!

Mobius and his deadspeak were swept aside on the instant. Harry, paralysed, could do nothing. He felt the Ferenczy step inside his head as a fish feels the lamprey's clamps in its gill, and was likewise impotent to stop it. It was as if some nameless slug had oozed in through his ear to eat his brain, and was now stretching itself luxuriously before commencing the feast. He tried to bring down the shutters of his mind but they were stuck, effortlessly held open by the invader.

OH? said Janos, as yet feeling his way, enjoying the horror of his host. AND DID I FEEL YOU CRINGE JUST THEN? COULD IT BE THAT YOU ATTEMPTED TO EVICT ME? AND WAS THAT A MEASURE OF YOUR STRENGTH? IF SO, THEN I'VE PRECIOUS LITTLE TO FEAR HERE! BUT FOR SHAME, HARRY KEOGH! WOULD YOU INVITE ME IN AND AS QUICKLY THROW ME OUT? AND WHAT SORT OF A HOST ARE YOU?

'My… invitation… wasn't to you!' Harry forced his brain into gear, tried to remind himself that this was just another vampire. Janos settled on the thought like a vulture to carrion:

I WAS NOT INVITED? BUT YOUR MIND WAS OPEN AS A WHORE'S CROTCH — AND JUST AS TEMPTING!

Something of Harry's horror receded; he tightened his grip on himself, forced his feverish mind into what he hoped was a defensive stance. But he could almost smell the vampire's vile breath and feel his stealthy tread in the corridors of his most secret being.

AND STILL YOU ACCUSE ME OF STENCHES! the invader laughed. WHAT WAS IT YOU LIKENED ME TO THE LAST TIME? A DEAD PIG? YOU OF ALL PEOPLE SHOULD KNOW BETTER, FOR I AM UNDEAD…

Suddenly Harry was cool. He had felt stifled but now it was as if someone had thrown open a window to blow out all the cobwebs of his mind. He filled his lungs with the rush of this weird, conjectural ether and felt stronger for it. And from a far more buoyant if mysterious viewpoint, he wondered at the audacity of the vampire that he should feel so safe and secure as to be able to just… just walk in here.

All of these most recent thoughts were guarded, so that Janos took Harry's silence as an indication of sheer terror. AND SO THIS IS THE MIGHTY NECROSCOPE, said the vampire. AND HOW DOES IT FEEL TO HAVE MY 'FILTHY LEECH'S MIND' IN YOUR HEAD, HARRY?

Harry continued to guard his thoughts. It wasn't difficult; it was like deadspeak, where with a small effort of concentration the dead heard only what he required them to hear. And again he felt a peculiar surge of confidence which was surely well out of place here. For, asleep and dreaming, he couldn't exert half as much control over his mind as when he was awake. However true that might be, still he sensed that Janos was becoming just a fraction more cautious.

YOU KNOW OF COURSE THAT I CAN BEND YOU TO MY WILL JUST AS I BENT — AND BROKE — THAT FOOL JORDAN? But was Janos stating a fact, or was he asking himself a question?

'Keep telling yourself that,' said Harry, without emotion. 'But remember: you entered of your own free will.'

WHAT? And now there was a ragged, worried edge to Janos's thoughts. As if for the first time he might be weighing the issues and considering his position here.

And in the back of Harry's mind, unsuspected by Janos, it was as if he heard Faethor advising him again, as he had in the ruins of his house outside Ploiesti:

Instead of shrinking back from him when you sense him near, seek him out! He would enter your mind? Enter his! He will expect you to be afraid; be bold! He will threaten; brush all such threats aside and strike! But above all else, do not let his evil weaken you. And, finally: There may be more to your mind than even you suspect, Harry…

Janos was beginning to think so too. THIS MIND OF YOURS IS… DIFFERENT FROM THE MINDS OF OTHER MEN. IT WILL GIVE ME GREAT PLEASURE TO EXPLORE IT. AND IT WILL GIVE YOU GREAT PAIN!

'Well, at least you have the vanity of the Wamphyri,' said Harry. 'But what is vanity without the means to match it?'

YOU KNOW US… WELL, said Janos, edgier than ever. PERHAPS TOO WELL.

'Having second thoughts, my son?'

And again, but angrily: WHAT?!

'Come now, not so nervous. I speak more as an uncle than a true father. But it's a fact I do have a son of my own. Except, of course, he is Wamphyri! But see, now I sense your trembling. What, you afraid? How so? For after all you have my measure. Have you not invaded my mind? Where is my resistance? With what may I resist? Here you are inside the castle of my very being. Ah, but there are castles and there are castles — and some are easier to get into than they are to get out of!' And at last Harry brought the shutters of his mind crashing down.

Janos was confused; this was no mere man; it was as if he talked to… something far greater than a man. In his panic, so the vampire became vicious:

THESE PUNY BARRIERS YOU HAVE ERECTED… I AM SURROUNDED BY DOORS. BUT I HAVE THE STRENGTH TO BEAT THEM ALL DOWN, INDEED TO TEAR THEM FROM THEIR HINGES!

Harry heard him, but he also heard this:

When he yawns his great jaws at you, go in through them, for he's softer on the inside!

'Beat them all down, then,' he answered. 'Tear them from their hinges — if you dare!'

Janos dared. He ran through Harry's mind shattering every barrier the Necroscope could put in his way, tearing down the shutters and screens on his Innermost Being. All Harry's past was there, his loves and hates, his hopes and aspirations, and all trampled under as the vampire marauded through previously secret corridors of id. In any one of these places the monster might pause a while, play, cause Harry to laugh, cry, scream — or die. But realizing now that indeed he had Harry's measure, he didn't pause but rampaged. And:

WHAT? WHAT? he finally laughed, as he came to a place more heavily fortified than all the rest put together. WHY, IT CAN ONLY BE THE VERY TREASURE HOUSE! AND WHAT MARVELLOUS SECRETS ARE STORED HERE, HARRY KEOGH? ARE THESE THE VAULTS OF YOUR TALENTS?

And before Harry could answer — if he would answer — Janos had wrenched two of the doors open.

Beyond one of them was the ultimate NOTHING, so that in a single moment Janos found himself teetering on the threshold of the Mobius Continuum. And behind the other… was Faethor Ferenczy, crouching there where he directed Harry's game, and now inspired Janos's uttermost terror!

The invader reared back — from Faethor, who had now emerged more fully from his hiding place and was frantically trying to push him through the doorway to eternity, and from the Mobius Continuum both — and grunted his shock, astonishment and total disbelief. For within a mainly human identity he had stumbled across not only an Unknowable and terrifying concept, but also the entirely monstrous and alien mind of his own long-dead father!