Of Thibor’s deeds, strangely, I heard with no small measure of pride. He butchered not only the infidel Turk but Hungarians, Germans, and other Christians in their thousands. Ah, he was a true son of his father! If only he had not been disobedient. Alas, (for him) but disobedience to me was not his only failing; like myself at the end of my Crusader adventure, he had not practised the caution of the Wamphyri. He was adored by the Szekely but set himself on a level with his superiors, the Wallachian princes, and his excesses had made him notorious. He was feared throughout the land. In short, he had in every way brought himself into prominence. A vampire may not be prominent, not if he values his longevity.
But Thibor was wild, demented in his cruelties! Vlad the (so called) Impaler, Radu the Handsome, and Mircea the Monk (whose reign was so short) had all tasked him with the protection of Wallachia and the chastisement of its enemies; tasks in which he delighted, at which he excelled. Indeed, the Impaler, one of history’s favourite villains, suffers undeservedly: he was cruel, aye, but in fact he has been named for Thibor’s deeds! Like my name, Thibor’s has been struck, but the stark terror of his deeds will live forever.
Now let me get on. When I had lived too long with the Turks, finally I deserted their cause — which was crumbling, as all causes must in the end — and returned to Wallachia. The time was well chosen. Thibor had gone too far; Mircea had recently acceded to the throne and he feared his demon Voevod mightily. This was the moment I had so long awaited.
Crossing the Danube, I put out Wamphyri thoughts ahead of me. Where were my gypsies now? Did they still remember me? Three hundred years is a long time. But it was night, and I was night’s master. My thoughts were carried on the dark winds all across Wallachia and into the shadowed mountains. Romany dreamers where they lay about their campfires heard me and started awake, gazing at each other in wonder. For they had heard a legend from their grandfathers, who had heard it from their grandfathers, that one day I would return.
In 1206 two of my mercenary Szgany had come home —the same two taken for questioning on the night of Crusader cowardice and treachery, whose lives had been spared — and they had returned to foster an awesome myth. But now I was here, a myth no longer. ‘Father, what shall we do?’ they whispered into the night. ‘Shall we come to meet you, master?’
‘No,’ I told them across all the rivers and forests and miles. ‘I have work to finish, and I alone must see to it. Go into the Carpatii Meridionali and put my house in order, so that I may have my own place when my work is done.’ And I knew that they would do it.
Then . . . I went to Mircea in Targoviste. Thibor was campaigning on the Hungarian border, a good safe way away. I showed the Prince living vampire flesh taken from my own body, telling him that it was flesh of Thibor. Then, because he was close to fainting, I burned it. This showed him one way in which a vampire may be killed. I told him the other way, too: the stake and decapitation. Then I questioned him about his Voevod’s longevity: did he not deem it strange that Thibor must be at least three hundred years old? No, he answered, for it was not one man but several. They all were part of the same legend, they all took the same name, Thibor. All of them, down through the years, had fought under the devil-bat-dragon banner.
I laughed at him. What? But I had studied Russian records and knew for a fact that this selfsame man — this one man — had been a Boyar in Kiev three hundred years ago! At that time it had been rumoured that he was Wamphyri. The fact that he still lived gave the rumour ample foundation. He was a lustful vampire — and now it seemed he lusted after the throne of Wallachia!