Blood Brothers

  “Yes?” Nathan put down a blanket, lay upon it, and looked up at the stars. Likewise Thikkoul.

  Except … first I should warn you: things are rarely as I see them.

  “You make errors?”

  Oh, I see what I see! Thikkoul answered at once. But how the things which I see shall come to pass, that is not always clear. The future is devious, Nathan. It takes a brave man to read it, and only a fool would guarantee its meaning.

  “I don’t understand,” Nathan frowned, shook his head.

  Thikkoul looked out through Nathan’s eyes at the stars—looked at them for the first time in a hundred years—and sighed. Ahh! he said. Boy and man, they fascinated me, and continue to fascinate me. I am in your debt, Nathan Kiklu of the Szgany. But repayment may be hard, for both of us.

  “No, it will be easy. Read my future, that’s enough.”

  But that was my meaning. What if I read hard things for you? Must I tell you your fate as well as your fortune?

  “Whatever you see, that will suffice.”

  I shall do as best I can, the other told him, and for a while was silent. Then … it came in a flood, in a flash, a river bursting its banks. So fast that Nathan could scarcely cling to the words and images as Thikkoul threw them into his mind:

  I see … doors! Like the doors on a hundred Szgany caravans but liquid, drawn on water, formed of ripples. And behind each one of them, a piece of your future. A door opens. I see a man, Szgany, a so-called “mystic”. His name is—lo … Jo … Iozel! And his game—is treachery! Now I see Turgosheim; the manse of a great wizard; you and he together. He would use you, learn from you, instruct and corrupt you! The door closes, but another opens…

  The sun rises and sets, and sunups come and go in a blur where you wander in a great dark castle of many caves. I see your face: your hollow eyes and greying hair? Now I see … a light to freedom, yes! But … upon a dragon? One door closes, and another opens. I see … a maiden; the two of you—three of you?—together. You seem happy; doors continue to open and close; and now you seem sad …

  Some hours are long as days; others fly like seconds; long and short alike, they draw you into the future. And always the doors of your mind, opening and closing. I see … a battle—war!—Szgany and Wamphyri! You win, and you lose. Now I see an eye, white and blind and glaring, much like my own before I died, but vast as a cavern! You stand before it and the eye … is another door! It blinks! And in the blink of a great blind eye, you … are …

  Thikkoul paused, like a man breathless.

  “Yes?” Nathan’s real voice was hoarse with excitement … but Thikkoul’s deadspeak was hoarse with horror as finally he continued:

  You are—gone!

  III

  In the chill, cheerless hours before dawn, made all the more cold and lonely because he was on his own now, Nathan walked away from the oasis over the blown sands which kept the subterranean caverns of the Thyre secret. He had been told that the going was firm between here and Sunside; but in any case, he’d grown used to walking in the desert and found it no great discomfort. The night was bright and the stars clear; Nathan’s shadow walked behind him, cast by the moon as it hurtled over the mountains of the barrier range, whose serrated ridge made a scalloped horizon in the far dark distance. Frequent meteorite showers left brilliant, ephemeral tracks across the sky.

  After so much time spent underground, Nathan’s night vision was much improved; he could see almost as well as in full daylight. As for direction: no chance that he could lose his way. No one among the Szgany knew the stars as well as he did; not even among the Thyre, that he knew of … except Thikkoul. And as he went at a brisk, long-striding pace across the featureless desert, Nathan thought back on what Thikkoul had told him, the conversation which had followed fast upon the dead astrologer’s reading:

  “What does it mean?” He had wanted to know.

  Everything. And nothing, Thikkoul had answered, a little sorrowfully now.

  “I can ignore it?”

  Of course. But alas, it won’t ignore you.

  “Can’t you make yourself plainer?”

  Thikkoul had sighed. Didn’t I warn you? The future is a devious thing, Nathan. This is the problem: will what I have read in the stars come to pass because, believing it, we make it come to pass? Or will it happen whether or no? And what if we should try to avoid it, how then? Could it be that our actions will cause the very event we seek to avoid? But in fact (Nathan had sensed the other’s incorporeal shrug), there’s no riddle—nothing contrary—in any of this. The answer is simplicity itself: what will be will be! And that is all.

  “I can set about making it happen,” Nathan had scratched his chin, repeating what the other had said but in his own way, “or take steps to avoid it, or simply let it be. But whichever I choose, it will make no difference?”

  Exactly. But there is one other complication. My readings are often symbolic. I don’t understand the doors I saw in your future: they seemed to be part of you. Nor do I understand the dragon-flight, or the vast eye which swallowed you in a blink. For these are things of your future, which are perhaps linked to your past. And so it’s for you to know and understand them. If not now, most certainly later …

  Nathan had frowned as he held to one of the things Thikkoul had told him. “How may a thing come to pass because I try to avoid it? What if I know of this blind white eye which you mentioned—for indeed I believe I do—and make sure I go nowhere near it? How then can I be swallowed by it?”

  There was a man, the other had answered. He feared water and had bad dreams, premonitions, about his death. He came to me that I would read his stars. I told him the dangers but he insisted. The forecast was this: that in the course of a single sunup he would drown in the borehole of River’s Rush, and his body never be found! I did not want to tell him but he insisted. Then, when he knew the truth he left River’s Rush and climbed to the surface, and travelled west, alone, into the desert. He would escape his fate, do you see? Well, he found himself a little shade and sat out in the desert for all of that sunup, until the evening was nigh. Then, making to return, he stumbled and took a fall which broke his skin of water. Close by was a well; he went to it and lowered the bucket. But then, when he hauled up the water, the wall crumbled and he fell in. The well was fed by the Great Red River; the river swept him away; he was seen, alive, lifting his hand up from the torrent, before being swirled into the borehole, lost forever …

  At the end of his story Thikkoul had sighed again before lapsing silent, waiting for Nathan’s response.

  “But if he went into the desert alone,” Nathan had queried eventually, “how can you know the sequence of events?” At which, once again he had sensed the other’s simplistic shrug, enabling him to guess the answer even before he heard it. It was deadspeak, of course: the ability of the Great Majority, and of Nathan, to converse among themselves in their graves.

  Because he told me all on the day I died! Thikkoul confirmed it. And his is a singularly awful “resting place”, Nathan, where in fact he knows no rest at all! For he was trapped in a swirling sump, where to this day his body remains, rotated and whirled in the frothing tumult. And all of his flesh long sloughed away; his bones all broken and reduced to rounded marbles, from the action of the waters. But at least he no longer fears the water, which has done its worst…

  Later, Nathan had asked The Five of River’s Rush if they knew of a man—Szgany, a “mystic”, perhaps—who dwelled in Sunside. Indeed they did: his name was Iozel Kotys, who upon a time had had dealings with the Thyre. He had traded with them: low-grade iron knives for their good skins and medicines. But a mystic? That was a device which Iozel had used all his days to avoid being taken in the tithe, until now he was well past his prime and had no need of it. But he was still the cunning one, Iozel Kotys! Why, it was rumoured among the Szgany that he had even been to Turgosheim in Starside! If so, then Iozel was the only man who ever returned unchanged from that dreadful place.

&nbs
p; After that, there had seemed nothing for it but that Nathan must go into Sunside. For quite apart from Thikkoul’s predictions—even despite them, anticipating or pre-empting them—he had after all travelled the length of the known world in order to do just that. His original intention had been to see how the Szgany of these parts lived, and so discover how his own people must live one day, in the shadow of the Wamphyri. But beyond that, his reasons were now several.

  The things which Thikkoul had told him had come thick and fast, but among the purely verbal had been blurred, indistinct scenes, even as the astrologer had seen them for himself. The impression of insubstantial doors opening and closing; dim figures (chiefly Nathan’s) weaving in and out of a succession of situations and locations; strange faces ogling and peering. Except … two of the latter had not been strange at all but loving, and beloved.

  Nathan remembered Thikkoul’s words, and the fleeting scene which had accompanied them. I see a maiden; the two of you— three of you?—together. You seem happy …

  Of course he would seem happy, if such were true. But how could it be? For those dim, wavering female forms had worn the glad shining faces of his mother, and of Misha Zanesti! Which was why, at the end of Thikkoul’s reading, Nathan’s voice had been hoarse with excitement. Ah, but now, thinking back on the rest of the astrologer’s words, his excitement was replaced by doubts and uncertainties.

  Nathan had always assumed that his mother and Misha were dead, or worse than dead, even though he had never seen their bodies or known for sure their whereabouts. And how should he think of them now? Thikkoul had told him: These are things of your future, which are perhaps Jinked to your past. And so it is for you to know and understand them.

  But how was he to understand them? Had the faces of those loved ones out of past times been simply that: scenes from the past, which yet influenced his future? Of course they had influence over him; they always would have. Or … was there more to it than that? What if they were alive even now: not as monstrous Wamphyri changelings but as simple slaves, thrall servants in some Starside aerie or craggy mansion? And if so, how to find them?

  Which was why he walked to Sunside in the brightening air, with the stars gradually fading overhead, and the barrier range growing up before him like a mirage out of the desert. For his future was right here; time bore him forward into it with every passing second; and since he couldn’t avoid it, he might just as well meet it head on. And somewhere along the way, all unsuspecting, Iozel Kotys was waiting for him. Which seemed as good a place as any to start…

  In the Sunside of Nathan’s infancy the Szgany had preferred to stay close to their mountains. Most of the Traveller trails had been in the foothills, rarely in the forests. The reasons were several: clouds breaking on the peaks provided good water; wild life was plentiful on the slopes and the hunting was excellent; the roots of the mountains were riddled with hiding places in the rocks, where cavern systems abounded.

  Here things were different. While these eastern people were Szgany, or of the same basic stock, they were not Travellers. Perhaps - almost certainly—they had been in the long ago, but no longer. Now, under total Wamphyri domination, they lived in sorry townships (corrals or pens, in effect) and wandered no more. In the Sunside Nathan knew, in the old times, his people had become Travellers in order to avoid and defy the vampires, and had only settled after their supposed “destruction”. But here the people had settled because the Wamphyri ordered it, which had marked the beginning of the infamous, immemorial tithe system. And so their towns were spread out evenly and in the open, like market places, where the Starside Lords and Ladies sent their lieutenants on regular, long-established errands to replenish their spires and manses. Except that unlike a market, the Wamphyri “purchased” nothing, but took what was deemed to be theirs by right of conquest. Which amounted to a percentage of everything, from grain and oils to beasts and blood—but mainly blood, and human.

  North of the grasslands at the edge of the forest, some twelve townships out of a total of around fifty stood roughly equidistant: four in the west, and eight towards the sprawling morass which lay beyond the habitable region to the east. The Thyre estimated that the distance between the Great Red Waste on the one hand and the swamp on the other was more than six hundred miles; and so Nathan considered himself fortunate that the first of the four towns to the west, a place called Vladistown after its founder, was the origin and last known home of Iozel Kotys.

  Dressed in his good rich clothes, and with the first rays of the sun warm on his back, Nathan came out of the desert and crossed the savannah, and saw the smoke of morning fires going up in lazy blue-grey spirals along the forest’s rim. Angling a little to the left, he headed for the closest huddle of houses where the woods had been cut back into a clearing.

  The first man he met was in the grasslands at the very edge of the forest: a hunter, he was shooting rabbits with a crossbow. Nathan heard the deceptively soft whirrr of a bolt and ducked, saw a rabbit bound spastically and fall back dead in the grass. Then … he saw the man with the crossbow, where he rose from his knees in a patch of gorse; and a moment later the hunter saw him. At first, facing each other across a distance of no more than a dozen paces, they froze; then the hunter’s jaw dropped, and his face turned pale.

  Nathan approached him fearlessly. The man was Szgany after all, and the Thyre had told him that although these people were not trustworthy, they could at least be trusted not to take his life. No, he was far too valuable for that. They might give his life away—give it to the Wamphyri, in return for their dubious favours—but they would never dare to take it for themselves. Also, apart from the ironwood knife he carried, Nathan was unarmed; he posed no obvious threat. But from the reaction of the other, one might very easily suppose that he did, and an extreme threat at that!

  The man dropped his weapon, fell to his knees again, and shivered like a naked child in morning sunlight which was warm and bright. He choked out some inarticulate greeting, an apology, and a question all in one. His speech was Szgany but the accent was difficult. Nathan frowned, looked into his eyes … and suddenly the man’s words and their meaning gained resolution.

  But even assisted by his as yet immature telepathy, still Nathan found the other’s thoughts a kaleidoscopic jumble, and his speech even more so:

  “Morning!” the other gasped. “You are early … the tithe is not until sundown! I mean … why are you here? No, no,” (he fluttered his hands), “for that’s no business of mine! Forgive me, Lord, I beg you! I’m a fool taken by surprise, whose words fall all wrong. But … the sun! Come, take cover in the woods! Hide yourself in the shade!”

  Now all was apparent. The man thought Nathan was Wamphyri, a lieutenant at least! Comparing himself with the other, he could see how easily the mistake had been made: his clothes of fine leather, yellow hair and strange eyes; but most of all his pale, unblemished flesh, which, seen in silhouette against the sun, might even appear grey. As for the hunter:

  The man was Szgany, certainly, but not like any other Nathan had ever seen. Where was his personal pride? Where was any sign of pride at all? Maybe twenty-seven or—eight years old, he was dirty, ragged, grovelling; his hair was matted and full of lice, and there were open sores on his face and hands. Why, even the wildest old loner of olden Sunside had cared for himself better than this one! Perhaps he was an idiot; but if so, why did they trust him with a crossbow? Certainly he knew how to handle the thing.

  “Get up,” Nathan told him, shaking his head. “I’m not Wamphyri.”

  “You’re not …?” A puzzled frown crossed the other’s face; only to be replaced in a moment by narrowed eyes which glittered their suspicion. “But you are one of theirs.”

  “I’m nobody’s,” Nathan said, stepping closer. “I’m my own man, free, and you have nothing to fear from me.”

  He went to take hold of his shoulder, draw the man to his feet. But the other fell backwards away from him, terrified in a moment.

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?Your own man,” he babbled. “Yes, yes, of course you are! And I’m a fool who says and questions too much, when in fact you are the one who should question, and I should supply the answers!”

  Nathan felt sick with disgust. Perhaps this creature was the village idiot after all; but at least his words had given him an idea. “You’re right,” he said, nodding. “That’s what I need: a little shade and a few answers.”

  “Then ask away!” the other cried, coming to a crouch and backing away towards the forest, and leaving his crossbow where it had fallen. “Whatever questions you like, Lord. And if I can answer them I will, be sure!”

  Nathan took up the weapon, loaded it with the spare bolt from under the tiller and applied the safety; and the other at once groaned and put up his trembling hands, as if to ward off a shot. Nathan looked at him, then at the crossbow in his hands and frowned again. “What?” he said. “Man, I won’t shoot you! Do you always greet strangers this way?”

  “Strangers!” the other was almost hysterical. “Do I greet strangers this way … always? But there are no strangers! Who would come? Who can come … except such as you? As yet you are unchanged … but soon, ah, soon! You’re one of theirs, I know it, come to practise your deceptions among your slaves!”

  “Deceptions?”

  “Ah! No! I did not mean it!” The other threw his arms wide and fell to his knees for a third time in the dappled shade of the trees. “Forgive me! I am confused!”

  “You’re … a fool!” Nathan couldn’t contain himself. The hunter burst out sobbing at once, crying:

  “No, no! I was not taken in the tithe! Please don’t take me now! Whatever you want, only ask it of me, but let me be a man all my days and not… not a monster!”

  “Now listen to me,” Nathan hardened his voice. “You are wasting my time. There’s something I want to know. And that’s all I want with you.” He tossed the crossbow aside.