Brian Lumley - The Source

Looking up at the rock as they followed flowing contours to its flank, Jazz asked Zek: 'Have you been here before?'

'No, but I've been told about it,' she answered. 'It's wormy as some vast blue cheese, left forgotten on a shelf. There are tunnels and caves right through it, enough room for Lardis's entire tribe and twice as many Travellers again. You could hide a small army in there!' They paused fifty yards from the boulder's base where the hillside fell away and a great cave opened, watched the stream of Travellers entering, taking travois, caravans, wolves and all with them. In a little while orange lights became flickeringly visible (and were quickly hooded) in 'window' holes higher up, where lamps or torches were lighted; and still Jazz and Zek stood there in the gathering gloom.

Lardis came looking for them, said: 'Give them a little longer to settle in and choose their places, then I'll meet you in there — ' he pointed, ' — just inside the main entrance, which we call the hall. But if you like your air fresh, best get your share of it now. It gets smoky later. By the time you see sunup again, you'll be ready to barter your eyes for one good deep breath of clean mountain air!' He took up the handles of Jazz's travois. 'Here, I'll take this the rest of the way.'

'Wait!' said Jazz. He dipped into an easily accessible bundle, came out with two full magazines for his gun. 'Just in case,' he said.

Lardis made no comment, went off toward the cavern entrance where now moving lights flickered here and there.

'Lardis is right,' Zek said. They'll take some time to get themselves settled in and the place fortified. Let's climb up, behind the rock. We might still be able to see the rim of the sun from up there. I don't like it when the sun goes down.'

'Are you sure you're not just putting something off?' Jazz answered. 'Zek, I'll not hold you to any promises. I mean, I know you're right: this isn't our world, and so we're drawn together.'

She linked arms with him. 'Actually,' she tossed back her hair, 'I think I'd be drawn to you in any world. No, it's just a feeling, that's all. Those caves look totally uninviting to me. See, even Wolf would prefer to stay out here with us.'

The great wolf padded along behind them where they climbed through trees along the steeply sloping base of the rock. For fifteen minutes they climbed, until Jazz said: 'Far enough, I think. It'll take us just as long to get down again. This rock's bigger than it looks. Come sunup, then maybe we'll climb it to the top.'

They found a ledge in the rock and sat there close together, Jazz with his arm around her. She leaned back against the coarse sandstone and toward him, sighed tiredly. 'Why do they call you Jazz?'

'Because my middle name is Jason,' he said. 'And I hate it! Don't make any cracks about the golden fleece, for God's sake!'

'Jason is a hero of my homeland,' she told him. 'I wouldn't joke about him.'

Wolf whined a little where he sat at their feet looking up at them. Zek snuggled closer.

Conscious of her warmth, and of her shape against him, Jazz said: 'Zek, finish your story.' It sounded abrupt, but he knew it wouldn't do to get caught up in something he couldn't control. Not now, up here with night settling fast.

'What?' she said, her tone surprised. Then… perhaps she sensed, or read, his thoughts. 'Oh, that! It was almost finished anyway. But… where was I?'

A little angry with himself, angry with everything, Jazz reminded her…

'I'll make it short,' Zek said, her voice a little cooler now. 'Then we can get on back down.

'The Wamphyri Lords were there in Karen's aerie to talk about The Dweller. But Karen had been right: it wasn't only The Dweller that concerned them. They wanted Karen's stack. Shaithis wanted me, too, for my magic — God knows for what else! The rest of the bunch would dice for Karen; the winner would put her to whatever use; afterwards… she would be burned. They feared that her vampire was a Mother. If it was and if she should vampirize her entire aerie — give all of her lieutenants eggs, and others to freshly selected, stolen Travellers — why then, with all of her "children" in thrall to her, there'd be no stopping her! She had to go before things went that far.

'As for her aerie: Fess Ferenc, Volse Pinescu and one of the lesser Lords were of a mind to produce their own eggs. With Karen out of the way they would do so; their "progeny" would fight it out and the winner become Lord of Karen's aerie. The losers would remain in thrall to their masters until new opportunities presented themselves. Wamphyri "children" in thrall, by the way, don't have an easy time of it; there's nothing a Lord enjoys more than using his own child, male or female, for his own satisfaction. The blood of one's own kin, especially of the vampire in him, is the greatest delicacy of all! If Dramal Doombody hadn't been done for, Karen's life would have been an unending nightmare.

The deed itself — the taking of Karen and her properties — that was to come before her vampire reached full maturity and took ascendancy. Patently it was a slow developer, but the Lords knew from their history and legends that Ladies were hard to get rid of once they achieved full flower. The "female of the species", so to speak. So… she would be invited to join with the Wamphyri Lords in their attack upon The Dweller. Her forces would be used as cannon-fodder; when the battle was over, and without pause, her depleted units would be crushed in their turn, wiped out, and Karen herself taken.

'If she refused to join in the attack on The Dweller, that would be seen as a rebuke, an insult; it would warrant a full-scale, subsequent attack on her stack. But it was hoped she would join in, for if her aerie could be taken intact, undamaged — simply walked into — so much the better.

'All of this I got in bits and pieces from the minds of Shaithis, Volse, Menor Maimbite and one or two others. I dared not stay with any mind too long, in case they should become aware of me. But Karen had been quite right: in protecting themselves against her probing, they had left themselves wide open to me. I can tell you now, Jazz, that there are many hells. And if one of them is that place we were told about as children, where if we're not careful we go for our sins, then be sure that the others are the minds of Wamphyri Lords! There's little enough to distinguish between them…

'Anyway, finally the meeting was over and Shaithis stood and made a closing speech. As best I can remember it went like this:

'"Lords, and Lady:

'"With one exception — the exception of one vote, that of our… charming hostess, who will, she assures us, give the matter her most earnest consideration — we are all agreed on a punitive expedition against The Dweller. The hour of that effort against our great and mutual enemy is still to be set, but until it is decided, all are to stand forewarned and prepared. We all have valid reasons to wish to be rid of him. Apart from the fact that he has set up house in our territory — I take it we are agreed that the mountains are ours? — very well; apart from that fact, and that he gives succor to Travellers, who are our traditional prey, some of us have more personal grievances.

'"Some hundred sundowns past, Lesk sent one of his men to parley with The Dweller. Only to parley, mind you, as we have heard from the lips of Lesk himself, most lucid of Lords. The man did not return. Angered (quite rightly), Lesk sent a warrior to test The Dweller's mettle. The Dweller contrived to trap rays of the recently sunken sun in mirrors, with which he burned Lesk's warrior to a crisp! Lesk, whose reasoning occasionally differs from that of, er, less sensitive minds, sent a second warrior — but not directly against The Dweller. For Lesk had determined that The Dweller was a hell-lander, sent here to spy on us and provoke us, perhaps preparing the way for large-scale invasion. The idea became obsessive — that is, he was convinced of its logic — especially so considering that immediately after Lesk's initial attacks upon The Dweller, the gate to the hell-lands was seen to rise up into the very mouth of its crater! Surely as preamble to the feared attack? And so he sent the second warrior directly into the hell-lands, through the gate, to let any would-be invaders see for themselves something of the might of the Wamphyri. Needless to say, the second warrior did not return. But then, no one ever has…