of the Wamphyri's presence here.
The Lords lived on trogs for long and long,' his informant told him. 'Until their stacks were established. And it's only recently that Lord Shaitan bred his first flyers and warriors, thus prompting the others to follow suit. But now . . . they're moving that much faster. They've organized supplicant tribes east of the great pass, who make their battle gauntlets for them, and other supplicants who ... are simply flesh. They take tithe from the poor bastards, even as I was taken. Raids west of the pass have been few and far between; certain of the Szgany tribes fight back! The Lidescis in particular are vicious in their defence of Sunside!
And you say you were a loner, who dwelled in the mountains and kept apart from men? Plainly you were, for there's that of the great wolf in you. But the barrier mountains are a mighty range; it's not surprising you didn't sight the Wamphyri on their infrequent raids. Ask yourself this: why should they raid west of the pass when there's easy meat in the east? Also, why should they be in a hurry to show themselves? What is time to them? But that was then, and this is now; Sunside will come more and more under attack ... "
And one other subject:
'Mentalism,' said Radu. 'Do they all have it? Who is the craftiest thought-thief, whom I must watch out for? And who is least talented, that I can spy on his mind?'
'You could get me killed!' Emil Hagisman protested. 'Perhaps I've said too much already!'
'And why have you?'
'Something about your eyes, their penetrating stare. Or your open atitude ... your "innocence", perhaps? You treat me as a man, not as a slave. I suspect it's because you are new to al this - ah, but you'l be a true Lord soon enough! Perhaps it's because you have more than mere mentalism. They say that Rusha Basti is a beguiler, too.'
'A beguiler? Hypnotism?' Radu hadn't realized it, not in himself.
There's that in your voice that lulls,' said the other. 'It makes me weary and lures words out of me.'
Radu held him close and stared deep into his eyes, which were feral even as Radu's own, but without his scarlet cores. Then say on, and tell me what I would know,' he said.
And Emil Hagisman told him - or would have. But at that very moment one of Radu's thrals came scrambling down from a high vantage/viewpoint looking northeast on the greater stacks of the Wamphyri. He was pointing back over his shoulder, gabbling, 'Lord Lykan! There in the sky around one of the mightiest aeries: aerial warriors, and flyers bearing armoured men! They swarm even now, perhaps against us!'
In moments Radu and the Gust's lieutenant had climbed up into a viewing niche, where they gazed out through a wide and jagged crack in the stack's outer sheath, upwards and into the heart of the nest of sky-scraping towers. And in one sense at least Radu's thral was correct: a swarm of men and creatures were massed about one of the central aeries. Except they were not descending from it, but atacking it.
'Shaitanstack!' Emil Hagisman gasped. 'Shaitan, the Lord of Vampires himself, is under atack!'
Radu looked at him. 'In two more hours I was to meet with him. Now ... it would seem not!'
'It was probably his invitation to you that started this going,' the other told him, shielding his eyes from the northern auroras as he tried to identify the shapes darting around Shaitanstack.
'Oh? How so?'
'A distraction, of course. The perfect time to launch a pre-emptive strike! What, a reception in Shaitanstack? Why, the Lords are al busy pretying themselves up, not to mention the Ladies! Proud, aye! And Shaitan himself, proudest of them all: he'll want his place to look its very best. Oh, they don't get their heads together very often, these vampire Lords, but when they do ... it's a grand contest of words and gestures, poses and postures!
'Al for me?'
'For them! Half-hinted taunts and chalenges, threats and insinuations. They thrive on it. But at a reception: no weapons alowed. They can crow, preen and bluster al they like, and no harm done. Until later, possibly.'
'You make them sound ... what, like fools? Buffoons!'
'Among themselves, so it would ofttimes seem - for they have each other's measure, after al. Wel, more or less. But among humankind? Ah, no. Great bears play rough-and-tumble in the foothills of Sunside, and no harm