The Cthulhu Mythos Megapack: Anthology Part 34

It must, I thought, be conscious of my presence even now; since the sight and hearing attachments could not fail to disclose the rays of my flashlight and the faint creaking of the floor beneath my feet. But in the end I did not dare meddle with the thing. I idly saw that it was the fresh, shiny cylinder with Akeley's name on it, which I had noticed on the shelf earlier in the evening and which my host had told me not to bother. Looking back at that moment, I can only regret my timidity and wish that I had boldly caused the apparatus to speak. G.o.d knows what mysteries and horrible doubts and questions of ident.i.ty it might have cleared up! But then, it may be merciful that I let it alone.

From the table I turned my flashlight to the corner where I thought Akeley was, but found to my perplexity that the great easy-chair was empty of any human occupant asleep or awake. From the seat to the floor there trailed voluminously the familiar old dressing-gown, and near it on the floor lay the yellow scarf and the huge foot-bandages I had thought so odd. As I hesitated, striving to conjecture where Akeley might be, and why he had so suddenly discarded his necessary sick-room garments, I observed that the queer odour and sense of vibration were no longer in the room. What had been their cause? Curiously it occurred to me that I had noticed them only in Akeley's vicinity. They had been strongest where he sat, and wholly absent except in the room with him or just outside the doors of that room. I paused, letting the flashlight wander about the dark study and racking my brain for explanations of the turn affairs had taken.

Would to heaven I had quietly left the place before allowing that light to rest again on the vacant chair. As it turned out, I did not leave quietly; but with a m.u.f.fled shriek which must have disturbed, though it did not quite awake, the sleeping sentinel across the hall. That shriek, and Noyes's still-unbroken snore, are the last sounds I ever heard in that morbidity-choked farmhouse beneath the black-wooded crest of a haunted mountain-that focus of trans-cosmic horror amidst the lonely green hills and curse-muttering brooks of a spectral rustic land.

It is a wonder that I did not drop flashlight, valise, and revolver in my wild scramble, but somehow I failed to lose any of these. I actually managed to get out of that room and that house without making any further noise, to drag myself and my belongings safely into the old Ford in the shed, and to set that archaic vehicle in motion toward some unknown point of safety in the black, moonless night. The ride that followed was a piece of delirium out of Poe or Rimbaud or the drawings of Dore, but finally I reached Townshend. That is all. If my sanity is still unshaken, I am lucky. Sometimes I fear what the years will bring, especially since that new planet Pluto has been so curiously discovered.

As I have implied, I let my flashlight return to the vacant easy-chair after its circuit of the room; then noticing for the first time the presence of certain objects in the seat, made inconspicuous by the adjacent loose folds of the empty dressing-gown. These are the objects, three in number, which the investigators did not find when they came later on. As I said at the outset, there was nothing of actual visual horror about them. The trouble was in what they led one to infer. Even now I have my moments of half-doubt-moments in which I half accept the scepticism of those who attribute my whole experience to dream and nerves and delusion.

The three things were d.a.m.nably clever constructions of their kind, and were furnished with ingenious metallic clamps to attach them to organic developments of which I dare not form any conjecture. I hope-devoutly hope-that they were the waxen products of a master artist, despite what my inmost fears tell me. Great G.o.d! That whisperer in darkness with its morbid odour and vibrations! Sorcerer, emissary, changeling, outsider...that hideous repressed buzzing...and all the time in that fresh, shiny cylinder on the shelf...poor devil..."prodigious surgical, biological, chemical, and mechanical skill"...

For the things in the chair, perfect to the last, subtle detail of microscopic resemblance-or ident.i.ty-were the face and hands of Henry Wentworth Akeley.

THE EATER OF HOURS.

by Darrell Schweitzer.

Chronophagos, the Devourer of Time, the Eater of Hours. What man remembereth even the hour of his death if the Chronophagos hath devoured it?

-Nicephoros Attaliades.

The Testament of Nightmares.

I.

We rode in the dark and the cold through that forest, where no bird sang, where no beast stirred but our own horses, where black water dripped from the naked branches, though no one could remember it having rained. Would the sun ever rise? It felt as if we were already in our graves.

I tell you we all crossed ourselves then, and we were by no means G.o.dly men, any of us: rogues and brigands, b.a.s.t.a.r.ds and younger sons, landless knights-a dozen of us, more? Who could remember?

Even I struggled to remember, as if rising from a deep, dark dream, as if swimming toward doubtful sunlight from out of a dank, muddy pond-remember? My own name, Erec de...Erec of Brittany, of some parentage or other, from some castle I could not quite bring to mind, a castle I did not own, where I was not particularly welcome at table. The boy beside me, called merely Jon, not old enough to have a beard yet, but in the company he kept, his soul was no doubt blackened already. My squire? Maybe even my own (b.a.s.t.a.r.d) son?

The big man beside him, with the wild red hair and the scarred face, Ulrich von Schwartzenberg, Ulrich of the Black Mountain, also called Ulrich the Axe, famed for his b.l.o.o.d.y deeds among Christians and pagans alike.

We rode in silence, even the hooves of our horses silent on the muddy path.

Would the sun ever rise? Would this night ever end?

Beside him Father Gregorias, the renegade priest, who had reputedly sold his soul to Satan, though now he lowered his head and counted his beads and muttered something I couldn't make out.

In the cold and the dark we rode, and cursed the treachery of the Greek emperor, Isaac Angelus...even as, admittedly, we had allowed ourselves to become distracted on the way to the Crusade, never laid eyes on a Turk, turned to pillage and rapine among the Hungarians and Greeks in order to reach the East...all for the glory of G.o.d, of course, until defeated, crushed by our fellow Christians, we fled northward, into the mountains, into lands unknown.

And the darkness closed over us like a tide, and it seemed the night would never end.

Suddenly the lead man of our company cried, "Hold!" and we came to a halt, gathered around him, some fingering or even drawing their weapons.

The blackness of the forest was absolute. The path we rode upon, it seemed to my fancy, was like a pale white tongue extended from a dark mouth, ready to draw us in.

"There is something-" the lead man said. (A French knight. Jehan de-? In my dream, I could not recall his entire name.) I leaned forward. Jon, the boy, looked to me expectantly. Father Gregorias, alone, did not look up, though his mount came to a halt with the rest.

"Yes, I see it."

And I saw, like a returning memory, like a face slowly unmasked, the dim shape of a tower with darkened windows, a wall, a gate. I shook my head. Horses neighed nervously. Father Gregorias went on with his praying, the tone of his voice rising to a frantic whine.

One of our number, who was wounded and soaked with blood, fell from his saddle with a splashy thud. No one moved to help him, not even the priest.

We filed, one by one, like doomed men, through the gate and into a courtyard. We were...twelve? The number of the apostles. Eleven? The apostles minus Judas? Twelve again, when Matthias was chosen?

Would the daylight never come?

So we dismounted, leaving our horses as they were (there were no grooms come to greet us) and we stood for a time, short or long, beyond counting, in the cold and the dark, while gradually the windows of the castle around us filled with light, like glowing eyes lazily opening from a deep and troubling dream.

And I thought I remembered all this happening before...in a deep and troubling dream.

The boy Jon held onto my arm with his pale hand, as if he had slipped in the mud and needed to steady himself, but actually, I think, for comfort.

It was Ulrich b.l.o.o.d.y-Axe who grunted and turned his head and said, "We'd better go in."

The door before us was already open, the way lit with candles held in cupped hands carven of palest marble and set in little alcoves along the walls.

Single-file, again, we ascended worn marble stairs, and emerged into a broad room, hung with rich draperies, the walls decorated with ancient shields and arms, a table set with a rich feast before us.

And we twelve (if it was twelve) sat down, waiting first in silence for some host to appear and greet us.

I noted, pleasantly surprised, that the knife on the table before me was my own. I'd thought I had lost it. I took it and began to eat of the meat set there (which was cold, but not spoiled) and the others ate, too, in silence, until after a time, after a few cups of wine, we were more at ease, and small talk arose among the company.

The boy Jon beside me nudged me and gazed up at the lofty rafters.

"Do you think this place is full of ghosts?"

"No, lad," said Ulrich from across the table. "Not ghosts."

But the conversation turned to the subject of ghosts, and several of our company told of ghosts, one, how a man had been slain on the way to the wars, but had not known it, his ghost going on, thinking himself alive, performing deeds of great valor, even returning home in triumph where he bought lands, begot sons, and lived in contentment for many years before discovering one day, by chance, that he was already dead.

"Then how can any man know," someone said, "if even his eyes and his memories deceive him?"

"Even his dreams," said Jehan, the French knight. "I have dreamed things, which have proven false, though I remember them as if I had lived them, as if somehow I dreamed the dreams of another man."

"Only Christ is eternal," someone said, though it was not the priest. "All else is darkness and shadows."

It seemed, for an instant, that I was not in that room, seated at that table at all, but far away, in a hot, dry land, fighting the pagans in the name of Christ, only to return to Europe and be unable to find my way home, to be diverted north, into mountains in an unknown land, in the darkness and the cold where I lay still in a dream from which I could not awaken.

And a voice spoke, in my mind, saying, "Chronophagos, the Eater of Time."

Then, somewhere in the depths of the castle, a deep bell tolled, and the feast was over. The lamps expired of their own accord, the flames sinking down into the marble, cupped hands.

We arose, in the almost total darkness and made our way, as memory served, until each of us came to his own chamber, where a bed was prepared, save that Jon the squire (if so he was) shared a room with me, whether because there was no room for him otherwise, or because he so chose, I do not know.

We two lay in the darkness for a time, in silence. I think I dozed off, and dreamt (dreaming within a dream or waking from one) of a young man who loved a maiden with a face like an angel. He composed, in his mind, the most exquisite lyrics in praise of her beauty, but, alas he could not write, nor had the skill to either sing or play any musical instrument, and the maiden was, in any case, above his station. So, while he might worship her from afar, she never knew of him at all. In both despair and hope, he turned from her, went off to the wars, hoping to win fame and wealth, whereby he might return and claim her.

Soon his own delicate and pale hands were soiled with blood.

And I wept for the innocence which had died, all the while unsure if this was my own youth I was recalling, or some other.

Then a noise started me out of sleep. Jon beside me, clutched my arm.

Very far away, in the depths of the castle, it seemed that stone ground upon stone, and something was walking upon stone, its tread heavy and harsh and shuffling.

"What is it?" Jon whispered.

"I think our souls are in great peril," I said.

We two arose from the bed, and drew out our swords, and stood on either side of the door throughout the night-Would the daylight never come? We heard screams and shouts. We heard the clash of arms. We heard Ulrich of the b.l.o.o.d.y Axe cursing, and we heard his great axe strike like a hammer.

But we did not go at once to the aid of our comrades, not, out of cowardice, I do not think, but because we somehow knew, as if recalling a dream, that it was not so, that we had not done so, that we had lived all this before, and our adventure did not end thus.

The boy Jon was weeping when at last the door opened, and there was only darkness beyond it, and we both sensed that something stood there, waiting for us to venture out.

Somehow, all I could see for the moment were his pale hands, floating in the darkness.

II.

I saw my own hands, floating, like pale paper cut-outs on a black stream. I saw them through eyes other than my own, as if awakening into another man's dream.

My master and I stood on either side of the open doorway, swords drawn. Nothing happened. Nothing stirred. The whole castle was now utterly silent, but for a subtle wind issuing through the corridors and halls, like a deep and distant sighing.

Like the soft breath of G.o.d, turning in his sleep. And I was greatly afraid then, for if G.o.d were asleep, no one could save us now from whatever danger we faced.

At my master's word, we two rushed through the doorway, probing the darkness with our swords. Metal sc.r.a.ped on the stone walls.

Then there was a faint light, almost a trick of the eye more than something actually seen. A hunched shape, moving away from us, a voice muttering the same phrase over and over again.

"You! Stop!" my master said, barely above a whisper but loud enough in that echoing gloom.

But the other did not stop, and when we cornered him, as the corridor turned sharply, there was an altercation, and I felt my blade sliding between ribs. Warm blood splashed over my hand. My master's shoulder shoved against me as he too thrust with his sword; and then we held a dying man in our arms as we made our way, awkwardly down a flight of stairs in total darkness, into the feasting hall where we had dined earlier.

A few embers smoldered in the fireplace, giving faint light.

We laid him down on the hearth.

He muttered the same phrase over and over again, in Greek, "Kyrie eleison..." Lord have mercy.

It was Father Gregorias.

I looked up at my master, with hopeless despair in my heart.

"We have murdered a man of G.o.d!"

"He was no more a man of G.o.d than you are!"

"But, but...I don't understand."

"I think I am beginning to," my master said.

I thought I was beginning to also. I thought I knew, or remembered, or dreamed, that the Castle of the Chronophagos, the Eater of Hours, Devourer of Time, was like an endless, dark labyrinth, from which no one who had entered there could ever escape, for once our days and hours, our lives have been taken by the Chronophagos, the Chronophagos may rehea.r.s.e them over and over in memory like lines from an old song, or a half-forgotten prayer, while we must drift helplessly like paper cutouts on a black stream.

III.

My only thought was to get away, from my crimes, from my various adventures, and if it suited me to be a man of G.o.d for a time, so be it. I had many names, more than I could remember, one of them Gregorias.... but, no, Gregorias died on the hearth amid the ashes, his guts ripped out by those two oafs, the Breton knight and the pretty boy I thought to carry away, because Erec de whatever-the-h.e.l.l had no idea what a pretty boy was good for, being, himself, despite his own long litany of black deeds, as innocent as a pale, new-borne babe.

Lord have mercy. Christ have mercy. So I made my way out of the feasting hall, groping down another flight of stairs, past the marble alcoves shaped like hands, where candles had burned out, leaving the cold air stale with the scent of their burning.

Would the daylight never come? Would this night never end?

Lord have mercy. Christ have mercy.

Outside in the courtyard, all the horses were gone except mine.

So the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds had run off. How chivalrous of them, to leave a horse for their old comrade, who knew their sins and could perhaps absolve them.

Was Gregorias ever really a priest? Who could remember? Who gave a d.a.m.n? Surely we were all d.a.m.ned.

I rode, in the darkness, through that black and dripping forest, the only sounds being the wet thudding of my horse's hooves, and then, after a time, there seemed to be no sound at all, only effortless, helpless motion, as I rode, and came to a turning-place, and turned, and turned again, and circled in the darkness, and came, once, face-to-face with all my companions on the muddy path, in the middle of the night that would not end, that would never end. I knew that much now, for I was beginning to understand, remembering how Gregorias had fled, and turned away from his companions who had betrayed him, and fled again, turning every way, for hours without end, in darkness without end, until I found myself, again, inside the castle from which I had departed, as if I had never departed, and once more those two half-wits chased me down the corridor and slid their swords into me and carried me down onto the warm, filthy hearth to die.

IV.

The priest was dead. Nevertheless, he sat at table with us as we feasted on cold meats. I remember him being there, with us, feasting, as no ghost could. Perhaps it was before he died. Perhaps even time was out of sequence, like pages in a book, misbound.

I, having no name at all, sat beside Ulrich b.l.o.o.d.y-Axe and considered my own course, whom I might take as an ally and allow to accompany me in my escape.

Even as I remembered riding in that forest, away from the castle, around and around in the darkness, until all paths inevitably led back to the castle, and we, like doomed men, dismounted and filed one by one up the stairs, past the marble hands with their smoldering candles, into the feasting-hall, where Father Gregorias sat with us and dismissed all talk of ghosts, discoursing instead about the Chronophagos, which, he said, was a remote cousin to the medusae, but far older, a thing made of living stone, out of the stone flesh of which this castle and the surrounding forest had grown, like hair from the head of a man who lies alive but sleeping in the ground for countless centuries; a thing older than Satan, about whom Satan had much to say; some monstrosity that fell from the unimaginably remote depths of the sky long before the birth of Adam; that which lay dreaming and waited until the stars moved in their courses to announce the world's last night, when it would be so gorged with dreams and with the stolen lives and memories of men that it would awaken to break the Earth apart in its hands as a man might crush an eggsh.e.l.l.

That's what Gregorias said, and he was dead.

Later, Ulrich and I rose from troubled sleep and made our way out into the corridor, into the darkness, where we battled stone giants, ancient warriors turned to stone yet still alive, the days of their lives having been devoured by the Chronophagos. Now they were mere dreams given form by the sleeping monster, and we battled them, breaking our swords and our axes upon them, until stone hands seized us by our throats, crushing the life out of us both.

Father Gregorias, awakening suddenly from some half-remembered nightmare, sat up on the ash-strewn hearth. He put his hand to his throat, remembering it crushed, and to his gut, where the sword went in.

He, who was dead, remembered us.

Christ have mercy.

But we were not G.o.dly men, any of the company of twelve.