Page 14 (2/2)
They dragged the vampires back inside the cave, as far back as they dared, then hurried back out into sunlight But Darcy was finished; he could do no ht out of it ’Is OK,’ Manolis understood ’I can do it’
Darcy crawled away along the ledge and sat there shivering, while Manolis took up the petrol and again entered the cave Aa thin trail of petrol behind hi in the cave and the container was al the last few drops, then tossed the container far out into e the flint, he held the naked flame to the trail of petrol
Blue fire so faint as to be ale and into the ue of fire like soiant’s blowtorch - followed in the next moment by a terrific explosion that blew out the ht loose scree and pebbles avalanching down from above The shock of it was sufficient to cause Manolis to stumble, and sit down beside Darcy
They looked at each other and Darcy said: ’What the - ?’
Manolis’s jaw hung loosely open Then he licked dry lips and said: "Their explosives They ot up and went shakily back to the blockeddown the mountain’s steep contours to the sea Hundreds of tons of rock had cos off And it was plain that nothing alive - but nothing - was ever going to come out of there
’It’s done,’ said Manolis, and Darcy found strength to nod his agree yellow in the rubble Next door to the collapsed cave another, s puffs of dust and a little smoke The stone wall between the two excavations had been shattered, spilling fractured rock onto the ledge But a the debris lay a lotthe rubble and looked more closely at what had been unearthed There in that broken wall, carefully packed in and sealed behind cleverly shaped blocks of stone, had lain the treasure for which Jianni Lazarides - alias Janos Ferenczy - had searched That sao Only the changing contours of the mountain, carved and fretted by nature in storms and earthquakes, had confused and foiled him The old Crusader castle had been his landed through the long years Still, he’d missed his mark by nothe dust and broken rocks, their excitement dulled to anticlimax after the horror of their too recent experience They saw a treasure out of tiold rhytons spilling rings, necklaces and ars, belt clasps and pectorals even a buckled breastplate of solid gold!
Their find eventually got through to Manolis ’But what do we do with it?’
’We leave it here,’ Darcy straightened up ’It belongs to the ghosts We don’t knohat it cost Janos to bring it here and bury it, or where - or how - he got it in the first place But there’s blood on it, be sure Eventually so for those two, and find this instead Let the authorities handle it I don’t even want to touch it’
’You are right,’ said Manolis, and they climbed back up to the castle
By 12:30 the tere back down into the village, where Manolis refuelled the boat for the trip to Karpathos While he worked his fisherers ’They were blasting,’ Manolis answered after a moment, ’so we didn’t disturb them Anyway, the cliffs are very steep and a ers anyway,’ one of the fishermen commented ’They don’t bother with us and we don’t bother with theht a litre of ouzo and they all sat around tables in an open taverna and killed the bottle dead Later, as their boat pulled away from the stone jetty, the Greek said, ’I needed that’
Darcy sighed and agreed, ’Me, too It’s nasty, thirsty work’
Manolis looked at him and nodded ’And a lot h, ood job ouzo is cheap, eh? Just think, with all of that gold we left up there, we could have bought the distillery!’ Darcy looked back and watched the hu on the horizon, and thought: Yes, and maybe we’ll e had
Halki to Karpathos was a little more than sixty ht of land so far as possible, and to cruise rather than race his engine When the rocks Ktenia and Karavolas were behind them, then he set a course more nearly south-west and left Rhodes behind for Karpathos proper
That an to play hi and not too bad; after what he’d faced already he wasn’t going to throw up now At least his talent wasn’t warning against shipwrecks or anything
To take Darcy’s mind off his misery, Manolis told hiest of the Dodecanese Islands,’ he said ’She lies just about half-way between Rhodes and Crete Where Halki goes east to west, Karpathos she goes north to south Maybe fifty kiloht wide Just the crest of sub place, really, and not many peoples But she has known the turbulent history!’
’Is that right?’ said Darcy, scarcely listening
’Oh, yes! Just about everyone ruled or owned or was the governor of Karpathos at one time or another The Arabs, Italian pirates out of Genoa, the Venetians, Crusaders of the Knights of St John, Turks, Russians - even the British! Huh! It took seven centuries for us Greeks to get it back!’
And when there was no answer: ’Darcy? Are you all right?’
’Only just How long before we’re there?’
’We’re almost half-way there already, my friend Another hour, or notthe point just under the landing strip That’s where we should find the Lazarus We can take a look at her, but that’s all Maybe we can hail so -on board, and see e think of hiht now I don’t think much of anybody,’ said Darcy
But as it happened Manolis rong and the Lazarus was not there They searched the small bays at the southern extren of the white ship Manolis’s patience was soon exhausted In a little while, when it beca was in vain, he headed north for the sandy shalloater beach at Amoupi and anchored there where they could wade ashore They ate a Greek salad at the beach taverna, and drank a small bottle of retsina between them When Darcy fell asleep in his chair under the taverna’s split-baarette He slish girls where they played in the sea, drank another bottle of retsina before it was time to wake Darcy up Just after 5:05 they set out to return to Rhodes
That evening, co in stiff, weary, and tanned by sun and sea-spray, Darcy and Manolis found four people waiting for thee of their hotel There were several moh, for Ben Trask and David Chung were his own men; but Zekintha Foener (now Siers to him except by hearsay Darcy had anticipated four and had booked accoroup he had only expected two On Harry Keogh’s advice he had tried to get a e to Zek and Jazz that they should stay out of it, but either it hadn’t reached thenore it He would find out later The two land, ould fly out here asap on co already dropped off their luggage in their rooms and introduced each other, were more or less ready to talk business Darcy need only introduce Manolis and s, then replay the action so far, and all systeo Before that, however
Darcy and Manolis excused the the E-Branch people where they waited for them Then Manolis took them all to a rather expensive taverna on the other side of tohich wasn’t likely to be swae secluded corner table with a view on the night ocean Here Darcy quickly restated the introductions, this tiroup
There was the married couple Zek and Jazz Sih Zek was a telepath of outstanding ability and an authority on vampires She was experienced as few before her, in that she had , the Waood-looking, about five-nine in height, slim, blonde and blue-eyed Her Greek mother had named her after Zante (or Zakinthos), the island where she was born Her father had been East Gerist Zek would be in her hteen months to two years older than her husband
Jazz Simmons had no extraordinary talents other than those hich an entirely mundane Mother Nature had endowed hience had expertly instructed hience work to be with Zek in Greece and the Greek islands Just a fraction under six feet tall, Jazz had unruly red hair, a square jaw under slightly hollow cheeks, grey eyes, good strong teeth, hands that were hard for all that they were artistically tapered, and long ar, loose-limbed appearance Lean, tanned and athletic, he looked deceptively easy-going was easy-going in normal circumstances and when there was little or no pressure But he was not to be underestie in surveillance, close protection, escape and evasion, winter warfare, survival, weapons handling (toJazz had lacked had been experience, and he’d got that in the best - or worst - of all possible places, on Starside
Then there were the two , a locator and scryer, and Ben Trask, a hu enty-six, a Chinese ’Cockney’ tried and true Born within the sound of Bow bells, he had been with the Branch for nearly six years and during that tiree in the extrasensory location of illegal drugs, especially cocaine If not for the fact that he’d been working on a long-terht well have been out here in the first place
Ben Trask was a blocky five feet ten, ht and slope-shouldered, and usually hat could only be described as a lugubrious expression His speciality was Truth: presented with a lie or deliberately falsified concept, Trask would spot it immediately E-Branch loaned him out to the police authorities on priority jobs, and he was in great de of certain less than honest members of the international comn embassies better than most people know the backs of their hands Also, he’d played a part in the Yulian Bodescu affair and wasn’t likely to take anything too lightly
While they waited for theirpieces for his teahten up as the full horror of the situation was brought home to them Then he was interested to knohy Jazz and Zek had invited the
Jazz answered for theets our vote every ti Zek and me to keep a low profile’
That’s very loyal of you,’ Darcy told him, ’but it was Harry himself ould have preferred to keep you out of it - for your own sakes Not that I’ood hands and you two probably fit the bill perfectly Harry’s main concern was that Janos Ferenczy is one powerful mentalist He has already killed Trevor Jordan and controls Ken Layard, so you can see why Harry orried He was ainst you, Zek However, since Janos is now in Roe - and with Harry gone there to hunt hihted to have you on the team!’
’So when does it all start - for us, I et into it
’For you it starts tomorrow,’ Darcy told hiht, back at the hotel after we’ve finished here, that will be the ti That’s e detail, as best we can, ill be doing what - and to who towards their table with a loaded trolley ’As for this very est we enjoy our food and relax as best we can Because you’d better believe that tomorrow’s a busy day’
While Darcy Clarke and his tea back on the one just ended
Harry’s flight to Athens had been uneventful Aboard the plane for Budapest, however, when he’d closed his eyes even before takeoff and determined to catch an hour’s sleep
He’d felt thean to drift into drea they were there he’d forced hi that fact from the telepathic talents who had found him ’They’ could only be Ken Layard and Sandra, but their ESP was cold now and tainted Almost completely in thrall to Janos Ferenczy, their tentative touches were sliht not to recoil from theely enough accepted that it was probably good advice:
Instead of shrinking back from him when you sense him near, seek him out! He would enter your rew less apprehensive of discovery and avidly scanned him, so Harry in turn scanned them Indeed he spoke to them in whispers, under his breath:
’Ken? Sandra? So he has your co-operation now Well, and you’ve done a good job for hi you I knew that he would use you, that in fact he can’t do without you What, him? Face to face and man to man? Not a chance Your vampire superht Onehe harbours up there in that pesthole in the mountains, and he’s afraid of me You warned me he’d read the future and seen his victory there Well, you can tell him from me that the future doesn’t alork out that way’
Ahhh! He sensesss ussss! It was Sandra, hissing like a snake in Harry’s ths are surfacing
She was right and Harry felt the strangeness of it He was stronger, and didn’t know the source of his new vitality Was it Faethor? he wondered Possibly But for thehe could do about Faethor, and in a storm any port is better than none
Ken Layard’s locator’s mind was fastened on Harry like a carrier beam He let his own slide down it (but secretly) to its source, gazed out through Layard’s eyes
It was as if Harry were there in the flesh and he was, in Layard’s flesh! They were in the same subterranean room as before Sandra sat opposite him (opposite Layard) at the table, and Janos furiously paced the pavings to and fro, to and fro ’Where is he? What is he thinking?’ the monster’s eyes burned red where he turned them on Sandra Plainly he orried, but he tried to hide it behind a mask of fury
’He is aboard a plane,’ Sandra answered, ’and he is co’
’So soon? He’s a madman! Doesn’t he know he’ll die? Can he not see that hts?’
’He hides the, thrust his half-handsohts? And you a ht-thief? What, and do you seek to o for you, if you continue to place obstacles in hts!’
The master vampire had co into the frightened girl’s eyes from only inches away His lips curled back like a leather ed teeth of soraphically, but she had no answer for hi for ed ’Too strong? Listen: in the bowels of this very castle lie the ashes of men like satyrs who in their day swar to the death women, men and babes alike!’ he told her ’Aye, and when they’d slain the lot, then even the beasts of the field were not beneath their lust! For two thousand years some of these creatures - whose loins are now dust, whose bones are turned to salts - have gone without But I say this to you: donow before I’m tempted to raise the torainst you, and as fast as they tore you your vae! Only picture it: your sweet flesh awash in all their filth, ruined and ruined again and again and again!’
Harry looked at him up from Layard’s throat, and spat it into the va and clawing at his face, Harry said to him with Layard’s voice: ’Are you deaf as well as insane, Janos Ferenczy? She can’t see intointo yours!’
Layard, shocked and astonished, sat clutching at his own throat; but for a few seconds rip on what he now coered back to the table, his head cocked questioningly, disbelievingly on one side ’What?’ he glared madly at Layard ’What?’ He lifted a claw of a hand
’Go on,’ Harry taunted ’Strike! For it’s only your thrall you’ll hurt and not the one who commands him!’
Janos’s jaw fell open He understood ’You?’ he breathed
Harry caused Layard’s face to split into a hurin And: ’You know,’ he said, ’this fascination of yours with my mind isn’t ious I had thought you would learn your lesson, Janos, but apparently I rong Very wellso now let’s see what goes on in your head!’
’Release hi his head in talon hands and hurling himself away from the table ’Send the Necroscope out of here! I don’t want him in my mind!’
’Don’t worry,’ Harry told him, as Layard jerked and writhed where he sat ’Did you really think I would bathe myself in a sewer? Only reht to discover my plans Well, and now I’ll tell the for you, Janos And as you now see, our powers are more or less equal’
He withdrew from Layard’s round, heading north and a little west for Budapest And Harry ell satisfied Back in Edinburgh less than a week ago he’d wondered at his precognitive gli future, and felt that he stood on the threshold of strange new developments Now he experienced a sense of justification: his Necroscope’s poere growing, expanding to fill the gap created by Harry Jnr’s ta That was Harry’s explanation, anyway
Half-way into the flight - asleep in his seat, and unafraid to be asleep - Harry reached out with his deadspeak and found M&ouraveyard where he lay buried Möbius knew hiot no answer Actually, I’ve been half-afraid to contact you That last ti, Harry
Harry nodded So now you knohat I’ainst Well, at the moment I have him on the run; he’s not sure what I can do; but he knohatever he plans against me will have to be more physical than mental Physically, I’m still very vulnerable That’s why I need the M&ou You want me to take it up where I left off?
Yes
Very well, open your mind to me
Harry did as he was instructed, said: Enter of your own free will, and a moment later felt Möbius timid in the labyrinth vaults of his mind
You’re an open book, said M&oues that are stuck down, Harry told hilue them for me That’s the part of me that I’ve lost Only unlock those doors and I’ll have access tocaverns of extra-mundane mind And: Locked? he said then I’ll say they have been - and by an expert! But Harry, these are no ordinary locks and bolts and bars I’e, where an entire section has been closed off This is indeed the source of your instinctive nize! Whoever did it was a genius!
Harry offered a grim nod Yes, he was But Faethor Ferenczy, and his son Janos, they were both able to open those doors by sheer force of will
Möbius was realistic They are Wamphyri, Harry And I was only a man I was a deteriant!
You can’t do it? Harry held his breath
Not by force of will By reason, perhaps
Then do what you can, Harry breathed again
I may need your help
How can I help you?
While I work, you can study
Study what?
Your numbers, said Möbius, surprised What else?
But I know less than a backward child! Harry protested Why, to ue and troublesome concept
Study them anyway, Möbius told him, and lit up a screen before his inner eye Simple additions awaited solutions, and incolared at Harry with e for him to print the answers on their pupils
I I don’t know the fucking answers! Harry groaned
Then work theh of his own
Four rows of seats in front of Harry, across the central aisle, so face The irl-slender and effearette holder, and his heavy-lidded, deep set-eyes were dark as his thoughts
Nikolai Zharov had fouled up very badly in England and this was his punishment Where Norman Harold Wellesley and Romania’s Securitatea had failed, noas Zharov’s turn His superiors had spelled it out to hih yourself And if you fail don’t bother to come back
Well, Greece ay back there somewhere now, but Zharov didn’t suppose it ary, Romania - ould care where he died? No one at all -
- Just as long as he died
By 6:30 ph, tourist, had been out of Budapest airport and onto a train heading east for a place called Mezobereny That had been the end of the line for him, the halt at which he’d disembarked Past Mezobereny the tracks turned southward for Arad, which was too far out of his way Froo by bus, taxi, cart, on foot - whatever it took
On the outskirts of Mezobereny he found a small family hotel called the Sarkad after the district, where he took a rooht He’d chosen the Sarkad for the old world graveyard which stood guarded by tall, shady trees in a few acres just across the dusty village road If there were to be night visitations - dreams influenced by his enemies, maybe, or perhaps more physical visitors -Harry wanted the dead on his side Which hy, before he settled down for the night, he stood by hisand sent his deadspeak thoughts out across the road to the dead in their graves
They had heard of the Necroscope, of course, but could scarcely believe that he was actually here; full of questions, they kept hiht hour slipped by, Harry was obliged to tell them that he was tired, and that he reallyinto bed, he thought to himself: What a masterpiece of understatement!
Harry was no spy in the norht have noticed the man who’d followed him from the railway station to the Sarkad and taken the room next door
Earlier, Nikolai Zharov had listened to the Necroscope one to his , so had the Russian The light fro Harry’s shadohere he stood looking out Zharov had ain And he’d looked where Harry was looking
Then, for the first tiraveyard And at that he’d shuddered, drawn his curtains, lit a cigarette and sat on the edge of his bed to sh’s talent He had been in Bonnyrig when Wellesley tried to kill the Necroscope, and he’d seen what caarden after the traitor’s attack failed Add to that certain details from the report of those Securitatea cretins in Romania, and perhaps this wasn’t after all the perfect tiood time to check his weapons He opened the secret compartment in the base of his briefcase, took out and asseazine of sixteen rounds went up into the grip, and a spare ht-inch blade slender as a screwdriver, and a garotte consisting of a pair of grips with eighteen inches of piano wire strung between them Any one of these methods would suffice, but Zharov must be sure when the tih iven the least opportunity to talk to anyone Or rather, to anything
And again the picture of those two - people? - spied across the river near Bonnyrig, coarden, flashed unbidden on Zharov’s mind’s eye He remembered how they’d moved - each step an effort of supernatural will - and how one of the bits behind, which followed on of their own accord after hiht these things; he wasn’t yet ready for bed; putting on his coat again, he’d gone down to the hotel barrooet himself a drink
Indeed, several drinks
Just as Harry had talked to his new friends in their place across the road when he ake, so he now talked to them in his dreams; except this tiue, as most dreams are But he was not so deeply asleep that he couldn’t sense Ken Layard’s locator mind when it swept over him (which it did, frequently), nor so far reuish between the trivial gossip of the tee dead and the occasional tidbit of real-life ihts first picked up the new voice, he knew instinctively that this was a ly, hefor er Thank God I’ve found you!
Do I know you? Harry was a little cautious
In a way, said the other We’ve nized him, and knehy he hadn’t made the connection earlier It was simple: this was a voice he would normally associate with life - until now, anyway It wasn’t, or at least it shouldn’t be, the voice of a dead man Wellesley? he said But what happened?
You h quite a lot, Harry Not physical stuff, no, of course not, but lots of questioning - you know? Physical I could probably handle, butinto me the more clearly I could see what a shit I’d been It was all over for o back to, no real prospects Well, it sounds hackneyed, I know, but the simple fact of it was that I was ’a ruined ed un anymore - the honourable solution, and all that rot - so I used a pair of leather bootlaces I was half-afraid they’d snap, but they didn’t
Harry found it hard to pity him The man was a traitor after all So what do you want from me? he said Would you like me to say how sorry I am? Offer you a shoulder to cry on? Hey, I have lots of friends a the dead who didn’t try to kill me!
That’s not why I’ot what I deserved I think we all do I caize that I wasn’t stronger
Harry gave a snort Oh, ! he said Gee, Harry, I’er Hey, if I had been I would’ve fucking killed you!
Wellesley sighed Well, it orth a try I’m sorry I bothered you It’s just that when I killed inning He began to withdraw
What’s that? Harry held him Your hard times? Then he sahat the other ht?
Wellesley shrugged He was a beaten et e deserve I’m sorry I bothered you, Harry
No, wait Harry had an idea Listen, ould you say to a chance to square it with eneral?
Is there a way? (Sudden hope in Wellesley’s voice)
There could be It all depends
Just naht?
That’s right Nobody could see into my mind But as you can see, it died with me
Harry shook his head Maybe it didn’t You see, e’re doing now isn’t the same It isn’t telepathy but deadspeak You control it yourself You don’t have to speak toyou had was uncontrollable You didn’t even knoas there If someone hadn’t noticed it - hadn’t discovered that your mind was a stone wall - you still wouldn’t know you’d ever had it A at?
I’m not sure, said Harry I’m not even sure if it’s possible But it would be one hell of a bonus if I had that talent of yours!
Well, obviously it would, Wellesley answered But as you’ve just pointed out, it wasn’t a talent It was so on its oithout e or assistance
Maybe so, but sooverned it I’d just like to see hoorks, that’s all Then, if I could sort of imitate it, learn how to switch it on and off at will
You want to have a look insidethere’s a way you can do that?
Maybe there is, said Harry, with your help And maybe that’s why no one else ever could: because you just kept them out Now tell ave a wry chuckle At the tiht it was fantastic I re on ht dead speaking to that guy!’
That’s not at all bad! Harry laughed But he was serious again in a osani, and how he stole Max Batu’s evil eye?
That, too, Wellesley answered But he cut it out of his heart, read it in his guts, tasted it in his blood
Yes, he did, Harry nodded, but it doesn’t have to be that way You see, that’s always been the difference between osani’s sort It’s the difference between a necromancer and a Necroscope He would take what he wanted by force He would torture for it But ly, Wellesley told hi ith the dead, he said
So hoill you do it? Wellesley was eager now
Actually, said Harry, it’s you who has to do it
Really? So tell o blank and invite me in, Harry answered Just relax like I was a hypnotist putting you to sleep, and say to me: enter of your own free will
As easily as that?
The first part, anyway, said Harry
Very well, Wellesley was committed So let’s try it