Wrath and Ruin

by C W Briar

  Hmm. Let’s go back to your escape.

  It happened one evening when Miss Fairmont and Vince started out cordial with each other. More than cordial. They danced together ’round the fire like they had forgotten how much they hated one another the night before. Indecent dancing, with hands that didn’t care who was watching.

  I didn’t want to be there. I would have rather been sleeping, but Vince ordered me to keep bringing them drinks. I wanted to beat his face with my platter … Forgive me. I got caught up grumbling.

  After some dancing, Miss Fairmont pretended like she was going to kiss Vince, but then walked away, giggling. Well, his temper flared up real quick. He pulled her back hard by the shoulder. Miss Fairmont screamed and slapped him, so Vince punched her. She staggered, and wasn’t no telling what’d she do next as she stood there, hand on her cheek and eyes swimming in anger and fear.

  Miss Fairmont ran toward the golden light. Vince chased her and caught up after a few strides, and he pummeled her something awful. Mr. Durousseau wasn’t in sight, and Mr. Codding shook with laughter like he was watching a vaudeville show. I looked for a weapon or anything else I could use to stop Vince without him beating me to death, as well. But I didn’t need to find one. Miss Fairmont’s screams changed, and I knew what she’d done before I saw it.

  She was jabbing her hand at his belly, and I could see the knife flashing by the firelight each time the blade come out of him. She’d pulled it from his belt. Vince tried to flee to the light, but he collapsed on his side, clutching his wounds as he groaned and mumbled for help.

  Maybe he was too far from the glow, or maybe Dorothy wished for him to die while he pleaded for healing. I’m not sure which. All I know is those wounds didn’t recover like the burns. Wasn’t long ’fore he slipped into eternal slumber in a pool a his own blood.

  That fight, far as I can tell, is what woke the island. It moved and started humming.

  Describe how it moved.

  Yes, sir. The ground moved so quickly to one side, I fell to my hands and knees.

  Perhaps an earthquake?

  No, sir. It kept moving through the water like a ship. Those cave spouts? They started shooting doubly high and raining down all over the island. And the ground hummed a song so loud that I not only heard it but felt it rumbling through my body. Just like the golden light, the song was beautiful but terrifying.

  I can’t describe that chorus properly. It rolled like an army of chariot wheels and shivered like organ pipes. My ears danced to it, but mais, my frightened heart was trying to leap out a my chest.

  Is that when you escaped?

  Yes, sir. I ran when I could and crawled when the island moved up and down too much. It’s well I did, ’cause a mouth opened in the ground near the light. I was uphill when it happened, and when I looked back, I saw more teeth than I could ever count. All a them was big as swords. Vince’s body fell into the maw first.

  Miss Fairmont and Mr. Codding went next. They never ran away like I did. Instead, they covered their ears, fell on their knees, and gnashed their jaws like rabid dogs. Both a them was biting at air up until the island swallowed them.

  The wish-people vanished, or at least I couldn’t find any of them. I did see Mr. Durousseau curled up under some brush, covering his ears. He sent me away, tears pouring out. He didn’t go as mad from the song as the others, but he was squirming and moaning in pain, nonetheless.

  I tried to help Mr. Durousseau to his feet, but the world lifted up right quick beneath me, and I lost my grip on his arm. Suddenly, I fell sideways through the brush. The branches slapped me from head to toe till I tumbled into nothing but air. I spun and spun, then I crashed into the water.

  When I come up to the surface, I saw what I’d been living on for those weeks. The island was a leviathan. It raised its head up out a the water as high as a mountain. Its shape covered up at least a third of the starry sky, and the moonlight reflected on the waterfall running off its back.

  What did it look like?

  I can’t give but a penny’s-worth description of it. The body looked like a centipede with hundreds of writhing, serpent-tail legs on its belly. Forests covered its whole hide like a wet, matted coat. Up on its head, between the bumps we’d called hills, the golden light was shining bright from the stone horn. That glow was pulsing exactly like the light I’d seen during the ship wreck.

  The leviathan bent over and stared down at me with twenty of the oldest, blackest, saddest eyes on this earth. Its peepers was on its chin, and they yanked my worst feelings out a my heart and mind. First I started sobbing and bobbing my head like I was grieving a hundred funerals all at once. Then came the fear. Mais, I didn’t know you could feel fear so awful that you swear your shaking body’s going to rip to crumbs.

  It loathed me. It loathed me something fierce, and I still feel it when I imagine those eyes, like its very thoughts could grab me to drag me to the bottom of the ocean, and I couldn’t—

  Miss Flora?

  —free of that clawed mind. All my sight went blind ’cept for those eyes—

  Miss Flora, are you all right?

  —song turned into a growl, every rumble one after another hitting me, and hitting me, and hitting me, and I couldn’t swim away no matter how much I thrashed with my limbs, ’cause I wanted to dive and drown myself just to get away—

  Miss Flora!

  —oh heavens, death would a been better—

  Miss Flora, sit down and breathe!

  —I still see it in my mind, right where it was grabbing my thoughts and cursing at me with words no person could ever say, and that fear just biting—

  Elizabeth, wake up!

  —screamed so hard my mouth ripped and all I tasted was blood and the salt from the ocean splashing in my mouth, and then it come even closer and I clenched my neck so hard my spine felt ready to snap, and the stars burned in its eyes without any warmth—

  Elizabeth, stop!

  —it lifted me up with just its mind, warning me—

  Oh, my word. How … how are you floating?

  —pushed on my heart till sand flowed—

  (screams) Security, help!

  —hates us all, but specially hated me for fighting—

  What happened to—oh, your eyes. Security! Elizabeth, come down.

  —let go of me when I thought “I’m not yours! You can’t have me or control me, and I won’t do what you want!”

  …

  Miss Flora? Hello? Wake up.

  (inaudible)

  No, did you see it? She was just floating right there … Miss Flora, wake up … I have a pulse, but it’s racing so fast, it’s like water rushing through a hose.

  (inaudible)

  Go get the nurses.

  …

  Miss Flora? Look at me. Are you all right?

  Yes, sir. Why am I down here?

  You fell after you were … Do you remember anything from the last minute?

  I was telling you about the leviathan, and then I woke up here with my head hurting. Doctor, what’s wrong? You look like you seen a ghost.

  I don’t know what I saw. Have you had any unusual incidents since the rescue?

  No. Do you mind if I sit in the chair?

  Let me pick it back up. Go ahead.

  I am frightful dizzy, but I can finish.

  That big monster let me go and dove into the sea. A whole cliff a water rushed over me and pushed me down so deep that my ears hurt enough to burst. I couldn’t tell which way was up, so I just kicked and swam. Lucky for me, I got back to the surface.

  A few hours later, I reached the blessed shores of the Virgin Island. Some folks took care a me till the Navy arrived … How come you stopped writing notes?

  Miss Flora, are you feeling any unusual symptoms right now?

  My heart is fluttering, but I’m fine. You have to believe my story, doctor.

  Hold on. I need a minute to think.

  It’s all true. Doctor, I got nothing to gain in lying. The
truth is all I have.

  What did you call the island creature? A le … le …

  Leviathan, sir.

  And you believe this island-sized leviathan sunk the SS Providence?

  For certain. And I know you haven’t found it, but the ocean is an awful big place to hide.

  This makes no sense. Do you have any evidence to support your story? Evidence for everyone, not just me? The people of this country want explanations for what happened to the Providence, but do you know how they will react if we blame a giant sea monster? Half of them will mock the report, and half will panic.

  I don’t know what to say, doctor. You have my word. I just want to leave this place and return home to my family. I haven’t seen them in a long while.

  The nurses are here … Send them in … Pardon me, but I’m going to stop the recording now.

  How soon will I go home, sir?

  Very soon. Tell me, is this leviathan creature of yours large enough to drag down a battleship that’s sailing at full steam?

  -END OF RECORDING-

  Stargazing

  There is no secret in why I moved from Boston to a home in the countryside. Plenty of sensible, sane people do it for the same reason as I. While living in the city, I rolled through each day like some marble trapped in a perpetual machine; I careened down tracks without purpose and rotated around cogs wound up by long-forgotten builders. The rural life offered a quieter, more primal existence—one where nature could nourish my humanity.

  When I was a child, my grandmother lived in a beguilingly tall home outside Arkham. My parents brought me there for visits during the stifling summer months. All of my fondest memories, like swimming in the river by moonlight, came from those holidays in the country. Sadly, the pleasant times ceased when my mother and father passed away. I lived out the remainder of my youth with my aunt, crowded into an apartment building surrounded by other apartment buildings.

  Is it then any wonder why I accepted an English professorship at a college near my family’s old vernal retreat? I left Boston, forsaking with it a night sky made hazy by riverfront factories and stained by gas lamps. By contrast, my new home dwelt in a pristine environment, a place where the seemingly infinite host of stars gathered each evening in the obsidian firmament. Instead of the noise of bustling carriages and shouting street vendors, my windows opened to the singing of birds and crickets.

  I adored my new residence. Any sensible person with a preference for quiet and solitude would have felt the same way.

  On days when I came home early from the college, I explored the acres behind my house. The previous owners had cut paths through the otherwise unkempt forest. I was so overjoyed with wandering those trails that losing myself on them became a goal rather than a fear. An intoxicating, rapturous sense of wonder overtook me on each journey, and I trekked farther and farther from home.

  Bear in mind I took logical precautions for my safety. I kept track of the time, and I oriented myself according to the surrounding hilltops. Nonetheless, an evening came when I failed to find my way out of the woods before dusk. I navigated slowly after that, holding my hands out in front of me. Thanks to the moonbeams filtering through the canopy, I managed to find my way out long before dawn.

  It may seem senseless, and perhaps even mad, but the incident did not in any way caution me against further twilight escapades. In fact, it had quite the opposite effect on me. I acquired a taste for adventure that is so lacking in our modern era. My dreams escorted me back to the trails, stoking my curiosity for what lay beyond the unexplored bends.

  Do not interpret my desire to roam the dark, untamed lands as an indication of insanity. Others travel at great cost to the Congo or Orient, but my frontier stretched out from my back porch. I was merely pursuing a more thrilling form of escape from modernity, a return to the origins of our species. Everyone speaks highly of being in nature, but is it truly nature if it is gardened and therefore unnatural?

  Being no fool, I carefully considered what items I would need for an extended hike. I filled a bag with food, a lantern, and a canteen of water. On the next cloudless night, I put on a coat, grabbed my supplies, and set off like a settler in a wild, undiscovered land.

  Nature greeted me as one of her own. Crickets serenaded me with their violin songs. The constellations followed me with their slow parade toward the western horizon. The trees ushered me forward; craven men would have been dispirited by the creaking and groaning of their boughs, but I recognized the old, deciduous giants were welcoming me with waving arms.

  Never had I felt so alive. My dim, timid lantern barely pushed back the darkness with its glow, but I continued resolutely into the furthest depths of the unspoiled realm. I hiked down new trails, and after what I can only guess was about three hours, I came to a clearing carpeted with dry, dead leaves. Nothing grew in the area save a few wiry, bristled shrubs. The canopy opened over the field, and the stars, which had merely coruscated through the branches during my walk, shone in full, magnificent array.

  Obscure shapes protruded from the center of the field, reflecting the light from my lantern. Curious, I approached them. Such curiosity should seem quite sensible to you, as any man would have felt the same. Furthermore, why would anyone be cautious of small, motionless objects in a forest? Exploration is not a sign of madness.

  The dead leaves, thickly accumulated on the ground, crunched underfoot as I trudged across the field. The objects catching my attention were six stones arranged in a circle around a stump. The tree that once stood there had been cut down, and even in the dark I could see axe marks in the exposed flesh and rings of the wood.

  Stooping, I examined the stones, each of which had two numbers chiseled into them. The upper numerals ranged between 1771 and 1816, but the lower numerals all read 1833. I logically and sensibly deduced that what I found were grave markers of people who had passed away in the same year, perhaps during a single event. My imagination scrawled possible endings for the unnamed residents buried in the soil. All of the stories were tragic.

  I thought to turn back and head toward home, not out of cowardice but because I saw no further trails to follow. I considered my journey complete, and the tombstones reinforced my sense of finality. However, nature reminded me that exploration is not limited to paths created by others. The wind changed its course, raking my hair and whispering wordless promises of discovery. The curled leaves spread across the field flipped like pages of an unread book.

  A swift gust swooped down from the sky and snuffed out my lantern, leaving only starlight by which to see, as the moon had yet to rise. I calmly opened my bag to take out matches but then realized I had left them in my cupboard. Though sensible and sane, I am also human, and, as such, naturally prone to errors.

  As my eyes adjusted to the fuller darkness, I noticed a distant fire outlining the tops of trees in red. My desire to be near a source of light was, I think you would agree, to be expected. The coaxing that pushed me toward it, however, came from an external motivation. I was not alone; that thought burrowed into the basest levels of my awareness, yet I could do nothing about it. A possession, if you believe in that sort of thing, took hold of my curiosity.

  I could not refrain from approaching the fire any more than I could refrain from breathing. The compulsion to keep walking forward, at first a purring hunger, grew into a ravenous craving. I crossed the remainder of the clearing and entered the old, thick forest on the other side.

  The farther I traveled, the more I became aware of patterns in the forest sounds, as though nature were uttering an ancient, rhythmic, alien language. I have no way of adequately describing the anomaly, but familiar rustling and creaking noises aligned into cadences best described as song or speech. The earth, through groans and heavy sighs, expressed messages untranslatable to me, a mere human. The wind became breath, a breath that both lured and chased me toward the fire.

  My thoughts submerged deeper and deeper into my subconscious. My movements became erratic, controlled
by long-neglected primal instincts rather than my mind. I rushed through thorn bushes and clambered down a rocky cliff into a ravine. My every step was a release, the giving in to irresistible desire. Curiosity, my sole motivation, coursed through my veins.

  I recall the trees swaying in time with the rhythms of the earth, casting down flower petals like spectators at a coliseum. My memory of the minutes or hours after that is vacant.

  When my natural senses awoke, I was on my knees at the edge of a different clearing. A stone obelisk towered over me. Its surface was covered with misshapen circles that linked and folded over one another in a baffling, dizzying display. Similar monuments ringed the entire field, and all of them glowed because of the wild, gnashing, torrid bonfire at the center.

  Robed figures moved in a bizarre kind of dance around the blaze, their movements both frantic and mesmerizing. The worshippers cast dead birds into the fire, and each time, a deafening roar of ten thousand cawing crows filled my head. I covered my ears, but my efforts did nothing to lessen the birds’ torrential, painful cries.

  I tried to get up and flee from the savage ritual, but severe trembling consumed the entirety of my strength. The air whirled, spreading an odious stench of brimstone and rotting fish. Caws from the unseeable swarm of crows rose and fell. The woods frothed and shook. Trees beat branches together with a brutality found only in war, their reckless percussions vibrating my bones.

  Most oppressive of all was the power pressing down mercilessly upon me; the charcoal sky descended to the earth as a formless giant and crushed me under the terrible weight of its eternality. The stars I so greatly adored stared back at me, all of them eyes of an audience watching indifferently as I screamed for mercy. Yes, when we gaze at the host above, they gaze back.

  The robed people gathered around me, their faces hidden by hoods and veils of darkest shadow. They reached out with wrinkled, gnarled hands but did not touch me. Instead, they chanted as the invisible fingers of some colossal, ethereal monstrosity seized my body and carried me toward the fire. The stars observed my torment like a jury at an execution.