tribes of the Szgany. But to what end? Yet more Lords and Ladies, and no more room to house them.
'Men go to war for two main reasons; to feed themselves, and to expand into new territory. No, three, for even the most peaceful of men will retaliate against an aggressive neighbour who seeks to relieve him of those selfsame commodities, food and space. The Wamphyri were no different. Of food there was plenty - as yet -but space was limited. Lesser Lords of low-huddling mansions envied those in their rearing spires, and slovens in crumbling caves could only imagine the opulence of Ladies in their vasty caverns. As for fresh-spawned vampires: they must be satisfied with their lot in whatever niches were available in the canyon floor!
'Satisfied ...? Oh ...?
'It was a scenario for war!
'Younger or less affluent Lords banded together and made vampire thralls, lieutenants, warriors, more than any legitimate requirement. They marched on the greater spires, to take them one at a time. And for every Lord vanquished, staked out, beheaded, burned, there were three or four to occupy the various levels of the ravaged stack. And then the new masters of these levels, being freshly blooded and full of battle, would make war with each other: level against level, stack against stack, manse against manse! Even so, amidst all the reek and roil, most of the Warlords held back from breeding warriors with the power of flight, for any who broke this rule would soon find themselves under attack from all the others in a body.
'But after each wave of fighting, victors and vanquished both would see how worn down and rag-tag they had become, and raid on Sunside like recurrent plagues to replenish themselves. And we may readily understand how, in order to fuel themselves for more war - or restore themselves in its aftermath - our Wamphyri ancestors raped and depleted Sunside. How, with never a thought for the future, they harried the Szgany who were that future almost to extinction! Aye, for while some of us may have resisted it all our lives, we nevertheless admit that the blood is the life, and in those early days of Turgosheim Szgany blood was rapidly running out!
'Eventually, common sense prevailed; the Lords called a Grand Truce; they gathered together and talked. And here, thirteen hundred years later, we may consider ourselves fortunate that among the hotheads were thinkers. They saw now how Turgosheim was small in comparison with Olden Starside in the west. Turgosheim was small; the range in which it was a gash was small; the region across the mountains - called Sunside for obvious reasons - that, too, was small. Quite obviously, to destroy Sunside would have been to destroy themselves. So they saw how close they'd come to disaster. Well, the upshot was this:
'No more wars, not for some time, anyway; a resurgence of Zolteism; a ban on raiding, even hunting on Sunside, and likewise on the breeding of unnecessary creatures. Peace returned to Turgosheim ....ut at a price. What price? Suppression of Wamphyri passions, the outlawing of territorial expansionism, and the introduction of the tithe-system. Which rules apply even to the present day, and we've each sworn by our sigils to abide by them.
'Oh, there have been feuds, even wars between times, but never so wasteful, and never so threatening to all of us. So things have stood for long and long.
'Except ....imes are changing, and the changes have crept up on us all but unseen. My meaning? Simply this: that once again Turgosheim is filling up, with too many thralls, lieutenants, Lords and Ladies. Except this time it's our duty to heed the lessons of history, and never again allow matters to reach such a head that we go up against each other.
'In short: we need to expand! - but outwards, to avoid a great clashing of heads. Aye, and some among us may even feel the need to abandon Turgo Zolte's doctrines entirely, and let their parasites hold full sway. For they fear the stagnation of their leeches, which are the driving force of the Wamphyri as a race.
'Expansion, then - but to where? In all this range there is only one gorge suitable to our needs, whose spires and caverns are protected from the sun: Turgosheim. As for new blood for our young Lords and Ladies - from what source? Already Sunside feels the strain, as it did those many hundred years ago. The Szgany are grown unwilling to