Nathan nodded. 'I've heard that: that sometimes among the Wamphyri there would be a necromancer.'

What? The other was aghast. No, no - not that! The ones of which 'I speak merely talked to the dead; they were beloved of the dead; they didn't torture them!

Beloved of the dead? But hadn't Nathan heard that expression before, as used by Lardis Lidesci in respect of certain hell-landers he'd known? The old Lidesci had never been too explicit with regard to The Dweller and his father, however, and had always spoken of them in hushed tones. It was a subject Nathan might like to pursue, but suddenly ...

... His senses were spinning! He swayed dizzily, staggered, and sat down with a bump. He pictured himself standing under a waterfall, letting the water flow over him. It was an entirely involuntary thing: an instinctive longing for old, irretrievable pleasures. But it was easy to see how, under extremes of deprivation, a man's mind might turn to the conjuring of false comforts in his final hours. Except in Nathan's case, his mind seemed to have called up a personal devil to torment him!

So that in answer to what this - this what? mental mirage? - had just said to him, he croakingly replied: 'Why does the idea of the living torturing the dead shock you so? Can't you see how you've reversed the process, so that now the dead torture the living? But for you I would be sleeping my last sleep, dying. And you are keeping me from it, prolonging it, making it worse.'

The other was horrified at Nathan's determination. What has brought you to this? The most precious thing any creature can have is life. And you, so young, reject it? The abnegation of alJ earthJy responsibility? Best be warned, Nathan: give up your pJace among the living -go willingly to an unnecessary death - and you'll find no solace among the Great Majority. What extreme is this you've been driven to, and why?

Nathan took his head in his hands and stared at the sand between his feet, and despite himself the events of the recent past were mirrored in the eye of his mind, where his inquisitor saw them. So that in a little while: In the Thyre there is no urge for vengeance. The 'voice' was quieter now. When we are hurt we move away from it, and never go back there.

'So would I,' Nathan told him. 'If you would let me.'

But in the Szgany (the other ignored him), there is this deep-seated need for revenge upon an enemy. Just as there was in you. So what happened to it?

'My vow against the Wamphyri? Perhaps I saw its futility: they are indestructible. But I am Szgany, and if I've allowed my vow to die within me, then I might as well follow it into oblivion. No great loss, for what use is a man who can't even honour his own vow?'

Self-pity? (The shake of an incorporeal head.) And in any case, you are mistaken. What, you? No great Joss, did you say? But you must believe me when I tell you that you would be the greatest loss of all.' As for the Wamphyri: they are not indestructible. They were destroyed, upon a time, some of them. And by others like yourself. And ... I perceive ... that what was in those others is also in you! You thought I spoke of necromancy, but you were wrong. There have been - will always be - necromancers among the Wamphyri, that is true. But these were men who talked to the dead before you, Nathan! By no means ordinary men, no, but certainly not necromancers! Neither are you a necromancer. But you are ... a Necroscdpe!

Nathan had given up answering with his voice. He didn't need to, anyway. Necroscope? I don't know the word.

Neither did I! It is one of their words. As I am Thyre and you are Szgany, and the great vampire Lords are Wamphyri, so they were Necroscopes. And so are you. Its meaning is simple: you talk to the dead. And I am the dead proof of it.

Then why don't they talk to me in return? Nathan's question seemed perfectly logical. I mean the Szgany, of course. Why don't the dead of my own kind talk to me?

Perhaps later there will be time to ask them, the other told him. Some of them, your people, have spoken to me from time to time; those of them who have graves at least. But you Szgany have strange ways: you've burned so many of your dead, and when they are burned it is that much harder. Harder still if their ashes are scattered. Perhaps that is why your people scatter the ashes of vampires: to deny them even the slightest chance of some monstrous nether-existence.

'I suppose it is,' Nathan answered thoughtfully, reverting to the use of his physical voice again, which after all came more naturally to him. 'But what of the Thyre when they die? What is their lot?'

We are not put down into the darkness of the earth but elevated, the other told him. Neither are we scattered but gathered together. Eventually we are dust, but not for long and long ... He paused, and in the next moment suddenly gasped: Ah, you see! Proof that you are a Necroscope! You asked me a question whose answer is a great secret, and yet I made no complaint but merely answered you. For I know that you are good and would never torment me, or use the knowledge to any evil advantage.

'What knowledge?'

Of the last resting places of the Thyre.

'But you've said nothing, only that they are brought up instead of being put down. I didn't even understand you.'

You would understand if you tried to, the other insisted. You Travellers live on the surface, in the woods and hills of Sunside, and when you die you are put down into the earth. Or you were upon a time, until recently. And you would be again, if the Wamphyri should be driven out or destroyed. You spend your lives in the air and the light, and your deaths in the earth and the dark. But among the Thyre the opposite is the case. Our lives -

'- Are spent in the earth?' Nathan finished it for him. 'And your deaths ... where?'

You have seen the place, the other answered, reverently. One of the places, at least. One of many such places.

A picture formed in Nathan's mind, which he recognized at once. He looked up, at the stairway cut into the precipitous sandstone cliffs, and the gloomy mouths of caves leading off from it into unknown darkness. The tombs of the Thyre?'

Indeed, and much more than that. For this is one of the places where our world enters yours.

Which was something else Nathan didn't understand. He thought back on what he knew of the desert folk: very little, actually. Only that they were thought of as primitive nomads who wandered at the edge of the furnace desert and occasionally crossed the grasslands to trade with the Szgany. It had always been assumed that they lived above ground, perhaps in caves or tents, but apparently ... and there he got a grip of himself. For without even realizing it, suddenly he had begun to believe.

That I am real, an incorporeal mind? That I was real, upon a time? But didn't I say that I could prove it? Well, and the proof lies up there.

Nathan was tempted, but he was also sceptical. Was this really the mind of some dead creature, or was it his own mind trying to provoke him into a futile attempt at saving his life? 'Are you telling me that your bones -your remains - are up there?'

Yes.

Though it was something of an effort, and probably wasted at that, Nathan stood up again. And knowing that it would take a far greater effort to climb the sandstone stairs, nevertheless he made his way to the foot of the cliffs and looked up at the mouths of the caves.

The place is sacred, the Thyre voice sighed in his mind. Only go there and my people will know, and eventually come to see what you are about. In this way you can save yourself.

'But if it's a sacred place,' Nathan answered, starting up the steep climb, 'surely they'll kill me?'

The Thyre don't kill.

Then they'll chase me away, or carry me into the desert to die.' Suddenly giddy, he closed his eyes for a moment and clutched at the sheer face.