Way of the Heron

The Way Of The Heron

By C. T. Creekmur

Epilogue Two

The Return Of Hunts-by-night

Author's warning: This story depicts men performing sexual acts upon one another that immature people might find shocking. If graphic depictions of sex between men upsets you, or if you are under 21 years of age, then DO NOT READ THIS! - go read something else!

Please understand that this is a work of fantasy and fiction, set in a time when safe sex was unheard of. It is not intended to provoke or promote promiscuity or abandonment of common sense where sex is concerned. Especially in this day and age.

Though historical personages are mentioned, none of the principal characters are based on real individuals and any similarity to such is coincidental. This story is copyrighted (c) by the author and may not be reproduced in any form without the specific written permission of the author.

Historical Note: This chapter begins in July of 1869. The action begins in False Pass, but goes on to describe events in a number of other places and times.

And now, on with the story!

1 - JAKOB'S TALE

"You got a minute, Doc?"

Cy Orwins looked up from the medical book he had been reading. He was relaxing behind the desk in his small clinic at False Pass. He smiled at the elderly Russian man, the retired town blacksmith, who was halfway through the door.

Though in his sixties, Jakob Onatov was still a handsome man. The brilliant red hair he had sported in his youth could be guessed at by the few remaining ruddy streaks in his otherwise long white hair. And though age was beginning to sag his muscles, the burly blacksmith's arms plainly showed the effects of a lifetime of swinging heavy hammers.

Cy knew from experience the strength of those arms, having made love to Jakob on a few occasions. Like most of the men in False Pass, Cy and Jakob followed the Way of the Heron and regularly shared their bodies with their brother Elxa tribesmen, raising good energy to nourish the land they lived on. And since the discovery of the Heart Call, that concept had become an even more palpable reality to the heron men. Cy sighed quietly, remembering Jakob's gentle, slow love, before he replied.

"Sure, Jakob. Have a seat."

Jakob took a moment to look behind him before he shut the door. As he moved to take a chair he noticed Cy's curious expression.

"I didn't want my sons to see me comin' in here," he explained. "Can you keep this between us?"

"Of course. You know I don't talk about anything that goes on between my patients and myself."

Jakob glanced at the title of the book Cy had been reading.

"'The Human Heart'. You readin' that for my benefit?"

"Honestly, yes. The doctor at Port Bolon recommended it and Dusty was able to order it for me. What's up?"

"You told me to come back if I had that pain in my chest again. Well, I did, about half an hour ago. Luckily none of my sons were around when it happened. I thought I was gonna faint."

Cy frowned and got up, thinking of the pain Jakob had come to see him about before. From what Jakob had told Cy, the pain had begun as an uncomfortable twinge in his chest, about the time Cy had arrived in False Pass, but had grown in intensity and frequency since then. Knowing what the doctor would want, Jakob unbuttoned his shirt. Cy got out his stethoscope and pressed it to the man's furry chest. He listened intently for a full minute.

"Was it hard to breathe while you were having this pain?" Cy asked at length.

"A little," Jakob admitted.

"I have something I want you to try."

Jakob buttoned up his shirt as Cy went to get something out of his desk.

"I really think you should let your sons know about your condition, Jakob," Cy advised as he produced a small pillbox.

"I don't wanna worry them," he responded, eyeing the object Cy held. "What's that?"

"The next time you have one of those pains in your chest, put one of these pills under your tongue and hold it there. The pain ought to go away fairly quickly."

"Okay. Thanks."

"Jakob, it's not a cure," Cy warned. "Your condition will get worse until your heart fails. You need to seriously consider moving to the spirit realm. From what we know about the place, it will start healing and rejuvenating you as soon as you get there. The other members of the tribe as old as you have already done so. You could live with them."

"But what about my boys?"

"You've been taking care of your boys all their lives. Isn't it time you let them take care of themselves for a change?"

"They do, Doc. They run the forge as well as I ever did and make money so we can all eat. But I know they'd be as broken up about it as me if we had to part company. Did I ever tell you the story of how I came to join the Elxa?"

"No," Cy began. He realized Jakob was trying to avoid the subject of his health, which wasn't good, but decided to let him talk. "I've heard you came here after the Elxa moved into the valley of the heron, but not much more."

"That's right." Jakob paused. "Have you heard the stories they tell of Hunts-by-night?"

Cy nodded. He recalled the events of the Spring just past. Among the other wonders that occurred was the revelation that the lover of Hunts-by-night, a man named Jack Ramsey who shared Hunts-by-night's power, had returned and joined the spirit animals in protecting the valley of the heron. Cy had considered asking to examine Jack, to see if there was a scientific explanation for the amazing things the man could do, but had not voiced his wish to anyone.

"My story involves him and his lover, Jack Ramsey, who was a close friend of mine. Hunts-by-night's real name was Basil." Cy's expression changed and Jakob smiled. "You didn't think he was real, did you?"

"Well, I've never run across any other stories about immortals with supernatural powers."

"Have you ever heard about vampires?"

"Vampires?" smiled Cy. "That's a myth."

Jakob gave Cy a look that Cy knew meant the man was deadly serious.

"Vampires are real. Hunts-by-night was one."

"Jack too?"

"Yes, but not when I first met him. I loved Jack like a brother in my younger days, when I lived at Fort Vancouver and Jack was a trapper who came to the fort occasionally. But we were separated by circumstances beyond our control. He became Basil's lover and after an accident that almost killed Jack, Basil changed him somehow into a being like himself. And it was lucky for me that he did, otherwise I wouldn't be here jawin' with you now, Doc."

As Jakob went on, Cy fell under the spell of his story. The years rolled backward and the scene changed. Cy could almost see what Jakob was describing, a storm at sea in the summer of 1833.

Jakob could dimly remember the storm. How it had tossed the ship, a British frigate, like a toy. And Ian, his handsome, crimson haired Scottish gaoler, coming down into the hold to unlock his fetters, bolted to the ship's hull. Jakob arose from his bed of stale straw, rubbed his chaffed wrists and asked what was happening.

"The ship can't take much more of this storm, Jakob lad." Ian admitted. "It looks to me as if it'll be every man for himself before long. I'm takin' a chance on you, lettin' you loose like this before the cap'n gives me leave to do so, but I won't be havin' your death on my conscience. Wait here and I'll be back soon."

But Ian never came back. No sooner had the gaoler left Jakob to go up on deck than something caused the ship to lurch violently, rolling almost to the point of capsizing. Some of the cargo shifted and Jakob might have been crushed had not those items closest to his makeshift gaol been securely enveloped in cargo nets. Then a great, foaming explosion of seawater burst down the gangway. The unexpected wave swept Jakob off his feet and tossed him among some crates and barrels, almost rendering him unconscious.

Dazed, soaked to the skin and choking on salt water, Jakob fought his way to his feet, up the gangway and onto the deck. The wind-driven rain stung his eyes as he got a grip on a section of railing and surveyed the damage wrought by the storm, the tattered sails, one mast broken aloft and loose ropes that writhed and snapped like whips in the gale. The harried sailors screamed at each other in order to be heard above the howling tempest as they labored to save themselves. The vessel shuddered and leapt upon a sea that seemed to boil, the whole scene of sheer chaos lit intermittently by huge, livid bolts of lightning.

By their vivid light Jakob could get glimpses of a rugged coastline lashed by foaming waves. As the mountains of water impacted unceasingly against unyielding cliffs of stone, the ominous booming noise of the titanic impacts could just be heard above the storm. Jakob recalled Ian saying the day before that the ship was nearing the California coast. He caught sight of that rocky shore again as another bolt of lightning fell and illuminated a wild confusion of wind and water.

Caught in the teeth of the gale the proud ship was shaken like a terrier in the jaws of a tiger. Another heave of the ship tore Jakob's grip loose from the railing and knocked him off balance. Before he could regain his feet, a huge wave broke across the deck, picking him up and carrying him away into the sea.

At first it was a struggle for Jakob just to keep his head above the heaving waves. Then his hands found a small barrel washed from the ship. He clung to the buoyant object desperately and, unable to do anything else, he prayed, trying to remember the words he had learned as a boy in the great onion domed churches of Kiev. Images of richly clad priests amid the incense scented grandeur of their icons and holy relics filled Jakob's head as the raging dark waters closed in around him.

Then those memories faded out and Jakob began to contemplate the odd calm he found himself wrapped in, so different from what he had experienced on the sea. He opened his eyes and looked around at a strange room. From the bare, whitewashed walls and sparse furnishings, Jakob surmised he was in a Spanish mission.

He turned his head towards the single window, set deeply in the adobe wall. Bright moonlight spilled across the broad sill and onto the dark planks of the floor. Then he became aware of a presence. Someone was sitting in a nearby chair. Before Jakob could ask who was there, the figure spoke.

"Hello, Jakob."

Jakob sat up despite his stiff, sore and protesting muscles, trying to get a better look at his visitor. But there was not quite enough light to see the man's face. Nevertheless, the voice sounded familiar.

"How do you feel?"

"Weak," Jakob answered.

"I'm not surprised. But the brothers here tell me you ought to recover completely from your ordeal."

"Who are you?"

The man struck a light and lit a candle, then moved his chair closer to the bedside. Jakob saw a handsome metiff, a half-breed, whose native blood showed in the features of his face and sharp, black eyes. But his white ancestry was expressed in the red brown of his long hair and full beard, as well as the paleness of his skin.

"Jack," he breathed, recognizing the man, "Jack Ramsey!"

A flood of memories came to Jakob in a flash. The time he had lived at Fort Vancouver, working in the blacksmith's shop and spending his free time with Jack whenever the trapper was around the fort. Jakob had come to regard Jack as a very close and dear friend and had felt terribly for him when he was forced to leave.

His secret, the same one Jakob shared, that they both liked to be with men, had been exposed. To escape the cruel whisperings of the men at the fort, as well as the rejection of his trapping partner, Jack had left. Jakob would have followed him if he had been free to do so, but his status as a Russian citizen in British territory made him suspect to the authorities and he was restricted to the fort and the immediate surrounding area.

In the months that followed, Jakob had come to wish he had defied those orders and gone into the wilderness with Jack. Sometimes he had dreams of being with Jack, and of the free life they might have built together in the unknown lands, living and loving as they pleased. Jakob reached out and grasped Jack's hand, unable to speak for the joy that filled his heart.

"I'm glad to see you too, old friend," smiled Jack, who was equally touched.

As he gave Jakob's hand a kiss, Jack looked up into the Russian's face. A great ruddy bread bursting from his cheeks covered most of it, right up to less than an inch below his eyes. Thick, bushy eyebrows shaded two pale gray eyes and his hair, grown long while he was in captivity, was a glorious red mane hanging loosely about his bare shoulders, getting lost in the crimson fur that Jack knew - from experience - spread thickly across his chest and over his back.

"How... why are you here?" asked Jakob in wonder.

"I wanted to make sure you were all right, Jakob. I found you on the beach after the storm and brought you here. The brothers were good enough to take care of you for me."

"You found me?"

"Yes. I just happened to have business in this area. A lucky break for you, eh?"

"Where am I?"

"The mission of San Tomas."

"San Tomas?" he repeated. "I'm not sure where... "

"I'd say it's about a hard day's ride north of Fort Ross."

"Oh. Did you find anyone else?"

"From your ship? No. Only some debris washed up on the coast."

"So I was the only survivor?"

"It seems so."

Feelings of regret for Ian's fate notwithstanding, Jakob breathed a great sigh of relief and released Jack's hand, sinking back down into his bed.

"Don't worry," Jack reassured him. "No one here knows you're wanted for murder."

Jakob lurched back up in alarm.

"How did you know that?" he hissed.

"I just do," Jack replied calmly. "Don't worry about how."

Jakob just stared at Jack, his mind whirling. What did Jack want? To blackmail him? No, not Jack! That was impossible. They were too close. Or at least they had been.

"Jack, I swear to you, as my name is Jakob Feodorovitch Onatov, I did not kill anyone!"

"I know," he said quietly.

"How can you know these things? I haven't seen you in almost two years and now here you are, sayin' you know all about me, what I've been through since I saw you last!"

"I don't know everything," Jack protested. "Would you tell me your side of it? How you came to be accused?"

"It was that self-righteous prig of a doctor, Catsby."

"Dr. Martin Catsby? He's been dead for the past six months."

"Good," spat Jakob. "If there's any justice, he's roastin' in hellfire right now."

"I agree he wasn't the best man I've ever known, but how did he cause your troubles?"

"You remember how he was. Always thumpin' that bible of his, denouncin' sin wherever he thought he detected it. The chief factor at the fort had to put up with it because he was saddled with Catsby by the Hudson Bay Company, not to mention that he was practically the only doctor in the whole Oregon country!"

"I know. I remember how we had to get permission for you to go hunting with me, so we could go out into the woods to have our fun."

"If only I were stronger," Jakob said, giving Jack a lustful look he remembered well and squeezing his hand. "I would show you how happy I am to see you again!"

"Old friend," murmured Jack, "we have lots of time to get reacquainted. And I have many things to tell you as well, but first, go on with your story."

"Well, after you left, Catsby was furious that you hadn't been arrested and punished for your 'crimes against nature', but the chief factor wasn't an agent of British law and told Catsby so. In anger, Catsby began payin' informants and soon had a list of every man at the fort who indulged in the sort of things we liked to do."

"That must have been a rather long list."

"It was long enough," sighed the Russian. "He couldn't do much about the natives or most of the white men whose names were reported to him, but when he found out about me, he began agitatin' to have me deported.

"As I was one of the only two blacksmiths they had, the chief factor resisted Catsby's efforts to get rid of me. I was 'necessary for the operation of the fort' as he put it."

"That must have pleased you."

"It did. I've never quite fit in anywhere I've gone, so it was good to hear someone say I was needed," Jakob sighed, "but I'll probably never hear such praises again."

"You will, I'm sure," said Jack confidently.

"Thanks. But to go on with my story, when Catsby realized he couldn't get rid of me so easily, he paid off a man at the fort to accuse me falsely of murder."

"Who?"

"Francois Voux," Jakob answered bitterly.

"He's dead also," volunteered Jack.

"Huh! It sounds as if someone has avenged me on them both."

Jack gave Jakob a significant look, but the Russian was not sure what it meant and went on with his story.

"The chief factor had no choice but to lock me up until a ship could be found to take me to the nearest British consul, in Hawaii, for a trial. It was a long time before a ship stopped at the fort that was bound for those islands. Once I got there, the consul decided there wasn't enough evidence to convict me, but for the sake of peace and quiet, he ordered me turned over to the Russian authorities at Fort Ross in California. There was another delay while we waited for yet another boat headed that way. At last one showed up and that's where we were bound when the storm hit."

"What would the Russians have done to you?"

"It's hard to say. Depends on what sort of mood they would've been in when I arrived," Jakob explained. "They could have sent me back to Russia, or had me shot, or even let me go."

"Sounds like it's a good thing you don't have to take your chances with them."

"So they don't know I'm here?"

"No. The brothers here at San Tomas know nothing more about you than your first name, which I told them. And they have better things to do than gallop off to Fort Ross to report every stranger with a Russian sounding name who washes up on their beach!"

"I'm very much in your debt, Jack, and I hope I have the chance to repay you."

"Get better quickly so you can come back north with me, and that'll be thanks enough."

"Back to Fort Vancouver? That doesn't sound wise."

"No, not there. I have a new home now."

"Oh?"

"Yes. Let me tell you about it."

Over the next hour or so Jack told his friend about the Elxa, surprising Jakob with the news that they were one and the same with the fabulous heron men of Northwestern legend, a native tribe that was said to be made up of men like himself and Jakob. Not only were they real, there were even a few like minded white men attached to the group. The tribe had recently found a new home, a mountain valley hidden in the wilds of the southern Cascades.

There, it was hoped the Elxa would be protected from an expected influx of American settlers from the east. Those powers interested in seeing America's 'Manifest Destiny' spread to the Pacific coast were already funding orators and circulating pamphlets lauding the Oregon country as a land of milk and honey, or, a second Eden, created especially for the American pioneer. One such huckster, more brazen than most, went so far as to say the lucky settlers of this new land would have but to 'tickle Oregon's fertile soil with a hoe, and she would laugh a harvest'!

Jack and his friend, Basil, had helped lead the Elxa on a trek from their old adobe city hidden in a canyon on the edge of La Grande Vallee to the new land they had found. It was a secluded mountain valley of breathtaking beauty, well watered, fertile and abounding in game. The Elxa had named it the valley of the heron in honor of their premiere totem, the Heron Spirit, the leader of those supernatural forces that guided and protected the heron men.

Jakob was impressed by what his rescuer had to say, but nonetheless he noted the way Jack looked and sounded whenever he spoke Basil's name. It was obvious that the men were more than just friends. Jakob managed to put the disappointment that caused him aside for the time being and responded to Jack's story of the Elxa with an expression of wonder.

"Amazin'!," Jakob muttered, after Jack had finished. "You helped found a veritable republic for men like us!"

"Well, I wouldn't go quite that far," chuckled Jack. "The Elxa have been able to establish themselves in their new home, but it'll take some time before they're considered to be a sovereign tribe. You wouldn't have anything to worry about from the Russian or British authorities if you came to live with us there, and I'm sure my friends would be as glad as I to have you settle there."

"It certainly sounds like a heaven-sent opportunity."

"Well, you rest and think about it," Jack said, glancing at the window. "I have to go now, but I'll be back after sunset."

Jakob looked at the window as well and saw a barely perceptible brightening of the sky that heralded the dawn. He watched as Jack got up and leaned over the bed to kiss him. Jakob sat up to meet him halfway, embracing his friend warmly to let him know how happy he was to see him again.

"Ahem," came a noise from the doorway.

"Ah. Hello, Pedro," Jack smiled, breaking away from Jakob to face the friar. "I believe Jakob is feeling much better."

"Yes, I can see that."

"I'm sorry, er, father," managed Jakob. "We were only... "

"He understands," Jack whispered, adding a broad wink so that Jakob would understand as well.

"Oh... "

"Until tonight, my dear friend," smiled Jack as he left.

"I hope Jack didn't keep you up all night," Pedro began, extinguishing the candle.

Knowing the friar had the same nature as he and Jack, Jakob studied him. The simple, dark robelike garment he wore could not hide his masculine charms. In fact, it clung to Pedro's form in all the right places, giving Jakob a good idea of the broadly muscular body underneath. Pedro had a dark, trimmed beard and his hair was tonsured in monkly fashion. His bare feet and the backs of his hands were quite hairy, hinting at the thick pelt that probably covered the rest of him. Pedro went on.

"You were very weak, almost dead, when he brought you here to us, Jakob. You need rest, and lots of it."

"I really feel much better," Jakob responded.

"Well, perhaps you might like to take breakfast with the other brothers this morning," smiled Pedro, his brown eyes meeting Jakob's easily.

"I'd like that. When?"

"We usually eat about an hour after sunrise. But the sun isn't up yet. Rest and I'll come for you when it is time."

"Good," Jakob said, settling back into the bed. "Maybe I'll see my friend Jack there."

"I don't think so," the friar frowned.

"Why?"

"Your friend Jack has, er, odd habits," he said, looking thoughtful. "We never see him by day."

"That's rather odd," puzzled the Russian. "Do you know what business he has around here?"

"No. Perhaps Jack will tell you more when he returns this evening," the friar said, moving towards the door.

"Wait. How long have I been here?"

"Three days. Jack has sat with you every night since he brought you here, waiting for you to wake up. You and he must be... very close."

"We were," sighed Jakob as he laid his head back into the pillow, "and I hope we will be again."

"From what I have observed, your prayers will surely be fulfilled," Pedro assured the Russian before he left.

After a simple but filling breakfast that Jakob thoroughly enjoyed after his involuntary fast, Pedro steered Jakob to a room especially built so the men of the mission could keep themselves clean. A wooden vat, big enough to hold four men, rested on a brick floor, with an ingenious system of pipes and roof cisterns that delivered sun-warmed water for baths. Jakob readily stripped and got in the tub while Pedro opened the spigots and then sought out the soap while the warm water sluiced deliciously over the Russian's furry body. When the vat was half full, the friar cut the flow off.

"I suppose I ought to confess to you." Pedro began as he rubbed the pale brick of soap into a cloth, saturating it with suds. "While you were unconscious, I had the pleasure of bathing you with damp rags, exploring every part of your body. You are a very handsome and well endowed man, Jakob."

"You're a handsome man too, Pedro," Jakob sighed as he relaxed, letting the friar begin to clean him. As the soapy cloth scrubbed and slid across his body, Jakob murmured, "I wish I'd been awake to enjoy what you did before, if it felt as good as this does."

Pedro smiled as he carefully washed Jakob's face, keeping the suds out of the man's eyes. Then he rubbed soap into the Russian's great crimson beard and sank his fingers into it, rubbing gently. The friar sighed as he worked and spoke.

"Your hair is so beautiful... so long, and such a lovely color, like some autumn leaves."

"May I ask you a personal question, Pedro?"

"Certainly."

"Is it hard for you livin' in a place like this?"

"How do you mean?"

"Well, constantly surrounded by men whom you cannot touch, who don't share your nature."

Pedro chuckled softly and Jakob looked at him wonderingly.

"Can you keep a secret, Jakob?"

"Sure."

"Our abbot Esteban shares our tastes for manflesh," Pedro confided. "When he first came to San Tomas, he brought a few others like himself and thereafter only accepted new monks who thought the same way. When he was much younger, he'd been initiated into a secret society within the church, centuries old, called the Order of the Holy Rod. I'm sure you can guess which sort of 'rod' we adore when our brotherhood gathers together to celebrate the rites!" he grinned.

"Wow. You sound like the heron men... "

"We've heard those myths, of a tribe of man-loving natives," Jakob confirmed. "Our abbot was intrigued by it and has been gathering and writing down the legends... "

"It's not a legend," Jakob said, surprising Pedro.

"No?!"

"Jack is one of them, a heron man. He's invited me to come with him to their lands, a lost valley somewhere in the southern Cascades, and become a member of their tribe."

"Huh! Well, in that case, I suppose I shouldn't bother trying to convince you to stay here and join us, then."

"But I'm not a Catholic."

"That's alright," winked Pedro. "We don't discriminate here! If anyone asks, you can say you are a layman, a non-religious, living among us to enjoy our pious ways."

Jakob smiled as he spoke up.

"I'm not anything, come to think of it. I was raised in the Russian Orthodox faith, of course, but it's been years since I darkened the doors of any church. I have to admit though, if Jack wasn't offerin' me what he has, I might have taken you up on your offer. I don't have anywhere to call home, and this place seems very nice."

"Perhaps, before you leave, you might like to attend one of our meetings?"

Jakob tried to imagine what 'rites' the brothers of the Holy Rod conducted. The randy thoughts ignited his libido, and Pedro smiled when he saw the physical results. Reaching down in the warm water, he stroked Jakob's growing cock gently.

"May I take care of this for you, my friend?"

Jakob lifted himself so he could sit on the edge of the tub. Pedro shucked his simple garment, revealing a pelt of body hair that suggested he was half-animal as he climbed into the big tub and unhesitatingly swallowed Jakob's half-hard cock. It did not stay half-hard for long. Pedro knew exactly what to do to please a man and soon the Russian was gasping in sheer delight as he fired gouts of his hot seed shot down the friar's hungry throat.

"I've wanted to do that since I first laid eyes on you, Jakob," Pedro confessed afterwards, resting his head on one red furred thigh. "I find you so handsome... "

"I like you too, Pedro! Lemme return the favor... "

The friar was going to protest that Jakob might still be too weak for such exercises, but before he could get the words out, Jakob urged him to stand up before kneeling in the water and taking Pedro as the friar had him. Pedro gripped the sides of the vat and gave in to the insistent suctioning, until it pulled him off the cliff. Jakob swallowed the friar's joyjuice and released the man only when he was soft and spent.

"How was that?" he grinned.

"No devotee of the Holy Rod could have done as well!" Pedro affirmed, stroking Jakob's hair and beard lovingly. "You'll be very welcome at our next meeting!"

Jakob urged Pedro to sit down and began to wash the friar. The sounds of voices made them look to the door as two more monks entered. Each pair stared at the other for a few moments until Pedro broke the silence.

"Ah, Amadeo, Virgilio," he smiled. "Do you wish to join us?"

Jakob invited them also with a grin and a nod. The pair agreed and fell to stripping. Jakob sighed, almost sorry he had already agreed to go with Jack to the valley of the heron. He found himself hoping he would be staying at San Tomas long enough to have a chance to partake of the 'sacred rites' of the Order of the Holy Rod.

That evening Jakob was pulling on his boots and frowning at the damage the salt water had done to the leather when a light tapping sounded at his door. He looked up to see Jack standing there and smiled a welcome at his friend. Jakob made a brief gesture at a small bundle on the bed.

"Not much in the way of worldly possessions, eh?" Jakob asked. "Though on second thought I suppose I'm lucky to have anything at all, even my life."

"Are you planning on going somewhere?"

"Yes, for a walk with you. I wanna stretch my legs."

"Alright," Jack began as they left the room.

The men made their way outside. They passed the mission's gardens, where the air was scented by the herbs and the few rose bushes that shared the space, and by silent agreement, towards the massive gates. Soon they left the walled compound.

The land around the Spanish mission was gently rolling scrubland, except for some cultivated fields that showed themselves as darker areas under the moon's uncertain light. Beyond those fields, the soil turned sandy as the land fell towards the sea. They could dimly hear the pounding of the surf somewhere ahead as Jakob spoke.

"Jack, I'm glad you happened to be here when I needed help, but I'm not the only one wonderin' about you, why you're here, where you go durin' the day, things like that."

Jack looked at his friend and frowned in thought.

"If you don't wanna talk about it, it's okay. I suppose it's none of my business anyway."

"No, I can tell you. I was here at the request of a friend. She's looking for someone who we know had been here before, someone she knew a very long time ago... "

Jack was silenced as they stopped at the top of a slight rise. A wide beach lay before them, bathed in moonlight. A chilly wind blew stiffly off the ocean, tossing their hair and stinging their eyes with its salt, so they turned and went back a little ways, to a rogue boulder that stood beside the path. Sitting close together on the leeward side of the broad rock, Jack sighed, looking troubled.

"Jakob, I could try and explain myself to you, but in order to fully understand, I'd have to tell you another story, one I'm sure you'd find incredible, hard to believe and perhaps frightening."

"Like I said, I don't need to know."

"Alright then," Jack said, pulling Jakob closer.

Jakob nuzzled his friend's ear and whispered a randy suggestion.

"You sure you feel up to... oh... " Jack said as Jakob took his friend's hand and placed it on the strained crotch of his pants. "Well, I guess this can't wait... "

Jakob kissed Jack then, urgently, and the men gave themselves up to a deliberate, open-eyed, mutual passion.

"Oh, my... "

"Are you alright Jakob?"

"I'm better than alright Jack," he sighed. "After you left Fort Vancouver, there were times I thought I'd never feel fulfilled again, the way you used to... the way you do make me feel."

"I love you too, Jakob," he smiled.

"And Basil?" asked Jakob.

Jack rose up on one elbow and looked down at his friend with gentle eyes.

"Why, him too. He doesn't own me, or I him. He won't be mad at me for loving you, Jakob."

"These heron men keep sounding better and better."

"So, you wanna come meet them?"

"Of course. The brothers of San Tomas are wonderful, but I wanna be where you are. Besides, how could I pass up the opportunity of livin' someplace where men like me can have respect and companionship instead of contempt and rejection? And I can hardly wait for my tribal initiation!"

"Ha!" snorted Jack. "Now that's the Jakob I remember. Never too tired to stop thinking about sex!"

"When did you wanna leave?"

"Why," Jack began, looking intently at his friend, "there's no rush. I want you to be fully rested and recovered before we leave here. It's not an easy trek. We'll be going through some lonesome wilderness... "

"It won't be lonesome to me as long as you're around," Jakob said in all sincerity.

"Well," smiled Jack, "as soon as you feel up to it, we'll leave." Jack's smile faded as he looked at Jakob again.

"What's the matter?"

"I was thinking of the journey we'd be making. We would have to travel only at night."

"Why?"

"That's something my story would explain."

"Well, tell it to me then."

"Let's go back to your room first," Jack said, reaching for his clothing. "This tale will probably take the rest of the night to tell."

With Jakob reclining on his bed, Jack sat in the chair and began to tell him everything that had happened to him after the last time they had seen one another, how he left Fort Vancouver and wandered aimlessly, more or less towards the Blue Mountains. He had met Basil there, somewhere in the vast uplands, and learned his incredible secret. Jakob's eyes went wide with surprise when he heard it.

"He was a what?!"

"A vampire. You've probably never heard of... "

"Of course I have! My grandfather told me stories of witches and werewolves and vampires all the time while I was growin' up. And he believed in them."

"And you?"

"Jack," Jakob muttered, shaking his head, "really now... "

"When you lived in Fort Vancouver, didn't you hear the stories the natives told about the demon known as 'Hunts-by-night'?"

"Yes, but, those were just legends... "

"No, they weren't. My friend Basil is the one known as Hunts-by-night. He's lived with the Elxa for over two hundred years, protecting them from their enemies."

Jack forged on, even though he knew Jakob was listening with a quite a bit of skepticism. He told his friend about Basil's story of his life, and their journey to the Rendezvous. When he got to the battle with the rogue Atsina band, Jakob spoke up.

"I heard about that."

"You did? How?"

"While I was in Hawaii, an American ship put in with newspapers and magazines. One of them had an article by a man whose last name was Irving. I can't recollect his first name. Anyway, he wrote quite a colorful account of the battle. You'll have to tell me your version of it."

"Well, I didn't see all of it. Just the part up to when I was shot."

"Shot!?" exclaimed Jakob. "I don't remember seein' any scars on you! What happened?"

"I died."

"Very funny, Jack... "

Jakob did not see what happened next, only the result. One moment Jack was sitting in the chair. The next instant he was standing beside Jakob, on the opposite side of the bed, looking down at his friend with an expression of mild amusement.

"Ah!!" Jakob started. "How'd you do that?"

"The same way you might. I got up from the chair there and walked over to here. I just did it too fast for your eyes to follow."

"But how?"

"I was shot and I was dying. Another vampire, a friend of Basil's, gave me a new life, by making me a vampire, like they were."

Jakob muttered something in Russian and crossed himself. Jack frowned at what he saw in his friend's mind and stood his ground. Jakob repeated his actions and Jack shook his head.

"I'm not some demonic entity you can banish with a prayer and a pious gesture, Jakob."

Jakob just stared at Jack, as the realization of what his friend really was sank in.

"If you want me to leave, say so and I'll leave you."

Jakob continued to stare dumbly, his thoughts in a turmoil, so Jack turned and started for the door.

"Well you're showing a lot of ingratitude, if I must say so."

"Wait," Jakob managed, causing Jack to come back. "What do you want from me?"

"I want you to get well and come with me to live with the heron men and be happy," Jack said. "Because I love you."

"But you're not... "

"Alive anymore? Or human? That didn't seem to matter to you when we made love."

"I didn't know that then! Dammit, Jack! What do you expect when you spring something incredible like that on people?"

"He's right, you know."

Both men started when they heard the new voice. Someone, a man dressed in a suit of crimson-dyed buckskin was suddenly sitting in the chair Jack had vacated. Jakob blinked and rubbed his eyes, for he could scarcely believe them.

"Who... " he began.

"Basil!" exclaimed Jack. "I didn't expect to see you here!"

"And I didn't expect to find you babbling all our secrets to every man who tickles your fancy!"

"I'll never tell anyone what Jack told me," Jakob vowed as he stared at the blonde stranger, the legendary Hunts-by-night, of whom Jakob had heard. "Besides, who would believe me if I did?"

"Well, you're right there. And I can tell you're a man of your word." Basil looked at Jakob a little longer before turning his strangely glittering blue eyes to Jack. "You haven't told him about Fleur."

"Who?" asked Jakob.

"I hadn't got to that part of the story yet." Jack looked at his friend. He explained who Fleur was and that during the journey to Rendezvous, they had made love several times.

"Did you like it?" asked Jakob.

"It was... different. Good, but different. I still prefer to be with men though."

"Why did you want me to know about this?"

"Because I got Fleur pregnant. She had twin boys, my sons, whom I named Basil and Jakob, in honor of the men I love most in the world. But because of what I became later, I can't be a husband or a father. Do you understand?"

"Are you askin' me to take care of them?"

"Well, I know you like both men and women. And Fleur needs a man who can give her physical love."

"And your sons need a father," Jakob added. "Of course I'll do it. I'll love and protect your boys as if they were my own. I'll support them as best I can."

"There's a new town to the west of the valley of the heron, called False Pass, that was recently begun by some of the white Elxa who want to live in the ways they're accustomed to," began Basil. "They could probably use a blacksmith."

"That sounds great, but I'll need to buy tools. I survived the shipwreck with only the clothes on my back."

"You have more than that, my new friend," Basil smiled. "The Elxa will welcome you into their tribe, a circle of loving brothers. We will see you get what you need."

"Thank you."

"You're quite welcome, Jakob." Basil looked out the window. "I suppose I could fly you both back to the valley of the heron tonight, if you wish." Basil's eyes came back to Jakob as he caught the Russian's thoughts. "I know about the brothers here. I brought this for their Abbot."

Basil pulled a scroll of deerskin out of the pocket of his coat to show his companions.

"It's a message from Ikukua, the chief shaman of the Elxa. His spirit helpers have told him about the Order of the Holy Rod. I am sure Esteban and his monks have been invited to visit the valley of the heron."

"I'm glad," Jakob answered, thinking longingly of Pedro and feeling a desire to make love to the hairy monk again. Then he remembered his thoughts were an open book to the two vampires and blushed.

"It's alright," murmured Basil. "We don't mean to eavesdrop on others' thoughts, but your desire is wonderful to feel. I hope you will feel that way about me, in time." As Jakob began to imagine making love to Basil, he stood up.

"Gather your belongings. We'll go as soon as I deliver this and have a few words with the Abbot."

Jack followed Basil out the door.

"I'm sorry about telling Jakob what I did. I thought it would be okay."

"It is," Basil said, hugging Jack. "But let me tell you something I've learned from long experience. I know you just wanted to set the record straight with your friend. But in the end, it doesn't matter what he or any other mortal thinks of us. From now on, try not to worry yourself about what kind of stories mortals make up about beings like us. They love their myths. And they will never, ever, thank you for telling them the truth. Even when the truth transforms lives in a way so positive that even the most dull-witted can see the good in it, no one will welcome or be grateful for truth. Trust me on this Jack, I've been around long enough to witness virtually every possible permutation of human behavior and I know what I'm talking about."

Two hours or so later, Jakob felt Basil slow his flight. Jakob was completely enveloped in a blanket to protect him against the cold wind that buffeted them as they flew. He was sandwiched between Jack and Basil, being held tightly.

He felt a sensation that told him they were falling, but in a controlled way. Suddenly, Basil touched down. Jack removed the blanket that covered Jakob. The Russian looked around.

They were standing at the edge of a forest. A large clearing stood open before the men. Jakob could see a scattering of conical native lodges, wickyups, and lean-tos set up not too far from a pool nestled in the bend of a stream. A few native men were swimming there, their naked bodies silvered by moonlight.

"Isn't it a little cold for swimmin'?" asked Jakob.

"I thought you Russians loved the cold," chuckled Jack.

"There's a big hot spring over there," Basil pointed, indicating a spot beyond the pool Jakob could not see. "The overflow keeps the pond warm year around."

"That's convenient!"

"The valley of the heron is full of hot springs," added Jack as they started to walk towards the camp, which Basil had told Jakob was called Roman Rock, in his honor. As they approached an intricately decorated lodge, the one set aside for Basil's use, a young metiff woman came out and greeted Basil and Jack in a flurry of Quebecois.

Jakob liked her almost at once. The four went inside, where he found a place to put down his small pack of belongings. One of them was a gift from Jack that Jakob could not wait to try out, a fine Hawkins rifle. He looked forward to hunting with it, and bringing back meat and hides to support the lodge.

Fleur showed him her sons. Marcus, the child of her first husband, a trader who was killed by Indians, was a little over one year old and crawled around the teepee enthusiastically. His brothers, the twins Basil and Jakob fathered by Jack before he became a vampire, were sleeping peacefully, bound to their cradleboards.

As Jack watched Jakob cuddle and play with Marcus, he knew he had done the right thing to bring Jakob there. Basil agreed silently and suggested they go to let him and Fleur get better acquainted. Promising to look in on them tomorrow evening, the pair left.

Jakob managed to divert and tire Marcus out while Fleur saw to a few tasks she had gotten behind on. Caring for three infants was a time consuming task for a lone woman. Luckily, the other heron men shared the spoils of their hunts with her, and Jakob promised to keep her and her children fed as well, gesturing at his rifle.

When Marcus finally fell asleep, Fleur tucked him away with his brothers and returned to sit with Jakob beside the fire in the central hearth. Though it was late, they talked quietly for a time. Talk led to touches, and Fleur eventually gestured to the nest of plush furs she slept in and invited Jakob to share them.

Jakob felt the different, soft warmth of a woman's body yield itself to him, so unlike his male friends, whose hard and hairy bodies would meet his with equal force, almost as if they were duelling. He enjoyed that, but he enjoyed this too, the feeling of being the sole, dominate force, taking what was freely given and making it his own. Before they were done, Jakob knew Fleur was enjoying it too, making him proud of his manhood.

Early next morning Jakob emerged from the lodge. The new sunlight struck coppery sparks from the abundance of body hair he sported. He was wearing only the old, cotton sailors' trousers he had been given before the shipwreck. He frowned at the way the garment was becoming worn and determined to go hunting soon, so Fleur could make him a pair of buckskin pants.

But first, he needed to wash. Going to the edge of the pool, he tested the water with his toes. It was as warm as he had been told. Leaving his pants on the grassy bank, he waded in and swam a bit, finding some parts of pool quite deep. He floated on his back, and relaxed until he heard splashing noises.

Looking, he saw a naked native wading in. Jakob caught a glimpse of his heavily hanging genitals before the water rose to hide them. He licked his lips involuntarily and the newcomer swam easily up to him.

"Good morning," he smiled. "I am Many Stars."

"I'm Jakob."

"Ah! You are the friend of Takonxa! He told us he was hoping you would help Fleur look after her children, because you are a lover of both men and women, is that so?"

"Yes. I think Fleur and I will get along fine. And Jack told me the heron men would make me welcome."

"Oh, yes, handsome one," Many Stars murmured, reaching out to caress Jakob's crimson beard.

Many eyes will be drawn to you...

Many sighs will be uttered because of you...

Many tongues will be moved to sing of you...

Already Many Stars has been drawn, and sighed and sang...

"What was that?"

"It is our way to sing when our hearts are moved, Jakob."

Jakob did not know what to say, and Many Stars went on.

"Have you washed?"

"I've just been swimmin'."

"There is soap and some rags over there," Many Stars pointed.

Jakob looked to see a small waterfall, steaming slightly, at the point where the overflow from the hot spring fell into the pool. The men moved towards it by silent agreement. Taking turns, they washed each other, leaving no parts of their bodies unexplored. The cascade of warm water sluiced over them deliciously, washing away the suds.

Many Stars led Jakob to the far side of the pool and spread out a blanket. The men lay upon it and soon were grappling, seeking the pleasure one man can give another man, achieving it, and resting easily together afterwards. They talked, and Jakob asked where the best hunting was in the area.

His new friend insisted on showing him and the pair spent the rest of that day together, following faint trails and the marks of deersign. In the late afternoon, Jakob brought down a huge elk and even after gutting it, the two men were scarcely able to carry the beast back to Roman Rock.

The other heron men in the camp gladly helped relieve the pair of their welcome burden and began to prepare a feast. Jakob presented the skin and the best cuts to Fleur, who was impressed by Jakob's hunting skill. She cooked a meal for him and Many Stars, with whom Jakob shared the credit for the kill, and as the men ate, Fleur began to clean the skin, already planning to work it into a suit for Jakob.

Many Stars showed Jakob a traditional blessing that fathers gave their children in the tribe he had been born into. Taking tiny bits of elk fat, Jakob put them in the mouths of the boys he would be a father to from then on. As he did so, he bid them to grow as big and strong as the elk who had died to feed them.

The men ate only enough to take the edge off their hunger. They did not want to eat more, since they planned on attending the feast later. Jakob spoke of Basil's suggestion about setting up a forge in False Pass and plying his trade there as a blacksmith. Many Stars nodded, saying the men there could use a blacksmith, but the heron men who had settled in Roman Rock had agreed to live more simply, and had no great need for Jakob's skills.

Time passed and after three months, Jakob had his forge. The men of False Pass helped him build it and a home for his family. Basil provided his tools, buying them with ancient pieces of eight he had hoarded over the centuries, most of them acquired during uprisings against the Spanish, when such 'losses' would be expected. His telepathy and power of flight made it possible for him to know where the things Jakob needed could be found and get them quickly. Jack showed off his great strength by setting Jakob's huge anvil in the spot the blacksmith wanted, moving the mass of solid iron as if it weighed only a few pounds.

The same day Jakob opened his forge for business, he discovered Fleur was pregnant again by him. In due time another healthy, red haired son was born, whom he named Jack in honor of his friend. By that time however, Jack had left the valley of the heron with Basil to go and search for Marcus, Basil's first lover, another vampire whom Basil had sought for centuries. Somehow Basil had learned Marcus was last seen in China, a country Basil had never visited.

Jakob watched False Pass and his sons grow. Though he and Fleur continued to make love, they had no more children. When the boys were big enough, he let them help him in the forge, pumping the bellows and fetching tools. He taught them all he knew about metal, the ways it could be heated and forged and shaped. And when he realized they were all growing into men who loved men, he guided them into that knowledge as well.

He told them how they could please each other, words that were not wasted on the boys, who all slept together in a loft and put their father's advice to the test, experimenting on each other as often as they could. And as they got older and bolder, they began asking their father for sex as well. Jakob gave them what they asked for, gently showing them what mansex was all about, and it bonded them even closer than before. When Fleur passed away, his sons began taking turns sleeping with him, cuddling warmly with the man whom they loved and owed so much.

"I let them gradually take over the heavy jobs at the forge. But I still can't resist goin' out and doin' some little jobs, especially the fancy stuff," Jakob said, breaking the spell of storytelling he had cast over Cy. He reached into an inside pocket of his coat. "That reminds me. I have something for you."

Jakob set the object on the desk. Cy's eyes widened in surprise. Thin rods formed a long, open prism shape. Nails bent into fancy shapes were welded along its length and spelled out 'Dr. Cyrus Orwins'.

"I thought you'd like that for your desk."

"Jakob!" Cy exclaimed, picking it up and scrutinizing it. "It's beautiful! Thank you!"

"I can think of some other ways you could thank me," he winked.

"I'm sure you could," chuckled Cy. Then he became serious. "But if you want to keep on playing around with me and the other heron men, in the flesh, that is, and not in medicine dreams, then you'd better be thinking of moving to the spirit realm, soon. Otherwise," the doctor began, pointing emphatically to the book he had been reading, "the experts say your condition will only get worse."

"If I asked the tribe to hold a Heart Call, just for me, would that heal me?"

"I thought of that." Cy opened a drawer of his desk and took something out. Jakob saw a roll of deerskin. "I wrote Falling Star and asked that question. Read his answer for yourself."

Jakob took the skin and looked at it.

"'My brother,'" Jakob read, "'I have consulted with the spirits who guide our tribe, as well as Ayuta and other elders of the green men. They and I believe the Heart Call would not help in this case, because Jakob's problems are part of the natural decline of old age. And if the Heart Call could rejuvenate him, what then? Shall we call on the power when he ages again? Shall we do so for every member of the tribe who would want what amounts to earthly immortality? This cannot be done without troubling the hearts of many, to whom it would seem an abuse of the power we have been granted. Urge Jakob to join our elders in the spirit realm where he can continue to live in the flesh, if that is what he wishes. I will speak with him if you think it will help.'" Jakob paused and looked at the Elxa shaman's signature, a tribal mark he knew well. He looked up at Cy.

"Looks like I don't have much choice in the matter."

Cy nodded as Jakob handed back the scroll.

"Will you do something for me, Doc?"

"Sure. What?"

"Will you explain what's wrong with me to my sons? And why I have to leave them?" Jakob's voice faltered and he dabbed at his eyes with a bandanna. "I... I'm not sure I could do it." Cy got up and came around the desk to hug Jakob.

"Yes, I will. And you're not losing them, Jakob. They can visit you in the spirit realm, you know that. And after a few years there, you ought to be well enough to come back here for short visits."

"You think so?" Jakob asked, standing up so he could return Cy's hug fully.

"If what I've heard is true, yes. You know as well as anyone the wonders the Elxa have discovered lately. Let's go talk to your sons."

"Right now?" Jakob whispered. Cy felt the man rubbing a familiar heated hardness in his pants against the doctor's thigh.

"I guess it can wait a couple of hours," replied Cy with a kiss before he began to lead Jakob up to his rooms above the office, already looking forward to a slow, gentle bout of mansex with the remarkable blacksmith.

2 - THE DAUGHTER OF HEAVEN

"Hello, Hun Tzu."

Hun Tzu had been sitting in the camp he had made in the spirit realm, quietly watching the sunset. He had been aware of someone approaching him from behind, but had paid little heed. There were no threats to anyone's safety in the spirit realm.

He turned and saw his heron brother, Jack Ramsey. He was one of Hun Tzu's brothers who now made his home in the spirit realm. For on earth, he was a vampire, a creature of the night who had to have human blood to survive, but in the spirit realm, he was merely human once more, and glad to be so.

Another man was with Jack, a stranger to Hun Tzu. Though he knew the man had also been a vampire, and had some connection to Jack through their mutual friend, the legendary Hunts-by-night, Hun Tzu did not know his name. He smiled at his heron brother.

"Hello, Jack."

"Hun Tzu, I'd like you to meet Marcus."

"Hello," the brown haired and bearded man said, embracing Hun Tzu when he rose.

"I am glad to meet you."

"I wanted you to meet, because I learned Marcus knows something about your family, the Ch'a clan."

"You do?" Hun Tzu asked in mild surprise, facing Marcus.

"I was telling Jack about my travels while I lived on Earth and found out I knew an ancestor of yours, a great mystic named Ch'a I Fei."

"I remember my foster father, Ch'a Wei Fei, telling me stories about him. I Fei was supposed to have been a high official at the Imperial court. But Wei Fei never mentioned that I Fei knew a vampire."

"Perhaps the tale was lost," Marcus frowned a little. "I am certain he wrote an account of our adventure."

"Maybe you could tell it to me," suggested Hun Tzu.

"I'd be glad to."

The three sat down. As the sun disappeared and twilight deepened, Marcus turned to Jack.

"You said you had encountered some of Hun Tzu's kin as well, when you and Basil went to China."

"Oh! That's right." Jack looked at Hun Tzu. "I've been meaning to tell you about it. There's not much, but maybe you'll find it interesting."

"Go ahead," invited Hun Tzu. Jack began to speak, conjuring an image that was familiar to Hun Tzu, describing the city and the home he had grown to adulthood in, but many years earlier, in the mid 1830's.

Jack stood in the open gate of the Ch'a compound, watching with interest the throng of evening passersby and scanning their minds randomly, learning more about Foochow. He was robed from head to foot in the all-concealing garb of a nomad trader from central Asia. It had proven to be a useful costume to mask his Western identity from the mostly xenophobic Chinese, allowing him to move more freely among the natives and learn about them.

Foochow was a revelation to Jack, after passing his whole life in the sparsely populated Oregon territory. It seemed to him that all the fabled 'teeming millions' of China were to be found in this one seaport, the capital of the coastal province of Fukien. But Jack already knew that there were other cities in that land, dozens of them, all just as packed with humanity as Foochow was. And the Ch'a compound itself stood in one of the 'sleepy' outer suburbs, nowhere near the bustling heart of the city!

Another thing he learned from scanning the minds of the people of Foochow was the surprising prevalence of men like himself in that part of China. So ingrained was the 'nanfeng', the 'male practice' as homosexuality was called in that time and place, that there was a form of officially recognized same-sex marriage to legitimize male couples who chose to bond in that way. It was so very different from what Jack had come to expect from the 'civilized' people he had known, the British, the Americans, and the Spanish.

From what he had observed in his short life, there were as many men who preferred men among the rulers of America as there were among the Chinese of Fukien Province. But the Chinese were nowhere near as hypocritical when it came to dealing with the man-lovers. Here there were novels and plays celebrating nanfeng, and open acceptance of the men who followed its ways. Indeed, Jack understood there was a body of literature concerning man-loving men that spanned Chinese history, from the shadowy time of the Shang, over five millennia ago, to the present Manchu dynasty.

"Honorable sir?"

Jack looked. He saw a servant of the Ch'a household at his elbow. The handsome young man was resplendent in his lavender silk livery, embroidered with the Ch'a crest in silver thread.

"Yes, Wu?"

"My master requests your presence."

Jack nodded. Though Wu had spoken in Chinese, Jack understood the servant perfectly. Thanks to his telepathic abilities, he had already mastered the language.

Jack reentered the compound, crossing an unusual pavement as he did so. It was made up of slabs of malachite, the variegated stone oddly veined and mottled with random streaks and circles of various shades of green, from a light, creamy celery color to a green so dark it could be mistaken for black. Jack turned his steps towards a small, but ornate structure built near the courtyard's center, topped with the curiously curved roof style that usually adorned Chinese temples. The building bore an impressive title: 'The Pavilion of Gathered Refinements'.

Trellises attached to its outer walls were overgrown with vines bearing sweet scented, night-blooming moonflowers. Huge moths with white wings flitted lazily from blossom to blossom, fanning their musky fragrance, dispersing it through the night air. While they fed, their wings meshed with the blanched petals and for a moment a new creation seemed to hang trembling on the dark vine, then was gone.

Jack knew Basil was waiting for him in the flower bedecked pavilion with their host, the geomancer, Ch'a Fei Gai. The events since they had arrived in Foochow, two days ago, ran through his mind again. The vampires had only been in the city a couple of hours, when Fei Gai had appeared and approached fearlessly, addressing the pair politely in English, saying he had been waiting for them!

For anyone other than a vampire endowed with the ability to read minds, this would never have been believed. But they knew at once that the old man could not only be trusted, but that he understood what manner of beings they were. And he shared their man-loving nature as well. Intrigued, Basil and Jack accepted his offer of hospitality.

They followed him back to his compound, a sort of walled enclosure that reminded Basil of the Byzantine palaces he had grown up in. A common feature of Chinese cities, these compounds consisted of a number of buildings linked together in a rough square, all facing an inner courtyard, rendering the whole secure and private. Fei Gai's household servants lived in most of these buildings. His only family was his nephew, Ch'a Wei Fei, who was his apprentice in the art of geomancy. He would also one day become Hun Tzu's adoptive father.

This ancient Chinese art had allowed Fei Gai to know the vampires were coming and predict when and where they would arrive. In the days that followed their initial meeting, the elder had spent the greater part of his nights with Basil, helping him plan his search for Marcus. Fei Gai had trustworthy contacts in almost every part of China, who could provide the pair secure shelter during the days.

Jack entered the fragrant pavilion where Fei Gai kept his extensive library. Many niches of polished ebony held rows of documents, some in scroll form and others bound like western books. Basil smiled warmly at his lover and companion in greeting as he joined them at a low, black-lacquered table, cunningly inlaid with ivory, jade, nacre and gold leaf.

"Fei Gai and I have completed our traveling arrangements," Basil began. "After I take one more look through Foochow for any leads I might have missed, we will go south, along the coast."

Jack agreed, and that was the beginning of their almost forty year journey, which was greatly aided by Fei Gai's network of contacts. Unfortunately, it proved a fruitless search and though Basil did not give up hope, Jack at last decided to return to Oregon. As he could not fly like Basil, he had trekked up the eastern shores of Asia, swam the narrow Bering Strait, and then followed the west coast of North America down to his native country.

"So, you knew my father when he was a young man," Hun Tzu smiled as Jack's story ended.

"Yes. We never went back to Foochow though, which was a shame. We might have met you there if we had."

"We know each other now." Hun Tzu reached to take Jack's hand and squeeze it gently. Then he turned to Marcus. "And what do you have to tell me, my new friend?"

Marcus smiled and began his tale. His voice was pleasant and drew his listeners into another place, another time, almost a thousand years in the past. Like some penny novel, Marcus' story began in a trackless desert, on a dark, moonless night, long, long ago...

In the year 890 of the Christian era, it was not unusual to find many caravans wending their way between Persia and China, following the ancient and fabled Silk Road. One caravan in particular was far inside China by that time and soon would come to the eastern terminus of the Silk Road, the great trading city of Sian, but for that particular night, it had halted at an oasis somewhere in the sandy, empty vastness of the Gobi Desert. The master of this mobile marketplace, an Arab by the name of Masouf ibn Ali, was a man constantly busied by his many responsibilities.

Just then Masouf was making the evening rounds of his camp, checking to make sure the guards were alert and stationed correctly. He was paying an emir's ransom, it seemed to him, for his caravan's protection and he was determined to make sure he was getting his money's worth. At last, feeling somewhat reassured about his security, he returned to his tent.

Masouf entered his darkened pavilion and muttered a curse on his lazy slaves. They ought to have lit at least one light by now! Lighting a straw from a brazier of coals, he touched the flame to the spout of a brass oil lamp.

As the light grew, Masouf realized he was not alone in his tent. A man, brown haired and bearded, sat cross legged on the carpet beside a low table cluttered with scrolls and papers. Masouf muttered a curse, naming the Mohammedan Satan.

"Iblis!"

"No, Masouf, not the devil," came a response in fluent Arabic. "Though there are some who say I'm even worse than him."

"Marcus." the Arab breathed, recognizing the voice of his strange fellow traveler, who had shadowed his caravan from its start in Baghdad.

Marcus had lived there in Baghdad, the brilliant and cosmopolitan center of the Arab world, for the past few years. At that time, it was the only city on Earth that boasted streetlights, and that was only one example of its many advances. Marcus had made the acquaintance of a relative of Masouf's, a refined and scholarly savant who held the position of chief librarian at the court of the Caliph.

Marcus shared his substantial knowledge of Greek philosophy and Roman history with his host, who welcomed this addition to his archives with all the joy a seeker after knowledge could feel. In return, Marcus had been allowed free access to the vast library that served the Islamic government, familiarizing himself with virtually all the poetry and prose of the vigorous and expanding Islamic civilization that was preserved there. Then, through the intercession of that relative, Marcus had arranged to attach himself to Masouf's caravan, moved by curiosity to see the lands of central Asia and the Far East.

Many nights in the course of their journey, Marcus had entertained Masouf with tales of the extravagance of the Caliph's court. Of how he had seen the Commander of the Faithful, al-Mu'tamid himself, relaxing in a pool filled with mercury and strewn with pillows, upon which he floated as if in a bath of liquid silver and listened to musicians and poets performing by moonlight. Or of the grand banquets with their profusion of gold and silver tableware and vessels, studded with gems or engraved in cunning arabesques or verses from the holy Ko'ran in decorative script. These priceless treasures would be displayed upon enormous tables which groaned beneath the weight of viands from all parts of the known world that cost nearly as much as the containers that held the food.

By now, Masouf was used to the way the odd Byzantine vanished at sunrise and reappeared in the evenings. He was also used to the way Marcus brought goods to him for sale and he eyed the large sack that lay beside the man speculatively. Noticing his gaze, Marcus invited him to sit and inspect its contents.

Within the bag, Masouf found a number of weapons: daggers, knives and gracefully curved eastern swords, all with their sheaves and belts. There were also a couple of shirts of chain mail. He told Marcus they would fetch a good price in Sian's marketplace.

"Where do you keep acquiring such fine merchandise?"

"Would you believe me if I told you I tracked down and killed the robbers who lay in wait for you, all along your route?"

"By Allah, I would! But then, you ought to have more than a few weapons to show for your trouble."

"I do," Marcus said, placing a small pouch of soft leather on the table.

Masouf's eyes narrowed. He opened the bag and spilled its contents onto the table. Small bits of color glittered in the light of the lamp like frozen fire.

"There is no God but Allah, and Mohammed is His prophet!" Masouf breathed in pious awe, fingering the precious jewels. He selected a ruby the size of an almond and studied it in the firelight. Though cold and clear, it flashed the color of hot, fresh blood. "This one by itself would ransom a sultan!" he enthused. The caravan master then managed to curb his aroused excitement long enough to make a more practical suggestion. "If you should need my help selling them when we each Sian, I know many dealers in gemstones there."

"I will consider your kind offer," Marcus nodded.

"Of course, I would expect a nominal fee for my services," the Arab added as he watched, glassy eyed, while Marcus rebagged the fabulous fortune in jewels, a sight that seemed to him one straight out of the pages of the Thousand and One Nights.

"Of course," repeated Marcus genially. He paused to select an emerald the size of a man's thumbnail and pushed it across the table to Masouf. "Please take this as a token of my thanks for allowing me to accompany your caravan."

Masouf pulled at his beard in distraction before picking up the gem. "I will thank my noble kinsman a hundredfold for suggesting my humble hospitality to you!"

Marcus just smiled as he concealed the small sack in his cloak. "And now I must be going."

Masouf knew it would be useless to ask where Marcus was going. So he watched silently as the mysterious man left his tent. Then he turned back to the weapons, which he inventoried as he replaced them in their sack.

Unknown to Masouf, no one had actually seen Marcus leave his tent. With his vampire speed, he moved out into the open desert faster than mortal eyes could follow. Then he took to the air.

Within a few minutes, he landed on the outskirts of Wuwei. It was the next city Masouf's caravan would pass on its way to Sian. Pulling the hood of his robe over his head, Marcus went into the city, looking like any other wandering desert dweller.

Technically, he was still in the Gobi desert, but the Chinese of Wuwei had succeeded in making the land around their city bloom. Marcus admired the well-kept fields and gardens, but it was not the delicate perfume of flowers he followed. It was the scent of death.

Unlike the vampires of Europe, who by and large tended to hide from mortal sight in graveyards and catacombs, the vampires of China chose to live in much the same manner as Marcus had in Constantinople. They owned homes and were attended by faithful human servants. By then Marcus had mastered the language and was used to seeing the Chinese ideograms left in places only another vampire would espy, the warnings that declared this city or that hamlet as the hunting grounds of a particular 'mo-kwei hsien', a 'demon immortal'. Then would follow the usual threats of death to any other vampire who might dare to trespass.

But so far, Marcus had found himself to be far older than any others of his kind he had encountered in the course of his travels. Because of this, as had happened so often in the other lands he visited, the vampires Marcus had met fled from him as soon as they sensed his age and power. He remembered Vatha, crippled by an unknown catastrophe that had befallen all their kind before Marcus' own dark rebirth, and assumed this event had touched China as it had the rest of the world.

So Marcus cloaked his thoughts well as he neared the outer walls of a certain compound, unobtrusively marked with warning glyphs. Marcus was all silent attention, a shadow that lies among others, unnoticed, a skill he had learned long ago. As he waited, he could hear three of his kind stirring within the compound, making the small, dry sounds that the dead make, and other dead recognize at once.

And their thoughts! So surprisingly mundane, concerned with keeping up their pretense at mortality. Overseeing the books their trusted mortal slaves kept, making sure their land taxes were paid and arranging for repairs to be made on the leaky roof over the northern apartments!

And above all, the thirst. They were all fledglings, the oldest scarcely a hundred years along on his personal voyage through eternal life, and they were all eager to go out and hunt. Marcus melted deeper into the shadows of a neighboring building, waiting for them to emerge.

He chose to follow the eldest, named Cho. Marcus flitted noiselessly after Cho through the dark and narrow streets of Wuwei. Cho quickly found a victim in the poor section of the city and as he drank, lost in the relief of his unslakable thirst, Marcus took what he wanted from the distracted vampire's unguarded thoughts.

The one who had made Cho. A name and the city he lived in, far to the south. Marcus noted it well and prepared to take his leave in the same unobtrusive manner.

'Who are you!?'

The telepathic query turned Marcus back. The Chinese vampire was looking daggers at him, over the dead body of his victim. Cho was also trying to read Marcus' mind, but failing. Marcus could feel the other's thoughts pressing hard up against the defenses he had raised.

"No harm meant to you." Marcus spoke those words in an even, almost apologetic manner, too quietly for mortal ears to perceive. "I am going now and will not return."

Marcus levitated from where he stood slowly. Then, from Cho, Marcus felt rage abruptly transform into intense fear. Evidently, Cho had never seen another vampire fly.

No. That was wrong. The unexpected action had triggered a flood of memories in the Wuwei vampire, which Marcus caught in a twinkling moment of time.

Marcus saw this vampire when he was newly made. Cho was following his maker as he was taught how to use his newborn power. As they passed through a darkened alley, the elder vampire had shrunk back in fear, pressing himself and his fledgling into the shadows as another shadow passed by in the sky above.

For a fraction of an instant, Cho had glimpsed a woman flying above them. Her fluttering, filmy garments, pierced easily by the silvery moonlight, fully revealed the outlines of her desirable body, every voluptuous, feminine curve. All were sharply silhouetted against the disk of a gibbous moon as she flew past.

'Be still! Do not think!' Cho's maker hissed in a voice almost too low for vampire ears. 'Never let her see you!'

'Who... '

'She is Kuei T'ien, the Daughter of Heaven! She is a vampire like us, but she is so old that she commands vast and mighty powers. In all of China, only she can fly! And if she wishes, she can cast fire at you with a mere thought, consuming you utterly! Avoid her, and you will live... '

There was more, that Cho learned later. Kuei T'ien lived in a unique temple by the sea in Foochow, a pagoda built of jade and green glass, where she was worshipped as an all-powerful goddess by an evil sect of powerful magicians, although why she allowed these mortals to consort with her was unknown. Her powers of flight gave her access to all of China, which she oversaw like a private estate, destroying with her mental fire any of her kind she encountered whose powers were a threat to her.

By the time it took to review all these images in his mind, Marcus was far from Wuwei. When he saw Masouf's caravan in the distance, he landed on a hill close by, to pause and consider what he had seen. A lizard, disturbed by his presence, scuttled past his feet and he looked at it, wondering what the Wuwei vampire had meant when his maker mentioned the ability to 'cast fire', a trick Marcus had never heard of.

Even as he thought of it, Marcus could feel something uncoiling from his mind, reaching out to strike the unlucky reptile like a whip. The small animal suddenly burst open as the water in its body boiled away in an instant. Then what was left burned like dry wood and was consumed in moments, leaving a spot of greasy ashes on the sand.

Before sunrise, Marcus had tested this new ability until he was sure he could summon it at will and control it precisely. As he sought for a refuge against the coming day, he decided that despite his new power he would have to become more cautious. When he encountered Kuei T'ien, for he was sure he would, sooner or later, he would have to make sure the meeting was on his terms.

At last the caravan came to Sian, the eastern terminus of the Silk Road. As soon as he could, Masouf left to meet with his factors in the city, some of whom were Arabs like himself, who had chosen to live and raise their families there. There was a quarter of the city set aside for the foreigners' use, ceded to them by the Chinese, who appreciated the trade they brought, but not the traders' alien ways.

Thus the walled quarter was crowded with Muslims, Jews, Nestorian Christians, Zoroastrians and even a few Hindus and Japanese. It was a forced familiarity to be sure, but it was harmonious for the most part, in a way unheard of in the West, where groups so different were normally at each other's throats constantly. But business was business, after all, and the lure of profit trumped, as it always did, in every time and place, religious and ethnic zeal.

Sometime after sunset, Marcus also arrived in Sian and was soon wending his way through the narrow streets of the foreign quarter. Finding the bazaar of the gem-sellers, he scanned the minds of the proprietors until he found an honest merchant. Then Marcus sold a couple of his jewels.

He studied the money he had received from the jewel merchant in open curiosity. Each of the thick, shiny disks had a square hole punched in its center, allowing a set number of them to be strung together in a standard unit of cash. Concealing the strings of gold coins in pockets within his nomad's robes, Marcus turned to leave. He intended to explore the city and in the process find a safe place he could use to pass the days as long as he stayed there. The gold he possessed would help purchase such a safe haven if it were necessary.

But Marcus paused when he realized a mortal had been studying him from across the bazaar. In a moment he scanned the man's mind, and was surprised by what he found there. As Marcus approached, the man bowed politely to the curious vampire and spoke.

"Honorable sir, my home is nearby. Would you give it the joy of your presence?"

"Your name is I Fei, of the Ch'a clan," Marcus said, coming closer to the man. He noted the lack of fear in I Fei as he did so. "You are a master of geomancy. Your craft has told you what I am and where you could find me."

"Correct," returned the man. "And I also know you are in danger. I believe I can help you."

"And why would you wish to do that?"

"Because we have the same enemy."

"How could I have enemies?" Marcus protested. "I've only just arrived in China. No one even knows I'm here."

"She will know, sooner or later," I Fei said. Marcus knew at once who I Fei meant. The man made a gesture to caution Marcus. "Try not to think of her. She will sense it in your thoughts if you do and be able to find you."

"I know the power of minds like mine and hers. And I know how to shield my thoughts. But... "

"Please come to the safety of my home. I will explain all there."

Following I Fei, Marcus was led from the bazaars of Sian to the city's more upscale quarter. Armed servants guarded the gate of I Fei's compound and hastened to open it to their master and his guest. Soon thereafter, Marcus followed I Fei into one of the sumptuous chambers of his home, which he decided must be the man's library.

A vast collection of writings lay nestled neatly in ornately carved shelves of ivory, standing against walls paneled with strips of fragrant camphorwood. The vampire looked longingly at I Fei's library. He wondered if he would have the chance to read any of this impressive collection of literature, the product of a civilization that appeared to be the oldest on Earth.

Already Marcus had caught enough stray thoughts from the people of Sian to tell him much about their country. It seemed China was so old, and had recorded so much, that its sages, having comprehended the cyclical nature of human events, had come to definite conclusions about how everything should be done in order to achieve peaceful and harmonious lives for the greatest number of Chinese. These rituals, apparently meaningless to outsiders, kept the people in touch with their respective places in society and the duties each place demanded.

War, for example, they eschewed, and not from cowardice or lack of ability. Like many other subjects, the Chinese had long ago learned all there was to know about tactics and warfare. But they also knew of war's ultimate futility, how victors in time are always conquered in their turn. All that knowledge was crystallized in a book by a general named Sun Tsu, written some five hundred years before the birth of Christ. Marcus saw a copy of that book, The Art of War, resting in one of the ivory niches and looked forward to reading it.

I Fei had gone to an odd three-legged table in the midst of the room. Marcus admired the workmanship that must have gone into its making. It was triangular in shape, lacquered a deep violet, and its legs were fashioned from some sort of white stone, alabaster or moonstone, perhaps. These latter had been sculpted in the images of muscular daemons, who appeared to strain and sweat under some vast weight as they supported the table.

Marcus watched as his host carefully arranged several fist-sized crystals in a specific way on the surface of that unique table. They were natural stones of rock crystal, amethyst and others, unworked but still showing all the pellucid perfection of highly organized matter. There seemed to be no recognizable pattern in their placement, but as I Fei worked, he murmured to himself. His words seemed partly an incantation and partly a song as he shifted the crystals, as if he were playing a rather odd game of chess with himself. Then, suddenly, he stopped and looked up at his visitor.

"We can talk freely now. My craft has set up a screen around this room that Kuei T'ien cannot read through."

"What do you mean... "

Marcus' voice trailed off and he looked about himself suspiciously. He had tried to read the minds of I Fei's servants whom he knew were outside, but got nothing. The walls of the chamber had indeed somehow become opaque to his telepathy, which meant Kuei T'ien would not be able to hear the thoughts of those within, either.

"I see," he admitted to I Fei. "You are a formidable magician."

"It is a science I have had the fortune to master," he demurred modestly as he gestured easily at the table before him. "These crystals, arraigned in discrete patterns, can generate fields of subtle energy. In this particular configuration, they interfere with the mental abilities that you vampires possess."

"So you know what I am."

"Yes. And such a one is she, the daemonic and misnamed Kuei T'ien. But you are the first of your kind with a power equal to hers to come into our land for centuries. With your help, I can vanquish her and free China from the threat she poses to our empire."

"I have learned she oppresses her own kind, killing any whose powers might rival hers, but what has she to do with mortal affairs?"

"Do you know of her connection to the Black Lotus Sect, a fraternity of dark magicians?"

"I did not know their name, but yes."

"My emperor, Chao Tsung, has entrusted me with the task of ridding our empire of these evil magi. But with the power of Kuei T'ien protecting them, well, they are virtually untouchable by their fellow mortals."

"Why does she help them?"

"I have only lately learned why. The power Kuei T'ien wields is no longer enough for her. She wants to rule all China directly and, scheming with the archmagi of the Black Lotus, she believes she has discovered a way to gain vastly more power, enough to dominate the peoples of my nation just as she now dominates her fellow vampires."

"How?"

"All we know is that it somehow involves this same science," I Fei said, gesturing again at the crystals arrayed on his table. "The wizards of the Black Lotus have been busy throughout China, buying or stealing crystals like these. Their temple in Foochow is by now filled with them, and the gods themselves only know what they intend to do with so much power. Those cultists whom we have managed to capture for questioning commit suicide by a means we do not understand nor can prevent, so they cannot be tortured into revealing what they know."

"So this... whatever it is they plan to do... it hasn't yet been attempted?"

"If it had, all China might now be groaning under Kuei T'ien's yoke, and the leading members of the Black Lotus would be ruling the various provinces as governors in the name of an immortal demon empress. For if their plan works as envisioned, Kuei T'ien will become a dark goddess, too powerful for anyone to oppose. And it isn't just China that would suffer, but eventually the rest of the world as well, for ambition such as hers can never be content until she has it all. With your help, I believe I can stop her."

"You are lucky I am not like most of the vampires at large in the world, who refuse to have anything to do with mortal affairs. Tell me your plan, I Fei."

A little less than a month later, Marcus stood upon a roof within a compound in Foochow, gazing across the city. I Fei and his imperial agents had procured the former home of a wealthy merchant as a base of operations. From his perch the vampire could see the infamous Po T'a, the Glass Pagoda, where Kuei T'ien and the Black Lotus Sect plotted the domination of China, and perhaps, the world.

The common people of Foochow though had their own name for the building, which reflected their suspicions of what went on inside it. To them it was the Miao Pi, the Temple of Evil Practices. Lit from within by innumerable lamps, it seemed to Marcus that the jade and green glass tower burned luridly, looming over the city like a pillar of otherworldly flame.

He frowned as his telepathy drew blanks. It appeared that the Po T'a was shielded in a manner similar to that I Fei knew of. Marcus was sure Kuei T'ien was there nonetheless, if I Fei's informants were right, and his hand went to a sword buckled at his hip.

Feeling he was ready to face Kuei T'ien in her own lair, Marcus leapt down into the courtyard and entered the house. I Fei's occult crystals had been set up there as well, making it proof against Kuei T'ien's eavesdropping. I Fei looked up at Marcus expectantly from where he sat.

"I cannot tell if she is there," the vampire began, "but if your intelligence was accurate, we dare not delay."

I Fei nodded as he arose. His sources all told basically the same story, of a great gathering of the devotees of the Black Lotus Cult. He could not help but conclude that they were about to attempt the rite that the sect hoped would give Kuei T'ien limitless power.

"Then we go now."

I Fei took a lantern and descended a staircase that led deep under the compound, followed by four retainers whom he had personally trained. Marcus brought up the rear, straining all his senses to their utmost as they entered a long tunnel that led to the pagoda. The ancient stonework was encrusted with irregular patches of unearthly, phosphorescent mold and the air was heavy with the scent of the not-too-distant sea.

Marcus considered the things I Fei had told him about the tunnel as they followed it. It was far older than the pagoda it led to, for the foundations of the Black Lotus Sect's temple predated China itself. From what he had read in the west, Marcus guessed that it had something to do with the legend of an ancient, worldwide empire, centered on a island metropolis that had sunk into the Atlantic Ocean many thousands of years ago.

But that particular moment was not the one to be distracted by obscure legends of lost empires. I Fei and his followers were counting on Marcus to protect them once they were inside the temple. Then he noticed the men ahead of him had stopped.

They were pausing before a bronze door, its oddly patterned surface slick with green, waxy verdigris. It had apparently not been used for a very long time. The stonework that anchored it to the tunnel walls was obviously different, built at some later date, but just as heavy and solid. Marcus moved to the front of the group when I Fei beckoned.

"I believe there may be guards on the other side," he whispered.

Marcus sent his thoughts ahead of him. The barrier to his mental perceptions seemed weaker here and he wondered why. Then, as if through a sort of psychic fog, he felt another mind.

There was a single guard on the other side of the door. Taking what the man knew of the temple's security arraignments from his mind, Marcus considered how he was going to break the lock and kill the guard without alerting his fellows. Then he paused as he read the thoughts that were uppermost in the man's mind.

The guard was unusually excited, preoccupied by what he knew of the great doings going on in the pagoda high above him. He was a lowly neophyte in the cult of the Black Lotus, yearning for the power he knew was being exercised by his superiors who dwelt in the heights of the translucent temple. His knowledge of the cult's activities was limited, but he knew quite enough to alarm Marcus.

Just as they had feared, Kuei T'ien and the hierarchy of the Black Lotus Sect were ready to begin their rite, perhaps had already begun it. Marcus passed this information along to his ally. I Fei was fairly sure the energy field would mask their approach, despite the odd weakness in it Marcus had detected at that location.

"There is a great danger though," I Fei whispered. "If we get too close to the nexus of the field, the crystals that generate it, she will sense our presence immediately."

"I've had a great deal of practice at screening my thoughts," Marcus returned. "If you all stay close to me, I might be able to screen you as well."

Turning back to the door, Marcus planted a suggestion in the cultist's mind. Soon the sound of a key turning in the lock caused the vampire's accomplices to flatten themselves against the tunnel wall. The hinges, unused to movement, squealed plaintively in the darkness as the door inched open. The guard had to put his shoulder to the long disused portal and push with all his might.

It was just what Marcus wanted. Grasping the handle from his side, he jerked the stubborn door open in a display of his great strength. The surprised guard fell into the vampire's clutches and Marcus drained him, silently and quickly.

"Are there are any more guards on this level?" I Fei whispered as his followers removed the guard's body.

"I'll check."

Marcus looked beyond the open door and probed with his mind. To his surprise, the field of energy that had blocked his telepathy seemed to fade suddenly and give way. When I Fei saw the vampire's expression change, he hissed.

"What's wrong?"

"Wait!" Marcus hissed back, trying to locate another mind. "Something is happening!"

As the minds of the other Black Lotus cultists became open to him, Marcus scanned through them quickly, stretching his vampire senses upward until he found an elder of the sect who was involved with the rite I Fei so feared. Through his eyes, Marcus saw a great chamber within the pagoda, glinting every shade of green by the light of innumerable torches. Crystals of all shapes and sizes were arraigned on the floor in a complex mandala, meant to generate many fields of subtle energies, nested one inside the other, the outer ones amplifying the ones within them. Black cloaked sorcerers circled and chanted outside the construct. In its center, within the nexus of the rite, stood a naked woman, Kuei T'ien!

On her upper arms and around her thighs were tied long, broad, white silk ribbons. Mystic characters had been painted on them with blood, gory charms of some sort to aid in the ritual. The forces generated by the crystals were causing the ribbons to ripple and snap in the air around Kuei T'ien, as if a strong breeze were blowing, and her dark, shining hair was being stirred in a similar manner. But Marcus could see no evidence of a wind elsewhere in the chamber. The candles and torches set up in the space burned steadily, showing the air around them was calm.

From the mind of the magus he was seeing all this through, Marcus learned the secret of the rite. The simplicity of the idea it was based upon surprised him. All vampires knew that their powers increased as they aged, so the solution to Kuei T'ien's problem was time!

The energies evoked from the crystal mandalas were warping time, speeding it up at the spot where Kuei T'ien stood. As Marcus watched, the silken charms bound to her body frayed and rotted and vanished as centuries began to pass by in mere seconds for her. Her skin grew paler and he could feel her power growing.

Marcus knew he could not hope to fight her and win now. She had become able to crush him or any other vampire easily in a contest. But still, it was not enough for her.

Her skin began to glow and become translucent as an odd light pervaded her body. Enraptured by the transformation, Kuei T'ien's mind was focused on the power that grew and grew, and ignored the effect that power was having on her physical body. As the light grew, emanating apparently from her heart, Marcus could see her form shading from matter into energy, and instantly wondered where that energy would go when there was no longer a body for it to be housed in... Breaking his mental connection to the magus, Marcus backed away from the open door.

"Run!" he hissed to his companions.

The mortals obeyed him at once as a low rumbling, almost too low for human ears to hear, began to echo down the tunnel from behind them. The intensity of the rumbling quickly increased, becoming a distinct vibration that could be plainly felt beneath the men's feet as they fled back to I Fei's base. Marcus covered their retreat, uncertain what was going to happen, but fearing a catastrophe.

They managed to regain their starting point safely. While the others sought shelter, I Fei scrambled to follow Marcus up onto the roof. The allies looked across the skyline of Foochow to see a fantastic sight. The Po T'a was giving off an irregular, shimmering light, while the singular vibrations they had felt below ground sounded clearly in the open air above as a sharp, crystalline note, quickly intensifying, and becoming painful to mortal ears.

I Fei clapped his hands to the sides of his head in a vain attempt to stop it. The horrible vibration seemed to be conducted not just through the air, but through the Earth and everything that stood on it. Marcus could feel the fabric of the house beneath him starting to crumble as the vibration reached a shrieking crescendo, shaking not just I Fei's base, but the entire city like an earthquake.

His telepathy no longer daunted, Marcus probed the temple and saw the result he had feared. Most of the mortals within were dead, slain by their close proximity to Kuei T'ien, whose body lost the last of its material form. For a split second, raw energy writhed and pulsed where she had stood. Then it expanded explosively.

The Po T'a gave one last screaming shimmer in the night before it utterly disintegrated in a titanic detonation, sending tiny shards of jade and glass flying in all directions. Marcus grabbed I Fei and hustled his companion to shelter as the remnants of the pagoda descended to pound on the rooftiles. It was over in a few minutes, leaving sparkling drifts of coarse green sandy grit to encumber roofs, streets and courtyards all over Foochow.

"I doubt China will ever be troubled by Kuei T'ien again," Marcus observed to I Fei, after he related what he had seen through the power of his telepathy. "And now I can go back to my anonymous wanderings, to see the rest of your vast country."

But I Fei was able to convince Marcus to stay with him. Through I Fei's contacts in the Imperial Court, Marcus gained access to the state archives, an awesome mass of writings collected over the course of tens of centuries of eastern civilization. Even with his vampyric abilities, it took Marcus many years to go though so vast a compilation of documents.

In the meantime China underwent another of its periodic changes of dynasties, as the T'ang regime faltered and rebellions arose throughout the country. Marcus protected the Ch'a clan during this turbulent time and as a result, I Fei and his sons survived to serve another emperor, T'ai Tsu, the first of the Liao dynasty.

"Once I had finished my studies in the Imperial library," Marcus said, winding down his tale, "I bid I Fei, by then an old man, farewell and resumed my wanderings through China. In the course of my travels, I encountered a Buddhist monastery where the monks, all man lovers, lived together in much the same way as the heron men do.

"They called their discipline 'the path of the hidden snake'. I decided to stay nearby to study them, and found a cave in the hills overlooking the monastery to hide in. One day sometime later, while I was resting in the dark recesses of the cavern, a man came into my lair and began speaking to me familiarly.

"Despite my initial surprise, I knew he understood what I was and that he meant me no harm, for my mind always remained wide awake during the days despite the sluggishness of my body. He was one of the green men, sent to Earth to bring an elder monk over to the spirit realm before he died. He had sensed my presence and power, felt that I was a man lover like him, and came to make contact. It was not long afterwards that I myself was invited to come to this world, and I have never thought about going back. Until recently."

"Oh?" Hun Tzu wondered.

"Marcus and I," began Jack, "have been discussing the possibility of going off to search for Basil. I'm fairly sure he's still somewhere in China. And we don't want to leave him there searching in vain for Marcus."

"It's been so long since Jack saw Basil that we're not sure where to begin the search," added Marcus. "And my knowledge of China is nearly a thousand years out of date." Marcus paused a moment, then went on. "Jack tells me you are a geomancer, like I Fei."

"I have had the good fortune to master that science. I would be glad to use my skill to help you find Basil, if you wish."

"That would be marvelous," Marcus sighed in relief. "Jack feared we might be condemning ourselves to another decades long search, like the one he made with Basil in search of me."

"It might take some time, but nowhere near as long as that," assured Hun Tzu. "By opening trees to various parts of China, I could take readings with my lo-pan in many areas, in a relatively short time. If luck is with us, and Basil had not left China, I ought to be able to track his personal energy down easily."

"We will be ready to go with you and protect you when you do," said Jack, as Marcus nodded in agreement. "From what I saw during my time there, the Manchu Dynasty is losing control of China. Warlords and gangs of brigands are taking over in various places, and the legitimate government is too weak and inept to stop them. And then there are the foreign powers who would have taken over long ago, except that they can't agree among themselves how to divide up such a rich country equally."

"I have no doubt of what you saw. I grew up there." Hun Tzu muttered sadly. He shook his head. "Danger or no, finding our lost brother is most important. I will let you know when I am ready, after I have spoken with Mayati and Falling Star. My lover must know about these plans, and our shaman might have insights or suggestions that would affect our search."

"That's a good suggestion," Marcus agreed. He knew by then that Falling Star was a powerful mystic in his own right.

"Perhaps," Hun Tzu went on, thoughtfully, "we ought to begin our search at this monastery Marcus spoke of. I would not be surprised if Basil had also found it and lingered nearby."

"That sounds reasonable." Jack nodded.

"Then we will meet again soon, my friends," nodded Hun Tzu as he arose. "I will return to my home at Heron Ranch and begin preparations."

3 - THE SEARCH

In the far west of Szechuan, where the mountains rise and merge into those of Tibet, a monastery had stood for many centuries, sheltering a group called themselves followers of the path of the hidden snake. From several vantage points it commanded a view of a cultivated valley and a city that were nearly as old as it was. These were favored places for the inmates of that spiritual refuge to go and meditate.

On this day, one middle-aged monk sat alone at one such secluded nook. It was a small open pavilion perched on the very edge of an outcrop of weathered granite. Behind it, beyond the point where the naked rock rose out of the earth, a thick stand of bamboo grew. The tall plants made it seem as if the pavilion were suspended between the rustling greenery and the empty air beyond. The last light of a florid sunset caressed the pavilion's interior, imparting to every surface a slight rosy hue.

A web of fine chains suspended an elaborately wrought oil lamp from the center of the pavilion. The brass fixture was fashioned in the form of a rampant flying dragon which belched a bright flame from its open mouth, providing illumination as the sun slid behind the great mountains that loomed toward the west. By its light, the monk, Zhu, was studying a scroll unfurled on a low table set before him where he sat on the floor.

The document was of silk and very old, yellowed with age. But the words were older, written during the T'ang Dynasty by another man who shared Zhu's special nature. Time was annihilated as Zhu moved a delicately carved ivory pointer beneath the words as he read, allowing one manlover to speak to another across the centuries that separated them.

+Fond of the moon +we view side by side +until weariness calls us +to our shared bed

+O robust friend +manly and tender +your arms hold me close +all through the night

+The joy you gave me +that moonlit night +will last a lifetime +and far, far beyond...

The monk sat back and sighed. "T'o... " he whispered as his breath escaped, involuntarily speaking the name of the man who moved his heart as profoundly as the poet's had been moved by another. Zhu had fallen in love with his aged teacher and mentor, and the pair had spent many happy years together. Then T'o had passed on, but not in the way most mortals did. From time out of mind, Zhu's monastery had been visited by mortals who knew a great secret, the way to a realm of unending life reserved by the gods for men who love men, a place Zhu and his brothers called Ren Ai Kwo, the country of manlove.

Like many before him, T'o had been taken to that finer world when the infirmities of age began to tell upon him, so he would never taste death, and, as Zhu had been told, would grow young and vital again. Someday, it was certain Zhu would join T'o there. He sighed, thinking of the long years that must pass before he was old enough to follow his lover hence.

The harsh tang of smoke tickled Zhu's nose as he inhaled. The monk got up and went to the railing that had been carved to look like a series of intertwining snakes. He looked down from his pavilion and saw black vapors rising from the distant walled city that stood among the fields that patterned the valley floor in varicolored squares, all deepening in twilight shadow. Zhu frowned.

Word had been brought of the revolt centered further to the east, involving a rogue general who sought to make himself king of an independent Szechuan. The local magistrate, a loyal Manchu, had in Zhu's opinion acted incredibly rashly by openly defying the usurper. Thus, he had drawn a contingent of the rebel army upon his defenseless prefecture, bringing all the horrors of civil war with them.

A rustling in the bamboo thicket brought Zhu around. He thought not only of the rebels, but also of reports he had heard of Tibetan bandits in the area, taking advantage of the chaos in China. He suspiciously eyed the lush greenery around him, which was capable of concealing the approach of a sizable number of people. Even before the revolt, the authority of the empire had been waning and as law and order broke down, even the sanctity of a monastery no longer defended it against violation.

Zhu was relieved when he saw an unarmed man appear on the path to the pavilion, but wondered what a stranger was doing there. He was about to advance and greet the man when the monk spotted two others coming behind him. Zhu stared in astonishment: they were Westerners!

He looked at the first man again and noted his blue eyes and the light brown full beard he sported despite his youth, the marks of a half-breed Chinese. Unlike many of his fellows Zhu felt no hatred of the man for that. There were many like the newcomer among his fellow monks, driven forth from a society that hated them, to the safety of the monastery.

"Ah," one of the Westerners began, speaking fluent Chinese, "here is a monk. He can introduce us to the head of the order." The brown haired and bearded man looked at Zhu and went on. "My name is Marcus. These are my brothers, Jack and Hun Tzu. We are men of your nature, from the place you call Ren Ai Kwo. We wish to meet with your master."

"Of course," Zhu replied. He was surprised by the man's words, but not unduly so. Part of the training the men of his order received was to always be prepared to encounter the inhabitants of Ren Ai Kwo, who were of all races and tended to appear and disappear unpredictably. "Forgive me for asking, but do you know of my lover, T'o? He was taken to your world three years ago."

"Yes, I do," Marcus smiled. "He is well... "

"What is it?" asked Zhu as Marcus' smile faded and he looked back the way he had come.

"Hun Tzu, get behind us," Jack warned as Marcus was distracted by something apparent only to Jack and himself. No sooner had Hun Tzu joined Zhu in the pavilion than a dozen men emerged from the surrounding forest of bamboo. They were quite a ragtag crew, clad in various types and degrees of armor and carrying a similar miscellany of weapons. A few held torches. The groups stared at each other a few moments before the leader of the newcomers spoke.

"By the empress' tits! Foreign devils!"

"Rebel soldiers," Jack said for Hun Tzu and Zhu's benefit. "They intend to loot the monastery."

"If you know that, you should also know we are sworn to kill all foreigners we find! I, T'ak the Mighty, have this very day personally killed two of the Christian missionaries who scorn our ways and corrupt our youth! I thoroughly enjoyed it, just as I shall enjoy killing you! And we will continue to kill until no western devil breathes sacred Chinese air!"

"'A thousand mice do not equal one tiger'," Marcus replied calmly to T'ak's bellicose speech, repeating an old Chinese saying. "And here are two tigers," he said, indicating Jack and himself. "Leave the monastery now without harming anyone, and we will let you live."

"Arrogant round-eye!" spat T'ak. "You will beg for death before I grant it! Kill all of them except for that one!" the mercenary leader ordered his minions, as he pointed at Marcus. "I will personally execute him with the death of a thousand cuts!"

Before the gang could take a step, both Jack and Marcus vanished. T'ak exclaimed and turned to his lieutenant, but T'e was gone as well. One of the rebel soldiers spoke from behind.

"Where is Hsu?" he asked, naming another of the group who had disappeared.

T'ak was on the verge of ordering his men to spread out and look for the foreigners when he felt something strike his face. He reached to feel some sort of slippery fluid that wetted his cheek. It was dark in the torchlight and the smell was familiar, shockingly so.

"Blood?! Where... "

As T'ak looked up he found his answer. He was appalled to see Marcus a score of feet above him, suspended in midair, biting the throat of T'e, whose struggles against his attacker were futile. As Marcus took the last of the bandit's blood, he flung his body down on top of T'ak.

In the time it took for T'ak to push the dying T'e off him and get up, Jack had returned. Moving almost too fast to see, he broke one soldier's neck, took his sword and decapitated three more before T'ak was able to fire an arrow at him. Pivoting as he skewered another of the gang, Jack touched the missile and guided it into the chest of another, piercing his heart.

Before T'ak could draw another arrow, the last of his men died. Marcus swooped and grabbed the bandit, who had gone from T'ak the terrible to T'ak the terrified. Ignoring T'ak's useless pleas for mercy, pleas T'ak himself had often heard from his victims but never heeded, Marcus scanned his mind. Learning all he needed, he broke the rebel leader's neck and tossed his body among those of his men.

"T'ak knew of no other rebel units nearby," he said, turning towards his mortal companions. Zhu looked appalled by what he had witnessed and Hun Tzu was reassuring him of his friends' good will towards Zhu's brother monks. Once the monk was calmer, Marcus went on. "But Jack and I will scout the area thoroughly to make sure before we leave."

"Where is Jack?" asked Zhu, finding his tongue.

Marcus glanced about him. When his face registered puzzlement, Hun Tzu produced his lo-pan. Manipulating it quickly, he too looked concerned as he read the signs.

"What is it?"

"Jack is now with Basil!" he replied.

"How?!" asked Marcus.

"He was taken," Hun Tzu muttered, studying the lo-pan, "by a means I cannot identify. It seems they are in no danger for the present. But there is something else."

"What?"

"I am reading more vampires where Basil and Jack are... " Hun Tzu looked up from his lo-pan and into Marcus' eyes. "They are all very old - and very powerful."

"The fallen ones?" breathed Marcus. "Together in one place?"

"It appears so," the geomancer replied, scrutinizing his lo-pan again.

"Tell me where he is," Marcus demanded. "We will go to him at once. My apologies," he said, turning to Zhu. "But we must go."

"Of course. Go and save your brother."

+* * *

Moments after Jack had slain the last of his opponents, the world had inexplicably dissolved around him and reformed as someplace else. He had time for a thrill of shock as he recognized his lover, Basil, and the ancient vampire, the Councilor, who had made Jack a vampire. In that split-second the Councilor's mind overwhelmed his and Jack found himself helplessly caught in a stream of memories not his own. Time rolled backward and he saw a unit of Roman legionnaires trudging wearily through a trackless, moss-covered forest.

The woods were infernally damp, with mists roiling between the boles of huge trees. Water fairly drooled from every leaf, like a multitude of green tongues. As he watched the soldiers slogging along through this wet wilderness, Jack became aware that he was watching a portion of a great army engaged in a punitive expedition against the German tribes who constantly harassed Rome's northern frontier.

It happened without warning. Suddenly the forest was alive with fur clad and axe wielding blonde warriors, shouting their bloodcurdling battle cries at the top of their lungs. The Romans, taken totally by surprise, fell like ripe wheat before the scythe of Teutonic steel. Rolling over the unit, the barbarians vanished back into their forests, seeking more Romans to kill.

Jack's attention was focused on a knot of Romans who had fallen as they fought together. He gasped as he recognized one of the bodies in the pile. Then a movement nearby distracted him. Jack saw a woman emerge from the woods and stroll among the bodies, studying them. He saw at once that she was another vampire. When she came to the man Jack recognized, she knelt beside him.

"Marcus Artorian Casperix... " she cooed gently over the unconscious man.

"What have you found, my dear?" another vampire asked.

Jack stared in mounting shock as he recognized the speaker. Though Jack had never met him, he knew his face from memories Basil and the Councilor had shared with him. It was the one called the rogue, long sought for by his fellow vampires for the great crime he had committed, the mass slaying of most of his kind who had lived on earth centuries ago. The rogue's eyes were strange, like the Councilor's, furnished with lineal pupils crossed like an X. Jack looked at the woman again and saw her eyes were normal.

"A survivor," she answered. "A man who may suit our purpose."

"Yes," the rogue agreed as he also scanned Marcus' mind. "He will do. Heal him, and then I shall take us home."

The woman stripped Marcus of his clothing and armor, then took a sword from the grasp of a dead soldier and sliced her arm open. She allowed the blood to pour out over the wounds that had brought Marcus to the edge of death. The effect was like magic as the damage was undone and the man's body restored to whole.

The scene shifted abruptly and Jack saw the interior of a rich villa. Marcus awoke with a start, sitting up in the bed he had been laid in. It was night and a single lamp burned fitfully nearby. The confused man got up and went out onto a balcony that was separated from the room by a few slender stone pillars and hangings of sheer silk that moved with the warm evening breeze.

Marcus went to the marble balustrade. Leaning on it, he looked out over a calm, moonlit bay uncomprehendingly. With a start, he ran his hands over his naked body, seeking wounds that he remembered, but were no longer there. Low, feminine laughter brought him around.

"No, Marcus, you are not dreaming."

Marcus stared at the woman who had spoken. He could tell at once she was a noble, by the silk dress she wore. Such a garment was worth many times its weight in gold and only the women related to the Emperor or wealthy senators could afford it. It shimmered in the moonlight and whispered with every movement she made. It was also nearly transparent and did nothing to obscure the wearer's charms.

"My... my lady," he faltered, "where... "

"You are in my villa, on the coast of southern Gaul," she purred, coming to stand beside Marcus at the balustrade. "I brought you here to be my overseer, to run it for me."

"But, I am a soldier... "

"That life is over, Marcus. I found you dying in the Teutoburg Wood and saved you. Now you will serve me in all that I require, for as long as I say."

"The forest... I remember now! My unit was overwhelmed, but surely not all of the legion! It is my duty to stay with them. I'm not a deserter... "

"I know. You are not. Listen to me, Marcus, your legion no longer exists. Your overconfident general, Quinctilius Varus, led it and two others right into a barbarian trap. Only a handful survived the slaughter, and they live on as slaves to German masters. As far as anyone knows, you are dead. And you would be, if not for me."

"How did you save me? And bring me here?" Marcus looked out at the bay again. It had taken him weeks to travel from his home in northern Italy to the encampment of his legion on the Rhine.

Ignoring the questions, she turned and Marcus caught the heady scene of her fair, perfumed hair, silvered by the moonlight. "Don't you want to stay with me?"

"My lady... I... " Marcus stammered as he tried to comprehend what he had just been told.

"My name is Cornelia," she cooed, taking his hand and raising it to her cheek. On the way, she deliberately allowed Marcus' hand to graze one of her full breasts. "Would it be so hard to serve me after serving Rome?"

"Oh, my lady, if what you say is true... "

"It is," she began, "and I can give you other proofs of it. But not tonight."

"Then... I am willing to serve you... "

"But?"

Marcus took his hand away from Cornelia's face and stepped back as he replied.

"Forgive me, my lady, but there is one service I cannot do for you."

"In my bed, you mean?"

Marcus nodded.

"Are you... incapable of the act of love?"

"My lady, I have never had the desire to go with women."

"Ah, you are a lover of men."

"Yes."

Cornelia smiled. "I knew that before I brought you here. It was why I chose you. You see, Marcus, the man you are replacing, my former overseer, became overly enamored of me. It made him... unreliable."

"How do you know these things?"

"Because I can read mortal minds, among other abilities."

As Cornelia said that, she vanished. Marcus started and looked about himself, but could see no one. Cornelia's voice sounded again and he looked toward the source. She was standing about thirty feet above him, on a narrow ledge atop the line of pillars that separated the balcony from the bedroom.

"Some believe me a goddess, others a sorceress, but for all my power, Roman Law looks upon me as a weak woman and requires me and my property to be under the control of a man." Cornelia informed a shocked Marcus. "I have such a protector, a being like myself, only vastly more powerful. You will address him as 'Master' if he chooses to reveal himself to you, which is unlikely. I will give you your orders and if you have questions, you will address them to me. Do you understand?"

"Yes, my lady."

"Yes," she said, scanning Marcus' mind in a way that allowed him to feel her doing it, "I believe you will be loyal. But to make sure, let me give you a glimpse of the punishment I meted out to your predecessor."

Marcus was instantly overwhelmed by sensations and memories not his own. He was somehow with another man and felt what he felt as he was chained and dragged from the presence of his beloved mistress. It was not long before he endured rape at the hands of the slavers, who joked that he would soon be too foul for such fun. They turned him over to a Roman captain who needed rowers for his galley. And Marcus shuddered at the stroke of the slavemaster's whip as the naked man toiled endlessly over an oar, amid the stench and filth of a multitude of lost souls whose labors would end only when their lives did.

"I can also be generous," Cornelia said, jumping down easily to join Marcus and leading him back inside the room. "Loyalty to me and the Master will be greatly rewarded. Hermann. Edwy. Come in."

Two youths in their late teens entered through a door Marcus had not noticed before. One was of the German race Marcus had so recently fought, with pale blonde hair. The other looked to be from the isle of Britain, for his hair had the bright redness those people were known for. Both looked expectantly at Marcus, who felt desire for the pair rising in him as he returned their gaze.

"These two are yours, Marcus, to aid you in... whatever you need done." Cornelia turned to the pair. "Take your master to the bath. Treat him well."

"Yes, my lady," answered Hermann.

"Will you come with us, master?" Edwy asked.

Marcus was led to the villa's bath. An important room in any Roman dwelling, the chamber was lavish, even by the empire's standards. Curious mosiacs covered the floors, showing a group of nymphs and satyrs dancing. They ringed a central pool of heated water. Marcus stepped into the waist-deep water and turned to see his attendants doffing their chitons.

The pair entered the pool. As they washed him, Marcus returned the caresses, which became progressively more erotic. Then, for Jack, the scene wavered and once again he was back, standing before the Councilor and Basil. Jack at once fell into Basil's arms.

"My love," Basil murmured, "it's so very good to see you again."

"Basil, I've found Marcus. He's... "

"I know. He'll be here soon."

"What did I see?"

"I showed you Marcus' beginning," the Councilor began. "He served Cornelia well for the better part of two decades, until a plague swept through southern Gaul. Marcus would have perished like so many others then, but Cornelia had become fond of him. As he lay on his deathbed, she made Marcus a vampire, much to the annoyance of the rogue. He did not punish her, but sent Marcus away, warning him never to return to Gaul. Marcus spent centuries exploring the rest of the empire before settling in Constantinople, where he met Basil and they had their encounter with Vatha."

"Why have you shown me these things?"

"Yes, why, Councilor T'eth?" a new voice began. The trio looked to see another vampire, a man who possessed eyes like hers. The X-shaped pupils widened and narrowed as he scrutinized Jack.

"They deserve to know the truth, especially now, at the point where one journey ends and another begins." The Councilor murmured cryptically. "Basil, Jack, this is Captain Z'ill."

"You know we have no time for this."

"'Time must always be made for truth'," she said as if quoting some saying unknown to Basil or Jack. Captain Z'ill seemed to recognize it though. He heaved a sigh.

"Very well. Just try to remember that time is short."

"How much longer?"

"The Chief Engineer says fifty cycles, perhaps less."

"I understand."

"Why did he call you T'eth?" Jack asked.

"It is my name. I will explain later. Ah," she paused and turned. "Here are your friends."

For the first time, Jack realized he was in a cavern. From one of several openings that led out of the chamber he, Basil and T'eth stood in, Marcus emerged, followed by Hun Tzu. It was an emotional reunion for Basil. While he and Marcus exchanged centuries of experiences telepathically, Hun Tzu explained to Jack how he and Marcus both had heard and seen all he had about Marcus' past as they flew to find Jack.

"You are the Councilor I've heard so much about," began Hun Tzu as he addressed the female vampire. "Or should we call you T'eth now?"

"Either will do. 'Councilor T'eth' is a title I have not used in millenia, but it is time for me to reassume it."

"What is happening?" Marcus asked, turning from Basil.

"Come. There is much to see, and little time left to see it."

"Where are we?" Jack queried as the Councilor led them into another tunnel.

"Deep inside a mountain," Marcus answered, "located in a trackless and uninhabited part of Tibet. Somehow, you were taken directly here... "

"Teleportation, we call it," interupted T'eth. "One of many tools my people use."

"Your people?"

"As you may have guessed from the appearance of my eyes, I am not human. But neither am I an angelic being fallen from the heaven of Judaeo-Christian mythology. I was born mortal, on another world, far from here. It is called Phaa and my folk refer to themselves as the Phaalin."

"Another world? But how did you come to earth?" asked Marcus.

"Look," T'eth answered.

The heron men were silenced by the sight that met their eyes as they reached the end of the tunnel. It opened onto an enormous cavern, brightly lit by globes of brilliant light suspended from the roof. The light made it plain to see that the rock had been excavated deliberately, leaving smooth floors and walls. Also bathed in this illumination was a vast object that had an organic look, somewhat reminicient of a gigantic whelk shell with multicolored spines that spiraled out from its twisted top.

"What is it?"

"It is our ship, Hun Tzu," T'eth replied as they continued towards it. "Her name is L'yra. We are explorers, seeking knowledge as we journey through space, visiting other worlds. Nearly ten thousand of your years ago, we encountered a spatial anomaly... "

"A what?"

"One of the many dangers of deep space. Someday your race will leave earth and learn what we have. Anyway, the anomaly seriously damaged our ship and we had to land on the first planet we could find that was like Phaa... "

"Earth," finished Basil.

"Yes. We created this cavern for L'yra to rest in while she healed... "

The heron men did a double take at the ship.

"It's alive?" Jack exclaimed.

"I feel it now," nodded Marcus. "It's... her thoughts... so different."

"L'yra was badly wounded," T'eth murmured as she reached out and stroked the side of the ship.

The heron men did likewise and wondered. What appeared to be L'yra's outer shell was not hard and cold like a seashell, but had warmth and the pliabilty of something like hardened leather. Even Hun Tzu, with his merely human senses, could feel the pulse and rush of L'yra's blood flowing beneath the finely haired surface.

"She is fully healed now?"

"Yes, Hun Tzu. Now, after all these centuries, my fellow Phaalin and I can go home."

"But before that," a new voice began, bringing the group around, "there are things we must do."

"The rogue!" Basil started.

"Master... " whispered Marcus, seeing him with the eyes of memory, as a Roman lord.

"This is Judge H'aph," T'eth introduced. H'aph frowned at the group.

"There is little time, T'eth. Telling these earthlings our history will not spare them from the cleansing."

"They deserve to know everything before we leave their world."

"What is the cleansing?" asked Jack. H'aph turned to him.

"I shall tell you, in less time than T'eth would take. When we first arrived on earth, we allowed L'yra to alter our bodies so that we could survive in your world - don't ask how, your science is too primitive to begin to understand the process. But L'yra's injuries affected the treatments, rendering them less than desirable. We survived, but became what your legends call vampires. And in time we found that humans could be infected by our blood and also become vampires.

"Two and a half millenia ago, I made a judgement," H'aph paused to glare at T'eth "as was my right. There were too many formerly human vampires on earth. Their presence was affecting the progress of human civilization, and not in a positive way. Cultures were not developing systems of justice and law, and why should they when they had vampires to read minds, separate the guilty from the innocent, and punish the guilty? It is one of our highest laws, not to interfere with developing cultures, but our actions were having that effect. So I performed the first cleansing, despite the objections of some of my crewmates."

Marcus grasped the implications of H'aph's words first. H'aph nodded at him.

"You all know of the supposed 'crime' I committed; to me it was my duty, upholding Phaalin law. T'eth was delegated to watch me from then on, so I would not repeat my action. Four decades ago she tried to get Basil and Jack involved in her guard duties, but I prevented that."

Basil nodded, recalling how H'aph had let him know where Marcus had last been seen, sending him and Jack off on a fruitless search throughout China. And spoiling T'eth's plans for the Elxa vampires.

"Now that we are about to leave your planet, T'eth can no longer argue against me or restrain my actions. Phaalin technology inadvertantly created vamprism and contaminated your world. It would be irresponsible of us not to clean up after ourselves. Before we go, all traces of our presence here, including vampirism, must be wiped out."

"You're going to do it again... " Marcus breathed.

"In less than fifty hours, the second and final cleansing will begin. All formerly human vampires will be destroyed. And L'yra shall return the Phaalin crew to its normal, mortal state."

"What of Cornelia? I thought you loved her. Will you kill her too?"

"I am a Phaalin Judge. I must uphold the law no matter what my personal feelings are. I will see to it that the second cleansing is quick and thorough. There will be no suffering survivors like Vatha." H'aph glared at T'eth again. "And there would have been none the first time if you had not stopped the process prematurely!"

H'aph turned his back on the stunned group and went away. They looked to T'eth. She shook her head.

"I can't stop it. No one can. The process that made us what we are will be reversed. The Phaalin will return to normal, but the humans will die, burned from within as the billion of tiny Phaalin machines that flow in their blood disintergrate."

"Tiny machines?" asked Jack.

"Your people will someday learn how to build with atoms as we do. Uncounted billions of these devices swarm in our blood, keeping us from aging and dying... "

"But they were defective machines," nodded Marcus.

"Yes, making us vampires." T'eth tapped one of the metallic wristbands she wore. "L'yra, how long until liftoff?"

"Forty nine point eight nine cycles," a feminine voice crooned.

"More than enough time," T'eth muttered to herself before going on in a louder voice. "Five to beam to last coordinates."

"Energizing."

As L'yra complied, T'eth and the heron men dissolved into waves of sparkling energy and were almost instantly reconstituted on the grounds of the monastery of those who followed the path of the hidden snake. T'eth turned to her companions.

"Go now, back to your spirit realm. You will be safe there from the effects of the cleansing."

"You know of the spirit realm?"

"Yes, but H'aph does not. You must survive."

"Why?"

"Why would I care about you? Because there is another law we Phaalin honor, that truth must be defended. You know the truth now about how vampires came to be, the result of a malfunction of an alien device, and you must live to let others know." T'eth paused. "You are also good men, you have not misused your power. I trust you not to create more like yourselves and cause the problems H'aph feared. Go now and live."

"What of Cornelia?" asked Marcus.

"Or the green man?" Basil added. "Or those I created while I lived in Constantinople? Do they still survive? And is there any hope for them if they do?"

"I can only do so much," T'eth demurred, "but I will do what I can."

"We have two days," Marcus told his fellows as they returned to the huge pine that served as a portal to the spirit realm. "This is what I plan to do... "

+* * *

No sooner had the sun set in London than a certain old tree glowed on the estate called Lionsgate and six heron men came out of it. Marcus, Basil and Jack took off at once into the city. The others went to the nearby mansion and rang the bell. The servant who opened the door stared in mingled surprise and delight.

"Master Philip! You've come back!"

"Hello Peter. Is my uncle at home?"

"No sir, he is at Swansgrave Manor."

"Oh, well, I shall be staying for only a short time." Phil glanced at Hun Tzu and Eben. "Shall we relax in the library while we wait?"

"Are you expecting visitors?" asked Peter.

"Yes, but you need not concern yourself about them. I shall see to it."

Besides Philip and Leo, a few more of those whom Basil had known long ago in Constantinople had survived and continued to live in the area of London. After explaining the danger they were in, Hun Tzu treated them so that they could enter the spirit realm and be protected. It was not as many as Basil had hoped for and as dawn approached, he retreated to safety, wishing he could do more.

It was full day in that part of China where the monastery of those who followed the path of the hidden snake stood. So Hun Tzu and those heron men who could be there saw an unbelievable sight when the time came for the Phaalin to depart. A great flash of light to the westward told of the disintergation of the cavern L'yra had laid in for millennia, the conversion of billions of tons of rock to pure energy to fuel the ship and broadcast a deadly signal.

Throughout the world, all traces of Phaalin technology were eradicated. And this time, as Judge H'aph had promised, it was thorough. Those vampires who returned to earth after the Phaalin were gone found themselves a tiny remnant of a unique culture that had been present behind the shadows of the human world almost since its beginning. Most of them, like Marcus, were content to be human again and stay in the spirit realm. Those few who wished to remain on earth promised to make no more of their kind. But only time would tell if such promises could be kept.

THE END

of The Return Of Hunts-by-night

the second epilogue to the series

'The Way Of The Heron'

by C. T. Creekmur

comments or suggestions are welcome at tcreekmur@hotmail.com

Copyright (c) 2009 by Charles T. Creekmur

"All Rights Reserved"

submitted to www.nifty.org 1/27/2009

this is the last of the heron stories for now I hope you have enjoyed them