“If you take up this quest, the Chagga people will remember you in our songs.”
“I’m not doing this for you,” Dinga said.
“Then at least with the rainy season ended, your journey should be easier.”
V.
The silence was so perfect, so profound, that Dinga thought he had passed through the veil into the next world. He only had to traverse two chambers from the site of his ambush to reach the iron hut. Thick and stout, the door of a palace’s keep, it stood three heads taller than him and broad enough for three men of his size to pass through at the same time quite comfortably. A sense of foreboding rippled through him. Though he knew that the massive door was set correctly, it had the illusion of being crooked. It canted first to the left then, in his next glance, to the right — a back-and-forth sensation that inspired a sense of seasickness. He reached for one of the iron handholds and pulled the door open.
The door opened into a dark cavernous hallway, though light danced at the end of it. The glow wavered like heat lines from desert sand. Through the wavering ebon murk of the desolate hallway, Dinga made out wall paintings depicting a story he could barely comprehend. Decadent art depicted people at worship to the mountain, of creatures rising from the oceans. Blocks of ancient carving, like stone corpses, in an off-kilter arrangement induced more of the nauseating vertigo. The sensation abandoned him immediately if he didn’t look directly at the art. The sounds of prayerful murmurs half-heard, almost like music played in a dream, echoed from the end of the passage.
Dinga stood outside the room and peered around the corner at the strange scene. Half a dozen naked men knelt dumbly in a half-circle. Each had rings through their noses, large enough for them to be herded like a favored cosset. Each man had been crudely castrated. Judging from the burn scars radiating from the emptiness of their groins across their thighs and bellies, their wounds had been cauterized by torch fire. Like living scrolls, the men had words — old words not meant to be pronounced by human tongues, carved into their flesh. Rough leather cords ran through their lips, sewing their mouths shut. Their sounds had the dissonant quality of cries from a gagged mouth. The vacant expression each wore gave them the semblance of being kin.
A white-skinned woman, not pale like the Spartan, but possessing an unhealthy pallor of color having been drained from her, milled at the center of their entranced ardor. Her head wrapped in a cloth, she doted on them like some horrible mother. Down-turned slits passed for eyes on a face with sagging jowls and endless folds. She squatted before them, rearing back on her haunches, her body like a rotted pear. Rows of what appeared to be gelatinous eggs lined the wall behind her. On an altar of bones, candles in golden holders reflected light reflected onto jewels on the far wall, a thousand gleaming eyes. Incense wafted from bronze bowls.
Suddenly sensing the presence of an intruder, she met Dinga’s eyes squarely. Red froth escaped her lips. If she had said any words, Dinga was already moving and didn’t hear them. The men stirred to somnambulance and scrambled after him. Dinga ran the first man through; the next swipe of his sword severed another man from his shoulder-bone to his breast. Pity was the closest thing that Dinga felt. These were no warriors; there was no honor in this slaughter. No, these were mercy killings. Their littered bodies were like fallen leaves. The last man turned to run away, but he was cut down in an instant. The man left a bloody smear, a red snail’s wake, as he crawled toward the woman.
Her merciless eyes followed Dinga. What he thought was an ancient story writ into the ice-scarred veins of her skin, upon closer inspection, was the scale-like quality of that skin. She had dwelt with her Higher Ones for so long that she was no longer quite human. The air in the room became stagnant, growing hot, as if heat was generated within him, slowly cooking him from the inside. A sickly yellow-green glow emanated from a split in the space between them. The witch-mother began to laugh uncontrollably. Terrible and maniacal, her laughter was more unsettling than if she had started screaming.
“You are too late,” she said in her queer, flat tone. “The vitality of such a fine warrior may finally prove enough to call them forth.”
The pale green light, accompanied by a strange buzzing, revealed black spots, which soon split and opened into mouths. It was as if the hut itself attempted to give birth to an old and hungry power. Dinga could feel it coming. His mistake, he realized, was believing the woman to be the owner of the hut. No, she was its priestess and the hut its temple. It. That which dwelled outside, and that was how Dinga knew it — the Dweller Outside — neared. Over the tittering of her age-dimpled face, her fat tongue lolled over her teeth. She began to chant.
His heart pumped madly. He had no knowledge of the dark arts. He knew no ritual to undo the opening that she wrought. All he knew was the sword and the blessing of Onyame. He ran the cold iron of his blade through her heart. Her half-closed eyes sprang open, terribly bulbous, distracted but still standing despite the hunk of metal protruding from her chest. Unaware, her arm drifted into the fissure she had created. The burning light of a terrible sunset blistered and charred her arm to a fleshy red ruin. She continued her atonal drone, forming words he almost recognized — all despite her life quickly draining from her. With her life ebbing, the doorway she opened started to close. A bestial howl cried from beyond. With a last gasp, an ebon tentacle lashed out, a taloned finger carving into her flesh. Before Dinga had a chance to study the words, the tentacle withdrew, just as the crack in space sealed itself. Her vacant eyes congealed, then hardened. Her entire body appeared to gain the sheen of ice, her skin transformed to crystal. Dinga could still feel the steady pulse of energy building.
The throb of power intensified. The altar tore from its perch on the wall and revealed a shaft that led further down the mountain. Dinga dove for the tunnel and scrambled madly, as fast as he could, praying for passage through the honey-combed mountain. He turned his head, only to see arcs of lightning crackling throughout the room. A few moments later, a terrible explosion roared in his ears.
Dinga re-traversed the course of the mountain in much shorter time, his route now much more direct. He noticed the lights dancing around the mountain the moment he emerged from the tunnels and trekked back along the ridge of forest. The first smell of smoke alerted him to trouble. By the time he reached the village, all that remained was the smoldering ruins. The great houses were smashed to rubble, the walls scorched to screes of pebbles. The ironworks lay topped and aflame. The cloying stench of burnt flesh choked the air. He imagined the screams of the poor souls now silenced. Numbness washed over him, not the dreadful cold stilling his body’s warmth but more a chill of the spirit. The scent of death was heavy in the air, though no bodies could he find. Shards of crystal littered the area.
“Victory comes at a great cost,” Naiteru said from behind him. Dinga whirled at the sound of his voice, disturbed that he had never heard the man’s approach. He rested his hand on the hilt of his dagger.
“The village?” Dinga asked.
“Her will bound the land,” Naiteru said. “The ... witch-mother.”
The man that stood before him wore the face of his childhood friend, but his bearing, his manner, was that of a stranger, not the warrior he knew.
“Who are you?” Dinga asked.
“You are perceptive, gentle warrior. You may call me Naiteru-kop. I have been touched by the Old Ones. I will usher them into this plane when the time comes.”
Dinga drew his dagger. Naiteru-kop stripped it from him, with the effort of a parent taking away a child’s plaything.
“We will meet again, young Dinga,” Naiteru-kop tossed the dagger aside and turned to walk away. “For your sake, let it be later rather than sooner.”
Dinga watched him for a time then turned to the horror of the village. With nothing left to keep him there, he searched the camp for what he knew remained. After a few minutes, he found it: Naiteru’s spear. Dinga used it as a walking stick and headed out of the village, his eyes forever
fixed on the horizon.
VI.
The incessant howl of the wind stirred Leopold to wakefulness. His clothes were clammy; the coppery taste of fear filled his mouth. He was quite aware of his heartbeat, but his dream had the eerie clarity of memory. And prophecy. At first, he thought it further excitement at some new discovery. He had gone to bed with the men re-doubling their efforts at the dig. The stone ruins of many buildings, the acropolis, the elliptical temple. The certainty of their expedition having awoken something seized him.
Possessed of the singular notion to flee, and to leave all of his things and run. Neither the direction nor the destination mattered, only the fact that he needed to leave this dead, cursed city, lest he re-live the terror of the original denizens. The desolate summit called to him, hidden by the Stygian shadow of the leering mountain.
Leopold had an irresistible urge to glance back, maybe to gauge the pace of the pursuit of whatever stalked him. Maybe it was the same bit of regretful longing that caused Lot’s wife to turn back toward Sodom and Gomorrah. Regardless of the reason, he looked back and what he saw rooted him to his spot every bit as much as if he has been changed into a pillar of salt.
McKreager staggered toward him.
Whatever damnable fervor in which he had taken to the shard still possessed him. Wearing a loose cloth around his head, he still clutched the crystal. His hand appeared white, as if the color had drained from it, his vessels a network of blue bulges. Terribly sloth-like, with sweat streaked down his face, he huffed with each step. Watching him had the prescient cruelty of watching him give birth. Tenebrous power curled about him. The hastily-thrown-on cloth slowly fell from his head. McKreager’s skull splintered and protruded, the jutting bones pointed in five directions. He opened his mouth. His words had a musical quality to them.
And Leopold began to laugh. A terrible, cold laughter.
JON CARVER OF
BARZOON, YOU
MISUNDERSTOOD
BY GRAHAM J. DARLING
Jon Carver of Barzoon, you misunderstood.
The True Love whom you met in dreams was the goddess of this planet: pluripotent relict of a vanished race, marooned here eons before you ever were. (Do not doubt her love; she was made for love.) Your crash-landing awakened her to purpose. The honeyed tongue she thrust between your lips divided to sample your every cell; while she cradled your broken body, you and she populated an empty world.
Its seas were modelled on your tears and its bogs on your bile. The waving jungles you hacked through came from your hair; the vitreous plains you traversed, from your fingernails; the sluggoths you battled, from your own lymphocytes; the steeds you rode, from your heart. The warriors you led to blood and glory were your sons, working out their destiny; the princesses you rescued, your daughters; the Transfederation you built by the seat of your pants, already your family. (Have you not wondered why they all speak your tongue?)
The caecal dungeons in bone citadels you regularly woke in, and escaped from, were hospital wards, where your eyes or limbs sliced in ivory swordplay were switched out; here they all are, mounted and healed, looking and waving at you, in the Museum of the Man.
The Darkened Lord against whom you strove is yourself, enthroned. We surrendered Brain-Priests are your own. Here is your crown. Please be seated. She’ll be with you in a minute.
SUN SORROW
BY PAUL JESSUP
…and then Beyla sat down under the lost arch and thought again of Carcosa, and the hidden secrets she’d searched for in its crowded temples and burning libraries. She picked up the rabbit head, deep in her own thoughts, staring into the dead eyes. Wanting to forget. Wanting to remember. Perverse, the way her mind worked. She rubbed the tips of the ears, pushing them back against the head. Slick, like hair. The oracle. She had found him. He was dead, but she had found him.
She ran her hands over the fur of the rabbit head and felt the cool, glassy bone jutting out from where the neck used to be. She spun it in her hands, severed from the corpse that sat behind her, large head, rabbit head, head as big as human head. Teeth of human teeth placed in rabbit mouth, dead eyes staring at her. She was pressed between two alleys and under the stained glass arch, the red sun above like a staring eye, dead man eye looking right at her, staring right at her.
— Do you know who I am?
No response. She shook the head. Hoping to revive it. Hoping it would twitch its nose, move its whiskers. Nothing. Behind, she heard the caws of the birds crying out and missed the red shores of Carcosa. She wished she’d never left the cursed city. Shehe thought again of the sleeping gods and the spiral towers and wanted to go back. But no, no, banished.
— Answer me. Tell me what you know. Do you know who I am, what I’ve done?
She lifted the skull right up to her lips. Eyes staring at eyes. It did not smell. She expected it to smell. She saw glowing maggots in the eyes, eating away at them, devouring them and laying eggs.
— Can you give me redemption? Can you save me, change me? I’m not my actions, am I? I’m something more than the things I’ve done; that has to be it. I’m not a bad person. I’m not a demon or a witch-eater. I’m a good person, deep down inside. Can’t you understand that? Can’t you take this away, clean me from the inside out, wash these memories away?
The smile was crooked, human teeth too big for rabbit mouth. She saw a grin at the corners of the lips and wondered if it was laughing at her. She felt like screaming and crying and pounding her fists. She just didn’t understand, couldn’t understand at all. In life, the Loryx would’ve been able to do these things, been able to see her for who she really was and wipe her mistakes away.
But the Loryx was dead. She let the skull drop to the ground. It rolled around, spinning with worm-eaten eyes glancing at her, weighing her with death. She turned, walked away, walked back into the city where the paper lanterns were just starting to glow and the red light of dusk was washing over the towers like a rag from a wound.
The city of a hundred fires, the city of the burning towers, the city of Xylos, the city of the dreaming dead. This was the city where others went to forget, to lose themselves amongst grand and simple pleasures, the city where the red flowers blossomed on the alleyway corpses and the air was filled with the light of glowing night worms. This was a city whose name was etched at the first hours when the sun broke and the world started spinning towards decay and death. It was the first city of the new world, the dying world. The first city born in the age of constant death.
They say that before the sun cracked, the world was filled with life and everyone was expected to live forever. They say that before the sun cracked, the world was a place of constant wonder, of amazing things that were never seen again. They say all sorts of things about the world before death, but many discount it as idle dreams and escapism. Stories told to pacify the weak of spirit.
Beyla ran her hands over the red-clay walls as she walked, her head bent down and staring at the cobblestones beneath her feet. It was a pattern of red, white, red, black, red, gray. Maybe she should’ve kept the rabbit skull. Maybe it would’ve spoken to her, told her about her life, forgiven her for her mistakes. Maybe all it took was time for the oracle to shake off the cold hand of death and tell her what she desperately wanted to hear.
The clay walls felt like bones under her hand. The red sun was gone now, set beneath the swollen crust of the world. Cold settled under her skin and she kept herself from shivering by wrapping her arms around her shoulders. She tried to keep warm. That was the curse of the broken sun: hot, sweating daylight hours filled with moist fire and dark, cold, blue nights that froze and iced the skin. She had to find a place to sleep for the night, before the cold really came in and she became like the many homeless dead on the city streets.
Where did Mims want to meet? She couldn’t remember. Some part of her didn’t want to remember. Remembering would bring back all the life she’d lived until now and she didn’t want any of that. She fought against her nihilistic i
mpulses and remembered briefly where she was supposed to meet him. The Shrinking Giant. A house. A grand old place near the edges of the city.
With that memory followed another memory tagging along behind it, grabbing onto it and riding it up into her thoughts. Climbing into her mind before she could forget it, make it go away, or make it stop. Clear, clear, clear. Like a bell ringing in her mind. So clear.
She remembered:
Shoving little face under the water and it struggled and she held it down and it was flailing and she pushed harder. She couldn’t look down. Couldn’t look into the eyes. She wanted to stop existing, she wanted to stop being, but she couldn’t. She had to keep on living, so pushed it down harder. Cramming the head against the rocks at the bottom of the lake.
She was crying. She remembered that. Remembered her cheeks wet with tears and she would lift the head up, thinking, No, no, I’ll let you live. I love you so much I’ll let you live, and then she would see the face, wide eyes and screaming and terrified, and she would shove it back down under the water again. And she was crying again. And the body was flailing again.
Why couldn’t she forget these things? If only it had been the once ....
Mims: raven hair, piled up on head. Stick-thin body. Low-lidded, sleepy-eyed. Nose-like bird beak, lips plump and crooked in a constant sarcastic grin. He rolled dice in his hands when he was nervous and cheated at cards whenever they stopped for a drink. He had nightmares of snakes devouring him. He had known Beyla since they were young, and lived up in the far north and dreamt of Carcosa together.
He knew of her memories and didn’t care. He didn’t believe in absolution and didn’t believe in the concept of the soul or a spirit. He believed in finite existences, human beings like fireflies, our lights going out all-too-fast. He knew she would probably kill the oracle; his cards had told him as much earlier on in the day. The oracle was meant to die and we was waiting to die. Beyla just happened to be the one who killed him each time, each repetition of the action creating a greater weight around their necks.
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