Karz Biteri's voice fell to a hoarse whisper. Taken in the grip of his subject, he was no longer the Historian but a commentator on current events: a dangerous pastime at best, and more so for a thrall. Even so, he wasn't voicing his own specific fears but those of his master, Maglore of Runemanse, who was himself much given to rumination and often out loud. 'Even now,' Biteri continued, 'in the secret caverns of certain of the larger manses ..." He paused and glanced nervously all about, cautioning: '- this next is rumour, you understand, which may not be repeated - warriors designed for aerial combat are mewling in their vats! Abominations which have been forbidden ever since that creature of Shaitan's slaughtered Turgo Zolte in the swamps, on the day his people came fleeing out of the west to make homes for themselves in ... in the ...'

He paused again and once more cast all about with startled eyes, this way and that. Had someone come into the room unseen? Suddenly, for all the flaring of the gas jets and the searing glare of their mantles, it seemed darker. But then, it always seemed darker when a Lord was about.

Karz Biteri gulped and his parched throat clenched in upon itself like a fist. But somehow he croaked out the last few words: 'Homes for ... for themselves in ... in the dark clefts and crags.'

And as the echoes of his words died away, now the unseen intruder made his - no, her - presence known, and flowed into view from the shadows. Seeing and knowing her, Karz gulped that much harder and fell to his knees. 'My ... my Lady!'

This was a public place in the lower levels, set aside for aspiring lieutenants, thrall nurses, manse-managers, beast victuallers, brewers, and other specially talented thralls such as Karz Biteri. Honeycombed with lesser rooms, it was a sprawling cavern system which looked out over eastern Starside towards the sunless and forbidding Icelands. At the current hour one would not normally expect to find any Lord or Lady in this vicinity; there was precious little here for them, or so Karz Biteri had always supposed. And this close to sunup (even though the sun could not harm them in the depths of Turgosheim) they usually preferred to be in their own apartments. But right here and now the presence of the Lady Wratha was living, or undead, proof of the unpredictability of the Wamphyri.

Wratha the Risen: she was herself like a ray of sunlight falling upon some dark jewel. At least, that was her guise. But Biteri knew that on occasion she looked far more like something risen up from hell! For indeed she had returned from hell, or its brink, this ex-Szgany girl who was now a powerful Lady of the Wamphyri.

She laid a hand upon his bowed, balding head and her perfume fell on him cloyingly. 'Up, Historian,' she sighed. 'What? And is this not a free place? You have every right to be here, you and these tithelings of yours. But I was passing by, on my way through the levels to Wrathspire, and I heard something of your words as you instructed these ... young people.' She drew him to one side, while he fluttered his hands and said:

'My ... my words, Lady? But there was nothing of any deliberate mischief in them. I merely recounted the histories, what little is known of them, in accordance with my Lord Maglore's command. It is part of the induction, and ...'

'I know these things,' she stopped him with a glance.

'But I thought that something which I heard was more of the present than the past, and I wondered at the presumption of any thrall that he should so speculate upon the affairs of his superiors.'

'My Lady,' again Biteri went to his knees, almost collapsing there this time. 'If I have ... offended?'

'Up/' she hissed, almost dragging him to his feet. 'Perhaps you have offended. But if so ... well, you are not my thrall to punish, and as yet I've no reason to repeat what I heard.' She glared at him, and her huge eyes opened a fraction wider. Their fire held an almost physical heat, which would normally be contained beneath the scarp of carved bone worn upon her brow, and subdued by small circular plates of a deep blue volcanic glass fixed to her temples in front of her conch-like ears. But when she opened wide the doors to those furnace eyes, like this ...

She saw the cold sweat on Biteri's brow, the pounding of a vein in his neck, and inquired: 'Do you fear me, Historian?'

'I am but a thrall,' he gave his stock answer, the only entirely safe answer. 'Here in Turgosheim, the Wamphyri hold sway. If I do or think incorrectly I may die, or worse! Wherefore I fear no one but myself, for my own actions underwrite the terms of my existence. I repeat: in Turgosheim the Lords, and of course the Ladies, hold sway.'

'Only in Turgosheim?'

'And in all the world,' he added hurriedly, 'when the sun is down and shadows creep. As for me: things are as they are, and mine is not to fear but to obey.'

'Then obey me now,' she told him, her voice low, languorous, deadly dangerous, 'and make no more speeches of warriors mewling in their vats. Ah, I know where you have heard these whispers - which are the fears of old, old men, whose learning has stunted their manly appetites - but put them out of your mind. Aye, while yet your mind is your own.'

'Of course, Lady, yes!' he answered, following her where she moved back towards the tithelings.

She paused and took his arm, as if he were the friend of a lifetime, saying, 'Do you know, Historian, but just as Maglore has you, I too had a trusted thrall upon a time. Oh, I've had many such, aye, but this one was ... very special. No hard and thorny lieutenant, but a soft-skinned song-bird out of Sunside. Yes, it's true: he bathed me and sang me songs! Alas, but the many intimacies I allowed him were not enough; he would be my husband and lord it over Wrathspire as my equal! For he was a strong, comely young man, and what was I but a woman, after all?'

She let go his arm and suddenly her voice was cold as ice. 'Well, he's not much for singing now, though I'll admit he grunts a bit. For now when I go to my bed, the bulk of his warty hide guards my doorway, and what small part remains of his brain cringes from the lash of my thoughts!'

And Karz shuddered deep inside as he remembered what he'd heard of the guardian of Wratha's bedchamber: that it once was a handsome Szgany thrall, whose ambitions had been bigger than his member. And he was reminded of an old thrall adage: 'Never attempt the seduction of your master, neither by word nor deed. Remember: seduction was only the first of his disciplines!'

But Wratha's voice was light again as she commanded, 'And now you must show me these likely tithe-lings of yours, fresh out of Sunside.'

The Historian couldn't deny her. What she suggested went against the general rule, but she'd caught him preaching less than orthodox lessons, which gave her the upper hand. And now she would inspect the tithelings, likewise unorthodox, but what could he do? Nothing, except step aside as she went among them smiling like a girl: the Lady Wratha, dead and buried ninety-five years ago, but undead all the years flown between.

As she turned her eyes away from him, Karz could only marvel at this thing anew. He was forty-five years old and looked seventy, while she was more than one hundred years but looked only twenty - at the moment, anyway. It was her vampire, he knew, moulding her metamorphic flesh to the shape she desired, presenting her as fresh and vital as life itself. Ah, but only anger her and the thing inside would respond instantly, a transformation which even the greatest of the Lords would avoid at any cost! For Wratha was no simple Szgany girl, and it astonished the Historian that she ever had been - if she ever had been.

He thought on what Maglore the Seer had told him of her:

Wratha had been a Sunsider, living in a small tribal community with her father. The leader's son had wanted her, but her father, a strong man in his own right, said she should have the husband of her choice. Being contrary as well as beautiful, she wouldn't make a choice but scorned all of the tribe's young men alike. When her father died, the leader made it plain that her choice had now narrowed down: she could be his son's woman, or she could be listed for the tithe. It was simple as that.