'If any man here hears you say that, you'll get a sword in the guts.'
'Yeah, I know. But by the Granite Thrones, it's bloody good to see them all.' He raised his voice. 'I said, it's bloody grand to see you all! It's good to know I'm not alone!'
'Have you been fighting 'em?' rumbled Fat Bill. 'The bloodsuckers, I mean?'
'Fighting and killing them,' said Pettrus.
'Good. 'Cos we've got a plan.' Fat Bill grinned, but Wood felt his heart sinking. To Wood, the word 'plan' was usually synonymous with 'trouble', 'error' and inevitably, 'massacre'. 'We need some handy men to help carry it out.'
'It's nothing to do with robbing the Gollothrim Bank again, is it?' scowled Pettrus. 'You know what happened that time.'
'No,' said Fat Bill, and Wood realised everybody was quiet in the Black Barracks, all eyes on Fat Bill, Wood and Pettrus. 'This is something infinitely more juicy.'
Graal was tired. Bone weary. He had never felt so tired before and attributed it to the wounds suffered at the claws of Bhu Vanesh. He reined in his horse at the top of a rocky, barren hill, a stolen black charger from the stables of the old Mayor of Gollothrim, and turned in his saddle. Skanda was close behind, riding side-saddle on a small, grey mare which constantly eyed Graal with nervous eyes, tosses of the head and snorts and stamps.
Skanda pulled alongside Graal, and smiled.
'You are weary?'
'Through to my bones.'
'Bhu Vanesh did more than torture your flesh. I think he may have poisoned your soul.'
Graal snorted. 'My soul was destroyed long centuries ago.' He gazed out, across a country scattered with long shadows from a low winter sun. Snow rimed the rocks and trees, frosted the long yellow grass, and clung like diamonds to huge, scattered boulders.
'It will be night soon.'
'No time to camp,' said Skanda, and dropped from the saddle, stretching his back. 'We have too much ground to cover, and tick tock tick tock, the clockwork always moves when you wind it up.'
'I'm not sure I agree with your choice of paths.' Graal was still gazing into the far distance. His mouth was a narrow, bitter crease, his hands albino pale on the pommel of his saddle.
'The Gantarak Marshes? It is a straight line.'
'It's a damn dangerous line. I've heard tales of whole armies lost in the murky, shitty depths. And even now winter insects will be waiting to bite and sting and feed.'
'On blood?' Skanda laughed, light gleaming from his gloss black teeth. 'How beautifully, deliciously ironic! A blood-sucker feeding from a blood-sucker! I am stunned that you find the concept so hateful. Surely you must empathise with the insect?'
'I despise insects,' said Graal, voice a growl. 'I find their lack of empathy disturbing.'
'What, and you vachine are so much better?'
'We look after our own.'
'Until you slaughter an entire civilisation to satiate a mammoth greed.'
Graal shrugged. 'I am what I am. I believe in selfpreservation and building on one's triumphs. What other goal to seek other than total domination? Total dominion? 'If one does not strive to reach the pinnacle of vachine development, then one should stay in the ground with all the other worms.''
'As spoken by a true vampire prophet. But his logic, and yours, are flawed. For by turning against your own race in your desperate search for an ultimate kingship, you left your flank unprotected.'
'Sacrificing the vachine of Silva Valley was a necessary evil! A move on the gameboard of life and conquest, a sacrifice that will lead eventually to ultimate victory!'
'I'm surprised you still feel that way after watching Bhu Vanesh twist Kradek-ka's head from his shoulders.'
'There are always casualties in war,' growled Graal.
'Indeed there are,' said Skanda. 'But normally one seeks to wipe out the enemy, not one's own nation.'
'It was the only way,' said Graal. Then shrugged. 'Anyway, plenty more vachine survive to the north who know nothing of my betrayal; I can always go slithering back to them with my tail between my legs.' He grinned, an almost boyish grin if it hadn't been for the evil gleam in his cold blue eyes.
'There are more?' Skanda's head snapped up, a little too sharp.
Graal stared at Skanda. 'More vachine? Yes. Does that bother you?'
Skanda relaxed, and his words slid out, cool as chilled snakemeat. 'Of course not. I know the vachine civilisation wasn't restricted to Silva Valley. How many more?'
'Thousands,' said Graal, and grinned. ' Hundreds of thousands. Far north, north of the Black Pike Mountains which are simply pimples on the arse of the World Beast. North, where the ice rules, where the vachine built their master civilisation, Garrenathon, with the help of Harvesters Pure.'
'Indeed,' said Skanda, voice still cold, eyes fixed on Graal. 'Why, then, do you not reside there? In this Garrenathon? Surely you would be received as a great general? Surely you could satisfy your whims of wealth and power and dominion from such a seat?'
Graal shook his head. 'Kradek-ka and I, we came here, to Silva. Oversaw the building. So you see? The vachine of Silva Valley were our puppets, our playthings, right from the start; nurtured, grown, crafted, awaiting the time when we could resurrect the Vampire Warlords. But we underestimated them. Bastards.'
'Come. Time to move on,' said Skanda, and hopped up onto the mare with incredible agility. His black eyes fixed, once, on Graal, then turned and stared off to the far north. There, he imagined vast, vast cities of ice; a world of huge towers and temples and palaces, filled with a million clockwork vampires, a million vachine. 'One day, I will find you,' he whispered.
'What was that?'
'Nothing. I shall lead the way, Graal. We wouldn't want you falling in the marsh now, would we?'
After the biting and discomfort of two days in the Gantarak Marshes, Graal was relieved to break free onto the Great North Road. Snow fell occasionally, a light peppering that drifted in the wind and frosted the pines which lined the road. They rode north for a while, horses picking their way with ease, but Skanda grew increasingly agitated at this open route commonly used by armies, and now by association, possible vampire armies. After all, the Warlords were spreading their new rule, their new plague, with acumen. And the Great North Road was the easiest way to move troops up and down the flanks of Falanor…
They cut northeast from the Great North Road just south of Old Valantrium, and travelled east towards Moonlake but with no intention of entering the city – which would either be deserted, or maybe ravaged by vampires, Graal was sure. He had not been privy to all plans set in motion by the Vampire Warlords; but certainly, infesting every city of Falanor was an initial priority.
Graal and Skanda travelled in silence, mostly. Graal thought long and hard on his past actions, on the vachine, their betrayal, the blood-oil legacy, and Kell. Kell. The bastard who had helped his current tumbling downfall… or at least, that was one way Graal saw events. If Kell had not killed the Soul Stealers, then Graal might, might just, have had the strength necessary to overthrow the Vampire Warlords in their initial moment of weakness. Instead, Graal had been slapped aside like a naughty child.
Bastard, he thought. Bastard!
Another two days saw the ancient walls of Old Skulkra edging into view past the rolling snowy heather of Valantrium Moor. Those two days had been a desolation for Graal, two days of plodding across high, exposed moorland, a sharp nasty wind cutting from east to west and carrying ice and snow, no paths to follow in this deserted landscape and a cold sky wider than the world.
Now, as the frozen heather dropped down from the moorland plateau, so Skanda found them a sheltered place and they made camp before nightfall. The sky was the colour of topaz and stars lay strewn like sugar on velvet. Graal built a fire, and for a change Skanda came and sat with him, and both warmed hands over the flames.
'What's the plan when we arrive?' said Graal, eyeing the small boy with distaste. Skanda may look like a child, a young human boy, but Graal knew different; he still remembered his inhuman movements when Shanna and Tashmaniok tried to cut his head from his shoulders. He had danced between their silver swords like a ghost. Like one of the Ankarok. The Ancient Race.
