'You'll… let them know?' Eugen had started shuddering and couldn't control it. 'How will you let — ?'
'I'll shout,' said Harry, with a mirthless grin. 'Don't worry, they'll hear me.'
But what if he starts shouting first? Ion Zaharia asked as Harry walked out of the graveyard.
Then stop him, Harry answered. And: But try not to kill them. Life's precious, as you know well enough. So let them live what they have left. And anyway, they're not worthy to be in here with such as you…
Harry drove very carefully back to Bucharest, parked the car in the airport car park and locked it, and pressed the keys into the soil of a large flowerpot in the booking lounge. Then, just five minutes past his actual reporting time, he handed in his ticket and luggage. It was the same as when he'd come in: no one looked at him twice.
The Olympia Airlines plane took off just eleven minutes late, at 12:56. As it turned its nose south for Bulgaria and the Aegean, Harry was rewarded by the sight of an Aeroflot jet going in for a landing. There would be a bright-eyed couple of lads on board just dying to get their hands on him. Well, so let them die.
Forty minutes later, with the Aegean just swimming up into view through the circular windows, Harry reached out with his deadspeak to the cemetery outside Ploiesti. How are things?
All's well, Harry. No one's been in here, and these two haven't been a problem. The big one did faint, eventually. His small friend came to, took one look, and passed out again!
Harry said: Ion, Alexandru, all of you -1 don't have the words to thank you.
You don't need any. Can we just leave these two where they are now, and… dig ourselves in again?
Harry's nod was reflex as he reclined his seat and lay back a little. The dead in the Romanian graveyard picked it up anyway, and began to disperse back to their resting places. Thanks again, Harry told them, withdrawing his thoughts and allowing himself some small relaxation for the first time in… well, in a day at least.
Don't mention it, was their response.
Harry tried to get Faethor. If he could contact the others as easily as that, communication with the long-dead father of vampires should be no problem. After a few seconds of concentration, he got through.
Harry? I see you are safe. Ah, but you're the resourceful one, Harry Keogh!
You knew I was in trouble?
(Faethor's mental shrug). As I've told you before: I sometimes overhear things. Did you want something?
It seemed to me we might save ourselves some time, Harry answered. / have nothing to do right now, and in a little while my head will be full of the clutter of friends and the atmosphere of a friendly place — not that I'm complaining! So I thought maybe now would be a good time for you to tell me the rest of Janos's story.
There's not much more to tell. But if you wish it…?
I wish it.
And: Very well, my son, Faethor sighed. So be it.
As has been told, I was away for three hundred years. Three centuries of blood! The Great Crusade was only the start of it; later I served Genghis Khan, and then his grandson Batu. In 1240 I assisted and delighted in the taking of Kiev, and in burning it to ashes. Eventually it was time for me to 'die'… and return as Fereng the Black, son of the Fereng! Then, under Hulegu in 1258, I helped bring down Baghdad. Ah, such years of bloodshed, pillage and rape!
But the Mongols were on the wane, and by the turn of the century I had forsaken them in order to fight for Islam. Oh, yes, I was an Ottoman! Me, a Turk, a Moslem ghazi! Ah, what it is to be a mercenary, eh? And with the Turks, for one and a half centuries more, I revelled in blood and death and the sheer glut of war! In the end, however, I had lived with them too long and so was obliged to desert their cause. Ah, well, and it was crumbling anyway.
And so finally I returned and put Thibor down (as has also been told), then took me off into the unchanged and unchanging mountains to seek out Janos and see how well he had kept house for me.
In the interim, however, I had kept my ears open. Wamphyri ears are delicate instruments, be sure, and miss very little. Aye, and they had always been alert for news of my sons, Thibor and Janos. Well, of the former we know. And of the latter?
Where Thibor had been greedy for blood, Janos had been simply greedy. In my time abroad he had had many interests, but mainly he'd been a thief, a pirate, a corsair. Does it surprise you? It should not: for the Barbary pirates had their origin in petty princelings who rose up during the Christian-Moslem conflicts of the Crusades. That then had been Janos's chiefest business during the time of my absence: a grand thief on the broad bosom of the Mediterranean, to loot them who had looted others!
And now he's a sailor again, eh? Well, and why not? Oh, he knows the sea well enough, that one, who now for a profession brings up treasure from the ocean and digs for it in the islands around. Hah! And who, pray, would know better where to find it — since he was the one who laid it down, more than five hundred years ago! And what was that all about, you may wonder, that great squirreling for nuts, as if some fearsome winter were about to descend? But it was, it was! Aye, just such a winter: for Janos had worked hard at his art to look well into the future, and had not liked what he saw there.
For one thing, he had doubtless seen my return, and he did not need to look to know how I would deal with him! And so he had made provision for another time, far beyond the hour of my revenge. This present time, of course, when he is up again and about in the world of men.
But (you may ask) my revenge for what? The loss of Marilena was three to four hundred years in my wake, and I could have killed him then for that; so what now? I will tell you:
First, for his desertion from my cause. To go a-pirating he must first vacate my house. Second, for his treatment of my Szgany. For in the early years of my absence he had kicked out the Szgany Ferengi and reinstated the filthy Zirra, whom I had cursed! Third and last, but not least, for the way in which he greeted me, when at last I was returned.
On my way I had gathered faithful Gypsies to me, who had remembered me through all the years of my exile. Not the originals, no, for they were dust, but the sons of their sons. Ah, they remember legends, the Szgany! But when I went up to my castle I went alone, by night, for a task force would be too obvious and could only appear threatening.
Alas, when I was come there I saw the place a ruin. Well, perhaps not quite so bad, but near enough. The battlements were broken; earthworks without were untended; the repair in general was bad. Left to fend for itself through much of my absence, the place had suffered. But Janos, done with pirating now and returned to other pursuits, was to house. And just as I had tried to follow his career, so he had followed mine.
He knew I was coming; guards were out, with clear instructions; I was challenged, and upon identifying myself…
… Was set upon!
They had sharpened hardwood staves. They had crossbows with wooden bolts. They carried the curved long knives of the Turks. Silver they had, too, on their weapons, and garlic in which to steep them! And each party of men, they had casks of oil, and torches with which to fire it!…To burn what? I ask you.
I fled them, up into the crags and for many a mile in the high places. I limped, scurried, cried out in some great pain, kept barely ahead of my pursuers. They knew I was injured and that they would have me. Janos sent out his entire household to hunt me down. But… I merely lured them. What, Faethor Ferenczy, with his tail between his legs, running from Zirra scum?