I would have cringed away from him but could not. Inside I cringed — perhaps that child of his within me cringed, too — but externally my skin merely shivered. I tried to speak, but that also had grown too difficult. My lips only trembled and I made a moaning sound.
‘Thibor,’ the old devil said, his voice level as if in polite conversation, ‘you’ve much to learn, my son. About me, about yourself, about the Wamphyri. You are not yet aware, you fail to perceive all the mysteries I have bestowed upon you. But what I am, you shall be. And the powers I possess, they too shall be yours. You have seen and learned a little, now see and experience more!’
He continued to balance me on my side, but propped up my head a little so that I could see his face. His magnetic eyes held me, a fish, speared on their pupils. My blurred sight cleared; the picture sharpened; I saw more clearly than ever before. My body and limbs might well be made of lead, but my mind was sharp as a knife, my awareness so keen that I could almost feel the change taking place in the creature who leaned over me. Faethor had somehow, for some reason, heightened my perceptions, increased my sensitivity.
‘Now watch,’ he hissed. ‘Observe!’
The skin of Faethor’s face, large-pored and grainy at best, underwent a swift metamorphosis. Watching it I thought: I have never known what he looks like. And even now I won’t know. He is how he wants me to see him!
The pores of his face opened up more yet, pockmarks cratering his flesh. His jaws, enormous already, elongated with a sound like gradually tearing cloth, and his leathery lips rolled back until his mouth was all bulging, crimson gums and jagged, dripping teeth. I had seen Faethor’s teeth before, but never displayed like this. Nor was the metamorphosis complete.
It was all in the jaws, in the teeth, in the nightmarish
Then, for a long time, I knew no more.
For which, as you might suppose, I was not unthankful .
At first, when I regained consciousness, I thought that I was alone. But then I heard Ehrig whimpering in a shadowed corner — heard him and remembered. I remembered the comradeship we’d shared, all the bloody battles we’d been through together. Remembered how he had been my true friend, who would gladly lay down his life for me — and I mine for him.
Perhaps he remembered, too, and that was why be whimpered. I did not know. I only knew that when the Ferenczy had fastened his teeth in my spine, Ehrig was nowhere to be seen.
To say that I beat him would not do his punishment justice, but without Faethor’s vampire stuff in him he would certainly have died. It could be that I consciously tried to kill him; I can’t say about that, either, for the episode is no longer clear in my mind. I only know that when I was done with him he no longer felt my blows, and that I myself was completely exhausted. But he healed, of course, and so did I. And I conceived a new strategy.
After that . . there were times of sleeping, of waking, of eating. Outwardly, life consisted of little more. But for me these were also times of waiting, and of patient, silent scheming. As for the Ferenczy: he tried to train me like a wild dog.
It started like this: he would come silently to the door and listen. Strangely, I knew when he was there. I would feel fear! And when I became afraid, then he would be there. At times I could feel him groping at the edges of my mind, slyly attempting to insinuate himself into my very thoughts. I remembered how he had communicated with old Arvos over a distance and did what I could to close my mind to him. I think I succeeded greatly, for after that I could sense a frustration other than my own.
He used a system of rewards: if I was ‘good’ and obeyed him, there would be food. He would call through the door: ‘Thibor, I have a pair of fine piglets here!’