latecomers shot by him, and all was silence once more.
Now climb, said the Ferenczy, again closing his grip on the mind of his mental slave.
The rungs were wide and shallow, twelve inches apart and set very firmly into the mortar between the stones. Dumitru found that he could carry his torch and, using only his feet and one hand, still climb easily enough. After only nine or ten rungs the chimney narrowed considerably, and after as many again flattened through about forty-five degrees to become little more than an upward-sloping shaft. Within the space of a further twenty feet the rungs petered out and were replaced by shallow slab-like steps; the “floor” then levelled out entirely and the “ceiling” gradually receded to a height of some nine or ten feet.
Now Dumitru found himself in a narrow, featureless stone passageway no more than three feet wide and of indeterminate length, where a feeling of utmost dread quickly enveloped him, bringing him to a crouching halt. Trembling and oozing cold sweat—with his heart fluttering in his chest like a trapped bird, and clammy perspiration sticking his clothes to his back and thighs—the youth thrust out his torch before him. Up ahead in the shadows where they flickered beyond the full range of illumination, a pair of yellow triangular eyes—wolf eyes and feral—floated low to the floor and reflected the torch’s fitful light. They were fixed upon Dumitru.
An old friend of mine, Dumiitruuu, Janos Ferenczy’s voice crawled in his mind like mental slime. Just like the Szgany, he and his kith and kin have watched over me many a year. Why, all manner of curious folk might come wandering up here but for these wolves of mine! Did he perhaps frighten you? You thought him below and behind you, and here he is ahead? But can’t you see that this is my bolthole? And what sort of a bolthole, pray, with just one way in and out? No, only follow this passage far enough, and it emerges in a hole in the face of the sheer cliff. Except … you shall not be required to go so far …
The voice scarcely bothered to disguise its threat; the Ferenczy would not be denied his dues now; his grip on Dumitru’s mind and will tightened like a vice of ice. And: Proceed, he coldly commanded.
Ahead of the youth the great wolf turned and loped on, a grey shadow that merged with the greater darkness. Dumitru followed, his step uncertain, his heart pounding until he thought he could actually hear the blood singing in his ears, like the ocean in the whorl of a conch. And he wasn’t the only one who could hear it.
Ah, my son, my son! The voice was a gurgle of monstrous anticipation, of unbridled lust. Your heart leaps in you like a stag fixed with a bolt! Such strength, such youth! I feel it all! But whatever it is that causes such panic in you, be sure it is almost at an end, Dumiitruuu … The passage widened; on Dumitru’s left the wall as before, but on his right a depression, a trench running parallel, cut in the solid rock—indeed in bedrock—that deepened with each pace he took. He extended his torch out over the rim and looked down, and in the deepest section of the trench saw … the rim and narrow neck of a black urn, half-buried in dark soil!
The rim of the urn—like a dark pouting mouth, with lips that seemed to expand and contract loathsomely in the flickering light—stood some five feet below the level of Dumitru’s path. Beyond the urn, the bed of the trench had been raised up. Cut in a “V, like a sluice, it sloped gently downwards to a raised rim channelled into a narrow spout which projected directly over the mouth of the urn; in the other direction, the “V-shaped bed sloped upwards and out of sight into shadows. The raised rim of rock and carved spout above the urn looked for all the world like guttering over a rain barrel, and like guttering they were stained black from the flow of some nameless liquid.
For several long moments Dumitru stood trembling there, gasping,
Now climb, said the Ferenczy, again closing his grip on the mind of his mental slave.
The rungs were wide and shallow, twelve inches apart and set very firmly into the mortar between the stones. Dumitru found that he could carry his torch and, using only his feet and one hand, still climb easily enough. After only nine or ten rungs the chimney narrowed considerably, and after as many again flattened through about forty-five degrees to become little more than an upward-sloping shaft. Within the space of a further twenty feet the rungs petered out and were replaced by shallow slab-like steps; the “floor” then levelled out entirely and the “ceiling” gradually receded to a height of some nine or ten feet.
Now Dumitru found himself in a narrow, featureless stone passageway no more than three feet wide and of indeterminate length, where a feeling of utmost dread quickly enveloped him, bringing him to a crouching halt. Trembling and oozing cold sweat—with his heart fluttering in his chest like a trapped bird, and clammy perspiration sticking his clothes to his back and thighs—the youth thrust out his torch before him. Up ahead in the shadows where they flickered beyond the full range of illumination, a pair of yellow triangular eyes—wolf eyes and feral—floated low to the floor and reflected the torch’s fitful light. They were fixed upon Dumitru.
An old friend of mine, Dumiitruuu, Janos Ferenczy’s voice crawled in his mind like mental slime. Just like the Szgany, he and his kith and kin have watched over me many a year. Why, all manner of curious folk might come wandering up here but for these wolves of mine! Did he perhaps frighten you? You thought him below and behind you, and here he is ahead? But can’t you see that this is my bolthole? And what sort of a bolthole, pray, with just one way in and out? No, only follow this passage far enough, and it emerges in a hole in the face of the sheer cliff. Except … you shall not be required to go so far …
The voice scarcely bothered to disguise its threat; the Ferenczy would not be denied his dues now; his grip on Dumitru’s mind and will tightened like a vice of ice. And: Proceed, he coldly commanded.
Ahead of the youth the great wolf turned and loped on, a grey shadow that merged with the greater darkness. Dumitru followed, his step uncertain, his heart pounding until he thought he could actually hear the blood singing in his ears, like the ocean in the whorl of a conch. And he wasn’t the only one who could hear it.
Ah, my son, my son! The voice was a gurgle of monstrous anticipation, of unbridled lust. Your heart leaps in you like a stag fixed with a bolt! Such strength, such youth! I feel it all! But whatever it is that causes such panic in you, be sure it is almost at an end, Dumiitruuu … The passage widened; on Dumitru’s left the wall as before, but on his right a depression, a trench running parallel, cut in the solid rock—indeed in bedrock—that deepened with each pace he took. He extended his torch out over the rim and looked down, and in the deepest section of the trench saw … the rim and narrow neck of a black urn, half-buried in dark soil!
The rim of the urn—like a dark pouting mouth, with lips that seemed to expand and contract loathsomely in the flickering light—stood some five feet below the level of Dumitru’s path. Beyond the urn, the bed of the trench had been raised up. Cut in a “V, like a sluice, it sloped gently downwards to a raised rim channelled into a narrow spout which projected directly over the mouth of the urn; in the other direction, the “V-shaped bed sloped upwards and out of sight into shadows. The raised rim of rock and carved spout above the urn looked for all the world like guttering over a rain barrel, and like guttering they were stained black from the flow of some nameless liquid.
For several long moments Dumitru stood trembling there, gasping,
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