by Barry Reese
“What is that you’re holding?” George asked, having spied the remnants of the leather bag.
Ki-Gor held it up for his friend to examine. “It was in the shaman’s tent. There is the hint of blood on it.”
Tembu George took the bag and narrowed his eyes. “I have seen this before. About three months ago I went in search of some children who had wandered away from our tribal lands. They had come into Wunguba territory by mistake. I managed to find them, but not before the shaman had come upon them. He held this bag in his right hand and was yelling at the children, accusing them of having spied on his conversation with Idh-yya.”
“Idh-yya,” Ki-Gor repeated, rolling the word across his tongue as if tasting it. “What is that?”
George shrugged his massive shoulders and looked amused. “How the hell should I know? I stepped from the brush and scared him half to death. He took off, claiming he was going to return with enough warriors to kill all of us spies. I never saw him again.”
Ki-Gor grunted. He was ready to abandon this strange place and return to Helene’s side. He had never had the patience for investigation of any sort, though he was called upon to do it surprisingly often.
“I can tell you about Idh-yya.”
The female voice made both Ki-Gor and George jump. They spun around in the direction that the voice had come from, weapons at the ready.
It was unusual enough for someone to sneak up on either of the two jungle heroes, but to catch both unawares was virtually unheard of.
As the two men caught sight of the dark-clad figure perched in one of the nearby trees, both felt a twinge of almost supernatural recognition. Neither had ever seen the Revenant in person, but both knew the jungle legends well enough: a hero to the downtrodden, the Revenant was an immortal being, having lived for centuries in the land of Bordia and its surrounding nations. Like Ki-Gor, the Revenant was white but at one with the jungle surroundings. Also like Ki-Gor, the Revenant had been historically described as male, but in recent months, the ghost had altered its form for unknown reasons. Indeed, as the lithe figure dropped to the ground just before Ki-Gor and George, there was no mistaking the firm curves of the female body.
“Good afternoon,” Revenant said, speaking in one of the most common local dialects. “I take it that you’re Ki-Gor?” she asked with a nod of her head in the blond man’s direction. “So that makes you Tembu George.” Revenant offered a gloved hand to George, who shook it warmly.
“I never thought I’d meet you face-to-face,” he said. “It’s an honor. And might I say that you feel very solid for a ghost.”
Revenant shrugged. “Taking solid form is the least of my abilities.”
“How do you know of us?” Ki-Gor asked. He was naturally suspicious of anyone or anything that was new.
“You’re famous, the both of you. Every tribesman for hundreds of miles has heard tell of you. Stories like that have a way of reaching my ear.”
Ki-Gor thought about her words for a moment and then accepted them at face value. Like George, he had heard many stories about the Revenant—as a child, he had sometimes dreamt that perhaps this living ghost was his own father come back to life. Perhaps, he mused, the Revenant would eventually come and take Ki-Gor home to live with him. As he grew older, he had pushed such silly fantasies aside. “Who is Idh-yya?”
Revenant looked up as a large cloud drifted past the sun. In the sudden twilight gloom, all three of them felt the temperature drop noticeably. “A dark god, part of a whole pantheon of monsters who want to control or destroy humanity, depending on their mood that day.”
Ki-Gor took the ruined bag from Tembu George and tossed it aside. It was best not to handle things that had been overly tainted by witchcraft. Turning back to Revenant, his long hair began to whip back and forth as the winds suddenly picked up. “Is this Idh-yya now here? Is he roaming these lands?”
Sally started to say that she didn’t think so, that the men or women who were behind this obviously wanted to collect these relics for some later use, but she found the hairs on the back of her neck beginning to rise. It was very cold and very windy now, and she found herself drawing her pistols in response to some inner warning.
Ki-Gor hefted his knife while George raised his rifle, both scanning their surroundings for signs of danger. Neither of them needed Revenant to tell them that something was wrong—they were both such hardened warriors that they were able to recognize impending threats on their own.
The sounds of several men screaming in mortal agony spurred the three of them into action. Without hesitation, they sprinted in the direction of the screams, nimbly jumping over anything that blocked their path.
They came to a small clearing beside the riverbank. Seven men lay dead on the ground, their Asian features twisted into expressions of pain and horror. They wore matching black jumpsuits with armbands displaying the crest of the Warlike Manchu. Sally recognized the garb as belonging to the Ten Fingers, a group of ninja-inspired foot soldiers used by the Manchu.
Standing next to the water was a man whose back was turned to Sally and the others. His Ten Fingers uniform had been ripped from the waist up, revealing a fit body lined with scars. His dark hair was wild and unkempt, and even from behind, Revenant could see that he wore a heavy necklace that seemed to glow with an awful inner light.
The man turned to face the three jungle heroes and Sally involuntarily gasped at the face he presented. In other times, he might have been handsome, but now his eyes were open wide and were pitch black, with fiery red pits. His mouth opened and closed in seemingly random fashion, and the necklace he wore seemed to be fused to his skin. The stone that was held on the end of the chain depicted a long-haired half-snake, half-human individual with wildly waving hair: Idh-yya.
Revenant quickly ran through what she’d studied of Idh-yya and the necklace which bore its name. A minor functionary in the greater pantheon of gods that served Azathoth, an entity that danced madly in the center of the universe, Idh-yya was a wind demon at its core. It used the air around itself as a weapon, sometimes generating powerful windstorms.
Ki-Gor let out a cry of annoyance as small specks of sand began to blow into his face and eyes. He averted his gaze somewhat and looked at Revenant as she stepped forward.
“If that necklace is manipulating you somehow, just give us a sign and we can try to help you,” she said.
The man grinned wolfishly, his mouth movements settling down. He jerked his shoulders from side-to-side and it occurred to Sally that it looked as if he was getting used to the parameters of his body. “The man whose body this was… no longer inhabits it. He fell prey to my seductive call and chose to awaken me by placing me around his neck. I am Idh-yya and you may bow down before me.”
George’s answer to that demand was as deafening as it was sudden. He took quick aim with his rifle and pulled the trigger, the shells rocketing straight through Idh-yya’s head, causing it to explode in a rain shower of blood, brain and bone.
Ki-Gor grinned as Idh-yya’s host swayed and fell to the ground. “That thunder stick of yours has done the trick again!”
“You should really carry one yourself,” George said, basking in the quick victory he’d earned them.
“I prefer to kill with a knife,” Ki-Gor replied, examining his blade. “If I’m going to end something’s life, I should do it with my own hand.”
“I wouldn’t celebrate too soon,” Revenant warned and both men looked towards the fallen form of Idh-yya, which had slowly begun to stagger upright. Its headless body turned to face them, and tiny wisps of smoke began to coalesce on its shoulders, forming a semi-transparent copy of the dead man’s head.
“It will take more than that to banish me from this plane,” Idh-yya warned. He raised both hands, and suddenly hurricane-force winds buffeted the heroes. Ki-Gor had not braced himself for the sudden impact and was sent flying backwards. He snagged a tree limb with one mighty hand and pulled himself against the trunk, though his shoulder ached
from being wrenched in the process.
George, meanwhile, was struck on the right temple by a large rock, and he fell onto his back, blood streaming down his ebony cheek.
Only Revenant seemed prepared for the attack. Though she was in many ways the least experienced of this trio, the past year had honed her reflexes in ways that even jungle life could not. She had faced alien entities, dark magicians and Nazi assassins—a headless man possessed by an evil wind god was just the latest in a growing procession of strangeness.
As soon as the gale-force winds began to blow, Revenant had thrown herself to the ground, digging in with her gloved fingers. The soil was fairly wet, thanks to a hard rain that had fallen two days before, and Sally was able to find purchase and hold on tight. Her muscles ached from the strain but she was able to avoid being tossed around like a rag doll.
Idh-yya paused, having come to the limits of what he could do in this human body. The wispy head he possessed turned towards Revenant and a sneer appeared on his face. “You fancy yourself a legend, don’t you? A ghostly figure, bent on justice… such a pretty little bitch, filling the heads of the superstitious with lies.”
Revenant sat back and raised her gun. She’d loaded it with silver bullets that had been soaked in holy water—a trick she’d learned from the Peregrine. Against some foes, it seemed to make a major difference.
The bullets lodged in Idh-yya’s chest, and the creature unleashed a howl of pure agony that caused Sally’s head to thump.
Revenant was about to finish the job when Ki-Gor jumped past her, knife raised high. He landed beside Idh-yya and brought the blade down with a powerful stroke. The knife sliced through the false “head” that Idh-yya possessed and continued on to the ruined remains of his shoulder and neck. Ki-Gor snarled like a lion as he repeatedly plunged the blade into his foe. One of his attacks caused the necklace to get caught up in the blade and Ki-Gor yanked it free, pulling the occult object from Idh-yya’s skin. Bit of flesh came with the relic, but Ki-Gor tossed it all aside as Idh-yya’s human form fell to the ground, seemingly devoid of all life at last.
Revenant quickly snatched up the necklace and stared at it. She could hear a voice serving as a siren’s call, urging her to put on the piece of jewelry and embrace her destiny.
Ki-Gor watched her for a moment and then knelt at George’s side. The big man was still unconscious, but Ki-Gor could tell the wound was not life-threatening.
“I’m a little surprised this was so easy,” Sally said, moving over to join Ki-Gor. “I really expected a little more resistance from whoever was behind this—and it looks like I even manage to confirm who that was. The men who are dead here are members of a sect called the Ten Fingers. They work for—”
“I don’t care.” Ki-Gor reached under George and lifted him up with a grunt. Even with Ki-Gor’s incredible strength, it was an amazing feat to hold George’s dead weight in such a manner. “Keep your troubles out of my jungle.”
Sally frowned and started to state that this jungle didn’t belong to any one man, especially not Ki-Gor, but she held her tongue. There was simply no point in arguing over it, and he was right about one thing: she needed to go.
Without saying goodbye, the Revenant turned and sprinted off back into the jungle. She’d flown one of the Claws team’s planes to Africa and landed in a large clearing approximately three miles from here. Unfortunately for her, she never made it more than a few hundred feet away from the riverbank.
A tiny pinprick sensation on the left side of her neck caused Sally to stumble to a halt. Bugs were a persistent problem in the Congo, but the Revenant had a horrible feeling that this was no ordinary bug bite. She reached up and felt something against her skin. Yanking it free, she held up a small dart, dripping with some foul-smelling liquid.
“Oh, no,” she whispered. In desperation, she began fumbling for the small radio transceiver that would contact the rest of the Claws team, but her vision blurred, and she quickly saw the ground rushing up to meet her.
As she lay on the ground, her breathing quick and shallow, a man stepped up beside her. He reached down and grabbed the necklace with long thin fingers, adorned by sharp nails. His flowing Oriental robes stood in stark contrast to the jungle setting.
The Warlike Manchu had not entrusted his Ten Fingers to such an important task. He had watched from the shadows as they had first succumbed to temptation and then as Idh-yya had fallen in battle.
The Manchu studied Sally Pence for a moment before moving away from her. The drug would leave her helpless for quite some time, and in the fierce jungles of the Congo, that was as good a death sentence as any.
CHAPTER V
The Mask of Nyarlathotep
New Orleans, Louisiana
“A shame about Mardi Gras,” the Peregrine said as he accompanied Professor Stone through the darkened city streets. “I always wanted to come but never managed to do it.”
Stone nodded sagely, a ghostly smile on his lips. He was a good bit taller than Max Davies, but the two men moved in easy step with one another. “It’s been cancelled before—during the Civil War and again during the first World War. You’ll have your opportunities to see it once this whole affair with the Axis is over.”
“Hopefully that will be sooner rather than later.”
“Given how badly you’ve damaged their Occult Forces Project, I’d say that Nazis are on their last legs.” Stone came to a halt outside a small establishment which bore a colorful sign on its door. The sign showed a crescent moon surrounded by a number of brightly lit stars. A dark-haired woman wearing a gypsy headdress was depicted in profile next to the moon, with the words Sister Lydia, Fortune Teller scrawled underneath. “This is it.”
The Peregrine looked around, verifying that the streets were empty. A group of Fifth Columnists had been arrested a few days before, after a failed attempt at blowing up city hall. As a result, there was a curfew in effect, and thus far Max had seen no signs that anyone was daring to break it.
As Stone began knocking on the door, Max found himself worrying over the return of Nyarlathotep to his life. He’d encountered human avatars of the dark messenger of the gods several times before—indeed, the Peregrine had destroyed the most recent incarnation of Nyarlathotep just two months ago in Germany. Though Max was certain that Nyarlathotep had not been revived again—at least, not so soon—it was still disconcerting to hear his name invoked once more. Most of the Peregrine’s enemies didn’t live long enough to earn a rematch with the hero, but Nyarlathotep was one of a select few—the others being the Warlike Manchu and Doctor Satan—who had bedeviled Max on numerous occasions.
The door opened a crack, revealing the face of a woman who resembled the gypsy on the sign. This woman, however, was a good fifteen years older and much of the suppleness of her face had given way to age lines.
She regarded both men with wary eyes, taking in Stone’s well-chiseled physique and the Max’s domino-style mask, its bird-like beak resting almost imperceptibly on the bridge of his nose. “You are here about the Mask,” she said matter-of-factly.
Stone couldn’t hide his astonishment. “You were expecting us?”
“Not the two of you specifically, but I knew that someone would come calling this night. Enter, please, and of your own free will.” This last comment was followed by a brief cackle.
The men stepped inside, taking in the eclectic furnishings. The house smelled of musty papers and burning incense. She led them into a nearby sitting room where a round table covered by a red and gold cloth lay in the center of the floor. A crystal ball rested atop the cloth and there were three chairs set around the table, as if she knew the number of visitors she would receive.
Sister Lydia took a seat and gestured for the men to do the same. As soon as Stone was in his chair, he started to speak. “My name is Professor—”
“I know who you are,” Lydia snapped. “I read the papers.” She pointed a bony finger at the Peregrine. “And I recognize you, as well. The hunter
of dark things, cursed to spend his life in a war with the devil.”
Max said nothing, but he felt his heart skip a beat at her words. Nyarlathotep had once given him a vision of his future and it matched up with what Lydia was saying: he would live and die in his tireless war on evil, and he would outlive all that he loved.
Lydia turned her attention back to Stone, and the heroic professor felt a momentary sense of embarrassment as she openly admired him. He was used to being the center of female attention, but he had never taken advantage of that situation—indeed, most of his life was spent in such devotion to his craft that it left little time for romance. “The Mask of Nyarlathotep is not what you think it is,” the fortune teller stated.
“What do you mean?” Stone asked.
“Despite the name, it is not an artifact of evil, nor do its origins lie with Nyarlathotep himself. The Mask was something that the dark messenger coveted, and he spent many long years chasing after it, but he was always rebuffed in the end. My grandmother and my mother both helped safeguard the Mask from his vile clutches. In time, he became associated with the Mask, but he has never once held it in his own hands.”
“Then what is it?” Max asked.
Lydia rose and moved towards a small wooden box that lay on the floor. She unlocked it with a key she removed from inside her blouse and pulled forth a carved wooden mask that was painted a garish shade of blue. The mask had been carved into the likeness of a man’s face with small holes cut for the eyes and nostrils with a thin slit for the mouth.