Jazz couldn’t suppress a small shiver. He grimaced and said: ‘God, what a world this is! But tell me: by “her condition” do you mean the fact that she’s now Wamphyri, or is it worse than that? I mean, does she have Dramal’s leprosy, too?’
‘No, not that,’ Zek answered, ‘but it’s possible she’s in an even worse fix, if you can imagine that. You see, Wamphyri legends have it that the first true Mother was a human female whose vampire produced more than the normal single egg. Indeed, the eggs were produced almost endlessly, until the vampire itself and its female host were drained – until there was nothing left of them! They gave birth to vampires until the effort withered them to lifeless husks. And this was how Dramal had determined to repay the others of the Wamphyri for their scorn, their naming him Doombody and for his isolation: but mainly for the sheer evil of it. He would cause to be brought into this world a hundred vampire eggs, all of which would find hosts in the denizens of his aerie. Why, even the flying beasts and warrior creatures would be Wamphyri! Which would mean the debasement of the entire hag-ridden race! Do you understand?’
Jazz nodded, but a little uncertainly. ‘I think so. He hoped that Karen would become a Mother, that her vampire would produce the same endless stream of eggs. But how could he be sure?’
‘Maybe he couldn’t,’ she shrugged. ‘Maybe he merely hoped it would be so – but he told Karen it would be. And she, poor, damned, doomed creature that she is, she believes it. And the Wamphyri do have strange powers. Perhaps in some way he has engineered it. Anyway, he’s gone now into corruption and so she waits, and the vampire in her slowly matures. Except . . . some mature more quickly than others. In some it is a matter of days, in others many years. If her vampire is a Mother, then she’ll suffer the same fate as that first Mother of legend . . .’
Zek paused, and on impulse reached across and touched Jazz’s face. Before she could withdraw her hand, he kissed her fingers. This, too, was on impulse. She smiled at him and shook her head.
‘I know what you’re thinking,’ she said. ‘And I certainly don’t have to read your mind. It’s a grasshopper mind anyway; from such a very dire subject to – dalliance? – in one move.’ Then she grew serious again. ‘But you’re right, Jazz, this is a very terrible world. And we’re not out of it yet by a long shot. We should both save our strength.’
‘I’ve noticed,’ he told her, ‘that you’ve been sticking pretty close to me. Maybe it’s as well I can’t read your mind.’
She laughed. ‘There are a lot of unattached male Travellers, Jazz,’ she said. ‘Now to them, and to Lardis too, it will seem I’ve made up my mind – whether I have or not. This way I won’t have to keep fending them off. But don’t make me keep fending you off, too, for I’m not sure how well I’d succeed.’
He gave a mock sigh, grunted, ‘Promises, promises!’ Then he grinned. ‘OK, you win. And anyway, I ache enough already.’
At the end of the next leg of their journey, the sun appeared to have moved some degrees eastward, at the same time sinking appreciably lower in the sky; or maybe it was just that the Travellers had come down out of the foothills, so lowering their horizon. Whichever, Jazz noticed a definite urgency – a heightened awareness – in Lardis and his people; the pass through the mountains was still only a few miles to the east, and the sun’s descent seemed that much more obvious. Yes, and Shaithis of the Wamphyri had a score to settle, so the sooner the tribe reached its cavern sanctuary the better.
Following a fairly well-defined trail down out of the foothills, the going had been quick and surprisingly easy. A little less than twenty miles had been covered in the time allowed for only half of that, and Lardis was well pleased. He called camp on the westward bank of a river at the edge of the great forested region, told his people they could have four hours of rest. He sent out hunters, too, into the thigh-length savanna grass after whichever birds and animals lived there. Then he found himself a spot on the riverbank and cast a line there, and sat in the long twilight with his back to the bank fishing and making his plans.