and black-draped windows. Somehow, it's a very gratifying sight. But don't take my word for it; just wait and watch, and see for yourselves.' And he continued to gaze out across Starside.
Out there in what was once vampire heartland -rising up dramatically from a plain littered with the broken stumps and shattered segments of all the once-great stacks, which had not survived The Dweller's war on the Wamphyri - there stood Karenstack. Reaching almost a kilometre in height, the last aerie stood out as a lone fang of rock against the banded blue background of the north, its awesome shadow falling like a black, spastic arm far across Starside, and visibly stretching itself in the improving light, as if blindly groping for the north-eastern horizon.
The group on the bluff waited - a minute or two, three at the outside - for the sun's rays to sweep down, find them, and flood over them. Following which, in the very next moment, they observed the effect which Lardis had so desired to see: a golden stain spreading itself across the uppermost levels of the stack, burning in windows as hollow as eye-sockets, lighting up the grim mouths of launching bays, and seeming to set the high turrets and embrasures afire in a blinding effulgence.
And so like a giant candle, Karenstack stood falsely radiant amid Starside's silence, desolation and devastation ...
For long minutes the four stood there, their attention rapt upon the molten grandeur of Karenstack's crest, which had become the centrepiece in an otherwise bleak and barren scene. But as reflective angles changed and the golden fire began to fade on the stack's stone face, so their momentarily uplifted spirits settled down again and the sense of wonder departed.
"Vampire World 1 - Blood Brothers"
And from below: 'Ahoy, up there! Time we got on ..."
Lardis blinked, nodded, turned his face to the others. 'Andrei's right,' he said, shading his eyes against the unaccustomed dazzle. 'Let's get down.'
The young men went first, with Lardis bringing up the rear. But before following on behind, he cast one more glance out across Starside: its moonscape of endless, boulder-strewn plains, the distant glitter of a frozen ocean, the unvisioned but imagined Icelands under their fluttering aurora banners, and of course Karenstack. And at last he sighed and began to follow the three youths down into the gloom of the pass ...
....nd having descended a little way paused, rooted to the spot, suddenly frozen in his tracks. For Karen-stack was burning still in his mind's eye and on the lenses of his retinas. Karenstack and something else he'd seen, or thought to see - but what? He closed his eyes and the picture came up clearer: the aerie's crest aglow with its false halo of fire. But below the area of reflected light, where the golden rays could never reach: Black motes swirling, jetting, settling towards the yawning mouth of a vast landing bay; midges at this distance, but what would they be up close?
As if in answer to his inward-directed question, a small black bat hovered close to his face, fanning his cheek before side-slipping and stooping on a moth which he'd disturbed. In the next moment it was gone, and Lardis breathed easier. Bats, yes, that was what he'd seen: great clusters of them, closing on the stack. Except that unlike the little fellow who fanned his cheek, they'd been the great bats of Starside - aye, and familiars of the Wamphyri, upon a time - which Zek had called Desmodus. And their home would be Karen-stack itself, deserted now except for their black-furred colony.
'Father?' Jason's voice came from below. 'Are you coming? Can I give you a hand?'
'No, no,' Lardis husked from a dry throat, then swallowed and found his voice. 'I'm fine. I'm coming. Get on down.'
But from then on, and all the way back to where they had tethered their animals at the head of the descent to Sunside, and for most of the trek back to Settlement -which took the greater part of sunup to complete, for they had friends to see along the way - Lardis was far less given to talking and kept his thoughts to himself.
'Bats, yes,' he would mutter, and nod his head furiously, when the others were out of sight and hearing. The great bats of Starside.' Until, by the time they were home again, he had almost convinced himself.
During his waking hours, at least...
In his dreams, however, Lardis Lidesci was not convinced. For the blood of