by S. T. Joshi
There were the rapids he’d had to struggle through this morning. The fields were marked with tiny blobs representing black flowers. Yet there was no sign of any large building. That the nightmare spires could have escaped the eye of any cartographer, however amateurish, was beyond belief—unless that person had intended it to stay “hidden,” to come as a surprise to those unlucky enough to find themselves there.
Then his heart froze as he saw that the river was swallowed up before it reached the edge of the paper. All drawing and writing ceased, swallowed by an enormous stain of black ink. Whether this was on the original map or was just a product of poor photocopying was impossible to tell in the gloom. But neither possibility could explain how the stain now began to spread ominously across the map, devouring all the badly drawn details in its path.
But I am already sailing through that darkness, he thought. The map was only now “catching up” to reality, whatever that was. He was unsure whether this place was “real.” His cold, numbed body and his fevered mind were both unsure of what was any longer defined by that word.
Obviously the laws that governed the world he was used to didn’t apply here. What laws did apply would be a dreadful new discovery, he felt sure.
The ancient names he’d heard chanted earlier echoed repeatedly around his head, making it feel like an empty eggshell, waiting to be crushed. In his gut he knew that any answers he might seek were hidden within the dreadful syllables of those names. If he had the courage to seek them . . .
As he looked at himself with new eyes, the thought of ever returning to his old life sickened him. Yet his cowardly, sick self baulked at what lay ahead.
He crouched in the bottom of the boat, covered his head and sobbed.
* * *
Drifting. Days buried under bruised nights. The dark tide too merciful to drown him, too jealous to release him.
Years later, or maybe only hours, a dim shoreline lashed by black rains rises at the farthest reaches of the ebony tide.
Up ahead, a black dawn is breaking. Up ahead, the shadows gather in procession.
The Ballad of Asenath Waite
ADAM BOLIVAR
Adam Bolivar specializes in writing ballads, a traditional poetic form that taps into haunted undercurrents of British folklore to produce spectral effects seldom found in other forms of writing. His collection of weird balladry and Jack tales, The Lay of Old Hex, appeared in 2017 from Hippocampus Press. Adam was born and bred in Boston, Massachusetts, and currently resides in Portland, Oregon with his wife and son.
Six bullets did I send that day
Into my friend’s ripe head;
And though you think me mad I say
That he by then was dead.
Well, Edward Derby was his name,
Of Pickman’s tainted line;
His verses would put Poe’s to shame—
Permit me to opine.
We rambled midst old Arkham haunts,
Two brothers, arm-in-arm,
Ignoring all the vulgar taunts
Of boors who lacked in charm.
On days when he would call on me,
He knocked upon my door
In quick succession: one-two-three,
A pause and then two more.
My friend toward black magic turned
And read abhorrent works
In books a wise man would have burned,
For in them madness lurks.
He found a wife at thirty-eight,
With bulging piscine eyes,
But this was not the only trait
About her to despise.
His young bride’s name was Asenath,
A child to Ephraim Waite,
Whose chants could churn the ocean’s wrath,
Then cause it to abate.
To say I was concerned for him
Would understate my dread,
For it was such a morbid whim
Which drove the two to wed.
His visits after that were rare,
And furtive were his looks;
His eyes took on a glassy stare
From delving into books.
Some three years hence a message came,
A telegram from Maine,
Addressed by Edward to my name;
Its contents most insane.
To Chesuncook I drove that morn,
Where in a gaol was held
My friend, his clothes in tatters torn,
His ravings madly yelled.
“Ye Black Goat of the Wood—it came . . .
Iä! Shub-Niggurath!
Kamog! Kamog! Old Ephraim’s name . . .
The black-winged foul shoggoth!
“My wife controlled my carnal form
A puppet to her strings,
Which led me to that wood where swarm
The most infernal things.”
I drove him home while Edward raved,
Then came a sudden change:
Commanding in how he behaved,
His essence now most strange.
He harried me to take the wheel,
Though Edward couldn’t drive,
This stranger with a will of steel—
Old Ephraim come alive!
“My lapse in judgment pray absolve,”
He said, most grim his tone.
“For sanity will soon dissolve
When lost in the unknown.”
At last I left him at his door;
Profound was my relief,
For I came quickly to abhor
This thaumaturgic thief.
I little heard from Edward then,
Until there came his knock:
Three briskly and then two again;
His call came as a shock.
“She is not Asenath at all,”
He whispered in my ear.
“Old Ephraim has her in his thrall,
That gruesome puppeteer.
“My mind and his he will transfer,
Just as he’s done before;
For that is what he did to her,
And has since days of yore.”
It had become quite clear to me
That he must leave his wife,
For nothing but catastrophe
Had she brought to his life.
Alas, instead, he was confined
Within a padded cell,
For lost was Edward Derby’s mind,
And Asenath’s as well.
Inside the hospital a man
Who was not now my friend,
For Ephraim Waite’s abysmal plan
Had reached its fiendish end.
At Candlemas there came a knock:
Three times and then two more;
I hastened then to turn the lock,
And open up the door.
Upon my step a fœtid thing,
Enrobed in scarf and coat,
Which shambled like a ghoul to bring
A scrawled handwritten note.
Exterminate that devil-spawn,
Oozed up from darkest hells,
For Edward Derby’s mind is gone,
And in him Kamog dwells.
I fainted at what Edward wrote;
You know the aftermath,
For when they looked inside his coat,
The corpse was Asenath.
The Visitor
NANCY KILPATRICK
Award-winning author Nancy Kilpatrick has published eighteen novels and more than two hundred short stories, and has edited fifteen anthologies, including Expiration Date and the upcoming nEvermore! Recently, Danse Macabre: Close Encounters with the Reaper and Vampyric Variations have received awards. Recent short work can be found in Searchers After Horror; The Darke Phantastique; Zombie Apocalypse: Endgame!; Blood Sisters: Vampire Stories by Women; The Madness of Cthulhu 2; Innsmouth Nightmares; and Stone Skin Bestiary.
IAN JOLTED AWAKE. Where am I? BLEARY-EYED, HE turned his head and saw the red digits on the clock radio—1:00 A.M. Something was very wrong, he felt i
t!
Heart thudding, his flesh unpleasantly slick beneath the covers, totally clogged up from the flu or virus or whatever the hell had attacked him the minute he’d arrived on the island of Granada, he lay still, struggling to calm his thundering heartbeat, fighting for control of his breathing, desperate to keep from having an asthma attack.
Little light came through the nearly closed slats of the Venetian blinds, but it was enough to see that both the room and closet doors were closed, the bathroom door was ajar the way he’d left it, that tiny room empty, but he couldn’t see the shower, which was behind the door.
Darting glances told him no one was in the room with him—how could there be? The outer door—the only door— was locked. The screened windows were barred from opening more than four inches. He took a deep, calming breath, hearing the rattle of mucus in his chest, blindly reaching for his inhaler on the night table and then remembering he’d left it in the bathroom, and felt disheartened.
The thought had been good. Get away from the stress of work, of life, but really the emotional turmoil of a relationship that had run its course and was now certifiably dead, or so Rob had decreed.
Ian had found a brochure in the coffee room at work listing this island he’d never even thought of visiting, one so far south it could have belonged to Venezuela when France, then Britain took possession of the land until 1974, the year Grenada gained independence—or so the brochure said.
This spontaneous get-away had Ian on a tight budget—as usual, especially since he’d been abandoned two months ago in the expensive apartment. Why had he agreed to put the lease in just his name? Well, because Rob said it made sense and he’d keep the utilities in his name, so they’d be equally responsible. Except that the utilities in Rob’s name had been canceled and Ian had to set up an account and fork over a deposit when the lights and stove stopped working.
This “resort”—not really a resort, more a little motel with a pool—was located at the southern end of the island, two miles from the airport, far from the famous Grand Anse beach where the well-to-do stayed. Ian’s unfashionable digs were a lot cheaper, if a little distressed. But the Caribbean Sea was close enough, a five-minute walk, although he’d only been there yesterday around 9:00 A.M., just after he’d arrived, hoping the sea air and the gentle waves would soothe his hurt soul. But the waves were violent, the sky black with the coming storm, and the wind nearly blew him into the salty water. He decided on a nap after the early flight, hung the Do Not Disturb sign on the outer doorknob, and crawled into bed, asleep in seconds. But he didn’t wake until around ten last night, only to discover that he’d come down with the plague. Perfect! What could be better?—alone, abandoned, sick, in a strange land and his cell phone didn’t seem to be working down here.
He’d never been anywhere by himself before, certainly not outside the U.S., so that alone made him nervous. But he didn’t know what else to do. Two months without Rob in his life after three years with him in his life allowed a heaviness to descend over Ian like a lead weight pushing against his heart. His job was affected to the point where his boss suggested he take time off, or think about leaving voluntarily, permanently. He couldn’t really afford either, since he was now stuck with the apartment rental, but Bonnie and her husband Lou—friends since high school— had insisted he needed to get away, even just for this very short but cheap weekend. Fly out Friday night, arrive Saturday morning, fly home Sunday night—that seemed reasonable to Ian. It would have been the right thing to do if he hadn’t gotten so sick. Maybe he could spend the weekend sleeping—
The white blades of the ceiling fan directly above the bed caught his attention. They sliced the air like knives, a soft whir. Other than that, the utter lack of sound was so unlike life in Cambridge that he found the silence disconcerting.
And then he heard another noise. A small noise. In the room!
“Okay, calm down!” he ordered himself for the twentieth time, this time aloud, wheezing. “You’ve had a dream, that’s all.” More like a nightmare, one he couldn’t remember and likely didn’t want to remember. He was in a strange bed, in a strange country where it was too hot, away from the familiar— which was the whole point of coming here. “Of course you’re nervous,” he reassured himself, sucking in air to a too-familiar rattle in his chest. “Who wouldn’t be?”
Rob wouldn’t be, that’s who! Nothing upset Rob. He was a rock, logical, stable emotionally, all the things Ian was not. And Ian had relied on that rock to hold him up, at least he used to; now he had to rely on himself, and that was hard. Almost impossible. He’d always been “high-strung,” his mom said, and despite all the effort in the world, controlling his emotions was a 24/7 fight, a battle he’d lost over the last couple of months.
He was a wreck, and he knew it. His world had collapsed and he couldn’t cope. And now he was in a strange place, alone, and it just made everything worse! One more day, he thought, then I get on a plane for home—and immediately he began worrying about terrorism on the flight, or mechanical failure that would drop the 747 into the ocean where he would drown and be consumed by fish. His wheezing increased.
In the darkness he reached for his almost useless cell phone on the bedside table and checked the time: 1:11 A.M. Right! he thought, the spooky time, and then he reached for a tissue from the box to try to unclog his sinuses and, after pulling one up, knocked the box to the floor.
Finally, with a weary sigh, he pushed the thin blanket and top sheet off his hot, sweaty body, instantly feeling cooler. It was hellishly humid here, even in the middle of the night. He wondered how anything could stand living this far south—and this was winter!
The air from the fan was a relief at first, but Ian realized that it probably wasn’t a great idea to get too cool, so he pulled the covers up to his neck.
He was just thinking about picking up the box of Kleenex when he heard the sound again. A kind of soft crackle, as if paper was being crumpled.
Immediately his heart began thumping. With a groan, he swung his feet to the floor and turned on the lamp, squeezing his eyes shut at the blast of incandescent light. He held his woozy head in his hands for a second until the room stopped spinning. Then, under the safety of the soft illumination, Ian scanned the room. Nothing and silence, just the fan. The sound was probably from outside the window directly across from the bed. He felt like an idiot. Stupid. A wuss. The way he always felt about himself, but now, add to it that physically he felt like shit.
Ian heaved a bigger sigh of exhaustion, the rattle from his bronchial tubes depressing, and sat up, swinging his feet to the floor. He had to pee. And retrieve the inhaler. He bent and picked up the Kleenex box and placed it back on the table.
Maybe that’s why he’d woken up. He was sick. He needed to be upright, as always when he got bronchitis or flu or a cold or whatever caused his bronchial tubes to swell so he couldn’t easily inhale or exhale air.
The room, now infused with light, looked the same as when he’d gone to bed. The red eye of the TV, the other red eye of the smoke detector in the ceiling, the multi-red eyes and slashes of the clock radio, the alarm set by the last resident of this room, apparently. His suitcase sat on the floor where he’d left it after a quick unpack of a cooler outfit before flight fatigue overwhelmed him and he’d decided to wait and stash the case in the closet in the morning. His passport and the keys to his apartment sat on the narrow counter that held a microwave and some plane snacks they had passed out instead of a meal—a mini bag of veggie chips, a packet of roasted cashews, and a second Coke he’d gotten gratis from the flight attendant who felt sorry for him, but then he decided not to drink it.
Ian shoved himself off the bed with a groan and stood on wobbly legs. Now he felt chilled. He stumbled to the bathroom as quickly as he could, peed, flushed, didn’t bother with soap, just a quick water rinse of his fingers, grabbed the inhaler off the windowsill—he was shaking now from the chills and had to get back to bed!
He switched off the b
athroom light; then, on second thought, switched it back on as a memory from childhood of demons in the darkness flitted through his consciousness. If he closed the door partially there would be just a line of light along the bedroom floor but not enough to disturb his sleep—at least he hoped that would be so.
He grabbed the Coke on his way back to bed, then perched on the edge of the bed, pulling the top sheet and thin blanket he’d found in the closet earlier around his shoulders like a feeble old man. He’d better use the inhaler first before he had the Coke—or should he have a drink before the Ventolin raced through his system and got his hands shaking and his heart racing at 120 bpm? Keep hydrated, came to mind, something his mom would have said. And then he remembered Ventolin dried out his mouth and throat too, so he pulled the tab on the can and took a good swallow. The harsh, sweet cola tasted great, so he guessed he needed it, and he downed half the liquid before he placed the can on the bedside table.
Silence. Chills. He needed sleep.
Suddenly that sound again, paper softly crackling. This time he identified it—over by the window, under the window, between the trash can and his suitcase, which were about two feet apart in this small room. Maybe it’s a rat! he thought, suddenly terrified. He should go look. But he was afraid. He glanced around the room quickly, searching for a weapon, seeing nothing. Then he remembered a broom in the closet of this efficiency room.
He placed the inhaler on the table as quietly as he could, stood naked on trembling legs, paused—silence—then tiptoed the five steps to the closet and took hold of the narrow door’s knob. What if there’s someone, or someTHING in there?
“You’re so paranoid,” Rob had always accused. “You’re afraid of your shadow.” He heard Rob’s voice as if he were in this room and had just said that.
But Rob had been right. Ian was afraid of just about everything. Anything could go wrong at any time. But with Rob’s encouragement, he had started to let go of some of his instinctive fears, and then—boom! Rob had gotten tired of him. No, Rob had met someone else! Ian’s biggest fear, one Rob had always reassured him would never happen. Until he stopped reassuring him and Ian sensed something was very wrong, and . . .
