The Vampyre (10 page)

‘Ali asked the Pasha to join us. He did so in terms of the utmost respect - I was surprised, for Ali, we had thought, respected no one but himself, yet with Vakhel Pasha, he seemed almost afraid. He was interested - and worried, I felt - to discover that we knew the Pasha already. We described to him our meeting in Yanina, and all the circumstances surrounding it. “Did you find your escaped boy?” I asked Vakhel Pasha, dreading his reply. But he smiled and shook his head. “What made you think that my serf was a boy?”

‘I blushed, as Ali collapsed into paroxysms of delight. Vakhel Pasha watched me with a lazy smile. “Yes, I caught my serf,” he said. “Indeed, it is she who will shortly be performing for us.”

‘“Beautiful she is,” said Ali with a wink, “like the peris of Heaven.”

‘Vakhel Pasha inclined his head politely. “Yes - but she is headstrong too. I almost think, if it weren't that I loved her as my own child, I would have let her escape.” He paused, and his pale brow was shaded by an expression of sudden pain. I was surprised - but had no sooner caught the shadow than it had passed from his face. “Of course” - his lip curled faintly - “I have always enjoyed the thrill of a chase.”

‘“Chase?” I asked.

‘“Yes. Once she had broken from Yanina.”

‘“That was what you were waiting for?”

‘He stared at me, then smiled. “If you like.” He stretched out his fingers as though they were claws. “I had known all along that she was there, of course, hiding. So I had my guards patrol the roads, while I waited” - he smiled again - “studying in the monaster y.”

‘“But if you had to wait for her to break, how did you know she was there in the first place?” Hobhouse asked.

‘The Pasha's eyes gleamed like sun on ice. “I have a nose for such things.” He reached for a grape, and delicately sucked the juices out. Then he looked up at Hobhouse again. “Your friend,” he said casually, “the fat Greek - it appears that she had been hiding in the cellar of his house.”

‘“Athanasius?” I asked in disbelief.

‘“Yes. It is strange, isn't it? He was clearly a great coward.” The Pasha took another grape. “But it is often said that the bravest men are those who first have to conquer their fear.”

‘“Where is he now?” I asked.

‘Ali giggled with sudden delight. “Outside,” he hissed cheerfully, “on a spike. He did very well - only died this morning. That was very impressive, I thought - the fat are usually the quickest to go.”

‘I glanced at Hobhouse. He had turned as white as a corpse - I was relieved that I had no more colour to lose. Ali seemed oblivious to our sense of shock, but Vakhel Pasha, I could see, was watching us with a bitter smile on his lips. “What happened?” I asked him, as lightly as I could. “I hunted them down,” Vakhel Pasha replied. “By Pindus - a rebel stronghold - so they almost got away.” Again, I saw a faint shadow cross his face. “Almost - but not quite.”

‘“The fat Greek,” said Ali, “he must have known a lot of useful stuff - about the rebels, and so on. But he wouldn't talk. Had to rip his tongue out in the end. Annoying.” He smiled benignly. “Yes, a brave man.”

‘There was a sudden flutter of sound from the musicians. We all looked up. A girl in red silks had come running into the hall. She approached us; her face was concealed behind flowing veils, but her body was beautiful, slim and olive-brown. There was a rustle of bells from her ankles and wrists as she prostrated herself; then, at a snap of the fingers from Vakhel Pasha, she rose to her feet. She waited, in a posture to which she had clearly been trained; there was a crash of cymbals; the girl began to dance.'

Lord Byron paused, then sighed. ‘Passion is a rare and lovely thing, the true passion of youth and hope. It is a pebble dropped into a stagnant pond - it is the striking of an unheard bell. And yet just as ripples die, and echoes fade, so too is passion a fearful state - for we all know, or we soon find out, that happiness remembered is the worst unhappiness of all. What can I tell you? That the girl was as pretty as an antelope? - pretty and graceful and alive?' The vampire shrugged faintly. ‘Yes, I can, but it means nothing. Two sleepless centuries have passed me by since I watched her dance. She was lovely, but you will never picture her as she was, while I . . .' - he stared at Rebecca, frowning, his eyes blazing cold, and then he shook his head - ‘while I have become the thing you see.' He closed his eyes. ‘Understand, however, that my passion was
furious.
I was in love before I even knew who my goddess was. Slowly, veil by veil, she revealed her face. If she had been pretty before, she now grew painfully beautiful.' Again, he stared at Rebecca, and again he frowned, his features stamped with disbelief and desire. ‘Auburn hair, she had.' Rebecca touched her own. Lord Byron smiled. ‘Yes,' he murmured, ‘very like yours, but hers was braided and woven with gold; her eyes were large and black; her cheeks the colour of the setting sun; her lips red and soft. The music ended; the girl fell in a sensual movement to the floor, and her head bent low just before my feet. I felt her lips touch them - the lips that had met my own before, when we had embraced in the inn at Aheron.'

Lord Byron stared past Rebecca into the dark. Almost, she thought, as though he were making an appeal, as though the darkness were the centuries that had borne him on their flow, far from that shiver of happiness.

‘It was Nikos?' she asked.

‘Yes.' He smiled. ‘Nikos - or rather, the girl who had pretended to be a boy named Nikos. She raised her head, and tossed back her hair. Her eyes met mine; there was no sign of recognition in them, only the dulled indifference of the slave. How clever she was, I thought, how brave and strong-willed! And all the time, of course, yes, all the time' - he glanced at Rebecca again - ‘how beautiful! It was no wonder that I began to feel a tumult in my blood and turmoil in my thoughts, and feel as though I were in an Eden, being offered the fruit of a forbidden tree. This was the poetry of life I had travelled to find! A man, I thought, cannot always cling to the shores. He must follow where the ocean takes him, or what is life? - an existence without passion, sensation or variety - and therefore, of course, very much like death.'

Lord Byron paused and frowned. ‘That is what I believed, anyway.' He laughed hollowly. ‘And it was true enough, I suppose. There
can be
no life without tumult or desire.' He sighed, and glanced up at Rebecca again. ‘And if I tell you all this, it is so you can understand, both my passion for Haidée, and why I acted on it; for I knew - and even now, even here, I think I was right - that to smother an impulse is to kill the soul. And so when Vakhel Pasha, leaving Tapaleen with his serf in tow, requested us to stay with him in Aheron, I accepted. Hobhouse was furious, and swore he wouldn't go; even Ali frowned mysteriously, and shook his head - but I wouldn't be persuaded. And so it was agreed, that I would travel with Hobhouse down the Yanina road, and then we would separate, Hobhouse to tour Ambracia, and myself to stay in Aheron. We would meet again, after three weeks, in a town on the south coast named Missolonghi.'

Again Lord Byron frowned. ‘All most romantic, you see - and yet, if it was quite true that I was sick with passion to an extent I scarcely understood myself, that was not everything.' He shook his head. ‘No, there was another reason for my visit to Aheron. On the night before Vakhel Pasha's departure, I had dreamed again. For the second time, I was amongst ruins, not of a small town now, but of a great city, so that wherever I looked, there was nothing but decay, the shattered steps of thrones and temples, dim fragments cast pale by the moon, tenanted by nothing but the jackal and the owl. Even the sepulchres, I saw, lay open and bare, and I knew, amongst all this vast expanse of wreckage, there was no other living man but me.

‘I felt the Pasha's nails across my throat again - felt his tongue as he lapped at my blood. Then I saw him ahead of me, a pale form luminous amidst the cypress and stone, and I followed him. Incredibly ancient, he seemed now - as ancient as the city he led me through, possessed of the wisdom of centuries, and the secrets of the grave. Ahead of us loomed the shadow of some titanic form. “Follow me,” I heard whispered; I approached the building; I walked inside. There were staircases, stretching and twisting impossibly; up one of them the Pasha walked, but when I ran to join him, the staircase fell away, and I was lost in a vast enclosure of space. Still the Pasha climbed, and still, in my head, I heard his call: “Follow me.” But I could not; I watched him, and felt a thirst more terrible than any longing I had ever known, to see what lay at the summit of the stairs, for I knew that it was immortality. High above my head, a dome arched, jewelled and glowing; if only I could reach that, I thought, I would understand, and my thirst would be slaked. But the Pasha was gone, and I stood abandoned to crimson shadow. “Follow me,” I could still hear as I struggled to wake, “follow me,” but I opened my eyes, and the voice bled away on the morning light.

‘I imagined sometimes, during the next few days, that I heard the whisper again. Of course, I knew it was fancy, but even so, I was left feeling restless and disturbed. I found myself desperate for Aheron.'

LORD BYRON,
Manfred

H
obhouse, as we had agreed, parted from me on the Yanina road. He rode on south; I turned back to the mountains, and the winding track to Aheron. We rode hard the whole day - I say we, for with Fletcher and myself came a single guard, a faithful rogue named Viscillie, lent to me, in a signal show of favour, by Ali Pasha himself. The crags and ravines were as lonely as ever; crossing through the desolate wilds a second time, I couldn't help but remember how easily my six guards had been picked off before. Yet I never felt truly worried - not even when we passed the site of the ambush, and I caught a glint of bone in the sun. I was costumed like an Albanian pasha now, you see, all crimson and gold, very
magnifique
, and it's hard to be a coward when you're dressed like that. So I twirled my moustaches, and swaggered in my saddle, and felt myself the equal of any bandit in the world.

‘It was late when we heard the waterfall's roar, and knew that we had reached the Aheron. Ahead of the bridge, the road forked: one path led down, towards the village where I had stayed before; the other ever up. We took the second path; it was steep and narrow, winding through crags and littered boulders, while to our right, a chasm of blackness, yawned the gorge through which the Aheron flowed. I began to feel nervous, ridiculously, wretchedly nervous, as though the waters below me were chilling my soul, and even Viscillie, I noticed, seemed ill at ease. “We must hurry,” he muttered, glancing at the red-lined mountain peaks to the west. “It will be nightfall soon.” He drew out a knife. “Wolves,” he said, nodding at me. “ Wolves - and other beasts.”

‘Ahead of us, in an unclouded blaze of light, the sun was disappearing fast. But even after it was gone, its heat remained, oppressive and thick, so that as the twilight deepened into night, the stars themselves seemed like prickles of sweat. The track began to wind more sharply upwards, through a forest of dark cypresses, their roots twisting and clutching at the rocks, their branches shadowing our path in black. Suddenly, Viscillie reined in his horse and held up his hand. I couldn't hear anything, but then Viscillie pointed, and I saw, through a break in the trees, a gleam of something pale. I rode forwards; ahead of me was an ancient archway, its marble cast white by the moon, but crumbling, on either side of the path, into rubble and weeds. There was an inscription, barely legible, just above the arch: “This, O Lord of Death, is a place sacred to you . . .” - nothing more could be read. I glanced around: everything seemed still. “There's nothing here,” I said to Viscillie, but he, whose eyes were trained to the night, shook his head and pointed up the path. Someone was walking there, his back to us, in the shadow of the rocks. I spurred my horse forwards, but still the figure didn't look round, just continued walking with a relentless stride. “Who are you?” I asked, wheeling in my horse to confront the man. He said nothing, just stared ahead, and his face was shadowed by a coarse black hood. “Who are you?” I asked again, then leaned down to flick the hood back from the man's face. I stared - and laughed. It was Gorgiou. “Why didn't you say?” I asked. But still Gorgiou said nothing. Slowly, he looked up at me, and his eyes seemed without sight, glazed and torpid, sunk deep into his skull. No flicker of recognition crossed his face; instead, he turned, and my horse whinnied in sudden fear and backed away. Gorgiou crossed the path and went into the trees. I watched him disappear, his pace the same slow stride as before.

‘Viscillie joined me, and his horse too seemed coltish and afraid. Viscillie kissed the blade of his knife. “Come, My Lord,” he whispered. “These ancient places are haunted by ghosts.”

‘Our horses continued nervous, and it was only with an effort that we could force them to carry on. The path was widening now, as the rocks on one side began to fall away, while on the other a sheer cliff rose high above our heads. This was a promontory, I realised, jutting out between us and the Aheron; I stared up at it, but its summit was just a line of black against the silver of the stars, blotting out the moonlight so that we could scarcely see ahead. Reluctantly, our horses picked their way along the path, until the cliff grew less sheer and the moonlight returned. Ahead of us, the path rounded its way past an outcrop of rock - we followed it, and there, built up the mountainside, were the ruins of a town. The path snaked upwards, to a castle built on the peak. It too seemed ruined, and I could see no light shining from its battlements. Nevertheless, staring at the jagged form the castle made against the stars, I was certain that we had reached our journey's end, and that there, inside its walls, Vakhel Pasha would be expecting us.