Necroscope - Deadspeak Part 7

. but an island? An island, say, in the Greek Sea, which had so many?

Ah, if only it could have been that easy!

But places change, Nature takes her toll, earthquakes rumble and the lan d is split asunder, and treasures are buried deeper still where old markers fall or are simply torn down. The mapmakers then were not nearly so accurate , and even a keen memory - the very keenest vampire memory - will fade a lit tle in the face of centuries . . .

Janos sighed and glanced out of the window at the harbour lights, and at those measuring the leagues of ocean, lighting their ships like luminous inchworms far out on the sea. The odious proprietor had gone now, back down stairs to serve ouzo and watered-down brandy and count his takings. But the bouzouki music still played amidst bursts of coa.r.s.e laughter, the would-be lovers still danced and groped, and the young wh.o.r.e remained seated in her alcove as before.

The hour must be ten, and Janos had said he would contact his American th rall about then. Well, and he would ... in a while, in a while.

He poured a little wine for himself, good and deep and red, and watched the way his gla.s.s turned to blood. Aye, the blood was the life - but not in a place like this! He would sup when he would sup, and meanwhile the wine co uld ease his parch. What was it after all but the plaguy unending thirst of the vampire, which one must either tame or die for? Or at least, tame within certain limits . . . And Janos wasn't shrivelled yet.

The wh.o.r.e had heard the c.h.i.n.k of his gla.s.s against the bottle. Now she l ooked across, her surly mouth pouting; she, too, had a gla.s.s, which was empt y.

Janos felt her eyes on him and turned his head. Across the room she too k note of his straight-backed height, dark good looks and expensive clothin g, and wondered at the dark-tinted spectacles which shielded his eyes. But at this distance she could not see how coa.r.s.e and large-pored was his skin, how wide and fleshy his mouth, or the disproportionate length of his skull , ears and three-fingered hands. She only knew that he looked powerful, det ached, deep. And certainly he was not a poor man.

She smiled, however unprettily, stood up and stretched - which had the desired effect of lifting her pointed b.r.e.a.s.t.s - and crossed to Janos's wind ow-seat. He watched her swaying towards him and thought: Of your own free w ill.

'Will you drink it all?' she asked him, c.o.c.king a knowing eyebrow. 'All to yourself ... all by yourself?'

'No,' he said at once, his expression remaining entirely ambivalent, 'I require very little . . . of this.'

Perhaps his voice surprised her: it was a growl, a rumble, so deep it made her bones shiver. And yet she didn't find it displeasing. Still, its force wa s sufficient that she took a pace to the rear. But as she drew back so he smil ed, however coldly, and indicated the bottle. 'Are you thirsty, then?'

Was he a Greek, this man? He knew the tongue, but spoke it like they di d in some of the old mountain villages, which modern times and ways would n ever reach. Or perhaps he wasn't Greek after all; or maybe he was but many times removed, by travel and learning and the exotic dilution of far, forei gn parts.

The girl didn't normally ask, but now she said: 'May I?' 'By all means. As I have said, my real requirements lie in another direction .'.

Was that a hint? He must know what she was, surely? Should she invite hi m through the alcove and into her curtained room? Then, as she filled her gl a.s.s ... it was as if he had read her mind! - though of course that wouldn't be too difficult. 'No,' he said, with a slight but definite shake of his gre at head. 'Now you must leave me alone. There are matters to occupy my mind, and friends will soon be joining me here.'

She threw back her wine, and smiling, he refilled her gla.s.s before repeati ng, 'Now go.'

And that was that; the command was irresistible; she returned to her be nch under the alcove. But now she couldn't keep her eyes off him. He was aw are of it but it didn't seem to bother him. If he had not commanded her att ention, then he might feel concerned.

Anyway, it was now time for Janos to discover what Armstrong was doing.

He put the girl out of his mind, reached out with his vampire senses along the waterfront to the mole, and into the shadows there where ma.s.sive walls reached up out of the still waters. No bright lights there, just heaps of mended nets, lobster pots, and the floats and amphorae-like vases with whic h the fishermen caught the octopus. And the ever faithful Armstrong, of cou rse, waiting for his master's commands.

Do you hear me, Seth?

Tm here, where I should be,' Armstrong whispered into the shadows of th e mole, as if he talked to himself. He made no mention of the hunger, which Janos could feel in his mind like an ache. That was good, for a master's n eeds must always come first; but at the same time a man should not forget t o reward a faithful dog. Armstrong would receive his reward later.

/ now seek out the mentalist, the Englishman, Janos briefly explained, and him I shall send to you. The other English will doubtless accompany him . That one is not required, for he can only hinder my works. One of them ca n tell us as much as two. Do you understand?

Armstrong understood well enough - and again Janos felt the hunger in him. So much hunger that this time he commanded: You will neither mark h im nor take anything from him - nor yet give him anything of yourself! Do you hear me, Seth?

'I understand.'

Good! I suggest that he receive a stunning blow - say, to the back of the ne ck? - and that he then falls in the water where it is deep. Look to it, then, fo r if all is well I shall send them to you soon.

Without more ado he then sent his vampire senses creeping amidst the br ight lights of the New Town, searching among the hotels and tavernas, in an d around the bars, fast-food stalls and nightclubs. It was not difficult; the minds he sought were different, possessed some small powers of their own . And one of them at least had already been penetrated, damaged, almost des troyed. Indeed it was going to be destroyed, but not just yet. Time enough for that when Janos knew all that it knew. And from the single glimpse he h ad stolen before crushing down on that mind and driving it to seek sanctuar y in oblivion, he was certain that it knew a great deal.

The mind of a mentalist, aye: a 'telepath', as they called them now. B ut if Janos had caught the thought-thief spying on him (or if not on him d irectly, at least spying on the drug-running operation of which he was a p art), how much then had he discovered before he was caught? Enough to make him dangerous, be sure! For in the moment of shutting him down Janos had sensed that the mindspy knew what he was, and that must never be. What? To be discovered as a vampire here in this modern world? Oh, some might scof f at such a suggestion - but others would not. This mentalist was just suc h a one, and there'd been echoes in his mind which hinted he knew of other s. An entire nest of them.

Janos detected and seized upon a wave of frightened thoughts. He knew t he scent of them. It was a mind he had encountered before, recently, which like a familiar face he now recognized. Terrified, cringing thoughts they w ere, bruised and battered to mental submission - but rising now once more t o consciousness. He tracked them like a bloodhound, and entering that shudd ering mind knew at once that this was the one and he'd made no mistake . .

Ken Layard attended Trevor Jordan in the latter's hotel room. Their sing le rooms were side by side, with access from a corridor. For twelve hours so lid the telepath had lain here now: six of them as still as a corpse, under the influence of a powerful sedative administered by a Greek doctor, four mo re in what had seemed a fairly normal sleeping mode, and the rest tossing an d turning, sweating and moaning in the grip of whatever dream it was that bo thered him. Layard had tried to wake him once or twice, but his friend hadn'

t been ready for it. The doctor had said he'd come out of it in his own good time.

As for what the trouble was: it could have been anything, according to the doctor. Too much sun, excitement, drink - a bug which had got into his system, perhaps? Or a bad migraine - but nothing to worry about just yet. T he tourists were always going down with something or other.

Layard turned away from Jordan's bed, and in the next moment heard his f riend say: 'What? Yes - yes - I will.' He spun on his heel, saw Jordan's eye s spring open, watched him push himself upright into a seated position.

There was a jar of water on Jordan's bedside table; Layard poured him a gla.s.s and offered it to him. Jordan seemed not to see it. His eyes were almo st glazed. He swung his legs out of the bed, reached for his clothes where they were draped over a chair. The locator wondered: is he sleepwalking?

'Trevor,' he quietly said, taking his arm, 'are you - ?'

'What?' Jordan faced him, blinked rapidly, suddenly looked him full in t he face. His eyes focussed and Layard guessed that he was now fully consciou s, and apparently capable. 'Yes, I'm OK. But . . .'

'But?' Layard prompted him, while Jordan continued to dress himself. T here was something almost robotic about him.

The telephone rang. As Jordan went on dressing, Layard answered it. I t was Manolis Papastamos, wanting to know how Jordan was doing. The Greek lawman had come on the scene only seconds after Jordan's collapse; he'd helped Layard get him back here and called in the doctor.

Trevor's fine,' Layard answered his anxious query. 'I think. He's gettin g dressed, anyway. What's happening your end?'

Papastamos spoke English the same way he spoke Greek: rapid-fire. 'We're watching the boats - both of them - but nothing,' he said. 'If anything has come ash.o.r.e from the Samothraki it couldn't have been very much, and certai nly not the hard stuff, which is about what we expected. I've checked out th e Lazarus, too; unlikely that there's any connection; its owner is one Jiann i Lazarides, archaeologist and treasure-seeker, with good credentials. Or ..

. let's just say he has no record, anyway. As for the crew of the Samothraki : the captain and his first mate are ash.o.r.e; they may have brought a very li ttle of the soft stuff with them; they're watching a cabaret at the moment, and drinking coffee and brandy. But more coffee than brandy. Obviously they plan on staying sober.'

Jordan had meanwhile finished with dressing and was heading for the doo r. He moved like a zombie, and his clothes were the same ones he had worn t his morning. But the nights were still chilly; plainly he hadn't so much ch osen these light, casual clothes as taken them because they'd been handy. L ayard called after him: 'Trevor? Where do you think you're going?'

Jordan looked back. "The harbour,' he answered automatically. 'St Paul's Gate, then along the mole to the windmills.'

'h.e.l.lo? h.e.l.lo?' Papastamos was still on the phone. 'What now?'

'He says he's going to the windmills on the mole,' Layard told him. 'And I'm going with him. There's something not right here. I've known it all day.

Sorry, Manolis, but I have to hang up on you.'

'I'll see you down there!' Papastamos quickly answered, but Layard only caught half of it as he was putting the phone down. And then he was strugg ling into his jacket and following Jordan where he made his way doggedly do wnstairs into the lobby, then out of the door and into the Mediterranean ni ght.

'Aren't you going to wait for me?' he called out after him, but Jordan ma de no answer. He did glance back, once, and Layard saw his eyes staring out of his sick-looking face like holes punched in pasteboard. Plainly he wasn't g oing to wait for him, or for anyone else for that matter.

Layard almost caught up with his robotic partner as Jordan crossed a ro ad heading for the waterfront, but then the lights changed, engines revved, and mopeds and cars started rolling in the scrambling, death-wish, devil-t ake-the-hindmost fashion of Greek traffic. In that same moment he found him self separated from Jordan by b.u.mper-to-b.u.mper metal; and by the time the e xhaust fumes had cleared and the lights changed again, the telepath had dis appeared into milling groups of people where they thronged the streets. Hur rying after him, Layard knew he'd lost him.

But at least he knew where he was going . . .

Jordan felt that he was fighting it for all he was worth, every step of the way, even knowing it was useless. It was like being drunk in a strange p lace and among strangers, when you lie on your back and the room spins. It a ctually seems to spin, the corners of the ceiling chasing each other like th e spokes of a wheel. And there's nothing you can do to stop it because you k now it isn't really spinning - it's your mind that's spinning inside the hea d on top of your body. Your b.l.o.o.d.y head and body but they won't obey you . .

. you can't make them do what you want no matter how hard you try!

And all the time you can hear yourself trapped in your own skull like a fly in a bottle, buzzing furiously and banging repeatedly against the gla.s.s, and s aying over and over again, 'Oh, G.o.d, let it stop! Oh, G.o.d, let it stop! Oh, G.o.d ... let... it... stop!'

It's the alcohol - the alien in your system, which has taken control - an d fighting it only makes you feel that much worse. Try lifting your head and shoulders up off the bed and everything spins even faster, so fast you can fe el the centrifugal force dragging you down again. Force yourself to your feet and you stagger, you turn, begin to spin with the room, with the entire bloo dy universe!

But only lie still, stop fighting it, close your eyes tight and cling to y ourself . . . eventually it will go away. The spinning will go away. The sickn ess. The buzzing of the fly in the bottle - which is your own battered, astoni shed, gibbering psyche - will go away. And you'll sleep. And it's possible the strangers will roll you and rob you blind.

Roll you? They could steal your underpants - even rape you, if they felt i nclined - and you couldn't stop them, wouldn't feel it, wouldn't even suspect.

It was a replay of Jordan's first violent experience with alcohol. That had been when he'd started university and got homesick - of all b.l.o.o.d.y thing s! A couple of fellow students, college comedians thinking to have a little fun at his expense, had spiked his drinks. Then they'd played a few tricks o n him in his room. Nothing vicious: they'd rouged his cheeks, given him a cupid's bow mouth, fitted him up with a garter-belt and stockings and stuck a Mickey Mouse johnnie on his d.i.c.k.

He woke up cold, naked, ill, not knowing what had happened, wanting to die. But a day or two later when he was sober, he'd tracked them down one a t a time and beaten the living s.h.i.t out of them. Since when he'd only ever got physical when there was no other way around it.

But by G.o.d, he wished he could get physical now! With himself, with this mind and body which wouldn't obey him, with whoever it was that was doing t his to him. For that was the terrible thing: he knew it was someone else doi ng it to him, jerking him about like a puppet on a set of strings, and there was still nothing he could do about it!

'Stop!' he kept telling himself. 'Get a grip of yourself. Sit down . . . t hrow up ... hold your head in your hands . . . wait for Ken. Do anything - but of your own free will!' But before his runaway body could even begin to obey such instructions: AH . . . BUT IT IS NOT FREE! YOU CAME SPYING, INVADED.

MY MIND - AN ANT IN A WASP'S NEST! SO NOW PAY THE PRICE.

GO ON: PROCEED JUST AS YOU ARE. GO TO THE WINDMILLS.

That terrible, gonging, magnetic voice in his head -that will which su perimposed itself over his will - that telepathic, hypnotic command of som e One or Thing as powerful, more powerful, than anything he'd ever imagine d before, which made a mockery of resistance more surely than any Mickey F inn.

Jordan's legs felt like rubber - almost vibrating, tw.a.n.ging at the knees - as he strained to hold them back. As well hold back opposite magnetic poles , or a moth from a candle. And still he followed the waterfront to the mole, and along its rocky neck, until the ancient windmills stood visible there aga inst a horizon of dark ocean.

Dressed all in black, Seth Armstrong was waiting, crouching in the shado ws where the sea wall was shaped like a castle's battlements, after the styl e of the old Crusaders whose works were still visible all around. He let Jor dan go stumbling by, looked back into the darkness of the mole, under the wi nking lights of Rhodes Old Town where it sprawled on the hill. He heard foot steps, running, and a voice, panting: 'Trevor? For Christ's sake, slow down, will you? Where the h.e.l.l do you t h - ?' And Armstrong struck.

Layard saw something big, black, gangling, step out of the shadows. One e ye glared at him from a slit in a black balaclava. Gasping, he skidded to a h alt, spun on his heel to flee - and Armstrong rabbit-punched him down to the night-shining cobbles of the path. Out like a light, Layard lay crumpled at t he foot of the sea wall. And Jordan, feeling the strictures on his will slack en a little, turned back. He saw the large, dark, mantis-like figure of Armstrong bent over Layard 's unconscious form, saw his friend hoisted aloft on powerful shoulders - an d ejected through one of the wall's embrasures, out into thin air! A moment more and there came a splash - then the chop, chop, chop of disturbed water gradually settling - and finally, as the figure in black now turned towards him . . .

. . . More running footsteps!

The beam of a torch cut the night, slashing it to left and right like a whi te knife through black card. And Manolis Papastamos's voice, just as sharp, sli cing the silence: 'Trevor, Ken, where are you?'

Be careful! the alien voice in Jordan's mind commanded, but the order w as the merest whisper and no longer directed at him. It no longer dominated but merely advised. And he knew that his telepathic mind had simply 'overh eard' instructions meant for some other, meant in fact for the man in black . Do not allow yourself to be caught or recognized!

Splashing sounds from below the wall, and a gurgling cry. Ken Layard was alive! But Jordan knew for a fact that the locator couldn't swim. He forced his legs to carry him to the wall, where he could look out through an embra sure. And all the while he was aware of his controlling alien, confused and furious, mewling like a scalded cat in the back of his mind. But no longer f ully in control.

Papastamos came running, a small, slim, streamlined shape in the night, and Jordan saw the long-limbed, gangling figure in black back off into the s hadows. 'Man -Manolis!' he forced his parched throat to croak. 'Look out!'

The Greek lawman came to a halt, breathlessly called out: Trevor?' and fl ashed his torch beam full in Jordan's face.

The shadows erupted and Armstrong smashed a blow to Papastamos's face.

The Greek rode with it, went sprawling. His torch fell with him, clattering , its beam slithering everywhere. The man in black was running back along t he mole towards the town. Papastamos cursed in Greek, s.n.a.t.c.hed at the torch where it rolled past him, aimed it after the fleeing figure. Its beam trap ped an elongated human shadow, jerking on the sea wall like a giant crab es caping to the sea. But Papastamos was armed with more than just a torch.

His Beretta Model 92S barked five times in rapid succession, slinging a f ive-spoked fan of lead after the scuttling shadow. A wailing cry of pain and a gasped, 'Uh - uh - uh!' came back, but the footsteps didn't stop running.

'M-M-Manolis!' Jordan hadn't let up on his battle with the clamp on his will.

'K-K-Ken ... is ... in ... the . . . sea!'

The Greek got up, ran to the sea wall. From below came a gurgling and ga sping, the slosh of water wind-milled by flailing arms. And without a though t for his own safety, Papastamos climbed up into the embrasure and launched himself feet-first into the harbour . . .

In his window-seat upstairs in the Taverna Dakaris, Janos Ferenczy's thre e-fingered right hand closed on his winegla.s.s and applied pressure until the gla.s.s shattered. Wine and fragments of gla.s.s, and a little blood, too, were s queezed out from between his tightly clenched fingers. If he felt any pain it didn't show in his gaunt-grey face, except perhaps in the tic jerking the fl esh at one corner of his mouth.

'Janos . . . master!' Armstrong spoke to him from a little over three hundr ed yards away. 'I'm shot!'

How badly?

'In the shoulder. I'll be useless to you until I heal. A day or two.'

Sometimes I think you have always been useless to me. Go back to the boa t. Try not to be seen.

'I... I haven't got the telepath.'

/ know, fool! I shall see to it myself.

'Then be careful. The man who shot me was a policeman!'

Oh? And how do you know that?

'Because he shot me. His gun. Ordinary people don't carry them. But eve n without it, I guessed what he was as soon as I saw him. He was expecting trouble. Policemen look the same in whatever country.'

You are a veritable mine of information, Seth! the vampire's thoughts we re scathingly sarcastic. But I take your point. And since it now seems I may not take this thought-thief for my own, I shall find some other way to . .

. examine him. His own telepathy shall be his undoing. His mind is receptive to the thoughts of others, which until now has made him a big fish in a lit tle pond. Ah, but now he has a shark to contend with! For I was a mindspy fi ve centuries before he was born!

'I'm going back to the boat,' Armstrong confirmed.

Good! And if any of my crew are ash.o.r.e, be sure to call them back. And J anos thrust the other out of his mind.

He returned to Jordan where he had staggered to a seat underneath one of the antique windmills and sat there in moon- and starlight. Jordan was exha usted, totally drained by the mental battle he'd fought with his unknown adv ersary, but not so far gone that he couldn't appreciate what he'd come up ag ainst.

The last time Jordan had experienced anything like this had been the a utumn of 1977, at Harkley House in Devon. Yulian Bodescu. And it had taken Harry Keogh to clear up that mess! And was this like that? he wondered. H ad he and Ken Layard sensed the presence of ... of this Thing, even before it had become entirely apparent to them? Or apparent to him, anyway? All the pieces were starting to fit together now, and the picture they were fo rming was - terrible! Cannabis resin, cocaine? They were commonplace, even harmless, compared to this.

E-Branch must be put in the picture at once. The thought was like an invo cation: E-BRANCH? That deep, seething voice was there inside Jordan's head a gain, and mental jaws were tightening on his mind. WHAT IS THIS E-BRANCH ? And pinned there by the sheer weight of the vampire's telepathic power , Jordan could only squirm as the monster commenced a minute, painful ex amination of all his most private thoughts . . .

Janos might have examined Jordan all night, except he was interrupted.

Looking down out of his window, he saw the bearded, big-bellied Pavlos Th emelis, master of the Samothraki, making his way across the street towards the Taverna Dakaris. He was a little late, coming to meet with the man he called Jianni Lazarides; but coming anyway, and Janos couldn't continue t o dig away at Jordan's mind and hold a conversation with Themelis at the s ame time.

This morning he had found himself under the scrutiny of a thought-thief , reached out and delivered a blow to the other's mind. It had been an inst inctive reaction which nevertheless served to give the vampire time to thin k. Jordan was strong, however, and had recovered. Well, and now Janos must strike again at that mind - a different sort of blow - and one from which t he English mindspy would not recover. Not without a deal of help, anyway.

Driving his vampire senses deep into Jordan's psyche, Janos found the D oor of Sanity locked, bolted and barred against all Mankind's worst fears.

And chuckling he turned the key, took down the bars, threw back the bolts - and opened the door!