him ...
Afterwards: Nathan went back to his mother's house and dug in the ruins. He wasn't satisfied that the searchers had done everything in their power. And in order to be absolutely certain, when he was finished with the house he laid bare the floor of the barn. And found nothing, not even a bloodstain.
He stood on the spot where he'd last seen Misha in the embrace of a snarling red-eyed fiend, hung his head, gritted his teeth, clenched his fists. But he didn't cry. No, he told himself, I'll shed no tears until I've shed his blood, taken his shaggy head, smeJJed the stench of his burning hide and seen his last black trace go drifting on the wind!
It was his Szgany vow.
He slept again, and before the dawn went to the Zanesti house where it stood undamaged. Misha's father and surviving brother were there, pale as ghosts, sitting in silence. Before, they hadn't much cared for Nathan; now, her father cradled his head and cried on it. But Nathan wouldn't. And Misha's brother (perhaps thoughtlessly, but surely he could be forgiven) said, 'She never knew a man; she'd been with no one; she wasn't even whole. Once, I would have killed the man who looked at her like that! And now I would kiss him - because Misha had loved him.' And he'd looked at Nathan, perhaps hopefully.
But the youth could only shake his head and say, 'Always remember, you have each other." Which, while he'd not intended it that way, caused them to see that Nathan had no one. Before they could say anything he left them and went looking for Lardis, only to discover that the old Lidesci had experienced the selfsame doubts and returned to his ruined cabin on the knoll.
Nathan joined him there, where Lardis had been at work again in the wreckage. He came across him sitting in what had been his garden, with eyes as vacant as his soul, staring south, waiting for the first glimmer of light to make a silver stain on the far faint curve which was the rim of the world. And when at last Lardis sensed him there, blinked life back into his eyes and looked at him, then Nathan said:
'What will you do, Lardis? Will it be as you told it to Vratza Wransthrall? Will you trek with your people, and turn them into Travellers as in the old days, to keep them from the Wamphyri?'
Lardisshookhishead.'Some will moveon,'he answered, gruffly. 'Can you blame them? But I will stay here. Not "here", you understand, but in Settlement. And I fancy a good many will stay with me. Maybe that way, by adopting at least this one of the Wamphyri's methods, we'll defeat them in the end.' 'By adopting their methods?'
Lardis nodded. 'When the Wamphyri have something, they fight to keep it. Especially territory. They are fiercely territorial, Nathan. In the old days, most of their wars were for territory, for the great aeries, the Starside stacks. Oh, they were for blood, too, and for the sheer hell of it; but mainly they were about territory. It's what drove them to go against The Dweller, and why they were destroyed. And now, finally, it's why they've returned.'
'And how will you keep Settlement?' 'By defending it! This sunup you'll see activity as never before in Settlement. So much to do ... I shouldn't be sitting here ... I must get on down!' He stood up.
Nathan touched his arm. 'I won't be seeing it,' he said, shaking his blond head. 'I'm heading east.' Lardis was disappointed. 'You're deserting me?' 'Never that,' the other answered. 'I came to find out what you would do so that eventually I'd know where to find you. But first I must find Nestor.'
'Nestor?' Lardis's eyebrows peaked. 'Why, anyone would think you weren't there last night! Nestor's gone into Starside, Nathan, in the mouth of a flyer. Look, I've no time for this and so must speak plainly: Nestor's dead, or worse than dead! Can't you get that into your head?'
Nathan followed him down the first flight of steps cut in the steep side of the knoll. 'But you wounded the flyer with a bolt from one of the great crossbows,' he replied. 'What if it crashed? In fact, I dreamed that it crashed - on the wooded slopes over Twin Fords.'
Lardis turned to him. 'You dreamed it? What, and are you a seer? Since when?'
A seer? Am I? Nathan wondered. No, I don't think so.