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The Dweller’s Secret - Karen Defects -War!
The sun’s declining rays were starting to fade where they turned the highest peaks gold when The Dweller, Harry Jnr, called hisHe wanted to speak to everyone who lived in or was supported by the garden, and he must do it nohile there was still time He stood on a balcony under the hollow eaves of his house and addressed guests, Travellers, trogs,no distinction His mother was there, too, for a little while, before she went indoors Srey-haired and quite bereft of norance Harry Snr couldn’t bear to look at her, forgetting that in his Alec Kyle body she wouldn’t recognize hilad when she went inside And anyway, to her it had all been so long, long ago
’Friends, it’s time for truths,’ Harry Jnr held up his arms and the low hubbub of voices was stilled ’It’s tis I haven’t deliberatelyWell, noant to put that right There are soht for This just isn’t your fight at all You came or were sent here by the will of others And I can just as easily take you out of it Zek, Jazz, Harry, I’ to you
’As for you Travellers, you can return to your travelling The way is open to you: go non the saddle and through the passes to Sunside And you trogs: you can be down on the plain on Starside and hidden away in your caves - or in other, safer places - long before the Wamphyri strike But you should all be aware that they will strike, and soon’
A low, s; Harry, Zek and Jazz looked at each other in dis male Traveller cried: ’But why, Dweller? You are powerful You have given us weapons We can kill the Wamphyri! Why do you send us away?’
Harry Jnr looked down on him ’Are the Wamphyri your enemies?’
’Yes!’ they all cried And: ’They always have been,’ shouted the sa man
’And do you desire to kill theain the massed shout ’All of them!’
He nodded ’Aye, all of thes There was a tiainst therunted discussion ’For you, Dweller, aye,’ answered their spokesood’
’And you, Harry - father? You’ve been a scourge on vampires in your oorld Do you hate them still?’
’I knohat they would do to my world,’ Harry answered ’Yes, I would hate them in this and any world’
Harry Jnr looked at the over theaze fell on Zek and Jazz ’And you two,’ he said ’I can take you out of here, back where you came from Do you know that? Any place in your world where you want to go Do you understand?’
They looked at each other, then Jazz said, ’If you can do it now, then you can do it later You saved us once, not so long ago And we’ve faced the Wamphyri before How can you think we’ll run out on you?’
Again Harry Jnr’s nod ’Let me tell you how it is,’ he said ’Beforeto build sos to help me, I found a wolf on the hillside His pack had turned on hiht I didn’t know or understand the things I kno I took the wolf in, healed hiain Too soon, and I thought I had saved his life But in fact he’d been saved by the creature within hiathering Harry Keogh found hi fearfully up at his son
’Father,’ Harry Jnr continued, ’I told you there were reasons why I couldn’t come back Reasons why I must stand and defend my place But all of you have told me how you hate and would destroy the Waht for an, only to be cut short
This is how the wolf repaid olden h; Harry kne beyond any doubt that he gazed upon his own true son But the eyes in his face were scarlet in the twilight!
A long, low sigh went up froan to an to break up, drift away in sroups In a little while only Harry Snr, Jazz and Zek reht: they’re here because without o
’I’ll take you out of here now,’ he said
’Like hell you will!’ his father growled ’Coht be The Dweller but you’re also my flesh You, a vampire? What kind of vampire that so many people have loved you? I don’t believe it!’
Harry Jnr came down ’Believe it or not,’ he said ’It’s the truth Oh, I’ for it I have mastery over it, I have it tamed It takes me on now and then, but I’m always ready and I alin Or have so far, anyway So the vaet its strength, its powers, its tenacity It gets a host, and that’s all But there are disadvantages, too For one, I have to stay here on Starside, or close to Starside The sunlight -real sunlight - would hurt me But the main reason I stay here is because this has become my place My place, my territory No other shall have it!’
He looked at them with his scarlet eyes, smiled mirthlessly ’So there you have it And now, if you’re ready?’
’Not , until this is over, anyway I didn’t look for you for eight years just to leave you now’
Harry Jnr looked at Jazz and Zek Jazz said: ’You already have our answer’
Trogs caht Their spokesman said: ’We were Lesk’s creatures, and we didn’t like it We liked working for you Without you we have nothing We stay and fight’
Harry Jnr’s face showed his despair The trogs ood with his weapons Then lanterns ca, fros
Jazz and Zek tried to count heads; pointless, there were as hty of them Not a man, woman or child had run out
’So,’ said Harry Snr, looking at therouped theht!’
His son could only throw up his hands in aht
An hour later at The Dweller’s ar out Geruns and shells to the Travellers The armoury ell-stocked and there eapons for everyone There were half-a-dozen flame-throwers, too, and Travellers who had been trained in their use Harry Jnr was there to point out that the shells for the shotguns were probably the most expensive ah most of the equipment had been stolen (Harry Jnr made no bones about it; he believed the manufacturers ell able to stand the loss), he’d been obliged to order and buy these shells Jazz, ever practical, had asked how they’d been paid for With Traveller gold, he’d been told, of which this world had an abundance The Travellers considered it pretty, and of course it was very malleable; on the other hand it was e a It made nice baubles, which was about as much as could be said for it!
For hiun, a Russian job firing a mix of tracer and explosive shells The weapon could be used with a tripod or carried in both arun and had trained with it; it was capable of laying down a deadly and shattering barrage of fire
’But still,’ he told The Dweller, ’from what I’ve seen of Was are toys’
Harry Jnr nodded, but: The flame-throwers are not toys,’ he said ’And I assure you the Wamphyri won’t like this silver shot! Still, I take yourOne warrior - even a dozen - but forty? Ah, but you haven’t seen all hed the thing in his hand It was as large as an orange and very heavy He shook his head ’I don’t know this one’
’It’s A pill-boxes and foxholes A very gri metallic phosphorus!’
Meanwhile, Harry Snr had used the Mobius Continuum (for the first time in this world) to convey two very ih over most of the others They knew their job and had practiced it on many previous occasions In a hollowed-out depression at the peak’s crest, literally an ’aerie’ in its own right, greatsun’s rays and hurl them down - or up - at any attackers The Travellers also had shotguns and bandoliers of vampire-lethal shells
As Harry dropped off his astonished charges and prepared to return to the garden, so his keen eyes spotted so in the sky As yet it o or three arden, but even at that distance its size and shape made it unmistakable A flyer, like Shaithis’s mount!
The Travellers had seen it too ’Shall we try to burn it?’ they cried, springing to their mirror-weapons
’One flyer?’ Harry frowned Instinct cautioned hiainst abrupt action ’Not unless it arden’
He went back there, looked for Harry Jnr Instead he found Zek Foener, her eyes closed where she stood facing east and slightly north, one tre, Zek?’ Harry asked
’No, Harry,’ she answered, without opening her eyes ’so to join us
She wants to fight on our side She has four fine warriors, but they’re holding back until she calls to them Now she wants to know if it’s safe for her to land’ ’She’s not attacking us?’
’She’s joining us!’ Zek repeated ’You don’t know her like I do, Harry She’s different’
Karen was closer now, aoff Everyone in the garden had seen her Jazz Si froun ’What is it?’ he said
At the same moment The Dweller had materialized Zek spoke to both men, told them what she’d told Harry Snr ’Harry,’ The Dweller turned to his father ’Go and tell the Travellers to hold their fire Let’s see if she’s genuine’
Before anything else, Harry detoured straight to the peak where the Travellers manned their e, then spread the word right through the garden and its defenders Meanwhile, Zek had told the Lady Karen: land in front of the wall, between the wall and the cliffs
Karen’s flyer swept closer, swooped lower, swiftly grew larger in the sky Far behind it, four dark shapes o of the heavens Tiny at this distance, still everyone kne big they really were, knehat they really were ’Here she co face-on to a low night wind that moaned from the west, dropped lower It seemed to hover for a moment, like a kite, then dipped down and uncoiled its nest of springy worently down, lowered its wings for stability The thing parked there, swaying and nodding hugely, gazing with vacuous disinterest first at the garden, then down the sweeping raarden Karen dismounted, came to the wall She was dressed - or undressed - to cause consternation, as was her wont
The two Harrys, Jazz and Zekher, but she held back She saw that Jazz was immediately shaken, stricken by Karen’s looks Harry Snr, too: awed by Karen’s beauty It was an unearthly beauty, of course, for it was the work of her vaiven her in looks, shape and desirability, it had taken from her in the bloody fire of her eyes She was unmistakably Wamphyri
Only The Dweller see battle?’ His voice was unemotional
’I’ve come to die with you,’ she answered
’Oh? And is it that certain?’
’Certain?’ she repeated him ’If you believe in miracles, pray for one! For myself, I don’t care’ And she told the what Zek Foener had already made known, hohichever way she jumped the Wamphyri meant to be rid of her This wayat least I’ll take a few of thes, your lieutenants?’ The Dweller pressed her
’I activated s, turned them loose,’ she answered ’My "lieutenants", as you call thes! Them I sent away Maybe the Lords have taken them on I neither know nor care’
’Your aerie stands empty?’
’Aye’
’You’ve sacrificed a lot’
’No,’ she tossed her head, ’I have been sacrificed And now you’d better make your final preparations You can’t hear them but I can, and they’re on their way’
’She’s right,’ Zek confir for war, open to read like reading a !’
The Dweller nodded, pointed to the four dark shapes squirting down through the darkening sky ’Your warriors Karen - are they trustworthy?’
They answer only my commands,’ she answered
Then station two of theain he pointed, ’and the other pair down there, at the foot of the cliffs where the first trees grow There they’ll form our protection - some protection, at least - and they’ll be well-positioned for launching, if the need should arise And hoill you fight?’
’In the thick of it!’ She swept back her diaphanous cloak froauntlet froht hand into it Blades, hooks and scythes gleaht where she flexed the deadly thing, adjusting its fit
’Look!’ Jazz snapped ’I see them’
It was impossible not to see thee and small, like the approach of a small swarm of locusts Except, while they were just as ravenous, they were not small and they were not locusts
’Everyone to his station!’ The Dweller cried ’Are those la the wall, Travellers turned on their batteries of ultraviolet laht with their hot, sht wouldn’t kill vareatly and blind Waht the elbow of a passing Traveller ’What of your women and children?’ he asked ’And my mother?’
’Gone, Dweller,’ the man answered ’Doard Sunside, where they’ll stay until they know the outcome’
Harry Jnr turned to his father and the others He nodded grimly Then we’re ready,’ he said
’Just as well,’ Jazz Simmons answered, ’for it’s already started’ He inclined his head doard Starside ’Listen -’
Hoarse trog cries and the clamour of battle drifted up out of the shadows The roar and blast of gunfire, too, fro skills had been able to accommodate weapons
Harry Jnr said: ’Well, this was to be expected The Lords have been es of thesetime now There’ll be many hundreds of them but I may have their measure’ He turned to his father ’Harry, I could use some expert help’
’Just name it’
’When did you last call up the dead?’