by John Wilson
Hei’s smile broadened. “I have served many over the years.”
“Perhaps then we should call you Shenxian, Claec or even Heian.”
Hei tilted his head in acknowledgment. “You may call me what you wish. I have many names.”
“What do you want with us?” she asked.
Howard could hear that she was struggling to keep her voice calm.
“I don’t want anything with you. It’s young Howard I want. He’s the one with the true power.”
“What do you mean?” Howard asked in a panic. “I have no power.”
“Just because you don’t know you have it doesn’t mean you don’t.”
Hei was close now, and black spots were racing wildly across Howard’s vision.
“I can taste your power,” Hei went on, licking his lips. “It runs off you like a falling tide off rocks.”
Howard shuddered and struggled to keep his knees from giving way.
Cate began to speak. “Don’t make the mistake of assuming that I have no power,” she said. “Let us go or…”
Howard never found out what Cate’s threat was. Without taking his eyes off Howard, Hei chanted something unintelligible. Cate’s voice faded, and she slumped to the floor.
“Cate!” Howard crouched beside her.
“Your annoying partner is only sleeping,” Hei said. “Leon, why don’t you tell our young friend why we need him?”
Howard stood up and turned to Leon, who was lounging against the rock wall, idly caressing a tentacled idol.
“The goth geek,” Leon began, waving casually at Cate on the floor, “told you some of it, and we’ve shown you some in your dreams, but there is more—much, much more.
“Long before you can imagine, when you were only a single cell floating on the ocean currents of this new world, the Elder Gods came here from the distant stars of a different dimension. They were the few surviving exiles fleeing from a great war that had destroyed entire galaxies. They found refuge here, hiding from the Ancient Ones who had defeated them in war.”
Despite his terror and the swirling black spots, Howard felt himself strangely drawn to this bizarre tale of primordial aliens visiting Earth. He couldn’t have pulled his gaze from Leon’s wide, mesmeric eyes even had he wanted to.
“For countless millennia the Elder Gods hid, but eventually they were discovered. One of the Ancient Ones read the dimensions right and arrived on this world. He was greedy to destroy the Elder Gods, but he was careless, and his enemies had learned much during their long wait. He was too powerful to be killed, so they trapped him with knots of power in the empty expanses of nothingness between the dimensions of space and time. He lies there still, in R’lyeh—in a deathlike sleep, alive and yet not alive—and one day soon he will arise to take his rightful place as lord of all.”
“This is insanity!” Howard shouted.
“No point in getting upset,” Hei interjected smoothly. “You have no choice now, so just listen. All will become clear.”
“After the Ancient One was trapped,” Leon continued, “the Elder Gods felt safer. They built vast cities of stone in the remotest corners of the world. But they missed their home. As the puny life of this world struggled to pull itself out of the slime, the Elder Gods waited and planned. At length, they felt strong enough to return to their own dimension.”
While Howard listened to Leon’s ancient-history lesson, he managed to tear his eyes away for a second to look down at Cate. She was in the same position as before, breathing regularly. She opened one eye and winked at him.
“What does all this have to do with us?” Howard asked, returning his gaze to Leon. “The Ancient One is trapped, and the Elder Gods have returned to their dimension.”
“Well, my geek friend,” Leon said in an almost friendly voice, “setting aside the stories that some of the Elder Gods remained behind in lost and hidden corners of this world, we are concerned with the Ancient One. He sleeps in death and dreams. As you know, the Realm of the Elder Gods is sweeping closer. As it does, it squeezes the nothingness where the Ancient One sleeps. The void is being crushed closer to our own time, creating a congruence. We are closer to the Ancient One than we have ever been—he can hear us, and we can hear him.”
“Why do you care?” Howard asked. “You’re less than a backyard ant to these gods you’re talking about. They won’t even notice you.”
“Those of us who worship the Ancient One,” Hei cut in, “have been waiting for this moment of conjunction forever. This is our chance to awaken our god so that he may bring death and destruction to all unbelievers.”
Hei spoke with a chilling calm, but Leon chimed in with eager fanaticism. “He has promised that we’ll be able to travel freely through the realms of time and space. Imagine the power! We will swim in the methane seas of Titan, surf the swirling rings of Saturn and more. We will watch suns explode off Orion’s shoulder and understand Azathoth, the crawling chaos at the center of everything.” Leon’s eyes gleamed with a manic fervor as he described his mad dreams.
“All we need—all we have ever needed—is the key,” Hei explained. “A key to usher in a golden age of belief and allow a select few to travel to places and times you cannot begin to imagine. You should be honored.”
“Honored?”
“Yes, honored.” Hei leaned forward, and Howard felt a wave of nausea sweep through him. “You are the key. You have been chosen to awaken the Ancient One from his dreaming death.”
“What is the Ancient One called?” Cate asked, hauling herself off the floor and standing beside Howard.
“Threaten me again and I will return you to a less annoying state,” said Hei. “The Ancient One is known by many names,” he continued. “His true name can never be pronounced by human mouths, but he has been called Xieshen, or you may know him as Cthulhu.”
“Cthulhu,” Howard said, his tongue twisting around the odd syllables. “I’ve heard of that.”
“As the dimensions have swirled closer,” Hei said, “some of the Ancient One’s dreams have leaked through to those who can hear them. I briefly thought we had found the chosen one in the writer H.P. Lovecraft, but the time was not right, and he was weak and merely used what he discovered to write stories. But enough of this idle chatter. The Ancient One has waited long enough. It is time.”
SANXINGDUI
THE GOLDEN MASK
“Where is everyone?” Chen asked. He and Ting sat on their horses in front of Sanxingdui’s open city gates. They looked up the wide boulevard that led directly to Emperor Kun’s palace. Normally it was a thriving place, with market stalls lining both sides and the city’s residents going about their daily business. Now it was deserted except for a flock of squabbling crows and a few skinny dogs scavenging for scraps among piles of garbage.
“The city’s been abandoned,” Ting whispered. It was obvious, but the sight was so shocking that she had to say it out loud.
“I can see that,” Chen said, “but why? The flood is not too bad this far from the mountains.”
After the landslide, Chen and Ting had worked their way down from the mountains, giving the destroyed army camp a wide berth. They had met only a few straggling survivors who paid them no attention. It had taken them most of the day, and as they traveled, they had felt four more powerful earthquakes and seen columns of dust rise from landslides in the mountains.
As they had neared the city, they’d moved closer to the river, which, fed by the water pouring out of Min Lake, had become a surging torrent. It had flooded fields and swept away dwellings built too close to the old riverbank. At Sanxingdui it had destroyed the docks by the river and washed away sections of the city walls. But everything else seemed intact, which made the total absence of people even stranger.
“Even if they had been escaping the flood,” Ting pointed out, “they couldn’t all have fled in the time since the landslide this morning. This has been planned. Look! The sacred masks have been removed from their pedestals on either side o
f the road.”
“What should we do?”
“Let’s go to the palace and see if we can find a clue there to tell us what happened.”
Leaving the horses grazing on a patch of grass by the gate, Chen, Ting and Fu made their way through the eerily deserted streets. All the masks and the huge bronze trees that had decorated the city squares were gone. Even Fu seemed overwhelmed by the silence and stayed close to Ting.
Only when they reached the main square in front of the palace did they meet anyone—and it was someone they knew. Shenxian’s assistant, Fan Tong, dressed in grubby workman’s clothes, was hauling a large elephant tusk out of the palace and loading it onto a handcart.
“What are you doing?” Ting asked.
“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m taking this elephant tusk to the sacred pit. Nice of you to show up and offer to help, but I could have used the help this morning. I’ve moved sixty-seven of these things to the pit, and you show up when I’m on the last one.”
“But the city looks abandoned. Why are you still here?” Chen asked.
“Because Shenxian left me here,” Fan Tong said bitterly.
“Where is everyone else?”
“Packed up and moved to Jinsha.” Fan Tong dropped the fat end of the tusk onto the cart with a thump.
“Why?”
“Because the end of the world’s coming. If you ask me, it can’t come soon enough. I’ve been Shenxian’s loyal servant forever, and what do I get for it? I get abandoned in this collapsing dump to work for the emperor while Shenxian goes off to find an army. I should have gone to Jinsha like the rest of them, but what’s the point of that? One place is as bad as another at the end of the world.”
“The emperor is still here?” Chen asked.
“Of course. He and that sorceress woman are alone in the palace.” Fan Tong shrugged wearily, lifted the handles of his cart and set off around the corner of the palace, leaving Chen and Ting staring after him.
“I almost feel sorry for him,” Ting said.
“Not me. When he had Shenxian looking after him, he was unbearable. He deserves the job of filling in the sacred pits.”
“We should go and find the emperor and Jingshen,” Ting suggested. “They’ll be able to tell us what happened.”
As she led the way up the palace steps, Chen noticed that the huge statue of Emperor Kun holding an elephant tusk was gone, presumably into the sacred pit. As they reached the doors, a strong earthquake shook the building. It didn’t last long, but cracks wide enough for Chen to put his hand in appeared on the mud walls.
When the shaking stopped they moved into the building, keeping close to the walls in case the ceiling collapsed. Fu scampered on ahead, checking out the rooms on either side. Eventually he disappeared into the tearoom.
“Even when my city is emptied, I cannot escape you.”
Chen recognized the emperor’s voice coming from the room. He and Ting hurried in to find Kun sitting at the tea table with Fu on his lap. He looked up as the two bowed.
“Dogs are very clever. For all my shouting at him, I could never hide the fact that I had a soft spot for this ugly beast.” He happily scratched Fu behind the ears. “I see you made it back safely. Jingshen is making tea. Perhaps, Chen, you could honor us with one of your clever serving dances?”
“I would be glad to,” he said.
“Sit and tell me of your journey across the mountains.”
Before Chen could begin his story, Jingshen appeared in the doorway with a tray of tea. “I heard voices,” she said, “so I brought cups for all.”
With her encouragement, Chen served the tea. His body still hurt from the unaccustomed hours on horseback, but he struggled through.
Once they had settled, Chen and Ting told Kun and Jingshen about their adventures, the rescue, the journey across the mountains and the tribal army’s destruction in the earthquake and its resulting landslide and flood.
“So,” Chen concluded, “Shenxian’s plan cannot work. Sanxingdui is safe. The people can return.”
“I’m afraid it’s not that simple,” Jingshen said. “Shenxian’s army is not the danger.”
Chen was about to ask her what she meant, but a deep and all-too-familiar rumble came at them from the ground below. All four of them held on to their teacups as the room swayed and the table lurched wildly, throwing the teapot and its tray onto the floor.
When the movement had ceased, Kun said, “The tremors are getting stronger.”
“And more frequent,” Jingshen added.
“Is it time?” Kun asked.
“It is very close.” Turning to Chen and Ting, she went on, “Come and look.” She led them to the window that faced the Min Mountains.
The mountains still stood, but they were dwarfed by an immense cloud of dust. The cloud was round, but streamers of darker dust writhed out from it, and lightning flashed within it.
Chen found the red glow of the sun setting behind the cloud disturbing somehow. “It’s much worse than this morning,” he remarked. “The dust cloud is growing, and it almost seems alive.”
He sensed Jingshen staring at him.
“Tell me what it looks like,” she said.
“It looks like an overturned bowl with tendrils—no, tentacles—coming out from it. The lightning seems almost alive, and the sun, glowing red in the middle, looks like”—Chen paused, searching for the right word—“it looks like an eye watching us.”
“It’s the eye of God,” Jingshen said.
“What does it mean?”
“It means that Shenxian is still alive, and that we must go down to the Chamber of the Deep.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Jingshen answered, turning to look at Kun, “that is where the Golden Mask is, and it must be destroyed before Shenxian gets here.”
The emperor regarded her calmly. “You have advised me long and well,” he said at length, “but what you ask is hard. The Golden Mask is everything. It is our connection to the gods and the source of the power that has kept our city safe for centuries. Without it we are nothing. Are you certain?”
Jingshen nodded slowly. “There is no other way. The dimensions are opening, and already we have a glimpse of the ancient terrors hidden within them. Shenxian’s power is growing by the minute. If we do not destroy the Golden Mask, he will put it on—and then nothing we can do will prevent the end of everything.”
“If the Golden Mask is so powerful, can you not wear it and defeat Shenxian?” Ting asked.
“The power of the Golden Mask is far too great for any mortal to control. Putting it on will give the wearer access to all other dimensions and all times. What Shenxian’s desire for power has blinded him to is that the mask works in two ways: it not only opens other dimensions to the wearer, but also opens our dimension to all others. There are beings in those other dimensions that would gleefully destroy everything in our world without a second thought.
“The time of the prophecy has come. The dimensions are close, and the magic holding the Golden Mask is weak. I fear it is already too late to save Sanxingdui, but if we fracture the mask’s power and prevent Shenxian from wearing it, we will save the rest of the world. It must be done, and it must be done now. There is little time.”
The emperor let out a sigh and nodded his head. “Of course you’re right. This day has been long foreseen, but I had hoped…”
Kun lifted a heavy lantern from the wall, lit it with a flint and, with Jingshen beside him, set off to the stairs that led down to the Chamber of the Deep. Chen and Ting, their minds reeling with questions and worries, followed with Fu at their heels.
The stairs spiraled down around a vast bronze tree of life—taller than the highest building in the city, yet buried deep in the earth. Sacred ornaments, statues and masks hung from the tree’s forged branches. Bells tinkled and the ornaments swayed as vibrations passed through the earth.
At last the stairs twisted in more tightly, ending in front of an arch f
ormed by the tree’s metal roots. A heavy door covered in fantastic carved faces sealed the arch. Jingshen passed the emperor a large key, and he handed her the lantern. He inserted the key in the door’s lock and turned it three times. The door swung out, forcing the emperor to step back.
Chen stood in the fragile circle of light provided by the lantern and stared into the blackness through the door. Cold air wafted out of the arch, making them all shiver. Chen suddenly had the odd feeling that the darkness beyond the door went on forever, and that if he stepped into it, he would be lost in infinity.
Jingshen stepped forward and held the lantern high. Something glittered in the depths of the darkness. “You must do it,” she said.
Taking a deep breath, Kun moved through the door. Jingshen, Chen, Ting and Fu followed him, and as the light increased, they all saw the Golden Mask. It sat atop a roughly carved jade pillar. Kun and Jingshen had seen it many times before, but Chen and Ting were struck dumb by the mask’s beauty and radiating sense of power.
The Golden Mask was a fraction of the size of the many sacred masks that had decorated the city’s temples and public spaces, but it had an energy they lacked. In the flickering lantern light it seemed to move and change expression—one moment it was smiling, the next frowning. And always the large protruding eyes were watching. Chen felt they were searching deep into his soul. The three horizontal lines incised in the center of the mask’s broad forehead seemed to be winking at him.
Jingshen tapped Kun on his shoulder and handed him a small bronze hammer.
“That’s too small,” Kun said. “It will never break the mask.”
“Sometimes the power is concentrated in small things. Strike the mask three times,” she ordered.
The emperor took the hammer. It felt stupidly light. This couldn’t succeed in breaking the mask! Nevertheless, he stepped forward and held the lantern high.
Jingshen began intoning:
When that which is far comes near,
That which is closed may open.
Kun raised the hammer. The mask seemed to be grinning. Tentatively he brought the hammer down on the forehead. As far as Chen could see, nothing happened.