Wamphyri

Thibor narrowed his eyes as the glare from the Ferenczy's lantern brightened, lighting up the entire dungeon. Three other prisoners were with him here, yes, and dead or alive it wasn't hard to guess who they'd be. As to how or why the castle's master had brought them here —that was anybody's guess. They were of course Thibor's Wallach companions, and also old Arvos of the Szgany. Of the three, it seemed to be the stumpy Wallach who'd survived: the one who was all chest and arms. He lay crumpled on the floor where stone flags had been laid aside to reveal black soil underneath. His body seemed badly broken, but still his barrel chest rose and fell with some regularity and one of his arms twitched a little.

‘The lucky one,' said the Ferenczy, his voice deep as a pit. ‘Or perhaps unlucky, depending on one's point of view. He was alive when my children took me to him.'

Thibor rattled his chains. ‘Was? Man, he's alive now! Can't you see him moving? See, he breathes!'

‘Oh, yes!' the Ferenczy moved closer, in that soundless, sinuous way of his. ‘And the blood surges in his veins, and the brain in his broken head functions and thinks frightened thoughts — but I tell you he is not alive. Nor is he truly dead. He is undead!' He chuckled as at some obscene joke.

‘Alive, undead? Is there a difference?' Thibor yanked viciously on his chains. How he would love to wrap them round the other's neck and squeeze till his eyes popped out.

‘The difference is immortality.' His tormentor thrust his face closer yet. ‘Alive he was. mortal, undead he "lives" forever. Or until he destroys himself, or some accident does the job for him. Ah, but to live forever, eh, Thibor the Wallach? How sweet is life, eh? But would you believe it can be boring, too? No, of course not, for you have not known the ennui of the centuries. Women? I have had such women! And food?' His voice took on a slyness. ‘Ah! Gobbets you've not yet dreamed of. And yet for these last hundred — nay, two hundred — years, all of these things have bored me.'

‘Bored with life, are you?' Thibor ground his teeth, put every last effort into wrenching his chains' staples from the sweating stone. It was useless. ‘Only set me free and I'll put an end to your — uh! — boredom.'

The Ferenczy laughed like a baying hound. ‘You will? But you already have, my son. By coming here. For, you see, I have waited for one just such as you. Bored? Aye, that I have been. And indeed you are the cure, but it's a cure we'll apply my way. You'd slay me, eh? Do you really think so? Oh, I've my share of fighting to come, but not with you. What? I should fight with my own son? Never! No, I'll go forth and fight and kill like none before me! And I'll lust and love like twenty men, and none shall say me nay! And I'll do it all to the ends of the earth, to such excess that my name shall live forever, or be stricken forever from man's history! For what else can I do with passions such as mine, a creature such as I am, condemned to life?'

‘You speak in riddles,' Thibor spat on the floor. ‘You're a madman, crazed by your lonely life up here with nothing but wolves for company. I can't see why the VIad fears you, one madman on his own. But I can see why he'd want you dead. You are... loathsome! A blemish on mankind. Misshapen, split-tongued, insane: death's the best thing for you. Or locked up where natural men won't have to look at you!'

The Ferenczy drew back a little, almost as if he were surprised at Thibor's vehemence. He hung his lantern from a bracket, seated himself on a stone bench. ‘Natural men, did you say? Do you talk to me of nature? Ah, but there's more in nature than meets the eye, my son! Indeed there is. And you think that I'm unnatural, eh? Well, the Wamphyri are rare, be sure, but so is the sabre-tooth. Why, I haven't seen a mountain cat with teeth like scythes in... three hundred years! Perhaps they are no more. Perhaps men have hunted them down to the last. Aye, and it may be that one day the Wamphyri shall be no more. But if that day should ever come, believe me it shall not be the fault of Faethor Ferenczy. No, and it shall not be yours.'

‘More riddles — meaningless mouthings — madness!' Thibor spat the words out. He was helpless and he knew it. If this monstrous being wished him dead, then he was as good as dead. And it was no use to reason with a madman. Where is the reason in a madman? Better to insult him face to face, enrage him and get it over with. It would be no pleasant thing to hang here and rot, and watch maggots crawling in the flesh of men he'd called his comrades.

‘Are you finished?' the Ferenczy asked in his deepest voice. ‘Best to be done now with all hurtful ranting, for I've much to tell you, much to show you, great knowledge and even greater skills to impart. I'm weary of this place, you see, but it needs a keeper. When I go out into the world, someone must stay here to keep this place for me. Someone strong as I myself. It is my place and these are my mountains, my lands. One day I may wish to return. When I do, then I shall find a Ferenczy here. Which is why I call you my son. Here and now I adopt you, Thibor of Wallachia. Henceforth you are Thibor Ferenczy. I give you my name, and I give you my banner: the devil's head! Oh, I know these honours tower above you; I know you do not yet have my strength. But I shall give it to you! I shall bestow upon you the greatest honour, a magnificent mystery. And when you are become Wamphyri, then —‘

‘Your name?' Thibor growled. ‘I don't want your name.

I spit on your name!' He shook his head wildly. ‘As for your device: I've a banner of my own.'

‘Ah?' the creature stood up, flowed closer. ‘And what are your signs?'

‘A bat of the Wallachian plain,' Thibor answered, ‘astride the Christian dragon.'

The Ferenczy's bottom jaw fell open. ‘But that is most propitious. A bat, you say? Excellent! And riding the dragon of the Christians? Better still! And now a third device: let Shaitan himself surmount both.'

‘I don't need your blood-spewing devil.' Thibor shook his head and scowled.

The Ferenczy smiled a slow, sinister smile. ‘Oh, but you will, you will.' Then he laughed out loud. ‘Aye, and I shall avail myself of your symbols. When I go out across the world I shall fly devil, bat, and dragon all three. There, see how I honour you! Henceforth we carry the same banner.'

Thibor narrowed his eyes. ‘Faethor Ferenczy, you play with me as a cat plays with a mouse. Why? You call me your son, offer me your name, your sigils. Yet here I hang in chains, with one friend dead and another dying at my feet. Say it now, you are a madman and I'm your next victim. Isn't it so?'

The other shook his wolfish head. ‘So little faith,' he rumbled, almost sadly. ‘But we shall see, we shall see. Now tell me, what do you know of the Wamphyri?'

‘Nothing. Or very little. A legend, a myth. Freakish men who hide in remote places and spring out on peasants and small children to frighten them. Occasionally dangerous: murderers, vampires, who suck blood in the night and swear it gives them strength. "Viesczy", to the Russian peasant; "Obour", to the Bulgar; "Vrykoulakas" in Greek-land. They are names which demented men attach to themselves. But there is something common to them in all tongues: they are liars and madmen!'

‘You do not believe? You have looked upon me, seen the wolves which I command, the terror I excite in the hearts of the VIad and his priests, but you do not believe.'

‘I've said it before and I'll say it again,' Thibor gave his chains a last, frustrated jerk. ‘The men I've killed have all stayed dead! No, I do not believe.'

The other gazed at his prisoner with burning eyes. ‘That is the difference between us,' he said. ‘For the men I kill, if it pleases me to kill them in a certain way, do not stay dead. They become undead...‘ He stood up, stepped flowingly close. His upper lip curled back at one side, displayed a downward curving fang like a needle-sharp tusk. Thibor looked away, avoided the man's breath, which was like poison. And suddenly the Wallach felt weak, hungry, thirsty. He was sure he could sleep for a week.