Shame on you! said the other. You know how I like a good argument: the persuasion of unassailable logic, the deft manipulation of words, the skilful haggling before a bargain is struck. Would you deny me these simple pleasures?
'Spit it out, Faethor,' said Harry. 'Tell me what you want, and also what it's worth to you. And only then — if I can deliver and still live with myself — only then let's talk about bargains.'
Bah! the other answered; but was equally quick to follow up, Very well. And without more ado: / have heard it from the dead that you are come upon hard times. Yes, I admit it, I knew that you had been stripped of your powers. Oh, it's true, I am a pariah among the dead, but sometimes when they talk it pleases me to 'overhear' what is said.Much has been said about you, Harry Keogh, and I have overheard it. Not only are you forbidden to deadspeak, but you no longer command the facility of instantaneous transportation. This is all true?
'Yes.'
So (Harry sensed Faethor's curt nod.) Now, I know nothing of this… teleportation? And so in that sphere may not help you. It involves numbers, I believe — the simultaneous resolution of myriad complicated equations? — and in that I admit to a failing. I am out of touch by a thousand years, and even in my heyday was never much of a mathematician. But as for the question of deadspeak, there we might come to some agreement.
Harry tried not to show his eagerness. 'An agreement? You think you can return it to me? You don't know what you're saying. Experts have handled my case. In my waking hours I can no more speak to the dead than pour acid in my ears! That is, I can, but the result would be the same. I know for I've tried it — once! And also because it was forced upon me — once!'
So, said Faethor again. And I have also heard it whispered by the dead, that this mischief was worked upon you by your own son in a world other than this world. Astonishing! So, you found your way there, did you? Aye, and suffered the consequences…
'Faethor,' said Harry, 'get to the point.'
The point is simple. Only the Wamphyri could so interfere with your mind, and even then only one of their most powerful. It was the art of fascination — hypnotism — as used by a great master of that art, which crippled you, Harry Keogh. Ah, and I pride myself that I too was just such a master!
'You're saying that you can cure me?'
Faethor chuckled darkly, for he knew as well as Harry himself that the ex-Necroscope was hooked. What is written may be erased, he said, as you now appreciate. But just as surely, what is set askew may be put to rights! Only put yourself in my hands, and it shall be done.
Harry shrank back. 'Put myself in your hands? Let you into my mind, as Dragosani once let Thibor into his? Do you think I'm mad?'
/ think you are desperate.
'Faethor, I-'.
Now listen to me, the long-extinct vampire interrupted. / have spoken of mutual advantage, and of the dead whispering in their tombs. But some of them do more than merely whisper. In the mountains of the Metalici and Zarundului there are those who cry out in their very terror of that which is risen up! For not even the centuries-dead — not even their bones and their dust — are safe from this one. Aye, and I know his name, and I deem myself responsible.
And now Harry was hooked more surely than ever, but like a fish on a line he intended to give the vampire a good run for his money. 'Faethor,' he said, 'you're saying that one of the Wamphyri has come among us. But I already knew this. Where's the advantage in that? Was I supposed to deliver my mind into your hands for such a scrap as this? You do think I'm mad!'
No, I think you are dedicated. To the eradication of what you term a foulness. You would destroy it before it destroys you. You would do it for the safety and sanity of your world, and I would do it… solely for my satisfaction. For I hated this one even as I hated Thibor.
'Who was he?' Harry shot the question, hoping against hope to catch the other out and read the answer in his startled mind.
But Faethor only tut-tutted, and Harry sensed a saddened, disappointed shake of his head. No need for that, my son, he said, oh so quietly, for I'll gladly tell you his name. Why not? For you won't remember it when you awaken. His name — his most hated, despised name — was Janos! And such was the venom in his voice that Harry knew it was true.
'Your son,' he sighed, nodding. 'Your second son, after Thibor. Janos Ferenczy. So now at least I know who I'm up against, if not what.'
The who of it is Janos, said Faethor, and without my help the what of it will destroy you utterly!
'Then tell me about him,' Harry answered. Tell me all you can of him, and I'll try to do the rest. You've bargained well. I can't refuse you.'
Again Faethor chuckled. And: Indeed your memory is short, he said. It will last only as long as your dream!
Harry saw that it was true and his frustration turned to anger. 'Then what has been the point? Did you only come to mock me after all?'
Not at all, I came to seal a bargain. And it is sealed. You will come to me where you know I lie, and we shall speak again — but the next time you'll remember!
'But I won't even remember this time!' Harry cried out.
Ah, but you will, you will, Faethor's fading voice came echoing out of the rolling fog. You'll remember something of it, at least. For I've seen to it, Harry. I've seen to it, Haaarry Keeooogh!
'Harry?' Someone stood beside him, bent over him.
'Harry' Sandra's urgent hand was on his arm; and Darcy Clarke hurrying to answer a banging at the door, where Manolis Papastamos was shouting to be let in; and a feeble dawn light struggling to find cracks in the louvres.
Harry leaped awake, lurched upright like a drunkard and almost overturned his chair. But Sandra was there to support him. He held her close, and in another moment Darcy and Manolis were in the room.
'A terrible thing! A terrible thing!' Manolis kept repeating, as Darcy opened a window and shutters to let in the pale light of a newly dawning day. But as the room sprang to life so Manolis's jaw fell open and he pointed a trembling hand at a huge Greek tapestry covering the better part of one entire wall. The tapestry was moving!
'God almighty!' Darcy gasped, as Sandra clung to Harry more tightly yet.
The tapestry was a panorama of banded blue sky over brown mountains and white villages, but printed on the sky in letters eighteen inches high was a name: FAETHOR. And it was printed in fur that crawled!
Already Harry's dream was forgotten, but he would never in a lifetime forget his waking conversations with this father of vampires. 'Faethor!' he gasped the word out loud. And as if it were some Word of Power, the name at once broke up the legend written on the tapestry — into a hundred individual bats! No bigger than winged mice, they released their hold on the fabric and whirled around the room once before escaping through the open window.
And: 'So, it's true,' said Manolis Papastamos, white and trembling, the first to regain command of his senses. 'It all comes together. I had thought Ken Layard and Trevor Jordan were the strange policemen, and you three stranger still. But of course, because you hunt the strange criminal!'
Sandra caught a telepathic glimpse of his mind, and knew that he knew.
'You should have told me from the beginning,' he said, flopping down into a chair. 'I am a Greek and some of us understand these things.'