the top of the spiral staircase, and a hulking lieutenant appeared on the landing. He paused uncertainly. Maglore scowled at him. 'Well? Is it urgent?'
'Your creature waxes in its vat, Lord,' the lieutenant reported. 'Alas, it has wrenched loose the breathing tubes and so may drown in its fluids.'
'What!' Maglore sprang up. 'Why did you not reconnect the tubes?'
'Go into the vat?' The lieutenant fell back. 'But the creature is voracious, and ill-humoured!'
Take me there, now!' Maglore shouted. 'If aught befalls that construct of mine ... by Turgosheim, you'll know the meaning of ill-humour!'
Half-way across the floor he paused and looked back. 'You, Nathan. Explore the manse. If you are weary, ask any thrall to show you your room. Nowhere is forbidden to you, but avoid the women ... at least until I have spoken to them. Now I must go, but one last thing: I shall keep you as a friend, for I value you for yourself and not as a cringing vampire thrall. But let me make myself plain: I will take it very hard if you should try to run away. And always remember, a man without legs cannot run very far at all.. .'
He had made himself plain. In any case, Nathan couldn't see where he might run. What, into Turgosheim? Or up on to the roof of the manse and the rim of the gorge, and so across the mountains to Sunside? To be picked up and brought back again? No, for his stay here was to be a long one. According to Thikkoul, anyway.
Nathan remembered Maglore's words (it seemed as well to remember everything the Seer Lord said): 'Nowhere is forbidden to you.' But did that include Maglore's chambers? Whether or no, he explored his master's rooms first. At least he felt comparatively safe here, which was probably more than could be said for the rest of the place.
As a powerful Lord of the Wamphyri, Maglore didn't stint himself: his apartments were huge. While some of the rooms were natural caves, massive cysts in the volcanic wall of the gorge, others had been carved from the virgin rock. And above every doorway Maglore's familiar sigil was plainly visible: the loop with a half-twist, chiselled in bas-relief into arch or lintel.
Maglore's bedroom faced north, away from the sun. There Nathan looked out through narrow windows on the blue-glittering rim of the world, where strange auroras wove over a coldly distant horizon. But while the windows were wide enough to take a man, he made no attempt to step up and pass through the thick exterior wall; it was enough to simply put his head out. For out there where a precarious ledge or balcony clung to the face of the turret, and a low wall of grafted cartilage was the only protection against a fall of what must be at least twelve hundred feet ... the whole affair seemed very unsafe! In any case, the view was mainly away from Turgosheim and so uninteresting. That was Nathan's excuse, anyway ...
As he explored Maglore's kitchen, a vampire thrall came ghosting, making the place clean. Once-Szgany and male, he was small, thin, ghastly pale; only his eyes contained a spark, and they were yellow, feral, dangerous. When he saw Nathan he gave a start, and then was curious. 'You'll be the new one,' he nodded. 'Well, and you've a lot to learn. For one thing, you're in the wrong place. A room has been set aside for you. If Maglore were to find you here .. .'
'He left me here,' Nathan answered. 'There are no restrictions upon me.'
'Oh?' The other raised an eyebrow, offered a half-sneer. 'Then you must consider yourself fortunate - for now!' He busied himself about the room. 'At any rate, you've been warned.'
Watching him at work (he worked hard, making the kitchen scrupulously clean), Nathan thought: This man was Szgany, like me. Now he's a thrall, a vampire, the next step between Szgany and lieutenant. Except he's reached his limit because he isn't ... the right stuff? In Settlement, Lardis Lidesci burned such as him, before they could head for Starside. Should I pity him, or should I be afraid of him?
'Why do you watch me?' Nostrils gaping, eyes glaring, the other rounded on him; and Nathan saw that he really should not pity him. It was much too late for that.
'You must know this place well,' he said, mainly for something to say.
'Runemanse? Turgosheim? I know them well enough,' the vampire answered.