Alhazred

by Donald Tyson

  “Our cause is just,” he said harshly, his face almost touching my own. “We will triumph in the end.”

  By way of answer, I chose to bite his cheek. He howled in fury and pulled back, blood streaming down his chin and neck.

  “Nyarlathotep!” I cried with all the strength in my lungs.

  The effect was astonishing. The fighting ceased in the scroll room and in the large outer chamber of the scriptorium. For several heartbeats everyone stood frozen in place and held their breath. The sound of more distant battles echoed from the corridor. Then time moved again, and the fighting resumed.

  “Your god is a fraud,” the guardian said with a sneer on his lips.

  He thrust his tiny poisoned blade deep into the flesh of my neck. There was almost no pain, only a prick like that of a thorn. Before he could remove it, Martala grasped him by the collar with her left fist and pulled him backward, ripping the blade away.

  “Take care,” I called to her, my voice strangely weakened. “His hand is deadly.”

  She did not even look at me, but kept her eyes fixed upon him as she searched for a vital place to bury her knife. As fast as she was, he was quicker. He regained his feet in an instant and while she watched his right hand to avoid the poisoned steel, he struck her with his left fist in the side of the face. She fell without a sound and lay motionless.

  From the corridor came irregular cries. They were not the same as the former shouts of battle, but were screams of terror, each cut off as it reached its height of intensity. My mind strangely calm, I observed that the screams drew nearer. A kind of heat pulsed through my heart and moved in my veins. It made me weak, so that it was an effort merely to hold up my head.

  The enraged face of the guardian loomed over mine, his left cheek a mass of bloody flesh.

  “I would like to stay and watch the poison take its effect, which will be the work of only a few minutes,” he hissed. “You will be intrigued by its action upon your body. Alas, I must carry this scroll to my masters.”

  He turned his hand so that his little blade was on its side and prepared to draw it across my throat. I found myself unable to raise my arm in defense, but could only meet his gaze with my own.

  The sudden stillness was so absolute, it made him hesitate and turn to look over his shoulder at the rest of the room. Glancing past him, I saw Feisel standing with his back against one of the racks, bloody sword limp in his hand. It slipped from his fingers and clattered to the floor. Everyone stood as though carved from stone, staring at the doorway, which was filled with the body of a tall brother of the order. Yet it was not a member of the brotherhood, I corrected myself. The robe he wore beneath his cloak was of a different cut, and faded by wind and sun. Its dusty hem swept the floor and stirred the air into a breeze that touched my face with chillness. In it was the dryness of the desert and the scent of death.

  With swift steps he walked in a circle around the perimeter of the room, touching with his black hand now this man, now that man as he passed, yet sparing them scarce a glance. As his bony fingers reached out, the man he was about to touch screamed, and as the touch was made, the cry cut off in his throat, and he fell to dust, so that his robe collapsed to an empty, rumpled pile on the floor.

  The traitor who had been about to kill me found strength to leap to his feet and confront the dark man as he approached with his hand outstretched.

  “I defy you, demon,” he shrieked.

  The dark man brushed his cheek, and he became dust.

  He was about to continue past me, when I made a noise in my throat. He paused to regard me, as though with mild curiosity.

  “I am your agent,” I croaked. It was almost impossible to talk. My throat had swollen. “Cure me.”

  “That is not in my power,” he said in a hollow tone.

  Bending at the waist, he reached down to touch my head, and I thought my end had come. The touch did not kill me, but seemed to have no effect.

  “I have delayed the action of the poison. What would have taken minutes will now take days. Travel above the Cataracts. That is where the poison was brewed. There you will find its antidote.”

  “Wait! How will I find it?”

  He had already passed on, killing as he went. In seconds he departed from the scriptorium, and I heard the death cries of the traitors echoing in the corridors.

  I tried to stand but found myself too weak even to move my legs.

  Let me help you, my love, Sashi said within my mind.

  Closing my eyes, I saw her beautiful face near mine. She breathed her perfumed breath into my parted lips, and strength returned to my limbs. The pain in my joints that had been increasing in intensity vanished.

  Opening my eyes, I pushed myself to my feet. My head felt strange, as though it were a hollow bell. I recognized my dagger where it lay a few steps away, and retrieved it.

  “How long can you counteract the effects of the poison?”

  Not long. It is powerful and seeks your death. You must hurry.

  The servants and brothers of the order who remained in the scriptorium stood or stumbled about as though entranced. Feisel knelt over the body of his son, weeping with such force that his square shoulders shook. He had torn away his caul. As I bent to the pile of clothing that had been the traitorous guardian and extracted my scroll, he watched me with wild eyes that streamed tears, but he seemed powerless to speak or act. I shoved the scroll under the sash of my robe and gathered the unconscious Martala into my arms. Her weight was slight. Not wasting a word or glance on Feisel, I left the scriptorium and walked along the corridors, making my way toward the cedar door that led to the hall of pillars and freedom from this accursed place.

  Everywhere, the halls were littered with the bodies of the dead and wounded, and with little piles of clothing that had once been living men. Screams still echoed from the corridor of the private chambers, but my path led away from it. None of the brotherhood attempted to question or stop me. They were unhinged by the presence of their living god, and probably could not have remembered their own names. From the piles of remains, I saw that the traitors had not been great in number, but their uprising might have succeeded due to the late hour at which it occurred, had not the intervention of the god of chaos ended it.

  At least now I knew how important I was to Nyarlathotep’s purposes, I reflected with bitterness. My self-appointed master was quite willing to let me die rather than inconvenience himself. If I was to avoid death, it must be by my own efforts.

  I spent a few precious minutes searching around for where Martala had hidden our possessions. At last I set her down and gently began to slap her cheeks and rub her hands. She sighed a deep sigh and opened her pale eyes. They did not focus on my face.

  “Where did you put our belongings?”

  She seemed not to understand my words. I repeated them. With an effort, she lifted her head and looked around.

  “That room,” she said, pointing at an archway. “Behind the red clay pots.”

  In moments I returned to her side with our belongings, which she had packed into the travel packs given to us by Feisel. Slinging my arm through their straps, I bent to pick her up, but she waved me off and stood on her own feet. Her balance was still not certain. I held her elbow.

  “Wait,” she said, stopping abruptly and patting her robe. “Where is my knife? We must go back for it.”

  “Damn your knife,” I said, pushing her forward. “I’ll buy you a new knife, if I live to see another moon.”

  Cursing weakly, she allowed me to push her through the cedar door and into the deserted hall of pillars. I could not resist pausing before one of the gold plaques on the pillars and prying at its corner with the point of my dagger. The thick gold plate bent but did not come free, and I saw it was fastened too securely to be removed in haste without damaging it. With regret I left t
he enigmatic plates behind us.

  Chapter 25

  Away from the moon shadow of the Sphinx, we opened our packs, stripped off our robes, and changed into our common clothing. The serpent who sheds his old skin must feel the same relief that I experienced once more to stand in my sturdy Muslim coat, Gor’s skull at my belt, my water skin hanging from its shoulder strap at my right hip, and my dagger on its woolen baldric at my left hip, where a sword would have hung, had I possessed such a weapon. Knowing my eccentricity, the girl had filled the water skin. I patted it with contentment.

  Martala balled up her white servant robe and cast it away from her with a sound of disgust.

  “No, put it into the pack.”

  She did not question, but retrieved the robe and stuffed it into her travel pack. When I slung mine over my shoulders on its straps, she did the same.

  Luck was with us. Brothers had arrived at the Sphinx that very night, and had left their horses in the usual hollow, where they had not yet been retrieved but stood pawing the ground and tugging at their tethers. They were three in number. We took the best two and rode at a canter to the ferry. It had completed the unloading of its cargo, and the stout ferry master was about to cast off and sail back to Feisel’s private dock on the eastern bank of the river.

  I stopped behind a screen of dense brush and dismounted, then pulled off my pack and took from it my caul of black silk. Martala regarded me curiously from her saddle.

  “Wrap this around your head,” I told her, handing her the scarf.

  She did as ordered, and I felt a small satisfaction that she had ceased to question every command I gave her. With my knife, I notched the hem of my black robe and tore off a thin strip of cloth. I used this to bind the girl’s hands loosely in front of her, then closed and donned my pack. Before remounting, I took a moment to renew the glamour that concealed my disfigurements. It was easy to forget, after living for weeks in a place where my face had so seldom been seen, save by my servant. I mounted, took the reins from her saddlebow, and led her horse beside mine toward the landing place of the ferry.

  Before the ferry master could speak, I held up my hand.

  “I have urgent business in Fustat. I must get this bitch across the river immediately.”

  He glanced at the girl, and saw that her hands were bound. Still he hesitated. He was the same stocky man with the bristling black beard who had carried me across the river with Feisel.

  “Your master commands you to obey me in all things.”

  I made the sign of greeting used between brothers of the Order. To my great relief, the boatman appeared to recognize it.

  “We are just casting off,” he said gruffly. “Get your horses on board.”

  When we were underway, I caught the eye of the ferry master and beckoned him over. He left the tiller in the hands of the younger man who helped manage the boat. He was not happy at being given orders by a stranger, but he would obey me as long as he thought I had Feisel’s authority.

  “Your master wants me taken to the main docks of the city. He has ordered that you are to arrange for passage in a ship sailing upriver to the First Cataract. He will compensate you when he returns.”

  The man stroked his beard and thought. The effort must have been painful, since it caused him to narrow his eyes and distort his mouth.

  “I know of a ship sailing to the Cataract at first light. They may have room for you. Do you mean to take the girl?”

  “That’s why I’m going.” I lowered my voice to give it a conspiratorial tone. “It is necessary for the good of the brotherhood that she be conveyed to the Cataract.”

  He began to ask a question, saw me shake my head, and closed his mouth.

  “The captain is a friend of mine. I’ll make sure you get passage.”

  With the brotherhood in disarray beneath the Sphinx, I judged that I had several hours to escape Fustat before I was pursued. Once Feisel recovered from his grief over Dru’s death, he would want me apprehended, not only to get back the scroll I had stolen, but to make certain that neither Martala nor I ever betrayed his secrets. He had overheard Nyarlathotep’s words, as had others, so there seemed no reason to conceal our destination. Delay was death for me. I must get up the Nile as quickly as possible, though what I was expected to do there I had not the faintest notion.

  The first rays of the morning sun that broke over the roofs of the muddy and unfinished city of Fustat saw us glide away from the docks on board a flat-bottomed and wide-beamed trading vessel that was aptly named the Elephant’s Foot. The sunlight lit the edges of the fortress of Babylon with fire and gave its looming stone walls an evil aspect. Soldiers moved along its battlements, no larger than ants, their helmets glinting like sparks cast off from a blacksmith’s hammer. It was a place that knew no rest. Somewhere below its foundations, in the bowels of its dungeons, men groaned in despair. I was delighted to turn my back upon it and gaze southward toward the unseen and unguessed fountains of the Nile.

  “How far up the river must we go?” Martala asked, as though she had read my thoughts.

  “The dark man said to sail above the Cataracts. How many are there, anyway?”

  “Many. But it is uncommon for anyone to venture above the first two. The people there are black-skinned and barbarous of custom. It is a dangerous land, Alhazred.”

  In spite of myself, I laughed, and she responded with a smile.

  “Perhaps I will take the risk, even so, since the alternative is death by poison.”

  I looked down into her pale eyes. A bruise discolored her left cheek. The traitorous guardian had struck her a hard blow, and it was a wonder that the bones of her face had not shattered.

  “You are not bound to me. If you wish, you may depart at the first landing. I will give you money so that you can make your way back to Memphis, or anywhere else you desire to travel.”

  “I am your servant,” she said with an angry tone. “When the poison begins to act, you will have need of my help.”

  To this practical if somewhat callous observation, I had no argument. In a few days I might not even be able to walk under my own strength.

  In spite of her ponderous name and broad beam, the Elephant’s Foot glided swiftly against the sluggish current of the Nile when there was a good breeze behind her to fill her enormous square sail. When the breeze died, slower but constant progress was maintained by rhythmic sweeping of the banks of long oars on either side of the ship, for she was a galley, and chained slaves sat on benches below her deck. Her half-Greek captain must have overseen the construction of the craft, which mingled in her details both Greek and Egyptian ornaments.

  Captain Critias was the son of a Greek trader and an Egyptian merchant’s daughter, as I learned in the course of our many conversations. He loved to talk almost as much as he loved his ship. He was a man of small size, but athletic and active, with great strength in his arms. The top of his bald head gleamed with sweat in the sunlight as he darted about, barking orders to his crew, for he wore no turban. He was shaven on the chin, a style not uncommon among the Coptic Egyptians, but by way of compensation, he had allowed his fringe of brown hair to grow long down his back, and kept it in order by braiding it like the lash of a whip. It hung almost to his buttocks, and swung from side to side as he moved.

  His fat young Egyptian wife shared his cabin. She spoke seldom, and then in so soft a voice that it was barely to be understood, but she smiled often and was a great favorite with the crew, who numbered nine Egyptians and four Greeks. They did not dislike their captain, but were afraid of him, and leapt on the instant he gave an order without a grumble, even those twice his size. This was a matter of curiosity to me, since Critias seemed even-tempered and fair in his ways. As was true of most of the Greek traders I had seen in Egypt, he liked to make a display of his wardrobe. Rich silk trim and gold embroidery ornamented his long whit
e tunic, and his belt, broad as my hand, was made of oiled crocodile skin. Jewels caught the sun on the hilt of his sword, which he wore with the assurance of a soldier.

  Martala and I were given a reasonably clean rolled rug to lie upon at night, and an open place near the stern of the ship, a favorable location for sleeping as we soon learned. The breeze was usually behind us, and blew the clean scent of the river into our nostrils. There is no stench so foul as the stench of a slave galley. Even though the slaves were always kept below deck, unless one fell ill, their odor found its way to every part of the ship. Accustomed as I was to the fragrance of human corpses, this did not trouble me greatly, but I was glad for Martala’s sake that most of the stench would be blown away from us during the nights.

  Everything aboard the Elephant’s Foot took place in the open air, except the ordeal of the rowers. The captain’s cabin, located just astern of the mast, consisted of little more than a roof that kept off the sun. He spent much of his time on top of it, scanning the river for signs of drifting logs or other obstructions. When a difficulty was seen, he darted down his ladder and took the long tiller in his own hands. Watching him work it, I understood why his arms were so massive. The ship and the river did not fight each other, but when it was necessary to tack across the current they held a conversation. It could be heard in the lap of the water against the bow and in the creak and groan of the rigging.

  The savor of flat loaves of bread baking in pans, and of strips of mutton frying in oil as the captain’s wife, Fatima, prepared the midday meal, almost overpowered the stench from the hold. She cooked for all the crew working above deck. The evil-looking stew eaten by the slaves was prepared by a slave master near the bow and carried down through the forward hatch in wooden buckets. When the meal was ready, she spoke soft words to her husband, who bellowed to his first mate, and the crew assembled with pans to receive their portions and carry them wherever they wished to enjoy them. Martala and I, as the only passengers aboard the ship, were favored with a bench at the table, and sat facing the stern opposite Critias and his first officer. His wife never sat, but seemed in constant motion as she supplied the table with food and drink.